No, I read the article, thanks.:-) Yes, I'm aware that Microsoft's statement really only indicated that they wanted to see a list of what was being transferred. I was merely responding to the parent post.
Actually what happened is I agree to grant you a license to live in the house (AKA a lease) and I specifically prohibit you from transferring this lease (sublet it) to anyone else.
This isn't really accurate, either, although I can agree that the scenario I used also isn't completely accurate. I will grant you that your scenario is the way Microsoft would *like* for things to work.
I think we can all see the value in letting an owner protect his property in this manner, no?
I'm not sure you can classify this as "protecting their property." In this case, transferring ownership isn't going to cause damage to the "property." Also, we're assuming that there were no ongoing monthly license fees, which would have made the license more like a lease. I'm, of course, separating licensing from any explicit support that was paid for.
Hey ninja-retard... What's so Anti-Trust about enforcing their license? It's not like the lawyers didin't read it before they accepted it, did they?
You obviously don't know what monopolies and anti-trust actions are all about. Although this kind of situation is unlikely to stack up evidence against Microsoft (because other companies have similar licensing policies), you need to realize that the very fact that Microsoft has a monopoly prevents businesses from being able to choose more license-friendly alternatives.
Try this comparable situation to understand better. Say that you live in an area where one company has a total monopoly on heating oil, gas, electricity and HVAC equipment. You get ready to sell your house, and the giant power-monopoly tells you that the furnace, hot water heater, supply lines, storage tanks and ductwork can't be considered part of the sale, based on the contract you had to sign if you wanted heat and power in your house. They also put an unreasonable price tag on "transferring" these assets to another owner.
My guess is that with Blue-light, there weren't lawyers reading all of the software EULAs. They probably just clicked "accept" like everybody else. What choice did they really have?
the only problem is getting that paintbrush in those little hard to reach areas - like the heart.
Slightly off-topic, but you'd be amazed at the progress in catheterized procedures these days. Doctors can now completely repair a hole in the heart by just inserting a catheter up one of the veins in the leg -- no zipper scar, no rib spreaders. I'm sure they can apply similar techniques to an interior "paint job" for the body.
It doesnt seem fair to charge a receipitent for a call
Maybe not, but I'm not sure that I want incoming calls on my mobile to be free here in the USA. The fact that it costs to receive calls is pretty much the only reason that there are no telemarketers calling your cell phone. As soon as it's "free" for the receiver, you can bet they'll start including your cell phone in their calls. Can you even *IMAGINE* just how annoying that would be?
My guess is you're wrong, and that the plaintiffs here are in the habit of encouraging large companies to use more accessible technologies before suing them
Curiosity got the better of me. The Google search didn't really help, although it did bring up a Robert Gumson who is on the Executive Committee for NYS Independent Living Council, and has attended activities that would indicate that he may be considered an activist in this area. Not sure if it's the same guy, though. Given his impairment, it should be no surprise that he's highly interested in accessibility.
Of more interest is the pdf of the court order. On page four, it is clearly footnoted (#4) that "Plantiffs' Counsel informed the Court that Plaintiffs made no effort to resolve this dispute prior to filing their Complaint. (Tr., Oct. 16, 2002). Although the law does not require Plaintiffs to confer with Southwest prior to filing this action, in light of Plaintiffs' Counsel's discussion of the proactive measures that other companies, such as Amazon.com, have taken to modify their websites to make them more accessible to visually impaired persons, it is unfortunate that Plaintiffs made no attempt to resolve this matter before resorting to litigation."
It's clear that the plaintiffs were, as you said, interested in establishing precendent for the future. It's also implied that the judge may have detected this and it may be part of the reason for the outcome. Although I definitely don't think it's fair for someone with a disability to be denied accessibility to a web site, I also think that they really should have tried to work *with* Southwest before they spent taxpayer dollars on this. Not everything needs to go to court.
I have to say I think the judge was wrong on this one
I disagree, simply because of the can of worms it opens up. However, I'd like to know if Southwest was approached prior to a lawsuit about the problem, and what their reaction was. I would think that it would be in their best interest to do what they could to improve accessibility. My guess is that first contact with them was by a lawyer, which would make even the best of us a bit standoffish. Although I'd love to know the facts. Anybody know anything?
RIAA should be paying webcasters to play the music.
No... that would give them too much control over what tunes get played through web casting. Just make it even, with nobody paying anything, and there's a greater chance that people will get to hear the music they like rather than what the RIAA is pushing on them. It's not a perfect chance, though, because we'll always be subject to the whim of the person or group doing the webcasting, or perhaps wherever their financing comes from.
I would be remis if I didn't say, however, that a blown axle just before the batteries were supposed to have given out is just a bit too convenient.
Actually, it was just a wheel bearing, but I know from experience that that'll make a car undriveable -- the wheel eventually locks up. However, you're right. It was just a little too convenient. Almost like they had the excuse ready to go. I mean, if wheel bearings are a common point of failure on these cars, wouldn't you think they'd have replaced them just prior to such a high profile demonstration? Duh.
Maybe this Delorean works about as well as the one in "Back to the Future." He should have just slammed his head onto the steering wheel, and it would have started working again.
And what right do they have to divulge people's personal information without their consent,...
Nobody said that they were "divulging" this information. It was just stated that they are keeping the information in a database. They never actually said what they did with it. It all depends on whether you consider making the information available to other police offers as "divulging." I would presume that it's not publicly available.
Having said that, please realize that I'm not advocating what they are doing.
If that's the case, then why bother having a list in the first place?
I'm not advocating what they've done, but I think I know why. By having a list of potentials, they can narrow their initial search for a suspect by checking out likely entries from the database. That's EXACTLY what the police do with people who HAVE been convicted of a crime. When a new crime takes place, they look at known criminals first. In this case, they've just extended the list to people who they think MIGHT commit a crime.
I wonder if they show the pictures to victims to get an identity....
in windows, you can change your language at ANY time from an icon in the system tray, you don't even need to log off and on again
That doesn't answer my question. You don't have a system tray at login time. It's much more convenient to be able to choose language as part of the login process. I'm also guessing that a properly locked down workstation in Windows won't let you change the language once you've logged in, as you shouldn't have the privilege to do that.
Sorry, but just adding an account but not giving them write access or the ability to change doesn't fly either.
Agreed. Instead, provide the group with no write access for system files (obviously), and provide read-only access to settings files within their login directory. The trick here is making sure ALL of the settings files for ALL of the applications are locked down in this manner. Other than that, provide the ability to create new files within the login directory, and schedule a periodic job to clean things up every once in a while.
UNIX is still and open OS if you have an account. Windows or a flavor of it is still the better option.
Would you care to explain yourself? I have yet to find a version of "locked down" Windows that allows reasonable productivity that I can't easily circumvent. Although I admit that it's gotten harder with each new OS release. With UNIX, on the other hand, you really can do a pretty good job of locking things down -- you just have to know what you're doing. Are you just trolling here?
Either way, try and be patient with teenagers, they have so much pressure on them already(mostly manufactured by big media). It's up to those of us who have already been burned countless times by these people(riaa), to try and salvage what we can.
Actually, the latest economic hard times *may* help resolve this situation. Since most teenagers (not all) depend on money from parents to be able to afford this kind of junk, you may see a significant drop in sales because this is the type of expenditure that will be the first to go.
The only legal pressure could come from their customers if they want to access the RIAA website for some reason.
And to satisfy those customers, they could just summarize the RIAA website:
We, the Recording Industry Association of America, would like to offer you substandard products at high prices. Please be aware that those contributing to the development of our products are underpaid, and the funds collected from sales will be used to establish laws further limiting your freedom. We thank you for your patronage.
I'm not so sure about that. Since their network is a private one, they certainly have the right to blacklist anybody they want. Should they share that list with other ISPs, there may be some problems. But setting up their own list is not illegal. Furthermore, should they see this thing out, they may eventually have more business than they can even handle.
RIAA may be able to take them to court, but it would probably be worth the $$$ to fend them off.
MS wants to push its customers around, its customers should just stop paying to be treated like theives and move onto a OSes that seem to work [like linux]
Agreed, but the MS coffers are now being used to get laws into place that would force Linux to behave the same way. And even worse, they are trying to push the DRM technology into the hardware. Just to be fair, though, I must say that MS obviously isn't the only company involved in this. To some extent, they are responding to demands from the RIAA and others.
..as opposed to a couple of CDs (Linux) which would be very useful to a lot of users?
Please, people. Read the article. Dell does offer Redhat on some of its systems. As many have already said, FreeDOS is only a "token" operating system to get around Microsoft's licensing requirements, will only be available on a couple machines, and is primarily intended only for volume buyers who already have licensing agreements and prefer to install the OS themselves. I would imagine that many customers who are interested in this will be installing Windows anyway, but have already purchased enterprise licensing to avoid getting slapped by the Software Mafia^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^HBSA.
Well, while there may be some contention over the "dinosaur" picture, there is little possibility for problems with the use of "zilla" in the name. Apparently, that word has existed since at least 1913, and the first movie (Gojira) didn't come out until 1954. As best as I can tell, Godzilla wasn't used until the 1956 American release.
Also, they don't have a trademark on the use of a dinosaur. At best, they can keep you from using "Zilla" in conjunction with a dinosaur logo, but they surely should not be able to keep you from using one or the other alone.
Personally, I think they should just back the heck off and count all of this as free advertising. It's not like they are losing any money as a result of these types of uses. All they are getting with a lawsuit is negative publicity. If they must protect their trademark, then at least come to an agreement that allows interested parties permission to specialized use of the name and/or logo.
Maybe because they want to keep track of what you're watching and recording?
ALL companies WANT to keep track of this kind of stuff. At least in this case, you have to option to refuse to participate. Unlike some companies, they aren't FORCING anyone to provide this information -- at least not yet.
Seriously, where is a license thats mostly-GPL, mostly-open-soruce, but disallows certain things like spyware/adware, or marketing of a competitive product
? Doesn't that sort of defeat the whole purpose of "Open Source" if you can't create a competing product? Maybe you mean "can't create and sell a competing product." But even so, if somebody copies your GPL-ed program and tries to sell it, somebody else will just copy their source code and give it away for free.
Most everyone is aware that you don't make money from GPL software by simply selling the software. You make money by service, added convenience of your distribution, or selling a non-GPL-ed add-on products. Or sometimes you make money from donations by people who just want to reward your efforts. But if provide the source code for everything, you've got to expect people to download and distribute for free.
If they find that pop-up/under is not working, they will come up with new ways to be intrusive
I totally agree that pop-up/under ads are currently just about this most annoying thing on the internet (with the possible exception of spam mail). And I know this question has been asked again and again, but I've never seen a really good answer, so I'll ask again. For sites and ISP's that need to rely on advertising for their revenue, what's the most effective way to handle it? There are really two situations that need to be considered. Individual sites may need advertising to keep themselves running. There are also ISP's who offer free or reduced-rate service that relies on advertising. How should each situation be handled?
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OK. I can't resist. How about feces? Think that would make the right statement? ;)
No, I read the article, thanks. :-) Yes, I'm aware that Microsoft's statement really only indicated that they wanted to see a list of what was being transferred. I was merely responding to the parent post.
Actually what happened is I agree to grant you a license to live in the house (AKA a lease) and I specifically prohibit you from transferring this lease (sublet it) to anyone else.
This isn't really accurate, either, although I can agree that the scenario I used also isn't completely accurate. I will grant you that your scenario is the way Microsoft would *like* for things to work.
I think we can all see the value in letting an owner protect his property in this manner, no?
I'm not sure you can classify this as "protecting their property." In this case, transferring ownership isn't going to cause damage to the "property." Also, we're assuming that there were no ongoing monthly license fees, which would have made the license more like a lease. I'm, of course, separating licensing from any explicit support that was paid for.
You obviously don't know what monopolies and anti-trust actions are all about. Although this kind of situation is unlikely to stack up evidence against Microsoft (because other companies have similar licensing policies), you need to realize that the very fact that Microsoft has a monopoly prevents businesses from being able to choose more license-friendly alternatives.
Try this comparable situation to understand better. Say that you live in an area where one company has a total monopoly on heating oil, gas, electricity and HVAC equipment. You get ready to sell your house, and the giant power-monopoly tells you that the furnace, hot water heater, supply lines, storage tanks and ductwork can't be considered part of the sale, based on the contract you had to sign if you wanted heat and power in your house. They also put an unreasonable price tag on "transferring" these assets to another owner.
My guess is that with Blue-light, there weren't lawyers reading all of the software EULAs. They probably just clicked "accept" like everybody else. What choice did they really have?
Slightly off-topic, but you'd be amazed at the progress in catheterized procedures these days. Doctors can now completely repair a hole in the heart by just inserting a catheter up one of the veins in the leg -- no zipper scar, no rib spreaders. I'm sure they can apply similar techniques to an interior "paint job" for the body.
Maybe not, but I'm not sure that I want incoming calls on my mobile to be free here in the USA. The fact that it costs to receive calls is pretty much the only reason that there are no telemarketers calling your cell phone. As soon as it's "free" for the receiver, you can bet they'll start including your cell phone in their calls. Can you even *IMAGINE* just how annoying that would be?
Curiosity got the better of me. The Google search didn't really help, although it did bring up a Robert Gumson who is on the Executive Committee for NYS Independent Living Council, and has attended activities that would indicate that he may be considered an activist in this area. Not sure if it's the same guy, though. Given his impairment, it should be no surprise that he's highly interested in accessibility.
Of more interest is the pdf of the court order. On page four, it is clearly footnoted (#4) that "Plantiffs' Counsel informed the Court that Plaintiffs made no effort to resolve this dispute prior to filing their Complaint. (Tr., Oct. 16, 2002). Although the law does not require Plaintiffs to confer with Southwest prior to filing this action, in light of Plaintiffs' Counsel's discussion of the proactive measures that other companies, such as Amazon.com, have taken to modify their websites to make them more accessible to visually impaired persons, it is unfortunate that Plaintiffs made no attempt to resolve this matter before resorting to litigation."
It's clear that the plaintiffs were, as you said, interested in establishing precendent for the future. It's also implied that the judge may have detected this and it may be part of the reason for the outcome. Although I definitely don't think it's fair for someone with a disability to be denied accessibility to a web site, I also think that they really should have tried to work *with* Southwest before they spent taxpayer dollars on this. Not everything needs to go to court.
I disagree, simply because of the can of worms it opens up. However, I'd like to know if Southwest was approached prior to a lawsuit about the problem, and what their reaction was. I would think that it would be in their best interest to do what they could to improve accessibility. My guess is that first contact with them was by a lawyer, which would make even the best of us a bit standoffish. Although I'd love to know the facts. Anybody know anything?
No... that would give them too much control over what tunes get played through web casting. Just make it even, with nobody paying anything, and there's a greater chance that people will get to hear the music they like rather than what the RIAA is pushing on them. It's not a perfect chance, though, because we'll always be subject to the whim of the person or group doing the webcasting, or perhaps wherever their financing comes from.
Actually, it was just a wheel bearing, but I know from experience that that'll make a car undriveable -- the wheel eventually locks up. However, you're right. It was just a little too convenient. Almost like they had the excuse ready to go. I mean, if wheel bearings are a common point of failure on these cars, wouldn't you think they'd have replaced them just prior to such a high profile demonstration? Duh.
Maybe this Delorean works about as well as the one in "Back to the Future." He should have just slammed his head onto the steering wheel, and it would have started working again.
Nobody said that they were "divulging" this information. It was just stated that they are keeping the information in a database. They never actually said what they did with it. It all depends on whether you consider making the information available to other police offers as "divulging." I would presume that it's not publicly available.
Having said that, please realize that I'm not advocating what they are doing.
I'm not advocating what they've done, but I think I know why. By having a list of potentials, they can narrow their initial search for a suspect by checking out likely entries from the database. That's EXACTLY what the police do with people who HAVE been convicted of a crime. When a new crime takes place, they look at known criminals first. In this case, they've just extended the list to people who they think MIGHT commit a crime.
I wonder if they show the pictures to victims to get an identity....
That doesn't answer my question. You don't have a system tray at login time. It's much more convenient to be able to choose language as part of the login process. I'm also guessing that a properly locked down workstation in Windows won't let you change the language once you've logged in, as you shouldn't have the privilege to do that.
But does it let you change at login time? Or do you have to login first and then change?
Agreed. Instead, provide the group with no write access for system files (obviously), and provide read-only access to settings files within their login directory. The trick here is making sure ALL of the settings files for ALL of the applications are locked down in this manner. Other than that, provide the ability to create new files within the login directory, and schedule a periodic job to clean things up every once in a while.
UNIX is still and open OS if you have an account. Windows or a flavor of it is still the better option.
Would you care to explain yourself? I have yet to find a version of "locked down" Windows that allows reasonable productivity that I can't easily circumvent. Although I admit that it's gotten harder with each new OS release. With UNIX, on the other hand, you really can do a pretty good job of locking things down -- you just have to know what you're doing. Are you just trolling here?
Actually, the latest economic hard times *may* help resolve this situation. Since most teenagers (not all) depend on money from parents to be able to afford this kind of junk, you may see a significant drop in sales because this is the type of expenditure that will be the first to go.
And to satisfy those customers, they could just summarize the RIAA website:
I'm not so sure about that. Since their network is a private one, they certainly have the right to blacklist anybody they want. Should they share that list with other ISPs, there may be some problems. But setting up their own list is not illegal. Furthermore, should they see this thing out, they may eventually have more business than they can even handle.
RIAA may be able to take them to court, but it would probably be worth the $$$ to fend them off.
Don't forget Adelphia and the Rigas family....
Agreed, but the MS coffers are now being used to get laws into place that would force Linux to behave the same way. And even worse, they are trying to push the DRM technology into the hardware. Just to be fair, though, I must say that MS obviously isn't the only company involved in this. To some extent, they are responding to demands from the RIAA and others.
Please, people. Read the article. Dell does offer Redhat on some of its systems. As many have already said, FreeDOS is only a "token" operating system to get around Microsoft's licensing requirements, will only be available on a couple machines, and is primarily intended only for volume buyers who already have licensing agreements and prefer to install the OS themselves. I would imagine that many customers who are interested in this will be installing Windows anyway, but have already purchased enterprise licensing to avoid getting slapped by the Software Mafia^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^HBSA.
You are so wrong.
Also, they don't have a trademark on the use of a dinosaur. At best, they can keep you from using "Zilla" in conjunction with a dinosaur logo, but they surely should not be able to keep you from using one or the other alone.
Personally, I think they should just back the heck off and count all of this as free advertising. It's not like they are losing any money as a result of these types of uses. All they are getting with a lawsuit is negative publicity. If they must protect their trademark, then at least come to an agreement that allows interested parties permission to specialized use of the name and/or logo.
ALL companies WANT to keep track of this kind of stuff. At least in this case, you have to option to refuse to participate. Unlike some companies, they aren't FORCING anyone to provide this information -- at least not yet.
?
Doesn't that sort of defeat the whole purpose of "Open Source" if you can't create a competing product? Maybe you mean "can't create and sell a competing product." But even so, if somebody copies your GPL-ed program and tries to sell it, somebody else will just copy their source code and give it away for free.
Most everyone is aware that you don't make money from GPL software by simply selling the software. You make money by service, added convenience of your distribution, or selling a non-GPL-ed add-on products. Or sometimes you make money from donations by people who just want to reward your efforts. But if provide the source code for everything, you've got to expect people to download and distribute for free.
I totally agree that pop-up/under ads are currently just about this most annoying thing on the internet (with the possible exception of spam mail). And I know this question has been asked again and again, but I've never seen a really good answer, so I'll ask again. For sites and ISP's that need to rely on advertising for their revenue, what's the most effective way to handle it? There are really two situations that need to be considered. Individual sites may need advertising to keep themselves running. There are also ISP's who offer free or reduced-rate service that relies on advertising. How should each situation be handled?