Yea in theory you are right but let's take a hard look at your arguments. "If you're using software on a different platform, then you're not covered by it. " What percentage of people is that? Let's make it even a bit more honest what % of people using Linux and or BSD have not downloaded FFmpeg or some other package that adds H.264 support?
And if you have already paid for OS/X, Windows, Android or... you have already paid. H.264 free to you as far as you can tell.
Is it really free? Well to be honest it may be since both Microsoft and Apple own patents on parts of H.264 they may actually get to distribute it for zero cost to themselves. Yes the consumer is some way probably pays some tiny bit somewhere in the chain but for the average person it feels as free as air. And honestly that is what counts to the vast majority of people.
I blame the people that don't have a clue about politics but think that they do and are way too interested!
If you get into politics you will find that you become part of the problem.
We need a real change. I don't support any candidate. I am not their supporter. I am a voter. That makes me the boss doing a job interview! That is concept that the voters must get into their heads. We are the boss and we are doing the interviews. You get the job if we say so. This whole "politically" active cheerleader crap is just not helping. And people need to start respecting others rights to choose. Hey just because they don't agree with you are see priorities differently doesn't make a person stupid. We need to end the Us vs Them we have now because it is really Us vs Us. What we need is the US vs the politicians.
Wow what a tin hat trip this is. First of all the kill switch is that selective. It would be an all or nothing war type thing. I don't know how many times I have to keep saying this but if the government wants to take out a website they will just use a DOS attack with some bot net like any other group would. That way the can say "it wasn't us" but frankly the simple truth is that NO speech website on the internet is worth the political risk to take out by illegal means. The political fall out would just be to great. Those that run websites and fear the US government will take them out in such a manner are just silly, paranoid, or think they are far more important than they really are. If the US government is going to take you down it will be with legal means and not with some presidential big red switch.
That by the way one of the reasons I like this big red switch in the hands of the president. If it can only be pressed by presidential order so that means the president would have to take responsibility for it. Which makes the chances of it being abused minimal. But the chicken little fear this seems to inspire is at best amusing but at worst harmful and distracting to any type of reasonable debate.
Yep. The Republicans are in big businesses' back pocket and the Demarcates are in Hollywood's back pocket. Thank goodness Hollywood isn't big business.... Hey but you know at least Hollywood supports their freedom of expression. Anyone else's not so much if it could in anyway impact their control and profits... Yea... I think I will start throwing up now.
Because the DaMattster is one of the many mindless drones that populate both parties. He believes that his party is good and enlightened while the other is stupid and evil. All is good that is "pick your party" and all that is wrong and evil is "the party you are not a member off". He is a true believer and a follower.
Actually maybe he will learn from this that there are good people "a few" in both parties. And a really annoying politicos "the vast majority" in both parties.
Yes but I do not see YouTube throwing away iPhone, IE, and Safari users just to push VP8. Yes it will help but YouTube will always support H.264 as well. I know it sounds like I am not for VP8 but that really isn't the case. I just have been around long enough to know how things work.
Cons Only gets 3G on the AT&T network. Only works with TMobile or AT&T in the US.
They are really nice devices. Just wish they offered CDMA version in the US or that the US moved to GSM. Maybe when LTE is everywhere we will have a single standard here.
The E-series are nice but that is only a good choice if he is on AT&T. T-Mobile's 3g band in the US usually isn't supported on unlocked Nokia's and only AT&T and TMobile use GSM in the states. Since he mentioned Verizon coverage I would guess he is in the US. The mobile market in the US can be a bit complex to say the least. A lot will depend what carrier this person is using. Since he is a student he may be on a family plan with his folks so switching to AT&T and getting a smartphone data plan may not be an option for him at this time.
No it isn't Right now H.264 is free as in beer to every Windows, Mac, iPhone, iPod, iPad, Android, WinMo, and Palm WebOS users on the planet. And probably a good deal more people that I am leaving out. For the vast majority of them that is free enough. To make this work Google is going to have to get VP8 out on a lot of devices convince a lot of developers to produce video in that format. Will it happen? Maybe one can really hope. The other solution will be if we can ever get software patents overturned. BTW which I am all for. But to even state that just being free is good enough goes 100% counter to history. MP3 isn't free Vorbis Ogg is. You just don't see much music in Ogg format do you? You have to have the support in devices to make a format fly.
poetmatt you really should drop it. You can not fight a zealot with fear and stage with simple facts. What we have here is someone that wants to be a celeb.
Which brings up an interesting issue. I would like to see software patents revoked but what about when software emulates hardware? As in the case of an emulator. You have software emulating patented hardware. The issue is even more confusing when PLDs. Can the PLD logic be patented if not then what about if use that to synthesis hardware. But you comments about Groklaw are really just over the top silly tin foil hat stuff. You may disagree with PJ on this subject but to accuse her of being in IBMs pay is as sill and as cruel as to suggest that you in Turbo Hercules pay. At this point I would just classify you and an over zealous nut case. Had you just disagreed then I would have just put it down to just a difference of opinion but those attacks without any evidence put you clearly in the zero credibility area.
"Concerning Groklaw, I don't want to make claims as to who funds it (although a lot of people have previously " Okay then don't "- not in this discussion here but elsewhere - voiced theories that might make sense), but there's no doubt that it's been slavishly loyal to IBM all along. Like I said, Groklaw's PJ is more loyal to IBM than Rush Limbaugh is to the Republican Party. Even if PJ doesn't disclose anything, I venture to guess Rush Limbaugh makes a lot of money, so the Republican Party can't afford him as a staffer." Oh yes you did. Wow PJ compared to Rush Limbaugh! You go boy. Or wearing mirrored sun glasses and a base ball cap living next to Hank Hill. Wow that was so funny.
IBM is not using the patents to attack Hercules. Hercules is up and available right now. Show me a take down notice or law suite. Yep IBM wants to make as much money as possible and the Z/OS lock makes them money. NEON is a way to run Z/OS not on the ZMachine hardware so blame. Also IBM said that it wouldn't use patents to attack FOSS NEON isn't FOSS. So nope this doesn't effect the FOSS community really at all. The one thing I would love to see is IBM to release a version of Z/OS for "educational" use. I would like to play with and learn it.
Thanks for your post. Really this has been turned down by both Groklaw and the Linux Foundation. For those that don't know this is what TurboHercules wants. IBM sells z/OS which is a closed source OS with a restrictive license that says you can only run it on an IBM zMachine. TurboHercules wants IBM to allow customers that buy z/OS to run it on the Hercules emulator. There is nothing involving the GPL or FOSS here at all except that Hercules runs under Linux and is released under the Q license which is FOSS but not GPL compatible. Now Neon wants to sell a closed source solution that allows you to off load some zMachine processing to co processors which IBM says violated their z/OS license. This is massive spin of the highest order. It has nothing to do with FOSS or patents or anything else. If you do not want to be stuck running IBM hardware I suggest that people migrate their software to Linux on the zMachine and then they can migrate away from the zMachine to any Linux box on the want. The company TurboHercules is actually spreading FUD because IBM doesn't want to do things their way. AKA TurboHercules is using the FOSS community for it's own ends and wrapping it's self in the FOSS flag. Both Groklaw and the Linux Foundation have said that they are spreading FUD.
BTW http://www.hercules-390.org/ is really a cool program. You can get older IBM mainframe OSs and run them on it and you can even run Linux on it if you want your own IBM mainframe to play with.
I suggest you actually read the law. The Communications act already give the president permission to do this. It was passed right after WWII started. Do you think you could send a telegram to Japan or Germany in 1943? Nope. The really rampant fear that people seem to have is just mind numbing at times. Yep go ahead and please debate this but do not use such silly chicken little fears in the debate! All that can do is make anyone questioning this bill to look like a nut job. Instead of this boarder line pathological fear let us all reason. Why should we pass this law? What benefits will it have. What risks are involved. How can we prevent abuses while keeping the benefits there are any?
No president will use this law lightly because it would be stupid. This would be at the same level as declaring martial law.
Besides if the government would never use this to silence opposition or debate. They would use bot nets to make classic DOS attacks on sites that couldn't be traced or some other tactic that would be more subtle and wouldn't disrupt commerce and the smooth running of the internet. To use the big red switch would be clumsy inefficient, and just stupid. Please if the government was going to be that evil don't you think they would be as smart and effective at being evil as some random poster on Slashdot?
I don't know. In the USA there is public debate of the law and it's pros and cons are discussed. People can public voice concerns and safe guards and restrictions to the law may added to avoid or at least minimize abuses. On top of that people are free to make stupid comments comparing the US to a totalitarian dictatorship and not be thrown in jail.
If you live in North Korea there is no restrictions to what you can see or read except that government protects the people from having to see any lies. And since that statement is without a doubt the truth anyone that states that they doubt it are confused and sick. For those poor people the government will help them by reeducating them. However there are some evil agents of outside forces trying to destroy the workers paradise that is North Korea, and those will be punished to protect the innocent workers.
Or to be used to stop a DOS attack on government or news servers or to shut down attacks on other vital services. The anti-government fear can be a bit much at times. It is good to question the government's polices but it is not good to be extremely paranoid. This like everything else can be used for good as well as bad things. Just tell me what public utility doesn't have the ability isolate parts of it's network to control damage? In many ways this is as outlandish of a fear as the government shutting off electricity, water, gas, or phone service to it's political opponents. Heck if the government was going to take out some server like that they would just use some botnet to do a classic DOS attack that couldn't be traced back to the government flipping some big red switch! Please if you are going to be a complete paranoid at least keep your fears some what plausible.
He is having problems printing. In this case Java may be the best solution to the problem. Given a choice I really do prefure java to java script but that is just me. In this case he was asking for the best browser to solve his problems. I would suggest using Chrome since this seems like an Intranet app and not an Internet app. To solve the printing issue I would suggest going with a PDF output. That will bypass all the issues with browser printing and will give the developer a good print out. Hey PDF really is a good solution for printing. But yes there seems to me a lot of ways to skin this cat. You could write a Java app or applet. You could do a classic client server solution in any number of languages, you can do a browser based solution. Since the author posted that he is writing in Rails he is probably committed to a web based solution. A popular but I feel over hyped solution. However if that is where his skills lie might I suggest that he look at http://www.rubyinside.com/prawn-ruby-pdf-library-987.html and http://ruby-pdf.rubyforge.org/pdf-writer/demos/index.html Since this is a ticketing system for a shipping he may want to think about things like interfacing with RFID and barcode readers. Not to mention generating barcodes.
Actually I am an Android users and I really don't have any issues with multitasking on my phone. My wife has WebOS and I also have an iPod Touch so I have experience with all three. I agree that the Kin is a good example of Microsoft blowing it. The ZunePass is great. If I could get it on my Android phone I would in a second. Microsoft just doesn't know how to promote it. The Kin blows in other ways. It may actually be a good messaging phone but you must have a data plan. I would just get an Android phone instead. It isn't Win Phone 7. It isn't a ZunePhone. It isn't a messaging phone, it isn't a smartphone! It also isn't a WinMo 6.5 phone. It just has a list of things it isn't. If it was a WinPho7 phone with games and apps and the ZunePass it could be a smash hit. Frankly it looks cool but just not worth it over a smart phone for about the same cost. I will say that I do not think multitasking is over rated. It really is all to handy even on my Android phone.
Slashdot Mirror
Yea in theory you are right but let's take a hard look at your arguments.
"If you're using software on a different platform, then you're not covered by it. "
What percentage of people is that? Let's make it even a bit more honest what % of people using Linux and or BSD have not downloaded FFmpeg or some other package that adds H.264 support?
And if you have already paid for OS/X, Windows, Android or... you have already paid. H.264 free to you as far as you can tell.
Is it really free? Well to be honest it may be since both Microsoft and Apple own patents on parts of H.264 they may actually get to distribute it for zero cost to themselves.
Yes the consumer is some way probably pays some tiny bit somewhere in the chain but for the average person it feels as free as air.
And honestly that is what counts to the vast majority of people.
Maybe but again they will always support H.264 because of the devices that don't support it.
I blame the people that don't have a clue about politics but think that they do and are way too interested!
If you get into politics you will find that you become part of the problem.
We need a real change.
I don't support any candidate. I am not their supporter. I am a voter. That makes me the boss doing a job interview!
That is concept that the voters must get into their heads. We are the boss and we are doing the interviews. You get the job if we say so.
This whole "politically" active cheerleader crap is just not helping. And people need to start respecting others rights to choose.
Hey just because they don't agree with you are see priorities differently doesn't make a person stupid.
We need to end the Us vs Them we have now because it is really Us vs Us.
What we need is the US vs the politicians.
Wow what a tin hat trip this is.
First of all the kill switch is that selective. It would be an all or nothing war type thing. I don't know how many times I have to keep saying this but if the government wants to take out a website they will just use a DOS attack with some bot net like any other group would. That way the can say "it wasn't us" but frankly the simple truth is that NO speech website on the internet is worth the political risk to take out by illegal means.
The political fall out would just be to great.
Those that run websites and fear the US government will take them out in such a manner are just silly, paranoid, or think they are far more important than they really are.
If the US government is going to take you down it will be with legal means and not with some presidential big red switch.
That by the way one of the reasons I like this big red switch in the hands of the president.
If it can only be pressed by presidential order so that means the president would have to take responsibility for it.
Which makes the chances of it being abused minimal.
But the chicken little fear this seems to inspire is at best amusing but at worst harmful and distracting to any type of reasonable debate.
Yep. The Republicans are in big businesses' back pocket and the Demarcates are in Hollywood's back pocket. Thank goodness Hollywood isn't big business.... ... I think I will start throwing up now.
Hey but you know at least Hollywood supports their freedom of expression. Anyone else's not so much if it could in anyway impact their control and profits...
Yea
How about you vote for candidates and not parties? Yes that is what I expect.
But then I expect a lot. Like manners and rational thought.
Because the DaMattster is one of the many mindless drones that populate both parties.
He believes that his party is good and enlightened while the other is stupid and evil.
All is good that is "pick your party" and all that is wrong and evil is "the party you are not a member off".
He is a true believer and a follower.
Actually maybe he will learn from this that there are good people "a few" in both parties.
And a really annoying politicos "the vast majority" in both parties.
Yes but I do not see YouTube throwing away iPhone, IE, and Safari users just to push VP8.
Yes it will help but YouTube will always support H.264 as well.
I know it sounds like I am not for VP8 but that really isn't the case.
I just have been around long enough to know how things work.
Cons
Only gets 3G on the AT&T network.
Only works with TMobile or AT&T in the US.
They are really nice devices. Just wish they offered CDMA version in the US or that the US moved to GSM. Maybe when LTE is everywhere we will have a single standard here.
The E-series are nice but that is only a good choice if he is on AT&T.
T-Mobile's 3g band in the US usually isn't supported on unlocked Nokia's and only AT&T and TMobile use GSM in the states.
Since he mentioned Verizon coverage I would guess he is in the US. The mobile market in the US can be a bit complex to say the least.
A lot will depend what carrier this person is using. Since he is a student he may be on a family plan with his folks so switching to AT&T and getting a smartphone data plan may not be an option for him at this time.
Maybe combine it with Google Voice to make the routing the number easy. Now if Google voice just offered VOP integrated with it you would be all set.
Yep I thought the exact same thing. It doesn't really mean a thing but would a jury understand that?
No it isn't
Right now H.264 is free as in beer to every Windows, Mac, iPhone, iPod, iPad, Android, WinMo, and Palm WebOS users on the planet. And probably a good deal more people that I am leaving out.
For the vast majority of them that is free enough.
To make this work Google is going to have to get VP8 out on a lot of devices convince a lot of developers to produce video in that format.
Will it happen? Maybe one can really hope.
The other solution will be if we can ever get software patents overturned.
BTW which I am all for.
But to even state that just being free is good enough goes 100% counter to history.
MP3 isn't free Vorbis Ogg is. You just don't see much music in Ogg format do you?
You have to have the support in devices to make a format fly.
poetmatt you really should drop it.
You can not fight a zealot with fear and stage with simple facts.
What we have here is someone that wants to be a celeb.
Which brings up an interesting issue.
I would like to see software patents revoked but what about when software emulates hardware?
As in the case of an emulator. You have software emulating patented hardware. The issue is even more confusing when PLDs.
Can the PLD logic be patented if not then what about if use that to synthesis hardware.
But you comments about Groklaw are really just over the top silly tin foil hat stuff.
You may disagree with PJ on this subject but to accuse her of being in IBMs pay is as sill and as cruel as to suggest that you in Turbo Hercules pay.
At this point I would just classify you and an over zealous nut case. Had you just disagreed then I would have just put it down to just a difference of opinion but those attacks without any evidence put you clearly in the zero credibility area.
Oh yeah got to love the voice of reason....
Because it is just about never heard from.
"Concerning Groklaw, I don't want to make claims as to who funds it (although a lot of people have previously "
Okay then don't
"- not in this discussion here but elsewhere - voiced theories that might make sense), but there's no doubt that it's been slavishly loyal to IBM all along. Like I said, Groklaw's PJ is more loyal to IBM than Rush Limbaugh is to the Republican Party. Even if PJ doesn't disclose anything, I venture to guess Rush Limbaugh makes a lot of money, so the Republican Party can't afford him as a staffer."
Oh yes you did. Wow PJ compared to Rush Limbaugh!
You go boy. Or wearing mirrored sun glasses and a base ball cap living next to Hank Hill.
Wow that was so funny.
IBM is not using the patents to attack Hercules. Hercules is up and available right now. Show me a take down notice or law suite.
Yep IBM wants to make as much money as possible and the Z/OS lock makes them money.
NEON is a way to run Z/OS not on the ZMachine hardware so blame. Also IBM said that it wouldn't use patents to attack FOSS NEON isn't FOSS.
So nope this doesn't effect the FOSS community really at all.
The one thing I would love to see is IBM to release a version of Z/OS for "educational" use. I would like to play with and learn it.
Thanks for your post.
Really this has been turned down by both Groklaw and the Linux Foundation.
For those that don't know this is what TurboHercules wants.
IBM sells z/OS which is a closed source OS with a restrictive license that says you can only run it on an IBM zMachine.
TurboHercules wants IBM to allow customers that buy z/OS to run it on the Hercules emulator.
There is nothing involving the GPL or FOSS here at all except that Hercules runs under Linux and is released under the Q license which is FOSS but not GPL compatible.
Now Neon wants to sell a closed source solution that allows you to off load some zMachine processing to co processors which IBM says violated their z/OS license.
This is massive spin of the highest order.
It has nothing to do with FOSS or patents or anything else.
If you do not want to be stuck running IBM hardware I suggest that people migrate their software to Linux on the zMachine and then they can migrate away from the zMachine to any Linux box on the want.
The company TurboHercules is actually spreading FUD because IBM doesn't want to do things their way.
AKA TurboHercules is using the FOSS community for it's own ends and wrapping it's self in the FOSS flag.
Both Groklaw and the Linux Foundation have said that they are spreading FUD.
BTW http://www.hercules-390.org/ is really a cool program. You can get older IBM mainframe OSs and run them on it and you can even run Linux on it if you want your own IBM mainframe to play with.
I suggest you actually read the law.
The Communications act already give the president permission to do this. It was passed right after WWII started.
Do you think you could send a telegram to Japan or Germany in 1943?
Nope.
The really rampant fear that people seem to have is just mind numbing at times. Yep go ahead and please debate this but do not use such silly chicken little fears in the debate!
All that can do is make anyone questioning this bill to look like a nut job.
Instead of this boarder line pathological fear let us all reason.
Why should we pass this law?
What benefits will it have.
What risks are involved.
How can we prevent abuses while keeping the benefits there are any?
No president will use this law lightly because it would be stupid. This would be at the same level as declaring martial law.
Besides if the government would never use this to silence opposition or debate.
They would use bot nets to make classic DOS attacks on sites that couldn't be traced or some other tactic that would be more subtle and wouldn't disrupt commerce and the smooth running of the internet.
To use the big red switch would be clumsy inefficient, and just stupid. Please if the government was going to be that evil don't you think they would be as smart and effective at being evil as some random poster on Slashdot?
I don't know.
In the USA there is public debate of the law and it's pros and cons are discussed. People can public voice concerns and safe guards and restrictions to the law may added to avoid or at least minimize abuses.
On top of that people are free to make stupid comments comparing the US to a totalitarian dictatorship and not be thrown in jail.
If you live in North Korea there is no restrictions to what you can see or read except that government protects the people from having to see any lies. And since that statement is without a doubt the truth anyone that states that they doubt it are confused and sick. For those poor people the government will help them by reeducating them. However there are some evil agents of outside forces trying to destroy the workers paradise that is North Korea, and those will be punished to protect the innocent workers.
So exactly where do you live?
Or to be used to stop a DOS attack on government or news servers or to shut down attacks on other vital services.
The anti-government fear can be a bit much at times. It is good to question the government's polices but it is not good to be extremely paranoid.
This like everything else can be used for good as well as bad things. Just tell me what public utility doesn't have the ability isolate parts of it's network to control damage?
In many ways this is as outlandish of a fear as the government shutting off electricity, water, gas, or phone service to it's political opponents.
Heck if the government was going to take out some server like that they would just use some botnet to do a classic DOS attack that couldn't be traced back to the government flipping some big red switch!
Please if you are going to be a complete paranoid at least keep your fears some what plausible.
True. I guess that is worse. They saw tablets coming and still couldn't make a good one.
He is having problems printing. In this case Java may be the best solution to the problem. Given a choice I really do prefure java to java script but that is just me.
In this case he was asking for the best browser to solve his problems.
I would suggest using Chrome since this seems like an Intranet app and not an Internet app.
To solve the printing issue I would suggest going with a PDF output. That will bypass all the issues with browser printing and will give the developer a good print out. Hey PDF really is a good solution for printing.
But yes there seems to me a lot of ways to skin this cat. You could write a Java app or applet. You could do a classic client server solution in any number of languages, you can do a browser based solution.
Since the author posted that he is writing in Rails he is probably committed to a web based solution. A popular but I feel over hyped solution. However if that is where his skills lie might I suggest that he look at http://www.rubyinside.com/prawn-ruby-pdf-library-987.html and http://ruby-pdf.rubyforge.org/pdf-writer/demos/index.html
Since this is a ticketing system for a shipping he may want to think about things like interfacing with RFID and barcode readers. Not to mention generating barcodes.
Actually I am an Android users and I really don't have any issues with multitasking on my phone. My wife has WebOS and I also have an iPod Touch so I have experience with all three.
I agree that the Kin is a good example of Microsoft blowing it.
The ZunePass is great. If I could get it on my Android phone I would in a second. Microsoft just doesn't know how to promote it.
The Kin blows in other ways. It may actually be a good messaging phone but you must have a data plan. I would just get an Android phone instead. It isn't Win Phone 7. It isn't a ZunePhone. It isn't a messaging phone, it isn't a smartphone!
It also isn't a WinMo 6.5 phone. It just has a list of things it isn't.
If it was a WinPho7 phone with games and apps and the ZunePass it could be a smash hit.
Frankly it looks cool but just not worth it over a smart phone for about the same cost.
I will say that I do not think multitasking is over rated. It really is all to handy even on my Android phone.