Verizon refused to set me up with their DSL service when they found out that one of my computers was running Linux. They told me it wouldn't work. Even after I said I would hook the DSL up to my win2k box.
Re:Perhaps I'm completely missing the point here..
on
HP Backs Off DMCA Threat
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· Score: 3, Interesting
IANAL either, but I am in the US and this is how I understand the situation:
It is correct that a company can not bring criminal charges against a person or another company. When an individual sues another individual, it must be for a violation of civil law. The DMCA is a federal criminal law, so it is up to the US Justice Dept to per^H^Hrosecute victims. The FBI is like a police department; they do not engage in prosecutions, but they have the power to make arrests, conduct investigations with court orders, etc.
One of the many problems with the DMCA is that the line between civil and criminal prosecution is blurring. With Dmitry Skylarov, he was effectively arrested and prosecuted by Adobe; the FBI and the Justice Dept were willing participants, but I don't think there's much doubt that Adobe was calling the shots.
HP backing down from the DMCA threat is not enough to directly prevent a lawsuit. However, if HP will not cooperate in the prosecution (providing witnesses etc) due to public outcry, it is no longer worthwhile for the Justice Dept to prosecute, because they basically have no case. So again, it is not a question of actual policy but the effects of policy.
Actually, that's not true. (someone correct me if I'm wrong on this, but I think I'm close). When you compile gcc, it first compiles a version of itself (stage 1) using your current gcc. Then it uses stage 1 to compile itself again, resulting in stage 2. Finally, it compiles itself one more time using stage 2, resulting in stage 3. The build succeeds if and only if stage 2 and stage 3 are identical. This process ensures that your final gcc is free from any defects in the original gcc. Once you have a clean gcc, you can rebuild the rest of your system using it.
Take a look at www.linuxfromscratch.org to see how this works for an entire system.
This is the same sort of attitude that Microsoft uses to convince people that their software is inherently more secure than anything open-source. If the software's security procedures are publicly available, so they say, how is possible for the procedures to be secure?
To which we respond, it's all about the implementation of those procedures. But you've all read that rant before.
Doesn't Sony have a music division which is part of the RIAA? And doesn't the RIAA make a concerted effort to stop people from ripping CDs? So how can Sony make a device to do just that? Is one division going to sue the other or something?
...if we could convince the article's web server that there were 25 hours a day, it would have an extra hour of CPU time and it wouldn't get slashdotted until AFTER some responses were posted.
I have the cell phone number from hell. I've had this number since August of last year. It's starting to quiet down now, but I used to get several calls a week for some guy who was in serious trouble with multiple credit card companies and god-only-knows who else, and just disappeared. One caller threatened legal action against me when I told him he had the wrong number. It used to be three calls per week at least. Now it's down to about two per month. After 11 months!!
This is an interesting thought, but it will never work for Microsoft. In my experience, most Linux users are much less tolerant of pieces of software that don't work together than most Windows users are. If I have to use a certain distro for a piece of software, then I won't be using that piece of software (especially since I use LFS). This could change if hordes of people suddenly started using Linux overnight, but that isn't going to happen. People who were already considering switching would start to do so, learn how things work in the world of Linux (where software must cooperate in order to be accepted), and be all ready to train the next set of newbies. If Microsoft understood how to penetrate that kind of market, they would have destroyed Linux already (not to mention Apple).
It's fairly obvious that this article is a Microsoft-funded troll. But there's something much more sinister going on here.
Microsoft's best defense against Linux these days is that it is un-American (or worse, an illegal violation of intellectual property rights) to use free software. This article seems to me to take for granted the idea that all software must cost money, no matter what. Hence, they focus on RedHat (who is currently losing money) as a representative of all Linux users. They also assume that Linux has failed simply because it hasn't taken over the desktop market completely.
Articles like this aren't dangerous because they declare Linux dead. Even my computer-illiterate friends can explain to me why no article on MSNBC will ever say good things about Linux (or Solaris, or OS X, or FreeBSD, or BeOS, or OS/2, etc). This article is dangerous because of the ideas it gets into people's heads. For example, that all production-quality software is commerical. Or that open source is an affront to capitalism. Or that open-source is insecure, or that it violates intellectual property rights (not in this article, but in other places).
The question is, how do you fight against such widespread assumptions?
Cable companies dropping their customers by raising prices isn't going to hurt P2P that much. The xxAAs are up against a much bigger enemy: college students. Most large universities have dorm-room ethernet connections which are far superior to cable modem access (I've had both, so I know the difference). A big problem with cable is that the upload speed sucks. Universities don't have that problem. And dorm-room ethernet isn't going away or going up in price just because the RIAA says it should. So maybe the cable companies can cause a few people inconvenience, but they can't win the RIAA's war.
They're a bit smarter than dumb terminals. But I have a feeling I'd either go nuts or quit fairly quickly in a setup like this. I like the feeling of being able to go to work in the morning, and sit at my desk where I always sit. Yes, I'm a sheep.
Besides, I bet the've got a Fire 15k serving these. You can do MUCH cooler things with a 106 CPU server than serve thousands of frame buffers:-P
They told me their DSL used proprietary software that wouldn't work under Linux. Even if I hooked a Win2k box up to the DSL modem and the Linux machine just happened to be on my network.
RoadRunner, on the other hand, was more than happy to have me as a customer after hearing that story:)
Um. Let's just remember who we're talking about here...Verizon isn't any better than the RIAA when it comes to corporate citizenship...I vaguely recall them suing 2600 for registering verizonsucks.com, and they refused to install DSL in my apartment when they found out one of my computers was running Linux.
This simply is not something we ever have to worry about. I'm sure Microsoft owns enough congresspeople that they could get it laughed off the floor. And they have significant interest in doing so, because they are going to be the first company the sharks go after if something like this becomes law.
I didn't have any desire to see Blow. Then I got a shitty bootleg from gnutella. It looked like a very good movie. So I paid the NYC theater mafia $9.50 to see it on the big screen. So they actually profitted from me downloading a bottleg. I may even buy the DVD one of these days.
But the MPAA doesn't want you to know about people like me.
He's comparing three completely different products as if they were similar.
I took a class last fall that required us to do some fairly intrusive kernel hacking in Linux using VMWare. It served that purpose fairly well; it was nice to be able to accidently fsck up your entire filesystem (no pun intended) without having to worry about losing your work. The only problem we had was that it absolutely refused to maintain the correct time.
I also used it when I was messing with Linux From Scratch, so I could see how it worked before trying to install it on actual hardware. That's what I still use VMWare for; doing test runs of risky software.
VirtualPC is a Macintosh program for people who need to run the occasional Windoze program. I don't know why they even bothered with a PC version. I also don't know why they compare it to VMWare.
I'm not familiar with Bochs, but it sounds to me like several layers of abstraction on the VMWare model. So of course it's slow. That's what layers of abstraction do!
So I'm not quite sure what the point of this article was. Someone want to fill me in?
Slashdot Mirror
Verizon refused to set me up with their DSL service when they found out that one of my computers was running Linux. They told me it wouldn't work. Even after I said I would hook the DSL up to my win2k box.
IANAL either, but I am in the US and this is how I understand the situation:
It is correct that a company can not bring criminal charges against a person or another company. When an individual sues another individual, it must be for a violation of civil law. The DMCA is a federal criminal law, so it is up to the US Justice Dept to per^H^Hrosecute victims. The FBI is like a police department; they do not engage in prosecutions, but they have the power to make arrests, conduct investigations with court orders, etc.
One of the many problems with the DMCA is that the line between civil and criminal prosecution is blurring. With Dmitry Skylarov, he was effectively arrested and prosecuted by Adobe; the FBI and the Justice Dept were willing participants, but I don't think there's much doubt that Adobe was calling the shots.
HP backing down from the DMCA threat is not enough to directly prevent a lawsuit. However, if HP will not cooperate in the prosecution (providing witnesses etc) due to public outcry, it is no longer worthwhile for the Justice Dept to prosecute, because they basically have no case. So again, it is not a question of actual policy but the effects of policy.
Hope this clears things up...
Actually, that's not true. (someone correct me if I'm wrong on this, but I think I'm close). When you compile gcc, it first compiles a version of itself (stage 1) using your current gcc. Then it uses stage 1 to compile itself again, resulting in stage 2. Finally, it compiles itself one more time using stage 2, resulting in stage 3. The build succeeds if and only if stage 2 and stage 3 are identical. This process ensures that your final gcc is free from any defects in the original gcc. Once you have a clean gcc, you can rebuild the rest of your system using it.
Take a look at www.linuxfromscratch.org to see how this works for an entire system.
A lot of college students have bandwidth like that. I used to be able to get speeds up to 900k/s when I lived in university housing.
But we didn't waste our time downloading movies. We just used Windoze file sharing to watch them from someone else's hard disk.
This is the same sort of attitude that Microsoft uses to convince people that their software is inherently more secure than anything open-source. If the software's security procedures are publicly available, so they say, how is possible for the procedures to be secure?
To which we respond, it's all about the implementation of those procedures. But you've all read that rant before.
(+1 Brings Back Memories)
Doesn't Sony have a music division which is part of the RIAA? And doesn't the RIAA make a concerted effort to stop people from ripping CDs? So how can Sony make a device to do just that? Is one division going to sue the other or something?
...if we could convince the article's web server that there were 25 hours a day, it would have an extra hour of CPU time and it wouldn't get slashdotted until AFTER some responses were posted.
I have the cell phone number from hell. I've had this number since August of last year. It's starting to quiet down now, but I used to get several calls a week for some guy who was in serious trouble with multiple credit card companies and god-only-knows who else, and just disappeared. One caller threatened legal action against me when I told him he had the wrong number. It used to be three calls per week at least. Now it's down to about two per month. After 11 months!!
This is an interesting thought, but it will never work for Microsoft. In my experience, most Linux users are much less tolerant of pieces of software that don't work together than most Windows users are. If I have to use a certain distro for a piece of software, then I won't be using that piece of software (especially since I use LFS). This could change if hordes of people suddenly started using Linux overnight, but that isn't going to happen. People who were already considering switching would start to do so, learn how things work in the world of Linux (where software must cooperate in order to be accepted), and be all ready to train the next set of newbies. If Microsoft understood how to penetrate that kind of market, they would have destroyed Linux already (not to mention Apple).
You're going to be hard-pressed to find a commercial solution which is more widely used (and therefore proven in the industry) than OpenSSH.
Former US President Richard Nixon can claim prior art on this. He recorded 18 and a half minutes of silence back in the 70s.
This is no fun. The map graphic is so big that we can't even slashdot the site because there isn't enough bandwidth.
It's fairly obvious that this article is a Microsoft-funded troll. But there's something much more sinister going on here.
Microsoft's best defense against Linux these days is that it is un-American (or worse, an illegal violation of intellectual property rights) to use free software. This article seems to me to take for granted the idea that all software must cost money, no matter what. Hence, they focus on RedHat (who is currently losing money) as a representative of all Linux users. They also assume that Linux has failed simply because it hasn't taken over the desktop market completely.
Articles like this aren't dangerous because they declare Linux dead. Even my computer-illiterate friends can explain to me why no article on MSNBC will ever say good things about Linux (or Solaris, or OS X, or FreeBSD, or BeOS, or OS/2, etc). This article is dangerous because of the ideas it gets into people's heads. For example, that all production-quality software is commerical. Or that open source is an affront to capitalism. Or that open-source is insecure, or that it violates intellectual property rights (not in this article, but in other places).
The question is, how do you fight against such widespread assumptions?
There is a very limited extent to which you can do this. I believe gnutella is perfectly happy to run on port 80...
Cable companies dropping their customers by raising prices isn't going to hurt P2P that much. The xxAAs are up against a much bigger enemy: college students. Most large universities have dorm-room ethernet connections which are far superior to cable modem access (I've had both, so I know the difference). A big problem with cable is that the upload speed sucks. Universities don't have that problem. And dorm-room ethernet isn't going away or going up in price just because the RIAA says it should. So maybe the cable companies can cause a few people inconvenience, but they can't win the RIAA's war.
Yes, a company most certainly can get away with imprisioning you. How quickly we forget what Adobe did to Dimitry Skylarov...
"Dozens of other governments have charged ICANN with being too dominated by U.S. interests"
So the solution is to put it under control of the US government. Does this sound as dumb to everyone else as it does to me?
When I hear stuff like this, I start to wonder what the real motivations are...
But not THAT cool.
:-P
They're a bit smarter than dumb terminals. But I have a feeling I'd either go nuts or quit fairly quickly in a setup like this. I like the feeling of being able to go to work in the morning, and sit at my desk where I always sit. Yes, I'm a sheep.
Besides, I bet the've got a Fire 15k serving these. You can do MUCH cooler things with a 106 CPU server than serve thousands of frame buffers
They told me their DSL used proprietary software that wouldn't work under Linux. Even if I hooked a Win2k box up to the DSL modem and the Linux machine just happened to be on my network.
:)
RoadRunner, on the other hand, was more than happy to have me as a customer after hearing that story
Um. Let's just remember who we're talking about here...Verizon isn't any better than the RIAA when it comes to corporate citizenship...I vaguely recall them suing 2600 for registering verizonsucks.com, and they refused to install DSL in my apartment when they found out one of my computers was running Linux.
This simply is not something we ever have to worry about. I'm sure Microsoft owns enough congresspeople that they could get it laughed off the floor. And they have significant interest in doing so, because they are going to be the first company the sharks go after if something like this becomes law.
:)
Microsoft is our friend here.
I didn't have any desire to see Blow. Then I got a shitty bootleg from gnutella. It looked like a very good movie. So I paid the NYC theater mafia $9.50 to see it on the big screen. So they actually profitted from me downloading a bottleg. I may even buy the DVD one of these days.
But the MPAA doesn't want you to know about people like me.
What else do you expect from the state that brought us Interstate 238?
He's comparing three completely different products as if they were similar.
I took a class last fall that required us to do some fairly intrusive kernel hacking in Linux using VMWare. It served that purpose fairly well; it was nice to be able to accidently fsck up your entire filesystem (no pun intended) without having to worry about losing your work. The only problem we had was that it absolutely refused to maintain the correct time.
I also used it when I was messing with Linux From Scratch, so I could see how it worked before trying to install it on actual hardware. That's what I still use VMWare for; doing test runs of risky software.
VirtualPC is a Macintosh program for people who need to run the occasional Windoze program. I don't know why they even bothered with a PC version. I also don't know why they compare it to VMWare.
I'm not familiar with Bochs, but it sounds to me like several layers of abstraction on the VMWare model. So of course it's slow. That's what layers of abstraction do!
So I'm not quite sure what the point of this article was. Someone want to fill me in?