Note: I believe that the topic I mention here actually deserves an AskSlashdot article all by itself, since it's an interesting topic, but since my article submission has been sitting in the queue since February 20th, and CmdrTaco never did anything after I e-mailed him (I e-mailed him before he left), I'll post this question in a fairly relevant article. I'll ask my question first, and you'll see how it's not offtopic (Maybe touchy subjects like this is getting too controversial for Slashdot - if it's not, I'd like to see them make a new news article about it)
Here's my question. Can licenses be applied to patches?. One good example of this is the LAME Encoder. A little more background for those who don't know what it is. There is an ISO-based mp3 encoder, along with source code, that is freely available for download. The source code though, is heavily broken in many places, and the sound quality of a ISO-based mp3 encoder is very subpar compared to the commerical mp3 encoder of Fraunhofer, one of the leading companies behind the technology of mp3. However, Fraunhofer owns a lot of patents to the methods behind encoding mp3, so a couple of years ago, they decided to send legal threats everyone that offered a compiled version or modified version of the ISO-based encoder.
LAME, according to the homepage, is "not an mp3 encoder. It is a GPL'd patch against the dist10 ISO demonstration source. LAME is totally incapable of producing an mp3 stream. It is incapable of even being compiled by itself. You need the ISO source for this software to work. The ISO demonstration source is also freely available, but any commercial use (including distributing free encoders) may require a license agreement from FhG."
Here's my point - are patches covered under the GPL (or any license?). If yes, what's going to stop someone from creating a Artistic license patch for Linux the linux kernel? Or a Sun Community License? Or a completely proprietery license? Remember, what LAME does is GPL-infect a piece of code that is has no copyright on, simply by patching it. By extending this analogy a little further, you can see that there is no real need to respect the original author's copyright, since you can just patch his source code with whatever license you got.
So, the answer is yes, you can change the license - it's all too easy. But should it be this way?
I completely agree with you, but I think you're missing the point.
One of the great things about Open Source (as in a license like Mozilla, not SCSL) is that the company no longer has absolute control over what happens to the code. Sure, they own the copyright, but the code is out there, and the Mozilla License gives us right to fork the code, and do our own development. They might have released it under selfish or capitalistic reasons, but there is still source code being contributed to the community.
Michael, however, has turned something which we all tend to look down upon and actually inovated. So before you guys go beat him like a little girly man, remember that his domain squatting eventually transelated into inovation.
and how exactly do you innovate with other people's trademark, like win-zip, tu-cows, talk-city, metacrawler, windac, and audiograbber?
I agree with you, although I do believe that there is some action that needs to be done. Now that Robertson has successfully IPO'ed mp3.com, it's time for him to return the squatted domain names back to their respective owners, for legal, it not moral reasons.
I doubt a class action suit from all those trademark owners would look good for MPPP's price...
Some more information here from Dimension Music. Apparently Robertson simply refuses and ignores requests to have the rightful domain name handed back to their right owners. The programmer behind Audiograbber is getting pretty upset, since mp3.com wholeheartedly endorses MusicMatch, audiograbber's competitor, and audiograbber.com redirects people to mp3.com.
Robertson suggested the the advanced AAC format be called mp4, because it was the logical progression from mp3 (even though AAC is not really mpeg layer 4). Others then found out that Robertson had already registered mp4.com in advance, and accused him of trying to rename a format for his own benefit.
You need to work on your reading skills. I did NOT say the image infers that all patents are frivolous, but that the image subconsciously affect's someone's opinion since they see the image.
Can we replace the icon for Patents? Or at least have another icon for the more legitimate (or patents under scruntiny?)
I understand it's all in the name of humor (and the icon is indeed very funny), but I also think that the icon unconsciously biases any posters or readers to think of any patent to be trivial, or frivolous.
Patent laws need to be fixed, but that doesn't mean all patents are bad. If I had a patent on some groundbreaking device, I would hate to get the attention of Slashdot, who would pigeonhole my creation with an icon of patenting knifes and forks.
Actually from what I remember, N64 was the late comer in the market, with its under-performed spec (well, with no incentivies large enough for ppl to switch). It was mainly Sega Saturn's market the PlayStation eroded. And CD were used in both SS and PSX, so it can't be the CD's.
How about a familiar API called DirectX, a fixed spec for less incompatibility, and the support of many PC developers who are not willing to program on the PlayStation?
I personally don't want my game crashing in the middle of me playing. And as we all know that if it is going to be windows based OS, then it wll crash at the most random times.
I don't get it - I'm not a big fan of Microsoft crashes, but are there actually people that think Microsoft run timers in their OSes set to crash at random intervals?
Windows 9x crashes so much because there are so many legacy applications they have to support, and memory protection-wise they don't care that much. Windows 2000 already proves to be impressively stable for 35 million lines of code.
Since X-box will be running on a unified spec, it's very doubtful that it will crash that much, since they have a much much smaller set of hardware/software to test and make robust.
I personally don't understand where MS gets off thinking that they can just jump into the Console gaming market. And if they do pull it off it will just go to show how much weight they do pull with Mindshare of the average Joe
So in other words, they suck if they fail, and they suck if they succeed?
I think everyone was being just as(even more) critical when Sony rolled out their Playstation. "What, we already have Nintendo and Sega - Sony makes walkmans and compact disk players, they won't survive in the console market!"
The X-box is attractive because the architecture will be very close to the commodity PCs. That means it will be very easy for companies to port games to and from the X-box and Windows 9x. Easy to port translates to less money to reach a larger audience. A conformity to a single standard (in terms of hardware and software) also means developers can be more comfortable in pushing the limits of whatever they have, as opposed to creating a game for the lowest common denominator.
Assuming Microsoft doens't fsck it up too much, they have a very solid chance of taking marketshare, not from Sony, but mainly from Sega and Nintendo's lackluster lineup these days.
Console gamers only care about the games, not the internals. That's why consoles are so popular! You don't have to care about which chips you have; all games are compatible!
Oh, and I doubt the X-box will be upgradable - that's why they are choosing the specs now...
imagine if you can't copyright designs... Then every single car on the highway is going to start looking exactly like Ferrari's, Porsches, Diablos,...:-)
I guess it's Nintendo's fault that people are playing so much video games that they have blisters. that's like Gun makers offering free bulletproof vests for those who keep getting hurt from shooting themselves...
The Athlon beats the Coppermine, clock for clock, even when the L2 cache is running at 1/3 speed.
As you can see here, the Athlon 800 delivered a severe can of whoop-ass to the Pentium III 800 (both 133 and 100 bus speeds). And the following two points can be observed:
1) The Athlon 800 has the same cache divider as the Athlon 1Ghz. 2) The performance of the Athlon does not "severely lag" behind the Pentium, and in fact, it's a whole lot faster!
expect the Athlon to significantly lag the PIII at the same speed
Dude, either you work for Intel (FUD anyone?), or you better have some concrete information to back up your outrageous claims.
Also..I dislike many of Microsoft's tactics are much as anyone else, but Netscape's failure was more due to their own lack of understanding of what users wanted than with Microsoft leveraging the OS. For me,
You might disagree with me, but the entire DOJ agrees with me. Why do you think Netscape died? MS bundled IE into windows, and reduced it to a commodity item.
Specifically, they talk about how they implemented most of amazon's functionality, almost feature by feature.
Bezos has a point about not wanting to be "Netscape." Barnes & Nobles is just like Microsoft - they are leveraging their wielding power in the brick and mortar stores (operating systems) and trying to gain a presence online by providing an Amazon clone (web browser).
"Nobody needs more than 640Kb of memory." - Bill Gates
On a more serious note, the chips will be in high demand for (inclusively, not exclusively) servers and gamers. The fact that more people are using the internet means that the demand for a faster server is going to always increase. As for gamers, computer games are probably one of the few genres of applications that continually push the limit of the state-of-the-art computers nowadays. You think having GeForce is enough? Now that we offload the geometry and lighting to the video card, the CPU can spend more time creating more lifelike and realistic AI.
And of course, chips introduced at a higher speed means that the lower-grade CPUs will have their costs slashed, which is a definite good thing for consumers.
And finally, do you expect Intel and AMD to close down their R&D because "nobody needs faster comptuers anymore"? there's always Microsoft to make them look slow;)
But the names of the colleges mentioned are hilarious as hell:
Beaver College
Ball State University (Ball U, BSU for short)
Morehead University (yes please)
The word 'beaver' too often elicits ridicule in the form of derogatory remarks pertaining to the rodent, the TV show Leave It to Beaver and the vulgar reference to the female anatomy," Beaver president Bette E. Landman lamented in a letter sent Feb. 15 to alumni, parents, staff and students.
Fantasia 2000: The Museum of Science is currently not showing the "IMAX" movie "Fantasia 2000." According to Cherie Rivers, manager of Omni programs at the Museum of Science "The nonnegotiable requirement to show Fantasia 2000 exclusively for four months with no other film programs allowed was unacceptable to the Museum of Science since it would deny the Museum the opportunity to present our mission related film programs."
Slashdot Mirror
Here's my question. Can licenses be applied to patches?. One good example of this is the LAME Encoder. A little more background for those who don't know what it is. There is an ISO-based mp3 encoder, along with source code, that is freely available for download. The source code though, is heavily broken in many places, and the sound quality of a ISO-based mp3 encoder is very subpar compared to the commerical mp3 encoder of Fraunhofer, one of the leading companies behind the technology of mp3. However, Fraunhofer owns a lot of patents to the methods behind encoding mp3, so a couple of years ago, they decided to send legal threats everyone that offered a compiled version or modified version of the ISO-based encoder.
LAME, according to the homepage, is "not an mp3 encoder. It is a GPL'd patch against the dist10 ISO demonstration source. LAME is totally incapable of producing an mp3 stream. It is incapable of even being compiled by itself. You need the ISO source for this software to work. The ISO demonstration source is also freely available, but any commercial use (including distributing free encoders) may require a license agreement from FhG."
Here's my point - are patches covered under the GPL (or any license?). If yes, what's going to stop someone from creating a Artistic license patch for Linux the linux kernel? Or a Sun Community License? Or a completely proprietery license? Remember, what LAME does is GPL-infect a piece of code that is has no copyright on, simply by patching it. By extending this analogy a little further, you can see that there is no real need to respect the original author's copyright, since you can just patch his source code with whatever license you got.
So, the answer is yes, you can change the license - it's all too easy. But should it be this way?
One of the great things about Open Source (as in a license like Mozilla, not SCSL) is that the company no longer has absolute control over what happens to the code. Sure, they own the copyright, but the code is out there, and the Mozilla License gives us right to fork the code, and do our own development. They might have released it under selfish or capitalistic reasons, but there is still source code being contributed to the community.
and how exactly do you innovate with other people's trademark, like win-zip, tu-cows, talk-city, metacrawler, windac, and audiograbber?
I doubt a class action suit from all those trademark owners would look good for MPPP's price...
Some more information here from Dimension Music. Apparently Robertson simply refuses and ignores requests to have the rightful domain name handed back to their right owners. The programmer behind Audiograbber is getting pretty upset, since mp3.com wholeheartedly endorses MusicMatch, audiograbber's competitor, and audiograbber.com redirects people to mp3.com.
Robertson suggested the the advanced AAC format be called mp4, because it was the logical progression from mp3 (even though AAC is not really mpeg layer 4). Others then found out that Robertson had already registered mp4.com in advance, and accused him of trying to rename a format for his own benefit.
You need to work on your reading skills. I did NOT say the image infers that all patents are frivolous, but that the image subconsciously affect's someone's opinion since they see the image.
I understand it's all in the name of humor (and the icon is indeed very funny), but I also think that the icon unconsciously biases any posters or readers to think of any patent to be trivial, or frivolous.
Patent laws need to be fixed, but that doesn't mean all patents are bad. If I had a patent on some groundbreaking device, I would hate to get the attention of Slashdot, who would pigeonhole my creation with an icon of patenting knifes and forks.
You better give us some proof that "RMS wrote in", otherwise it looks like you're heading down to the -1 section.
So in other words, you let your zealotry and blind bias against Microsoft completely dominate any rational or logical judgement you can produce?
Actually from what I remember, N64 was the late comer in the market, with its under-performed spec (well, with no incentivies large enough for ppl to switch). It was mainly Sega Saturn's market the PlayStation eroded. And CD were used in both SS and PSX, so it can't be the CD's.
How about a familiar API called DirectX, a fixed spec for less incompatibility, and the support of many PC developers who are not willing to program on the PlayStation?
I don't get it - I'm not a big fan of Microsoft crashes, but are there actually people that think Microsoft run timers in their OSes set to crash at random intervals?
Windows 9x crashes so much because there are so many legacy applications they have to support, and memory protection-wise they don't care that much. Windows 2000 already proves to be impressively stable for 35 million lines of code.
Since X-box will be running on a unified spec, it's very doubtful that it will crash that much, since they have a much much smaller set of hardware/software to test and make robust.
I personally don't understand where MS gets off thinking that they can just jump into the Console gaming market. And if they do pull it off it will just go to show how much weight they do pull with Mindshare of the average Joe
So in other words, they suck if they fail, and they suck if they succeed?
The X-box is attractive because the architecture will be very close to the commodity PCs. That means it will be very easy for companies to port games to and from the X-box and Windows 9x. Easy to port translates to less money to reach a larger audience. A conformity to a single standard (in terms of hardware and software) also means developers can be more comfortable in pushing the limits of whatever they have, as opposed to creating a game for the lowest common denominator.
Assuming Microsoft doens't fsck it up too much, they have a very solid chance of taking marketshare, not from Sony, but mainly from Sega and Nintendo's lackluster lineup these days.
Console gamers only care about the games, not the internals. That's why consoles are so popular! You don't have to care about which chips you have; all games are compatible!
Oh, and I doubt the X-box will be upgradable - that's why they are choosing the specs now...
None of the websites were the main college PR web sites. They were all college student home pages.
imagine if you can't copyright designs... Then every single car on the highway is going to start looking exactly like Ferrari's, Porsches, Diablos, ... :-)
I guess it's Nintendo's fault that people are playing so much video games that they have blisters. that's like Gun makers offering free bulletproof vests for those who keep getting hurt from shooting themselves...
No, because I'm not sure if the two 7% groups actually overlap ;-)
As you can see here, the Athlon 800 delivered a severe can of whoop-ass to the Pentium III 800 (both 133 and 100 bus speeds). And the following two points can be observed:
1) The Athlon 800 has the same cache divider as the Athlon 1Ghz.
2) The performance of the Athlon does not "severely lag" behind the Pentium, and in fact, it's a whole lot faster!
expect the Athlon to significantly lag the PIII at the same speed
Dude, either you work for Intel (FUD anyone?), or you better have some concrete information to back up your outrageous claims.
Why?
And I will start feeling sorry for Netscape when someone demonstrates they weren't trying to own the entire Internet.
uh, duh. Any for-profit organization is going to try and capitalize as much as possible. What's your point?
Netscape, more than any other entity I can think of, damaged the viability of a free non-proprietary WWW.
You obvious can't think of Microsoft, ActiveX, non-pure Java, etc. etc. etc. etc.
You might disagree with me, but the entire DOJ agrees with me. Why do you think Netscape died? MS bundled IE into windows, and reduced it to a commodity item.
http://www.wired.com/wired/arch ive/7.06/barnes.html
Specifically, they talk about how they implemented most of amazon's functionality, almost feature by feature.
Bezos has a point about not wanting to be "Netscape." Barnes & Nobles is just like Microsoft - they are leveraging their wielding power in the brick and mortar stores (operating systems) and trying to gain a presence online by providing an Amazon clone (web browser).
We should be boycotting B&N, not amazon.
"Nobody needs more than 640Kb of memory." - Bill Gates
On a more serious note, the chips will be in high demand for (inclusively, not exclusively) servers and gamers. The fact that more people are using the internet means that the demand for a faster server is going to always increase. As for gamers, computer games are probably one of the few genres of applications that continually push the limit of the state-of-the-art computers nowadays. You think having GeForce is enough? Now that we offload the geometry and lighting to the video card, the CPU can spend more time creating more lifelike and realistic AI.
And of course, chips introduced at a higher speed means that the lower-grade CPUs will have their costs slashed, which is a definite good thing for consumers.
And finally, do you expect Intel and AMD to close down their R&D because "nobody needs faster comptuers anymore"? there's always Microsoft to make them look slow ;)
Beaver College
Ball State University (Ball U, BSU for short)
Morehead University (yes please)
The word 'beaver' too often elicits ridicule in the form of derogatory remarks pertaining to the rodent, the TV show Leave It to Beaver and the vulgar reference to the female anatomy," Beaver president Bette E. Landman lamented in a letter sent Feb. 15 to alumni, parents, staff and students.
Fantasia 2000: The Museum of Science is currently not showing the "IMAX" movie "Fantasia 2000." According to Cherie Rivers, manager of Omni programs at the Museum of Science "The nonnegotiable requirement to show Fantasia 2000 exclusively for four months with no other film programs allowed was unacceptable to the Museum of Science since it would deny the Museum the opportunity to present our mission related film programs."