If RedHat becomes a newbie's OS, I'll still be happy [..] the good stuff will remain. If you want, you'll be able to install RedHat as a "desktop OS w/ developer support"
Franky, that's delusional. I'll ask again, in bold this time: what advantage would that give AOL over Microsoft?
If they ship a full Linux distro (any distro), then instead of AOLusers using Microsoft by default, they might end up using free (beer/speech) apps by default (gasp). Heck, nobody wins then (except the AOLusers, but that's hardly top of AOL or Microsoft's list of priorities).
No, if they ship an OS, it will have to be crippled and contain only AOL apps (along with copy control to protect Time Warner content). Further, if they're going to do it properly, they're going to see the sense in ensuring that it simply won't allow any other ISP's or non approved apps to gain a foothold.
Cynical? Hardly, this is the company that came up with the idea of sticky installs that do everything short of frying your hard drive to stop you changing ISP's.
I'm holding to my point. AOL don't want Red Hat, it's just a convenient target. They want Linux geeks to create a Linux based OS that will try to turn turn a PC into a AOL Homestation. For your safety, security and convenience, remember. It's actually stupid of them to look at Red Hat, but think of this as the beginning of their Journey to Clueville.
What advantage would that give them, distributing an OS that actively encourages its users to get a clue and consider alternatives?
Last time I checked, my TIVO didn't do a damn thing to encourage me to get a clue.
The charitable assumption is that you're deliberately quoting out of context, but are agreeing with the body of my post, but given the forum, I'm going to go ahead and assume that you stopped reading at that line to get your retort in faster. And it would have been a smart and incisive retort, if it hadn't actually been agreeing with exactly what I then went on to say, that an OS from AOL won't be Red Hat Linux in any recognisable form.
Do me the courtesy of reading the post to which I was replying, and you'll find that it was presented as a positive for Linux. I'm saying it's not that. That doesn't make it a negative. Go pick a fight somewhere else.
What a strange assumption I keep reading, that AOL-Time Warner actually have any interest in Red Hat Linux in particualr, or GNU/Linux in general. What advantage would that give them, distributing an OS that actively encourages its users to get a clue and consider alternatives?
What I'd expect to see is for them to buy up a bunch of developers (Red Hat or any other) and set them to work in the bowels of the AOL/TW Death Star producing something based on a Linux kernel, with most of GNU stripped out, no daemons, no package manager, no compiler, a brand new GUI, AOL-only apps with built in copy restrictions and automatic billing (already got your credit card number), and a daemon that hunts down and kills non-AOL approved processes, all for your security and convenience. I expect it to ship branded as "AOL", not "Red Hat" or even "AOL Linux". Possibly "Secure Linux" if they want to resell it as a perfect Son of SSSCA compliant implementation.
Impossible, you say? How much would it cost to develop? Ten million? Twenty? Fifty? A hundred million? A billion dollars? To control the desktop and the distribution and billing of content before Microsoft get in there first with Blackcomb and Homestation, that's pocket change.
They don't need any particular distro to do that, they just need developers. So run Alan, run for the hills, and take as many as you can with you.
is that those who make them secret often won't even divulge what it is they've made secret
It makes me wonder exactly who in the Oz governement actually knows what the hell is going on.
Compare with Bletchley Park in Britain during WWII, home of the Enigma codebreaking project. When the war ended, all of the people who worked there were instructed not to tell anyone what they were doing, without limit of time. Many of the records were destroyed. Very few people even know the whole story of exactly what had gone on.
Fifty or so years later, the government declassified the project. Or some of the project. Great! Only, the people who worked there were never told that they could now speak about these parts, or about which parts they could still not talk about. Was that because there are no surviving records, or because they were overlooked, or because the government still actively wants to keep them secret?
It sounds like a tiny, trite and rhetorical point, but when you think it through, this turns out to be a fully fledged bastard of a valid question: who knows?
[Timothy complaining about censorship] The irony, the irony
Oh hush, unlimited editor moderation points results in a benign dictatorship. As/. editors have pointed out, they use their unlimited powers fairly.
Of course, all dictators view themselves as benign, and they all view their actions as fair/necessary for the greater good/ordained by god. But we can be sure that in this case, it's actually true, because, er, it's... ah... they...um...
No, I forget. I bet it was something pretty damn convincing and reassuring though!
Perhaps these are the people who will buy the boxed version en masse
Uh, that's a pretty big assumption. I honestly believe that the bastard child of any such union will ship with as little mention of Linux as humanly possible. It will install branded as an AOL product from one CD, will have no standard package manager, none of the standard daemons, no compiler. It will be Linux for Dummies, but they won't even know that, because it will simply be "AOL".
And THIS my friends is exactly what is WRONG with the Linux community
Uh oh, talking to the voices in your head can't be a good sign.
The X86/GNU/Linux "community" is defined by all of the people in it. Some of us flat out want to contribute to an uncompromising OS aimed squarely and honestly at geeks who are willing to put in the time to learn how to do it right. I already think most distros are too big a kludgy compromise. For example, you simply cannot fit even a bare bones graphical KDE install into the same hard drive footprint as a Windows 98 install, no matter how hard you pare it down (yes, yes, KDE is better, but that doesn't mean it has to be bigger). That's already a bad sign. AOL-Linux fills me with a creepy feeeling, and makes me think that BSD might very well have a lot going for it.
One of the best things about contributing to Linux (even in a small way by running and commenting on betas) is the thanks and kudos you get from your peers. Why would I want to contribute to a community composed mostly (100 million of 'em!) of people who won't give a damn about the contributions, except to demand more of them?
Instead of grousing about the possibility of slackers coming into the Linux community (like they aren't here already), why not just pledge yourself to working harder?
Same back atcha. My reason is that for X86/GNU/Linux to supplant Windows, it will first have to become Windows, at which point, why would I care about it? Then it's off to BSDland for me.
Gasp, yes, that's right, I do only want to contribute to an uncompromising geek OS, not an idiot proof OS aimed at idiots. Deal.
Saying to default to 40 bit and just dont say anything? I could make 1000 faulty analogies, but will instead say that if EVERY OS shipped that way, then someone would write a program/script to change it over to 128 easily, for free, highly available, just because there was a need for normal people.(create the need, and you create the program)
What part of what actually happened are you having trouble understanding? It's already trivial to upgrade the encryption on Windows boxen, even in suspect countries. You just have to click the "I am not a terrorist" button.
The plain old fact is that the terrorists were just too clueless or lazy to click a couple of buttons. How is your script going to help that?
It shouldn't be a case of whether a user needs or does not need strong encryption. Aunt Jemima may not need strong encryption but she doesn't need people going through her dirty laundry either.
40 bits isn't strong enough? Look, if it comes down to the NSA needing to dedicate 5 days of supercomputer time to cracking Aunt Jemima's mail, they'll just trump up a tax evasion charge and blackmail her, or just beat her private key out of her. What is it with the assumption that we need practically uncrackable encryption rather than just encryption that's prohibitively expensive to crack routinely? For all real world purposes, it's equally good protection.
Best case: they distribute and support a full Red Hat install based on OS code. 100 million people realise that Linux is ready from the desktop, get a clue, and leave AOL in droves for real ISPs
Worst case: they throw a bllion dollars pocket change at it, strip it down to the kernel and rebuild it with copy control and automatic billing software built in, no package manager, no daemons, no compiler, no nothing except a GUI and the AOL approved apps, and a watchdog process that kills anything it doesn't expect to see as a security risk. It ships as "AOL" with no mention of Linux except in 6 point yellow-on-white under the help page referenced by the keyword: "&"300"~##!(!)!". 100 million people are left using a crippleware "OS" that aggresively prevents tinkering or expansion or manipulating of content, or installation of any other ISP, all for their safety and convenience, and those people will never, consider moving to any other OS until the end of time.
Realistic case: see "Worst case", but add "Although they'll have to support dual boot for a while, to let people play games. For a while."
I don't see the problems. You will still be able to modify things to suit you
That's a pretty big assumption.
There is no way for AOL to destroy the modular design of Linux/GNU software. To do so, they would have to custom modify and maintain far too many packages.
Excuse me while I choke in disbelief. That's too big a task for AOL-Time-Warner? How much would it cost? Ten million? Fifty? A hundred million? A billion dollars? Pocket change.
You're absolutely right that AOL-Time-Warner are out to get Microsoft, but I think you're missing the ultimate point, even though you get very, very close. AOL-Time-Warner want to torpedo Windows, because it allows users to change ISP's. Let's say the default AOL-OS install doesn't let you do that. They've won, right?
No. If they put Linux on the desktop of 100 million users, other ISP's - MSN included - will have to support it. Don't cheer yet, because that puts AOL-Time-Warner back to square one, and they're not going to be that dumb.
If AOL-OS is ever released, you can bet your bottom dollar that it won't allow you to install anything that doesn't come directly off an AOL server or CD. There will be no package manager, no daemons, no compiler. There will be a Linux kernel, an absolute minumum subset of tools, a single GUI, and a daemon sitting watching for unknown "rogue" processes and removing them and their associated files. And this will be done for your safety and security.
While they're at it, content protection (read: copy control) will be built in from day 1, as will automatic billing (they already have your credit card number). This will be for your protection and convenience.
You want to bet this is too big a task? For AOL-Time-Warner? Two billion. Five billion. How much is it worth in the long term to gain an absolute strangehold on both the desktop and all content distribution? Ten billion? Twenty billion?
And one final point. Do you really think that the name Linux will even appear in the bastard child of this rape? I doubt it very much indeed. AOL-OS at a pinch, but more likely just "AOL".
It seems to me that a Linux user is a Linux user and that one more Linux user
it seems to me that one more AOL-Linux user is a Linux user who will not contribute, and who will demand features and bells and whistles over stability and security every time.
Actually, it looks like comedy is the intended effect. Otherwise they wouldn't be using Goku, Sailor Moon, and (sortof) Matrix effects, and Darth Vader wouldn't have Mickey Mouse ears
Yes, it's a tough call, but these are practically mandatory in hentait/anime. If you made an opera out of Star Wars, you'd have a large woman playing Leia, right?
Perhaps, perhaps. Trouble is, it would cost $19 to find out, and commercial profit is one of the criteria for finding against fair use.
On balance, the judge probably got it right, I'm just saying that it's not entirely a black and white proposition.
if you bothered to look at the clip, you would see it is nowhere near a "character-for-character, scene-for-scene remake"
Ooh, the Anonymous Coward has taken the moral high ground. I guess that blows my researched and reasoned arguments and refernces out of the water. Next time I'll be sure to wait until after the/. effect has died down before posting references to give other people context before they make up their minds. No, wait... wouldn't that be utterly pointless? Sigh.
By the mere fact that this animated porn is *animated* and taking ideas from the Star Wars movies, for use in a completely different context - I'd say that it qualifies autoamtically [as "for comic effect"]! As it was already pointed out, "comic effect" doesn't necessarily mean you personally find it humorous. It only means that it's potentially humorous to some people.
It's a very close call. The important word is "for comic effect". The intention matters. AFAIK, people don't primarily make or watch hentai as or because it's funny, they make and watch it as and because it's porn.
Unless you've actually watched it. Have you watched it?
Strangely enough, I made it perfectly clear in my post that I hadn't. I also talked in terms of probabilities based on the available evidence. Perhaps you could brush up on your reading comprehension, and consider adding some value to the debate rather than just noise.
people are allowed to use intellectual property for parody purposes, which is clearly what Star Ballz is doing
People are allowed to use IP for "fair use", of which parody is one example, the one the creators are claiming here. But parody is defined as "for comic effect or ridicule".
Some hentai can be viewed as funny, but you can say the same for some musicals. This looks like either hentai in a Star Wars style, or (as Lucasarts claimed) Star Wars in a hentai style. I don't think comedy is a primary goal in either case.
Ridicule implies commentary or criticism, as in "Spaceballs" or "Troopers". Perhaps there's some of that here, but from the shots it looks very much like a character-for-character, scene-for-scene remake, only with large animated sexual organs.
We'd need to watch it to be sure, but I don't see it as being that clear cut, not at all.
Not so much parody as poaching, perhaps.
on
Star Ballz Trumps Lucas
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· Score: 3, Insightful
Starballz claims this is a parody. Really? Parody, says Websters is "a literary or musical work in which the style of an author or work is closely imitated for comic effect or in ridicule." Case law shows that criticising or commenting on the original is also fair use (although not necessarily parody).
Having your own original characters do a Matrix freeze-orbit scene is parody for comic effect (please, enough, stop doing this now). Borrowing the characters, but spoofing twenty two other works and making very cutting critital points about "moichandising, moichandising" leaves you mostly clear, as Mel Brooks showed, and in agreement with the very informative overview of fair use and parody laws at publaw.com
But this... well, I dunno. It's commercial, it's not commenting or criticising that I can see (not is it primarily comic per se, it's part of a well defined genre of its own, like musical), it uses substantial portions of the original (characters, scenes and plot). That only leaves the effect on the original which is, to be fair, minimal. But in three out of the four criteria that a court should use to decide fair use, it appears to fall down.
Perhaps it does comment on or criticise the original. Of course, we'd have to watch it first to find out. And perhaps Lucasarts should have done so too:
Their disregard for legal procedure is underscored by the fact that Lucasfilm's attorney admitted that he did not even watch Starballz prior to filing suit
It's hard to sympathise with a lawyer getting bitchslapped at the best of times, but this, if true, is probably karmic enough to cancel out any actual moral transgretion.
I can't believe the comment about our opressive government! Obviously you people have not studied oppression in history!
And neither have you, or you would understand that all dictatorships are benign - to begin with. The 2nd amendment to the Constitution recognises exactly that.
The intention or the degree of oppression is not the issue. Dictating directly or through propaganda what is right and what is wrong - as opposed to serving the will of the electorate - is oppression. I'd say that we have a government so composed of incumbents and hereditary heirs that it already views itself as master and not servant. A benign master perhaps, but a master none the less, and you don't give power to a good man that you wouldn't want his bad successor to have.
As you say, it doesn't look too bad right now. Of course, it gets just a little worse every year, but not so much that any one incident is enough to force the issue, and all the controls and crackdowns are justifiable. It's unfortunate that we can't move towards a more liberal society that treats people as innocent until proven guilty, but, hey, there's a lot of bad people in the world, right? Just one more restriction, then we'll be done, promise.
And so we go. Are you willing to bet that in 30 years, the next generation isn't going to look back and say "My god, why didn't you stop this peacefully when you had the chance?"
<sarcasm> Because if I sent an email saying "I think President Bush is doing a bad job." to someone, the secret police are going to bust in and put me in a labor camp. </sarcasm>
Hey, want some seeds for a plant that produces a non-physiologically addicting mood enhancing drug that's safer than alcohol or tobacco, that produces no victim, nor a need for crime, nor violent behaviour, nor any effects on society - other than removing the demand that creates organised crime.
Here it... wait a second, there's someone at the door.
While I agree that the size and scope of government should be kept to a minimum, we should be able to trust the elected officials in a republican system, since we choose who our representatives will be
(You vote Libertarian, right?) What if all of the candidates are corrupt? How is that better than the one party system in China? And at least in China they count all the votes, even though they're meaningless.
despite what most people think, law enforcement officials are WAY to busy to concern themselves with the details of your private life. They are only concerned for the information that will help them protect the public from criminals
Examples of criminals under US law (in various states): breaking the speed limit by 1mph. Having sex with a married person to whom you are not married. Same sex sex. Watching a bought DVD on a Linux system.
The problem with "it's OK, they're only interested in criminals" is that in practical terms everyone is a criminal. What you mean is: chances are they're only interested in other criminals.
This presumption - or creation - of guilt is the same as at the heart of Chinese censoring. There is a ruling overclass (heridatary and incumbent in both nations). The populace aren't fit to be trusted, and need to be monitored and controlled. But it's all for our own good, so what are we complaining about?
Sorry, that's not an attitude that I can easily stomach.
There I was, foaming at the mouth and ready to launch into a "how can you be so stupid?" diatribe. How can you keep encryption out of the hands of Bad People by denying it to Good People? In general terms, writing laws aimed at criminals is futile, because the criminals (by definition!) won't care about the law and will use whatever technology or methods they want. Nobody would be stupid or lazy or overconfident enough to use the lame default encryption on an export system, surely?
And then I read the article.
The al-Qa'ida machine was indeed running 40 bit encryption. It's hard to credit, but it really does appear that they simply were too stupid or too lazy or overconfident to upgrade the default lame-o-crypt settings. It's astonishing, especially compared to the planning that they put into September 11th, but there it is.
No, I don't think we should try and ban strong encryption. There are plenty of Good People who can make use of it (think Tibet), and any competent and determined Bad People can get it anyway. But these opponents just demonstrated clearly that while they were determined, they were not competent, and that changes my mind, just a litle.
I can see an argument for encouraging developers (Microsoft, MacOS and yes, Linux hackers) to supply 40 bit security by default on all consumer systems. Aunt Jemima doesn't need strong encryption, you and I probably don't need it. I wouldn't want strong encryption to be limited, but honest to god, I'd be flattered if anyone ever thought it was worth breaking even 40 bits worth on anything that I produced. I want the option to upgrade to be there, but I feel no particular need to use it, and here's the kicker: the less we kick up a fuss about it - and just quietly download the strong stuff ourselves without demanding that Aunt Jemina have it by default - the better.
I can't help but think that the more noise we make about the distinctions between low and high encryption, the more likely it is that even stupid, lazy, overconfident terrorists will perk up their ears and ask "Hey! Is this something we should be thinking about? Maybe we should send Achmed out to buy a copy of 'Security For Dummies'." Because they clearly are dummies, and I'm quite happy for them to stay that way, thanks all the same.
Slashdot Mirror
Franky, that's delusional. I'll ask again, in bold this time: what advantage would that give AOL over Microsoft?
If they ship a full Linux distro (any distro), then instead of AOLusers using Microsoft by default, they might end up using free (beer/speech) apps by default (gasp). Heck, nobody wins then (except the AOLusers, but that's hardly top of AOL or Microsoft's list of priorities).
No, if they ship an OS, it will have to be crippled and contain only AOL apps (along with copy control to protect Time Warner content). Further, if they're going to do it properly, they're going to see the sense in ensuring that it simply won't allow any other ISP's or non approved apps to gain a foothold.
Cynical? Hardly, this is the company that came up with the idea of sticky installs that do everything short of frying your hard drive to stop you changing ISP's.
I'm holding to my point. AOL don't want Red Hat, it's just a convenient target. They want Linux geeks to create a Linux based OS that will try to turn turn a PC into a AOL Homestation. For your safety, security and convenience, remember. It's actually stupid of them to look at Red Hat, but think of this as the beginning of their Journey to Clueville.
- What advantage would that give them, distributing an OS that actively encourages its users to get a clue and consider alternatives?
Last time I checked, my TIVO didn't do a damn thing to encourage me to get a clue.The charitable assumption is that you're deliberately quoting out of context, but are agreeing with the body of my post, but given the forum, I'm going to go ahead and assume that you stopped reading at that line to get your retort in faster. And it would have been a smart and incisive retort, if it hadn't actually been agreeing with exactly what I then went on to say, that an OS from AOL won't be Red Hat Linux in any recognisable form.
Do me the courtesy of reading the post to which I was replying, and you'll find that it was presented as a positive for Linux. I'm saying it's not that. That doesn't make it a negative. Go pick a fight somewhere else.
What a strange assumption I keep reading, that AOL-Time Warner actually have any interest in Red Hat Linux in particualr, or GNU/Linux in general. What advantage would that give them, distributing an OS that actively encourages its users to get a clue and consider alternatives?
What I'd expect to see is for them to buy up a bunch of developers (Red Hat or any other) and set them to work in the bowels of the AOL/TW Death Star producing something based on a Linux kernel, with most of GNU stripped out, no daemons, no package manager, no compiler, a brand new GUI, AOL-only apps with built in copy restrictions and automatic billing (already got your credit card number), and a daemon that hunts down and kills non-AOL approved processes, all for your security and convenience. I expect it to ship branded as "AOL", not "Red Hat" or even "AOL Linux". Possibly "Secure Linux" if they want to resell it as a perfect Son of SSSCA compliant implementation.
Impossible, you say? How much would it cost to develop? Ten million? Twenty? Fifty? A hundred million? A billion dollars? To control the desktop and the distribution and billing of content before Microsoft get in there first with Blackcomb and Homestation, that's pocket change.
They don't need any particular distro to do that, they just need developers. So run Alan, run for the hills, and take as many as you can with you.
It makes me wonder exactly who in the Oz governement actually knows what the hell is going on.
Compare with Bletchley Park in Britain during WWII, home of the Enigma codebreaking project. When the war ended, all of the people who worked there were instructed not to tell anyone what they were doing, without limit of time. Many of the records were destroyed. Very few people even know the whole story of exactly what had gone on.
Fifty or so years later, the government declassified the project. Or some of the project. Great! Only, the people who worked there were never told that they could now speak about these parts, or about which parts they could still not talk about. Was that because there are no surviving records, or because they were overlooked, or because the government still actively wants to keep them secret?
It sounds like a tiny, trite and rhetorical point, but when you think it through, this turns out to be a fully fledged bastard of a valid question: who knows?
Oh hush, unlimited editor moderation points results in a benign dictatorship. As /. editors have pointed out, they use their unlimited powers fairly.
Of course, all dictators view themselves as benign, and they all view their actions as fair/necessary for the greater good/ordained by god. But we can be sure that in this case, it's actually true, because, er, it's... ah... they...um...
No, I forget. I bet it was something pretty damn convincing and reassuring though!
Uh, that's a pretty big assumption. I honestly believe that the bastard child of any such union will ship with as little mention of Linux as humanly possible. It will install branded as an AOL product from one CD, will have no standard package manager, none of the standard daemons, no compiler. It will be Linux for Dummies, but they won't even know that, because it will simply be "AOL".
Uh oh, talking to the voices in your head can't be a good sign.
The X86/GNU/Linux "community" is defined by all of the people in it. Some of us flat out want to contribute to an uncompromising OS aimed squarely and honestly at geeks who are willing to put in the time to learn how to do it right. I already think most distros are too big a kludgy compromise. For example, you simply cannot fit even a bare bones graphical KDE install into the same hard drive footprint as a Windows 98 install, no matter how hard you pare it down (yes, yes, KDE is better, but that doesn't mean it has to be bigger). That's already a bad sign. AOL-Linux fills me with a creepy feeeling, and makes me think that BSD might very well have a lot going for it.
One of the best things about contributing to Linux (even in a small way by running and commenting on betas) is the thanks and kudos you get from your peers. Why would I want to contribute to a community composed mostly (100 million of 'em!) of people who won't give a damn about the contributions, except to demand more of them?
Same back atcha. My reason is that for X86/GNU/Linux to supplant Windows, it will first have to become Windows, at which point, why would I care about it? Then it's off to BSDland for me.
Gasp, yes, that's right, I do only want to contribute to an uncompromising geek OS, not an idiot proof OS aimed at idiots. Deal.
What part of what actually happened are you having trouble understanding? It's already trivial to upgrade the encryption on Windows boxen, even in suspect countries. You just have to click the "I am not a terrorist" button.
The plain old fact is that the terrorists were just too clueless or lazy to click a couple of buttons. How is your script going to help that?
Write it as a virus, then get back to us.
40 bits isn't strong enough? Look, if it comes down to the NSA needing to dedicate 5 days of supercomputer time to cracking Aunt Jemima's mail, they'll just trump up a tax evasion charge and blackmail her, or just beat her private key out of her. What is it with the assumption that we need practically uncrackable encryption rather than just encryption that's prohibitively expensive to crack routinely? For all real world purposes, it's equally good protection.
Best case: they distribute and support a full Red Hat install based on OS code. 100 million people realise that Linux is ready from the desktop, get a clue, and leave AOL in droves for real ISPs
Worst case: they throw a bllion dollars pocket change at it, strip it down to the kernel and rebuild it with copy control and automatic billing software built in, no package manager, no daemons, no compiler, no nothing except a GUI and the AOL approved apps, and a watchdog process that kills anything it doesn't expect to see as a security risk. It ships as "AOL" with no mention of Linux except in 6 point yellow-on-white under the help page referenced by the keyword: "&"300"~##!(!)!". 100 million people are left using a crippleware "OS" that aggresively prevents tinkering or expansion or manipulating of content, or installation of any other ISP, all for their safety and convenience, and those people will never, consider moving to any other OS until the end of time.
Realistic case: see "Worst case", but add "Although they'll have to support dual boot for a while, to let people play games. For a while."
That's a pretty big assumption.
Excuse me while I choke in disbelief. That's too big a task for AOL-Time-Warner? How much would it cost? Ten million? Fifty? A hundred million? A billion dollars? Pocket change.
You're absolutely right that AOL-Time-Warner are out to get Microsoft, but I think you're missing the ultimate point, even though you get very, very close. AOL-Time-Warner want to torpedo Windows, because it allows users to change ISP's. Let's say the default AOL-OS install doesn't let you do that. They've won, right?
No. If they put Linux on the desktop of 100 million users, other ISP's - MSN included - will have to support it. Don't cheer yet, because that puts AOL-Time-Warner back to square one, and they're not going to be that dumb.
If AOL-OS is ever released, you can bet your bottom dollar that it won't allow you to install anything that doesn't come directly off an AOL server or CD. There will be no package manager, no daemons, no compiler. There will be a Linux kernel, an absolute minumum subset of tools, a single GUI, and a daemon sitting watching for unknown "rogue" processes and removing them and their associated files. And this will be done for your safety and security.
While they're at it, content protection (read: copy control) will be built in from day 1, as will automatic billing (they already have your credit card number). This will be for your protection and convenience.
You want to bet this is too big a task? For AOL-Time-Warner? Two billion. Five billion. How much is it worth in the long term to gain an absolute strangehold on both the desktop and all content distribution? Ten billion? Twenty billion?
And one final point. Do you really think that the name Linux will even appear in the bastard child of this rape? I doubt it very much indeed. AOL-OS at a pinch, but more likely just "AOL".
AOL-Time-Warner, as an AC points out below, threatening dire consequences. I'll spell them out:
"Secure Red Hat Linux, now with New Improved Copy Protection and Automatic Billing for your Enjoyment and Convenience!"
I would add "Enter your Credit Card Number to Install this System", but that's a bit moot. They already have it.
If this happens, AOL-Time-Warner lusers will get a system based on the Linux kernel. The kernel. From there on up, it will be fully SSSCA compliant.
it seems to me that one more AOL-Linux user is a Linux user who will not contribute, and who will demand features and bells and whistles over stability and security every time.
I'll pass, thanks all the same.
Yes, it's a tough call, but these are practically mandatory in hentait/anime. If you made an opera out of Star Wars, you'd have a large woman playing Leia, right?
Perhaps, perhaps. Trouble is, it would cost $19 to find out, and commercial profit is one of the criteria for finding against fair use.
On balance, the judge probably got it right, I'm just saying that it's not entirely a black and white proposition.
Ooh, the Anonymous Coward has taken the moral high ground. I guess that blows my researched and reasoned arguments and refernces out of the water. Next time I'll be sure to wait until after the /. effect has died down before posting references to give other people context before they make up their minds. No, wait... wouldn't that be utterly pointless? Sigh.
It's a very close call. The important word is "for comic effect". The intention matters. AFAIK, people don't primarily make or watch hentai as or because it's funny, they make and watch it as and because it's porn.
Strangely enough, I made it perfectly clear in my post that I hadn't. I also talked in terms of probabilities based on the available evidence. Perhaps you could brush up on your reading comprehension, and consider adding some value to the debate rather than just noise.
People are allowed to use IP for "fair use", of which parody is one example, the one the creators are claiming here. But parody is defined as "for comic effect or ridicule".
Some hentai can be viewed as funny, but you can say the same for some musicals. This looks like either hentai in a Star Wars style, or (as Lucasarts claimed) Star Wars in a hentai style. I don't think comedy is a primary goal in either case.
Ridicule implies commentary or criticism, as in "Spaceballs" or "Troopers". Perhaps there's some of that here, but from the shots it looks very much like a character-for-character, scene-for-scene remake, only with large animated sexual organs.
We'd need to watch it to be sure, but I don't see it as being that clear cut, not at all.
Starballz claims this is a parody. Really? Parody, says Websters is "a literary or musical work in which the style of an author or work is closely imitated for comic effect or in ridicule." Case law shows that criticising or commenting on the original is also fair use (although not necessarily parody).
Having your own original characters do a Matrix freeze-orbit scene is parody for comic effect (please, enough, stop doing this now). Borrowing the characters, but spoofing twenty two other works and making very cutting critital points about "moichandising, moichandising" leaves you mostly clear, as Mel Brooks showed, and in agreement with the very informative overview of fair use and parody laws at publaw.com
But this... well, I dunno. It's commercial, it's not commenting or criticising that I can see (not is it primarily comic per se, it's part of a well defined genre of its own, like musical), it uses substantial portions of the original (characters, scenes and plot). That only leaves the effect on the original which is, to be fair, minimal. But in three out of the four criteria that a court should use to decide fair use, it appears to fall down.
Perhaps it does comment on or criticise the original. Of course, we'd have to watch it first to find out. And perhaps Lucasarts should have done so too:
It's hard to sympathise with a lawyer getting bitchslapped at the best of times, but this, if true, is probably karmic enough to cancel out any actual moral transgretion.
And neither have you, or you would understand that all dictatorships are benign - to begin with. The 2nd amendment to the Constitution recognises exactly that.
The intention or the degree of oppression is not the issue. Dictating directly or through propaganda what is right and what is wrong - as opposed to serving the will of the electorate - is oppression. I'd say that we have a government so composed of incumbents and hereditary heirs that it already views itself as master and not servant. A benign master perhaps, but a master none the less, and you don't give power to a good man that you wouldn't want his bad successor to have.
As you say, it doesn't look too bad right now. Of course, it gets just a little worse every year, but not so much that any one incident is enough to force the issue, and all the controls and crackdowns are justifiable. It's unfortunate that we can't move towards a more liberal society that treats people as innocent until proven guilty, but, hey, there's a lot of bad people in the world, right? Just one more restriction, then we'll be done, promise.
And so we go. Are you willing to bet that in 30 years, the next generation isn't going to look back and say "My god, why didn't you stop this peacefully when you had the chance?"
Hey, want some seeds for a plant that produces a non-physiologically addicting mood enhancing drug that's safer than alcohol or tobacco, that produces no victim, nor a need for crime, nor violent behaviour, nor any effects on society - other than removing the demand that creates organised crime.
Here it... wait a second, there's someone at the door.
(You vote Libertarian, right?) What if all of the candidates are corrupt? How is that better than the one party system in China? And at least in China they count all the votes, even though they're meaningless.
Examples of criminals under US law (in various states): breaking the speed limit by 1mph. Having sex with a married person to whom you are not married. Same sex sex. Watching a bought DVD on a Linux system.
The problem with "it's OK, they're only interested in criminals" is that in practical terms everyone is a criminal. What you mean is: chances are they're only interested in other criminals.
This presumption - or creation - of guilt is the same as at the heart of Chinese censoring. There is a ruling overclass (heridatary and incumbent in both nations). The populace aren't fit to be trusted, and need to be monitored and controlled. But it's all for our own good, so what are we complaining about?
Sorry, that's not an attitude that I can easily stomach.
There I was, foaming at the mouth and ready to launch into a "how can you be so stupid?" diatribe. How can you keep encryption out of the hands of Bad People by denying it to Good People? In general terms, writing laws aimed at criminals is futile, because the criminals (by definition!) won't care about the law and will use whatever technology or methods they want. Nobody would be stupid or lazy or overconfident enough to use the lame default encryption on an export system, surely?
And then I read the article.
The al-Qa'ida machine was indeed running 40 bit encryption. It's hard to credit, but it really does appear that they simply were too stupid or too lazy or overconfident to upgrade the default lame-o-crypt settings. It's astonishing, especially compared to the planning that they put into September 11th, but there it is.
No, I don't think we should try and ban strong encryption. There are plenty of Good People who can make use of it (think Tibet), and any competent and determined Bad People can get it anyway. But these opponents just demonstrated clearly that while they were determined, they were not competent, and that changes my mind, just a litle.
I can see an argument for encouraging developers (Microsoft, MacOS and yes, Linux hackers) to supply 40 bit security by default on all consumer systems. Aunt Jemima doesn't need strong encryption, you and I probably don't need it. I wouldn't want strong encryption to be limited, but honest to god, I'd be flattered if anyone ever thought it was worth breaking even 40 bits worth on anything that I produced. I want the option to upgrade to be there, but I feel no particular need to use it, and here's the kicker: the less we kick up a fuss about it - and just quietly download the strong stuff ourselves without demanding that Aunt Jemina have it by default - the better.
I can't help but think that the more noise we make about the distinctions between low and high encryption, the more likely it is that even stupid, lazy, overconfident terrorists will perk up their ears and ask "Hey! Is this something we should be thinking about? Maybe we should send Achmed out to buy a copy of 'Security For Dummies'." Because they clearly are dummies, and I'm quite happy for them to stay that way, thanks all the same.