I see people in/. begging for a legal and legit music distribution one second and then cursing D/RM the next... you cant have it both ways. this isnt a bad thing.
It, and services like it, may not have the endorsement of the big boys of the RIAA - but I don't listen to their music anyways. The fact that you can't find Britney on EMusic doesn't make it any less a music download service. You CAN have it both ways; sadly, the markets don't seem to work in this area. Rather than listen to the masses that have spoken their minds through the popularity of file-sharing, the RIAA has chosen to legislate the market back to familiar ground.
This is nothing new; industries have tried this as long as their has been a legal system that enables it. The current situation of the steel industry is heartening; because they could not compete against overseas producers, the paid politicians to impose tariffs on steel imports. However, though those tariffs are barely a year old, the industry backlash has already begun - turns out the tariffs hurt steel-consuming industries much more than it helps the steel producers.
It will probably take a lot longer, but this is similar to what will eventually happen with DRM. Laws will be enacted, until the point comes where Joe Public, who at the moment is oblivious to the massive potential downside of DRM, wakes up one morning and realizes he, and his business, is getting the short end of the stick. Partial repeals and reverse legislation will be passed in response to the backlash, until we get to a point where there is some balance between the producers and consumers.
Don't get me wrong, I think that VeriSign are a bunch of whores for doing this, but I don't think it will affect the spam filters like everyone's been shouting about on other sites as well.
I did a dig on a bunch of nonexistent domains. The only time I got hits was when I queried a www.*.com or www.*.net domain. For example, sfdlkjfdsjfsd.com still returns the correct response - no A, no MX, no nothing.
So unless the spammers are specifying a return address from a www subdomain of a non-existent domain, the filters would seem to be unaffected.
You're going on the assumption that they're referring to MD5 hashes of entire files. Not so. Typically such comparisons generate many hashes per file, by going through each file line-by-line, and for each line generating a hash of it and the next 5 lines or so. When all is said and done, this gives you many hashes of small blocks of code within a file, which can then be compared to the hashes from a different codebase. Any time 5 lines are the same between the codebases, you would get a match.
When was the last time you tried the JDBC driver? For a long time, the "official" driver was only a beta. It's now a full release (SP1, actually), and I find it works very well on my Linux/Java webservers. If not, there are plenty of third-party drivers that work extremely well.
And I have to disagree with you that Postgres is on the same level as SQL Server. I've got lots of experience with both also, SQL has proven itself both faster and more stable than Postgres. I'm not a Microsoft fan, but if there's one thing they got right it's SQL Server.
Well, I think they've just spelled out part 2 of their business plan.
Step 1: Declare the GPL invalid, and claim ownership of Linux.
Step 2: Steal liberally from Linux source code in order to reinvigorate their nearly-dead OS.
Step 3: Profit.
Granted, step 1 is a long shot, now 'm starting to see other ways they could benefit from this lawsuit besides a hefty settlement from IBM.
The $19,000 was because the judge awarded them legal fees - and this was for a completely separate case, where PanIP was suing them for defamation and trademark infringement by naming their organization the "PanIP Group Defense Fund". Additionally, there was no mention of punitive damages, so we can only assume that their lawyer's fees were approx. $19,000.
Which leaves them back at $0 that they've actually made from the PanIP mess, plus a whole slew of other legal fees from the original (and still ongoing) lawsuit - fighting the patents.
So yes, you should contribute. They're standing up against everything that's wrong with the American patent and IP system, and deserve our assistance.
You're missing the point. Linux/Unix is also not suitable for real-time control systems. If you're looking for an OS for that type of application, you choose something like QNX.
To expand on your example, if you're hiring a DBA, which of the following applicants would you hire:
A web developer with a clean record
A web developer who is a convicted felon
A DBA with 10 years experience
It's not just about which OS gets targeted more by viruses (your "convicted felon"). Server OS decisions should be based on OS features. I myself prefer Linux because it has a large variety of network applications available for it, and I consider it much more stable than Windows. More importantly, to tie in the example above, I hired a web developer because I needed a web developer.
But for control systems, the primary OS requirement is guaranteed real-time response (i.e. no possibility that another process is blocking the control system from a timely response). Windows is certainly not suitable for this, but neither is Linux. This is a highly-specialized niche. And just like a good web developer could probably do decent DBA work most of the time, Windows or Linux could probably perform this role 90% of the time. But if you need to guarantee quality work 100% of the time, you'd hire the DBA.
From a subjective viewpoint, I would agree with you that Linux is probably a better choice than Windows. But from an objective viewpoint, it's madness to choose either when the lives of hundreds or thousands are at stake.
Well, I'm not one of the anti-spam crowd to begin with, so I don't consider myself a Dean apologist in this particular case. My filters work fine for me, so I could care less about spam. I wouldn't see what the big deal is regardless of the sender - and certainly not worthy of front-page Slashdot.
Nonetheless, credit where credit is due. This type of speedy resolution is to be commended regardless of whether it was Bush, Dean or some random company. You speak of pro-Dean bias; why then was there no mention in the article that Dean's campaign staff immediately rectified the problem?
The title of your post sums it up more accurately than you know. Dean's campaign didn't start out targeting the net - it's the net activists that came to them. Ever since then, the campaign has been going through a lot of growing pains getting themselves up to date on the technology that those supporters are demanding. And they have had a lot of success, but also the occassional failure, like this instance.
However, here's an important follow-up post linked to from one of the author's links. Seems that once Dean's campaign was notified that their partners may be less-than-credible, they investigated and terminated their relationship with them within a day. Obviously I'm biased (see my sig), but it seems like an honest mistake to me.
Are there any other cataclysmic events in the offing?
One fear is that the entire West Antarctic and Greenland ice sheets might disappear into the oceans raising sea levels by seven metres or more. Even the most pessimistic experts say this is only a worry if the world warms by about 4 C, which is outside the range of mainstream predictions for the next century. And a glacial collapse is such a slow process it would take several hundred years for all the ice to slide into the sea.
As mentioned above, it's important to note that the study mentioned in the original post is only referring to ice caps that are alreday floating in the water. Johannessen himself says:
"Because the ice cap is already in the water when it is melting, you are not adding any mass. Only precipitation, discharge from rivers and the melting of glaciers can cause the water to rise."
If the ice caps are melting now, glaciers may melt later. That is when the situation will start turning catastrophic. This particular study doesn't really add any insight to the global warming debate. But of course, many will sieze on it to justify there claims that global warming does not exist. Sad, really.
All in all, a half-researched and largely irrelevant story on Slashdot's part...
If GNUCash wants to attract attention (and consequently developers and donations), they need to spend a little time focusing on the high-tech consumer market (like slashdotters). People who want personal finance software that has full online banking, just like Quicken and Money offer. Once they get that in place, the users will follow, and so will the publicity.
I can honestly say that the ONLY reason I haven't installed Linux on my one remaining Windows machine is because I need something like Money or Quicken to do my online banking - automatic statement downloads, online transfers, bill payment, etc. The closest I've seen is Kapital, which I had terrible experiences with.
I'm shit with C/C++ dev, but I'd be happy to help in some other way, or monetarily. Please - those of you who want to see Linux compete in the desktop arena and are able to help with GnuCash, please do. A successful personal finance program will do amazing things for desktop Linux adoption.
You have to wonder what is going through their MINDS! I mean, really. Don't most creatures have at least SOME sense of self-preservation???
Yes. It's called a "golden parachute". They don't give a shit about the company - it's owned by shareholders. They're driving the stock up and dumping it before the shit hits the fan. Self-preservation at its best.
And yet they're doing it. There case against IBM may be just as ridiculous as any lawsuit Microsoft could dream up against Linux developers/supporters, but that hasn't stopped it from proceeding.
In our court system, if you really want to litigate, you'll always be able to find a reason, valid or not.
Say what we will about Microsoft, at least they have an actual business plan. In contrast to the SCO nonsense we've been wading through, it's nice to see Microsoft accepting Linux as a fact of life and choosing to compete instead of litigate.
On the other hand, it stated only that the users had no prior experience with XP or Linux.
My guess is that they probably rounded up a bunch of Mac users for the test. I would hope they would recognize that experience with another flavor of Windows would probably unfairly bias the XP side of the test.
Time to start a viable open-source voting-machine project. These guys started something promising, but it looks like development has ceased. Anybody know of a decent, active open-source electronic voting system?
It'd be funny if Microsoft used its considerable political influence to fix this patent problem, and wound up killing SCO as a side-effect. Hey, it may be cheaper than licensing DRM from InterTrust...
On average, it only costs $7 million to "buy" a congressman...
Even thought it's not a lawsuit, I expect lawsuits will follow. To be honest, this may be the best possible defense by the Linux community. If thousands of local groups file complaints and/or lawsuits again SCO for their actions, it's inevitable that SCO will receive some judgements against them. The only way they can avoid this is if they have legal precedent to back them up. This means that to cut losses, they would need to expedite the IBM case. Dragging out the IBM case is their only real ace in the hole; the longer they can put it off, the more chance there is that companies will actually believe their claims and purchase licenses from them.
Slashdot Mirror
I see people in /. begging for a legal and legit music distribution one second and then cursing D/RM the next... you cant have it both ways. this isnt a bad thing.
I must have just dreamed up EMusic then...
It, and services like it, may not have the endorsement of the big boys of the RIAA - but I don't listen to their music anyways. The fact that you can't find Britney on EMusic doesn't make it any less a music download service. You CAN have it both ways; sadly, the markets don't seem to work in this area. Rather than listen to the masses that have spoken their minds through the popularity of file-sharing, the RIAA has chosen to legislate the market back to familiar ground.
This is nothing new; industries have tried this as long as their has been a legal system that enables it. The current situation of the steel industry is heartening; because they could not compete against overseas producers, the paid politicians to impose tariffs on steel imports. However, though those tariffs are barely a year old, the industry backlash has already begun - turns out the tariffs hurt steel-consuming industries much more than it helps the steel producers.
It will probably take a lot longer, but this is similar to what will eventually happen with DRM. Laws will be enacted, until the point comes where Joe Public, who at the moment is oblivious to the massive potential downside of DRM, wakes up one morning and realizes he, and his business, is getting the short end of the stick. Partial repeals and reverse legislation will be passed in response to the backlash, until we get to a point where there is some balance between the producers and consumers.
-j
Ok, my dig is returning A records now too... I stand corrected...
-j
Don't get me wrong, I think that VeriSign are a bunch of whores for doing this, but I don't think it will affect the spam filters like everyone's been shouting about on other sites as well.
I did a dig on a bunch of nonexistent domains. The only time I got hits was when I queried a www.*.com or www.*.net domain. For example, sfdlkjfdsjfsd.com still returns the correct response - no A, no MX, no nothing.
So unless the spammers are specifying a return address from a www subdomain of a non-existent domain, the filters would seem to be unaffected.
-j
You're going on the assumption that they're referring to MD5 hashes of entire files. Not so. Typically such comparisons generate many hashes per file, by going through each file line-by-line, and for each line generating a hash of it and the next 5 lines or so. When all is said and done, this gives you many hashes of small blocks of code within a file, which can then be compared to the hashes from a different codebase. Any time 5 lines are the same between the codebases, you would get a match.
-j
8:00 am: Session 1: Why can't we get past using the letter K?
-j
TheKompany.com is slashdotted 24 hours a day. I swear it's running on a 386. How about a torrent for the whole site?
-j
The article also contains the following choice morsel regarding this phrase:
But like other flashes in the pan, it retreated as quickly as it had appeared.
They obviously don't read slashdot.
-j
When was the last time you tried the JDBC driver? For a long time, the "official" driver was only a beta. It's now a full release (SP1, actually), and I find it works very well on my Linux/Java webservers. If not, there are plenty of third-party drivers that work extremely well.
And I have to disagree with you that Postgres is on the same level as SQL Server. I've got lots of experience with both also, SQL has proven itself both faster and more stable than Postgres. I'm not a Microsoft fan, but if there's one thing they got right it's SQL Server.
-j
Well, I think they've just spelled out part 2 of their business plan.
Step 1: Declare the GPL invalid, and claim ownership of Linux.
Step 2: Steal liberally from Linux source code in order to reinvigorate their nearly-dead OS.
Step 3: Profit.
Granted, step 1 is a long shot, now 'm starting to see other ways they could benefit from this lawsuit besides a hefty settlement from IBM.
-j
The $19,000 was because the judge awarded them legal fees - and this was for a completely separate case, where PanIP was suing them for defamation and trademark infringement by naming their organization the "PanIP Group Defense Fund". Additionally, there was no mention of punitive damages, so we can only assume that their lawyer's fees were approx. $19,000.
Which leaves them back at $0 that they've actually made from the PanIP mess, plus a whole slew of other legal fees from the original (and still ongoing) lawsuit - fighting the patents.
So yes, you should contribute. They're standing up against everything that's wrong with the American patent and IP system, and deserve our assistance.
-j
To expand on your example, if you're hiring a DBA, which of the following applicants would you hire:
- A web developer with a clean record
- A web developer who is a convicted felon
- A DBA with 10 years experience
It's not just about which OS gets targeted more by viruses (your "convicted felon"). Server OS decisions should be based on OS features. I myself prefer Linux because it has a large variety of network applications available for it, and I consider it much more stable than Windows. More importantly, to tie in the example above, I hired a web developer because I needed a web developer.But for control systems, the primary OS requirement is guaranteed real-time response (i.e. no possibility that another process is blocking the control system from a timely response). Windows is certainly not suitable for this, but neither is Linux. This is a highly-specialized niche. And just like a good web developer could probably do decent DBA work most of the time, Windows or Linux could probably perform this role 90% of the time. But if you need to guarantee quality work 100% of the time, you'd hire the DBA.
From a subjective viewpoint, I would agree with you that Linux is probably a better choice than Windows. But from an objective viewpoint, it's madness to choose either when the lives of hundreds or thousands are at stake.
-j
Well, I'm not one of the anti-spam crowd to begin with, so I don't consider myself a Dean apologist in this particular case. My filters work fine for me, so I could care less about spam. I wouldn't see what the big deal is regardless of the sender - and certainly not worthy of front-page Slashdot.
Nonetheless, credit where credit is due. This type of speedy resolution is to be commended regardless of whether it was Bush, Dean or some random company. You speak of pro-Dean bias; why then was there no mention in the article that Dean's campaign staff immediately rectified the problem?
-j
The title of your post sums it up more accurately than you know. Dean's campaign didn't start out targeting the net - it's the net activists that came to them. Ever since then, the campaign has been going through a lot of growing pains getting themselves up to date on the technology that those supporters are demanding. And they have had a lot of success, but also the occassional failure, like this instance.
However, here's an important follow-up post linked to from one of the author's links. Seems that once Dean's campaign was notified that their partners may be less-than-credible, they investigated and terminated their relationship with them within a day. Obviously I'm biased (see my sig), but it seems like an honest mistake to me.
-j
From the New Scientist article:
Are there any other cataclysmic events in the offing?
One fear is that the entire West Antarctic and Greenland ice sheets might disappear into the oceans raising sea levels by seven metres or more. Even the most pessimistic experts say this is only a worry if the world warms by about 4 C, which is outside the range of mainstream predictions for the next century. And a glacial collapse is such a slow process it would take several hundred years for all the ice to slide into the sea.
As mentioned above, it's important to note that the study mentioned in the original post is only referring to ice caps that are alreday floating in the water. Johannessen himself says:
"Because the ice cap is already in the water when it is melting, you are not adding any mass. Only precipitation, discharge from rivers and the melting of glaciers can cause the water to rise."
If the ice caps are melting now, glaciers may melt later. That is when the situation will start turning catastrophic. This particular study doesn't really add any insight to the global warming debate. But of course, many will sieze on it to justify there claims that global warming does not exist. Sad, really.
All in all, a half-researched and largely irrelevant story on Slashdot's part...
-j
If GNUCash wants to attract attention (and consequently developers and donations), they need to spend a little time focusing on the high-tech consumer market (like slashdotters). People who want personal finance software that has full online banking, just like Quicken and Money offer. Once they get that in place, the users will follow, and so will the publicity.
I can honestly say that the ONLY reason I haven't installed Linux on my one remaining Windows machine is because I need something like Money or Quicken to do my online banking - automatic statement downloads, online transfers, bill payment, etc. The closest I've seen is Kapital, which I had terrible experiences with.
I'm shit with C/C++ dev, but I'd be happy to help in some other way, or monetarily. Please - those of you who want to see Linux compete in the desktop arena and are able to help with GnuCash, please do. A successful personal finance program will do amazing things for desktop Linux adoption.
-j
You have to wonder what is going through their MINDS! I mean, really. Don't most creatures have at least SOME sense of self-preservation???
Yes. It's called a "golden parachute". They don't give a shit about the company - it's owned by shareholders. They're driving the stock up and dumping it before the shit hits the fan. Self-preservation at its best.
Or as it's known in some circles, a felony.
-j
Who would SCO sue?
And yet they're doing it. There case against IBM may be just as ridiculous as any lawsuit Microsoft could dream up against Linux developers/supporters, but that hasn't stopped it from proceeding.
In our court system, if you really want to litigate, you'll always be able to find a reason, valid or not.
-j
Say what we will about Microsoft, at least they have an actual business plan. In contrast to the SCO nonsense we've been wading through, it's nice to see Microsoft accepting Linux as a fact of life and choosing to compete instead of litigate.
-j
On the other hand, it stated only that the users had no prior experience with XP or Linux.
My guess is that they probably rounded up a bunch of Mac users for the test. I would hope they would recognize that experience with another flavor of Windows would probably unfairly bias the XP side of the test.
-j
Hmm... the article seems to have been archived, the link is no longer accurate.
Read it here.
-j
And additionally, their privacy policy is also crap. According to the article the following is an excerpt:
"we may disclose, sell, trade, or rent your Personally Identifiable Information to others without your consent."
Sounds like an all-around fun bunch of guys to do business with.
-j
Yeah, because nothing helps you focus like being wired on caffeine...
And how is this a solution to helping him get his work done BEFORE midnight?
-j
Time to start a viable open-source voting-machine project. These guys started something promising, but it looks like development has ceased. Anybody know of a decent, active open-source electronic voting system?
-j
It'd be funny if Microsoft used its considerable political influence to fix this patent problem, and wound up killing SCO as a side-effect. Hey, it may be cheaper than licensing DRM from InterTrust...
On average, it only costs $7 million to "buy" a congressman...
-j
Even thought it's not a lawsuit, I expect lawsuits will follow. To be honest, this may be the best possible defense by the Linux community. If thousands of local groups file complaints and/or lawsuits again SCO for their actions, it's inevitable that SCO will receive some judgements against them. The only way they can avoid this is if they have legal precedent to back them up. This means that to cut losses, they would need to expedite the IBM case. Dragging out the IBM case is their only real ace in the hole; the longer they can put it off, the more chance there is that companies will actually believe their claims and purchase licenses from them.
-j