I'm amazed this has got to be the first "battle of the OS's" type article I've read in a long time that not only presents the strengths and weakness's of the various OS's in a balanced and honest fashion but also presents a conclusion at the end of the article that makes logical sense based on the reviews given during the body of the article. I've gotten used to stories (usually involving NT or w2k) that slam a certain OS for performance, stability, and price at every turn but in the end give it their "Editors Choice" because it has prettier widgets than it's competitors. What I really liked best about this story is that not only did the conclusion mesh with the rest of the story but that the author didn't name one OS King of All Unix (on Intel) but gave a nice little chart with very logical recomendations. A nice use the right tool for the right job approach. To add yet another random and disconnected thought to this little ramble of a post, I noticed that the author seemed to put a very high weight on stability, on par with any *nix user I've met, which is nice because I personally value stability above all else for both my workstations and my servers. Ok I'm done with my little pre-coffee post;->
The old economic laws certainly don't work; the Net itself violates even the most basic law of supply and demand (supply is essentially infinite, but demand is clearly nonzero). The Open-Source ethic might be an answer, but it also might not. Your wrong on this point, the old laws are alive and well, and are in fact responcible for everything we are seeing on the internet today. Classical and neo-classical economic theory basically states that in free markets people will do what benefits them the best. Because of market forces this will also lead to people doing what is best for society. Why? Because the market represents societies wants/desires/needs. Adam Smith called it "harmony of interests" the market rewards people who give it what it wants. This applies to open source as well. A particular niche in the market has a desire for the source code to any software that they use, they are prepared to reward individuals and companies that provide it, the reward is often in the form of giving programming/testing help to the developer. Us OSS advocates also pay for free software, and will give preference to any commercial product that includes rights to the source code. It's capitalism baby.
Supply of IP is certainly not infinate, even on the 'Net! While the supply of copies of Godsmack's Voodoo may be unlimited, the supply of good music is limited. Only a small portion of the population has the musical talent needed to write and perform music that appeals to even a modest audience (say 10,000 fans, worldwide) and even among the talented only a few of them are able constantly create music that continues to appeal to us, and even those amazingly talented people are only able to create a limited number of songs per year. The same applies to movies, software,/. colums etc... Ya see there is scarcity in the world of IP, even on the Internet.
The current situation also fits pretty well with Karl Marx's Theory of Dialectic Materialism, which simply put says that over time technology will advance to a point where the old economic system in place can no longer cope and ends up constraining production and eventually there will be a revolution in which the old ideas are thrown out and a new economic system that reflects the new technology is put in place until eventually technology once again outpaces the system etc... Marx went on to say that every society goes through six stages (tibalism or primitive communism, slave-state, feudelism, capitalism, state socialism, utopian communism) The concept of dialetic materialism is fairly sound, in the West we've advanced all the way to stage four. A follower of the neo-classical school (such as myself) would argue that socialism/communism will never happen and free market capitalism is the final economic stage of a mature society, using the argument that capitalism is the only economic system with enough built in flexibility to cope with changing technology. Hell the oldest socialist nation in the world recently "reverted" to capitalism rather than "progressing" onward to communism, so that says something for my case;-> So rather than a revolution happening, companies in a capitalist market will respond to market conditions, entrepanuers(sp) will start new companies and some old ones will die, capitalism evovles with technology for the most part.
What clearly doesn't work today is mercantilism, which never really worked well in the first place. Katz calls it "corpratism" and thinks it's a new thing, but it's been around since before we were a country. Mercantilists have an appealing argument, they want to do what's best for the country, and what's best for the country is to: export goods for a profit, import less, prevent theft/piracy. Using these justifications they get stuff like the DMCA passed, which restrict consumer rights in order to preven piracy and protect profits (mostly from those evil foreign pirates). It's an old story, and I could go into a lot more detail about it but I just finished writing several pages on all of this for a Econ test yesterday and I'm kinda tired of it;->
For those interested in learning more about all of this, I'd suggest reading Wealth of Nations by Adam Smith, along with the writings of some popular mercantilists like Munn, or Colbert. It wouldn't hurt to read Marx either. For a good overview of economics I'd suggest either taking a History of Economics course or at least reading the textbook for one, I forget the authors of mine at the moment but if you email I'll send you more information when I have access to my notes and stuff.
Who the hell has streaming MPEG video for Linux? I'm not huge into webcasts and the like but I was under the impression that real video was our only option for this at the moment.
That's a good point, and I agree as far as new movies are concerned. I think initially this will work the best with older films, classics and stuff, and could do for independent file makers what MP3.com did for independent muscians (eventually, even current broadband offerings aren't quite fast enough for streaming video at a decent quality) What I really see for the future of movies on demmand is some type of union between broadband 'net access and digital cable. What I'd like to see is a situation like a few years down the road. You jump on the web and start searching movie on demand databases, you find what your looking for and purchase it for some really low price, like say $.50 for a "classic" flick and $1 for a new release. You then type in some sort of digital ID number for your digital cable box, plug in your password and bam 10 seconds later Casablanca (in B&W of course;-) is playing on your big screen HDTV set. The $.50 shows up on your cable bill, but you see you didn't order the movie from you cable co, they only served as an access provider ya see, they maybe get a cut of the $.50 from the content provider, most likely they survive off of selling access to the consumer. Once the bandwidth (and the encoding technology) exists in a few years this could very well be a reality, with a few modifications I'm sure. What we're seeing here is the first tenetive steps in that direction.
I really hope that Yahoo! decides to webcast these movies via something fairly cross platform like RealVideo (until an open source streaming video codec is released of course;-> ) to stream Bruce Lee to the masses. It would be a pretty big setback to Linux and other alt OS's (in the desktop market) if the first experiment in webcasting to a mass market audience is supported only on a single platform. In all fairness I'd like for Yahoo! to webcast in multiple formats, hopefully when this goes live we'll have the option of viewing in RealVideo, Netmeetings, Quicktime and Vivo (they still around?) the upside to that would be if RealVideo's numbers are higher than other formats the Linux community could that as one more peice of ammo to get Apple to port/open source quicktime to linux: "Look at usage numbers on RealVideo, check out the number of Linux clients that connected, wouldn't you like to tap into that?";->
The study is flawed mainly because it doesn't see the 'Net for what it is. That is to say they don't see it as a mere communications tool, and as a tool it is morally neutral. Like a baseball bat, a hammer or a handgun the Internet can be used for good or for evil, it can bring you closer to people or it can shut you off from them. It's all in what you see it as, and how you use it. For me the 'net is just another tool in my communications toolbox, depending who i'm communicating with and what's being communicated I make the choice between emailing, ICQing, calling or going over in person. Many times a lengthy ICQ conversation will turn into a phone call when I feel that the conversation has moved beyond ICQ's ability to keep up. It's also not uncommon for me to stop a long phone call and tell the person to come on over, I don't care what anyone else says communication face to face with another person is a much richer experiance than anything else. So much is told through body language and eye contact, that you simply miss with any other medium. Not to forget the ability of physical contact to really bring two people closer, or to express emotions that words only weakly describe. On the other hand, when it comes to a simple exchange of information that isn't deep or incredibly timely email rules, you can't beat it for sheer efficientcy. Need to reach alot specific people with some important news, you've got mailing lists, have a message you want the whole world to hear you've got the WWW at your disposal to get the word out cheaply and quickly. Just what the hell is my point you ask? I seem to have forgotten, I'm sure it's around here somewhere, lemme check.... Ok I've got it, the point that the Standford people missed is that the Internet needs to be seen as just one more way for humans to communicate and like any tool it can be overused and misapplied. If they want to do some work that actually helps people they should be looking into the causes for depression and what makes individuals fear social contact, and withdraw. Looking at how the Internet leads to social isolation is as valid as to looking at how baseball bat technology leads to lethal beatings, you need to look at the motives behind both to really do some good.
Another thing that the marketing types just don't get is the fact that in general geek types (I know we're no longer the only ones on the 'net but i'd wager that we still account for the bulk of the time spent online) aren't very responsive to advertising in general, at least among my other geek freinds. Marketing types try to reach the broadest possible base in their target demographic by trying to present a message that everyone (in that demographic) will relate to, ie the lowest common denominator. This approach works pretty well on "normal" and "average" people but tends to fall apart when presented to people who are not as mainstream (like most geeks) Think of how many damned commercials you've seen that insulted your intelligence or just plained irritated the piss out of you. The fact is most people do watch/listen to the ads in traditional media, and are influenced by them. I had to watch enough damned focus group videos and look at more fucking marketing breakdowns in an "intro to marketing class" i was forced to take to doubt that the boys on Madison Avenue have perfected advertising to a fine art when it comes to the general population. At any rate they know that geek types are a bad audience for advertising. I don't remember what our demographic is called but they don't much like people of above average intelligence, highly creative people, cynics and skeptics or those outside the mainstream. Ya see the problem people like us is that we are unpredictable, and we look for substance over style and pretty shiny things. That and for the most part our interests are varied enough that as a group we rarely congregate towards any one unifying thing and therefore are really hard to target./. is an exception of course and you'll notice that for the most part the banners here don't suck huge amounts of ass (except for the doubleclick ones that started popping up recently, but I use my firewall to block most all doubleclicks ads anyway) in fact it was/. banner that first turned me on to thinkgeek, which is a pretty damn cool store IMO. Oh I seem to have forgotten the point i waas trying to make when i started this comment, oh well.;->
Damn Straight. I personally could care less about watching movies on DVD either on my computer or my TV, VHS is just fine for me. What I do want and need is big, fast, affordable removable storage. I personally would have been just thrilled to death if no one had ever gotten the idea of watching DVD movies on computers so the whole DVD Forum would never had gotten worried about copyright protection and had simply come out with a single DVD-R/RW standard for computers first that worked, and stuck to it and let the MPAA people work out how to distribute movies all on their own. Just my thoughts, for what they are worth.
Well for starters I think the prank itself was funny as hell. As someone up above said it reminds me of the good old days when being online was about having a good time, not about business and politics. After reading news stories about the prank though, and particulary the comments by the Real Bill Clinton (tm) concerning the Internet and his understanding of it, I got really depressed. Evidently he only ever uses the net for ebay and amazon (and probably porn but who would admit that on a CNN interview?) and that he doesn't really understand it. Yet he felt qualified to sign the DMCA, both CDAs and other Internet legislation. Does this bother anyone else? The internet is arguably the most important new communications medium since the railroad was invented or the first telegraph lines were laid. I mean really, he's not qualified to make descisions about the internet, or any other high tech issues (like the DMCA) I know it's only a pipe dream but it would be nice if we could elect specialized leaders, ie, one body of government that dealt with purely internal matters, another that dealt with foreign affairs, and another for technology issues ect.. so each body has an elected president that is presumably qualified for the task at hand. For example, ESR would make a great technology president but would probably be weak in foreign affiars and trade relations. The government as a whole would still need one central leader to act in times of crisis and to arbitrate disputes between the various mini-governents whenever their paths cross, but would have very little daily administration type of stuff to do. Ahh hell what do i know, just talking outta my ass.;->
Remember cdrom caddies? were real popular once a upon time. I beleive plextor still makes a caddy version for a couple of their drives. If you've never encountered cdrom caddies they are basically jewel cases with the same sliding guard thingy 3.5" floppies use. They are kind of a pain in the ass though, unless you keep all your CD's in their very own caddy but then there's the space issue. That and I don't think anyone ever made audio cd players that used caddies, but I may be mistaken. A caddy drive may be an option if you wanted to build your own car MP3 player though.;->
But what if MS breaks up and and they clean house at the OS "Baby Microsoft?" They could take a cue from the Linux invation and get their act together as a fresh, new company.
I still can't decide if that would be good thing or not. I mean we already have a hard enough time competing with buggy, overpriced windows, what would happen if a smaller OS only M$ was created an then released a smaller, faster version of windows that actually didn't suck?;->
They likely won't have service packs, but special Windows 2000 Plus! packs put out a couple of times each year availble only at CompUSA for only $99! ;->
Also, How do you claim that you are read by highly technical linux geeks, when you rarely write about anything technical, much less a topic that can be highly technical.
Well for starters you are reading his work and commenting on it, and you claim to be a perl programmer and are probably a highly technical linux geek also. I'm a linux geek and I read Katz, I personally find him interesting and even though I don't always agree with him it's usually worth the 15 minutes it takes to read an article and some comments. You may want to re-read he post, he never claims to be a technocrat, more than once he says that he is just a writer, writing about stuff he's interested in and cares about.
Ahh this reaks of the same type of protectionist policies governments all of the world throughout time have laid down upon the helpless consumers in search of lower prices through free markets. On the bright side at least clemson is being honest about why are they are blocking access. I personally was waiting for the arcticle to mention either "protecting the childern" or "preventing piracy" instead they merely gave a real weak cover (bandwidth) and then quickly admitted to pure old greed, it's nice to see honesty in authority figures for a change.
Does anyone else have a problem with the fact that people who can't grasp the concept of email are the same ones that are now trying to legislate the 'net? In the past I have doubted Congress's ability to effectively understand and govern the internet, now I believe beyond a shadow of a doubt, that as a body Congress is completely and wholly unqualified for the task. No wonder the CDA's and DMCA's keep getting passed(of course the CDA is as much a Constitutional issue as it is a technology one, I had also once entertained hopes that perhaps congress had managed to figure out what the 1st amendment meant in the last 200 years.) This bunch of neo-luddites probably curl up in the fetal position and wet themselves anytime someone mentions "the internet" "childern" and "piracy" in the same sentence. As someone mentioned in an earlier post "congress typically lags about 10 years behind" when it comes to communications technology. Anyone else agree that the gap there is a little to fscking big?! This is just yet another case of our elected representives being completely out of touch with the people they are governing, and society in general, and not really caring what the people want. I'd wager by the sheer volume of email mentioned in the article that the people more communication with their representitives.
Well I have to agree with Rob on a starcraft port, that would kick major amounts of ass;-> I would also reall like to see halflife ported over to linux, in which case i wouldn't need to do my monthly reboot into windows anymore, and seeing as how they already have a half life server for linux, it seems only fair to allow us Linux geeks to actually play the game too. Other games I'd like to see on linux are (in a nearly random order): Age of Empires (1 and 2) Worms Blood 1 and 2 The whole spacequest series!
Ack. Recently during a department meeting our security guy was explaining to our PHB the steps he has taken to protect our general purpose internet server (web, ftp, email primairly) He told her about how we use ipchains firewall rules to protect the system and started talking about the IDS we recently installed (portsentry by Psionic Software which is some pretty impressive softare, and it's GPL'd) and how it responds to a portscan, which is to drop the route to the attacker completely by appending the ipchains ruleset. She initially told him to remove portsentry and the firewall rules because she "didn't like the idea of denying anyone access to our resources" I think a book like this could be very useful in such situations when the person in charge simply doesn't grasp the basic principles of network security (or really networks in general.) And if reading it doesn't help it sounds big and heavey enough to be used as an effective LART.;->
Since I run an IPMASQ/Firewall, at home, I just use ipchains rules to block out all traffic TO their servers: /sbin/ipchains -A output -j REJECT -d 199.95.207.0/24 /sbin/ipchains -A output -j REJECT -d 204.253.104.0/24 /sbin/ipchains -A output -j REJECT -d 199.95.208.0/24 /sbin/ipchains -A output -j REJECT -d 208.211.225.0/24
I only started doing this a few days ago (kinda profetic eh?) so I know i'm missing a few of the subnets their servers use (my rough guess is about 1 in 8 gets through;-( ) since i block traffic to their sites, their servers don't even get my IP address;->. If your machine isn't behind a firewall you control you can still run firewall rules locally to keep out unwanted crap and/or visitors;->
Ok well maybe not, though given the current batch of candidates I'd personally cast my vote towards Katz if he decided to run. But that is not the point of my post. From the comments I've read so far, most of us seem to think that the small steps we can personally take to combat the growing corporate threat are too slow and too ineffective to matter. Sadly those sentiments are probably correct. We are not likely to receive salvation at the hands of a clueful politician either. Therefore we can do one of two things; We can either sit around on slashdot complaining about the lack of options in our political system or we can stand up for ourselves by forming the Slashdot party and start fielding candidates. The sad truth of the matter is that no one is going to care if a bunch of linux geeks post revolutionary ideas on Slashdot. We have to bring our ideas to the "real" world, we need to take the ideas and ideals expressed here and do something with them. Plato (excuse my paraphrasing but I can't seem to find my copy of "The Republic")said that the just man becomes a leader not because he seeks power or money, but because to be ruled by the unjust is intolerable. He also goes on to say that the just leader doesn't rule the people but serves them, and watches out for their well being. Those words ring just as true today as they did 2000 years ago. Now is the time for just men and women to stand up against tyranny and seize the power that is rightfully theirs. For too long we have veiwed politics as something beyond the grasp of the average citizen, and because of that corporations now govern the government. Enough with the concept of passive resistance it's not working, boycotts and letter writing campaigns are all well and good but we really want to make waves, and get our issues in the public view the best way to do it is as an elected official, or even as a serious candidate. I can rant against censorship, corpratism and the eroding foundations of American democracy all I want as a common citizen and probably never be noticed or taken seriously. However if I make those issues my platform as a legitiment candidate (even if I don't win) I will get noticed, my ideas will get ink and airtime and issues will be brought out into daylight. Even a minor official, like a school board member, can make major waves by taking a strong idealogical stand. Small waves today could turn into a political tsunami in the next ten years, if we just stand up and flex our political muscles.
So I'm putting the call out to all Slashdotters to try and get one ours on your local ballot this year. Those of you that so eloquently post your freedom loving prose get up and prove that you really mean what you say here. This week I'll be investigating what it takes to get on the ballot for the school board here in Anchorage. If I'm able to run for a seat I'll announce my candiacy here on/. (assuming I can get the story posted) Anyone else interested in the concept of a Slashdot party please email me directly in addition to posting replies.
Breifly I have an account setup with janus.com that has the bulk of money spread across 3 of there funds plus a money market account. I still maintain an account with my brick and morter bank (not a problem since they now offer online banking) and since I have auto deposite of my paycheck and credit card autopay (off of my visa check card) setup for most of my bills I never actually have to go there or write checks for that matter. In fact I can safely ignore my snailmail completely now;-> With the janus setup I've bought into there Olympus fund (pretty tech heavey returned over %100 in 99, will probably have similar returns for a few more years if the this bull market continues) their growth and income fund which did around %35 in 99, and a global life sciences fund which is very new and as you might guess is invested in biotech pretty heavy, which to me seems like the next biggest growth area after the internet. Plus a money market account I keep becuase it has check writing abilities and I like having it for emergencies (since i don't have an actual credit card) The beauty part of the system is that since janus gives you full access to your funds online 24/7 I really can use them like very high interest savings account, and when the money is needed either have it in the money market account or my real checking account in a matter of minutes (unless the market is closed, then transactions are of course delayed untill 8am EST;-) Like I said with this system in place I never have to write checks, buy stamps or even actually check my snail mail, very smooth. I also have an account with schwab.com but with the amounts I'm dealing with their fees are just chewing me up and I'm going to switch to etrade or a similar outfit RSN. I hope this helps!
Lawyers are professionals who provide a service. They have to represent their clients in their clients best interests. They might not be the best for society, but so be it. Lawyers gerally are not in a position to take the higher ground. Most of the remarks hurled at lawyers should truly be redirected at the companies that they represent, because in reality they are calling the shots.
I don't buy into that argument. For starters the statement that lawyers can't/shouldn't take the higher ground because they're only duty is to faithfully represent the needs of their clients also applies to the compies they represent. The only legal duties a corporation has (that is the managers that run it) is to make their best effort to make a profit to the shareholders, this might not be what is best for society, but so be it. See where I'm going with this? We can all find ways to rationalize and justify behaviour we know to be wrong, most of it involves finger pointing and "i was just following orders" type statements. Lawyers don't HAVE to take every case presented to them. If Big Evil Company (tm) wants to sue The Little Guy (tm)into oblivian you can take the high ground, it's easy you can always say "No I won't take your case" and walk away. Being humans with all that free will and stuff we are perfectly capable of making moral decisions for oursleves, instead of merely sticking to the minimum required by law. Each of us can and should take a stand when we are asked to participate in something we know to be wrong, legal are or not. As a soon to be legal professional can you honestly say that you respect your future peers that sued McDonalds because some daft twit spilt coffee on themselves? Or the ones that helped the DVD mafia to harass and torment the people behind DEC-CSS? I think your wrong when you say that most/.ers don't understand how the legal profession works, I think most of us understand it well enough to be disgusted by it. It's simply mind blowing to me that a proffession that in this country, was founded on the principles of justice and truth has morphed into something so base and holds the general public in such low regard that the only reasoning behind some very anti-social (if not actually amoral) lawsuits given to the public is nothing more than "I was only following orders"
I'm personally of the opinion that not even a childs parents should have the right to censor what information they (the child) has access too. The whole concept that childern need "proctection" from ideas disgusts me, no one was ever harmed by learning something new or even seeing or hearing or reading something offensive or disgusting. The individual who actually does the reading or viewing has simply opened their mind a little more and developed better judgment. The real target censorship nazi's are trying to protect isn't the childern or innocent members of society, they're protecting themselves. From what are they protecting themselves you ask? Simple, from the childern, from the innoncent members of society. Knowledge is power, and people in power want to keep it under wraps. Parents want to control the way their childern grow up, want to decide when and how they learn about life. Governments want to control what their citizens know. If it's a "democracy" those in power want to keep the voters from knowing their dirty laundry and backroom deals, while at the same time very much want them to know what nasty stuff their opponents have pulled. Despotic governments don't want their citizens to know anything that would make them question the authority of the goverment so they ban books, censor the internet(or block it entirely) and even murder their own citizens to keep them silent. No matter who is doing it, parents, governments or the media censorship of anyone at all is not only wrong but hypocritical as well. If we are not careful we could all end up living in a "Brave New World" where only one man in civilized society can read Shakespere. The rest of us will be doped up on soma and loaded with subliminal programming.
So I say: Everyone, everywhere of every age, of every race, in every country has the right to have access to anything and everything ever written, filmed, photographed, recorded or scanned.
To answer the obvisious questions, no I don't have kids now, I would like to eventully though. And when I do I will let them read and watch whatever they want, from day 1. Even at 8 years old if they really want to read Mein Kampf while downloading the complete Mapelthorpe(sp?) collection with Debbie Does Dallas on their TV, I won't stop them. I figure if they are old enough to take an interest they are old enough to learn about it, whatever it is they are learning about. Like I said before, knowledge is power and I sure as hell want my (future) kids to be able to kick some ass when they grow up.
The implication of adapting this tax system to online transactions would be to treat it as any other out-of-state transaction - ie the purchaser would have to declare it and pay tax on it when it entered the state.
Good point, i guess I should've said when applied to out of state transactions. Because in the case of tradional mail order the state still doesn't play a part in making the transaction happen, state services don't in anyway contribute to the proccess. The seller pays to have a catalogue sent to you (pays the Post Office, a federal service) you then call them (on a phone line you've already paid for) or mail them (again pay for the service directly, to the post office) an order form with a selection and the correct amount of money, including enough for the delivery service. The consumer, and the seller, in any mail order/internet transaction is already directly paying for all the services needed to make it possible.
At best taxing internet/mail order transactions subsidizes local brick and mortar stores that do need state services in order to do business, at worst it slows the growth of internet commerce and takes away the competitive advantage of online businesses.
actually they can. several states now, including alaska have legalized hemp for medical reasons, depsite the fact that Federally it's still illegal. If AK does re-legalize hemp the feds can come in and arrest people for it but they cannot legally even ask for the cooperation of the local authorities, nor can they make use of any state resources for the arrest, transport and holding of suspects in this case. This applies to every state and on every law where state law contradicts federal law. Besides the states have the right to pass whatever laws they want and the feds can't do anything to force a change. In the recent past the Federal government has tied public funding to other often unrelated issues. The best example is for federal highway dollars, at one time congress hung a few provisions on to recieving these funds, one was to adopt a 55mph speed limit (which -thank god- has been removed) and one requiring that states raise the legal drinking age from 18 to 21. Now that funding isn't tied to the speed limit, most states have done away with the 55mph BS. The federal government would still prefer that we alld rive 55, but can't do a damn thing about it. Unless they start tying federal funding to not legalizing hemp, they have no power to stop any state from legalizing it. At worst they could deny us some grant or the other but they couldn't actually make any arrests. Unless some damn fool starts exporting it to other states, then the feds got em because interstate commerce is handeled federally, as well as crimes that cross state lines.
Oh yea I almost forgot, another good reason to consider relocating to Alaska: There's a big push going on now to RE-legalize hemp for recreational use, looks like it will get on the ballat this year too. If it does it stands a REAL good chance of passing;->
Slashdot Mirror
I'm amazed this has got to be the first "battle of the OS's" type article I've read in a long time that not only presents the strengths and weakness's of the various OS's in a balanced and honest fashion but also presents a conclusion at the end of the article that makes logical sense based on the reviews given during the body of the article. I've gotten used to stories (usually involving NT or w2k) that slam a certain OS for performance, stability, and price at every turn but in the end give it their "Editors Choice" because it has prettier widgets than it's competitors. What I really liked best about this story is that not only did the conclusion mesh with the rest of the story but that the author didn't name one OS King of All Unix (on Intel) but gave a nice little chart with very logical recomendations. A nice use the right tool for the right job approach. To add yet another random and disconnected thought to this little ramble of a post, I noticed that the author seemed to put a very high weight on stability, on par with any *nix user I've met, which is nice because I personally value stability above all else for both my workstations and my servers. Ok I'm done with my little pre-coffee post ;->
Supply of IP is certainly not infinate, even on the 'Net! While the supply of copies of Godsmack's Voodoo may be unlimited, the supply of good music is limited. Only a small portion of the population has the musical talent needed to write and perform music that appeals to even a modest audience (say 10,000 fans, worldwide) and even among the talented only a few of them are able constantly create music that continues to appeal to us, and even those amazingly talented people are only able to create a limited number of songs per year. The same applies to movies, software, /. colums etc... Ya see there is scarcity in the world of IP, even on the Internet.
The current situation also fits pretty well with Karl Marx's Theory of Dialectic Materialism, which simply put says that over time technology will advance to a point where the old economic system in place can no longer cope and ends up constraining production and eventually there will be a revolution in which the old ideas are thrown out and a new economic system that reflects the new technology is put in place until eventually technology once again outpaces the system etc... Marx went on to say that every society goes through six stages (tibalism or primitive communism, slave-state, feudelism, capitalism, state socialism, utopian communism) The concept of dialetic materialism is fairly sound, in the West we've advanced all the way to stage four. A follower of the neo-classical school (such as myself) would argue that socialism/communism will never happen and free market capitalism is the final economic stage of a mature society, using the argument that capitalism is the only economic system with enough built in flexibility to cope with changing technology. Hell the oldest socialist nation in the world recently "reverted" to capitalism rather than "progressing" onward to communism, so that says something for my case ;-> So rather than a revolution happening, companies in a capitalist market will respond to market conditions, entrepanuers(sp) will start new companies and some old ones will die, capitalism evovles with technology for the most part.
What clearly doesn't work today is mercantilism, which never really worked well in the first place. Katz calls it "corpratism" and thinks it's a new thing, but it's been around since before we were a country. Mercantilists have an appealing argument, they want to do what's best for the country, and what's best for the country is to: export goods for a profit, import less, prevent theft/piracy. Using these justifications they get stuff like the DMCA passed, which restrict consumer rights in order to preven piracy and protect profits (mostly from those evil foreign pirates). It's an old story, and I could go into a lot more detail about it but I just finished writing several pages on all of this for a Econ test yesterday and I'm kinda tired of it ;->
For those interested in learning more about all of this, I'd suggest reading Wealth of Nations by Adam Smith, along with the writings of some popular mercantilists like Munn, or Colbert. It wouldn't hurt to read Marx either. For a good overview of economics I'd suggest either taking a History of Economics course or at least reading the textbook for one, I forget the authors of mine at the moment but if you email I'll send you more information when I have access to my notes and stuff.
Who the hell has streaming MPEG video for Linux? I'm not huge into webcasts and the like but I was under the impression that real video was our only option for this at the moment.
That's a good point, and I agree as far as new movies are concerned. I think initially this will work the best with older films, classics and stuff, and could do for independent file makers what MP3.com did for independent muscians (eventually, even current broadband offerings aren't quite fast enough for streaming video at a decent quality) ;-) is playing on your big screen HDTV set. The $.50 shows up on your cable bill, but you see you didn't order the movie from you cable co, they only served as an access provider ya see, they maybe get a cut of the $.50 from the content provider, most likely they survive off of selling access to the consumer. Once the bandwidth (and the encoding technology) exists in a few years this could very well be a reality, with a few modifications I'm sure. What we're seeing here is the first tenetive steps in that direction.
What I really see for the future of movies on demmand is some type of union between broadband 'net access and digital cable. What I'd like to see is a situation like a few years down the road. You jump on the web and start searching movie on demand databases, you find what your looking for and purchase it for some really low price, like say $.50 for a "classic" flick and $1 for a new release. You then type in some sort of digital ID number for your digital cable box, plug in your password and bam 10 seconds later Casablanca (in B&W of course
I really hope that Yahoo! decides to webcast these movies via something fairly cross platform like RealVideo (until an open source streaming video codec is released of course ;-> ) to stream Bruce Lee to the masses. It would be a pretty big setback to Linux and other alt OS's (in the desktop market) if the first experiment in webcasting to a mass market audience is supported only on a single platform. In all fairness I'd like for Yahoo! to webcast in multiple formats, hopefully when this goes live we'll have the option of viewing in RealVideo, Netmeetings, Quicktime and Vivo (they still around?) the upside to that would be if RealVideo's numbers are higher than other formats the Linux community could that as one more peice of ammo to get Apple to port/open source quicktime to linux: "Look at usage numbers on RealVideo, check out the number of Linux clients that connected, wouldn't you like to tap into that?" ;->
The study is flawed mainly because it doesn't see the 'Net for what it is.
That is to say they don't see it as a mere communications tool, and as a
tool it is morally neutral. Like a baseball bat, a hammer or a handgun the
Internet can be used for good or for evil, it can bring you closer to people
or it can shut you off from them. It's all in what you see it as, and how
you use it.
For me the 'net is just another tool in my communications toolbox, depending
who i'm communicating with and what's being communicated I make the choice
between emailing, ICQing, calling or going over in person. Many times a
lengthy ICQ conversation will turn into a phone call when I feel that the
conversation has moved beyond ICQ's ability to keep up. It's also not
uncommon for me to stop a long phone call and tell the person to come on
over, I don't care what anyone else says communication face to face with
another person is a much richer experiance than anything else. So much is
told through body language and eye contact, that you simply miss with any
other medium. Not to forget the ability of physical contact to really bring
two people closer, or to express emotions that words only weakly describe.
On the other hand, when it comes to a simple exchange of information that
isn't deep or incredibly timely email rules, you can't beat it for sheer
efficientcy. Need to reach alot specific people with some important
news, you've got mailing lists, have a message you want the whole world to
hear you've got the WWW at your disposal to get the word out cheaply and
quickly.
Just what the hell is my point you ask? I seem to have forgotten, I'm sure
it's around here somewhere, lemme check.... Ok I've got it, the point that
the Standford people missed is that the Internet needs to be seen as just
one more way for humans to communicate and like any tool it can be overused
and misapplied. If they want to do some work that actually helps people they
should be looking into the causes for depression and what makes individuals
fear social contact, and withdraw. Looking at how the Internet leads to
social isolation is as valid as to looking at how baseball bat technology
leads to lethal beatings, you need to look at the motives behind both to
really do some good.
Another thing that the marketing types just don't get is the fact that in general geek types (I know we're no longer the only ones on the 'net but i'd wager that we still account for the bulk of the time spent online) aren't very responsive to advertising in general, at least among my other geek freinds. Marketing types try to reach the broadest possible base in their target demographic by trying to present a message that everyone (in that demographic) will relate to, ie the lowest common denominator. This approach works pretty well on "normal" and "average" people but tends to fall apart when presented to people who are not as mainstream (like most geeks) /. is an exception of course and you'll notice that for the most part the banners here don't suck huge amounts of ass (except for the doubleclick ones that started popping up recently, but I use my firewall to block most all doubleclicks ads anyway) in fact it was /. banner that first turned me on to thinkgeek, which is a pretty damn cool store IMO. ;->
Think of how many damned commercials you've seen that insulted your intelligence or just plained irritated the piss out of you. The fact is most people do watch/listen to the ads in traditional media, and are influenced by them. I had to watch enough damned focus group videos and look at more fucking marketing breakdowns in an "intro to marketing class" i was forced to take to doubt that the boys on Madison Avenue have perfected advertising to a fine art when it comes to the general population. At any rate they know that geek types are a bad audience for advertising. I don't remember what our demographic is called but they don't much like people of above average intelligence, highly creative people, cynics and skeptics or those outside the mainstream. Ya see the problem people like us is that we are unpredictable, and we look for substance over style and pretty shiny things. That and for the most part our interests are varied enough that as a group we rarely congregate towards any one unifying thing and therefore are really hard to target.
Oh I seem to have forgotten the point i waas trying to make when i started this comment, oh well.
Damn Straight. I personally could care less about watching movies on DVD either on my computer or my TV, VHS is just fine for me. What I do want and need is big, fast, affordable removable storage. I personally would have been just thrilled to death if no one had ever gotten the idea of watching DVD movies on computers so the whole DVD Forum would never had gotten worried about copyright protection and had simply come out with a single DVD-R/RW standard for computers first that worked, and stuck to it and let the MPAA people work out how to distribute movies all on their own. Just my thoughts, for what they are worth.
Well for starters I think the prank itself was funny as hell. As someone up above said it reminds me of the good old days when being online was about having a good time, not about business and politics. After reading news stories about the prank though, and particulary the comments by the Real Bill Clinton (tm) concerning the Internet and his understanding of it, I got really depressed. Evidently he only ever uses the net for ebay and amazon (and probably porn but who would admit that on a CNN interview?) and that he doesn't really understand it. Yet he felt qualified to sign the DMCA, both CDAs and other Internet legislation. Does this bother anyone else? The internet is arguably the most important new communications medium since the railroad was invented or the first telegraph lines were laid. I mean really, he's not qualified to make descisions about the internet, or any other high tech issues (like the DMCA) I know it's only a pipe dream but it would be nice if we could elect specialized leaders, ie, one body of government that dealt with purely internal matters, another that dealt with foreign affairs, and another for technology issues ect.. so each body has an elected president that is presumably qualified for the task at hand. For example, ESR would make a great technology president but would probably be weak in foreign affiars and trade relations. The government as a whole would still need one central leader to act in times of crisis and to arbitrate disputes between the various mini-governents whenever their paths cross, but would have very little daily administration type of stuff to do. ;->
Ahh hell what do i know, just talking outta my ass.
Remember cdrom caddies? were real popular once a upon time. I beleive plextor still makes a caddy version for a couple of their drives. If you've never encountered cdrom caddies they are basically jewel cases with the same sliding guard thingy 3.5" floppies use. They are kind of a pain in the ass though, unless you keep all your CD's in their very own caddy but then there's the space issue. That and I don't think anyone ever made audio cd players that used caddies, but I may be mistaken. A caddy drive may be an option if you wanted to build your own car MP3 player though. ;->
I still can't decide if that would be good thing or not. I mean we already have a hard enough time competing with buggy, overpriced windows, what would happen if a smaller OS only M$ was created an then released a smaller, faster version of windows that actually didn't suck? ;->
They likely won't have service packs, but special Windows 2000 Plus! packs put out a couple of times each year availble only at CompUSA for only $99!
;->
Also, How do you claim that you are read by highly technical linux geeks, when you rarely write about anything technical, much less a topic that can be highly technical.
Well for starters you are reading his work and commenting on it, and you claim to be a perl programmer and are probably a highly technical linux geek also. I'm a linux geek and I read Katz, I personally find him interesting and even though I don't always agree with him it's usually worth the 15 minutes it takes to read an article and some comments. You may want to re-read he post, he never claims to be a technocrat, more than once he says that he is just a writer, writing about stuff he's interested in and cares about.
Ahh this reaks of the same type of protectionist policies governments all of the world throughout time have laid down upon the helpless consumers in search of lower prices through free markets. On the bright side at least clemson is being honest about why are they are blocking access. I personally was waiting for the arcticle to mention either "protecting the childern" or "preventing piracy" instead they merely gave a real weak cover (bandwidth) and then quickly admitted to pure old greed, it's nice to see honesty in authority figures for a change.
Does anyone else have a problem with the fact that people who can't grasp the concept of email are the same ones that are now trying to legislate the 'net? In the past I have doubted Congress's ability to effectively understand and govern the internet, now I believe beyond a shadow of a doubt, that as a body Congress is completely and wholly unqualified for the task. No wonder the CDA's and DMCA's keep getting passed(of course the CDA is as much a Constitutional issue as it is a technology one, I had also once entertained hopes that perhaps congress had managed to figure out what the 1st amendment meant in the last 200 years.) This bunch of neo-luddites probably curl up in the fetal position and wet themselves anytime someone mentions "the internet" "childern" and "piracy" in the same sentence.
As someone mentioned in an earlier post "congress typically lags about 10 years behind" when it comes to communications technology. Anyone else agree that the gap there is a little to fscking big?! This is just yet another case of our elected representives being completely out of touch with the people they are governing, and society in general, and not really caring what the people want. I'd wager by the sheer volume of email mentioned in the article that the people more communication with their representitives.
Well I have to agree with Rob on a starcraft port, that would kick major amounts of ass ;->
I would also reall like to see halflife ported over to linux, in which case i wouldn't need to do my monthly reboot into windows anymore, and seeing as how they already have a half life server for linux, it seems only fair to allow us Linux geeks to actually play the game too.
Other games I'd like to see on linux are (in a nearly random order):
Age of Empires (1 and 2)
Worms
Blood 1 and 2
The whole spacequest series!
That's about it for me.
Ack. Recently during a department meeting our security guy was explaining to our PHB the steps he has taken to protect our general purpose internet server (web, ftp, email primairly) He told her about how we use ipchains firewall rules to protect the system and started talking about the IDS we recently installed (portsentry by Psionic Software which is some pretty impressive softare, and it's GPL'd) and how it responds to a portscan, which is to drop the route to the attacker completely by appending the ipchains ruleset. She initially told him to remove portsentry and the firewall rules because she "didn't like the idea of denying anyone access to our resources" ;->
I think a book like this could be very useful in such situations when the person in charge simply doesn't grasp the basic principles of network security (or really networks in general.) And if reading it doesn't help it sounds big and heavey enough to be used as an effective LART.
Since I run an IPMASQ/Firewall, at home, I just use ipchains rules to block out all traffic TO their servers:
/sbin/ipchains -A output -j REJECT -d 199.95.207.0/24
/sbin/ipchains -A output -j REJECT -d 204.253.104.0/24
/sbin/ipchains -A output -j REJECT -d 199.95.208.0/24
/sbin/ipchains -A output -j REJECT -d 208.211.225.0/24
;-( ) since i block traffic to their sites, their servers don't even get my IP address ;->. If your machine isn't behind a firewall you control you can still run firewall rules locally to keep out unwanted crap and/or visitors ;->
I only started doing this a few days ago (kinda profetic eh?) so I know i'm missing a few of the subnets their servers use (my rough guess is about 1 in 8 gets through
Ok well maybe not, though given the current batch of candidates I'd personally cast my vote towards Katz if he decided to run.
/. (assuming I can get the story posted) Anyone else interested in the concept of a Slashdot party please email me directly in addition to posting replies.
But that is not the point of my post. From the comments I've read so far, most of us seem to think that the small steps we can personally take to combat the growing corporate threat are too slow and too ineffective to matter. Sadly those sentiments are probably correct. We are not likely to receive salvation at the hands of a clueful politician either. Therefore we can do one of two things; We can either sit around on slashdot complaining about the lack of options in our political system or we can stand up for ourselves by forming the Slashdot party and start fielding candidates. The sad truth of the matter is that no one is going to care if a bunch of linux geeks post revolutionary ideas on Slashdot. We have to bring our ideas to the "real" world, we need to take the ideas and ideals expressed here and do something with them.
Plato (excuse my paraphrasing but I can't seem to find my copy of "The Republic")said that the just man becomes a leader not because he seeks power or money, but because to be ruled by the unjust is intolerable. He also goes on to say that the just leader doesn't rule the people but serves them, and watches out for their well being. Those words ring just as true today as they did 2000 years ago. Now is the time for just men and women to stand up against tyranny and seize the power that is rightfully theirs. For too long we have veiwed politics as something beyond the grasp of the average citizen, and because of that corporations now govern the government.
Enough with the concept of passive resistance it's not working, boycotts and letter writing campaigns are all well and good but we really want to make waves, and get our issues in the public view the best way to do it is as an elected official, or even as a serious candidate. I can rant against censorship, corpratism and the eroding foundations of American democracy all I want as a common citizen and probably never be noticed or taken seriously. However if I make those issues my platform as a legitiment candidate (even if I don't win) I will get noticed, my ideas will get ink and airtime and issues will be brought out into daylight. Even a minor official, like a school board member, can make major waves by taking a strong idealogical stand. Small waves today could turn into a political tsunami in the next ten years, if we just stand up and flex our political muscles.
So I'm putting the call out to all Slashdotters to try and get one ours on your local ballot this year. Those of you that so eloquently post your freedom loving prose get up and prove that you really mean what you say here. This week I'll be investigating what it takes to get on the ballot for the school board here in Anchorage. If I'm able to run for a seat I'll announce my candiacy here on
Breifly I have an account setup with janus.com that has the bulk of money spread across 3 of there funds plus a money market account. I still maintain an account with my brick and morter bank (not a problem since they now offer online banking) and since I have auto deposite of my paycheck and credit card autopay (off of my visa check card) setup for most of my bills I never actually have to go there or write checks for that matter. In fact I can safely ignore my snailmail completely now ;-> With the janus setup I've bought into there Olympus fund (pretty tech heavey returned over %100 in 99, will probably have similar returns for a few more years if the this bull market continues) their growth and income fund which did around %35 in 99, and a global life sciences fund which is very new and as you might guess is invested in biotech pretty heavy, which to me seems like the next biggest growth area after the internet. Plus a money market account I keep becuase it has check writing abilities and I like having it for emergencies (since i don't have an actual credit card) The beauty part of the system is that since janus gives you full access to your funds online 24/7 I really can use them like very high interest savings account, and when the money is needed either have it in the money market account or my real checking account in a matter of minutes (unless the market is closed, then transactions are of course delayed untill 8am EST ;-) Like I said with this system in place I never have to write checks, buy stamps or even actually check my snail mail, very smooth. I also have an account with schwab.com but with the amounts I'm dealing with their fees are just chewing me up and I'm going to switch to etrade or a similar outfit RSN.
I hope this helps!
Lawyers are professionals who provide a service. They have to represent their clients in their clients best interests. They might not be the best for society, but so be it. Lawyers gerally are not in a position to take the higher ground. Most of the remarks hurled at lawyers should truly be redirected at the companies that they represent, because in reality they are calling the shots.
/.ers don't understand how the legal profession works, I think most of us understand it well enough to be disgusted by it. It's simply mind blowing to me that a proffession that in this country, was founded on the principles of justice and truth has morphed into something so base and holds the general public in such low regard that the only reasoning behind some very anti-social (if not actually amoral) lawsuits given to the public is nothing more than "I was only following orders"
I don't buy into that argument. For starters the statement that lawyers can't/shouldn't take the higher ground because they're only duty is to faithfully represent the needs of their clients also applies to the compies they represent. The only legal duties a corporation has (that is the managers that run it) is to make their best effort to make a profit to the shareholders, this might not be what is best for society, but so be it. See where I'm going with this? We can all find ways to rationalize and justify behaviour we know to be wrong, most of it involves finger pointing and "i was just following orders" type statements. Lawyers don't HAVE to take every case presented to them. If Big Evil Company (tm) wants to sue The Little Guy (tm)into oblivian you can take the high ground, it's easy you can always say "No I won't take your case" and walk away.
Being humans with all that free will and stuff we are perfectly capable of making moral decisions for oursleves, instead of merely sticking to the minimum required by law. Each of us can and should take a stand when we are asked to participate in something we know to be wrong, legal are or not. As a soon to be legal professional can you honestly say that you respect your future peers that sued McDonalds because some daft twit spilt coffee on themselves? Or the ones that helped the DVD mafia to harass and torment the people behind DEC-CSS?
I think your wrong when you say that most
I'm personally of the opinion that not even a childs parents should have the right to censor what information they (the child) has access too. The whole concept that childern need "proctection" from ideas disgusts me, no one was ever harmed by learning something new or even seeing or hearing or reading something offensive or disgusting. The individual who actually does the reading or viewing has simply opened their mind a little more and developed better judgment.
The real target censorship nazi's are trying to protect isn't the childern or innocent members of society, they're protecting themselves. From what are they protecting themselves you ask? Simple, from the childern, from the innoncent members of society. Knowledge is power, and people in power want to keep it under wraps. Parents want to control the way their childern grow up, want to decide when and how they learn about life. Governments want to control what their citizens know. If it's a "democracy" those in power want to keep the voters from knowing their dirty laundry and backroom deals, while at the same time very much want them to know what nasty stuff their opponents have pulled. Despotic governments don't want their citizens to know anything that would make them question the authority of the goverment so they ban books, censor the internet(or block it entirely) and even murder their own citizens to keep them silent.
No matter who is doing it, parents, governments or the media censorship of anyone at all is not only wrong but hypocritical as well. If we are not careful we could all end up living in a "Brave New World" where only one man in civilized society can read Shakespere. The rest of us will be doped up on soma and loaded with subliminal programming.
So I say: Everyone, everywhere of every age, of every race, in every country has the right to have access to anything and everything ever written, filmed, photographed, recorded or scanned.
To answer the obvisious questions, no I don't have kids now, I would like to eventully though. And when I do I will let them read and watch whatever they want, from day 1. Even at 8 years old if they really want to read Mein Kampf while downloading the complete Mapelthorpe(sp?) collection with Debbie Does Dallas on their TV, I won't stop them. I figure if they are old enough to take an interest they are old enough to learn about it, whatever it is they are learning about. Like I said before, knowledge is power and I sure as hell want my (future) kids to be able to kick some ass when they grow up.
The implication of adapting this tax system to online transactions would be to treat it as any other out-of-state transaction - ie the purchaser would have to declare it and pay tax on it when it entered the state.
Good point, i guess I should've said when applied to out of state transactions. Because in the case of tradional mail order the state still doesn't play a part in making the transaction happen, state services don't in anyway contribute to the proccess. The seller pays to have a catalogue sent to you (pays the Post Office, a federal service) you then call them (on a phone line you've already paid for) or mail them (again pay for the service directly, to the post office) an order form with a selection and the correct amount of money, including enough for the delivery service. The consumer, and the seller, in any mail order/internet transaction is already directly paying for all the services needed to make it possible.
At best taxing internet/mail order transactions subsidizes local brick and mortar stores that do need state services in order to do business, at worst it slows the growth of internet commerce and takes away the competitive advantage of online businesses.
actually they can. several states now, including alaska have legalized hemp for medical reasons, depsite the fact that Federally it's still illegal. If AK does re-legalize hemp the feds can come in and arrest people for it but they cannot legally even ask for the cooperation of the local authorities, nor can they make use of any state resources for the arrest, transport and holding of suspects in this case. This applies to every state and on every law where state law contradicts federal law. Besides the states have the right to pass whatever laws they want and the feds can't do anything to force a change. In the recent past the Federal government has tied public funding to other often unrelated issues. The best example is for federal highway dollars, at one time congress hung a few provisions on to recieving these funds, one was to adopt a 55mph speed limit (which -thank god- has been removed) and one requiring that states raise the legal drinking age from 18 to 21.
Now that funding isn't tied to the speed limit, most states have done away with the 55mph BS. The federal government would still prefer that we alld rive 55, but can't do a damn thing about it.
Unless they start tying federal funding to not legalizing hemp, they have no power to stop any state from legalizing it. At worst they could deny us some grant or the other but they couldn't actually make any arrests. Unless some damn fool starts exporting it to other states, then the feds got em because interstate commerce is handeled federally, as well as crimes that cross state lines.
Oh yea I almost forgot, another good reason to consider relocating to Alaska: There's a big push going on now to RE-legalize hemp for recreational use, looks like it will get on the ballat this year too. If it does it stands a REAL good chance of passing ;->