In a totally different case, with a totally different fact
picture,
Capitol
Records, Inc., et al., vs Debbie Foster and
Amanda Foster, Lee R. West United
States District Judge
says:
The Copyright Act does not expressly
render anyone liable
for infringement committed by
another.
Metro_Goldwyn-Mayer Studios, Inc. v. Grokster,
Ltd.. 545 U.S.
913, (2005). Rather, the doctrine of
secondary liability emerged from common
law principles.
Id. Under those common law principles, one
infringes a
copyright contributorily by intentionally
inducing or encouraging a direct
infringement. The
elements of a claim for contributory copyright
infringement
are: (1) direct infringement by third party;
(2) knowledge by the defendant
that third parties were
directly infringing; and (3) substaintial participation
by
the defendant in infringing activities. See Newborn v.
Yahoo!, 391
F. Supp.2d 181, (D.D.C. 2005); see also
Newborn v. Yahoo! Inc., 437
F.Supp.2d 1 (D.D.C 2006)
(finding defendant was entitled to an award of
attorneys'
fees after prevailing upon plaintiff's frivolous and
objectively
unreasonable contributory copyright claim).
Merely supplying means to
accomplish infringing activity
cannot give rise to imposition of liability for
contributory copyright infringement. Id.;see
also A & M Records,
Inc. v. Napster, Inc. 239. F.3d
1004, 1013 (9th Cir. 2001). One infringes a
copyright
vicariously by profiting from direct infringement while
declining to
exercise a right to stop or limit it.
Grokster, 545 U.S.
913.
I have copied the above by hand so check
the original.
The judge is basicly saying that indirect infringement
requires direct infringement. If this principle were
applied to the "coupons
expiration date + gplv3" theory,
it would say that Microsoft is not guilty of
infringement
if Novell is not guilty of direct infringement.
Free software
advocates, in their zeal to get
Microsoft, should not attack this principle,
because that
would make it easier for the RIAA to persecute innocent
people
accused of copying songs.
Because of the
grandfat
her clause, the FSF has all but admitted it
does not intend to proceed
against Novell.
What is the microkernel style exactly? It is basicly a way of using the MMU to do some kinds of checking. The extra code that does this checking runs at least 100 times per second on every CPU that runs the OS. To facilitate this checking, developers must reorganize the way their code is organized, breaking the flow of thought and understanding into a lot of small pieces.
All to do some checking that at least theoreticly could have been done at design, compile, link time once.
This checking only checks for only some of the possible coding errors. Most OSes do not crash because of stray memory references. There are 49 other crash landings.
When all you have is a hammer, everything looks like a nail.
Microkernels are a solution in search of a problem.
T lives in academia, so he and his colleagues should be thinking high level. Rather than finding an expensive low level solution to a low level problem, he should be thinking about automated ways of doing all kinds of checking at design, compile, link time.
I am told (I do not know from personal experience), that in many University CS departments, the OS people are at war with the compiler design people, so perhaps this is politicly impossible. (Cheap shot.)
The GPLv3 + coupon expiration date theory is not intended to be taken seriously by any court. It is counterFUD.
Eben Moglen is a very smart lawyer. However, he was the General Counsel to the Free Software Foundation, and the FSF is at war with Microsoft. In any war the fist causality is truth. Eben Moglen is running a bluff, but he knows his bluff can not be called.
I order for the bluff to be called, Microsoft would have to try to enforce one of its bogus patents. Microsoft will never do that because it would expose the patent to scrutiny. Moglen is proceding on the theory that "one good lie deserves another" and "any stick is good enough to beat a mad dog with". The theory is designed to appeal to unthinking suits and PHBs, the kind that could be fooled by Microsoft patent FUD.
Unfortunately some free software advocates have started "breathing their own exhaust fumes" and started believing this preposterous theory.
This counterFUD move may be a brilliant tactical move, but it may be in the long run counter productive, because people like PJ destroy their own credibility by slavishly following it.
The reason the microkernels fail is that ukernels are a form of bondage and discipline programming.
Bondage and Discipline programming occurs when the smart people on the central committee decide that ordinary developers are not smart enough to decide how to code on their own. They create a "system" that won't let the ordinary developers make certain kinds of errors. Pascal is the canonical Bondage and Discipline language.
There are 3 flaws in B&D programming.
Bondage and discipline programming causes overhead and reduces your performance.
bondage and discipline programming won't let you choose the best method to achieve your goal, so your design becomes more difficult.
The smart people on the central committee, the creators of the B&D system, are not as smart as they think they are.
Linus Torvalds' criticism of ukernels (
Thread starts here. ) accuses them of the first 2 flaws, but he politely does not mention the third.
The tunes people also have
a harsh criticism of ukernels .
They accuse it of abstraction inversion
There is less criticism of ukernels in academia where it might be a career limiting move (CLM). Bondate and discipline programming seems to be commonly advocated there.
For low dexterity persons using GNU/Linux, I recommend the Kensington Turbo Mouse pro and drag locking.
I wrote the code for drag locking years ago as part of the Mouse driver when it was part of XFree86, (now Xorg.org). Drag locking allows some of the extra mouse buttons that are part of late model mice and trackballs, to function as drag locks for the more commonly used buttons 1 and 3.
Drag locking allows a low dexterity person to do a drag, without having to move the mouse cursor and hold down a button at the same time. Using drag locking, a person with a stump, rather than a hand could successfully do drags.
Drag locking is not supported by the auto installation programs that come with most distros.
To invoke drag locking the file/etc/X11/xorg.conf, (used to be/etc/X11/XF86Config) must be edited by hand.
Section "InputDevice"
Driver "mouse"
Identifier "Mouse[1]"
Option "Device" "/dev/psaux"
Option "Emulate3Buttons" "no"
Option "Name" "Autodetection"
Option "Protocol" "ExplorerPS/2"
Option "Vendor" "Kensington"
Option "DragLockButtons" "8 1 9 3"
Option "Buttons" "7"
Option "ZAxisMapping" "6 7"
EndSection
The 'Option "DragLockButtons"' line says that button 8 is a "drag lock" for button 1 and
button 9 is a "drag lock" for button 3. I am not a low dexterity person, but I prefer to use
drag locking with a trackball.
If someone installs a ring in your nose,....
on
Does ODF Have a Future?
·
· Score: 2, Interesting
If someone installs a ring in your nose, is it really smart to save money on a hacksaw?
The entity that installed the ring, expects to recover the cost of the ring, plus a lot more.
The expiration date on the grandfather clause has expired. If Linspire agreed to this deal without excluding GPLv3 software, Linspire would be in violation of GPLv3. Thus, the exclusion of GPLv3, from the deal is to protect Linspire, not Microsoft. Microsoft does not give a *%$#, it has not and does not agree to any version of GPL, so GPLv3 terms are not relevant to Microsoft.
The Microsoft patent claims are FUD. Both sides know that Microsoft will never bring these claims into a court
where they could be carefully checked. This allows both sides to say virtually anything and
get away with it.
Microsoft can say its patent claims are valid, without telling anyone precisely what they are.
On the other hand, Eben Moglen, and Pamala Jones of Groklaw, are free to expound this ridiculous
"coupon expiration date + gplv3" counterFUD theory. Any stick is good enough to beat a mad dog with.
Apparently, the tactic has worked. Because the tactic is aimed at suits, who might be worried about Microsoft's
FUD, the counterFUD theory does not have to be sound to work.
No one has ever come up with some on point case law showing that distributing coupons is the same thing as "distributing software" within the meaning of
Title 17 section 106.
Pure software licenses, like both version of the gpl, lack the power to prohibit anything that is allowed by
copyright law with out the permission of the copyright holder. The GPLv3 does not even try. Let us look at the definitions section:
To
propagate a work means to do anything
with it that,
without
permission, would make you directly or secondarily
liable for infringement
under applicable copyright law,
except executing it on a computer or modifying
a private
copy. Propagation includes copying, distribution (with or
without
modification), making available to the public, and
in some countries other
activities as well.
To convey a work means any kind of
propagation that
enables other parties to make or receive copies. Mere
interaction with a user through a computer network, with
no transfer of a
copy, is not conveying.
As you can see, if something is allowed by the applicable copyright law, without permission of the copyright holder, it is not propagating or conveying. Since the gplv3 is basicly a bunch of complicated restrictions on propagating and conveying, the gplv3 does not even try to prohibit such activity. Not that it would do any good if it did try to prohibit such activity.
The other way to go, is to say, that Microsoft's activity with the coupons is indirect infringement. Indirect infringement is not in the statute, it is judge made law. A recent court decision on a totally unrelated matter seems to block this path.
In a totally different case, with a totally different fact
picture,
Capitol
Records, Inc., et al., vs Debbie Foster and
Amanda Foster, Lee R. West United
States District Judge
says:
The Copyright Act does not expressly
render anyone liable
for infringement committed by
another.
Metro_Goldwyn-Mayer Studios, Inc. v. Grokster,
Ltd.. 545 U.S.
913, (2005). Rather, the doctrine of
secondary liability emerged from common
law principles.
Id. Under those common law principles, one
infringes a
copyright contributorily by intentionally
inducing or encouraging a direct
infringement. The
elements of a claim for contributory copyright
infringement
are: (1) direct infringement by third party;
(2) knowledge by the defendant
that third parties were
directly infringing; and (3) substaintial participation
by
the defendant in infringing activities. See Newborn v.
Yahoo!, 391
F. Supp.2d 181, (D.D.C. 2005); see also
Newborn v. Yahoo! Inc., 437
F.Supp.2d 1 (D.D.C 2006)
(finding defendant was entitled to an award of
attorneys'
fees after prevailing upon plaintiff's frivolous and
objectively
unreasonable contributory copyright claim).
Merely supplying means to
accomplish infringing activity
cannot give rise to imposition of liability for
contributory copyright infringement. Id.;see
also A & M Records,
Inc. v. Napster, Inc. 239. F.3d
1004, 1013 (9th Cir. 2001). One infringes a
copyright
vicariously by profiting from direct infringement while
declining to
exercise a right to stop or limit it.
Grokster, 545 U.S.
913.
So... why is there no BSD/Windows hybrid?? Its not like existence of Linux would stop that?
The dominance of Linux has reduced the importance of BSD to Microsoft. If BSD had Linux's dominant position, Microsoft would have wanted to co-opt it. As it is, BSD is not important enough to co-opt.
Linus' original message is by no means as confrontational and sharp as the Infoworld indicates. Linus and RMS are comming from different perspectives. Linus' is more pragmatic. RMS is driven by his particular beliefs. The kernel will definitely not be moving to GPLv3. The world is not comming to and end. GPLv2 and GPLv3 software can coexist on the same distribution.
Both are sincere in their beliefs. RMS is accused of being idealogical and hard to get along with, however it was perspective and tenacious that created free software and the GPL in the first place.
RMS is the original author of GPL, gcc, bash, glib, emacs and many other important tools.
No "normal" person would have had the vision or determination to do what RMS has done.
He originally intended to create the compiler, the runtime library, the editor (emacs) and to OS.
Only a person that was a little bit "crazy" would have even attempted to do this.
The Free software world and the "open source" world are greatly indebted to RMS, no matter how hard to get
along with he is, or what people may think of him. The vary characteristics that some people dislike, are exactly
the characteristics that made it possible for RMS to achieve what he achieved.
Without RMS free software would be nowhere. The GPL was introduced from the start, as being with a certain idealogical intent, the intent of the GPLv3 is in the same spirit as this intent.
It may be this idealogical attitude, together with acceptance of a faulty academic idea called the microkernel, that caused RMS to fail in creating a workable kernel to work with his other software. The HURD is nowhere.
What is called GNU/Linux and sometimes just Linux, is a merger between Linus' kernel and RMS' free software, and much other software.
Linus attitude is pragmatic. He uses the GPL as a tool just has he uses gcc. He is a great programmer and kernel hacker. He had the wit to reject the academic idea of the Microkernel which if adopted could have killed Linux just has it did the Hurd. There is no better person to lead the Linux kernel project.
If the BSDI USL lawsuit had not delayed the BSD project there would have been no Linux. Linus would have joined one of the BSD projects as just another BSD hacker. One of the BSDs would have become the dominant free software
OS.
I believe that if this had happened, Microsoft would have destroyed BSD's commercial chances using "embrace and extend". They would have created a BSD/Windows hybrid that would have duplicated BSD's API. This would have happened because BSD lacks the GPL's so called "viral clause" that prevents embrace and extend. The existence of this hybrid would have been used by Microsoft to prevent the suits from even considering a move to free software.
Linus lacks the vision that RMS has. This has caused him to make several blunders such as the Bitkeeper Debacle.
However the discipline implicit in the GPLv2 will prevent him from making any fatal mistakes. Were Linus to attempt to go in any totally insane direction, his project will fork. He knows this vary well.
I have given several presentations to Austin Linux Group from this perspective.
UFOs are commonly observed making maneuvers that would be impossible with any kind of action reaction ( =impulse) drive. They clearly have some kind of space drive.
The laws of physics as currently understood are not correct.
This is why some science types are passionately opposed to admitting that the UFO exist. The UFOs are the negation of everything that they have been taught and believe in.
When we figure out how the alien space drive works, perhaps we will discover that the speed of light was not the limit we thought it was.
gcc including g++ if wanted. auto* tools. gdb. emacs. svn.
These tools do not have point and clicky sexyness; They just work. They are portable. You can even
port to a winTurd OS, but only God would know why you would want to. They are all free as in freedom can be downloaded from the internet, and come with most GNU/Linux distros.
They were designed by programmers for programmers, without any care for what the suits might think.
They are complex in spots. But every bit of complexity addresses some real problem or issue.
Programmers that understand and use these tools, would not use any other.
If you can write better tools that replace all the features of these tools, please do so.
GPL 2 & 3 and coupons
on
GPLv2 Vs. GPLv3
·
· Score: 5, Interesting
Suppose that Darth wants to do something bad with some Free software. The GPL prevents Darth from doing this, when it works, by a two step process.
Darth realizes that he is doing something that requires a license under applicable copyright law. The GPL is the only license available.
The provisions of the GPL do not allow what Darth wants to do, so that Darth can not use GPL as a license if he does it.
Suppose that Darth goes ahead and does it anyway, what does the enforcement process look like? Darth gets sued under copyright law, like IBM did against SCO with IBM's counter claims.
The free software side has to prove two things:
Darth has done something that requires a license under applicable copyright law.
The GPL does not protect Darth because Darth has not abided by its terms.
In order the suit to be successfull against Darth, both steps have to succeed.
Step (2) can be optimized by the FSF, by adjusting the terms of the GPL, to make it as difficult as possible for Darth. The GPLv3 is an improvement in this process.
Step (1) is the step that the FSF can not control, because the applicable copyright law is written by the legislature (in the U.S. that would be congress), not by the FSF! Therefore, step (1) is the weak point!
If Microsoft is ever sued under the copyright law because of the coupons, Microsoft will attack the week point of the argument (1). This is what Microsoft's lawyers will say:
Microsoft has not and will not agree with any version of the GPL. Distributing these coupons does not require a license under applicable copyright law. Distributing coupons is not distributing software in the meaning of copyright law. Therefore the terms of the GPL (both versions) are irrelevant. The expiration date of the coupons is irrelevant. Game over.
The key assertion in the above is:
Distributing coupons is not distributing software in the meaning of copyright law.
If Microsoft can win on the key assertion. Then it will win. If the lawyers for the free software side can knock out the key assertion then they will win.
Why do the coupons exist in the first place? Why did not Microsoft just hand out SuSE installation DVDs? The reason is obvious. Microsoft did not want to become a GNU/Linux distributor. The coupons are a dodge to get around this. The whole raison d'etre for the coupons was that that Microsoft avoid becoming a GNU/Linux distributor! Can anyone believe that Microsoft allowed the coupon scheme to proceed, without first getting on Lexis and finding out whether the scheme would work? It is guaranteed that in some Microsoft lawyer's briefcase, there is a brief. And that brief deleniates in excruciating detail why the coupon scheme does not make Microsoft a GNU/Linux distributor. And the brief was checked and rechecked by multiple lawyers before the coupon scheme was ever allowed to proceed.
The free software argument against the MS-Novel coupon scheme, is a chain. And like any chain, it is only as strong as its weakest link. It is no good for free software advocates to sit back and congratulate themselves on how strong their strong point (2) is. Of course it is strong! The FSF deliberately designed the GPLv3 to make it strong! The point is, that Microsoft is not going to attack this strong point. Microsoft is going to attack the weak point (1).
Instead of congratulating them selves, free software advocates should be critically examining their own arguments looking for weak points. And when they find one, they should research the caselaw looking for ways to shore up their arguments! They should not be replying to the weak points with mere repeated assertion of what they hope should be true, instead they should do some real scholarship.
Let us not forget the anti-patent provisions of
GPLv2!
It includes an "im
I believe I have found another way for the gplv3 anti-patent
provisions to backfire.
"You are not required to accept this License in order to receive or
run a copy of the Program."
Large corporate "end users" of gplv3 software will use this provision
to contract directly a seperate patent peace with large
non-distributors with possibly bogus patent claims. (This time they
will not go through a conveyor intermediary like Novell).
The "end user" will not be subject to the anti-patent provisions
because they only "receive" and "run" the program. The non-distributor
will not be subject to the anti-patent provisions, because as a
non-distributor, non-copyer, non-everything elser, they do not require
a license under copyright law.
In order to protect its patent peace, and in order not to run afoul
of the gplv3 anti-patent provisions, the corporate "end user" must
insure that it remains a pure "end user", that is, a person that
"receives" and "runs" the program only. It will prevent its employees
from making any contribution to any gplv3 project, even bug reports,
so that it does not become a "modifier". The corporate "end user" must
become a pure "free rider" in order to protect its patent peace.
This can not be what the authors of draft gplv3 intended.
The existence of this scenario, actually makes the Novell-MS deal
a "good thing". Apologies to Martha Stewart.
Consider a situation that Eben Moglen has recently discussed.
Suppose there is a corporate "end user" so politicly dangerous
to MS, that MS must make a peace with it before proceeding with
the FUD war. Like say, the NY stock exchange.
Which method is preferable, from the point of view of the Free
software community, for the NY exchange to receive it's patent
peace? Remember these are corporate suits we are talking about;
They care nothing about principles for freedom or the free software
movement, They WILL make a separate peace if it seems advantageous
from a financial prospective and not too risky.
Under my scenario, direct agreement with MS, the section 11
anti patent provisions would apply to the NY exchange, if
it lost its "pure end user" status. Therefore the NY exchange
will zealously guard this status, preventing its employees
from making any contribution to a gplv3 project.
If the NY exchange, gets its patent peace through the Novell-MS
deal, then the NY exchange has not made any agreement with MS,
and its agreement with Novell probably does not even mention
the Novell-MS deal. So the section 11 provisions would not
apply to the NY exchange, so the exchange could go ahead and
agree to the gplv3 and allow its programmers to make contributions
to gplv3 projects.
Clearly the second scenario, is preferable from the point of
view of the free software community.
There are reference books at the library that list the
contact information for every fortune 500 company. MS
has the money on hand to pay someone to look up this info and
try to make agreements with them all.
Let's stop being so mean to Novell. Novell has only done
what corporations can be expected to do: Exploit every
loophole and ambiguity, just like water flows into every
crack, crevice and fissure, as it moves down hill.
Do we really want there to be only one corporate free software
distributor?
If MS had half a brain they would buy this company immediately! This could work like wine in reverse! MS could say to the suits, "you don't have to migrate away from our wind-turd OS, you can buy this emulator!" The suits are too stupid to realize that they would be missing the most important advantage of Free Software, namely freedom, but the suits would like not having to convert their powerpoint presentations to open office!" This is horrible news!
This is a secure way to agree to agree on a one-time pad, or other key, but it is subject to man in the middle attacks. How does fred know that it is alice other end of the line switching resistors, or is it darth the man in the middle swiching resistors?
Unless you're a lawyer with equivalent expertise and experience to Eben Moglen's, you might want to think about whose legal theories are more likely to be correct, yours or his. I'd vote for the latter. Proof by authority. Eben Moglen is an advocate for a position. Remember MS has lawyers to. You are not going to take everything they say as gospel are you?
The new GPL can not redefine copyright law to make it apply in situations the legislature never intended. New versions of the GPL can only redefine what happens when someone does require a license under the existing law that the legislature passed.
Copyright law not the EULA prevents you from making those copies. copying is one of the activities that copyright law is concerned with. Show me where copyright law says something about coupons.
As the FSF is fond of saying the GPL (all versions) is a copyright license not a contract. Copyright Licenses allow you to do things that would otherwise be illegal under copyright law.
I can not find the provision of copyright law, that says you need a license to distribute coupons. Copyright law talks about copying, distributing, and creating derived works! MS does none of these things! (with respect to Linux). The distribution of coupons is not regulated by copyright law. (Unless the coupons were themselves copyrighted, but that is a digression.) Therefore MS does not require a copyright license like the GPL.
A license that MS does not require, and has not agreed to can not restrict MS in any way.
If people had not been engaged in wishfull thinking, they would have realized this already.
Suppose I do not have any of these genetic risks. Suppose that I am celibate and therefore do not worry about aids. Suppose I do not wish to subsidize those who are subject to these risks. Can I buy insurance offshore, in say, London, excluding AIDS and allowing genetic tests, to get a lower rate? If I can, and enough people find out about it, it will effectively nullify this law and other "anti-discrimination" laws.
What happens to the Internet when the east coast is flooded due to a super tidal wave, because most of the La Palma volcano has slid into the sea? The people stuck in the traffic jams on the East coast will be dead of course, but how long till we can restart our civilization?
Same question about the erruption of the Yellowstone super volcano?
Could the Internet reroute so that the people still alive could cumunicate?
I think families should move away from the East Coast and leave it to people who want to live fast and die hard. But no one ever listens.
In any case, our civilization should have a plan to survive. How come no one ever asks the Presidential candidates about this? These disasters, are not a question of if, but of when! They will happen! Nobody is arguing that they will not happen someday.
We have to endure the global warning nonsense, even though we are living in a temporary warm period in a glacial age and humanity has historically fared better in the warm periods.
Perhaps it is because these disasters, unlike global warming, can not be used as a pretext for socializing the economy.
Slashdot Mirror
The judge is basicly saying that indirect infringement requires direct infringement. If this principle were applied to the "coupons expiration date + gplv3" theory, it would say that Microsoft is not guilty of infringement if Novell is not guilty of direct infringement.
Free software advocates, in their zeal to get Microsoft, should not attack this principle, because that would make it easier for the RIAA to persecute innocent people accused of copying songs.
Because of the grandfat her clause, the FSF has all but admitted it does not intend to proceed against Novell.
All to do some checking that at least theoreticly could have been done at design, compile, link time once.
This checking only checks for only some of the possible coding errors. Most OSes do not crash because of stray memory references. There are 49 other crash landings.
When all you have is a hammer, everything looks like a nail.
Microkernels are a solution in search of a problem.
T lives in academia, so he and his colleagues should be thinking high level. Rather than finding an expensive low level solution to a low level problem, he should be thinking about automated ways of doing all kinds of checking at design, compile, link time.
I am told (I do not know from personal experience), that in many University CS departments, the OS people are at war with the compiler design people, so perhaps this is politicly impossible. (Cheap shot.)
Eben Moglen is a very smart lawyer. However, he was the General Counsel to the Free Software Foundation, and the FSF is at war with Microsoft. In any war the fist causality is truth. Eben Moglen is running a bluff, but he knows his bluff can not be called.
I order for the bluff to be called, Microsoft would have to try to enforce one of its bogus patents. Microsoft will never do that because it would expose the patent to scrutiny. Moglen is proceding on the theory that "one good lie deserves another" and "any stick is good enough to beat a mad dog with". The theory is designed to appeal to unthinking suits and PHBs, the kind that could be fooled by Microsoft patent FUD.
Unfortunately some free software advocates have started "breathing their own exhaust fumes" and started believing this preposterous theory.
This counterFUD move may be a brilliant tactical move, but it may be in the long run counter productive, because people like PJ destroy their own credibility by slavishly following it.
Bondage and Discipline programming occurs when the smart people on the central committee decide that ordinary developers are not smart enough to decide how to code on their own. They create a "system" that won't let the ordinary developers make certain kinds of errors. Pascal is the canonical Bondage and Discipline language.
There are 3 flaws in B&D programming.
Linus Torvalds' criticism of ukernels ( Thread starts here. ) accuses them of the first 2 flaws, but he politely does not mention the third.
The tunes people also have a harsh criticism of ukernels . They accuse it of abstraction inversion There is less criticism of ukernels in academia where it might be a career limiting move (CLM). Bondate and discipline programming seems to be commonly advocated there.
I made a presentation to Austin Linux Group on Tanenbaum-Torvalds microkernel vs monolithic kernel Debate.
I wrote the code for drag locking years ago as part of the Mouse driver when it was part of XFree86, (now Xorg.org). Drag locking allows some of the extra mouse buttons that are part of late model mice and trackballs, to function as drag locks for the more commonly used buttons 1 and 3.
Drag locking allows a low dexterity person to do a drag, without having to move the mouse cursor and hold down a button at the same time. Using drag locking, a person with a stump, rather than a hand could successfully do drags.
Drag locking is not supported by the auto installation programs that come with most distros.
To invoke drag locking the file /etc/X11/xorg.conf, (used to be /etc/X11/XF86Config) must be edited by hand.
The 'Option "DragLockButtons"' line says that button 8 is a "drag lock" for button 1 and button 9 is a "drag lock" for button 3. I am not a low dexterity person, but I prefer to use drag locking with a trackball.The entity that installed the ring, expects to recover the cost of the ring, plus a lot more.
Freedom is not free, but slavery costs more.
Why can not people effected by this problem simply put the right answer in their hosts files?
The expiration date on the grandfather clause has expired. If Linspire agreed to this deal without excluding GPLv3 software, Linspire would be in violation of GPLv3. Thus, the exclusion of GPLv3, from the deal is to protect Linspire, not Microsoft. Microsoft does not give a *%$#, it has not and does not agree to any version of GPL, so GPLv3 terms are not relevant to Microsoft.
Microsoft can say its patent claims are valid, without telling anyone precisely what they are.
On the other hand, Eben Moglen, and Pamala Jones of Groklaw, are free to expound this ridiculous "coupon expiration date + gplv3" counterFUD theory. Any stick is good enough to beat a mad dog with.
Apparently, the tactic has worked. Because the tactic is aimed at suits, who might be worried about Microsoft's FUD, the counterFUD theory does not have to be sound to work.
No one has ever come up with some on point case law showing that distributing coupons is the same thing as "distributing software" within the meaning of Title 17 section 106.
Pure software licenses, like both version of the gpl, lack the power to prohibit anything that is allowed by copyright law with out the permission of the copyright holder. The GPLv3 does not even try. Let us look at the definitions section:
As you can see, if something is allowed by the applicable copyright law, without permission of the copyright holder, it is not propagating or conveying. Since the gplv3 is basicly a bunch of complicated restrictions on propagating and conveying, the gplv3 does not even try to prohibit such activity. Not that it would do any good if it did try to prohibit such activity.
The other way to go, is to say, that Microsoft's activity with the coupons is indirect infringement. Indirect infringement is not in the statute, it is judge made law. A recent court decision on a totally unrelated matter seems to block this path.
In a totally different case, with a totally different fact picture, Capitol Records, Inc., et al., vs Debbie Foster and Amanda Foster, Lee R. West United States District Judge says:
Both are sincere in their beliefs. RMS is accused of being idealogical and hard to get along with, however it was perspective and tenacious that created free software and the GPL in the first place.
RMS is the original author of GPL, gcc, bash, glib, emacs and many other important tools. No "normal" person would have had the vision or determination to do what RMS has done. He originally intended to create the compiler, the runtime library, the editor (emacs) and to OS. Only a person that was a little bit "crazy" would have even attempted to do this. The Free software world and the "open source" world are greatly indebted to RMS, no matter how hard to get along with he is, or what people may think of him. The vary characteristics that some people dislike, are exactly the characteristics that made it possible for RMS to achieve what he achieved. Without RMS free software would be nowhere. The GPL was introduced from the start, as being with a certain idealogical intent, the intent of the GPLv3 is in the same spirit as this intent.
It may be this idealogical attitude, together with acceptance of a faulty academic idea called the microkernel, that caused RMS to fail in creating a workable kernel to work with his other software. The HURD is nowhere.
What is called GNU/Linux and sometimes just Linux, is a merger between Linus' kernel and RMS' free software, and much other software.
Linus attitude is pragmatic. He uses the GPL as a tool just has he uses gcc. He is a great programmer and kernel hacker. He had the wit to reject the academic idea of the Microkernel which if adopted could have killed Linux just has it did the Hurd. There is no better person to lead the Linux kernel project.
If the BSDI USL lawsuit had not delayed the BSD project there would have been no Linux. Linus would have joined one of the BSD projects as just another BSD hacker. One of the BSDs would have become the dominant free software OS.
I believe that if this had happened, Microsoft would have destroyed BSD's commercial chances using "embrace and extend". They would have created a BSD/Windows hybrid that would have duplicated BSD's API. This would have happened because BSD lacks the GPL's so called "viral clause" that prevents embrace and extend. The existence of this hybrid would have been used by Microsoft to prevent the suits from even considering a move to free software.
Linus lacks the vision that RMS has. This has caused him to make several blunders such as the Bitkeeper Debacle. However the discipline implicit in the GPLv2 will prevent him from making any fatal mistakes. Were Linus to attempt to go in any totally insane direction, his project will fork. He knows this vary well.
I have given several presentations to Austin Linux Group from this perspective.
Free software history
Lessons of Free Software History
Tanenbaum-Torvalds microkernel vs monolithic kernel Debate
The laws of physics as currently understood are not correct.
This is why some science types are passionately opposed to admitting that the UFO exist. The UFOs are the negation of everything that they have been taught and believe in.
When we figure out how the alien space drive works, perhaps we will discover that the speed of light was not the limit we thought it was.
These tools do not have point and clicky sexyness; They just work. They are portable. You can even port to a winTurd OS, but only God would know why you would want to. They are all free as in freedom can be downloaded from the internet, and come with most GNU/Linux distros.
They were designed by programmers for programmers, without any care for what the suits might think.
They are complex in spots. But every bit of complexity addresses some real problem or issue.
Programmers that understand and use these tools, would not use any other.
If you can write better tools that replace all the features of these tools, please do so.
Suppose that Darth goes ahead and does it anyway, what does the enforcement process look like? Darth gets sued under copyright law, like IBM did against SCO with IBM's counter claims. The free software side has to prove two things:
In order the suit to be successfull against Darth, both steps have to succeed. Step (2) can be optimized by the FSF, by adjusting the terms of the GPL, to make it as difficult as possible for Darth. The GPLv3 is an improvement in this process. Step (1) is the step that the FSF can not control, because the applicable copyright law is written by the legislature (in the U.S. that would be congress), not by the FSF! Therefore, step (1) is the weak point! If Microsoft is ever sued under the copyright law because of the coupons, Microsoft will attack the week point of the argument (1). This is what Microsoft's lawyers will say:
The key assertion in the above is:
If Microsoft can win on the key assertion. Then it will win. If the lawyers for the free software side can knock out the key assertion then they will win.
Why do the coupons exist in the first place? Why did not Microsoft just hand out SuSE installation DVDs? The reason is obvious. Microsoft did not want to become a GNU/Linux distributor. The coupons are a dodge to get around this. The whole raison d'etre for the coupons was that that Microsoft avoid becoming a GNU/Linux distributor! Can anyone believe that Microsoft allowed the coupon scheme to proceed, without first getting on Lexis and finding out whether the scheme would work? It is guaranteed that in some Microsoft lawyer's briefcase, there is a brief. And that brief deleniates in excruciating detail why the coupon scheme does not make Microsoft a GNU/Linux distributor. And the brief was checked and rechecked by multiple lawyers before the coupon scheme was ever allowed to proceed.
The free software argument against the MS-Novel coupon scheme, is a chain. And like any chain, it is only as strong as its weakest link. It is no good for free software advocates to sit back and congratulate themselves on how strong their strong point (2) is. Of course it is strong! The FSF deliberately designed the GPLv3 to make it strong! The point is, that Microsoft is not going to attack this strong point. Microsoft is going to attack the weak point (1).
Instead of congratulating them selves, free software advocates should be critically examining their own arguments looking for weak points. And when they find one, they should research the caselaw looking for ways to shore up their arguments! They should not be replying to the weak points with mere repeated assertion of what they hope should be true, instead they should do some real scholarship.
Let us not forget the anti-patent provisions of GPLv2! It includes an "im
Large corporate "end users" of gplv3 software will use this provision to contract directly a seperate patent peace with large non-distributors with possibly bogus patent claims. (This time they will not go through a conveyor intermediary like Novell).
The "end user" will not be subject to the anti-patent provisions because they only "receive" and "run" the program. The non-distributor will not be subject to the anti-patent provisions, because as a non-distributor, non-copyer, non-everything elser, they do not require a license under copyright law.
In order to protect its patent peace, and in order not to run afoul of the gplv3 anti-patent provisions, the corporate "end user" must insure that it remains a pure "end user", that is, a person that "receives" and "runs" the program only. It will prevent its employees from making any contribution to any gplv3 project, even bug reports, so that it does not become a "modifier". The corporate "end user" must become a pure "free rider" in order to protect its patent peace.
This can not be what the authors of draft gplv3 intended.
The existence of this scenario, actually makes the Novell-MS deal a "good thing". Apologies to Martha Stewart.
Consider a situation that Eben Moglen has recently discussed.
Suppose there is a corporate "end user" so politicly dangerous to MS, that MS must make a peace with it before proceeding with the FUD war. Like say, the NY stock exchange.
Which method is preferable, from the point of view of the Free software community, for the NY exchange to receive it's patent peace? Remember these are corporate suits we are talking about; They care nothing about principles for freedom or the free software movement, They WILL make a separate peace if it seems advantageous from a financial prospective and not too risky.
Under my scenario, direct agreement with MS, the section 11 anti patent provisions would apply to the NY exchange, if it lost its "pure end user" status. Therefore the NY exchange will zealously guard this status, preventing its employees from making any contribution to a gplv3 project.
If the NY exchange, gets its patent peace through the Novell-MS deal, then the NY exchange has not made any agreement with MS, and its agreement with Novell probably does not even mention the Novell-MS deal. So the section 11 provisions would not apply to the NY exchange, so the exchange could go ahead and agree to the gplv3 and allow its programmers to make contributions to gplv3 projects.
Clearly the second scenario, is preferable from the point of view of the free software community.
There are reference books at the library that list the contact information for every fortune 500 company. MS has the money on hand to pay someone to look up this info and try to make agreements with them all.
Let's stop being so mean to Novell. Novell has only done what corporations can be expected to do: Exploit every loophole and ambiguity, just like water flows into every crack, crevice and fissure, as it moves down hill.
Do we really want there to be only one corporate free software distributor?
If MS had half a brain they would buy this company immediately! This could work like wine in reverse! MS could say to the suits, "you don't have to migrate away from our wind-turd OS, you can buy this emulator!" The suits are too stupid to realize that they would be missing the most important advantage of Free Software, namely freedom, but the suits would like not having to convert their powerpoint presentations to open office!" This is horrible news!
This is a secure way to agree to agree on a one-time pad, or other key, but it is subject to man in the middle attacks. How does fred know that it is alice other end of the line switching resistors, or is it darth the man in the middle swiching resistors?
Indirect infringement when the direct infringement does not exist? (Because of the grandfather clause.) Good luck with that one!
The new GPL can not redefine copyright law to make it apply in situations the legislature never intended. New versions of the GPL can only redefine what happens when someone does require a license under the existing law that the legislature passed.
Copyright law not the EULA prevents you from making those copies. copying is one of the activities that copyright law is concerned with. Show me where copyright law says something about coupons.
I can not find the provision of copyright law, that says you need a license to distribute coupons. Copyright law talks about copying, distributing, and creating derived works! MS does none of these things! (with respect to Linux). The distribution of coupons is not regulated by copyright law. (Unless the coupons were themselves copyrighted, but that is a digression.) Therefore MS does not require a copyright license like the GPL.
A license that MS does not require, and has not agreed to can not restrict MS in any way.
If people had not been engaged in wishfull thinking, they would have realized this already.
That is Bezerkley!
Suppose I do not have any of these genetic risks. Suppose that I am celibate and therefore do not worry about aids. Suppose I do not wish to subsidize those who are subject to these risks. Can I buy insurance offshore, in say, London, excluding AIDS and allowing genetic tests, to get a lower rate? If I can, and enough people find out about it, it will effectively nullify this law and other "anti-discrimination" laws.
What happens to the Internet when the east coast is flooded due to a super tidal wave, because most of the La Palma volcano has slid into the sea? The people stuck in the traffic jams on the East coast will be dead of course, but how long till we can restart our civilization?
Same question about the erruption of the Yellowstone super volcano?
Could the Internet reroute so that the people still alive could cumunicate?
I think families should move away from the East Coast and leave it to people who want to live fast and die hard. But no one ever listens.
In any case, our civilization should have a plan to survive. How come no one ever asks the Presidential candidates about this? These disasters, are not a question of if, but of when! They will happen! Nobody is arguing that they will not happen someday.
We have to endure the global warning nonsense, even though we are living in a temporary warm period in a glacial age and humanity has historically fared better in the warm periods.
Perhaps it is because these disasters, unlike global warming, can not be used as a pretext for socializing the economy.