"You still spend 99% of your time writing the software"
The organizations he mentions (Redhat and IBM) do not spend 99% of there time writing free software. More like 1% (for RedHat, much less for IBM). That small bit may be concentrated in a small number of developers who spend a lot of time making free software. But if you're making your money doing something else, the vast majority of your organizations time is going to be spent doing that something else.
"You don't seem to be making a distinction between free, open, and free+open software."
That is correct. I do not make such a distinction. As far as I'm concerned, there is source code I have access to and the rights to do with it what I will, and there is code I don't have the source to, or can't use the source of how I like. Within the first category, I suppose there is source I have to pay for, and source anyone can have for free; I prefer the latter, not chiefly on price, but because more people will be contributing to it. I understand that others make various distinctions between classes of source they can use some ways but not others, and they are welcome to do so. I have yet to find such a distinction useful. In my experience, if there is a really good library with such a license, it does something many want, so there is a similar lib with a do-as-you-will license; and that one is better anyway, because more people use it. For my purposes, the only usefullness of GPL and like licensed code has been when it's had a single copyright holder, thus making it easy to call them up and discuss moving it into the source-I-pay-for category. It is nice to be able to see try out the code before deciding whether to pay for it.
"If this is your business model, you can use it with open as well as closed software."
Hmmm... I suppose in theory I could identify the people who want the software ahead of time, and get them all to commit to pooling their resources to fund the devlopment. But that would depend on convincing them they wanted it before I actually wrote it, which seems unlikely. Generally, I'm writing something few people realize will be helpful to them, but I'm betting that once they see it, they'll want it. I'm taking a risk here, I could be wrong. If I'm right, I'll be rewarded in proportion to how right I am, because I'll sell it to a lot of people. These sales will happen over a period of time, and were the code open (as I would define it), I would not get more than a few. A competitor could take the code and sell it much cheaper, because they would have no expenses to recoup.
Exactly. I use, and contribute back to, BSDish code regularly. The LGPL still makes me isolate the library in question in its own binary which bugs me. I don't like using code where the liscense imposes technical restrictions; particularly (as far as I can tell) pointless ones. So so far I've only once considered using an LGPL lib, because it looked good enough to be worth the hassle. (decided not to for license-unrelated reasons)
"you have every right to use even the exact same code you contributed to the GPL project in your own proprietary works"
But I can't use the GPL project itself in my proprietary works.
"If you don't contribute to GPL projects for ideological reasons"
Not at all. I don't contribute to GPL projects because I don't use the code in the first place. If I am using open source code in a project, I want to be able to use it, and my closed source code, together in the same binary which I am then going to sell; and I'm not going to distribute my closed source. Unless I'm stupendously mistaken, that's exactly what the GPL forbids. No problem; if that's the way the copyright holder of that code wants it that's entirely up to them; I just won't use that code. I've got nothing ideological against the GPL, just practical. Since I don't use the code, I obviously don't need enhancements to it, so I don't make them or pay others to. Since I am able to use BSD code the way I want, I do use it, and I do wind up making enhancements and/or paying others to, and every time so far I've released those enhancements under the same license and sent them off to the project maintainer (since I'm not an incredibly selfish SOB; though I'd do it for entirely practical reasons, even if I were). So to the extent that your intent is to maximise contributions to your open source project, I think the GPL is a bad choice, despite the fact that that might seem to be one of its goals. The GPL may be the right choice if your intent is more, uh, ideological. If you just don't want nasty closed-source developers like me to incorporate your code into a product we make money off without giving you or the world anything in return, use the GPL. In which case I'll respect your wishes and not use your code.
Well, you and I are mostly on the same side of this, but:
"Also, as a result of open source software, how many people do you think have LOST their jobs? Or will lose their jobs?"
Practically none. An open source project that is every bit as good as its best proprietary competitor is a rare thing. There are a few, but where they exist, they just mean that that particular application has become a commodity; you can no longer make money just by writing, or having written, that one app. So proprietary developers will have to write better apps, or other apps. But this really isn't much different than being faced with strong proprietary competition. Nobody in their right mind would try to make money today by writing a new spreadsheet program from scratch, and not because of OpenOffice; because of Excel. Proprietary software will continue to be viable as long as companies can find new software people want enough to pay for. There will never be open source versions of all software, because there is no such thing as "all software". If you write the next big thing that everyone wants, then sure, open source is going to come along and do it too, and eventually may eclipse your stuff. But you'll make a lot of money first.
I think open source is a great thing. But, like you, I don't think it would be great if all software development were open source. Luckily, that's not going to happen.
"After almost two decades of Free (OS) Software, you still don't get it."
After almost two decades of Free Software, a few people make a living writing free software for people who sell something else, generally support or hardware. Despite constant assurances from RMS, no significant number of people make money from writing the software.
"Who do you think is most qualified to deliver (meaningful) support,"
A well-organized support organization. Employing the original developers might be a small advantage, but less so if the code is well written and documented.
"... fixes and enhancements to any kind of software? " The need for fixes, and the advantage of the original developers in making fixes and enhancements are inversely proportional to the quality of the code. Certainly they'll have some advantage, since no code is perfect, but it's hard to ask people to strive to eliminate their market advantage. That said, I actually have paid people for enhancements to their BSDish licensed code. Where'd I get the money? Selling proprietary software.
Certainly there are ways to fund some software development that aren't dependent on the code being closed. But for a lot of software, there is a much more effective and direct way to fund it if it is not open source: You can just charge for the actual product.
"Just because you are too daft to figure out a viable business model doesn't mean it can't be done."
I've got a viable business model. I spend a lot of money writing software that a bunch of people will pay a significantly smaller amount of money for. Then I sell it to them. I make money, they get the software without any one of them paying for all the development. I fail to see the problem.
I definitely agree. Some of the software I develope is propriety, and going to stay that way, so I won't touch GPL'd code. But I've contributed several enhancements to BSDish licenced code, and even paid the original developers of BSDish licenced code to make enhacements I needed. The GPL tries to make more enhacements to code open, which is laudable. But its effect is that I at least just don't make enhacements at all.
IIRC, BitKeeper told you so. They've always been right up front about the fact that they don't want anyone to reverse engineer their product and make an open source replacement. Which makes perfect sense for them, they've got a product that has open source competitors, but is enough better that people will pay for it. If someone makes an open source replacement that's just as good, it will obviously be a problem for them. Not that they've opposed, for example, improvements to SubVersion; just reverse engineering their own product to use against them. Now plenty of software companies are in this position; Bitkeeper was (arguably) cool enough to offer the open source community something in exchange for not reverse-engineering them: free (as in beer) use of their software.
Now that someone is reverse-engineering them, I don't see why anyone expects them to give their software away free. Well, OK, I understand Richard Stallman would expect them to do that and more. But as a rule I don't take grant-supported ideologues very seriously.
He seems to think, and I agree, that your post was a non-sequitur, because there is no particular correlation between pro-sports fandom and athletic ability. In my experience, quite the opposite. The athletic people I know aren't particularly likely to watch football, because they are outside instead; whereas the football fans are more likely to be out-of-shape couch potatoes.
In any case, in discussing whether voters should be allowed to decide to spend money on a wifi network, it does seem relevant to note that an overwhelming majority apparently think it is fine for them to decide to spend it on a football stadium.
So many people say, without any evidence. The only real direct democracies I know of are small towns in New England. I've lived in such a town. Once a year, every resident that showed up for town meeting got to vote on the town budget. That town had the most well-controlled spending of any governmental unit I've known. In less direct democracies, candidates will promise people all sorts of bread and circuses; they just don't talk about how they are going to pay for it, and the voters don't think about it. At town meeting, you're not going to get any remotely controversial spending through without everyone and their brother directly asking the voters how they think they are going to pay for it. For getting people to think about limiting government excesses, there's nothing like Roberts Rules of Order. In terms of sane budgets, I've seen no approach that comes anywhere close to having the individual voters vote on every bloody line-item. It's too bad it isn't practical on larger scales.
"You are now locked in to paying $16 a month for your city's commie Wi-Fi solution, whether you use it or not."
Um, no. If a Colorado city wants to build a wifi network, we can vote on it. If the voters choose to spend tax money to build the network, one guy speculates service might cost $16 a month for those that use it.
"Connection speeds will undoubtably suck, but you will have few alternatives, because there will be no more mom-and-pop ISP's offering higher-speed DSL solutions"
I don't know about the entire state, but in all three Colorado cities I do know about, there are no mom-and-pops offering DSL. There is Quest offering DSL.
"Hell, your local phone and companies might not bother with anything other than large corporate accounts now."
My "local" phone and cable companies are Quest and Comcast. If my city offers cheap wireless access, somehow I doubt they will stop taking my money for a much faster connection. They've already got the wires going to my house, and it's not like they spend anything on customer support anyway.
"You can also say goodbye forever to all the free Wi-Fi hotspots you had all over town"
I might say goodbye to them if I had them, but I don't. Some coffee shops provide access for a fee. There is one free hotspot downtown, provided by the chamber of commerce, which I imagine would remain, since (under the articles speculation) the signal would not be pre-paid, and the hot spot in question is obviously directed toward tourists.
I don't pay for access at coffee shops, since it's expensive and not that useful to me. I would pay for wireless, in addition to broadband via cable, if it gave me access anywhere in town. I don't particularly care who provides it; but currently no private company seems to be interested. So I'd vote for it; You presumably would vote against it if you lived here. But you don't, so who are you, or the state government, to tell the voters of my city how we can choose to spend our tax money?
"Best of all, if your city government is anything like every other city government I've ever looked at closely, part of your fee which you think is going to bandwidth will be going to fact-finding 'conferences' for city council members in the Bahamas."
Too bad city coucil members are apointed for life by the emperor, isn't it?
Unfortunately, my city is not on the articles list of ones considering wifi networks, which kind of surprises me. I mean are we really going to let Colorado Springs not only out-techie, but even out-commie the Peoples Republic? That's crazy. Hell, our city govenrment runs a frickin restaurant. And now that I think of it, that hasn't caused any big crash in the viability of privately owned restaurants. And now that I really think about it, it, and the associated gardens, etc. have given the tourists somewhere to walk to from the main downtown street, and that whole series of blocks now has lot's more private business going on, even a couple restaurants.
Frankly, I think one could argue in favor of setting up a city-wide wifi network even to those who don't plan to use it personaly. It would be worth it just to keep our image as a hip, tech-savy place, and thus continue to attract the large number of tech-oriented people and small businesses that keep our local economy going.
I'd guess "normal people" aren't using whatever "serious" software packages the AC I was replying to meant. In any case, most "normal people" I know won't pay for tech support either. If they can't figure it out by themselves or with the help of a geek friend, they'll do without. There are some packages where an IT department will pay for support, and where maybe it makes sense for them to do so. But for the vast majority of software packages, the software and documentation should be all users need. It is silly to suggest one should give these away, then compete with others for support dollars that should ideally not exist. There are various good ways to pay for development of OSS, but they don't cover all cases well. The charge-for-support model in particular covers only very few, and ideally should not cover those.
There is certainly software that requires more or less support than others, and certainly software that requires very little support. Unless by "support" you're talking about basic documentation, then there absolutely is software good enough that it doesn't require support. And if you're going to charge for basic documentation, forget it.
I've used a wide variety of software, and I have never used paid support. If I need more than a help file, I'll use something else.
Heck, even for purely in-house stuff, one of our basic code/documentation quality standards is that you don't need the original developers help to use it; and that's when the original developer is already on the payroll anyway. I'm certainly going to hold ouside vendors to the same standard.
It is absolutely possible to write code (and docs) good enough that no one will pay for support; and that's what I'd like to make my living doing.
I've made my living for more than ten years using various software packages, development tools, databases, what have you. Certainly plenty of things that pass whatever line you want to set to mean "serious". I have never in my life called tech support for a software issue. If I need to pay someone to help me use your software, your software is not worth my time. The whole "you can make money from support" OSS argument is total bunk. If your software is good enough, you can't; and to whatever extent you can make money doing support, so can anyone else. Open source is great if you're not trying to make money from doing development directly, which is actually a lot of the time. But it sure isn't all the time.
"I'm quite sure just about everyone here would do her anyways?"
Not my type. Yeah, inteligence is part of my type, but even just going purely on the physical, she's always seemed to me to be bony and kinda funny-looking.
In truth, I suspect she's every bit as dumb as she seems. Certainly there are plenty of actresses, etc. who are famously dumb blondes, but when you see them not acting, it is clear they are in fact quite inteligent and hard working, and are acting the dumb blonde part because it brings them success. Christina Applegate might be the cannonical example; she got playing the role of a stupid bimbo, but seen out of that role, on a talk show for example, she is incredibly articulate. But Paris isn't compromising her ego for financial success; she isn't acting dumb to get rich. She was born damn rich. I suppose she could be acting dumb to get attention. But working hard at acting stupid in pursuit of a cleverly crafted strategy whose whole purpose is to make oneself a world-famous icon of spoiled stupidity strikes me as pretty clear evidence one is actually stupid in reality.
Informative? Just telling people what day it is counts as informative? Seems like a pretty low standard.
Oh, wait, I see, it's informative because he's pointing out that it's an April Fools joke. But really, is saying "IT'S A JOKE!!!" really all that informative?
Particularly considering that a small amount of reflection will reveal that it is not particularly funny; and a small amount of research will reveal it is an actual functioning service. Which is to say, it is not, in actual fact, a joke.
Actually, I used to know a graphic designer who occasionally wore a beret. He did graphic design for the US Army as a civilian employee. Note, however:
-the beret was not black, but green
-when he first got the beret, he was not a civilian
-if anyone tried to make him use the GIMP instead of Photoshop, the ass-beating would have been rather extreme
No. ActiveX does not ring a bell. It is software, and while it might simulate a ringing bell using your sound card, to actually ring a bell would require specialized hardware most systems are not equipped with.
Huh, I never would have guessed MetaCrawler was still around. They used to be my search engine of choice. They generally returned a link to a page that had the information I wanted somewhere in the top 5-10 hits. But sometime in 99 I realized I wasn't looking through the top 5-10. I was just picking the right one, almost without fail. Without even realizing it, I was scanning down the list, looking for the magic words "found on Google". So I ditched the middle man.
Since then, when I haven't found what I wanted via Google, I've tried various strategies. Trying other search engines has almost never helped, and certainly hasn't been as effective as thinking of a different way to search Google. I at least have found little value in having a second-favorite.
Presumably Google won't rule as the king of search from now till the end of time; but for the near future it looks pretty good.
Societies that have insufficient wealth redistribution mechanisms (e.g. Haiti), and simply let the rich use their power to continually concentrate wealth in the hands of a progressively smaller set wind up in the shitter fast. Of course, societies that have excessive wealth redistribution mechanisms (e.g. the old Communist bloc) also suck.
The question is not, should the government take from the rich and give to the poor. The question is, how much, and by what mechanisms?
Lets say you could beat the index pretty soundly, acheiving a reliable 15% annual return. Let's further say you have considerably more available capital than most, say 1 million dollars. So you can manage your money and make 150,000 in a year, and you probably should.
Why would you want to be an investment manager for others? Because if you can reliable acheive a 15% return, "others" will pay you several million a year, at least.
Usually, and in certainly in this particular case, I beleive that fraud is wrong, and that I may, and probably should, say so. There would be little point in saying so, or even in beleiving fraud to be wrong in the first place, if I did not beleive others should agree with me.
It would be absurd to say that I beleive a particular thing is wrong, but, hey, if you don't think so, no problem, go ahead. By saying something is wrong, one is inherently saying "I will not do this because I think it is wrong, and you should not do this because you should think it is wrong too." If one thought it should apply only to oneself, there would be no point in mentioning it. So, yes, I beleive others should agree with me that htis is wrong.
You, apparently, do not think this instance of fraud is wrong. You are entirely entitled to this opinion, though I beleive it to be incorrect. We could possibly have had an interesting discussion about this dissagreement, if only you could have gotten past your shock and horror at the thought that someone thought you were incorrect, and had the audacity to not only tell you so, but to make the apparently horrifying suggestion that you should change your mind. Why I would say anything in the first place if I did not hold this opinion is beyond me.
"I feel that lies like this one, which directly harm no one, and despite your fallacious use of the term 'stealing', relieve no one of any of their property,"
It seems to me you are assuming your conclusion. Whether this instance of fraud harms anyone is certainly an important question in determining its morality, but the answer is, in my opinion, hardly obvious. Also note, that while I do not necessarily agree with your restrictive definition of "stealing", I've opted to accept it for the purposes of this discussion, and have referred since to "fraud". May I assume you agree that this word accurately describes the case?
"...should be left to individuals to decide for themselves whether they are 'right' or 'wrong'."
I would say that the set of things individuals should decide for themselves is exactly the inverse of the set of things I would call "wrong". If it is wrong, you should not do it; If it is not wrong, it's up to you if you want to do it or not.
So it sure looks to me like you do care whether I think this fraud is wrong. You do not think it is wrong, and you feel quite strongly that I should think your beleif is acceptable. But it would only be reasonable for me to think that if I also did not think it was wrong.
The high point of your year apparently. Glad I could bring some small joy to your dull gray existence. As far as what I hope for when I'm your age, my children will be out of diapers by then, and I already have a fun car; unlike some, I don't intend to wait until midlife to acquire an imagination.
"BTW, I checked my first reply -- you should too -- the word "idiot" doesn't appear in it.... "
There's that reading comprehension again. I said: "Count the number of times you tell me (in various insulting ways) that I'm an idiot...", which would imply we're not looking for the actual word, hence the "various ways". Rather, count the number of times you insultingly question my intelligence. In case your counting skills do not exceed your reading skills, I found 9.
And in my original reply to you, how many times do I question your intelligence? How many times do I imply any off topic charachter faults at all? Zero. All I did was disagree with you, which apparently is incredibly heinous, Mr. Oh-So-Tollerant-Of-Divergent-Views. Well, OK, I said lying was wrong, which I suppose might be considered offensive if you were in fact, a liar. Should I now realize this is a way out there, radical position? Do you expect to lead me to this realization through continual unnecessary insults rather than reasoned dialog? Or have you just found that reasoned dialog is a bit beyond your ken, and retreated to a more comfortable level?
Do you spew your obnoxious vitriol at anyone who beleives anything different than you? That might have something to do with why you don't have anyone in your life more interesting to spend time with than strangers on the internet who still think you're an idiot, even if they don't say it in every single sentence.
Realist talk. Everyone, on average, performs only as well as the index (obviously). If you can beat the index with any reliability, you should have no problem making a killing as an investment manager. If investment managers don't have much concept of the products the companies they invest in are hawking, they have the budget to hire advisers who do, and if they don't do that, they won't keep their jobs long.
Slashdot Mirror
"You still spend 99% of your time writing the software"
The organizations he mentions (Redhat and IBM) do not spend 99% of there time writing free software. More like 1% (for RedHat, much less for IBM). That small bit may be concentrated in a small number of developers who spend a lot of time making free software. But if you're making your money doing something else, the vast majority of your organizations time is going to be spent doing that something else.
"You don't seem to be making a distinction between free, open, and free+open software."
That is correct. I do not make such a distinction. As far as I'm concerned, there is source code I have access to and the rights to do with it what I will, and there is code I don't have the source to, or can't use the source of how I like. Within the first category, I suppose there is source I have to pay for, and source anyone can have for free; I prefer the latter, not chiefly on price, but because more people will be contributing to it. I understand that others make various distinctions between classes of source they can use some ways but not others, and they are welcome to do so. I have yet to find such a distinction useful. In my experience, if there is a really good library with such a license, it does something many want, so there is a similar lib with a do-as-you-will license; and that one is better anyway, because more people use it. For my purposes, the only usefullness of GPL and like licensed code has been when it's had a single copyright holder, thus making it easy to call them up and discuss moving it into the source-I-pay-for category. It is nice to be able to see try out the code before deciding whether to pay for it.
"If this is your business model, you can use it with open as well as closed software."
Hmmm... I suppose in theory I could identify the people who want the software ahead of time, and get them all to commit to pooling their resources to fund the devlopment. But that would depend on convincing them they wanted it before I actually wrote it, which seems unlikely. Generally, I'm writing something few people realize will be helpful to them, but I'm betting that once they see it, they'll want it. I'm taking a risk here, I could be wrong. If I'm right, I'll be rewarded in proportion to how right I am, because I'll sell it to a lot of people. These sales will happen over a period of time, and were the code open (as I would define it), I would not get more than a few. A competitor could take the code and sell it much cheaper, because they would have no expenses to recoup.
Exactly. I use, and contribute back to, BSDish code regularly. The LGPL still makes me isolate the library in question in its own binary which bugs me. I don't like using code where the liscense imposes technical restrictions; particularly (as far as I can tell) pointless ones. So so far I've only once considered using an LGPL lib, because it looked good enough to be worth the hassle. (decided not to for license-unrelated reasons)
"you have every right to use even the exact same code you contributed to the GPL project in your own proprietary works"
But I can't use the GPL project itself in my proprietary works.
"If you don't contribute to GPL projects for ideological reasons"
Not at all. I don't contribute to GPL projects because I don't use the code in the first place. If I am using open source code in a project, I want to be able to use it, and my closed source code, together in the same binary which I am then going to sell; and I'm not going to distribute my closed source. Unless I'm stupendously mistaken, that's exactly what the GPL forbids. No problem; if that's the way the copyright holder of that code wants it that's entirely up to them; I just won't use that code. I've got nothing ideological against the GPL, just practical. Since I don't use the code, I obviously don't need enhancements to it, so I don't make them or pay others to. Since I am able to use BSD code the way I want, I do use it, and I do wind up making enhancements and/or paying others to, and every time so far I've released those enhancements under the same license and sent them off to the project maintainer (since I'm not an incredibly selfish SOB; though I'd do it for entirely practical reasons, even if I were). So to the extent that your intent is to maximise contributions to your open source project, I think the GPL is a bad choice, despite the fact that that might seem to be one of its goals.
The GPL may be the right choice if your intent is more, uh, ideological. If you just don't want nasty closed-source developers like me to incorporate your code into a product we make money off without giving you or the world anything in return, use the GPL. In which case I'll respect your wishes and not use your code.
Well, you and I are mostly on the same side of this, but:
"Also, as a result of open source software, how many people do you think have LOST their jobs? Or will lose their jobs?"
Practically none. An open source project that is every bit as good as its best proprietary competitor is a rare thing. There are a few, but where they exist, they just mean that that particular application has become a commodity; you can no longer make money just by writing, or having written, that one app. So proprietary developers will have to write better apps, or other apps. But this really isn't much different than being faced with strong proprietary competition. Nobody in their right mind would try to make money today by writing a new spreadsheet program from scratch, and not because of OpenOffice; because of Excel.
Proprietary software will continue to be viable as long as companies can find new software people want enough to pay for. There will never be open source versions of all software, because there is no such thing as "all software". If you write the next big thing that everyone wants, then sure, open source is going to come along and do it too, and eventually may eclipse your stuff. But you'll make a lot of money first.
I think open source is a great thing. But, like you, I don't think it would be great if all software development were open source. Luckily, that's not going to happen.
"After almost two decades of Free (OS) Software, you still don't get it."
After almost two decades of Free Software, a few people make a living writing free software for people who sell something else, generally support or hardware. Despite constant assurances from RMS, no significant number of people make money from writing the software.
"Who do you think is most qualified to deliver (meaningful) support,"
A well-organized support organization. Employing the original developers might be a small advantage, but less so if the code is well written and documented.
"... fixes and enhancements to any kind of software? "
The need for fixes, and the advantage of the original developers in making fixes and enhancements are inversely proportional to the quality of the code. Certainly they'll have some advantage, since no code is perfect, but it's hard to ask people to strive to eliminate their market advantage. That said, I actually have paid people for enhancements to their BSDish licensed code. Where'd I get the money? Selling proprietary software.
Certainly there are ways to fund some software development that aren't dependent on the code being closed. But for a lot of software, there is a much more effective and direct way to fund it if it is not open source: You can just charge for the actual product.
"Just because you are too daft to figure out a viable business model doesn't mean it can't be done."
I've got a viable business model. I spend a lot of money writing software that a bunch of people will pay a significantly smaller amount of money for. Then I sell it to them. I make money, they get the software without any one of them paying for all the development. I fail to see the problem.
I definitely agree. Some of the software I develope is propriety, and going to stay that way, so I won't touch GPL'd code. But I've contributed several enhancements to BSDish licenced code, and even paid the original developers of BSDish licenced code to make enhacements I needed.
The GPL tries to make more enhacements to code open, which is laudable. But its effect is that I at least just don't make enhacements at all.
IIRC, BitKeeper told you so. They've always been right up front about the fact that they don't want anyone to reverse engineer their product and make an open source replacement. Which makes perfect sense for them, they've got a product that has open source competitors, but is enough better that people will pay for it. If someone makes an open source replacement that's just as good, it will obviously be a problem for them. Not that they've opposed, for example, improvements to SubVersion; just reverse engineering their own product to use against them. Now plenty of software companies are in this position; Bitkeeper was (arguably) cool enough to offer the open source community something in exchange for not reverse-engineering them: free (as in beer) use of their software.
Now that someone is reverse-engineering them, I don't see why anyone expects them to give their software away free. Well, OK, I understand Richard Stallman would expect them to do that and more. But as a rule I don't take grant-supported ideologues very seriously.
He seems to think, and I agree, that your post was a non-sequitur, because there is no particular correlation between pro-sports fandom and athletic ability. In my experience, quite the opposite. The athletic people I know aren't particularly likely to watch football, because they are outside instead; whereas the football fans are more likely to be out-of-shape couch potatoes.
In any case, in discussing whether voters should be allowed to decide to spend money on a wifi network, it does seem relevant to note that an overwhelming majority apparently think it is fine for them to decide to spend it on a football stadium.
So many people say, without any evidence. The only real direct democracies I know of are small towns in New England. I've lived in such a town. Once a year, every resident that showed up for town meeting got to vote on the town budget. That town had the most well-controlled spending of any governmental unit I've known. In less direct democracies, candidates will promise people all sorts of bread and circuses; they just don't talk about how they are going to pay for it, and the voters don't think about it. At town meeting, you're not going to get any remotely controversial spending through without everyone and their brother directly asking the voters how they think they are going to pay for it. For getting people to think about limiting government excesses, there's nothing like Roberts Rules of Order. In terms of sane budgets, I've seen no approach that comes anywhere close to having the individual voters vote on every bloody line-item. It's too bad it isn't practical on larger scales.
"You are now locked in to paying $16 a month for your city's commie Wi-Fi solution, whether you use it or not."
Um, no. If a Colorado city wants to build a wifi network, we can vote on it. If the voters choose to spend tax money to build the network, one guy speculates service might cost $16 a month for those that use it.
"Connection speeds will undoubtably suck, but you will have few alternatives, because there will be no more mom-and-pop ISP's offering higher-speed DSL solutions"
I don't know about the entire state, but in all three Colorado cities I do know about, there are no mom-and-pops offering DSL. There is Quest offering DSL.
"Hell, your local phone and companies might not bother with anything other than large corporate accounts now."
My "local" phone and cable companies are Quest and Comcast. If my city offers cheap wireless access, somehow I doubt they will stop taking my money for a much faster connection. They've already got the wires going to my house, and it's not like they spend anything on customer support anyway.
"You can also say goodbye forever to all the free Wi-Fi hotspots you had all over town"
I might say goodbye to them if I had them, but I don't. Some coffee shops provide access for a fee. There is one free hotspot downtown, provided by the chamber of commerce, which I imagine would remain, since (under the articles speculation) the signal would not be pre-paid, and the hot spot in question is obviously directed toward tourists.
I don't pay for access at coffee shops, since it's expensive and not that useful to me. I would pay for wireless, in addition to broadband via cable, if it gave me access anywhere in town. I don't particularly care who provides it; but currently no private company seems to be interested. So I'd vote for it; You presumably would vote against it if you lived here. But you don't, so who are you, or the state government, to tell the voters of my city how we can choose to spend our tax money?
"Best of all, if your city government is anything like every other city government I've ever looked at closely, part of your fee which you think is going to bandwidth will be going to fact-finding 'conferences' for city council members in the Bahamas."
Too bad city coucil members are apointed for life by the emperor, isn't it?
Unfortunately, my city is not on the articles list of ones considering wifi networks, which kind of surprises me. I mean are we really going to let Colorado Springs not only out-techie, but even out-commie the Peoples Republic? That's crazy. Hell, our city govenrment runs a frickin restaurant. And now that I think of it, that hasn't caused any big crash in the viability of privately owned restaurants. And now that I really think about it, it, and the associated gardens, etc. have given the tourists somewhere to walk to from the main downtown street, and that whole series of blocks now has lot's more private business going on, even a couple restaurants.
Frankly, I think one could argue in favor of setting up a city-wide wifi network even to those who don't plan to use it personaly. It would be worth it just to keep our image as a hip, tech-savy place, and thus continue to attract the large number of tech-oriented people and small businesses that keep our local economy going.
I'd guess "normal people" aren't using whatever "serious" software packages the AC I was replying to meant. In any case, most "normal people" I know won't pay for tech support either. If they can't figure it out by themselves or with the help of a geek friend, they'll do without. There are some packages where an IT department will pay for support, and where maybe it makes sense for them to do so. But for the vast majority of software packages, the software and documentation should be all users need. It is silly to suggest one should give these away, then compete with others for support dollars that should ideally not exist.
There are various good ways to pay for development of OSS, but they don't cover all cases well. The charge-for-support model in particular covers only very few, and ideally should not cover those.
There is certainly software that requires more or less support than others, and certainly software that requires very little support. Unless by "support" you're talking about basic documentation, then there absolutely is software good enough that it doesn't require support. And if you're going to charge for basic documentation, forget it.
I've used a wide variety of software, and I have never used paid support. If I need more than a help file, I'll use something else.
Heck, even for purely in-house stuff, one of our basic code/documentation quality standards is that you don't need the original developers help to use it; and that's when the original developer is already on the payroll anyway. I'm certainly going to hold ouside vendors to the same standard.
It is absolutely possible to write code (and docs) good enough that no one will pay for support; and that's what I'd like to make my living doing.
I've made my living for more than ten years using various software packages, development tools, databases, what have you. Certainly plenty of things that pass whatever line you want to set to mean "serious". I have never in my life called tech support for a software issue. If I need to pay someone to help me use your software, your software is not worth my time. The whole "you can make money from support" OSS argument is total bunk. If your software is good enough, you can't; and to whatever extent you can make money doing support, so can anyone else. Open source is great if you're not trying to make money from doing development directly, which is actually a lot of the time. But it sure isn't all the time.
"I'm quite sure just about everyone here would do her anyways?"
Not my type. Yeah, inteligence is part of my type, but even just going purely on the physical, she's always seemed to me to be bony and kinda funny-looking.
In truth, I suspect she's every bit as dumb as she seems. Certainly there are plenty of actresses, etc. who are famously dumb blondes, but when you see them not acting, it is clear they are in fact quite inteligent and hard working, and are acting the dumb blonde part because it brings them success. Christina Applegate might be the cannonical example; she got playing the role of a stupid bimbo, but seen out of that role, on a talk show for example, she is incredibly articulate. But Paris isn't compromising her ego for financial success; she isn't acting dumb to get rich. She was born damn rich. I suppose she could be acting dumb to get attention. But working hard at acting stupid in pursuit of a cleverly crafted strategy whose whole purpose is to make oneself a world-famous icon of spoiled stupidity strikes me as pretty clear evidence one is actually stupid in reality.
Informative? Just telling people what day it is counts as informative? Seems like a pretty low standard.
Oh, wait, I see, it's informative because he's pointing out that it's an April Fools joke. But really, is saying "IT'S A JOKE!!!" really all that informative?
Particularly considering that a small amount of reflection will reveal that it is not particularly funny; and a small amount of research will reveal it is an actual functioning service. Which is to say, it is not, in actual fact, a joke.
Actually, I used to know a graphic designer who occasionally wore a beret. He did graphic design for the US Army as a civilian employee.
Note, however:
-the beret was not black, but green
-when he first got the beret, he was not a civilian
-if anyone tried to make him use the GIMP instead of Photoshop, the ass-beating would have been rather extreme
First you call Linux an "inferior underlying system", and now you're calling it "like Windows"? You must be trolling.
"Does ActiveX ring a bell?"
No. ActiveX does not ring a bell. It is software, and while it might simulate a ringing bell using your sound card, to actually ring a bell would require specialized hardware most systems are not equipped with.
Huh, I never would have guessed MetaCrawler was still around. They used to be my search engine of choice. They generally returned a link to a page that had the information I wanted somewhere in the top 5-10 hits. But sometime in 99 I realized I wasn't looking through the top 5-10. I was just picking the right one, almost without fail. Without even realizing it, I was scanning down the list, looking for the magic words "found on Google". So I ditched the middle man.
Since then, when I haven't found what I wanted via Google, I've tried various strategies. Trying other search engines has almost never helped, and certainly hasn't been as effective as thinking of a different way to search Google. I at least have found little value in having a second-favorite.
Presumably Google won't rule as the king of search from now till the end of time; but for the near future it looks pretty good.
Absolutely.
Societies that have insufficient wealth redistribution mechanisms (e.g. Haiti), and simply let the rich use their power to continually concentrate wealth in the hands of a progressively smaller set wind up in the shitter fast. Of course, societies that have excessive wealth redistribution mechanisms (e.g. the old Communist bloc) also suck.
The question is not, should the government take from the rich and give to the poor. The question is, how much, and by what mechanisms?
Lets say you could beat the index pretty soundly, acheiving a reliable 15% annual return. Let's further say you have considerably more available capital than most, say 1 million dollars. So you can manage your money and make 150,000 in a year, and you probably should.
Why would you want to be an investment manager for others? Because if you can reliable acheive a 15% return, "others" will pay you several million a year, at least.
Usually, and in certainly in this particular case, I beleive that fraud is wrong, and that I may, and probably should, say so. There would be little point in saying so, or even in beleiving fraud to be wrong in the first place, if I did not beleive others should agree with me.
It would be absurd to say that I beleive a particular thing is wrong, but, hey, if you don't think so, no problem, go ahead. By saying something is wrong, one is inherently saying "I will not do this because I think it is wrong, and you should not do this because you should think it is wrong too." If one thought it should apply only to oneself, there would be no point in mentioning it. So, yes, I beleive others should agree with me that htis is wrong.
You, apparently, do not think this instance of fraud is wrong. You are entirely entitled to this opinion, though I beleive it to be incorrect. We could possibly have had an interesting discussion about this dissagreement, if only you could have gotten past your shock and horror at the thought that someone thought you were incorrect, and had the audacity to not only tell you so, but to make the apparently horrifying suggestion that you should change your mind. Why I would say anything in the first place if I did not hold this opinion is beyond me.
"I feel that lies like this one, which directly harm no one, and despite your fallacious use of the term 'stealing', relieve no one of any of their property,"
It seems to me you are assuming your conclusion. Whether this instance of fraud harms anyone is certainly an important question in determining its morality, but the answer is, in my opinion, hardly obvious. Also note, that while I do not necessarily agree with your restrictive definition of "stealing", I've opted to accept it for the purposes of this discussion, and have referred since to "fraud". May I assume you agree that this word accurately describes the case?
"...should be left to individuals to decide for themselves whether they are 'right' or 'wrong'."
I would say that the set of things individuals should decide for themselves is exactly the inverse of the set of things I would call "wrong". If it is wrong, you should not do it; If it is not wrong, it's up to you if you want to do it or not.
So it sure looks to me like you do care whether I think this fraud is wrong. You do not think it is wrong, and you feel quite strongly that I should think your beleif is acceptable. But it would only be reasonable for me to think that if I also did not think it was wrong.
"Made you reply! I win!"
.... "
The high point of your year apparently. Glad I could bring some small joy to your dull gray existence. As far as what I hope for when I'm your age, my children will be out of diapers by then, and I already have a fun car; unlike some, I don't intend to wait until midlife to acquire an imagination.
"BTW, I checked my first reply -- you should too -- the word "idiot" doesn't appear in it
There's that reading comprehension again. I said: "Count the number of times you tell me (in various insulting ways) that I'm an idiot...", which would imply we're not looking for the actual word, hence the "various ways". Rather, count the number of times you insultingly question my intelligence. In case your counting skills do not exceed your reading skills, I found 9.
And in my original reply to you, how many times do I question your intelligence? How many times do I imply any off topic charachter faults at all? Zero. All I did was disagree with you, which apparently is incredibly heinous, Mr. Oh-So-Tollerant-Of-Divergent-Views. Well, OK, I said lying was wrong, which I suppose might be considered offensive if you were in fact, a liar. Should I now realize this is a way out there, radical position? Do you expect to lead me to this realization through continual unnecessary insults rather than reasoned dialog? Or have you just found that reasoned dialog is a bit beyond your ken, and retreated to a more comfortable level?
Do you spew your obnoxious vitriol at anyone who beleives anything different than you? That might have something to do with why you don't have anyone in your life more interesting to spend time with than strangers on the internet who still think you're an idiot, even if they don't say it in every single sentence.
Realist talk. Everyone, on average, performs only as well as the index (obviously). If you can beat the index with any reliability, you should have no problem making a killing as an investment manager. If investment managers don't have much concept of the products the companies they invest in are hawking, they have the budget to hire advisers who do, and if they don't do that, they won't keep their jobs long.