Ideally, the law should codify what is right and wrong, in as many cases as possible (there will always be exceptions). So while it should not depend on the law, it should certainly be reflected by the law.
NO!
The law should codify only what is necessary for people to get along together in one world. Ethics should not be even brought up; they are irrelevant, except in the practical case.
The law is not about what is right and wrong. Or even what is moral and immoral. It is about keeping society functioning. What makes it possible for you to walk around without worrying about the safety of your life, limb, and property. It makes sure you pay the costs of your actions, good or bad, right or wrong, legal or illegal. And none of those categories necessarily overlap.
The moment the law starts to be based on what is 'right' and what is 'wrong' we start having trouble. Always
Ah, but what if, by releasing it as Open Source you could get it to influence technology on a global scale, but you couldn't by releasing it in a closed-source model? What would you do then?
(And it should be pointed out that quite a few people do make a living writing Open Source software, and if you can create something great you most certainly will be able to get someone to pay you to work on it.)
The point of the article is that OSS has greater leverage than closed-source. Not really new, but neat to see documented.
And a Kia costs less than a Lexus. You could buy a 486 on ebay. A $380 computer is going to be crap.
Sure it is. So? The point is that Apple does not compete in that market, and shows no interest in doing so. There are a lot of people I would recommend a $380 computer too, because they don't need anything more. (Well, they might need to run a current version of Word...) Apple is intentionally keeping itself out of that market, which can be a gateway market into faster computers.
This may be a good business choice, but it is definitely a limiting one.
1: The pinstripes have been fading since the introduction of OS X, and are already completely missing in 10.3. (At least in the menu/title bars. There are a couple of places where they still exist, almost subliminally.)
2: Blue is a standard (and default) highlight color on Macs, since before OS X, and almost all of the places that are shown blue could well be highlighted in those screenshots.
It really looks almost the same as my current desktop, with the single exception of the reverse-color 'Apple' menu, and squared-off corners on the menubar. (And discounting the new features, of course.) I don't see what you are talking about.
Actually, that was my problem with this law: It required porn to be sold. It made it illegal to post porn without selling it. (Or, at least, taking a credit card and checking that it was valid. Close enough, since the easiest way to do that is to charge money to it.)
Basically, it outlawed open-source porn. If you had something you wanted to put up, for free, with protections, it was illegal.
There are better ways to do this protection than requiring everyone who posts a risque story or photo to become a small business. There are filter products out there, or self-rating services, or...
I've been using Spamassassin for several years at home. I've got it set so it lets through about 10 spam emails a week. (On a semi-bad week.)
I normally have in the range of 2-10 false positives a year, just about all of them automated replies of one sort or another. (Webcards, emailed receipts, that sort of thing.)
Oh, I get around 60-150 spam emails a day. (Lately it has been going down. I used to get 150 a day quite regularly.)
By the way, what ever happened to those rumors about IBM making the new processors for Macs? Those ever pan out?
IBM made the G3's (which Apple just recently took out of their iBook line.) and makes the G5's, which are in Apple's current desktop line.
When was this that this idiot thought Apple would never release a computer with an IBM processor in it? Apple and IBM have been working together on processors since the mid 90's.
Re:What does your average user need with 3 gigs/da
on
Comcast Gets Tough on Spam
·
· Score: 3, Insightful
Serving their own (popular) web page? Hosting a busy mailing list for some obscure interest? Doing both at once?
I'm sure Slashdot has put more than 3gigs load on some of the websites it has linked to. Many are hosted out of somebody's basement. (Ok, so that is a one-day load.)
Do you really have to be a business to need to send stuff to other people?
I feel I should mention assembly was the one class where I ever turned in a program that was my first draft, and that I had never tried running myself. (And yes, it ran for the teacher. I was not surprised.)
Now, my classmates could never quite seem to get theirs to work right...
While I learned assembly, and found it useful for learning to understand exactly how the machines think, I'm not sure I agree with his basic premise. Namely, that great code (code that is well designed for it's job, and easy to work with and under) is always the efficient code, in machine terms.
The machine thinks one way. A human thinks in another. Code that is well designed for easy updating, and extending, is code that is easy for a human to understand. If that is not the most efficient way for the machine to do it, that may be the price for 'great' code in this project. (The ideal balance depends on the project, of course. A kernel should be machine-efficient, for example.)
...So now we only need to bribe a few people from each party to rig an election. Say, at two or three polling places...
I'm not saying that you don't have good points. The point is at that level of paranoia I can't think of any secure solution.
Verified electronic voting, with a good selection of random recounts, is as secure and reliable as paper voting. Maybe more so, if the type of problems Florida had can be reckoned into the accounting...
In theory you could, but only if you are either starting from scratch, or have a good tool to convert them into a format you can use.
(Oh, and there are programs to edit PDFs like Word files.)
But that's not the point I was making. I was making the point that they are perfectly normal file formats, and I see no good reason to dis-include them from a list of such. (And plenty to include them.)
'.doc' and '.ppt' are the two of the three (with Excel being the other) most important file-formats to support. (Actually, you could probably list each version of DOC and the rest. It's not like MS ever releases a new version that can be read in the old...)
Those are what businesses use everyday, and have thousands/millions of documents in. If your desktop platform doesn't support them, you're business doesn't work these days.
Just out of curiosity, what do you think of my standard disclaimer:
This email copyright the author. Unless otherwise noted, you
are expressly allowed to retransmit, quote, or otherwise use
the contents for non-commercial purposes. This copyright will
expire 5 years after the author's death, or in 30 years,
whichever is longer, unless such a period is in excess of
local copyright law.
I see a fair number of replies saying this is illegal, but I'm not so sure.
Of course, signing them up without asking and demanding they pay you would be illegal. But that's not really what you are talking about...
You are talking about something I've seen two pieces of mail doing this week: sending a sign-up contract that looks like a bill, and when they pay it providing the service. If they don't pay, well you were only offering. If they do, you have a customer...
(Of course, I'd like to add this if you ever try it: DIE SCUM!)
In general, lower than Diesel. Higher on a nitrate oxides, but the total lack of sulfates allow some scrubbers to be used that aren't otherwise possible. (Not that the average user is likely to install them...)
I find the most unsettling part of Perl is that I always thought scripting languages should be easy to learn: a limitation that makes them poorly suited to large or complex projects. And on the other end of the spectrum, an industrial-strength language should take years to learn properly but once mastered you can build the universe.
So, which is the unsettling part; that Perl is an industrial-strength language that is easy to learn (at least learn usably), or that Perl is a scripting language that is suited to large and complex projects?
Laws are not meant to be a guide to ethics, at least not in most modern states. (Religious states are a different mater.) They are there to keep society running smoothly. To protect a person's rights to property and life, and the pursuit of both. (Or whatever the state has decided it wants to protect the pursuit of.)
You can be unethical and law-abiding, in fact should be both, if your actions do not impair anyone else's right to live their life. You can be a criminal and ethical if you do something that disrupts others but is an ethical action.
Messing this one up is one of the biggest mistakes any country can make. It was the point of US's separation of church and state. Unfortunately we seem to be forgetting it...
Slashdot Mirror
NO!
The law should codify only what is necessary for people to get along together in one world. Ethics should not be even brought up; they are irrelevant, except in the practical case.
The law is not about what is right and wrong. Or even what is moral and immoral. It is about keeping society functioning. What makes it possible for you to walk around without worrying about the safety of your life, limb, and property. It makes sure you pay the costs of your actions, good or bad, right or wrong, legal or illegal. And none of those categories necessarily overlap.
The moment the law starts to be based on what is 'right' and what is 'wrong' we start having trouble. Always
Could this be used in a spam filter? A somewhat adaptive whitelist?
Not that it would solve anything, but it could be useful...
And did you know about either of these rules before the articles hit /.?
These both sound like average goofs, for a company that's grown fast enough to not need financiers.
Hey, I remember being fingerprinted in second grade, in school, specifically for some file or other. Those are probably still someplace.
Ah, but what if, by releasing it as Open Source you could get it to influence technology on a global scale, but you couldn't by releasing it in a closed-source model? What would you do then?
(And it should be pointed out that quite a few people do make a living writing Open Source software, and if you can create something great you most certainly will be able to get someone to pay you to work on it.)
The point of the article is that OSS has greater leverage than closed-source. Not really new, but neat to see documented.
Sure it is. So? The point is that Apple does not compete in that market, and shows no interest in doing so. There are a lot of people I would recommend a $380 computer too, because they don't need anything more. (Well, they might need to run a current version of Word...) Apple is intentionally keeping itself out of that market, which can be a gateway market into faster computers.
This may be a good business choice, but it is definitely a limiting one.
1: The pinstripes have been fading since the introduction of OS X, and are already completely missing in 10.3. (At least in the menu/title bars. There are a couple of places where they still exist, almost subliminally.)
2: Blue is a standard (and default) highlight color on Macs, since before OS X, and almost all of the places that are shown blue could well be highlighted in those screenshots.
It really looks almost the same as my current desktop, with the single exception of the reverse-color 'Apple' menu, and squared-off corners on the menubar. (And discounting the new features, of course.) I don't see what you are talking about.
Yes
Actually, that was my problem with this law: It required porn to be sold. It made it illegal to post porn without selling it. (Or, at least, taking a credit card and checking that it was valid. Close enough, since the easiest way to do that is to charge money to it.)
Basically, it outlawed open-source porn. If you had something you wanted to put up, for free, with protections, it was illegal.
There are better ways to do this protection than requiring everyone who posts a risque story or photo to become a small business. There are filter products out there, or self-rating services, or...
For a little more complicated, here's my spamassassin-relevent rules from .procmailrc (Note I've got actions I'm not currently using.):
:0c
:0 /dev/null
:0fw
:0
:0
:0fw
| spamc
# Marks extreme spam, and handls one of several ways.
:0
* ^X-Spam-Level: \*\*\*\*\*\*\*\*\*
{
#First report it as spam to the athorities.
| spamassassin -r
#
# For complete deletion...
#
#
# Remove markup...
# | spamassassin -d
#
# For sending to the FTC
# ! uce@ftc.gov
# For when checking highspam...
$MAILDIR/.caughtspam.highspam/
}
:0
* ^X-Spam-Status: Yes
$MAILDIR/.caughtspam/
I've been using Spamassassin for several years at home. I've got it set so it lets through about 10 spam emails a week. (On a semi-bad week.)
I normally have in the range of 2-10 false positives a year, just about all of them automated replies of one sort or another. (Webcards, emailed receipts, that sort of thing.)
Oh, I get around 60-150 spam emails a day. (Lately it has been going down. I used to get 150 a day quite regularly.)
IBM made the G3's (which Apple just recently took out of their iBook line.) and makes the G5's, which are in Apple's current desktop line.
When was this that this idiot thought Apple would never release a computer with an IBM processor in it? Apple and IBM have been working together on processors since the mid 90's.
Serving their own (popular) web page? Hosting a busy mailing list for some obscure interest? Doing both at once?
I'm sure Slashdot has put more than 3gigs load on some of the websites it has linked to. Many are hosted out of somebody's basement. (Ok, so that is a one-day load.)
Do you really have to be a business to need to send stuff to other people?
I didn't say they weren't. I just said they should be considered as 'real' file formats, because the ability to read them matters.
I feel I should mention assembly was the one class where I ever turned in a program that was my first draft, and that I had never tried running myself. (And yes, it ran for the teacher. I was not surprised.)
Now, my classmates could never quite seem to get theirs to work right...
While I learned assembly, and found it useful for learning to understand exactly how the machines think, I'm not sure I agree with his basic premise. Namely, that great code (code that is well designed for it's job, and easy to work with and under) is always the efficient code, in machine terms.
The machine thinks one way. A human thinks in another. Code that is well designed for easy updating, and extending, is code that is easy for a human to understand. If that is not the most efficient way for the machine to do it, that may be the price for 'great' code in this project. (The ideal balance depends on the project, of course. A kernel should be machine-efficient, for example.)
...So now we only need to bribe a few people from each party to rig an election. Say, at two or three polling places...
I'm not saying that you don't have good points. The point is at that level of paranoia I can't think of any secure solution.
Verified electronic voting, with a good selection of random recounts, is as secure and reliable as paper voting. Maybe more so, if the type of problems Florida had can be reckoned into the accounting...
In theory you could, but only if you are either starting from scratch, or have a good tool to convert them into a format you can use.
(Oh, and there are programs to edit PDFs like Word files.)
But that's not the point I was making. I was making the point that they are perfectly normal file formats, and I see no good reason to dis-include them from a list of such. (And plenty to include them.)
'.doc' and '.ppt' are the two of the three (with Excel being the other) most important file-formats to support. (Actually, you could probably list each version of DOC and the rest. It's not like MS ever releases a new version that can be read in the old...)
Those are what businesses use everyday, and have thousands/millions of documents in. If your desktop platform doesn't support them, you're business doesn't work these days.
Of course, that is for desktop platforms...
Just out of curiosity, what do you think of my standard disclaimer:
I see a fair number of replies saying this is illegal, but I'm not so sure.
Of course, signing them up without asking and demanding they pay you would be illegal. But that's not really what you are talking about...
You are talking about something I've seen two pieces of mail doing this week: sending a sign-up contract that looks like a bill, and when they pay it providing the service. If they don't pay, well you were only offering. If they do, you have a customer...
(Of course, I'd like to add this if you ever try it: DIE SCUM!)
In general, lower than Diesel. Higher on a nitrate oxides, but the total lack of sulfates allow some scrubbers to be used that aren't otherwise possible. (Not that the average user is likely to install them...)
So, which is the unsettling part; that Perl is an industrial-strength language that is easy to learn (at least learn usably), or that Perl is a scripting language that is suited to large and complex projects?
How about Slash? It runs the little site you are on right now... (There are others too. Take a good look through Google.)
NO!
Laws are not meant to be a guide to ethics, at least not in most modern states. (Religious states are a different mater.) They are there to keep society running smoothly. To protect a person's rights to property and life, and the pursuit of both. (Or whatever the state has decided it wants to protect the pursuit of.)
You can be unethical and law-abiding, in fact should be both, if your actions do not impair anyone else's right to live their life. You can be a criminal and ethical if you do something that disrupts others but is an ethical action.
Messing this one up is one of the biggest mistakes any country can make. It was the point of US's separation of church and state. Unfortunately we seem to be forgetting it...