What will Oracle rip^^^base its Unbreakable Linux on?
More importantly where will businesses go to get their linux OS upon which to run Oracle?
Yes I know, Oracle will provide the OS and that is the idea behind Oracle's Unbreakable Linux, but there is a problem that should be considered by anyone who is interested in replacing Red Hat support subscriptions with Oracle support subscriptions. The CEO of Oracle does not believe in supporting open source because Ellison fears that "if we could do this, other people could do this too" and Ellison believes that when it comes to open source "if it ever got good enough we'd just take the intellectual property".
So you see there is no way the CEO of Oracle is going to allow any significant Oracle development to be placed in an open source product because then everyone would just take Oracle's intellectual property. linux as an open source product from Oracle is a dead end without Red Hat and any business that considers buying linux support from Oracle as apposed to an actual open source vendor like Red Hat either misunderstands the implications or has rocks in their head.
The legislation would immunize groups such as the Motion Picture Association of America and the Recording Industry Association of America from all state and federal laws if they disable, block or otherwise impair a "publicly accessible peer-to-peer network."
Anyone whose computer was damaged in the process must receive the permission of the U.S. attorney general before filing a lawsuit, and a suit could be filed only if the actual monetary loss was more than $250.
According to the draft, the attorney general must be given complete details about the "specific technologies the copyright holder intends to use to impair" the normal operation of the peer-to-peer network. Those details would remain secret and would not be divulged to the public.
The draft bill doesn't specify what techniques, such as viruses, worms, denial-of-service attacks, or domain name hijacking, would be permissible. It does say that a copyright-hacker should not delete files, but it limits the right of anyone subject to an intrusion to sue if files are accidentally erased.
Of course software can't really be destroyed but there could be significant inconvenience and recovery costs for end user's who are targeted by RIAA to have their computer "impaired".
One of the fine senators from the US state of Utah, one Orrin Hatch, attempted to pass legislation that would allow organizations such as the RIAA to illegally infiltrate and destroy software and information on personal computers of the citizens whom he supposedly represented. It seems the corporations he actually represents find the legal process and the concept of innocent until proven guilty by your peers in a court of law to be too cumbersome for them to deal with.
The same senator recently had an article on his website where he supported the "technology" behind the CP80 (clean port 80) effort. Unfortunately the CP80 effort is not technology but rather is another legal effort to throw people in jail who refuse to adhere to the mores of a specific segment of society and block undesireable internet content from other countries, pretty much what China does to their citizens, perhaps the CP actually stands for China Protocol. No technology was developed for CP80 its just an effort to create laws based on the mores of a minority.
The irony is that this senator started his political carreer by pushing out an incumbent with the following critical stance in his election effort "Hatch criticized Moss's 18-year tenure in the Senate, saying that many Senators, including Moss, had lost touch with their constituents". This was the beginning of Hatch's political career which started in 1976!
the Court concludes that Microsoft maintained its monopoly power by anticompetitive means and attempted to monopolize the Web browser market, both in violation of 2.
In essence, Microsoft mounted a deliberate assault upon entrepreneurial efforts that, left to rise or fall on their own merits, could well have enabled the introduction of competition into the market for Intel-compatible PC operating systems. Id. 411. While the evidence does not prove that they would have succeeded absent Microsoft's actions, it does reveal that Microsoft placed an oppressive thumb on the scale of competitive fortune, thereby effectively guaranteeing its continued dominance in the relevant market. More broadly, Microsoft's anticompetitive actions trammeled the competitive process through which the computer software industry generally stimulates innovation and conduces to the optimum benefit of consumers.
Really you should at least read some of the filings in the case against Microsoft yourself then you too will see what a pack of morally challenged scheming criminals they are.
'That evidence was one man talking about "discussions"'
And by itself perhaps there would be skepticism, on the other hand, considering the MO of the convicted criminal management at Microsoft this is business as usual. To take the edge off your own doubt perhaps you should read the US DOJ Finding of Facts from the antitrust case against Microsoft, then you will see how Goldfarb's description of the questionable activities fits Microsoft's methods and tactics.
"We do not want to spend time for any OSS bug fixing so our main requirement was -official support for all OSS products"
Not buying a service contract doesn't mean YOU have to fix bugs in OSS. The most popular OSS packages are already updated with bug fixes by a thriving community which includes those expensive support providers. A service contract is more important for set up, maintenance, and training if you don't have the skills in house.
"QT is $3300 per seat. We have dropped the development and rewrote everything to C# (MSVS 2005 is ~$700)"
The $3300 QT package is comparable to the MSDN Visual Studio subscription which can range in price from $1200 to over $10k. What you get for the $700 MSVS 2005 is not the same as the $3300 QT seat.
"Embedded Linux from a reputable RT vendor is $25,000 per 5 seats per year. We needed only 3 seats. We had to buy 5 nevertheless. The support was bad. We will go for VxWorks or WinCE in our next product."
Is $5k per seat bad? How much are you going to pay for VxWorks or WinCE? The support is another issue but there are other vendors.
"Red Hat Linux WS is $299. An OEM version of Windows XP Pro is ~$140."
And Red Hat Linux WS comes complete with software packages that will cost several thousands of dollars on Windows XP Pro. the $140 for XP Pro is just for an OS which is pretty much useless by itself.
"A Cygwin commercial license will cost tens of thousands of dollars and is only available for large shops. We need 5 seats. Windows Unix services are free."
If you use linux you wont need Cygwin will you. Sounds like a good reason to choose OSS and avoid Windows.
"we have decided that the survival of our business is more important for us then 'do-good' ideas"
Many businesses are utilizing OSS and they aren't doing it for "'do-good' ideas", they have found exactly the opposite of what you are claiming here.
If you see closed source software as a better proposition for your business then go for it, but don't expect everyone to follow your words as wisdom.
"The throttling begun in June, but it was not made public until September 30th when the National Broadcasting Corporation published a statement"
Interestingly TeliaSonera was finishing up the acquisition of NextGenTel during this time. Was this just a test to see what the reaction of customers would be? If there was serious backlash the company was about to change names so TeliaSonera would not get a black eye. Or perhaps this is how TeliaSonera does business and the NextGenTel customers were getting a taste of their new broadband master's rules, I think I saw another post that claimed Telia used the same tactics.
"The ISP claim that the free content is growing more rapidly than their infrastructure can handle, and that they prioritize their investments to suit content providers who pay up."
Which sounds similar to the monopolistic arguements here in the States, but the arguement doesn't hold when you review the actual numbers. In TeliaSonera's Q2 report they claim 34.9% margins on 44 million SEK. What we have here is an attempt at extortion by a service provider who holds a virtual monopoly on a customer base which demands the content from providers on another network.
No, "I think therefore I am" is a rationalization.
"So, after considering everything very thoroughly, I must finally conclude that the proposition, I am, I exist, is necessarily true whenever it is put forward by me or conceived in my mind" - Rene Descartes
It is an intellectual excercise to find some basis from which to rationalize everything else. Descartes was make a rational conclusion, not a leap of faith.
"empathy is SUBJECTIVE, not OBJECTIVE. Subjective things are in the realm of FAITH, not REASON."
Wrong, empathy is an emotion, it is part of our survival instincts and it serves many social and individual benefits. And subjective things are not in the real of faith, faith is in the realm of subjective things.
-The imaginative projection into another's feelings, a state of total identification with another's situation, condition, and thoughts. The action of understanding, being aware of, being sensitive to, and vicariously experiencing the feelings, thoughts, and experience of another of either the past or present without explicitly articulating these feelings.
"Human beings are incapable of separating themselves from bias- so it doesn't matter if you are faithfull or unfaithful, "objective ideology" will always be religious because human beings are incapable of being objective, as you have proven with the rest of your post."
Wrong, it is possible for humans to seperate themselves from bias and think objectively otherwise the world would still be flat and the center of the universe, but that is beside the point. If "objective ideology" is not objective due to bias then its not "objective ideology" is it. You can argue that objectiveness is an impossibility and there would be some fine debating points but proposing to define "objective ideology" as religious because of inherent falliablity in human character is idiocy and attempting do so only creats an oxymoron because of the definition of two words.
"Thus the belief they can bring "objectiveness", which doens't exist, to government is at best a waste of time."
I wouldn't exactly call it a waste of time. While it is true that it will be impossible to bring objectiveness to politics they may have an affect. If all they do as a group is inspire some voters their is the possibility of having some impact on the political fabric.
"Any time you stop another person from speaking, and discriminate against them in job applications, you are committing censorship, whether you admit it or not."
WTF? What do job applications have to do with seperation of church and state? I absolutely agree with your statement but I don't see the relationship to the originial intent of speration between church and state in the United States government and the religious fervor trying to turn the USA and its schools into a religious state. There is freedom to practice religion in the United States but it is illegal to use the government of the United States to create a state religion to be forced upon all its citizens, try reading the works of Thomas Jefferson.
"As I said, human beings are incapable of being truly objective- and with this line you've proved that you ARE NOT OBJECTIVE."
Whether or not I'm objective has absolutely nothing to do with the meaning of objectivity and religion. Any one who attempts to associate the two only succeeds in creating a goofy oxymoron.
Nice oxymoron, if its an objective ideology then it can't be religious, can it. (that's a rhetorical question the faithful will likely answer incorrectly, the answer is no its no religious)
-a strong belief in a supernatural power or powers that control human destiny -sometimes used interchangeably with faith or belief system -A system of ideas and rules for behavior based on supernatural explanations
-undistorted by emotion or personal bias; based on observable phenomena -emphasizing or expressing things as perceived without distortion of personal feelings, insertion of fictional matter, or interpretation
"When scientists start attempting to use governmental censorship"
The reason these scientists are banding together is because science is being censored by religious zealots through the government, just like those facist islamist states. The objective of their organization is not to censor but to bring objectiveness to a government which affects all of us, christians, muslims, buddhists, aethiests, etc.
Its funny how the zealots believe that stopping them from forcing their religion on the rest of us is somehow censorship. Nobody is taking your religion away, just keep it to yourself and out of OUR government.
"the impious presumption of legislators and rulers, civil as well as ecclesiastical, who, being themselves but fallible and uninspired men, have assumed dominion over the faith of others, setting up their own opinions and modes of thinking as the only true and infallible, and as such endeavoring to impose them on others, hath established and maintained false religions over the greatest part of the world and through all time: That to compel a man to furnish contributions of money for the propagation of opinions which he disbelieves and abhors, is sinful and tyrannical" - Thomas Jefferson 1779
"If I'm trying to make a *tool* that will always be available, then I will use the LGPL because that *tool* will always be available and usable."
Are you playing with semantics? The original parent didn't say *tool* he said application.
Whatever you released under the LGPL will always remain available but the use of your LGPLed code in closed source applications is a dead end. When the developer of the closed source decides to drop the application its on a path to obsolescence and nothing will bring it back.
As far as GPLed code being useless due to the viral nature of the GPL you are obviously wrong as evidenced by the bergeoning base of open source software licensed under the GPL. Due to the interest in using and developing GPL software its future is ensured and and application or tool will always be available.
Reality does not match your interpretation of the effects of GPL on the uesfullness or longevity of applications.
"I still feel that by choosing GPL I am giving up my freedoms as a developer."
What freedoms as a developer?
You still own the copyright to your code, any modifications by 3rd parties are given back to you, so what have you given up?
Or perhaps you are refering to the freedom to charge an inflated price to license the binaries compiled from your source and reap a massive profit margin, but you may need to consider the licensing of all closed source proprietary software and libraries you utilzed to make your closed source application, you may own less of your application than you thought.
Also realize that the freedom given to you to use the GPL Spices to create your own recipe does not give you the freedom to steal the GPL Spices for your own profit. If you don't want a GPL recipe then don't use the GPL Spices, that is where the freedom exists, choice.
I think OSX is an excellent OS and is on par with every other solution for server or desktop, but I'd agree that OSX is not seriously considered for servers for three reasons, its expensive, it lacks support for several enterprise applications, and most importantly linux is out there.
I read TFA and it seems to me that it was just flaimbait, no serious content whatsoever. Tom attended an Apple developer conference and came out fired up but clueless. OSX is supposed to make a dent in the server market by 2008 but today they don't even register on the IDC world wide server market reports. In fact, Tom seems to be completely ignorant of the raging growth of linux in the server market with double digit growth for the last 4 or so years that IDC has been tracking linux. Unless Tom is holding back I see no compelling reason anyone would seriously consider OSX as the server platform of choice over linux. Linux on the other hand has many compelling reasons like no vendor lock in, broad application support, architecture agnostic, market leading security, performance, and cost, and more, and the market growth shows that business is aware of these compelling reasons.
I'll even go so far as to boast that OSX is a distant 3rd to linux desktop market share based on data I've seen on in web page hits. While Windows and OSX can show market share numbers based on boxes sold with their OS preinstalled and claim nobody uses linux the untold secret is that linux desktop share from custom boxes and after purchase installs far exceeds the OSX market share.
"Turns out for some things regulation is better - look at how a poor country like Cuba has better healthcare (with lower infant mortality rates) than the wealthy US."
Based on the CIA fact book Cuba doesn't appear to have a significantly different infant mortality rate from that of the USA, 6.22 versus 6.43. I would also question the accuracy of data available from a country which is ruled by a dictatorship whose people risk their lives attempting escape from the country.
While it doesn't provide as much drama as comparing a poor communist dictatorship to the USA, Canada may be a better comparison as I believe they have significant regulation of health care and they do have a significantly better infant mortality rate than the USA or Cuba, 4.69 versus 6.43 and 6.22.
So perhaps there are some benefits to regulation, then again it may not be a good idea to take a single metric as proof of correlation as infant mortality is likely affected by many factors which are beyond the control of government regulation.
"As any libertarian will tell you, government regulation and meddling in a market can only hurt consumers.
It's for this reason that the United States, with fewer government controls has a superior and chepaer broadband, telecoms network...oh what? Crap."
Ironically not only does the USA not have superior and cheaper broadband but we don't have fewer government controls either. I think the biggest difference between USA and European regulation may be that in the USA the regulation and application of regulation are almost always in the favor of a few corporations rather than in the favor of the consumer or the "free market".
Corporations in the USA seem to be driven on two basic principles, tomorrow may be the second coming so don't invest long term, and competition is a bad thing so invest heavily in crushing competition and establishing a monopoly.
Rather than being a freemarket the various technology based industries in the USA are being divided up by a handful of coporations with the objective of maximizing profits for a few while minimizing investment. Any challenge to established monopolies are not met with aggresive competition to maintain customer base but instead are met with lawsuits and lobbyists.
I suspect that in most cases the real issue is a lack of understanding of the fundamentals underlying the technology people are trying to use. While a nice UI and preconfiguration may make it possible for someone with limited knowlege to be capable of installing and configuring a complex software package it is a poor solution to the lack of knowlege.
Having said that I will also go so far as to say that open source has a better solution to the complexity issue than Microsoft's wizardized software packages, LiveCDs. You can download a live linux CD for just about every solution you need, Desktop, Router, Webserver, Media Player, etc., etc. No need to go through Microsoft's complex software package installation and registration process, just pop in the CD for your application and boot, done.;)
Admittedly you do have to be careful about which printer you purchase to use with linux but its really not that difficult. Most printers are supported by linux and in the case of the most popular manufacturers, HP and Epson, its almost guaranteed to be compatible with drivers already included with your linux install.
As a linux user I go one step further and try to support the manufacturers that support me. HP has an entire open source project to support their printers in linux and most distros include that package. That being the case I can tell you that a recent experience installing an HP printer on a Windows machine and the same printer on a linux machine was quite interesting.
The printer was an HP PSC-1400 all in one printer. On the Windows machine the process was pretty much as you had stated, however, since it is an all in one printer it was necessary to install additional software from the included CD to make all the printers features available, so the process was drawn out with lots of dialogs and lots of reboots, pretty lame.
The linux box on which an PSC-1400 was installed had Fedora Core 5 and no discs were needed because when I added a printer the HP open source drivers were already there. The printer worked out of the box with a much faster and easier setup than the Windows box with no reboots, swapping discs, just one add printer dialog and away it went. The Fedora Core 5 install also had The Gimp preinstalled and xsane and guess what, it saw the scanner in the PSC-1400 and it just worked. So the scanner setup was easier too. And another bonus was the fact that the image scanning and editing software included with the linux install was many times better than the crappy Windows software I had to install.
While you still need to use some caution when selecting printers for use with linux its no where near as difficult as you portray it and in fact with many printer choices the process is even simpler than the Windows route and you end up with better software packages to utilize your new toys.
"The patent system in its current form gives the patent holder the right to prevent others from using the patent - not protect your invention."
No, from uspto.gov...
The right conferred by the patent grant is, in the language of the statute and of the grant itself, "the right to exclude others from making, using, offering for sale, or selling" the invention in the United States or "importing" the invention into the United States. What is granted is not the right to make, use, offer for sale, sell or import, but the right to exclude others from making, using, offering for sale, selling or importing the invention.
You can stop others from "making, using, offering for sale, selling or importing the invention" but they could come up with a better solution to the same problem with their own invention, as long as it is a novel and unique approach. The problem is that many patents are ideas not inventions. The rules for patentability state that you cannot patent an idea, I suspect because it creates all the problems we have today, but since ideas are being patented, well, we have the problems of today.
"What is really slick was how this guy just milked several geniuses for idea, and he won't have to pay them for it."
The article was slim on details but it did explain that he was using greed as a motivator. When he collects from somebody else for a specific patent the greedy geniuses with their names on the patent will get a cut of the extortion, I mean licensing fees.
"This person knows exactly what he's doing and is playing the patent game perfectly. At this rate, he will win, or his antics will slow down the ability for new ideas to actually be produced"
There are many others he learned from, it is the same game played over and over since early in the industrialization of the United States. And there will not be an either/or on his winning or the slowing of ideas. Many others have already shown how to get rich by gaming the system so the odds are he will win, but at the same time it will slow down ideas because people and business will be discouraged by the gaming and will be caught up in worthless litigation. If he wins everyone else loses is how it works.
Oh, and if you think putting something in the public domain prevents some company from patenting it, think again. Sun has a patent application on stuff I put into the public domain 3 years ago. People have suggested I write to the USPTO or something. Wake up! I don't make any money from open source and it's not me who's being impacted. It's the people who would use the open source software who would be affected and *they* need to do something if they want to use it. If the public doesn't want to protect their own rights, then the public be damned.
Interestingly, it works the same way with copyright. I discovered this while watching the TSCOG vs IBM case where TSCOG registered copyrights for Unix code which Novell later registered as well. It is not up to the patent office or the copyright office to administer the law, that takes place in the courts.
If Sun ever takes anyone to court over those patents your work in the public domain can be used as prior art to shut down any such litigation and likely invalidate Sun's patents. I'm not sure which is more powerful, a patent or prior art, but as long as you didn't lose out on recouping your time invested by not applying for a patent I think you did the right thing. Even if you had filed a patent its likely Sun still would have filed for a similar patent and received it, then you would be out your patent filing fees and Sun would still have their patent on the same or similar idea.
Just as a side note, the USPTO is not supposed to approve patents on ideas, the entire patented software fiasco is a disaster. Software should be covered by copyright, not patents.
"Isn't this along the same lines as the fears of Google snatching up all the best and brightest of the Computer Scientists from Apple and Microsoft?"
No, its a lottery, if the best and brightest which attent these "Invention Sessions" get their name on a patent, and somebody else comes up with the same idea and actually produces an invention from the idea, IV turns their lawyers against said invention producing company to collect a fee and the bets and brightest who have their name on the patent get a pay day. No job, career, benefits, etc., just a patent lottery ticket.
"While yes, such a concentration of bright people can really lock down the rest of the industry (although not likely), it's also something completely unique that we should really give a chance."
I used to think this was something unique to our time as well, however, a little research into patent litigation will show how patent trolls have been around since at least the early 1800s.
"Inventions help people, yes, as with any business involving intellectual property, there is room for abuse, but there is also room for incredible progress."
Incredible progress is happening now all around us, patent trolls bring nothing of benefit to innovation or invention. They patent their ideas but only wait until someone else comes up with the same or similar idea and actually produces a product from the idea, then they litigate.
"What's the difference between Apple or Microsoft plunging millions of dollars into R&D and then licensing their technology out to other companies? Isn't this exactly the same?"
These patent trolls are not investing the money into R&D, they put all their investment into acquiring the patent paperwork and then litigate against someone who came up with the same or similar idea and invested into the R&D to generate a product.
"Wake up people, fear mongering about this company is completely misdirected, they have a good opportunity to do a lot of good, the true fear that should be exposed here is the ability to abuse the intellectual property laws in america, IV has nothing to do with it."
If IV actually comes up with some ideas that are novel and they broker some deals with companies who are willing to fund the R&D to create a product then great. If what IV does is take their patent portfolio and go after businesses who came up with similar or the same ideas idependant of IV and already funded the R&D to create a marketable product then they are just another patent troll. Based on what is presented in the news article it sounds no different from any other patent troll operation already in existence.
I really take issue with companies whose business models center around taking others to court.
If you RTFA, that's not the business model. It's something they may have to do when patents of theirs (they apply for their own patents as well as buy some up) get infringed and the other party won't agree to license it, but that's no different than any other firm protecting its assets.
If YOU RTFA, that is the business model.
From TFA...
Twenty years ago, he notes, software makers--some of whom now flout patents--faced the same predicament with trying to get the market to respect copyrights. Even big corporations, he says, would buy a single copy of a spreadsheet program and copy it. That has largely changed, through education, changes in the law, and some vigorous enforcement. Myhrvold is aware he may have to do some enforcement of his own. A moment after calling litigation "disastrous," he adds: "Sometimes disaster happens, and you have to do it."
If you RTFA you would have noticed that the business model of IV is to think up lots of ideas to patent but not actually create anything. They intend to go after those who actually do the creating and attempt to extort capital out of them.
While IV calls their little meeting of the minds Invention Sessions they are actually idea sessions. There is no follow up after the idea session to do all the research and development necessary to make an actual invention out of the ideas that are brain stormed. If patent rules were properly followed ideas would not be patented, you have to go from idea to invention before you have something that is patentable. Unfortunately corporate lawyers have hounded the USPTO enough to make idea patents the norm, which explains the existence of these patent trolls.
"This just in: Capitalism and Morals do not necessarily go hand in hand."
Caveat Emptor
Doesn't matter if its politics, economics, religion, software, hardware, or even information.
The fact that there are people running businesses with questionable ethics in no way reflects on the morality of the underlying economic philosophy. History easily shows that people who have questionable morals have no difficulty working within the structure of any social philosophy which gains any significant following whether it be economic, religious, or governmental in nature.
So when someone comes around selling their alternative economic philosophy based on the idea that the current system inherently lacks morality, caveat emptor.
Slashdot Mirror
More importantly where will businesses go to get their linux OS upon which to run Oracle?
Yes I know, Oracle will provide the OS and that is the idea behind Oracle's Unbreakable Linux, but there is a problem that should be considered by anyone who is interested in replacing Red Hat support subscriptions with Oracle support subscriptions. The CEO of Oracle does not believe in supporting open source because Ellison fears that "if we could do this, other people could do this too" and Ellison believes that when it comes to open source "if it ever got good enough we'd just take the intellectual property".
So you see there is no way the CEO of Oracle is going to allow any significant Oracle development to be placed in an open source product because then everyone would just take Oracle's intellectual property. linux as an open source product from Oracle is a dead end without Red Hat and any business that considers buying linux support from Oracle as apposed to an actual open source vendor like Red Hat either misunderstands the implications or has rocks in their head.
http://news.com.com/2100-1023-945923.html
Of course software can't really be destroyed but there could be significant inconvenience and recovery costs for end user's who are targeted by RIAA to have their computer "impaired".
Is that grasp of technology or strangle hold on?
One of the fine senators from the US state of Utah, one Orrin Hatch, attempted to pass legislation that would allow organizations such as the RIAA to illegally infiltrate and destroy software and information on personal computers of the citizens whom he supposedly represented. It seems the corporations he actually represents find the legal process and the concept of innocent until proven guilty by your peers in a court of law to be too cumbersome for them to deal with.
The same senator recently had an article on his website where he supported the "technology" behind the CP80 (clean port 80) effort. Unfortunately the CP80 effort is not technology but rather is another legal effort to throw people in jail who refuse to adhere to the mores of a specific segment of society and block undesireable internet content from other countries, pretty much what China does to their citizens, perhaps the CP actually stands for China Protocol. No technology was developed for CP80 its just an effort to create laws based on the mores of a minority.
The irony is that this senator started his political carreer by pushing out an incumbent with the following critical stance in his election effort "Hatch criticized Moss's 18-year tenure in the Senate, saying that many Senators, including Moss, had lost touch with their constituents". This was the beginning of Hatch's political career which started in 1976!
burnin
"That's a civil action not a criminal conviction."
:P
That's funny, okay so technically speaking they are just convicts. Better?
What planet are you from?
http://www.usdoj.gov/atr/cases/f4400/4469.htm
Really you should at least read some of the filings in the case against Microsoft yourself then you too will see what a pack of morally challenged scheming criminals they are.
http://www.usdoj.gov/atr/cases/ms_index.htm
'That evidence was one man talking about "discussions"'
And by itself perhaps there would be skepticism, on the other hand, considering the MO of the convicted criminal management at Microsoft this is business as usual. To take the edge off your own doubt perhaps you should read the US DOJ Finding of Facts from the antitrust case against Microsoft, then you will see how Goldfarb's description of the questionable activities fits Microsoft's methods and tactics.
http://www.usdoj.gov/atr/cases/f3800/msjudgex.htm
Scum bags through and through. Reason enough to not do business with these clowns in any way.
burnin
Not buying a service contract doesn't mean YOU have to fix bugs in OSS. The most popular OSS packages are already updated with bug fixes by a thriving community which includes those expensive support providers. A service contract is more important for set up, maintenance, and training if you don't have the skills in house.
The $3300 QT package is comparable to the MSDN Visual Studio subscription which can range in price from $1200 to over $10k. What you get for the $700 MSVS 2005 is not the same as the $3300 QT seat.
Is $5k per seat bad? How much are you going to pay for VxWorks or WinCE? The support is another issue but there are other vendors.
And Red Hat Linux WS comes complete with software packages that will cost several thousands of dollars on Windows XP Pro. the $140 for XP Pro is just for an OS which is pretty much useless by itself.
If you use linux you wont need Cygwin will you. Sounds like a good reason to choose OSS and avoid Windows.
Many businesses are utilizing OSS and they aren't doing it for "'do-good' ideas", they have found exactly the opposite of what you are claiming here.
If you see closed source software as a better proposition for your business then go for it, but don't expect everyone to follow your words as wisdom.
"The throttling begun in June, but it was not made public until September 30th when the National Broadcasting Corporation published a statement"
l ?.v=1
Interestingly TeliaSonera was finishing up the acquisition of NextGenTel during this time. Was this just a test to see what the reaction of customers would be? If there was serious backlash the company was about to change names so TeliaSonera would not get a black eye. Or perhaps this is how TeliaSonera does business and the NextGenTel customers were getting a taste of their new broadband master's rules, I think I saw another post that claimed Telia used the same tactics.
"The ISP claim that the free content is growing more rapidly than their infrastructure can handle, and that they prioritize their investments to suit content providers who pay up."
Which sounds similar to the monopolistic arguements here in the States, but the arguement doesn't hold when you review the actual numbers. In TeliaSonera's Q2 report they claim 34.9% margins on 44 million SEK. What we have here is an attempt at extortion by a service provider who holds a virtual monopoly on a customer base which demands the content from providers on another network.
http://biz.yahoo.com/bw/060728/20060727006173.htm
>
No, "I think therefore I am" is a rationalization.
"So, after considering everything very thoroughly, I must finally conclude that the proposition, I am, I exist, is necessarily true whenever it is put forward by me or conceived in my mind" - Rene Descartes
It is an intellectual excercise to find some basis from which to rationalize everything else. Descartes was make a rational conclusion, not a leap of faith.
"evolution theory is extrapolated from one observation: the variation of species"
i dence
Um no, start here...
http://www.gate.net/~rwms/EvoEvidence.html
and try here...
http://anthro.palomar.edu/evolve/evolve_3.htm
better yet, allow me to assist...
http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=evolution+ev
"empathy is SUBJECTIVE, not OBJECTIVE. Subjective things are in the realm of FAITH, not REASON."
e nt=firefox-a&rls=org.mozilla%3Aen-US%3Aofficial&q= define%3A+empathy&btnG=Search
Wrong, empathy is an emotion, it is part of our survival instincts and it serves many social and individual benefits. And subjective things are not in the real of faith, faith is in the realm of subjective things.
http://www.google.com/search?hs=mE1&hl=en&lr=&cli
-The imaginative projection into another's feelings, a state of total identification with another's situation, condition, and thoughts. The action of understanding, being aware of, being sensitive to, and vicariously experiencing the feelings, thoughts, and experience of another of either the past or present without explicitly articulating these feelings.
"Human beings are incapable of separating themselves from bias- so it doesn't matter if you are faithfull or unfaithful, "objective ideology" will always be religious because human beings are incapable of being objective, as you have proven with the rest of your post."
Wrong, it is possible for humans to seperate themselves from bias and think objectively otherwise the world would still be flat and the center of the universe, but that is beside the point. If "objective ideology" is not objective due to bias then its not "objective ideology" is it. You can argue that objectiveness is an impossibility and there would be some fine debating points but proposing to define "objective ideology" as religious because of inherent falliablity in human character is idiocy and attempting do so only creats an oxymoron because of the definition of two words.
"Thus the belief they can bring "objectiveness", which doens't exist, to government is at best a waste of time."
I wouldn't exactly call it a waste of time. While it is true that it will be impossible to bring objectiveness to politics they may have an affect. If all they do as a group is inspire some voters their is the possibility of having some impact on the political fabric.
"Any time you stop another person from speaking, and discriminate against them in job applications, you are committing censorship, whether you admit it or not."
WTF? What do job applications have to do with seperation of church and state? I absolutely agree with your statement but I don't see the relationship to the originial intent of speration between church and state in the United States government and the religious fervor trying to turn the USA and its schools into a religious state. There is freedom to practice religion in the United States but it is illegal to use the government of the United States to create a state religion to be forced upon all its citizens, try reading the works of Thomas Jefferson.
"As I said, human beings are incapable of being truly objective- and with this line you've proved that you ARE NOT OBJECTIVE."
Whether or not I'm objective has absolutely nothing to do with the meaning of objectivity and religion. Any one who attempts to associate the two only succeeds in creating a goofy oxymoron.
"religious ideology of objectivism"
A +religion
j ective
Nice oxymoron, if its an objective ideology then it can't be religious, can it. (that's a rhetorical question the faithful will likely answer incorrectly, the answer is no its no religious)
http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&lr=&q=define%3
-a strong belief in a supernatural power or powers that control human destiny
-sometimes used interchangeably with faith or belief system
-A system of ideas and rules for behavior based on supernatural explanations
http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=define%3A+ob
-undistorted by emotion or personal bias; based on observable phenomena
-emphasizing or expressing things as perceived without distortion of personal feelings, insertion of fictional matter, or interpretation
"When scientists start attempting to use governmental censorship"
The reason these scientists are banding together is because science is being censored by religious zealots through the government, just like those facist islamist states. The objective of their organization is not to censor but to bring objectiveness to a government which affects all of us, christians, muslims, buddhists, aethiests, etc.
Its funny how the zealots believe that stopping them from forcing their religion on the rest of us is somehow censorship. Nobody is taking your religion away, just keep it to yourself and out of OUR government.
"the impious presumption of legislators and rulers, civil as well as ecclesiastical, who, being themselves but fallible and uninspired men, have assumed dominion over the faith of others, setting up their own opinions and modes of thinking as the only true and infallible, and as such endeavoring to impose them on others, hath established and maintained false religions over the greatest part of the world and through all time: That to compel a man to furnish contributions of money for the propagation of opinions which he disbelieves and abhors, is sinful and tyrannical"
- Thomas Jefferson 1779
"If I'm trying to make a *tool* that will always be available, then I will use the LGPL because that *tool* will always be available and usable."
Are you playing with semantics? The original parent didn't say *tool* he said application.
Whatever you released under the LGPL will always remain available but the use of your LGPLed code in closed source applications is a dead end. When the developer of the closed source decides to drop the application its on a path to obsolescence and nothing will bring it back.
As far as GPLed code being useless due to the viral nature of the GPL you are obviously wrong as evidenced by the bergeoning base of open source software licensed under the GPL. Due to the interest in using and developing GPL software its future is ensured and and application or tool will always be available.
Reality does not match your interpretation of the effects of GPL on the uesfullness or longevity of applications.
burnin
"I still feel that by choosing GPL I am giving up my freedoms as a developer."
What freedoms as a developer?
You still own the copyright to your code, any modifications by 3rd parties are given back to you, so what have you given up?
Or perhaps you are refering to the freedom to charge an inflated price to license the binaries compiled from your source and reap a massive profit margin, but you may need to consider the licensing of all closed source proprietary software and libraries you utilzed to make your closed source application, you may own less of your application than you thought.
Also realize that the freedom given to you to use the GPL Spices to create your own recipe does not give you the freedom to steal the GPL Spices for your own profit. If you don't want a GPL recipe then don't use the GPL Spices, that is where the freedom exists, choice.
Theivery is a crime, not a freedom.
"OSX isn't a serious solution."
:P
I think OSX is an excellent OS and is on par with every other solution for server or desktop, but I'd agree that OSX is not seriously considered for servers for three reasons, its expensive, it lacks support for several enterprise applications, and most importantly linux is out there.
I read TFA and it seems to me that it was just flaimbait, no serious content whatsoever. Tom attended an Apple developer conference and came out fired up but clueless. OSX is supposed to make a dent in the server market by 2008 but today they don't even register on the IDC world wide server market reports. In fact, Tom seems to be completely ignorant of the raging growth of linux in the server market with double digit growth for the last 4 or so years that IDC has been tracking linux. Unless Tom is holding back I see no compelling reason anyone would seriously consider OSX as the server platform of choice over linux. Linux on the other hand has many compelling reasons like no vendor lock in, broad application support, architecture agnostic, market leading security, performance, and cost, and more, and the market growth shows that business is aware of these compelling reasons.
I'll even go so far as to boast that OSX is a distant 3rd to linux desktop market share based on data I've seen on in web page hits. While Windows and OSX can show market share numbers based on boxes sold with their OS preinstalled and claim nobody uses linux the untold secret is that linux desktop share from custom boxes and after purchase installs far exceeds the OSX market share.
So all I can say to Tom is
burnin
Based on the CIA fact book Cuba doesn't appear to have a significantly different infant mortality rate from that of the USA, 6.22 versus 6.43. I would also question the accuracy of data available from a country which is ruled by a dictatorship whose people risk their lives attempting escape from the country.
While it doesn't provide as much drama as comparing a poor communist dictatorship to the USA, Canada may be a better comparison as I believe they have significant regulation of health care and they do have a significantly better infant mortality rate than the USA or Cuba, 4.69 versus 6.43 and 6.22.
So perhaps there are some benefits to regulation, then again it may not be a good idea to take a single metric as proof of correlation as infant mortality is likely affected by many factors which are beyond the control of government regulation.
Ironically not only does the USA not have superior and cheaper broadband but we don't have fewer government controls either. I think the biggest difference between USA and European regulation may be that in the USA the regulation and application of regulation are almost always in the favor of a few corporations rather than in the favor of the consumer or the "free market".
Corporations in the USA seem to be driven on two basic principles, tomorrow may be the second coming so don't invest long term, and competition is a bad thing so invest heavily in crushing competition and establishing a monopoly.
Rather than being a freemarket the various technology based industries in the USA are being divided up by a handful of coporations with the objective of maximizing profits for a few while minimizing investment. Any challenge to established monopolies are not met with aggresive competition to maintain customer base but instead are met with lawsuits and lobbyists.
No.
;)
I suspect that in most cases the real issue is a lack of understanding of the fundamentals underlying the technology people are trying to use. While a nice UI and preconfiguration may make it possible for someone with limited knowlege to be capable of installing and configuring a complex software package it is a poor solution to the lack of knowlege.
Having said that I will also go so far as to say that open source has a better solution to the complexity issue than Microsoft's wizardized software packages, LiveCDs. You can download a live linux CD for just about every solution you need, Desktop, Router, Webserver, Media Player, etc., etc. No need to go through Microsoft's complex software package installation and registration process, just pop in the CD for your application and boot, done.
burnin
After reading through five pages it all ended at "var dom = new ActiveXObject(......"
No thanks, next book please.
"The Linux way is more time intensive."
You don't use linux, do you.
Admittedly you do have to be careful about which printer you purchase to use with linux but its really not that difficult. Most printers are supported by linux and in the case of the most popular manufacturers, HP and Epson, its almost guaranteed to be compatible with drivers already included with your linux install.
As a linux user I go one step further and try to support the manufacturers that support me. HP has an entire open source project to support their printers in linux and most distros include that package. That being the case I can tell you that a recent experience installing an HP printer on a Windows machine and the same printer on a linux machine was quite interesting.
The printer was an HP PSC-1400 all in one printer. On the Windows machine the process was pretty much as you had stated, however, since it is an all in one printer it was necessary to install additional software from the included CD to make all the printers features available, so the process was drawn out with lots of dialogs and lots of reboots, pretty lame.
The linux box on which an PSC-1400 was installed had Fedora Core 5 and no discs were needed because when I added a printer the HP open source drivers were already there. The printer worked out of the box with a much faster and easier setup than the Windows box with no reboots, swapping discs, just one add printer dialog and away it went. The Fedora Core 5 install also had The Gimp preinstalled and xsane and guess what, it saw the scanner in the PSC-1400 and it just worked. So the scanner setup was easier too. And another bonus was the fact that the image scanning and editing software included with the linux install was many times better than the crappy Windows software I had to install.
While you still need to use some caution when selecting printers for use with linux its no where near as difficult as you portray it and in fact with many printer choices the process is even simpler than the Windows route and you end up with better software packages to utilize your new toys.
No, from uspto.gov...
You can stop others from "making, using, offering for sale, selling or importing the invention" but they could come up with a better solution to the same problem with their own invention, as long as it is a novel and unique approach. The problem is that many patents are ideas not inventions. The rules for patentability state that you cannot patent an idea, I suspect because it creates all the problems we have today, but since ideas are being patented, well, we have the problems of today.
"What is really slick was how this guy just milked several geniuses for idea, and he won't have to pay them for it."
The article was slim on details but it did explain that he was using greed as a motivator. When he collects from somebody else for a specific patent the greedy geniuses with their names on the patent will get a cut of the extortion, I mean licensing fees.
"This person knows exactly what he's doing and is playing the patent game perfectly. At this rate, he will win, or his antics will slow down the ability for new ideas to actually be produced"
There are many others he learned from, it is the same game played over and over since early in the industrialization of the United States. And there will not be an either/or on his winning or the slowing of ideas. Many others have already shown how to get rich by gaming the system so the odds are he will win, but at the same time it will slow down ideas because people and business will be discouraged by the gaming and will be caught up in worthless litigation. If he wins everyone else loses is how it works.
Interestingly, it works the same way with copyright. I discovered this while watching the TSCOG vs IBM case where TSCOG registered copyrights for Unix code which Novell later registered as well. It is not up to the patent office or the copyright office to administer the law, that takes place in the courts.
If Sun ever takes anyone to court over those patents your work in the public domain can be used as prior art to shut down any such litigation and likely invalidate Sun's patents. I'm not sure which is more powerful, a patent or prior art, but as long as you didn't lose out on recouping your time invested by not applying for a patent I think you did the right thing. Even if you had filed a patent its likely Sun still would have filed for a similar patent and received it, then you would be out your patent filing fees and Sun would still have their patent on the same or similar idea.
Just as a side note, the USPTO is not supposed to approve patents on ideas, the entire patented software fiasco is a disaster. Software should be covered by copyright, not patents.
No, its a lottery, if the best and brightest which attent these "Invention Sessions" get their name on a patent, and somebody else comes up with the same idea and actually produces an invention from the idea, IV turns their lawyers against said invention producing company to collect a fee and the bets and brightest who have their name on the patent get a pay day. No job, career, benefits, etc., just a patent lottery ticket.
I used to think this was something unique to our time as well, however, a little research into patent litigation will show how patent trolls have been around since at least the early 1800s.
Incredible progress is happening now all around us, patent trolls bring nothing of benefit to innovation or invention. They patent their ideas but only wait until someone else comes up with the same or similar idea and actually produces a product from the idea, then they litigate.
These patent trolls are not investing the money into R&D, they put all their investment into acquiring the patent paperwork and then litigate against someone who came up with the same or similar idea and invested into the R&D to generate a product.
If IV actually comes up with some ideas that are novel and they broker some deals with companies who are willing to fund the R&D to create a product then great. If what IV does is take their patent portfolio and go after businesses who came up with similar or the same ideas idependant of IV and already funded the R&D to create a marketable product then they are just another patent troll. Based on what is presented in the news article it sounds no different from any other patent troll operation already in existence.
If YOU RTFA, that is the business model.
From TFA...
Twenty years ago, he notes, software makers--some of whom now flout patents--faced the same predicament with trying to get the market to respect copyrights. Even big corporations, he says, would buy a single copy of a spreadsheet program and copy it. That has largely changed, through education, changes in the law, and some vigorous enforcement. Myhrvold is aware he may have to do some enforcement of his own. A moment after calling litigation "disastrous," he adds: "Sometimes disaster happens, and you have to do it."
If you RTFA you would have noticed that the business model of IV is to think up lots of ideas to patent but not actually create anything. They intend to go after those who actually do the creating and attempt to extort capital out of them.
While IV calls their little meeting of the minds Invention Sessions they are actually idea sessions. There is no follow up after the idea session to do all the research and development necessary to make an actual invention out of the ideas that are brain stormed. If patent rules were properly followed ideas would not be patented, you have to go from idea to invention before you have something that is patentable. Unfortunately corporate lawyers have hounded the USPTO enough to make idea patents the norm, which explains the existence of these patent trolls.
"This just in: Capitalism and Morals do not necessarily go hand in hand."
Caveat Emptor
Doesn't matter if its politics, economics, religion, software, hardware, or even information.
The fact that there are people running businesses with questionable ethics in no way reflects on the morality of the underlying economic philosophy. History easily shows that people who have questionable morals have no difficulty working within the structure of any social philosophy which gains any significant following whether it be economic, religious, or governmental in nature.
So when someone comes around selling their alternative economic philosophy based on the idea that the current system inherently lacks morality, caveat emptor.
burnin