I think you picked a bad example there. I checked out the Wheel Barrow patent that you referenced, and it looks like this guy has come up with a clever and relatively non-obvious extension to the basic design of a Wheel Barrow, by adding the ability for the Barrow to essentially "kneel" for loading.
This doesn't counter the fact that there are quite a few bad patents being issued for computer software, covering very obvious techniques that have been in use for many years. And above and beyond this abuse of the system in place, there is the argument advanced (persuasively I think) in an LPF white paper, that shows that the economic and social benefits of patents on material invensions completely break down when applied to software because of the completely different ratio between production and design costs in producing a physical artifact and a software artifact.
As Linux grows in popularities, the commercial vendors are bringing there "binary only" ways to the platform. Thus suddenly that "quick recompile" doesn't become an option.
I also wish there was support for a wider range of video hardware
I think to "Do the Right Thing" when it comes to greater video hardware support under Linux, a transition will be needed, that will be the move from video support in the Xserver/SVGAlib/whatever, to video support in the kernel. That is, the direction that things are going with framebuffer support and projects like GGI. Then it'll be possible to experiment with new directions for the Linux interface without having to worry about recreating all that hardware support each time.
This is an except from the Xwindows chapter of the "Unix Hater's Handbook" (the full text of which is not available on line). Perhaps folks who have a deep understanding of the current state of the X protocol and the X client/server model could comment on which of these criticism can be addressed (or have been) within the framework of X, and which really are fundemental architectural issues.
If marketing people were allowed to design cars, we'd all be driving coal-powered tricycles that only ran on tuesdays.
But they'd all have great adjustable cup holders that expand to hold a Big Gulp, and oversized vanity mirrors.
Oh yeah...and you'd have to relicense your car from the manufacturer every year or it would stop working!
Further misuse of "free"
on
RMS Responds
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· Score: 1
Gosh yes, Tom is correct. This misappropriation of the word free has got to stop. For example, it is often said that we live in a free society, yet I come to find out that I'm not allowed to take people off the streets and lock them up in my house! Where does a society claiming to be free get off telling me what I can do with my life?. Perhaps we have an open society, as we allow people to wander around whereever they want, but as long as I am denied my right to lock them up when I feel like it, we certainly can't be said to be living in a free society.
...we have a perfectly nice one, we just need to steal it back. I think there is far to much meaning imbued in the term "hacker" to replace it easily. Much like other marginalized communities have taken derogitory labels and reappropriated them as a badge of pride (I'll let you think of your own examples here), we should do the same. Of course we have the advantage that the label "hacker" was a badge of pride to begin with:)
'cause its attitudes like this toward our childen that sooner or later translate into a slow but certain erosion of our democratic society and our civil liberties. How can we expect a kid who has been subjected to nothing but authoritarian bullshit suddenly wake up on their 18th birthday and participate in a Free Society?
I recently heard Molly Ivins speak, and she made the point that each time we are scared, we give up a little bit more of our freedom, because somebody tells us it will make us safe.
But it never does make us any safer... Just less free.
I'm already a fan of www.unamerican.com for their fine work in giving voice to unpopular opinions and dissent. Now they have some excellent coverage on Littleton.
Also, for those still *in* the Hellmouth, you might want to check out www.hsunderground.com.
If either of the Colorado gunmen had been able to stand up in class and talk about the rage they were feeling, or speak to a guidance counseler about it, maybe none of this would have happened. But they knew that if they told the truth about how they felt, they would be punished, just as many of the messages Jon has received have described.
Instead, you bottle your rage up inside until you are triggered to lash out by the smallest, most inappropriate things. And you are punished for that. Repeat the cycle a few more times, and you get a psychotic vicious animal.
Over the past few days I've been reacting to the Colorado tragedy, and wondering why, while I'm sad at the loss of life, I feel more sympathy for the gunmen than any of the people that were killed by them.
I think the answer is that deep down I realize that given less fortunate circumstance (i.e. my parents making lots of sacrifices to take their kid out of the public school system where he was getting beaten up on a daily basis, and putting me into a private school) *I could have been one of those kids*.
...of the "hacker tribe" system that ESR so reveres. I sympathize with most of his article, but I do think he is incorrect to castigate Perens, RMS, et. al. for their public airing of their concerns over the APSL. Without such public debate (which sadly sometimes turns flamish), the hacker culture would not have acheived nearly what it has. The Bazaar applies to more than just source code.
I believe it's available on a number of collections. The name of the short is "Luxo Jr". I have it on a collection of Pixar shorts including "Tin Toy" & "Red's Dream". I've also seen it on a couple animation "best of" collections.
...I've occasionally seen this column before, and it's invariably unfocused and rambling. He doesn't seem to have gotten much bettern since I last saw him.
You just have to start with low expectations...
on
Review:Wing Commander
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· Score: 1
...I went in expecting badly acted B-movie cheese, with stuff blowing up, and I got it!:) Enjoyed the heck out of it.
proposed O'Reilly Parody...
on
Quickie Fu
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· Score: 1
This one just occured to me... "Hamlet in a Nutshell" with the sub-title "Considering yourself king of infinite space."
Sadly I haven't the graphics chops to pull it off. So I'm releasing this joke under GPL:)
I'm impressed to see how many/. participants understand that liberties must be defended for all, not just the folks you agree with.
I'm a proud (card-carrying) member of the ACLU, and while I would love to see a legal (and constitutional) framework to keep spammers out of my mailbox (and for that matter, telemarketers off my telephone), I understand that may not be possible at the same time as preserving a legal climate and culture that promotes the free and open exchange of ideas... Even unpopular or commercial ones.
Any law involving restriction of speech rights must be subject to a thorough vetting of its constitutionality. If it passes such a test, well and good, but if not, then I'm afraid it was a bad law, and other solutions to the spam problem must be sought.
Jon's article talks about potential Y2K computer problems being used as a smokescreen to avoid dialog on the various (and much more serious) social and environmental problems that will face us in the new millenium. This message has already been expressed very forcefully by Bruce Sterling in his "Manifesto of January 3, 2000":
I found Perl to be powerful, but was always vaguely dissatisfied with the obscurity of its syntax, and the fact that it is so willing to let you shoot yourself in the foot. I've started working with Python now, and found it to be much cleaner, more maintainable, and strangely enough, it even appears to be more extensible. Go Python!
High Tech workers must remember: We are lucky!
on
Why Work Sucks
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· Score: 1
We happen to have a passion for an area of expertise that is greatly in demand right now. As far as I can tell, I can lie down on a street corner right now with a sign that says "Java" on my chest, and people would be rushing to offer me 75K a year jobs.
Lets look at my girlfriend now, who has just as much education as I do, at a better school. I also think she is the smarter of the two of us. Unfortunately, her passion and talent is for illustration (and she's quite good at it). She has to scrape and scrabble to make a third of what I do. Fair?
I supposed the Randites might suggest that it is her own damn fault for choosing a career in a more glutted, less (currently) valued field. But how many of us chose our field for the money it pays? Surely not the average Slashdot reader, who has a real passion for the technology with which they work and play.
Let's remember the folks who are getting chewed up and spat out of the gears of the "New Economy" today, or whose gonna be there for us when the great wheel turns?
He uses his voice to express ideas, and by his philosophy, ideas should be free (like speech, not beer:). If somebody wishes to encode a copy of his ideas in a proprietary format, well, that is their right. It is our job to make non-proprietary formats that are just as good if not better, so we can encode ideas in those formats as well.
Slashdot Mirror
I think you picked a bad example there. I checked out the Wheel Barrow patent that you referenced, and it looks like this guy has come up with a clever and relatively non-obvious extension to the basic design of a Wheel Barrow, by adding the ability for the Barrow to essentially "kneel" for loading.
This doesn't counter the fact that there are quite a few bad patents being issued for computer software, covering very obvious techniques that have been in use for many years. And above and beyond this abuse of the system in place, there is the argument advanced (persuasively I think) in an LPF white paper, that shows that the economic and social benefits of patents on material invensions completely break down when applied to software because of the completely different ratio between production and design costs in producing a physical artifact and a software artifact.
As Linux grows in popularities, the commercial vendors are bringing there "binary only" ways to the platform. Thus suddenly that "quick recompile" doesn't become an option.
I also wish there was support for a wider range of video hardware
I think to "Do the Right Thing" when it comes to greater video hardware support under Linux, a transition will be needed, that will be the move from video support in the Xserver/SVGAlib/whatever, to video support in the kernel. That is, the direction that things are going with framebuffer support and projects like GGI. Then it'll be possible to experiment with new directions for the Linux interface without having to worry about recreating all that hardware support each time.
http://www.cc.foi.hr/uh/x-windows.html
This is an except from the Xwindows chapter of the "Unix Hater's Handbook" (the full text of which is not available on line). Perhaps folks who have a deep understanding of the current state of the X protocol and the X client/server model could comment on which of these criticism can be addressed (or have been) within the framework of X, and which really are fundemental architectural issues.
If marketing people were allowed to design cars, we'd all be driving coal-powered tricycles that only ran on tuesdays.
But they'd all have great adjustable cup holders that expand to hold a Big Gulp, and oversized vanity mirrors.
Oh yeah...and you'd have to relicense your car from the manufacturer every year or it would stop working!
Gosh yes, Tom is correct. This misappropriation of the word free has got to stop. For example, it is often said that we live in a free society, yet I come to find out that I'm not allowed to take people off the streets and lock them up in my house! Where does a society claiming to be free get off telling me what I can do with my life?. Perhaps we have an open society, as we allow people to wander around whereever they want, but as long as I am denied my right to lock them up when I feel like it, we certainly can't be said to be living in a free society.
This misuse of language has got to stop!
...we have a perfectly nice one, we just need to steal it back. I think there is far to much meaning imbued in the term "hacker" to replace it easily. Much like other marginalized communities have taken derogitory labels and reappropriated them as a badge of pride (I'll let you think of your own examples here), we should do the same. Of course we have the advantage that the label "hacker" was a badge of pride to begin with :)
'cause its attitudes like this toward our childen that sooner or later translate into a slow but certain erosion of our democratic society and our civil liberties. How can we expect a kid who has been subjected to nothing but authoritarian bullshit suddenly wake up on their 18th birthday and participate in a Free Society?
I recently heard Molly Ivins speak, and she made the point that each time we are scared, we give up a little bit more of our freedom, because somebody tells us it will make us safe.
But it never does make us any safer... Just less free.
...as I was driving home last night. I thought it should be called the Morlock Society, but both www.morlock.com and www.morlock.org are taken :)
No, seriously, those of us who remember what it was like, why can't we reach back to the kids who are coming after us?
I'm already a fan of www.unamerican.com for their fine work in giving voice to unpopular opinions and dissent. Now they have some excellent coverage on Littleton.
Also, for those still *in* the Hellmouth, you might want to check out www.hsunderground.com.
If either of the Colorado gunmen had been able to stand up in class and talk about the rage they were feeling, or speak to a guidance counseler about it, maybe none of this would have happened. But they knew that if they told the truth about how they felt, they would be punished, just as many of the messages Jon has received have described.
Instead, you bottle your rage up inside until you are triggered to lash out by the smallest, most inappropriate things. And you are punished for that. Repeat the cycle a few more times, and you get a psychotic vicious animal.
Over the past few days I've been reacting to the Colorado tragedy, and wondering why, while I'm sad at the loss of life, I feel more sympathy for the gunmen than any of the people that were killed by them.
I think the answer is that deep down I realize that given less fortunate circumstance (i.e. my parents making lots of sacrifices to take their kid out of the public school system where he was getting beaten up on a daily basis, and putting me into a private school) *I could have been one of those kids*.
I'm now 31, and it still hurts!
...of the "hacker tribe" system that ESR so reveres. I sympathize with most of his article, but I do think he is incorrect to castigate Perens, RMS, et. al. for their public airing of their concerns over the APSL. Without such public debate (which sadly sometimes turns flamish), the hacker culture would not have acheived nearly what it has. The Bazaar applies to more than just source code.
I believe it's available on a number of collections. The name of the short is "Luxo Jr". I have it on a collection of Pixar shorts including "Tin Toy" & "Red's Dream". I've also seen it on a couple animation "best of" collections.
...I've occasionally seen this column before, and it's invariably unfocused and rambling. He doesn't seem to have gotten much bettern since I last saw him.
...I went in expecting badly acted B-movie cheese, with stuff blowing up, and I got it! :) Enjoyed the heck out of it.
This one just occured to me... "Hamlet in a Nutshell" with the sub-title "Considering yourself king of infinite space."
:)
Sadly I haven't the graphics chops to pull it off. So I'm releasing this joke under GPL
-raf
I'm impressed to see how many /. participants understand that liberties must be defended for all, not just the folks you agree with.
I'm a proud (card-carrying) member of the ACLU, and while I would love to see a legal (and constitutional) framework to keep spammers out of my mailbox (and for that matter, telemarketers off my telephone), I understand that may not be possible at the same time as preserving a legal climate and culture that promotes the free and open exchange of ideas... Even unpopular or commercial ones.
Any law involving restriction of speech rights must be subject to a thorough vetting of its constitutionality. If it passes such a test, well and good, but if not, then I'm afraid it was a bad law, and other solutions to the spam problem must be sought.
Jon's article talks about potential Y2K computer problems being used as a smokescreen to avoid dialog on the various (and much more serious) social and environmental problems that will face us in the new millenium. This message has already been expressed very forcefully by Bruce Sterling in his "Manifesto of January 3, 2000":
h tml
http://www.well.com/conf/mirrorshades/viridian.
And is pursued in more detail on the Viridian mailing list:
http://www.bespoke.org/viridian/
How do we get people to address the real problems? Marketing!
Check it out.
I found Perl to be powerful, but was always vaguely dissatisfied with the obscurity of its syntax, and the fact that it is so willing to let you shoot yourself in the foot. I've started working with Python now, and found it to be much cleaner, more maintainable, and strangely enough, it even appears to be more extensible. Go Python!
We happen to have a passion for an area of expertise that is greatly in demand right now. As far as I can tell, I can lie down on a street corner right now with a sign that says "Java" on my chest, and people would be rushing to offer me 75K a year jobs.
Lets look at my girlfriend now, who has just as much education as I do, at a better school. I also think she is the smarter of the two of us. Unfortunately, her passion and talent is for illustration (and she's quite good at it). She has to scrape and scrabble to make a third of what I do. Fair?
I supposed the Randites might suggest that it is her own damn fault for choosing a career in a more glutted, less (currently) valued field. But how many of us chose our field for the money it pays? Surely not the average Slashdot reader, who has a real passion for the technology with which they work and play.
Let's remember the folks who are getting chewed up and spat out of the gears of the "New Economy" today, or whose gonna be there for us when the great wheel turns?
He uses his voice to express ideas, and by his philosophy, ideas should be free (like speech, not beer :). If somebody wishes to encode a copy of his ideas in a proprietary format, well, that is their right. It is our job to make non-proprietary formats that are just as good if not better, so we can encode ideas in those formats as well.