I think their "worry" is that companies like Dell sell computers with lots of stuff, they might put some program like Ghostscript or QT libraries on a system with the Anti-virus software. As the GPL covers SHIPPED systems, I could see their point, much like how Ubuntu can't SHIP nvidia drivers on the CD (even with nvidia's permission) because they might be considered "bundled" with the Linux OS. Certain parts of that have been shot down as the FSF's reading treats separate programs "bundled" as separate programs, but not ALL of the argument is settled because certain people (RMS fans) tend to over-read the "viral" parts trying to make GPL "leech" onto programs that just RUN next to GPL code.
I think the SEC statement is complete FUD, there is NO legal problem running any program 100% third party on any Open Source code as a user. The problem might come from systems Distributed by OEMs, if you think one GPL program on a disk makes the whole thing GPL... that's stupid and just wrong legally. If they're making this statement about OSS, why not about Microsoft... ever READ the visual studio bundle agreements for microsoft libraries "sort of" included in the Windows OS... they about own your ass if they wanted to... and reserve the rights to add, delete, modify the "shared libraries" terms any time they want.. GPL v2 was around 15 years. who's "unpredictable" here!
this is how a good many high-profile criminal cases are argued by DAs everywhere. Misrepresenting the leagal status of your case is almost universally allowed now days. Most things we worry about here... like being charged kiddie-porn or terrorism or hacking are delt with the same way.. half truths by prosecutors trying to "invent" crimes and trying to bend laws to fit instead of knowing how to charge you with breaking the appropriate law (which would be a slam dunk). Prosecutors routinely try to bring in non-relevant evidence, in a trial over 1 or 2 illegal pics they might put the worst stuff they find that might be in your cache and use that to bait the jury and confuse the issue of "morality" with which pictures break the law and WHY. Police do the same in their "reports", I've seen police reports with ""'s that a person said this or that when it wasn't what was said at all, but what the police THOUGHT was the answer they wanted to hear... and not the facts.
Fact is that the present jury system is DESIGNED to REMOVE the jury from the facts. Designed to obscure facts of a case from the Jury, while crippling their ability to ask for facts or have the appropriate laws relevant to the case pointed out to the. Juries are treated as a bunch of dumb slobs to beg to push the Blue button or Red button so they can go home. The civil system is even worse as all the cases "waste the courts time" so incentive to pull big stunts and baited arguments is in full effect because the jury just has to "agree", it doesn't have to make LEGAL sense!!!
why does Apple like BSD operating systems (OSX) and LGPL web browsers (webkit/KHTML) but not BSD licensed audio or video codex? Apple's outright hostility to Vorbis and Theora is quite a fantastic case of NIH considering they sell software packages as a "total solution" and such support would absolutely NOT hurt them.
I want an "iPod shuffle" cart and 4 GB of flash memory (SD would be cooler). THAT would be the killer feature turning every DS into a real iPod! Apple and Nintendo are both to NIH to try that out though. But they would rule the market for it.
Opera only has access to Flash 7. That's ADOBE's issue, nothing Nintendo or Opera can do about it at this time. YouTube typically uses just flash 7 as their content is mostly FREE so they don't care. Note that even Apple ditched Adobe, I'd wonder if it wasn't just hardware but Adobe's licensing that was getting in the way for iPhone too.
It won't happen because time has proven that hackers ruin it for everybody. The Wii can download games directly and over a secure connection (read even from YOU) the Wii uses Secure Digital cards formatted for Wii to save data, so it's nearly bullet proof. They have no presence on the PC desktop like Apple did, nor do they have experience to build a presence on PCs and risk the business model. Nintendo is a hardware company, they use a hardware solution. If all the pieces fall into place they will have a very nice game channel, easy to use, and relatively protected from hackers.
because the Wii IS a DVD player.. it's just missing a few hundred Kb of software to PLAY the DVDs. There's modchips that already allow this. The issue is that the DVD group charges $5 CASH per unit or something ungodly and that's not worth it for Nintendo.
not full games, but samplers, similar to the ones at the store, or the multi-player options for mini-games many DS carts have for sharing between DS units. It's a GREAT idea.
In my opinion the missing function is having a supported SD adapter on the DS. That would open it up to up to 2 GB of goodness. If Nintendo used Syncing the SD card to home based Wii consoles similar to iPods and iTunes they'd make a killing. In my opinion Apple and Nintendo should make a joint product and make an iPod Shuffle cart for DS. That would triple the number of iPods in the world overnight (like we needed more). Music is the one missing thing and iTunes would be the way to go. Extra credit if they let you sync the Wii with your iTunes PC...like a Nintenapple TV. Wii just needs access to more storage space thru USB.
Either way the business model of both Apple and Nintendo is the same. Sell tightly linked hardware that gets content by offering the protection media companies want in a package customers can accept. Apple could even put some DS games on iPod Touch and iPhone! It's not like Apple does gaming seriously, and Nintendo has no good way of putting media on Wii without building bridges Apple already has. Wii's power consumption make it much more acceptable to keep online full time than a desktop PC (notebooks you carry so they're not online all the time).
Apple's shuffle is a joke, and music on phones is annoying. But the DS could replace the shuffle and put Apple music in millions of more hands. The idea too is that many kids have to choose iPod or DS at this point... DS is more durable by far, it would be win-win.
Mickey is already protected by trademark and business marks. Even if you could reprint Disney works, the marks are still actively used, so you wouldn't be allowed to use their characters or titles in anything but reprints, and probably wouldn't be able to use their name to market said reprints.
All the current rule does is prevent archival/public sharing of already long-ago produced works. The law already has the tools it needs to protect the Mouse (or the Jedi) for a very long time.
copyright is an absolute monopoly.. that's the point. At 5-10 years it makes sense to let a company aggressively protect its profit because it's SHORT. Does anybody really care about sharing Beatles on P2P as half the band is DEAD 50 years later? But in legal terms a pre-release leak and sharing 50 year-old songs on P2P is the same thing! That's why nobody respects it. Make the law reasonable and more people will respect it.. strange but it might work.
Lessing argued EXACTLY that before the Supreme Court. That unrestricted additions to copyright length for free, constituted "takings" from the pubic interest. The Supreme Court ruled the public had no case as the Constitution granted the term limits to Congress to do with as they pleased.
So taking back copyright is perfectly legal, and the argument has ALREADY been argued in court!!! We just have to get Congress to vote to change it!!
you have a point. Disney does do real "work" with their properties. Although even the Mouse is covered under trademark rules... you couldn't use their image of the mouse in your cartoons even if it was out of copyright only reproduce old versions of movies, which should be fine. Like you said, when Disney reworks the movies from analog film to digital, with the work for restoration required there's no reason not to give THAT work a new copyright. Of course the old version on VHS would fall OUT, but there would be a better, easier to access release under a new copyright for another 20 years. That would make preservation and updating part of the publisher's job to make money, not sit back on a bunch of "property" they don't pay fair taxes on and wait for somebody to infringe in 30 years.
Say M$'s not evil to the former head of IT for Mass.! He formed a committee on archiving electronic and their opinion was that Microsoft had not PROMISED to maintain formats "forever" and now... so another more stable format was needed and everybody went nuts he was anti-Microsoft. Now, Microsoft is dropping 10 year old formats with no announcement and no easy way to update your archived docs to newer formats!!! I'd say the guy was absolutely RIGHT!!!
Will they apologize and get him his job back? Microsoft still didn't "promise" or sign a CONTRACT to support old docs, they made nothing Legally binding; but they didn't mind misleading the public to get somebody fired for planning ahead for this event.. that's pretty evil.
this is EXACTLY Ubuntu's problem... and the problem of OSS in general. Most IT staff is managed by guys that were good on Win 98/2000 and those managers are "past their peak" and want to ride out and not rock the boat. IT management days of being geeks at home is long gone from what I've seen.
I will be a few years until the 25-30 year olds get enough clout to suggest something like Linux. At this point only IT staff see windows as "broken" because normal people don't see how stable servers and such are or what alternatives are. To get any OSS in the door it has to be half the cost, twice as good and tells you what to do before you need to do it!
good point about the GTK dragging. My point is that all the cross platform apps I use like Gimp, Inkscape, etc. are all GTK and work the same on windows, mac, & linux.
The hassle of GTK on mac is that it doesn't fit any of the Mac HIG because it's forced to use X11 compatibility mode. That was a downer on Tiger, but the Leopard version of X11 has big usability problems making it "discouraging" to use right now.
the "great firewall of China" was pretty much built by US companies with approval from Congress years ago. Many Congressmen have financial ties to these companies and when they cry "think of the children" they really want their favorite censorship company to get a cushy federal law passed so their products can be forced on US companies all over.
Sorry, but the cat's out of the bag already. It's been that way for years.
the problem is that scooters aren't safe with 3 people and various baggage "attached". There isn't a "market" for these vehicals, it's more of a hacked together from whatever parts people can find. Moving them to stable vehicles that have comparable fuel efficiency to the scooters as well as a stable utility design will help out more than it hurts.
Like other posters said, the US has a great many rules in the name of auto "safety".. in some states they even tag your car for RUST spots... what's needed versus what's fashionable is the focus of this auto.
I think you hit on the key (and probably only) point of difference, that Ubuntu is Canonical's ONLY product where Fedora is a "throw away" test ground for RHEL. The key question to ask about Fedora is not it's comparison to Ubuntu, but to RHEL... does the free version support the commercial RHEL software, at least unoffically? Ubuntu is building Commercial support into their FREE distro... so you don't have to pay for commercial apps. That would be the biggest difference between them.
it's dangerously close to a Bill of Attainder, but each of the laws like this come close, but there are 3 points: perpetual & ex post facto, property, and stigma.... these rules don't take property past the original offense and they only apply to those already "convicted" even though the law is after the consequences are finished. so it's not a "real" attainder law... but it's damn close. I'm surprised no court has ruled using that argument as it's in the ACTUAL Constitution and not the Bill of Rights.
well in Miami, it got so bad that they had guys with good jobs homeless because there were no "lawful" apartments for them to live in.. they weren't allowed to leave the city nor would the courts make exceptions to the zoning rules. so they stayed homeless living vagrant under some bridge exactly between "safe zones". That's Sick.
but this is close to ex post facto, if not unreasonable. If a judge ruled that ONE offender was particularly offensive on the internet, then it would be reasonable. In this case they are passing a law that probably affects people that have already "paid their dues".. i.e. have served their time and moved on.... restricting movement and requiring "sign-ins" is one thing that's probably over the line in terms of the Constitution as it is not legal to allow "perpetual" punishment for a crime. This is close to a bill of Attainder. This is clearly over the line and would be struck down as it would effect people that committed a crime years ago without judicial oversight.
I'd expect they know the difference... after all, they deal in much more important stuff. Who's to say that Louis the 14th chair is REALLY Louis the 14th? They're pretty easy to make in China, or a meticulous SCA member could dupe you. Christie's whole reason for commanding the prices they do is that they have experts that are PAID to know these things, not believe, not opinion, but Know, to the ability of science who made this and where it came from.
Like you said, if they are making the claim of being in said episodes, then they'd better have prop master paperwork to back it up or they'll be sued.
You are assuming that "IT" people are technical!!! I understand what the parent is saying. Mixing Ubuntu LTS and Kbuntu not LTS is a mistake. I know a lot of IT people that can barely keep windows version separate, that's part of Microsoft's problems getting things fixed over on their side. Let alone expect those same "wintel" admins to keep Ubuntu versions straight? The idea is that a commercial or large scale app can port to that version and know everybody is the same. While 75% of the code is the same for the releases, I can see in 3 years that an IT department would allow some members to use the KDE version of 8.04 like every other version then have trouble with compatibility but not be ready for the next LTS due to some App.
The solution is probably to hold up LTS for both until 8.10, but Ubuntu has already run it's timeframe for LTS and it's time to get one out to keep the 5 year plan working. They want to show the 5 year plan in action so that OEMs and ISVs will take them as seriously as Red Hat or Suse even though they are a truly free OS.
the more I use Knoppix vs Ubuntu the more Gnome seems limited.. but KDE is too wide open.
The effect of Suse or Mandriva releases I've used was to reskin half of KDE to make it "simpler" but then leave you digging for options in the other half they didn't feel like updating. Neither distro reskins the same things either. The effect is that most KDE "fans" end up using the bog default version and adding their own customizations to it.
While that's great for everybody to have their own, it sucks for a community distro because nobody agrees on which things to strip out.. nobody agrees on a sane default and nobody want's to clean up the multiple option panes in 8 different places in a sane manner. That's what keeps it from being default in more distros. The Gnome folks just force what they think is sane and everybody lives with it... it's not great but it's easier for new users because there's only "one way" in most cases so at least support is easier.
There is still some licensing issues with the underlying QT license in that it is all-GPL or all-pay... there's no LGPL like GTK and Gnome. It looks like they fixed the cross-platform license problems (QT windows was pay only for a long time) but GTK already snapped up most of the cross platform action and troltech hasn't done much to go after it. Most QT stuff at this point is strictly Linux as "K" apps.. there's not much incentive to port to windows or mac because there are already GTK equivalents in that space.
i do agree, I think we should trust Trolltech more than Novell at this point due to Novell being "in bed" with Microsoft and the head of their cross platform projects being too much of a Microsoft fanboi and not paying attention to Microsoft's history of screwing their partners over IP issues. Mono, Samba, open office are all on the block for Novell to screw up by putting Microsoft "IP" in there "nobody" else can use.
Slashdot Mirror
I think their "worry" is that companies like Dell sell computers with lots of stuff, they might put some program like Ghostscript or QT libraries on a system with the Anti-virus software. As the GPL covers SHIPPED systems, I could see their point, much like how Ubuntu can't SHIP nvidia drivers on the CD (even with nvidia's permission) because they might be considered "bundled" with the Linux OS. Certain parts of that have been shot down as the FSF's reading treats separate programs "bundled" as separate programs, but not ALL of the argument is settled because certain people (RMS fans) tend to over-read the "viral" parts trying to make GPL "leech" onto programs that just RUN next to GPL code.
I think the SEC statement is complete FUD, there is NO legal problem running any program 100% third party on any Open Source code as a user. The problem might come from systems Distributed by OEMs, if you think one GPL program on a disk makes the whole thing GPL... that's stupid and just wrong legally. If they're making this statement about OSS, why not about Microsoft... ever READ the visual studio bundle agreements for microsoft libraries "sort of" included in the Windows OS... they about own your ass if they wanted to... and reserve the rights to add, delete, modify the "shared libraries" terms any time they want.. GPL v2 was around 15 years. who's "unpredictable" here!
this is how a good many high-profile criminal cases are argued by DAs everywhere. Misrepresenting the leagal status of your case is almost universally allowed now days. Most things we worry about here... like being charged kiddie-porn or terrorism or hacking are delt with the same way.. half truths by prosecutors trying to "invent" crimes and trying to bend laws to fit instead of knowing how to charge you with breaking the appropriate law (which would be a slam dunk). Prosecutors routinely try to bring in non-relevant evidence, in a trial over 1 or 2 illegal pics they might put the worst stuff they find that might be in your cache and use that to bait the jury and confuse the issue of "morality" with which pictures break the law and WHY. Police do the same in their "reports", I've seen police reports with ""'s that a person said this or that when it wasn't what was said at all, but what the police THOUGHT was the answer they wanted to hear... and not the facts.
Fact is that the present jury system is DESIGNED to REMOVE the jury from the facts. Designed to obscure facts of a case from the Jury, while crippling their ability to ask for facts or have the appropriate laws relevant to the case pointed out to the. Juries are treated as a bunch of dumb slobs to beg to push the Blue button or Red button so they can go home. The civil system is even worse as all the cases "waste the courts time" so incentive to pull big stunts and baited arguments is in full effect because the jury just has to "agree", it doesn't have to make LEGAL sense!!!
why does Apple like BSD operating systems (OSX) and LGPL web browsers (webkit/KHTML) but not BSD licensed audio or video codex? Apple's outright hostility to Vorbis and Theora is quite a fantastic case of NIH considering they sell software packages as a "total solution" and such support would absolutely NOT hurt them.
I want an "iPod shuffle" cart and 4 GB of flash memory (SD would be cooler). THAT would be the killer feature turning every DS into a real iPod! Apple and Nintendo are both to NIH to try that out though. But they would rule the market for it.
Opera only has access to Flash 7. That's ADOBE's issue, nothing Nintendo or Opera can do about it at this time. YouTube typically uses just flash 7 as their content is mostly FREE so they don't care. Note that even Apple ditched Adobe, I'd wonder if it wasn't just hardware but Adobe's licensing that was getting in the way for iPhone too.
It won't happen because time has proven that hackers ruin it for everybody. The Wii can download games directly and over a secure connection (read even from YOU) the Wii uses Secure Digital cards formatted for Wii to save data, so it's nearly bullet proof. They have no presence on the PC desktop like Apple did, nor do they have experience to build a presence on PCs and risk the business model. Nintendo is a hardware company, they use a hardware solution. If all the pieces fall into place they will have a very nice game channel, easy to use, and relatively protected from hackers.
because the Wii IS a DVD player.. it's just missing a few hundred Kb of software to PLAY the DVDs. There's modchips that already allow this. The issue is that the DVD group charges $5 CASH per unit or something ungodly and that's not worth it for Nintendo.
not full games, but samplers, similar to the ones at the store, or the multi-player options for mini-games many DS carts have for sharing between DS units. It's a GREAT idea.
In my opinion the missing function is having a supported SD adapter on the DS. That would open it up to up to 2 GB of goodness. If Nintendo used Syncing the SD card to home based Wii consoles similar to iPods and iTunes they'd make a killing. In my opinion Apple and Nintendo should make a joint product and make an iPod Shuffle cart for DS. That would triple the number of iPods in the world overnight (like we needed more). Music is the one missing thing and iTunes would be the way to go. Extra credit if they let you sync the Wii with your iTunes PC...like a Nintenapple TV. Wii just needs access to more storage space thru USB.
Either way the business model of both Apple and Nintendo is the same. Sell tightly linked hardware that gets content by offering the protection media companies want in a package customers can accept. Apple could even put some DS games on iPod Touch and iPhone! It's not like Apple does gaming seriously, and Nintendo has no good way of putting media on Wii without building bridges Apple already has. Wii's power consumption make it much more acceptable to keep online full time than a desktop PC (notebooks you carry so they're not online all the time).
Apple's shuffle is a joke, and music on phones is annoying. But the DS could replace the shuffle and put Apple music in millions of more hands. The idea too is that many kids have to choose iPod or DS at this point... DS is more durable by far, it would be win-win.
Ask a Nin-ja!
Mickey is already protected by trademark and business marks. Even if you could reprint Disney works, the marks are still actively used, so you wouldn't be allowed to use their characters or titles in anything but reprints, and probably wouldn't be able to use their name to market said reprints.
All the current rule does is prevent archival/public sharing of already long-ago produced works. The law already has the tools it needs to protect the Mouse (or the Jedi) for a very long time.
copyright is an absolute monopoly.. that's the point. At 5-10 years it makes sense to let a company aggressively protect its profit because it's SHORT. Does anybody really care about sharing Beatles on P2P as half the band is DEAD 50 years later? But in legal terms a pre-release leak and sharing 50 year-old songs on P2P is the same thing! That's why nobody respects it. Make the law reasonable and more people will respect it.. strange but it might work.
Lessing argued EXACTLY that before the Supreme Court. That unrestricted additions to copyright length for free, constituted "takings" from the pubic interest. The Supreme Court ruled the public had no case as the Constitution granted the term limits to Congress to do with as they pleased.
So taking back copyright is perfectly legal, and the argument has ALREADY been argued in court!!! We just have to get Congress to vote to change it!!
you have a point. Disney does do real "work" with their properties. Although even the Mouse is covered under trademark rules... you couldn't use their image of the mouse in your cartoons even if it was out of copyright only reproduce old versions of movies, which should be fine.
Like you said, when Disney reworks the movies from analog film to digital, with the work for restoration required there's no reason not to give THAT work a new copyright. Of course the old version on VHS would fall OUT, but there would be a better, easier to access release under a new copyright for another 20 years. That would make preservation and updating part of the publisher's job to make money, not sit back on a bunch of "property" they don't pay fair taxes on and wait for somebody to infringe in 30 years.
Say M$'s not evil to the former head of IT for Mass.! He formed a committee on archiving electronic and their opinion was that Microsoft had not PROMISED to maintain formats "forever" and now... so another more stable format was needed and everybody went nuts he was anti-Microsoft. Now, Microsoft is dropping 10 year old formats with no announcement and no easy way to update your archived docs to newer formats!!! I'd say the guy was absolutely RIGHT!!!
Will they apologize and get him his job back? Microsoft still didn't "promise" or sign a CONTRACT to support old docs, they made nothing Legally binding; but they didn't mind misleading the public to get somebody fired for planning ahead for this event.. that's pretty evil.
this is EXACTLY Ubuntu's problem... and the problem of OSS in general. Most IT staff is managed by guys that were good on Win 98/2000 and those managers are "past their peak" and want to ride out and not rock the boat. IT management days of being geeks at home is long gone from what I've seen.
I will be a few years until the 25-30 year olds get enough clout to suggest something like Linux. At this point only IT staff see windows as "broken" because normal people don't see how stable servers and such are or what alternatives are. To get any OSS in the door it has to be half the cost, twice as good and tells you what to do before you need to do it!
good point about the GTK dragging. My point is that all the cross platform apps I use like Gimp, Inkscape, etc. are all GTK and work the same on windows, mac, & linux.
The hassle of GTK on mac is that it doesn't fit any of the Mac HIG because it's forced to use X11 compatibility mode. That was a downer on Tiger, but the Leopard version of X11 has big usability problems making it "discouraging" to use right now.
the "great firewall of China" was pretty much built by US companies with approval from Congress years ago. Many Congressmen have financial ties to these companies and when they cry "think of the children" they really want their favorite censorship company to get a cushy federal law passed so their products can be forced on US companies all over.
Sorry, but the cat's out of the bag already. It's been that way for years.
the problem is that scooters aren't safe with 3 people and various baggage "attached". There isn't a "market" for these vehicals, it's more of a hacked together from whatever parts people can find. Moving them to stable vehicles that have comparable fuel efficiency to the scooters as well as a stable utility design will help out more than it hurts.
Like other posters said, the US has a great many rules in the name of auto "safety".. in some states they even tag your car for RUST spots... what's needed versus what's fashionable is the focus of this auto.
I think you hit on the key (and probably only) point of difference, that Ubuntu is Canonical's ONLY product where Fedora is a "throw away" test ground for RHEL. The key question to ask about Fedora is not it's comparison to Ubuntu, but to RHEL... does the free version support the commercial RHEL software, at least unoffically? Ubuntu is building Commercial support into their FREE distro... so you don't have to pay for commercial apps. That would be the biggest difference between them.
it's dangerously close to a Bill of Attainder, but each of the laws like this come close, but there are 3 points: perpetual & ex post facto, property, and stigma.... these rules don't take property past the original offense and they only apply to those already "convicted" even though the law is after the consequences are finished. so it's not a "real" attainder law... but it's damn close. I'm surprised no court has ruled using that argument as it's in the ACTUAL Constitution and not the Bill of Rights.
well in Miami, it got so bad that they had guys with good jobs homeless because there were no "lawful" apartments for them to live in.. they weren't allowed to leave the city nor would the courts make exceptions to the zoning rules. so they stayed homeless living vagrant under some bridge exactly between "safe zones". That's Sick.
but this is close to ex post facto, if not unreasonable. If a judge ruled that ONE offender was particularly offensive on the internet, then it would be reasonable. In this case they are passing a law that probably affects people that have already "paid their dues".. i.e. have served their time and moved on.... restricting movement and requiring "sign-ins" is one thing that's probably over the line in terms of the Constitution as it is not legal to allow "perpetual" punishment for a crime. This is close to a bill of Attainder. This is clearly over the line and would be struck down as it would effect people that committed a crime years ago without judicial oversight.
I'd expect they know the difference... after all, they deal in much more important stuff. Who's to say that Louis the 14th chair is REALLY Louis the 14th? They're pretty easy to make in China, or a meticulous SCA member could dupe you. Christie's whole reason for commanding the prices they do is that they have experts that are PAID to know these things, not believe, not opinion, but Know, to the ability of science who made this and where it came from.
Like you said, if they are making the claim of being in said episodes, then they'd better have prop master paperwork to back it up or they'll be sued.
You are assuming that "IT" people are technical!!! I understand what the parent is saying. Mixing Ubuntu LTS and Kbuntu not LTS is a mistake. I know a lot of IT people that can barely keep windows version separate, that's part of Microsoft's problems getting things fixed over on their side. Let alone expect those same "wintel" admins to keep Ubuntu versions straight? The idea is that a commercial or large scale app can port to that version and know everybody is the same. While 75% of the code is the same for the releases, I can see in 3 years that an IT department would allow some members to use the KDE version of 8.04 like every other version then have trouble with compatibility but not be ready for the next LTS due to some App.
The solution is probably to hold up LTS for both until 8.10, but Ubuntu has already run it's timeframe for LTS and it's time to get one out to keep the 5 year plan working. They want to show the 5 year plan in action so that OEMs and ISVs will take them as seriously as Red Hat or Suse even though they are a truly free OS.
the more I use Knoppix vs Ubuntu the more Gnome seems limited.. but KDE is too wide open.
The effect of Suse or Mandriva releases I've used was to reskin half of KDE to make it "simpler" but then leave you digging for options in the other half they didn't feel like updating. Neither distro reskins the same things either. The effect is that most KDE "fans" end up using the bog default version and adding their own customizations to it.
While that's great for everybody to have their own, it sucks for a community distro because nobody agrees on which things to strip out.. nobody agrees on a sane default and nobody want's to clean up the multiple option panes in 8 different places in a sane manner. That's what keeps it from being default in more distros. The Gnome folks just force what they think is sane and everybody lives with it... it's not great but it's easier for new users because there's only "one way" in most cases so at least support is easier.
There is still some licensing issues with the underlying QT license in that it is all-GPL or all-pay... there's no LGPL like GTK and Gnome. It looks like they fixed the cross-platform license problems (QT windows was pay only for a long time) but GTK already snapped up most of the cross platform action and troltech hasn't done much to go after it. Most QT stuff at this point is strictly Linux as "K" apps.. there's not much incentive to port to windows or mac because there are already GTK equivalents in that space.
i do agree, I think we should trust Trolltech more than Novell at this point due to Novell being "in bed" with Microsoft and the head of their cross platform projects being too much of a Microsoft fanboi and not paying attention to Microsoft's history of screwing their partners over IP issues. Mono, Samba, open office are all on the block for Novell to screw up by putting Microsoft "IP" in there "nobody" else can use.