It's like selling deluxe air or executive toilet paper! It'd piss me off if it wasn't for the fact that the dorks who get rooked by this scheme are exactly the kinds of people who deserve it. Probably the same kinds of idiots who buy executive parachutes, for chrissakes.
...and, is it just me or does this whole scam remind you of the executive intro to Monty Python's instant record collection?
X-men would have been a huge flop if they had spandex costumes and just took a plot line straight from the comic books with no adaptation.
How would you know? To my knowledge nobody has ever even considered this approach.
I've always thought the X-Men special (XMen vs. the Avengers #4) where Magneto stands trial for crimes against humanity at the Hague would make a brilliant movie. It's entirely self-contained, loads of action...and a real struggle of good vs. evil. No need to dumb-down the story so everyone gets it - you could handle all that with flashbacks during the trial. And have the real history of the characters...and not some made-up mishmash that some goober with a camera thought might go over well.
Well, if Bill doesn't like GPL, how about LGPL? Notice he didn't mention that?
LGPL in a nutshell, creates a library. You may use the library in any way you like. The code you write that uses the library isn't affected by any GPLish license. Add on to the library, and you have to publish that...but write an app that uses it? That's fine. Sounds like a good govt. alternative to me.
But - there's why Bill fears anything GPL. Public money should go to public works. If I pay tax dollars for something to benefit the public, like public highways...well I am the public! I'd like to use it. And I'd be even happier if some company didn't come along and scoop it up and make it their own. Like how M$ copied Berkeley sockets verbatim and implemented netbios on top of it.
So with GPL, if Bill wants his own way, Bill has to write his own code. Waah. And if he uses the public roads, he has to obey the rules of the road. Double Waah. An unauthorized toll booth on a public road...is called theft.
Weaselmancer
PS: Isn't it too bad that the original Berkeley sockets aren't LGPL? Then the Samba guys would know exactly how M$ netbios shares work. See why Bill fears the GPL?
Wireless is not a casual item like a modem is. Joe sixpack wants a modem to get onto AOL. He doesn't care about the method, only the result. Joe gets prOn, and on a modem that cost a whole ten bucks less! That's 5 blank cd's fer chrissakes.
But.
Joe Sixpack doesn't use wireless. It's a step-up on the tech ladder. And those who are in the know, are in the know and would *never* use a SOFT WiFi. No bottom feeders use wireless. And a soft-anything is a bottom feeder solution.
Let some clueless HW mfg make these things. If they're lucky they'll sell maybe five of them.
Nor has Miguel made any secret of his ambitions to enrich the software libre desktop with more sophisticated infrastructure, using Microsoft Windows as the model. The Bonobo technology was designed to provide a lightweight compound architecture inspired by The Beast's COM, and there was even a Gnome Basic scripting language mooted at one point.
Thank God Miguel is looking out for us! I just know that someday, someday soon...my Linux distro will be compatible with Outlook viruses.
Nonsense. This book is nothing more than shelf decoration for marketdroids, a spammer's version of Harvey Mackay's meaningless claptrap. Allow me to translate:
"...getting closer to customers without violating their trust." Impossible. Getting closer to me is finding out more about me. It's creepy, it violates my privacy and therefore violates trust, QED. People who follow this advice will still be mailing Grandma coupons for coffins.
"How To Profit From Personalization." This translates directly into, "How to still use your expensive databases to target customers and maybe with any luck get less grief from it." Profit is mentioned up-front: No conscience is implied.
"Making It Personal shows businesses how to make personalization a win-win situation for everyone involved." The funniest part of the review, hands down. "Win-Win" is a meaningless catchphrase used by the kinds of people who say "touch base" when they mean "talk with". Also the funniest part of the review - they're using a spam catchphrase to sell a spam book to spammers. Poetic.
"In additional, personalization features are now appearing in software applications from companies like Oracle and Microsoft." This needs no discussion, but it's worth repeating.
"Making It Personal will prepare you and your company for a world where your customers demand that you get personal." Utter nonsense, the proof of which lies in the fact that there's a market for this book. If people were OK with Big Business knowing personal detail, you could make it Really Personal. But they're not - so you need this book to learn how to sugar-coat privacy invasion. Hardly something the public is demanding, right?
Seriously! Who cares if Linux gets.001% or 100% of the desktop market? How would your universe *really* change?
Desktop share is what you're interested in if you're in love with a commercial product. I know people who were in love with OS/2 and are still heartbroken about it being crowded out of the arena.
And there was a time when the OS/2 people jumped up and down about Desktop Market Share, because they wanted OS/2 to be the ruling os, forever and ever. It lost the war to Microsoft, and now it's MS on the desktop for the most part. And all the people who loved OS/2 were shit out of luck, because the corporate software product lost its profit margin, and died.
But can that happen to Linux? Nope.
No corporate entity can die and take Linux with it. No marketing droid can claim it's unprofitable and bury it. It will *always* be there - getting better and better, gaining features, applications, and usability. No profit margin dictates it's survival. To put it simply, if I boot a Windows box, or OS/X, or BSD or anything else - Linus does not care.
Try to imagine a scenario that kills Linux. Then you'll see just how irrelevant the whole "who owns the desktop" argument is.
Weaselmancer
PS: For extra credit, try to imagine a scenario that buries Windows. Hint - imagine WINE/Transgaming being able to run MS Office 2k and all DirectX 7.0+ games. It gives new insight into why MS is diversifying like mad (MSNBC,.NET, MSN, XBox, WinCE, etc...)
It's a formula for success that hasn't (to my knowledge) really been tried yet, so here goes:
Change Nothing.
It's really just that simple. Who is the target audience? People who watch the Sci-Fi channel...or to put it more simply, Us Geeks. And we're sticklers for detail. Don't believe me? Go to a sci-fi con sometime and ask anyone there who Nomad is. You will have your ears talked straight off.
I really wanted the miniseries to make up for the movie. I really did. But as I sat there watching it I couldn't help but say over and over, "Well that's wrong. So's that. She shouldn't be there. Those aren't supposed to look like that. He shouldn't be here yet." And so on.
Other bits were pleasing, and an improvement over the movie. Hearing the water sellers cry in the city was a nice touch. Cloaks over the stillsuits. Fremen popping up from the sand to fight. Details like that are exactly what we're looking for.
So my advice is this...if you're short on time, omit something if you must. That's entirely understandable. But don't change anything! Omissions are far easier to ignore. Having Irulan seduce Feyd was inexcusable.
If I were to take a picture of the Mona Lisa and crop it a bit to fit on my web page, everyone would still be able to tell it was the Mona Lisa. If I put her in a bikini top, give her a moustache and make the background Coney Island....well, it's no longer the Mona Lisa, right?
Please, if anyone at Sci-Fi is reading this...show this series the same respect you'd show any other work of art. Mr. Herbert wrote everything in a particular way to express a story he had in mind - you cannot improve upon it. All you can do is change it, and it's his story that we are fans of. So read the books carefully, and please don't paint another moustache on Dune.
...and it's worth noting that ALL of the Apollo XIII astronauts made it home safely after the explosion. And the astronauts were sitting on top of pretty much the most dangerous fuel cell you can make, high-pressure liquid oxygen and liquid hydrogen. In a vacuum. In zero G. Not only did they live, but the system still partially functioned!
Just a small something for all of the WTC/Hindenburg/Hydrogen-is-dangerous posters to think about.
Couldn't agree more. My method was to use a different middle initial for snailmail, and disposable email addresses from flashmail or hotmail or whatever.
But you have to do it each and every time! Never let up. I'll share my best spam story to illustrate.
It had been a while since I'd seen a concert. I live in Ohio, and decided to see the Red Hot Chili Peppers at a local venue. I won't mention its name, but they're local to Akron and a good place for a new band to Blossom. [wink, wink]
Said venue is an outdoor amphitheater. I always loved going there as a teenager. Bands, stars and a blanket. Nothing better.
And I come back years later and it's Corporate. Six dollar beers, and you're not even allowed to bring a blanket in to sit on - put your ass on the grass and deal with it. For free, you also get a half-hour walk back to your car to stash your blanket.
So I get home, and I'm furious. I go to their webpage and type up a well-written but angry letter and send it to The Powers That Be. The gist of the letter is that I will NEVER attend another concert there, even with a personal invitation from Jesus Christ. And what do you suppose happens?
....wait for it....
They put me on a mailing list informing me of exciting new shows coming up and ticket deals!
So everyone, by all means - hinder these marketing morons. Call their 800 numbers, tie up their salespeople...make it expensive and annoying because they're likely to not understand anything else.
List companies/organizations that have switched to or are created new uses for Linux
Probably not a good idea. This will provide the M$ marketdroids with a list of people to assimilate. They'd pitch fantastic "we're a bazillion dollar company so we can do this for effect" deals at them to get them to switch. And watching companies bail off a Linux advocacy site would be demoralizing.
Approval from whom? The software authors? Doesn't matter. According to the DCMA, it is illegal to write code to bypass security. If something is illegal, that's the bottom line, consent of the "victim" notwithstanding.
Adobe tried to get the Feds to spring Dimitry, and it was a no-go. If a cop says you're allowed to run a red light and you do...guess what? You still get a ticket.
Stand on a stage and tell someone how I cracked their software??
Some people have really short memories.
Didn't some Russian guy just get busted for that??
Slashdot Mirror
Oh this has to be a joke!
It's like selling deluxe air or executive toilet paper! It'd piss me off if it wasn't for the fact that the dorks who get rooked by this scheme are exactly the kinds of people who deserve it. Probably the same kinds of idiots who buy executive parachutes, for chrissakes.
...and, is it just me or does this whole scam remind you of the executive intro to Monty Python's instant record collection?
Weaselmancer
How would you know? To my knowledge nobody has ever even considered this approach.
I've always thought the X-Men special (XMen vs. the Avengers #4) where Magneto stands trial for crimes against humanity at the Hague would make a brilliant movie. It's entirely self-contained, loads of action...and a real struggle of good vs. evil. No need to dumb-down the story so everyone gets it - you could handle all that with flashbacks during the trial. And have the real history of the characters...and not some made-up mishmash that some goober with a camera thought might go over well.
Weaselmancer
Madnick really said that? Has this bozo never heard of a TCP/IP stack?
Weaselmancer
The problem isn't grammar, it's spelling. Does this make me a logic Nazi?
Weaselmancer
Well, if Bill doesn't like GPL, how about LGPL? Notice he didn't mention that?
LGPL in a nutshell, creates a library. You may use the library in any way you like. The code you write that uses the library isn't affected by any GPLish license. Add on to the library, and you have to publish that...but write an app that uses it? That's fine. Sounds like a good govt. alternative to me.
But - there's why Bill fears anything GPL. Public money should go to public works. If I pay tax dollars for something to benefit the public, like public highways...well I am the public! I'd like to use it. And I'd be even happier if some company didn't come along and scoop it up and make it their own. Like how M$ copied Berkeley sockets verbatim and implemented netbios on top of it.
So with GPL, if Bill wants his own way, Bill has to write his own code. Waah. And if he uses the public roads, he has to obey the rules of the road. Double Waah. An unauthorized toll booth on a public road...is called theft.
Weaselmancer
PS: Isn't it too bad that the original Berkeley sockets aren't LGPL? Then the Samba guys would know exactly how M$ netbios shares work. See why Bill fears the GPL?
Although you probably could run these games with the no-CD patch, how would you install them?
I always thought the best thing about Transgaming was the whiz-bang Installshield stuff. Or is that a part of the CVS archive?
Weaselmancer
..because it'll never happen.
Wireless is not a casual item like a modem is. Joe sixpack wants a modem to get onto AOL. He doesn't care about the method, only the result. Joe gets prOn, and on a modem that cost a whole ten bucks less! That's 5 blank cd's fer chrissakes.
But.
Joe Sixpack doesn't use wireless. It's a step-up on the tech ladder. And those who are in the know, are in the know and would *never* use a SOFT WiFi. No bottom feeders use wireless. And a soft-anything is a bottom feeder solution.
Let some clueless HW mfg make these things. If they're lucky they'll sell maybe five of them.
Weaselmancer
A quote from The Register:
Nor has Miguel made any secret of his ambitions to enrich the software libre desktop with more sophisticated infrastructure, using Microsoft Windows as the model. The Bonobo technology was designed to provide a lightweight compound architecture inspired by The Beast's COM, and there was even a Gnome Basic scripting language mooted at one point.
Thank God Miguel is looking out for us! I just know that someday, someday soon...my Linux distro will be compatible with Outlook viruses.
Weaselmancer
Nonsense. This book is nothing more than shelf decoration for marketdroids, a spammer's version of Harvey Mackay's meaningless claptrap. Allow me to translate:
"...getting closer to customers without violating their trust." Impossible. Getting closer to me is finding out more about me. It's creepy, it violates my privacy and therefore violates trust, QED. People who follow this advice will still be mailing Grandma coupons for coffins.
"How To Profit From Personalization." This translates directly into, "How to still use your expensive databases to target customers and maybe with any luck get less grief from it." Profit is mentioned up-front: No conscience is implied.
"Making It Personal shows businesses how to make personalization a win-win situation for everyone involved." The funniest part of the review, hands down. "Win-Win" is a meaningless catchphrase used by the kinds of people who say "touch base" when they mean "talk with". Also the funniest part of the review - they're using a spam catchphrase to sell a spam book to spammers. Poetic.
"In additional, personalization features are now appearing in software applications from companies like Oracle and Microsoft." This needs no discussion, but it's worth repeating.
"Making It Personal will prepare you and your company for a world where your customers demand that you get personal." Utter nonsense, the proof of which lies in the fact that there's a market for this book. If people were OK with Big Business knowing personal detail, you could make it Really Personal. But they're not - so you need this book to learn how to sugar-coat privacy invasion. Hardly something the public is demanding, right?
Weaselmancer
Finally an excuse to use my old Amiga!
The amiga keyboard uses a 6502 processor to communicate to the main cpu - a 68000.
That's computer-to-computer communication, and therefore protected by the Wiretap statute. Right? ;^)
We wouldn't just love to - we have. Remember Dimitry? He broke an American law in Russia, and still somehow got a free trip to Club Fed.
Seriously! Who cares if Linux gets .001% or 100% of the desktop market? How would your universe *really* change?
Desktop share is what you're interested in if you're in love with a commercial product. I know people who were in love with OS/2 and are still heartbroken about it being crowded out of the arena.
And there was a time when the OS/2 people jumped up and down about Desktop Market Share, because they wanted OS/2 to be the ruling os, forever and ever. It lost the war to Microsoft, and now it's MS on the desktop for the most part. And all the people who loved OS/2 were shit out of luck, because the corporate software product lost its profit margin, and died.
But can that happen to Linux? Nope.
No corporate entity can die and take Linux with it. No marketing droid can claim it's unprofitable and bury it. It will *always* be there - getting better and better, gaining features, applications, and usability. No profit margin dictates it's survival. To put it simply, if I boot a Windows box, or OS/X, or BSD or anything else - Linus does not care.
Try to imagine a scenario that kills Linux. Then you'll see just how irrelevant the whole "who owns the desktop" argument is.
Weaselmancer
PS: For extra credit, try to imagine a scenario that buries Windows. Hint - imagine WINE/Transgaming being able to run MS Office 2k and all DirectX 7.0+ games. It gives new insight into why MS is diversifying like mad (MSNBC, .NET, MSN, XBox, WinCE, etc...)
It's a formula for success that hasn't (to my knowledge) really been tried yet, so here goes:
Change Nothing.
It's really just that simple. Who is the target audience? People who watch the Sci-Fi channel...or to put it more simply, Us Geeks. And we're sticklers for detail. Don't believe me? Go to a sci-fi con sometime and ask anyone there who Nomad is. You will have your ears talked straight off.
I really wanted the miniseries to make up for the movie. I really did. But as I sat there watching it I couldn't help but say over and over, "Well that's wrong. So's that. She shouldn't be there. Those aren't supposed to look like that. He shouldn't be here yet." And so on.
Other bits were pleasing, and an improvement over the movie. Hearing the water sellers cry in the city was a nice touch. Cloaks over the stillsuits. Fremen popping up from the sand to fight. Details like that are exactly what we're looking for.
So my advice is this...if you're short on time, omit something if you must. That's entirely understandable. But don't change anything! Omissions are far easier to ignore. Having Irulan seduce Feyd was inexcusable.
If I were to take a picture of the Mona Lisa and crop it a bit to fit on my web page, everyone would still be able to tell it was the Mona Lisa. If I put her in a bikini top, give her a moustache and make the background Coney Island....well, it's no longer the Mona Lisa, right?
Please, if anyone at Sci-Fi is reading this...show this series the same respect you'd show any other work of art. Mr. Herbert wrote everything in a particular way to express a story he had in mind - you cannot improve upon it. All you can do is change it, and it's his story that we are fans of. So read the books carefully, and please don't paint another moustache on Dune.
...and it's worth noting that ALL of the Apollo XIII astronauts made it home safely after the explosion. And the astronauts were sitting on top of pretty much the most dangerous fuel cell you can make, high-pressure liquid oxygen and liquid hydrogen. In a vacuum. In zero G. Not only did they live, but the system still partially functioned!
Just a small something for all of the WTC/Hindenburg/Hydrogen-is-dangerous posters to think about.
Couldn't agree more. My method was to use a different middle initial for snailmail, and disposable email addresses from flashmail or hotmail or whatever.
But you have to do it each and every time! Never let up. I'll share my best spam story to illustrate.
It had been a while since I'd seen a concert. I live in Ohio, and decided to see the Red Hot Chili Peppers at a local venue. I won't mention its name, but they're local to Akron and a good place for a new band to Blossom. [wink, wink]
Said venue is an outdoor amphitheater. I always loved going there as a teenager. Bands, stars and a blanket. Nothing better.
And I come back years later and it's Corporate. Six dollar beers, and you're not even allowed to bring a blanket in to sit on - put your ass on the grass and deal with it. For free, you also get a half-hour walk back to your car to stash your blanket.
So I get home, and I'm furious. I go to their webpage and type up a well-written but angry letter and send it to The Powers That Be. The gist of the letter is that I will NEVER attend another concert there, even with a personal invitation from Jesus Christ. And what do you suppose happens?
They put me on a mailing list informing me of exciting new shows coming up and ticket deals!
So everyone, by all means - hinder these marketing morons. Call their 800 numbers, tie up their salespeople...make it expensive and annoying because they're likely to not understand anything else.
List companies/organizations that have switched to or are created new uses for Linux
Probably not a good idea. This will provide the M$ marketdroids with a list of people to assimilate. They'd pitch fantastic "we're a bazillion dollar company so we can do this for effect" deals at them to get them to switch. And watching companies bail off a Linux advocacy site would be demoralizing.
Approval from whom? The software authors? Doesn't matter. According to the DCMA, it is illegal to write code to bypass security. If something is illegal, that's the bottom line, consent of the "victim" notwithstanding.
Adobe tried to get the Feds to spring Dimitry, and it was a no-go. If a cop says you're allowed to run a red light and you do...guess what? You still get a ticket.
Stand on a stage and tell someone how I cracked their software?? Some people have really short memories. Didn't some Russian guy just get busted for that??