But, if you download or buy a single copy of Linux, the ONLY reason you can copy it to all 2000 of your internal machines is that you accept the GPL right?
distribution inside your organisation does not require you to agree to the GPL.
(Of course, the odd part is how vhenement some/.ers are about this. You'd think that I was threatening the very nature of copyleft just by saying "it's a contract.")
well, i am not vehement about it; i just disagreed with your interpretation that the constraints of the gpl constituted consideration.
it didnt degenerate into personal attacks or anything, so it's all good.
i think we'll just have to agree to disagree on wether it is enough to make the gpl a contract. In a year or two, the courts might settle it for us.
In fact, they could even have the ID chip shut off after a year, requiring people to buy new tyres from Ford on yearly basis no matter what the wear/tear/condition was.
dont be rediculous. no company would put their customers into a mandatory, pointless, yearly upgrade cycle just to sustain their profits.
I mean, to do that, they'd have to have a monopoly.
And while you're waiting for it to compile, you can install Debian and be more productive.
nah. i'll just sleep. i have at least 8 hours where i'm not using my computer anyway; it can compile stuff for me while i'm out having fun or getting sleep.
The GPL grants that right, and then takes part of it away.
no. it doesnt.
it grants a right and defines the limitations on it. The part you insist is taking something away from you is a clarification of where the rights it is granting you end.
If i say you can borrow my car, but i want it back by 6pm. i'm not giving you the right to use my car in perpetuity and then taking that right away.
I don't see where the money argument comes into play here?
the money argument came in based on time to develop and the cost of programmer salaries for the development, i think. (it's been a while since i read the original microsoft article and the register article about it, but i think that was the crux of it.)
As was pointed out in the Register article, their sample was skewed to create this result due to the fact that they chose two developers using linux who had uncharacteristically complex projects (resulting in developer man months of 1955 and 1700) and a simple thin client project using XP embedded that took two developers one month (resulting in a developer man month total of 2).
When your sample size is 50, that pretty much ruins any validity your sample has of representing the industry as a whole.
the register article is here: http://www.theregister.co.uk/content/4/3180 4.html
The GPL lets you use the software for free (yay!), and then you can make your own software based on GPL'd software (again, yay!). BUT--if you do make any software based on GPL'd software, you have to release it in a near-identical license to the GPL--and here is where the right is taken away, and where the whole "BSD v GPL" shism comes from.
under copyright law, you do not have a right to make a derivative work and distribute it. The GPL is not taking away a right to do that.
The GPL is granting you the priviledge of making derivative works and distributing them and is defining the constraints and limits on doing so. That does not constitute taking away a right.
That would be like saying that the BSD license takes away the right of a user to use BSD code without attributing it to the original author (because that is a constraint put on the use of the code in the BSD license).
You dont have that right. You never had that right. So nobody can take it away from you.
The founding fathers also understood that society and morals change over time. They set in place a system to facilitate that change and allow the government to evolve with it.
Challenging laws and free speech issues in the court system is part of the process of the evolution of government. I think the founding fathers would prefer people to be agressive in defending their position against agressive government interference; after all, that's basically how this country got started.
with respect to amsterdam, lots of places have zoning laws that would do the same thing as what you describe. I'm not sure if Dallas has zoning laws to taht effect, but it is really irrelevent to the issue at hand. He wasnt convicted of selling adult comics next to a church. he was convicted of selling obscene material (regardless of where he sold it).
To be honest (and i dont mean this as an attack, though it might sound like one), your argument about Amsterdam would sound better if it wasnt just random speculation on your part. It would still be irrelevent, but it'd sound more convincing.
In part, but only in making the more general argument that obscene material isn't necessarily protected speech. This is what the poster I quoted had taken issue with, saying that there were no obscenity clauses in the Constitution.
i agree that obscene material isnt necessarily protected speech.
Actually, this case struck down the test of "utterly without redeeming social value." The new test was whether the work did not have serious literary, artistic, political, or scientific value. The example given in the decision of this "serious value" was medical books which use graphic illustrations and descriptions of human anatomy as a necessary tool for education.
my error. i seriously misworded my statement. (it was late, i was tired, insert any excuse that'll get me off the hook for screwing up here)
Yes, I'm ashamed to be one of those geeks that doesn't partake in the Monty Python on a nightly basis... But no, I've been here since 1999 and damn proud of it:-P
1999? damn young whippersnappers got no appreciation for history. you got no appreciation for what come before you.
I do however have every episode of ST:TNG on VHS, does that count?
ST:TNG? come back when you pick up the original series. VHS? back in my day we had to record our tv shows by pointing a super 8 camera at the tv.
i tell ya, kids these days, they just dont....*SNORE* *SNORE*
true, but it's hard to claim you were in the dark when IBM's legal dept. is offering guided tours of the incredibly well lit room you made the decision in.
I'm no doctor, but as i understand it you do it with rats by putting a bunch of male rats in a cage together.
Apparently, you do it with McBride by putting him in a company with $.001 stock options and an artificially inflated valuation based primarily on how loud you can yell obscenities at your target market.
You know, nowhere but the stock market can picking a fight with a guy you absolutely know will beat the crap out of you make people want to bet money on you.
We view IBM's counterclaim filing today as an effort to distract attention from its flawed Linux business model
You gotta love it when a company that has posted multiple million dollar losses for the last 5 years, can't find a market for their product, and admits in it's sec filings that it's current actions will alienate it from it's market and customers says IBM has a flawed business model.
but it is "a law". it falls under the classification of "law" and even calls itself "law". It's the highest law, but it's still law. It is not "a statute"
Whatever. Enough. Sorry for trying to make a subtle distinction in a place that obviously doesn't handle subtlety well.
i have no problem with the subtle distinction you were trying to make. The difference between a federal statute and the constitution is good to note.
I was merely making a subtle distinction in the same vein.
I think we do agree, though, that this is largely pointless to pursue and your original point about the distinction between federal law and the constitution is clear.
I find this kind of argument strange. Why does the freedom of speech necessarily cover local sales of adult manga? The US Constitution doesn't guarantee the "freedom to distribute racy Japanese comics for a profit at any locale." Yet that's what the guy is in trouble for, not for his speech.
to which i said that the issue of free speech is about the merits of the material and it's qualification as being obscene. The distribution of the material is irrelevent to wether it is actually obscene.
in your original post, you also said:
I don't think this porn vendor's right to express ideas has been unduly circumscribed. Most likely he could have legally communicated whatever idea that he may have had.
I agree that it has nothing to do with his right to express ideas, but that isnt what the free speech issue in this case is about.
Your whole argument in your first post is that the vendor's free speech rights are not affected. We agree on that.
The point of the whole free speech angle is that if the manga itself is protected speech, then it fails to me part 3 of the criteria to be found obscene. (part 3 is not constrained to community standards. only part 1 is) if the material fails the definition of obscenity, he cannot be convicted of peddling obscene material.
and he can, because it is not protected speech, because the state considers it obscene. Miller Vs. California, 1973, the Court determined that obscenity can be measured by state, rather than national, standards.
absolutely true, however, part 3 of the criteria that is listed in Miller Vs. California requires that the material have no redeeming social or political content. That criteria isnt constrained to the opinions of the community. The community standard only applies to part 1 of the obscenity definition.
The free speech issue wouldnt attack the community standards argument, or even the state law argument, it would attack the idea that the material itself has no other redeeming value, and that is irrelevent to the community in which it is sold.
I agree that the Supreme Court is not in the business of second guessing juries in general.
The post i was replying to said they could not hear the case regardless of its merits because they'd have to throw out the community standards precedent they themselves set.
My point was that if the supreme court wanted to hear the case, they could do so without interfering with the community standards section of the definition of obscenity.
It's a state law. I don't think this sort of law would hold up if it was federal, but since it is a Texan state law.
Obscenity is defined in such a way that local community standards are a part of determining if something is obscene. As such, it would be hard to declare something obscene on a federal level.
Until just recently it was illegal for gay men to have consentual sex in Texas..
this was the case in many other states as well. Don't think it was just Texas. Several years ago there was a guy in Georgia who went to jail for having consentual oral sex with his wife in the privacy of their own home. Apparently, that violated the sodomy laws in Georgia.
(i know someone is going to ask how they cought/convicted him. He was getting a divorce and his wife got the DA to press charges against him for sodomy. She got immunity and testified against him. He went to jail and she was awarded all the family assets since he was a convict. Personally, I think i'd have to kill her.)
It seems some Texans feel they have a right to dictate what others can and can not do even when it doesn't affect them in the least and isn't harmful.
That has nothing to do with texas. That's a human problem.
Yes, but it has been decided that obscenity it handled on a state wide level, and not federal. This is because what is obscene in one state is perfectly acceptable in another.
Actually, the criteria for obscenity has 3 parts; all of which have to be satisfied for something to be obscene. The first part deals with the average community standard. The second part deals with application of state law. The third part deals generically with if the material has any redeeming social or literary value. That third part says nothing limiting it to local or state consideration for redeeming value.
If the supreme court decided that the comic expressed an idea that could be considered speech, it could be protected and could not be found to be obscene, since it would fail the third criteria of the test.
For example: Prostitution is legal in Nevada, and not considered obscene. Try handing flyers for prostitution out in, say, St. George, Utah.
actually, prostitution is not legal in all of Nevada. Nevada law makes prostitution legal in counties that have a population lower than a certain cap (i think it's 10000 people). Prostitution is not legal in Las Vegas, for example.
I dont think the prostitution thing is relevent to the discussion though. The criminalization of prostitution isnt by way of asserting it is obscene. I think it is predicated on the idea that it's a crime against nature (like bestiality and sodomy laws).
I believe the "across the street from a school" is the main problem
This shouldnt matter at all in the case. There are plenty of convenience stores selling porn across the street from schools in Texas. I think this was included for the prejudicial value it would have on public opinion and the jury.
If I recall correctly, in Texas it is illegal to sell "obscenity" within a certain range (1000 ft?) of a school.
I dont think there is any such restriction in Texas.
I disagree that the supreme court is stuck. the community standards issue is only 1/3 of the test required to find something obscene. All three of the requirements of the test must be satisfied for something to be obscene.
The supreme court could find that it failed either of the other two parts without ever touching the community standards issue.
Is it law? Sure. Is Linux a program? Sure. Is it more accurate to call Linux a kernel? Of course. Is it more accurate to distinguish the Constitution from that which it controls? Of course.
but you stopped short of covering the point of contention. The point of contention is "if someone said linux was not a program, would that be inaccurate?" and the answer is "yes".
Again, my apologies for the confusion. I was glossing Hemos's use of the word "law" as a layman's substitute for the lawyerSpeak "statute," since he called the First Amendment "a federal law," not merely "federal law".
That is a fair point to make. However, you made the same mistake Hemos did by saying it wasnt a law at all.
What the Founding Fathers *did* intend was for states' sovereignity to be better respected.
This is true, but it is also true that the Founding Fathers explicitly intended that the expression and dissemination of unpleasant and unpopular ideas should be protected from interference from government (federal and local).
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But, if you download or buy a single copy of Linux, the ONLY reason you can copy it to all 2000 of your internal machines is that you accept the GPL right?
distribution inside your organisation does not require you to agree to the GPL.
the company that bought the license has not committed copyright infringement. SCO has.
(Of course, the odd part is how vhenement some /.ers are about this. You'd think that I was threatening the very nature of copyleft just by saying "it's a contract.")
well, i am not vehement about it; i just disagreed with your interpretation that the constraints of the gpl constituted consideration.
it didnt degenerate into personal attacks or anything, so it's all good.
i think we'll just have to agree to disagree on wether it is enough to make the gpl a contract.
In a year or two, the courts might settle it for us.
In fact, they could even have the ID chip shut off after a year, requiring people to buy new tyres from Ford on yearly basis no matter what the wear/tear/condition was.
dont be rediculous. no company would put their customers into a mandatory, pointless, yearly upgrade cycle just to sustain their profits.
I mean, to do that, they'd have to have a monopoly.
And while you're waiting for it to compile, you can install Debian and be more productive.
nah. i'll just sleep. i have at least 8 hours where i'm not using my computer anyway; it can compile stuff for me while i'm out having fun or getting sleep.
The GPL grants that right, and then takes part of it away.
no. it doesnt.
it grants a right and defines the limitations on it. The part you insist is taking something away from you is a clarification of where the rights it is granting you end.
If i say you can borrow my car, but i want it back by 6pm. i'm not giving you the right to use my car in perpetuity and then taking that right away.
I don't see where the money argument comes into play here?
0 4.html
the money argument came in based on time to develop and the cost of programmer salaries for the development, i think. (it's been a while since i read the original microsoft article and the register article about it, but i think that was the crux of it.)
As was pointed out in the Register article, their sample was skewed to create this result due to the fact that they chose two developers using linux who had uncharacteristically complex projects (resulting in developer man months of 1955 and 1700) and a simple thin client project using XP embedded that took two developers one month (resulting in a developer man month total of 2).
When your sample size is 50, that pretty much ruins any validity your sample has of representing the industry as a whole.
the register article is here:
http://www.theregister.co.uk/content/4/318
The GPL lets you use the software for free (yay!), and then you can make your own software based on GPL'd software (again, yay!). BUT--if you do make any software based on GPL'd software, you have to release it in a near-identical license to the GPL--and here is where the right is taken away, and where the whole "BSD v GPL" shism comes from.
under copyright law, you do not have a right to make a derivative work and distribute it. The GPL is not taking away a right to do that.
The GPL is granting you the priviledge of making derivative works and distributing them and is defining the constraints and limits on doing so. That does not constitute taking away a right.
That would be like saying that the BSD license takes away the right of a user to use BSD code without attributing it to the original author (because that is a constraint put on the use of the code in the BSD license).
You dont have that right. You never had that right. So nobody can take it away from you.
The founding fathers also understood that society and morals change over time. They set in place a system to facilitate that change and allow the government to evolve with it.
Challenging laws and free speech issues in the court system is part of the process of the evolution of government. I think the founding fathers would prefer people to be agressive in defending their position against agressive government interference; after all, that's basically how this country got started.
with respect to amsterdam, lots of places have zoning laws that would do the same thing as what you describe. I'm not sure if Dallas has zoning laws to taht effect, but it is really irrelevent to the issue at hand. He wasnt convicted of selling adult comics next to a church. he was convicted of selling obscene material (regardless of where he sold it).
To be honest (and i dont mean this as an attack, though it might sound like one), your argument about Amsterdam would sound better if it wasnt just random speculation on your part. It would still be irrelevent, but it'd sound more convincing.
In part, but only in making the more general argument that obscene material isn't necessarily protected speech. This is what the poster I quoted had taken issue with, saying that there were no obscenity clauses in the Constitution.
i agree that obscene material isnt necessarily protected speech.
Actually, this case struck down the test of "utterly without redeeming social value." The new test was whether the work did not have serious literary, artistic, political, or scientific value. The example given in the decision of this "serious value" was medical books which use graphic illustrations and descriptions of human anatomy as a necessary tool for education.
my error. i seriously misworded my statement. (it was late, i was tired, insert any excuse that'll get me off the hook for screwing up here)
The goatse.cx guy just called a press conference to announce the lawsuit he's filing against you for stealing his intellectual property.
He said that, unlike his last lawsuit (against IBM and, ironically, the origin of the picture) he thinks he can win against you.
Yes, I'm ashamed to be one of those geeks that doesn't partake in the Monty Python on a nightly basis... But no, I've been here since 1999 and damn proud of it :-P
1999?
damn young whippersnappers got no appreciation for history. you got no appreciation for what come before you.
I do however have every episode of ST:TNG on VHS, does that count?
ST:TNG? come back when you pick up the original series. VHS? back in my day we had to record our tv shows by pointing a super 8 camera at the tv.
i tell ya, kids these days, they just dont....*SNORE* *SNORE*
true, but it's hard to claim you were in the dark when IBM's legal dept. is offering guided tours of the incredibly well lit room you made the decision in.
How does one grow balls that size?
I'm no doctor, but as i understand it you do it with rats by putting a bunch of male rats in a cage together.
Apparently, you do it with McBride by putting him in a company with $.001 stock options and an artificially inflated valuation based primarily on how loud you can yell obscenities at your target market.
You know, nowhere but the stock market can picking a fight with a guy you absolutely know will beat the crap out of you make people want to bet money on you.
We view IBM's counterclaim filing today as an effort to distract attention from its flawed Linux business model
You gotta love it when a company that has posted multiple million dollar losses for the last 5 years, can't find a market for their product, and admits in it's sec filings that it's current actions will alienate it from it's market and customers says IBM has a flawed business model.
-> move out of the united states
this just changes the accent (and possibly language) in which you receive your biased news.
I'm still saying that it's not a law.
but it is "a law". it falls under the classification of "law" and even calls itself "law". It's the highest law, but it's still law. It is not "a statute"
Whatever. Enough. Sorry for trying to make a subtle distinction in a place that obviously doesn't handle subtlety well.
i have no problem with the subtle distinction you were trying to make. The difference between a federal statute and the constitution is good to note.
I was merely making a subtle distinction in the same vein.
I think we do agree, though, that this is largely pointless to pursue and your original point about the distinction between federal law and the constitution is clear.
in the original post, you said :
:
I find this kind of argument strange. Why does the freedom of speech necessarily cover local sales of adult manga? The US Constitution doesn't guarantee the "freedom to distribute racy Japanese comics for a profit at any locale." Yet that's what the guy is in trouble for, not for his speech.
to which i said that the issue of free speech is about the merits of the material and it's qualification as being obscene. The distribution of the material is irrelevent to wether it is actually obscene.
in your original post, you also said
I don't think this porn vendor's right to express ideas has been unduly circumscribed. Most likely he could have legally communicated whatever idea that he may have had.
I agree that it has nothing to do with his right to express ideas, but that isnt what the free speech issue in this case is about.
Your whole argument in your first post is that the vendor's free speech rights are not affected. We agree on that.
The point of the whole free speech angle is that if the manga itself is protected speech, then it fails to me part 3 of the criteria to be found obscene. (part 3 is not constrained to community standards. only part 1 is)
if the material fails the definition of obscenity, he cannot be convicted of peddling obscene material.
and he can, because it is not protected speech, because the state considers it obscene. Miller Vs. California, 1973, the Court determined that obscenity can be measured by state, rather than national, standards.
absolutely true, however, part 3 of the criteria that is listed in Miller Vs. California requires that the material have no redeeming social or political content. That criteria isnt constrained to the opinions of the community. The community standard only applies to part 1 of the obscenity definition.
The free speech issue wouldnt attack the community standards argument, or even the state law argument, it would attack the idea that the material itself has no other redeeming value, and that is irrelevent to the community in which it is sold.
I agree that the Supreme Court is not in the business of second guessing juries in general.
The post i was replying to said they could not hear the case regardless of its merits because they'd have to throw out the community standards precedent they themselves set.
My point was that if the supreme court wanted to hear the case, they could do so without interfering with the community standards section of the definition of obscenity.
It's a state law. I don't think this sort of law would hold up if it was federal, but since it is a Texan state law.
Obscenity is defined in such a way that local community standards are a part of determining if something is obscene. As such, it would be hard to declare something obscene on a federal level.
Until just recently it was illegal for gay men to have consentual sex in Texas..
this was the case in many other states as well. Don't think it was just Texas. Several years ago there was a guy in Georgia who went to jail for having consentual oral sex with his wife in the privacy of their own home. Apparently, that violated the sodomy laws in Georgia.
(i know someone is going to ask how they cought/convicted him. He was getting a divorce and his wife got the DA to press charges against him for sodomy. She got immunity and testified against him. He went to jail and she was awarded all the family assets since he was a convict. Personally, I think i'd have to kill her.)
It seems some Texans feel they have a right to dictate what others can and can not do even when it doesn't affect them in the least and isn't harmful.
That has nothing to do with texas. That's a human problem.
Yes, but it has been decided that obscenity it handled on a state wide level, and not federal. This is because what is obscene in one state is perfectly acceptable in another.
Actually, the criteria for obscenity has 3 parts; all of which have to be satisfied for something to be obscene. The first part deals with the average community standard. The second part deals with application of state law. The third part deals generically with if the material has any redeeming social or literary value. That third part says nothing limiting it to local or state consideration for redeeming value.
If the supreme court decided that the comic expressed an idea that could be considered speech, it could be protected and could not be found to be obscene, since it would fail the third criteria of the test.
For example: Prostitution is legal in Nevada, and not considered obscene. Try handing flyers for prostitution out in, say, St. George, Utah.
actually, prostitution is not legal in all of Nevada. Nevada law makes prostitution legal in counties that have a population lower than a certain cap (i think it's 10000 people). Prostitution is not legal in Las Vegas, for example.
I dont think the prostitution thing is relevent to the discussion though. The criminalization of prostitution isnt by way of asserting it is obscene. I think it is predicated on the idea that it's a crime against nature (like bestiality and sodomy laws).
I believe the "across the street from a school" is the main problem
This shouldnt matter at all in the case. There are plenty of convenience stores selling porn across the street from schools in Texas. I think this was included for the prejudicial value it would have on public opinion and the jury.
If I recall correctly, in Texas it is illegal to sell "obscenity" within a certain range (1000 ft?) of a school.
I dont think there is any such restriction in Texas.
I disagree that the supreme court is stuck. the community standards issue is only 1/3 of the test required to find something obscene.
All three of the requirements of the test must be satisfied for something to be obscene.
The supreme court could find that it failed either of the other two parts without ever touching the community standards issue.
Is it law? Sure. Is Linux a program? Sure. Is it more accurate to call Linux a kernel? Of course. Is it more accurate to distinguish the Constitution from that which it controls? Of course.
but you stopped short of covering the point of contention. The point of contention is "if someone said linux was not a program, would that be inaccurate?" and the answer is "yes".
Again, my apologies for the confusion. I was glossing Hemos's use of the word "law" as a layman's substitute for the lawyerSpeak "statute," since he called the First Amendment "a federal law," not merely "federal law".
That is a fair point to make. However, you made the same mistake Hemos did by saying it wasnt a law at all.
What the Founding Fathers *did* intend was for states' sovereignity to be better respected.
This is true, but it is also true that the Founding Fathers explicitly intended that the expression and dissemination of unpleasant and unpopular ideas should be protected from interference from government (federal and local).