The original story at Ars Technica is called "Black ops: how HBGary wrote backdoors for the government". The person who submitted the story is not colour blind... Thanks,
GerardM
When you burn carbon based material, you do want it to burn to CO2. When the process of burning is incomplete, you get stuff like CO and soot. One is poisonous the other carcinogenic..
The fact that we do not want to produce CO2 implies that we need more efficient engines and/or burn less fuel. Thanks,
GerardM
When you buy proprietary software, you buy software that has already been developed. What you typically cannot get at any price is the modifications that you need to make it work properly for you.
When you buy open source software, you either pay for a service contract or you pay to develop the functionality that is not there yet.
The consequence of this is that in stead of a commodity, software is more like infrastructure.. it is there for all and as long as we pay our taxes to keep up the maintenance, we all benefit.
Thanks,
GerardM
Hoi, You may have noticed that both the US government and the European Union have found Microsoft to be a monopolist. Government regulation is a solution to monopolism.
I love Semantic MediaWiki. I use it for a private wiki and it is really nice. It has several things going for it and one drawback. It is really great how you can bring all kinds of content together defining relation types on the fly. It's drawback is that it works for one language at a time. This in my opinion is one aspect that is holding the semantic web back.
My private opinion is that http://omegawiki.org/ provides the multilingual support, a combination that brings the Semantic MediaWiki together with the OmegaWiki technology provides the best of both worlds.
Hoi, Given that Citizendium is not available for public viewing, it is inappropriate to list it as a relevant resource. When it gets its first public airing, there will be only some 1000 articles. This is hardly going to make an effect. There are many other public wikis that provide a resource that is certainly more relevant at this time for education; Wikieducator comes to mind.
The only thing that we have heard from Dr Sanger is his insistence that it is going to do better.
When you buy a Best Buy or CompUSA system you buy a Microsoft computer. No choice. When you upgrade this system to Linux, it does not run your precious WoW any more.
You cannot say that the OLPC system COULD not run games like a conventional laptop but you do not prove it by assuming it. The OLPC system has not been made to run Windows. It's first and foremost priority is to run in schools and do this well. The problem with an insistence that it should play the latest games is, that there is a big divide in those people who are interested in the Windows games and the people who could not care less.
By buying into "it must run the latest games", you buy into brutally expensive hardware and software that is overpriced by at least a factor two given the functionality that is actually used. You buy a system that only one person can use at a time while it is often the kids the game functionality is there for.
The OLPC system is innovative hardware that proves that a computer does not need to be as expensive as they currently are. When it is possible to build a full features system for $130,- then the current prices of laptops and desktops for that matter are overpriced. On the OLPC it says explicitly that there will be little that you can not do that you can do on a $1.000,- laptop.
The point. Computers are overpriced not only because of the cost of proprietary software but also because of the cost of the rat race that is the hardware market. There are few people that need a $1000,- system. When the motivation is that they also run games, I would urge people to buy a dedicated game kit, that incidentally is able to run everything that runs on a PC and is often intentionally crippled to prevent these "other" uses.
It is not only but also proprietary software that makes computers expensive.
The proof of the pudding is in the eating; consider Mr Brandt comes up with a computer generated list of potential problematic articles. These are scrutinized and where needed problematic content is removed. The wiki methodology works thanks to Mr Brandt.
Conclusion; the best way of improving Wikipedia is by showing where it has a problem. Mr Brandt disproved his opinion. Live and learn.:)
It is evident that you do not understand the functioning of the Wikimedia Foundation Board. The board is and has always been very much involved in the day to day running of Foundation and also (some) of its projects. The notion that they did not meet that often IRL is in this Internet age not really relevant. Tools like Skype and IRC are very much used.
Jimmy did and does a great job. If it were me he should (and in him the Wikimedia Foundation) get a Nobel peace price. However, the changes under way in the WMF are significant. These changes have not found their final form at all and given the enormous growth of the projects and as a consequence the need for the managing of the resulting issues it is likely that the WMF organisation is like a wiki; a work in progress.
The current crop of Wiktionaries suffer from the problem that there is too much repetition and once an error is introduced on one wiktionary it is hard to find where it was propageted to. http://wiktionaryz.org/ tries is a project where the information is to be entered into a wiki based relational database.
WiktionaryZ is still very much pre-alpha, but it has already shown that the concept of using relational technology in a MediaWiki environment is sound..
With $ 100.000.000 to spend it is certain that much technology can be produced and, a lot of content can be accumulated. There is much information that is waiting to be freed. Spending it on technology and the convertion of existing data will prove to provide a great benefit and dare I say, a greater return on investment than buying stuff that is under copyright and does not really add value.
When you are big and play poker, when you bet the company, you play for big stakes. In my opinion Microsoft cannot afford not to sell MsVista in Europe. Yes, it truly is Microsoft's option not to sell it in Europe. It will really quickly kill off their monopoly. It is one of those things where the only option left open to European governments and the European Union is to take it's business elsewhere. Without sales of the Vista software in Europe many organisations will not be able to have one platform everywhere. This in turn will kill Microsoft off.
Thanks,
GerardM
Wikiwiki was the name of a bus company who brought people from their hotel to the airport and the other way around. Wiki is Hawaian for quick.. I have heard Ward Cunningham himself say this on several occasions.
Thanks, GerardM
Indeed most Africans do not have Internet at home. There are Internet cafe's doing brisk business. It is possible to bring Wikipedia content to mobile telephones.. They do have mobile telephones in Africa..
Thanks,
GerardM
There is enough content that has no home in any wikipedia about Africa. There are plenty readers and there could be plenty writers. What is needed is the basic stuff that we take for granted. Localisation of MediaWiki, promoting an easier user interface; the WYSIWYG developed by Wikia (among others) I expect will prove an important step forward.
Wiki is Hawaian for quick..
Thanks, GerardM
Afrikaans is not Dutch. It is a language spoken in Africa since the 1700's. It evolved into a distinct language. NB you forgot Arab, Portuguese and Spanish..
Thanks, GerardM
You apparantly did not read it carefully because had you done so you would have known it was originally published in the New York times.
Thanks,
GerardM
When the public for a MediaWiki installation is not too big, a must have extra is the Semantic MediaWiki. It really helps in making content rich and when using it in an environment for more organisational knowledge sharing, it is one of the best extras you can find.
Thanks,
GerardM
Slashdot Mirror
The suggestion that it takes anyone but the WMF to provide free access is a fallacy. Wikipedia Zero is free for any ISP who cares to provide it.
The original story at Ars Technica is called "Black ops: how HBGary wrote backdoors for the government". The person who submitted the story is not colour blind...
Thanks,
GerardM
How do you subtitle ogg material. Without it, it does not have the relevance it could have. Thanks, GerardM
The Wikimedia Foundation does not allow MP3. When one of the biggest websites does not use MP3 but ogg, it makes a serious difference.
Thanks,
GerardM
When you burn carbon based material, you do want it to burn to CO2. When the process of burning is incomplete, you get stuff like CO and soot. One is poisonous the other carcinogenic..
The fact that we do not want to produce CO2 implies that we need more efficient engines and/or burn less fuel.
Thanks,
GerardM
When you buy proprietary software, you buy software that has already been developed. What you typically cannot get at any price is the modifications that you need to make it work properly for you. When you buy open source software, you either pay for a service contract or you pay to develop the functionality that is not there yet. The consequence of this is that in stead of a commodity, software is more like infrastructure.. it is there for all and as long as we pay our taxes to keep up the maintenance, we all benefit. Thanks, GerardM
Hoi,
You may have noticed that both the US government and the European Union have found Microsoft to be a monopolist. Government regulation is a solution to monopolism.
Thanks,
GerardM
I love Semantic MediaWiki. I use it for a private wiki and it is really nice. It has several things going for it and one drawback. It is really great how you can bring all kinds of content together defining relation types on the fly. It's drawback is that it works for one language at a time. This in my opinion is one aspect that is holding the semantic web back.
My private opinion is that http://omegawiki.org/ provides the multilingual support, a combination that brings the Semantic MediaWiki together with the OmegaWiki technology provides the best of both worlds.
Thanks,
GerardM
Hoi,
Given that Citizendium is not available for public viewing, it is inappropriate to list it as a relevant resource. When it gets its first public airing, there will be only some 1000 articles. This is hardly going to make an effect. There are many other public wikis that provide a resource that is certainly more relevant at this time for education; Wikieducator comes to mind.
The only thing that we have heard from Dr Sanger is his insistence that it is going to do better.
Thanks,
GerardM
Not only Qatar but also Thailand has large ISPs that are being blocked with some regularity. It is certainly not an isolated issue.
Thanks,
GerardM
Hoi,
On a WMF mailing list Angela said that there was no substance to all this. I had also heard from other channels that there is not much to this.
So even though it is nice to speculate, there is not much to all this.
Thanks,
GerardM
When you buy a Best Buy or CompUSA system you buy a Microsoft computer. No choice. When you upgrade this system to Linux, it does not run your precious WoW any more.
You cannot say that the OLPC system COULD not run games like a conventional laptop but you do not prove it by assuming it. The OLPC system has not been made to run Windows. It's first and foremost priority is to run in schools and do this well. The problem with an insistence that it should play the latest games is, that there is a big divide in those people who are interested in the Windows games and the people who could not care less.
By buying into "it must run the latest games", you buy into brutally expensive hardware and software that is overpriced by at least a factor two given the functionality that is actually used. You buy a system that only one person can use at a time while it is often the kids the game functionality is there for.
Thanks,
GerardM
The OLPC system is innovative hardware that proves that a computer does not need to be as expensive as they currently are. When it is possible to build a full features system for $130,- then the current prices of laptops and desktops for that matter are overpriced. On the OLPC it says explicitly that there will be little that you can not do that you can do on a $1.000,- laptop.
The point. Computers are overpriced not only because of the cost of proprietary software but also because of the cost of the rat race that is the hardware market. There are few people that need a $1000,- system. When the motivation is that they also run games, I would urge people to buy a dedicated game kit, that incidentally is able to run everything that runs on a PC and is often intentionally crippled to prevent these "other" uses.
It is not only but also proprietary software that makes computers expensive.
Thanks,
GerardM
The proof of the pudding is in the eating; consider Mr Brandt comes up with a computer generated list of potential problematic articles. These are scrutinized and where needed problematic content is removed. The wiki methodology works thanks to Mr Brandt.
:)
Conclusion; the best way of improving Wikipedia is by showing where it has a problem. Mr Brandt disproved his opinion. Live and learn.
Thanks,
GerardM
It is evident that you do not understand the functioning of the Wikimedia Foundation Board. The board is and has always been very much involved in the day to day running of Foundation and also (some) of its projects. The notion that they did not meet that often IRL is in this Internet age not really relevant. Tools like Skype and IRC are very much used.
Jimmy did and does a great job. If it were me he should (and in him the Wikimedia Foundation) get a Nobel peace price. However, the changes under way in the WMF are significant. These changes have not found their final form at all and given the enormous growth of the projects and as a consequence the need for the managing of the resulting issues it is likely that the WMF organisation is like a wiki; a work in progress.
Thanks,
GerardM
The current crop of Wiktionaries suffer from the problem that there is too much repetition and once an error is introduced on one wiktionary it is hard to find where it was propageted to. http://wiktionaryz.org/ tries is a project where the information is to be entered into a wiki based relational database.
..
WiktionaryZ is still very much pre-alpha, but it has already shown that the concept of using relational technology in a MediaWiki environment is sound
With $ 100.000.000 to spend it is certain that much technology can be produced and, a lot of content can be accumulated. There is much information that is waiting to be freed. Spending it on technology and the convertion of existing data will prove to provide a great benefit and dare I say, a greater return on investment than buying stuff that is under copyright and does not really add value.
Thanks,
GerardM
When you are big and play poker, when you bet the company, you play for big stakes. In my opinion Microsoft cannot afford not to sell MsVista in Europe. Yes, it truly is Microsoft's option not to sell it in Europe. It will really quickly kill off their monopoly. It is one of those things where the only option left open to European governments and the European Union is to take it's business elsewhere. Without sales of the Vista software in Europe many organisations will not be able to have one platform everywhere. This in turn will kill Microsoft off. Thanks, GerardM
Wikiwiki was the name of a bus company who brought people from their hotel to the airport and the other way around. Wiki is Hawaian for quick.. I have heard Ward Cunningham himself say this on several occasions. Thanks, GerardM
Indeed most Africans do not have Internet at home. There are Internet cafe's doing brisk business. It is possible to bring Wikipedia content to mobile telephones.. They do have mobile telephones in Africa.. Thanks, GerardM
There is enough content that has no home in any wikipedia about Africa. There are plenty readers and there could be plenty writers. What is needed is the basic stuff that we take for granted. Localisation of MediaWiki, promoting an easier user interface; the WYSIWYG developed by Wikia (among others) I expect will prove an important step forward. Wiki is Hawaian for quick.. Thanks, GerardM
Afrikaans is not Dutch. It is a language spoken in Africa since the 1700's. It evolved into a distinct language. NB you forgot Arab, Portuguese and Spanish..
Thanks, GerardM
You apparantly did not read it carefully because had you done so you would have known it was originally published in the New York times.
Thanks,
GerardM
First there was VistA, now they are waiting for Vista. VistA helps the sick. VistA is open source.
:)
Thanks,
GerardM
PS if you do not believe it, do some googling.
VistA is already there .. it helps to tend the sick ..
http://www.va.gov/vista_monograph/
Thanks,
GerardM
When the public for a MediaWiki installation is not too big, a must have extra is the Semantic MediaWiki. It really helps in making content rich and when using it in an environment for more organisational knowledge sharing, it is one of the best extras you can find. Thanks, GerardM