Actually, you raise an interesting point. There are those who believe information wants to be free, yet get angry at spyware. Why does someone else's information get to be free, but not yours? It's a double-standard in that philosophy that I never noticed before now. Interesting post.
It's not a "horrible article" simply because it neglected to mention one of many minor formats that few use when compared to WMA, AAC, and MP3, the formats discussed in the article. Simply because a lot of Slashdotters mention these formats in article discussions doesn't mean they're at all mainstream.
I think I speak for everyone when I say, break out the popcorn! I love it. Especially the idea of a malware company getting annoyed when another program intrusively attempts to control their applications. Sounds familiar, doesn't it?
What if it's a legitimate and accurate phrase for describing it? "Another danger of astrology is being suckered into accepting the 'Earth revolves around the Sun' idea, which downplays the significance of the Earth.'" -- scientists hundreds of years ago.;)
If you're going to say people are suckers if they disagree, you should offer reasons and evidence why. Without that, you become just another voice in the argument.
Just as much could be said about the Clinton Administration (with regards to both environmentalism and "business cronies"). Clinton did not even bother submitting Kyoto for ratification. Just saying--I'd hate to see a valid discussion turn into a political debate.
I see this happen sometimes in DMCA articles. People forget that the DMCA came into being on Clinton's watch. Singling out Bush is bad because it distracts discussion of the real facts of the issue.
That's not a good comparison. Taking one situation and applying it to another doesn't prove the point. It's obvious that cigarettes are the cause of smokers' problems, but such direct links don't exist about global warming. While global warming may be an observed phenomena, the cause of the phenomena is what is often in question in debates on the issue--human-caused, or natural?
I'd rather not offer my opinion either way because I haven't been convinced either way. I believe more scientific study should be done on the issue to learn more first, but I also believe in treating the environment well regardless.
Not saying I agree with everything stated in those articles; I'm merely pointing out that there is another side to the issue. I'm sure there is an effect that our manmade chemicals are having, but the fact that there is a despute over the extent of its effect (despite what Michael seems to think with his "heads-in-the-sand dept." quip...) or its permanance means there are plenty of scientists who disagree that humans are the cause any more than natural climate cycles of the Earth are. Studies show the ozone is a lot more self-maintaining than you and I were raised to believe, and that most of the chemicals we hear about that are so damaging never even reach the altitudes necessary to do damage to the ozone.
To sum it up--there is disagreement because there is little proven evidence either way (think of it as similar to brain tumors and cell phones), and the studies that are out end up being contradicted by another. Simply looking at percentages of scientific papers published in the last decade doesn't necessarily prove much more than a general published consensus in the last decade in those specific science magazines.
I notice that a lot of companies profiting from OSS also offer service-based business models. When Bill Gates says there's no money in Open Source, he's referring to the seemingly logical idea that it's hard to make money selling product when someone can just compile the source code for themselves. I think this is partly true, and when companies like Red Hat make money, it's because of their technical support and service models. They happen to base their services on OSS software.
The article mentions that "[t]heir business models contain various mixes of proprietary and open-source software components." What does that mean exactly? Does that mean closed-source components, and if so, which parts are closed and why?
Honestly, I've learned to completely ignore Slashdotter speculation about Apple products.:) Taco was wrong about the iPod, and everyone was wrong about the iPod Mini. Reading posts saying "What's the point?" is amusing since it's the same thing people asked last time and the time before.
When talking about it, free software usually refers to the money-free most people think of. When you capitalize it to become Free Software, then you're referring to Stallman's idea.:)
Quite simply, this is a situation that can be addressed with education. Since we don't have access to big media, we have to do it by word-of-mouth. This means spreading Firefox and other crap-free alternatives, even free plugins for IE if someone chooses to use that browser. It's also important not to force things on people in our typically annoying geek ways. Educate people, so that they can decide for themselves and realize that there is a world of software in which this stuff is frowned upon and actively fought against. Someday with enough effort, spyware will become an amusing memory.
The real question is if idealogue file-swappers will respect the wishes of those who DON'T want their material being swapped around on P2P networks.
If you don't respect the wishes of those people, you violate the idea that this is for the artists. That includes Metallica, even if you hate Lars Ulrich. You can't pick and choose your moralities.
I don't get why copyrights don't matter in P2P articles but they matter in "GPL source code theft" articles.
Am I the only one who sees it as a little hypocritical when people defend Debian's late release schedules while accusing Microsoft of "vaporware tactics" when they take a long time to release Longhorn? They both do major testing and sometimes drop things that people want, but apparently it's okay when Debian does it.
Remember, this is why so many moved to FOSS. EULAs and their ilk.
What a crock. I guarantee the biggest reason people move to FOSS is because it's free and they don't have to pay for it. It's also the reason people pirate games, not some freedom movement that's sticking it to the evil publishers and fighting for gamer rights. No, it's nothing more than wanting to get something without having to pay for it, like with music, movies, and everything else that gets pirated.
If you don't like Valve's Steam system, DON'T USE IT! I'm so sick of Slashdotters acting like whiny victims whenever a piece of software comes out that attempts to protect itself from piracy. DON'T USE IT. NOBODY'S GOT A GUN TO YOUR HEAD.
Say it over and over until you realize the choice is up to you. This isn't food and water here. It's a video game. And if you pirate the game, that completely invalidates any moral arguments you attempt to make about the issue. End of story.
I'm a Gentoo user, but this is just stupid. Gentoo is hardly just a couple of steps away from LFS. I've done an LFS system just once, and you have to do everything by hand, and it takes a very long time. Gentoo is almost entirely automated, and the parts that aren't are spelled out step by step in the manual.
Watching a bunch of GCC output doesn't make you an expert at installing Linux from scratch. I like Gentoo a lot, but it's silly to apply some sort of elite mental image of its users simply because they can type "emerge foo."
Heh, just look at all the "Overrated" mods. People use that to bring down your karma while avoiding the consequences of meta-moderation. "Overrated" mods don't get meta-moderated. My karma has died because of troll moderators who follow all my posts.
I e-mailed Taco about this, and he just said, "We're always working on new moderation solutions." So don't expect much change...
Slashdot is a bunch of kooks complaining about stuff. This website is not an objective source of factual reporting and discussion, and it hasn't been for quite a number of years now.
This has to be the tenth voting machine article on the front page in the past month. How many more "e-voting" articles are we going to get before we get back to endless SCO and "M$" articles? We've got a quota to meet, people.
The reason is that Slashdot has morphed from a "tech news" site into just a geek sounding board where people can get up on a pulpit and preach their little opinions as though they're important. Everyone thinks they're a lawyer, a sociologist, an economist, and that everyone is concerned with what they have to say.
Well, have fun when your games get pirated left and right by a culture that increasingly has home broadband.
Meanwhile, Steam allows convenient patch and content distribution as well as built-in verification that what you own is legally what you own. They wouldn't have to do it if their livelihood wasn't on the line thanks to pirates. Expect id's next game to be even more draconian after the Doom 3 piracy fiasco that cost them millions. People apparently have no shame anymore.
One, Valve wouldn't have to require activation if people weren't pirating the fuck out of every game coming out. This has to be the first time in forever that I can remember a game getting in the hands of legitimate users before the pirates. The Doom 3 weekend fiasco cost id Software millions of dollars.
Oh, but I forgot, it's not "theft" when it comes to pirating games. It's only theft when it's "GPL source code theft," like with CherryOS.
Two, Michael's editorializing is ridiculous and yet another illustration of why he's the least-liked editor on Slashdot. Please, Michael, keep your little opinions to yourself. It's a ridiculous opinion, and we don't need your editorializing. Put it in a comment like the rest of us have to! Don't you have a Censorware site to run...
Valve has done absolutely nothing wrong here, it's not the first time they've done this, and it won't be the last. Don't like it? Then the pirates need to stop doing this shit and ruining it for everyone. It's gotten to the point that millions are being lost in revenue, and people who slave away for years on a game are losing money that they earned. There is absolutely no valid justification anyone has ever given on Slashdot for ripping off programmers and developers, and if you think it's "draconian" (everyone's favorite term to describe protecting against pirates), then maybe you should talk to the pirates on BitTorrent instead of Valve.
Slashdot Mirror
How could this happen in March if San Andreas wasn't out yet?
Actually, you raise an interesting point. There are those who believe information wants to be free, yet get angry at spyware. Why does someone else's information get to be free, but not yours? It's a double-standard in that philosophy that I never noticed before now. Interesting post.
Beetlejuice
Edward Scissorhands
Big Fish
It's not a "horrible article" simply because it neglected to mention one of many minor formats that few use when compared to WMA, AAC, and MP3, the formats discussed in the article. Simply because a lot of Slashdotters mention these formats in article discussions doesn't mean they're at all mainstream.
I think I speak for everyone when I say, break out the popcorn! I love it. Especially the idea of a malware company getting annoyed when another program intrusively attempts to control their applications. Sounds familiar, doesn't it?
What if it's a legitimate and accurate phrase for describing it? "Another danger of astrology is being suckered into accepting the 'Earth revolves around the Sun' idea, which downplays the significance of the Earth.'" -- scientists hundreds of years ago. ;)
If you're going to say people are suckers if they disagree, you should offer reasons and evidence why. Without that, you become just another voice in the argument.
Just as much could be said about the Clinton Administration (with regards to both environmentalism and "business cronies"). Clinton did not even bother submitting Kyoto for ratification. Just saying--I'd hate to see a valid discussion turn into a political debate.
I see this happen sometimes in DMCA articles. People forget that the DMCA came into being on Clinton's watch. Singling out Bush is bad because it distracts discussion of the real facts of the issue.
That's not a good comparison. Taking one situation and applying it to another doesn't prove the point. It's obvious that cigarettes are the cause of smokers' problems, but such direct links don't exist about global warming. While global warming may be an observed phenomena, the cause of the phenomena is what is often in question in debates on the issue--human-caused, or natural?
I'd rather not offer my opinion either way because I haven't been convinced either way. I believe more scientific study should be done on the issue to learn more first, but I also believe in treating the environment well regardless.
The reason is that not everybody agrees. For instance, the ozone hole that has been growing and shrinking every few decades. As kids, we were all told the hole's expansion was caused by greenhouse gases. But it actually grows and shrinks, and the cycles correspond with solar cycles of the sun. That's just one of many reasons there is disagreement; here are some others:
Study by Swiss and German scientists shows Earth is getting warmer because Sun is burning brighter
"Global Warming Bomshell"
Global warming or lack thereof
The Real Cost of Global Warming
Not saying I agree with everything stated in those articles; I'm merely pointing out that there is another side to the issue. I'm sure there is an effect that our manmade chemicals are having, but the fact that there is a despute over the extent of its effect (despite what Michael seems to think with his "heads-in-the-sand dept." quip...) or its permanance means there are plenty of scientists who disagree that humans are the cause any more than natural climate cycles of the Earth are. Studies show the ozone is a lot more self-maintaining than you and I were raised to believe, and that most of the chemicals we hear about that are so damaging never even reach the altitudes necessary to do damage to the ozone.
To sum it up--there is disagreement because there is little proven evidence either way (think of it as similar to brain tumors and cell phones), and the studies that are out end up being contradicted by another. Simply looking at percentages of scientific papers published in the last decade doesn't necessarily prove much more than a general published consensus in the last decade in those specific science magazines.
I notice that a lot of companies profiting from OSS also offer service-based business models. When Bill Gates says there's no money in Open Source, he's referring to the seemingly logical idea that it's hard to make money selling product when someone can just compile the source code for themselves. I think this is partly true, and when companies like Red Hat make money, it's because of their technical support and service models. They happen to base their services on OSS software.
The article mentions that "[t]heir business models contain various mixes of proprietary and open-source software components." What does that mean exactly? Does that mean closed-source components, and if so, which parts are closed and why?
Honestly, I've learned to completely ignore Slashdotter speculation about Apple products. :) Taco was wrong about the iPod, and everyone was wrong about the iPod Mini. Reading posts saying "What's the point?" is amusing since it's the same thing people asked last time and the time before.
When talking about it, free software usually refers to the money-free most people think of. When you capitalize it to become Free Software, then you're referring to Stallman's idea. :)
Quite simply, this is a situation that can be addressed with education. Since we don't have access to big media, we have to do it by word-of-mouth. This means spreading Firefox and other crap-free alternatives, even free plugins for IE if someone chooses to use that browser. It's also important not to force things on people in our typically annoying geek ways. Educate people, so that they can decide for themselves and realize that there is a world of software in which this stuff is frowned upon and actively fought against. Someday with enough effort, spyware will become an amusing memory.
Slashdot--Where copyrights matter only in GPL source theft articles. Any other time, we hate them!
The real question is if idealogue file-swappers will respect the wishes of those who DON'T want their material being swapped around on P2P networks.
If you don't respect the wishes of those people, you violate the idea that this is for the artists. That includes Metallica, even if you hate Lars Ulrich. You can't pick and choose your moralities.
I don't get why copyrights don't matter in P2P articles but they matter in "GPL source code theft" articles.
Am I the only one who sees it as a little hypocritical when people defend Debian's late release schedules while accusing Microsoft of "vaporware tactics" when they take a long time to release Longhorn? They both do major testing and sometimes drop things that people want, but apparently it's okay when Debian does it.
Remember, this is why so many moved to FOSS. EULAs and their ilk.
What a crock. I guarantee the biggest reason people move to FOSS is because it's free and they don't have to pay for it. It's also the reason people pirate games, not some freedom movement that's sticking it to the evil publishers and fighting for gamer rights. No, it's nothing more than wanting to get something without having to pay for it, like with music, movies, and everything else that gets pirated.
If you don't like Valve's Steam system, DON'T USE IT! I'm so sick of Slashdotters acting like whiny victims whenever a piece of software comes out that attempts to protect itself from piracy. DON'T USE IT. NOBODY'S GOT A GUN TO YOUR HEAD.
Say it over and over until you realize the choice is up to you. This isn't food and water here. It's a video game. And if you pirate the game, that completely invalidates any moral arguments you attempt to make about the issue. End of story.
I'm a Gentoo user, but this is just stupid. Gentoo is hardly just a couple of steps away from LFS. I've done an LFS system just once, and you have to do everything by hand, and it takes a very long time. Gentoo is almost entirely automated, and the parts that aren't are spelled out step by step in the manual.
Watching a bunch of GCC output doesn't make you an expert at installing Linux from scratch. I like Gentoo a lot, but it's silly to apply some sort of elite mental image of its users simply because they can type "emerge foo."
Heh, just look at all the "Overrated" mods. People use that to bring down your karma while avoiding the consequences of meta-moderation. "Overrated" mods don't get meta-moderated. My karma has died because of troll moderators who follow all my posts.
I e-mailed Taco about this, and he just said, "We're always working on new moderation solutions." So don't expect much change...
Slashdot is a bunch of kooks complaining about stuff. This website is not an objective source of factual reporting and discussion, and it hasn't been for quite a number of years now.
This has to be the tenth voting machine article on the front page in the past month. How many more "e-voting" articles are we going to get before we get back to endless SCO and "M$" articles? We've got a quota to meet, people.
I guess the point of Slashdot these days is to fit as many Windows articles on the front page as possible, while ignoring important Linux news...
The reason is that Slashdot has morphed from a "tech news" site into just a geek sounding board where people can get up on a pulpit and preach their little opinions as though they're important. Everyone thinks they're a lawyer, a sociologist, an economist, and that everyone is concerned with what they have to say.
Well, have fun when your games get pirated left and right by a culture that increasingly has home broadband.
Meanwhile, Steam allows convenient patch and content distribution as well as built-in verification that what you own is legally what you own. They wouldn't have to do it if their livelihood wasn't on the line thanks to pirates. Expect id's next game to be even more draconian after the Doom 3 piracy fiasco that cost them millions. People apparently have no shame anymore.
One, Valve wouldn't have to require activation if people weren't pirating the fuck out of every game coming out. This has to be the first time in forever that I can remember a game getting in the hands of legitimate users before the pirates. The Doom 3 weekend fiasco cost id Software millions of dollars.
Oh, but I forgot, it's not "theft" when it comes to pirating games. It's only theft when it's "GPL source code theft," like with CherryOS.
Two, Michael's editorializing is ridiculous and yet another illustration of why he's the least-liked editor on Slashdot. Please, Michael, keep your little opinions to yourself. It's a ridiculous opinion, and we don't need your editorializing. Put it in a comment like the rest of us have to! Don't you have a Censorware site to run...
Valve has done absolutely nothing wrong here, it's not the first time they've done this, and it won't be the last. Don't like it? Then the pirates need to stop doing this shit and ruining it for everyone. It's gotten to the point that millions are being lost in revenue, and people who slave away for years on a game are losing money that they earned. There is absolutely no valid justification anyone has ever given on Slashdot for ripping off programmers and developers, and if you think it's "draconian" (everyone's favorite term to describe protecting against pirates), then maybe you should talk to the pirates on BitTorrent instead of Valve.