The DMCA includes provisions which deal with technological copy protection schemes. Why? To prevent piracy. Do you think the MPAA really cares if you buy their products with the intention of watching them on Linux vs. Windows? Of course not. They get their cut either way. Their interest is to prevent piracy.
The DVD CCA, now...they care, because without license fees for CSS, they have no income, correct?
I'm sure we'll see hundreds of comments rehashing the same arguments about how we paid for the DVDs and we only want to view them using our OS of choice, and how copying DVDs is inpractical.
What I'm sure will be lost in the noise is the fact that some of the sites the MPAA is going after are, in fact, for crackers who only want to pirate DVDs. I've seen these sites..."dudez, get your moviez here...". Of course going after DeCSS is the wrong approach, but there are two sides to the story, and some people will just try to pirate movies.
Now I'm sure I'll get flamed for being a corporate lackey. That's not the case. However, we'd do well to remember that the MPAA has a right and a duty to attempt to prevent pirating. We need to educate them that just because we have a copy of DeCSS doesn't mean we're going pirates, no more than having a sthethoscope means that we're safecrackers.
Notice the conspicuous absence of the words "Open Source". It looks like this will be based on SGI's source, not Mesa, and therefore closed. Hopefully, nVidia's part will be open enough to help the Mesa/XFree team.
The GIMP is a nice application, don't get me wrong, but the UI stinks. It has severe usability problems. Tear off/persistent menus would go a long way towards fixing this problem. Aver tried to repeat an operation several times in the GIMP, when it's buried three levels down in the menus? Major PITA. How 'bout some of the redo-last functionality from Photoshop? Come on, hiding everything behind several menu layers (in a pop-up menu at that) is not good UI design.
Tarantella Enterprise II is the flagship Tarantella product providing enterprise class features for customers demanding an extensible, scaleable solution. Tarantella Enterprise II servers can be configured as a centrally managed array, supporting thousands of users. They can also connect to hundreds of application servers providing the reliablility, availability and scaleability needed for enterprises.
What is Tarantella software? Is it middleware?
In a way it is middleware, but that term does not truly describe the full capabilities of the Tarantella product ("Tarantella"). Tarantella is middleware in that it sits between your appliation servers and client devices. But unlike most traditional middleware, Tarantella allows you to deploy existing server based applications, as well as new ones, over the network, via a web interface, without the need to rewrite anything.
Well, I'm glad we got that cleared up!
Ok, so it gets slightly more informative, but apparently the most important thing about the product is that it's fully buzzword compliant.
It appears many people on/. are advocating the wrong approach to dealing with this, namely spreading the code far and wide. This is doomed to fail, because we're being driven underground, and prevented from engaging in perfectly legal activity...the reverse engineering of CSS for the purposes of compatibility. Spreading the code around in the absence of someone willing to take responsibility for maintaining it is not going to help in producing a Linux/OpenSource DVD player. Running underground is acting like the pirates they want to paint us as.
I can understand Jon and Derek's position. When the laywer hounds of hell are after you and you're in the hotseat, it's perfectly natural to turn and run. Is there a larger organization (with deeper pockets and/or staff lawyers) that'd be willing to take a stand with Jon and/or Derek to fight for their rights? Perhaps we could get the FSF or the EFF interested. Probably the EFF more so than the FSF, but still do we wish to give up our rights simply because we're unwilling to fight for them?
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The DMCA includes provisions which deal with technological copy protection schemes. Why? To prevent piracy. Do you think the MPAA really cares if you buy their products with the intention of watching them on Linux vs. Windows? Of course not. They get their cut either way. Their interest is to prevent piracy.
The DVD CCA, now...they care, because without license fees for CSS, they have no income, correct?
I'm sure we'll see hundreds of comments rehashing the same arguments about how we paid for the DVDs and we only want to view them using our OS of choice, and how copying DVDs is inpractical.
What I'm sure will be lost in the noise is the fact that some of the sites the MPAA is going after are, in fact, for crackers who only want to pirate DVDs. I've seen these sites..."dudez, get your moviez here...". Of course going after DeCSS is the wrong approach, but there are two sides to the story, and some people will just try to pirate movies.
Now I'm sure I'll get flamed for being a corporate lackey. That's not the case. However, we'd do well to remember that the MPAA has a right and a duty to attempt to prevent pirating. We need to educate them that just because we have a copy of DeCSS doesn't mean we're going pirates, no more than having a sthethoscope means that we're safecrackers.
Notice the conspicuous absence of the words "Open Source". It looks like this will be based on SGI's source, not Mesa, and therefore closed. Hopefully, nVidia's part will be open enough to help the Mesa/XFree team.
The GIMP is a nice application, don't get me wrong, but the UI stinks. It has severe usability problems. Tear off/persistent menus would go a long way towards fixing this problem. Aver tried to repeat an operation several times in the GIMP, when it's buried three levels down in the menus? Major PITA. How 'bout some of the redo-last functionality from Photoshop? Come on, hiding everything behind several menu layers (in a pop-up menu at that) is not good UI design.
Well, I'm glad we got that cleared up!
Ok, so it gets slightly more informative, but apparently the most important thing about the product is that it's fully buzzword compliant.
It appears many people on /. are advocating the wrong approach to dealing with this, namely spreading the code far and wide. This is doomed to fail, because we're being driven underground, and prevented from engaging in perfectly legal activity...the reverse engineering of CSS for the purposes of compatibility. Spreading the code around in the absence of someone willing to take responsibility for maintaining it is not going to help in producing a Linux/OpenSource DVD player. Running underground is acting like the pirates they want to paint us as.
I can understand Jon and Derek's position. When the laywer hounds of hell are after you and you're in the hotseat, it's perfectly natural to turn and run. Is there a larger organization (with deeper pockets and/or staff lawyers) that'd be willing to take a stand with Jon and/or Derek to fight for their rights? Perhaps we could get the FSF or the EFF interested. Probably the EFF more so than the FSF, but still do we wish to give up our rights simply because we're unwilling to fight for them?
Does this refer to the linux version too? .ra files into .mp3?
BTW, does anyone know a way to convert