We could help map the human genome with our spare cycles, under GPL. Then we don't have to worry about Monsanto and other companies patenting segments of our genetic code...
[caveat - I own 500 shares of Monsanto - wanna buy some?]
Sure, I'll tell you what a "mission critical application" is.
Think of a nice little spacecraft, on its way to Mars. Think of the software that inserts it into the proper orbit.
That's a mission critical application.
Of course, if you have bozo scientists using foot pounds per square inch because the US is the last country in the world (literally) to not be on metric - you can still crash and burn.
If you look way up above you'll find a thread where people talk about the document and Who Wrote It.
It sounds like MSFT's Linux Myths, because that was probably used as a template to create the document.
Just because there's a conspiracy out there by a corporation with more cash reserves than all the Linux companies put together, doesn't mean that you need to be paranoid...
But it does mean that they still don't get how the Net works: we keep finding out the truth and it bubbles up and pops right in front of MSFT's surprised faces.
Ah, but even if we do become batteries, at least we'll be Open Source batteries...
And we'll get to use cool kendo moves when the Linus arises to Free BSD us from the Microsoft Matrix...
Re:W2K/NT5: don't assume doubling will continue
on
Gartner Slams Linux
·
· Score: 2
That's what all the Microsofties think - if they just release W2K, all will be well. Sadly, they forgot WHY they are losing market share: 1. stability of the OS 2. code bloat 3. stability of the OS 4. failure to impose their own "required" shared library standards on themselves (MSFT products), not just all third-party vendors 5. stability of the OS
Until they solve at least 4 of the above 5 problems, they will continue to lose market share. Perhaps not by a 2x measure, but at least at a 1.8x measure.
Did I mention that their OS cost as part of the total computer package, especially for servers (e.g. Cobalt Qube for $299 vs $699+ for Msft) is another major hindrance?
Seriously, though, even though I have a few hundred shares of Salon.com and all my friends love it, I have to question the value of the book itself. Just because something is hot (Linux), doesn't mean a book about key players will be a good read.
This trend towards ghostwritten and/or poorly written books must be stopped. I sometimes wonder if the serialization on the web, where many people post with obvious grammatical and spelling errors, has some impact on the quality of certain books.
Just like the serialization of Sherlock Holmes in a pulp paper of the time was highly correlated... oh, wait, those were actually good... never mind.
Patents do assist in helping people make money, but nowadays we have mostly corporations registering patents, whereas in the early days of the republic we had people like my grandfather inventing a better radiator and getting a patent for it.
The money is a method of: 1. reimbursing the inventor for the time and effort of creation; 2. assisting in the publication of the details of the work which is patented, so that others can adopt good ideas; and 3. providing a mechanism for licensing those works and spreading the idea/work.
The problem is that patents nowadays are used to make it very difficult to compete with another idea which improves on the original.
What, specifically is it that the coders fear in the rapid adoption of Linux in the mainstream? Good question, but I remember the reactions of the Net community to the worldwide exponential growth of the Net and the countless newbies who didn't know about the underlying protocols (and didn't care). Similar to the reaction of radio hobbyists when both commercial radio and then, eventually, CB radio, became popularized.
Personally, I agree with you: we should be glad that people use our code and that we make a real difference in this world.
But then, you've never had a letter (or a few thousand) from an irate (and newbie) gamer who wants you to fix his game and won't give you enough details for you to figure out what's wrong in the first place.
Seriously, in addition to being in the Constitution of the United States of America (as opposed to the separation of church and state, which is in the writings), patents exist for one reason only:
To encourage people to come up with new inventions.
Obviously, the system is not working. Just as copyright and trade secrets are used to hamper the development of knowledge by a society in today's modern world, so do patents nowadays serve only to lessen the march of science.
Hmm. Personally, I think it should go to someone dealing with the science of networking, which has allowed the Net to keep on even with geometric increases in bandwidth, users, nodes, and loads. As opposed to those who make atomic-size miniature pianos.
But I doubt it will happen. Some of those networking advances use some pretty hefty math.
Wrong. In practice we do water down other countries regulations requiring privacy, except for our insistence on having back doors into cryptographic specs, which our companies can't reveal. We have the biggest mandatory govt holes in our Telecom equipment licensed for Telecom than any other Euro country. And we have no protection of individual records, whereas the EU requires all countries that trade data with them to protect EU citizen's privacy rights, as well as permit the citizen to view the data. We forced the EU to sign off on our data specs and ignore the fact that we sell off our own people's private medical and commercial data, even though they didn't want to, in that we could then publish it.
Yes, you are absolutely correct, Mil/NSA equipment can resolve much better than 1 meter spec - one can even read your watch and tell you the make of it, as well as how far off your second hand is.
But those sats are mucho expensivo - why do you think we keep the shuttle program around?
I think you've hit the nail on the head here. The problem is, if I hear that there's a new exploit to hack a W2K/WNT/W9x site I either: a. wait a month to get the SP; or b. download it from their possibly compromised site
Since they don't give me source, I can't be sure that someone hasn't hacked their site and replaced the code that I'll be applying with a Trojan Horse exploit if I go to MSFT.
If, on the other hand, I actually ftp the files from Red Hat, I can look at the code and make sure no exploits exist.
Or, if I'm used to MSFT-level security, I just let it autodownload. It amounts to the same level of security.
But: it's MY choice. Not like on the MSFT site, where I have NO choice, but have to hope noone put up a file that had a viral attachment or was replaced by a bogus file. And I have NO guarantees about it if I go the MSFT route.
I think you're correct that, sadly, the US tends to win out in the privacy debates, watering down other countries' more strict regulations "for the good of the market".
However, in many states of the US, it's illegal to record conversations over wires, as Linda Tripp now nows. Washington State, Virginia, a bunch of others. If a packet stream passes from or to one of these states, it's illegal under US law to tap the conversation, encrypted or not, if it represents the digitized information of a voice conversation, without the permission of BOTH (or ALL if more than two) parties. Exceptions exist for one-way conversations like TV or radio, in that implicit consent has been given with the radio and TV licenses.
Looks like the AC found out that a latency effect applies both to posting and to viewing space-based images. Sure, you could track movements, if you knew when and where they were going, but with a one week latency in delivered images, it wouldn't help much.
Not true. Many states outlaw the commercial sale of pictures of individuals without their consent, as do many countries. It doesn't matter if it's in space or on the ground - it's still illegal. Not that it's easy to prosecute.
You could always put a sign on the top of your car and your house stating:
"You do not have my permission to photograph me. Should you do so without a proper court order, you hereby agree to pay me $1 billion per picture per person who sees said picture, per viewing minute. Signed... (your signature)"
Of course, they'll probably repro your signature and do a reverse trace on your car and house to get your credit info and suck your bank account dry and take out a loan on your house, but it's the thought that counts....
Seriously, unless you're talking current.mil systems, this is the old stuff we used to use. While it could track if you controlled it, you're more likely looking at the stills on a predesignated area, which would be great for Bill G to display on the wall screens of his home as people enter the buildings, or maybe for finding a Sasquatch (if you knew where it would be), but not for much else.
While a good attempt, there were some corrections to your list. The Real List of Reasons why Communicator 5.0 is delayed is: > = changed
> 15. Fear of Microsoft has them trying to add One... More... Feature! (IRC? WTF? Just gimme a browser that doesn't crash all the time under X.) > 14. The Netscape campus has been invaded by Open-Source (e.g. communist) squirrels. > 13. The remaining bugs are demanding stock options. 12. It is in accordance with prophecy. 11. It has been proven by scientists that the web causes cancer (what doesn't?), and the browser will not be released until further knowledge on the matter has been obtained. 10. Mozilla is caught in a subspace neutrino field distortion. > 9. They're trying to put down a pheasant revolt against AOL. > 8. The developers are too busy playing Railroad Tycoon II for Linux. 7. Communicator 5 was actually released in May. Everyone else has happily been using it for months now. We just didn't know how else to tell you that we don't like you. 6. They're arranging the code so that delays will be easier to conduct in the future. 5. Future looks cloudy, ask again. 4. Browser? What browser? 3. They're all inebriated. 2. Too busy watching the market instead of coding. 1. It's all your fault. Now get out there and beta test!
Interesting viewpoint, but I'll bet $1000 that many of my stock holdings in companies will survive. Johnson&Johnson, Disney, AT&T will survive. They may alter their form for the Net - Disney is 1/3 Net nowadays, AT&T is 1/2 Net nowadays, but they'll be doing mostly the same things, only in different delivery mechanisms.
We confuse the transmigration of the delivery mechanism with the alteration of the corporate culture. Disney movies are still the same, even if you get them on your flat-screen HDTV and your cell phone screen with web-enabled story change points. The mode of presentation and mechanism of delivering the experience change, but it's still Entertainment.
I think that possibly 1/5th of all corporations in twenty years will be radically different from those that are so 1995 - Red Hat for example. But people still need to eat and drink Pepsi.
Interesting, considering/. rejected my submission of the same news item two days ago...
However, to be realistic, the only way that AOL/Netscape can succeed with 5.0 is if they kick out the Linux and Mac versions REAL SOON. Without the non-MS OS crowd, they're doomed.
And, stop fudging on the standards compliance issue.
I mean, let's face it, we can't afford (oh, ok, except for the IPO crowd) to hire our own PR and Marketing divisions, so if we let them do the research for us, we can avoid all the countless hours of focus groups, usability testing, and other things that to many of us are like watching paint dry - and, instead, use that time to fix the code that their research shows could be presented in an unflattering way to us.
Cool!
Could we give Bill G an award for Service to the Penguin? I mean, since he's working for us, when you look at it that way?
RSADSI may have a number of lawyers, but you have to remember that MSFT could easily field larger teams of lawyers, especially considering the firm's origins. Preston, Gates, and Ellis is the firm that Bill G's dad was/is a senior partner in, and, Justice Dept slipups notwithstanding, I would be surprised that a task force wasn't assigned to seeing if MSFT could grab up something in this area.
Remember the MIT/MSFT deal - that was about patents which become the property of MIT, but grant a full unpaid license to MSFT.
But, I must admit, GnuPG would be a better approach from the viewpoint of an unpolluted patent method, since it would be harder for big firms to patent it after it has become prior art.
Slashdot Mirror
Why not kill two avians with a single rochier?
...
We could help map the human genome with our spare cycles, under GPL. Then we don't have to worry about Monsanto and other companies patenting segments of our genetic code
[caveat - I own 500 shares of Monsanto - wanna buy some?]
Sure, I'll tell you what a "mission critical application" is.
Think of a nice little spacecraft, on its way to Mars. Think of the software that inserts it into the proper orbit.
That's a mission critical application.
Of course, if you have bozo scientists using foot pounds per square inch because the US is the last country in the world (literally) to not be on metric - you can still crash and burn.
OK?
If you look way up above you'll find a thread where people talk about the document and Who Wrote It.
...
It sounds like MSFT's Linux Myths, because that was probably used as a template to create the document.
Just because there's a conspiracy out there by a corporation with more cash reserves than all the Linux companies put together, doesn't mean that you need to be paranoid
But it does mean that they still don't get how the Net works: we keep finding out the truth and it bubbles up and pops right in front of MSFT's surprised faces.
Ah, but even if we do become batteries, at least we'll be Open Source batteries ...
...
And we'll get to use cool kendo moves when the Linus arises to Free BSD us from the Microsoft Matrix
That's what all the Microsofties think - if they just release W2K, all will be well. Sadly, they forgot WHY they are losing market share:
1. stability of the OS
2. code bloat
3. stability of the OS
4. failure to impose their own "required" shared library standards on themselves (MSFT products), not just all third-party vendors
5. stability of the OS
Until they solve at least 4 of the above 5 problems, they will continue to lose market share. Perhaps not by a 2x measure, but at least at a 1.8x measure.
Did I mention that their OS cost as part of the total computer package, especially for servers (e.g. Cobalt Qube for $299 vs $699+ for Msft) is another major hindrance?
Isn't that why all my news items get rejected?
... oh, wait, those were actually good ... never mind.
Seriously, though, even though I have a few hundred shares of Salon.com and all my friends love it, I have to question the value of the book itself. Just because something is hot (Linux), doesn't mean a book about key players will be a good read.
This trend towards ghostwritten and/or poorly written books must be stopped. I sometimes wonder if the serialization on the web, where many people post with obvious grammatical and spelling errors, has some impact on the quality of certain books.
Just like the serialization of Sherlock Holmes in a pulp paper of the time was highly correlated
Patents do assist in helping people make money, but nowadays we have mostly corporations registering patents, whereas in the early days of the republic we had people like my grandfather inventing a better radiator and getting a patent for it.
The money is a method of:
1. reimbursing the inventor for the time and effort of creation;
2. assisting in the publication of the details of the work which is patented, so that others can adopt good ideas; and
3. providing a mechanism for licensing those works and spreading the idea/work.
The problem is that patents nowadays are used to make it very difficult to compete with another idea which improves on the original.
What, specifically is it that the coders fear in the rapid adoption of Linux in the mainstream? Good question, but I remember the reactions of the Net community to the worldwide exponential growth of the Net and the countless newbies who didn't know about the underlying protocols (and didn't care). Similar to the reaction of radio hobbyists when both commercial radio and then, eventually, CB radio, became popularized.
Personally, I agree with you: we should be glad that people use our code and that we make a real difference in this world.
But then, you've never had a letter (or a few thousand) from an irate (and newbie) gamer who wants you to fix his game and won't give you enough details for you to figure out what's wrong in the first place.
Seriously, in addition to being in the Constitution of the United States of America (as opposed to the separation of church and state, which is in the writings), patents exist for one reason only:
To encourage people to come up with new inventions.
Obviously, the system is not working. Just as copyright and trade secrets are used to hamper the development of knowledge by a society in today's modern world, so do patents nowadays serve only to lessen the march of science.
Well, I never thought I'd say it, even if Laura and some other friends work there:
...
Thank god for MSFT.
Yup, you can bet that right now their trained hordes of lawyers are thinking of creative ways of invalidating this patent.
Maybe I could patent Stupidity
Hmm. Personally, I think it should go to someone dealing with the science of networking, which has allowed the Net to keep on even with geometric increases in bandwidth, users, nodes, and loads. As opposed to those who make atomic-size miniature pianos.
But I doubt it will happen. Some of those networking advances use some pretty hefty math.
Wrong. In practice we do water down other countries regulations requiring privacy, except for our insistence on having back doors into cryptographic specs, which our companies can't reveal. We have the biggest mandatory govt holes in our Telecom equipment licensed for Telecom than any other Euro country. And we have no protection of individual records, whereas the EU requires all countries that trade data with them to protect EU citizen's privacy rights, as well as permit the citizen to view the data. We forced the EU to sign off on our data specs and ignore the fact that we sell off our own people's private medical and commercial data, even though they didn't want to, in that we could then publish it.
Yes, you are absolutely correct, Mil/NSA equipment can resolve much better than 1 meter spec - one can even read your watch and tell you the make of it, as well as how far off your second hand is.
But those sats are mucho expensivo - why do you think we keep the shuttle program around?
I think you've hit the nail on the head here. The problem is, if I hear that there's a new exploit to hack a W2K/WNT/W9x site I either:
a. wait a month to get the SP; or
b. download it from their possibly compromised site
Since they don't give me source, I can't be sure that someone hasn't hacked their site and replaced the code that I'll be applying with a Trojan Horse exploit if I go to MSFT.
If, on the other hand, I actually ftp the files from Red Hat, I can look at the code and make sure no exploits exist.
Or, if I'm used to MSFT-level security, I just let it autodownload. It amounts to the same level of security.
But: it's MY choice. Not like on the MSFT site, where I have NO choice, but have to hope noone put up a file that had a viral attachment or was replaced by a bogus file. And I have NO guarantees about it if I go the MSFT route.
I think you're correct that, sadly, the US tends to win out in the privacy debates, watering down other countries' more strict regulations "for the good of the market".
However, in many states of the US, it's illegal to record conversations over wires, as Linda Tripp now nows. Washington State, Virginia, a bunch of others. If a packet stream passes from or to one of these states, it's illegal under US law to tap the conversation, encrypted or not, if it represents the digitized information of a voice conversation, without the permission of BOTH (or ALL if more than two) parties. Exceptions exist for one-way conversations like TV or radio, in that implicit consent has been given with the radio and TV licenses.
Looks like the AC found out that a latency effect applies both to posting and to viewing space-based images. Sure, you could track movements, if you knew when and where they were going, but with a one week latency in delivered images, it wouldn't help much.
Not true. Many states outlaw the commercial sale of pictures of individuals without their consent, as do many countries. It doesn't matter if it's in space or on the ground - it's still illegal. Not that it's easy to prosecute.
... (your signature)"
....
You could always put a sign on the top of your car and your house stating:
"You do not have my permission to photograph me. Should you do so without a proper court order, you hereby agree to pay me $1 billion per picture per person who sees said picture, per viewing minute.
Signed
Of course, they'll probably repro your signature and do a reverse trace on your car and house to get your credit info and suck your bank account dry and take out a loan on your house, but it's the thought that counts
Seriously, unless you're talking current .mil systems, this is the old stuff we used to use. While it could track if you controlled it, you're more likely looking at the stills on a predesignated area, which would be great for Bill G to display on the wall screens of his home as people enter the buildings, or maybe for finding a Sasquatch (if you knew where it would be), but not for much else.
...
Give me a hovercam any day
Watch what you say about my grammer. Actually, she died this year. I guess she wasn't Y2K-compliant.
While a good attempt, there were some corrections to your list. The Real List of Reasons why Communicator 5.0 is delayed is: > = changed
> 15. Fear of Microsoft has them trying to add One... More... Feature! (IRC? WTF? Just gimme a browser that doesn't crash all the time under X.)
> 14. The Netscape campus has been invaded by Open-Source (e.g. communist) squirrels.
> 13. The remaining bugs are demanding stock options.
12. It is in accordance with prophecy.
11. It has been proven by scientists that the web causes cancer (what doesn't?), and the browser will not be released until further knowledge on the matter has been obtained.
10. Mozilla is caught in a subspace neutrino field distortion.
> 9. They're trying to put down a pheasant revolt against AOL.
> 8. The developers are too busy playing Railroad Tycoon II for Linux.
7. Communicator 5 was actually released in May. Everyone else has happily been using it for months now. We just didn't know how else to tell you that we don't like you.
6. They're arranging the code so that delays will be easier to conduct in the future.
5. Future looks cloudy, ask again.
4. Browser? What browser?
3. They're all inebriated.
2. Too busy watching the market instead of coding.
1. It's all your fault. Now get out there and beta test!
Interesting viewpoint, but I'll bet $1000 that many of my stock holdings in companies will survive. Johnson&Johnson, Disney, AT&T will survive. They may alter their form for the Net - Disney is 1/3 Net nowadays, AT&T is 1/2 Net nowadays, but they'll be doing mostly the same things, only in different delivery mechanisms.
We confuse the transmigration of the delivery mechanism with the alteration of the corporate culture. Disney movies are still the same, even if you get them on your flat-screen HDTV and your cell phone screen with web-enabled story change points. The mode of presentation and mechanism of delivering the experience change, but it's still Entertainment.
I think that possibly 1/5th of all corporations in twenty years will be radically different from those that are so 1995 - Red Hat for example. But people still need to eat and drink Pepsi.
Interesting, considering /. rejected my submission of the same news item two days ago ...
However, to be realistic, the only way that AOL/Netscape can succeed with 5.0 is if they kick out the Linux and Mac versions REAL SOON. Without the non-MS OS crowd, they're doomed.
And, stop fudging on the standards compliance issue.
I mean, let's face it, we can't afford (oh, ok, except for the IPO crowd) to hire our own PR and Marketing divisions, so if we let them do the research for us, we can avoid all the countless hours of focus groups, usability testing, and other things that to many of us are like watching paint dry - and, instead, use that time to fix the code that their research shows could be presented in an unflattering way to us.
Cool!
Could we give Bill G an award for Service to the Penguin? I mean, since he's working for us, when you look at it that way?
RSADSI may have a number of lawyers, but you have to remember that MSFT could easily field larger teams of lawyers, especially considering the firm's origins. Preston, Gates, and Ellis is the firm that Bill G's dad was/is a senior partner in, and, Justice Dept slipups notwithstanding, I would be surprised that a task force wasn't assigned to seeing if MSFT could grab up something in this area.
Remember the MIT/MSFT deal - that was about patents which become the property of MIT, but grant a full unpaid license to MSFT.
But, I must admit, GnuPG would be a better approach from the viewpoint of an unpolluted patent method, since it would be harder for big firms to patent it after it has become prior art.
Yes, perhaps they've had their team of patent lawyers working to embrace RSA and extend their control. Especially if the main patent expired.
...
Anyone can file a patent