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User: Mr.+McGibby

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  1. Re:Freedom of contract on The Right To Read: Time Limited Textbooks · · Score: 1

    It's funny how all the pseudo-libertarians around here are unwilling to let the market decide...

    Noone is suggesting that a law be made.

  2. Re:Free Speech for Programmers and New DeCSS Mirro on More DeCSS Time-Warner Hypocrisy · · Score: 1

    While I am not arguing the legality fo the DeCSS code. The point of free speech isn't totally free of argument. No one would argue that distributing copies of some copyrighted novel by someone other than the owner of the copyright would be legal or just. Of course the problem is that DeCSS was not written by the people suing using it's copyright. The copyright holder of DeCSS is the one who owns the rights. The question is who owns DeCSS.

  3. Re:any community needs maintencence on The Tragedy of the Digital Commons · · Score: 1

    Hooray!

    What is needed is a little better installation procedure. It's obvious that people are going to get the programs in order to download stuff and not share it. That doesn't mean however that with a little hand holding, they wouldn't be willing to share their own files. Make that part a little more in your face and people will respond.

  4. Re:Subversive... but True on Intelligence In The Cosmos: Flesh or Machine? · · Score: 2
    If this logic applies to extra-terrestials, it applies to terrestials. We need to get over our protoplasm fixation, scrap manned space travel, and get serious about going to the stars

    Let me say that this is indicitive of the entire problem that the space programs of the world face. Why go into space in the first place?

    To:

    1. Make money (economic interests)
    2. Find cool stuff (research)
    3. Be in cool places (tourism)

    Well, if there is any credence the first item then our economic system will naturally find it and exploit it. The type of mission will determine the most economic.

    If all we're interested in is number two then go ahead and send all the unmanned probes you feel like. That however does not provide communication with whatever intelligence you may find. You just find out they exist and maybe some pictures of them on vacation. Once you decide you want to talk to them then it isn't space travel at all. It may the transport medium, but it has nothing with space travel.

    Now number three is the KEY point here! It's different and has a completely different purpose from number two! Human beings like to travel to different places. Just because television allowed people to view far-off lands didn't change the fact that people still want to go to those far off lands. It's more than idle entertainment. It's a basic driving force in our race. The exploration instinct can be very powerful.

    The exploration instinct that makes us travel to far-off places is the same one that makes us do research. Research may provide benefits to humanity in some cases. The fact is that humans do research because we WANT to. And there is nothing wrong with that. And in the same way, the reason that humans want to travel to the stars themselves is because they WANT to. It's exactly the same thing.

    Have we become so selfish that we only do things when they provide some tangible benefit. What ever happened to the mountain climbers creed?

    "I climb it because it is there."

  5. You forget the people downloading... on Embedding Ads In MP3s? · · Score: 1
    1. Napster would be nuts to add an option to strip such ads since this would only fuel the flames that already plague them.
    2. Most non-techies use Napster, not gnapster or gnutella because Napster has all the press.
    3. Therefore, it might work.

    One major point is being missed here. Most people aren't going to bother. Just because 90% of techies use mp3s doesn't mean that 90% of the people using programs like Napster are techies. One rule of advertising is that you make your ad as obtrusive as possible without being obtrusive. If it isn't more than 30 seconds long, most people won't even bother to even try to find and option to remove it.

    All that has to be done is to make all the ads slightly different lengths. Now how are you going to make an option that strips the ad without potentially stripping some of the music? This might be a good thing to show that people really aren't downloading music to steal, only to preview it for themselves and maybe buy it on CD.

  6. Download removed! on Gameboy Emulator For PalmOS · · Score: 1

    Looks like Gambit has removed the demo from their web site citing incompatability with certain kinds of devices.

  7. Re:They said it's not a Java copy, anyone believe on Microsoft Releases C# Language Reference · · Score: 1
    Java doesn't let you use primitives (int, short, etc) as classes without wrapping them yourself (lots of overhead). ... C# does.


    So what? syntactical sugar, nothing more.


    Keeping track of two different ways of dealing with integers is silly. I should be able to do something like the following in Java but I can't:


    Integer a;

    for (int i = 0; i &lt loopBound; i++)

    {

    a = a + i;

    }

    Java doesn't let you drop down to native code and turn off the garbage collector if you need to. Or use pointers if you want to talk to the underlying C-based OS. ... C# does.


    Translation : Java doesn't allow you to break its programming model and create very intentionally unstable code. C# does.


    If you want Object Oriented programming with raw C-like access to the O/S, use C++. That's what its there for (ask Bjarne. he says this every time the subject comes up).


    A language should provide the programmer with the tools to write stable code, not restrict him so that he can't do simple things if he needs to. A good language should make the good stuff easy, and the hard stuff available. What happens when I need access some system pointer? The language determines that I really don't need it!?!


    Java doesn't have a "foreach" statement. ... C# does.


    Syntactical sugar. Easily done by adding a foreach functional object (see C++ STL), using the collections classes. Yes, I'd rather see real generic programming (no casts) in Java like it is in C++, but until that's there, make do.


    Why make do if C# already has it? Java doesn't seem to jumping on the bandwagon.


    Java doesn't support indexers (methods on a class - say List, which allow you to take the object of type List, and use it like an array - eg: List l; l[index] = "asjdasid" C#, however, does.


    Syntactial sugar. In C++, that's operator overloading. I didn't realize "l.get(index)" was so fucking hard to type or read.


    Well, it is. There's nothing wrong with syntactical sugar if it makes my code more readable. Operator overloading can be overused I agree, but it certainly fits very well in some situations. Since lists are very similar to Arrays, why not use the same syntax?

  8. Re:Hello. It uses Java. Surprised at unpopularity? on Is Freenet Vapourware? Ian Clarke Responds · · Score: 1
    What are you getting at? So it has bugs - so does every other platform! Never mind cross-platform, even Windows doesn't run consistently on all hardware configurations! So your point is what? Details please.

    However, I don't remember Microsoft using the "so it has bugs!" excuse to defend problems in Windows. They say, "Oh, a bug. We'll have to fix that". Whether they do or not isn't the point. The difference between the Java VM and different Windows platforms is that there is a fix. I have my doubts that you will be able to find a non-hardware-specific program that simply will not run on a machine with a little updating of the machine itself. There are Java programs that will simply not work on the Mac, no matter how you reconfigure the machine.

    What the hell are you talking about? As for CLASSPATH issues, for example, I think you'll find Java Web Start is one way of solving that problem. It certainly isn't an inherent limitation of Java, so what's your point?

    I don't know what Java Web Start is, but I have an idea and if I need to get something else to make my Java programs run, then it is an inherant problem in Java.