Is techdirt (or Mike, or whoever) arguing that the same firm would be less productive if it had paid for instead of pirated the software?
Just as a micro-example, think of something like graphic/web design where there's a lot of independant contractors. Designer One bought Adobe CS, he now has much larger overhead and has to work N hours just to pay off software. Meanwhile, Designer Two is using the latest Adobe for free, he doesn't have the overhead, and has more features which makes more efficient and can charge a lower rate.
Furthermore if Designer Two was stopped from warezing Adobe, he might have just been excluded from the market because he lacked the tools. So he's pushing rates down both through a lower cost structure and increased competition.
So, yeah, Designer One ends up looking like the uncompetitive sucker in this situation.
OTOH, I suppose you could argue that businesses in the area are getting cheaper websites, which make them more efficent, thus justifying the whole situation. I don't know, I'm not an economist.
Most Mac users I know are full on legit. There are a couple... but every Windows user I know has TONS of illegal crap.
Most businesses use Windows and most of the larger ones in the US are pretty legit.
The Mac users I know are no where close to being legit, and that includes people who use the systems professionally. At least in my circles, I could easily get expensive Mac warez like FinalCut Pro while the Windows stuff is Office 2000 or Winzip keys and crap like that.
Alright, that's pretty much the Maximum-FUD version of the story, stretching the truth pretty far. Hopefully someone articulate will set the story straight and the moderators won't have to reward the loonies.
Bottom line is that ODF is a better format -- it's a cleaner format and superior for archival purposes.
I've noticed that Word will stream open a large DOC file, so that you can start to work on it before it's been entirely loaded -- similar to a web page. IIUC, this is because DOC is just a sequence of formatting commands and not really structured information. I'm guessing their XML format takes the same approach.
On the otherhand if ODF is highly structured, this approach might not be possible. They may need to load and parse a big chunk of XML before doing anything with it.
Well, VA/OSTG is rather explict that they exist in order to monitize the online Linux community, so it's not really a conspiracy to believe that Slashdot story selection is driven by this.
It should be pretty obvious that Slashdot will have a lot of Vista coverage, usually with negative spin ("not so bad?") because it riles up the fanboys which spikes ad revenue. In general, positive stories about Linux here don't get very many comments -- the "opens source community" is much more interested in hearing about how a guy couldn't install Vista on his laptop than positive alternatives.
when there's a new version out and screenshots are actually necessary.
Well, this is apparenlty the first real beta version, it came out yesterday, and I hadn't seen any thing more than some trival stuff before this. So it's interesting to me. FWIW, I also like Linux screenshots
The only difference is that it is highly unlikely that there was any payment received for the reviews(to be a touch cynical).
OK, as designated "shillboy", let me offer this advice to all -- If this article is pissing you off, you better just unplug the Internet for the next six months, because you head is going to fucking explode by the time Windows comes out.
How is a common person who uses email and stores images going to benefit from this when they won't even understand what they're looking at? This is more of a powertoy for heavy users and shouldn't be a featured bullet point of why someone should purchase this.
Nobody _needs_ moral cover. Watching that DVD would infringe copyright laws, I guess, like the first time I drank a beer or bought a pack of cigarettes infringed a law,
Well, that's the "normal" view (aka my view) on matters -- "Don't get caught!"
But the RIAA/MPAA is very much trying to throw down a "moral" gauntlet on this activity, including propaganda and a legal system that's weighted to heavily discourage personal piracy. And the more "sensitive" among us I believe really dislike being labeled a "bad person" and feel they have to rise to the occassion and justify themselves.
Of course there is at least one pasty-faced Slashdot troll who _does_ try and pretend it's a big moral issue: you. I dunno if anyone will go for that, though:)
Not really, when not making meta-comments, I tend to stick to OS Advocacy trolling... these Big Media discussions are so full of repetitive groupthink that they are utterly boring and not worth stirring up. You could literally cut and paste the comments from one story to the next and nobody would notice.
Disqualifying - and that is what you are doing, even if you're saying you're just making an observation - arguments based on the (lack of) merits of the author is poor style.
Hey! You've disqualified my meta-comment with your meta-meta comment. Poor style!:D
In the heyday of railroads, new patents were being issued every few hours on improvements in track shape and airbrakes.
It's a point that's often ignored. Pretty much every mechanical device you can think of was the subject of a patent at one time. I picked up a used book that goes into excrutiating detail about the 1000s of patents that were filed regarding mundane things like bakeries (conveyor belt+oven=patent. obvious, no?). In 20 years, software patents may be largely a non-issue for most computing users.
The parts of the patent system that are broken, or badly in need of a tune-up, are not related to computer programs, they are related to issues of proper review, rational litigation, and what should be public disclosure of licensing, and mandatory licensing.
At least in the US, there appears to be a growing constituancy that agrees with this. However the discussion here is usually dominated by the No Patents crowd.
In case it wasn't clear, I'm "pro-pirate" myself, and it was mostly a meta-comment about Slashdot and not an attack on the fine Netizens who provide me free MP3s.
Just that I somehow manage to drive 75MPH to work every day without posting essays on the Internet about how Speed Limits are immoral and the Highway Patrol are corrupt assholes who incorrectly pull over Grannys.
Stop trying to pretend that there is only one point of view on slashdot.
Where did I do that? It's rather "sad" that you'd accuse me of something that I intentionally avoided. But to elaborate:
First, story selection represents a point-of-view of the Editors and how they want the discussion to unfold. Perfectly reasonable to discuss. That's how this thread started.
Second, Slashdot has a voting system (so-called moderation) where users vote on whether they agree or disagree with posts. X people make a point, Y people vote it up. Observe a consistant pattern for the next 100 stories on the topic. Once you've identified the pattern, there's no problem in analyzing it.
Oh, I questioned the orthodoxy of the "computing monoculture" analogy in another post, so now the zealots are running around modbombing everything else. Which only proves that I've stumbled on something important enough for people to attempt to censor.
I was really getting at the "why", not the "what". Yes, most of the complaints are valid to a degree, and yes the system is crooked, but that's not why it gets dredged up here on a daily basis.
Sadly, even the EFF has fallen into this trap. At their best, they focus on critical public policy issues such as the length of copyright and the government tapping Internet traffic, but on the other hand they run "Downloading is cool, RIAA sucks" ads in Wired.
There is not necessarily any quailty problems with telesyncing - it's used all the time commercially. However, I'm guessing a pirate telesync is just a consumer camcorder on a tripod in an empty theater.
Maybe you have not been reading/. for long or something but it certainly is not a pro-piracy haven
You are not reading very deeply into this. What goes on here is very much a justification-fest for Internet copyright infringmenet, where frail nerds tell each other that they aren't bad persons by voting the same opinions +5 Insightful over and over again.
Dislike of RIAA/MPAA tactics is only one small part of this, you can also claim that "information wants to be free", "their business model is obsolete", "people wouldn't pay for this stuff anyway", "their statistics lie", "infringement is not (as bad as) stealing!!!!!!", or really any argument that happens to fit the bill and you'll be lauded because you've provided moral cover for someone.
Admittedly, there is a small "free music" faction on slashdot trading their public-domain folksongs, but by in large the obsession with firesharing around here is very much because computer nerds love the downloading. (myself included)
If you have any doubt this is the predominate attitude, check the "DSL/Cable Hog" stories, Bittorrent site stories, or video game piracy stories -- same attitude over-and-over which is that "Piracy is great fun except for those meanies trying to stop us".
Slashdot Mirror
Is techdirt (or Mike, or whoever) arguing that the same firm would be less productive if it had paid for instead of pirated the software?
Just as a micro-example, think of something like graphic/web design where there's a lot of independant contractors. Designer One bought Adobe CS, he now has much larger overhead and has to work N hours just to pay off software. Meanwhile, Designer Two is using the latest Adobe for free, he doesn't have the overhead, and has more features which makes more efficient and can charge a lower rate.
Furthermore if Designer Two was stopped from warezing Adobe, he might have just been excluded from the market because he lacked the tools. So he's pushing rates down both through a lower cost structure and increased competition.
So, yeah, Designer One ends up looking like the uncompetitive sucker in this situation.
OTOH, I suppose you could argue that businesses in the area are getting cheaper websites, which make them more efficent, thus justifying the whole situation. I don't know, I'm not an economist.
Most Mac users I know are full on legit. There are a couple... but every Windows user I know has TONS of illegal crap.
Most businesses use Windows and most of the larger ones in the US are pretty legit.
The Mac users I know are no where close to being legit, and that includes people who use the systems professionally. At least in my circles, I could easily get expensive Mac warez like FinalCut Pro while the Windows stuff is Office 2000 or Winzip keys and crap like that.
You try to "save as" a file and every folder hangs.
Poorly written anti-virus software?
There's also good ol' fashion trolling.
MS-XML seems to use 1- and 2-character tags. It's probably not that much more bloated than RTF, and plus it's zipped.
Thanks for the Bat-Clarification. And I agree, ODF is a waste of Microsoft's competitive talents.
Alright, that's pretty much the Maximum-FUD version of the story, stretching the truth pretty far. Hopefully someone articulate will set the story straight and the moderators won't have to reward the loonies.
Bottom line is that ODF is a better format -- it's a cleaner format and superior for archival purposes.
Follow up. Here's some XML examples from both:1 44611543
http://www.groklaw.net/article.php?story=20051125
I've noticed that Word will stream open a large DOC file, so that you can start to work on it before it's been entirely loaded -- similar to a web page. IIUC, this is because DOC is just a sequence of formatting commands and not really structured information. I'm guessing their XML format takes the same approach.
On the otherhand if ODF is highly structured, this approach might not be possible. They may need to load and parse a big chunk of XML before doing anything with it.
Well, VA/OSTG is rather explict that they exist in order to monitize the online Linux community, so it's not really a conspiracy to believe that Slashdot story selection is driven by this.
It should be pretty obvious that Slashdot will have a lot of Vista coverage, usually with negative spin ("not so bad?") because it riles up the fanboys which spikes ad revenue. In general, positive stories about Linux here don't get very many comments -- the "opens source community" is much more interested in hearing about how a guy couldn't install Vista on his laptop than positive alternatives.
when there's a new version out and screenshots are actually necessary.
Well, this is apparenlty the first real beta version, it came out yesterday, and I hadn't seen any thing more than some trival stuff before this. So it's interesting to me. FWIW, I also like Linux screenshots
The only difference is that it is highly unlikely that there was any payment received for the reviews(to be a touch cynical).
OK, as designated "shillboy", let me offer this advice to all -- If this article is pissing you off, you better just unplug the Internet for the next six months, because you head is going to fucking explode by the time Windows comes out.
How is a common person who uses email and stores images going to benefit from this when they won't even understand what they're looking at? This is more of a powertoy for heavy users and shouldn't be a featured bullet point of why someone should purchase this.
Who do you think is reading these articles?
Or if you pull the network cable out, the little piece of paper will keep flying forever as if something is happening.
I have to say that MS must have enormous balls to add a "stability monitor" to Windows.
"Stability Index" is going to become the new "Uptime".
Yes, because Slashdot has never run a story of just screenshots of KDE, Gnome, a Linux Install program, or any other pre-release software.
Nobody _needs_ moral cover. Watching that DVD would infringe copyright laws, I guess, like the first time I drank a beer or bought a pack of cigarettes infringed a law,
:)
... these Big Media discussions are so full of repetitive groupthink that they are utterly boring and not worth stirring up. You could literally cut and paste the comments from one story to the next and nobody would notice.
Well, that's the "normal" view (aka my view) on matters -- "Don't get caught!"
But the RIAA/MPAA is very much trying to throw down a "moral" gauntlet on this activity, including propaganda and a legal system that's weighted to heavily discourage personal piracy. And the more "sensitive" among us I believe really dislike being labeled a "bad person" and feel they have to rise to the occassion and justify themselves.
Of course there is at least one pasty-faced Slashdot troll who _does_ try and pretend it's a big moral issue: you. I dunno if anyone will go for that, though
Not really, when not making meta-comments, I tend to stick to OS Advocacy trolling
Disqualifying - and that is what you are doing, even if you're saying you're just making an observation - arguments based on the (lack of) merits of the author is poor style.
:D
Hey! You've disqualified my meta-comment with your meta-meta comment. Poor style!
In the heyday of railroads, new patents were being issued every few hours on improvements in track shape and airbrakes.
It's a point that's often ignored. Pretty much every mechanical device you can think of was the subject of a patent at one time. I picked up a used book that goes into excrutiating detail about the 1000s of patents that were filed regarding mundane things like bakeries (conveyor belt+oven=patent. obvious, no?). In 20 years, software patents may be largely a non-issue for most computing users.
The parts of the patent system that are broken, or badly in need of a tune-up, are not related to computer programs, they are related to issues of proper review, rational litigation, and what should be public disclosure of licensing, and mandatory licensing.
At least in the US, there appears to be a growing constituancy that agrees with this. However the discussion here is usually dominated by the No Patents crowd.
In case it wasn't clear, I'm "pro-pirate" myself, and it was mostly a meta-comment about Slashdot and not an attack on the fine Netizens who provide me free MP3s.
Just that I somehow manage to drive 75MPH to work every day without posting essays on the Internet about how Speed Limits are immoral and the Highway Patrol are corrupt assholes who incorrectly pull over Grannys.
Stop trying to pretend that there is only one point of view on slashdot.
Where did I do that? It's rather "sad" that you'd accuse me of something that I intentionally avoided. But to elaborate:
First, story selection represents a point-of-view of the Editors and how they want the discussion to unfold. Perfectly reasonable to discuss. That's how this thread started.
Second, Slashdot has a voting system (so-called moderation) where users vote on whether they agree or disagree with posts. X people make a point, Y people vote it up. Observe a consistant pattern for the next 100 stories on the topic. Once you've identified the pattern, there's no problem in analyzing it.
Oh, I questioned the orthodoxy of the "computing monoculture" analogy in another post, so now the zealots are running around modbombing everything else. Which only proves that I've stumbled on something important enough for people to attempt to censor.
I was really getting at the "why", not the "what". Yes, most of the complaints are valid to a degree, and yes the system is crooked, but that's not why it gets dredged up here on a daily basis.
Sadly, even the EFF has fallen into this trap. At their best, they focus on critical public policy issues such as the length of copyright and the government tapping Internet traffic, but on the other hand they run "Downloading is cool, RIAA sucks" ads in Wired.
There is not necessarily any quailty problems with telesyncing - it's used all the time commercially. However, I'm guessing a pirate telesync is just a consumer camcorder on a tripod in an empty theater.
Maybe you have not been reading /. for long or something but it certainly is not a pro-piracy haven
You are not reading very deeply into this. What goes on here is very much a justification-fest for Internet copyright infringmenet, where frail nerds tell each other that they aren't bad persons by voting the same opinions +5 Insightful over and over again.
Dislike of RIAA/MPAA tactics is only one small part of this, you can also claim that "information wants to be free", "their business model is obsolete", "people wouldn't pay for this stuff anyway", "their statistics lie", "infringement is not (as bad as) stealing!!!!!!", or really any argument that happens to fit the bill and you'll be lauded because you've provided moral cover for someone.
Admittedly, there is a small "free music" faction on slashdot trading their public-domain folksongs, but by in large the obsession with firesharing around here is very much because computer nerds love the downloading. (myself included)
If you have any doubt this is the predominate attitude, check the "DSL/Cable Hog" stories, Bittorrent site stories, or video game piracy stories -- same attitude over-and-over which is that "Piracy is great fun except for those meanies trying to stop us".