What we truly need is Linux(tm) in a Lego(tm)
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Linux In A Box
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· Score: 3
Imagine being able to snap together a Beowulf cluster. Run out of disk space, just snap on another RAID brick. Best of all, with the mindstorm attachments, you can watch the system upgrade itself when it needs more resources.
Just don't let your system have a credit card number or you may find it taking over your apartment today, and the world tomorrow....
My biggest pet peeve with my first few computer courses were that the canned coding exercises didn't contribute to anything.
What I would have greatly enjoyed was if the courses had used actual open source projects where the potential would have been there for the code from homework to earn immortality.
Think of the motivation that would result from telling a bunch of sixteen year olds that they have the potential to have their names indelibably stamped onto a product thousands of people will use.
I'd give some specific ideas for projects, but (a) I don't know the skill level of your students and (b) I don't know what territory your curriculum will cover and kernel hacking vs. database hacking vs. network hacking vs. UI hacking have quite a bit of differences.
Just as a non-musician appreciates Mozart when it's played, can't a non-programmer appreciate a browser when he uses it?
I think that, to a certain extent, you and I are talking past each other. My contention is not that art is not intended to enjoyed by people who can not read musical scores or understand esoteric programming languanges.
My point is that part of the value of such arts as programming and orchestral compasition lies within the esoteric symbols used to record the product and not solely in the final presentation.
After all, Milne didn't write Winnie-the-Poo for parents. It was written for mainly for the enjoyment of children.
And yet, literate adults are still able to experience Milne's art by examining the 'source code' without performing the work by reading it aloud for a child.
Programmers usually don't write for other programmers.
Hmm. How many non-programmers use emacs?;)
Users are the ones who determine what programs are crap and what are good, even though they will never see the code.
And programmers will admire or castigate many nuances of the work of art that the average user will miss and in the case of very well written open-source or free software, programmers will be able to enjoy the art in the source without viewing the end product. So, yes, end users will be able to experience the art of the programmer, but other programmers can also experience the art that is contained within the source code.
I'm not knocking what they have created, I'm sure many people here have coded some genuinely useful and innovative programs. All I'm saying is that the act of programming is not expressive, just like building a wall isn't expressive. It's all about putting things together in a consistent and methodical manner so that it acheives its purpose.
In any form of art, painting, sculpting, archetecture (sp?), caligraphy, poetry, prose, performing arts, musical composition, etc., the goal is almost invariably to 'put things together in a consistent and methodical manner.' (I'll not a possible exception for Da Da and some other of the more esoteric art movements.)
If you closely examine a Da Vinci or Degas work of art, you will see evidence of their methodical and consistent manner. Similiarly, theatre troups and orchestras that are world renowned have achieved their level of excellence mostly because of their consistent and methodical manners in applying their skills. So, too, can be programming.
I'll gladly grant that most programming is on the same level as drawing comic books, but in both cases along with all the trash are some excellent pieces of fine art. I do mostly maintence programming for a living. Some of the code I've fixed defects in has been as close to art as a consumer tabloid. Other portions of code are beautiful to contemplate, showing elegance, cleverness and spirit (the same qualities we look for in music and paintings).
It seems true. A symphony is only beautiful when it is performed. A program is beautiful when it runs. Depending on the hardware or orchestra, the composer's score or programmer's code could be played beautifully or crappily.
Beauty is in the eye of the beholder. Scores can be beautiful to those who know how to read them, so too can code be beautiful to those who can comprehend. Those who can not understand staff notation or awk might only be able to appreciate the beauty of the output, but that does not diminish the beauty in the original.
Imagine an illerate child and a fabulous tale such as 'The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe.' To the child, the book is just ugly pages until the kind parent reads the story aloud and then the child is captivated by the beauty of the story. The parent is able to perceive the beauty of the story without 'performing' the work because he or she can comprehend the written word.
One of my favorite bands, Mental Destruction, spent two years writing one of their albums in assembler and C. No synthesizers were used, no analog equipment, no instruments. The entire album was coded on qwerty keyboards.
Is their album not art? If it is not art, what qualitatively differentiates Mental Destruction composing music with code from Bach composing with staff notation? If it is art, what qualitatively differentiates a program with some other output from what Mental Destruction has done?
All this talk fundamentally boils down to an increase in the mutation rate, combined with a possible increase in the ratio of beneficial (== more-likely-to-propagate, like bigger brains, breasts, and buns) mutations to harmful (== less-likely-to-propagate, like $DISEASE_FOO) mutations.
I think that this whole scenario will be interesting to watch pan out. Does anyone really think that the first people that can afford this will be making the kids smarter? Heck No! Starlets in Hollywood will be wasting all of their cash on making their sons and daughters with an unblemished physique. Just look at the number of rich people that spend money on plastic surgery vs. the number of people that spend money on increasing their intellect.
I contend that if designing children by DNA is ever available, that DNA designing firms will charge by the modification and (for the most part) only parents rich enough to provide the perfect body and the perfect mind will opt for genius children.
The other interesting thing is that if you examine selective breeding programs, you find that highly specialized species are more prone to health problems. The all around healthiest dogs out there are the mutts. I think that this principle will likely apply to engineered people. The more people are engineered to be beautiful (according to the standards of the day) or smart, if future generations continue down the same path, the only happy and holistically healthy children will be the unengineered 'God children.' [I just had to get the obligatory Gattaca reference in.]
I expect for several generations (or even centuries) to pass before your average Joes and Jills are smart enough to look at engineered children holistically instead of only engineering certain traits.
Another question: if it [UNIXWARE] was kept separate, you think Caldera would open-source it?
I could be wrong, but I think it would be pretty unfeasible to open source Unixware. I imagine that there is a horrendous amount of license and patent encumbered code in the product.
On the other hand, Tarantulla on Linux could ver well be a WTS killer.
(The ramifications are that two separate legal entities could possibly conspire to start an outfit for mass distribution of binary-only, GPL-derived software products. And that just wouldn't be nice, now would it?)
Personally, I don't see what the problem would be. Big deal if someone figures out a way to weasel out of providing source. The only situation where it would have an impact on the open source community is in the situation of the company A making source level changes, distributing to company B binary only media and company B sells the cd's. And, if this situation occurs, then I'd be willing to wager that the original authors could take both of the companies to court. Most of law deals with intent and a good case could probably be made that two companies colluding to intentionally circumvent the GPL does in fact break the contract so that neither company can keep the right of re-distriution.
I stand by the numbers, although as I pointed out, they are a few years old (circa 1997), I seriously doubt that the percentages have changed much over the last 3 or so years. I will look for the resource, but I doubt it is publicly available anymore, since it was M$ hype, and they don't like to keep that sort of thing lying about where it can be used.
I'm not saying that I don't believe you. Well, yes I am saying that I don't believe you. Your assertion runs contrary to my perceptions. Since I don't have any hard numbers, my perceptions might very well be wrong. But, without some hard numbers and/or some convincing arguments (preferably the former), I'm not willing to change my mind.
They need an installed base to get NGWS off the ground, and they weren't getting it (contrary to US popular opinion, the M$ user-base remains relatively small outside the US).
I've seen a post from someone in Germany that states that Microsoft has 98% of the desktop marketshare in Germany. I think I recall the number in France being something like 80%. I'd be highly interested to have a resource which states otherwise.
My cousin, the end user, has received a copy of GPL-ed software without a source. That's fine, according to the GPL, but now someone has the obligation to give the source to my cousin for a reasonable cost. Who? Me? Or you, the original seller of Broken Inside Linux?
I think (but am not certain, as I am not a lawyer) that no one has the obligation to provide the source to your cousin. By providing a source disk to you, I have fulfilled my distribution obligations to you. The GPL (I don't think) could restrict your rights under first sale. However, if you made any modifications, or further copies, then you would be responsible for providing source if you distributed those items.
First, comparing the retail upgrade version to the OEM full version is a bit misleading. The upgrade version takes into account that you're a repeat MS customer and as such, gives you a price break.
With Windows 98, you can get the retail upgrade for about $80, but the retail full version costs about $150. If you can get the OEM full version of Windows 98 for $100, you are way ahead.
Second, I'd be willing to wager that the big reason that there is not a whole lot of differentiation in price between OEM and retail pricing is supply and demand. There are relatively few mom and pop system builders for people to make money on selling small numbers of OEM Windows licenses to. Anywhere the demand is relatively small, there will likely be an inflated price. If you're price is too high, look for another distributor.
The key word is "marketplace". Since GPL'd software is made available without cost, I wouldn't think this could be made to apply to GPL'd software
GPL'd software is all over the marketplace. Anything from Linux to Perl can be bought in retail outlets.
I think you are confusing the notion of 'first sale' which only governs the physical media that software (or books or magazines) is sold on with 'the right to make and distribute copies on terms other than simple fair use' which the GPL specifically grants that other software doesn't
First sale has absolutely no effect on the rights of the copyright holder to prevent someone from making further copies. First sale, does say that if you buy a cd, the seller can't put restrictions on what you do with it outside of writing a seperate legally binding contract.
An example of a seperate contract would be when I worked at one company, we could buy Microsoft software at the cost of production provided we signed a contract stating that we would not sell it. Contracts such as this that are actually signed are usually enforcable. But, the usual situation is that no such contract exists in the case of most resellers that get pc's bundled with Windows from a distributor.
First off, IANAL so take my words with a couple shovels full of salt
I mean, if Red Hat (or anyone else) sells me a piece of Linux with the source code, can I resell it legally without source code? Is the license valid only the first time something is sold?
If I understand the idea of first sale, it only applies to the media which has physically changed hands. First sale does not invalidate the copyright on the content of the media, but only the further distribution of the actual physical media.
In other words, theoretically, a person could buy a binary only Linux cd, and turn around and resell it without being liable for distribution of the source. However, if that person decides to make copies of the binary only cd and sell them, they can only do so under the fair use clause of the copyright act (which would likely prohibit the selling of the copies) or under the licensing of the GPL.
What you have to understand is that GPL in no way invalidates the idea of first sale, but it does confer priveledges that go far beyond what first sale allows, provided you play by the terms of the contract.
If I've gotten a CD (say in the back of O'Reilly's Apache book) can I now sell that CD for more than the cost of the media? Isn't that just another form of unbundling?
IIRC (and I'm too lazy to look it up) the cost of media provision in the GPL only applies to providing source code for GPL software that was distributed without source and only then in the event that the source is requested by the person to whom the software was distributed.
In other words, if I sell a binary only cd of GPL licensed software and someone requests the source on cd, I am not allowed to sell him or her a cd with the source at above the cost of the physical media.
However, (from my understanding) I am allowed to sell cd with the source for GPL licensed software for whatever I feel like, provided I have not distributed the software prior to the sale. It is only if I distribute GPL software without source code am I obligated to provide source code at the cost of the media (and then only to people that I have distributed it to).
Of course, IANAL and its been a heck of a long time since I've actually read the GPL, so YMMV...
What makes you think they would pirate Win2k now that this court decision clears the air for purchase of it? You don't think M$ let this come to trial by accident, do you?
From what I understand, Microsoft does believe that unbundling Windows is the same as piracy. The article mentions that Microsoft is the plaintiff in the suit. Microsoft sued the hardware manufacturer because the manufacturer's sale of Win/DOS violated the license agreement between Microsoft and the manufacturer and, as such, was an act of piracy.
I wish there was a similiar suit in the US, so people could dispose of old Windows disk however they pleased. Three years ago I got five bucks out of Windows 3.1 on 5.25 floppy on ebay. Its a shame that such a thing can not happen now...
I think BDR has authored a very well written, thought filled editorial on the state of music in the modern world. I think he missed the largest piece of the puzzle. If you want to make money with anything (be it coding or playing tunes) it needs to be approached as a business.
Sure, sites like MP3.com and tools like Napster make it easier to promote on an international level, but they don't provide all the back-breaking legwork that has to be done to get people to want to look up BDR on Gnutella.
If you want to make money, you need to provide something that people want to buy, and somehow let the people that want to buy know that you have what they want. The Internet and tools like Gnutella make this much easier than it has been, but it has not removed all the work. The internet also makes it easier to post my resume, but if I don't take the time to sharpen my skills and put my resume in the right places, who will look at it? And my resume would be for essentially a one time sale. To make serious money from music, you need thousands of sales. To get thousands of sales, it takes a non-trivial amount of money and sweat and organizational talent.
The SBA (Small Business Administration) states that in the US, 70% of new businesses fail within the first 5 years. The two primary reasons are: lack of working capital and poor management. The Music business is no different from any other business, it takes hard work, and phenomenal organizational skills to make serious money.
And this is the one thing that even BDR admits that major lables provide to signed artists, the labels provide management, marketing, and distribution support. To try to make a living off of music without those things provided by a label, the independent artist will need to provide those things for him or her self.
The bottom line: if BDR thinks that he or she can make a living off of his or her music, BDR ought to find someone to hire to do the business end if BDR is not interested in the blood, sweat, and tears it takes to run a business. There is a reason that Brian Epstein was considered 'the fifth Beatle.' There is a reason that Lars in his interview stressed the importance of Metallica's manager in decision making. If an artist has the aptitude to run a business, great, if not, look for someone that does.
FreeBSD is now backed by the BSDi people that have contributed better enhancements than anything SGI or IBM has put into Linux.
Show me any single machine that can run 40,000+ simultaneous instances of FreeBSD like IBM's S/390 can do with Linux.
Show me the LVM that BSDi has released for FreeBSD like IBM's LVM they've open-sourced for Linux.
Show me the journaling file systems BSDi has contributed to FreeBSD like IBM and SGI have done for Linux.
Show me the large memory patches, SMP patches, ccNUMA patches, and crash analysis patches that BSDi has contributed to FreeBSD like SGI has for Linux.
FreeBSD might very well trounce Linux in terms of stability and speed, I've not seen any numbers that show this one way or the other. But, I'd be very careful when making claims about what BSDi is doing for FreeBSD in comparison to what IBM and SGI are doing for Linux. Not that I'm saying that BSDi is not a good citizen of the open source community, only that SGI and IBM have certainly put their code where there mouths are in very far-reaching and irrevocable ways (there is no going back on code that has been GPL'd).
Something to carry around and write stories on is precisely why I just bought a used NEC v/50 on ebay. It cost me $215 w/ shipping. 20 MB RAM and 2.1 GB hard disk. Emacs takes freaking forever to load up, but vi (vim actually) is all I really need as I do most of my writing in an xterm anyway.
The only pissers are:
All the X apps (like Netscape Communicator, xevil, etc.) that were never intended to be seen on a 640 x 480 display and don't have scroll bars where they need them if the windows are resized to fit such a small screen).
XFree86 only supports 256 colors on the Western Digital SVGA chipset
The battery lasts about 100 minutes which for me is 2 round trips to work on the bus. The funniest part is all the people staring at me like I'm rich cause I have a laptop.
With HavenCo's preference for anonymous business relationships, I'd be willing to wager that the CIAs, NSAs, Mossads, etc. of the world will be among the first customers....
while I'm not familiar with Behe's work...
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Calculating God
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· Score: 1
It is amazing that seemingly rational people can make a leap from something that science is (currently) unable to explain, to something that is unexplainable in principle, namely god, as the explanation. Positing god doesn't "explain" anything at all. It simply ends all discussion of how things happen by claiming that god did it.
The argument from design does not have to make a leap in logic in quite such a manner.
I do agree with you that using God as the explanation for something whose explanation is unknown is flawed logic. I am reminded of alleged miracles that are determined to be miracles simply because there is no other explanation. This is simply an argument from ignorance and carries absolutely no weight.
I would contend that the only way a person could have knowledge that a given event was supernatural in nature is if he or she were given that knowledge supernaturally. This has the unfortunate side-effect of making it very difficult (if not impossible) to verify that a miracle has occurred through scientific investigation. If an actual miracle took place, empiracal evidence combined with logic could only conclude that there was no known explanation for what took place, not that a miracle had occurred.
I do think that two important pieces of the argument from design are being left out in your summary. The first is that objects that appear to be designed do imply some sort of designer. The second is whether that designer needs to be some sort of deity. The complexity of life does imply that there is some sort of design process at work. The next question is whether what we know of the design implies a design process of an intelligent being or not.
I spent the better part of two years on a discussion list composed of 3 agnostics, 1 atheist, 1 Orthodox Christian, 1 Fundamentalist Baptist, and myself (a former Roman Catholic, currently Evangelical Protestant but heavily leaning towards Orthodoxy). After two years we still have not agreed on definitions of the words: supernatural, nature, miracle, and reason and discussion seems to be pretty much winding down.
A truly deep discussion of the roots of a religion needs to start with a discussion of axiology: what items can be accepted as axiological. There are very few people that are willing to take the discussion to that depth. Most people (on all sides of the debate) fall into the trap of assuming that empiricism is the battle ground where the debate should take place.
The problem with this assumption is that axiology can not be truly discussed through an empirical outlook. The discussion of axiology needs to precede the choice of methodology (such as an empirical scientific approach) to finding truth.
My favorite part of the article was the statement: It requires 1.2 megawatts (million watts) of power, enough to power 1000 typical homes.
If the typical home uses $50/month in power (which is a conservative estimate), this thing will cost some $50,000 a month to power (well, perhaps slightly less as I'm sure anyone eating that much wattage gets a bulk discount). Wow. Perhaps uncle Sam ought to pay for some Transmeta chips.
Slashdot Mirror
Imagine being able to snap together a Beowulf cluster. Run out of disk space, just snap on another RAID brick. Best of all, with the mindstorm attachments, you can watch the system upgrade itself when it needs more resources.
Just don't let your system have a credit card number or you may find it taking over your apartment today, and the world tomorrow....
My biggest pet peeve with my first few computer courses were that the canned coding exercises didn't contribute to anything.
What I would have greatly enjoyed was if the courses had used actual open source projects where the potential would have been there for the code from homework to earn immortality.
Think of the motivation that would result from telling a bunch of sixteen year olds that they have the potential to have their names indelibably stamped onto a product thousands of people will use.
I'd give some specific ideas for projects, but (a) I don't know the skill level of your students and (b) I don't know what territory your curriculum will cover and kernel hacking vs. database hacking vs. network hacking vs. UI hacking have quite a bit of differences.
Just as a non-musician appreciates Mozart when it's played, can't a non-programmer appreciate a browser when he uses it?
I think that, to a certain extent, you and I are talking past each other. My contention is not that art is not intended to enjoyed by people who can not read musical scores or understand esoteric programming languanges.
My point is that part of the value of such arts as programming and orchestral compasition lies within the esoteric symbols used to record the product and not solely in the final presentation.
After all, Milne didn't write Winnie-the-Poo for parents. It was written for mainly for the enjoyment of children.
And yet, literate adults are still able to experience Milne's art by examining the 'source code' without performing the work by reading it aloud for a child.
Programmers usually don't write for other programmers.
Hmm. How many non-programmers use emacs? ;)
Users are the ones who determine what programs are crap and what are good, even though they will never see the code.
And programmers will admire or castigate many nuances of the work of art that the average user will miss and in the case of very well written open-source or free software, programmers will be able to enjoy the art in the source without viewing the end product. So, yes, end users will be able to experience the art of the programmer, but other programmers can also experience the art that is contained within the source code.
I've read code that made me laugh and cry, but that wasn't anything to do with aesthetics, more to do with the quality.
I've read books that made me laugh and cry, but that wasn't anything to do with aesthetics, more to do with the quality.
I've heard poems that made me laugh and cry, but that wasn't anything to do with aesthetics, more to do with the quality.I've seen paintings that made me laugh and cry, but that wasn't anything to do with aesthetics, more to do with the quality.
I've viewed plays that made me laugh and cry, but that wasn't anything to do with aesthetics, more to do with the quality.
What again is the qualitative differentiation between any of these judgements?
I'm not knocking what they have created, I'm sure many people here have coded some genuinely useful and innovative programs. All I'm saying is that the act of programming is not expressive, just like building a wall isn't expressive. It's all about putting things together in a consistent and methodical manner so that it acheives its purpose.
In any form of art, painting, sculpting, archetecture (sp?), caligraphy, poetry, prose, performing arts, musical composition, etc., the goal is almost invariably to 'put things together in a consistent and methodical manner.' (I'll not a possible exception for Da Da and some other of the more esoteric art movements.)
If you closely examine a Da Vinci or Degas work of art, you will see evidence of their methodical and consistent manner. Similiarly, theatre troups and orchestras that are world renowned have achieved their level of excellence mostly because of their consistent and methodical manners in applying their skills. So, too, can be programming.
I'll gladly grant that most programming is on the same level as drawing comic books, but in both cases along with all the trash are some excellent pieces of fine art. I do mostly maintence programming for a living. Some of the code I've fixed defects in has been as close to art as a consumer tabloid. Other portions of code are beautiful to contemplate, showing elegance, cleverness and spirit (the same qualities we look for in music and paintings).
It seems true. A symphony is only beautiful when it is performed. A program is beautiful when it runs. Depending on the hardware or orchestra, the composer's score or programmer's code could be played beautifully or crappily.
Beauty is in the eye of the beholder. Scores can be beautiful to those who know how to read them, so too can code be beautiful to those who can comprehend. Those who can not understand staff notation or awk might only be able to appreciate the beauty of the output, but that does not diminish the beauty in the original.
Imagine an illerate child and a fabulous tale such as 'The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe.' To the child, the book is just ugly pages until the kind parent reads the story aloud and then the child is captivated by the beauty of the story. The parent is able to perceive the beauty of the story without 'performing' the work because he or she can comprehend the written word.
Scores and code are no different.
One of my favorite bands, Mental Destruction, spent two years writing one of their albums in assembler and C. No synthesizers were used, no analog equipment, no instruments. The entire album was coded on qwerty keyboards.
Is their album not art? If it is not art, what qualitatively differentiates Mental Destruction composing music with code from Bach composing with staff notation? If it is art, what qualitatively differentiates a program with some other output from what Mental Destruction has done?
All this talk fundamentally boils down to an increase in the mutation rate, combined with a possible increase in the ratio of beneficial (== more-likely-to-propagate, like bigger brains, breasts, and buns) mutations to harmful (== less-likely-to-propagate, like $DISEASE_FOO) mutations.
I think that this whole scenario will be interesting to watch pan out. Does anyone really think that the first people that can afford this will be making the kids smarter? Heck No! Starlets in Hollywood will be wasting all of their cash on making their sons and daughters with an unblemished physique. Just look at the number of rich people that spend money on plastic surgery vs. the number of people that spend money on increasing their intellect.
I contend that if designing children by DNA is ever available, that DNA designing firms will charge by the modification and (for the most part) only parents rich enough to provide the perfect body and the perfect mind will opt for genius children.
The other interesting thing is that if you examine selective breeding programs, you find that highly specialized species are more prone to health problems. The all around healthiest dogs out there are the mutts. I think that this principle will likely apply to engineered people. The more people are engineered to be beautiful (according to the standards of the day) or smart, if future generations continue down the same path, the only happy and holistically healthy children will be the unengineered 'God children.' [I just had to get the obligatory Gattaca reference in.]
I expect for several generations (or even centuries) to pass before your average Joes and Jills are smart enough to look at engineered children holistically instead of only engineering certain traits.
Another question: if it [UNIXWARE] was kept separate, you think Caldera would open-source it?
I could be wrong, but I think it would be pretty unfeasible to open source Unixware. I imagine that there is a horrendous amount of license and patent encumbered code in the product.
On the other hand, Tarantulla on Linux could ver well be a WTS killer.
(The ramifications are that two separate legal entities could possibly conspire to start an outfit for mass distribution of binary-only, GPL-derived software products. And that just wouldn't be nice, now would it?)
Personally, I don't see what the problem would be. Big deal if someone figures out a way to weasel out of providing source. The only situation where it would have an impact on the open source community is in the situation of the company A making source level changes, distributing to company B binary only media and company B sells the cd's. And, if this situation occurs, then I'd be willing to wager that the original authors could take both of the companies to court. Most of law deals with intent and a good case could probably be made that two companies colluding to intentionally circumvent the GPL does in fact break the contract so that neither company can keep the right of re-distriution.
Again, I'm not a lawyer, so YMMV.
I stand by the numbers, although as I pointed out, they are a few years old (circa 1997), I seriously doubt that the percentages have changed much over the last 3 or so years. I will look for the resource, but I doubt it is publicly available anymore, since it was M$ hype, and they don't like to keep that sort of thing lying about where it can be used.
I'm not saying that I don't believe you. Well, yes I am saying that I don't believe you. Your assertion runs contrary to my perceptions. Since I don't have any hard numbers, my perceptions might very well be wrong. But, without some hard numbers and/or some convincing arguments (preferably the former), I'm not willing to change my mind.
cheerio
They need an installed base to get NGWS off the ground, and they weren't getting it (contrary to US popular opinion, the M$ user-base remains relatively small outside the US).
I've seen a post from someone in Germany that states that Microsoft has 98% of the desktop marketshare in Germany. I think I recall the number in France being something like 80%. I'd be highly interested to have a resource which states otherwise.
My cousin, the end user, has received a copy of GPL-ed software without a source. That's fine, according to the GPL, but now someone has the obligation to give the source to my cousin for a reasonable cost. Who? Me? Or you, the original seller of Broken Inside Linux?
I think (but am not certain, as I am not a lawyer) that no one has the obligation to provide the source to your cousin. By providing a source disk to you, I have fulfilled my distribution obligations to you. The GPL (I don't think) could restrict your rights under first sale. However, if you made any modifications, or further copies, then you would be responsible for providing source if you distributed those items.
First, comparing the retail upgrade version to the OEM full version is a bit misleading. The upgrade version takes into account that you're a repeat MS customer and as such, gives you a price break.
With Windows 98, you can get the retail upgrade for about $80, but the retail full version costs about $150. If you can get the OEM full version of Windows 98 for $100, you are way ahead.
Second, I'd be willing to wager that the big reason that there is not a whole lot of differentiation in price between OEM and retail pricing is supply and demand. There are relatively few mom and pop system builders for people to make money on selling small numbers of OEM Windows licenses to. Anywhere the demand is relatively small, there will likely be an inflated price. If you're price is too high, look for another distributor.
The key word is "marketplace". Since GPL'd software is made available without cost, I wouldn't think this could be made to apply to GPL'd software
GPL'd software is all over the marketplace. Anything from Linux to Perl can be bought in retail outlets.
I think you are confusing the notion of 'first sale' which only governs the physical media that software (or books or magazines) is sold on with 'the right to make and distribute copies on terms other than simple fair use' which the GPL specifically grants that other software doesn't
First sale has absolutely no effect on the rights of the copyright holder to prevent someone from making further copies. First sale, does say that if you buy a cd, the seller can't put restrictions on what you do with it outside of writing a seperate legally binding contract.
An example of a seperate contract would be when I worked at one company, we could buy Microsoft software at the cost of production provided we signed a contract stating that we would not sell it. Contracts such as this that are actually signed are usually enforcable. But, the usual situation is that no such contract exists in the case of most resellers that get pc's bundled with Windows from a distributor.
First off, IANAL so take my words with a couple shovels full of salt
I mean, if Red Hat (or anyone else) sells me a piece of Linux with the source code, can I resell it legally without source code? Is the license valid only the first time something is sold?
If I understand the idea of first sale, it only applies to the media which has physically changed hands. First sale does not invalidate the copyright on the content of the media, but only the further distribution of the actual physical media.
In other words, theoretically, a person could buy a binary only Linux cd, and turn around and resell it without being liable for distribution of the source. However, if that person decides to make copies of the binary only cd and sell them, they can only do so under the fair use clause of the copyright act (which would likely prohibit the selling of the copies) or under the licensing of the GPL.
What you have to understand is that GPL in no way invalidates the idea of first sale, but it does confer priveledges that go far beyond what first sale allows, provided you play by the terms of the contract.
If I've gotten a CD (say in the back of O'Reilly's Apache book) can I now sell that CD for more than the cost of the media? Isn't that just another form of unbundling?
IIRC (and I'm too lazy to look it up) the cost of media provision in the GPL only applies to providing source code for GPL software that was distributed without source and only then in the event that the source is requested by the person to whom the software was distributed.
In other words, if I sell a binary only cd of GPL licensed software and someone requests the source on cd, I am not allowed to sell him or her a cd with the source at above the cost of the physical media.
However, (from my understanding) I am allowed to sell cd with the source for GPL licensed software for whatever I feel like, provided I have not distributed the software prior to the sale. It is only if I distribute GPL software without source code am I obligated to provide source code at the cost of the media (and then only to people that I have distributed it to).
Of course, IANAL and its been a heck of a long time since I've actually read the GPL, so YMMV...
What makes you think they would pirate Win2k now that this court decision clears the air for purchase of it? You don't think M$ let this come to trial by accident, do you?
From what I understand, Microsoft does believe that unbundling Windows is the same as piracy. The article mentions that Microsoft is the plaintiff in the suit. Microsoft sued the hardware manufacturer because the manufacturer's sale of Win/DOS violated the license agreement between Microsoft and the manufacturer and, as such, was an act of piracy.
I wish there was a similiar suit in the US, so people could dispose of old Windows disk however they pleased. Three years ago I got five bucks out of Windows 3.1 on 5.25 floppy on ebay. Its a shame that such a thing can not happen now...
I think BDR has authored a very well written, thought filled editorial on the state of music in the modern world. I think he missed the largest piece of the puzzle. If you want to make money with anything (be it coding or playing tunes) it needs to be approached as a business.
Sure, sites like MP3.com and tools like Napster make it easier to promote on an international level, but they don't provide all the back-breaking legwork that has to be done to get people to want to look up BDR on Gnutella.
If you want to make money, you need to provide something that people want to buy, and somehow let the people that want to buy know that you have what they want. The Internet and tools like Gnutella make this much easier than it has been, but it has not removed all the work. The internet also makes it easier to post my resume, but if I don't take the time to sharpen my skills and put my resume in the right places, who will look at it? And my resume would be for essentially a one time sale. To make serious money from music, you need thousands of sales. To get thousands of sales, it takes a non-trivial amount of money and sweat and organizational talent.
The SBA (Small Business Administration) states that in the US, 70% of new businesses fail within the first 5 years. The two primary reasons are: lack of working capital and poor management. The Music business is no different from any other business, it takes hard work, and phenomenal organizational skills to make serious money.
And this is the one thing that even BDR admits that major lables provide to signed artists, the labels provide management, marketing, and distribution support. To try to make a living off of music without those things provided by a label, the independent artist will need to provide those things for him or her self.
The bottom line: if BDR thinks that he or she can make a living off of his or her music, BDR ought to find someone to hire to do the business end if BDR is not interested in the blood, sweat, and tears it takes to run a business. There is a reason that Brian Epstein was considered 'the fifth Beatle.' There is a reason that Lars in his interview stressed the importance of Metallica's manager in decision making. If an artist has the aptitude to run a business, great, if not, look for someone that does.
FreeBSD is now backed by the BSDi people that have contributed better enhancements than anything SGI or IBM has put into Linux.
Show me any single machine that can run 40,000+ simultaneous instances of FreeBSD like IBM's S/390 can do with Linux.
Show me the LVM that BSDi has released for FreeBSD like IBM's LVM they've open-sourced for Linux.
Show me the journaling file systems BSDi has contributed to FreeBSD like IBM and SGI have done for Linux.
Show me the large memory patches, SMP patches, ccNUMA patches, and crash analysis patches that BSDi has contributed to FreeBSD like SGI has for Linux.
FreeBSD might very well trounce Linux in terms of stability and speed, I've not seen any numbers that show this one way or the other. But, I'd be very careful when making claims about what BSDi is doing for FreeBSD in comparison to what IBM and SGI are doing for Linux. Not that I'm saying that BSDi is not a good citizen of the open source community, only that SGI and IBM have certainly put their code where there mouths are in very far-reaching and irrevocable ways (there is no going back on code that has been GPL'd).
Something to carry around and write stories on is precisely why I just bought a used NEC v/50 on ebay. It cost me $215 w/ shipping. 20 MB RAM and 2.1 GB hard disk. Emacs takes freaking forever to load up, but vi (vim actually) is all I really need as I do most of my writing in an xterm anyway.
The only pissers are:
The battery lasts about 100 minutes which for me is 2 round trips to work on the bus. The funniest part is all the people staring at me like I'm rich cause I have a laptop.
With HavenCo's preference for anonymous business relationships, I'd be willing to wager that the CIAs, NSAs, Mossads, etc. of the world will be among the first customers....
It is amazing that seemingly rational people can make a leap from something that science is (currently) unable to explain, to something that is unexplainable in principle, namely god, as the explanation. Positing god doesn't "explain" anything at all. It simply ends all discussion of how things happen by claiming that god did it.
The argument from design does not have to make a leap in logic in quite such a manner.
I do agree with you that using God as the explanation for something whose explanation is unknown is flawed logic. I am reminded of alleged miracles that are determined to be miracles simply because there is no other explanation. This is simply an argument from ignorance and carries absolutely no weight.
I would contend that the only way a person could have knowledge that a given event was supernatural in nature is if he or she were given that knowledge supernaturally. This has the unfortunate side-effect of making it very difficult (if not impossible) to verify that a miracle has occurred through scientific investigation. If an actual miracle took place, empiracal evidence combined with logic could only conclude that there was no known explanation for what took place, not that a miracle had occurred.
I do think that two important pieces of the argument from design are being left out in your summary. The first is that objects that appear to be designed do imply some sort of designer. The second is whether that designer needs to be some sort of deity. The complexity of life does imply that there is some sort of design process at work. The next question is whether what we know of the design implies a design process of an intelligent being or not.
I spent the better part of two years on a discussion list composed of 3 agnostics, 1 atheist, 1 Orthodox Christian, 1 Fundamentalist Baptist, and myself (a former Roman Catholic, currently Evangelical Protestant but heavily leaning towards Orthodoxy). After two years we still have not agreed on definitions of the words: supernatural, nature, miracle, and reason and discussion seems to be pretty much winding down.
A truly deep discussion of the roots of a religion needs to start with a discussion of axiology: what items can be accepted as axiological. There are very few people that are willing to take the discussion to that depth. Most people (on all sides of the debate) fall into the trap of assuming that empiricism is the battle ground where the debate should take place.
The problem with this assumption is that axiology can not be truly discussed through an empirical outlook. The discussion of axiology needs to precede the choice of methodology (such as an empirical scientific approach) to finding truth.
My favorite part of the article was the statement: It requires 1.2 megawatts (million watts) of power, enough to power 1000 typical homes.
If the typical home uses $50/month in power (which is a conservative estimate), this thing will cost some $50,000 a month to power (well, perhaps slightly less as I'm sure anyone eating that much wattage gets a bulk discount). Wow. Perhaps uncle Sam ought to pay for some Transmeta chips.