Only we do it, by paying more for the products advertised. So it is totally bogus to say, that the folks who skip advertising are "stealing". If they bought a can of coke they already payed for the commercial and thus the show.
Also the stations brought this upon them selves, by allowing adverts to become so annoying that nobody wants to see them, and by letting ads totally screw up their program. I don't have a TV anymore, since any films i want to watch i surely don't want to watch on TV. They're hacked to tiny little bits with the best scenes totally fucked up by inconvenient breaks and glaring blaring adverts.
So the "free television" is neither "free", nor is it fun. I really don't care if their business model goes down the drain. I really prefer to hand it over to the MPAA directly than being screwed twice by paying to the MPAA via Coke for the privilege of being served with annoying ads.
Imagine buying that nice chunk of Hardware for $199 and being able to actually do something useful with it... and the best part is, that MS is losing money on every sale. And that project is actually underway.
That only leaves to figure out what to use it for. The thing has an ethernet port, the gameports can probably be used as USB-ports given the right adapters, and there's Video/Audio out...
What is to hinder anyone to provide their own network? Note that MS doesn't just want to provide the network to drive sales of games, they're looking for a source of income too (if we accept that MS is actually loosing money on the consoles, and has a hard time making up for it in sold games, let alone making some actual profit).
But if online networks are profitable, then the software publishers will want their share in that and won't leave it all to microsoft. Microsoft has not yet the leverage to dictate software publishers too rigid conditions, especially if they want said publishers to produce interesting online games for the Xbox, even more so as the puplishers could as well partner with Sony if they don't like MSs conditions.
So since Microsoft has no leverage to press their contracts on publishers like EA, what is to hinder them to draw up their own gaming network and compete with Microsoft? This could become even funnier if MS then got to be at the recieving end of the "being screwed by badly documented and slightly changed protocols" tactics: it's the publishers and programmers of the game that control its interfaces, and they could just do the very same thing to microsoft, that microsoft did to others with the "standard" for "Word".
The consequence of that is, that it's not a good idea to tie your business to Microsoft: either you don't fit in their plans or have an overall bad business idea, then you'll just be left out in the cold, or your idea is working well, and Microsoft would rather make the profit themselves than let you have it, then you'll be screwed too.
If you have a successfull business that totally depends on MS, then sell out as fast as possible before Microsoft makes sure it isn't worth a dime anymore. Even big corporations like AOL have a hard time dealing with MS, a startup wouldn't stand a snowballs chance in hell, they'd be out of business years before they could get any court to listen to them, let alone rule in their favor.
If the schools are successful in ditching M$, they become role models for parents who face the same BSA nonsense at work. (emphasis added by me)
It all sounds like the beginning of a big success story for Open-Source. However most stories are judged by their ending. Even faced by the threat of the BSA audit the schools should take care that the migration goes as smoothly as possible. It would only help Microsoft if some schools became spectacular examples of a failed migration. Being under pressure from the BSA and a tight schedule didn't help here, but now that MS has backed up a bit the schools (that want to migrate, and not face the BSA again) should take a little time to ensure everything goes over as smooth as possible.
Anyway the schools should realize that the BSA-raid may be called off for now, but it can hit them any time in the future (after a little grace period). Only then the BSA will probably pick them one by one to avoid all that publicity (divide and conquer).
That includes anyone at Microsoft, and all those folks who Microsoft showed relevant parts of code or of the API-fundamentals to. And US-security is relying on the slim possibility, that everyone of those large number of people is honouring the NDAs and won't be swayed by any sum of money or geek-status to disclose such critical information.
This implies that Windows- (and thus US-) security relies on: A) everyone who did see the code honouring the NDA B) noone being able to reverse-engineer code/APIs C) noone happening accidentally over one of the huge number of security flaws and telling the wrong people
To summarize, this "security" relies on the fact that noone tried very hard to breach it (or maybe it is already breached, and the russian, chinese and afghanistan (with their C64) spies are happily meeting in US-high-security outfits and plotting to bring the US-economy to a grinding halt by screwing up any US-corporation that relies on MS-software).
If MS-Software is really that flawed the government should demand they fix their software until they can safely present at least their APIs, before they may go on selling any software. Considering how much depends on the security of MS-software that doesn't sound unreasonable to me. To make sure that MS follows those orders they could hold that nice stash of 'em for ransom.
I think it strange, that Dune is absent in this list, IMO it should rank among the top ten. It's definitely better than "Jurassic Park", but maybe i'm the only one who thinks, that a good story outranks special effects.
We have a system called GEMA here in germany, basically they 'tax' blank audio-cassettes (CDs are being figured out), and the money is supposed to go to the artists. The problem is, that the GEMA is a bureaucracy, and most of the money vanishies into supporting itself, so the evident purpose of the GEMA has become, to support itself...
One problem (and the reason why you need a bureaucracy of a kind) is: how to distribute the collected money fairly among the artists, the GEMA invests so much into solving it, that hardly any money is left to distribute, which is also a kind of solution.
Also now they got it into their head, not only to tax blank media, but also CD-Burners, Harddisks and whole PCs, and with significant taxes at that. Naturally the PC-Industry isn't happy with that, so there's some haggling going on (basically the PC Industry is putting it off as long as possible, and argues, they should use DRM-solutions).
Another thing is, that they somehow also get a cut for public concerts (don't know why, but it even applies if you hire some band to play at a family occasion if theyre registered with the GEMA, or cover any registered artist) if there is any artist registered with them (i sure know, that i will only hire local Bands if they're not registered with the GEMA, i prefer to hand them the extra money directly instead of investing it in overhead.
Slashdot is behind closed doors now? This is news to me. Also, while probably a lot of Linux developers read, and some even post here, i don't believe the majority of/. readers to be linux developers.
That would not only mean money for Be, it would also set a precedent and make it easier for other OS-makers to push similar claims through. That would make Microsoft a little more careful applying these business practices, and while that is not much it's at least more than the DoJ did by completely fscking up the case.
Yeah, so what about rubbing the CD in alcohol and insert it "flambee"? Or just a piece of ice formed like a CD? Or a "CD" out of chocolate (white, if you like)? or inserting it with nearly the speed of light? Making it up from quark-matter, or just try and construct a black hole of the right size...
See, i can think up even sillier examples...
but OTOH i could just have a damaged disk that has the same effect as copyprotected media...
They're working at legislation to make circumvention of copy-protection illegal here too. Last i heared it's even worse than the DMCA. The problem is, that those laws are made by the EU, not really following democratic processes (since nobody is looking, and everybody is only concerned about what's going on in their own country), and then the EU-countries have to follow that guidelines. Germany didn't even opt to go for the most consumer-friendly way possible. Hopefully we're spared this being pushed through in a few months (that was the original plan, since we are running late in following that specific EU-guideline) but it will come. Meanwhile the media is completely ignoring the story, apparently it's to complex a subject...
... to prevent them being sued to hell and back? If that happened to me i would sure take it out of their hide and rise a big fuss about it too. Especially in the US of A, where McDonalds has to print "Dangerous: hot beverage" or somesuch on their coffe cups, i'd expect they'll have to make the warning stickers larger than the CD-cover.
Maybe someone can think of a way to make them pay really large for damages (put some important documents on that iMac, claim it was the only copy, and you needed it just that day...) i'd relly like to see the creators of that copyprotection bleed over this. Also i think this should make for a really nasty press story: before it was just some abstract copyprotection that would make one or the other CD not play, but now it's about destroying ones propertywhen attempting to play the CD.
Re:DMCA violation
on
Enigma
·
· Score: 3, Interesting
Interesting enough Hitlers Book "Mein Kampf" ("My Fight") is kind of forbidden in Germany. This is done by using the copyright that lies with Bavaria (one german state), they just insist on their copyright and refuse to print the book. The copyright outside of germany isn't in their control though (i believe it lies with some britain company), so it can be printed elsewhere.
All this is not very effective (there's still some copies about in old attics, most are probably 'imported' from outside) and does more to propagate the book by mystifying it than to avoid it's distribution. It would make far more sense to distribute annotated copies to demonstrate what a load of bullshit the book is (there's an artist reading and commenting selected passages from the book, doing just that).
As for the Horst Wessel Lied: it's forbidden in Germany, performing it in public will get you in trouble (and rightly so), ID-soft replaced it in their german version of Wolfenstein, and even films critical of the 3rd reich will probably run into legal troubles in germany if they include it. Also it's apparently covered by some complex copyrights.
If the folks of the USPTO were in the least responsible for patents they do grant they would be more careful about it, and, when in doubt not grant the patent. This is not about throwing them all in jail, but about motivating them to do their job. At the moment the USPTO profits by granting as many patents as possible and let the courts deal with it (shifting the job of examining the validity of patents to the courts, and the costs to the folks being sued). Since it should be the job of the parent office to examine the validity of patents they should have some motivation to do so. Also they should have some power to make their job possible. This could easily be done if it were possible that they refuse to grant patents on the grounds that the language is too complicated.
It should be obvious, that the current practice of US patent law hurts small businesses and startups most and generally slows down innovation. The only people who win by this are lawyers and scum like PanIP.
It's not the point, if it is innovative, the fact that theirs was a growing business shows, that at least it was a good business idea.
The point here is, that Microsoft wants to control everything they can, if they can't they'll cancel support. As a result of this Microsoft is not a good business partner to have for startups: if you don't have success, well, then they'll dump you (who wouldn't, no problem there), but if you are successful then it might either be against microsofts interests to follow up on that technology, or, if they think it's worth following up, they'll want to do it themselves. In both cases they'll kick you in the back, because if it is to be done, then it's them who want to do it.
Most of the code is probably in the last tarball (20020411) the diff to 20020509 contains the changes (in a reversible form), so it's sufficient to pull the latest diff (especially if you have the latest sources), and do a 'patch -fR -p1' with it to get the 'dlls/quartz' dir which probably contains most of the pulled code. Then you can also draw source-rpms before 20020509. Maybe you can also roll back the CVS-tree (didn't look). The code is still all over the place. Since it's GPL it should be (standard IANAL disclaimer) no problem to pick it up from the original author.
But then there is the question if one should really ignore the authors wishes in that way (OTOH, if you contact him privately, maybe he agrees that development of his work should go on, and feels safe enough from litigation having made the effort to pull the code). The main problem is though: The code will probably become worthless over time if not maintained, so it is not enough to simply put the code back, but there also needs to be someone to maintain and develop it (and take the same risk as the original author to be sued).
Re:Mozilla employs security through obscurity....
on
Mozilla 1.0 RC2 is out
·
· Score: 2
Choosing non-obvious path-names is one security concept (and a very simple one at that) to deflect the most blunt attacks. Any half decent trojan/virus/worm/whatever could either deduce or simply look up the relevant directory (hey, mozilla has to find it too) and then wreak havoc there. Obscuring the Windows directory by renaming it was one security tip for windows (some years ago) AFAIK.
Note, that many attacks are really primitive, and against those blunt attacks simple measures do help, so why not employ them?
Jean-Pierre Petit Les Aventures d'Anselme Lanturlu
on
Comic Book Physics
·
· Score: 2
The subject "comic book physics" reminded me of the books by Jean-Piere Petite. He wrote some really nice and interesting comic books, and i think he really managed to illustrate some (advanced) physics/mathematics concepts (relativity, black holes, magneto-hydrodynamics, topology,...) in his books without confusing his audience with mathematical formulae.
I read the books when i was about two years into studying physics (and they were still interesting), and i wished i'd have read them earlier (maybe about the age of 14 or so). The best thing about the books was, that they would teach you to be curious about nature/mathematics (provided some interest in the subject), and to play with your imagination and new concepts.
There's this website about the book, but apparently it isn't very forthcoming (yet) if you aren't interested in french versions of Anselms adventures. I know there is a german translation of the (originally french) comics (which you can still order at amazon), but couldn't find an english one (maybe there is no one, or the main characters first name isn't "anselm").
This is the real issue: the power microsoft has over you, once you start using their software (and agree to their license in doing so). It's not about Microsoft selling bad software that crashes, it's not about the price of the software in the shop, it's about the price you pay later, when you have to rely on Microsoft to alter their software, when Microsoft presses the rights the license gives them, and when you realize that because of undocumented formats your own documents are yours no longer.
The arguments of that peruvian congressman apply in a much broader sense: it's not only states who can't afford to be subjected to the whims of just one corporation. Also his argument considering costly migration is valid here too: if migration is costly now, well, it will only get worse later, and the more you depend on microsofts continued service, the more they can demand for it.
And finally the schools should realize, that while Microsoft may be nice about it now (in face of an unexpected reactions) the license gives them the right to repeat the exercise any time they want, only then they will probably pick one school after the other (divide and conquer). They are at the mercy of MS, and will continue to be so, as long as they use their software.
It wasn't as if Microsoft had to sieve through the whole of softimage codebase to check for IP-infringement. Is it really asked too much of MS to read the letters and look into the problem?
There wasn't even a reaction from MS until they were dragged into court. When MS bought softimage the responsibilities became theirs, especially after getting cease and desist letters. Ignorance is no way to avoid responsibility, it just doesn't hold up in courts, not even for megacorporations.
So what, we're lied to every day
on
The Magic Box Hoax
·
· Score: 4, Insightful
There's those computercompanies who tell us their "magic boxes" will make our lifes better, or their software. TV-broadcasters ensuring us we couldn't live without watching their Channels every day (makes one wonder what humankind did before the invention of TV), car companies convincing us that we need a car that can drive 150 MPH although there's only very few chances to do so,...
Also there's all these "get rich quick" schemes and whatnot, but what they all have in common: there needs to be someone gullible enough to believe all those smooth lies and greedy enough to act before thinking for the scheme to work. How's this one different from any big corporation selling their product with even bigger lies? Just because it's a single guy instead of a whole corporation thats selling hot air on lies?
If that guy get's sued i'd like to sue all that corporations who told me i could get the hottest women in town just because i wear the right sneakers, drink the correct beverage or drive the right car. Then i have some serious issues with any companies selling XXX-light products because i didn't loose a single pound despite eating tons of the stuff. And then i want a free passage to my plot on the moon.
Where exactly is the difference between a scam and "good advertising"?
P.S. Never play D&D with Physics majors - our DM never gave us wish spells because he knew we'd do stuff like changing fundamental constants of nature - i.e. resetting Planck's constant to 1 - high enough so we could quantum-tunnel through walls and stuff.
If you change the Planck constant to 1 then walls are not your main concern anymore. There probably aren't any walls left after a very short time (sorry, couldn't resist).
Slashdot Mirror
Only we do it, by paying more for the products advertised. So it is totally bogus to say, that the folks who skip advertising are "stealing". If they bought a can of coke they already payed for the commercial and thus the show.
Also the stations brought this upon them selves, by allowing adverts to become so annoying that nobody wants to see them, and by letting ads totally screw up their program. I don't have a TV anymore, since any films i want to watch i surely don't want to watch on TV. They're hacked to tiny little bits with the best scenes totally fucked up by inconvenient breaks and glaring blaring adverts.
So the "free television" is neither "free", nor is it fun. I really don't care if their business model goes down the drain. I really prefer to hand it over to the MPAA directly than being screwed twice by paying to the MPAA via Coke for the privilege of being served with annoying ads.
Imagine buying that nice chunk of Hardware for $199 and being able to actually do something useful with it ... and the best part is, that MS is losing money on every sale. And that project is actually underway.
...
That only leaves to figure out what to use it for. The thing has an ethernet port, the gameports can probably be used as USB-ports given the right adapters, and there's Video/Audio out
What is to hinder anyone to provide their own network? Note that MS doesn't just want to provide the network to drive sales of games, they're looking for a source of income too (if we accept that MS is actually loosing money on the consoles, and has a hard time making up for it in sold games, let alone making some actual profit).
But if online networks are profitable, then the software publishers will want their share in that and won't leave it all to microsoft. Microsoft has not yet the leverage to dictate software publishers too rigid conditions, especially if they want said publishers to produce interesting online games for the Xbox, even more so as the puplishers could as well partner with Sony if they don't like MSs conditions.
So since Microsoft has no leverage to press their contracts on publishers like EA, what is to hinder them to draw up their own gaming network and compete with Microsoft? This could become even funnier if MS then got to be at the recieving end of the "being screwed by badly documented and slightly changed protocols" tactics: it's the publishers and programmers of the game that control its interfaces, and they could just do the very same thing to microsoft, that microsoft did to others with the "standard" for "Word".
The consequence of that is, that it's not a good idea to tie your business to Microsoft: either you don't fit in their plans or have an overall bad business idea, then you'll just be left out in the cold, or your idea is working well, and Microsoft would rather make the profit themselves than let you have it, then you'll be screwed too.
If you have a successfull business that totally depends on MS, then sell out as fast as possible before Microsoft makes sure it isn't worth a dime anymore. Even big corporations like AOL have a hard time dealing with MS, a startup wouldn't stand a snowballs chance in hell, they'd be out of business years before they could get any court to listen to them, let alone rule in their favor.
If the schools are successful in ditching M$, they become role models for parents who face the same BSA nonsense at work. (emphasis added by me)
It all sounds like the beginning of a big success story for Open-Source. However most stories are judged by their ending. Even faced by the threat of the BSA audit the schools should take care that the migration goes as smoothly as possible. It would only help Microsoft if some schools became spectacular examples of a failed migration. Being under pressure from the BSA and a tight schedule didn't help here, but now that MS has backed up a bit the schools (that want to migrate, and not face the BSA again) should take a little time to ensure everything goes over as smooth as possible.
Anyway the schools should realize that the BSA-raid may be called off for now, but it can hit them any time in the future (after a little grace period). Only then the BSA will probably pick them one by one to avoid all that publicity (divide and conquer).
That includes anyone at Microsoft, and all those folks who Microsoft showed relevant parts of code or of the API-fundamentals to. And US-security is relying on the slim possibility, that everyone of those large number of people is honouring the NDAs and won't be swayed by any sum of money or geek-status to disclose such critical information.
This implies that Windows- (and thus US-) security relies on:
A) everyone who did see the code honouring the NDA
B) noone being able to reverse-engineer code/APIs
C) noone happening accidentally over one of the huge number of security flaws and telling the wrong people
To summarize, this "security" relies on the fact that noone tried very hard to breach it (or maybe it is already breached, and the russian, chinese and afghanistan (with their C64) spies are happily meeting in US-high-security outfits and plotting to bring the US-economy to a grinding halt by screwing up any US-corporation that relies on MS-software).
If MS-Software is really that flawed the government should demand they fix their software until they can safely present at least their APIs, before they may go on selling any software. Considering how much depends on the security of MS-software that doesn't sound unreasonable to me. To make sure that MS follows those orders they could hold that nice stash of 'em for ransom.
I think it strange, that Dune is absent in this list, IMO it should rank among the top ten. It's definitely better than "Jurassic Park", but maybe i'm the only one who thinks, that a good story outranks special effects.
We have a system called GEMA here in germany, basically they 'tax' blank audio-cassettes (CDs are being figured out), and the money is supposed to go to the artists. The problem is, that the GEMA is a bureaucracy, and most of the money vanishies into supporting itself, so the evident purpose of the GEMA has become, to support itself ...
One problem (and the reason why you need a bureaucracy of a kind) is: how to distribute the collected money fairly among the artists, the GEMA invests so much into solving it, that hardly any money is left to distribute, which is also a kind of solution.
Also now they got it into their head, not only to tax blank media, but also CD-Burners, Harddisks and whole PCs, and with significant taxes at that. Naturally the PC-Industry isn't happy with that, so there's some haggling going on (basically the PC Industry is putting it off as long as possible, and argues, they should use DRM-solutions).
Another thing is, that they somehow also get a cut for public concerts (don't know why, but it even applies if you hire some band to play at a family occasion if theyre registered with the GEMA, or cover any registered artist) if there is any artist registered with them (i sure know, that i will only hire local Bands if they're not registered with the GEMA, i prefer to hand them the extra money directly instead of investing it in overhead.
Slashdot is behind closed doors now? This is news to me. Also, while probably a lot of Linux developers read, and some even post here, i don't believe the majority of /. readers to be linux developers.
You don't visit LKML very often, do you?
That would not only mean money for Be, it would also set a precedent and make it easier for other OS-makers to push similar claims through. That would make Microsoft a little more careful applying these business practices, and while that is not much it's at least more than the DoJ did by completely fscking up the case.
And then the RIAA wonders why people don't honour their "intellectual property", when they go out and actively seek to destroy other peoples property.
Yeah, so what about rubbing the CD in alcohol and insert it "flambee"? Or just a piece of ice formed like a CD? Or a "CD" out of chocolate (white, if you like)? or inserting it with nearly the speed of light? Making it up from quark-matter, or just try and construct a black hole of the right size ...
...
...
See, i can think up even sillier examples
but OTOH i could just have a damaged disk that has the same effect as copyprotected media
They're working at legislation to make circumvention of copy-protection illegal here too. Last i heared it's even worse than the DMCA. The problem is, that those laws are made by the EU, not really following democratic processes (since nobody is looking, and everybody is only concerned about what's going on in their own country), and then the EU-countries have to follow that guidelines. Germany didn't even opt to go for the most consumer-friendly way possible. Hopefully we're spared this being pushed through in a few months (that was the original plan, since we are running late in following that specific EU-guideline) but it will come. Meanwhile the media is completely ignoring the story, apparently it's to complex a subject ...
No it's not better here in germany, only later.
I mean, they can be used as circumvention devices to copy protected digital content, so the DMCA should apply, no?
... to prevent them being sued to hell and back? If that happened to me i would sure take it out of their hide and rise a big fuss about it too. Especially in the US of A, where McDonalds has to print "Dangerous: hot beverage" or somesuch on their coffe cups, i'd expect they'll have to make the warning stickers larger than the CD-cover.
...) i'd relly like to see the creators of that copyprotection bleed over this. Also i think this should make for a really nasty press story: before it was just some abstract copyprotection that would make one or the other CD not play, but now it's about destroying ones propertywhen attempting to play the CD.
Maybe someone can think of a way to make them pay really large for damages (put some important documents on that iMac, claim it was the only copy, and you needed it just that day
Interesting enough Hitlers Book "Mein Kampf" ("My Fight") is kind of forbidden in Germany. This is done by using the copyright that lies with Bavaria (one german state), they just insist on their copyright and refuse to print the book. The copyright outside of germany isn't in their control though (i believe it lies with some britain company), so it can be printed elsewhere.
All this is not very effective (there's still some copies about in old attics, most are probably 'imported' from outside) and does more to propagate the book by mystifying it than to avoid it's distribution. It would make far more sense to distribute annotated copies to demonstrate what a load of bullshit the book is (there's an artist reading and commenting selected passages from the book, doing just that).
As for the Horst Wessel Lied: it's forbidden in Germany, performing it in public will get you in trouble (and rightly so), ID-soft replaced it in their german version of Wolfenstein, and even films critical of the 3rd reich will probably run into legal troubles in germany if they include it. Also it's apparently covered by some complex copyrights.
If the folks of the USPTO were in the least responsible for patents they do grant they would be more careful about it, and, when in doubt not grant the patent. This is not about throwing them all in jail, but about motivating them to do their job. At the moment the USPTO profits by granting as many patents as possible and let the courts deal with it (shifting the job of examining the validity of patents to the courts, and the costs to the folks being sued). Since it should be the job of the parent office to examine the validity of patents they should have some motivation to do so. Also they should have some power to make their job possible. This could easily be done if it were possible that they refuse to grant patents on the grounds that the language is too complicated.
It should be obvious, that the current practice of US patent law hurts small businesses and startups most and generally slows down innovation. The only people who win by this are lawyers and scum like PanIP.
It's not the point, if it is innovative, the fact that theirs was a growing business shows, that at least it was a good business idea.
The point here is, that Microsoft wants to control everything they can, if they can't they'll cancel support. As a result of this Microsoft is not a good business partner to have for startups: if you don't have success, well, then they'll dump you (who wouldn't, no problem there), but if you are successful then it might either be against microsofts interests to follow up on that technology, or, if they think it's worth following up, they'll want to do it themselves. In both cases they'll kick you in the back, because if it is to be done, then it's them who want to do it.
Most of the code is probably in the last tarball (20020411) the diff to 20020509 contains the changes (in a reversible form), so it's sufficient to pull the latest diff (especially if you have the latest sources), and do a 'patch -fR -p1' with it to get the 'dlls/quartz' dir which probably contains most of the pulled code. Then you can also draw source-rpms before 20020509. Maybe you can also roll back the CVS-tree (didn't look). The code is still all over the place. Since it's GPL it should be (standard IANAL disclaimer) no problem to pick it up from the original author.
But then there is the question if one should really ignore the authors wishes in that way (OTOH, if you contact him privately, maybe he agrees that development of his work should go on, and feels safe enough from litigation having made the effort to pull the code). The main problem is though: The code will probably become worthless over time if not maintained, so it is not enough to simply put the code back, but there also needs to be someone to maintain and develop it (and take the same risk as the original author to be sued).
Choosing non-obvious path-names is one security concept (and a very simple one at that) to deflect the most blunt attacks. Any half decent trojan/virus/worm/whatever could either deduce or simply look up the relevant directory (hey, mozilla has to find it too) and then wreak havoc there. Obscuring the Windows directory by renaming it was one security tip for windows (some years ago) AFAIK.
Note, that many attacks are really primitive, and against those blunt attacks simple measures do help, so why not employ them?
The subject "comic book physics" reminded me of the books by Jean-Piere Petite. He wrote some really nice and interesting comic books, and i think he really managed to illustrate some (advanced) physics/mathematics concepts (relativity, black holes, magneto-hydrodynamics, topology, ...) in his books without confusing his audience with mathematical formulae.
I read the books when i was about two years into studying physics (and they were still interesting), and i wished i'd have read them earlier (maybe about the age of 14 or so). The best thing about the books was, that they would teach you to be curious about nature/mathematics (provided some interest in the subject), and to play with your imagination and new concepts.
There's this website about the book, but apparently it isn't very forthcoming (yet) if you aren't interested in french versions of Anselms adventures. I know there is a german translation of the (originally french) comics (which you can still order at amazon), but couldn't find an english one (maybe there is no one, or the main characters first name isn't "anselm").
This is the real issue: the power microsoft has over you, once you start using their software (and agree to their license in doing so). It's not about Microsoft selling bad software that crashes, it's not about the price of the software in the shop, it's about the price you pay later, when you have to rely on Microsoft to alter their software, when Microsoft presses the rights the license gives them, and when you realize that because of undocumented formats your own documents are yours no longer.
The arguments of that peruvian congressman apply in a much broader sense: it's not only states who can't afford to be subjected to the whims of just one corporation. Also his argument considering costly migration is valid here too: if migration is costly now, well, it will only get worse later, and the more you depend on microsofts continued service, the more they can demand for it.
And finally the schools should realize, that while Microsoft may be nice about it now (in face of an unexpected reactions) the license gives them the right to repeat the exercise any time they want, only then they will probably pick one school after the other (divide and conquer). They are at the mercy of MS, and will continue to be so, as long as they use their software.
It wasn't as if Microsoft had to sieve through the whole of softimage codebase to check for IP-infringement. Is it really asked too much of MS to read the letters and look into the problem?
There wasn't even a reaction from MS until they were dragged into court. When MS bought softimage the responsibilities became theirs, especially after getting cease and desist letters. Ignorance is no way to avoid responsibility, it just doesn't hold up in courts, not even for megacorporations.
There's those computercompanies who tell us their "magic boxes" will make our lifes better, or their software. TV-broadcasters ensuring us we couldn't live without watching their Channels every day (makes one wonder what humankind did before the invention of TV), car companies convincing us that we need a car that can drive 150 MPH although there's only very few chances to do so, ...
Also there's all these "get rich quick" schemes and whatnot, but what they all have in common: there needs to be someone gullible enough to believe all those smooth lies and greedy enough to act before thinking for the scheme to work. How's this one different from any big corporation selling their product with even bigger lies? Just because it's a single guy instead of a whole corporation thats selling hot air on lies?
If that guy get's sued i'd like to sue all that corporations who told me i could get the hottest women in town just because i wear the right sneakers, drink the correct beverage or drive the right car. Then i have some serious issues with any companies selling XXX-light products because i didn't loose a single pound despite eating tons of the stuff. And then i want a free passage to my plot on the moon.
Where exactly is the difference between a scam and "good advertising"?
P.S. Never play D&D with Physics majors - our DM never gave us wish spells because he knew we'd do stuff like changing fundamental constants of nature - i.e. resetting Planck's constant to 1 - high enough so we could quantum-tunnel through walls and stuff.
If you change the Planck constant to 1 then walls are not your main concern anymore. There probably aren't any walls left after a very short time (sorry, couldn't resist).