I am sick and tired of seeing ignorant posts from people who obviously haven't read and/or don't understand the GPL getting moderated up as "Interesting" and "Insightful".
Moderators, please go read the GPL before you moderate, so you can tell when someone like gregm above doesn't know what he's talking about. It's obvious that a lot of people who think they have an informed opinion on this issue have not given the GPL a thorough examination.
Well, I have to agree. The US has been transitioning itself from a thriving democracy to a corporate fascist state since 1980, if not before. Voter apathy and ignorance have let our leaders get away with this kind of crap. It's time to get out, and the majority of the population in this country deserve to live with what's left.
Ooops, slight problem. Where to go? Global economy == global corporate domination. Ha ha ha! And to think, everyone thought the communists were the ones who would bring us a one world totalitarian government. What a convenient decoy they were.
People do this all the time. I believe it's called, "Marching Season". It's kind of like the KKK marching through South Central LA with police protection.
Sorry to respond to my own message, but I had a thought that I felt like sharing.
Since SCO is pretty obviously doomed, maybe this is a good time to take advantage of the "free SCO" offer and own a piece of history. Think of what a great conversation piece it will be at parties! "Do I remember SCO? Hell yeah, I've even got a copy! Check it out!"
I ran into some SCO guys at a conference last year and, man, you want to talk about some depressed individuals... I mean, they were trying to have fun but they were really bitter about the way things were headed.
I just feel sorry for SCO. They can't seem to break away from the old ways of doing business. I don't think there's much point in having some kind of outcry or letter writing campaign. SCO will either reinvent itself or die, and if Linux doesn't kill it, BSD will.
It's actually kind of sad.
Yay! Somebody with a brain!
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Lo-Tech Cinema
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· Score: 1
I couldn't have said this better myself.
Yes, these people were ill-prepared to do any serious camping or hiking. Yes, maybe they made stupid decisions and spent too much time bickering. Remember, these characters were film students, as in artists, as in people whose nature it is to bicker because they're used to being hyperfocused on their own work and fighting to get their vision across in the collaborative medium of film, and that behavior naturally extends into just about everything else. I used to be a film student, and I know.
Another thing about being a film student is that when you're working on a project it is really hard to think about anything else, like bringing enough food for your camping trip (though you'll definitely pack extra film). Their primary purpose for being in the woods at all was to shoot that documentary, not have a nice time camping. I've done projects in which I engaged in (in retrospect) really stupid, life-threatening behavior. Once I was driving on a busy freeway by the eyepiece of a Super-8 camera because I wanted to get some "in traffic" shots and didn't want to mess around with finding someone else to drive. Looking back, Gods, that was a really stupid thing to do, and I'm lucky I didn't have an accident, but when that hyperfocus mentality is going and the camera is rolling you just don't think about stuff like that.
You do this kind of stuff because you get so focused on making film that you really just don't think about anything else. You know, it amazes me that on a site like/. nobody would understand this. Since those bastards at OSU closed the cinema department I was forced into computer-geekdom and I see a lot of similarities.
Imagine you were in a marathon coding session, only instead of sitting at a desk all the time you were going on a camping trip. If you got into coding the way I do, you'd probably forget the toilet paper and get lost under the big EXIT sign too.
Also, I thought a really important aspect of the film that explained a lot of the behavior was that they kept filming it. Josh even said something about it to Heather. When you're behind the camera it really doesn't feel quite like reality, and you feel like you're somehow in control. Didn't anyone else catch that it was Heather who was filming the most, and Heather who was the most determined to press on when the others wanted to go back? And of course they kept filming in the house. They were out of their minds with fear and exhaustion, and filming is a psychological defence mechanism because it separates you from reality (in your mind only, as they found out).
But in spite of all of that, if you still think they were just a bunch of bickering idiots, surely you do not really believe that bickering idiots deserve to be terrorized and exhausted to the point of delirium, then brutally murdered. If you do, you're a sociopath and should be locked up. Or you're Jerry Pournelle, which is about the same thing.
Re:Interesting dividing line.
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Lo-Tech Cinema
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· Score: 1
Of course it says something about the people who don't like it. It says they have better taste and more refined sensibilities than those who do like it. I don't expect you to understand that what movies people like says alot about them.
It could also say that their sensibilities are not refined enough to appreciate it. Given that you seem to believe that "alot" is a word, perhaps meaning something akin to "a lot", I am inclined to believe that for you this is most likely to be the case.
Once again I really do have to wonder, why do people like you put so much effort into telling everyone how bad you think BWP is? It's almost as if you believe that by actively disliking it, you place yourself above those who do so you can look down upon them with disdain. You remind me of people with no jobs who sit around in coffee houses and complain about how Throbbing Gristle sold out.
If you didn't like the movie, fine. If you want to say so, fine. If you want to say so repeatedly, well, that's kind of weird, but OK, whatever. If you want to sit around and insult anyone who liked it, then maybe you should seriously look into getting a life or something.
Well, I think your idea of what makes a good movie is awfully limiting. Also, the jerky cameras were not for faux-realism, it's how the actors actually worked the cameras. The whole point of the movie was that it was created without the direct intervention and control of the crew.
I think that by keeping your mind closed to different types of narrative you are losing out on some amazing art. One of my other favorite movies is Slacker, which had absolutely no plot but I was so engrossed in it that I watched it several times in a row.
I find your opinion to be presumptuous, pretentious, and without merit. The fact that you did not like the movie does not make it a "bad movie". For example, I thoroughly despise improvisational jazz and would rather listen to fingers against a chalkboard but I can definitely respect it as a sophisticated form of music and refrain from insulting the perfectly intelligent people who do enjoy it.
It is really interesting how the people who did not like this movie are going out of their way to say so, to the point of participating in a discussion forum and revisiting their comments enough to reply in turn to those who've replied to them. When I see a movie I dislike, and then run across a discussion of it on the internet, I generally just find something else I'm interested in. Why are you so obsessed with this "bad movie" that you'd spend so much time on it?
This isn't meant as flame, it's just really strange! Why do you insist that the movie was bad and that everyone should "just face it"? Why do you care? What do you stand to lose if everyone else likes it? Are you afraid of what that says about you?
I mean it, I really don't understand. I'd be truly grateful for any insight you could provide.
Interesting dividing line.
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Lo-Tech Cinema
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· Score: 1
I just saw the movie yesterday, and remembering it being mentioned on/. a week ago I decided to go back and read what other people thought of it. It was really interesting to see the wide range of opinions on the matter, and confims my belief that no truly great art (or even good art) is loved (or even liked) by everyone.
It seems to me (and I apologize in advance for how arrogant this is going to sound) that those who didn't like The Blair Witch Project are saying more about themselves than they're saying about the movie. I guess you could say the same for those who praised it, but it really hit me when reading the negative comments. I kept thinking, when reading the comments of the people who strongly disliked it, that if we were to meet we would probably have absolutely nothing to talk about and that we would probably dislike eachother very intently.
It's very strange, for me to think something like that. I try to make it a practice to not judge people by their likes and dislikes in music, film, literature, etc., but for some reason I can't avoid it here. I really wonder why that is.
Since it can run Linux, I'm surprised that nobody has mentioned this yet...
Beowulf!;-)
Think about it! All that precious time stuck in rush hour traffic can be used to model intergalactic gas clouds. The bigger the jam, the more the RAM! Screw the cops, we need Gflops!
We got a great big convoy, hackin' through the night We got a great big convoy, a Linux geek's delight! C'mon and join our convoy, we'll take 'em dead or alive We're gonna net this hackin' convoy and brute force RC5! Connnvvooooooooy...!
Your "heuristic" is really an emotional problem: fear and envy of success.
I think we can all do without the Ayn Rand-ian psychoanalysis. It is presumptuous and sophomoric.
It is not unreasonable to believe that public companies, as a general rule, behave differently than private ones. Instead of having a few relatively constant owners, upper management must answer to an ever-changing stream of owners who generally aren't in for the long haul, particularly in the age of the mutual fund. It seems perfectly natural to have concerns about the effect of an IPO on a company's priorities when you as a customer are deciding whether to invest your time and money in their product, since the future of that product is at stake.
While it may not make sense to dislike a company purely because they're large and/or publicly traded, it definitely doesn't make sense to act as if it doesn't matter at all and accuse anyone who believes otherwise of being a success-hating commie psychopath.
My suggestion to you, and you may take it for whatever it's worth, is to think about why a person says what he or she says, what legitimate concerns that person might have, and address those in a non-adversarial manner. Seek to educate rather than confront.
I mean, did you really think the person to whom you responded would say, "Hey, you're right! I do have an emotional problem regarding success. I'm going to get off Slashdot and make an appointment with a qualified mental health professional right now!"
The above is not a rhetorical question--I really would like to know! What product from MS and its hardware partners is supposed to be equivalent to a Sun E10000? I guess I haven't been following MS well enough, because the last I heard, NT scaled to no more than eight processors and loses any sign of linear scalability after four.
A Sun E10000 maxes out at 64 UltraSPARC processors. NT may (try to) compete with Solaris on low end machines but are people really using NT servers for tasks that, in the Sun world, would typically be assigned to a fully loaded E4500 or higher?
Even on Alpha, NT isn't a 64-bit OS. That matters at the level we're talking about. I could understand Microsoft taking on Sun's workstations (where NT is eating everyone alive except Linux and the BSDs) and low end servers, but unless the game has changed dramatically there isn't anything Microsoft that competes in this market.
Microsoft's claims of the E10000's faults sound ridiculous considering that, to my knowledge, no MS-based system has any of the functionality they discuss AT ALL, much less better. I find it hard to believe even MS could make such statements, so what product do that have on that level? Clearly I missed something!
As for eBay, I used it for a few months a year or so ago and it was slow and extremely unreliable even then. I have to believe that poor configuration and administration are more to blame than any OS, even NT.
I don't know what the hell "liberal" means anymore, except maybe "weenie". If that's the meaning of the word, then the Voice fits it very well.
I'm a Leftist, a Progressive, maybe even a Socialist (depends on my mood), but Liberal? Pffft! Yuck-O.
Liberals read the Village Voice. Leftists read The Nation. Liberals sip wine. Leftists down scotch (straight up). Liberals support gun control. Leftists smuggle guns to East Timor.
Phooey on Liberals! They're just Republicans with inferiority complexes.
And for the record, I was beat up pretty frequently in school (especially middle school), and you bet I wanted to make those rotten jocks pay for it. And now I do, when I charge them for my consulting services! Woo hoo!
I'm currently working as a consultant to a national retailer who will be rolling out POS systems built on Red Hat 5.2 at hundreds of locations around the U.S. this summer.
The biggest obstacle I've seen has nothing to do with the readiness of Linux "for the enterprise" but the learning curve involved in transitioning a non-Unix staff. People who feel that Linux is "not ready" for this or that have generally been, from what I've seen, people who don't know Unix and just don't know how to use Linux effectively.
Most people who know Unix (and by that I don't mean so-called sysadmins who can only use HP-UX's SAM or AIX's SMIT GUI tools) see the strengths of Linux and *BSD very quickly. People who don't know Unix are deluding themselves into thinking they're using computers when in reality computers are using them!
The "leaders" of the free software and open source communities are not self-appointed. Remember the LSA? That was an example of self-appointed leadership, and it failed.
People like RMS, Linus, ESR, etc., are respected by a lot of people in the community, and that is how they maintain positions of leadership. "Leader" probably isn't the right word--they fill a role similar to village elders in older times. They've been around, they've done a lot, and people listen to them.
Where we all disagree is in how much respect we think they each deserve. This, though, is a good thing as it preserves diversity of opinion.
Democratic elections, on the other hand, suck rocks because then everything becomes political. Let people lead who earn the respect of the community, not those who sway voters. Please, let's not turn our happy anarchy into a miserable "democratic" nation state.
If free software isn't a case of workers owning the means of production, I guess I don't know what is. The success of Linux and other free software is libertarian socialism at work, though many of the people involved do not know that.
Kropotkin beats Marx! Kropotkin beats Rand! Go Kropotkin! Go go go! Wooo-hooo!
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I am sick and tired of seeing ignorant posts from people who obviously haven't read and/or don't understand the GPL getting moderated up as "Interesting" and "Insightful".
Moderators, please go read the GPL before you moderate, so you can tell when someone like gregm above doesn't know what he's talking about. It's obvious that a lot of people who think they have an informed opinion on this issue have not given the GPL a thorough examination.
Well, I have to agree. The US has been transitioning itself from a thriving democracy to a corporate fascist state since 1980, if not before. Voter apathy and ignorance have let our leaders get away with this kind of crap. It's time to get out, and the majority of the population in this country deserve to live with what's left.
Ooops, slight problem. Where to go? Global economy == global corporate domination. Ha ha ha! And to think, everyone thought the communists were the ones who would bring us a one world totalitarian government. What a convenient decoy they were.
People do this all the time. I believe it's called, "Marching Season". It's kind of like the KKK marching through South Central LA with police protection.
Sorry to respond to my own message, but I had a thought that I felt like sharing.
Since SCO is pretty obviously doomed, maybe this is a good time to take advantage of the "free SCO" offer and own a piece of history. Think of what a great conversation piece it will be at parties! "Do I remember SCO? Hell yeah, I've even got a copy! Check it out!"
Hmmmm!
I ran into some SCO guys at a conference last year and, man, you want to talk about some depressed individuals... I mean, they were trying to have fun but they were really bitter about the way things were headed.
I just feel sorry for SCO. They can't seem to break away from the old ways of doing business. I don't think there's much point in having some kind of outcry or letter writing campaign. SCO will either reinvent itself or die, and if Linux doesn't kill it, BSD will.
It's actually kind of sad.
I couldn't have said this better myself.
/. nobody would understand this. Since those bastards at OSU closed the cinema department I was forced into computer-geekdom and I see a lot of similarities.
Yes, these people were ill-prepared to do any serious camping or hiking. Yes, maybe they made stupid decisions and spent too much time bickering. Remember, these characters were film students, as in artists, as in people whose nature it is to bicker because they're used to being hyperfocused on their own work and fighting to get their vision across in the collaborative medium of film, and that behavior naturally extends into just about everything else. I used to be a film student, and I know.
Another thing about being a film student is that when you're working on a project it is really hard to think about anything else, like bringing enough food for your camping trip (though you'll definitely pack extra film). Their primary purpose for being in the woods at all was to shoot that documentary, not have a nice time camping. I've done projects in which I engaged in (in retrospect) really stupid, life-threatening behavior. Once I was driving on a busy freeway by the eyepiece of a Super-8 camera because I wanted to get some "in traffic" shots and didn't want to mess around with finding someone else to drive. Looking back, Gods, that was a really stupid thing to do, and I'm lucky I didn't have an accident, but when that hyperfocus mentality is going and the camera is rolling you just don't think about stuff like that.
You do this kind of stuff because you get so focused on making film that you really just don't think about anything else. You know, it amazes me that on a site like
Imagine you were in a marathon coding session, only instead of sitting at a desk all the time you were going on a camping trip. If you got into coding the way I do, you'd probably forget the toilet paper and get lost under the big EXIT sign too.
Also, I thought a really important aspect of the film that explained a lot of the behavior was that they kept filming it. Josh even said something about it to Heather. When you're behind the camera it really doesn't feel quite like reality, and you feel like you're somehow in control. Didn't anyone else catch that it was Heather who was filming the most, and Heather who was the most determined to press on when the others wanted to go back? And of course they kept filming in the house. They were out of their minds with fear and exhaustion, and filming is a psychological defence mechanism because it separates you from reality (in your mind only, as they found out).
But in spite of all of that, if you still think they were just a bunch of bickering idiots, surely you do not really believe that bickering idiots deserve to be terrorized and exhausted to the point of delirium, then brutally murdered. If you do, you're a sociopath and should be locked up. Or you're Jerry Pournelle, which is about the same thing.
It could also say that their sensibilities are not refined enough to appreciate it. Given that you seem to believe that "alot" is a word, perhaps meaning something akin to "a lot", I am inclined to believe that for you this is most likely to be the case.
Once again I really do have to wonder, why do people like you put so much effort into telling everyone how bad you think BWP is? It's almost as if you believe that by actively disliking it, you place yourself above those who do so you can look down upon them with disdain. You remind me of people with no jobs who sit around in coffee houses and complain about how Throbbing Gristle sold out.
If you didn't like the movie, fine. If you want to say so, fine. If you want to say so repeatedly, well, that's kind of weird, but OK, whatever. If you want to sit around and insult anyone who liked it, then maybe you should seriously look into getting a life or something.
Well, I think your idea of what makes a good movie is awfully limiting. Also, the jerky cameras were not for faux-realism, it's how the actors actually worked the cameras. The whole point of the movie was that it was created without the direct intervention and control of the crew.
I think that by keeping your mind closed to different types of narrative you are losing out on some amazing art. One of my other favorite movies is Slacker, which had absolutely no plot but I was so engrossed in it that I watched it several times in a row.
Zentropa?! You've got to be kidding. That movie was nothing like Pi, except that it was in black and white.
And Solaris? I've admin'd many Sun boxen in my life but I have no idea what that has to do with Pi or TBWP.
I find your opinion to be presumptuous, pretentious, and without merit. The fact that you did not like the movie does not make it a "bad movie". For example, I thoroughly despise improvisational jazz and would rather listen to fingers against a chalkboard but I can definitely respect it as a sophisticated form of music and refrain from insulting the perfectly intelligent people who do enjoy it.
It is really interesting how the people who did not like this movie are going out of their way to say so, to the point of participating in a discussion forum and revisiting their comments enough to reply in turn to those who've replied to them. When I see a movie I dislike, and then run across a discussion of it on the internet, I generally just find something else I'm interested in. Why are you so obsessed with this "bad movie" that you'd spend so much time on it?
This isn't meant as flame, it's just really strange! Why do you insist that the movie was bad and that everyone should "just face it"? Why do you care? What do you stand to lose if everyone else likes it? Are you afraid of what that says about you?
I mean it, I really don't understand. I'd be truly grateful for any insight you could provide.
I just saw the movie yesterday, and remembering it being mentioned on /. a week ago I decided to go back and read what other people thought of it. It was really interesting to see the wide range of opinions on the matter, and confims my belief that no truly great art (or even good art) is loved (or even liked) by everyone.
It seems to me (and I apologize in advance for how arrogant this is going to sound) that those who didn't like The Blair Witch Project are saying more about themselves than they're saying about the movie. I guess you could say the same for those who praised it, but it really hit me when reading the negative comments. I kept thinking, when reading the comments of the people who strongly disliked it, that if we were to meet we would probably have absolutely nothing to talk about and that we would probably dislike eachother very intently.
It's very strange, for me to think something like that. I try to make it a practice to not judge people by their likes and dislikes in music, film, literature, etc., but for some reason I can't avoid it here. I really wonder why that is.
Beowulf! ;-)
Think about it! All that precious time stuck in rush hour traffic can be used to model intergalactic gas clouds. The bigger the jam, the more the RAM! Screw the cops, we need Gflops!
We got a great big convoy, hackin' through the night
We got a great big convoy, a Linux geek's delight!
C'mon and join our convoy, we'll take 'em dead or alive
We're gonna net this hackin' convoy and brute force RC5!
Connnvvooooooooy...!
I think we can all do without the Ayn Rand-ian psychoanalysis. It is presumptuous and sophomoric.
It is not unreasonable to believe that public companies, as a general rule, behave differently than private ones. Instead of having a few relatively constant owners, upper management must answer to an ever-changing stream of owners who generally aren't in for the long haul, particularly in the age of the mutual fund. It seems perfectly natural to have concerns about the effect of an IPO on a company's priorities when you as a customer are deciding whether to invest your time and money in their product, since the future of that product is at stake.
While it may not make sense to dislike a company purely because they're large and/or publicly traded, it definitely doesn't make sense to act as if it doesn't matter at all and accuse anyone who believes otherwise of being a success-hating commie psychopath.
My suggestion to you, and you may take it for whatever it's worth, is to think about why a person says what he or she says, what legitimate concerns that person might have, and address those in a non-adversarial manner. Seek to educate rather than confront.
I mean, did you really think the person to whom you responded would say, "Hey, you're right! I do have an emotional problem regarding success. I'm going to get off Slashdot and make an appointment with a qualified mental health professional right now!"
The above is not a rhetorical question--I really would like to know! What product from MS and its hardware partners is supposed to be equivalent to a Sun E10000? I guess I haven't been following MS well enough, because the last I heard, NT scaled to no more than eight processors and loses any sign of linear scalability after four.
A Sun E10000 maxes out at 64 UltraSPARC processors. NT may (try to) compete with Solaris on low end machines but are people really using NT servers for tasks that, in the Sun world, would typically be assigned to a fully loaded E4500 or higher?
Even on Alpha, NT isn't a 64-bit OS. That matters at the level we're talking about. I could understand Microsoft taking on Sun's workstations (where NT is eating everyone alive except Linux and the BSDs) and low end servers, but unless the game has changed dramatically there isn't anything Microsoft that competes in this market.
Microsoft's claims of the E10000's faults sound ridiculous considering that, to my knowledge, no MS-based system has any of the functionality they discuss AT ALL, much less better. I find it hard to believe even MS could make such statements, so what product do that have on that level? Clearly I missed something!
As for eBay, I used it for a few months a year or so ago and it was slow and extremely unreliable even then. I have to believe that poor configuration and administration are more to blame than any OS, even NT.
I don't know what the hell "liberal" means anymore, except maybe "weenie". If that's the meaning of the word, then the Voice fits it very well.
I'm a Leftist, a Progressive, maybe even a Socialist (depends on my mood), but Liberal? Pffft! Yuck-O.
Liberals read the Village Voice. Leftists read The Nation. Liberals sip wine. Leftists down scotch (straight up). Liberals support gun control. Leftists smuggle guns to East Timor.
Phooey on Liberals! They're just Republicans with inferiority complexes.
And for the record, I was beat up pretty frequently in school (especially middle school), and you bet I wanted to make those rotten jocks pay for it. And now I do, when I charge them for my consulting services! Woo hoo!
I'm currently working as a consultant to a national retailer who will be rolling out POS systems built on Red Hat 5.2 at hundreds of locations around the U.S. this summer.
The biggest obstacle I've seen has nothing to do with the readiness of Linux "for the enterprise" but the learning curve involved in transitioning a non-Unix staff. People who feel that Linux is "not ready" for this or that have generally been, from what I've seen, people who don't know Unix and just don't know how to use Linux effectively.
Most people who know Unix (and by that I don't mean so-called sysadmins who can only use HP-UX's SAM or AIX's SMIT GUI tools) see the strengths of Linux and *BSD very quickly. People who don't know Unix are deluding themselves into thinking they're using computers when in reality computers are using them!
The "leaders" of the free software and open source communities are not self-appointed. Remember the LSA? That was an example of self-appointed leadership, and it failed.
People like RMS, Linus, ESR, etc., are respected by a lot of people in the community, and that is how they maintain positions of leadership. "Leader" probably isn't the right word--they fill a role similar to village elders in older times. They've been around, they've done a lot, and people listen to them.
Where we all disagree is in how much respect we think they each deserve. This, though, is a good thing as it preserves diversity of opinion.
Democratic elections, on the other hand, suck rocks because then everything becomes political. Let people lead who earn the respect of the community, not those who sway voters. Please, let's not turn our happy anarchy into a miserable "democratic" nation state.
If free software isn't a case of workers owning the means of production, I guess I don't know what is. The success of Linux and other free software is libertarian socialism at work, though many of the people involved do not know that.
Kropotkin beats Marx! Kropotkin beats Rand! Go Kropotkin! Go go go! Wooo-hooo!
http://www.anarchy.org