Just because someone has a right to something (eg, copying for personal use something you bought) doesn't mean someone else is obligated to provide you with that right.
I'd argue that this situation is at least as likely if people aren't allowed to make copies for their own personal use: If I buy a CD then later it gets damaged, and I was legally prevented from being able to make a backup copy, then I'd say it would be more reasonable that I go after that company and demand they give me a replacement.
Having said that, I wish the record execs did think in the way that you said - then maybe we'd see fewer attempts to prevent CDs etc from be copied, even for personal use.
That sort of idea, though IMO it doesn't do it as well as MUI. It's difficult to describe (and my memory of what I disliked about swing is hazy), but most of the layout managers only work for rather simple interfaces, so that just leaves Gridbag for anything non-trivial. In MUI, the most common way to arrange objects is in rows or columns, which seems more natural than specifying a position in a grid for most purposes.
Hmm weren't the layout managers part of awt though?
Also, this doesn't help if you want to program in a language other than Java;)
What I'm saying is that yea, *Windows* might be lacking,
True - the thing is that it's very rare for an OS to have a truely exclusive feature that isn't on any OS anywhere, no matter how obscure. The best you can do when telling good points of an OS is to either list a feature which isn't on some of the common mainstream alternatives, or list a set of features for which no other OS has all of them, only some of them. In both cases, I can say that I miss such features.
but if you're goign to change OS (to AmigaOS) then Un*x boxen have the majority of those things you miss and a lot more going for them besides.
True, I'm not saying I'd automatically switch back to the Amiga if I were to give up Windows, but my point is that it would be a consideration, and there would be some benefits for me which don't exist on other platforms.
but most often you got no choice in the matter, an app (not so much later on, you generally goa choice) would typically open it's own screen rather than use windows on the WB
The important point being "later on" though.. it's a bit like saying applications on Windows are still opening up in little DOS windows;)
And even with the old applications which don't give you a choice, there are simple utilities ("mode promoters") which will force an application onto a different screen IIRC.
Well if there's no interest in it commercially, any company trying to bring it back commercially won't have much luck anyway, so who cares?
I don't see why you should tell others how they should spend or invest their money. Vastly more has been spent of OSs such as Windows and MacOS, but I don't complain about that.
Out of curiosity, for people that are using +/-RW, what are you using it for? All the applications that I can think of needing large amounts of rewritable space, it would be better to just use an external drive than DVD.
Can you get external 4.7GB drives for the price of a DVD RW?
RW does have various uses, like any sort of backup disc that you want to gradually update stuff on, without having to write a new disc everytime.
And indeed, in the shops that I've looked here in the UK, RW is often no more expensive that R (in fact I bought a pack of RW, because they were on offer and actually cheaper than the R discs in the same shop).
The Amiga was a great gaming machine back in the days tho, and that's what I used it for.
I don't see that that reduces the original point.. let's face it, most people only use PCs for games now (and other equally supposedly unimportant stuff like Internet chatting/browsing, which didn't really apply 10+ years ago), but this doesn't detract from the PC's technical qualities.
I remember Datatypes being an amusing way to get round the GIF patent - commercial programs such as PersonalPaint were released without GIF support internally, but could support them through datatypes. It's a lot harder to sue or prevent distribution of a freely available small file than a commercial application..
Thank you, Captain The-Point-Went-Right-Over-Your-Head. If what I said about the Pegasos was obvious, how come people talk as if Amiga-related platforms haven't been released in years?
And just because I agree with part of what a post says doesn't mean I'm explaining it, sorry if this point is too subtle for you.
- Datatypes (OS standard way of loading files in any format): From a user point of view, you can add support for a new file format to all your programs by installing a small file. From a developer point of view, you can add support for all OS supported file formats just by using this functionality. On Windows, I having to code support for simple things like BMP/PCX myself, or rely on 3rd party libraries (which means abiding by their licence, and supplying large DLLs with my programs). - Decent GUI toolkit in the form of MUI (yes, it wasn't OS standard, but until MUI is ported elsewhere, it's exclusive to AmigaOS - though I have a feeling that the OS standard Reaction toolkit seems to work similarly): This is programming GUIs the way it should be - just say you want, eg, three objects in a row, and let the toolkit worrying about resizing; it's actually easier than programming with so-called "visual" editors, and has the advantage that windows/GUIs are always automatically resizable, so you don't have to worry about that (similarly you don't have to worry about things like changing font sizes). It's ridiculous that some GUIs are still written with hardcoded x/y coordinates. - A side benefit of having decent GUI toolkits (MUI and others) for the user is that it's very common that windows are resizable as standard, and the contents resize to fit. There's nothing more enfuriating to see a tiny window on Windows with a small textbox or whatever inside, and I can't resize if (or instead, I can resize it, but the contents don't enlarge!) - Assigns: Shortcuts basically. Windows only gets halfway with its shortcut - I can't include the shortcut in a filename, I can only use the shortcut on its own (eg, c:\shortcut\dir_inside_shortcut) - was this fixed in XP? - ARexx: OS standard scripting language. It wasn't anything special in itself, but it was OS standard, so commonly supported by most applications. Which means you don't have to learn different scripting languages to support different applications. - Screens: Multiple workspaces, done dynamically. Why do OSes like BeOS (and Linux window managers?) bother to implement workspaces, but then only stick with a fixed number?
Just a few off the top of my head. Also there are things which aren't exclusive to AmigaOS, but are still improvements over Windows (and since I use Windows, it still counts as features that one might miss):
- Doesn't make GUI mistakes that Windows does: It's much quicker to find menus at the top of the screen, and using the right mouse button means you can select (or unselect) multiple options with the left button, without opening the menu several times. - Decent command line interface: I don't mean the commands/syntax, but things like being able to resize it, having a non-fixed number of lines (I can't believe I'm still having to tell Windows how many lines I want by buffer to be - did they fix this in XP?)
And not quite an OS feature, but I still miss the email client YAM.
I can't help feeling that it might be better if IP entered the public domain if a company goes bust. I don't see how it is in the original spirit of IP laws if technology can just disappear down a black hole, or if what happens to it is decided by people who had no hand in creating the original (and the company going bust hasn't chosen to hand over control to these other people).
Sure, we got some progress in the last 10 years (two OS updates), but not much. I can't help feeling that projects such as AROS and MorphOS would have benefitted enormously from this.
AFAIK, there's a difference between Kickstart and AmigaOS. Kickstart is the BIOS, and it's written for your version of AOS, but the AOS is a big problem too.
Actually the ROMs do contain a large amount of the OS (especially before 3.5) I believe. Someone who wanted to just play old A500 games would need the ROMs, but wouldn't need proper full OS installation. But yes, you are right that in order to be fully useful, people would need to obtain the Workbench disks (or the full OS for 3.5/3.9).
This being said, I do think we'll see another Amiga platform in the future... Just in time for that new version of Duke 'Nukem to be ported to it
An Amiga-branded platform is about as likely as Duke Nukem, given that the owners of the IP appear to enjoy doing nothing but play pass-the-parcel with it this last decade.
Though, Amiga compatible platforms are being released (ie, the Pegasos, as well as AROS as mentioned in the article).
Re:Let...it...die...peacefully...
on
Amiga Sells AmigaOS
·
· Score: 3, Insightful
Let the Amiga go...let it fade into computer history. It's time to pull the plug and take off the feeding tube.
This doesn't make sense. If no one is using it, then it will die naturally. If people are using it, then there is still interest and it shouldn't die. Telling ppl to "let it go" doesn't make sense - who are you to dictate what computers other people should use?
If the above was posted to any other article (eg, saying that people should let Mac die rather than ressurecting it with OS X, or saying similarly to any of the really obscure OSs that sometimes get posted about on Slashdot), I can't help feeling it'd be flamebait, but posting this on an Amiga story appears to be instant Karma.
There is a world of difference between a soldier and an accountant. Sure, both an accountant and a soldier can serve their country. But one is risking his life while the other is risking his paycheck.
And one is contributing towards a peaceful society, whilst the other is killing people. It's fallacious to suggest that putting yourself at risk implies that the deed is therefore good.
The problem is that not all wars are necessarily just. In the case of risk of invasion (eg, World War 2), then the soldier is certainly doing a great service to his country. But the wars America has been involved with lately hardly come anywhere close to it.
There are arguments for and against whether such wars are justified - but it's absurd to suggest that the original poster is not "serving his country" because he doesn't want to be forced to take part in whatever wars the US decides to start in future, and as the other poster said, there are plenty of more constructive ways one can serve their country.
People in the military should be honored for risking their necks vice being booed on slashdot. The fact that they are booed instead disgusts me.
It seems to me that generally (ie, outside of Slashdot) it's the accountants, businessmen and so on that are booed or at best ignored, whilst the military are looked on highly, and it seems to be a great taboo to say otherwise (I remember when the Iraq war started, people would say "It doesn't matter that you were against the war - now you have to support our boys"). But personally, I'd prefer a world were accountants were viewed more highly than the military.
Is this a joke? Are you seriously trying to suggest that these are in the same league? Frankly, I find these sorts of thoughtless comparisons rather offensive. People died fighting for civil rights.
If people are being sent to prison (or could be sent to prison) as a result of copyright related matters, then that puts it in the same league.
And even whilst playing an old game on an emulator may be seen as nothing compared to matters of sexuality, the same kind of laws cover all sorts of areas that dictate the level of control private corporations can have over information that people have paid for. Imagine you're blind, and are legally prevented from listening to ebooks that others can read - is that a trivial joking matter?
We're not talking music, we're talking software. The difference is in the terms. If the license says "buy one license per CPU", then you can either agree to it and do just that, or you can return it on the grounds that you disagree with the license.
If I've already bought a piece of software (which is a legal contract between two people, unlike installing software), then I'll use that according to the law. The seller has no more right to impose extra conditions after that than I do (imagine if I bought something, then phoned up the company saying "You're only allowed to spend that money on such-and-such - if you disagree, you can give me a refund"?)
Would you say it would be comparable to music if a slip of paper inside the sealed case told you how you could and couldn't use it?
I'd say it's comparable to having music copied in multiple locations (CD, computer, mp3 player). In both cases, it becomes dubious, and probably illegal, when these different copies are used simultaneously by different people. But I don't see that someone with several computers should be any different to someone with more than one music playing device.
But regulation of food and water doesn't stop people cooking up recipes or holding dinner parties, and such people aren't subject to these regulations. I hope that software regulations would apply only to where people are selling software commercially, as opposed to giving it away for free.
People who could lose would be those who are trying to make money, but are selling software they wrote in their spare time and aren't running a company (eg, shareware programmers).
If I'm correctly remembering, it seems that the quote you took was referring to that (I don't know when it was written - I dunno why slashdot doesn't seem to give years on the dates of articles).
The iPods now are new models which have USB and are Windows-compatible, which would hardly be a fair comparison to the post you quoted out of context, so this is a bit misleading. If it had remained Mac-only, I don't think it would be too unreasonable to suggest its market would be somewhat limited.
There's the low end flash based devices, there's the midrange flash and maybe small disk, and there's the high end.
Don't forget to add CD based ones to the low end. Maybe not as portable, but store a lot more than low end flash even on a single disc, and it's a lot easier to change what's on there - just pop in a new CD.
No, they weren't wrong. Someone saying a product is poor value for money in their opinion isn't contradicted by other people buying it. Unless you're the school of thought that says something is true because a lot of people think it.
I guess you don't sell your own work for a living, now do you?
Speaking for myself, I work for a living, but I doubt my next of kin will still be paid for what I do now, up to 70 years after my death (or longer).
My view is that the idea of copyrights are fine, but that doesn't mean I agree with the implementation, so I would see downloading could be considered moral, depending on certain factors such as age.
I think the issue comes down to whether there is some implication of "popularity" or "relevance" based on the position in the list returned. If you want analogies, would it be okay if an exam board awarded grades, but gave a preferential marking style (I realise that Yahoo aren't directly adjusting positions, though more frequent spidering would indirectly give improved results) to people who paid them money?
And yes, I wouldn't argue that fundamental rights are at stake here, but you could say that of a lot of stories in YRO. It seems to be more of a "Things you might want to know about things online, that may affect you adversely" category, but I guess that name isn't quite so snappy;)
Slashdot Mirror
Just because someone has a right to something (eg, copying for personal use something you bought) doesn't mean someone else is obligated to provide you with that right.
I'd argue that this situation is at least as likely if people aren't allowed to make copies for their own personal use: If I buy a CD then later it gets damaged, and I was legally prevented from being able to make a backup copy, then I'd say it would be more reasonable that I go after that company and demand they give me a replacement.
Having said that, I wish the record execs did think in the way that you said - then maybe we'd see fewer attempts to prevent CDs etc from be copied, even for personal use.
Sounds a lot like Swing to me...
;)
As in Java?
That sort of idea, though IMO it doesn't do it as well as MUI. It's difficult to describe (and my memory of what I disliked about swing is hazy), but most of the layout managers only work for rather simple interfaces, so that just leaves Gridbag for anything non-trivial. In MUI, the most common way to arrange objects is in rows or columns, which seems more natural than specifying a position in a grid for most purposes.
Hmm weren't the layout managers part of awt though?
Also, this doesn't help if you want to program in a language other than Java
What I'm saying is that yea, *Windows* might be lacking,
True - the thing is that it's very rare for an OS to have a truely exclusive feature that isn't on any OS anywhere, no matter how obscure. The best you can do when telling good points of an OS is to either list a feature which isn't on some of the common mainstream alternatives, or list a set of features for which no other OS has all of them, only some of them. In both cases, I can say that I miss such features.
but if you're goign to change OS (to AmigaOS) then Un*x boxen have the majority of those things you miss and a lot more going for them besides.
True, I'm not saying I'd automatically switch back to the Amiga if I were to give up Windows, but my point is that it would be a consideration, and there would be some benefits for me which don't exist on other platforms.
but most often you got no choice in the matter, an app (not so much later on, you generally goa choice) would typically open it's own screen rather than use windows on the WB
The important point being "later on" though.. it's a bit like saying applications on Windows are still opening up in little DOS windows;)
And even with the old applications which don't give you a choice, there are simple utilities ("mode promoters") which will force an application onto a different screen IIRC.
Well if there's no interest in it commercially, any company trying to bring it back commercially won't have much luck anyway, so who cares?
I don't see why you should tell others how they should spend or invest their money. Vastly more has been spent of OSs such as Windows and MacOS, but I don't complain about that.
Out of curiosity, for people that are using +/-RW, what are you using it for? All the applications that I can think of needing large amounts of rewritable space, it would be better to just use an external drive than DVD.
Can you get external 4.7GB drives for the price of a DVD RW?
RW does have various uses, like any sort of backup disc that you want to gradually update stuff on, without having to write a new disc everytime.
And indeed, in the shops that I've looked here in the UK, RW is often no more expensive that R (in fact I bought a pack of RW, because they were on offer and actually cheaper than the R discs in the same shop).
The Amiga was a great gaming machine back in the days tho, and that's what I used it for.
I don't see that that reduces the original point.. let's face it, most people only use PCs for games now (and other equally supposedly unimportant stuff like Internet chatting/browsing, which didn't really apply 10+ years ago), but this doesn't detract from the PC's technical qualities.
I remember Datatypes being an amusing way to get round the GIF patent - commercial programs such as PersonalPaint were released without GIF support internally, but could support them through datatypes. It's a lot harder to sue or prevent distribution of a freely available small file than a commercial application..
Thank you, Captain The-Point-Went-Right-Over-Your-Head. If what I said about the Pegasos was obvious, how come people talk as if Amiga-related platforms haven't been released in years?
And just because I agree with part of what a post says doesn't mean I'm explaining it, sorry if this point is too subtle for you.
Ok, I'll bite
And I'll bite back:
- Datatypes (OS standard way of loading files in any format): From a user point of view, you can add support for a new file format to all your programs by installing a small file. From a developer point of view, you can add support for all OS supported file formats just by using this functionality. On Windows, I having to code support for simple things like BMP/PCX myself, or rely on 3rd party libraries (which means abiding by their licence, and supplying large DLLs with my programs).
- Decent GUI toolkit in the form of MUI (yes, it wasn't OS standard, but until MUI is ported elsewhere, it's exclusive to AmigaOS - though I have a feeling that the OS standard Reaction toolkit seems to work similarly): This is programming GUIs the way it should be - just say you want, eg, three objects in a row, and let the toolkit worrying about resizing; it's actually easier than programming with so-called "visual" editors, and has the advantage that windows/GUIs are always automatically resizable, so you don't have to worry about that (similarly you don't have to worry about things like changing font sizes). It's ridiculous that some GUIs are still written with hardcoded x/y coordinates.
- A side benefit of having decent GUI toolkits (MUI and others) for the user is that it's very common that windows are resizable as standard, and the contents resize to fit. There's nothing more enfuriating to see a tiny window on Windows with a small textbox or whatever inside, and I can't resize if (or instead, I can resize it, but the contents don't enlarge!)
- Assigns: Shortcuts basically. Windows only gets halfway with its shortcut - I can't include the shortcut in a filename, I can only use the shortcut on its own (eg, c:\shortcut\dir_inside_shortcut) - was this fixed in XP?
- ARexx: OS standard scripting language. It wasn't anything special in itself, but it was OS standard, so commonly supported by most applications. Which means you don't have to learn different scripting languages to support different applications.
- Screens: Multiple workspaces, done dynamically. Why do OSes like BeOS (and Linux window managers?) bother to implement workspaces, but then only stick with a fixed number?
Just a few off the top of my head. Also there are things which aren't exclusive to AmigaOS, but are still improvements over Windows (and since I use Windows, it still counts as features that one might miss):
- Doesn't make GUI mistakes that Windows does: It's much quicker to find menus at the top of the screen, and using the right mouse button means you can select (or unselect) multiple options with the left button, without opening the menu several times.
- Decent command line interface: I don't mean the commands/syntax, but things like being able to resize it, having a non-fixed number of lines (I can't believe I'm still having to tell Windows how many lines I want by buffer to be - did they fix this in XP?)
And not quite an OS feature, but I still miss the email client YAM.
I can't help feeling that it might be better if IP entered the public domain if a company goes bust. I don't see how it is in the original spirit of IP laws if technology can just disappear down a black hole, or if what happens to it is decided by people who had no hand in creating the original (and the company going bust hasn't chosen to hand over control to these other people).
Sure, we got some progress in the last 10 years (two OS updates), but not much. I can't help feeling that projects such as AROS and MorphOS would have benefitted enormously from this.
AFAIK, there's a difference between Kickstart and AmigaOS. Kickstart is the BIOS, and it's written for your version of AOS, but the AOS is a big problem too.
Actually the ROMs do contain a large amount of the OS (especially before 3.5) I believe. Someone who wanted to just play old A500 games would need the ROMs, but wouldn't need proper full OS installation. But yes, you are right that in order to be fully useful, people would need to obtain the Workbench disks (or the full OS for 3.5/3.9).
This being said, I do think we'll see another Amiga platform in the future... Just in time for that new version of Duke 'Nukem to be ported to it
An Amiga-branded platform is about as likely as Duke Nukem, given that the owners of the IP appear to enjoy doing nothing but play pass-the-parcel with it this last decade.
Though, Amiga compatible platforms are being released (ie, the Pegasos, as well as AROS as mentioned in the article).
Let the Amiga go...let it fade into computer history. It's time to pull the plug and take off the feeding tube.
This doesn't make sense. If no one is using it, then it will die naturally. If people are using it, then there is still interest and it shouldn't die. Telling ppl to "let it go" doesn't make sense - who are you to dictate what computers other people should use?
If the above was posted to any other article (eg, saying that people should let Mac die rather than ressurecting it with OS X, or saying similarly to any of the really obscure OSs that sometimes get posted about on Slashdot), I can't help feeling it'd be flamebait, but posting this on an Amiga story appears to be instant Karma.
There is a world of difference between a soldier and an accountant. Sure, both an accountant and a soldier can serve their country. But one is risking his life while the other is risking his paycheck.
And one is contributing towards a peaceful society, whilst the other is killing people. It's fallacious to suggest that putting yourself at risk implies that the deed is therefore good.
The problem is that not all wars are necessarily just. In the case of risk of invasion (eg, World War 2), then the soldier is certainly doing a great service to his country. But the wars America has been involved with lately hardly come anywhere close to it.
There are arguments for and against whether such wars are justified - but it's absurd to suggest that the original poster is not "serving his country" because he doesn't want to be forced to take part in whatever wars the US decides to start in future, and as the other poster said, there are plenty of more constructive ways one can serve their country.
People in the military should be honored for risking their necks vice being booed on slashdot. The fact that they are booed instead disgusts me.
It seems to me that generally (ie, outside of Slashdot) it's the accountants, businessmen and so on that are booed or at best ignored, whilst the military are looked on highly, and it seems to be a great taboo to say otherwise (I remember when the Iraq war started, people would say "It doesn't matter that you were against the war - now you have to support our boys"). But personally, I'd prefer a world were accountants were viewed more highly than the military.
Your example is totally different than the parent's, but thanks for playing.
Of course it's different - it wouldn't be an analogy if I simply repeated the same example the original poster gave.
How is it different in any relevant aspect? I don't recall ever signing a manual.
Every manual for a Nintendo game specifically states that you cannot back it up. What exactly overrides that?
And supposing this piece of paper I have specifically states that you owe me a load of money. What exactly overrides that?
Is this a joke? Are you seriously trying to suggest that these are in the same league? Frankly, I find these sorts of thoughtless comparisons rather offensive. People died fighting for civil rights.
If people are being sent to prison (or could be sent to prison) as a result of copyright related matters, then that puts it in the same league.
And even whilst playing an old game on an emulator may be seen as nothing compared to matters of sexuality, the same kind of laws cover all sorts of areas that dictate the level of control private corporations can have over information that people have paid for. Imagine you're blind, and are legally prevented from listening to ebooks that others can read - is that a trivial joking matter?
We're not talking music, we're talking software. The difference is in the terms. If the license says "buy one license per CPU", then you can either agree to it and do just that, or you can return it on the grounds that you disagree with the license.
If I've already bought a piece of software (which is a legal contract between two people, unlike installing software), then I'll use that according to the law. The seller has no more right to impose extra conditions after that than I do (imagine if I bought something, then phoned up the company saying "You're only allowed to spend that money on such-and-such - if you disagree, you can give me a refund"?)
Would you say it would be comparable to music if a slip of paper inside the sealed case told you how you could and couldn't use it?
I'd say it's comparable to having music copied in multiple locations (CD, computer, mp3 player). In both cases, it becomes dubious, and probably illegal, when these different copies are used simultaneously by different people. But I don't see that someone with several computers should be any different to someone with more than one music playing device.
But regulation of food and water doesn't stop people cooking up recipes or holding dinner parties, and such people aren't subject to these regulations. I hope that software regulations would apply only to where people are selling software commercially, as opposed to giving it away for free.
People who could lose would be those who are trying to make money, but are selling software they wrote in their spare time and aren't running a company (eg, shareware programmers).
Raise your hand if you have a FireWire port ...
Wasn't the original iPod FireWire (and Mac) only?
If I'm correctly remembering, it seems that the quote you took was referring to that (I don't know when it was written - I dunno why slashdot doesn't seem to give years on the dates of articles).
The iPods now are new models which have USB and are Windows-compatible, which would hardly be a fair comparison to the post you quoted out of context, so this is a bit misleading. If it had remained Mac-only, I don't think it would be too unreasonable to suggest its market would be somewhat limited.
There's the low end flash based devices, there's the midrange flash and maybe small disk, and there's the high end.
Don't forget to add CD based ones to the low end. Maybe not as portable, but store a lot more than low end flash even on a single disc, and it's a lot easier to change what's on there - just pop in a new CD.
No, they weren't wrong. Someone saying a product is poor value for money in their opinion isn't contradicted by other people buying it. Unless you're the school of thought that says something is true because a lot of people think it.
I guess you don't sell your own work for a living, now do you?
Speaking for myself, I work for a living, but I doubt my next of kin will still be paid for what I do now, up to 70 years after my death (or longer).
My view is that the idea of copyrights are fine, but that doesn't mean I agree with the implementation, so I would see downloading could be considered moral, depending on certain factors such as age.
I think the issue comes down to whether there is some implication of "popularity" or "relevance" based on the position in the list returned. If you want analogies, would it be okay if an exam board awarded grades, but gave a preferential marking style (I realise that Yahoo aren't directly adjusting positions, though more frequent spidering would indirectly give improved results) to people who paid them money?
And yes, I wouldn't argue that fundamental rights are at stake here, but you could say that of a lot of stories in YRO. It seems to be more of a "Things you might want to know about things online, that may affect you adversely" category, but I guess that name isn't quite so snappy;)