"Harvard justified its decision by claiming that Divinity School rules prohibited personal use of university computers in any way that clashed with its educational mission. But the dean was using his computer at home, not work. And no student or colleague suggested he had improperly behaved in any way as head of the Divinity School. His work was never questioned. It's ludicrous to suggest that the school would have fired him if he'd been downloading sports scores or bidding for furniture on eBay. But although he'd committed no crime and performed well in his job, he was forced out in disgrace..."
I think a little clarification may be needed hear - it appears to me that this man was not "fired" - he was "asked to step down."
Now, while I know those are more or less equivalent, it's important to note that he complied with the university's request, which leads me to believe he did not contest it. Were he to feel as strongly about this issue as Jon does, he would wait until he was formally fired and then take the University to court. This implies that he consented, and it appears that Jon is (as usual) creating an issue where there is none.
Furthermore, I object to the use of the statement "But the dean was using his computer at home, not work." Jon said that there was an understood agreement that "rules prohibited personal use of university computers in any way that clashed with its educational mission," - regardless of whether or not that rule was intended for these circustances, it _was_ a rule, and he _did_ break it. I'll reference some real (read: non-geek) culture here - these seems somewhat analogous to Les Miserables, in which the protagonist stole a loaf of bread to save his sister's (?) life, and was imprisoned for it. While the rules may not always be intended for such circumstances, they still do.
And I probably gave Jon a little too much blame/credit for repeating Rosen's ideas here, but that's out of habit.
(No, this isn't offtopic - it's a joke. And probably a bad one at that. But at least there's no choice to moderate down for bad taste.)
Thanks to the impending merger of CNET and Ziff-Davis, in the near future we will no longer subject to read these rumors and rampant speculation at two news sites fighting for banner impressions, but only one, since we'll be able to get our Jesse Berst together with patented banner advertising at a single, unified source of tech news overwhelmed by crap-with-paying-banners.
(disclaimer: yes, I know it's not really a "merger," and I have nothing against these sites other than the aformentioned Jesse Berst and rediculous patents. Besides, they'll probably both stay open and cover the exact same topics in separate articles in order to create more banner views.)
Wrong. The plural of acronyms (in reality, we're using the exacmple of MS more as an acronym than as an abbreviation) and numbers always use an apostrophy. That's why we have an apostrophy in "the 70's," for example.
I wish I had a site I could refer you to this, but I don't. I just know that I corrected my own English teacher for this, who promptly looked it up and found that I was correct. Trust me.
[RANT - this is my opinion; moderate appropriately]
I'm getting pretty sick and tired of hearing about license this, license that, GPL license, BSD license, etc. I can't believe that so many people here on slashdot can sometimes be so optimistic and unreasonable. Who here really believes that simply by attaching a license to software, everyone will politely follow the terms of that license to the letter?
Welcome to the real world - people don't give a damn about licenses. If metallica put a so-called "license" on their next MP3 that said you had to buy their CD to listen to it, no one here would change their piracy practices one bit. If someone sees something they can profit off of and get away with, they'll take the opportunity in a flash.
In fact, I'd be surprised in Windows didn't have any code either from GPLed programs or heavily inspired by them. We've already seen all their other illegal and immoral business practices, and such a transgression would be nothing to them. And how would they ever be caught? If anyone here honestly puts that below them, they probably don't belong on a site like this.
I just filled out a job application yesterday that asked many questions about my opinion of people, among other topics. Questions such as, "Do you think that if an employee thought that they could steal an item and get away with it, would they do so?" and "You see a customer who repeatedly buys items with gift certificates. You think nothing of it until you see that the customer is friends with an employee who authorizes gift certificates. What do you do?" and many, many more about how trusting I am, and whether I think people would steal things if they had such and such an opportunity.
I answered every one of those questions honestly, which basically summized to my saying that I think people are evil and lie, cheat, and steal every chance they get if it benefits themselves. And while doing it, I couldn't help but think of people probably doing exactly that on the same application, on questions like "How trustworthy do you consider yourself?" and "How well do you get along well with both colleages? Strangers?"
So, to get back on topic, you can't release the source code and expect people to pay simple because the software has a license. If it's really useful, you may get a couple bucks, but the more people want it and would be willing to pay, the more likely they are to pirate it. Either provide additional services to those who pay - either more features, or tech support like the linux vendors, etc - or go ahead and give it out free.
don't make a right. I know it's cliched, but that's the case here - if B&N wants to use the courts to attack Amazon's business model, they can go right ahead; I see nothing morally wrong with that.
But abusing a patent that was knowingly awarded unfairly is just plain over the line. Have some faith in the US justice system, if nothing else - they did bust Microsoft =) [keep in mind that I'm not arguing that the laws are necessarily correct, but according to the terms of the Sherman Antitrust Act I'd be amazed if any court could rule FOR Microsoft]
I dunno, I still have a hard time with one question which no one has been able to answer:
Why would a company such as VA spend $900 _million_ for a company that _lost_ $3 million last year, if they're truly not going to try and influence the stories covered?
Call me a pessimist, but as far as I've seen, the only reason a company spends such a ludicrous amount of money is when it expects to profit greatly from the venture. If Andover isn't making money - and a very questionable potential to do so - and they won't gain via propaganda, why would they do something so rediculous?!? I don't think that fostering the linux/geek community is worth nearly one _billion_ dollars.
I've yet to see anyone from VA or andover attmpt to quell my fears over that complaint. While there are various ways to explain the complaints of myself and many others who think that slashdot's quality has degraded since the andover buyout (not that I don't still love this site one hell of a lot), yet it's hard not to conclude that it's very likely that was _the_ cause.
I think we need a voice of reason here - we're instantly assuming that since companies like Amazon abuse their patents, CNET will do the same. Before hyping this up any further, how about contacting CNET ASAP and asking if they will either A) hold the patent defensively and not use it as basis for a suit against any other comapnies (except maybe doubleclick, they deserve it =), or B) release the patent into the public domain.
Wile the USPTO may be out of control, we're not helping any by ranting and raving here If CNET won't agree not to use the patent offensively unless otherwise provoked, THEN we can start worrying/complaining/DDoSing =)
On a side note, recall that Microsoft has a patent on the scrollbar, and IBM has a patent on pressing a "more" button - while M$ may be an "evil" company, you don't see them threatening gnome (yet). Most likely CNET will hold this patent defensively, since, judging by the USPTO's recent actions, if CNET wasn't awarded with it, someone else likely would be - and it's a good thing that's not doubleclick.
On the other hand, a web without any ads would be interesting - and I wonder what would happen to journalistic integrety without those monetary incentives. Unfortunately, that would also stifle innovativion and make many truly good sites - like slashdot - unfeasible to maintain.
IIRC, I'm pretty sure there's a clause in the Napster licensing agreement forbidding the use of bots on Napster. Someone pointed out in the "Metallica Sues Napster" article that, technically, NetPD was breaking the agreement and the list of names it gave metallica was not valid. There must be some kind of similar argument you can make here.
Is there any way to detect these detection programs? They could then be systematically banned from Napster and other services due to their autmated status.
Yes - finally, a slashdot article with good _content_, not hype! Jon Katz could really use some lessons from this guy. . . and Emmet, write more editorials. And give your self a nice karma bonus, this is actually good stuff.
you know you're a n3wb33 when. . .
on
Quickies Rock!
·
· Score: 4
Ha - only 4,784 spam mails since October 1997? In over two and a half years? Heck, I get more than that in two and a half WEEKS!
Strange - this comes the day after we finally get to see some Voodoo 5 beta benchmarks and the same day that, rumor has it, the GeForce 2 NDR is rumored to be lifted (and judging by the last paragraph of the Sharky Extreme article on Voodoo 5 vs. GeForce article, the rumors are true) - are all of these companies that confident that their cards are all good enough to steal the competitions' thunder, or is it just a freak coincidence?
You're an AC, and since this post started at score 0 I can tell that you weren't just logged in and choosing to post anonymously - so I'm gonna have to wonder how the hell you moderated anything. . .
I'd just like to take a quick second to THANK taco and katz for posting a katz article under his authorship. Every time it doesn't happen, we get hundreds of accusatory posts - but no one is ever grateful. Let's at least show some respect around here. . .
I just want to clarify something that seemed ambiguous in both Taco's post and the Think Geek page - are comments posted on slashdot by us, its audience, posted in this book?
If so, a few questions:
1.) Are the posters of those comments listed by name and/or handle?
2.) Have they been consulted about have their comments published?
3.) How much "new material" is in this book? How many pages is the text? $15 for a paperback seems like a bit much.
4.) As noted at the disclaimer on the bottom of each page of slashdot, "Comments are owned by the Poster." I think that giving the proceeds to charity is a worthy cause, but what if someone desired a cut of the profits for the portion of the content they provided? I sure hope no one here would be so selfish and arrogant, but it does happen. . .
5.) Has anyone at slashdot made an effort to keep this from going on Amazon? Put your money where your mouth is and support that boycott - and I'm sure that someone is making money through the sale from Think Geek, which is, of course, owned by the same people who are donating the rest of the proceeds - is it just the slashdot staffs' portion of the proceeds that go to charity, or everything andover and its employees get from this?
hey, just because mozilla isn't stable enough to handle all those popups while you're looking for porn doesn't mean all the rest of us need to hear it!
(it's funny - laugh. please. no, not the "troll" moderation. PLEASE!)
Try the Judiciary Act of 1789 (declared unconsitutional by Chief Justice John Marshall in the case of Marbury v. Madison) and the Judiciary Act of 1801. There are a few rare instances where the Supreme Court IS obligated to accept a case, but they're very rare.
IANAL, but I believe that there is legislation that allows the government to take antitrust issues directly to the Supreme Court on the first appeal, secifically to prevent companies from delaying via appeals like Microsoft (I believe it's been mentioned in other comments here). The Supreme Court is not required to accept the case, but it would be sent directly there.
Slashdot Mirror
Now, while I know those are more or less equivalent, it's important to note that he complied with the university's request, which leads me to believe he did not contest it. Were he to feel as strongly about this issue as Jon does, he would wait until he was formally fired and then take the University to court. This implies that he consented, and it appears that Jon is (as usual) creating an issue where there is none.
Furthermore, I object to the use of the statement "But the dean was using his computer at home, not work." Jon said that there was an understood agreement that "rules prohibited personal use of university computers in any way that clashed with its educational mission," - regardless of whether or not that rule was intended for these circustances, it _was_ a rule, and he _did_ break it. I'll reference some real (read: non-geek) culture here - these seems somewhat analogous to Les Miserables, in which the protagonist stole a loaf of bread to save his sister's (?) life, and was imprisoned for it. While the rules may not always be intended for such circumstances, they still do.
And I probably gave Jon a little too much blame/credit for repeating Rosen's ideas here, but that's out of habit.
Thanks to the impending merger of CNET and Ziff-Davis, in the near future we will no longer subject to read these rumors and rampant speculation at two news sites fighting for banner impressions, but only one, since we'll be able to get our Jesse Berst together with patented banner advertising at a single, unified source of tech news overwhelmed by crap-with-paying-banners.
(disclaimer: yes, I know it's not really a "merger," and I have nothing against these sites other than the aformentioned Jesse Berst and rediculous patents. Besides, they'll probably both stay open and cover the exact same topics in separate articles in order to create more banner views.)
So that explains where Steve Jobs got the idea for colorful iMacs - they're in technicolor!
Hey! I _know_ you had to stop applauding to type that. Get in the gallows, now!
. . . does she have a sister? Please?
So when does Hemos' old Geek Compound room go up on eBay?
And I'm only half joking =)
I'm wondering how Taco managed to attend the affair this afternoon AND post the OpenGL article at noon today.
."
Taco: "Excuse me, I have to, uh, go to the bathroom. .
Hemos: "But it's almost time for the ceremony! And why do you need your laptop? Rob? Rob! Get back here!"
Wrong. The plural of acronyms (in reality, we're using the exacmple of MS more as an acronym than as an abbreviation) and numbers always use an apostrophy. That's why we have an apostrophy in "the 70's," for example.
I wish I had a site I could refer you to this, but I don't. I just know that I corrected my own English teacher for this, who promptly looked it up and found that I was correct. Trust me.
[RANT - this is my opinion; moderate appropriately]
I'm getting pretty sick and tired of hearing about license this, license that, GPL license, BSD license, etc. I can't believe that so many people here on slashdot can sometimes be so optimistic and unreasonable. Who here really believes that simply by attaching a license to software, everyone will politely follow the terms of that license to the letter?
Welcome to the real world - people don't give a damn about licenses. If metallica put a so-called "license" on their next MP3 that said you had to buy their CD to listen to it, no one here would change their piracy practices one bit. If someone sees something they can profit off of and get away with, they'll take the opportunity in a flash.
In fact, I'd be surprised in Windows didn't have any code either from GPLed programs or heavily inspired by them. We've already seen all their other illegal and immoral business practices, and such a transgression would be nothing to them. And how would they ever be caught? If anyone here honestly puts that below them, they probably don't belong on a site like this.
I just filled out a job application yesterday that asked many questions about my opinion of people, among other topics. Questions such as, "Do you think that if an employee thought that they could steal an item and get away with it, would they do so?" and "You see a customer who repeatedly buys items with gift certificates. You think nothing of it until you see that the customer is friends with an employee who authorizes gift certificates. What do you do?" and many, many more about how trusting I am, and whether I think people would steal things if they had such and such an opportunity.
I answered every one of those questions honestly, which basically summized to my saying that I think people are evil and lie, cheat, and steal every chance they get if it benefits themselves. And while doing it, I couldn't help but think of people probably doing exactly that on the same application, on questions like "How trustworthy do you consider yourself?" and "How well do you get along well with both colleages? Strangers?"
So, to get back on topic, you can't release the source code and expect people to pay simple because the software has a license. If it's really useful, you may get a couple bucks, but the more people want it and would be willing to pay, the more likely they are to pirate it. Either provide additional services to those who pay - either more features, or tech support like the linux vendors, etc - or go ahead and give it out free.
[/RANT]
don't make a right. I know it's cliched, but that's the case here - if B&N wants to use the courts to attack Amazon's business model, they can go right ahead; I see nothing morally wrong with that.
But abusing a patent that was knowingly awarded unfairly is just plain over the line. Have some faith in the US justice system, if nothing else - they did bust Microsoft =) [keep in mind that I'm not arguing that the laws are necessarily correct, but according to the terms of the Sherman Antitrust Act I'd be amazed if any court could rule FOR Microsoft]
I dunno, I still have a hard time with one question which no one has been able to answer:
Why would a company such as VA spend $900 _million_ for a company that _lost_ $3 million last year, if they're truly not going to try and influence the stories covered?
Call me a pessimist, but as far as I've seen, the only reason a company spends such a ludicrous amount of money is when it expects to profit greatly from the venture. If Andover isn't making money - and a very questionable potential to do so - and they won't gain via propaganda, why would they do something so rediculous?!? I don't think that fostering the linux/geek community is worth nearly one _billion_ dollars.
I've yet to see anyone from VA or andover attmpt to quell my fears over that complaint. While there are various ways to explain the complaints of myself and many others who think that slashdot's quality has degraded since the andover buyout (not that I don't still love this site one hell of a lot), yet it's hard not to conclude that it's very likely that was _the_ cause.
I think we need a voice of reason here - we're instantly assuming that since companies like Amazon abuse their patents, CNET will do the same. Before hyping this up any further, how about contacting CNET ASAP and asking if they will either A) hold the patent defensively and not use it as basis for a suit against any other comapnies (except maybe doubleclick, they deserve it =), or B) release the patent into the public domain.
Wile the USPTO may be out of control, we're not helping any by ranting and raving here If CNET won't agree not to use the patent offensively unless otherwise provoked, THEN we can start worrying/complaining/DDoSing =)
On a side note, recall that Microsoft has a patent on the scrollbar, and IBM has a patent on pressing a "more" button - while M$ may be an "evil" company, you don't see them threatening gnome (yet). Most likely CNET will hold this patent defensively, since, judging by the USPTO's recent actions, if CNET wasn't awarded with it, someone else likely would be - and it's a good thing that's not doubleclick.
On the other hand, a web without any ads would be interesting - and I wonder what would happen to journalistic integrety without those monetary incentives. Unfortunately, that would also stifle innovativion and make many truly good sites - like slashdot - unfeasible to maintain.
IIRC, I'm pretty sure there's a clause in the Napster licensing agreement forbidding the use of bots on Napster. Someone pointed out in the "Metallica Sues Napster" article that, technically, NetPD was breaking the agreement and the list of names it gave metallica was not valid. There must be some kind of similar argument you can make here.
Is there any way to detect these detection programs? They could then be systematically banned from Napster and other services due to their autmated status.
There was one longwinded speech. It ran a total of six words: "Just remember, technical innovation means class war."
Obviously they were short a couple fingers or soemthing, because that sure as hell seems like seven words to me =)
Yes - finally, a slashdot article with good _content_, not hype! Jon Katz could really use some lessons from this guy. . . and Emmet, write more editorials. And give your self a nice karma bonus, this is actually good stuff.
Ha - only 4,784 spam mails since October 1997? In over two and a half years? Heck, I get more than that in two and a half WEEKS!
Strange - this comes the day after we finally get to see some Voodoo 5 beta benchmarks and the same day that, rumor has it, the GeForce 2 NDR is rumored to be lifted (and judging by the last paragraph of the Sharky Extreme article on Voodoo 5 vs. GeForce article, the rumors are true) - are all of these companies that confident that their cards are all good enough to steal the competitions' thunder, or is it just a freak coincidence?
You're an AC, and since this post started at score 0 I can tell that you weren't just logged in and choosing to post anonymously - so I'm gonna have to wonder how the hell you moderated anything. . .
April Fools was - by my watch - a full 21 days ago. Besides, that prank's old already - no one will fall for it _again_!
-----
Why can't we see others' karma anymore?
I'd just like to take a quick second to THANK taco and katz for posting a katz article under his authorship. Every time it doesn't happen, we get hundreds of accusatory posts - but no one is ever grateful. Let's at least show some respect around here. . .
Actually, I think that was a typo - he meant "we're only going to be selling this through Think Geek." Can Hemos or someone clarify that?
I just want to clarify something that seemed ambiguous in both Taco's post and the Think Geek page - are comments posted on slashdot by us, its audience, posted in this book?
If so, a few questions:
1.) Are the posters of those comments listed by name and/or handle?
2.) Have they been consulted about have their comments published?
3.) How much "new material" is in this book? How many pages is the text? $15 for a paperback seems like a bit much.
4.) As noted at the disclaimer on the bottom of each page of slashdot, "Comments are owned by the Poster." I think that giving the proceeds to charity is a worthy cause, but what if someone desired a cut of the profits for the portion of the content they provided? I sure hope no one here would be so selfish and arrogant, but it does happen. . .
5.) Has anyone at slashdot made an effort to keep this from going on Amazon? Put your money where your mouth is and support that boycott - and I'm sure that someone is making money through the sale from Think Geek, which is, of course, owned by the same people who are donating the rest of the proceeds - is it just the slashdot staffs' portion of the proceeds that go to charity, or everything andover and its employees get from this?
hey, just because mozilla isn't stable enough to handle all those popups while you're looking for porn doesn't mean all the rest of us need to hear it!
(it's funny - laugh. please. no, not the "troll" moderation. PLEASE!)
Lotta good playboy.com does when the Ask Jesus proxy replaces the pics with ones of Jesus =)
Try the Judiciary Act of 1789 (declared unconsitutional by Chief Justice John Marshall in the case of Marbury v. Madison) and the Judiciary Act of 1801. There are a few rare instances where the Supreme Court IS obligated to accept a case, but they're very rare.
IANAL, but I believe that there is legislation that allows the government to take antitrust issues directly to the Supreme Court on the first appeal, secifically to prevent companies from delaying via appeals like Microsoft (I believe it's been mentioned in other comments here). The Supreme Court is not required to accept the case, but it would be sent directly there.