The point, since you missed it, is that the first mention of apt-get or/etc is "proof" to a lot of people that Linux is unfit for end users. Never mind that Windows has at least as much unobvious wizardry for common use cases; only Linux is held accountable for it.
I've got a client who's in his sixties, and we had to configure the screen to 640x480 due to eyesight concerns. Even sitting at the screen 4 feet away, he cannot see text @ 1024x768.
Make the fonts bigger. Don't screw up the rest of the display just for that.
This Xmas, the windows tech guy will be seating at their Xmas dinner table while I will be eating Macaroni and Cheese from my microwave, alone at my house.
Just go upstairs, already. Your mom will be happy to see you again.
Vista, despite what you might read on various heavily biased web sites, is quite usable for basic tasks (word processing, email, websites without too much flash) even on 7 year old 1Ghz P3s with a a gig of RAM.
No way. It's barely tolerable on our year-old dual core 2GB laptop. I would not consider it on anything slower.
Note that your position is almost wholly speculative and has only been upheld one time in very specific circumstances in one jurisdiction in the United States. The whole notion of a EULA is laughable in most of the rest of the world, including the rest of the US.
Since copyright law is defined by the document I cited, please reference the clause that says "with the author's permission". Hint: there is none. If you own software, you can run it. The law says so.
If I remember correctly, there was no place to take the snow (at least not in Buffalo), so they were shipping it to Rochester via dump trucks since Rochester had missed out on all that snow.
If only there were some way that older applications could run under an OS that they weren't written for, perhaps with a "virtual pc" or similar. Too bad Microsoft doesn't own something like that.
Seriously, they broke hardware backward compatibility with Vista, so why not ship Windows 7 with Vista, XP, 98, and even DOS inside virtual machines? The underlying OS could be pure as the driven snow while still running old programs inside the exact environment they were written for.
Without a licence, or a statutory right, you have no right to install the software on a piece of hardware - that requires copying, which, in respect of a copyrighted work, is an act restricted by copyright.
(a) Making of Additional Copy or Adaptation by Owner of Copy. â" Notwithstanding the provisions of section 106, it is not an infringement for the owner of a copy of a computer program to make or authorize the making of another copy or adaptation of that computer program provided: (1) that such a new copy or adaptation is created as an essential step in the utilization of the computer program in conjunction with a machine and that it is used in no other manner, or
(2) that such new copy or adaptation is for archival purposes only and that all archival copies are destroyed in the event that continued possession of the computer program should cease to be rightful.
You are directly, explicitly allowed to make a copy of software that you have purchased for the purpose of using it.
It is stated in the documentation and presented on screen when the software is installed.
I hacked my copy to remove the license agreement. Since I did this before agreeing to the EULA fiction, I am not bound by it. Since nothing in copyright law forbids this, I acted legally.
OK, so I didn't, but can you prove that I actually agreed to anything? This sidesteps the issue of whether EULAs are legally binding.
It includes a license stating that the software is only licensed for use on Apple computers.
I have boxed copies of 10.{1,2,3,4,5} at home. Never once have I signed any agreement or acknowledgement or waiver of rights.
Since all Apple computers are sold with a copy of the OS, that means that a purchased copy can only be used as an upgrade or replacement of an OS provided by Apple.
Can you cite the relevant section of the UCC? I don't recall seeing that law.
It is not illegal to run OS X on generic PCs. It is a violation of the license, but the license does not carry the force of law.
Thank you, thank you, thank you. I'm mystified that Slashdotters are so quick to defend Apple for something that would induce pitchfork-bearing mobs if Microsoft even hinted at. Suppose MS released a version of $OS "for installation only on Dell computers", but sold on a shelf at Best Buy next to other software and not as an OEM product. Suppose further that Microsoft threatened legal actions against people who ignored the fine print. There is not a single person in here who would defend their right to use the law that way.
At this point, I'm not even sure that it's been settled that licenses are enforcible, given that their terms aren't available prior to the customer paying for the product, which makes it a sale or purchase.
Wonder if Psystar's considered a European division? I don't think our friends across the water are nearly so interested in the fiction of EULAs.
From Apple's point of view, in order to install them you need to have a Mac, which would have come with OS X, therefore making the boxed copy an upgrade.
Sure would've been simple for them to put the word "upgrade" on the box somewhere. Since they've never marketed it as such, I hope the judge gives them a beatdown on this specious argument.
I generally like Apple and have a fair amount of their stuff, but that doesn't make their dumb ideas and less dumb.
My old MP3 player wasn't an iPod, so I very carefully transferred any iTunes purchases to MP3 via rewritable CDs.
I am far from an audiophile - I think the standard iPod earbuds are just peachy - but I can't stand the sound of recompressed music. Honestly, I'd rank the resulting MP3s just about one notch above "recorded off the radio".
I get two as well. One is a big regional paper and one is a tiny paper covering just two local towns. I read the comics and op/ed page in the big paper. I get nothing more out of it. All the "big" stories are old news because I've read them all online.
This is so weird; I don't remember posting that, but I could have used those exact words. If it weren't for the comics and opinion pages, I'd cancel the larger city's newspaper in a heartbeat. If it weren't for the local stories, I'd cancel the smaller city's paper just as quickly.
realized my current boss (from a family of COS) was using these tactics at work. Making you feel like crap, incompetent, never doing any good work, so when he asked anything we would all comply ASAP.
Linux fails, because the overhead of running ubuntu gets COMBINED with the overhead of running FireFox of Epiphany or whatever, whereas windows overhead already includes IE.
Yes, because IE is compiled with -fomit-instructions and runs infinitely fast.
Then, if the ISP misses an obvious "illegal activity" the ISP might be held liable by the RIAA for not protecting the RIAA's intellectual property.
Exactly. By monitoring traffic, ISPs lose protection of the "safe harbor" section of the DMCA. So they have an agreement from the RIAA not to sue. Does that protect them from the MPAA? Wouldn't Microsoft have the same right to have the ISPs monitor for illicit copies of Windows? Can't ASCAP sue them the for not blocking lyrics sites?
I would suggest that ISPs think long and hard about whether they want to become liable for contributory copyright infringement for all their traffic just so they spend resources to help the RIAA. That doesn't exactly sound like a great deal.
ACDC's new album sucks. Well, at least the song I heard is the same old boring Angus, with the same old boring bass line, and the same old boring drum beat.
I like AC-DC about as much as the next Midwest-raised middle class kid. Having said that, when did any of their songs not sound identical?
Since they've now explicitly and announcedly decided to adopt a strategy of technology control measures, they just became a thorn in every geek's side.
That's actually preferable for us. I wonder what made them think that bringing the fight to our turf was a good idea?
An RIAA spokesman is quoted as saying that the litigation campaign has been "successful in raising the public's awareness that file-sharing is illegal."
Would a defendant be able to use that choice quote to show a judge that the lawsuit was merely a publicity stunt? If so, isn't that basically an invitation for the judge to smite the plaintiffs with a vengeance?
Slashdot Mirror
The point, since you missed it, is that the first mention of apt-get or /etc is "proof" to a lot of people that Linux is unfit for end users. Never mind that Windows has at least as much unobvious wizardry for common use cases; only Linux is held accountable for it.
I've got a client who's in his sixties, and we had to configure the screen to 640x480 due to eyesight concerns. Even sitting at the screen 4 feet away, he cannot see text @ 1024x768.
Make the fonts bigger. Don't screw up the rest of the display just for that.
This Xmas, the windows tech guy will be seating at their Xmas dinner table while I will be eating Macaroni and Cheese from my microwave, alone at my house.
Just go upstairs, already. Your mom will be happy to see you again.
With all that necessary just to run an end-user system, Windows will never be ready for the desktop.
Vista, despite what you might read on various heavily biased web sites, is quite usable for basic tasks (word processing, email, websites without too much flash) even on 7 year old 1Ghz P3s with a a gig of RAM.
No way. It's barely tolerable on our year-old dual core 2GB laptop. I would not consider it on anything slower.
Note that your position is almost wholly speculative and has only been upheld one time in very specific circumstances in one jurisdiction in the United States. The whole notion of a EULA is laughable in most of the rest of the world, including the rest of the US.
Since copyright law is defined by the document I cited, please reference the clause that says "with the author's permission". Hint: there is none. If you own software, you can run it. The law says so.
But let's face it, virtualization is only becoming fully capable as of the last year or so.
I was running Virtual PC on a PowerPC Mac 5 years ago. I disagree that virtualization is only now feasible.
If I remember correctly, there was no place to take the snow (at least not in Buffalo), so they were shipping it to Rochester via dump trucks since Rochester had missed out on all that snow.
If only there were some way that older applications could run under an OS that they weren't written for, perhaps with a "virtual pc" or similar. Too bad Microsoft doesn't own something like that.
Seriously, they broke hardware backward compatibility with Vista, so why not ship Windows 7 with Vista, XP, 98, and even DOS inside virtual machines? The underlying OS could be pure as the driven snow while still running old programs inside the exact environment they were written for.
Without a licence, or a statutory right, you have no right to install the software on a piece of hardware - that requires copying, which, in respect of a copyrighted work, is an act restricted by copyright.
You're completely, indisputably wrong. From Title 17, section 117 of the United States Code:
You are directly, explicitly allowed to make a copy of software that you have purchased for the purpose of using it.
It is stated in the documentation and presented on screen when the software is installed.
I hacked my copy to remove the license agreement. Since I did this before agreeing to the EULA fiction, I am not bound by it. Since nothing in copyright law forbids this, I acted legally.
OK, so I didn't, but can you prove that I actually agreed to anything? This sidesteps the issue of whether EULAs are legally binding.
It includes a license stating that the software is only licensed for use on Apple computers.
I have boxed copies of 10.{1,2,3,4,5} at home. Never once have I signed any agreement or acknowledgement or waiver of rights.
Since all Apple computers are sold with a copy of the OS, that means that a purchased copy can only be used as an upgrade or replacement of an OS provided by Apple.
Can you cite the relevant section of the UCC? I don't recall seeing that law.
It is not illegal to run OS X on generic PCs. It is a violation of the license, but the license does not carry the force of law.
Thank you, thank you, thank you. I'm mystified that Slashdotters are so quick to defend Apple for something that would induce pitchfork-bearing mobs if Microsoft even hinted at. Suppose MS released a version of $OS "for installation only on Dell computers", but sold on a shelf at Best Buy next to other software and not as an OEM product. Suppose further that Microsoft threatened legal actions against people who ignored the fine print. There is not a single person in here who would defend their right to use the law that way.
At this point, I'm not even sure that it's been settled that licenses are enforcible, given that their terms aren't available prior to the customer paying for the product, which makes it a sale or purchase.
Wonder if Psystar's considered a European division? I don't think our friends across the water are nearly so interested in the fiction of EULAs.
From Apple's point of view, in order to install them you need to have a Mac, which would have come with OS X, therefore making the boxed copy an upgrade.
Sure would've been simple for them to put the word "upgrade" on the box somewhere. Since they've never marketed it as such, I hope the judge gives them a beatdown on this specious argument.
I generally like Apple and have a fair amount of their stuff, but that doesn't make their dumb ideas and less dumb.
My old MP3 player wasn't an iPod, so I very carefully transferred any iTunes purchases to MP3 via rewritable CDs.
I am far from an audiophile - I think the standard iPod earbuds are just peachy - but I can't stand the sound of recompressed music. Honestly, I'd rank the resulting MP3s just about one notch above "recorded off the radio".
I get two as well. One is a big regional paper and one is a tiny paper covering just two local towns. I read the comics and op/ed page in the big paper. I get nothing more out of it. All the "big" stories are old news because I've read them all online.
This is so weird; I don't remember posting that, but I could have used those exact words. If it weren't for the comics and opinion pages, I'd cancel the larger city's newspaper in a heartbeat. If it weren't for the local stories, I'd cancel the smaller city's paper just as quickly.
realized my current boss (from a family of COS) was using these tactics at work. Making you feel like crap, incompetent, never doing any good work, so when he asked anything we would all comply ASAP.
Steve Jobs is a Scientologist?
Just out of idle curiosity, what do you do?
System administration, network management, email system design. I hedge my bets.
I'm a professional capacity planner, and it seems only the smartest 1% of companies ever think to bring me in to prevent problems.
Funny - I was just thinking the same thing about me and my specialty.
Linux fails, because the overhead of running ubuntu gets COMBINED with the overhead of running FireFox of Epiphany or whatever, whereas windows overhead already includes IE.
Yes, because IE is compiled with -fomit-instructions and runs infinitely fast.
Then, if the ISP misses an obvious "illegal activity" the ISP might be held liable by the RIAA for not protecting the RIAA's intellectual property.
Exactly. By monitoring traffic, ISPs lose protection of the "safe harbor" section of the DMCA. So they have an agreement from the RIAA not to sue. Does that protect them from the MPAA? Wouldn't Microsoft have the same right to have the ISPs monitor for illicit copies of Windows? Can't ASCAP sue them the for not blocking lyrics sites?
I would suggest that ISPs think long and hard about whether they want to become liable for contributory copyright infringement for all their traffic just so they spend resources to help the RIAA. That doesn't exactly sound like a great deal.
ACDC's new album sucks. Well, at least the song I heard is the same old boring Angus, with the same old boring bass line, and the same old boring drum beat.
I like AC-DC about as much as the next Midwest-raised middle class kid. Having said that, when did any of their songs not sound identical?
What's interesting is that a french fry and a pair of french cut panties are both "french cut" but look nothing alike.
On the other hand, if they made panties out of french fries, I bet a lot more geeks would learn what they look like.
Since they've now explicitly and announcedly decided to adopt a strategy of technology control measures, they just became a thorn in every geek's side.
That's actually preferable for us. I wonder what made them think that bringing the fight to our turf was a good idea?
An RIAA spokesman is quoted as saying that the litigation campaign has been "successful in raising the public's awareness that file-sharing is illegal."
Would a defendant be able to use that choice quote to show a judge that the lawsuit was merely a publicity stunt? If so, isn't that basically an invitation for the judge to smite the plaintiffs with a vengeance?