Believe it or not schools get quite a break on pricing - particularly if you are part of a large district.
On the other hand, our school went to StarOffice three years ago. Cost? $79. For the entire school. Every computer. And OpenOffice.org for the boarders. Under the new StarOffice 7 licensing terms I can even give THEM a copy if I wanted.
We were one of the first schools to move to Open/StarOffice however and not too many more have yet. Why? MS Office is 'cheap'!
This has some of the most updated versions of open source software including OOo 1.1. I've also found that it's installers are far superior to that of GNUwin's. In addition, GNUwin throws in a lot of software that normal people wouldn't know what to do with. Open CD tries to only include programs that are both user accessible and useful.
But StarOffice isn't free. Besides, OOo is not that fuctionally different from StarOffice. It might just be a foot in the door for Sun if people could be introduced to OpenOffice.org.
I JUST posted the same idea on an earlier post. Great idea, but who would fund it? Sun?
I think it would almost have to be a non-profit organization to further distance any hint of ethics issues. In fact, the Open CD project would be a killer way to do this if a sponsor could be found:
Schools do get major discounts - the bigger the district/college, the better. MS isn't stupid; they know how important it is to get their software to young minds as soon as possible.
I had a real fight on my hands moving us to Open/StarOffice here. In a strange way, it was fortunate that each copy of MS Office was fairly expensive for us (being a small girls school).
But even MS will have a hard time competing with 'free'. OpenOffice.org was an excellent choice for our boarding students as it let us standardize our document formats school-wide without regard to international/language considerations or version issues.
Really? No differences at all? Don't tell that to my international students who try to send documents from their versions to ours! Also, don't tell that to millions of Publisher users either. The newer versions have ALWAYS broken things in older projects.
And true XML support is only available in the 'Professional' version. Gotta keep everyone onboard you know.
Besides all of this, MS only has themselves to blame for fracturing the.DOC 'format'. Remember old versions of Works? What about the abortion that was Office 95? Hmmm. Don't want to discuss THAT do we?
Five years. Please keep in mind that it is ONLY five years. Many of my teachers have documents far older than that. As long as MS insists on keeping their proprietary format secret the compatibility will only get worse.
Okay, let's assume it's true: 'All your digital camera are belong to Kodak.' One question: Why wait so fscking long to enforce this?
Look, it's not as if Sony just started making digital cameras last week. I'm sorry but this just smacks of desperation here. First Kodak gets rid of their film camera biz, then they move to litigation. What this suggests is that they DO have more in common with SCO, the penultimate authors of books like 'Litigation, Profit, and YOU' and 'Sue Your Way to Financial Freedom'.
Kodak most certainly has a right to assert any reasonable claims but it's the TIMING I'm questioning here. I mean, didn't NASA have a hand in 'prior art?' After all, they've been sending compressed digital pics back from probes for a LONG time!
"You are only looking at a very narrow slice of the big picture."
We'll see how 'narrow' it is the first time an accident on the way to your nuke haven happens. And you know what? To HELL with accidents - what if a whacko terrorist group decides to self-detonate a shipment of spent fuel in downtown Omaha?
At least alternatives like coal can be and are being made cleaner over time. The tech to make coal a clean option is certainly a lot more viable than our current and foreseeable ability to clean up after a major nuclear disaster.
In my state (PA), we have several nuclear plants that are going to undergo decommission over the next few years. When this happens our alternatives are to build more of the same (good luck), or move to coal (an abundant resource), or windpower.
Fully 15% of PA's power will be generated by wind by 2010. Already windfarms are populating slopes in Wind Gap and Somerset and they are a welcome sight. Nowadays there are clean/green alternatives - and certainly those that present far less risk.
"The whole "what do we do with nuclear waste" thing is way overblown."
No, it's not overblown at all. I can deal with a lot of things but this is one that I don't want in MY backyard!
It doesn't take much of this radioactive shit to cause a serious disaster. I agree with using something like Yuca Mt. to store it all in but even this has problems.
1) Transportation. Getting it there will be more than half the fun. What if there's an accident on the way in? Which town along the way will become the next Chernobyl?
2) Possible environmental consequences. Things like water table contamination are a real concern.
3) Natural disasters. A sudden earthquake or volcanic activity could certainly ruin your day. Can you predict the future for 10,000+ years? That's how long a site would need to remain stable.
Of course, where it's all stored now is a bigger nightmare because it can hardly be protected - particularly from terrorists. Then there's the waste of the plants themselves. I haven't heard any real info on what to do with a decomissioned plant yet other than just 'leave it lay'. Not good at all.
I'm not nuke-phobic, but I am realistic about man - an imperfect being handling something that you simply CANNOT make a mistake about.
The sad thing is, this is hardly the first time this sort of thing has happened. I don't usually support Greenpeace, but check this info out about the city of Mayak since a nuclear disaster. These people still LIVE THERE! Some of the pictures in their image gallery are quite disturbing:
Is what's left behind there - a big crumbling concrete tomb no one seems to want to take responsibility for. Someone had better goddamn well do it or else EVERYONE will suffer again.
There isn't a hole deep enough to bury this demon in. Chernobyl is the kind of thing that gives me real nightmares. Part of me wishes I never read that book. What a horrible, HORRIBLE disaster.
In light of the DOJ's action against them I should think they'd want more sunshine, not less. This is especially true in this case where MS's biggest competitor is gaining ground.
It's true. If the mail records are subpoena'd and SCO doesn't produce them - regardless of the reason, they are in trouble. As a publically owned company they are requried to keep track of this sort of thing.
You're equating the stupidity of Diebold and the elections of public office with the actions of a company that has actually been convicted of a crime - monopolistic practices. A company that has the means, motive, and opportunity to commit yet another breach of their agreements.
Microsoft now has a track record is this sort of activity. It will be up to IBM/Red Hat/Novell/DOJ/FTC to ask a judge to verify the memo's authenticity - and maybe others as well.
If the memo had come into YOUR hands, would you have simply IGNORED it?
Actually, I think that IBM would have a case here to demand memos from SCO. You see, SCO has been playing the 'memo' game from IBM lately (demanding memos from various execs), so this fits in quite nicely.
I wonder what the judge on the IBM case would think of this and in light of it, if IBM were to request memos? I'm certain it would be granted because Microsoft's secretive actions go right to the heart of the case - barratry. Which is all that SCO is really about now.
...if they find out who did it, they may be able to bring a lawsuit against him/her. However, if they can't directly prove it and start axing any and all who may be responsible, they have another problem to deal with:
MORE MEMOS.
Who knows what else this person has in their possession eh? They is probably far worse than this. More meat, more gristle...
It's the McBride legal cartel that's FAR more interesting to investigate. This is hardly a new game for good 'ol Darl and his cronies only he's going for bigger fish.
The question is - where is this money coming from? What department at Microsoft authorized it, and do the shareholders/gov't know?
Squashing the competition is one thing, doing it in secret is another. This was clearly done this way to avoid more scrutiny by the DOJ. THAT'S what the problem here is.
If Microsoft wants to support SCO, they should just be honest about their intentions. If this memo is true, however, it's going to look fishy to anyone with half a brain at the FTC/DOJ.
...now that the cat's out of the bag. The FTC should be informed, IBM and Novell should demand memos, etc. Microsoft may end up wishing they'd never done this.
I wonder if anything will be done based on this leaked memo - I mean legally can anything be done?
"1952 Reader's Digest published "Cancer by the Carton"
Perhaps an article in Reader's Digest might be considered 'proof' beyond a reasonable doubt to you - but it was YEARS before the gov't (Surgeon General) acknowledged it. I believe it was 1964 in fact. Nonetheless, smoking in various forms had been going on for many years before this.
"There you go with the idiot "slippery slope" argument. Don't you do any other tricks?"
What? I'm supposed to just roll over and ignore the obvious? Its an important argument and one that has precedent elsewhere. But I guess one man's slippery slope is another man's lift ticket to Hell. Happy trails!
"...although again the quote marks are a grammatical error."
Uh, no they are not. You didn't use ignorant and bigot in the same context or together. I was paraphrasing the words. What are you now, an English teacher?
"Abraham Lincoln didn't put the Emancipation Proclamation up to a popular vote..."
Speaking of doing new tricks... You can't provide any sort of proof whatever that homosexual marriage is some sort of civil right - not legally, not scientifically. It's still a 'theory', not proven, not legalized (witness charges being brought on the New Paltz mayor today for an example of proof).
We don't agree on this point: I feel homosexuality is a lifestyle CHOICE. Minorities are what they are without choice. This is why I think it is valid to ask the American people about whether or not alternative marriages should be recognized.
It comes down to this: If it IS choice, then my slippery slope argument holds water. Why? Because I might choose to have sex with an animal, or someone too young, or a host of other abominations. Example: Is NAMBLA representing a lifestyle choice or a civil right? If you continue to blur the distinction there won't BE a distinction.
The constitution and the law in general was not designed with this sort of thing in mind nor was it designed to be flauted anytime a mayor thinks it should be.
Take a look at all the information posted on Groklaw today and yesterday. Can you say INFORMATION OVERLOAD?!
The strategy here is to overwhelm everyone with massive amounts of data to sift through. Again, when the mess is cleaned up it won't mean shit, but what it DOES do is buy them some more time.
Why doesn't Lucasarts then commission another game company to do this instead of hoarding it to themselves? They could at least assign a producer to oversee the project. This makes no sense to me as it appears that quite a few people are pretty upset about this.
"Not a very good example, since scientists have been saying for decades that smoking is addictive and harmful..."
Actually I think it's a great comparison. Sure, we know TODAY that smoking kills, but forty years ago there was little proof otherwise. People believed in the tobacco-backed studies. My point was that science can and has been twisted into proving various points of view. In some things, like whether homosexuality is genetic, these things are still in debate.
"I've explained repeatedly that the reasoning of SF's legal team is that the law is unconstitutional..."
In YOUR opinion. Not mine. And *I'VE* explained repeatedly that it is not the job of you or the mayor of SF to make that determination. We have due process through the courts - that's the way we handle things here. Or should. Is this truly a model way of dealing with things you want to uphold? A coupla good ol' boys would just LOVE that sort o' justice. Yee HAW!
That's the dangerous road we're currently travelling on.
"You drastically overestimate the importance of this issue. "
Really? Then why do YOU bother arguing the point, since it's a foregone conclusion? Why not just write me off as yet another 'ignorant' 'bigot'?
I think you know how the vast majority of Americans feel about this particular issue and are troubled by it. You see it as a civil rights cause, most of the rest of us out here see it as just one more burden on the family as well as a legal nightmare.
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Believe it or not schools get quite a break on pricing - particularly if you are part of a large district.
On the other hand, our school went to StarOffice three years ago. Cost? $79. For the entire school. Every computer. And OpenOffice.org for the boarders. Under the new StarOffice 7 licensing terms I can even give THEM a copy if I wanted.
We were one of the first schools to move to Open/StarOffice however and not too many more have yet. Why? MS Office is 'cheap'!
There is always Open CD:
www.theopencd.org
This has some of the most updated versions of open source software including OOo 1.1. I've also found that it's installers are far superior to that of GNUwin's. In addition, GNUwin throws in a lot of software that normal people wouldn't know what to do with. Open CD tries to only include programs that are both user accessible and useful.
Give it a try!
But StarOffice isn't free. Besides, OOo is not that fuctionally different from StarOffice. It might just be a foot in the door for Sun if people could be introduced to OpenOffice.org.
I JUST posted the same idea on an earlier post. Great idea, but who would fund it? Sun?
I think it would almost have to be a non-profit organization to further distance any hint of ethics issues. In fact, the Open CD project would be a killer way to do this if a sponsor could be found:
www.theopencd.org
What is the approximate worth of a copy of OpenOffice.org?
Right, it's FREE!
So, couldn't a bunch of OOo cd's just be distributed to our gov't with no hint of impropriety?
That could certainly make an impression!
Schools do get major discounts - the bigger the district/college, the better. MS isn't stupid; they know how important it is to get their software to young minds as soon as possible.
I had a real fight on my hands moving us to Open/StarOffice here. In a strange way, it was fortunate that each copy of MS Office was fairly expensive for us (being a small girls school).
But even MS will have a hard time competing with 'free'. OpenOffice.org was an excellent choice for our boarding students as it let us standardize our document formats school-wide without regard to international/language considerations or version issues.
Really? No differences at all? Don't tell that to my international students who try to send documents from their versions to ours! Also, don't tell that to millions of Publisher users either. The newer versions have ALWAYS broken things in older projects.
.DOC 'format'. Remember old versions of Works? What about the abortion that was Office 95? Hmmm. Don't want to discuss THAT do we?
And true XML support is only available in the 'Professional' version. Gotta keep everyone onboard you know.
Besides all of this, MS only has themselves to blame for fracturing the
Five years. Please keep in mind that it is ONLY five years. Many of my teachers have documents far older than that. As long as MS insists on keeping their proprietary format secret the compatibility will only get worse.
Okay, let's assume it's true: 'All your digital camera are belong to Kodak.' One question: Why wait so fscking long to enforce this?
Look, it's not as if Sony just started making digital cameras last week. I'm sorry but this just smacks of desperation here. First Kodak gets rid of their film camera biz, then they move to litigation. What this suggests is that they DO have more in common with SCO, the penultimate authors of books like 'Litigation, Profit, and YOU' and 'Sue Your Way to Financial Freedom'.
Kodak most certainly has a right to assert any reasonable claims but it's the TIMING I'm questioning here. I mean, didn't NASA have a hand in 'prior art?' After all, they've been sending compressed digital pics back from probes for a LONG time!
"You are only looking at a very narrow slice of the big picture."
We'll see how 'narrow' it is the first time an accident on the way to your nuke haven happens. And you know what? To HELL with accidents - what if a whacko terrorist group decides to self-detonate a shipment of spent fuel in downtown Omaha?
At least alternatives like coal can be and are being made cleaner over time. The tech to make coal a clean option is certainly a lot more viable than our current and foreseeable ability to clean up after a major nuclear disaster.
In my state (PA), we have several nuclear plants that are going to undergo decommission over the next few years. When this happens our alternatives are to build more of the same (good luck), or move to coal (an abundant resource), or windpower.
Fully 15% of PA's power will be generated by wind by 2010. Already windfarms are populating slopes in Wind Gap and Somerset and they are a welcome sight. Nowadays there are clean/green alternatives - and certainly those that present far less risk.
"The whole "what do we do with nuclear waste" thing is way overblown."
No, it's not overblown at all. I can deal with a lot of things but this is one that I don't want in MY backyard!
It doesn't take much of this radioactive shit to cause a serious disaster. I agree with using something like Yuca Mt. to store it all in but even this has problems.
1) Transportation. Getting it there will be more than half the fun. What if there's an accident on the way in? Which town along the way will become the next Chernobyl?
2) Possible environmental consequences. Things like water table contamination are a real concern.
3) Natural disasters. A sudden earthquake or volcanic activity could certainly ruin your day.
Can you predict the future for 10,000+ years? That's how long a site would need to remain stable.
Of course, where it's all stored now is a bigger nightmare because it can hardly be protected - particularly from terrorists. Then there's the waste of the plants themselves. I haven't heard any real info on what to do with a decomissioned plant yet other than just 'leave it lay'. Not good at all.
I'm not nuke-phobic, but I am realistic about man - an imperfect being handling something that you simply CANNOT make a mistake about.
The sad thing is, this is hardly the first time this sort of thing has happened. I don't usually support Greenpeace, but check this info out about the city of Mayak since a nuclear disaster. These people still LIVE THERE! Some of the pictures in their image gallery are quite disturbing:
http://archive.greenpeace.org/mayak/index.html
Is what's left behind there - a big crumbling concrete tomb no one seems to want to take responsibility for. Someone had better goddamn well do it or else EVERYONE will suffer again.
There isn't a hole deep enough to bury this demon in. Chernobyl is the kind of thing that gives me real nightmares. Part of me wishes I never read that book. What a horrible, HORRIBLE disaster.
In light of the DOJ's action against them I should think they'd want more sunshine, not less. This is especially true in this case where MS's biggest competitor is gaining ground.
It's true. If the mail records are subpoena'd and SCO doesn't produce them - regardless of the reason, they are in trouble. As a publically owned company they are requried to keep track of this sort of thing.
You're equating the stupidity of Diebold and the elections of public office with the actions of a company that has actually been convicted of a crime - monopolistic practices. A company that has the means, motive, and opportunity to commit yet another breach of their agreements.
Microsoft now has a track record is this sort of activity. It will be up to IBM/Red Hat/Novell/DOJ/FTC to ask a judge to verify the memo's authenticity - and maybe others as well.
If the memo had come into YOUR hands, would you have simply IGNORED it?
Actually, I think that IBM would have a case here to demand memos from SCO. You see, SCO has been playing the 'memo' game from IBM lately (demanding memos from various execs), so this fits in quite nicely.
I wonder what the judge on the IBM case would think of this and in light of it, if IBM were to request memos? I'm certain it would be granted because Microsoft's secretive actions go right to the heart of the case - barratry. Which is all that SCO is really about now.
...if they find out who did it, they may be able to bring a lawsuit against him/her. However, if they can't directly prove it and start axing any and all who may be responsible, they have another problem to deal with:
MORE MEMOS.
Who knows what else this person has in their possession eh? They is probably far worse than this. More meat, more gristle...
It's the McBride legal cartel that's FAR more interesting to investigate. This is hardly a new game for good 'ol Darl and his cronies only he's going for bigger fish.
SHOCKING!!!
A company convicted of monopolistic practices secretly funds an initiative to destroy it's competition.
What you mock in sarcasm may be viewed differently by those who care due to the secrecy of Microsoft's actions, not the actions themselves.
The question is - where is this money coming from? What department at Microsoft authorized it, and do the shareholders/gov't know?
Squashing the competition is one thing, doing it in secret is another. This was clearly done this way to avoid more scrutiny by the DOJ. THAT'S what the problem here is.
If Microsoft wants to support SCO, they should just be honest about their intentions. If this memo is true, however, it's going to look fishy to anyone with half a brain at the FTC/DOJ.
...now that the cat's out of the bag. The FTC should be informed, IBM and Novell should demand memos, etc. Microsoft may end up wishing they'd never done this.
I wonder if anything will be done based on this leaked memo - I mean legally can anything be done?
"1952 Reader's Digest published "Cancer by the Carton"
Perhaps an article in Reader's Digest might be considered 'proof' beyond a reasonable doubt to you - but it was YEARS before the gov't (Surgeon General) acknowledged it. I believe it was 1964 in fact. Nonetheless, smoking in various forms had been going on for many years before this.
"There you go with the idiot "slippery slope" argument. Don't you do any other tricks?"
What? I'm supposed to just roll over and ignore the obvious? Its an important argument and one that has precedent elsewhere. But I guess one man's slippery slope is another man's lift ticket to Hell. Happy trails!
"...although again the quote marks are a grammatical error."
Uh, no they are not. You didn't use ignorant and bigot in the same context or together. I was paraphrasing the words. What are you now, an English teacher?
"Abraham Lincoln didn't put the Emancipation Proclamation up to a popular vote..."
Speaking of doing new tricks... You can't provide any sort of proof whatever that homosexual marriage is some sort of civil right - not legally, not scientifically. It's still a 'theory', not proven, not legalized (witness charges being brought on the New Paltz mayor today for an example of proof).
We don't agree on this point: I feel homosexuality is a lifestyle CHOICE. Minorities are what they are without choice. This is why I think it is valid to ask the American people about whether or not alternative marriages should be recognized.
It comes down to this: If it IS choice, then my slippery slope argument holds water. Why? Because I might choose to have sex with an animal, or someone too young, or a host of other abominations. Example: Is NAMBLA representing a lifestyle choice or a civil right? If you continue to blur the distinction there won't BE a distinction.
The constitution and the law in general was not designed with this sort of thing in mind nor was it designed to be flauted anytime a mayor thinks it should be.
Take a look at all the information posted on Groklaw today and yesterday. Can you say INFORMATION OVERLOAD?!
The strategy here is to overwhelm everyone with massive amounts of data to sift through. Again, when the mess is cleaned up it won't mean shit, but what it DOES do is buy them some more time.
Unbelievable. God, I hate these f*cking guys...
Son of a BITCH! I didn't see that! Now THAT was a game I was really looking forward to!
Look Lucas, why not spin off a division to do this or give it to someone else to do? What a miserable decision!
Why doesn't Lucasarts then commission another game company to do this instead of hoarding it to themselves? They could at least assign a producer to oversee the project. This makes no sense to me as it appears that quite a few people are pretty upset about this.
"Not a very good example, since scientists have been saying for decades that smoking is addictive and harmful..."
Actually I think it's a great comparison. Sure, we know TODAY that smoking kills, but forty years ago there was little proof otherwise. People believed in the tobacco-backed studies. My point was that science can and has been twisted into proving various points of view. In some things, like whether homosexuality is genetic, these things are still in debate.
"I've explained repeatedly that the reasoning of SF's legal team is that the law is unconstitutional..."
In YOUR opinion. Not mine. And *I'VE* explained repeatedly that it is not the job of you or the mayor of SF to make that determination. We have due process through the courts - that's the way we handle things here. Or should. Is this truly a model way of dealing with things you want to uphold? A coupla good ol' boys would just LOVE that sort o' justice. Yee HAW!
That's the dangerous road we're currently travelling on.
"You drastically overestimate the importance of this issue. "
Really? Then why do YOU bother arguing the point, since it's a foregone conclusion? Why not just write me off as yet another 'ignorant' 'bigot'?
I think you know how the vast majority of Americans feel about this particular issue and are troubled by it. You see it as a civil rights cause, most of the rest of us out here see it as just one more burden on the family as well as a legal nightmare.