I have been following this issue since I was in grade school (when Voyager first landed) and even then, it seemed to me that the results were at worst equivocal (NASA itself admitted this at the time). Indeed, my subsequent education (which includes degrees in molecular biology and medicine) has actually strengthened my belief that the original results are not only consistent with , but almost expected of, a microbial lifeform that has spent many (hundreds of?) millions of years adapting to the dissicated conditions of modern day Mars (whatever environment it may have originally evolved in)... the falloff after the initial metabolic response is *quite* unsurprising -- excess water is toxic (via osmotic disruption, interference with local molecular conditions and ionic balances, etc.) even in earth biota.
Over the years, I collected a NASA data folder for Life on Mars (one of those geek mini-hobbies we all have), but with the advent of the Web, I learned that people found a short reasoned essay with links to actual data and statements on NASA website much more compelling (easy to comprehend, evaluate, and hence accept) than printouts, etc. Unfortunately, that data seemed to move around over the years, and around the time of pathfinder, all the *detailed* informative descriptions of the Voyager results were shoved off all the NASA websites, presumably as old news.
Does anyone have current NASA links to (detailed) results from Voyager? I prefer to think that those pages were simply relocated or temporarily in Web limbo, rather than 'forcibly retired' as known embarrassments to the agency.
P.S. At one time, I had a link to an account by a scientist observing the telemetry data as it first came in, apparently he exclaimed "My God, we found life! How do we announce that?" (or words to that effect). He said he was then taken aside and firmly told that he was *not* too express such a viewpoint in the future. I'm sure that many/.'ers know this story, and can provide me with a name, if not an active link to that account (which I did not get from a NASA site, and may no longer exist)
I would hardly be surprised if 10-15% of installations in an organization this size actually were 'apparently illegal'. This does not mean that the city had any tacit policy or tolerance of 'stolen software' (or did not purchase/track properly licensed software). It refers to the practical details of life in an office environment.
1. Registry corrupt. User (or tech) installs from nearest convenient CD and number
2. An app is installed for a single or time-limited use and never uninstalled.
3. Due to a hardware failure (even a single component), a system is returned (in whole or in part) or "parted" our to repair other systems on the bench. The software may be kept (may not be refundable), but tracking what went where may be a nightmare after a few years. The "items" (e.g. complete system packages) invoice no longer reflect the systems actually in use.
4. Tracking/accountability systems are complex, and often reveal unexpected weaknesses when data is accessed in unexpected ways, when data entry practices mutate over time, or when users do not fully understand the intent (and distinctions) of every single field
Any one of these could result in numerous (long-lived) apparent violations
I am not against commercial software (or MS), but we should recognize that the law lists countless situations where the courts have altered general legal principles, ruled clauses unenforceable, or otherwise made explicit (and even unexpected) allowances for the fact that a given law/clause was an undue hardship in "ordinary use"
Such rules occur even when the "rights" of the individuals are clear, when society has a compelling interest, and where (il)legality is uncontested. Sometimes the courts just throw up their hands. Examples (varying by jurisdiction, of course) range from "no pets" rental clauses to adultery to certain situation in child custody to [fill in your favorite]. Often, the "unworkablility" of the provision seems very tenuous to the party on the other side of the case.
The current mechanism for software licensing may turn out to be precisely such a case, thought the software industry has fought to keep it from being declared on until now. If audits like this become commonplace -who knows?- it may just turn out to be more of a burden than the courts want to take on. Or perhaps they'll take pity on the beleagered small-medium-large office. (Don't hold your breath)
My point is: keeping track of use of intangibles is not easy or straightforward. Keeping track of parts is at least as hard [even in mision critical settings such as military and aviation; as many news items have attested]. Keeping track of *intangible* parts (like software) may be next to impossible in a large fluid organization. If it turns out that eseentially every office has some apparent violations, it would be hard to argue that perfect compliance is possible or reasonable.
I don't like exceptions that 'bend the law', especially when they evenutally cause a law o be unenforceable. But the law has been around a long time, and has learned that sometimes, you simply have to let people do what they set about doing (run a business or a personal life) and cuts exemptions for them as a practical matter. Perhaps software licensing may be affected by this in the future.
In the comment process for this part of DMCA, I found the following letter. I was surprised that this issue doesn't get more play
Briefly put: data produced or stored by a software package may effectively become the property of the software company, if stored in a proprietary format.
My doctor was 'held hostage' for a few years by his records software. He couldn't change packages without losing his records, even though he hated the software he was using. He finally had to hire a programmer to analyze the his records and write a converter to a tab-delimited database, so he could import it into another software package.
Under DMCA, this would be illegal. The proprietary companies often call their proprietary formats a security measure (to protect patient privacy), so it really isn't a very big step to call this 'circumvention of a security feature'
I don't know about today, but apparently this was not uncommon a few years ago -- and we can expect it to come back if DMCA gives the software companies a big stick
Slashdot Mirror
I have been following this issue since I was in grade school (when Voyager first landed) and even then, it seemed to me that the results were at worst equivocal (NASA itself admitted this at the time). Indeed, my subsequent education (which includes degrees in molecular biology and medicine) has actually strengthened my belief that the original results are not only consistent with , but almost expected of, a microbial lifeform that has spent many (hundreds of?) millions of years adapting to the dissicated conditions of modern day Mars (whatever environment it may have originally evolved in)... the falloff after the initial metabolic response is *quite* unsurprising -- excess water is toxic (via osmotic disruption, interference with local molecular conditions and ionic balances, etc.) even in earth biota.
/.'ers know this story, and can provide me with a name, if not an active link to that account (which I did not get from a NASA site, and may no longer exist)
Over the years, I collected a NASA data folder for Life on Mars (one of those geek mini-hobbies we all have), but with the advent of the Web, I learned that people found a short reasoned essay with links to actual data and statements on NASA website much more compelling (easy to comprehend, evaluate, and hence accept) than printouts, etc. Unfortunately, that data seemed to move around over the years, and around the time of pathfinder, all the *detailed* informative descriptions of the Voyager results were shoved off all the NASA websites, presumably as old news.
Does anyone have current NASA links to (detailed) results from Voyager? I prefer to think that those pages were simply relocated or temporarily in Web limbo, rather than 'forcibly retired' as known embarrassments to the agency.
P.S. At one time, I had a link to an account by a scientist observing the telemetry data as it first came in, apparently he exclaimed "My God, we found life! How do we announce that?" (or words to that effect). He said he was then taken aside and firmly told that he was *not* too express such a viewpoint in the future. I'm sure that many
I would hardly be surprised if 10-15% of installations in an organization this size actually were 'apparently illegal'. This does not mean that the city had any tacit policy or tolerance of 'stolen software' (or did not purchase/track properly licensed software). It refers to the practical details of life in an office environment.
1. Registry corrupt. User (or tech) installs from nearest convenient CD and number
2. An app is installed for a single or time-limited use and never uninstalled.
3. Due to a hardware failure (even a single component), a system is returned (in whole or in part) or "parted" our to repair other systems on the bench. The software may be kept (may not be refundable), but tracking what went where may be a nightmare after a few years. The "items" (e.g. complete system packages) invoice no longer reflect the systems actually in use.
4. Tracking/accountability systems are complex, and often reveal unexpected weaknesses when data is accessed in unexpected ways, when data entry practices mutate over time, or when users do not fully understand the intent (and distinctions) of every single field
Any one of these could result in numerous (long-lived) apparent violations
I am not against commercial software (or MS), but we should recognize that the law lists countless situations where the courts have altered general legal principles, ruled clauses unenforceable, or otherwise made explicit (and even unexpected) allowances for the fact that a given law/clause was an undue hardship in "ordinary use"
Such rules occur even when the "rights" of the individuals are clear, when society has a compelling interest, and where (il)legality is uncontested. Sometimes the courts just throw up their hands. Examples (varying by jurisdiction, of course) range from "no pets" rental clauses to adultery to certain situation in child custody to [fill in your favorite]. Often, the "unworkablility" of the provision seems very tenuous to the party on the other side of the case.
The current mechanism for software licensing may turn out to be precisely such a case, thought the software industry has fought to keep it from being declared on until now. If audits like this become commonplace -who knows?- it may just turn out to be more of a burden than the courts want to take on. Or perhaps they'll take pity on the beleagered small-medium-large office. (Don't hold your breath)
My point is: keeping track of use of intangibles is not easy or straightforward. Keeping track of parts is at least as hard [even in mision critical settings such as military and aviation; as many news items have attested]. Keeping track of *intangible* parts (like software) may be next to impossible in a large fluid organization. If it turns out that eseentially every office has some apparent violations, it would be hard to argue that perfect compliance is possible or reasonable.
I don't like exceptions that 'bend the law', especially when they evenutally cause a law o be unenforceable. But the law has been around a long time, and has learned that sometimes, you simply have to let people do what they set about doing (run a business or a personal life) and cuts exemptions for them as a practical matter. Perhaps software licensing may be affected by this in the future.
Sorry, I was sure I included this link to the Letter of Comment.
In the comment process for this part of DMCA, I found the following letter. I was surprised that this issue doesn't get more play
Briefly put: data produced or stored by a software package may effectively become the property of the software company, if stored in a proprietary format.
My doctor was 'held hostage' for a few years by his records software. He couldn't change packages without losing his records, even though he hated the software he was using. He finally had to hire a programmer to analyze the his records and write a converter to a tab-delimited database, so he could import it into another software package.
Under DMCA, this would be illegal. The proprietary companies often call their proprietary formats a security measure (to protect patient privacy), so it really isn't a very big step to call this 'circumvention of a security feature'
I don't know about today, but apparently this was not uncommon a few years ago -- and we can expect it to come back if DMCA gives the software companies a big stick