All three credit agencies allow consumers to request that no new credit be granted. This includes both "instant credit" and new credit card offers. It's a really good idea unless you enjoy kiting your debt between different credit cards.
If you want to change banks, you can always shop for a better rate on-line and then request an account application from the bank you decide best fits your needs. This will probably be a better rate than the unsolicted card offers you get in the mail.
If they can make a smaller version with the battery in a backpack, I want one. Sounds like the perfect way to get my Christmas shopping done in a reasonable amount of time regardless of how crowded the stores are.
You missed the point. The idea is that they are "comparing notes" about autonomous model airplanes; not UAVs. The two terms actually mean the same thing but UAV has taken on a military use connotation. Model airplanes are still considered toys. There are quite a few instances of people all over the world "comparing notes" regarding various hobbies without running up against weapon export laws, prohibitions on contact, etc. The idea is to re-cast the subject of the discussion as something nonthreatening, not a weapon, etc.
You are not exporting plans for a UAV! You and your friends are simply comparing notes on how to build autonomus flying model airplanes. UAVs are weapons. Model airplanes are toys.
Radio controlled flying models have been around for a long time and no one considers them to be weapons. Functionally identical radio controlled drones and especially the larger ones are (e.g., Predator, Global Hawk, etc.). Adding a level of automonmy to a radio controlled "toy" shouldn't make it into a weapon. Making it big enough to carry some sort of ordnance probably does.
Cheers, Dave
P.S. IANAL, YMMV. They make the rules. If a rule doesn't work the way they want it to, they change the rule.
The kid got an interview on CNBC. Not quite fifteen minutes of fame but at least a couple. He also managed to get in a plug for "information wants to be free" and to note that what he did is explicitly legal.
Not trying to be funny but this is why I would tell the OP that it will take an infinite amount of money to replace the Internet. If you can ever get agreement on the technical issues you will then be forced to also deal with non-technical isues like porn (Think of the children), spam, politically sensetive content (Think of the dictators), phishing (Think of the corporations), etc. You will never be able to get everyone to agree. The only reason the existing Internet has its current freedoms is that it was never intended to become a public network. Don't expect any replacement Internet to have anywhere near the freedoms that exist on the current one.
If you try to replace the existing Internet, be prepared to deal with both the technical issues and the non-technical ones. Some of the technical changes will happen over time since the IETF moves the Internet forward as fast as it can but don't expect a clean slate replacement to be created anytime soon. If anything, I'd expect a replacement Internet to resemble broadcast media with government agencies deciding who can provide content and what the content will be. I think I'll stick with the existing Internet (warts and all) and just hope the IETF can keep making it faster.
Yeah, but since he's British it would have been calling him a "biscuit" which would have just gotten everybody confused.
The original usage of "hacker" (circa late 1970s) was someone who was *unskilled* at programming. Hacking at a program meant making random changes with little understanding of the problem until something approaching the correct answer appeared (usually a futile approach).
How many game consoles are open? Abolish copyright and companies like Microsoft will just market closed computers akin to gaming consoles. They will abscond with any open code they like but will have no incentive to give back to the open source community. This business model already works with gaming consoles.
Nothing stops you from running the TiVo software on alternative hardware now. The gotcha is that the TiVo services aren't available to you. For that matter, there are open source DVR projects like MythTV that already provide an open alternative. What people would like to be able to do is use TiVo services for scheduling what gets recorded but then do whatever they want with the recorded data. This violates the DRM agreements TiVo had to agree to in order to not get sued by the TV networks for providing a mechanism for unauthorized recording.
TiVo's business model is to provide people with a DVR at more or less cost and then make money by charging subscribers for using the device to schedule the shows they want to record. They actually have a pretty slick system that allows subscribers to schedule recordings when away from their system. This only works with the DRM baggage with a closed system.
Look into how open game consoles are. The answer is that they aren't. Without hacking the hardware you can't do anything but play the games offered by the console manufacturer. It wouldn't be hard at all to include copy protection mechanisms (e.g., the console validates that whatever has been inserted is a valid copy). Now extrapolate that to computers. You buy a console computer from whoever offers one and you are tied to their closed system. The GPL and copyright is what provides an open alternative to this. Take away copyright that protects GPLed code from being used in ways the authors don't agree with and you probably lose a viable open source development community.
I don't have a problem with copyrights or patents. I don't agree with software patents but that's a side issue. Any company that invests a huge amount of money into developing some product wants to know that they will get a reasonable return on that investment. Ditto for people who create copyrightable material (books, programs, etc.). For GPL developers that return is knowing they have contributed to an "open" software world.
There are some folks who take that position but they are generally *NOT* GPL proponents. Copyright is what gives the GPL teeth. GPLed code is freely available but it can only be modified and redistributed under the terms of the GPL. Why? Because it's copyrighted. Only agreeing to the terms of the GPL gives someone the right to modify and redistribute the code. Remove copyrights and anyone (Microsoft, SCO, TiVo, etc.) can do whatever they like with Linux.
That's where the whole TiVo thing comes in. Can someone create hardware that restricts the modifications an end user can make to GPLed code? The TiVo source code is freely available as per the GPL. A TiVo user can download it, modify it and re-distribute it but there's one small glitch: the modified code won't run on a TiVo machine. The machine enforces some sort of checksum to make sure that only unmodofoed code can run.
Abolish copyrights and my guess is all the big software publishers will just adopt a TiVo-like solution that ensures only legitimate copies of their product will run. That is, you can only buy a Microsoft computer that will only run Microsoft products (kind of the way game consoles work now). Worse, the same companies can cherry pick any open source code they want since there is no copyright protection. Finally, chances are that most open source developers won't like suporting the Microsofts of the world and will go do something else. Sounds like a *REALLY BAD IDEA* to me.
Sorry. You read something that looks like it's of interest and you try to summarize why it's interesting in a sentence or three. She is suing all of the members of the RIAA which is another way of saying she's suing the RIAA.
The AK-47 is probably responsible for more deaths than any other current weapon. The same factors that made it attractive to the Soviet Union make it attractive to all sorts of not so nice people. It's relatively cheap, robust, so simple it can be maintained by a trained chimp, offers good fire-power, etc. Making this weapon less affordable will probably save a huge number of lives. This may be a case where the ends justify the means.
Also, in response to the original post, the Russians licensed production of the AK-47. They did not give the design away. That the legal framework changed from state monopoly to patented technology should not bar them from now patenting the original design and each refinement. That their legal system at the time of the original design didn't recognize intellectual property is, if anything, an argument that they should now be able to patent valuable IP.
The U.S. government has been outsourcing intel work since at least the 1970s. They've also had problems with that outsourcing. See The Falcon and the Snowman.
The funniest part of the article is toward the very beginning:
The Redmond behemoth asserts that one reason free software is of such high quality is that it violates more than 200 of Microsoft's patents.
I'd say the best proof that Linux *DOES NOT* infringe any Microsoft patents is it's high quality and stability.
I don't see blue screens of death with Linux.
I must have rebooted my wife's new Vista laptop a dozen times while setting it up and installing the updates. I only reboot Linux boxes when there's a new kernel.
I don't have to worry about trojans and other malware with Linux.
I don't have to do "theraputic reboots" on my Linux boxes to keep them stable; they just run.
Linux has mature technology for limiting program actions called SE Linux. It would make the intrusive actions of UAC seem laughable if they weren't so annoying (UAC is kind of like clippy but able to stop programs from running).
etc.
The only way the quoted assertion could be true is if Microsoft has such patented technology but it doesn't put into Windoze. Darl McBride of SCO fame claimed Linux couldn't have matured and become "enterprise capable" unless it infringed SCO's IP for it's OS that doesn't scale and that is rapidly becoming ever more obsolete. Wouldn't Linux incorporating Microsoft IP mean that Linux should be the same sort of unstable piece of bloated crap that Windoze is?
Whatever "A" doesn't want to create without being paid will be created by "B", given that there are so many of "B" available, or it wasn't that important, anyway.
So that means the book I've written will eventually be written by someone else even though it's based on my unique experience and observations? I don't think so.
I remember when/usr/contrib had lots of interesting programs and how programs like awk and grep got their names. I also remember the BBS days of shareware and crippleware and everyone trying to make a buck by publishing proprietary software. BSD Unix came as close as anything to what you suggest (it was originally even based on a lot of the free software from the/usr/contrib days) but it was and still is a niche player. A lot of its popularity now would disappear if various GPLed programs hadn't been ported to it. People would still use it for firewalls, servers and such but you wouldn't hear about people considering it as a desktop operating system.
Given BSD's history and head start, Linux should never have happened if you are correct. There may be three decades of free software but it wasn't until Linux and the GPL attracted enough developers that FOSS actually became a viable contender for use on the desktop. Obviously something like the GPL is driving Linux faster than the BSD license drives BSD. Could be that the people who will contribute to a GPLed project won't release their work under a less restrictive license. If you look at the efforts to further tighten the GPL in GPLv3, you'll see that, if anything, contributors want to make sure that even quasi-legal use of their efforts like TiVo aren't allowed.
TiVo provides a really excellent example of what I'm talking about. With TiVo, you can do whatever you want to the source code; it just won't run on your TiVo if you modify it in any way. This meets the letter of the GPL but not the intent. A lot of the people who wrote the code that TiVo got for free don't like that. What makes you think that these same people will suddenly decide to freely donate their efforts to TiVo? They won't all just disappear if usage like TiVo or worse is allowed but the whole argument over how to prevent "TiVo-isation" pretty clearly indicates that the people who create GPLed code don't want to see it used in ways they don't approve of. Absent that control and a lot of them will simply just not bother writing FOSS code.
As with a lot of "there is no such thing as property" groups, QuestionCopyright.org* seems to not understand the purpose of copyright. Copyright is a legal construct created to encourage authors and other creative types to make their works public (e.g., published, performed, broadcast, etc.) by letting them retain legal control of the work. The import point is the person who creates the work gets to control its use.
People are motivated to create such works for any number of reasons. Some want the money that comes from charging for copies or viewing a performance, others just want credit. In any case, copyright is what lets the author determine who can access his or her works and under what terms. If we, as a society, don't give authors this control, there is a reasonable likelihood that a number of people who would otherwise create such a work will not because they don't want to see the fruits of their labor taken advantage of by others in ways they don't approve.
This brings us to open source software (OSS) and copyright. Some people license their work under a BSD license, some people put their work into the public domain, some license their work under the GPL and there are a number of other possible licenses. That there are a number of different OSS licenses and developers freely choose which license to release their project under means that the developers are making a conscious choice as to what kinds of restrictions they want on what they have created. This brings us to the GPL and similar licenses.
The GPL isn't just about attribution. People who just want attribution publish under a BSD license or something similar. The GPL is about creating a body of free software that stays free. As a number of court cases have demonstrated, there are all too many people out there who are more than willing to abscond with GPLed source for their proprietary products. Copyright law is what gives the GPL teeth to prevent this.
You can have free software without copyrights but it's going to be "free as in beer" software. Unfortunately, just like with beer, when the beer runs out, it doesn't matter if it's free. You still can't have any. If people aren't willing to develop without some level of control of the work after it's released, there won't be much free software. Copyright and the GPL means that at least some software will be "free as in speech" and, chances are, developers who continue to contribute to what they see is a greater good.
I guess I should rephrase what I said and say that you can have free software without copyrights but just not for very long. Lots of developers won't put up with having their work taken advantage of and will simply no longer create. Thus, the argument comes back to where I started, protection of an author's work is what incentivizes an author to create. Even if that incentive is just recognition by the developer community and knowledge that what they have created will stay free.
Cheers, Dave
* I will give them a point for at least being philosophically consistent. Once you grant anyone the right to restrict the use of a creative work then it becomes difficult to draw a line as to when a restriction is benign or even beneficial (e.g., the GPL) and when it's not (please remit $0.25 (aka, two bits) to me for enjoying the above discourse).
"If someone wishes to keep some tradition that doesn't fit with the local values and sets them apart from everyone else, that's up to them as long as it doesn't infringe on anyone else's freedom."
Here you seem to be saying that immigrants should only be required to learn and abide by the law (my stance), rather than going the further step of "insisting that immigrants learn the language and the culture" of your first post.
They are free (at least in the U.S.) to do anything that isn't against the law. I only point out that the more they assimilate into society, the more likely they are to succeed. When you can't speak the language, people can take advantage of you. The better you understand the language and culture, the better off you are in terms of types of employment open, knowing when someone is trying to pull some scam, etc.
Immigrants are free not to learn the language or the culture where they settle but refusing to do so is at their peril. I'm not looking for Congress to pass a law; the laws of economics are quite sufficient to enforce this. If you can't speak the language, chanes are that only the most menial jobs are open to you. The question is how to get those who have chosen to re-locate to understand this. They have the power to do anything they are capable of but chances are they will only succeed if they learn the language, culture, etc.
Vanguard uses a really simple but fairly foolproof way of preventing phishing. A couple of months ago account holders were asked to pick a photo from a variety of stock pictures (or provide their own). Users were then asked to also provide a caption for the photo. Where you login to your account, you provide the username which then brings you to a new screen with your photo and caption. No photo and appropriate caption, it's a fake. They also don't provide a convenient link in any official e-mail. They suggest that you navigate to their site and then bookmark the page.
A really determined phisher could mount a dictionary attack and collect a bunch of photos and captions but they still wouldn't be able to link the accounts to an e-mail address. Alternatively, a trojan could provide that information along with an e-mail address but if you've already got a trojan, you're dead meat anyway.
"Those who fought or now fight assimilation, don't."
I'll keep that in mind next St. Patrick's Day.
And I'll be right there drinking green beer alongside you. No one said someone who immigrates has to drop every single aspect of their old life. The great thing about the U.S. throughout its history (and quite a few other countries more recently) has been the acceptance of other cultures up to a point. So, we all like celebrating St. Patty's Day, I go to Octoberfest every once in a while, etc. What isn't allowed are those behaviors that are at odds with our values and cultural norms.
So celebrate St. Patty's Day along with everybody else who's Irish for a day, drink some beer at Octoberfest, go out for some sushi, etc. Just don't try to import "the troubles" to this country, practice female circumcision, etc. If someone wishes to keep some tradition that doesn't fit with the local values and sets them apart from everyone else, that's up to them as long as it doesn't infringe on anyone else's freedom. The consequences wil probably be that, to the extent they doesn't fit in, they'll have a harder time making it. It's not really all that tough.
And, no, it doesn't take a massive government program that supposedly makes that happen but which just institutionalizes the problem. It's only been since the days of "nanny government" that we seem to think that people are incapable of helping themselves.
The best way to succeed is decided by the market, not by the dictates of politicians.
I couldn't agree with you more. That's exactly what the market does. Which explains why the people who try not to assimilate are marginalized and the people who assimilate succeed.
I'm pro-immigration. The U.S., in particular, has a long history of growing through immigration. I just point out that historically the immigrant groups who assimilated eventually succeeded. Those who fought or now fight assimilation, don't.
I don't want to see another government hand-out program that institutionalizes the problem. I'd like to see the people who have the most interest in being successful be given their best shot at succeeding. That means convincing anyone who moves to this country (or any nother country) to do their best to fit in. I didn't make that rule; it's the way every society works. Fit in: succeed. Stay separate: fail. Any potential immigrant who doesn't like that rule should stay home because that's what they're going to face.
Cheers,
Dave
P.S. Please don't make assumptions about how my family got along once they got to this country. What you said may be true for some but wasn't true for them.
So, since I didn't mention a particular dictator or his political party, you lose for invoking Godwin's law when it doesn't apply. Or, do you even know what Godwin's Law is?
Probable not. Typical product of the liberal-socialist public education system.
Slashdot Mirror
All three credit agencies allow consumers to request that no new credit be granted. This includes both "instant credit" and new credit card offers. It's a really good idea unless you enjoy kiting your debt between different credit cards.
If you want to change banks, you can always shop for a better rate on-line and then request an account application from the bank you decide best fits your needs. This will probably be a better rate than the unsolicted card offers you get in the mail.
Cheers,
Dave
If they can make a smaller version with the battery in a backpack, I want one. Sounds like the perfect way to get my Christmas shopping done in a reasonable amount of time regardless of how crowded the stores are.
Cheers,
Dave
Perhaps a misplaced parenthesis?
Cheers,
Dave
You missed the point. The idea is that they are "comparing notes" about autonomous model airplanes; not UAVs. The two terms actually mean the same thing but UAV has taken on a military use connotation. Model airplanes are still considered toys. There are quite a few instances of people all over the world "comparing notes" regarding various hobbies without running up against weapon export laws, prohibitions on contact, etc. The idea is to re-cast the subject of the discussion as something nonthreatening, not a weapon, etc.
Cheers,
Dave
You are not exporting plans for a UAV! You and your friends are simply comparing notes on how to build autonomus flying model airplanes. UAVs are weapons. Model airplanes are toys.
Radio controlled flying models have been around for a long time and no one considers them to be weapons. Functionally identical radio controlled drones and especially the larger ones are (e.g., Predator, Global Hawk, etc.). Adding a level of automonmy to a radio controlled "toy" shouldn't make it into a weapon. Making it big enough to carry some sort of ordnance probably does.
Cheers,
Dave
P.S. IANAL, YMMV. They make the rules. If a rule doesn't work the way they want it to, they change the rule.
The kid got an interview on CNBC. Not quite fifteen minutes of fame but at least a couple. He also managed to get in a plug for "information wants to be free" and to note that what he did is explicitly legal.
Cheers,
Dave
Not trying to be funny but this is why I would tell the OP that it will take an infinite amount of money to replace the Internet. If you can ever get agreement on the technical issues you will then be forced to also deal with non-technical isues like porn (Think of the children), spam, politically sensetive content (Think of the dictators), phishing (Think of the corporations), etc. You will never be able to get everyone to agree. The only reason the existing Internet has its current freedoms is that it was never intended to become a public network. Don't expect any replacement Internet to have anywhere near the freedoms that exist on the current one.
If you try to replace the existing Internet, be prepared to deal with both the technical issues and the non-technical ones. Some of the technical changes will happen over time since the IETF moves the Internet forward as fast as it can but don't expect a clean slate replacement to be created anytime soon. If anything, I'd expect a replacement Internet to resemble broadcast media with government agencies deciding who can provide content and what the content will be. I think I'll stick with the existing Internet (warts and all) and just hope the IETF can keep making it faster.
Cheers,
Dave
Yeah, but since he's British it would have been calling him a "biscuit" which would have just gotten everybody confused.
The original usage of "hacker" (circa late 1970s) was someone who was *unskilled* at programming. Hacking at a program meant making random changes with little understanding of the problem until something approaching the correct answer appeared (usually a futile approach).
Cheers,
Dave
Possibilities like, Space Ship 3 is stealthy and doesn't carry passengers... I think my NOC stock just went up.
Cheers,
Dave
How many game consoles are open? Abolish copyright and companies like Microsoft will just market closed computers akin to gaming consoles. They will abscond with any open code they like but will have no incentive to give back to the open source community. This business model already works with gaming consoles.
Cheers,
Dave
Nothing stops you from running the TiVo software on alternative hardware now. The gotcha is that the TiVo services aren't available to you. For that matter, there are open source DVR projects like MythTV that already provide an open alternative. What people would like to be able to do is use TiVo services for scheduling what gets recorded but then do whatever they want with the recorded data. This violates the DRM agreements TiVo had to agree to in order to not get sued by the TV networks for providing a mechanism for unauthorized recording.
TiVo's business model is to provide people with a DVR at more or less cost and then make money by charging subscribers for using the device to schedule the shows they want to record. They actually have a pretty slick system that allows subscribers to schedule recordings when away from their system. This only works with the DRM baggage with a closed system.
Look into how open game consoles are. The answer is that they aren't. Without hacking the hardware you can't do anything but play the games offered by the console manufacturer. It wouldn't be hard at all to include copy protection mechanisms (e.g., the console validates that whatever has been inserted is a valid copy). Now extrapolate that to computers. You buy a console computer from whoever offers one and you are tied to their closed system. The GPL and copyright is what provides an open alternative to this. Take away copyright that protects GPLed code from being used in ways the authors don't agree with and you probably lose a viable open source development community.
I don't have a problem with copyrights or patents. I don't agree with software patents but that's a side issue. Any company that invests a huge amount of money into developing some product wants to know that they will get a reasonable return on that investment. Ditto for people who create copyrightable material (books, programs, etc.). For GPL developers that return is knowing they have contributed to an "open" software world.
Cheers,
Dave
There are some folks who take that position but they are generally *NOT* GPL proponents. Copyright is what gives the GPL teeth. GPLed code is freely available but it can only be modified and redistributed under the terms of the GPL. Why? Because it's copyrighted. Only agreeing to the terms of the GPL gives someone the right to modify and redistribute the code. Remove copyrights and anyone (Microsoft, SCO, TiVo, etc.) can do whatever they like with Linux.
That's where the whole TiVo thing comes in. Can someone create hardware that restricts the modifications an end user can make to GPLed code? The TiVo source code is freely available as per the GPL. A TiVo user can download it, modify it and re-distribute it but there's one small glitch: the modified code won't run on a TiVo machine. The machine enforces some sort of checksum to make sure that only unmodofoed code can run.
Abolish copyrights and my guess is all the big software publishers will just adopt a TiVo-like solution that ensures only legitimate copies of their product will run. That is, you can only buy a Microsoft computer that will only run Microsoft products (kind of the way game consoles work now). Worse, the same companies can cherry pick any open source code they want since there is no copyright protection. Finally, chances are that most open source developers won't like suporting the Microsofts of the world and will go do something else. Sounds like a *REALLY BAD IDEA* to me.
Cheers,
Dave
Sorry. You read something that looks like it's of interest and you try to summarize why it's interesting in a sentence or three. She is suing all of the members of the RIAA which is another way of saying she's suing the RIAA.
Cheers,
Dave
Cheers,
Dave
The AK-47 is probably responsible for more deaths than any other current weapon. The same factors that made it attractive to the Soviet Union make it attractive to all sorts of not so nice people. It's relatively cheap, robust, so simple it can be maintained by a trained chimp, offers good fire-power, etc. Making this weapon less affordable will probably save a huge number of lives. This may be a case where the ends justify the means.
Also, in response to the original post, the Russians licensed production of the AK-47. They did not give the design away. That the legal framework changed from state monopoly to patented technology should not bar them from now patenting the original design and each refinement. That their legal system at the time of the original design didn't recognize intellectual property is, if anything, an argument that they should now be able to patent valuable IP.
Cheers,
Dave
Cheers,
Dave
http://www.rkmc.com/Lanham_Act_Also_Applies_to_Fal se_Advertising_Claims.htm
...)
The only problem is that patent litigation tends to be expensive and Microsquish has lots of money.
(Oh yeah. IANAL, YMMV, this does not constitue legal advise, check your shorts,
Cheers,
Dave
- I don't see blue screens of death with Linux.
- I must have rebooted my wife's new Vista laptop a dozen times while setting it up and installing the updates. I only reboot Linux boxes when there's a new kernel.
- I don't have to worry about trojans and other malware with Linux.
- I don't have to do "theraputic reboots" on my Linux boxes to keep them stable; they just run.
- Linux has mature technology for limiting program actions called SE Linux. It would make the intrusive actions of UAC seem laughable if they weren't so annoying (UAC is kind of like clippy but able to stop programs from running).
- etc.
The only way the quoted assertion could be true is if Microsoft has such patented technology but it doesn't put into Windoze. Darl McBride of SCO fame claimed Linux couldn't have matured and become "enterprise capable" unless it infringed SCO's IP for it's OS that doesn't scale and that is rapidly becoming ever more obsolete. Wouldn't Linux incorporating Microsoft IP mean that Linux should be the same sort of unstable piece of bloated crap that Windoze is?Cheers,
Dave
I remember when /usr/contrib had lots of interesting programs and how programs like awk and grep got their names. I also remember the BBS days of shareware and crippleware and everyone trying to make a buck by publishing proprietary software. BSD Unix came as close as anything to what you suggest (it was originally even based on a lot of the free software from the /usr/contrib days) but it was and still is a niche player. A lot of its popularity now would disappear if various GPLed programs hadn't been ported to it. People would still use it for firewalls, servers and such but you wouldn't hear about people considering it as a desktop operating system.
Given BSD's history and head start, Linux should never have happened if you are correct. There may be three decades of free software but it wasn't until Linux and the GPL attracted enough developers that FOSS actually became a viable contender for use on the desktop. Obviously something like the GPL is driving Linux faster than the BSD license drives BSD. Could be that the people who will contribute to a GPLed project won't release their work under a less restrictive license. If you look at the efforts to further tighten the GPL in GPLv3, you'll see that, if anything, contributors want to make sure that even quasi-legal use of their efforts like TiVo aren't allowed.
TiVo provides a really excellent example of what I'm talking about. With TiVo, you can do whatever you want to the source code; it just won't run on your TiVo if you modify it in any way. This meets the letter of the GPL but not the intent. A lot of the people who wrote the code that TiVo got for free don't like that. What makes you think that these same people will suddenly decide to freely donate their efforts to TiVo? They won't all just disappear if usage like TiVo or worse is allowed but the whole argument over how to prevent "TiVo-isation" pretty clearly indicates that the people who create GPLed code don't want to see it used in ways they don't approve of. Absent that control and a lot of them will simply just not bother writing FOSS code.
Cheers,
Dave
As with a lot of "there is no such thing as property" groups, QuestionCopyright.org* seems to not understand the purpose of copyright. Copyright is a legal construct created to encourage authors and other creative types to make their works public (e.g., published, performed, broadcast, etc.) by letting them retain legal control of the work. The import point is the person who creates the work gets to control its use.
People are motivated to create such works for any number of reasons. Some want the money that comes from charging for copies or viewing a performance, others just want credit. In any case, copyright is what lets the author determine who can access his or her works and under what terms. If we, as a society, don't give authors this control, there is a reasonable likelihood that a number of people who would otherwise create such a work will not because they don't want to see the fruits of their labor taken advantage of by others in ways they don't approve.
This brings us to open source software (OSS) and copyright. Some people license their work under a BSD license, some people put their work into the public domain, some license their work under the GPL and there are a number of other possible licenses. That there are a number of different OSS licenses and developers freely choose which license to release their project under means that the developers are making a conscious choice as to what kinds of restrictions they want on what they have created. This brings us to the GPL and similar licenses.
The GPL isn't just about attribution. People who just want attribution publish under a BSD license or something similar. The GPL is about creating a body of free software that stays free. As a number of court cases have demonstrated, there are all too many people out there who are more than willing to abscond with GPLed source for their proprietary products. Copyright law is what gives the GPL teeth to prevent this.
You can have free software without copyrights but it's going to be "free as in beer" software. Unfortunately, just like with beer, when the beer runs out, it doesn't matter if it's free. You still can't have any. If people aren't willing to develop without some level of control of the work after it's released, there won't be much free software. Copyright and the GPL means that at least some software will be "free as in speech" and, chances are, developers who continue to contribute to what they see is a greater good.
I guess I should rephrase what I said and say that you can have free software without copyrights but just not for very long. Lots of developers won't put up with having their work taken advantage of and will simply no longer create. Thus, the argument comes back to where I started, protection of an author's work is what incentivizes an author to create. Even if that incentive is just recognition by the developer community and knowledge that what they have created will stay free.
Cheers,
Dave
* I will give them a point for at least being philosophically consistent. Once you grant anyone the right to restrict the use of a creative work then it becomes difficult to draw a line as to when a restriction is benign or even beneficial (e.g., the GPL) and when it's not (please remit $0.25 (aka, two bits) to me for enjoying the above discourse).
Immigrants are free not to learn the language or the culture where they settle but refusing to do so is at their peril. I'm not looking for Congress to pass a law; the laws of economics are quite sufficient to enforce this. If you can't speak the language, chanes are that only the most menial jobs are open to you. The question is how to get those who have chosen to re-locate to understand this. They have the power to do anything they are capable of but chances are they will only succeed if they learn the language, culture, etc.
Cheers,
Dave
Vanguard uses a really simple but fairly foolproof way of preventing phishing. A couple of months ago account holders were asked to pick a photo from a variety of stock pictures (or provide their own). Users were then asked to also provide a caption for the photo. Where you login to your account, you provide the username which then brings you to a new screen with your photo and caption. No photo and appropriate caption, it's a fake. They also don't provide a convenient link in any official e-mail. They suggest that you navigate to their site and then bookmark the page.
A really determined phisher could mount a dictionary attack and collect a bunch of photos and captions but they still wouldn't be able to link the accounts to an e-mail address. Alternatively, a trojan could provide that information along with an e-mail address but if you've already got a trojan, you're dead meat anyway.
Cheers,
Dave
So celebrate St. Patty's Day along with everybody else who's Irish for a day, drink some beer at Octoberfest, go out for some sushi, etc. Just don't try to import "the troubles" to this country, practice female circumcision, etc. If someone wishes to keep some tradition that doesn't fit with the local values and sets them apart from everyone else, that's up to them as long as it doesn't infringe on anyone else's freedom. The consequences wil probably be that, to the extent they doesn't fit in, they'll have a harder time making it. It's not really all that tough.
And, no, it doesn't take a massive government program that supposedly makes that happen but which just institutionalizes the problem. It's only been since the days of "nanny government" that we seem to think that people are incapable of helping themselves.
Cheers,
Dave
I'm pro-immigration. The U.S., in particular, has a long history of growing through immigration. I just point out that historically the immigrant groups who assimilated eventually succeeded. Those who fought or now fight assimilation, don't.
I don't want to see another government hand-out program that institutionalizes the problem. I'd like to see the people who have the most interest in being successful be given their best shot at succeeding. That means convincing anyone who moves to this country (or any nother country) to do their best to fit in. I didn't make that rule; it's the way every society works. Fit in: succeed. Stay separate: fail. Any potential immigrant who doesn't like that rule should stay home because that's what they're going to face.
Cheers,
Dave
P.S. Please don't make assumptions about how my family got along once they got to this country. What you said may be true for some but wasn't true for them.
So, since I didn't mention a particular dictator or his political party, you lose for invoking Godwin's law when it doesn't apply. Or, do you even know what Godwin's Law is?
Probable not. Typical product of the liberal-socialist public education system.
Cheers,
Dave