I'll take a stab at a guess how it works...and if this isn't how it works, I wonder if it would.
-You print the document as normal.
-On the repeat print, the "watermark" image color pattern matches the document you already printed. In essence, you double-up on the toner placed down in particular locations to make the Glossmark image. Viewed straight on, the extra-heavy toner pattern is indistinguishable from the rest of the printing as the color is the same, but the glossy surface is seen when viewed at an angle.
You are assuming, based on stereotypes, that judges will not know what Linux is. No matter what you try to label it as, that is what you are doing.
Nope...read the quote again. It's not an assumption, it's a "safe bet." In other words, the odds show that the judge won't know what Linux is. In another form: When reaching into a bag of 10 dimes and 25 slugs, "It's a safe bet that the token pulled out (averge small claims court judge) is a slug (doesn't know what Linux is.)
How do the honest companies ever stay in business, much less turn a profit?
1. The cynical part of me says that the remaining companies aren't necessarily more honest, they're just better at avoiding getting caught. Or just plain luckier. Or maybe they place more bribes at the right places.
The honest companies don't have to spend millions on litigation brought about by cheating; they don't get caught because they haven't done anything wrong.
I have already done it. All you do is enter your name, address, phone number, and SSN and a helpful representative from the RIAA will contact you in 30-60 days to tell you if they want to prosecute you.
Free-X had been trying to negotiate with Microsoft, and was requesting the release of a "signed" Linux boot loader, which would allow Xbox owners to run the open source operating system without any hardware modifications or the exploitation of the console. Microsoft would not negotiate, group members have told ZDNet Australia.
The EU has no relevance in this issue.
Re:Creation of a blue collar computing segment
on
More Cheap Linux PCs
·
· Score: 4, Insightful
I agree that computer expertise segmented along economic boundaries is a bad thing; the following thought came to mind while I thought about it:
If the working poor are using the cheap PCs and Linux as opposed to the Wintel machines out there, all that practical experience could conceivably serve a grander purpose: "street smart" computer users who with a little more formal training could be sysadmins and jump into the IT sector with the corresponding higher wages.
Being "less educated" with the greater set of "practical skills" is not necessarily a bad thing. When Microsoft advertises its MCSE program, encouraging people with (and I nearly quote) "no computer experience needed!" to apply, I put people with practical skills above those with a zero pervious experience and a nicely framed certification certificate.
It's a simple case of "book smarts" versus "street smarts." "Book smarts" can get you the honors at graduation; "street smarts" get the job done.
At my alma matter, the student lounge (aka "the pit") was probably the safest place to have a laptop--we had one guy who would leave his there ALL DAY and he had no reason to worry about it walking off. No lock, no password--in fact, passersby who knew this guy would frequently surf the web a little bit or check e-mail.
Why? Besides the fact that it was old, we all trusted each other. Even if you didn't know somebody by name, you recognized them from seeing them around the engineering building every day. No need to lock up the laptop, somebody was always there who would keep an eye on it while you went to class, ran to see an instructor, whatever.
The library was another story. You can bet that I kept my laptop tethered to the table, a nearby water pipe, whatever, when I made my rare journeys to the library. Nothing happened in the engineering building; it all happened in the library or on the liberal arts side of campus.
To stray back on topic: get a laptop. Dorm rooms are small enough as it is, and a laptop will save valuable desktop space and allow you to work elsewhere on campus when your roommate is on the verge of driving you batty.
No it wouldn't. The UNIX code allegedly used in Linux would be EVIDENCE that contract term were violated. IIRC, it is this alleged contract terms violation amongst other illegal acts that is at the heart of the suit, not whether there is UNIX code in Linux--a point that seems to have fallen by the wayside. The code is merely evidence; and it is this ghost-like "evidence" that SCO claims to have that is causing SCO to look like a bunch of buffoons. "We have evidence, but we really don't want to show it. But it proves IBM violated our IP."
As I have said before, changing or destroying evidence doesn't change the fact that a crime was committed.
Bryan Ma, senior research manager with IDC for the Asia-Pacific region, said that the PCs could pose a threat to Microsoft for two reasons. HP's decision to preload Linux, which can be distributed for free, allows customers to avoid the cost of a license for Microsoft's Windows operating system. Additionally, with the rampant amount of piracy in Thailand, users could easily purchase the low-cost PCs and install pirated Windows software on them.
I bet that the MS countermove would be to offer to pay the subsidy for the Thai gov't if they instead used Windows machines. The two choices: (1) Use Thai gov't revenue to subsidize the hardware, or (2) Let somebody else pay the subsidy for you for an OS that is far more prevalent.
Being a gov't body where the bottom line is nearly always the major influence, where do you go?
Fixing code doesn't change the suit
on
What if SCO is Right?
·
· Score: 2, Interesting
LINDON, Utah-March 7, 2003-The SCO® Group (SCO) (Nasdaq: SCOX), the owner of the UNIX operating system, announced today that it has filed legal action against IBM (NYSE:IBM) in the State Court of Utah, for misappropriation of trade secrets, tortious interference, unfair competition and breach of contract. The complaint alleges that IBM made concentrated efforts to improperly destroy the economic value of UNIX, particularly UNIX on Intel, to benefit IBM's new Linux services business.
What seems to be fogotten here is what the lawsuit really is about. It is not simply about UNIX code being used in the Linux kernel, as seems to be the opinion of the vocal majority here. The suit alleges that IBM committed breech of contract and misappropriation of trade secrets. The alleged inclusion of UNIX source code by IBM into the Linux kernel is the EFFECT of IBM's alleged actions--it is simply EVIDENCE.
Removing the evidence does not change the fact that a crime was committed. Sure, the Linux kernel could be rewritten as needed if there is UNIX code inside, but then you need to update each and every single machine using the violating kernel and destroy all copies of the kernel that have the code incorporated in them.
Like a sign on my profesor's door says: "Binaries may die, but source code lives forever." If the code is out there, it will be out there forever.
All this talk of securing the memory, link from keyboard to main box, graphics cards, yadda yadda yadda...does this seem a bit over-the-top to anybody? I mean, this all sounds like something that the government would use for electronic warfare countermeasures. How many businesses really need this type of security?
You can try to lock down the system all you want, but as long as there is a screen in use, security can be breeched by a device you can buy in nearly any corner drugstore.
It's called a camera.
If a user has physical access to the machine and access to the data contained therein, no amount of cut-and-paste security features or print prevention is going to stop a malicious, privledged user from whipping out the $5 disposable camera and taking old-fashioned pictures of the screen.
Proper code and secure configurations will prevent outside attacks from obtaining data; it's trusted users that will prevent inside attacks.
One, called "Method, apparatus and system for directing access," describes the use of "hidden frames" to inject javascript onto an unsuspecting user's computer, which can later be used to send the browser to another Web site.
A patent on cyberhijacking?
"The reason the Internet has stalled out so badly is that advertising is a non-profitable segment," he added. The use of "hijacked traffic" is a question of balance, Shuster said, but there has to be effective advertising so "a provider of content can make a reasonable living."
No, the Internet has not "stalled out so badly" despite the waste of bandwidth that obtrusive advertising such as this brings about. Between AdSubtract Pro and Mozilla, at least I won't be affected by your need to destroy the 'Net experience.
"They will be hugely effective," Shuster said. "I apologize in advance to everybody on the Internet who won't be able to surf the Net in quiet anymore."
If you feel the need to apologize, perhaps you need to (1) re-evaluate your actions, or (2) quit lying; if you were sorry, you wouldn't do it.
Then there's the Big Brother issue. When Walker unveiled his plan earlier this year in an off-the-record talk at the fabled TED tech conference, the idea of people-scanning cameras on the Net "creeped everybody out," says one attendee. Walker thinks this is a bogus issue, since cameras will be pointed only to areas where people aren't supposed to be. "I don't see a problem with that," says Marc Rotenberg of the Electronic Privacy Information Center. But Rotenberg worries about whether a future iteration of the system might include facial recognition and other features that could track ordinary people.
And if anybody is caught on camera, it's because they are where they shouldn't be. Don't want to be on camera? Don't go where you shouldn't go!
Microsoft wants to work with hardware vendors earlier, as soon as they create new PC technologies, so that they can synchronize hardware and software development and produce better computers.
The goal is to make Windows-based computers more consistent, easier to navigate and able to provide a better computing experience, Gates said in an e-mail interview.
It sounds like the goal is to homogenize the hardware/OS into a single, unseparable entity via technology--already done in legalese by the MS EULA.
"The PC industry has been incredibly successful over the years, but hardware and software development have sometimes been a little out of sync," he [Gates] said. "The best way to advance the state of the art is to work together even more closely, always starting from the customer's perspective and focusing on the combination of hardware and software that works best to create an innovative and compelling next-generation PC."
That's fine and dandy, but coming from Microsoft, it's a tough pill to swallow. How does buggy, security-hole ridden software come from the customer's perspective? Granted the code is so complex that writing bug-free software is damn near impossible, but I would much prefer that debugging has a higher priority than the addition of new (and largely unused) features.
This just doesn't smell right, but I can't quite decide why without going overboard into MS-bashing.
Why is this newsworthy, other than the fact it's a hardware manufacturer doing this?
I've used Liquid Audio (http://liquid.com/) several times to download tracks to my Windows box. Granted that the tracks are in one of two proprietary formats (liquid audio's format or a.wma file) but I have yet to encounter a track that I couldn't burn to CD from within Liquid's player or WIndows Media. Liquid Audio's player is free for the download or you can get a more capable edition for $20, so that's pretty much a non-issue.
Concerned with DRM and the lack of portability? I am too. I like to listen to my tracks on my desktop and occasionally on my laptop when I'm across campus studying. When I download a track (or several) the first thing I do is burn a CD. You now have an unfettered backup on a CD playable anywhere, plus you can re-rip it to MP3 if so desired.
I've bought several tracks and a few complete albums this way, and the sound quality is quite good (to me, anyway). Here is the audio codec info from one track, "Stealin'" by Uriah Heep: Windows Media Audio V8, 128 kbps, 44 kHz, stereo. Plus I can replace the DRM copy of the track with the non-DRM copy to keep my collection unfettered and completely back-upable.
Maybe it's the music selection I'm missing, or somethign with the integration between the site and the iPod. That very well could be the case, as I've never used an iPod or a modern Mac (last one I used was a 128K Mac where a 20MB hard drive was huge)
Please note that it wasn't the cellphones that caused the crash...it was the terrorists who forced their way into the cockpit that caused the plane to go down.
It was the passengers with cellphones that prevented the plane from crashing to the White House or US Capitol by attempting to overpower the terrorists after they got word from the ground what was happening.
Some time ago it was in the news that Panama had legislation floating about that would require ISPs to block the ports that VoIP used, citing that it would decimate the domestic telephone industry.
It didn't matter whether the traffic had a endpoint in Panama...even traffic passing THROUGH Panama was supposed to be blocked.
To combat camcorder piracy Cinea and Sarnoff will develop methods of encoding films with artifacts that are invisible to the human eye, but play havoc with the electronics of a camcorder.
I suppose that given the natural latency of the human eye, this could work. When I pick up a TV screen in my old-style video camera, the picture has bands of light and dark in to, presumably due to the scan rate of the camera matching the scan rate of the television.
In the movies, when you see a scene with a television in it, why are there no such artifacts? Is it due to shooting with film, camera speed, ?? I would think that adding some sort of latency in a video camera to emulate that of the human eye would render such protection schemes useless.
As expected, the article nor the follow-up links had any information regarding HOW this protection would work (or at least none that I could find).
Privacy in the electronic age has become a massive, intractable paradox. People are terrified about the ability of corporations to track their lives, but the world economy has come to depend upon all-seeing computer systems.
I'm not sure "terrified" is a word I would use..."deeply concerned" yes, but not "terrified". If people were terrified, then people wouldn't use technologies like the Mobil SpeedPass, the I-Pass for Illinois' automated tollbooths, or even credit/debit cards.
People scream for privacy, yet at the same time use online banking, crecit cards, and unencrypted e-mail. It was pointed out in a particular blog that RFID tags such as what Benneton or Michelin have proposed to use are a very deep threat to privacy...amongst other abuses, stalkers could conceivably use the technology to track their victims. While true, it is also unlikely, as tracking would require placing RFID scanners in strategic locations and linking to them. Not impossible, but improbable.
"Dragging all human behavior into the public is literally totalitarian," said Bob Blakely, chief security and privacy scientist for IBM's Tivoli Systems. "If you erode privacy, you erode liberty, because people don't tolerate things going on in front of them that they don't approve of."
I would tend to think that all human behavior is public in some fashion, technology or no. If you do not want your shopping/eating habits known to the general public, then don't shop or eat in public places. Anybody who has sat on a park bench and just watched people go about their lives can tell you a lot about human behavior, since it is so public. It's like the arguement regarding women who wear revealing clothing then get mad when men look at them. If you don't want me looking (note I said look, not leer) at your cleavage, then don't wear the ultra-low cut supertight t-shirt that shows nearly all to the world.
On the other hand, few people really want to restrict the flow of information. Search engines such as Google have made the world a smaller and far more accessible place. Collaboration among researchers on diseases such as SARS (Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome) would be far more difficult without the ability to share patient data rapidly.
Very true. We are a "live in the now" society, wanting what we want when we want it. Instant messaging, downloaded music, instant credit for thos big purchases are such examples of an "immediate need" society. We have a need, we want it fufilled NOW. Not ten minutes from now, not in a few days, but NOW. Remember when eyeglasses took several weeks to get? Now you can walk into a Sterling Optical, get your eyes checked, and, you have your new glasses ready to go home with you.
Ultimately, though, business, government and individuals are going to have to agree to a compromise. Companies will likely have to take consumers' objections more into consideration when it comes to collecting or selling personal data. The legal fees and fines that come with misusing data will also help whip businesses into line, said John Tomaszewski, chief privacy officer at CheckFree, which specializes in payment systems.
Total agreement here. What information I give to you isn't really your information. It is still mine, but I am loaning it to you so you can provide the goods/services I am arranging, and that is it. No more, no less. If I haven't agreed to let you use my information for any other purpose, then you have no permission to do so. In a sense, your personal information is copyrighted (that dreaded word, I know) by you and is only released under your terms.
Am I missing something, or is everybody failing to see the forest with all the trees in the way?
The issue appears to be what to call the stand-alone Mozilla browser. Why not call it simply...
MOZILLA BROWSER?
It's very clear what the product is, conflicts with nobody, and ends all this wasteful bickering. The solution is so frikking simple though that I MUST be missing something.
Microsoft is actively courting id Software for the exclusive console rights to Doom III. According to the article--a feature on current developments in the jaw-dropping PC FPS--the company behind the Xbox is offering an undisclosed amount of money to id in exchange for the right to make their latest game an Xbox-only title as far as consoles are concerned. (It'd still come out on the PC, of course.)
And just where does the OS on most PCs come from?
Yes, the article is short on facts and long on speculation...still, perhaps a more appropriate title would have been "Could Doom III be Microsoft Exclusive?"
Let's pretend for a moment that this really is going on behind the scenes. Does it make sense for id to create software for one console, when there are several choices out there? Microsoft would have to pony up a lot of cash to make up for lost revenue from other consoles, which we are all well aware that they can certainly do.
In a sense, Microsoft would be buying up a monopoly on Doom III. What did Microsoft get a vicious finger-waving from the DoJ for again? Oh yeah, abuse of monopoly power. If this is all going down as told, it appears that Microsoft DID in fact learn a good lesson from the anti-trust trials...the DoJ's bark is worse than its bite.
Yesterday, Microsoft chief technology officer Craig Mundie said the company won't charge companies to participate in the program, despite the word "Premium" in its name. Microsoft will receive a royalty for each copy of CE that is distributed, whether it is altered or not.
If it is altered in a generally useful way, such as to work optimally with a particular processor, Mundie said Microsoft expects the alterer to license the new version back to itself, for free, for incorporation into future versions.
But if it is altered to work particularly in one device, with "value-added engineering," the modifier retains ownership of the changed portions, although it must sublicense a copy to Microsoft.
Microsoft pledges it won't incorporate the changed portions into CE for six months after the modifier begins selling its product. It says it will pay no royalties to such alterers, because "it's of mutual benefit," Mundie said.
So...if I modify WinCE code and redistribute it, I pay a royalty to Microsoft, who gets a royalty-free copy of my work. They turn around and incorporate it into their WinCE code after six months (hmmm...) and redistribute MY code, but royalty-free. How is MS using my code royalty-free "of mutual benefit" again?
Still a one-way royalty stream (towards MS as expected). Why is their code subject to royalty payments but mine isn't?
It's a step in the right direction, but something seems fishy here.
Slashdot Mirror
I'll take a stab at a guess how it works...and if this isn't how it works, I wonder if it would.
-You print the document as normal.
-On the repeat print, the "watermark" image color pattern matches the document you already printed. In essence, you double-up on the toner placed down in particular locations to make the Glossmark image. Viewed straight on, the extra-heavy toner pattern is indistinguishable from the rest of the printing as the color is the same, but the glossy surface is seen when viewed at an angle.
It's just a guess, but it seems to make sense.
You are assuming, based on stereotypes, that judges will not know what Linux is. No matter what you try to label it as, that is what you are doing.
Nope...read the quote again. It's not an assumption, it's a "safe bet." In other words, the odds show that the judge won't know what Linux is. In another form: When reaching into a bag of 10 dimes and 25 slugs, "It's a safe bet that the token pulled out (averge small claims court judge) is a slug (doesn't know what Linux is.)
How do the honest companies ever stay in business, much less turn a profit?
1. The cynical part of me says that the remaining companies aren't necessarily more honest, they're just better at avoiding getting caught. Or just plain luckier. Or maybe they place more bribes at the right places.
The honest companies don't have to spend millions on litigation brought about by cheating; they don't get caught because they haven't done anything wrong.
I have already done it. All you do is enter your name, address, phone number, and SSN and a helpful representative from the RIAA will contact you in 30-60 days to tell you if they want to prosecute you.
Don't you mean when they want to prosecute you?
I would like to point out that the article never mentions Internet Explorer--only the Windows OS.
I don't know much about the program, but I'd wager that the SERVE program is a separate, secure application that uses the Internet to submit the vote.
Free-X had been trying to negotiate with Microsoft, and was requesting the release of a "signed" Linux boot loader, which would allow Xbox owners to run the open source operating system without any hardware modifications or the exploitation of the console. Microsoft would not negotiate, group members have told ZDNet Australia.
The EU has no relevance in this issue.
I agree that computer expertise segmented along economic boundaries is a bad thing; the following thought came to mind while I thought about it:
If the working poor are using the cheap PCs and Linux as opposed to the Wintel machines out there, all that practical experience could conceivably serve a grander purpose: "street smart" computer users who with a little more formal training could be sysadmins and jump into the IT sector with the corresponding higher wages.
Being "less educated" with the greater set of "practical skills" is not necessarily a bad thing. When Microsoft advertises its MCSE program, encouraging people with (and I nearly quote) "no computer experience needed!" to apply, I put people with practical skills above those with a zero pervious experience and a nicely framed certification certificate.
It's a simple case of "book smarts" versus "street smarts." "Book smarts" can get you the honors at graduation; "street smarts" get the job done.
My $b10 for the day.
At my alma matter, the student lounge (aka "the pit") was probably the safest place to have a laptop--we had one guy who would leave his there ALL DAY and he had no reason to worry about it walking off. No lock, no password--in fact, passersby who knew this guy would frequently surf the web a little bit or check e-mail.
Why? Besides the fact that it was old, we all trusted each other. Even if you didn't know somebody by name, you recognized them from seeing them around the engineering building every day. No need to lock up the laptop, somebody was always there who would keep an eye on it while you went to class, ran to see an instructor, whatever.
The library was another story. You can bet that I kept my laptop tethered to the table, a nearby water pipe, whatever, when I made my rare journeys to the library. Nothing happened in the engineering building; it all happened in the library or on the liberal arts side of campus.
To stray back on topic: get a laptop. Dorm rooms are small enough as it is, and a laptop will save valuable desktop space and allow you to work elsewhere on campus when your roommate is on the verge of driving you batty.
No it wouldn't. The UNIX code allegedly used in Linux would be EVIDENCE that contract term were violated. IIRC, it is this alleged contract terms violation amongst other illegal acts that is at the heart of the suit, not whether there is UNIX code in Linux--a point that seems to have fallen by the wayside. The code is merely evidence; and it is this ghost-like "evidence" that SCO claims to have that is causing SCO to look like a bunch of buffoons. "We have evidence, but we really don't want to show it. But it proves IBM violated our IP."
As I have said before, changing or destroying evidence doesn't change the fact that a crime was committed.
Bryan Ma, senior research manager with IDC for the Asia-Pacific region, said that the PCs could pose a threat to Microsoft for two reasons. HP's decision to preload Linux, which can be distributed for free, allows customers to avoid the cost of a license for Microsoft's Windows operating system. Additionally, with the rampant amount of piracy in Thailand, users could easily purchase the low-cost PCs and install pirated Windows software on them.
I bet that the MS countermove would be to offer to pay the subsidy for the Thai gov't if they instead used Windows machines. The two choices: (1) Use Thai gov't revenue to subsidize the hardware, or (2) Let somebody else pay the subsidy for you for an OS that is far more prevalent.
Being a gov't body where the bottom line is nearly always the major influence, where do you go?
LINDON, Utah-March 7, 2003-The SCO® Group (SCO) (Nasdaq: SCOX), the owner of the UNIX operating system, announced today that it has filed legal action against IBM (NYSE:IBM) in the State Court of Utah, for misappropriation of trade secrets, tortious interference, unfair competition and breach of contract. The complaint alleges that IBM made concentrated efforts to improperly destroy the economic value of UNIX, particularly UNIX on Intel, to benefit IBM's new Linux services business.
0 32 73
http://ir.sco.com/ReleaseDetail.cfm?ReleaseID=1
What seems to be fogotten here is what the lawsuit really is about. It is not simply about UNIX code being used in the Linux kernel, as seems to be the opinion of the vocal majority here. The suit alleges that IBM committed breech of contract and misappropriation of trade secrets. The alleged inclusion of UNIX source code by IBM into the Linux kernel is the EFFECT of IBM's alleged actions--it is simply EVIDENCE.
Removing the evidence does not change the fact that a crime was committed. Sure, the Linux kernel could be rewritten as needed if there is UNIX code inside, but then you need to update each and every single machine using the violating kernel and destroy all copies of the kernel that have the code incorporated in them.
Like a sign on my profesor's door says: "Binaries may die, but source code lives forever." If the code is out there, it will be out there forever.
All this talk of securing the memory, link from keyboard to main box, graphics cards, yadda yadda yadda...does this seem a bit over-the-top to anybody? I mean, this all sounds like something that the government would use for electronic warfare countermeasures. How many businesses really need this type of security?
You can try to lock down the system all you want, but as long as there is a screen in use, security can be breeched by a device you can buy in nearly any corner drugstore.
It's called a camera.
If a user has physical access to the machine and access to the data contained therein, no amount of cut-and-paste security features or print prevention is going to stop a malicious, privledged user from whipping out the $5 disposable camera and taking old-fashioned pictures of the screen.
Proper code and secure configurations will prevent outside attacks from obtaining data; it's trusted users that will prevent inside attacks.
"We're going to continue to tweak things, and be responsive to the kind of input we're getting from customers," he said.
The input being cold, hard, cash of course. The more money they get, the more they will "respond."
One, called "Method, apparatus and system for directing access," describes the use of "hidden frames" to inject javascript onto an unsuspecting user's computer, which can later be used to send the browser to another Web site.
A patent on cyberhijacking?
"The reason the Internet has stalled out so badly is that advertising is a non-profitable segment," he added. The use of "hijacked traffic" is a question of balance, Shuster said, but there has to be effective advertising so "a provider of content can make a reasonable living."
No, the Internet has not "stalled out so badly" despite the waste of bandwidth that obtrusive advertising such as this brings about. Between AdSubtract Pro and Mozilla, at least I won't be affected by your need to destroy the 'Net experience.
"They will be hugely effective," Shuster said. "I apologize in advance to everybody on the Internet who won't be able to surf the Net in quiet anymore."
If you feel the need to apologize, perhaps you need to (1) re-evaluate your actions, or (2) quit lying; if you were sorry, you wouldn't do it.
Then there's the Big Brother issue. When Walker unveiled his plan earlier this year in an off-the-record talk at the fabled TED tech conference, the idea of people-scanning cameras on the Net "creeped everybody out," says one attendee. Walker thinks this is a bogus issue, since cameras will be pointed only to areas where people aren't supposed to be. "I don't see a problem with that," says Marc Rotenberg of the Electronic Privacy Information Center. But Rotenberg worries about whether a future iteration of the system might include facial recognition and other features that could track ordinary people.
And if anybody is caught on camera, it's because they are where they shouldn't be. Don't want to be on camera? Don't go where you shouldn't go!
Yes, Virginia, it's really that simple.
Microsoft wants to work with hardware vendors earlier, as soon as they create new PC technologies, so that they can synchronize hardware and software development and produce better computers.
The goal is to make Windows-based computers more consistent, easier to navigate and able to provide a better computing experience, Gates said in an e-mail interview.
It sounds like the goal is to homogenize the hardware/OS into a single, unseparable entity via technology--already done in legalese by the MS EULA.
"The PC industry has been incredibly successful over the years, but hardware and software development have sometimes been a little out of sync," he [Gates] said. "The best way to advance the state of the art is to work together even more closely, always starting from the customer's perspective and focusing on the combination of hardware and software that works best to create an innovative and compelling next-generation PC."
That's fine and dandy, but coming from Microsoft, it's a tough pill to swallow. How does buggy, security-hole ridden software come from the customer's perspective? Granted the code is so complex that writing bug-free software is damn near impossible, but I would much prefer that debugging has a higher priority than the addition of new (and largely unused) features.
This just doesn't smell right, but I can't quite decide why without going overboard into MS-bashing.
OK, so cellphones cause trouble...I've read stories in airplane magezines where cellphones affected small-plane avionics.
BUT...to say "planes and WiFi" don't mix is inappropriate, since:
(a) the article makes no montion of WiFi
(b) WiFi is lower power
(c) Wifi is in the 2400MHz range. CDMA is 1900GHz, GSM is 900/1800/1900MHz, depending on where you are.
CLearly, if Lufthansa felt that WiFi was no threat to avionics, they wouldn't be testing it on international flights OVER WATER.
Why is this newsworthy, other than the fact it's a hardware manufacturer doing this?
.wma file) but I have yet to encounter a track that I couldn't burn to CD from within Liquid's player or WIndows Media. Liquid Audio's player is free for the download or you can get a more capable edition for $20, so that's pretty much a non-issue.
I've used Liquid Audio (http://liquid.com/) several times to download tracks to my Windows box. Granted that the tracks are in one of two proprietary formats (liquid audio's format or a
Concerned with DRM and the lack of portability? I am too. I like to listen to my tracks on my desktop and occasionally on my laptop when I'm across campus studying. When I download a track (or several) the first thing I do is burn a CD. You now have an unfettered backup on a CD playable anywhere, plus you can re-rip it to MP3 if so desired.
I've bought several tracks and a few complete albums this way, and the sound quality is quite good (to me, anyway). Here is the audio codec info from one track, "Stealin'" by Uriah Heep: Windows Media Audio V8, 128 kbps, 44 kHz, stereo. Plus I can replace the DRM copy of the track with the non-DRM copy to keep my collection unfettered and completely back-upable.
Maybe it's the music selection I'm missing, or somethign with the integration between the site and the iPod. That very well could be the case, as I've never used an iPod or a modern Mac (last one I used was a 128K Mac where a 20MB hard drive was huge)
Please note that it wasn't the cellphones that caused the crash...it was the terrorists who forced their way into the cockpit that caused the plane to go down.
It was the passengers with cellphones that prevented the plane from crashing to the White House or US Capitol by attempting to overpower the terrorists after they got word from the ground what was happening.
Some time ago it was in the news that Panama had legislation floating about that would require ISPs to block the ports that VoIP used, citing that it would decimate the domestic telephone industry.
It didn't matter whether the traffic had a endpoint in Panama...even traffic passing THROUGH Panama was supposed to be blocked.
Not sure what happened with that.
To combat camcorder piracy Cinea and Sarnoff will develop methods of encoding films with artifacts that are invisible to the human eye, but play havoc with the electronics of a camcorder.
I suppose that given the natural latency of the human eye, this could work. When I pick up a TV screen in my old-style video camera, the picture has bands of light and dark in to, presumably due to the scan rate of the camera matching the scan rate of the television.
In the movies, when you see a scene with a television in it, why are there no such artifacts? Is it due to shooting with film, camera speed, ?? I would think that adding some sort of latency in a video camera to emulate that of the human eye would render such protection schemes useless.
As expected, the article nor the follow-up links had any information regarding HOW this protection would work (or at least none that I could find).
Privacy in the electronic age has become a massive, intractable paradox. People are terrified about the ability of corporations to track their lives, but the world economy has come to depend upon all-seeing computer systems.
I'm not sure "terrified" is a word I would use..."deeply concerned" yes, but not "terrified". If people were terrified, then people wouldn't use technologies like the Mobil SpeedPass, the I-Pass for Illinois' automated tollbooths, or even credit/debit cards.
People scream for privacy, yet at the same time use online banking, crecit cards, and unencrypted e-mail. It was pointed out in a particular blog that RFID tags such as what Benneton or Michelin have proposed to use are a very deep threat to privacy...amongst other abuses, stalkers could conceivably use the technology to track their victims. While true, it is also unlikely, as tracking would require placing RFID scanners in strategic locations and linking to them. Not impossible, but improbable.
"Dragging all human behavior into the public is literally totalitarian," said Bob Blakely, chief security and privacy scientist for IBM's Tivoli Systems. "If you erode privacy, you erode liberty, because people don't tolerate things going on in front of them that they don't approve of."
I would tend to think that all human behavior is public in some fashion, technology or no. If you do not want your shopping/eating habits known to the general public, then don't shop or eat in public places. Anybody who has sat on a park bench and just watched people go about their lives can tell you a lot about human behavior, since it is so public. It's like the arguement regarding women who wear revealing clothing then get mad when men look at them. If you don't want me looking (note I said look, not leer) at your cleavage, then don't wear the ultra-low cut supertight t-shirt that shows nearly all to the world.
On the other hand, few people really want to restrict the flow of information. Search engines such as Google have made the world a smaller and far more accessible place. Collaboration among researchers on diseases such as SARS (Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome) would be far more difficult without the ability to share patient data rapidly.
Very true. We are a "live in the now" society, wanting what we want when we want it. Instant messaging, downloaded music, instant credit for thos big purchases are such examples of an "immediate need" society. We have a need, we want it fufilled NOW. Not ten minutes from now, not in a few days, but NOW. Remember when eyeglasses took several weeks to get? Now you can walk into a Sterling Optical, get your eyes checked, and, you have your new glasses ready to go home with you.
Ultimately, though, business, government and individuals are going to have to agree to a compromise. Companies will likely have to take consumers' objections more into consideration when it comes to collecting or selling personal data. The legal fees and fines that come with misusing data will also help whip businesses into line, said John Tomaszewski, chief privacy officer at CheckFree, which specializes in payment systems.
Total agreement here. What information I give to you isn't really your information. It is still mine, but I am loaning it to you so you can provide the goods/services I am arranging, and that is it. No more, no less. If I haven't agreed to let you use my information for any other purpose, then you have no permission to do so. In a sense, your personal information is copyrighted (that dreaded word, I know) by you and is only released under your terms.
My two cents for the evening.
Am I missing something, or is everybody failing to see the forest with all the trees in the way?
The issue appears to be what to call the stand-alone Mozilla browser. Why not call it simply...
MOZILLA BROWSER?
It's very clear what the product is, conflicts with nobody, and ends all this wasteful bickering. The solution is so frikking simple though that I MUST be missing something.
Microsoft is actively courting id Software for the exclusive console rights to Doom III. According to the article--a feature on current developments in the jaw-dropping PC FPS--the company behind the Xbox is offering an undisclosed amount of money to id in exchange for the right to make their latest game an Xbox-only title as far as consoles are concerned. (It'd still come out on the PC, of course.)
And just where does the OS on most PCs come from?
Yes, the article is short on facts and long on speculation...still, perhaps a more appropriate title would have been "Could Doom III be Microsoft Exclusive?"
Let's pretend for a moment that this really is going on behind the scenes. Does it make sense for id to create software for one console, when there are several choices out there? Microsoft would have to pony up a lot of cash to make up for lost revenue from other consoles, which we are all well aware that they can certainly do.
In a sense, Microsoft would be buying up a monopoly on Doom III. What did Microsoft get a vicious finger-waving from the DoJ for again? Oh yeah, abuse of monopoly power. If this is all going down as told, it appears that Microsoft DID in fact learn a good lesson from the anti-trust trials...the DoJ's bark is worse than its bite.
Yesterday, Microsoft chief technology officer Craig Mundie said the company won't charge companies to participate in the program, despite the word "Premium" in its name. Microsoft will receive a royalty for each copy of CE that is distributed, whether it is altered or not.
If it is altered in a generally useful way, such as to work optimally with a particular processor, Mundie said Microsoft expects the alterer to license the new version back to itself, for free, for incorporation into future versions.
But if it is altered to work particularly in one device, with "value-added engineering," the modifier retains ownership of the changed portions, although it must sublicense a copy to Microsoft.
Microsoft pledges it won't incorporate the changed portions into CE for six months after the modifier begins selling its product. It says it will pay no royalties to such alterers, because "it's of mutual benefit," Mundie said.
So...if I modify WinCE code and redistribute it, I pay a royalty to Microsoft, who gets a royalty-free copy of my work. They turn around and incorporate it into their WinCE code after six months (hmmm...) and redistribute MY code, but royalty-free. How is MS using my code royalty-free "of mutual benefit" again?
Still a one-way royalty stream (towards MS as expected). Why is their code subject to royalty payments but mine isn't?
It's a step in the right direction, but something seems fishy here.