Having NO drivers versus proprietary ones - which is better?
And this is the standard false dichotomy that opponents to the GPL like to ask. Of course given only those choices we would rather have proprietary ones. But even better would be free (libre) drivers. And to get those we have to convince the people making the drivers that everyone wants their drivers to be Free. To do that you have to stop accepting the non-free drivers that the companies give you. One we have free drivers, the entire community benefits from better driver software. So the answer to your question is "NO drivers for a little bit leading to free drivers forever is better than proprietary drivers forever."
That's the theory, in any case. But don't make it look as though FSF is trying to cripple your computer for its own lofty ideals. The ultimate goal is to make it so everyone will see it as a mistake if people don't release their software under a free license. There are two major methods to acheive this goal so far: try and win through superior software alone, or, in addition, use your rights as a software writer to make sure your software isn't used against this goal.
You can change the software all you like and keep it as secret as you like as long as you don't try and distribute your program without source code under the GPL. You do *not* have to contribute to the original product, and you do not have to get any permission from the project to release modified code (as long as it is in turn GPL'd). Many businesses use GPL software all the time, tweaking it so it works for their own in-house purposes, and it never sees the light of day. This is acceptable use, and is in fact encouraged because it demonstrates the spectacular freedom of FOSS. All the GPL is trying to accomplish is to make sure that people don't change software, and then try and distribute it without freedoms attached.
I can't believe people still are confused about this aspect of the GPL.
First, it doesn't control the software - you can fuck up the software as much as you like and make any changes you want. What you can't do is use the author's work for (in a sense) "the forces of evil."
You miss a crucial point in the FSF's seemingly hypocritical behavior - they want people to redistribute software in a way they see as "good." They see the RIAA's way of redistributing media (not at all) as "bad." They aren't criticizing the fact that the RIAA restricts how you can distribute your music, they are criticizing the way they restrict it.
The FSF's way is to restrict your rights just a little bit, and in a fair way - you have to give credit (that's a fair restriction and in the BSD license as well), and you have to pass the same freedoms onto others. Without the GPL, you have the potential that your work could be used to make something you don't believe in (proprietary software). The community could potentially stop benefitting from your work after a single generation.
So it comes down to protecting what you believe in, and benefitting the community. If you're going to make an argument about the GPL and the Free Software ideals, you have to argue those ideas.
Actually Fermat was always saying stuff like that scribble in the margin. It was a fun exercise to go through and prove or disprove all the claims Fermat had made. That fun lasted only about a few decades...except that one pesky problem...
Oh awesome, hilarious tech support and customer service calls!! Those are always a hoot!
I think if Slashdot wants to keep up this unprecedented humor level, they should start posting Garfield comics regularly. I'll tag this "garfield" to remind them.:)
You're absolutely right, God is not necessary for moral action. But why should religious people believe that God is telling them to act violently? It all depends on the person. One's religion (or lack thereof) has no bearing on whether a person is going to commit terrible acts.
You're right, you'll certainly be faster. But you'll be very specialized, and what happens when COBOL/Java/PHP/whatever goes out of favor in how many years? Better to know how to psuedocode and use manuals for reference.
As for other code out there that's already been written, I hear they made a service that will search the Internet for you. Giggle or something. You should google for it.
The thing with software patents, though, is that they are, with few exceptions, ideas that any competent computer scientist could invent given the idea. So when a company invents something and then produces it (because there's no moeny in not producing it), then anyone can look at it and go "ohhhh that's neat, now I will implement it" and no knowledge or research is lost. The implementation is often hidden today anyway, so the point is moot. Other, more non-trivial patents (which are usually algorithms or math, like RSA) will be published in any case - Microsoft authors many papers which are not patented. Microsoft, to my knowledge, does not have any non-trivial patents (patents which can be implemented by the seeing them in action).
But that leaves the legal bills you have to pay in the first place. A troll company that is rich enough to acquire patents can afford a lawsuit, but for the "small inventor" it's difficult but there is still a possiblity of losing nothing but time and court costs (self-representation). Add "loser pays" and there's even less incentive for the "small inventor" to go against a big company. Secondly, ideologically, "loser pays" assumes that the person suing has done something wrong.
Basically it comes down to the fact that every change that hinders patent trolls also hinders the "small inventor" as well, and the "small inventor" is probably the reason most people support software patents.
There's no way they can truly shut down patent trolls without dismantling the entire software patent system or making it completely impervious to small developers (the people that patents are really supposed to "protect"). If you have a "loser pays" technique, then the larger companies are just going to drown the small man into debt. Trolls already pay in lawyers' fees when they do lose, and the problem with trolls is that they are usually right. If you say that products must be actively developed, the troll will do it themselves... v e r y s l o w l y. And what if the patent holder is going to college, or another situation.
Patent trolls either exist or you get rid of the whole system.
The C++ specification book (Stroustrup) is a thousand pages and very densly written.
And contains tons of stuff which is meaningless to memorize..NET is the same way, too. Who needs to know all of the subclasses and methods of some obscure function? If you know the general concepts of how computers work, you can apply it to anything, leaving the specifics in the manual when you need them. Having the concepts means you know where to look. "I say now, as I said then, that a man should keep his little brain-attic stocked with all the furniture that he is likely to use, and the rest he can put away in the lumber-room of his library, where he can get it if he wants it. --Sherlock Holmes
URGENT: Recruits wanted for the 15th Brigade of Penetration Black Hat Experts (Pen 15)! Do you have what it takes to penetrate the network? Is your staying power for penetrating networks all night long unmatched? Then join the Pen 15 club today! You'll get your chance to test your skills out on a farm of over 500 fertile Windows Vista boxes, all of which have never been penetrated before! And don't think you won't be getting any help: our trained technicians (as well as our legal and acquisitions staff) are experts in penetration! Every member of the Pen 15 club will get a commemerative arm band or a special "temporary" forehead tattoo! The hacker who penetrates the most boxes will even receive a grand prize from Microsoft: a Pen 15 fanny pack! So, send in those resumes and get penetratin'!
Yes, there are a few ISPs on each end, but the real problem is in the huge infrastructure in-between owned by an oligopoly (I think mostly AT&T) and not in the free market. That's how they can start charging Google - they basically control all the internet traffic in the US, so switching ISPs will do you no good at all. Not to mention not all areas have more than 2 choices (their phone and cable provider).
If you let the "free market" work it out, AT&T will just do whatever the hell it wants with its pipes. Which includes extorting Google. This isn't a free market we're talking about, so we have to legislate in order to make sure AT&T plays fair.
Either way, making fun of Al Gore's statement is funny and it always will be.
Ah, the classics never die! And you know what else, Family Circus, Cathy, and Garfield are funny and they always will be. Oooh you know what else is funny? Bush looks like a monkey! Hahaha! Man, sometimes I wonder how I have time for all this humor with my 3 kids and their soccer practice. Sometimes I don't even have time to watch American Idol or the Lifetime channel.
Seriously, a member of the media taking such a bold stand against government and corporations these days? I thought the Cubs would win the World Series first.
It doesn't help that 75% of the pro-net-neutrality articles I see on Slashdot and elsewhere don't even mention the "double-dipping" nature of net neutrality. Some even further confuse the issue by comparing a tiered internet to "first-class flights" or toll roads, which is totally false. Unfortunately, there seems to be very many persuasive people arguing against it, and very few persuasive people arguing for neutrality.
You can spend the time writing it in C, or you could just combine those six operations into a single one and have MATLAB or perl whatever do it in the right order like you say. Or am I missing something?
Oh yeah, baby, let me at that hot Linux action! I can't tell you how many times I've had to pay for sites to watch sweet videos of Gentoo compiling software, or videos of a Red Hat desktop where someone hits the little hat and the menu pops up!! Once I found this sweet video of someone configuring their sendmail.cf. It was HOT.
Last I checked there were some pretty big towns in "flyover" states - Chicago, Houston, Philidelphia, Detroit, Dallas, Columbus, Indianapolis, Austin, Milwaukee...
Slashdot Mirror
That's not accurate at all. It's more like allowing users to pipe to or from GPLed software but not releasing the source code of said software.
And this is the standard false dichotomy that opponents to the GPL like to ask. Of course given only those choices we would rather have proprietary ones. But even better would be free (libre) drivers. And to get those we have to convince the people making the drivers that everyone wants their drivers to be Free. To do that you have to stop accepting the non-free drivers that the companies give you. One we have free drivers, the entire community benefits from better driver software. So the answer to your question is "NO drivers for a little bit leading to free drivers forever is better than proprietary drivers forever."
That's the theory, in any case. But don't make it look as though FSF is trying to cripple your computer for its own lofty ideals. The ultimate goal is to make it so everyone will see it as a mistake if people don't release their software under a free license. There are two major methods to acheive this goal so far: try and win through superior software alone, or, in addition, use your rights as a software writer to make sure your software isn't used against this goal.
You can change the software all you like and keep it as secret as you like as long as you don't try and distribute your program without source code under the GPL. You do *not* have to contribute to the original product, and you do not have to get any permission from the project to release modified code (as long as it is in turn GPL'd). Many businesses use GPL software all the time, tweaking it so it works for their own in-house purposes, and it never sees the light of day. This is acceptable use, and is in fact encouraged because it demonstrates the spectacular freedom of FOSS. All the GPL is trying to accomplish is to make sure that people don't change software, and then try and distribute it without freedoms attached.
I can't believe people still are confused about this aspect of the GPL.
First, it doesn't control the software - you can fuck up the software as much as you like and make any changes you want. What you can't do is use the author's work for (in a sense) "the forces of evil."
You miss a crucial point in the FSF's seemingly hypocritical behavior - they want people to redistribute software in a way they see as "good." They see the RIAA's way of redistributing media (not at all) as "bad." They aren't criticizing the fact that the RIAA restricts how you can distribute your music, they are criticizing the way they restrict it.
The FSF's way is to restrict your rights just a little bit, and in a fair way - you have to give credit (that's a fair restriction and in the BSD license as well), and you have to pass the same freedoms onto others. Without the GPL, you have the potential that your work could be used to make something you don't believe in (proprietary software). The community could potentially stop benefitting from your work after a single generation.
So it comes down to protecting what you believe in, and benefitting the community. If you're going to make an argument about the GPL and the Free Software ideals, you have to argue those ideas.
Actually Fermat was always saying stuff like that scribble in the margin. It was a fun exercise to go through and prove or disprove all the claims Fermat had made. That fun lasted only about a few decades...except that one pesky problem...
Oh awesome, hilarious tech support and customer service calls!! Those are always a hoot!
:)
I think if Slashdot wants to keep up this unprecedented humor level, they should start posting Garfield comics regularly. I'll tag this "garfield" to remind them.
You're absolutely right, God is not necessary for moral action. But why should religious people believe that God is telling them to act violently? It all depends on the person. One's religion (or lack thereof) has no bearing on whether a person is going to commit terrible acts.
My point was that the argument can go both ways.
You're right, you'll certainly be faster. But you'll be very specialized, and what happens when COBOL/Java/PHP/whatever goes out of favor in how many years? Better to know how to psuedocode and use manuals for reference.
As for other code out there that's already been written, I hear they made a service that will search the Internet for you. Giggle or something. You should google for it.
The thing with software patents, though, is that they are, with few exceptions, ideas that any competent computer scientist could invent given the idea. So when a company invents something and then produces it (because there's no moeny in not producing it), then anyone can look at it and go "ohhhh that's neat, now I will implement it" and no knowledge or research is lost. The implementation is often hidden today anyway, so the point is moot. Other, more non-trivial patents (which are usually algorithms or math, like RSA) will be published in any case - Microsoft authors many papers which are not patented. Microsoft, to my knowledge, does not have any non-trivial patents (patents which can be implemented by the seeing them in action).
You're right about the debt thing.
But that leaves the legal bills you have to pay in the first place. A troll company that is rich enough to acquire patents can afford a lawsuit, but for the "small inventor" it's difficult but there is still a possiblity of losing nothing but time and court costs (self-representation). Add "loser pays" and there's even less incentive for the "small inventor" to go against a big company. Secondly, ideologically, "loser pays" assumes that the person suing has done something wrong.
Basically it comes down to the fact that every change that hinders patent trolls also hinders the "small inventor" as well, and the "small inventor" is probably the reason most people support software patents.
There's no way they can truly shut down patent trolls without dismantling the entire software patent system or making it completely impervious to small developers (the people that patents are really supposed to "protect"). If you have a "loser pays" technique, then the larger companies are just going to drown the small man into debt. Trolls already pay in lawyers' fees when they do lose, and the problem with trolls is that they are usually right. If you say that products must be actively developed, the troll will do it themselves... v e r y s l o w l y. And what if the patent holder is going to college, or another situation.
Patent trolls either exist or you get rid of the whole system.
And contains tons of stuff which is meaningless to memorize.
"I say now, as I said then, that a man should keep his little brain-attic stocked with all the furniture that he is likely to use, and the rest he can put away in the lumber-room of his library, where he can get it if he wants it. --Sherlock Holmes
It's also a short step from atheism to complete immoraility. No matter what we believe, we're still screwed on this front.
I hope you don't think that only men have adam's apples.
I got this Microsoft bulletin in the mail:
URGENT:
Recruits wanted for the 15th Brigade of Penetration Black Hat Experts (Pen 15)! Do you have what it takes to penetrate the network? Is your staying power for penetrating networks all night long unmatched? Then join the Pen 15 club today! You'll get your chance to test your skills out on a farm of over 500 fertile Windows Vista boxes, all of which have never been penetrated before! And don't think you won't be getting any help: our trained technicians (as well as our legal and acquisitions staff) are experts in penetration! Every member of the Pen 15 club will get a commemerative arm band or a special "temporary" forehead tattoo! The hacker who penetrates the most boxes will even receive a grand prize from Microsoft: a Pen 15 fanny pack! So, send in those resumes and get penetratin'!
Should I join???
Yes, there are a few ISPs on each end, but the real problem is in the huge infrastructure in-between owned by an oligopoly (I think mostly AT&T) and not in the free market. That's how they can start charging Google - they basically control all the internet traffic in the US, so switching ISPs will do you no good at all. Not to mention not all areas have more than 2 choices (their phone and cable provider).
If you let the "free market" work it out, AT&T will just do whatever the hell it wants with its pipes. Which includes extorting Google. This isn't a free market we're talking about, so we have to legislate in order to make sure AT&T plays fair.
Ah, the classics never die! And you know what else, Family Circus, Cathy, and Garfield are funny and they always will be. Oooh you know what else is funny? Bush looks like a monkey! Hahaha! Man, sometimes I wonder how I have time for all this humor with my 3 kids and their soccer practice. Sometimes I don't even have time to watch American Idol or the Lifetime channel.
Seriously, a member of the media taking such a bold stand against government and corporations these days? I thought the Cubs would win the World Series first.
It doesn't help that 75% of the pro-net-neutrality articles I see on Slashdot and elsewhere don't even mention the "double-dipping" nature of net neutrality. Some even further confuse the issue by comparing a tiered internet to "first-class flights" or toll roads, which is totally false. Unfortunately, there seems to be very many persuasive people arguing against it, and very few persuasive people arguing for neutrality.
So if you're clever, please stand up!
You can spend the time writing it in C, or you could just combine those six operations into a single one and have MATLAB or perl whatever do it in the right order like you say. Or am I missing something?
Oh yeah, baby, let me at that hot Linux action! I can't tell you how many times I've had to pay for sites to watch sweet videos of Gentoo compiling software, or videos of a Red Hat desktop where someone hits the little hat and the menu pops up!! Once I found this sweet video of someone configuring their sendmail.cf. It was HOT.
hahaha antiquated usage triumphs again!!
Shit, where can I get a beer and nachos for a dollar???
Last I checked there were some pretty big towns in "flyover" states - Chicago, Houston, Philidelphia, Detroit, Dallas, Columbus, Indianapolis, Austin, Milwaukee...