If there was nothing to push against, what would cause something to be held back and "ripple" as if there were some sort of repulsive force?
Not really related to the ripple they are talking about in the article, but "repulsive force" doesn't require something to push against. When students first learn of Newton's third law, "for every action, there's an opposite and equal reaction", teachers often give as an example that when you push against a wall, the wall pushes against you. That gives the idea to students that there must be something to push back against you (don't feel bad, some early rocket scientists thought the same thing). That is, however, not true. You don't need something to push against, you just need to exert a force in one direction, and there will be a a force in the opposite direction.
Because of this misconception, it was originally thought that rockets wouldn't work in space, because the exhaust they put out wouldn't be able to push against the atmosphere. But hey, they do!
Let's say we've reached the edge of the universe, what happens when we step beyond that boundary? What is out there that would possibly hold back further expansion of our universe?
Gravity. There's an attractive force between every object with mass. When you jump, you move away from the center of the earth, but only for a short time. You accelerate up, but then you start decelerating. You reach a maximum height, then you start accelerating back down. During the big bang, the universe started expending. It was originally thought that there would be a "big crunch", and the universe would stop expanding, than start collapsing towards the center. Then we discovered the universe was not only not slowing down in it's expansion, but actually accelerating. That made no sense, so Dark Energy was used to explain it (a force like gravity, but pushing outwards). Under that scenario, the universe would end not through a big crunch, but would simply become dark as suns die and black holes evaporate. If we don't need Dark Energy, maybe the big crunch theory will come back.
the legal limit on commercials for every hour of programming in the US is 20 minutes; in the UK it's 7 minutes
Actually, there's no legal limit on commercials in the US except for Children's programming. They had dropped that limit too, but it got reintroduced in the Children's Television Act of 1990.
At my university, this Linux computer we use for some experiments require that some kernel modules get loaded when the experiments are being run, and unloaded when they're finished. So, one must become root to perform these functions.
The geniuses decided that it was a pain to type 'su' and a password each time (or even using sudo). So they started using root as their main account. And yes, that machine is connected to the 'net, because they like to be able to ssh into it from outside, and because every once in a while, they even browse from it.
So given my experience, I have no idea why you've been modded flamebait, other that someone found your classification of these users as "incompetent," "idiots," and "morons" offensive. I can't find more suitable terms myself.
this has been known for 3 months and there are still no patches available from microsoft? According to windows update, I'm fully patched, according to their test page, IE is still vulnerable. I think that's even worse than it being a new vulnerability.
Lucky me that I use firefox, and just got IE out to try out that test. And don't give me stuff about "turn off activeX" or some bs like that. The point is, how many non-tech savvie people think they're safe because they've done what we told them to do and kept their computers patched?
Finding humor in tragic situations isn't necessarily being insensitive, you know. Humor is used to relieve tension. People often joke about mistakes they make, what they're afraid of, and about death.
If he were in the middle of the disaster area laughing at the survivors and how they lost all they had, well, I'd call him an insensitive bastard and knock some sense into him. As it is, the joke he made was humorous and I laughed even though I was saddened by what happened...that is, until I saw you being a dumbass and taking him seriously.
What I want is some way to spend more of my time awake, instead of wasting 8 hours a day sleeping.
Maybe you could use some drug that will help you read articles before complaining about their content. Their focus is the same as yours.
Among its [the Pentagon's] aims: to develop stimulants capable of keeping soldiers awake, alert and effective for as long as seven days straight. The armed forces have taken leading roles in testing modafinil and donepezil as performance enhancers for pilots and soldiers.
What happens when you don't sleep? Among other things, you find it difficult to focus and concentrate. These drugs aim to allow you to continue alert and focused without sleeping for long periods of time, and as expected, you can focus even more if you take them in a natural state.
Some of these may be available for consumption as early as 2008 (in some form, most likely not as powerful as you want them). I'd be wary of side-effects before you take these things and start sleeping once a week though.
Look, it's another sample of one who thinks that his behavior is typical.
Look, it's another idiot who thinks that because people use a tool for illegal purposes, those who use it legitimately should have their right to do so taken away from them.
Because the pitiful post you link to fail to account for the fact that power consumption per MIPS tend to decrease. Probably not as fast as the MIPS increase, but definitely close. I had a 400W PSU for my first 286, and I still have one for my P4.
You had a 400 W power supply for your 286?? Are you sure it wasn't 40? That's closer to the number of what I had on my 386
Giving you the benefit of the doubt, your 400W was definitely not being used by the processor. The 80286 processor requires 3 Watts (5 volts at 600 mA). In comparison, the pentium 4 requires about 55 watts.
You're right though, his link didn't account for decreasing power consumption. That's because he's assuming an "ideal computer" with power requirements much lower than even your 286. As the text says, the numbers given have NOTHING to do with technology, "they are the maximum that thermodynamics will allow...until computers are built from something other than matter and occupy something other than space".
A hypothetical particle that travels faster than light is a Tachyon and according to wikipedia, "some strange properties have been attributed" to them. They definitely haven't been proven, and in fact their existance would cause problems with our understanding of several things. You may have seen something related to that, or something else that "appears" to violate that limit but no one is challenging the speed of light in normal space for particles that have positive mass right now. Not to say that they won't...as you've mentioned, our understanding of how things work has been challenged and replaced with new theories many, many times, but the above link doesn't use relativity, it uses the law of thermodynamics to prove a point and, as Einstein has said, "[Thermodynamics] is the only physical theory of universal content which, within the framework of the applicability of its basic concepts, I am convinced will never be overthrown," and it wasn't even his theory.
Pretty much the only hope you have to violate the concepts in that link is to hope what the author suggested happens, that is a computer not made of any matter.
"Wouldn't it be great if you all improved Visual Studio or whatever for us free of charge between releases and then wouldn't it be cool if we kept your improvements and then sell them in our next version of Visual Studio."
I'm not sure that is a standard definition of Open Source Development.
Actually, assuming they keep the whole development source open and not just snippets that need to be improved, and assuming they don't yank it out from under us using some ridiculous license once they start selling, there's just nothing wrong with that. "Free" software doesn't mean "free as in beer" and open source doesn't necessarily mean free software either. There's plenty of open source projects out there with non-gpl compatible licenses, but I'd still call them "open".
Of course, the freer the better. That still has nothing to do with whether they sell the improvements in their next version of the product or not, even if it IS GPL. I hope they do since the only way others follow suit is if the model proves to be profitable.
He's either a troll, or he tried to be sarcastic and failed, but either way don't take him seriously. He's quoting Colonel Jessep from "A Few Good Men". Even if you're not familiar with the play, you should be familiar with Jack Nickolson's "You can't handle the truth!" speech from the movie. Specifically:
Jessep: "I'll answer the question. You want answers?"
Kaffee: "I think I'm entitle to them."
Jessep: "You want answers??"
Kaffee: "I want the truth!"
Jessep: "You can't handle the truth! Son, we live in a world that has walls, and those walls have to be guarded by men with guns. Who's going to do it? You? You, Lieutenant Weinberg? I have a greater responsibility than you can possibly fathom. You weep for Santiago, and you curse the Marines. You have that luxury. You have the luxury of not knowing what I know--that Santiago's death, while tragic, probably saved lives, and my existance, while grotesque and incomprehensible to you, saves lives. You don't want the truth because deep down in places you don't talk about at parties, you want me on that wall--you need me on that wall. We use words like 'honor', 'code', loyalty'. We use those words as the backbone of a life spent defending something. You use them as a punch line. I have neither the time nor the inclination to explain myself to a man who rises and sleeps under the blanket of the very freedom that I provide and then questions the manner in which I provide it. I would rather that you just said 'thank you' and went on your way. Otherwise, I suggest you pick up a weapon and stand the post. Either way, I don't give a damn what you think you're entitled to!"
Jessep is a Colonel stationed at Guantanamo, and those are the walls he's talking about. Don't want to give much more info about it, you should see it. It's a good movie, go watch it, and stop feeding the troll.
You have taken my meaning out of context and used as fuel for an invalid argument based on the semantics of the word "stealing"
Err...he used sarcasm to point out that your use of the word "stealing" is wrong. Just because two things are illegal, it doesn't mean there's no difference between two crimes. Let me see how you like it if I do it. "Look...he took money from that bank. He's loitering!" He tried to explain to you that what he did with your quote was plagiarizing it, not stealing it. You can't steal quotes, you can't steal movies (unless you rob a store and take the dvd).
Stealing something and copying a copyrighted material are two completely different crimes. Just because it's done with movies via the net instead of with books via xerox machines doesn't give you the right to give it a new term.
...to support an out of date and largely ignored point of view that getting things for free helps commerce.
Out of date and largely ignored? You don't get free samples of food at the supermarkets you shop? You don't get aol cd's giving you 1000 free hours (or however many they're giving these days. Free samples are EVERYWHERE. You must hook the customer so he can start buying your stuff. I just got a free 12-month subscription of sports illustrated. Really, this isn't a hypothetical example, I did. I would never buy sports illustrated, but it's free, and it's here at the house, so I read it. Maybe in 12 months I'll start to like it, who knows?
It would have been more productive if you had decided to infer the meaning from my post that I clearly meant to convey.
When arguing, you can do two things. You can show someone where they are wrong, and you can, (pay attention, this is important), show them a different point of view. He showed a different point of view and I think it was an effective enough argument.
But since I'm right about the situation
That's great. I'm going to claim that I'm right now, ok? Will that settle the discussion, and will you accept my side? Don't reply again saying that you're right, that's just going to cause me to have to reply once more to say that I'm right, and...damn, this is messing with my head, where will it stop???
you wouldn't really do that because disagreeing with the fact that breaking intellectual property laws is healthy for commerce would require you to be illogical and therefore irrelavent.
Now you're getting it. Sometimes the breaking of these intellectual property laws IS healthy for the commerce, you're right. Seriously though, it serves as a free sample, which causes the person to decide that the movie they thought was going to be horrible is actually worth seeing it in the theatre, where the quality doesn't freaking suck. Like others pointed out, it also helps to increase the quality of the movies in hollywood, because people stop paying for bad movies, since they know it's bad ahead of time. It keeps the pressure on for the movie industry to do some quality control on their stuff.
Perfect quality videos would be a bit worse, although not by much. There's still the "This is a great, I want to see it in the big screen" factor, as well as the whole atmosphere of a movie theatre. DVD's offer stuff that's not pirated like special features, and the nice little case. I own 220+ dvd's (it's been a while since I counted), and I'm a college student. Imagine how many I would have if I had more funds. I've also downloaded movies, but I can honestly say that not a single movie I downloaded and liked has not been bought or is not on the list of my monthly movie to buy. Heck, it hasn't even stopped me from renting, much less going to the theatre or buying.
Here's how it is. Try and argue these points:
Does piracy hurt? It depends, it can. Does piracy help? It depends, it can. Should piracy be illegal? It already is, why are you complaining? Should piracy be treated as th
I think this would be a great place to link all your Fahrenheit 9/11 torrents!
Michael Moore doesn't own the rights to the movie, Harvey and Bob Weinstein do. Even if Michael Moore doesn't care if his movie is pirated, I'm pretty sure the distributors do. At best, this can put your conscience at rest but it definitely doesn't mean you can start hosting the illegal copy in your website and expect not to get a cease and desist.
Yeah, I know, torrents are different, and slashdot isn't responsible for what we post. You, however, seem to be thinking that it's now legal to download F911 when saying, "I am quite pleased by Moore's decision to broaden his audience by allowing free downloads of the film." He's not really allowing them, he's just saying he doesn't morally disagree with the practice.
It was a good translation...the spirit was there, if not the grammer. However, since I had trouble as well, I'll try to improve on the original job. Notice I say improve rather than replace, I'll just correct the grammer:)
In regards to the demands of the national and international press, that empathizes with the Brazilian Government in this moment without precendent in our history, in which the director of an important public institution of this country is personally attacked by those interested in maintaining a homeogenic model, I will, after discussing the matter with my lawyers and federal prosecutors, attest that the judicial action taken against me is, by itself, so insulting and without merit that it does not deserve a response.
On the other hand, I would like to maintain that the move to software that protects the values of openess and freedom is, to the Brazilian Government, something intimately connected to the democratic principle. And because we have come through a long and difficult road to reach our current level of democracy in this country, we will not surrender in our battle.
If democracy is an ideal, it is never insignificant. If democracy is a dream, it is a dream this country will never wake up from.
The future is free.
I have an even greater respect for the original translator now. Although I'm fluent in both languages, it's quite difficult to make direct translations (I guess I just never have to).
Go and live in Zimbabwe or Uganda for six months, then complain about bad government.
Ok, we're not as bad off as other places. Can you name other countries that you'd choose to live in instead of Zimbabwe or Uganda?
You think the police, or racism, are bad in the USA? Try living in South America!
Where exactly in South America? I'm not familiar with every country in there, but naming the entire freaking continent as racist offends me. I lived in Brazil for most of my childhood, and when I moved to the US the very first thing I noticed at school was that during lunch hour, the tables were automatically segregated. There are all these whites eating together, there are all these blacks eating together...I had no idea where I should try to sit, I had never seen such a thing. Does racism exist in Brazil? Yes, it does...but it's not even a 10th of what I've seen here. After seeing that, I finally noticed for the first time that my father's yearbook containing absolutely no one that was not white (my father's American, I was born in Brazil).
On the other side, the US is a great country, and the very fact that there are so many people complaining of the government's actions proves that...There's nothing more democratic than different views (not that I know any different, Brazil is just as democratic, and Brazilians complain about their government quite often).
Furthermore, when Americans say that the US is the greatest country in the world...I find that great. Not because I think it's literraly true, but because I think that patriotism is something to be proud of, and the love for your country will only make people work harder to make it everything they want it to be. You'll hear no complaints from me whenever anyone claims the US is great, awesome, the land of the free. I just don't want to hear this bashing of other countries, and all of this, "we're the only free country in the world, and everyone hates us for it" crap.
Oh and shoot the person that came up with the holochamber idea. These guys are out exploring space and the best they can do for excitement is do fantasy games indoors? Losers.
So...someone invents this machine. In it, you can do whatever you want, be anywhere. Yes, it's all fantasy, but it feels as real as if you were actually there. The computer is smart enough to create new stories for you that you don't know ending of, you can interact with people that act and feel real...You think they could do better for entertainment??
I think if we ever invent the thing, we'll have real issues getting anything accomplished. The only industry that will survive is the industry supplying power to the holodeck, and the only payment people will want is time on the holodeck. Food? Holodeck is linked to replicators, you can eat whatever you want. Exploring space? No one would want the real thing, they'd do that on the holodeck, where it'll be full of exciting things, without any of the problems, boredom, or danger.
Then again, they did explore that problem with TNG also, with Barclay's addiction to the thing.
So do you still think we're the only ones who "matter"?
Actually...yes, I do. Don't get me wrong, If you take a look at my sig, I don't prentend to guarantee my opinion on any subject to be the only correct one, in fact, I say they're biased (which would lead it to be incorrect often, depending on how strongly I feel about something). However, before you dismiss me completely, let me explain my reasoning, and you may agree with me or not, I welcome you to make up your own mind.
PHBs see articles about things all the time. Everytime there's a press release on the benefits of Open Source, it doesn't mean that all companies running windows will switch to Linux the next day because they heard it's better. Vice-versa for article claiming Microsoft's model is the way to go and Linux shops.
So what will happen is...they'll see this press release once. Ask their professionals about it (that would be us), who will tell them that this is a bunch of BS. If they see minor media attention to it, they'll believe us, and forget about the subject within the week.
Now, if Linus makes a big deal about it and they get more publicity...well, given their lack of knowledge on the subject, it really boils down to an advertising war. They start seeing this a lot in the press, they start getting worried...and then our opinion is suddenly not that valuable anymore, after all, we're not lawyers, we're zealots. It suddenly looks like Linus is worried, and is on the defensive...he must have something to hide!!!
Now, I would agree with you that something needs to be done if they continue getting press regardless. However, I think their claims are so outrageous that unless we start reacting, the media won't touch them. After all, the media only likes to publish controversial articles when it actually does cause a stir...articles without an audience don't generate money.
What Linus _should_ do is write a well-thought-out rebuttal and get it into the major news outlets to let everyone know how ridiculous these claims are.
I don't think Linus should bother. As it is, everyone who matters can see how ridiculous that is. If Linus places a rebuttal in major news outlets, it'll give credibility to these people (or at least more public controversy, as they will post a response themselves, then Linus will have to reply, and this will continue to go on fueling publicity for Brown's book). They WANT people to take them seriously and reply. They're powerless if we don't.
Really...I'd just rather see Linus's usual witty replies in a board somewhere, definitely not in a major news outlet. It won't give them fuel to their campaign and I'll be able to laugh, perhaps as much as I laughed after reading their press release.
I completely agree with you on your first statement. Code libraries are often not helpful because you are most of the time maintaining something others have written.
I completely agree with you that the parts of a code library that are most likely to be reusable are known and published algorithms. That and other trivial things is pretty much all I have in my code library.
Then you went and drew two conclusions that were completely different from the ones I drew out of the same facts we both agree with.
First you say "code libraries aren't that helpful" in the title. No, they won't be a significant portion of the code you right for the new company, but they're helpful enough in preventing you from reinventing the wheel every single time. Do I really want to rewrite everything I use again and again everytime I need it? Heck, I find them very helpful in preventing me from doing that.
Second, you say "it's probably wrong to take something you were specifically paid to produce for one company along with you to another, so don't do it." It's not that black and white, and it really depends on what exactly is in that code library (ethically at least. IANAL so I couldn't tell you legally). Without question, only code you wrote yourself is ethical for you to take with you. Other than that, in my opinion anything not directly related to the project you were working on is fair game. How likely is it that you're not going to be using certain primitives in your new job? How likely is it that if you write it again from scratch it will be different? You're just saving time, not giving away company secrets (which would be unethical)
Why must you tease me with your promise of screenshots? Gets me every time...
I'm always fooled into this false sense of security based on the fact that no one really rtfa's, and click on the link, only to find the slashdotting effect has forced me to go work instead of look at pretty pictures.
I'm really interested in Theora, so I've done some looking around trying to get some more information. Theora, from the faq, is a superset of the VP3 codec. I couldn't find much more information on what it is specifically that they improved on.
The VP3 codec has one major drawback in my opinion. It's designed to keep a constant quality without paying attention to the file size. You can do constant bitrate on it, but you can't use multiple pass encoding with variable bitrates to get that balance of quality while having strict file size control (as with xvid). Is this something that is being added to Theora, does anyone know?
Experts attribute the downfall to the rehashing of old stories over and over again, as well as the exageration of "EVERYthing because it makes for more entertaining reading."
Slashdot Mirror
Not really related to the ripple they are talking about in the article, but "repulsive force" doesn't require something to push against. When students first learn of Newton's third law, "for every action, there's an opposite and equal reaction", teachers often give as an example that when you push against a wall, the wall pushes against you. That gives the idea to students that there must be something to push back against you (don't feel bad, some early rocket scientists thought the same thing). That is, however, not true. You don't need something to push against, you just need to exert a force in one direction, and there will be a a force in the opposite direction.
Because of this misconception, it was originally thought that rockets wouldn't work in space, because the exhaust they put out wouldn't be able to push against the atmosphere. But hey, they do!
Let's say we've reached the edge of the universe, what happens when we step beyond that boundary? What is out there that would possibly hold back further expansion of our universe?Gravity. There's an attractive force between every object with mass. When you jump, you move away from the center of the earth, but only for a short time. You accelerate up, but then you start decelerating. You reach a maximum height, then you start accelerating back down. During the big bang, the universe started expending. It was originally thought that there would be a "big crunch", and the universe would stop expanding, than start collapsing towards the center. Then we discovered the universe was not only not slowing down in it's expansion, but actually accelerating. That made no sense, so Dark Energy was used to explain it (a force like gravity, but pushing outwards). Under that scenario, the universe would end not through a big crunch, but would simply become dark as suns die and black holes evaporate. If we don't need Dark Energy, maybe the big crunch theory will come back.
Actually, there's no legal limit on commercials in the US except for Children's programming. They had dropped that limit too, but it got reintroduced in the Children's Television Act of 1990.
The geniuses decided that it was a pain to type 'su' and a password each time (or even using sudo). So they started using root as their main account. And yes, that machine is connected to the 'net, because they like to be able to ssh into it from outside, and because every once in a while, they even browse from it.
So given my experience, I have no idea why you've been modded flamebait, other that someone found your classification of these users as "incompetent," "idiots," and "morons" offensive. I can't find more suitable terms myself.
Lucky me that I use firefox, and just got IE out to try out that test. And don't give me stuff about "turn off activeX" or some bs like that. The point is, how many non-tech savvie people think they're safe because they've done what we told them to do and kept their computers patched?
Excellent poster, will reply to again. :)
Finding humor in tragic situations isn't necessarily being insensitive, you know. Humor is used to relieve tension. People often joke about mistakes they make, what they're afraid of, and about death.
If he were in the middle of the disaster area laughing at the survivors and how they lost all they had, well, I'd call him an insensitive bastard and knock some sense into him. As it is, the joke he made was humorous and I laughed even though I was saddened by what happened...that is, until I saw you being a dumbass and taking him seriously.
Maybe you could use some drug that will help you read articles before complaining about their content. Their focus is the same as yours.
Among its [the Pentagon's] aims: to develop stimulants capable of keeping soldiers awake, alert and effective for as long as seven days straight. The armed forces have taken leading roles in testing modafinil and donepezil as performance enhancers for pilots and soldiers.
What happens when you don't sleep? Among other things, you find it difficult to focus and concentrate. These drugs aim to allow you to continue alert and focused without sleeping for long periods of time, and as expected, you can focus even more if you take them in a natural state.
Some of these may be available for consumption as early as 2008 (in some form, most likely not as powerful as you want them). I'd be wary of side-effects before you take these things and start sleeping once a week though.
Look, it's another idiot who thinks that because people use a tool for illegal purposes, those who use it legitimately should have their right to do so taken away from them.
You had a 400 W power supply for your 286?? Are you sure it wasn't 40? That's closer to the number of what I had on my 386
Giving you the benefit of the doubt, your 400W was definitely not being used by the processor. The 80286 processor requires 3 Watts (5 volts at 600 mA). In comparison, the pentium 4 requires about 55 watts.
You're right though, his link didn't account for decreasing power consumption. That's because he's assuming an "ideal computer" with power requirements much lower than even your 286. As the text says, the numbers given have NOTHING to do with technology, "they are the maximum that thermodynamics will allow...until computers are built from something other than matter and occupy something other than space".
A hypothetical particle that travels faster than light is a Tachyon and according to wikipedia, "some strange properties have been attributed" to them. They definitely haven't been proven, and in fact their existance would cause problems with our understanding of several things. You may have seen something related to that, or something else that "appears" to violate that limit but no one is challenging the speed of light in normal space for particles that have positive mass right now. Not to say that they won't...as you've mentioned, our understanding of how things work has been challenged and replaced with new theories many, many times, but the above link doesn't use relativity, it uses the law of thermodynamics to prove a point and, as Einstein has said, "[Thermodynamics] is the only physical theory of universal content which, within the framework of the applicability of its basic concepts, I am convinced will never be overthrown," and it wasn't even his theory.
Pretty much the only hope you have to violate the concepts in that link is to hope what the author suggested happens, that is a computer not made of any matter.
Does 3CPO look frigging silver in those pictures??
"Wouldn't it be great if you all improved Visual Studio or whatever for us free of charge between releases and then wouldn't it be cool if we kept your improvements and then sell them in our next version of Visual Studio."
I'm not sure that is a standard definition of Open Source Development.
Actually, assuming they keep the whole development source open and not just snippets that need to be improved, and assuming they don't yank it out from under us using some ridiculous license once they start selling, there's just nothing wrong with that. "Free" software doesn't mean "free as in beer" and open source doesn't necessarily mean free software either. There's plenty of open source projects out there with non-gpl compatible licenses, but I'd still call them "open".
Of course, the freer the better. That still has nothing to do with whether they sell the improvements in their next version of the product or not, even if it IS GPL. I hope they do since the only way others follow suit is if the model proves to be profitable.
Jessep: "I'll answer the question. You want answers?"
Kaffee: "I think I'm entitle to them."
Jessep: "You want answers??"
Kaffee: "I want the truth!"
Jessep: "You can't handle the truth! Son, we live in a world that has walls, and those walls have to be guarded by men with guns. Who's going to do it? You? You, Lieutenant Weinberg? I have a greater responsibility than you can possibly fathom. You weep for Santiago, and you curse the Marines. You have that luxury. You have the luxury of not knowing what I know--that Santiago's death, while tragic, probably saved lives, and my existance, while grotesque and incomprehensible to you, saves lives. You don't want the truth because deep down in places you don't talk about at parties, you want me on that wall--you need me on that wall. We use words like 'honor', 'code', loyalty'. We use those words as the backbone of a life spent defending something. You use them as a punch line. I have neither the time nor the inclination to explain myself to a man who rises and sleeps under the blanket of the very freedom that I provide and then questions the manner in which I provide it. I would rather that you just said 'thank you' and went on your way. Otherwise, I suggest you pick up a weapon and stand the post. Either way, I don't give a damn what you think you're entitled to!"
Jessep is a Colonel stationed at Guantanamo, and those are the walls he's talking about. Don't want to give much more info about it, you should see it. It's a good movie, go watch it, and stop feeding the troll.
Err...he used sarcasm to point out that your use of the word "stealing" is wrong. Just because two things are illegal, it doesn't mean there's no difference between two crimes. Let me see how you like it if I do it. "Look...he took money from that bank. He's loitering!" He tried to explain to you that what he did with your quote was plagiarizing it, not stealing it. You can't steal quotes, you can't steal movies (unless you rob a store and take the dvd).
Stealing something and copying a copyrighted material are two completely different crimes. Just because it's done with movies via the net instead of with books via xerox machines doesn't give you the right to give it a new term.
Out of date and largely ignored? You don't get free samples of food at the supermarkets you shop? You don't get aol cd's giving you 1000 free hours (or however many they're giving these days. Free samples are EVERYWHERE. You must hook the customer so he can start buying your stuff. I just got a free 12-month subscription of sports illustrated. Really, this isn't a hypothetical example, I did. I would never buy sports illustrated, but it's free, and it's here at the house, so I read it. Maybe in 12 months I'll start to like it, who knows?
It would have been more productive if you had decided to infer the meaning from my post that I clearly meant to convey.
When arguing, you can do two things. You can show someone where they are wrong, and you can, (pay attention, this is important), show them a different point of view. He showed a different point of view and I think it was an effective enough argument.
But since I'm right about the situation
That's great. I'm going to claim that I'm right now, ok? Will that settle the discussion, and will you accept my side? Don't reply again saying that you're right, that's just going to cause me to have to reply once more to say that I'm right, and...damn, this is messing with my head, where will it stop???
you wouldn't really do that because disagreeing with the fact that breaking intellectual property laws is healthy for commerce would require you to be illogical and therefore irrelavent.
Now you're getting it. Sometimes the breaking of these intellectual property laws IS healthy for the commerce, you're right. Seriously though, it serves as a free sample, which causes the person to decide that the movie they thought was going to be horrible is actually worth seeing it in the theatre, where the quality doesn't freaking suck. Like others pointed out, it also helps to increase the quality of the movies in hollywood, because people stop paying for bad movies, since they know it's bad ahead of time. It keeps the pressure on for the movie industry to do some quality control on their stuff.
Perfect quality videos would be a bit worse, although not by much. There's still the "This is a great, I want to see it in the big screen" factor, as well as the whole atmosphere of a movie theatre. DVD's offer stuff that's not pirated like special features, and the nice little case. I own 220+ dvd's (it's been a while since I counted), and I'm a college student. Imagine how many I would have if I had more funds. I've also downloaded movies, but I can honestly say that not a single movie I downloaded and liked has not been bought or is not on the list of my monthly movie to buy. Heck, it hasn't even stopped me from renting, much less going to the theatre or buying.
Here's how it is. Try and argue these points:
Does piracy hurt? It depends, it can. Does piracy help? It depends, it can. Should piracy be illegal? It already is, why are you complaining? Should piracy be treated as th
Michael Moore doesn't own the rights to the movie, Harvey and Bob Weinstein do. Even if Michael Moore doesn't care if his movie is pirated, I'm pretty sure the distributors do. At best, this can put your conscience at rest but it definitely doesn't mean you can start hosting the illegal copy in your website and expect not to get a cease and desist.
Yeah, I know, torrents are different, and slashdot isn't responsible for what we post. You, however, seem to be thinking that it's now legal to download F911 when saying, "I am quite pleased by Moore's decision to broaden his audience by allowing free downloads of the film." He's not really allowing them, he's just saying he doesn't morally disagree with the practice.
In regards to the demands of the national and international press, that empathizes with the Brazilian Government in this moment without precendent in our history, in which the director of an important public institution of this country is personally attacked by those interested in maintaining a homeogenic model, I will, after discussing the matter with my lawyers and federal prosecutors, attest that the judicial action taken against me is, by itself, so insulting and without merit that it does not deserve a response.
On the other hand, I would like to maintain that the move to software that protects the values of openess and freedom is, to the Brazilian Government, something intimately connected to the democratic principle. And because we have come through a long and difficult road to reach our current level of democracy in this country, we will not surrender in our battle.
If democracy is an ideal, it is never insignificant. If democracy is a dream, it is a dream this country will never wake up from.
The future is free.
I have an even greater respect for the original translator now. Although I'm fluent in both languages, it's quite difficult to make direct translations (I guess I just never have to).
Ok, we're not as bad off as other places. Can you name other countries that you'd choose to live in instead of Zimbabwe or Uganda?
You think the police, or racism, are bad in the USA? Try living in South America!
Where exactly in South America? I'm not familiar with every country in there, but naming the entire freaking continent as racist offends me. I lived in Brazil for most of my childhood, and when I moved to the US the very first thing I noticed at school was that during lunch hour, the tables were automatically segregated. There are all these whites eating together, there are all these blacks eating together...I had no idea where I should try to sit, I had never seen such a thing. Does racism exist in Brazil? Yes, it does...but it's not even a 10th of what I've seen here. After seeing that, I finally noticed for the first time that my father's yearbook containing absolutely no one that was not white (my father's American, I was born in Brazil).
On the other side, the US is a great country, and the very fact that there are so many people complaining of the government's actions proves that...There's nothing more democratic than different views (not that I know any different, Brazil is just as democratic, and Brazilians complain about their government quite often).
Furthermore, when Americans say that the US is the greatest country in the world...I find that great. Not because I think it's literraly true, but because I think that patriotism is something to be proud of, and the love for your country will only make people work harder to make it everything they want it to be. You'll hear no complaints from me whenever anyone claims the US is great, awesome, the land of the free. I just don't want to hear this bashing of other countries, and all of this, "we're the only free country in the world, and everyone hates us for it" crap.
So...someone invents this machine. In it, you can do whatever you want, be anywhere. Yes, it's all fantasy, but it feels as real as if you were actually there. The computer is smart enough to create new stories for you that you don't know ending of, you can interact with people that act and feel real...You think they could do better for entertainment??
I think if we ever invent the thing, we'll have real issues getting anything accomplished. The only industry that will survive is the industry supplying power to the holodeck, and the only payment people will want is time on the holodeck. Food? Holodeck is linked to replicators, you can eat whatever you want. Exploring space? No one would want the real thing, they'd do that on the holodeck, where it'll be full of exciting things, without any of the problems, boredom, or danger.
Then again, they did explore that problem with TNG also, with Barclay's addiction to the thing.
Actually...yes, I do. Don't get me wrong, If you take a look at my sig, I don't prentend to guarantee my opinion on any subject to be the only correct one, in fact, I say they're biased (which would lead it to be incorrect often, depending on how strongly I feel about something). However, before you dismiss me completely, let me explain my reasoning, and you may agree with me or not, I welcome you to make up your own mind.
PHBs see articles about things all the time. Everytime there's a press release on the benefits of Open Source, it doesn't mean that all companies running windows will switch to Linux the next day because they heard it's better. Vice-versa for article claiming Microsoft's model is the way to go and Linux shops.
So what will happen is...they'll see this press release once. Ask their professionals about it (that would be us), who will tell them that this is a bunch of BS. If they see minor media attention to it, they'll believe us, and forget about the subject within the week.
Now, if Linus makes a big deal about it and they get more publicity...well, given their lack of knowledge on the subject, it really boils down to an advertising war. They start seeing this a lot in the press, they start getting worried...and then our opinion is suddenly not that valuable anymore, after all, we're not lawyers, we're zealots. It suddenly looks like Linus is worried, and is on the defensive...he must have something to hide!!!
Now, I would agree with you that something needs to be done if they continue getting press regardless. However, I think their claims are so outrageous that unless we start reacting, the media won't touch them. After all, the media only likes to publish controversial articles when it actually does cause a stir...articles without an audience don't generate money.
I don't think Linus should bother. As it is, everyone who matters can see how ridiculous that is. If Linus places a rebuttal in major news outlets, it'll give credibility to these people (or at least more public controversy, as they will post a response themselves, then Linus will have to reply, and this will continue to go on fueling publicity for Brown's book). They WANT people to take them seriously and reply. They're powerless if we don't.
Really...I'd just rather see Linus's usual witty replies in a board somewhere, definitely not in a major news outlet. It won't give them fuel to their campaign and I'll be able to laugh, perhaps as much as I laughed after reading their press release.
I completely agree with you that the parts of a code library that are most likely to be reusable are known and published algorithms. That and other trivial things is pretty much all I have in my code library.
Then you went and drew two conclusions that were completely different from the ones I drew out of the same facts we both agree with.
First you say "code libraries aren't that helpful" in the title. No, they won't be a significant portion of the code you right for the new company, but they're helpful enough in preventing you from reinventing the wheel every single time. Do I really want to rewrite everything I use again and again everytime I need it? Heck, I find them very helpful in preventing me from doing that.
Second, you say "it's probably wrong to take something you were specifically paid to produce for one company along with you to another, so don't do it." It's not that black and white, and it really depends on what exactly is in that code library (ethically at least. IANAL so I couldn't tell you legally). Without question, only code you wrote yourself is ethical for you to take with you. Other than that, in my opinion anything not directly related to the project you were working on is fair game. How likely is it that you're not going to be using certain primitives in your new job? How likely is it that if you write it again from scratch it will be different? You're just saving time, not giving away company secrets (which would be unethical)
Why must you tease me with your promise of screenshots? Gets me every time...
I'm always fooled into this false sense of security based on the fact that no one really rtfa's, and click on the link, only to find the slashdotting effect has forced me to go work instead of look at pretty pictures.
Very similar to the google case, I think step 4 only applies to the lawyers
The VP3 codec has one major drawback in my opinion. It's designed to keep a constant quality without paying attention to the file size. You can do constant bitrate on it, but you can't use multiple pass encoding with variable bitrates to get that balance of quality while having strict file size control (as with xvid). Is this something that is being added to Theora, does anyone know?
werd
Experts attribute the downfall to the rehashing of old stories over and over again, as well as the exageration of "EVERYthing because it makes for more entertaining reading."