There's a difference between just plain meanness, which you describe very eloquently, and the frustration of paying a lot of money for school, only to discover that you won't get the kind of instruction and help you expect from your teachers, because they can't communicate with you. Teaching is about communication, and if you aren't able to communicate effectively with the students, then you aren't qualified to be a teacher, and trying to do a job you simply aren't equipped for is bound to be painful on both sides. But, in my opinion, you should never have been in that position.
Get that straight. You can't look at an inanimate object and say it is or is not "speech". Speech is the act of talking. For the purposes of the first amendment, the concept is broadened to include most forms of communication, so the act of speaking, of writing and distributing, etc are protected. Writing the DeCSS algorithm and showing to people is a pretty pure form of speech - you are simply communicating information. It's not like the stupid "Fire!" in a crowded theater example where that act is more than just communication.
So stop analyzing what the program does when compiled and run on a computer - you've missed the point. When you run it, that's not speech. When you show the code to another human being, that's speech.
Jesus Christ! You missed the whole fucking point of his post you moron! He so clearly explained why voting for a third party is not a wasted voteRIGHT NOW, and then you brilliantly say "While your points are correct, the road to a day when a vote for a third party is not wasted will be long". WTF!!? He's right, but he's wrong? This is the kind of idiocy we don't need anymore.
</rant>
Actually, your post appears to exhibit a poor understanding of the nature of scientific research. When you say science is "based on facts", you are making some unwarranted assumption about the nature of facts.
The facts you find in your research are very often determined by what questions you ask. Profit motivation, driven by corporate funding, will alter the nature of the questions asked in academic research, thus changing the nature of the facts discovered.
And that doesn't even take into consideration corruption of the human beings involved.
Corporate research is an excellent thing. So is research done for the sake of research. Academic research should be public domain, just to preserve the diversity of research that is done. Imagine if this "paradigm" really takes root, and the vast majority of universities conduct research for profit. There is some very important research done that will be abandoned because there's no product to sell at the end.
People won't care about performance nearly as much as they do about compatibility. If all we wanted was a 64 bit architecture that was fast -it's already out there. It's called Alphas. So, this race between AMD and Intel is about which will Windows run on? It's too bad, though, since Linux has already proven that a good OS is capable of working anywhere. I would prefer to have more choices in the hardware world....
I suppose it's true that if I were a typical perl programmer (ie - stupid) I would find writing writing that Java code over and over again pretty tedious, and I would prefer the one-liner approach to everything.
Fortunately, I'm not, so I don't write the same code over and over again. I write it once, and make use of it for years on end. It's called good program design - maybe you should try it.
One of the reasons I can get faster and faster CPU's every year, yet still see no difference in how fast my computer runs is because too many application writers are getting off on programming in "tasks" for their applications to do even though I, the user, never asked it to do so. I run application x to do word processing, but little do I know, x is also listening for mail, watching the file system, watching my every action to see if it can help, etc. Now, they'll be watching where I'm looking, etc. I would appreciate it if a standard developed that application writers would allow enable/disable options for this stuff. There are times when I want my machine to run fast. Period.
On a related note, software takes advantage of faster and faster computers by doing more and more, rather than just going faster. Sometimes this is great, but I'd like to have some choice in the matter, as a user.
Computers doing things I never asked them to do - thinking on their own and then acting on their own decisions is not a good trail to go down for everyday usage. It's like the argument between the console and the GUI - developers like to know what is happening. I believe it actually is possible to have both - a nice GUI so that it isn't necessary to memorize obscure commands and and understandable program that doesn't do more than you asked it to. This is the kind of "GUI innovation" I'd like to see.
I have to take exception to applications on central servers. As you point out yourself - you'll be able to run 1-2 IF you have local app servers serving just 25 workstations.
It's sounds tempting - put everything on servers, it's much easier to maintain. It's true - from the admin point of view, having everything on the server is much easier. It's also much easier from that point of view to lie down and go sleepytime and forget about the users....
Problems with central apps: Software needs unique to small groups - they are often left out in the cold. typically, fighting starts about putting special need apps on the central servers. End result - they can't do their work.
And, network delays - as has already been pointed out, employees will sit staring at useless screens waiting for stuff to happen.
Given good cloning/replication/remote admin, you shouldn't need to put apps on a central server just so going from version 2.5 to 2.6 is easier. You ought to be able to set up a script that remotely updates the necessary applications across many workstations.
But perhaps the most tantalising development on the horizon for LEP technology, says Burroughes, is the possibility of creating video displays for, say, wireless Internet access, that can be rolled up.
This is what I've been waiting for forever. I don't want a laptop, I don't want a palm-pilot - I want a piece of paper I can take out of my pocket and start computing/surfing/etc. I figured I'd have to wait at least 5 years though, so I'm excited.
Although I believe we owe a lot to Stallman, and a lot to the GPL, it may be time to ditch it.
The reason is, we're losing site of why we like open-source software, of why we do it, and of the goal for better software and global peace (I just threw that in there, seems to fit).
I don't think most hackers contribute their changes back to the community because the bibl^H^H^H^HGPL told them to. They do it because they enjoy doing it, or they enjoy seeing a program get better because of their actions, or they enjoy getting recognition as being a hacker of open-source code. Whatever - I don't think Apache has much trouble getting people to contribute back to them, and their not using the GPL for their stuff.
I've seen plenty of people worrying that they don't want their code used by someone else to make money. To these people I suggest a)you're being a bit arrogant and stupid (I'll let you figure out why), and b)you're forgetting what makes open-source software "better". Why would someone be able to make money off your program by turning it proprietary? The open source version is free - it's got more development power behind it, it's more responsive to users, etc, etc.
Which leads me to the goal of the movement - free software for all. What's the best way to achieve it? Throw off all proprietary strategies and start out-producing! After, aren't we saying that open-source is superior as an economic model? ie, it's a more productive way to produce high-quality software. Well, stop trying to win the game by "cheating" (ie using proprietary strategies like the GPL), and start winning by burying them.
Yes, if you see parallels between this and capitalism vs communism, then you're right. However, I see OSS as the new capitalism - in the sense that it is a more efficient system and will leave the old capitalism behind.
I think the GPL played a needed role in getting the movement jump-started. But, I'd like to see it be phased out by the community. I'd like to see a new license developed that, instead of putting restrictions on people, it merely informed them about the software - about where it comes from, where to contribute to, who the maintainers are, where to get tech help, etc. Not really a license, I know, but stuff like that could be standardized to good effect.
A good migration path might be for more and more developers to start using the LGPL, and then as more time goes by, just use the non-license, or even public domain (I don't like public domain as a name because it implies it's just "out there" without a specific group of people that maintain it).
It seems offensive to me that just an idea can be patented. As other people have pointed out elsewhere, ideas are cheap and a dime-a-dozen. What's difficult is getting a working implementation of a good idea.
Patents should be restricted, at the very least, to demonstrated, working models.
This is a good point. It seems to me that the way of the future is for companies to provide contract work in software. Redhat will provide support in the form of on-site contractors, similar to EDS and the like, to manage IT for a company. I also see people working contract jobs where their job is essentially to modify and customize free software to the specific needs of a company. This is all very biased since it represents what I hope will happen - companies no longer paying for software, but rather employing people to support their software needs.
I also think it likely that these Linux distros will run into hard times, and when that happens, the real fighting will begin, and it will be interesting what tactics they try. I don't doubt the ideals of open-source will be ditched for the sake of survival.
I find it odd that the Athlon can be shown to be 33-38% faster in pure FPU benchmarks than Coppermine, but none of that performance seems to show up unless you make a test specific for it. Is this an indication that the Athlon CPU is great but that the chipsets are awful for it? What would an Athlon do with a chipset as good as Intel's?
Notice how none of your examples are very IP related. Cars, clothing, food, internet service - those are products that actually cost money to produce and/or administer. I am not arguing capitalism doesn't work - it does. Much, much better than any central planning could ever do. But, there are other possibilities in store for us in the future. There will come a day when those things too become virtually free, but that day isn't here yet. I hope that when it does, you won't be one of those who insists we should pay for it anyway at inflated prices in order to be good, loyal capitalists.
Apparently net access is practically free, and downloading MP3's is free, so.... I'll let you judge whether working is necessary for these things.
The point is that spending $16 for a CD should not be considered a virtue. It ought to be considered really, really dumb, and it should make you feel like an idiot. You play into the hands of some very rich, arrogant, power-hungry people.
What you are suggesting is that good capitalists should work and spend there hard-earned money on expensive CD's, just because it's the "right" thing to do. You may call it theft to do otherwise, but some people just call it downloading. Some people want to change your definitions of things, and possibly make the world a better place. The information age is about making things so cheap as to be practicaly free - and that is a serious threat to capitalism. So, our government is being asked to legislate profits for the "owners of ideas and knowledge", for the purpose of perpetuating capitalism. Those of us on the other side of the fence want to start the process of ending capitalism in order to build something new and better, now that it's slowly becoming possible (because of technology). Most don't realize this is what the fighting is about, because most don't want to think it's capitalism vs communism (which it isn't, really, but I'm sure you're thinking that after reading this).
So, as I said, let's not make a virtue out of a necessity that's no longer a necessity (ie capitalism).
If you give can give me an MP3 of any song, then I can give folks copies of the Linux kernel (gcc, emacs, whatever) without any licensing, effectively making it too then public domain Ok, sounds good.
Then anyone can create a nice operating system without these cumbersome restrictions Ok, sounds good too!
The way our constitution is written in the US, you have every right not specified in law. The original writers of the constitution had some debate about whether to include the bill of rights, because by doing so, it implied you only had the rights specified, and anything else was iffy, but in actuality, the intention is that anything not specified, you have an implied right to. It appears they may have made a mistake by including the bill of rights.
Anyway, just thought I'd point that out. Not sure if it has anything to do with the argument you two were having (sorry, I couldn't make much sense of either of your posts).
But you don't have a leg to stand on when you advocate theft of copyrighted material.
He certainly does have a leg to stand on. The point is, how much of IP law is reasonable. Just because it's the law doesn't make it right. If we continue down the path of ever strengthening IP laws against the tide of digital copying, we will get in trouble. Advocating civil disobedience has a long and honored history for us (in the US and elsewhere), and there are plenty of arguments to support his views.
I wonder if it's not a combination of factors - 1) that people on the internet are more likely people of means, and people who are able to take care of themselves are more likely to be libertarian, and 2) people on the net tend to be more computer savvy, and computer people tend to be more arrogant, which is another trait many libertarians share.
I'll have to agree with Kaa about your level of confusion. In addition, massacres on definitely did occur. By some counts, Genghis Khan was responsible for more deaths (~100,000,000) than any other single person ever, in absolute terms! And there weren't that many people living back then.
Slashdot Mirror
There's a difference between just plain meanness, which you describe very eloquently, and the frustration of paying a lot of money for school, only to discover that you won't get the kind of instruction and help you expect from your teachers, because they can't communicate with you. Teaching is about communication, and if you aren't able to communicate effectively with the students, then you aren't qualified to be a teacher, and trying to do a job you simply aren't equipped for is bound to be painful on both sides. But, in my opinion, you should never have been in that position.
Get that straight. You can't look at an inanimate object and say it is or is not "speech". Speech is the act of talking. For the purposes of the first amendment, the concept is broadened to include most forms of communication, so the act of speaking, of writing and distributing, etc are protected. Writing the DeCSS algorithm and showing to people is a pretty pure form of speech - you are simply communicating information. It's not like the stupid "Fire!" in a crowded theater example where that act is more than just communication.
So stop analyzing what the program does when compiled and run on a computer - you've missed the point. When you run it, that's not speech. When you show the code to another human being, that's speech.
Jesus Christ! You missed the whole fucking point of his post you moron! He so clearly explained why voting for a third party is not a wasted vote RIGHT NOW , and then you brilliantly say "While your points are correct, the road to a day when a vote for a third party is not wasted will be long". WTF!!? He's right, but he's wrong? This is the kind of idiocy we don't need anymore.
</rant>
Actually, your post appears to exhibit a poor understanding of the nature of scientific research. When you say science is "based on facts", you are making some unwarranted assumption about the nature of facts.
The facts you find in your research are very often determined by what questions you ask. Profit motivation, driven by corporate funding, will alter the nature of the questions asked in academic research, thus changing the nature of the facts discovered.
And that doesn't even take into consideration corruption of the human beings involved.
Corporate research is an excellent thing. So is research done for the sake of research. Academic research should be public domain, just to preserve the diversity of research that is done. Imagine if this "paradigm" really takes root, and the vast majority of universities conduct research for profit. There is some very important research done that will be abandoned because there's no product to sell at the end.
No one can say human beings don't deserve what they get. :-(
People won't care about performance nearly as much as they do about compatibility. If all we wanted was a 64 bit architecture that was fast -it's already out there. It's called Alphas. So, this race between AMD and Intel is about which will Windows run on? It's too bad, though, since Linux has already proven that a good OS is capable of working anywhere. I would prefer to have more choices in the hardware world....
I suppose it's true that if I were a typical perl programmer (ie - stupid) I would find writing writing that Java code over and over again pretty tedious, and I would prefer the one-liner approach to everything.
Fortunately, I'm not, so I don't write the same code over and over again. I write it once, and make use of it for years on end. It's called good program design - maybe you should try it.
One of the reasons I can get faster and faster CPU's every year, yet still see no difference in how fast my computer runs is because too many application writers are getting off on programming in "tasks" for their applications to do even though I, the user, never asked it to do so. I run application x to do word processing, but little do I know, x is also listening for mail, watching the file system, watching my every action to see if it can help, etc. Now, they'll be watching where I'm looking, etc. I would appreciate it if a standard developed that application writers would allow enable/disable options for this stuff. There are times when I want my machine to run fast. Period.
On a related note, software takes advantage of faster and faster computers by doing more and more, rather than just going faster. Sometimes this is great, but I'd like to have some choice in the matter, as a user.
Computers doing things I never asked them to do - thinking on their own and then acting on their own decisions is not a good trail to go down for everyday usage. It's like the argument between the console and the GUI - developers like to know what is happening. I believe it actually is possible to have both - a nice GUI so that it isn't necessary to memorize obscure commands and and understandable program that doesn't do more than you asked it to. This is the kind of "GUI innovation" I'd like to see.
I have to take exception to applications on central servers. As you point out yourself - you'll be able to run 1-2 IF you have local app servers serving just 25 workstations.
:-)
It's sounds tempting - put everything on servers, it's much easier to maintain. It's true - from the admin point of view, having everything on the server is much easier. It's also much easier from that point of view to lie down and go sleepytime and forget about the users....
Problems with central apps:
Software needs unique to small groups - they are often left out in the cold. typically, fighting starts about putting special need apps on the central servers. End result - they can't do their work.
And, network delays - as has already been pointed out, employees will sit staring at useless screens waiting for stuff to happen.
Given good cloning/replication/remote admin, you shouldn't need to put apps on a central server just so going from version 2.5 to 2.6 is easier. You ought to be able to set up a script that remotely updates the necessary applications across many workstations.
Don't ask me how though - I'm just a "user".
But perhaps the most tantalising development on the horizon for LEP technology, says Burroughes, is the possibility of creating video displays for, say, wireless Internet access, that can be rolled up.
This is what I've been waiting for forever. I don't want a laptop, I don't want a palm-pilot - I want a piece of paper I can take out of my pocket and start computing/surfing/etc. I figured I'd have to wait at least 5 years though, so I'm excited.
Although I believe we owe a lot to Stallman, and a lot to the GPL, it may be time to ditch it.
The reason is, we're losing site of why we like open-source software, of why we do it, and of the goal for better software and global peace (I just threw that in there, seems to fit).
I don't think most hackers contribute their changes back to the community because the bibl^H^H^H^HGPL told them to. They do it because they enjoy doing it, or they enjoy seeing a program get better because of their actions, or they enjoy getting recognition as being a hacker of open-source code. Whatever - I don't think Apache has much trouble getting people to contribute back to them, and their not using the GPL for their stuff.
I've seen plenty of people worrying that they don't want their code used by someone else to make money. To these people I suggest a)you're being a bit arrogant and stupid (I'll let you figure out why), and b)you're forgetting what makes open-source software "better". Why would someone be able to make money off your program by turning it proprietary? The open source version is free - it's got more development power behind it, it's more responsive to users, etc, etc.
Which leads me to the goal of the movement - free software for all. What's the best way to achieve it? Throw off all proprietary strategies and start out-producing! After, aren't we saying that open-source is superior as an economic model? ie, it's a more productive way to produce
high-quality software. Well, stop trying to win the game by "cheating" (ie using proprietary strategies like the GPL), and start winning by burying them.
Yes, if you see parallels between this and capitalism vs communism, then you're right. However, I see OSS as the new capitalism - in the sense that it is a more efficient system and will leave the old capitalism behind.
I think the GPL played a needed role in getting the movement jump-started. But, I'd like to see it be phased out by the community. I'd like to see a new license developed that, instead of putting restrictions on people, it merely informed them about the software - about where it comes from, where to contribute to, who the maintainers are, where to get tech help, etc. Not really a license, I know, but stuff like that could be standardized to good effect.
A good migration path might be for more and more developers to start using the LGPL, and then as more time goes by, just use the non-license, or even public domain (I don't like public domain as a name because it implies it's just "out there" without a specific group of people that maintain it).
It seems offensive to me that just an idea can be patented. As other people have pointed out elsewhere, ideas are cheap and a dime-a-dozen. What's difficult is getting a working implementation of a good idea.
Patents should be restricted, at the very least, to demonstrated, working models.
This is a good point. It seems to me that the way of the future is for companies to provide contract work in software. Redhat will provide support in the form of on-site contractors, similar to EDS and the like, to manage IT for a company. I also see people working contract jobs where their job is essentially to modify and customize free software to the specific needs of a company. This is all very biased since it represents what I hope will happen - companies no longer paying for software, but rather employing people to support their software needs.
I also think it likely that these Linux distros will run into hard times, and when that happens, the real fighting will begin, and it will be interesting what tactics they try. I don't doubt the ideals of open-source will be ditched for the sake of survival.
Are you sharing whatever it is you're smoking? I think I'd like some....
I'm not sure why it shows how stupid people are.
I find it odd that the Athlon can be shown to be 33-38% faster in pure FPU benchmarks than Coppermine, but none of that performance seems to show up unless you make a test specific for it. Is this an indication that the Athlon CPU is great but that the chipsets are awful for it? What would an Athlon do with a chipset as good as Intel's?
Notice how none of your examples are very IP related. Cars, clothing, food, internet service - those are products that actually cost money to produce and/or administer. I am not arguing capitalism doesn't work - it does. Much, much better than any central planning could ever do. But, there are other possibilities in store for us in the future. There will come a day when those things too become virtually free, but that day isn't here yet. I hope that when it does, you won't be one of those who insists we should pay for it anyway at inflated prices in order to be good, loyal capitalists.
Apparently net access is practically free, and downloading MP3's is free, so.... I'll let you judge whether working is necessary for these things.
The point is that spending $16 for a CD should not be considered a virtue. It ought to be considered really, really dumb, and it should make you feel like an idiot. You play into the hands of some very rich, arrogant, power-hungry people.
What you are suggesting is that good capitalists should work and spend there hard-earned money on expensive CD's, just because it's the "right" thing to do. You may call it theft to do otherwise, but some people just call it downloading. Some people want to change your definitions of things, and possibly make the world a better place. The information age is about making things so cheap as to be practicaly free - and that is a serious threat to capitalism. So, our government is being asked to legislate profits for the "owners of ideas and knowledge", for the purpose of perpetuating capitalism. Those of us on the other side of the fence want to start the process of ending capitalism in order to build something new and better, now that it's slowly becoming possible (because of technology). Most don't realize this is what the fighting is about, because most don't want to think it's capitalism vs communism (which it isn't, really, but I'm sure you're thinking that after reading this).
So, as I said, let's not make a virtue out of a necessity that's no longer a necessity (ie capitalism).
If you give can give me an MP3 of any song, then I can give folks copies of the Linux kernel (gcc, emacs, whatever) without any licensing, effectively making it too then public domain
Ok, sounds good.
Then anyone can create a nice operating system without these cumbersome restrictions
Ok, sounds good too!
You make some excellent points!
Maybe you should have made the IAAL(I am a lawyer) disclaimer, so everyone could see why you'd say such a dumb thing.
The way our constitution is written in the US, you have every right not specified in law. The original writers of the constitution had some debate about whether to include the bill of rights, because by doing so, it implied you only had the rights specified, and anything else was iffy, but in actuality, the intention is that anything not specified, you have an implied right to. It appears they may have made a mistake by including the bill of rights.
Anyway, just thought I'd point that out. Not sure if it has anything to do with the argument you two were having (sorry, I couldn't make much sense of either of your posts).
Once the necessity has been removed, it's no longer wise to make it a virtue.
Times are a-changin', old fella. Go back to work and get over it.
But you don't have a leg to stand on when you advocate theft of copyrighted material.
He certainly does have a leg to stand on. The point is, how much of IP law is reasonable. Just because it's the law doesn't make it right. If we continue down the path of ever strengthening IP laws against the tide of digital copying, we will get in trouble. Advocating civil disobedience has a long and honored history for us (in the US and elsewhere), and there are plenty of arguments to support his views.
I wonder if it's not a combination of factors - 1) that people on the internet are more likely people of means, and people who are able to take care of themselves are more likely to be libertarian, and 2) people on the net tend to be more computer savvy, and computer people tend to be more arrogant, which is another trait many libertarians share.
I'll have to agree with Kaa about your level of confusion. In addition, massacres on definitely did occur. By some counts, Genghis Khan was responsible for more deaths (~100,000,000) than any other single person ever, in absolute terms! And there weren't that many people living back then.