Strangely enough, This reminds me of the war on drugs commercial where they have multitudes of teenage children proclaiming "I support terrorists" and "I killed those cops", and at the end gives a message something to the effect of "If you use drugs, Your supporting terrorism."
This commercial always really ticks me off. In fact, just reading a reference to it has gotten my hackles up.
Disclaimer:
I'm not into drugs, never used them and have no interest. I have only on very rare occaisions even partaken in alcohol. I'm not defending my
favorite pastime here.
This commercial so incredibly hypocritical. The reason those drugs fund terrorist operations is because they are so incredibly profitable. It's CHEAP to grow/make and the risks of producing/distributing them drive the price way up. So profits are HUGE. Small investment BIG return.
So who is responsible for this? Is it the kids who pay the horribly overinflated prices? Or is it the government that has a ridiculous ban on (some) drugs which makes such a market possible? More than that, they go in and burn the crops sometimes which makes the price go even higher as demand temporarily exceeds supply.
All this under a banner of altruism and mantra of protecting our children when all they really want is an opportunity to extend government power and control. Which of course extends police powers to the point where they are corrupted by it and end up accepting bribes, selling the drugs they seize on the side, planting evidence to gain homes/cars/etc they want and so on.
Meanwhile, the kids they are ostensibly trying to protect and their parents/loved ones are killed in terrorist attacks funded by the market they created.
Just because someone becomes in contact with a crime doesn't mean that they demand the release of basic human free will...
[
Assuming you mean basic human rights, not free will (you always have free will, even if they have cameras) it would be nice if this was true. Unfortunately, all too often it isn't. Sheeple are all too willing to sacrifice just about anything in the name of "peace and safety". Especially if it doesn't obviously map to affecting them personally in some way.
I'm under the impression a single person cant patent an idea thanks to expense, but I'm woried about your line: "Perhaps with at most a very small specified licensing charge for proprietary use to fund the filing of patents/etc. "
Yeah, that's a really dangerous line to walk. However, an organization responsible for patenting concepts/methods/etc for defensive purposes has to hae a way to pay for filing patents. It would simply have to be very carefully defined within the bylaws of the organization. I'm not talking about per-use charges here, but rather a company would pay x amount of dollars in a one time fee to gain the license for use in proprietary software. Any software licensed under any free license with source available is free, but otherwise you pay the fee. Perhaps only until the cost of filing the patent is paid for? At that point we stop charging. Or, maybe not, and the money goes into a fund to defend the patents held if necessary.
Ideally, we'd have people volunteering their time/etc to file patents for us, and then we wouldn't charge anyone anything, but would rather make the patent open for use. In the "public domain" so to speak. And yes, that can be done, though unfortunately you can reverse your thoughts on that later. Which is why it'd need to be codified in the bylaws of the organization in perpetuity. Unfortunately, I think we can see from past experience that this is even more wishfull thinking than my idea is.
And what other format are you going to use when you travel to a custumer's site to give a presentation and you need to deal with whatever computer setup they have in their conference room?
Depends who. A random person, or a company. If a company [microsoft] wrote a bsd implementation of the patents, then included it in some proprietry software, that would be bad.
It would be bad for Microsoft to license things under a BSD license?... I'd say that's actually an improvement over the license they use for most things they make.
So let me get this straight, software patents are bad, unless they are being used to hurt proprietary software companies? Using software patents only reinforces their legitimacy. While I think it's perfectly reasonable to hold them defensively, so someone else can't patent it and then use it against you, but not to use those patents actively against anyone, including Microsoft.
You don't effect political change on a topic by taking advantage of it for your own personal benefit while decrying it out the other side of your mouth.
If software patents are here to stay, the more that are in the hands of competitive non monopoly open source companies, instead of microsoft/aol etc, the better.
Hrm. Yes it's better if those patents are in the hands of trustworthy people, but I'm not sure a corporation in any form qualifies. If it was a single person I'd have an easier time, as their ideals are less likely to change. Even then I'd be concerned, profit is a strong motivator.
I'm not sure that there is a "right" answer to this problem, and it may be that companies like redhat filing these patents is the best we can hope for, but I'd be happier if there were a way that we could form a NFP organization analgous to the FSF that would hold the ownership of patents for free software innovations. The group existing with a very specific charter regarding their use, or rather lack of it. Perhaps with at most a very small specified licensing charge for proprietary use to fund the filing of patents/etc.
This is true, and because of their history I'm inclined to believe that's what they intend.
Unfortunately, we have absolutely no guarantees. This is only what the redhat of today intends, and the people currently running it won't be running it forever. Some future nimrod who ends up running redhat might see things differently, or be forced to see things differently by a board of directors.
Their exclusion of some very valid licenses (eg lgpl and bsd) concerns me as well. Does this mean they/will/ go after people who use their "patents" in their lgpl/bsd licensed software? Is this yet another attempt to scare people into using the GPL?
First, there is a difference between a government mandated device being implanted in your car, and stealing cable. While people who don't drink and drive, particularly those who don't drink, would (in large part) likely just blow on the thing and start their car, those it is targeted at would bypass it. While there would potentially be a few people who on a rare occaision might get into the car and be surprised to find out they'd had a bit much, most people who actually drink and drive would just have it bypassed, altered, etc. So this would help no-one but those who manufacture the device.
In regards to liability, you are right, there wouldn't be anyone to sue. Same as there was no-one to sue when the government mandated air-bags and childredn died from it because they didn't bother to wait and fully research its use.
This lack of legal liability doesn't alter the fact that they are responsible.
RE: The truck, I wasn't as clear as I should've been. I meant a truck out of control. Accidents in progress, etc. There are times when speed and maneuverability are called for, and a speed governor and automatic controls can remove or impair your ability to skillfully avoid an accident.
If older cars fall under a grandfather clause for those devices, then people who want to drink and drive will simply drive older cars. I wouldn't expect that to last long if I were you. Before long the "for the children" mantra will either require them to be installed for make owning an older car illegal.
[I said]
More children die from drowning in buckets per year than die in a gun related incident.
[You replied]
And more people die each year of heart disease than are murdered. Should murder not be illegal?
No. Should we make buckets illegal?
Despite what people would like you to think, none of these happen that often. I'd be willing >to bet that a person who pulls a gun on the rapist/stalker/mugger/deranged psycho is more likely to be killed than someone that doesn't, just like the person with the gun in their home is more likely to be killed by that gun than they are to use it to protect their family.
Well, you can bet all you want, but you'd be wrong. I'll be happy to take your money though.
When you have some time, you should check out John Lott's research. The thing is, people don't make headlines for using a gun to defend themselves unless someone gets hurt. In fact, many times it goes completely unreported when someone defends their life with a gun. Especially when it happens in areas like DC and Chicago where even owning one is illegal.
I'm not trying to say that watermarking is a good thing. I'm definately against this absurd plan. My point was that yes, it's wrong for them to make laws because they are bored. But don't try to fix this by telling them to make laws to harass other people unnecessarily. Make them find something productive to do that actually contributes to society instead. Like getting a real job.
Why is it than we've not seen a legislative mandate that requires car manufacutrers to prevent drunk driving?
And who is going to define what drunk driving is? You can't have it be hardcoded, as different localities have different ratings. So what are you going to do? Have the dealers set it? Make people voluntarily drive their cars in to have it set? Broadcast the setting?
And how long before a device shows up on the black market to set it yourself? Or to ignore settings/disable it/etc? Or just instructions on bypassing it?
Who is going to handle the liability when that woman being chased hops in her car and it malfunctions and won't let her drive it to
get away?
Who is going to pay for all the older cars
to get retrofitted?
How about limiters that prevent aggressive driving or speeding?
And when that out of control truck is bearing
down on you and you can't get away? What about
when you swerve lanes to avoid some idiot who doesn't have one and it thinks you're being aggressive? When you are being stalked/chased/etc?
Who is going to pay for all the older cars to be retrofitted?
Why have we not seen legislative mandates that require gun manufacturers to make guns that can't kill innocent people (or, at the very least, cannot be accidentally fired i.e. by a child)?
Despite what many people would like you to think it doesn't happen that often. More children die from drowning in buckets per year than die in a gun related incident. (If you wonder why your liberal friends figures don't match that, ask them to remove the numbers for gang-bangers that kill each other and compare again. Sorry, those aren't "innocent children"). Again, what are you going to do when those "smart" guns fail and someone who desprately needed to protect themselves from a rapist, stalker, mugger, deranged psycho, etc can't do so because it fails?
This is an issue for markets. Not some goon in government. The answer to bad laws and stupid lawmakers is not to try to redirect their evil at some other group. It's to stop the evil.
National Defense means exactly that. It means preparedness. This does not mean they get to manipulate steel companies, or energy companies. Yes, I realize there's more to national defense than than "guys with guns"
While I'm not a total isolationist, I do have leanings in that direction. WWI and WWII are the only two wars in recent history I think we had any business being involved in.
As far as schools go, I thought I covered that, but no, govt has no place in schools. Schools are a perfect example of the triumph of private industry over govt. Govt schools exist all over, and with greater budgets than private schools, yet privately schooled and homeschooled kids consistantly outperform publicly educated children.
Heh. I agree in part regarding campaign finance reform. However, instead of full disclosure, why not have a constitutionally limited government? (shocking idea, I know). If they followed the constitution, and remained limited to only those powers allowed them there'd be no NEED to bribe, buy, or influence them. It'd do you no good.
If you haven't already read it, I would suggest you might want to give Bastiat's The Law a read.
Do you think these mega-corps would be more likely to provide broadband service if there was less regulation? I think they would still only provide it where it was cheapest and most profitable to do so. If a municipality wanted to take matters into their own hands, let 'em, I say.
Well, I'm not sure about megacorps. They do tend to be slower-moving and prefer larger markets. However, de-regulation isn't there to help the megacorps, it's there to help the small companies that form to fill demand. A good example of this is the internet when it was still in its dialup days. No regulation. And the large companies (prodigy/aol/etc) weren't filling the need. Small companies popped up/everywhere/ filling that need. The only broadband arena that I really have hope for right now in the long term is wireless. Because (at least for the moment) it's an open market, and anyone (even the small guys) can compete.
A pat answer based on assumption that government involvement in the "marketplace" always makes things worse
It's not a pat answer. And most of your examples range in an area that yeah, it's nearly impossible to prove has been (or can be) done better by private industry. Maybe a couple of them can't. But I'd be willing to bet a years wages that if the demand was there, and govt wasn't filling it already, someone would find a way to fill it, and for a company to do so.
Something of a non sequitur. No commercial interest ran in to fill the need in either of those cases. Do you think that public sanitation would be better if there were not public water and sewers?
Honestly, I don't know. I've never had an opportunity to find out. No commercial interest ran in because there's no way the local govt would've permitted them to do so. If I had to guess, I'd say if there was a way to do it, private would be better. I want to clarify though. When I say private, I mean private with competition. Not a natural monopoly.
Do you really want only private industry and competition in all aspects of society? How about national defense? How about courts? Where, exactly, do you draw the lines?
No. As I said before, I'm not an anarcho-capitalist. Government has its rightfull place, but that is not in the economy, or in business. National Defense is one of the very few valid roles of the central government. Courts are another valid role for government. I've heard some compelling arguments otherwise, but none that describe a society I would want to live in.
Where do I draw the lines? That's a good question. It becomes particularly hairy when you start dealing with limited resources. For example, water pipes and sewer pipes. While I don't claim to know it all, I can't think of a way for those to be shared. Maybe the best solution for those/is/ to be run by your local government, and we just have to suck up and deal with the negative aspects of what that means. Or maybe it means a natural monopoly. Not that those are any different.
However, internet, telephone, and cable infractructure isn't the same way. They are still limited resources, but not in the same fashion, they can be shared. While I wasn't of this opinion before, I read a couple accounts of some local munincipalities which laid the infrastructure and then paid for it with money from leasing it to various companies. With specific limitations (open leasing, no regulation) I would be open to this sort of thing I think. Still pondering it though.
I think universal schooling is a good too. I'm in favor of vouchers, by the way, but the society as a whole has a responsibility to ensure that all are educated. We can't remain a free people if people don't have a basic appreciation for our Constitution and other institutions and that means schools.
Yet we have public/universal schooling now and we don't have that. People are ignorant, and they have no appreciation for how things do work (and more importantly how they should work). Instead they get indoctrinated with government propaganda. Meanwhile, private schools with a fraction of the funding consistantly turn out better students. More than that, homeschooled kids turn out better.
Yes, some things need to be handled by government. I am not an anarcho-capitalist, I'm a classical liberal. I do not agree that things like internet, and phone, and gas/water/sewer fall under the list of things that need to be govt managed. I didn't use to feel that way about roads, but frankly these days I think roads can even be managed better by private industry.
I appreciate the issue of resources, and not running thousands of connections to everyones home. I do not pretend to know the answer to this. And, I might even be in agreement with a concept of a/local/ govt (city/county) laying infrastructure, and then selling access to it to various companies. As long as that is sold at a fixed rate, and the money used to maintain and upgrade that infrastrucutre, thus eliminating the long-term tax burden.
But I am not in support of a national action of this nature. And I'm not interested in a city providing anything beyond the infrastructure. And (lots of ands here) I would be concerned about the abuse of the ownership of that infrastructure. For example, telling companies they can't carry certain kinds of content, or only allowing a select few companies to sell over it, or forcing companies to carry certain content (war on X ads, etc).
We do agree (again) though that there isn't much difference between a regulated natural monopoly and government doing things.
Nobody seriously believes that our entire road system should be turned over to toll roads, with the obvious congestion and complication this would cause with every burrough, county, city, state and the federal government collecting payments every few miles.
Definately not. I find it amusing that here you recognize that governments inability to be efficient would cause delays and problems, but yet you still support the idea of govt getting involved in broadband.
Why must we live with oligopolies that "compete" against each other to provide these services. Somehow, the cable companies always seem to show up within months of the DSL offerings in an area with roughly the same service offering at roughly the same price. Yeah, the free market will bring us the best result, sure.
I'm guessing you meant that last comment to be sarcasm, but it's misplaced. That is not free-market competition. Both industries are highly regulated. Most areas only allow one cable company, and most only have one phone company. As a result, they have no fear of true competition. Yes, cable/dsl compete with each other, but DSL has a limited availability based on distance from the CO. So they get most of those, and the cable gets everyone else. No competition necessary.
The US Founding Fathers knew the value of a free people freely communicating. They established the post office to ensure that people could easily communicate over great distances, without regard to their economic status or resources.
Actually, the Post Office originated from Britain. It was abandoned and reformed during the period of revolt under the articles of confederation, and was not placed in the constitution till months later, and then only as a temporary act that was continued several times before being made permanent. IMO, this is an example of even early americans being accustomed to govt provision.
Surely private industry could have done a better job. As evidence, I would submit the pony express. The US Mail was doing a horrible job of delivering mail to california. The founder of the
pony express company (central overland something) couldn't get any backing from the govt for an official mail route to do the job right so he started his own company and successfully ran mail until the day the telegraph run was completed.
I'm surprised that local and state governments aren't more involved in making sure that their area has the best broadband service.
Yeah, me too. Only I am surprised they haven't done so by truly deregulating those industries which can make it happen. (Not the pathetic stuff they've called "deregulation" so far) and giving incentives like tax breaks and cheap or free permits for the needed infrastructure work.
It's time that government, at all levels, makes sure that all of that unused fiber capacity that's supposedly lying around gets lighted up and serving the people. If we leave this to the oligopolies, that fiber won't get used until it's already obsolete.
That's called extra capacity, and it's there for the purpose of future expansion. The major cost of fiber is in its use, not laying it. And that fiber isn't going to be "obsolete" anytime soon, so I wouldn't worry about that if I were you.
I'm pretty conservative most of the time, but what's happening now must be some kind of market distortion that the government should work to correct. If there's all this unused capacity and lots of demand but not at the current price point, then the markets need a little prod to close the gap.
Yes, it is market distortion, and it is caused by too much government involvement, not too little. The more they prod the market, the worse it will get.
Let's do it. Nobody would wait for competing water, sewer or electric services to come hook up your neighborhood.
I would. I grew up using a well for years because the local government couldn't be bothered to run water lines to my home. And I owned a home for a few years in the late 90s that STILL didn't have public sewer availability and it was two minutes from the city limits. Gimme private industry and competition any day.
Local water and sewer service, TVA, Hoover Dam, Interstate Highway System, National Parks. All of which there is about zero private interest in maintaining but enrich our lives tremendously.
I don't know about you, but I've never been in an environment where any of those (except parks) were run by private industry. I'm just curious how you can say they benefit from government involvement. I myself have been generally less than satisfied with local water and sewer services, and roads in general. I'm one of those who/do/ truly believe we'd be better off with a private road system. It sure couldn't get worse than what we have now. And just FYI, anytime studies are done it's revealed that private parks are better maintained and run than than public ones.
I wonder if the Department of Water and Power sees Adelphia as competition, and is inhibiting them in the obvious way. Or, this might be another case where you shouldn't attribute to malice what can equally be explained as bumbling by a cable company.
I understand a general dislike for the cable company, but come on. What is your cable company motivated by? Profit. Profit is the lifeblood of any company. They didn't spend all that money laying cable so that it could just sit there. They want customers to use it. I find it highly unlikely that your cable company is holding it up on purpose once they've already laid the infrastructure. Their claims regarding DWP are entirely believable.
I don't know that I would attribute it to malice, there's no real need for them to worry about competition, as they are a govt entity, but I think it's quite likely DWP's typical slow-moving-government status is the problem.
[snip]
Just the other night I decided to dump Linux off my home machine all together and went with FreeBSD.
[snip]
I have absolutely no regrets.
Great! I'm glad you found an OS that makes you productive and happy. However, those things which you list do not make *BSD a better OS. They make it a different OS. *BSD appeals to a different type of user, imo. Ignoring the masses on both sides and looking at the core userbase that is. Some of us like having flexibility and choice, and we don't mind putting in the time to know all about our system. When that's the case little things like a lot of kernel versions just aren't a big deal.
Linux is not for everybody. Neither is *BSD. Each person has to decide for themselves which system fits their needs and then use it. All this OS bigotry is just ridiculous.
I'm all for proselytizing, and cheering the benefits. The problem (for me at least) comes in when people have this underlying tone of trying to declare one OS better than the other. Isn't it enough that you use it? (speaking generally here, not specifically to the previous poster) Or do you need the masses to agree with you before your choice can be validated?
While I don't disagree I have a bit to add to the theory of why now. AV companies would be foolish to take heat, and hits to their bottom line, for something they don't even know for sure exists.
The only way for the FBI to try and bolster the support among these pathetic companies was to inform them that ML exists.
This begs the question of why not share it with them under a veil of secrecy. But come on, this is not just an executive decision. It would have to be shared within the company with geek types. And frankly, we're just not that likely to keep the lid on something like this as a group.
So, do you take a chance in a good political climate, and go forward... or do you try to keep it secret and hope no-one reveals you. If you take the second option you know people will be crying "conspiracy!" so why create more problems for yourself.
As security advisor at Microsoft, his job presumably was to define policies that keep those holes from getting into the software and/or to keep Microsoft's sites secure. Microsoft's products are full of holes and their services have suffered major security compromises, so he can't have been very effective.
While I largely agree with your point, I'll make one in his defense anyway. He/did/ work for Microsoft. So his hands were pretty much tied, and he would've been forced to use inferior tools (MS products) to accomplish his goals. So I'd say you have to adjust the scale you judge him on. Perhaps by the remarkably small number of comprimises considering the products he was forced to use?
come on now who give two shits, this garbage has been on slashdot like 3 times in the last 4 days. i repeat this is NOT real news.
Heh. Can you say "self-centered"? Hello!? The world does not revolve around you. Do you get irritated when your local news station reports on stuff you don't care about personally? This/is/ news, and it affects a sizeable portion of/. readership. Through information on this site, (primarily through comments, I'll grant) readers are able to keep abreast of what's going on, and get tips on how they might speed things up/etc.
Just because it isn't important to you doesn't mean it isn't news.
The support line is down. (The one at 888-262-6300) but they setup a new one immediately on the morning it happened at 1-866-706-8818. It goes directly to support, no menus.
It seems static addressing has gone away to me as well. And I'm disappointed. But considering that ti's an always on service I would be surprised if your ip changed very often. And I expect they'll probably offer static's again once things get settled down. Trying to co-ordinate the assignment of ip addresses while bringing everyone online would be rather difficult.
I have to agree that their service agreement/AUP really sucks. And their changes really irritate me as well. So we're on the same page there. I can't really comment on the dns servers though, as I run my own.
Hrm. With the fact that a mass mailing went out for this potentially happening both via snail-mail and email I have to assume you mean no mail sat morning.
I too failed to receive anything saturday morning, but considering that it wasn't AT&T's idea, it's doubtfull they even had a chance. I don't think it's really something you can blame on AT&T.
I posted this in reply to the how-to in the other thread, but seems I might be better served to post it here or many people might not see it.
FWICT, the best way to get your service re-established goes like this:
-kill your dhcp client. Wipe your leases.
-re-init your cable modem:
(Unplug it, wait 20-30 seconds and plug it in)
-Wait for it to sync up. If it doesn't, keep trying.
-Once it resyncs, run:
tcpdump -i eth0 -lf dst port 68
This should list the dhcp replies going out
on your subnet. If you don't see them,
something is still not right. Try re-initing
your cable modem again.
-Start your dhcpclient
This should get you setup. Remember, if you're like me and were on a static number and blocking dhcp traffic you'll need to alter your firewall rule(s).
Just a quick note here. I've put in two calls to AT&T since this began. The first one Saturday morning, the second one this morning. I was very impressed with the courtesy with which I was treated. The lady I spoke with the first day, whose name I cannot recall (unfortunately) was obviously frazzled and had already had to deal with several irate customers. Yet she still did her best to provide me with information and was very courteous. More than that, I didn't have to wait hardly at all to get a response. Less than 10 minutes on the morning of the event. Not bad at all. She was a bit skewed on details, (i.e. maintained that linux was not going to be a "supported" platform. In her mind that meant I wouldn't be able to connect. But that's easily forgiven)
Today, Jennifer was also helpfull. She gave what info she could, and was very straight with me on how things were going. I'm sure it had been a long day for her as well yet she still was extremely courteous.
So, on that side I'm very happy. And if they hold to their estimate as it was given to me, and have everyone up in the next 7 to 10 days I think most everyone will be happy. And the more of us who reconfigure stuff ourself the faster it'll go.
However, on the downside, their AUP and TOU still really sucks. While it's been awhile since I last read it, I think it's even gotten WORSE if that can be believed. There's some really ridiculous stuff in there. And of course, there's the whole "limiting downstream speeds" thing. So they can offer tiered service later. Woo! Now I can pay more for the same level of service! What fun!
All this is largely unnecesary. Instead, first
thing, kill your dhcpclient, then pull the plug on your cablemodem and plug it back in. You may have to do this once or twice before you establish a connection to the network. You should also wait for around 20 to 30 seconds before plugging it back in.
Then, run this:
tcpdump -i eth0 -lf dst port 68
This should then begin spewing out the replies from at&t's dhcp server(s). Once you start getting these (should be in the 12./8. Mine was in 12.239, in texas) you should be home free. Just wipe any lease files you have left lying around make any necessary modifications to it's config file, and restart your dhcpclient. It should come back up right away. If not, you might try assigning yourself a static one then trying again. Just make sure you pick an ip that's way up there in the pool so the dhcp server doesn't try to pass it out before you are done using it or you'll cause some poor user & tech unnecessary headaches.
Slashdot Mirror
This commercial always really ticks me off. In fact, just reading a reference to it has gotten my hackles up.
Disclaimer: I'm not into drugs, never used them and have no interest. I have only on very rare occaisions even partaken in alcohol. I'm not defending my favorite pastime here.
This commercial so incredibly hypocritical. The reason those drugs fund terrorist operations is because they are so incredibly profitable. It's CHEAP to grow/make and the risks of producing/distributing them drive the price way up. So profits are HUGE. Small investment BIG return.
So who is responsible for this? Is it the kids who pay the horribly overinflated prices? Or is it the government that has a ridiculous ban on (some) drugs which makes such a market possible? More than that, they go in and burn the crops sometimes which makes the price go even higher as demand temporarily exceeds supply.
All this under a banner of altruism and mantra of protecting our children when all they really want is an opportunity to extend government power and control. Which of course extends police powers to the point where they are corrupted by it and end up accepting bribes, selling the drugs they seize on the side, planting evidence to gain homes/cars/etc they want and so on.
Meanwhile, the kids they are ostensibly trying to protect and their parents/loved ones are killed in terrorist attacks funded by the market they created.
ARGH!
</rant mode>
Assuming you mean basic human rights, not free will (you always have free will, even if they have cameras) it would be nice if this was true. Unfortunately, all too often it isn't. Sheeple are all too willing to sacrifice just about anything in the name of "peace and safety". Especially if it doesn't obviously map to affecting them personally in some way.
Yeah, that's a really dangerous line to walk. However, an organization responsible for patenting concepts/methods/etc for defensive purposes has to hae a way to pay for filing patents. It would simply have to be very carefully defined within the bylaws of the organization. I'm not talking about per-use charges here, but rather a company would pay x amount of dollars in a one time fee to gain the license for use in proprietary software. Any software licensed under any free license with source available is free, but otherwise you pay the fee. Perhaps only until the cost of filing the patent is paid for? At that point we stop charging. Or, maybe not, and the money goes into a fund to defend the patents held if necessary.
Ideally, we'd have people volunteering their time/etc to file patents for us, and then we wouldn't charge anyone anything, but would rather make the patent open for use. In the "public domain" so to speak. And yes, that can be done, though unfortunately you can reverse your thoughts on that later. Which is why it'd need to be codified in the bylaws of the organization in perpetuity. Unfortunately, I think we can see from past experience that this is even more wishfull thinking than my idea is.
Flash.
It would be bad for Microsoft to license things under a BSD license? ... I'd say that's actually an improvement over the license they use for most things they make.
So let me get this straight, software patents are bad, unless they are being used to hurt proprietary software companies? Using software patents only reinforces their legitimacy. While I think it's perfectly reasonable to hold them defensively, so someone else can't patent it and then use it against you, but not to use those patents actively against anyone, including Microsoft.
You don't effect political change on a topic by taking advantage of it for your own personal benefit while decrying it out the other side of your mouth.
If software patents are here to stay, the more that are in the hands of competitive non monopoly open source companies, instead of microsoft/aol etc, the better.
Hrm. Yes it's better if those patents are in the hands of trustworthy people, but I'm not sure a corporation in any form qualifies. If it was a single person I'd have an easier time, as their ideals are less likely to change. Even then I'd be concerned, profit is a strong motivator.
I'm not sure that there is a "right" answer to this problem, and it may be that companies like redhat filing these patents is the best we can hope for, but I'd be happier if there were a way that we could form a NFP organization analgous to the FSF that would hold the ownership of patents for free software innovations. The group existing with a very specific charter regarding their use, or rather lack of it. Perhaps with at most a very small specified licensing charge for proprietary use to fund the filing of patents/etc.
This is true, and because of their history I'm inclined to believe that's what they intend.
/will/ go after people who use their "patents" in their lgpl/bsd licensed software?
Unfortunately, we have absolutely no guarantees. This is only what the redhat of today intends, and the people currently running it won't be running it forever. Some future nimrod who ends up running redhat might see things differently, or be forced to see things differently by a board of directors.
Their exclusion of some very valid licenses (eg lgpl and bsd) concerns me as well. Does this mean they
Is this yet another attempt to scare people into using the GPL?
In regards to liability, you are right, there wouldn't be anyone to sue. Same as there was no-one to sue when the government mandated air-bags and childredn died from it because they didn't bother to wait and fully research its use. This lack of legal liability doesn't alter the fact that they are responsible.
RE: The truck, I wasn't as clear as I should've been. I meant a truck out of control. Accidents in progress, etc. There are times when speed and maneuverability are called for, and a speed governor and automatic controls can remove or impair your ability to skillfully avoid an accident.
If older cars fall under a grandfather clause for those devices, then people who want to drink and drive will simply drive older cars. I wouldn't expect that to last long if I were you. Before long the "for the children" mantra will either require them to be installed for make owning an older car illegal.
[I said] More children die from drowning in buckets per year than die in a gun related incident. [You replied] And more people die each year of heart disease than are murdered. Should murder not be illegal?
No. Should we make buckets illegal?
Despite what people would like you to think, none of these happen that often. I'd be willing >to bet that a person who pulls a gun on the rapist/stalker/mugger/deranged psycho is more likely to be killed than someone that doesn't, just like the person with the gun in their home is more likely to be killed by that gun than they are to use it to protect their family.
Well, you can bet all you want, but you'd be wrong. I'll be happy to take your money though. When you have some time, you should check out John Lott's research. The thing is, people don't make headlines for using a gun to defend themselves unless someone gets hurt. In fact, many times it goes completely unreported when someone defends their life with a gun. Especially when it happens in areas like DC and Chicago where even owning one is illegal.
I'm not trying to say that watermarking is a good thing. I'm definately against this absurd plan. My point was that yes, it's wrong for them to make laws because they are bored. But don't try to fix this by telling them to make laws to harass other people unnecessarily. Make them find something productive to do that actually contributes to society instead. Like getting a real job.
And who is going to define what drunk driving is? You can't have it be hardcoded, as different localities have different ratings. So what are you going to do? Have the dealers set it? Make people voluntarily drive their cars in to have it set? Broadcast the setting?
And how long before a device shows up on the black market to set it yourself? Or to ignore settings/disable it/etc? Or just instructions on bypassing it?
Who is going to handle the liability when that woman being chased hops in her car and it malfunctions and won't let her drive it to get away?
Who is going to pay for all the older cars to get retrofitted?
How about limiters that prevent aggressive driving or speeding?
And when that out of control truck is bearing down on you and you can't get away? What about when you swerve lanes to avoid some idiot who doesn't have one and it thinks you're being aggressive? When you are being stalked/chased/etc?
Who is going to pay for all the older cars to be retrofitted?
Why have we not seen legislative mandates that require gun manufacturers to make guns that can't kill innocent people (or, at the very least, cannot be accidentally fired i.e. by a child)?
Despite what many people would like you to think it doesn't happen that often. More children die from drowning in buckets per year than die in a gun related incident. (If you wonder why your liberal friends figures don't match that, ask them to remove the numbers for gang-bangers that kill each other and compare again. Sorry, those aren't "innocent children"). Again, what are you going to do when those "smart" guns fail and someone who desprately needed to protect themselves from a rapist, stalker, mugger, deranged psycho, etc can't do so because it fails?
This is an issue for markets. Not some goon in government. The answer to bad laws and stupid lawmakers is not to try to redirect their evil at some other group. It's to stop the evil.
While I'm not a total isolationist, I do have leanings in that direction. WWI and WWII are the only two wars in recent history I think we had any business being involved in.
As far as schools go, I thought I covered that, but no, govt has no place in schools. Schools are a perfect example of the triumph of private industry over govt. Govt schools exist all over, and with greater budgets than private schools, yet privately schooled and homeschooled kids consistantly outperform publicly educated children.
Heh. I agree in part regarding campaign finance reform. However, instead of full disclosure, why not have a constitutionally limited government? (shocking idea, I know). If they followed the constitution, and remained limited to only those powers allowed them there'd be no NEED to bribe, buy, or influence them. It'd do you no good.
If you haven't already read it, I would suggest you might want to give Bastiat's The Law a read.
Well, I'm not sure about megacorps. They do tend to be slower-moving and prefer larger markets. However, de-regulation isn't there to help the megacorps, it's there to help the small companies that form to fill demand. A good example of this is the internet when it was still in its dialup days. No regulation. And the large companies (prodigy/aol/etc) weren't filling the need. Small companies popped up /everywhere/ filling that need. The only broadband arena that I really have hope for right now in the long term is wireless. Because (at least for the moment) it's an open market, and anyone (even the small guys) can compete.
A pat answer based on assumption that government involvement in the "marketplace" always makes things worse
It's not a pat answer. And most of your examples range in an area that yeah, it's nearly impossible to prove has been (or can be) done better by private industry. Maybe a couple of them can't. But I'd be willing to bet a years wages that if the demand was there, and govt wasn't filling it already, someone would find a way to fill it, and for a company to do so.
Something of a non sequitur. No commercial interest ran in to fill the need in either of those cases. Do you think that public sanitation would be better if there were not public water and sewers?
Honestly, I don't know. I've never had an opportunity to find out. No commercial interest ran in because there's no way the local govt would've permitted them to do so. If I had to guess, I'd say if there was a way to do it, private would be better. I want to clarify though. When I say private, I mean private with competition. Not a natural monopoly.
Do you really want only private industry and competition in all aspects of society? How about national defense? How about courts? Where, exactly, do you draw the lines?
No. As I said before, I'm not an anarcho-capitalist. Government has its rightfull place, but that is not in the economy, or in business. National Defense is one of the very few valid roles of the central government. Courts are another valid role for government. I've heard some compelling arguments otherwise, but none that describe a society I would want to live in.
Where do I draw the lines? That's a good question. It becomes particularly hairy when you start dealing with limited resources. For example, water pipes and sewer pipes. While I don't claim to know it all, I can't think of a way for those to be shared. Maybe the best solution for those /is/ to be run by your local government, and we just have to suck up and deal with the negative aspects of what that means. Or maybe it means a natural monopoly. Not that those are any different.
However, internet, telephone, and cable infractructure isn't the same way. They are still limited resources, but not in the same fashion, they can be shared. While I wasn't of this opinion before, I read a couple accounts of some local munincipalities which laid the infrastructure and then paid for it with money from leasing it to various companies. With specific limitations (open leasing, no regulation) I would be open to this sort of thing I think. Still pondering it though.
Yet we have public/universal schooling now and we don't have that. People are ignorant, and they have no appreciation for how things do work (and more importantly how they should work). Instead they get indoctrinated with government propaganda. Meanwhile, private schools with a fraction of the funding consistantly turn out better students. More than that, homeschooled kids turn out better.
Yes, some things need to be handled by government. I am not an anarcho-capitalist, I'm a classical liberal. I do not agree that things like internet, and phone, and gas/water/sewer fall under the list of things that need to be govt managed. I didn't use to feel that way about roads, but frankly these days I think roads can even be managed better by private industry.
I appreciate the issue of resources, and not running thousands of connections to everyones home. I do not pretend to know the answer to this. And, I might even be in agreement with a concept of a /local/ govt (city/county) laying infrastructure, and then selling access to it to various companies. As long as that is sold at a fixed rate, and the money used to maintain and upgrade that infrastrucutre, thus eliminating the long-term tax burden.
But I am not in support of a national action of this nature. And I'm not interested in a city providing anything beyond the infrastructure. And (lots of ands here) I would be concerned about the abuse of the ownership of that infrastructure. For example, telling companies they can't carry certain kinds of content, or only allowing a select few companies to sell over it, or forcing companies to carry certain content (war on X ads, etc).
We do agree (again) though that there isn't much difference between a regulated natural monopoly and government doing things.
Definately not. I find it amusing that here you recognize that governments inability to be efficient would cause delays and problems, but yet you still support the idea of govt getting involved in broadband.
Why must we live with oligopolies that "compete" against each other to provide these services. Somehow, the cable companies always seem to show up within months of the DSL offerings in an area with roughly the same service offering at roughly the same price. Yeah, the free market will bring us the best result, sure.
I'm guessing you meant that last comment to be sarcasm, but it's misplaced. That is not free-market competition. Both industries are highly regulated. Most areas only allow one cable company, and most only have one phone company. As a result, they have no fear of true competition. Yes, cable/dsl compete with each other, but DSL has a limited availability based on distance from the CO. So they get most of those, and the cable gets everyone else. No competition necessary.
The US Founding Fathers knew the value of a free people freely communicating. They established the post office to ensure that people could easily communicate over great distances, without regard to their economic status or resources. Actually, the Post Office originated from Britain. It was abandoned and reformed during the period of revolt under the articles of confederation, and was not placed in the constitution till months later, and then only as a temporary act that was continued several times before being made permanent. IMO, this is an example of even early americans being accustomed to govt provision.
Surely private industry could have done a better job. As evidence, I would submit the pony express. The US Mail was doing a horrible job of delivering mail to california. The founder of the pony express company (central overland something) couldn't get any backing from the govt for an official mail route to do the job right so he started his own company and successfully ran mail until the day the telegraph run was completed.
I'm surprised that local and state governments aren't more involved in making sure that their area has the best broadband service.
Yeah, me too. Only I am surprised they haven't done so by truly deregulating those industries which can make it happen. (Not the pathetic stuff they've called "deregulation" so far) and giving incentives like tax breaks and cheap or free permits for the needed infrastructure work.
It's time that government, at all levels, makes sure that all of that unused fiber capacity that's supposedly lying around gets lighted up and serving the people. If we leave this to the oligopolies, that fiber won't get used until it's already obsolete.
That's called extra capacity, and it's there for the purpose of future expansion. The major cost of fiber is in its use, not laying it. And that fiber isn't going to be "obsolete" anytime soon, so I wouldn't worry about that if I were you.
I'm pretty conservative most of the time, but what's happening now must be some kind of market distortion that the government should work to correct. If there's all this unused capacity and lots of demand but not at the current price point, then the markets need a little prod to close the gap.
Yes, it is market distortion, and it is caused by too much government involvement, not too little. The more they prod the market, the worse it will get.
Let's do it. Nobody would wait for competing water, sewer or electric services to come hook up your neighborhood.
I would. I grew up using a well for years because the local government couldn't be bothered to run water lines to my home. And I owned a home for a few years in the late 90s that STILL didn't have public sewer availability and it was two minutes from the city limits. Gimme private industry and competition any day.
I don't know about you, but I've never been in an environment where any of those (except parks) were run by private industry. I'm just curious how you can say they benefit from government involvement. I myself have been generally less than satisfied with local water and sewer services, and roads in general. I'm one of those who /do/ truly believe we'd be better off with a private road system. It sure couldn't get worse than what we have now. And just FYI, anytime studies are done it's revealed that private parks are better maintained and run than than public ones.
I understand a general dislike for the cable company, but come on. What is your cable company motivated by? Profit. Profit is the lifeblood of any company. They didn't spend all that money laying cable so that it could just sit there. They want customers to use it. I find it highly unlikely that your cable company is holding it up on purpose once they've already laid the infrastructure. Their claims regarding DWP are entirely believable.
I don't know that I would attribute it to malice, there's no real need for them to worry about competition, as they are a govt entity, but I think it's quite likely DWP's typical slow-moving-government status is the problem.
Great! I'm glad you found an OS that makes you productive and happy. However, those things which you list do not make *BSD a better OS. They make it a different OS. *BSD appeals to a different type of user, imo. Ignoring the masses on both sides and looking at the core userbase that is. Some of us like having flexibility and choice, and we don't mind putting in the time to know all about our system. When that's the case little things like a lot of kernel versions just aren't a big deal.
Linux is not for everybody. Neither is *BSD. Each person has to decide for themselves which system fits their needs and then use it. All this OS bigotry is just ridiculous.
I'm all for proselytizing, and cheering the benefits. The problem (for me at least) comes in when people have this underlying tone of trying to declare one OS better than the other. Isn't it enough that you use it? (speaking generally here, not specifically to the previous poster) Or do you need the masses to agree with you before your choice can be validated?
The only way for the FBI to try and bolster the support among these pathetic companies was to inform them that ML exists.
This begs the question of why not share it with them under a veil of secrecy. But come on, this is not just an executive decision. It would have to be shared within the company with geek types. And frankly, we're just not that likely to keep the lid on something like this as a group.
So, do you take a chance in a good political climate, and go forward... or do you try to keep it secret and hope no-one reveals you. If you take the second option you know people will be crying "conspiracy!" so why create more problems for yourself.
A smart move on the FBI's part.
Yup. It's all there for the world to see. Course, no worries, nobody does it since it's a violation of the AUP. </sarcasm>
No, I think you can blame Excite for that. If they hadn't spent money like it grew on trees they'd still be in business.
While I largely agree with your point, I'll make one in his defense anyway. He /did/ work for Microsoft. So his hands were pretty much tied, and he would've been forced to use inferior tools (MS products) to accomplish his goals. So I'd say you have to adjust the scale you judge him on. Perhaps by the remarkably small number of comprimises considering the products he was forced to use?
Heh. Can you say "self-centered"? Hello!? The world does not revolve around you. Do you get irritated when your local news station reports on stuff you don't care about personally? This /is/ news, and it affects a sizeable portion of /. readership. Through information on this site, (primarily through comments, I'll grant) readers are able to keep abreast of what's going on, and get tips on how they might speed things up/etc.
Just because it isn't important to you doesn't mean it isn't news.
The support line is down. (The one at 888-262-6300) but they setup a new one immediately on the morning it happened at 1-866-706-8818. It goes directly to support, no menus.
It seems static addressing has gone away to me as well. And I'm disappointed. But considering that ti's an always on service I would be surprised if your ip changed very often. And I expect they'll probably offer static's again once things get settled down. Trying to co-ordinate the assignment of ip addresses while bringing everyone online would be rather difficult.
I have to agree that their service agreement/AUP really sucks. And their changes really irritate me as well. So we're on the same page there. I can't really comment on the dns servers though, as I run my own.
I too failed to receive anything saturday morning, but considering that it wasn't AT&T's idea, it's doubtfull they even had a chance. I don't think it's really something you can blame on AT&T.
I posted this in reply to the how-to in the other thread, but seems I might be better served to post it here or many people might not see it.
FWICT, the best way to get your service re-established goes like this:
-kill your dhcp client. Wipe your leases.
-re-init your cable modem:
(Unplug it, wait 20-30 seconds and plug it in)
-Wait for it to sync up. If it doesn't, keep trying.
-Once it resyncs, run:
tcpdump -i eth0 -lf dst port 68
This should list the dhcp replies going out
on your subnet. If you don't see them,
something is still not right. Try re-initing
your cable modem again.
-Start your dhcpclient
This should get you setup. Remember, if you're like me and were on a static number and blocking dhcp traffic you'll need to alter your firewall rule(s).
Just a quick note here. I've put in two calls to AT&T since this began. The first one Saturday morning, the second one this morning. I was very impressed with the courtesy with which I was treated. The lady I spoke with the first day, whose name I cannot recall (unfortunately) was obviously frazzled and had already had to deal with several irate customers. Yet she still did her best to provide me with information and was very courteous. More than that, I didn't have to wait hardly at all to get a response. Less than 10 minutes on the morning of the event. Not bad at all. She was a bit skewed on details, (i.e. maintained that linux was not going to be a "supported" platform. In her mind that meant I wouldn't be able to connect. But that's easily forgiven)
Today, Jennifer was also helpfull. She gave what info she could, and was very straight with me on how things were going. I'm sure it had been a long day for her as well yet she still was extremely courteous.
So, on that side I'm very happy. And if they hold to their estimate as it was given to me, and have everyone up in the next 7 to 10 days I think most everyone will be happy. And the more of us who reconfigure stuff ourself the faster it'll go.
However, on the downside, their AUP and TOU still really sucks. While it's been awhile since I last read it, I think it's even gotten WORSE if that can be believed. There's some really ridiculous stuff in there. And of course, there's the whole "limiting downstream speeds" thing. So they can offer tiered service later. Woo! Now I can pay more for the same level of service! What fun!
All this is largely unnecesary. Instead, first
/8. Mine was in 12.239, in texas) you should be home free. Just wipe any lease files you have left lying around make any necessary modifications to it's config file, and restart your dhcpclient. It should come back up right away. If not, you might try assigning yourself a static one then trying again. Just make sure you pick an ip that's way up there in the pool so the dhcp server doesn't try to pass it out before you are done using it or you'll cause some poor user & tech unnecessary headaches.
thing, kill your dhcpclient, then pull the plug on your cablemodem and plug it back in. You may have to do this once or twice before you establish a connection to the network. You should also wait for around 20 to 30 seconds before plugging it back in.
Then, run this:
tcpdump -i eth0 -lf dst port 68
This should then begin spewing out the replies from at&t's dhcp server(s). Once you start getting these (should be in the 12.