This is a good troll - the best kind, actually. This is obviously not Sig 11, as anyone who checks the user profile can tell. However, the language of the troll is particularly convincing. Best of all, he/she/it makes a lot of good points. The gist of their argument is that BXXP is unnecessary - that TCP/HTTP already does everything that is needed. TCP does support more than 700kbps, HTTP 1.1 does permit persistence, etc. Very well done, and it's already trolled one or two people.
Moderate them down Troll. Moderate them up Funny. Just PLEASE don't moderate them Interesting, Informative, Insightful, or Flamebait, because they're not.
As if I'm really worried about the government censoring content anymore. The fact is, the worst threat to our freedom to speech (at least here in the U. S. of A.) is not the government, but rather, large powerful corporations with the best lawyers who can silence anyone who can't afford to pay for their liberty. Now whether or not MacNN is in the wrong or not is up for debate (and what better forum for that debate than Slashdot!), but whenever a large corporation throws their weight around, whether or not they're justified to do so, I want to know about it. Slashdot is really the only place that I would find out about it.
I don't use Napster. I've never used it, in fact. I think the people who say that Napster won't cost the music industry money are kidding themselves. The music industry will lose money if Napster or one of its cousins works. A lot of money.
However, the idea of the music industry losing a lot of money is, in my mind, not necessarily a bad thing.
I just can't help but wonder if the people who use Napster understand that the music industry could be radically changed by their actions. I mean, I've heard that most of the stuff on Napster is crap - Backstreet Boys, Britney Spears, etc. If Napster/GNUTella/FreeNet really take off, to the point where Big Music just bites it, it will mean no more Britney, Backcrap, etc, forcing Napster-ers to listen to music that isn't overproduced to the point of being bad.
I can't condone the actions of people who illicitly copy information across Napster. It is illegal. It will hurt those companies. And that's (as Stuart Smalley would say,) okay. I do believe in the free exchange of information, and I can acknowledge that Big Media is against the free exchange of information.
Alright, I seem to have forgotten my point. I guess it's this: I wish people would choose a side other than "Napster doesn't hurt anyone". Either pick "Napster hurts people and I'm okay with that", like I have, or "Napster hurts people and I'm not okay with that".
There was an interview in Salon today with the Napster CEO. I dunno, Napster seems more and more like a bunch of profiteers all the time. Plus the CEO seems a little over-optimistic. Information only wants to be free until the servers get unplugged. I kinda hope that this victory for the RIAA pushes along development on Gnutella, and to a greater extent, Freenet. A much more ideal situation would be one where no matter what laws are passed, the system remains intact.
By "You all," who exactly are you referring to? Last time I checked, the user base of Slashdot did not consist of one gestalt entity, but rather as thousands of individual entities. These entities, or "people," each have different ideas and opinions that make them unique from other "people" even though common interests draw them to a communal forum.
For instance, while some people who frequent Slashdot find that whiny, loud-mouthed latecomers who attempt to mask their own feelings of guilt and boost their sense of self-importance by spouting off-topic inflammatory garbage wherever they feel like it are doing the Slashdot community a severe disservice; others think that such persons are merely being dumbasses. However, all members of the Slashdot community can agree that such nonsense is unwelcome and not very well thought out.
Perhaps a more appropriate example is this: Some people like The Phantom Menace. Others don't. Some people agree with the MPAA's stance on Intellectual Property protection. Others don't. Some people read Slashdot. Other don't. Look Ma - all the circles in the Venn diagram intersect!
If everybody on Slashdot had the exact same opinion, there would be very little need for discussion forums at all, now would there? But there are forums, and those forums exist so that people with different opinions can share different ideas. That's why I read Slashdot. Not for posts like yours, but for the free exchange of different ideas.
In a decision that has just been made available, id has prevailed in the Paducha lawsuit on all points. Judge Johnstone has dismissed the case on all grounds, validating what we have said all along: the case lacked a shred of merit.
Now that this legal hurdle is out of the way, work can finally resume on id's latest title, "Columbine Revenge 2001," and our latest add-on pack to Q3A, "Cafeteria Crossfire"
I'm not concerned. As people are apt to state in this forum, there a bunch of perspective Journaling FSs out there. Here's how it will work: survival of the fittest. If XFS wins, it will be by the merits of the code which will be GPLed. I don't care what development model they use, as long as the code is GPLed, and the best there is!
The loose allegation that they might take GPLed patches and integrate them into the closed tree is just that: a loose allegation. Plus it doesn't make sense - if their code bases are similar enough so that they could apply verbatim patches to a closed tree, then why not just GPL the closed-source version too? I mean, they obviously can appriciate that the "All bugs are infinately shallow" principle carries over to IRIX as well as it does Linux. If, on the other hand, the code bases are so divergent that they would want to keep seperate implementations, the verbatim patches wouldn't work.
Also, this disturbs me:
Hence, the support from the original author, SGI, will most likely degrade over time since the stated goals from SGI do not run in parralel with the stated purpose of GPL (everyone is on equal footing--I show you all of my code, you show me all of your's).
Who cares? The point where "the community" decides that SGI isn't doing the best job with their code maintainence, it's GOOD that a fork occurs.
SGI's just a company - who released large sections of code under the GPL. That people within the community would treat regard their olive branch with fear and disrespect simply because they are a company rather than an individual simply seems to me as a lack of perspective about the freedoms that the GPL provides. If it makes you feel better, think of allowing companies like SGI to make kernel contributions as tricking them into giving up time and resources.
Sorry, I forgot: This virus is spreading like wildfire so forward this message on to all of your friends so that their files won't be destroyed! Sincerely, Steve Thompson, Compaq Computer Corp
VIRUS ALERT!!!!! THIS IS NOT A HOAX!!!! ----------------------------------- Exp erts at Microsoft have determined that there is a new and very destructive virus that infects your computer just by opening an email! It is called the ROOT VIRUS. "ROOT" is a famous hacker who has broken into thousands of computer systems and sends fake emails with a virus that can infect your computer just by opening them. When you open a message sent to you by Root, it infects a virus onto your system which basically wipes out your hard drive. If you see a mail from ROOT, DELETE IT IMMEDIATELY!!!! Sometimes this hacker will attempt to trick you into opening an email by making it look official. DO NOT TAKE ANY CHANCES! DELETE ANY AND ALL MESSAGES FROM ROOT IMMEDIATELY!
What do you mean a URL rewriter? How can a page on one site change the referrer to look like it came from another site? I can't think of a situation where a smart enough referrer-checker couldn't be written. A more technical explination of your statement would be helpful.
For anyone who hasn't read it, there's a much better article about Michael Hart written for Wired a few years ago. He certainly seems like an, um, odd fellow, but I wouldn't mind meeting him sometime.
I think this is happening a whole lot in RAD application development projects. It also locks people inevtiably into a windows platform when you throw ActiveX and stuff closer tied to windows.
You bring up a good point. It makes sense for Mozilla to be open-source because its success lies entirely on platform-diversity. If Linux fails to de-homoginize the OS market, Mozilla fails as well. If Linux succeeds, IE fails, since it is so Windows-centric. Yes, Mozilla may not be the best choice for everyone today, but as soon as non-IE browsers eat up more than half of the market share, web page content-providers will have to fall back on some sort of generally-accessable standard. And that standard will always be clean scriptless, pluginless HTML.
And I concede, Mozilla isn't good enough to make everyone want to switch on its own merits. Speed and resource-wize, it's comparable to IE. And being able to do things like ActiveX are good selling points for IE.
But Mozilla can wait until the climate is right for it to dominate. The code is out there. Frankly, I don't care if Netscape(TM) doesn't make any money off Netscape. If the company collapses, and Navigator is deemed a failure. I mean, basicly Netscape is a dead company. Their only source of revenue is their sucky portal. Oh, and their soon-to-be-demolished-by-Apache-2.0 server. I have already mourned the loss of Netscape. Fortunately, there's a lot of code that's out there and can be taken for future projects. Good code, too! So, when the time comes where cross-platform HTML becomes the standard again, Mozilla will be there, waiting. When the playing field is leveled, the true beauty of Mozilla will emerge.
Okay, at least on Win32, Mozilla is finally running about as stable and lo-mem as IE5. It crashes much less and is actually somewhat fast.
I have a few questions about how it will turn out, though:
1. When the debugging code is taken out, will it run faster/suck less memory, etc?
2. Are they going to get rid of the ugly, glitzy and only semi-functional interface in favor of, say, something with a working multi-level back button, drop-down address list and non-rounded menus? Don't get me wrong, the UI can be sleek, but mockable is a different story altogether.
3. Is the sidebar going away, please?
4. When will the widgets ever look like they're supposed to? (see http://www.mozilla.org/xpfe/nsGFXWidgets.html to see what I mean.)
Anyone who can lend some insight into these minor yet somewhat crucial issues, I would appriciate it.
Oh, please. If you would just drop the Randite Objectivism BS for two seconds, you would see that I'm actually arguing for a more libretarian attitude towards Internet government.
Most of the Internet problems that big business goes crying to about the government nowadays could be solved through technological mesaures. If companies would spend their effort working on a RBL-blacklist-on-steriods solution rather than calling in the FBI every time a script kiddie 0wnz them, or filing a lawsuit when they get one or two spam messages, the Internet would be able to govern itself just fine.
I'm sure if I had used a metaphor about the Boston Tea Party or something, you wouldn't have minded, since American colonists are an oppressed minority that were "better armed".
The attorney general likened the current dilemma to a modern day "Wild West."
"Perhaps it's a little like the Wild West in the development of America [with some] who say, 'Let not government be involved.' But there was also the marshals and Wyatt Earp and others who brought some order to it."
The Wild West indeed. Allow me to extend your metaphor, Ms. Reno.
For many years before the West was Wild, Native Americans lived there in relative peace and harmony with the earth and each other. There was no money. There was no need for written laws. Then, profit-seekers, outcasts and jerks from the east decided to head west to seek their fame and fortune. When they arrived, they walked around the place like they owned it, imposing their laws and ideologies; taking more and more away from the native peoples, until the land was no longer theirs at all.
Sound familiar?
We were here first, Ms. Reno. The US government didn't need to pass any laws that were specific to the Old West. Just imposing existing US law then was enough to ruin it for the original residents. Now how does that saying about history repeating itself go?
I think I have an answer to your last question, "Why don't they learn their lesson and just sell us our movies in a sensible way?"
Maybe next time you should read the story all the way through. I think it's apparent by the third paragraph that the movie industry is truly concerned about the rights of the consumer:
...Tesco's world sourcing director, Christine Cross, wrote to Warren Liebefarb, the president of Warner Home Video, saying that zoning is an "unnecessary practice". Zoning uses technology to prevent DVDs bought in, say, the US from playing on machines sold in Europe.
Film studio executives have emphasized that zoning is designed only to minimize piracy, and not to cheat customers in foreign markets. When accused in a recent Associated Press interview that region-coded DVDs impaired fair trade and worked against foreign consumer's best interests, Warner Brothers CEO Jamie Kellner was quick to deny the charges. "Absolutely not," Kellner told AP reporter Daniel Stewart during the interview which took place at Kellner's Beverly Hills mansion. "The thought that the movie industry would attempt to extort overseas customers through unfair pricing practices is simply appalling to me," Kellner continued, popping open a bottle of Champaign and proceeding to roll around in a pile of thousand dollar bills. "The movie industry is about the creation of art. I, and those in my industry who work to entertain the peoples of the world are simply artists. Nothing more and nothing less," Kellner said, as a servant spoon-fed him Caviar from a crystal platter in the backseat of his stretch limousine. "It's like they say, art is what makes the world go 'round," Kellner said.
I hope this silences anyone who would accuse the movie industry of any less-than-noble intentions.
You are incorrect. ESR, as "Open Sourcey" as he is, has much respect for the GPL. And as much of a GPL fanatic as I am, despite the fact that I sometimes disagree with some of his opinions, I can still see that the Jargon file gives a very objective presentation of the GPL. You really need to include more context in your original quotes. Observe:
The Jargon File has space set aside for the proper definition of the GPL (under Copyleft), but he also provides a space for the dissenting opinion, (under General Public Virus), but this entry it totally objective, even though you imply otherwise.
Here is the latter entry in full (emphasis mine):
Pejorative name for some versions of the GNU project copyleft or General Public License (GPL), which requires that any tools or apps incorporating copylefted code must be source-distributed on the same anti-proprietary terms as GNU stuff. Thus it is alleged that the copyleft `infects' software generated with GNU tools, which may in turn infect other software that reuses any of its code. The Free Software Foundation's official position as of January 1991 is that copyright law limits the scope of the GPL to "programs textually incorporating significant amounts of GNU code", and that the `infection' is not passed on to third parties unless actual GNU source is transmitted. Nevertheless, widespread suspicion that the copyleft language is `boobytrapped' has caused many developers to avoid using GNU tools and the GPL. Changes in the language of the version 2.0 GPL did not eliminate this problem.
These are true statements! It is indeed alleged that the copyleft `infects' software generated with GNU tools. However, ESR knows this to be false! He licenses his own software under the GPL!
As for your second quote, it is factually sound as well. Indeed, the term "GNU/Linux" has not gained widespread acceptance. This is merely a statement of fact. I wish GNU/Linux was used more. But it isn't. But that's reason to work to increase awareness, NOT a reason to ignore the facts in the interest of keeping the peace. You forget that "the peace" is already kept. They might not always agree, but both ESR and RMS have shown that they respect each other. I think it was Wavy Gravy who said at Woodstock, "We're all feeding each other."
I totally agree. I didn't mean to come across as saying that we should be lobbying for a "Free Software Exception," but rather that we should be lobbying for more freedoms in general. Nothing would make me happier than to see Sony release a hardware DVD player using DeCSS. Would I be necessarily against laws that give non-commercial entities or even individuals certain powers that corporations currently hold? No. But that's not what I was trying to convey here.
The reason I used the Dan Savage/Hands Off Washington story as my example is because it's a good example of how using measures which are somewhat reprehensable (i.e. lobbying in general) as a method of getting your way. I didn't mean to say that Dan Savage was advising that money be spent to Congress to ensure special rights for homosexuals, since I don't think that's what gay rights groups are looking to achive - special rights that is. But that's another flamey conversation althogether, and one that I don't want to dive into at the moment.
An interesting guy. His talk show "Savage Love Live" was better than I think he thought it was, but he stopped doing it anyway. Which reminds me, there's a new edition of The Stranger out today.
You're absolutely correct about the need for a lobby. I would be happy with a lobby coordinated by the EFF, or perhaps a FSF/EFF cooperation. I can remember a few years ago, when here in Washington State, a major gay right group, Hands Off Washington was able to raise a few million dollars and used it to sponsor a citizen's initiative that failed due to the fact that it tried to get more votes by not being as comprehensive as many members of the gay community had hoped.
Gay columnist and at that time radio host Dan Savage blasted Hands Off Washington for wasting their money on the Initiative, which he said was destined to fail (this was before the ballot) and said they should just take the money and use it for lobbying State Congress, since similar lobbying measures had worked in other states to provide 100% protection of gay rights, for only a fraction of the price.
If we as a community were able to raise a few million a year for National lobbing, would we see drastic change? Hell yes! When you look at the amount of money that will be spent on the DeCSS case vs. how much money we would have had to spend to prevent this case from happening in the first place, I think the choice is obvious.
Unfortunately, it doesn't matter if you've actually comitted a crime anymore. So long as A Big Corporation doesn't like something that you've done, you are as good as guilty at least in the eyes of those who can make your life a living hell.
And instead of realizing that the existing laws are in place simply as a convenience to large corporations used to make an example of those who really piss of those corporations, government agencies just overzealously enforce violations when they are told to do so by the corporations.
And what's the moral of the story? It's accountancy that makes the world go round, round, round, round. The simple fact is that these companies have too much power. And, indeed they are crybabies. Remember the kids that used to hit and not share their toys in kindergarten? Now they're all grown up, and they're the board members of the DVD CCA.
NEWS FLASH: Republicans Prefer Life "The Way It Used To Be"
WASHINGTON DC - In a startling announcement, Republicans all around the country have stated a public desire for things to go back to the way they used to be. This announcement has shocked both political pundits and everyday citizens as the startling has news has spread like wildfire across the country.
Senator Strom Thurmond (R-SC), first elected to Congress in 1956 on a segregationist platform, concurs with his fellow Republican's viewpoints. "Nowadays, there's too much focus on affirmative action and gender equality, and not enough emphasis on restoration of American family values," the Senator said.
Reactions from other members of congress have ranged from mock-amusement to severe distress. "I'm totally blown out of the water by [Senator Thurmond's] viewpoints," Senator Patty Murray (D-WA) said. "I mean who would have thought that someone like Mr. Thurmond would have any desire to have America return to a more traditional way of life? Really, who knew?"
A push for a return to traditional values is being pushed by Republicans at all levels of government. Under a bill proposed this week by Republican Arizona State Rep. Jean McGrath, students at Arizona universities would be forbidden from allowing members of the opposite sex into their dorm rooms, which the Senator described as "sleeping-parlors", and would be forced to use filtering software on all Internet connected computers.
"I'm making these changes so that life at Arizona State University can go back to how it used to be when I attended classes there in the late 1950s," McGrath said at a press conference last week. "I am hopeful that with the help of my fellow Congressmen, we can turn back the clock thirty, perhaps even forty years," McGrath said. "After we've taken care of that, I'm planning on resigning my post as State Representative and returning to a life of cooking and cleaning for my alcoholic husband. It'll be nice to leave voting and thinking to the men for a change," the Senator said.
Apparently, McGrath is not alone in her convictions. "When I was a boy, soda was a nickel, gas used to be full service with a smile, and women used to be pretty and smell nice," 40 Million glaze-eyed Republicans chanted in monotoned unison last week. "Whatever happened to family values?" the collective group was heard to chant.
Often times, I would like to have, say a MSDOS 3.3 boot disk, or a DOS 6.21 disk, complete with the limitations and quirks of those versions. It means cracking open my diskette collection and (literally) dusting off old diskettes that have often times not survived my poor storage technique. I would love to be able to download FreeDOS_almost_MSDOS_5.0_inst_disk_1.img, rawrite the file to diskette and run an installation that would install a DOS to a hard drive that looked, felt like and said that it was DOS 5.0.
I don't know if this is possible, or even legal, but if it was, it would be awesome. I realize that the project is still progressing, but once FreeDOS has reached its pinnacle - and it looks like that day is not far off - will any effort go into making "I can't believe it's not MSDOS version X" distributions that look, act and simulate behavior precisely of older DOS versions?
You are correct. What makes this case so scary is that it's not even how much money a company loses, but really how pissed they are at the accused. KM didn't actually cause millions of dollars of damage, but he revealed extemely embarassing security holes, causing Sun to retaliate against him by saying that he caused a loss the maximum amount of money they could get away with before anybody called BS. And the prosocutor took them at their word.
That's scary. Especially since many of the times that I would consider breaking the law justifiable involve pissing off large corporations!
Slashdot Mirror
This is a good troll - the best kind, actually. This is obviously not Sig 11, as anyone who checks the user profile can tell. However, the language of the troll is particularly convincing. Best of all, he/she/it makes a lot of good points. The gist of their argument is that BXXP is unnecessary - that TCP/HTTP already does everything that is needed. TCP does support more than 700kbps, HTTP 1.1 does permit persistence, etc. Very well done, and it's already trolled one or two people.
Moderate them down Troll. Moderate them up Funny. Just PLEASE don't moderate them Interesting, Informative, Insightful, or Flamebait, because they're not.
As if I'm really worried about the government censoring content anymore. The fact is, the worst threat to our freedom to speech (at least here in the U. S. of A.) is not the government, but rather, large powerful corporations with the best lawyers who can silence anyone who can't afford to pay for their liberty. Now whether or not MacNN is in the wrong or not is up for debate (and what better forum for that debate than Slashdot!), but whenever a large corporation throws their weight around, whether or not they're justified to do so, I want to know about it. Slashdot is really the only place that I would find out about it.
So, um... you go, Slashdot. You go.
I don't use Napster. I've never used it, in fact. I think the people who say that Napster won't cost the music industry money are kidding themselves. The music industry will lose money if Napster or one of its cousins works. A lot of money.
However, the idea of the music industry losing a lot of money is, in my mind, not necessarily a bad thing.
I just can't help but wonder if the people who use Napster understand that the music industry could be radically changed by their actions. I mean, I've heard that most of the stuff on Napster is crap - Backstreet Boys, Britney Spears, etc. If Napster/GNUTella/FreeNet really take off, to the point where Big Music just bites it, it will mean no more Britney, Backcrap, etc, forcing Napster-ers to listen to music that isn't overproduced to the point of being bad.
I can't condone the actions of people who illicitly copy information across Napster. It is illegal. It will hurt those companies. And that's (as Stuart Smalley would say,) okay. I do believe in the free exchange of information, and I can acknowledge that Big Media is against the free exchange of information.
Alright, I seem to have forgotten my point. I guess it's this: I wish people would choose a side other than "Napster doesn't hurt anyone". Either pick "Napster hurts people and I'm okay with that", like I have, or "Napster hurts people and I'm not okay with that".
Choose! CHOOSE!
There was an interview in Salon today with the Napster CEO. I dunno, Napster seems more and more like a bunch of profiteers all the time. Plus the CEO seems a little over-optimistic. Information only wants to be free until the servers get unplugged. I kinda hope that this victory for the RIAA pushes along development on Gnutella, and to a greater extent, Freenet. A much more ideal situation would be one where no matter what laws are passed, the system remains intact.
By "You all," who exactly are you referring to? Last time I checked, the user base of Slashdot did not consist of one gestalt entity, but rather as thousands of individual entities. These entities, or "people," each have different ideas and opinions that make them unique from other "people" even though common interests draw them to a communal forum.
For instance, while some people who frequent Slashdot find that whiny, loud-mouthed latecomers who attempt to mask their own feelings of guilt and boost their sense of self-importance by spouting off-topic inflammatory garbage wherever they feel like it are doing the Slashdot community a severe disservice; others think that such persons are merely being dumbasses. However, all members of the Slashdot community can agree that such nonsense is unwelcome and not very well thought out.
Perhaps a more appropriate example is this: Some people like The Phantom Menace. Others don't. Some people agree with the MPAA's stance on Intellectual Property protection. Others don't. Some people read Slashdot. Other don't. Look Ma - all the circles in the Venn diagram intersect!
If everybody on Slashdot had the exact same opinion, there would be very little need for discussion forums at all, now would there? But there are forums, and those forums exist so that people with different opinions can share different ideas. That's why I read Slashdot. Not for posts like yours, but for the free exchange of different ideas.
4-6-2000
In a decision that has just been made
available, id has prevailed in the
Paducha lawsuit on all points. Judge
Johnstone has dismissed the case on
all grounds, validating what we have
said all along: the case lacked a
shred of merit.
Now that this legal hurdle is out
of the way, work can finally resume
on id's latest title, "Columbine
Revenge 2001," and our latest add-on
pack to Q3A, "Cafeteria Crossfire"
The loose allegation that they might take GPLed patches and integrate them into the closed tree is just that: a loose allegation. Plus it doesn't make sense - if their code bases are similar enough so that they could apply verbatim patches to a closed tree, then why not just GPL the closed-source version too? I mean, they obviously can appriciate that the "All bugs are infinately shallow" principle carries over to IRIX as well as it does Linux. If, on the other hand, the code bases are so divergent that they would want to keep seperate implementations, the verbatim patches wouldn't work.
Also, this disturbs me:
Who cares? The point where "the community" decides that SGI isn't doing the best job with their code maintainence, it's GOOD that a fork occurs.
SGI's just a company - who released large sections of code under the GPL. That people within the community would treat regard their olive branch with fear and disrespect simply because they are a company rather than an individual simply seems to me as a lack of perspective about the freedoms that the GPL provides. If it makes you feel better, think of allowing companies like SGI to make kernel contributions as tricking them into giving up time and resources.
Sorry, I forgot:
This virus is spreading like wildfire so forward this message on to all of your friends so that their files won't be destroyed!
Sincerely,
Steve Thompson, Compaq Computer Corp
VIRUS ALERT!!!!! THIS IS NOT A HOAX!!!!p erts at Microsoft have determined that there is a new and very destructive virus that infects your computer just by opening an email! It is called the ROOT VIRUS. "ROOT" is a famous hacker who has broken into thousands of computer systems and sends fake emails with a virus that can infect your computer just by opening them.
-----------------------------------
Ex
When you open a message sent to you by Root, it infects a virus onto your system which basically wipes out your hard drive. If you see a mail from ROOT, DELETE IT IMMEDIATELY!!!! Sometimes this hacker will attempt to trick you into opening an email by making it look official. DO NOT TAKE ANY CHANCES! DELETE ANY AND ALL MESSAGES FROM ROOT IMMEDIATELY!
What do you mean a URL rewriter? How can a page on one site change the referrer to look like it came from another site? I can't think of a situation where a smart enough referrer-checker couldn't be written. A more technical explination of your statement would be helpful.
For anyone who hasn't read it, there's a much better article about Michael Hart written for Wired a few years ago. He certainly seems like an, um, odd fellow, but I wouldn't mind meeting him sometime.
r g.html
http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/5.02/esgutenbe
You bring up a good point. It makes sense for Mozilla to be open-source because its success lies entirely on platform-diversity. If Linux fails to de-homoginize the OS market, Mozilla fails as well. If Linux succeeds, IE fails, since it is so Windows-centric. Yes, Mozilla may not be the best choice for everyone today, but as soon as non-IE browsers eat up more than half of the market share, web page content-providers will have to fall back on some sort of generally-accessable standard. And that standard will always be clean scriptless, pluginless HTML.
And I concede, Mozilla isn't good enough to make everyone want to switch on its own merits. Speed and resource-wize, it's comparable to IE. And being able to do things like ActiveX are good selling points for IE.
But Mozilla can wait until the climate is right for it to dominate. The code is out there. Frankly, I don't care if Netscape(TM) doesn't make any money off Netscape. If the company collapses, and Navigator is deemed a failure. I mean, basicly Netscape is a dead company. Their only source of revenue is their sucky portal. Oh, and their soon-to-be-demolished-by-Apache-2.0 server. I have already mourned the loss of Netscape. Fortunately, there's a lot of code that's out there and can be taken for future projects. Good code, too! So, when the time comes where cross-platform HTML becomes the standard again, Mozilla will be there, waiting. When the playing field is leveled, the true beauty of Mozilla will emerge.
Okay, at least on Win32, Mozilla is finally running about as stable and lo-mem as IE5. It crashes much less and is actually somewhat fast.
I have a few questions about how it will turn out, though:
1. When the debugging code is taken out, will it run faster/suck less memory, etc?
2. Are they going to get rid of the ugly, glitzy and only semi-functional interface in favor of, say, something with a working multi-level back button, drop-down address list and non-rounded menus? Don't get me wrong, the UI can be sleek, but mockable is a different story altogether.
3. Is the sidebar going away, please?
4. When will the widgets ever look like they're supposed to?
(see
http://www.mozilla.org/xpfe/nsGFXWidgets.html
to see what I mean.)
Anyone who can lend some insight into these minor yet somewhat crucial issues, I would appriciate it.
Oh, please. If you would just drop the Randite Objectivism BS for two seconds, you would see that I'm actually arguing for a more libretarian attitude towards Internet government.
Most of the Internet problems that big business goes crying to about the government nowadays could be solved through technological mesaures. If companies would spend their effort working on a RBL-blacklist-on-steriods solution rather than calling in the FBI every time a script kiddie 0wnz them, or filing a lawsuit when they get one or two spam messages, the Internet would be able to govern itself just fine.
I'm sure if I had used a metaphor about the Boston Tea Party or something, you wouldn't have minded, since American colonists are an oppressed minority that were "better armed".
The Wild West indeed. Allow me to extend your metaphor, Ms. Reno.
For many years before the West was Wild, Native Americans lived there in relative peace and harmony with the earth and each other. There was no money. There was no need for written laws. Then, profit-seekers, outcasts and jerks from the east decided to head west to seek their fame and fortune. When they arrived, they walked around the place like they owned it, imposing their laws and ideologies; taking more and more away from the native peoples, until the land was no longer theirs at all.
Sound familiar?
We were here first, Ms. Reno. The US government didn't need to pass any laws that were specific to the Old West. Just imposing existing US law then was enough to ruin it for the original residents. Now how does that saying about history repeating itself go?
Maybe next time you should read the story all the way through. I think it's apparent by the third paragraph that the movie industry is truly concerned about the rights of the consumer:
I hope this silences anyone who would accuse the movie industry of any less-than-noble intentions.
Here's the "Beach" document from the WVE site, at http://www.wildrockies.org/wve/beach.htm
The Jargon File has space set aside for the proper definition of the GPL (under Copyleft), but he also provides a space for the dissenting opinion, (under General Public Virus), but this entry it totally objective, even though you imply otherwise.
Here is the latter entry in full (emphasis mine):
These are true statements! It is indeed alleged that the copyleft `infects' software generated with GNU tools. However, ESR knows this to be false! He licenses his own software under the GPL!
As for your second quote, it is factually sound as well. Indeed, the term "GNU/Linux" has not gained widespread acceptance. This is merely a statement of fact. I wish GNU/Linux was used more. But it isn't. But that's reason to work to increase awareness, NOT a reason to ignore the facts in the interest of keeping the peace. You forget that "the peace" is already kept. They might not always agree, but both ESR and RMS have shown that they respect each other. I think it was Wavy Gravy who said at Woodstock, "We're all feeding each other."
I totally agree. I didn't mean to come across as saying that we should be lobbying for a "Free Software Exception," but rather that we should be lobbying for more freedoms in general. Nothing would make me happier than to see Sony release a hardware DVD player using DeCSS. Would I be necessarily against laws that give non-commercial entities or even individuals certain powers that corporations currently hold? No. But that's not what I was trying to convey here.
The reason I used the Dan Savage/Hands Off Washington story as my example is because it's a good example of how using measures which are somewhat reprehensable (i.e. lobbying in general) as a method of getting your way. I didn't mean to say that Dan Savage was advising that money be spent to Congress to ensure special rights for homosexuals, since I don't think that's what gay rights groups are looking to achive - special rights that is. But that's another flamey conversation althogether, and one that I don't want to dive into at the moment.
Ross
An interesting guy. His talk show "Savage Love Live" was better than I think he thought it was, but he stopped doing it anyway. Which reminds me, there's a new edition of The Stranger out today.
You're absolutely correct about the need for a lobby. I would be happy with a lobby coordinated by the EFF, or perhaps a FSF/EFF cooperation. I can remember a few years ago, when here in Washington State, a major gay right group, Hands Off Washington was able to raise a few million dollars and used it to sponsor a citizen's initiative that failed due to the fact that it tried to get more votes by not being as comprehensive as many members of the gay community had hoped.
Gay columnist and at that time radio host Dan Savage blasted Hands Off Washington for wasting their money on the Initiative, which he said was destined to fail (this was before the ballot) and said they should just take the money and use it for lobbying State Congress, since similar lobbying measures had worked in other states to provide 100% protection of gay rights, for only a fraction of the price.
If we as a community were able to raise a few million a year for National lobbing, would we see drastic change? Hell yes! When you look at the amount of money that will be spent on the DeCSS case vs. how much money we would have had to spend to prevent this case from happening in the first place, I think the choice is obvious.
Unfortunately, it doesn't matter if you've actually comitted a crime anymore. So long as A Big Corporation doesn't like something that you've done, you are as good as guilty at least in the eyes of those who can make your life a living hell.
And instead of realizing that the existing laws are in place simply as a convenience to large corporations used to make an example of those who really piss of those corporations, government agencies just overzealously enforce violations when they are told to do so by the corporations.
And what's the moral of the story? It's accountancy that makes the world go round, round, round, round. The simple fact is that these companies have too much power. And, indeed they are crybabies. Remember the kids that used to hit and not share their toys in kindergarten? Now they're all grown up, and they're the board members of the DVD CCA.
NEWS FLASH: Republicans Prefer Life "The Way It Used To Be"
WASHINGTON DC - In a startling announcement, Republicans all around the country have stated a public desire for things to go back to the way they used to be. This announcement has shocked both political pundits and everyday citizens as the startling has news has spread like wildfire across the country.
Senator Strom Thurmond (R-SC), first elected to Congress in 1956 on a segregationist platform, concurs with his fellow Republican's viewpoints. "Nowadays, there's too much focus on affirmative action and gender equality, and not enough emphasis on restoration of American family values," the Senator said.
Reactions from other members of congress have ranged from mock-amusement to severe distress. "I'm totally blown out of the water by [Senator Thurmond's] viewpoints," Senator Patty Murray (D-WA) said. "I mean who would have thought that someone like Mr. Thurmond would have any desire to have America return to a more traditional way of life? Really, who knew?"
A push for a return to traditional values is being pushed by Republicans at all levels of government. Under a bill proposed this week by Republican Arizona State Rep. Jean McGrath, students at Arizona universities would be forbidden from allowing members of the opposite sex into their dorm rooms, which the Senator described as "sleeping-parlors", and would be forced to use filtering software on all Internet connected computers.
"I'm making these changes so that life at Arizona State University can go back to how it used to be when I attended classes there in the late 1950s," McGrath said at a press conference last week. "I am hopeful that with the help of my fellow Congressmen, we can turn back the clock thirty, perhaps even forty years," McGrath said. "After we've taken care of that, I'm planning on resigning my post as State Representative and returning to a life of cooking and cleaning for my alcoholic husband. It'll be nice to leave voting and thinking to the men for a change," the Senator said.
Apparently, McGrath is not alone in her convictions. "When I was a boy, soda was a nickel, gas used to be full service with a smile, and women used to be pretty and smell nice," 40 Million glaze-eyed Republicans chanted in monotoned unison last week. "Whatever happened to family values?" the collective group was heard to chant.
Often times, I would like to have, say a MSDOS 3.3 boot disk, or a DOS 6.21 disk, complete with the limitations and quirks of those versions. It means cracking open my diskette collection and (literally) dusting off old diskettes that have often times not survived my poor storage technique. I would love to be able to download FreeDOS_almost_MSDOS_5.0_inst_disk_1.img, rawrite the file to diskette and run an installation that would install a DOS to a hard drive that looked, felt like and said that it was DOS 5.0.
I don't know if this is possible, or even legal, but if it was, it would be awesome. I realize that the project is still progressing, but once FreeDOS has reached its pinnacle - and it looks like that day is not far off - will any effort go into making "I can't believe it's not MSDOS version X" distributions that look, act and simulate behavior precisely of older DOS versions?
Thanks,
Ross
You are correct. What makes this case so scary is that it's not even how much money a company loses, but really how pissed they are at the accused. KM didn't actually cause millions of dollars of damage, but he revealed extemely embarassing security holes, causing Sun to retaliate against him by saying that he caused a loss the maximum amount of money they could get away with before anybody called BS. And the prosocutor took them at their word.
That's scary. Especially since many of the times that I would consider breaking the law justifiable involve pissing off large corporations!