You've put forward this argument several times, tepples, but I'm not sure of the position you're taking.
Are you saying that this might not be a slam dunk? Or are you saying that Apple has absolutely no grounds to make a claim of trademark infringement? Or perhaps you are arguing some other point.
If you are saying that Apple has no guaranteed win based on the name alone, I think you may have a point.
I don't think inferior/superior has anything to do with it, as far as directly copying a product is concerned. More features does not necessarily mean superior, but that is neither here nor there.
This is no different than if Chevy started selling Mustangs that looked exactly like a Ford Mustang, and claimed it was a different product because their Mustang had a higher top speed, or better fuel efficiency, or that it had an 8 track in addition to the CD player. It doesn't matter if you consider any of these an improvement. Chevy cannot sell a complete copy of the Ford Mustang.
If the super shuffle merely "worked better" and didn't exactly resemble the Apple product, then it would compete in the marketplace on it's own merits. However, this company is not trying to compete with Apple. They're trying to leech of off Apple's efforts and Apple's success by direct and complete imitation. I don't know how to get that to sink in, other than with repetition: This isn't an evolutionary step, this is exact imitation.
Well, let's just cut out the unnecessary crap with your identity, and you just give me your money. After all, money is just data now days, isn't it? It's no longer tied to any material standard. And if it's just data, why wouldn't you want it to be free? Send it my way.
BTW, I would prefer that data in the human readable format known as Benjamins, if it's not too much trouble.
Re:I can't wait for these things to get smaller
on
Mac mini in a Volkswagen
·
· Score: 2, Insightful
You kids today and your newfangled forehead mounted IO ports. Back in my day, we used the butt port, and we liked it that way. Also, we used to have real sex with people, by typing to them. None of this perverted direct-connect wlan group sex with anonymous strangers every time you step out of your faraday cage.
What interests me is the whole idea of a Mac emulator. It is a neat idea, but I've never seen a high demand for a mac emu- at least not the sort of demand that would inspire one to think there is a paying market niche.
OS X on commodity x86 hardware is a bit of a holy grail to many on slashdot. Or so it seems. It actually might be a small but very vocal group of whiners. This next bit might be unfair, but I suspect that many of the people that want OS X on x86 hardware would not be willing to pay for it. So I think you got that part right.
Well, the funny thing is, you really don't have to reverse engineer it. It's already publicly available from other sources.
This should not be construed as a defense of CherryOS. Near as I can tell from the facts we've gotten so far, ChOS has violated copyright and/or* GPL.
*I normally avoid using the "and/or" construction, but I did in this case because I'm slightly confused if someone can violate both at the same time, or if it's one or the other. Seems to me logically to be the later, i.e., that if you don't follow the GPL, then you are in violation of another's copyrights. Can someone clear this up for me? And by someone, I mean someone who can tell their ass from a hole in the ground.
How about freeing up some of your info and posting some personal data, like your social security number, date of birth, passport number (include a jpeg that I can use to print a wallet size picture), credit card info (including expiration dates, security codes, and pins), billing address, etc.
I know you'll do this, because, as you said, you want to support me, since I support your beliefs. It's rather simple, and I know you won't miss it. And by "it", I mean your money and your credit rating.
P2P copyright infringment is not theft. But taking GPL code is "stealing" it.
It gets even more extreme than that. If someone uses code released under a completely different license, say BSD, and doesn't "give anything back" to the posters personal satisfaction, they are considered to be stealing.
A lot of the problem is that there is a natural tendency to side with the little guy against a perceived bully. It's giving favor or support to the underdog. This is all fine and good, but what happens when the underdog is wrong? Do we blindly and unquestioningly support the underdog, even when the underdog has not a leg to stand upon? According to at least a large part of the slashdot population, the answer is yes. The underdog is always right, big bad corporations are always wrong.
So what you're seeing is not hypocrisy so much as an oversimplified and childish world view. To the extent that such views are self serving (and thus, as you contend, hypocritical), I would say that that is the result of immaturity on the part of a large number of posters.
We run into this so often that it's tempting to make generalizations such as "Geeks are immature". A better generalization (because it's a bit more precise) is that "A large and vocal number of geeks on slashdot have a tendency to be immature, and this seems to skew the discussions towards immaturity. (It can get so frustrating that I've gone so far as to take a very immature stance or two myself.)
Hey, you're not supposed to actually read or to even understand the GPL here. You're just supposed to bludgeon people with it when they disagree with you. You're not new here; you should be ashamed! =)
The saddest truth is that I'll probably be modded funny (at best) or troll, instead of insightful. =)
Will the next batch of rovers be equipped with windsocks, to measure the direction of the wind?
And what do you call those spinning things to measure airspeed? The ones with four arms with little hemispheric "cups" that catch the wind. KnowwhatImeanVerne?
I don't think I will be able to persuade you, so we'll just have to agree to disagree.
It is my contention, however, that as a member of society you have certain duties and responsibilities to society. While you have a right to be "left alone", at times these duties outweigh that right. If they didn't we wouldn't have society or the benefits of society. It would be every man (woman and child) for himself. I believe in the rights of the individual, but not in an absolute sense. The individual does not exist in a vacuum.
OK, we're not as far apart as I thought, probably due to my own inability to think. We still do have major differences which we probably won't be able to resolve, not because we don't share the same values (approximately), but because we differ on which value takes priority.
To answer your somewhat loaded question, I do believe that Apple has the right to ask the court to compel a third party to give evidence in a civil court case. We know this is a fact of the law, that they have the legal right, but beyond that, I believe in this principle philosophically/ethically. Your right to be "left alone" is outweighed by you duty as a citizen to insure that justice is done.
Do you see our differences and our similarities? I do believe that an individual has a right to be "left alone" and "to do as they see fit (within certain bounds, of course)", but I also believe that there are times when other principles outweigh these rights. And I don't think the weighing and balancing of the priorities of principles, even on a case-by-case basis, in any way hinders our most basic rights. In short, I'm not an absolutist. Nor do I think you are an absolutist. We just have different criteria or preferences for how the law should be exercised and where the lines should be drawn.
In regards to Apple's expectations that an NDA will stop leaks, I think that it's a reasonable expectation, although probably not a completely realistic expectation. Do you see the distinction I'm making here? Of course you do. You basically said the same thing in different words. Furthermore, I don't think Apple, nor the courts, would maintain that, realistically, we can expect that all contracts and agreements will be fulfilled and honored. If this was realistic, we wouldn't have need of the courts to enforce contracts. We'd all be on the honor system, and all commerce would either grind to a halt, or we'd have a perfect society. Now, given that we want to be realistic, which of the two paths do you think society would follow? (Heh heh, and no looking at the back of the book for the answer. I know you can get this on your own. Oh, gee. There I go, being abrasively patronizing again. Sorry. =)) Anyway, I'm guessing we're actually fairly close on this underlying issue, though you might differ on how, when, and if it should be carried out.
Trade secrets have nothing to do with personal privacy.
You're saying that there is no linkage whatsoever between privacy and trade secrets. It doesn't matter if the original holder of the trade secret is an individual?
Corporations don't have rights. Only people have rights.
I'm afraid you're just plain wrong on that one. Corporations do have rights. That's the way the law is written in the USA. I'm not saying it's right. I'm just saying that's how it is.
OK, I get your point now, at least a little bit. It's still absurd, although less so than what I thought your point originally was.
My contention is still that "keeping a secret" can still be a condition to be met in a contract, and if the condition is not met, that's breaking a contract.
And it's reasonable for both parties to a contract or agreement to expect that the contract or agreement be fulfilled. Otherwise, why do we bother with contracts and agreements?
I do have problems with people being supenaed (coerced to testify) in any way for private wrongs. I believe obstruction of justice or the requirement to give out relevant information should be limited to criminal cases.
OK, that's certainly a valid position to take. I disagree, but you've made a valid point.
But consider this: You witness an car accident in which person dies. The person who you saw cause the accident was not acting criminally in any way, yet, based on what you saw, one party is clearly responsible. You are the only witness.
Do you honestly think you shouldn't be made to testify, if you are unwilling? This would be a non-criminal matter, although the fact that a person died makes it a serious matter.
I mean to suggest that it really isn't so easy to draw the line, as you have, between the court's power of subpoena in either criminal or civil cases.
You're suggesting the use of the "Reagan loophole", which is slightly different than znu's advice of saying the source was anonymous when in fact it wasn't.
It's much harder for someone to prove that you do remember a fact, so in this case perjury would be more difficult to prove. However, you would also have had to told your attorney from the outset that you don't remember, and there better not be any records. If your attorney knows that you actually do remember, then he knows you're committing an act of perjury, and he is legally required as an officer of the court to speak up.
Another weakness in your idea (although I'm not sure how this would play out) is that these people have just claimed they are journalists, as grounds to quash the subpoena. I think you'd be really testing the temper of the judge to claim you're a journalist one day, and then to claim you have a terrible memory for facts and that you keep no notes on the next day.
When a judge finds a person in contempt of court, the penalty is at the judges discretion. You might be fined a small amount of money each day you refuse to testify or you might be fined a larger amount or you might have to spend time in jail until you are willing to testify. I wonder which way the judge will lean if you've insulted him in this manner?
If you replace stolen trade secret with stolen car stereo, you'll see where your argument falls apart. In that case, why should any of the middle men have any expectation of privacy and confidentiality.
Or let's not replace one stolen item with another. Let's use the witness example. Probably more apropos in this particular case, since Apple is not suing the two websites, nor explicitly accusing them of complicity in a crime. If either website knows the identity of a witness to a crime, then they can be compelled to give that information, so that the witness may be questioned.
At any rate, you framed your objection much better here. There's hope for you yet. Either that, or I'm much less cranky after some much needed sleep, and there's some hope for me.
Slashdot Mirror
I use AM radio for news, and there aren't news MP3's.
You should look into this thing called "podcasting".
Granted, you're not going to get an up to the minute traffic report, breaking news, or a stock market report just as the market closes.
You've put forward this argument several times, tepples, but I'm not sure of the position you're taking.
Are you saying that this might not be a slam dunk? Or are you saying that Apple has absolutely no grounds to make a claim of trademark infringement? Or perhaps you are arguing some other point.
If you are saying that Apple has no guaranteed win based on the name alone, I think you may have a point.
I don't think inferior/superior has anything to do with it, as far as directly copying a product is concerned. More features does not necessarily mean superior, but that is neither here nor there.
This is no different than if Chevy started selling Mustangs that looked exactly like a Ford Mustang, and claimed it was a different product because their Mustang had a higher top speed, or better fuel efficiency, or that it had an 8 track in addition to the CD player. It doesn't matter if you consider any of these an improvement. Chevy cannot sell a complete copy of the Ford Mustang.
If the super shuffle merely "worked better" and didn't exactly resemble the Apple product, then it would compete in the marketplace on it's own merits. However, this company is not trying to compete with Apple. They're trying to leech of off Apple's efforts and Apple's success by direct and complete imitation. I don't know how to get that to sink in, other than with repetition: This isn't an evolutionary step, this is exact imitation.
Argh, my apologies for the double post - something very very weird happened.
It's much too early in the morning for me to be hearing about your conception and birth and why that would excuse a double posting. =)
Well, let's just cut out the unnecessary crap with your identity, and you just give me your money. After all, money is just data now days, isn't it? It's no longer tied to any material standard. And if it's just data, why wouldn't you want it to be free? Send it my way.
BTW, I would prefer that data in the human readable format known as Benjamins, if it's not too much trouble.
You kids today and your newfangled forehead mounted IO ports. Back in my day, we used the butt port, and we liked it that way. Also, we used to have real sex with people, by typing to them. None of this perverted direct-connect wlan group sex with anonymous strangers every time you step out of your faraday cage.
What interests me is the whole idea of a Mac emulator. It is a neat idea, but I've never seen a high demand for a mac emu- at least not the sort of demand that would inspire one to think there is a paying market niche.
OS X on commodity x86 hardware is a bit of a holy grail to many on slashdot. Or so it seems. It actually might be a small but very vocal group of whiners. This next bit might be unfair, but I suspect that many of the people that want OS X on x86 hardware would not be willing to pay for it. So I think you got that part right.
Yet, the case wouldn't really be materially different from the linux/GPL aspects of the SCO case. Just the same old shit, different scammer.
Compensation is not the only possible outcome of a civil complaint.
In this case, a more important outcome would be an injunction compelling ChOS to either comply with the GPL, or cease distribution.
Compensation, if any, is completely secondary and besides the point.
Well, the funny thing is, you really don't have to reverse engineer it. It's already publicly available from other sources.
This should not be construed as a defense of CherryOS. Near as I can tell from the facts we've gotten so far, ChOS has violated copyright and/or* GPL.
*I normally avoid using the "and/or" construction, but I did in this case because I'm slightly confused if someone can violate both at the same time, or if it's one or the other. Seems to me logically to be the later, i.e., that if you don't follow the GPL, then you are in violation of another's copyrights. Can someone clear this up for me? And by someone, I mean someone who can tell their ass from a hole in the ground.
How about freeing up some of your info and posting some personal data, like your social security number, date of birth, passport number (include a jpeg that I can use to print a wallet size picture), credit card info (including expiration dates, security codes, and pins), billing address, etc.
I know you'll do this, because, as you said, you want to support me, since I support your beliefs. It's rather simple, and I know you won't miss it. And by "it", I mean your money and your credit rating.
P2P copyright infringment is not theft. But taking GPL code is "stealing" it.
It gets even more extreme than that. If someone uses code released under a completely different license, say BSD, and doesn't "give anything back" to the posters personal satisfaction, they are considered to be stealing.
A lot of the problem is that there is a natural tendency to side with the little guy against a perceived bully. It's giving favor or support to the underdog. This is all fine and good, but what happens when the underdog is wrong? Do we blindly and unquestioningly support the underdog, even when the underdog has not a leg to stand upon? According to at least a large part of the slashdot population, the answer is yes. The underdog is always right, big bad corporations are always wrong.
So what you're seeing is not hypocrisy so much as an oversimplified and childish world view. To the extent that such views are self serving (and thus, as you contend, hypocritical), I would say that that is the result of immaturity on the part of a large number of posters.
We run into this so often that it's tempting to make generalizations such as "Geeks are immature". A better generalization (because it's a bit more precise) is that "A large and vocal number of geeks on slashdot have a tendency to be immature, and this seems to skew the discussions towards immaturity. (It can get so frustrating that I've gone so far as to take a very immature stance or two myself.)
Is that so? I had wondered, because you bear a striking resemblance to Fred Garvin.
Hey, you're not supposed to actually read or to even understand the GPL here. You're just supposed to bludgeon people with it when they disagree with you. You're not new here; you should be ashamed! =)
The saddest truth is that I'll probably be modded funny (at best) or troll, instead of insightful. =)
You've never heard of contingency fees? Not all lawyers are willing to work on contingency, but many do, and some of those are top lawyers.
Will the next batch of rovers be equipped with windsocks, to measure the direction of the wind?
And what do you call those spinning things to measure airspeed? The ones with four arms with little hemispheric "cups" that catch the wind. KnowwhatImeanVerne?
I don't think I will be able to persuade you, so we'll just have to agree to disagree.
It is my contention, however, that as a member of society you have certain duties and responsibilities to society. While you have a right to be "left alone", at times these duties outweigh that right. If they didn't we wouldn't have society or the benefits of society. It would be every man (woman and child) for himself. I believe in the rights of the individual, but not in an absolute sense. The individual does not exist in a vacuum.
OK, we're not as far apart as I thought, probably due to my own inability to think. We still do have major differences which we probably won't be able to resolve, not because we don't share the same values (approximately), but because we differ on which value takes priority.
To answer your somewhat loaded question, I do believe that Apple has the right to ask the court to compel a third party to give evidence in a civil court case. We know this is a fact of the law, that they have the legal right, but beyond that, I believe in this principle philosophically/ethically. Your right to be "left alone" is outweighed by you duty as a citizen to insure that justice is done.
Do you see our differences and our similarities? I do believe that an individual has a right to be "left alone" and "to do as they see fit (within certain bounds, of course)", but I also believe that there are times when other principles outweigh these rights. And I don't think the weighing and balancing of the priorities of principles, even on a case-by-case basis, in any way hinders our most basic rights. In short, I'm not an absolutist. Nor do I think you are an absolutist. We just have different criteria or preferences for how the law should be exercised and where the lines should be drawn.
In regards to Apple's expectations that an NDA will stop leaks, I think that it's a reasonable expectation, although probably not a completely realistic expectation. Do you see the distinction I'm making here? Of course you do. You basically said the same thing in different words. Furthermore, I don't think Apple, nor the courts, would maintain that, realistically, we can expect that all contracts and agreements will be fulfilled and honored. If this was realistic, we wouldn't have need of the courts to enforce contracts. We'd all be on the honor system, and all commerce would either grind to a halt, or we'd have a perfect society. Now, given that we want to be realistic, which of the two paths do you think society would follow? (Heh heh, and no looking at the back of the book for the answer. I know you can get this on your own. Oh, gee. There I go, being abrasively patronizing again. Sorry. =)) Anyway, I'm guessing we're actually fairly close on this underlying issue, though you might differ on how, when, and if it should be carried out.
Oh, and your mother dresses you funny.
Trade secrets have nothing to do with personal privacy.
You're saying that there is no linkage whatsoever between privacy and trade secrets. It doesn't matter if the original holder of the trade secret is an individual?
Corporations don't have rights. Only people have rights.
I'm afraid you're just plain wrong on that one. Corporations do have rights. That's the way the law is written in the USA. I'm not saying it's right. I'm just saying that's how it is.
d I'm simply suggesting that these things must be considered on a case-by-case basis
You win this time, Nutscrape. [evil laugh] but I'll be back! [disappears in a puff of smoke. or maybe a particularly thick fart cloud]
How did you know that about my mom? =)
OK, I get your point now, at least a little bit. It's still absurd, although less so than what I thought your point originally was.
My contention is still that "keeping a secret" can still be a condition to be met in a contract, and if the condition is not met, that's breaking a contract.
And it's reasonable for both parties to a contract or agreement to expect that the contract or agreement be fulfilled. Otherwise, why do we bother with contracts and agreements?
I do have problems with people being supenaed (coerced to testify) in any way for private wrongs. I believe obstruction of justice or the requirement to give out relevant information should be limited to criminal cases.
OK, that's certainly a valid position to take. I disagree, but you've made a valid point.
But consider this: You witness an car accident in which person dies. The person who you saw cause the accident was not acting criminally in any way, yet, based on what you saw, one party is clearly responsible. You are the only witness.
Do you honestly think you shouldn't be made to testify, if you are unwilling? This would be a non-criminal matter, although the fact that a person died makes it a serious matter.
I mean to suggest that it really isn't so easy to draw the line, as you have, between the court's power of subpoena in either criminal or civil cases.
You're suggesting the use of the "Reagan loophole", which is slightly different than znu's advice of saying the source was anonymous when in fact it wasn't.
It's much harder for someone to prove that you do remember a fact, so in this case perjury would be more difficult to prove. However, you would also have had to told your attorney from the outset that you don't remember, and there better not be any records. If your attorney knows that you actually do remember, then he knows you're committing an act of perjury, and he is legally required as an officer of the court to speak up.
Another weakness in your idea (although I'm not sure how this would play out) is that these people have just claimed they are journalists, as grounds to quash the subpoena. I think you'd be really testing the temper of the judge to claim you're a journalist one day, and then to claim you have a terrible memory for facts and that you keep no notes on the next day.
When a judge finds a person in contempt of court, the penalty is at the judges discretion. You might be fined a small amount of money each day you refuse to testify or you might be fined a larger amount or you might have to spend time in jail until you are willing to testify. I wonder which way the judge will lean if you've insulted him in this manner?
If you replace stolen trade secret with stolen car stereo, you'll see where your argument falls apart. In that case, why should any of the middle men have any expectation of privacy and confidentiality.
Or let's not replace one stolen item with another. Let's use the witness example. Probably more apropos in this particular case, since Apple is not suing the two websites, nor explicitly accusing them of complicity in a crime. If either website knows the identity of a witness to a crime, then they can be compelled to give that information, so that the witness may be questioned.
At any rate, you framed your objection much better here. There's hope for you yet. Either that, or I'm much less cranky after some much needed sleep, and there's some hope for me.
So, basically you're saying that I shouldn't have trusted my 486 and that the value of Pi isn't 3? No wonder my rocket ships all crash!