I'll grant most users never get beyond the out of box experience. The
Smart Tag menus in Office help out there with 'Smart Tag Options...' at the
bottom of the menu which draws the user's attention to exactly how to configure
them. Hopefully that means more users will actually think about what to
turn on and off.
I'm guessing (from the implementation in Office XP) that they will be on
by default, but only in a very minor way - things like recognizing dates and
times, contacts in your address book etc.
Getting a key to sign an ActiveX control costs $400. You can then
use it as many times as you like to sign whatever controls you like.
Most users just click 'ok' to any dialog box - the EULAs tend to desensitize
you to that. If on a corporate network then there may be policies that
prevent that happening, but that's not what we are talking about.
If you use XHTML (like you should now), then everything will work just
fine. Your browser should just ignore the tags it doesn't understand.
Users will download smart tags in the same way they download the Flash
control or Quicktime viewer. The first time they visit a company's site
they are likely to be hit with it from their home page.
As ActiveX controls, Smart Tag DLLs have the same Authenticode stuff as
current ActiveX controls do. If you blindly accept anything (ie most
users) then you can get hosed. There's nothing new there, except the
dialogs in XP are a little friendlier.
The default Smart Tags in Office XP just pick up things like dates and
times and ask if you want to schedule an Outlook Calendar event at that time,
match names that are in your contact list, pick up addresses and so on.
Pretty harmless junk really.
Getting users to download a smart tag is easy - just stick an <OBJECT=xxx>
tag on your page, convince them to hit the OK button to the security box and
away you go. Given that there are at least 30 different companies already
offering Smart Tags, I think the "MS only" idea is just hype.
I didn't exactly forget to add that. That's what I think Microsoft's whole point of adding Smart Tags is - not to control the web itself, just web development platforms and web browsing platforms.
They've never really been big on content, just platforms and applications.
Anyway, the Smart Tags service probably will be controlled
mainly by Microsoft for the main reason that most users never download updates
and it's highly unlikely users will bother updating their Smart Tags with other
sites information...
Besides, if MS made the word Linux go to their "Linux myth" page, do you
think any users would ever download the Slashdot updated tags? And even if they
did, would the MS version preempt third party SmartTags?
(Sigh). Go to MSDN.
Download the Smart Tag SDK. Go to Office eServices Smart Tags
page.
Look at the number of different (independent) companies providing Smart Tag
filters. You may learn the following:
Smart Tags are turned on and off individually by the user.
Smart Tags are COM components that can be downloaded in exactly the same
way as any other ActiveX control on the web.
Smart Tags can be customized for your particular web page using XML
embedded in the page.
Smart Tags are NOT controlled by centralized downloads for Microsoft.
Smart Tags can do *anything* - not just link a particular word to a set of
web sites. They are full blooded DLLs.
The default set of Smart Tags doesn't even link to any web sites.
You have to turn that on manually.
So, in other words, your desire to believe MS is evil seems to have gotten in
the way of your reasoning somewhere.
What Gartner/Dataquest is probably trying to measure here is the marketshare Linux has - in other words, how much money is flowing through each section of the operating system industry.
Thanks to the wonder of open source software, it doesn't really matter if 75% of the actual machines are running Linux (and most machines running Linux are probably assumed to be servers), if they are all downloads with no support contract then Red Hat, Mandrake and the others are still going to eventually run out of cash and go belly up.
What these numbers from IDC and Gartner are essentially saying is that Linux itself may be Red Hat's biggest competitor. If RH is only getting 10% to 15% of the money coming back to it then they are most likely being cut off by the very free (beer) nature of the GPL that allows you to install as many times as you like.
The other interesting thing from the ZDNet article is that no numbers for NT/2000 were mentioned from the Gartner study. I wonder what the split really was among the other operating systems?
Smart tags are just COM components. Download the SDK and write one for yourself. They are NOT controlled by Microsoft, they are NOT only provided by Microsoft.
Fact is, you don't get it and from the sound of it you didn't stop frothing at the mouth long enough to even try.
Download the SDK (it's available on msdn.microsoft.com). Have a long look at it. Figure it out. Learn something for once.
Whoever the idiots are that modded you up to +5 are just as bigoted and closed-minded. (There goes all my karma in one hit). Time to metamoderate...
Your problems doesn't exist. It's a strawman. The way Smart Tags work is the user has to enable them. Sure - it's possible that the user could turn on Microsoft's smart tags, but they could just as easily turn on Netscape's, Corel's or Sun's.
There is nothing that stops a Chevy salesman coming onto a Ford car lot except for the fact that he will be asked to leave (he's not trespassing until that point). Asking him to leave is the equivalent of putting the META tag on your site. Your analogy only serves to show that Smart Tags indeed mirror the way things work at the moment.
It is in no way illegal as the tags are turned on by the user and so the user is in control of what they are reading.
If someone wrote a perl script that did the same thing for use on an Apache or Squid proxy would you feel the same way? I think a lot of people need to get over their knee-jerk MS reaction and see the technology for what it really is - a way USERS can get more information (possibly on competitors) from a web site. The USER is in control - that is a good thing, remember?
No, I'm saying a third party doesn't have the right
to modify the user's experience for me. Remember the user is not creating these
links for themselves, a third party is doing it. While I agree that a technical
user would understand the difference and could put the smart links to good use,
the typical user won't.
Ah. I agree with that sentiment. I've trimmed most of the rest of
the post because we have hit what I believe is the central issue.
What I am saying is that Smart Tags as they currently stand are just fine
because they don't actually do anything pro-Microsoft by default. The user
has to make an active decision to turn that on. Currently the default tags
(looking at my Office XP install and the SDK - I don't have the appropriate beta
of IE6 or WinXP) are harmless - names, phone numbers and the like. There's
no company specific things there that I can see that are enabled by default.
Given that the web browser has the ability already to rewrite your site in
pretty much any way it likes through the use of filters and plugins, I don't see
Smart Tags as anything but a method of simplifying the browser customization.
If a company can convince users to run their Smart Tag filter then it's good for
them.
If Smart Tags become an opt-in technology rather than opt-out then (IMHO) they
become useless because the whole purpose is for the user to find more links to
information that is relevant to the page they are currently browsing, not for
the web designers to just get lazy and turn on the tags. This destroys
their whole reason for existing, and as a result I'd just call them bloatware in
that case.
My argument is that a third party DOES have the right to modify a user's
experience IF the user gives them that right. The user has the right to
apply whatever rose-colored glasses to information you provide, including the
rose-colored ones provided by whatever Smart Tag filter they install on their
machine.
I just don't want someone else modifying their perception of my site.
My take on this is that if the user has enabled the Smart Tag, then the user
has delegated the modification of the site to that (trusted) 3rd party. I
believe this is allowable.
I would say that Addison Wesley has the right to demand that Barnes and Noble
can't annotate books prior to sale.
Sure, but my take on Smart Tags is that they are equivalent to the customer
bringing along a representative of their choice to annotate the book before they
read it, after they bought it. I believe this is much closer to the real
nature, as the Smart Tag is part of the User Agent and not part of the HTTP
transaction.
Umm... you can't mod up your own posts. You can't even use moderator points
in the same thread.
I'm well aware of that, but by your comment I wasn't sure you were... or I
figured you might have a second account with mod points waiting to mod yourself
up. In regards to that comment I would say that I misrepresented you as a
scoundrel. I might think you are misguided, and I'd still like to know what that
line about wishing you had mod points meant, but the scoundrel comment was
probably uncalled for.
Scoundrel didn't offend me at all - I've been called far worse. You
learn very quickly not to take offense at anything on Slashdot, Usenet or pretty
much any public forum (or you go postal in a hurry). All I meant was I had
moderator points that I really wanted to give other posts on this article, but
decided to post instead. I just have this incredible ability to put across
a message that is only passingly similar to what I really mean, and never
exactly.
Again, "DeCSS case I put the link on the
page, "Smart Tags"(TM), SOMEBODY ELSE puts the link on MY page.
User's are included in the somebody else category.
Actually no one is touching your page. That's my whole point.
What is happening is the user is downloading your page unmodified, then
annotating it himself. This is exactly the same action as a student making
notations in the margin of their textbooks at college (DeCSS was probably a bad
example). Does the book publisher have the right to demand that no one
write in their books? I believe (and though IANAL, I think the law is on
my side) that the user has the right to do whatever they like with published
material for their own personal use. They can take your web site and run
filters over it to link every eighth word to pr0n and warez for all we know, or
just filter out the doubleclick ads.
By your argument, virus filters that block ActiveX and Java are modifying the
content and should be stopped. I disagree. The user has the right to
view the site and add/remove content for their own use as they see fit.
The publisher's rights stop once the site has been published.
WTF? How does the fact that the filters are XML mean
that the user's drive is open to 3rd parties? They aren't even cookies
1. The user can control what words are smart tagged
by editing an XML file on their PC. None of the posts has said where these files
are located, yet.
2. Third parties can add their own filters. Thus, they're either editing the
existing XML file or adding their own files. Yes, they are NOT cookies.
That's my point, cookies have undergone a great deal of scrutiny. Third parties
being able to alter "Smart Tag"(TM) filters on your PC, have not.
Smart tags are controlled via COM interfaces or XML files - one file for each
smart tag filter. These files are registered in the regsitry (as you'd
expect for COM objects). Download of these is controlled through exactly
the same methods they have been since IE 3.0.
It's in beta. What did you expect? Beta, to me, means software that may not work well. Not software that works
just fine ("fine" as defined by MS), but only directs to Microsoft Sites.
Oh. That explains it. My idea of beta was "Feature complete and
stable, just not ready for release". In other words, they haven't finished
all the content yet. If you actually look on their site, there are at
least 20 or 30 different 3rd party smart tag providers available already.
On a side note, have you ever hit the "what's
related" button on IE? Admittedly, no, I haven't. I have clicked the "Show Related Links" menu item
under tools and the "Related" toolbar button. Those functions are "Powered by
Alexa". (Whoever they are.)
FYI: "What's Related" is the name used in Netscape's browser for this
functionality that MS copied.
Yeah - that's what I meant. I just get confused by all the different
names between Netscape and IE. My bad.
Very good rebuttal, it almost appears as though some
thought was put into them. (Please read my signature.)
Nah - If I was thinking I would be writing code and not wasting time on
Slashdot.;-) Nice sig btw - I agree with it.
That aside, the choice to link or not to link is up
to the web publisher, this is a different issue than responsibility for the
content that was linked to.
True, but are you saying the user doesn't have the option of adding their own
content to what you provide? If this is the case then you'd better also
disallow scribbling on any textbook in college because that is EXACTLY the same
thing.
First, probably is not good enough.
Agreed.
Second, the user can decide how my site looks, but
the content is my business, hence it being MY site.
Garbage. The user has the right to do whatever they like with your site
for their own personal use. They can wrap it around a three-dimensional
naked sheep that sings a lewd ballad about goats if they want to. The user
can decide to only look at every third word, or run a filter to remove every
single link to doubleclick. You have NO rights as to what the user does
with the published work as long as they don't republish it themselves.
(iv) Third parties can provide their own smart tag
filters to link wherever they like. This isn't a Microsoft-only club. You can
even have a Slashdot smart tag if you like that links to articles on the
subject.
To me this is one of the most disturbing issues. I don't want political,
religious or any other type of special interest group to have any oppertunity to
bombard me with propoganda. I especially don't want them able to bombard my web
site with their propoganda.
So either include the META tag on your site. You still have no rights
as to what users do once they have downloaded your site. If they want to
interpret it by rearranging the words until they get Nazi war slogans then it's
up to them.
And once again links are content. People choose to
link or not link for specific reasons, and it is not the place of microsoft or
anyone else to add or take away links. Especially when they do it in a way that
may confuse users as to the provider of the content (and no, the squiggly purple
lines are NOT different enough... many users won't get the distinction, and what
about colorblind persons?)
Now you are hitting on something. If Microsoft doesn't give the user
the option of what smart tags are in use, or even enables only 'partner' tags by
default then there is an issue (especially now IE is the dominant browser).
Assuming the default tags are just the benign ones in Office XP (name lookups,
phone number etc.) then I don't see the problem.
The fact remains though that the user has the right to add and remove links
as they like from your site for their own viewing. This is completely
outside copyright restrictions and completely outside publisher's rights.
If you honestly believe that Addison Wesley has the right to demand that no
annotation be done on a textbook then you can feel free to continue your line of
discussion.
If I was the type of insecure scoundrel that had to
mod my own posts up I certainly wouldn't admit it.
Umm... you can't mod up your own posts. You can't even use moderator
points in the same thread. I'm quite secure in my posts though - I believe
that I should always be responsible for what I say and let it stand or fall on
its own merits.
You are correct, except for one thing: The user has chosen to put the links there. It's not Microsoft - they are providing the service, and they are not changing Bob corp.'s web site at all, just performing a reference lookup on behalf of the user.
IE already does this (in case you didn't notice) - just click on the "What's Related" button and you'll get a sidebar with everything on it.
Sorry, but that's no different from me standing in my competitor's store and handing out information about my store.
Umm... you can do this until they ask you to leave. I guess that means MS can put tags on your page until you ask them not to (use the META tag).
Aside from that, your argument is a strawman. This isn't like handing out leaflets in a store at all. It's like someone getting your mailorder catalog (your web page) and asking the postman (Internet Explorer) to scribble on any related info that he knows. As it is an optional service, the user can ask the postie to stop providing that extra information at any time.
Personally I see no problem with this. If someone else has cheaper hammers then as an end user I want to know about it. If someone is browsing Microsoft's site and 'Operating Systems' links to linux.org then is this a bad thing? You don't have to be Microsoft's partner to create a Smart Tag filter - go to msdn.microsoft.com and build one yourself if you care.
This word "Real"... I don't think it means what you think it means...
Real Fact: DeCSS case, I put the link on MY
page.
"Smart Tags"(TM), somebody else put the link on MY page.
(i) Is saying that the whole thing is about where the link goes. The "Real
Issue" is not where, but who put the link their and who controls where it goes.
Not true at all. In DeCSS, you put the link on your page. With
Smart Tags, the reader puts the link (remember they chose to turn in on) on the
page as they read it. This is exactly the same as complaining if someone
goes out, buys a book and then writes in the margins. No one is touching
your page - they are annotating their own view of it.
Real Fact: The code is written, works, and
exists in Office XP already.
So what? A lot of code is written, works and never gets published.
The Office XP code doesn't link you anywhere but to the help (and in fact I've
been using it for the past 2 or 3 months and quite like it).
I've got code that will make any GPL source a binary only module. Who
cares unless I use it?
Real Fact: Since these filters are XML files
on the local user's machine that the user can edit, IE is making the user's hard
drive available to third parties!
WTF? How does the fact that the filters are XML mean that the user's
drive is open to 3rd parties? They aren't even cookies - they are not sent
to a web site, they aren't published anywhere, they are simply installed like
software. This is akin to saying that since bash scripts are files on the
local machine that you can edit then bash is making the user's hard drive
available to third parties. What utter crud!!
Real Fact: So far, it's links to stock quotes
on MSN and where to by sports memorabilia on MSN.
It's in beta. What did you expect?
Perhaps you don't know this, but all IE distros are customizable by the
supplier through the 'branding.cab' file. This file can be edited to
provide whatever you like with your download of IE, and I expect plenty of 3rd
parties to be dumping lots and lots of effort into this. In fact, I'd be
surprised if it doesn't end up like ActiveX controls where the tag engines can
be downloaded from anywhere.
On a side note, have you ever hit the "what's related" button on IE? I
just did on the slashdot page and not one of the links went to a Microsoft site.
Guess that dispels your paranoid ravings for a little.
(i) If links are part of the content of a page, then the whole DeCSS case is sunk. You have to choose what you believe. Smart tags may indeed be the EFF's best friend here because if Microsoft can convince the courts that they are permitted to add whatever links they like because they are not part of a web page, then by implication you also have the right to link your page wherever you like and not be responsible for the content at the other end. So, either Microsoft and the EFF are both correct, or both are wrong. You can't have it both ways.
(ii) Smart Tags may or may not be included in the release. Microsoft is testing the waters to see people's reactions and if it is too bad then they are likely to can the idea.
(iii) Smart Tags will probably be disabled by default, or at the very least be an option in the Internet Connection Wizard. This means the end user is actually defining how they want to parse your web site - whether they want the tags or not.
(iv) Third parties can provide their own smart tag filters to link wherever they like. This isn't a Microsoft-only club. You can even have a Slashdot smart tag if you like that links to articles on the subject.
(iv) This isn't about publisher's rights. Microsoft isn't changing what is published, they are effectively providing reference material on what is published. As I stated in (i), links aren't content - they are just references to other content.
...and I wasted all those moderator points I would have loved to spend on this thread to bring you this.:-(
I got as far as the Meaning when I originally saw it in a list of cool.sigs somewhere, realised I knew what it meant and suddenly got a chill through me as I understood how much of my brain was filled with utterly useless things and how much time I wasted at a debug prompt in DOS.
I love your translation though. Makes my geek sig a lot more philisophical.:-)
Instead of going for a predetermined conclusion (ie Open Source must be better because that's my own personal religion), try going for something a little less ambitios - say the conversion of Utah to Catholicism (jk!!)
Seriously, don't aim for the conclusion that open source is better. Try instead for something a little less sweeping and make a case that at least one open source product should be included as an option when each purchase decision is made. It wouldn't be hard to make an excellent case to purchasing departments for OSS projects to be the standard that must be exceeded before a new software purchase order is filled.
You don't have to make the manager's decisions for them - that's what their job is, not yours. What you need is to make sure OSS is ALWAYS one of the options that is put before them.
Re:The problem with Napster and the RIAA
on
Napster Going Legit
·
· Score: 2
I agree, however you still find that the digital fingerprints can be removed and probably quite easily once you know what you are looking for. Preventing players from playing tunes without a digital fingerprint is tough because you then limit the players to tunes that have been published by someone with the technology to create a fingerprint, so in the end you end up with consumer backlash because their new player doesn't play existing music.
The problem is there is no backward and forward compatible solution that is both fair to users (ie lets them play their music in any device they own) and fair to producers (ie makes it difficult for people to redistribute without paying royalties).
Of course, the software industry has faced this problem for a while and has pretty much come up with the solution of targetting the major offenders and letting minor piracy slip. This is potentially the answer for the record companies - they just have to raise awareness of the fact that redistributing copyrighted material is wrong and get it through to all those college students who think it is their right to get it for free.
Re:The problem with Napster and the RIAA
on
Napster Going Legit
·
· Score: 2
So explain to me how the fact that there is a legal difference between infringement and theft makes any real difference to my argument.
Infringement is just as illegal as theft last time I looked. The fact that either can result in being put in prison and made to be a bad man's boyfriend is sufficient for me.
Split hairs as much as you like - my comment is still valid if you replace every instance on 'steal' with 'willfully infringe on copyright'.
Sure the speech is protected, but the University isn't required to use its OWN equipment and OWN resources to publish bitch sessions about itself. Claiming that an institution is violating the first amendment because it takes down negative material from it's own servers is just stupid.
The first amendment states that "Congress shall make no law... abridging the freedom of speech..." There is no law preventing this in this case - each student has the right to freely state their grievances. They do NOT have the right to force the university to air their grievances for them. Nothing is stopping the student with the grievance getting a geocities page and posting what they like.
Let's stop all this stupidity. The University had a right to take the site down if they deemed it not in the interests of the University. They had the right to reclaim the equipment and had a right to the work donated by the student. He has no rights to any of the posts, data or code on the system and he'd better go do some grovelling to get his degree back or he's successfully wasted 4 years of his life.
The problem Napster has is that there is no solution which retains the user's right to copy any music they buy as many times as they like FOR THEIR OWN USE, but prevents them from giving it away to all their friends.
Basically what the record companies need is a technology that allows them to sell music to a user once and that user can then use that music whenever and wherever they want personally. This is fair use, and pretty much what people have at the moment with music stored on physical media. With electronic copies, it is so easy just to copy the bits the whole things becomes unworkable given the fact that people WILL steal music (ie make a copy to give someone else) because it is a soft crime that doesn't leave you feeling bad.
What the technology has to prevent is the creation of more instances of that music for other people.
The only solutions are:
(i) Make everyone have their own personal key (like a social security number) that is required to access their copy of the music. This doesn't work because someone can just give their key to another person (assuming it too is digital). A physical key - like a dongle - has possibilities here but is too cumbersome at the moment to catch on.
(ii) Prevent anyone from accessing the "bits" and control the software. This is what the music industry is trying to do at the moment but it is doomed to failure because there are so many places the "bits" are available - right down to the interface at the sound card. The only way to achieve this is having hardware only decoders with a 'secret' key and a secure algorithm. Even then it is only a matter of time before someone extracts the key and the game is over.
What it comes down to is there is no solution - no matter what the RIAA tries to do they are screwed unless they control 100% of the hardware that can play music. This is simply not a feasible situation for many reasons - most of the commercial and not ethical.
...I do not think it means what you think it means (for some blatant karma whoring).
Free speech (despite the opinions of some of the/. eds and some of the peanut gallery) doesn't mean you can say anything you like, or that you can publish anything you like. Take some more obvious examples:
i) You cannot walk up to someone and say "Do you have some drugs".
ii) You cannot publish a list of where and when to stand on a particular street corner to get cheap goods if you know there is a very good probability that those goods have been stolen.
iii) You cannot (in your own privacy) group together with like minded individuals for the purpose of committing a crime (say assassinating the president).
iv) You cannot publish information the government has deemed sensitive.
[Note that (ii) above is actually very similar to what Napster does, or used to do before filters]
Basically, while you have the right to say anything you like in an abstract sense you do NOT have the right to say anything you like at all. The primary right to free speech is the right to criticize the government and publicly state what you feel would be a better way of doing things - when that right is removed you do not have a democratic system anymore.
In the case mentioned in this article there isn't even an issue of free speech involved. Someone has donated work to the university and the university has decided that work is now inappropriate. The UNIVERSITY owns the work and can do whatever the hell it likes. If the offsite backups are used then the university has the right to sue for theft of its property. Face it - the site will NEVER get back up.
As for the criminal charges: I can only assume there is more to the story - probably something to do with access to backups, or theft of some computer media (ie tapes)?
When are people going to learn that while a democracy preserves some rights, it also limits those rights with an individuals responsibility to the society as a whole. Democracy is NOT anarchy and never will be. The sooner people grow up and learn what responsibility is the better!
They do 'embrace and extend'. Ever seen the OpenGL nVidia extensions? Guess what are the first extensions to get coded for these days? Oops - extended a supposedly open spec!!
Look at the Linux driver - sure it's legal, but is it open source? I know about the NDA problems, but why does that prevent them from releasing a lower performance open source driver? Answer: Because it's not in their commercial interests while they have the best performance on Linux why let that good performance get back into the community where other vendors might take advantage of it?
nVidia, just like Microsoft, won out of sheer bloody minded persistance. The NV1 failed badly, so nVidia sided with Microsoft and DirectX and had cards supporting the next version of DX on the shelves as the versions were released. If you wanted T&L with your DX7 games then you had to get nVidia. If you got anything else then you were SOL. Now that nVidia is king of the hill they can afford to take on the bigger challenges - kinda like MS shrugging off IBM and going it alone.
nVidia is one company that I would be very careful of in the future. I think they have a big potential to be the next Microsoft, but don't have a monopoly to speak of at the moment and probably won't for a few years yet (ATI has to roll over first which ain't gonna happen easily). The battle is heating up at the moment and the consumers are going to be the winners in the short term. Who knows what the long term holds in this industry - we might all be using OS/2 on PPCs in 5 years!!
Where did you get the info that the GF2 was optional? All the stuff I see says it is part of the North Bridge (or IGP or whatever). The Dolby Decoder and twin memory controllers are the only configurable options I can see (look at http://www4.tomshardware.com/mainboard/01q2/010604 1/nforce-12.html)
It will never be as easy to use an ATI card with an nVidia mobo as it is to use an nVidia card because of the driver issue. You plug in a GF3 and it will just work - the existing drivers will just pick it up and use it. You are effectively getting your GF3 drivers bundled with the mobo driver package. You plug an ATI card in and your first experience is the good old 640x480 resolution in Windows (assuming we are talking mass marken here - Linux people tend to be cool with figuring out drivers). You also can get weird interactions - ATI end up having to devote time to make their drivers work with nVidia's mobos, while nVidia don't have to care about ATI (remember the nVidia/VIA/AGP4x thing a while back?)
Whatever happens, if nVidia gets a monopoly (very doubtful really) then there is little chance of them not exploiting it by the simple fact it exists. You can't fault a company for testing that it's own products work well with each other!!
Slashdot Mirror
I'll grant most users never get beyond the out of box experience. The Smart Tag menus in Office help out there with 'Smart Tag Options...' at the bottom of the menu which draws the user's attention to exactly how to configure them. Hopefully that means more users will actually think about what to turn on and off.
Getting users to download a smart tag is easy - just stick an <OBJECT=xxx> tag on your page, convince them to hit the OK button to the security box and away you go. Given that there are at least 30 different companies already offering Smart Tags, I think the "MS only" idea is just hype.
Oh, wait, with Bush in the whitehouse, the US will become the favorite toxic waste dump for the world :-)
Nope. That's what everyone is trying to use Australia for, not the US. After all what is all that desert good for anyhow?
I didn't exactly forget to add that. That's what I think Microsoft's whole point of adding Smart Tags is - not to control the web itself, just web development platforms and web browsing platforms.
They've never really been big on content, just platforms and applications.
Anyway, the Smart Tags service probably will be controlled mainly by Microsoft for the main reason that most users never download updates and it's highly unlikely users will bother updating their Smart Tags with other sites information...
Besides, if MS made the word Linux go to their "Linux myth" page, do you think any users would ever download the Slashdot updated tags? And even if they did, would the MS version preempt third party SmartTags?
(Sigh). Go to MSDN. Download the Smart Tag SDK. Go to Office eServices Smart Tags page. Look at the number of different (independent) companies providing Smart Tag filters. You may learn the following:
So, in other words, your desire to believe MS is evil seems to have gotten in the way of your reasoning somewhere.
What Gartner/Dataquest is probably trying to measure here is the marketshare Linux has - in other words, how much money is flowing through each section of the operating system industry.
Thanks to the wonder of open source software, it doesn't really matter if 75% of the actual machines are running Linux (and most machines running Linux are probably assumed to be servers), if they are all downloads with no support contract then Red Hat, Mandrake and the others are still going to eventually run out of cash and go belly up.
What these numbers from IDC and Gartner are essentially saying is that Linux itself may be Red Hat's biggest competitor. If RH is only getting 10% to 15% of the money coming back to it then they are most likely being cut off by the very free (beer) nature of the GPL that allows you to install as many times as you like.
The other interesting thing from the ZDNet article is that no numbers for NT/2000 were mentioned from the Gartner study. I wonder what the split really was among the other operating systems?
Smart tags are just COM components. Download the SDK and write one for yourself. They are NOT controlled by Microsoft, they are NOT only provided by Microsoft.
Fact is, you don't get it and from the sound of it you didn't stop frothing at the mouth long enough to even try.
Download the SDK (it's available on msdn.microsoft.com). Have a long look at it. Figure it out. Learn something for once.
Whoever the idiots are that modded you up to +5 are just as bigoted and closed-minded. (There goes all my karma in one hit). Time to metamoderate...
Your problems doesn't exist. It's a strawman. The way Smart Tags work is the user has to enable them. Sure - it's possible that the user could turn on Microsoft's smart tags, but they could just as easily turn on Netscape's, Corel's or Sun's.
There is nothing that stops a Chevy salesman coming onto a Ford car lot except for the fact that he will be asked to leave (he's not trespassing until that point). Asking him to leave is the equivalent of putting the META tag on your site. Your analogy only serves to show that Smart Tags indeed mirror the way things work at the moment.
It is in no way illegal as the tags are turned on by the user and so the user is in control of what they are reading.
If someone wrote a perl script that did the same thing for use on an Apache or Squid proxy would you feel the same way? I think a lot of people need to get over their knee-jerk MS reaction and see the technology for what it really is - a way USERS can get more information (possibly on competitors) from a web site. The USER is in control - that is a good thing, remember?
No, I'm saying a third party doesn't have the right to modify the user's experience for me. Remember the user is not creating these links for themselves, a third party is doing it. While I agree that a technical user would understand the difference and could put the smart links to good use, the typical user won't.
Ah. I agree with that sentiment. I've trimmed most of the rest of the post because we have hit what I believe is the central issue.
What I am saying is that Smart Tags as they currently stand are just fine because they don't actually do anything pro-Microsoft by default. The user has to make an active decision to turn that on. Currently the default tags (looking at my Office XP install and the SDK - I don't have the appropriate beta of IE6 or WinXP) are harmless - names, phone numbers and the like. There's no company specific things there that I can see that are enabled by default.
Given that the web browser has the ability already to rewrite your site in pretty much any way it likes through the use of filters and plugins, I don't see Smart Tags as anything but a method of simplifying the browser customization. If a company can convince users to run their Smart Tag filter then it's good for them.
If Smart Tags become an opt-in technology rather than opt-out then (IMHO) they become useless because the whole purpose is for the user to find more links to information that is relevant to the page they are currently browsing, not for the web designers to just get lazy and turn on the tags. This destroys their whole reason for existing, and as a result I'd just call them bloatware in that case.
My argument is that a third party DOES have the right to modify a user's experience IF the user gives them that right. The user has the right to apply whatever rose-colored glasses to information you provide, including the rose-colored ones provided by whatever Smart Tag filter they install on their machine.
I just don't want someone else modifying their perception of my site.
My take on this is that if the user has enabled the Smart Tag, then the user has delegated the modification of the site to that (trusted) 3rd party. I believe this is allowable.
I would say that Addison Wesley has the right to demand that Barnes and Noble can't annotate books prior to sale.
Sure, but my take on Smart Tags is that they are equivalent to the customer bringing along a representative of their choice to annotate the book before they read it, after they bought it. I believe this is much closer to the real nature, as the Smart Tag is part of the User Agent and not part of the HTTP transaction.
Umm... you can't mod up your own posts. You can't even use moderator points in the same thread.
I'm well aware of that, but by your comment I wasn't sure you were... or I figured you might have a second account with mod points waiting to mod yourself up. In regards to that comment I would say that I misrepresented you as a scoundrel. I might think you are misguided, and I'd still like to know what that line about wishing you had mod points meant, but the scoundrel comment was probably uncalled for.
Scoundrel didn't offend me at all - I've been called far worse. You learn very quickly not to take offense at anything on Slashdot, Usenet or pretty much any public forum (or you go postal in a hurry). All I meant was I had moderator points that I really wanted to give other posts on this article, but decided to post instead. I just have this incredible ability to put across a message that is only passingly similar to what I really mean, and never exactly.
Again, "DeCSS case I put the link on the page, "Smart Tags"(TM), SOMEBODY ELSE puts the link on MY page. User's are included in the somebody else category.
Actually no one is touching your page. That's my whole point. What is happening is the user is downloading your page unmodified, then annotating it himself. This is exactly the same action as a student making notations in the margin of their textbooks at college (DeCSS was probably a bad example). Does the book publisher have the right to demand that no one write in their books? I believe (and though IANAL, I think the law is on my side) that the user has the right to do whatever they like with published material for their own personal use. They can take your web site and run filters over it to link every eighth word to pr0n and warez for all we know, or just filter out the doubleclick ads.
By your argument, virus filters that block ActiveX and Java are modifying the content and should be stopped. I disagree. The user has the right to view the site and add/remove content for their own use as they see fit. The publisher's rights stop once the site has been published.
WTF? How does the fact that the filters are XML mean that the user's drive is open to 3rd parties? They aren't even cookies
1. The user can control what words are smart tagged by editing an XML file on their PC. None of the posts has said where these files are located, yet.
2. Third parties can add their own filters. Thus, they're either editing the existing XML file or adding their own files. Yes, they are NOT cookies. That's my point, cookies have undergone a great deal of scrutiny. Third parties being able to alter "Smart Tag"(TM) filters on your PC, have not.
Smart tags are controlled via COM interfaces or XML files - one file for each smart tag filter. These files are registered in the regsitry (as you'd expect for COM objects). Download of these is controlled through exactly the same methods they have been since IE 3.0.
A web page also has the ability to define smart tags for itself only. The XML for that is part of the page and remains on the page - it doesn't go anywhere on you HDD (except possibly the cache). For more information, including how to enable/disable smart tags in IE6, refer to the SDK: http://msdn.microsoft.com/downloads/default.asp?UR L=/code/sample.asp?url=/msdn-files/027/001/652/msd ncompositedoc.xml
It's in beta. What did you expect?
Beta, to me, means software that may not work well. Not software that works just fine ("fine" as defined by MS), but only directs to Microsoft Sites.
Oh. That explains it. My idea of beta was "Feature complete and stable, just not ready for release". In other words, they haven't finished all the content yet. If you actually look on their site, there are at least 20 or 30 different 3rd party smart tag providers available already.
On a side note, have you ever hit the "what's related" button on IE?
Admittedly, no, I haven't. I have clicked the "Show Related Links" menu item under tools and the "Related" toolbar button. Those functions are "Powered by Alexa". (Whoever they are.)
FYI: "What's Related" is the name used in Netscape's browser for this functionality that MS copied.
Yeah - that's what I meant. I just get confused by all the different names between Netscape and IE. My bad.
Very good rebuttal, it almost appears as though some thought was put into them. (Please read my signature.)
Nah - If I was thinking I would be writing code and not wasting time on Slashdot. ;-) Nice sig btw - I agree with it.
That aside, the choice to link or not to link is up to the web publisher, this is a different issue than responsibility for the content that was linked to.
True, but are you saying the user doesn't have the option of adding their own content to what you provide? If this is the case then you'd better also disallow scribbling on any textbook in college because that is EXACTLY the same thing.
First, probably is not good enough.
Agreed.
Second, the user can decide how my site looks, but the content is my business, hence it being MY site.
Garbage. The user has the right to do whatever they like with your site for their own personal use. They can wrap it around a three-dimensional naked sheep that sings a lewd ballad about goats if they want to. The user can decide to only look at every third word, or run a filter to remove every single link to doubleclick. You have NO rights as to what the user does with the published work as long as they don't republish it themselves.
(iv) Third parties can provide their own smart tag filters to link wherever they like. This isn't a Microsoft-only club. You can even have a Slashdot smart tag if you like that links to articles on the subject.
To me this is one of the most disturbing issues. I don't want political, religious or any other type of special interest group to have any oppertunity to bombard me with propoganda. I especially don't want them able to bombard my web site with their propoganda.
So either include the META tag on your site. You still have no rights as to what users do once they have downloaded your site. If they want to interpret it by rearranging the words until they get Nazi war slogans then it's up to them.
And once again links are content. People choose to link or not link for specific reasons, and it is not the place of microsoft or anyone else to add or take away links. Especially when they do it in a way that may confuse users as to the provider of the content (and no, the squiggly purple lines are NOT different enough... many users won't get the distinction, and what about colorblind persons?)
Now you are hitting on something. If Microsoft doesn't give the user the option of what smart tags are in use, or even enables only 'partner' tags by default then there is an issue (especially now IE is the dominant browser). Assuming the default tags are just the benign ones in Office XP (name lookups, phone number etc.) then I don't see the problem.
The fact remains though that the user has the right to add and remove links as they like from your site for their own viewing. This is completely outside copyright restrictions and completely outside publisher's rights. If you honestly believe that Addison Wesley has the right to demand that no annotation be done on a textbook then you can feel free to continue your line of discussion.
If I was the type of insecure scoundrel that had to mod my own posts up I certainly wouldn't admit it.
Umm... you can't mod up your own posts. You can't even use moderator points in the same thread. I'm quite secure in my posts though - I believe that I should always be responsible for what I say and let it stand or fall on its own merits.
You are correct, except for one thing: The user has chosen to put the links there. It's not Microsoft - they are providing the service, and they are not changing Bob corp.'s web site at all, just performing a reference lookup on behalf of the user.
IE already does this (in case you didn't notice) - just click on the "What's Related" button and you'll get a sidebar with everything on it.
Sorry, but that's no different from me standing in my competitor's store and handing out information about my store.
Umm... you can do this until they ask you to leave. I guess that means MS can put tags on your page until you ask them not to (use the META tag).
Aside from that, your argument is a strawman. This isn't like handing out leaflets in a store at all. It's like someone getting your mailorder catalog (your web page) and asking the postman (Internet Explorer) to scribble on any related info that he knows. As it is an optional service, the user can ask the postie to stop providing that extra information at any time.
Personally I see no problem with this. If someone else has cheaper hammers then as an end user I want to know about it. If someone is browsing Microsoft's site and 'Operating Systems' links to linux.org then is this a bad thing? You don't have to be Microsoft's partner to create a Smart Tag filter - go to msdn.microsoft.com and build one yourself if you care.
This word "Real"... I don't think it means what you think it means...
Real Fact: DeCSS case, I put the link on MY
page.
"Smart Tags"(TM), somebody else put the link on MY page.
(i) Is saying that the whole thing is about where the link goes. The "Real
Issue" is not where, but who put the link their and who controls where it goes.
Not true at all. In DeCSS, you put the link on your page. With
Smart Tags, the reader puts the link (remember they chose to turn in on) on the
page as they read it. This is exactly the same as complaining if someone
goes out, buys a book and then writes in the margins. No one is touching
your page - they are annotating their own view of it.
Real Fact: The code is written, works, and
exists in Office XP already.
So what? A lot of code is written, works and never gets published.
The Office XP code doesn't link you anywhere but to the help (and in fact I've
been using it for the past 2 or 3 months and quite like it).
I've got code that will make any GPL source a binary only module. Who
cares unless I use it?
Real Fact: Since these filters are XML files
on the local user's machine that the user can edit, IE is making the user's hard
drive available to third parties!
WTF? How does the fact that the filters are XML mean that the user's
drive is open to 3rd parties? They aren't even cookies - they are not sent
to a web site, they aren't published anywhere, they are simply installed like
software. This is akin to saying that since bash scripts are files on the
local machine that you can edit then bash is making the user's hard drive
available to third parties. What utter crud!!
Real Fact: So far, it's links to stock quotes
on MSN and where to by sports memorabilia on MSN.
It's in beta. What did you expect?
Perhaps you don't know this, but all IE distros are customizable by the
supplier through the 'branding.cab' file. This file can be edited to
provide whatever you like with your download of IE, and I expect plenty of 3rd
parties to be dumping lots and lots of effort into this. In fact, I'd be
surprised if it doesn't end up like ActiveX controls where the tag engines can
be downloaded from anywhere.
On a side note, have you ever hit the "what's related" button on IE? I
just did on the slashdot page and not one of the links went to a Microsoft site.
Guess that dispels your paranoid ravings for a little.
From the information I've seen:
:-(
(i) If links are part of the content of a page, then the whole DeCSS case is sunk. You have to choose what you believe. Smart tags may indeed be the EFF's best friend here because if Microsoft can convince the courts that they are permitted to add whatever links they like because they are not part of a web page, then by implication you also have the right to link your page wherever you like and not be responsible for the content at the other end. So, either Microsoft and the EFF are both correct, or both are wrong. You can't have it both ways.
(ii) Smart Tags may or may not be included in the release. Microsoft is testing the waters to see people's reactions and if it is too bad then they are likely to can the idea.
(iii) Smart Tags will probably be disabled by default, or at the very least be an option in the Internet Connection Wizard. This means the end user is actually defining how they want to parse your web site - whether they want the tags or not.
(iv) Third parties can provide their own smart tag filters to link wherever they like. This isn't a Microsoft-only club. You can even have a Slashdot smart tag if you like that links to articles on the subject.
(iv) This isn't about publisher's rights. Microsoft isn't changing what is published, they are effectively providing reference material on what is published. As I stated in (i), links aren't content - they are just references to other content.
...and I wasted all those moderator points I would have loved to spend on this thread to bring you this.
Wow!!
.sigs somewhere, realised I knew what it meant and suddenly got a chill through me as I understood how much of my brain was filled with utterly useless things and how much time I wasted at a debug prompt in DOS.
:-)
I got as far as the Meaning when I originally saw it in a list of cool
I love your translation though. Makes my geek sig a lot more philisophical.
Instead of going for a predetermined conclusion (ie Open Source must be better because that's my own personal religion), try going for something a little less ambitios - say the conversion of Utah to Catholicism (jk!!)
Seriously, don't aim for the conclusion that open source is better. Try instead for something a little less sweeping and make a case that at least one open source product should be included as an option when each purchase decision is made. It wouldn't be hard to make an excellent case to purchasing departments for OSS projects to be the standard that must be exceeded before a new software purchase order is filled.
You don't have to make the manager's decisions for them - that's what their job is, not yours. What you need is to make sure OSS is ALWAYS one of the options that is put before them.
I agree, however you still find that the digital fingerprints can be removed and probably quite easily once you know what you are looking for. Preventing players from playing tunes without a digital fingerprint is tough because you then limit the players to tunes that have been published by someone with the technology to create a fingerprint, so in the end you end up with consumer backlash because their new player doesn't play existing music.
The problem is there is no backward and forward compatible solution that is both fair to users (ie lets them play their music in any device they own) and fair to producers (ie makes it difficult for people to redistribute without paying royalties).
Of course, the software industry has faced this problem for a while and has pretty much come up with the solution of targetting the major offenders and letting minor piracy slip. This is potentially the answer for the record companies - they just have to raise awareness of the fact that redistributing copyrighted material is wrong and get it through to all those college students who think it is their right to get it for free.
So explain to me how the fact that there is a legal difference between infringement and theft makes any real difference to my argument.
Infringement is just as illegal as theft last time I looked. The fact that either can result in being put in prison and made to be a bad man's boyfriend is sufficient for me.
Split hairs as much as you like - my comment is still valid if you replace every instance on 'steal' with 'willfully infringe on copyright'.
Sure the speech is protected, but the University isn't required to use its OWN equipment and OWN resources to publish bitch sessions about itself. Claiming that an institution is violating the first amendment because it takes down negative material from it's own servers is just stupid.
... abridging the freedom of speech ..." There is no law preventing this in this case - each student has the right to freely state their grievances. They do NOT have the right to force the university to air their grievances for them. Nothing is stopping the student with the grievance getting a geocities page and posting what they like.
The first amendment states that "Congress shall make no law
Let's stop all this stupidity. The University had a right to take the site down if they deemed it not in the interests of the University. They had the right to reclaim the equipment and had a right to the work donated by the student. He has no rights to any of the posts, data or code on the system and he'd better go do some grovelling to get his degree back or he's successfully wasted 4 years of his life.
The problem Napster has is that there is no solution which retains the user's right to copy any music they buy as many times as they like FOR THEIR OWN USE, but prevents them from giving it away to all their friends.
Basically what the record companies need is a technology that allows them to sell music to a user once and that user can then use that music whenever and wherever they want personally. This is fair use, and pretty much what people have at the moment with music stored on physical media. With electronic copies, it is so easy just to copy the bits the whole things becomes unworkable given the fact that people WILL steal music (ie make a copy to give someone else) because it is a soft crime that doesn't leave you feeling bad.
What the technology has to prevent is the creation of more instances of that music for other people.
The only solutions are:
(i) Make everyone have their own personal key (like a social security number) that is required to access their copy of the music. This doesn't work because someone can just give their key to another person (assuming it too is digital). A physical key - like a dongle - has possibilities here but is too cumbersome at the moment to catch on.
(ii) Prevent anyone from accessing the "bits" and control the software. This is what the music industry is trying to do at the moment but it is doomed to failure because there are so many places the "bits" are available - right down to the interface at the sound card. The only way to achieve this is having hardware only decoders with a 'secret' key and a secure algorithm. Even then it is only a matter of time before someone extracts the key and the game is over.
What it comes down to is there is no solution - no matter what the RIAA tries to do they are screwed unless they control 100% of the hardware that can play music. This is simply not a feasible situation for many reasons - most of the commercial and not ethical.
...I do not think it means what you think it means (for some blatant karma whoring).
/. eds and some of the peanut gallery) doesn't mean you can say anything you like, or that you can publish anything you like. Take some more obvious examples:
Free speech (despite the opinions of some of the
i) You cannot walk up to someone and say "Do you have some drugs".
ii) You cannot publish a list of where and when to stand on a particular street corner to get cheap goods if you know there is a very good probability that those goods have been stolen.
iii) You cannot (in your own privacy) group together with like minded individuals for the purpose of committing a crime (say assassinating the president).
iv) You cannot publish information the government has deemed sensitive.
[Note that (ii) above is actually very similar to what Napster does, or used to do before filters]
Basically, while you have the right to say anything you like in an abstract sense you do NOT have the right to say anything you like at all. The primary right to free speech is the right to criticize the government and publicly state what you feel would be a better way of doing things - when that right is removed you do not have a democratic system anymore.
In the case mentioned in this article there isn't even an issue of free speech involved. Someone has donated work to the university and the university has decided that work is now inappropriate. The UNIVERSITY owns the work and can do whatever the hell it likes. If the offsite backups are used then the university has the right to sue for theft of its property. Face it - the site will NEVER get back up.
As for the criminal charges: I can only assume there is more to the story - probably something to do with access to backups, or theft of some computer media (ie tapes)?
When are people going to learn that while a democracy preserves some rights, it also limits those rights with an individuals responsibility to the society as a whole. Democracy is NOT anarchy and never will be. The sooner people grow up and learn what responsibility is the better!
Oh. Yeah. Throx is stupid. Bad Throx. :-(
You are also right about the exploitation. Thanks for setting me straight.
Yup. The fear component came in when I suddenly realized how much of my life I must have wasted staring at hex dumps of DOS code.
They do 'embrace and extend'. Ever seen the OpenGL nVidia extensions? Guess what are the first extensions to get coded for these days? Oops - extended a supposedly open spec!!
Look at the Linux driver - sure it's legal, but is it open source? I know about the NDA problems, but why does that prevent them from releasing a lower performance open source driver? Answer: Because it's not in their commercial interests while they have the best performance on Linux why let that good performance get back into the community where other vendors might take advantage of it?
nVidia, just like Microsoft, won out of sheer bloody minded persistance. The NV1 failed badly, so nVidia sided with Microsoft and DirectX and had cards supporting the next version of DX on the shelves as the versions were released. If you wanted T&L with your DX7 games then you had to get nVidia. If you got anything else then you were SOL. Now that nVidia is king of the hill they can afford to take on the bigger challenges - kinda like MS shrugging off IBM and going it alone.
nVidia is one company that I would be very careful of in the future. I think they have a big potential to be the next Microsoft, but don't have a monopoly to speak of at the moment and probably won't for a few years yet (ATI has to roll over first which ain't gonna happen easily). The battle is heating up at the moment and the consumers are going to be the winners in the short term. Who knows what the long term holds in this industry - we might all be using OS/2 on PPCs in 5 years!!
Where did you get the info that the GF2 was optional? All the stuff I see says it is part of the North Bridge (or IGP or whatever). The Dolby Decoder and twin memory controllers are the only configurable options I can see (look at http://www4.tomshardware.com/mainboard/01q2/010604 1/nforce-12.html)
It will never be as easy to use an ATI card with an nVidia mobo as it is to use an nVidia card because of the driver issue. You plug in a GF3 and it will just work - the existing drivers will just pick it up and use it. You are effectively getting your GF3 drivers bundled with the mobo driver package. You plug an ATI card in and your first experience is the good old 640x480 resolution in Windows (assuming we are talking mass marken here - Linux people tend to be cool with figuring out drivers). You also can get weird interactions - ATI end up having to devote time to make their drivers work with nVidia's mobos, while nVidia don't have to care about ATI (remember the nVidia/VIA/AGP4x thing a while back?)
Whatever happens, if nVidia gets a monopoly (very doubtful really) then there is little chance of them not exploiting it by the simple fact it exists. You can't fault a company for testing that it's own products work well with each other!!