What is the future of multi-user gnucash? Is there a working group or something similar? How much of a priority is this?
It would seem that a corporate offering would best be accomplished with this feature, and ensure some cash flow for your company.
On a similar vein, are the multiple dependencies meant to create a decision where there will be healthy installation contracts for you? (It's a joke, BTW)
Again, do all of those libraries really do something? How did it get to require so many packages? Did you start out with a Gnome system with a few other odds and ends, and just picked up from there, or was there a concious decision?
Re:Read for comprehension.
on
nVidia nForce
·
· Score: 2
What a bunch of whiners. It didn't have an RJ-45 jack. I'm sure that it had one of the old fashioned jacks. Just requires a soldering iron, a magnifying glass, and the patience of Job.
You folks must be waayyyyy too hung up on plug and play.
Re:What about Stargate SG-1
on
Andromeda
·
· Score: 2
I agree with you 100%. Loved the show. Unfortunately, I stopped watching it, as the local station bounced it around to about 6 different time slots in a two year span. Couldn't keep up with it:(
Sad thing is that the Andromeda station (different station) is doing the same thing:(
I thought Kevin Costner in Robin Hood was supposed to have had the worst 'British' accent in cinematic history, and Keanu was simply the worst actor in cinematic history.
I am not sure. It's a good question. But the better question is this: do artists perceive that they would earn more under this system. That's the real ticket. I am sure that Lars and the boys are incapable of making the analysis themselves, so will defer to the wise analysis of their trusted (read: RIAA sponsored) accountants.
Yeah, that last bit is ranting, but what I think doesn't matter: what the bands think is what matters.
Well, apparantly, you don't know what analysis is either, as you have mistaken and confused terms such as 'good' and 'better'.
By including data that the industry conveniently forgets in their PR, he is making a better analysis than what was previously available, and is taking steps towards what can be called good analysis.
Yes, the analysis is poor. But that does not mean that his results and his methods are not better than what came before.
Are you kidding? That's probably when the seller got, and now has to sell it because his own dot bomb is in the toilet, and he needs the money for name brand ramen, not the generic store brand.
I think the BSD guys are still smarting over Bruce not getting their signature on the letter to M$. Most of the people really doing work don't seem to mind (and understand the time pressures) but those sitting on the sideline seem to feel a need to pipe up.
FWIW, I may disagree with your (collective) choice of license. But it is your software. Not mine. If I don't like it, I'll either use it anyway, or move on.
Sounds like preaching to the choir to me. I pay what I think something is worth (for music, probably 30-75 cents per track, maybe as much as a dollar for something really good.) and after sucking out a little bit to pay for the server, it goes to the artist.
I think we already know that this won't work anytime soon. First is the issue of credit/debit cards. If MC or Visa takes 3% (with a minimum of $1), the system is fucked. This should be solvable by either: MC or VISA lowering their cut, or having a 'net card (sounds like deja vu. I'm sure I've heard this before) wherein you buy a $20 gift certificate from micropay.com. Your band signs up as a MicroPay band. Then, every time they get $4-$5, they get a check. All of this is highly automatable. You could probably even kludge GnuCash or something to do it really cheap.
The next problem is greed. The first and easy target of greed are the 'middlemen'. They (let's call them.... Sony) own the lawyers. The lawyers own the courts, and the courts make the rules. The middlemen don't want to go back to selling 2x4's and real estate. They like going to fancy parties and awards shows. What motivation do they possibly have to give the artist back some rights?
Second is the artists. Let's face it, Lars and the gang are a bunch of greedy pricks. Same thing with Courtney Love. That much heroin isn't free. How are they gonna keep their noses packed on $70,000 per year? For every band that talks about 'doing it for the music', there are 50 who have dreams of being the big rock star, with a Lambo, a Ferrari, and a bunch of hooker^H^H^H^H^H^Hsupermodel girlfriends. That ratio gets worse when the good natured band gets a taste of success.
Only consumers want this system. The record companies certainly don't. The radio stations are terrified of it (although this would work for them. No more annual payments for broadcast rights. Play a Britney song, pay for a Britney song.) And worst of all, I honestly don't think most of the 'musicians' would really care for it.
You are correct that his analysis isn't quite on target, but you must admit (I would hope:) that he is making a step in the right direction.
It seems that his goal is to say that the current fixation by RIAA members on current hits and current sales might not be the best one for long term growth and profits. Were I a shareholder, this would be more important.
You also seem to indicate that there is some way to predict the future sales of a record (you mention 2.5 million this year, and next, and next, etc). I believe the guy at Evergreen attempted to answer this concern with two pieces of information: first, he points out that without promotion, they don't go anywhere (unfortunately, as pointed out in another thread, there is no analysis of this point, merely conjecture based on a few groups). Second, he indicates that current bands (N'Sync, Britney, etc.) do not receive ongoing promotion. Again, I didn't see analysis of this on the report.
But, if these two points made in the article are accurate, it should allay your concerns WRT prediciting future sales.
Again, it's not a great study, but it seems to be looking in the right hemisphere, at least.
I'm sure it's possible to do a grey import (heck, I could probably just buy one from some embassy hack up in DC:) but it's much more difficult in the US than in the UK (and presumably elsewhere).
As a matter of fact, just read in a UK VW magazine that prices for optioned cars can run as much as 30% higher in the UK vs. a couple hundred miles down the road in Germany.
Anyway, if I were grey importing, I'd save my pennies and dimes and grey import one of those 3 series BMW diesel wagons.
Yes, there are (at least) two different 2.0 engines. The one available for the past several years in the US is an eight valve, single overhead cam engine.
There used to be a 16 valve, twin cam engine in the US. There still is abroad. It has much better power characteristics, and is not much more expensive.
But I believe that VW dropped it to prevent taking from Audi sales (like people buying VWs are comparing to Audis).
For most people, those engines aren't enough, and that's a big problem. See, Americans say "horsepower" when they really mean "torque". Personally, I like horsepower. I don't mind an engine that gets peak power at an RPM>4000. A five digit redline is no problem. And Honda's S2000 is no big deal.
It just requires a different driving style, and one that I can deal with.
The common saying is "no replacement for displacement". I can think of two, both of which are answered well by the imports (and not badly by my Mondeo, err, Mercury Mystique). The first is forced induction. With a water-jacketed and/or double impeller bearing, longevity is no big whoop. Mileage, economy, and weight are all improved over a larger (physically) engine making similar power.
The second replacement for displacement is weight. Lop off 100 lbs., gain 10 hp (or some such thing). That's why my bike, with a measly 100 or so HP can embarass a Corvette with, what, 400 hp?
That's also another point in favor of the Golf over the Jetta Wagon: about 300 lbs, I believe.
USians are idiots about V-8's, anyway. Someone convinced them that 305's and 302's were big killer engines. I've got some people at Mopar Performance and Cadillac Motorsports Development who could show them a thing or two.
Part of VW's problem is the lack of ability to special order cars, or develop your own options packages. With the bulk of their stuff coming out of Mexico, why wouldn't this be possible? Corporate management.
So what? Well, it's quite possible that without all of the junk that comes on most of the GLS that we are given, they would sell better. There is also the chicken-and-egg problem: I can't test drive one, or get one equipped like I want, so why would I buy one.
I don't care for the size or appearance of the Jetta Wagon. I also don't care for the price. I priced both the Jetta Wagon and the Golf (for 2001) to the spec I wanted (which meant identical equipment, although because of the model/equipment overlaps, it wasn't necessarily the same) and the Jetta was almost $2000 (US) more than the Golf.
GTI causes problems (I need four doors) and the Passat is just too freakin' big to get along with that engine. And let's not forget that the price is getting TRULY outrageous at that point. I could spend a couple more dollars and get the EuroVan (or whatever it is called this week) or better yet, a BMW 323iT.
I've seen the Focus, and it looks cheap. The Golf was/is much nicer, and not much more expensive.
But to the general message of your post: how difficult is it for Herr Piech to call Mexico and say "Hey, load up a couple of Golfs and send them to the mid-atlantic"? VW has already gone through EPA and CARB. It's now just a shipping cost.
Mitsu re-imagined the Eclipse. They hoped to go upmarket by just selling a V-6 (at least in the US). Let's also not forget that powerwise, the V-6 trounces the turbo Eclipse engine.
I can't explain the decisions WRT AWD. Also don't know about the GT-VR4, except that they shouldn't race bikes;)
First, look at how the M3 and the Z28 were derived. The former was a decendant (sp) of the 2002 and other touring coupes, which in turn derived from the many true sports cars (MGs, Alfa's, Porsche's) of the 50's.
The Z28 can trace its timeline through muscle-cars and pony-cars, neither or which could be said to be particular good handlers.
And while in the past, we had so many good phrases to describe cars (muscle cars, touring cars, pony cars, sports cars) they have all been lumped into the same, and somewhat generic, sports cars. Or worse, sporty cars, which is even more broad and useless a term.
Heck, I don't even need a WRX or Lancer levels of power (I ride motorcycles for a real speed/acceleration rush. I just like to be able to hit the loud peddle hard enough to get out of my own way in a car. For me, that translates into about 0-60 ~ 9 seconds)
I'm not sure about the HP cap. It could be insurance, but that is usually based on repair costs, chances of theft, etc. HP is coincidental with those factors, not causal, and I think the insurance cos. know that.
I've often wondered if it's not a way for the Germans and Japanese to thumb their noses at us. OR, it could be emissions related. I'm not sure of the specific laws, but I do have a good example of their general stupidity:
When the Nissan Altima was originally released, you could see, quite clearly, the Stanza sticker on the back. You see, the proper name of the car was the Nissan Stanza Altima. This allowed them to pass EPA and CARB regs. for about 10% what it would have cost had they called it the Nissan Altima.
(BTW, please flame me. I don't really give a rat's ass what the VW defenders have to say. I'm not making judgements based on business or anything other than the fact that they make something that I want, and they will not sell it in the United States. It's my right as a consumer in a capitalist country to bitch to high heaven about what I want, can afford, but still can't get.)
So, we can get a stripped golf with a built-in MP3 player (BFD) but we (in the US) will NOT be able to get the four door Golf with the 180hp turbo gas engine? (Before flaming, read that spec carefully, and then go research it. I know I did. That's exactly what I want, and according to VW, I can sit and spin).
So, Herr Piech, stick it up your ass and light it.
UNinstalling apps in Windows is a serious PITA. I'd say that roughly 50% of the uninstallers that I've used don't work. And no, I won't go buy a commercial 'uninstaller helper'. They think a browser is an important and integral part of the OS. I think a working uninstaller is a bit more important.
I was thining about this last night. While I'd like to buy some M$ software (so that they could be included in any potential lawsuit) I figured that the store with the most onerous return policy would be Babbage's, but I'm not sure that they sell any M$ stuff.
I'm not sure which companies are buying all of these bargain priced service contracts. I work for a small company ($4million US) and started work there after having some of these erstwhile contracts. Quite frankly, they were for shit. After about 8 months of me wiping the asses and covering for idiots, I cancelled the contracts, and did my own damned maintenance. The cost savings have been tremendous.
Problem is, by kicking out various proprietary cruft (Yeah, yeah, M$ was my first target, but there are others) I'm also making my job a hell of a lot easier, as the *nix stuff just keeps on going and going and going...
I'm not saying that some companies don't get some measure of value out of service contracts. But I have a feeling that most of them were purchased without a cost-benefit analysis (with the option of in house experts included) and solely for the purpose of allowing some manager to sleep at night, knowing that the CYA step was accomplished.
So, since I think service contracts are worthless (I figure that I should get what I paid for when I signed my contract. When I get that, THEN I'll start paying for service. But if you give me a 90% program, I consider the time waiting for the other 10% to be an extended installation period.) I don't bother with 'em. Four years and going, and haven't missed 'em a bit. What we have had to pay for, service wise, has been maybe 15% of what the service contract would have been (and no, the service contracts weren't out of the ordinary. They were just as useful as the extended warranty at Circuit City.)
I'm not sure that it necessarily is better. But it is older than most of the licenses you listed in your original comment. It also covers lots of packages. While courts should not decide on votes, if there were a challenge of the legitimacy of the GPL, the fact that a billion-trillion "Hello, World" programs are released under it might add a little pressure.
As to why not use (for example) the NPL? If I recall, many of the rights revert back to Netscape. I think the IBMPL and some of the others are similar. To have a license that I (as a developer, even though I'm not, really) value, I would have to change all instances of "Netscape Communications Corp." to "George Howell".
Which raises this problem: I can't afford to protect my license. Netscape (via AOL/TW) can. My only alternative is to release under GPL or BSD (as they are the only two that allow ME to retain my code, not Netscape). Both are backed by organizations that, while not as large as AOL/TW, are much larger that George Howell. So they have a better chance of getting the license to stand on its face. Then I just need to apply it to my situation (or assign rights to the FSF in the first place, but that's starting to get far afield).
So, should you ever see my software (and if you don't work at my company, you probably won't see my "Hello, World, and Everybody" scripts:) it is under GPL because:
BSD doesn't keep M$ from stealing my stuff (and I could give a rat's ass about their right to make money on my stuff)
NPL gives Netscape my rights
Other people will fund the initial challenges to the GPL.
I guess they wanted to update it to get more people to go to the movie. This crap of the MPAA licensing movies and requiring a click-through is getting out of hand.
But won't John Cleese be pissed off if I steal his bits for my own comedy act?
...Programming language? WTF are you talking about?
I don't have a life (newborn took care of that) and I live in Maryland. Maybe I'll go buy some software, open the celophane wrapper, and return it to Staples, just to see what happens.
Geez, I'm almost bored enough to do that (plus, I don't want to cut the grass:(
Slashdot Mirror
What is the future of multi-user gnucash? Is there a working group or something similar? How much of a priority is this?
It would seem that a corporate offering would best be accomplished with this feature, and ensure some cash flow for your company.
On a similar vein, are the multiple dependencies meant to create a decision where there will be healthy installation contracts for you? (It's a joke, BTW)
Again, do all of those libraries really do something? How did it get to require so many packages? Did you start out with a Gnome system with a few other odds and ends, and just picked up from there, or was there a concious decision?
What a bunch of whiners. It didn't have an RJ-45 jack. I'm sure that it had one of the old fashioned jacks. Just requires a soldering iron, a magnifying glass, and the patience of Job.
You folks must be waayyyyy too hung up on plug and play.
I agree with you 100%. Loved the show. Unfortunately, I stopped watching it, as the local station bounced it around to about 6 different time slots in a two year span. Couldn't keep up with it:(
Sad thing is that the Andromeda station (different station) is doing the same thing:(
I thought Kevin Costner in Robin Hood was supposed to have had the worst 'British' accent in cinematic history, and Keanu was simply the worst actor in cinematic history.
Or do I have that reversed?
I am not sure. It's a good question. But the better question is this: do artists perceive that they would earn more under this system. That's the real ticket. I am sure that Lars and the boys are incapable of making the analysis themselves, so will defer to the wise analysis of their trusted (read: RIAA sponsored) accountants.
Yeah, that last bit is ranting, but what I think doesn't matter: what the bands think is what matters.
Well, apparantly, you don't know what analysis is either, as you have mistaken and confused terms such as 'good' and 'better'.
By including data that the industry conveniently forgets in their PR, he is making a better analysis than what was previously available, and is taking steps towards what can be called good analysis.
Yes, the analysis is poor. But that does not mean that his results and his methods are not better than what came before.
Are you kidding? That's probably when the seller got, and now has to sell it because his own dot bomb is in the toilet, and he needs the money for name brand ramen, not the generic store brand.
I think the BSD guys are still smarting over Bruce not getting their signature on the letter to M$. Most of the people really doing work don't seem to mind (and understand the time pressures) but those sitting on the sideline seem to feel a need to pipe up.
FWIW, I may disagree with your (collective) choice of license. But it is your software. Not mine. If I don't like it, I'll either use it anyway, or move on.
Sounds like preaching to the choir to me. I pay what I think something is worth (for music, probably 30-75 cents per track, maybe as much as a dollar for something really good.) and after sucking out a little bit to pay for the server, it goes to the artist.
I think we already know that this won't work anytime soon. First is the issue of credit/debit cards. If MC or Visa takes 3% (with a minimum of $1), the system is fucked. This should be solvable by either: MC or VISA lowering their cut, or having a 'net card (sounds like deja vu. I'm sure I've heard this before) wherein you buy a $20 gift certificate from micropay.com. Your band signs up as a MicroPay band. Then, every time they get $4-$5, they get a check. All of this is highly automatable. You could probably even kludge GnuCash or something to do it really cheap.
The next problem is greed. The first and easy target of greed are the 'middlemen'. They (let's call them.... Sony) own the lawyers. The lawyers own the courts, and the courts make the rules. The middlemen don't want to go back to selling 2x4's and real estate. They like going to fancy parties and awards shows. What motivation do they possibly have to give the artist back some rights?
Second is the artists. Let's face it, Lars and the gang are a bunch of greedy pricks. Same thing with Courtney Love. That much heroin isn't free. How are they gonna keep their noses packed on $70,000 per year? For every band that talks about 'doing it for the music', there are 50 who have dreams of being the big rock star, with a Lambo, a Ferrari, and a bunch of hooker^H^H^H^H^H^Hsupermodel girlfriends. That ratio gets worse when the good natured band gets a taste of success.
Only consumers want this system. The record companies certainly don't. The radio stations are terrified of it (although this would work for them. No more annual payments for broadcast rights. Play a Britney song, pay for a Britney song.) And worst of all, I honestly don't think most of the 'musicians' would really care for it.
You are correct that his analysis isn't quite on target, but you must admit (I would hope:) that he is making a step in the right direction.
It seems that his goal is to say that the current fixation by RIAA members on current hits and current sales might not be the best one for long term growth and profits. Were I a shareholder, this would be more important.
You also seem to indicate that there is some way to predict the future sales of a record (you mention 2.5 million this year, and next, and next, etc). I believe the guy at Evergreen attempted to answer this concern with two pieces of information: first, he points out that without promotion, they don't go anywhere (unfortunately, as pointed out in another thread, there is no analysis of this point, merely conjecture based on a few groups). Second, he indicates that current bands (N'Sync, Britney, etc.) do not receive ongoing promotion. Again, I didn't see analysis of this on the report.
But, if these two points made in the article are accurate, it should allay your concerns WRT prediciting future sales.
Again, it's not a great study, but it seems to be looking in the right hemisphere, at least.
Forgot to answer your first sentence:
I'm sure it's possible to do a grey import (heck, I could probably just buy one from some embassy hack up in DC:) but it's much more difficult in the US than in the UK (and presumably elsewhere).
As a matter of fact, just read in a UK VW magazine that prices for optioned cars can run as much as 30% higher in the UK vs. a couple hundred miles down the road in Germany.
Anyway, if I were grey importing, I'd save my pennies and dimes and grey import one of those 3 series BMW diesel wagons.
Yes, there are (at least) two different 2.0 engines. The one available for the past several years in the US is an eight valve, single overhead cam engine.
There used to be a 16 valve, twin cam engine in the US. There still is abroad. It has much better power characteristics, and is not much more expensive.
But I believe that VW dropped it to prevent taking from Audi sales (like people buying VWs are comparing to Audis).
For most people, those engines aren't enough, and that's a big problem. See, Americans say "horsepower" when they really mean "torque". Personally, I like horsepower. I don't mind an engine that gets peak power at an RPM>4000. A five digit redline is no problem. And Honda's S2000 is no big deal.
It just requires a different driving style, and one that I can deal with.
The common saying is "no replacement for displacement". I can think of two, both of which are answered well by the imports (and not badly by my Mondeo, err, Mercury Mystique). The first is forced induction. With a water-jacketed and/or double impeller bearing, longevity is no big whoop. Mileage, economy, and weight are all improved over a larger (physically) engine making similar power.
The second replacement for displacement is weight. Lop off 100 lbs., gain 10 hp (or some such thing). That's why my bike, with a measly 100 or so HP can embarass a Corvette with, what, 400 hp?
That's also another point in favor of the Golf over the Jetta Wagon: about 300 lbs, I believe.
USians are idiots about V-8's, anyway. Someone convinced them that 305's and 302's were big killer engines. I've got some people at Mopar Performance and Cadillac Motorsports Development who could show them a thing or two.
Part of VW's problem is the lack of ability to special order cars, or develop your own options packages. With the bulk of their stuff coming out of Mexico, why wouldn't this be possible? Corporate management.
So what? Well, it's quite possible that without all of the junk that comes on most of the GLS that we are given, they would sell better. There is also the chicken-and-egg problem: I can't test drive one, or get one equipped like I want, so why would I buy one.
I don't care for the size or appearance of the Jetta Wagon. I also don't care for the price. I priced both the Jetta Wagon and the Golf (for 2001) to the spec I wanted (which meant identical equipment, although because of the model/equipment overlaps, it wasn't necessarily the same) and the Jetta was almost $2000 (US) more than the Golf.
GTI causes problems (I need four doors) and the Passat is just too freakin' big to get along with that engine. And let's not forget that the price is getting TRULY outrageous at that point. I could spend a couple more dollars and get the EuroVan (or whatever it is called this week) or better yet, a BMW 323iT.
I've seen the Focus, and it looks cheap. The Golf was/is much nicer, and not much more expensive.
But to the general message of your post: how difficult is it for Herr Piech to call Mexico and say "Hey, load up a couple of Golfs and send them to the mid-atlantic"? VW has already gone through EPA and CARB. It's now just a shipping cost.
Mitsu re-imagined the Eclipse. They hoped to go upmarket by just selling a V-6 (at least in the US). Let's also not forget that powerwise, the V-6 trounces the turbo Eclipse engine.
I can't explain the decisions WRT AWD. Also don't know about the GT-VR4, except that they shouldn't race bikes;)
Two problems: terminology and history.
First, look at how the M3 and the Z28 were derived. The former was a decendant (sp) of the 2002 and other touring coupes, which in turn derived from the many true sports cars (MGs, Alfa's, Porsche's) of the 50's.
The Z28 can trace its timeline through muscle-cars and pony-cars, neither or which could be said to be particular good handlers.
And while in the past, we had so many good phrases to describe cars (muscle cars, touring cars, pony cars, sports cars) they have all been lumped into the same, and somewhat generic, sports cars. Or worse, sporty cars, which is even more broad and useless a term.
Heck, I don't even need a WRX or Lancer levels of power (I ride motorcycles for a real speed/acceleration rush. I just like to be able to hit the loud peddle hard enough to get out of my own way in a car. For me, that translates into about 0-60 ~ 9 seconds)
I'm not sure about the HP cap. It could be insurance, but that is usually based on repair costs, chances of theft, etc. HP is coincidental with those factors, not causal, and I think the insurance cos. know that.
I've often wondered if it's not a way for the Germans and Japanese to thumb their noses at us. OR, it could be emissions related. I'm not sure of the specific laws, but I do have a good example of their general stupidity:
When the Nissan Altima was originally released, you could see, quite clearly, the Stanza sticker on the back. You see, the proper name of the car was the Nissan Stanza Altima. This allowed them to pass EPA and CARB regs. for about 10% what it would have cost had they called it the Nissan Altima.
Bureaucrats: your dollars at work.
(BTW, please flame me. I don't really give a rat's ass what the VW defenders have to say. I'm not making judgements based on business or anything other than the fact that they make something that I want, and they will not sell it in the United States. It's my right as a consumer in a capitalist country to bitch to high heaven about what I want, can afford, but still can't get.)
So, we can get a stripped golf with a built-in MP3 player (BFD) but we (in the US) will NOT be able to get the four door Golf with the 180hp turbo gas engine? (Before flaming, read that spec carefully, and then go research it. I know I did. That's exactly what I want, and according to VW, I can sit and spin).
So, Herr Piech, stick it up your ass and light it.
UNinstalling apps in Windows is a serious PITA. I'd say that roughly 50% of the uninstallers that I've used don't work. And no, I won't go buy a commercial 'uninstaller helper'. They think a browser is an important and integral part of the OS. I think a working uninstaller is a bit more important.
/usr/local/src/PACKAGE && make uninstall
/usr/local/bin/PACKAGE-BINARY && rm /etc/PACKAGE-CONFIG
In Linux, I can usually do:
1) cd
OR
2) rm
I was thining about this last night. While I'd like to buy some M$ software (so that they could be included in any potential lawsuit) I figured that the store with the most onerous return policy would be Babbage's, but I'm not sure that they sell any M$ stuff.
I'm not sure which companies are buying all of these bargain priced service contracts. I work for a small company ($4million US) and started work there after having some of these erstwhile contracts. Quite frankly, they were for shit. After about 8 months of me wiping the asses and covering for idiots, I cancelled the contracts, and did my own damned maintenance. The cost savings have been tremendous.
Problem is, by kicking out various proprietary cruft (Yeah, yeah, M$ was my first target, but there are others) I'm also making my job a hell of a lot easier, as the *nix stuff just keeps on going and going and going...
I'm not saying that some companies don't get some measure of value out of service contracts. But I have a feeling that most of them were purchased without a cost-benefit analysis (with the option of in house experts included) and solely for the purpose of allowing some manager to sleep at night, knowing that the CYA step was accomplished.
So, since I think service contracts are worthless (I figure that I should get what I paid for when I signed my contract. When I get that, THEN I'll start paying for service. But if you give me a 90% program, I consider the time waiting for the other 10% to be an extended installation period.) I don't bother with 'em. Four years and going, and haven't missed 'em a bit. What we have had to pay for, service wise, has been maybe 15% of what the service contract would have been (and no, the service contracts weren't out of the ordinary. They were just as useful as the extended warranty at Circuit City.)
I'm not sure that it necessarily is better. But it is older than most of the licenses you listed in your original comment. It also covers lots of packages. While courts should not decide on votes, if there were a challenge of the legitimacy of the GPL, the fact that a billion-trillion "Hello, World" programs are released under it might add a little pressure.
As to why not use (for example) the NPL? If I recall, many of the rights revert back to Netscape. I think the IBMPL and some of the others are similar. To have a license that I (as a developer, even though I'm not, really) value, I would have to change all instances of "Netscape Communications Corp." to "George Howell".
Which raises this problem: I can't afford to protect my license. Netscape (via AOL/TW) can. My only alternative is to release under GPL or BSD (as they are the only two that allow ME to retain my code, not Netscape). Both are backed by organizations that, while not as large as AOL/TW, are much larger that George Howell. So they have a better chance of getting the license to stand on its face. Then I just need to apply it to my situation (or assign rights to the FSF in the first place, but that's starting to get far afield).
So, should you ever see my software (and if you don't work at my company, you probably won't see my "Hello, World, and Everybody" scripts:) it is under GPL because:
BSD doesn't keep M$ from stealing my stuff (and I could give a rat's ass about their right to make money on my stuff)
NPL gives Netscape my rights
Other people will fund the initial challenges to the GPL.
YMMV, and all that rubbish.
I guess they wanted to update it to get more people to go to the movie. This crap of the MPAA licensing movies and requiring a click-through is getting out of hand.
But won't John Cleese be pissed off if I steal his bits for my own comedy act?
...Programming language? WTF are you talking about?
I don't have a life (newborn took care of that) and I live in Maryland. Maybe I'll go buy some software, open the celophane wrapper, and return it to Staples, just to see what happens.
Geez, I'm almost bored enough to do that (plus, I don't want to cut the grass:(