You should worry about this -- yes, it's clearly unconstitutional, and with time and money it would obviously be overturned.
However -- look how long it has taken. Two years, I believe. The problem is that large companies and consortiums of companies can run roughshod over individuals with impunity. Sure, it'll be overturned if someone can scrape together enough money or get enough support to go to a group like the EFF, but it takes *years* to do so. In the meanwhile, their business practices continue unabated.
Will right prevail eventually? Kind of, maybe. But the point is that they shouldn't have the nerve to try to forbid people from playing their own DVDs with any software they choose. You buy the DVD, you should have the right to play it and enjoy it anywhere at any time. You're not infringing on their rights by doing so -- but they're infringing on yours by trying to limit what you can and can't do.
People *should* go ballistic when their rights are trampled on. Thank God this guy was willing to fight.
While you have certain rights on paper as a citizen of the United States, if no one stands up for those rights it's the same as not having them at all. Look at what Ashcroft and his cronies are trying to do... until the Terrorist Act makes its way to the Supreme court, it'll be used to abuse the rights of many people -- I guarantee it. People who are not a threat to the country or our safety, just people who are nuisances to large corporations and/or the present administration. I have no doubt that that law will be overturned eventually -- but probably five to six years from now, after doing amazing damage to people who don't deserve it. Someone will challenge it and prevail, others without the money to go through the process of appeals and whatnot will simply have to take their lumps or worse.
If that's not worth getting upset about, I don't know what is.
The goal of many colleges is NOT to prepare a student for employment -- it's to give a student a fairly broad-based sampling of many disciplines while focusing on one.
I don't know what college the poster is going to, but I went to the number one ranked college in that survey (Truman) and found that much of the curriculum was designed only to prepare the students for further study and a life in academia. If that's not what you want, then you're probably in the wrong place.
It's not true only for disciplines like computer science, either. I studed journalism there, and many of the required courses were heavily tilted in favor of theory rather than practice. (A class on layout and design was only offered after the head of the communications department retired -- she blocked it as being too vocational).
Basically, many colleges are liberal arts schools, they're designed to teach academic disciplines -- not vocational ones. Choose your school wisely.
I've had very good luck with ComputerGeeks.com, they totally rock. I've probably placed five or six orders with them this year, every one of them arrived quickly and I got exactly what I expected. ComputerGeeks also certifies some equipment with Linux, which is awesome. (I usually check first anyway, but the extra effort is appreciated...)
On the other hand, I tried ordering from ComputerSurplusOutlet.com and was horrified I got a few sticks of RAM basically shoved in an envelope with no padding. Amazingly, they worked and didn't get broken in the mail. (Shipped postal, mind you...) I decided to give them another try, and ordered three used systems for cheap. They all arrived in the same box with insufficient padding. I called to complain and got a whole boatload of attitude from their marketing manager or something. She finally promised to refund my shipping, but it took three calls over three weeks to actually get them to honor it. Avoid them at ALL COSTS.
Summary: All hail ComputerGeeks.com, avoid ComputerSurplusOutlet.com -- and no, I'm not affiliated with either company in any way.
Having worked at a company that did Internet sales, I know there's no way to please everyone and no matter how good a company's service is they'll inadvertantly hose someone's order.
Here's a few tips, though -- never order from a company that won't give you a physical address and phone number to call. If ordering a sufficiently high dollar amount, call their customer service people FIRST and just ask one or two questions -- in other words, find out if a human being answers the phone and if they're helpful. If you get ripped off, call the state's attorney general's office and find out what your options are.
Now, my point is: why can't we have a similar system in place for the e-world? Some would do it through micropayments, many could do it through ISPs ("use fooISP, only $39.95, and get Salon in the bargain!"), and some big ones could go their own way ("Yahoo fulfilment center").
Well, so far, micropayments have been a big failure. Which is a shame, because on paper they seem like a good idea. But, no one has been able to make them popular yet.
The sheer magnitude of content Websites would make it difficult for ISPs to strike up contracts with all of them. Cable companies may have to work with fifty or so individual companies, (each channel is not owned by a separate company... many channels are owned by the same conglomerates...) while ISPs would each have to negotiate with thousands of Web providers. Not impossible, there are ways that the content providers could form something like a collective, but it's a long shot at best.
In all honesty, I'm not sure there's a perfect solution.
The fact that you mentioned above, that HBO shows ads in India, just further proves my point -- when folks won't or can't pay for content directly, it has to be supported in another form. (And, I'd imagine, that it's not an insignificant cost to produce HBO for non-English speaking audiences...)
The sheer diversity of Web content makes it impractical for sites to generate a great deal of subscriber revenue. Yes, there are four or five sites that I would pay $30 a year to subscribe to, but there are many more that I don't frequent often enough to pay for a subscription.
Quite frankly, I'm very worried about the direction the Web will eventually take. I have a feeling that it's going to go the same direction as commercial TV and radio. The vast majority of content eventually owned by a small number of corporations, and the diversity and quality of content going down the drain. (Not that there isn't crap on the 'Net already, but imagine even more crap churned out by the geniuses that run network TV and program top 40 radio...ugh.)
Frankly, I think people should complain about Flash advertising. There are too many people who are on dial-up that don't want to suffer through that crap. I don't mind text or graphics in ads, but a Flash banner or whatnot is just annoying. Being a Linux user who'd just as soon browse sites that are plain text and graphics, I find Flash to be evil anyway. Especially sites that demand that you have a Flash plugin, and have no other content.
I've worked for a dot-com that accepted banners, though, and it's hard to get that through the heads of the marketing idiots who are so proud of their five minute Flash banners. Of course, they've never had to deal with them on a dial-up connection or with a browser without a Flash plugin.
Why not send Salon a note about that? Complaining about ads in general isn't going to get anyone anywhere, but if you tell them "Hey, by the time your page actually loads, I've forgotten why I'm here..." they might take notice.
The CD-giveaway thing was a great thing once, because Linux was still relatively experimental and there was a need to find inventive ways to distribute Linux to anyone who might try it.
At this point, I think Linux has been around long enough, maybe it's time that people with slowband connections actually shell out for at least a CheapBytes CD or actually keep the companies that make distributions alive by buying a $40 box once a year. Is that really so much to ask?
Several companies still sell the cheap CDs, and I can't imagine too many people who can afford a computer that can't afford six bucks for the CD-ROM plus shipping. (Or whatever the total cost is...) Granted, there may be some "under-developed" countries who could use them, but the average teen or LUG member can afford to actually shell out a few bucks to help support the commercial efforts that support the software development.
It's one thing to buck insane licensing fees and want access to source code, it's another just to be a cheap-ass who is out to get everything for free. (This isn't a dig on the Free CD effort itself, they're trying to do the Right Thing. But I'd bet a lot of people sucking up the CDs could afford to buy one but instead take advantage of the generosity of others.)
Salon has been trying to find new ways to make money, the jump-through ads are much less annoying than the pop-ups, IMHO. Not much different than commercials on TV. You have the option to subscribe to Salon if you want to avoid them, just as you have the option to subscribe to HBO if you'd like commercial-free programs (though HBO does not offer a commercial channel, so you either pay up or do without the Sopranos...)
Everything can't be free. I'd rather have the click-through ads than pop-ups. Actually, I like Salon enough that I bucked up the yearly subscription fee, though it really doesn't offer so much more than the regular Salon.
Deal with the ads, stop bitching or don't be surprised when Salon goes under like so many other Webzines.
And what is wrong with this? Laws are ideally a representation of the values that a society has at large
What is wrong with this is that we feel we need to legislate almost everything. Certainly, laws are to some extent a reflection of the mores of a culture. Except, to a large degree, ours are not. We've gone beyond articulating laws for the obvious crimes that our society cannot and should not tolerate, to in many cases attempting to legislate all objectionable behavior. Essentially, we've become a society that believes that if it's not explicitly illegal, then it must be okay. And, if it's illegal we try to attach a moral stigma to it.
I'm not arguing that we should have no laws whatsoever, but certainly we should have far fewer than we do. People should take responsibility for their actions without the threat of the law hanging over them. The immediate reaction to any well-publicized atrocity or event is to figure out how we can legislate to prevent it happening in the future. If we have to depend on a colossus of legislation to protect our society that grows larger every year, how long before it collapses under its own weight?
Is that our society is so ethically-challenged and bereft of common sense that we have to make any undesirable behavior illegal, and any desirable behavior mandatory. (Seatbelts and motorcycle helmets, for instance.)
To many people it makes sense to make anything potentially harmful illegal, because how else would we discourage it?
We've gotten so used to our morality being legislated that we feel we have to pass laws for everything. That's why the abortion issue is such a big deal, because people equate morality with legality. The same deal with sexual harassment laws. We shouldn't need laws to tell us that sexual harassment is wrong, but without the threat of legal penalties many people would still be pinching their secretary on the ass every time they walked in the room or worse.
So, basically, because someone somewhere might use encryption for evil, and because the average voter doesn't have a clue what it's for, they have no problem with it being made illegal to prevent (in their mind) possible abuses.
Too bad we aren't learning from the British and Soviet mistakes.
Excuse me, what exactly are we supposed to have learned? That because Afghanistan is a tough opponent we should just allow them to harbor terrorists who strike at the US? We should only consider military action against countries that are obvious pushovers?
We haven't entered into military action with Afghanistan yet, so it's too soon to tell whether our military will fare better than the British or Soviet armies. It's not even a sure thing that we will engage in a ground action against Afghanistan, so it's not a foregone conclusion that we've made any mistakes.
It's amazing how quickly some people have lost their spines when it looks like we might actually have to engage in a real war, as opposed to a campaign of bombing helpless troops and conducting a war from a distance. Have you forgotten that this is a country whose government harbors a terrorist connected with several other strikes against the US, and who is likely tied to the murder of several THOUSAND innocent people of multinational decent?
Do you harbor some illusion that if we do nothing, that the terrorist actions will cease? I don't know what could possibly give that impression, since we've no concrete message from the terrorists what prompted this strike.
We should certainly take heed at what the British and Soviets have learned in actions against Afghanistan. Remember, we equipped the Afghanis in the first place against the Soviets...
I don't think that the Taliban government should be let off the hook. Yes, American soldiers will be killed in a ground action and that's a horrible thing. But it's a even more horrible thing to allow this attack on innocent people to go unpunished and wait in fear for the next attack. I have faith that we can win a war with Afghanistan if we have to. And if it's a prolonged war I'll be happy to sign up if they'll take someone my age. (I'm 31 and I'm pretty sure the cut-off is 26, though I'm not 100% sure of that since this is the first time I've been moved to consider serving with the armed forces...)
The cool thing may not be the software available through ports, but the way that software is distributed for BSD. Their ports system seems to be a pretty neat way of distributing software. I'm mostly a Linux user, but also have several BSD boxen at home. They both have their advantages. It's nice (from my point of view) to see any cross-pollination between the two groups.
It's all Free UNIX, it's all good. At least that's how I look at it.
is a lobby as effective as the NRA or insurance agencies. The problem we have is that the groups who are interested in protecting the rights of geeks are usually not ones with deep pockets.
I think we need to put more support behind the EFF, and a lot more money. Start having conventions in Washington and paying lobbyists to pay visits to representatives and appear on the talk shows. We geeks do a great job of getting the word out to other geeks, but stall a bit when communicating to the non-geek world.
You have to bear in mind that business and financial practices bear little (if any) resemblance to reality or common sense. If you choose to participate in such things, an appreciation of the absurd goes a long way...
No, Corel didn't release everything under the GPL. However, everything that Corel created as proprietary software that I can remember has been duplicated elsewhere -- I don't see any advantage in another company trying to pick up where Corel left off. Maybe they'll make a go of it, but I *really* doubt it.
From all the accounts I've heard of "juvie," it's not much better than prison, with all the attendant horrors of prison. I think this is a little too harsh for computer crimes committed by a minor.
My fear would be that he either will not survive the experience or that he would leave a far worse person than when he enters...
Did I say I didn't want that to change? No, I didn't. I simply said I'm sick of hearing about it, since it never changes and it's bloody depressing to see the stupid waste of human life over and over and over and over again.
If they want to report something that's news, any day where no Israeli or Palestinian is killed should be on the evening news. "Peace broke out in Israel today as both the Israelis and Palestinians put down their weapons and learned to just get along and tolerate one another." That would be news, and I would be beside myself with joy to hear it.
As my parents taught me when I was quite young, two wrongs do not make a right. (Though three lefts do...)
What is going on in Israel is horrible, no doubt. Our support of Israel isn't synonymous with persecution of Palestinians, though it is convenient and tempting for some to make that connection. Those weapons may be used against Palestinians, but they were not supplied for that purpose -- they were supplied for the purpose of protecting Israel from other Middle Eastern countries.
We're idealistic fools to believe that we can actually introduce peace in an area of the world that is so fundamentally unstable. But that doesn't mean we deserve to have our country attacked by terrorists. America as a country for the last fifty or sixty years has been the equivalent of a man in his teens and twenties, bright-eyed, idealistic and convinced that he can make a difference. Smart, strong and eager to help, but sometimes wrong-headed and certainly inexperienced. I believe the events yesterday are going to be our coming of age and disillusionment. I hope that we will find the organization(s) responsible, destroy them utterly and then learn not to get involved in others' battles.
Honestly, I believe we should simply write the entire Middle East off as unsalvageable and withdraw any support or relations with countries in that area altogether. If they want to kill one another and extract revenge until there are no survivors, fine. It's a cultural, not religious, thing that no amount of intervention will solve. If it weren't for the fact that we're so damn dependant on oil from that region I suspect we would have washed our hands of it long ago.
I've gotten so sick of seeing so-called news about Israelis killing Palestinians or vice-versa. It's not news, it's the status quo. They don't want peace, they don't want to settle their differences. It's age-old hatred and humanity at its worst. It's sickening from both sides, neither side is righteous. I suspect that if there is a God in Heaven he will be harsh indeed on leaders of both factions for the atrocities that they have carried out in His name.
How much do you know about retail? The "financial incentives" are likely the only way that retailers are going to make money on this. Game consoles come with little to no margin, that is profit over cost, that's why everyone sells consoles at about the same price. (It's illegal for any company to force retailers to uphold a set price on a product, though they can refuse to sell to a retailer altogether...)
Companies like Best Buy make money by forcing manufacturers to supplement their advertising, and then offering the product near cost in many cases. With Microsoft, if they don't get the "financial incentives," they have to come up with ad dollars out of their own pocket -- something they're not happy to do.
You know those Best Buy circulars that come in every Sunday paper that have prices that undercut everyone else? They're bought with money from Microsoft, Sony, etc. That's one of the things that gives chains like Best Buy and Circuit City their advantage, and they're not going to give it up.
So, yes, this is quite definitely the retail equivalent of hardball.
If they have filed, I hope that they're able to make a comeback somehow...
Not only do all of Loki's titles rock, they're a good bunch of people. I've talked to Scott Draeker and other folks from Loki several times and they're good people who deserve to succeed. They've worked really hard, and they weren't one of the companies that pissed away VC money as fast as they could get it.
News like this makes me want a drink -- and I don't even drink.
Actually, this is a bit different, Mexico announced they were going to do something, but faltered in the implementation.
This story is about offices actually using Linux.
I also have a strong hunch that a big part of the failure to move Mexican schools to Linux had more to do with resistance on the part of users rather than actual difficulty of Linux. Let's be honest, being a Linux guru is hard. Configuring Linux in an office should be the job of a Linux professional, and users should be instructed on its use. Using StarOffice, Netscape, KDE or GNOME (or your favorite Window mgr.) isn't hard, but it's different. Users get frustrated easily, and often whine that something is "too hard" and demand their old system. I've seen the same phenomenon with people forced to migrate from the MacOS to Windows or from Windows 3.11 to Windows 95.
If you happen to prefer Microsoft to Linux, or if your favorite application happens to run only on Windows, that's okay -- but as an end-user Linux is really no more difficult to use than Windows when it's properly set up. IMHO it's easier b/c once a user is used to the apps and interface, they're not crashing on a regular basis and disrupting their workflow.
He doesn't even mention the other points, like trying to avoid linking to competing sites.
LinuxToday used to have value because they posted *everything* and you could go there to quickly find anything going on in the Linux world. Now that's no longer the case.
Not surprisingly Internet.com has ruined them, and just about every other Linux property they touched. Reichard should be promptly fired, but instead he'll probably stay there until Internet.com folds or does away with the Linux channel. I hope this indiscretion travels with him so no one else is foolish enough to hire him.
Interestingly, the apology is under "normal news" so they don't even seem to consider it important enough to put at the top of the site.
Slashdot Mirror
You should worry about this -- yes, it's clearly unconstitutional, and with time and money it would obviously be overturned.
However -- look how long it has taken. Two years, I believe. The problem is that large companies and consortiums of companies can run roughshod over individuals with impunity. Sure, it'll be overturned if someone can scrape together enough money or get enough support to go to a group like the EFF, but it takes *years* to do so. In the meanwhile, their business practices continue unabated.
Will right prevail eventually? Kind of, maybe. But the point is that they shouldn't have the nerve to try to forbid people from playing their own DVDs with any software they choose. You buy the DVD, you should have the right to play it and enjoy it anywhere at any time. You're not infringing on their rights by doing so -- but they're infringing on yours by trying to limit what you can and can't do.
People *should* go ballistic when their rights are trampled on. Thank God this guy was willing to fight.
While you have certain rights on paper as a citizen of the United States, if no one stands up for those rights it's the same as not having them at all. Look at what Ashcroft and his cronies are trying to do... until the Terrorist Act makes its way to the Supreme court, it'll be used to abuse the rights of many people -- I guarantee it. People who are not a threat to the country or our safety, just people who are nuisances to large corporations and/or the present administration. I have no doubt that that law will be overturned eventually -- but probably five to six years from now, after doing amazing damage to people who don't deserve it. Someone will challenge it and prevail, others without the money to go through the process of appeals and whatnot will simply have to take their lumps or worse.
If that's not worth getting upset about, I don't know what is.
The goal of many colleges is NOT to prepare a student for employment -- it's to give a student a fairly broad-based sampling of many disciplines while focusing on one.
I don't know what college the poster is going to, but I went to the number one ranked college in that survey (Truman) and found that much of the curriculum was designed only to prepare the students for further study and a life in academia. If that's not what you want, then you're probably in the wrong place.
It's not true only for disciplines like computer science, either. I studed journalism there, and many of the required courses were heavily tilted in favor of theory rather than practice. (A class on layout and design was only offered after the head of the communications department retired -- she blocked it as being too vocational).
Basically, many colleges are liberal arts schools, they're designed to teach academic disciplines -- not vocational ones. Choose your school wisely.
I've had very good luck with ComputerGeeks.com, they totally rock. I've probably placed five or six orders with them this year, every one of them arrived quickly and I got exactly what I expected. ComputerGeeks also certifies some equipment with Linux, which is awesome. (I usually check first anyway, but the extra effort is appreciated...)
On the other hand, I tried ordering from ComputerSurplusOutlet.com and was horrified I got a few sticks of RAM basically shoved in an envelope with no padding. Amazingly, they worked and didn't get broken in the mail. (Shipped postal, mind you...) I decided to give them another try, and ordered three used systems for cheap. They all arrived in the same box with insufficient padding. I called to complain and got a whole boatload of attitude from their marketing manager or something. She finally promised to refund my shipping, but it took three calls over three weeks to actually get them to honor it. Avoid them at ALL COSTS.
Summary: All hail ComputerGeeks.com, avoid ComputerSurplusOutlet.com -- and no, I'm not affiliated with either company in any way.
Having worked at a company that did Internet sales, I know there's no way to please everyone and no matter how good a company's service is they'll inadvertantly hose someone's order.
Here's a few tips, though -- never order from a company that won't give you a physical address and phone number to call. If ordering a sufficiently high dollar amount, call their customer service people FIRST and just ask one or two questions -- in other words, find out if a human being answers the phone and if they're helpful. If you get ripped off, call the state's attorney general's office and find out what your options are.
Good luck, and be careful out there...
Now, my point is: why can't we have a similar system in place for the e-world? Some would do it through micropayments, many could do it through ISPs ("use fooISP, only $39.95, and get Salon in the bargain!"), and some big ones could go their own way ("Yahoo fulfilment center").
Well, so far, micropayments have been a big failure. Which is a shame, because on paper they seem like a good idea. But, no one has been able to make them popular yet.
The sheer magnitude of content Websites would make it difficult for ISPs to strike up contracts with all of them. Cable companies may have to work with fifty or so individual companies, (each channel is not owned by a separate company... many channels are owned by the same conglomerates...) while ISPs would each have to negotiate with thousands of Web providers. Not impossible, there are ways that the content providers could form something like a collective, but it's a long shot at best.
In all honesty, I'm not sure there's a perfect solution.
The fact that you mentioned above, that HBO shows ads in India, just further proves my point -- when folks won't or can't pay for content directly, it has to be supported in another form. (And, I'd imagine, that it's not an insignificant cost to produce HBO for non-English speaking audiences...)
The sheer diversity of Web content makes it impractical for sites to generate a great deal of subscriber revenue. Yes, there are four or five sites that I would pay $30 a year to subscribe to, but there are many more that I don't frequent often enough to pay for a subscription.
Quite frankly, I'm very worried about the direction the Web will eventually take. I have a feeling that it's going to go the same direction as commercial TV and radio. The vast majority of content eventually owned by a small number of corporations, and the diversity and quality of content going down the drain. (Not that there isn't crap on the 'Net already, but imagine even more crap churned out by the geniuses that run network TV and program top 40 radio...ugh.)
Frankly, I think people should complain about Flash advertising. There are too many people who are on dial-up that don't want to suffer through that crap. I don't mind text or graphics in ads, but a Flash banner or whatnot is just annoying. Being a Linux user who'd just as soon browse sites that are plain text and graphics, I find Flash to be evil anyway. Especially sites that demand that you have a Flash plugin, and have no other content.
I've worked for a dot-com that accepted banners, though, and it's hard to get that through the heads of the marketing idiots who are so proud of their five minute Flash banners. Of course, they've never had to deal with them on a dial-up connection or with a browser without a Flash plugin.
Why not send Salon a note about that? Complaining about ads in general isn't going to get anyone anywhere, but if you tell them "Hey, by the time your page actually loads, I've forgotten why I'm here..." they might take notice.
The CD-giveaway thing was a great thing once, because Linux was still relatively experimental and there was a need to find inventive ways to distribute Linux to anyone who might try it.
At this point, I think Linux has been around long enough, maybe it's time that people with slowband connections actually shell out for at least a CheapBytes CD or actually keep the companies that make distributions alive by buying a $40 box once a year. Is that really so much to ask?
Several companies still sell the cheap CDs, and I can't imagine too many people who can afford a computer that can't afford six bucks for the CD-ROM plus shipping. (Or whatever the total cost is...) Granted, there may be some "under-developed" countries who could use them, but the average teen or LUG member can afford to actually shell out a few bucks to help support the commercial efforts that support the software development.
It's one thing to buck insane licensing fees and want access to source code, it's another just to be a cheap-ass who is out to get everything for free. (This isn't a dig on the Free CD effort itself, they're trying to do the Right Thing. But I'd bet a lot of people sucking up the CDs could afford to buy one but instead take advantage of the generosity of others.)
Salon has been trying to find new ways to make money, the jump-through ads are much less annoying than the pop-ups, IMHO. Not much different than commercials on TV. You have the option to subscribe to Salon if you want to avoid them, just as you have the option to subscribe to HBO if you'd like commercial-free programs (though HBO does not offer a commercial channel, so you either pay up or do without the Sopranos...)
Everything can't be free. I'd rather have the click-through ads than pop-ups. Actually, I like Salon enough that I bucked up the yearly subscription fee, though it really doesn't offer so much more than the regular Salon.
Deal with the ads, stop bitching or don't be surprised when Salon goes under like so many other Webzines.
And what is wrong with this? Laws are ideally a representation of the values that a society has at large
What is wrong with this is that we feel we need to legislate almost everything. Certainly, laws are to some extent a reflection of the mores of a culture. Except, to a large degree, ours are not. We've gone beyond articulating laws for the obvious crimes that our society cannot and should not tolerate, to in many cases attempting to legislate all objectionable behavior. Essentially, we've become a society that believes that if it's not explicitly illegal, then it must be okay. And, if it's illegal we try to attach a moral stigma to it.
I'm not arguing that we should have no laws whatsoever, but certainly we should have far fewer than we do. People should take responsibility for their actions without the threat of the law hanging over them. The immediate reaction to any well-publicized atrocity or event is to figure out how we can legislate to prevent it happening in the future. If we have to depend on a colossus of legislation to protect our society that grows larger every year, how long before it collapses under its own weight?
Is that our society is so ethically-challenged and bereft of common sense that we have to make any undesirable behavior illegal, and any desirable behavior mandatory. (Seatbelts and motorcycle helmets, for instance.)
To many people it makes sense to make anything potentially harmful illegal, because how else would we discourage it?
We've gotten so used to our morality being legislated that we feel we have to pass laws for everything. That's why the abortion issue is such a big deal, because people equate morality with legality. The same deal with sexual harassment laws. We shouldn't need laws to tell us that sexual harassment is wrong, but without the threat of legal penalties many people would still be pinching their secretary on the ass every time they walked in the room or worse.
So, basically, because someone somewhere might use encryption for evil, and because the average voter doesn't have a clue what it's for, they have no problem with it being made illegal to prevent (in their mind) possible abuses.
Too bad we aren't learning from the British and Soviet mistakes.
Excuse me, what exactly are we supposed to have learned? That because Afghanistan is a tough opponent we should just allow them to harbor terrorists who strike at the US? We should only consider military action against countries that are obvious pushovers?
We haven't entered into military action with Afghanistan yet, so it's too soon to tell whether our military will fare better than the British or Soviet armies. It's not even a sure thing that we will engage in a ground action against Afghanistan, so it's not a foregone conclusion that we've made any mistakes.
It's amazing how quickly some people have lost their spines when it looks like we might actually have to engage in a real war, as opposed to a campaign of bombing helpless troops and conducting a war from a distance. Have you forgotten that this is a country whose government harbors a terrorist connected with several other strikes against the US, and who is likely tied to the murder of several THOUSAND innocent people of multinational decent?
Do you harbor some illusion that if we do nothing, that the terrorist actions will cease? I don't know what could possibly give that impression, since we've no concrete message from the terrorists what prompted this strike.
We should certainly take heed at what the British and Soviets have learned in actions against Afghanistan. Remember, we equipped the Afghanis in the first place against the Soviets...
I don't think that the Taliban government should be let off the hook. Yes, American soldiers will be killed in a ground action and that's a horrible thing. But it's a even more horrible thing to allow this attack on innocent people to go unpunished and wait in fear for the next attack. I have faith that we can win a war with Afghanistan if we have to. And if it's a prolonged war I'll be happy to sign up if they'll take someone my age. (I'm 31 and I'm pretty sure the cut-off is 26, though I'm not 100% sure of that since this is the first time I've been moved to consider serving with the armed forces...)
The cool thing may not be the software available through ports, but the way that software is distributed for BSD. Their ports system seems to be a pretty neat way of distributing software. I'm mostly a Linux user, but also have several BSD boxen at home. They both have their advantages. It's nice (from my point of view) to see any cross-pollination between the two groups.
It's all Free UNIX, it's all good. At least that's how I look at it.
is a lobby as effective as the NRA or insurance agencies. The problem we have is that the groups who are interested in protecting the rights of geeks are usually not ones with deep pockets.
I think we need to put more support behind the EFF, and a lot more money. Start having conventions in Washington and paying lobbyists to pay visits to representatives and appear on the talk shows. We geeks do a great job of getting the word out to other geeks, but stall a bit when communicating to the non-geek world.
You have to bear in mind that business and financial practices bear little (if any) resemblance to reality or common sense. If you choose to participate in such things, an appreciation of the absurd goes a long way...
No, Corel didn't release everything under the GPL. However, everything that Corel created as proprietary software that I can remember has been duplicated elsewhere -- I don't see any advantage in another company trying to pick up where Corel left off. Maybe they'll make a go of it, but I *really* doubt it.
From all the accounts I've heard of "juvie," it's not much better than prison, with all the attendant horrors of prison. I think this is a little too harsh for computer crimes committed by a minor.
My fear would be that he either will not survive the experience or that he would leave a far worse person than when he enters...
Did I say I didn't want that to change? No, I didn't. I simply said I'm sick of hearing about it, since it never changes and it's bloody depressing to see the stupid waste of human life over and over and over and over again.
If they want to report something that's news, any day where no Israeli or Palestinian is killed should be on the evening news. "Peace broke out in Israel today as both the Israelis and Palestinians put down their weapons and learned to just get along and tolerate one another." That would be news, and I would be beside myself with joy to hear it.
As my parents taught me when I was quite young, two wrongs do not make a right. (Though three lefts do...)
What is going on in Israel is horrible, no doubt. Our support of Israel isn't synonymous with persecution of Palestinians, though it is convenient and tempting for some to make that connection. Those weapons may be used against Palestinians, but they were not supplied for that purpose -- they were supplied for the purpose of protecting Israel from other Middle Eastern countries.
We're idealistic fools to believe that we can actually introduce peace in an area of the world that is so fundamentally unstable. But that doesn't mean we deserve to have our country attacked by terrorists. America as a country for the last fifty or sixty years has been the equivalent of a man in his teens and twenties, bright-eyed, idealistic and convinced that he can make a difference. Smart, strong and eager to help, but sometimes wrong-headed and certainly inexperienced. I believe the events yesterday are going to be our coming of age and disillusionment. I hope that we will find the organization(s) responsible, destroy them utterly and then learn not to get involved in others' battles.
Honestly, I believe we should simply write the entire Middle East off as unsalvageable and withdraw any support or relations with countries in that area altogether. If they want to kill one another and extract revenge until there are no survivors, fine. It's a cultural, not religious, thing that no amount of intervention will solve. If it weren't for the fact that we're so damn dependant on oil from that region I suspect we would have washed our hands of it long ago.
I've gotten so sick of seeing so-called news about Israelis killing Palestinians or vice-versa. It's not news, it's the status quo. They don't want peace, they don't want to settle their differences. It's age-old hatred and humanity at its worst. It's sickening from both sides, neither side is righteous. I suspect that if there is a God in Heaven he will be harsh indeed on leaders of both factions for the atrocities that they have carried out in His name.
I don't think a lot of GWB, but censoring his comments is a disservice to the American people. We deserve to hear his statements unedited.
How much do you know about retail? The "financial incentives" are likely the only way that retailers are going to make money on this. Game consoles come with little to no margin, that is profit over cost, that's why everyone sells consoles at about the same price. (It's illegal for any company to force retailers to uphold a set price on a product, though they can refuse to sell to a retailer altogether...)
Companies like Best Buy make money by forcing manufacturers to supplement their advertising, and then offering the product near cost in many cases. With Microsoft, if they don't get the "financial incentives," they have to come up with ad dollars out of their own pocket -- something they're not happy to do.
You know those Best Buy circulars that come in every Sunday paper that have prices that undercut everyone else? They're bought with money from Microsoft, Sony, etc. That's one of the things that gives chains like Best Buy and Circuit City their advantage, and they're not going to give it up.
So, yes, this is quite definitely the retail equivalent of hardball.
If they have filed, I hope that they're able to make a comeback somehow...
Not only do all of Loki's titles rock, they're a good bunch of people. I've talked to Scott Draeker and other folks from Loki several times and they're good people who deserve to succeed. They've worked really hard, and they weren't one of the companies that pissed away VC money as fast as they could get it.
News like this makes me want a drink -- and I don't even drink.
Actually, this is a bit different, Mexico announced they were going to do something, but faltered in the implementation.
This story is about offices actually using Linux.
I also have a strong hunch that a big part of the failure to move Mexican schools to Linux had more to do with resistance on the part of users rather than actual difficulty of Linux. Let's be honest, being a Linux guru is hard. Configuring Linux in an office should be the job of a Linux professional, and users should be instructed on its use. Using StarOffice, Netscape, KDE or GNOME (or your favorite Window mgr.) isn't hard, but it's different. Users get frustrated easily, and often whine that something is "too hard" and demand their old system. I've seen the same phenomenon with people forced to migrate from the MacOS to Windows or from Windows 3.11 to Windows 95.
If you happen to prefer Microsoft to Linux, or if your favorite application happens to run only on Windows, that's okay -- but as an end-user Linux is really no more difficult to use than Windows when it's properly set up. IMHO it's easier b/c once a user is used to the apps and interface, they're not crashing on a regular basis and disrupting their workflow.
He doesn't even mention the other points, like trying to avoid linking to competing sites.
LinuxToday used to have value because they posted *everything* and you could go there to quickly find anything going on in the Linux world. Now that's no longer the case.
Not surprisingly Internet.com has ruined them, and just about every other Linux property they touched. Reichard should be promptly fired, but instead he'll probably stay there until Internet.com folds or does away with the Linux channel. I hope this indiscretion travels with him so no one else is foolish enough to hire him.
Interestingly, the apology is under "normal news" so they don't even seem to consider it important enough to put at the top of the site.