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User: aristotle-dude

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  1. Re:Different VLC developer accuses FSF of FUD on VLC Developer Takes a Stand Against DRM Enforcement · · Score: 1

    How does DRM place restrictions on it any more than software compiled against a particular framework or in a platform specific exe format? To the end user, they are all the same thing. The recipient does not give a rats ass about the GPL license since it does not apply to the end user at all. It is not an EULA. The end user does not give a crap unless if they are trying to pirate software and the DRM gets in the way of stealing the software.

    The end user just wants to get the paid or free software, download it and sync it with iTunes to their iOS device. End of story.

  2. Re:The summary is wrong. on VLC Developer Takes a Stand Against DRM Enforcement · · Score: 1

    The issue isn't DRM, though. The issue is the Apple terms of service that the end user has to agree to in order to be allowed to use the store. It contained, as of last May, terms incompatible with the GPL (any version). (The terms were changed in June, and appear to no longer contain the incompatible terms).

    Does not matter either the GPL cannot dictate terms of sale in a brick and mortar store so why would it be the case of the app store? The GPL applies only to the developer that packages up/compiles the code into executable form.

    Nobody actually needs VLC. If they really want to be assholes then they can stop distributing their software all together. I'm sure someone can develop an alternative to VLC to fill the void.

  3. GPL v2 is compatible with DRM and the appstore on VLC Developer Takes a Stand Against DRM Enforcement · · Score: 2, Insightful

    The FSF need to stop spreading FUD and outright lies about their own license.

    RMS and his cohorts have done more to damage the general OSS movement with their radical FOSS brand than MSFT did through SCO.

    They are attacking a company that has done more for open source than a lot of companies. Consider their work on Webkit which forms the base of not only Safari but webOS (formerly Palm and how HP), webkit browers on android, Nokia and Blackberry. They also released released Bonjour, Quicktime Streaming Server, the base of OS X (Darwin), CUPS as well as a bunch of contributions to various open source projects. What has RMS done lately other than complain?

    http://www.opensource.apple.com/

    http://www.apple.com/opensource/

    http://developer.apple.com/opensource/

  4. Re:The summary is wrong. on VLC Developer Takes a Stand Against DRM Enforcement · · Score: 1

    The license they chose (GPL version 3) does not give Apple the ability to distribute this software. Had they chosen to stay with GPL Version 2, there would be no problem.

    VLC is under GPLv2, not GPLv3.

    Then there is no problem since the GPL v2 is silent on the issue of DRM. If it is not in the document/agreement then such imaginary terms cannot be enforced after the fact. If they want such terms then they should license under GPL V3 but be prepared to see contributions drop off sharply.

    The GPL v2 does NOT prohibit the use of DRM therefore the VLC people can either relicense under GPL v3 or shut the hell up.

  5. Re:Apple vs OSS on VLC Developer Takes a Stand Against DRM Enforcement · · Score: 2, Interesting

    Is this the final proof that Apple is not compatible with (GPL'ed) OSS?
    I sincerely hope so, because then we can finally lose the fanboys and talk about more interesting stuff here.

    And maybe for those occasions where somebody still has an urge to talk about Apple, we can change the icon into something borg-like, as we have for M$.

    By the way... if only BSD had a GPL license...

    I have a question for you. Do you enjoy using the internet? That TCP/IP that you are using is the ubiquitous "OPEN STANDARD" because the stack was originally released as BSD licensed code. Do you enjoy other OPEN standards? The majority of them exist because they the sample code was licensed as BSD or similar license. FOSS license do NOT encourage creation of OPEN STANDARDS and formats to the same degree as licenses like BSD. Licenses like BSD allow corporations to participate in development and collaboration over standards/protocols including a common compatible implementation while allowing them to use that code in their own software without fear of viral contamination of their own intellectual property.

    The GPL is not the best license to use if you want to further an open standard and interoperability between software platforms and applications. It is only useful if you want to keep it closed within the FOSS community.

  6. Re:Download now? on VLC Developer Takes a Stand Against DRM Enforcement · · Score: 0, Troll

    Apple is the "STORE", not the PUBLISHER. Apple is no more accountable than a brick and mortar store would be if the CD compiler did not include the source code on the CD.

    The company that "PUBLISHED" the app to the App "STORE" is bound by the GPL, not Apple and not me as a end user. I don't give a frak what the lawyers/liars hired by the GNU hippies think. They can eat shit and die for all I care. You cannot be held by the terms of a license that you are not a party to.

  7. Re:Download now? on VLC Developer Takes a Stand Against DRM Enforcement · · Score: 2, Insightful

    Or rather, certain interpretations of GPLv2 say that it allows these restrictions. The wording is unclear and may be understood either way, and "spirit of the license" has no legal weight. GPLv3 merely fixes this ambiguity.

    If a license does not contain the wording, there is nothing to interpret out of it. If the GNU chooses to be assholes, everyone outside of their faithful will hate them for it. There is not such thing as a "SPIRIT" of a "LICENCE". It is not legislation but an agreement created by the original authors for third parties.

  8. Re:DRM is not the (only) issue as far as I can see on VLC Developer Takes a Stand Against DRM Enforcement · · Score: 1

    A license cannot have an intention if it is not spelled out in the wording of the document. It is not a person but a thing.

    There is nothing wrong with DRM. You are allowed to sell GPL'ed software and as long as you provide the source code for download, I don't see a problem. DRM is just a means of verifying that you purchased the software. If you want it for free, get the dev tools, download the source and compile it yourself.

    When you buy GPL'ed software, you are paying for the convenience of having ready to go software in binary form with all of the extra graphics resources which might or might not be part of the source tree. INAL but graphics are not source code and therefore cannot be covered by the GPL as far as I understand it and so cannot be considered "virally" infected with the GPL.

  9. The summary is wrong. on VLC Developer Takes a Stand Against DRM Enforcement · · Score: 1

    The license they chose (GPL version 3) does not give Apple the ability to distribute this software. Had they chosen to stay with GPL Version 2, there would be no problem. If the actual authors of all the code wanted, they could agree to dual license it for distribution on the iOS platform. It is their own damn fault, not Apple's. The person submitting the application new better but deliberately chose to create controversy.

    If all of the contributors agreed, there would be no problem as the GPL does not supersede copyright. It cannot extinguish the copyright of each contributor to the code base. They could simply relicense the iOS code branch under a different license.

    As an end user, I am so pissed at this grandstanding and attempt to entrap that I want to know where I can sign up to sue not only these VLC asswipes but RMS and the GNU for creating such a discriminatory, viral and counter productive license. It does not further the idea of sharing and collaboration. It is an idealogical document.

    Honestly, why should they give a frak if software is distributed in a plain zip file, gzip, encrypted zip, rar, dmg, encrypted DMG or DRM'ed iOS package. It does not matter to the end user and you are allowed to sell GPL'ed software. Dictating how software is package should NOT be a part of the GPL. It is discriminator towards certain platforms and completely counter productive.

    Perhaps RMS and his co-horts should try leaving academia and actually "WORKING" for a living in a company that exists to earn a "PROFIT".

    Let us not forget that the GPL is a license for the CODE and not the binary. It is not an END USER AGREEMENT. What other licenses other than the COMMIE GNU ones dictate how a binary is compiled and packaged? Do other licenses forbid RPM packages or mention anything about the binary? No.

  10. Protest this as a tax payer. on CRTC To Allow Usage-Based Billing · · Score: 1

    Stop giving the government an interest free loan and instead pay only what you owe in taxes at tax time instead of giving them free money and then collecting a refund. Not only will you earn money in interest but you can send a message to the government by hitting them where it hurts.

  11. Re:60GB is nothing on CRTC To Allow Usage-Based Billing · · Score: 2, Informative

    Online petitions do nothing. Send letters to the CRTC, your local MPs and the Prime Ministers office.

    Another idea would be for a lot of people to protest this by requesting your payroll people to stop deducting your income tax, setup an interest bearing account to deposit what you would normally have deducted for tax, sending a letter to the tax people indicating your reason for doing this (as a protest) and paying your taxes at the end of the year instead of every pay period.

    It is legal to not pay your income tax until the end of the year.

  12. Re:Fermi's paradox. on The Galaxy May Have Billions of Habitable Planets · · Score: 1

    Consider: what is more unlikely? That before time there was an infinitely dense concentration of something that burst, creating everything we observe? Or that before time, there was something else that said, "I'll make something today" and created everything we observe?

    Considering that an infinitely dense concentration of anything is the simplest possible structure, I would say that it's, by very far, more probable to happen spontaneously than something complex enough to make a conscious decision to create everything.

    Infinitely dense? Utter nonsense. Nothing in the physical universe can be infinitely dense. All you are doing is taking the concept of an infinitely powerful creator god, renaming it and removing the persona from it to make it sound more scientific but neither concept is "science".

  13. Re:Fermi's paradox. on The Galaxy May Have Billions of Habitable Planets · · Score: 1

    Right. Who or what created God? Who or what created the initial condensation of matter or energy? Even if we could answer either of these, we'd just be going back into a recursive "who created that?". My point was just to show that none of those two possibilities can be ruled out based on logic or reasoning.

    Aren't you assuming that time and causality have to exist? Wouldn't you run in a similar paradox trying to find out when and how time came into being in your universe without a driver? Time and causality could exist merely to facilitate our physical universe and our ability to make sense of our existence. Without time and causality, the universe would be a confusing place.

    If you have an existence before the universe which does not have "time" and god is all there is then your question does not make much sense. Time is construct that we can wrap our tiny brains around while eternity is something that is incomprehensible to us.

  14. Re:Mac... on Beware the Garden of Steven · · Score: 1

    Where is the source for windows? Where can I download it?

    The comment you were replying to is obviously complete rubbish but why is it that whenever someone bashes the Mac for something you end up with people that will quickly compare it to Windows?

    It is compared to windows because windows is the dominant desktop OS and OS X is primarily a desktop OS whereas linux was originally written as a server OS. Even today, desktop linux is way behind because of one reason: commercial software.

    The reasons a lack of commercial software include:

    1. A lack of comprehensive and mandatory base library installs on every distro to allow developers to target linux as a "platform".

    2. A general hostility towards closed source and "paying" for software in the linux "USER" community.

    3. A lack of a clear dominant GUI toolkit available on all distros of linux.

    Both windows and OS X users are willing to "pay" for software and both MSFT and OS X provide a base set of libraries/frameworks/apis which developers can develop against and have a high level of confidence that their software will work on every end user machine.

    The majority of end users just use linux and contribute nothing towards the development of new software or features because they are more attracted to the fact that linux is free "gratis" rather than "free" as is open source.

  15. Re:No more Flash/Java? Gee, wonder why. on Want Flash Player On a MacBook Air? Download It Yourself · · Score: 1

    Care to identify a source for this rumor, or are you just making shit up as you go?

    The internets of course. The internet is one big game of "telephone" where a rumour grows as it passes from one person to the next.

    Steve Jobs said that the app store would be "ONE" way of getting mac software, not the "ONLY" way. To the average joe, it would be a convenient and "safe" way to get software which will not screw up your computer or steal your information. Power users can always go to places like versiontracker or macupdate to get other third party software that install their own frameworks that might or might not introduce instability. There will also always be third party drivers and helper applications distributed outside of the app store as well.

  16. Re:So? on Want Flash Player On a MacBook Air? Download It Yourself · · Score: 1

    Maybe. But it would be tough to get a Dell, HP (etc) without it installed.

    Along with a bunch of other crapware. When ever I get a fresh install of windows at work, I have to download flash because it does not come with "windows".

  17. Re:Cost to support benefit on Gosling Reacts To Apple's Java Deprecation · · Score: 1

    "With oracle now suing every other Java implementation out there", oh please, Oracle is suing one company over Java, and it isn't even clear Google has implemented a Java. You cannot patent a language, it is an abstract idea. They did a clean room implementation, so Oracle can take their (bought) implementation and stick it where the Sun don't shine.

    Sure they can but they cannot call it "JAVA" which is the problem. Google refers to Java all over the place in their documentation.

  18. Re:Cost to support benefit on Gosling Reacts To Apple's Java Deprecation · · Score: 2, Informative

    Really now, stop it with the FUD. Just one of those CPUs costs 568.58 - $683.66 CAD so you are looking at 1100-1300 for the CPUs alone then add the price of 8GB of ram, a 1TB SATA drive, Two Radeon HD 5770, a super drive, two 27" LED backlit display, a USB keyboard and mouse. That will add up to a lot of moola.

    Sure, you could buy cheaper monitors, a pair of Core2Duos CPUs, cheaper ram, cheaper HDs, cheaper CD-ROM drive but then you would be comparing Apples to a piece of crap.

    I have to ask you, why did not include a second ATI card when one could drive both displays and why would you need Apple Cinema displays for a "Workstation"? You artificially inflated the price. You could use a cheaper brand of monitor and only one ATI card.

  19. Re:Mac... on Beware the Garden of Steven · · Score: 1

    was never open.

    The core of OS X is open source. Where is the source for windows? Where can I download it?

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shared_source#Notable_Shared_Source_programs_and_projects Thought that might be relevant.

    That is not the source code to windows and Apple also not only contributes to existing open source projects but has released a number of server technologies as open source. Android would not be what is is today if Apple had not taken KHTML, forked it and created Webkit.

  20. Re:Why no Synaptic for OS X? ..... Or Windows? on Beware the Garden of Steven · · Score: 1

    Because of the tendency of those package managers to screw up systems with dependency hell by destroying the main system installed binary versions. If you think DLL hell is bad, dependency hell is even worse.

    Mac software should store dependencies either in the app package itself or in an Application support folder and NOT interfere with the base install of the OS.

  21. Re:But aren't native apps dying? on Beware the Garden of Steven · · Score: 1

    Crack smoking hippies think so. In reality, Web apps will never, ever replace native apps because some people like to work offline for extended periods of time, need the performance of native code and need OS integration for things like drag and drop between apps.

  22. Re:I have an idea on Beware the Garden of Steven · · Score: 2, Insightful

    Except that of those only Solaris, HP/UX and AIX are actually "real Unix". And OSX is a BSD.

    -uso.

    OS X has a XNU kernel which is a blend of the Mach kernel and some BSD code. It is not strictly a BSD. It also ships with System V branch UNIX code and some GNU userland tools as well as Apple developed tools. OS X is a commercial UNIX both in the trademark sense and that it contains some commercial UNIX code.

  23. Re:Mac... on Beware the Garden of Steven · · Score: 4, Insightful

    was never open.

    I have no idea how an AC was modded +4 Insightful for that tripe. I can sudo in any terminal to gain root access if my account is an administrator. To gain similar access on windows 7, you have to reboot into a special mode otherwise you cannot alter/replace certain system files. All settings on the machine are in accessible plist file. All graphics can be replaced with modded version. Doing similar changes in windows requires accessing a proprietary binary hive database (registry), hacking resources in dll files and then rebooting into the recovery mode to replace the dlls with your hacked version.

    The core of OS X is open source. Where is the source for windows? Where can I download it?

    Apple released the technology they used to build their pro apps as Core Animation and Core video so I have to ask you, where are the apis MSFT uses for their software for third party devs to use? Why don't they update and use the common controls library for their Office and VS.NET products instead of custom built dialogs?

  24. Why is Apple succeeding in a "down" economy? on Verizon Will Sell iPad+MiFi Bundles, Starting Oct 28th · · Score: 1

    I see a lot of people on here complaining about Apple's margins but I have to ask you all, which hardware company is pushing innovation in the tech industry? The answer is Apple. Apple could follow everyone else in the race to the bottom and possibly sell more units if they could find more manufacturing capacity, more IPS displays and more flash memory but even at the current price point, they are selling every unit they can manufacture. Lower margins only benefit the consumer in the short term and you eventually end up with stagnation of innovation. We see this in the PC industry industry to a large extent and even more so in the NETBOOK category. It is 2010 for crying out loud and yet you have netbooks with 1 GB of ram and slow processor for sale. Without any margin, there is no incentive to innovate and no room to "upgrade" specs if everyone is demanding a bottom basement price point. Apple uses their margins to innovate in hardware design and development of OS X and iOS. Without that margin, we never would have seen the iPhone/iPod Touch and iPad or we would have been paying through the nose for those iOS devices and paying hundreds of dollars for every upgrade of OS X.

    People are buying Apple products in the down economy because of their reputation for quality and a high resale value. Sure, you could buy a dell or some Android tablet but it will be obsolete within a year and have almost zero resale value whereas an Apple device is going to be upgradable to the new version of OS for at least a year or two and it will retain a higher resale value because of this.

    I would rather spend my money wisely on something that will last me for year than buy something for less that will be obsolete within a year and I would rather help fund innovation of technology than figuring out how to make a product cheaper.

  25. Re:Nothing you cannot already get. on Verizon Will Sell iPad+MiFi Bundles, Starting Oct 28th · · Score: 1

    Ok. You don't seem to get it. Apple is the largest flash memory consumer in the "WORLD" which means that they can negotiate the lowest price possible which means that they can offer their flash memory based products at a much lower price and still maintain a healthy margin./p>

    Nope, it's still you who's missing the salient point. Apple COULD offer those flash memory products (which contain a lot more than flash memory) at a much lower price than they do, but they choose not to, and they get away with it because of the quality of their design (I admit), the cachet of their brand, and the fact that there are few or no competitors with similar products.

    When there are equivalent competitors, Apple will be forced to lower prices. That's pretty much the only thing that does make them do that.

    If you can't get that, then you're wasting your time fulminating against my opinion. I'm done with this thread, enjoy.

    You are absolutely right. They could be just as stupid as everyone else and sacrifice margin in an attempt for marketshare but what would it gain them? Right now, they cannot manufacture enough units to cover the existing demand. Also, without the margins, who would fund the research and innovation? Have you noticed the stagnation in the PC industry? That is caused by razor thin margins because companies don't have the budgets for R&D for innovation but rather is spent on figuring out how to make things cheaper.

    As a consumer, you are experiencing diminishing returns on the "cheaper" products because they are also of lower quality than they used to be and there is very little change from year to year.

    One only need take a look at the "NETBOOK" segment. Innovation on that front is practically non-existent. They still have machines with 1 GB of ram and slow processors and the reason for that is a low price and almost no margin. There is zero incentive to innovate.

    I choose to buy products from companies that are leading the charge on innovation rather than looking for the cheapest upfront price. I would rather pay more upfront instead of having paid less upfront but paying more after three years of buying mediocre crap with only small improvements.