That's nice, but it's usually hard to prove a negative. How do you know RedHat or SUSE haven't been hacked? Because they haven't told you? How can you be sure?
Oh and BTW, Windows updates are signed, so even if someone managed to crack into it the packages would not install.
What a stunning, in-depth analysis of this ever-delicate issue. I'm back from reading the first two chapters, which seemed to go on and on, yet nonetheless were completely absorbing. Tomorrow I shall read the other nine, with a good cup of joe and some trail mix to keep me in top form. This is certainly one where we'll be calling "RTFA" for days to come!
Certainly my heartfelt gratitude go out to the Slashdot crew - especially ScuttleMonkey, bless his heart - for linking to such an enthralling tome of uncompromising educational policy.
Exactly. The point is that this "article" is meaningless, as is the relationship between what the Slashdot logs show and what the open source community does or doesn't do.
The onus is on Slashdot to stop posting these "news". They serve no purpose other than to prove yet again that "FUD" is not the exclusive domain of Microsoft. It destroys your credibility when you complain about FUD and then post things like these.
I looked at TFA, and I was kind of lost after reading this:
In its original form, the Poincaré conjecture states that every simply connected closed three-manifold is homeomorphic to the three-sphere (in a topologist's sense) S^3, where a three-sphere is simply a generalization of the usual sphere to one dimension higher.
Homeomorphic. Thank god, they dumb it down a bit later:
More colloquially, the conjecture says that the three-sphere is the only type of bounded three-dimensional space possible that contains no holes. This conjecture was first proposed in 1904 by H. Poincaré Eric Weisstein's World of Biography (Poincaré 1953, pp. 486 and 498), and subsequently generalized to the conjecture that every compact n-manifold is homotopy-equivalent to the n-sphere if it is homeomorphic to the n-sphere. The generalized statement reduces to the original conjecture for n==3.
More colloquially, it's homotopy-equivalent to the n-sphere! Of course!
what about PHP/Postgre/linux? or perl/mysql/linux? or PHP/mysql/solaris?
What you're implying is that people would be OK if they just switched to something else? And how is that different from Word? I can count the number of applications I've seen that are *truly* database and OS-agnostic. I'd like to see "everyone" switch phpBB or whatever from MySQL to Postgres in an afternoon. Too difficult... no different from switching from MS OFfice to OpenOffice, except probably in scale.
The vast majority of Linux distros come ship with Perl and Python. Is that not also a monoculture? If I were a virtus writer targetting Linux I don't think I'd run out of "monoculture" to exploit.
The ability to drop an asset that has become insecure is conversely proportional to your dependence on it. People create "monocultures" because they value convenience. Open source is not immune to that.
Let's see if the RIAA can manhandle XM Radio as well as they can bully and terrorize single mothers on fixed incomes. A market cap of 4.5B and 520M cash on hand sort of evens the playing field.
Yes... good heavens, by all means let's nail any manufacturer that releases anything that has a brushed metal finish to the wall. Right to the wall baby! With Aqua(TM) nails!!
Do you by by chance have proof of any sort whatsoever that the ODF issue is in any way tied to Abramoff and Microsoft?
Please, I'm sure a lot of people around here would like to get their hands on that sort of thing. I mean, if you can go so far as to publicly mention an association then surely you have some sort of evidence handy to accompany your claims?
When they finally catch the Zodiac Killer I'm sure Bruce Perens will try to find a "Microsoft angle" to him as well.
This is nothing but FUD that plays right into the scandal of the day. Perens needs to provide some proof that Abramoff was directly involved in the ODF issue as part of a lobbying effort by Microsoft, Gate's dad or the Easter Bunny. Otherwise I'd say he needs to keep his conspiracy theories to himself.
Hitler called. Says Godwin wants his hyperbolic, I've-lost-all-sense-of-measure argument back in time for some African warlord's trial for genocide at the Hague. Unless you're busy using it on Slashdot.
This is a fantastic piece of opinionated "journalism". From TFA:
But during one of those last long nights of working to finish-up DOS 2.0, something happened. I have heard this story from two people, each of whom was a friend of Allen's and in a position to know. Each told me the same story the same way. I am not staking my reputation on the accuracy of the story, but I am saying I have it from two good sources. Paul Allen certainly won't confirm or deny it, so I'll just throw it out for you to consider.
I have this story about, um, Richard Stallman... or maybe Linus Torvalds. I am not staking my reputation on the accuracy of the story, but I am saying I have it from two good sources. I'll just throw it out for you to consider. Ready? Here it goes:
So there was this goat, right? One night... [please visit my blog for the rest!]
I generally enjoy reading Scoble's blog because I think he's very honest about what he's doing and he does it in an environment that is probably not very conducive to the "total openess" he wants to have. He also gets points for even trying (though Microsoft was really one of the first larget tech corps to institutionalize blogging).
That said... it seems to be this is a classic case of mass-induced elitism. I don't think the Amazon guy was off in his line of questioning. What's good for Microsoft or Sun might not be for Amazon or eBay, yet Scoble and his friend come across as the quitenssential "it" boys, giggling and stomping their little feet because the hick across the table doesn't know what the small fork is for - as if his life depended on it.
I suppose if you live in that "blogosphere" long enough it must look to you like everyone is blogging and, more importantly, that everyone should be doing it. I don't think that's the case. I've found many corporate attempts at blogging to be underwhelming and downright stupid - if you don't "get it" then just don't do it at all. I doubt many millions of Amazon customers are going to decide one day that they won't spend a dime online anymore because Amazon doesn't have a blog.
The blogorati need to come out into the light and look around once in a while.
Slashdot Mirror
Oh and BTW, Windows updates are signed, so even if someone managed to crack into it the packages would not install.
Certainly my heartfelt gratitude go out to the Slashdot crew - especially ScuttleMonkey, bless his heart - for linking to such an enthralling tome of uncompromising educational policy.
Unless it was Microsoft, of course. But Apple doesn't "deserve it", I guess? Funny how that works around here.
The onus is on Slashdot to stop posting these "news". They serve no purpose other than to prove yet again that "FUD" is not the exclusive domain of Microsoft. It destroys your credibility when you complain about FUD and then post things like these.
Maybe Slashdot would like to release its server logs of the past five years so we can see what operating system the open source community uses?
I'm not going to "show" you anything. Go buy a "Windows for Zealot Dummies" book and enlighten yourself.
The network-enabled "clipbook" in NT4, while crude, worked well enough in 1997 or so.
Copy/paste between terminal server (or remote desktop as it's called now) sessions is completely transparent.
Using that ever-funny "M$" deal doesn't lend more credibility to your arguments, especially when they're wrong to begin with.
That's not as bad as I thought. Suddenly I had visions of a chinese sweatshop assembling W-88 MIRVs...
We bid these things out?? I thought Sandia or Livermore built them for the US Atomic Agency?!
Of course, they're worried about how much money the artists make. Right. That's their casus belli right there.
Thanks for this. I was obviously being facetious but it's good to get an understandable explanation of an interesting topic.
Homeomorphic. Thank god, they dumb it down a bit later:
More colloquially, it's homotopy-equivalent to the n-sphere! Of course!
Slow news day?
What you're implying is that people would be OK if they just switched to something else? And how is that different from Word? I can count the number of applications I've seen that are *truly* database and OS-agnostic. I'd like to see "everyone" switch phpBB or whatever from MySQL to Postgres in an afternoon. Too difficult... no different from switching from MS OFfice to OpenOffice, except probably in scale.
The vast majority of Linux distros come ship with Perl and Python. Is that not also a monoculture? If I were a virtus writer targetting Linux I don't think I'd run out of "monoculture" to exploit.
The ability to drop an asset that has become insecure is conversely proportional to your dependence on it. People create "monocultures" because they value convenience. Open source is not immune to that.
When all the thousands of PHP/AWStats defacements were made last year as well? Or is the PHP/MySQL/Linux triad not considered a "monoculture"?
As if a million heads had cried out in utter confusion and then exploded.
Let's see if the RIAA can manhandle XM Radio as well as they can bully and terrorize single mothers on fixed incomes. A market cap of 4.5B and 520M cash on hand sort of evens the playing field.
They did.
Yes, and all of them at the very accessible price point of $139.99!
Yes... good heavens, by all means let's nail any manufacturer that releases anything that has a brushed metal finish to the wall. Right to the wall baby! With Aqua(TM) nails!!
Please, I'm sure a lot of people around here would like to get their hands on that sort of thing. I mean, if you can go so far as to publicly mention an association then surely you have some sort of evidence handy to accompany your claims?
This is nothing but FUD that plays right into the scandal of the day. Perens needs to provide some proof that Abramoff was directly involved in the ODF issue as part of a lobbying effort by Microsoft, Gate's dad or the Easter Bunny. Otherwise I'd say he needs to keep his conspiracy theories to himself.
Hitler called. Says Godwin wants his hyperbolic, I've-lost-all-sense-of-measure argument back in time for some African warlord's trial for genocide at the Hague. Unless you're busy using it on Slashdot.
I have this story about, um, Richard Stallman... or maybe Linus Torvalds. I am not staking my reputation on the accuracy of the story, but I am saying I have it from two good sources. I'll just throw it out for you to consider. Ready? Here it goes:
So there was this goat, right? One night... [please visit my blog for the rest!]
That said... it seems to be this is a classic case of mass-induced elitism. I don't think the Amazon guy was off in his line of questioning. What's good for Microsoft or Sun might not be for Amazon or eBay, yet Scoble and his friend come across as the quitenssential "it" boys, giggling and stomping their little feet because the hick across the table doesn't know what the small fork is for - as if his life depended on it.
I suppose if you live in that "blogosphere" long enough it must look to you like everyone is blogging and, more importantly, that everyone should be doing it. I don't think that's the case. I've found many corporate attempts at blogging to be underwhelming and downright stupid - if you don't "get it" then just don't do it at all. I doubt many millions of Amazon customers are going to decide one day that they won't spend a dime online anymore because Amazon doesn't have a blog.
The blogorati need to come out into the light and look around once in a while.