For consoles the disc media is meaningless, no? I mean it's not like I can take a Wii game and stick it in my computer and play it.
Not quite. It makes a tiny difference. Those people who get thier game boxes modded/chipped/whatever you want to call it, can make backups of their games, and use those. For the PS2, it's standard DVD. You want to make a backup of God of War? Put it in your PC. Copy it to a regular ol' DVD (+/- R doesn't matter), and play that in your PS2. If PS3 games come on a blue-ray disk, or the XBox 360 games come on an HD disk, then that effects those people who like to do backups. It's tiny. It probably doesn't matter. I just hope (for my sake) that the PS3 games don't all come in Blue-Ray format.
You had it half right. Nobody knows what Blu-Ray is or that it's included in the PS3. But I'd also say that people aren't "angry" about the price. If people think it's too much, they just won't buy it. But, all of the armchair punditry in the world is all pointless. We'll see if they'll sell. Personally, I'm excited as hell about the PS3, and I'm buying one ASAP.
You're still having to do all the calculations for taxes: FICA, Medicare, State and Federal withholding by hand. That's not really a viable option unless you're an accountant. Not only does this need to be a core part of the program, but there needs to be a subscription program that updates all of the rates and rules on a regular basis and on a federal, state, and local level. It's important enough to me that I pay $300/year for this service now.
There are F/OSS alternatives available already to accomplish everything you've cited. I know, I've done it. A few minutes' googling will usually result in multiple F/OSS apps/systems/OSs, etc to accomplish a given task.
I can head down to my local office supply store and pick up a copy of Quickbooks for $150. There is no FOSS equivalent that has anywhere near the functionality of Quickbooks. You really can't get any more basic than that as far as business software goes. You can Google all day, but you won't find anything that comes remotely close to it.
Come on. Name one. Just one. One that has all of the functionality. Hell, how about 75% of the functionality? Where is this magical software?
I'm not exaggerating. You simply cannot run a viable small business with just Linux, unless you handle your accounting with a bookkeeper that is running Windows or OSX o even DOS.
Oh, that's brilliant. In one paragraph, you advocate for giving up our personal property rights to the government (or at some arbitrary amount of personal property, after which the government siezes it), and giving up personal rights to own intellectual property. Do you advocate that the convert to feudalism, so that we, the people, don't have to worry about pesky private property, and we let the nanny state take care of all of those desicions for us? You sound like you'd make a good serf.
I'm not convinced that the process is better. I think that the process and the idea behind it is academically lazy and poorly thought out. But really, that's irrelevant. If the process is better, it'll develop a better product, which should be the goal. That really doesn't seem to be the goal of the movement, though. The goal of the movement, according to most of the rhetoric, has something to do with some vague idea called "freedom".
If it's a better process, then maybe, eventually, we'll see better software. So far, results have been spotty at best, especially when considering the monetary cost of most of the software.
And ultimately, that's my point: I don't care if the software that I use is OSS or not. I want to use the best software to meet my needs. If the process is better, then maybe I'll use it in the future, but ONLY if the software is better.
Nobody that I have read has ever made a single valid point as to why there's an inherent good in OSS. I've read nothing but embarassingly bad pseudo academic masturbation. (think: "The Cathedral and the Bazaar"... uuugh)
without giving specific details of what the matter is.
That's simple. We currently use Intuit QBPOS for our cash registers and for all of our receiving, ordering, etc. It's a buggy mess. It's slow. It crashes at least once a day. There is no access to the data except through the program itself (closed, proprietary ddatabase). I've been testing MS's RMS product, and it's much better. No stability problems. Better functionality. Hence, I'm probably going to buy MS RMS. It looks like it's the best mid-range point of sale product out there, from what I can see. We use Exchange Server, but I just pay a few bucks a month to let somebody else administer it. So, I've never seen a problem with it. We don't have any OS problems to speak of.
You have taken the mantle of Libertarianism in defense of Microsoft when in fact Microsoft itself is based on government interference of personal property rights.
What in the hell are you talking about?
What part of "Repeal all anti-trust laws." is unclear?
What's to make you think somehow *this time* it will be different?
I don't think it will be different. They'll probably spin it off and it will be incompatible. But here's the point. You're assuming that OSS is some kind of good inherent in itself. That's the problem. So what if MS's Linux isn't compatible? So what if it becomes many times more popular than OSS Linux? What's the problem? OSS is just software. It's a tool. It's just lines of code. Software doesn't exist for it's own benefit. It exists to help us (humans) accomplish more. I don't care if my software is open source, proprietary, or written by hamsters. Software is not an end. Software is a means to an end. The only people for whom software is an "end" are the tiny segment of the population that are professional programmers. Hell, even for them, why would OSS be an inherent good?
And, in this particular case, OSS is already out there. You're not talking about MS buying a competitor and shutting down their product. That's not going to happen here.
So again, I ask, why should I, or anybody else, really care if their software becomes more popular than somebody else's software? I'm planning on using what works best for me and my business, regardless of where it came from or who made it. If MS can do "MS Linux" better than the current iterations of Linux, then good for them. Even better, good for everybody else who uses it!
OSS doesn't make the world a better place. It's all in how it (and other kinds of software) are used.
I'm not going to address a essay that hinges on the word "evil". "Evil" is a word that is best left to religion and other fairy tales. Instead of that badly written essay, you should instead go to the source. From lp.org:
Transitional Action: Eliminate all federal grants of monopoly or subsidy to any private companies, such as utilities, airlines, energy companies, agriculture, science, medicine, broadcasting, the arts and sports teams. Repeal all anti-trust laws. All federal agencies whose primary function is to make or guarantee corporate loans must be abolished or privatized.
You don't need some convoluted essay to explain the Libertarian stance. It's very simple: government is bad. Private rights (including property rights) are good. Government interfering with private property ("anti-trust") is very bad.
Sorry, but I just don't think that anti-monopoly laws are ethically or morally sound. I tend to agree with Libertarians on this one. I see it as the government using force to interfere with private property.
We have exactly 6 people. We need software that works out of the box, no questions asked. There's little room for error, either as far as time or money goes. Any time spent twiddling with software is money lost. It's that simple.
"Playing hard"? They've been found guilty in courts of law in several continents of illegal monopoly-abusing business practices. That's not "playing hard", that's "playing illegal".
We have lots of unethical and immoral laws in this country. The monopoly crap falls in that category. Just because my government tells me that something is illegal, doesn't make it wrong. It's also illegal to possess marijuana in the US. Does that make it wrong? Up until 1920, it was illegal for women to vote in this country.
It wasn't a "childish troll", it's just the state of things.
I'm sorry you're having trouble with Windows. I haven't run into any of that since the Windows 95/98/ME days, though. It's not even on my radar as a potential issue, quite honestly.
There are now a lot of angry people who will now go out of their way to get business to go elsewhere than Novell. Have you noticed that SCO's business went completely down the tubes? Novell's going to have a hard time avoding that.
The code is out there. There's nothing the developers can do about that. Novell will get tons of business from businesspeople (like myself) that WANT a MS-sanctioned Linux. They may lose developers and a few zealots. Big deal. They'll gain customers. They'll gain I think that this is the first smart thing that Novell has done in a long time.
I was responding to the childish troll about spyware and viruses. But no, I'm not worried about security or stability. A firewall and common sense takes care of security. Stability simply isn't an issue with MS products. Stability IS a problem with another product we're using right now, but I'm considering moving that function to a MORE STABLE version of it made by Microsoft.
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For consoles the disc media is meaningless, no? I mean it's not like I can take a Wii game and stick it in my computer and play it.
Not quite. It makes a tiny difference. Those people who get thier game boxes modded/chipped/whatever you want to call it, can make backups of their games, and use those. For the PS2, it's standard DVD. You want to make a backup of God of War? Put it in your PC. Copy it to a regular ol' DVD (+/- R doesn't matter), and play that in your PS2. If PS3 games come on a blue-ray disk, or the XBox 360 games come on an HD disk, then that effects those people who like to do backups. It's tiny. It probably doesn't matter. I just hope (for my sake) that the PS3 games don't all come in Blue-Ray format.
You had it half right. Nobody knows what Blu-Ray is or that it's included in the PS3. But I'd also say that people aren't "angry" about the price. If people think it's too much, they just won't buy it. But, all of the armchair punditry in the world is all pointless. We'll see if they'll sell. Personally, I'm excited as hell about the PS3, and I'm buying one ASAP.
Why should Ballmer be interested in free software?
You're still having to do all the calculations for taxes: FICA, Medicare, State and Federal withholding by hand. That's not really a viable option unless you're an accountant. Not only does this need to be a core part of the program, but there needs to be a subscription program that updates all of the rates and rules on a regular basis and on a federal, state, and local level. It's important enough to me that I pay $300/year for this service now.
If you think that all computing consists of web browsing, email, word processors, and games, then perhaps you need to get your head out of the sand.
What - more chair throwing?
Maybe if somebody in the OSS camp got excited about their software enough to throw a chair, we'd see some decent OSS other than Apache.
Dude, take off the Spock ears, and take a shower. You're getting creepy.
Unfortunately, it lacks payroll. Can't pay employees (or yourself) without it. That's pretty basic.
There are F/OSS alternatives available already to accomplish everything you've cited. I know, I've done it. A few minutes' googling will usually result in multiple F/OSS apps/systems/OSs, etc to accomplish a given task.
I can head down to my local office supply store and pick up a copy of Quickbooks for $150. There is no FOSS equivalent that has anywhere near the functionality of Quickbooks. You really can't get any more basic than that as far as business software goes. You can Google all day, but you won't find anything that comes remotely close to it.
Come on. Name one. Just one. One that has all of the functionality. Hell, how about 75% of the functionality? Where is this magical software?
I'm not exaggerating. You simply cannot run a viable small business with just Linux, unless you handle your accounting with a bookkeeper that is running Windows or OSX o even DOS.
Oh, that's brilliant. In one paragraph, you advocate for giving up our personal property rights to the government (or at some arbitrary amount of personal property, after which the government siezes it), and giving up personal rights to own intellectual property. Do you advocate that the convert to feudalism, so that we, the people, don't have to worry about pesky private property, and we let the nanny state take care of all of those desicions for us? You sound like you'd make a good serf.
I'm not convinced that the process is better. I think that the process and the idea behind it is academically lazy and poorly thought out. But really, that's irrelevant. If the process is better, it'll develop a better product, which should be the goal. That really doesn't seem to be the goal of the movement, though. The goal of the movement, according to most of the rhetoric, has something to do with some vague idea called "freedom".
If it's a better process, then maybe, eventually, we'll see better software. So far, results have been spotty at best, especially when considering the monetary cost of most of the software.
And ultimately, that's my point: I don't care if the software that I use is OSS or not. I want to use the best software to meet my needs. If the process is better, then maybe I'll use it in the future, but ONLY if the software is better.
Nobody that I have read has ever made a single valid point as to why there's an inherent good in OSS. I've read nothing but embarassingly bad pseudo academic masturbation. (think: "The Cathedral and the Bazaar"... uuugh)
without giving specific details of what the matter is.
That's simple. We currently use Intuit QBPOS for our cash registers and for all of our receiving, ordering, etc. It's a buggy mess. It's slow. It crashes at least once a day. There is no access to the data except through the program itself (closed, proprietary ddatabase). I've been testing MS's RMS product, and it's much better. No stability problems. Better functionality. Hence, I'm probably going to buy MS RMS. It looks like it's the best mid-range point of sale product out there, from what I can see. We use Exchange Server, but I just pay a few bucks a month to let somebody else administer it. So, I've never seen a problem with it. We don't have any OS problems to speak of.
You have taken the mantle of Libertarianism in defense of Microsoft when in fact Microsoft itself is based on government interference of personal property rights.
What in the hell are you talking about?
What part of "Repeal all anti-trust laws." is unclear?
What's to make you think somehow *this time* it will be different?
I don't think it will be different. They'll probably spin it off and it will be incompatible. But here's the point. You're assuming that OSS is some kind of good inherent in itself. That's the problem. So what if MS's Linux isn't compatible? So what if it becomes many times more popular than OSS Linux? What's the problem? OSS is just software. It's a tool. It's just lines of code. Software doesn't exist for it's own benefit. It exists to help us (humans) accomplish more. I don't care if my software is open source, proprietary, or written by hamsters. Software is not an end. Software is a means to an end. The only people for whom software is an "end" are the tiny segment of the population that are professional programmers. Hell, even for them, why would OSS be an inherent good?
And, in this particular case, OSS is already out there. You're not talking about MS buying a competitor and shutting down their product. That's not going to happen here.
So again, I ask, why should I, or anybody else, really care if their software becomes more popular than somebody else's software? I'm planning on using what works best for me and my business, regardless of where it came from or who made it. If MS can do "MS Linux" better than the current iterations of Linux, then good for them. Even better, good for everybody else who uses it!
OSS doesn't make the world a better place. It's all in how it (and other kinds of software) are used.
I took the porn site down. Business stuff. Sorry. It'll probably come back, but it'll be a while. My main business is taking all of my time right now.
You're right. I'm being slack.
I'm not going to address a essay that hinges on the word "evil". "Evil" is a word that is best left to religion and other fairy tales. Instead of that badly written essay, you should instead go to the source. From lp.org:
Transitional Action: Eliminate all federal grants of monopoly or subsidy to any private companies, such as utilities, airlines, energy companies, agriculture, science, medicine, broadcasting, the arts and sports teams. Repeal all anti-trust laws. All federal agencies whose primary function is to make or guarantee corporate loans must be abolished or privatized.
You don't need some convoluted essay to explain the Libertarian stance. It's very simple: government is bad. Private rights (including property rights) are good. Government interfering with private property ("anti-trust") is very bad.
M$ took down my design company for a week after a critical update went totally wrong, so this scenario isn't hypothetical by any means.
Sounds like you need to take your own advice and test the updates before applying them to mission critical systems.
With closed source, you are screwed if MS push a critical update and the older software is 'broken'.
I'm equally as screwed with OSS software, since I'm not a programmer and hiring a team of programmers is prohibitively expensive.
but the big name open source projects may well have many more eyes on the code.
That's nice as far as fixing bugs, but it has nothing to do with functionality, which is my primary gripe with Linux at this point.
Sorry, but I just don't think that anti-monopoly laws are ethically or morally sound. I tend to agree with Libertarians on this one. I see it as the government using force to interfere with private property.
We have exactly 6 people. We need software that works out of the box, no questions asked. There's little room for error, either as far as time or money goes. Any time spent twiddling with software is money lost. It's that simple.
"Playing hard"? They've been found guilty in courts of law in several continents of illegal monopoly-abusing business practices. That's not "playing hard", that's "playing illegal".
We have lots of unethical and immoral laws in this country. The monopoly crap falls in that category. Just because my government tells me that something is illegal, doesn't make it wrong. It's also illegal to possess marijuana in the US. Does that make it wrong? Up until 1920, it was illegal for women to vote in this country.
It wasn't a "childish troll", it's just the state of things.
I'm sorry you're having trouble with Windows. I haven't run into any of that since the Windows 95/98/ME days, though. It's not even on my radar as a potential issue, quite honestly.
There are now a lot of angry people who will now go out of their way to get business to go elsewhere than Novell. Have you noticed that SCO's business went completely down the tubes? Novell's going to have a hard time avoding that.
The code is out there. There's nothing the developers can do about that. Novell will get tons of business from businesspeople (like myself) that WANT a MS-sanctioned Linux. They may lose developers and a few zealots. Big deal. They'll gain customers. They'll gain I think that this is the first smart thing that Novell has done in a long time.
I was responding to the childish troll about spyware and viruses. But no, I'm not worried about security or stability. A firewall and common sense takes care of security. Stability simply isn't an issue with MS products. Stability IS a problem with another product we're using right now, but I'm considering moving that function to a MORE STABLE version of it made by Microsoft.