Don't leave anything in your car if you park it outside. Keep your garage door closed even during the day so people can't see in. Plant thorney bushes under the windows. Put up a couple of flood lights to take out the shadows in your yard. Keep your yard neat so it's obvious somebody lives there.
Yep. I learned all this stuff from Bruce Schneier funnily enough when I read his stuff about physical security measures buying you time and buying inconvenience for the intruder. It's all about using simple deterrents that make you an irritating target: from camera, motion detector, fences, dogs, alarms right the way up to those remote sentry guns from Aliens. (I wish I had one or two of those - my Dad got carjacked this morning)
The authorities played a similar sort of game in Mexico City in the late 70s by repainting the lines on the roads to carry more lanes and then boasting that they had "increased capacity by 50%!" - from four lanes to six IIRC. Then when the inevitable happened and far more accidents happened because of decreased room to manoeuvre, they reduced it back to four and claimed that there was now "33% less congestion!" Of course, nothing had changed (and certainly not the physical width of the road): 6 lanes is 50% more than 4 lanes, and 4 lanes is 33% less than six lanes.
I'd welcome the exact details of this story - googling picks up the Economist's link but I can't get it to open.
I'd like to point out that...
on
Capturing Genesis
·
· Score: 3, Insightful
...this story has been mentioned before. It is my single accepted submission on/. and thus occupies a special place in my memory:)
Chill dude - he's a volunteer donating his time and effort and using a little humour which perhaps comes off badly. At least he's not some sharecropper furthering the goals of a detestable company.
What can be done in seven years' time with hundreds of emplyees? Amazing stuff.
Not nearly as amazing as what can be done by several hundred thousand.
If people are really going to be able to hack up some XML applicaton like what's hyped, there might be some serious problems, no matter how many Mono's or GNU DotNETs there are.
Some feel that Microsoft has actually lost the war for the Windows API through too much chopping and changing over the past three or four years. It's all fire and maneouvre - COM, DCOM, DNA,.NET 1.0,.NET something else and now Longhorn which will be another - considerable - departure. So now let's say I'm a Windows development shop. What do I do? Invest up to seven years wasted time only to see it break and have to relearn and reinvest everything? Or do I stick to Web technologies and maybe other platforms with more stability (API-wise - I don't mean ones which fall over less although that is a consideration)?
Until the community stops getting cocky and starts getting worried, nothing will ever go anywhere.
I haven't seen much change in the level of vitriol aimed at Microsoft over the past ten years of being a Linux user. Hackers are cocky and impatient and arrogant - it often goes with writing good code. Despite all this "unprofessional behaviour", Linux has progressed enormously.
Being afraid is a good thing(tm), because it gets people working harder.
Here's the One Overarching Single Great Grand Unified Truth about Linux's progress. If you take anything away from this lecture^H^H^H^H^H^H^Hpost let it be this:
The vast majority of people working to improve Linux do not care about what Microsoft is up to, least of all what development tools they are hyping. Why should they be?
So, again, I emplore somebody to please change the graphic to more accurately represent what we have to fear this new century.
I'm glad someone else picked this up. I was browsing Design Patterns just the other day and the second chapter is devoted to a high-level look at how patterns can be used to solve the common issues of document editing. The author suggests recursive composition for the storage and you're right about the flyweight and command examples.
Microsoft just lives in a big bubble world where they re-invent things their own particular way.
There's another example in Writing Secure Code where the author practically bows down to a guru Microsoft coder for an incredibly stupid idea whereas it's the poor little intern that has the right idea. I can't remember the exact example but I know it was something to do with - you guessed it - code complexity. I'm sure it's not coincidence that the author of the blog tried to play down the complexity thing. Probably a cultural thing at Microsoft, or maybe just even a sign of institutional resignation that there's just too much old cruft which no one person can understand but since it's all they have, they need to deal with it the best they can.
I agree. I personally do not believe that EULAs are bona fide contracts. Neither do I think the GPL is a contract. I stated this earlier, if you forgot.
I did actually - too hung up on the GPL is a contract argument...
However, the form of the GPL is that of a contract. My only assertion is that *if* a EULA is a contract, *then* so is the GPL, on the basis that they use identical mechanisms to grant/impose rights and restrictions upon the user.
OK - I follow. I'm still a bit hazy on the similarities though -...goes to look at a standard EULA...
But according to the GPL, you MUST agree to the license before getting them. To quote: "These actions are prohibited by law if you do not accept this License." This is far more than the mere granting of permission.
I think because herein lies the Giant Hack of Copyright that copyleft achieves. If it was straight copyright we're all talking about then it would be pretty clear. Likewise if it was a straight contractual thing, no problem. But because it's the Drawing Hands version that combines both, you can't seperate them. I'm starting to believe the GPL really does have some contractual elements. If only more/. arguments were like this - well argued, polite, convincing etc...
The apology is necessary, but not sufficient. I should have added, "...and correct your non-compliance." After SCO corrects their non-compliance and apologizes to the licensors, then they'll get their rights back.
That would be a climbdown and a half.
But I was referring to Richard Stallman's remarks regarding Trolltech's placement of Qt under the GPL. Most KDE developers had coffee shooting out their noses as well when the heard his statements that day. His later clarifications made it clear that he believes a formal apology is necessary to regain any lost rights under the GPL.
Good grief. You're absolutely right. Dunno how I missed this but it confirms that the man is even further out than I thought - and I'm a Gnome-using, GPL-advocating kind of person.
No doubt, but it doesn't follow that EULAs or the GPL are not, in fact, both licenses and contracts. Calling something a license does not mean that it can't be a contract as well, and in fact it is common for documents that look like what the layperson would call a contract, a negotiated written document signed by both parties, to in fact function as both a contract and a license, and perhaps some other things as well.
Fair enough, but I think the GPL is very carefully and deliberately worded as a license and nothing more.
A distributor who elects option (b) under section 3 of the GPL is indeed making such a promise, namely a promise to distribute source code to anyone who requests it for a period of at least three years, in exchange for a license from the copyright holder.
I think you're wrong but fascinatingly so:) It took me a while to pin down what I think is wrong with that argument and it's this: that promise is not enforced under contract law. It's just part of a classical unilateral permission to use someone else's copyrighted work and hence must be enforced under copyright law. To quote Eben Moglen:
A contract, on the other hand, is an exchange of obligations, either of promises for promises or of promises of future performance for present performance or payment. The idea that 'licenses' to use patents or copyrights must be contracts is an artifact of twentieth-century practice, in which licensors offered an exchange of promises with users: 'We will give you a copy of our copyrighted work,' in essence, 'if you pay us and promise to enter into certain obligations concerning the work.' With respect to software, those obligations by users include promises not to decompile or reverse-engineer the software, and not to transfer the software.
Presenting the user with the terms of the shrinkwrap agreement after this sale then is viewed as an attempt to modify this contract, and this modification is found to fail because either the user does not perform acts sufficient to manifest assent to the modification or because the changes only benefit the copyright holder and thus lack the mutual exchange generally required for a contract to be enforcable.
If the typical EULA is a contract, then so is the GPL, for both operate under the same mechanism: the requirement to agree to the license before gaining any rights or permissions.
I don't really follow this logic: if EULAs are contracts, then then so is the GPL because both require assent? Nonsense. Firstly, the GPL is not a EULA. There is nothing in it which restricts usage. It only affects distribution. Secondly, although some EULAs may think they are contracts or try and impose contractual obligations, there is no mutual agreement entered into between the parties beforehand, nothing that specifies payment made for good or services received or penalties under contract law. It's just a license - permission to do something which you otherwise would not be allowed to do. Thirdly, the difference between contracts and licenses is far more than their similarities. I might just as well try and tell a court that homicide and illegal hunting are the same because in both cases I pulled a trigger but I wouldn't get very far.
The GPL is also like the typical EULA, in that you can LOSE YOUR RIGHTS if you do not follow the specified conditions and restrictions.
Other way around: the GPL GIVES YOU RIGHTS that you wouldn't otherwise have - permission to copy, modify or distribute someone else's copyrighted works. If you don't accept its terms, then you don't have those rights in the first place. Simple.
According to RMS, you lose your rights until such a time as you formally apologize.
Heh - thanks for the coffee out the nose. I'm sure SCO will get back their rights once they formally apologize for distributing IBM's copyrighted code without a license. Oh didn't you hear? SCO has been distributing Linux without a license to do so. Linux includes a considerable body of IBM"s copyrighted code so IBM is taking them to court. SCO can either fork out damages under copyright law (not contract law) or it can wave their license - the GPL - and get off. It can't really do the latter though since it says the GPL is unenforceable, null and void.
I'm not sure if you're trolling but nowhere does the GPL attempt to be a contract. Its use of the word "accept" is just like for any other kind of license: "do you accept the terms of this license?" If yes, then fine - here are the terms. If not then sorry, nothing else gives you permission to distribute the software.
That process is the same for any license. A license just gives a licensee permission to do what he otherwise wouldn't be allowed to, fishing on someone else's private property (a fishing license) or copying, distributing and modifying someone else's copyrighted work (the GPL). If the licensee doesn't "accept" the terms of the license then he doesn't have permission from the licensor and other laws kick in (trespassing and copyright laws in my two examples). But there are no requirements or agreements signed beforehand that must be honoured a la a contract.
And the "mode of assent" has nothing to do with whether there are contractual obligations in the GPL or not.
Paul Graham points out why this happens in another of his essays, Revenge of the Nerds.
The pointy-haired boss miraculously combines two qualities that are common by themselves, but rarely seen together: (a) he knows nothing whatsoever about technology, and (b) he has very strong opinions about it.
Suppose, for example, you need to write a piece of software. The pointy-haired boss has no idea how this software has to work, and can't tell one programming language from another, and yet he knows what language you should write it in. Exactly. He thinks you should write it in Java.
Why does he think this? Let's take a look inside the brain of the pointy-haired boss. What he's thinking is something like this. Java is a standard. I know it must be, because I read about it in the press all the time. Since it is a standard, I won't get in trouble for using it. And that also means there will always be lots of Java programmers, so if the programmers working for me now quit, as programmers working for me mysteriously always do, I can easily replace them.
Well, this doesn't sound that unreasonable. But it's all based on one unspoken assumption, and that assumption turns out to be false. The pointy-haired boss believes that all programming languages are pretty much equivalent. If that were true, he would be right on target. If languages are all equivalent, sure, use whatever language everyone else is using.
Linux is burdened with too much intellectual-property uncertainty for many companies to embrace and develop it further
This entire column is complete bollocks as I will now explain. (FLOSS = Free Libre and Open Source Software - remember folks, brush and FLOSS daily!)
The open-source movement has had a remarkable run of success that has seen software such as the Linux operating system and the Apache Web server emerge as major challenges to Microsoft (MSFT ). However, the movement is now facing a crisis. At its heart is a question that has been around from the very beginning: How does software owned by everyone and by no one survive in a world where copyrights and patents shape the legal landscape?
The same way it's always done - by being more reliable, more agile, better maintained and better supported. I'm also not sure how the author thinks that open source is not copyrighted - all of it is by definition.
then owned by AT&T. Intellectual-property questions about Linux came to the forefront after the SCO Group (SCOX ), which acquired the Unix trademarks, launched a series of lawsuits against alleged infringers of its rights.
Incorrect - SCO does NOT own the trademarks to Unix.
POTENTIAL INFRINGEMENTS. The central case, a 2003 suit against IBM (IBM ), an important corporate promoter of Linux, has degenerated into a messy contract dispute with no intellectual-property issues left on the table. SCO's threats to sue companies that use Linux have almost entirely evaporated.
Because they were and are lies. But the author is mistaken. There are "intellectual property" issues aplenty left on the table. IP - which is a lazy and meaningless term that conglomerates at least three kinds of entirely different sets of laws on intangible rights - is going to bite SCO severely because IBM is now suing it for distributing Linux without a license.
But now another problem has surfaced. Open Source Risk Management, a new outfit that indemnifies its customers against infringement claims, found in a review of Linux code that the operating system potentially infringes on 283 patents. Although IBM declared it would make no
effort to enforce its 60 patents involved, some are held by Linux foes, including 27 by Microsoft.
Patents granted in its infinite stupidity by the US patent office. Maths should not be patented.
The potential patent infringements pose no immediate threat to Linux. Such disputes typically take years to resolve, and courts rarely issue injunctions against alleged infringers. But the uncertainty is taking a toll. In the most significant response to date, the city government in Munich, Germany, has suspended a massive transition of desktop computers from Microsoft Windows to Linux, pending clarification of the patent situation (see BW Online, 8/9/04, "Will Legal Fears Freeze the Penguin?").
Munich is going ahead.
But open-source proponents also have to get their own intellectual-property house in order.
Again - what is meant by intellectual property here? Does he mean copyrights? All FLOSS is copyrighted. Does he mean trademarked? The brands that matter are trademarked. Does he mean patented? Sorry but the vast majority of FLOSS developers don't really care whether the US allows the patenting of maths or not. If he's talking about "ownership" then he's wrong. As the SCO episode demonstrated, every single line of Linux can be accounted for - unlike many closed-source vendors.
The development of open-source software is increasingly dominated by corporate interests that, one way or another, want to use Linux, Apache, and other open-source products to make money.
No - it's the other way around. Businesses have to decide why and how they are going to use open source software to survive. Plenty already have decided to use it to make money and give b
If you didn't like the movie, fine. All I can say is that it cast a spell over me (and my wife). Somehow the movie felt like watching a dream. I don't know exactly why that was, but it totally sucked me in.
"Cast a spell" - this is probably the best description of watching it for the first time. I thought the whole thing was both exquisitely filmed and disturbing at the same time.
Oh, I had been married for many years when I saw it. And several people I know who did like it were older, or were experienced in traditional long-term relationships.
I've noticed this as well. If you're not married and haven't grappled with thoughts of infidelity or been through the odd bad patch where just about every girl you meet comes on to you, then you're not going to identify with Dr. Bill at all - and identifying with the main character is vital in this film.
I thought it was vintage Kubrick which as usual yields more detail and enjoyment on each subsequent viewing.
Ah but you see Paul Graham at least practices what he preaches. He has written at length about why programming languages vary in power and why leveraging that power can really make a difference - no matter what pointed haired bosses think.
If some of the development community's best and brightest think this language is superior, why not drive an effort to help it put food on the table rather than relegate it to a tool that helps you write scripts to rotate witty quotes in your.plan file?
Python puts food on the table for me - and quite a lot of it too. My clients so far haven't cared what language their systems (some very large systems I might add) are written in - just that they work, are reliable, easy to maintain and took a surprisingly short time to write.
Pardon me while I go build a better mouse trap, pontificate on how much better it is and what a great mouse catcher I am, and then put it in my hamster's cage to prove it.
You do that. In the mean time many of us will continue to enjoy Graham's essays. I may not always agree with him but he's not just some theoretical pontificator - he founded ViaWeb and made it the leader in virtual shopfront building solutions by using the power of Lisp (hardly a mainstream commercial development language) and then sold it to Yahoo for several million dollars.
Hell, just look at that quote above. "He couldn't be a first rate hacker since he obviously chose NT voluntarily." According to the author, there's no way to succeed if you choose to build on NT.
That's not what he said. He said he couldn't be a first rate hacker. He's carefully defined what he thinks makes a first rate hacker leading up to this paragraph and then gives it as a counter-example.
Knowing Python doesn't make you a "first rate hacker". Any decent programmer can pick up a language like python in a day or two.
RTOFA. He says: And people don't learn Python because it will get them a job; they learn it because they genuinely like to program and aren't satisfied with the languages they already know. Which makes them exactly the kind of programmers companies should want to hire.
You claim: A good hacker (i.e. a programmer that a company would want to hire) is someone who can take their previous experience and apply that to the problem at hand, using the tools available.
Graham says a first rate hacker would not be satisfied with just any tools and would probably think that their previous experience isn't worth a whole lot - even though in the eyes of other hackers it might be godlike stuff. I agree that what he says is contraversial and pushes a lot of people's buttons but be fair in your criticism.
Oh yeah. Here's an enlightening extract from Accidental Empires by Bob Cringeley:
My secret suspicion is that Microsoft's cult of pesonality hides a deep-down fear on Gates's part that maybe he really doesn't know it all. A few times I've seen him cornered by some techie who is not from Microsoft and is not in awe, a techie who knows more about that subject at hand than Bill Gates ever will. I've seen a flash of fear in Gates's eyes then. Even with you or me topics can range beyond Bill's grasp, and that's when he uses his "I don't know how technical you are" line.... To take this particularly degrading weapon out of his hands forever, I propose that should you ever talk with Bill Gates and hear him say "I don't know how technical you are", reply by saying that you don't know how technical he is. It will drive him nuts.
Slashdot Mirror
Did one of the Subversion guys "steal" his girlfriend or something?
:)
No - he just checked her out
You might be alive but how will we know it's really you and not just an imitation?
They might have been from north of the border come to think of it...
I sent you this file to have your advice.
Nuff said.
Don't leave anything in your car if you park it outside. Keep your garage door closed even during the day so people can't see in. Plant thorney bushes under the windows. Put up a couple of flood lights to take out the shadows in your yard. Keep your yard neat so it's obvious somebody lives there.
Yep. I learned all this stuff from Bruce Schneier funnily enough when I read his stuff about physical security measures buying you time and buying inconvenience for the intruder. It's all about using simple deterrents that make you an irritating target: from camera, motion detector, fences, dogs, alarms right the way up to those remote sentry guns from Aliens. (I wish I had one or two of those - my Dad got carjacked this morning)
I feel the good in you Anonymous Coward - let go of your hate!
I remember you could boot Gentoo (of all distros!) CDs straight into UT2003. Hardware detected, X configured and then ran an xinit ut2003. Luvly...
The authorities played a similar sort of game in Mexico City in the late 70s by repainting the lines on the roads to carry more lanes and then boasting that they had "increased capacity by 50%!" - from four lanes to six IIRC. Then when the inevitable happened and far more accidents happened because of decreased room to manoeuvre, they reduced it back to four and claimed that there was now "33% less congestion!" Of course, nothing had changed (and certainly not the physical width of the road): 6 lanes is 50% more than 4 lanes, and 4 lanes is 33% less than six lanes.
I'd welcome the exact details of this story - googling picks up the Economist's link but I can't get it to open.
...this story has been mentioned before. It is my single accepted submission on /. and thus occupies a special place in my memory :)
You sir, now owe me a new keyboard and nasal cavity...
Chill dude - he's a volunteer donating his time and effort and using a little humour which perhaps comes off badly. At least he's not some sharecropper furthering the goals of a detestable company.
And when they patent everything to do with SOA and roll out Indigo they will have achieved that.
I don't think there is anything that will keep them from this. Anyone? anyone?
Maybe two things. 1. No-one uses it or 2. no-one outside the US cares about any stupid patents about it and re-implements it their own way.
What can be done in seven years' time with hundreds of emplyees? Amazing stuff.
.NET 1.0, .NET something else and now Longhorn which will be another - considerable - departure.
:)
Not nearly as amazing as what can be done by several hundred thousand.
If people are really going to be able to hack up some XML applicaton like what's hyped, there might be some serious problems, no matter how many Mono's or GNU DotNETs there are.
Some feel that Microsoft has actually lost the war for the Windows API through too much chopping and changing over the past three or four years. It's all fire and maneouvre - COM, DCOM, DNA,
So now let's say I'm a Windows development shop. What do I do? Invest up to seven years wasted time only to see it break and have to relearn and reinvest everything? Or do I stick to Web technologies and maybe other platforms with more stability (API-wise - I don't mean ones which fall over less although that is a consideration)?
Until the community stops getting cocky and starts getting worried, nothing will ever go anywhere.
I haven't seen much change in the level of vitriol aimed at Microsoft over the past ten years of being a Linux user. Hackers are cocky and impatient and arrogant - it often goes with writing good code. Despite all this "unprofessional behaviour", Linux has progressed enormously.
Being afraid is a good thing(tm), because it gets people working harder.
Here's the One Overarching Single Great Grand Unified Truth about Linux's progress. If you take anything away from this lecture^H^H^H^H^H^H^Hpost let it be this:
The vast majority of people working to improve Linux do not care about what Microsoft is up to, least of all what development tools they are hyping. Why should they be?
So, again, I emplore somebody to please change the graphic to more accurately represent what we have to fear this new century.
Perhaps the hourglass symbol?
I'm glad someone else picked this up. I was browsing Design Patterns just the other day and the second chapter is devoted to a high-level look at how patterns can be used to solve the common issues of document editing. The author suggests recursive composition for the storage and you're right about the flyweight and command examples.
Microsoft just lives in a big bubble world where they re-invent things their own particular way.
There's another example in Writing Secure Code where the author practically bows down to a guru Microsoft coder for an incredibly stupid idea whereas it's the poor little intern that has the right idea. I can't remember the exact example but I know it was something to do with - you guessed it - code complexity. I'm sure it's not coincidence that the author of the blog tried to play down the complexity thing. Probably a cultural thing at Microsoft, or maybe just even a sign of institutional resignation that there's just too much old cruft which no one person can understand but since it's all they have, they need to deal with it the best they can.
I agree. I personally do not believe that EULAs are bona fide contracts. Neither do I think the GPL is a contract. I stated this earlier, if you forgot.
...goes to look at a standard EULA...
/. arguments were like this - well argued, polite, convincing etc...
I did actually - too hung up on the GPL is a contract argument...
However, the form of the GPL is that of a contract. My only assertion is that *if* a EULA is a contract, *then* so is the GPL, on the basis that they use identical mechanisms to grant/impose rights and restrictions upon the user.
OK - I follow. I'm still a bit hazy on the similarities though -
But according to the GPL, you MUST agree to the license before getting them. To quote: "These actions are prohibited by law if you do not accept this License." This is far more than the mere granting of permission.
I think because herein lies the Giant Hack of Copyright that copyleft achieves. If it was straight copyright we're all talking about then it would be pretty clear. Likewise if it was a straight contractual thing, no problem. But because it's the Drawing Hands version that combines both, you can't seperate them. I'm starting to believe the GPL really does have some contractual elements. If only more
The apology is necessary, but not sufficient. I should have added, "...and correct your non-compliance." After SCO corrects their non-compliance and apologizes to the licensors, then they'll get their rights back.
That would be a climbdown and a half.
But I was referring to Richard Stallman's remarks regarding Trolltech's placement of Qt under the GPL. Most KDE developers had coffee shooting out their noses as well when the heard his statements that day. His later clarifications made it clear that he believes a formal apology is necessary to regain any lost rights under the GPL.
Good grief. You're absolutely right. Dunno how I missed this but it confirms that the man is even further out than I thought - and I'm a Gnome-using, GPL-advocating kind of person.
No doubt, but it doesn't follow that EULAs or the GPL are not, in fact, both licenses and contracts. Calling something a license does not mean that it can't be a contract as well, and in fact it is common for documents that look like what the layperson would call a contract, a negotiated written document signed by both parties, to in fact function as both a contract and a license, and perhaps some other things as well.
:) It took me a while to pin down what I think is wrong with that argument and it's this: that promise is not enforced under contract law. It's just part of a classical unilateral permission to use someone else's copyrighted work and hence must be enforced under copyright law. To quote Eben Moglen:
Fair enough, but I think the GPL is very carefully and deliberately worded as a license and nothing more.
A distributor who elects option (b) under section 3 of the GPL is indeed making such a promise, namely a promise to distribute source code to anyone who requests it for a period of at least three years, in exchange for a license from the copyright holder.
I think you're wrong but fascinatingly so
A contract, on the other hand, is an exchange of obligations, either of promises for promises or of promises of future performance for present performance or payment. The idea that 'licenses' to use patents or copyrights must be contracts is an artifact of twentieth-century practice, in which licensors offered an exchange of promises with users: 'We will give you a copy of our copyrighted work,' in essence, 'if you pay us and promise to enter into certain obligations concerning the work.' With respect to software, those obligations by users include promises not to decompile or reverse-engineer the software, and not to transfer the software.
Presenting the user with the terms of the shrinkwrap agreement after this sale then is viewed as an attempt to modify this contract, and this modification is found to fail because either the user does not perform acts sufficient to manifest assent to the modification or because the changes only benefit the copyright holder and thus lack the mutual exchange generally required for a contract to be enforcable.
Aha - thanks.
If the typical EULA is a contract, then so is the GPL, for both operate under the same mechanism: the requirement to agree to the license before gaining any rights or permissions.
I don't really follow this logic: if EULAs are contracts, then then so is the GPL because both require assent? Nonsense. Firstly, the GPL is not a EULA. There is nothing in it which restricts usage. It only affects distribution.
Secondly, although some EULAs may think they are contracts or try and impose contractual obligations, there is no mutual agreement entered into between the parties beforehand, nothing that specifies payment made for good or services received or penalties under contract law. It's just a license - permission to do something which you otherwise would not be allowed to do.
Thirdly, the difference between contracts and licenses is far more than their similarities. I might just as well try and tell a court that homicide and illegal hunting are the same because in both cases I pulled a trigger but I wouldn't get very far.
The GPL is also like the typical EULA, in that you can LOSE YOUR RIGHTS if you do not follow the specified conditions and restrictions.
Other way around: the GPL GIVES YOU RIGHTS that you wouldn't otherwise have - permission to copy, modify or distribute someone else's copyrighted works. If you don't accept its terms, then you don't have those rights in the first place. Simple.
According to RMS, you lose your rights until such a time as you formally apologize.
Heh - thanks for the coffee out the nose. I'm sure SCO will get back their rights once they formally apologize for distributing IBM's copyrighted code without a license. Oh didn't you hear? SCO has been distributing Linux without a license to do so. Linux includes a considerable body of IBM"s copyrighted code so IBM is taking them to court. SCO can either fork out damages under copyright law (not contract law) or it can wave their license - the GPL - and get off. It can't really do the latter though since it says the GPL is unenforceable, null and void.
I'm not sure if you're trolling but nowhere does the GPL attempt to be a contract. Its use of the word "accept" is just like for any other kind of license: "do you accept the terms of this license?" If yes, then fine - here are the terms. If not then sorry, nothing else gives you permission to distribute the software.
That process is the same for any license. A license just gives a licensee permission to do what he otherwise wouldn't be allowed to, fishing on someone else's private property (a fishing license) or copying, distributing and modifying someone else's copyrighted work (the GPL). If the licensee doesn't "accept" the terms of the license then he doesn't have permission from the licensor and other laws kick in (trespassing and copyright laws in my two examples). But there are no requirements or agreements signed beforehand that must be honoured a la a contract.
And the "mode of assent" has nothing to do with whether there are contractual obligations in the GPL or not.
Paul Graham points out why this happens in another of his essays, Revenge of the Nerds.
The pointy-haired boss miraculously combines two qualities that are common by themselves, but rarely seen together: (a) he knows nothing whatsoever about technology, and (b) he has very strong opinions about it.
Suppose, for example, you need to write a piece of software. The pointy-haired boss has no idea how this software has to work, and can't tell one programming language from another, and yet he knows what language you should write it in. Exactly. He thinks you should write it in Java.
Why does he think this? Let's take a look inside the brain of the pointy-haired boss. What he's thinking is something like this. Java is a standard. I know it must be, because I read about it in the press all the time. Since it is a standard, I won't get in trouble for using it. And that also means there will always be lots of Java programmers, so if the programmers working for me now quit, as programmers working for me mysteriously always do, I can easily replace them.
Well, this doesn't sound that unreasonable. But it's all based on one unspoken assumption, and that assumption turns out to be false. The pointy-haired boss believes that all programming languages are pretty much equivalent. If that were true, he would be right on target. If languages are all equivalent, sure, use whatever language everyone else is using.
I was trying to read too much into what he was quoted as saying in the article. Thanks for the corrections - points well taken.
Comments and clarifications welcome:
Linux is burdened with too much intellectual-property uncertainty for
many companies to embrace and develop it further
This entire column is complete bollocks as I will now explain. (FLOSS = Free Libre and Open Source Software - remember folks, brush and FLOSS
daily!)
The open-source movement has had a remarkable run of success that has seen software such as the Linux operating system and the Apache Web server emerge as major challenges to Microsoft (MSFT ). However, the movement is now facing a crisis. At its heart is a question that has been around from the very beginning: How does software owned by
everyone and by no one survive in a world where copyrights and patents shape the legal landscape?
The same way it's always done - by being more reliable, more agile, better maintained and better supported. I'm also not sure how the author thinks that open source is not copyrighted - all of it is by definition.
then owned by AT&T. Intellectual-property questions about Linux came to the forefront after the SCO Group (SCOX ), which acquired the Unix
trademarks, launched a series of lawsuits against alleged infringers of its rights.
Incorrect - SCO does NOT own the trademarks to Unix.
POTENTIAL INFRINGEMENTS. The central case, a 2003 suit against IBM (IBM ), an important corporate promoter of Linux, has degenerated into
a messy contract dispute with no intellectual-property issues left on the table. SCO's threats to sue companies that use Linux have almost entirely evaporated.
Because they were and are lies. But the author is mistaken. There are "intellectual property" issues aplenty left on the table. IP - which is a lazy and meaningless term that conglomerates at least three kinds of entirely different sets of laws on intangible rights - is going to bite SCO severely because IBM is now suing it for distributing Linux without a license.
But now another problem has surfaced. Open Source Risk Management, a new outfit that indemnifies its customers against infringement claims, found in a review of Linux code that the operating system potentially infringes on 283 patents. Although IBM declared it would make no
effort to enforce its 60 patents involved, some are held by Linux foes, including 27 by Microsoft.
Patents granted in its infinite stupidity by the US patent office. Maths should not be patented.
The potential patent infringements pose no immediate threat to Linux. Such disputes typically take years to resolve, and courts rarely issue
injunctions against alleged infringers. But the uncertainty is taking a toll. In the most significant response to date, the city government
in Munich, Germany, has suspended a massive transition of desktop computers from Microsoft Windows to Linux, pending clarification of
the patent situation (see BW Online, 8/9/04, "Will Legal Fears Freeze the Penguin?").
Munich is going ahead.
But open-source proponents also have to get their own intellectual-property house in order.
Again - what is meant by intellectual property here? Does he mean copyrights? All FLOSS is copyrighted. Does he mean trademarked? The
brands that matter are trademarked. Does he mean patented? Sorry but the vast majority of FLOSS developers don't really care whether the US
allows the patenting of maths or not. If he's talking about "ownership" then he's wrong. As the SCO episode demonstrated, every single line of Linux can be accounted for - unlike many closed-source vendors.
The development of open-source software is increasingly dominated by corporate interests that, one way or another, want to use Linux,
Apache, and other open-source products to make money.
No - it's the other way around. Businesses have to decide why and how they are going to use open source software to survive. Plenty already have decided to use it to make money and give b
If you didn't like the movie, fine. All I can say is that it cast a spell over me (and my wife). Somehow the movie felt like watching a dream. I don't know exactly why that was, but it totally sucked me in.
"Cast a spell" - this is probably the best description of watching it for the first time. I thought the whole thing was both exquisitely filmed and disturbing at the same time.
Oh, I had been married for many years when I saw it. And several people I know who did like it were older, or were experienced in traditional long-term relationships.
I've noticed this as well. If you're not married and haven't grappled with thoughts of infidelity or been through the odd bad patch where just about every girl you meet comes on to you, then you're not going to identify with Dr. Bill at all - and identifying with the main character is vital in this film.
I thought it was vintage Kubrick which as usual yields more detail and enjoyment on each subsequent viewing.
Ah but you see Paul Graham at least practices what he preaches. He has written at length about why programming languages vary in power and why leveraging that power can really make a difference - no matter what pointed haired bosses think.
.plan file?
If some of the development community's best and brightest think this language is superior, why not drive an effort to help it put food on the table rather than relegate it to a tool that helps you write scripts to rotate witty quotes in your
Python puts food on the table for me - and quite a lot of it too. My clients so far haven't cared what language their systems (some very large systems I might add) are written in - just that they work, are reliable, easy to maintain and took a surprisingly short time to write.
Pardon me while I go build a better mouse trap, pontificate on how much better it is and what a great mouse catcher I am, and then put it in my hamster's cage to prove it.
You do that. In the mean time many of us will continue to enjoy Graham's essays. I may not always agree with him but he's not just some theoretical pontificator - he founded ViaWeb and made it the leader in virtual shopfront building solutions by using the power of Lisp (hardly a mainstream commercial development language) and then sold it to Yahoo for several million dollars.
Hell, just look at that quote above. "He couldn't be a first rate hacker since he obviously chose NT voluntarily." According to the author, there's no way to succeed if you choose to build on NT.
That's not what he said. He said he couldn't be a first rate hacker. He's carefully defined what he thinks makes a first rate hacker leading up to this paragraph and then gives it as a counter-example.
Knowing Python doesn't make you a "first rate hacker". Any decent programmer can pick up a language like python in a day or two.
RTOFA. He says:
And people don't learn Python because it will get them a job; they learn it because they genuinely like to program and aren't satisfied with the languages they already know.
Which makes them exactly the kind of programmers companies should want to hire.
You claim:
A good hacker (i.e. a programmer that a company would want to hire) is someone who can take their previous experience and apply that to the problem at hand, using the tools available.
Graham says a first rate hacker would not be satisfied with just any tools and would probably think that their previous experience isn't worth a whole lot - even though in the eyes of other hackers it might be godlike stuff. I agree that what he says is contraversial and pushes a lot of people's buttons but be fair in your criticism.
Oh yeah. Here's an enlightening extract from Accidental Empires by Bob Cringeley:
...
My secret suspicion is that Microsoft's cult of pesonality hides a deep-down fear on Gates's part that maybe he really doesn't know it all. A few times I've seen him cornered by some techie who is not from Microsoft and is not in awe, a techie who knows more about that subject at hand than Bill Gates ever will. I've seen a flash of fear in Gates's eyes then. Even with you or me topics can range beyond Bill's grasp, and that's when he uses his "I don't know how technical you are" line.
To take this particularly degrading weapon out of his hands forever, I propose that should you ever talk with Bill Gates and hear him say "I don't know how technical you are", reply by saying that you don't know how technical he is. It will drive him nuts.