I understand that Java is the rage nowadays, but why Java?
Java is defintely NOT something that will last. Java is not a FREE language, it is still in many ways controlled by SUN.
Unlike C, C++ or Pascal, one day Java is still under Sun's control, one day Java is not FREE.
I rather see the ACM contest use python and/or perl than Java.
2. Language.
I understand that to ease the judging process, the English language is used.
But if the competition is to open to the whole world, wouldn't it be better that the contest be available in other languages as well?
Imagine that you are not an English speaker, and there are certain things in English that you may still have problem with - even if you are a top programmer - the problem of mis-understanding the question may hamper the competitors' ability to complete his/her/their project, as well as they should have been.
As I understand - and I am a member of ACM as well -, the ACM is made up of people of all ethnic groups, and there are MANY people from ACM that can be used to help out in the translation process, in problem texts or whatever that needs translated.
I hope that in coming years, the ACM competition will offer contestants a choice of either using the English text, or language of their own choice.
In this way, the competition would be fairer, get rid of the language problems, and you may have a better-run programming (computing) competion.
I am amaze by the fact that so many have been on the "Game Console Box" mania.
My feeling is this "trend" will not last.
It is like the "open-book" concept that had been on the tongue of many since the mid-80s (remember the dynabook?) the technology may or may not be here, but the application of the technology is such that it is like the "button-control drive mechanism of a car" GM (or Ford?) came out in the early 50s.
The concept may be intriquing, but I do not think that the people are going to stick with it.
Game may be interesting, but game is not the be-all-and-end-all thing for everyone. For game freaks, maybe, but not for most of us who have decided that we have to get ourselves A LIFE out of the box.
What is right doesn't always mean it necessarily conform strictly with legal term.
So when will it be okay to GPL something, and when will it be okay to "let go"?
It all boils down to the following criteria:
Will the enforcement be practical?
Will the enforcement be burdensome?
Will the enforcement be too far fetch?
Will the enforcement be flexible?
I am sure there are many other criteria one may have to think over in determining if something should be GPL or not.
But we must always remember - those of us who are writing codes in the open-source communities are writing the codes because WE LOVE TO SHARE WHAT WE HAVE TO THE WORLD, and not because we have to.
If someone start forcing me to do this or that, in order to conform to the "standard", then, the least I can do is to STOP CONTRIBUTING.
While some might say "so what?", for I am only an individual. There must be thousands more who will continue to write codes.
But then, I may be an individuals, the thousands of others _ARE_ individuals too. If something that causes me way too much troubles and ends up making me stop what I love to do, that very same something could have create the same sentiment to others as well - and they very well may stop contributing too.
In all due respect to RMS whomever, we are all human beings, and we can NOT thrive in an environment where EVERYTHING is either black, or white.
There must be SOME flexibility built in. That is, if someone writes a patch, or an extention to a GPLed program, that someone SHOULD have the right to determine if he wants to put his code under GPL or not.
Yes, I do understand that this may create a dangerous precedence - that Microsoft might even take this as their free ticket to produce a closed-source MS-Linux.
Even if Microsoft does that, the REAL open-source Linux will still lives on.
It is in some way comparable to the matter of censorship and freespeech.
In the arena of freespeech, there will be HATE speech. The only RIGHT way to counter the hate speeches is NOT to censor them, but to use your right of FreeSpeech in doing a point-to-point debate and to debunk their hate-speech as purely hateful trash.
Some people like to censor things that they don't like, and I am sure if there is a Microsoft-Linux, most of us will be very pissed.
But to BAN Microsoft from ever producing a closed-source MS-Linux will be the WRONG approach.
The right approach should be making the OPEN-SOURCE Linux even much better than the MS-Linux, and the heat-up competition will only mean that Linux (both open and close sourced) will getting better and better.
If someone wants to GPL his codes, we should thank him/her for his/her effort. But if someone decides that his/her code should NOT be under GPL, let the author be the final judge.
This is NOT the time to throw the whole legal books at people. The open-source movement does not have the luxury to antagonize and or scare off potential contributors. Throwing the book at them will only make them scared of the Open Source, and that is the one thing we should never do.
'Please note that this event is not open to the general public. If you did not receive an email invitation to this event from an Inprise/Borland employee addressed specifically to you, you are not eligible to attend. Thank you.'
I note with interest that the Kylix Kick Start event is NOT open to the public.
That is, Inprise/Borland has decided who are eligibled to be the ones who port their application from M$ Windoes to Linux.
What about those small vendors who have interesting applications? Maybe they don't sell as much, but their existence have eased the lives of many Windows users.
To Inprise/Borland - If you want to get into the Linux marketplace, you gotta understand the ethos of the Opensource - and that is, YOU DO NOT RESTRICT ANYONE FROM GETTING INVOLVED.
We are NOT the Microserf, so please don't do the Microserf thingy in the Linux arena.
You said: "Maybe this was addressed in the patent write up but I wasn't able to read it, presumably because of the Slashdot effect."
Don't you realize that Slashdot itself _has_ caused the time to travel backwards !
The Slashdot Effect [tm] has turned back the clock so much that the server that supposed to store the patent info hasn't got the chance to get the info yet !!
Yea ! We have done one of the "impossibles" - now what is left for all the slashdotters is to do another of the "impossible" - we are going to travel to the future using our (in)famous Slashdot Effect [tm].
Sometimes we do have to remember the wise words of the late Admire Grace Hopper:
"It's easier to obtain forgiveness than permission."
In most school situation, to obtain the permission to go ahead with a Linux implementation, one has to go through hoops and most often, the answer is a flat "NO !".
Sometimes you just have to do it, with or without any permission, and when everything is done - the computer lab is running smoothly, with all kinds of needed things that a school needs, for example - the admin can say "NO !" but that would mean they have to do it all over again.
Not so long ago, there were lots of furor of how the French, the Chinese, the Ruskies, the Isrealis and everybody and their cousins of the entire world were spying on the United States.
Ahhhh...
Now it is revealed that the POT who was making so much loud calls against all those kettles is him/her/itself not so angelic after all.
"How did you get only four million in Shintoism? It's by far the main religion of Japan, and I know Japan has many more than four million people. Also, China, which has about a billion people, is mainly Buddhist, isn't it? 350 million Buddhists just doesn't add up, especially with all the converts around the world. And aside from that, with these figures Christianity dominates over other religions, but not all combined. Two billion is not fifty percent of six billion."
Well... let me tell you this - the stats is a FAKE !
I have been looking, searching, and re-searching for the SOURCE of _that_ statistics everybody is referring to, and EVERYTIME it comes down to the Encyclopedia Britannica.
It all originated from the Encyclopedia Britannica, someone working for the Encyclopedia Britannica put up a stats which showed that Christianity is the biggest religion of the world - in term of followers - and yet, the people of Encyclopedia Britannica can NOT tell me where they obtain those figures from.
Why?
Because, those figures are FAKE ! That's why.
Someone just script out some figures from thin air, and put it into the Encyclopedia Britannica, and then EVERYBODY ELSE AND THEIR BROTHER IN-LAW quote that stats as though it is the HOLY GRAIL.
1.Christianity: 2 billion 2.Islam: 1.2 billion 3.Hinduism: 900 million 4.Secular/Nonreligious/Agnostic/Atheist: 900 million 5.Buddhism: 350 million 6.Chinese traditional religion: 225 million 7.primal-indigenous: 190 million 8.Yoruba religion: 20 million 9.Juche: 19 million 10.Sikhism: 18 million 11.Judaism: 15 million 12.Spiritism: 14 million 13.Babi & Baha'i faiths: 6 million 14.Jainism: 4 million 15.Shinto: 4 million 16.Cao Dai: 3 million 17.Tenrikyo: 2.4 million 18.Neo-Paganism: 1 million 19.Unitarian-Universalism: 800 thousand 20.Scientology: 750 thousand 21.Rastafarianism: 700 thousand 22.Zoroastrianism: 150 thousand
From the 80's onwards, people have been telling me that there was a "official statistic" that "clearly" showed that Christianity was the biggest religion of all.
So I looked for where they got that satistics, and I asked many questions.
Almost EVERYTIME I asked, and almost everytime I looked into the matter, it all points to the Encyclopedia Britannica, and I went to the library to check, "Walla !" there was the stat in there.
And I did asked the people who published the Encyclopedia Britannica where they obtain their statistics from, they couldn't give me a definite answer !
Yes, I did asked !
And yes, after more than 15 years, the Encyclopedia Britannica people still can't tell me where they obtain those figures from !
It seems like someone from the Encyclopedia Britannica DREAMT OF THE FIGURE and put them out in such a way that they have since became THE STATISTIC everybody and their cousin are refering to.
Let me say it again, the stat that you have just shown us is TOTALLY BASELESS.
I am not saying that there aren't many Christians.
I am not desputing that there _MAY BE_ a possibility that Christianity _is_ the BIGGEST religion of all.
But still, the stats that EVERYBODY HAS BEEN RELYING ON is a BASELESS STATISTICS, and nobody can come out with the VALID PROOF that the stats is based on an ACTUAL COUNTING based on VALID SCIENTIFIC METHOD !
Can anybody tell me why I am seeing so many fakeries on the Net?
I mean, there are so many people who are so publicly anti-porn (See that article on China's attempt of censorship and the author had to put the word "PORN" in it) but on the other hand, their hard drives may have thousands of kiddie-porn pictures and all other smut stuffs.
Isn't the etho of InterNet is LIVE AND LET LIVE - that is, you do your stuffs, I do mine, you leave me alone and I'll leave you alone, so long as what you do do not hurt me and vice versa?
I really long for the past days in the Net where everyone respect each others' privacy, and no one will come to tell you what you can do, what you can't.
Disclaimer: I am NOT for porn, but I am NOT going to ban porn just because I don't find it interesting. Just like I am not going to publicly asking those puritans to go to hell just because I am tired of their holier-than-thou views.
And one more question - just when all these will end?
Will it end when we are not allowed to watch, received, say or _think_ of anything someone, somewhere find disgusting?
> Don't you understand the concept of irony? > Read some of his previous posts and you'll get > what he means...
I _do_ understand the concept of irony, but not this.
Again, I must say that I do not support China's censorship move, _any_ censorship is bad. But this McCathy guy... his purposely home in on the PORN stuff.
Why?
WHAT IS RONG WITH PORN?
I mean, your view is different from my view. Your morality is different from mine. And there are things that you may find unacceptable, but to me if perfectly fine.
So, if you say that Jamie McCathy person is for "civil liberty", exactly _WHAT_ type of "civil liberty" is he for?
FOR CENSORSHIP ?
I mean, if he is against PORN - I don't mean the kiddie porn stuffs, but just plain-old garden-variety types of pron - he is FOR restricting people from accessing the PORN on the Net, and to me, my dear friend, is an act of CENSORSHIP.
So, Jamie McCathy is FOR censorship. Then, what's the use of criticize China for their censorship move while Jamie is him/herself a PRO-CENSORSHIP fella?
>If it was your ox being gored by a Chinese >sweatshop reverse engineering your code and >putting your company out of business by selling >a copycat product in the U.S. via the internet, >I expect you would look more kindly on the >treaties and the DMCA that enable you to protect >your company's IP and your job.
Do you know what? I am SICK AND TIRED of the RACIST thing that is going on on Slashdot.
ALmost everytime when you guys want to dump your trash on, you dump it on the Chinese.
In your little minds, it's CHINESE SWEATSHOPS that are doing harm to you. And it's your little mind that can never think that SWEATSHOPS is never a Chinese phenomena. You have AMERICAN SWEATSHOPS in America, but you well "Chinese sweatshop" at the drop of a hat just because it is fashionable to do so.
Shame on you !
And on the other matter, the copyright acts do NOT protect you from being REVERSED ENGINEERED !!
You go read the legal documents first.
REVERSE ENGINEERING happens all the time. In the Open Source arena, MOST OF THE DRIVERS were the result of reverse enginnering, simply because the vendors doesn't want to provide any details about their products.
Geeeeesh... you guys who want to place restriction on ANYTHING will do ANYTHING to protect your own selfish interests. Now you even want to get on the turf of reserse engineering.
What's next?
One look at your product and we must buy it, or you'd say we "stole" the "look" of your product and "embedded" it into our minds?
Gimme a break !!
I rather have my ox gored than to kow tow to assholes like you. If my ox being gored, then I just go and get another ox. After all, this world is build on innovation, not protection of OLD AND OBSOLETE IDEAS !!!
>It seems that The New York TImes is on the >list of `political sensitive' sites, but all >other U.S. papers are not.... Porn, however, >is free for all 1.3 billion people to view. >Go figure.
I always has some suspicions that slashdot has been invaded by puritans, and now to my horror, slashdot has not only been invaded, slashdot even promoted the puritans to the point letting puritans having their own soapbox here.
I am not here to argue that what China did was right. Censorship is censorship, but I still want to know what Jamie [email: jamie@mccarthy.org ] was thinking when he said "Porn, however, is free for all 1.3 bilion people to view. Go figure."
WHAT IS WRONG WITH PORN?
I mean, what is wrong with sex?
Is Jamie the kind of person who don't enjoy sex, huh?!
Oh wait, is Jamie related to that _other_ infamous McCathy of the '50s era?
I wonder.
And I also want to know what's the exact relationship between Jamie and slashdot. Is he in control now?
I am not a lawyer, so I would like to post this question - Just how effective are the comments?
In other words, I want to know what's the role the comments play in the whole scheme of things.
Is it juat "comments" and then forget about it type, or is it I would really take your comments seriously and I will see what can I do?
What happens when there are opposing type of comments - as you have pointed out, the pro- and anti-consumer type, from different entities?
What will the copyright office do in such instance?
Will they base their future action on the comments on the businesses - anti-consumer - or will it be based on how many pro-consumer vs. the anti-consumer?
I just want to know, so, many thanks for any comments (yes, I take your comment seriously) that you may have.
Lest people think that the Symantec corp's involvement in a censorship campaign is anything new, I want to point out that CENSORSHIP is nothing new to Symantec -
Case in point :
Sometime last year, when I found out that the OPTASM compiler - those of you who were from the _old_ world of 16bit dos/win3.1 may still remember the wonderful things the OPTASM compiler could do - is currently owned by the Symantec corp., and since Symantec is NOT selling OPTASM anymore, and is NOT interested in upgrading the OPTASM compiler to the 32/64bit world of today, I wrote to Symantec and request that they release the OPTASM compiler to the public domain, either on a GPL or related license, so that the world at large can benefit from some of the wonderful techniques that many people have enjoyed.
Do you think this is a reasonable request?
I mean, the Symantec corp isn't selling OPTASM anymore, and not selling OPTASM means they are NOT making any money out of OPTASM anymore, and they do not have ANY PLAN to introduce an upgrade version of OPTASM,... in one word, OPTASM is of NO USE to Symantec anymore.
So, my asking of Symantec to release the source code of OPTASM to the world should not be treated as an unreasonable request, right?
But to the Symantec corp, it isn't so.
They have stonewalled my request, and when I post my messages on Symantec's website forum, the Symantec Corp CHANGED THE ENTIRE FORUM and DELETE EVERY SINGLE MESSAGE THAT I HAVE POSTED !!
For the life of me, I do not know why Symantec wants so much to hold on to OPTASM - as far as I am concern, something that MAKES YOU NO MONEY is something that has NO VALUE, and something that has NO VALUE is something that can be consider as JUNK.
And if someone ask you to release the sourcecode of that junk, if I were Symantec Corp, I would do it in a martian minute !
I mean, why not?
If something is already NO VALUE for me, and if my release of the sourcecode to the world will give lots of GOODWILL, I would do it.
Apparently, Symantec doesn't operate that way.
They want to hold on to EVERYTHING, and they will go to the length of CENSORING other people to attain their goal of DOMINATION.
And about DOMINATION - I just don't know just what the hell that is worth Symantec's effort (including censorship) to dominate...
If it's MicroSoft, I can foresee that there _IS_ still some value to their Windoze code. But OPTASM, the 16bit assembly compiler?
From the message at http://community.borland.com/article/0,1410,21171, 00.html I learned that "Linux's Position Independent Code (PIC) specification for shared object libraries will require compiler code generation treatments conceptually identical to the DS segment switching required in exported functions in 16 bit Windows DLLs."
I think I have learned something new, but I just want to bounce off to you guys. Is the thing that I've quoted on the above paragraph something that is true?
I have questions about the At Large Membership of ICANN.
I have gone to the ICANN site and filled in the form and all that to join the "At Large Membership" thingy.
After I hit that "submit" button, the site told me to wait for a confirmation email (which I got) and a "PIN" number via snail mail (which I am still waiting, already 3 weeks !).
Does any of you received the "PIN" number via snail mail yet?
I wonder if this whole thing isn't a sham after all.
On its website it says that its contribution is "open", meaning open to the public to contribute codes, while its a shareware of sort - trial use for 30 days and then you must pay the guy money, or you must delete the thing from your box.
Hmmm....
And then there is a mention of bochs merging with freevmware, in order to make it GPL.
Well... freevmware is not exactly GPL either. It's LGPL.
Slashdot Mirror
Here is my comment:
1. Why Java?
I understand that Java is the rage nowadays, but why Java?
Java is defintely NOT something that will last. Java is not a FREE language, it is still in many ways controlled by SUN.
Unlike C, C++ or Pascal, one day Java is still under Sun's control, one day Java is not FREE.
I rather see the ACM contest use python and/or perl than Java.
2. Language.
I understand that to ease the judging process, the English language is used.
But if the competition is to open to the whole world, wouldn't it be better that the contest be available in other languages as well?
Imagine that you are not an English speaker, and there are certain things in English that you may still have problem with - even if you are a top programmer - the problem of mis-understanding the question may hamper the competitors' ability to complete his/her/their project, as well as they should have been.
As I understand - and I am a member of ACM as well -, the ACM is made up of people of all ethnic groups, and there are MANY people from ACM that can be used to help out in the translation process, in problem texts or whatever that needs translated.
I hope that in coming years, the ACM competition will offer contestants a choice of either using the English text, or language of their own choice.
In this way, the competition would be fairer, get rid of the language problems, and you may have a better-run programming (computing) competion.
Isn't that a COMPUTING competition is all about?
I am amaze by the fact that so many have been on the "Game Console Box" mania.
My feeling is this "trend" will not last.
It is like the "open-book" concept that had been on the tongue of many since the mid-80s (remember the dynabook?) the technology may or may not be here, but the application of the technology is such that it is like the "button-control drive mechanism of a car" GM (or Ford?) came out in the early 50s.
The concept may be intriquing, but I do not think that the people are going to stick with it.
Game may be interesting, but game is not the be-all-and-end-all thing for everyone. For game freaks, maybe, but not for most of us who have decided that we have to get ourselves A LIFE out of the box.
Law is law.
What is legal doesn't always mean what is right.
What is right doesn't always mean it necessarily conform strictly with legal term.
So when will it be okay to GPL something, and when will it be okay to "let go"?
It all boils down to the following criteria:
Will the enforcement be practical?
Will the enforcement be burdensome?
Will the enforcement be too far fetch?
Will the enforcement be flexible?
I am sure there are many other criteria one may have to think over in determining if something should be GPL or not.
But we must always remember - those of us who are writing codes in the open-source communities are writing the codes because WE LOVE TO SHARE WHAT WE HAVE TO THE WORLD, and not because we have to.
If someone start forcing me to do this or that, in order to conform to the "standard", then, the least I can do is to STOP CONTRIBUTING.
While some might say "so what?", for I am only an individual. There must be thousands more who will continue to write codes.
But then, I may be an individuals, the thousands of others _ARE_ individuals too. If something that causes me way too much troubles and ends up making me stop what I love to do, that very same something could have create the same sentiment to others as well - and they very well may stop contributing too.
In all due respect to RMS whomever, we are all human beings, and we can NOT thrive in an environment where EVERYTHING is either black, or white.
There must be SOME flexibility built in. That is, if someone writes a patch, or an extention to a GPLed program, that someone SHOULD have the right to determine if he wants to put his code under GPL or not.
Yes, I do understand that this may create a dangerous precedence - that Microsoft might even take this as their free ticket to produce a closed-source MS-Linux.
Even if Microsoft does that, the REAL open-source Linux will still lives on.
It is in some way comparable to the matter of censorship and freespeech.
In the arena of freespeech, there will be HATE speech. The only RIGHT way to counter the hate speeches is NOT to censor them, but to use your right of FreeSpeech in doing a point-to-point debate and to debunk their hate-speech as purely hateful trash.
Some people like to censor things that they don't like, and I am sure if there is a Microsoft-Linux, most of us will be very pissed.
But to BAN Microsoft from ever producing a closed-source MS-Linux will be the WRONG approach.
The right approach should be making the OPEN-SOURCE Linux even much better than the MS-Linux, and the heat-up competition will only mean that Linux (both open and close sourced) will getting better and better.
If someone wants to GPL his codes, we should thank him/her for his/her effort. But if someone decides that his/her code should NOT be under GPL, let the author be the final judge.
This is NOT the time to throw the whole legal books at people. The open-source movement does not have the luxury to antagonize and or scare off potential contributors. Throwing the book at them will only make them scared of the Open Source, and that is the one thing we should never do.
This is only my $0.02
Looking for open-source Educational apps?
Look no further than http://www.seul.org
They have open-source apps targetting education and some of them have incorporated the SIF standard.
Well... I am happy that Borland is at last doing something for all of us. The Kyrix is truly needed.
And if I may add this - I wish that Borland can do the following for all of us -
Turbo Perl
Turbo Python
Turbo PHP
Turbo XML
If Borland can do that, many of us would spend our hard earned money to buy the nice things from Borland.
"At some time in the past they had a fairly
broad line of compilers: Pascal, C, Basic, Assembler, and even Prolog!"
Don't forget that they _had_ a Turbo Modula-2 !
That thing never made into the market, but they _had_ it !
How I wish they can do a Turbo-Perl, Turbo-Python, and a Turbo-XML !!
:)
'Please note that this event is not open to the
general public. If you did not receive an
email invitation to this event from an
Inprise/Borland employee addressed
specifically to you, you are not eligible to
attend. Thank you.'
I note with interest that the Kylix Kick Start event is NOT open to the public.
That is, Inprise/Borland has decided who are eligibled to be the ones who port their application from M$ Windoes to Linux.
What about those small vendors who have interesting applications? Maybe they don't sell as much, but their existence have eased the lives of many Windows users.
To Inprise/Borland - If you want to get into the Linux marketplace, you gotta understand the ethos of the Opensource - and that is, YOU DO NOT RESTRICT ANYONE FROM GETTING INVOLVED.
We are NOT the Microserf, so please don't do the Microserf thingy in the Linux arena.
Thank you.
Just a question:
Is M$'s window media format codec better than the rest?
You said:
"Maybe this was addressed in the patent write up but I wasn't able to read it, presumably because of the Slashdot effect."
Don't you realize that Slashdot itself _has_ caused the time to travel backwards !
The Slashdot Effect [tm] has turned back the clock so much that the server that supposed to store the patent info hasn't got the chance to get the info yet !!
Yea ! We have done one of the "impossibles" - now what is left for all the slashdotters is to do another of the "impossible" - we are going to travel to the future using our (in)famous Slashdot Effect [tm].
:)
Does that mean I get to do a inter-galatic travel via wormhole some 25 yrears or 50 years - depending when the darn patent expires - from now?
Wow !
Sometimes we do have to remember the wise words of the late Admire Grace Hopper:
"It's easier to obtain forgiveness than permission."
In most school situation, to obtain the permission to go ahead with a Linux implementation, one has to go through hoops and most often, the answer is a flat "NO !".
Sometimes you just have to do it, with or without any permission, and when everything is done - the computer lab is running smoothly, with all kinds of needed things that a school needs, for example - the admin can say "NO !" but that would mean they have to do it all over again.
Ahhhh...
Not so long ago, there were lots of furor of how the French, the Chinese, the Ruskies, the Isrealis and everybody and their cousins of the entire world were spying on the United States.
Ahhhh...
Now it is revealed that the POT who was making so much loud calls against all those kettles is him/her/itself not so angelic after all.
Ahhhh...
Who says this world isn't fun?
You asked:
"How did you get only four million in Shintoism? It's by far the main religion of Japan, and I know Japan has many more than four million people. Also, China, which has about a billion people, is mainly Buddhist, isn't it? 350 million Buddhists just doesn't add up, especially with all the converts around the world. And aside from that, with these figures Christianity dominates over other religions, but not all combined. Two billion is not fifty percent of six billion."
Well... let me tell you this - the stats is a FAKE !
I have been looking, searching, and re-searching for the SOURCE of _that_ statistics everybody is referring to, and EVERYTIME it comes down to the Encyclopedia Britannica.
It all originated from the Encyclopedia Britannica, someone working for the Encyclopedia Britannica put up a stats which showed that Christianity is the biggest religion of the world - in term of followers - and yet, the people of Encyclopedia Britannica can NOT tell me where they obtain those figures from.
Why?
Because, those figures are FAKE ! That's why.
Someone just script out some figures from thin air, and put it into the Encyclopedia Britannica, and then EVERYBODY ELSE AND THEIR BROTHER IN-LAW quote that stats as though it is the HOLY GRAIL.
Geeesh !
You know what kills me the most?
The STATS that you have just shown !
From www.adherents.com:
1.Christianity: 2 billion
2.Islam: 1.2 billion
3.Hinduism: 900 million
4.Secular/Nonreligious/Agnostic/Atheist:
900 million
5.Buddhism: 350 million
6.Chinese traditional religion: 225
million
7.primal-indigenous: 190 million
8.Yoruba religion: 20 million
9.Juche: 19 million
10.Sikhism: 18 million
11.Judaism: 15 million
12.Spiritism: 14 million
13.Babi & Baha'i faiths: 6 million
14.Jainism: 4 million
15.Shinto: 4 million
16.Cao Dai: 3 million
17.Tenrikyo: 2.4 million
18.Neo-Paganism: 1 million
19.Unitarian-Universalism: 800 thousand
20.Scientology: 750 thousand
21.Rastafarianism: 700 thousand
22.Zoroastrianism: 150 thousand
From the 80's onwards, people have been telling me that there was a "official statistic" that "clearly" showed that Christianity was the biggest religion of all.
So I looked for where they got that satistics, and I asked many questions.
Almost EVERYTIME I asked, and almost everytime I looked into the matter, it all points to the Encyclopedia Britannica, and I went to the library to check, "Walla !" there was the stat in there.
And I did asked the people who published the Encyclopedia Britannica where they obtain their statistics from, they couldn't give me a definite answer !
Yes, I did asked !
And yes, after more than 15 years, the Encyclopedia Britannica people still can't tell me where they obtain those figures from !
It seems like someone from the Encyclopedia Britannica DREAMT OF THE FIGURE and put them out in such a way that they have since became THE STATISTIC everybody and their cousin are refering to.
Let me say it again, the stat that you have just shown us is TOTALLY BASELESS.
I am not saying that there aren't many Christians.
I am not desputing that there _MAY BE_ a possibility that Christianity _is_ the BIGGEST religion of all.
But still, the stats that EVERYBODY HAS BEEN RELYING ON is a BASELESS STATISTICS, and nobody can come out with the VALID PROOF that the stats is based on an ACTUAL COUNTING based on VALID SCIENTIFIC METHOD !
Can anybody tell me why I am seeing so many fakeries on the Net?
I mean, there are so many people who are so publicly anti-porn (See that article on China's attempt of censorship and the author had to put the word "PORN" in it) but on the other hand, their hard drives may have thousands of kiddie-porn pictures and all other smut stuffs.
Isn't the etho of InterNet is LIVE AND LET LIVE - that is, you do your stuffs, I do mine, you leave me alone and I'll leave you alone, so long as what you do do not hurt me and vice versa?
I really long for the past days in the Net where everyone respect each others' privacy, and no one will come to tell you what you can do, what you can't.
Disclaimer: I am NOT for porn, but I am NOT going to ban porn just because I don't find it interesting. Just like I am not going to publicly asking those puritans to go to hell just because I am tired of their holier-than-thou views.
And one more question - just when all these will end?
Will it end when we are not allowed to watch, received, say or _think_ of anything someone, somewhere find disgusting?
What's the freedom of all these, eh?
Live and let live, fellas !!
> Don't you understand the concept of irony?
> Read some of his previous posts and you'll get
> what he means...
I _do_ understand the concept of irony, but not this.
Again, I must say that I do not support China's censorship move, _any_ censorship is bad. But this McCathy guy
Why?
WHAT IS RONG WITH PORN?
I mean, your view is different from my view. Your morality is different from mine. And there are things that you may find unacceptable, but to me if perfectly fine.
So, if you say that Jamie McCathy person is for "civil liberty", exactly _WHAT_ type of "civil liberty" is he for?
FOR CENSORSHIP ?
I mean, if he is against PORN - I don't mean the kiddie porn stuffs, but just plain-old garden-variety types of pron - he is FOR restricting people from accessing the PORN on the Net, and to me, my dear friend, is an act of CENSORSHIP.
So, Jamie McCathy is FOR censorship. Then, what's the use of criticize China for their censorship move while Jamie is him/herself a PRO-CENSORSHIP fella?
Isn't that kinda of irony?
Seems like sometimes people lost touch of the "Free" thing.
Yes, it's a "free download", but it's a beta software.
Would it be still free if it is not beta anymore?
It is also a proprietor program, ie, no souce is available. How to do debugging and send in patches if no source is available?
Doesn't that defeat the whole idea of Open Source?
I just wonder.
>If it was your ox being gored by a Chinese
>sweatshop reverse engineering your code and
>putting your company out of business by selling
>a copycat product in the U.S. via the internet,
>I expect you would look more kindly on the
>treaties and the DMCA that enable you to protect
>your company's IP and your job.
Do you know what? I am SICK AND TIRED of the RACIST thing that is going on on Slashdot.
ALmost everytime when you guys want to dump your trash on, you dump it on the Chinese.
In your little minds, it's CHINESE SWEATSHOPS that are doing harm to you. And it's your little mind that can never think that SWEATSHOPS is never a Chinese phenomena. You have AMERICAN SWEATSHOPS in America, but you well "Chinese sweatshop" at the drop of a hat just because it is fashionable to do so.
Shame on you !
And on the other matter, the copyright acts do NOT protect you from being REVERSED ENGINEERED !!
You go read the legal documents first.
REVERSE ENGINEERING happens all the time. In the Open Source arena, MOST OF THE DRIVERS were the result of reverse enginnering, simply because the vendors doesn't want to provide any details about their products.
Geeeeesh... you guys who want to place restriction on ANYTHING will do ANYTHING to protect your own selfish interests. Now you even want to get on the turf of reserse engineering.
What's next?
One look at your product and we must buy it, or you'd say we "stole" the "look" of your product and "embedded" it into our minds?
Gimme a break !!
I rather have my ox gored than to kow tow to assholes like you. If my ox being gored, then I just go and get another ox. After all, this world is build on innovation, not protection of OLD AND OBSOLETE IDEAS !!!
>It seems that The New York TImes is on the
>list of `political sensitive' sites, but all
>other U.S. papers are not.
>is free for all 1.3 billion people to view.
>Go figure.
I always has some suspicions that slashdot has been invaded by puritans, and now to my horror, slashdot has not only been invaded, slashdot even promoted the puritans to the point letting puritans having their own soapbox here.
I am not here to argue that what China did was right. Censorship is censorship, but I still want to know what Jamie [email: jamie@mccarthy.org ] was thinking when he said "Porn, however, is free for all 1.3 bilion people to view. Go figure."
WHAT IS WRONG WITH PORN?
I mean, what is wrong with sex?
Is Jamie the kind of person who don't enjoy sex, huh?!
Oh wait, is Jamie related to that _other_ infamous McCathy of the '50s era?
I wonder.
And I also want to know what's the exact relationship between Jamie and slashdot. Is he in control now?
I am not a lawyer, so I would like to post this question - Just how effective are the comments?
In other words, I want to know what's the role the comments play in the whole scheme of things.
Is it juat "comments" and then forget about it type, or is it I would really take your comments seriously and I will see what can I do?
What happens when there are opposing type of comments - as you have pointed out, the pro- and anti-consumer type, from different entities?
What will the copyright office do in such instance?
Will they base their future action on the comments on the businesses - anti-consumer - or will it be based on how many pro-consumer vs. the anti-consumer?
I just want to know, so, many thanks for any comments (yes, I take your comment seriously) that you may have.
Lest people think that the Symantec corp's involvement in a censorship campaign is anything new, I want to point out that CENSORSHIP is nothing new to Symantec -
Case in point :
Sometime last year, when I found out that the OPTASM compiler - those of you who were from the _old_ world of 16bit dos/win3.1 may still remember the wonderful things the OPTASM compiler could do - is currently owned by the Symantec corp., and since Symantec is NOT selling OPTASM anymore, and is NOT interested in upgrading the OPTASM compiler to the 32/64bit world of today, I wrote to Symantec and request that they release the OPTASM compiler to the public domain, either on a GPL or related license, so that the world at large can benefit from some of the wonderful techniques that many people have enjoyed.
Do you think this is a reasonable request?
I mean, the Symantec corp isn't selling OPTASM anymore, and not selling OPTASM means they are NOT making any money out of OPTASM anymore, and they do not have ANY PLAN to introduce an upgrade version of OPTASM,
So, my asking of Symantec to release the source code of OPTASM to the world should not be treated as an unreasonable request, right?
But to the Symantec corp, it isn't so.
They have stonewalled my request, and when I post my messages on Symantec's website forum, the Symantec Corp CHANGED THE ENTIRE FORUM and DELETE EVERY SINGLE MESSAGE THAT I HAVE POSTED !!
For the life of me, I do not know why Symantec wants so much to hold on to OPTASM - as far as I am concern, something that MAKES YOU NO MONEY is something that has NO VALUE, and something that has NO VALUE is something that can be consider as JUNK.
And if someone ask you to release the sourcecode of that junk, if I were Symantec Corp, I would do it in a martian minute !
I mean, why not?
If something is already NO VALUE for me, and if my release of the sourcecode to the world will give lots of GOODWILL, I would do it.
Apparently, Symantec doesn't operate that way.
They want to hold on to EVERYTHING, and they will go to the length of CENSORING other people to attain their goal of DOMINATION.
And about DOMINATION - I just don't know just what the hell that is worth Symantec's effort (including censorship) to dominate...
If it's MicroSoft, I can foresee that there _IS_ still some value to their Windoze code. But OPTASM, the 16bit assembly compiler?
C'mon !
From the message at http://community.borland.com/article/0,1410,21171
I think I have learned something new, but I just want to bounce off to you guys. Is the thing that I've quoted on the above paragraph something that is true?
I thank you for any help you can render.
>I wonder if it's too late to include it in the
>RH6.2.
I have heard from a reliable source from Red Hat, that version 6.2 was SPECIFICALLY DELAYED to wait for X 4.0.
So, my guess it that it will be included in RH 6.2
I have questions about the At Large Membership of ICANN.
I have gone to the ICANN site and filled in the form and all that to join the "At Large Membership" thingy.
After I hit that "submit" button, the site told me to wait for a confirmation email (which I got) and a "PIN" number via snail mail (which I am still waiting, already 3 weeks !).
Does any of you received the "PIN" number via snail mail yet?
I wonder if this whole thing isn't a sham after all.
The bochs is kinda weird.
On its website it says that its contribution is "open", meaning open to the public to contribute codes, while its a shareware of sort - trial use for 30 days and then you must pay the guy money, or you must delete the thing from your box.
Hmmm....
And then there is a mention of bochs merging with freevmware, in order to make it GPL.
Well... freevmware is not exactly GPL either. It's LGPL.
Hmmm....
Don't know what to make of it.