I personally think he might be blowing a bit of smoke. But the failing is mine, not his.
I predict that only a handful of real/.ers can truly get art. Forever outsiders looking in.
These two quotes amount to two of the saddest most uninformed quotes I have ever read. You're a human being just as much as any artist. You have tastes and likes and dislikes. You've been somehow tricked to believe that you, or maybe just other slashdot readers, are somehow disconnected from great art. This is a depressing and ridiculous notion.
There's a cookie in your local browser that has information derived from your password.
Why would the cookie have to be derived from your password? Isn't that generally a bad idea? I thought most web sites generated a completely random token for your cookie when you log in. On their end, they associate that random token with an authenticated session. They don't need the user to have any actual information in the cookie, just a unique ID that they can use to look up data on their end.
So the simple answer is "It isn't broke so don't fix it" The shuttle is going to retire soon so the effort to make this any better is a waste.
Yeah, but the article says that the ISS uses the exact same procedure, just that they can exchange messages a few more times per day and their messages can be larger because they have better bandwidth.
Beyond that, there's the issue of what protocols are best for this purpose. The article doesn't go into detail about how the OST files are being uploaded, but the protocol may have influenced the decision. For example, how does IMAP compare with FTP or HTTP in terms of efficiency? Does IMAP allow you to resume interrupted transfers? Does IMAP allow you to compress the data before sending it?
(em, mine) I didn't say IMAP, I said POP. I would agree that with their situation that IMAP would not be ideal. However a once-a-day POP session to get the mail and a once-a-day SMTP session to send their mail should be very similar to their file transfers.
Are you sure they're not using the calendar or contact management?
Yes... from the article:
Normally an OST file has all your email, calendar contacts etc but for shuttle crew the OST is just a container for exchanging groups of messages.
So, once a day they bundle a bunch of emails into a single.OST file and upload it to the shuttle. The astronauts then open that.OST file in their local copy of Outlook. And they have to shut down Outlook while the upload is in progress because of Outlook file locking.
In addition, communication with the ground isn't always possible (you'll hear warnings of LOS - Loss of Signal during mission communications) so standard methods of email transfer like POP/SMTP, IMAP etc might not be reliable.
If a 'Loss of Signal' can interrupt a POP session, wouldn't it also interrupt a file upload? Couldn't they just POP into the server on Earth once a day to grab their emails to be stored in a simple mbox or some such? Wouldn't this also eliminate the file locking issue as mboxes and Maildirs are pretty old and stable solutions that don't have this problem? This just sounds like someone wanted to use Microsoft Outlook no matter what and hacked together a procedure to use it even though there are way better approaches. And isn't the whole point of Outlook that it has a built in calendar and meeting request system and network folders? They're not even using those more advanced parts of it, they just need email.
Have you seen their coverage maps? They make AT&T look good.
If you even bothered to read the summary, you would know that the Nexus One is having a hard time keeping a 3G signal even in places where other T-Mobile 3G phones pick it up just fine. The Nexus One owners aren't complaining that T-Mobile's 3G coverage is bad (although that's a valid complaint as well), they're complaining that the coverage is even worse with this specific phone.
Perhaps the writer overlooked this one little fact: Since when did we have a right to electricity? We don't. His argument is a non-starter.
It may not be an inalienable right guaranteed in the constitution, but it is a de facto right. Additionally, many states elevate it above simply de facto. Try renting an apartment to someone in Massachusetts without electricity http://www.mass.gov/Eeohhs2/docs/dph/regs/105cmr410.pdf (warning, PDF):
410.250: Habitable Rooms Other than Kitchen -- Natural Light and Electrical Outlets
The owner shall provide for each habitable room other than a kitchen:
(A) transparent or translucent glass which admits light from the outdoors and which is equal in area to no less than 8% of the entire floor area of that room.
(B) two separate wall-type convenience outlets, or one such outlet and one electric light fixture. The outlets shall be placed in practical locations and shall insofar as practicable, be on different walls and at least ten feet apart. (See 105 CMR 410.351.)
The document also goes into outlets and lights for bathrooms and kitchens. And for those who own, I'm guessing there are laws regulating utilities that require them to provide you service.
Setting aside his argument for a second. I don't think comparing GPS maps to subway maps is in any way helpful. Subway maps don't have to be exactly geographically accurate for at least reasons:
The user of the subway maps is not doing the navigating. It doesn't matter whether the next dot is 100m or 1000m away, all I need to know is to get off the next time the doors open, or that I can transfer between the red and orange line at this stop (this also applies to bus routes and train routes). When driving, if there are two rights coming up very close together, it helps to have the map with your path highlighted along the first one and not the second and having that match up to the reality that you're seeing out the windshield.
Subways are underground. It's not important that a map of the subway lines exactly match the above ground geography, just that stops are labeled and positioned approximately relative to one another.
Which is why Google's CEO had a point, however close he was to the idea that mattered - if you don't want Google to know something, don't tell them.
I agree, this would be like the CEO of facebook saying, "Hey, if you don't want people seeing photos of you drunk, maybe you shouldn't be posting them to facebook." I think we could all agree that this is a perfectly sane thing to say, and in no way reflects badly on the site operators.
I look at this statement as more of a helpful heads-up from google, "We record things for a lot of reasons: normal webserver logs, debugging errors, saving your searches if you have that option turned on, improving our search algorithm and so on. If the government comes to us with a request for your data under the patriot act, we *have* to give them the data. Every search engine and every other website is under the exact same requirements. If you have info you don't want the government ever getting, then you probably shouldn't search the internet for it."
Man, I am loving these Norwegian news sites. It looks like English and Norwegian have some similar words due to their common Germanic origin. But what's interesting is the fact that there seem to be many more false friends, which makes for amazing headlines like this one: "Innbrudd hos Nicky Hilton - Jeg hater folk som stjeler, twitrer søstera Paris". Which of course I interpret as "Inbred hos Nicky Hilton and her sister Paris hate folks who twitter".
What are the odds of a malfunctioning rocket creating a perfect concentric spiral with no imperfections?
Very likely. It's a spinning rocket. If it's spewing fuel there's every reason why the fuel would distribute itself out along a spiral pattern. There's no reason why it should be lopsided or otherwise messed up. Have you ever played with model rockets? If something is off center, your rocket will launch and spin all around and the smoke trail will be a 'perfect' corkscrew.
The redacted portion of section 3.1.2 references a "Fig. J", yet this figure is not in the document... I would loooove to see what figure J is all about.
Also, the non-redacted section about Diplomatic Pouches (4.1) is interesting. Specifically point E.3:
Diplomatic pouches that are inadvertently submitted for screening and that alarm (either accessible property or checked baggage) must be denied access to the sterile or secured area and returned by the STSO to the diplomatic courier or aircraft operator without any further screening. If required, notify an LEO/BAO for items that alarmed the screening system.
If they accidentally screen a diplomatic pouch and it tests positive for something, the bag isn't allowed into the secured area... but it's returned to the courier un-investigated. And they'll just be able to bring it on another flight where it won't get screened this time. I get the concept behind diplomatic pouches, but once the veil is pierced I don't think it makes sense to just ignore what you saw, especially once you know something's wrong. What if the courier opened the pouch themselves and showed the screener a ticking bomb and then closed it up again? The screener was never supposed to see that, so what then? Just go about your business?
I really like this triangular based scheme they've got going there. Everyone knows triangles are the sturdiest shape, so this is a good basis for the transfer of money. These techies should let some investment types in on their cool ideas.
Also, let's say I sign up directly from MIT and find one balloon, I get $2,000. Awesome, go me. MIT is out $2,000 for that balloon. If my friend Fred had referred me, I get my $2,000 and Fred gets $1,000. Now MIT is out $3,000 for that same balloon. One can see from this geometric progression that no matter how many referrals a balloon goes through MIT maxes out their payout at no more than $4,000 per balloon or $40,000 total. As long as they only pay out money if they get all 10, they can't lose money on this. But what's to stop me as an individual from noticing that I could just refer myself 10 times or so in series and then get a payout close to $4,000 instead of the $2,000..
So... where's the criticism of the current administration? Or are our President and Congress suddenly flawless?
Obama's been president for less than a year. Most of Bush's criticisms came three years in after he had already started two wars. You must not actually listen to NPR because I do, and I hear quite a bit of criticisms of the current administration. In addition, for your criticism of public radio to be at all applicable, the two presidents would have to be exactly equal. Or are you saying news outlets should criticize and praise everyone the exact same amount, regardless of what they've actually done? I don't want to go down the road of comparing the relative merits of either president in this post as that is orthogonal to my point, which would be: there isn't an absence of criticism of Obama on NPR, and a difference in criticism wouldn't mean bias anyway.
Furthermore, if you actually listened to NPR you would know that reporting the news is so much more than simply criticizing or praising someone. Actual investigations, real commentary (not partisan bickering), experts from across the field, real conversations; these are what you get from NPR, and what's missing from other news outlets. Every time I listen to a show like "On Point" they've got on 3 or 4 experts in a field (who often have various views) and are having a civil discussion with input and questions from the host, and from the public. They never try to pigeon-hole a subject into a right vs left debate. There's almost always cross cutting concerns and multiple, not just two, viewpoints.
If you really want to know what's wrong with other news outlets, just listen to "On The Media".
You produce the same amount of carbon, THEY produce the same amount of carbon, but YOUR costs to do business go up and the middleman brokering the credits makes a fortune.
The whole point is that *you* have been getting a free ride the whole time up until now. You were polluting to your heart's content without having to pay for what the pollution actually costs. It's called an externality, and as wikipedia says, "In such a case, prices do not reflect the full costs or benefits in production or consumption of a product or service." Now we're just saying that you have to pay for what you've been foisting on everyone else.
There! He knows that clearing his cookies solves the problem. Why all this bullshit about being tainted for three months and being afraid to use their service to write a bloody blog post? Does he think the "oh noes teh bing cookeez" are going to trash his blog and kill his hamster too?
Well, how about flash cookies? How do we know they didn't also run some very lightweight flash application just to set a cookie that most people wouldn't know about. Hell, most people don't know about regular cookies. I don't even know where flash stores its cookies or how I would get rid of them (don't you have to navigate to some Adobe site that runs a flash control panel or something?). I'm pretty sure there are some Firefox add-ons to delete flash cookies, and there's probably just a file somewhere in my profile directory, but I never think of it when I delete my other cookies. How about you?
The math starts to get interesting. At $1,000 per site average times 100k sites, thats only $ 1 Billion Dollars.
Lovely multiplication work there Mark... He goes on to say,
The distribution would obviously favor the larger sites, so of that billion dollars, would the top 1k sites take 500k each and the remaining 99k split the rest ?
First of all, why is this a question? It's your dumb plan, I don't have the answer. It would be like asking "How much manure would you have to fling in people's faces to earn back the cost of buying the manure?" Second of all, everyone's already discussing how idiotic it would be to leave the google index for even $1 million; $500 thousand would even worse. And third,
the remaining 99k split the rest
("the rest" being $500 tousand), so you're saying that you'll get 99,000 sites to leave Google all for just over $5.05 a piece? Let's say I'm the #2 result for the word "shoes" on Google; the #1 result just took their $500 thousand bribe and ran. You really think I'll give up my newly found #1 spot on the most popular search engine for a one time payment of $5.05?
He then goes on to write,
Given the stakes, why stop at $ 1 Billion Dollars ? Would the top 1k most visited sites take a cool $1mm each.
So his actual plan to give the top thousand sites $1 million, actually involves more than just $1 billion, because he still plans on paying the next 99,000 sites something to leave as well. If I owned any stock in any company that Mark Cuban is currently working for or on the board of, I would sell it this second.
Blank and flickering screens: No
Failure to recognize hard drives: No
Defaulting to the old 2.6.28 Linux kernel: No
Failure to get encryption running:
Okay, well to even the score:
Blank and flickering screens: Yes
Failure to recognize hard drives: Yes
Defaulting to the old 2.6.28 Linux kernel: Don't really know
Failure to get encryption running: Haven't tried
I was in the middle of an upgrade of my Compaq Presario R3000 laptop when I saw this article. The upgrade finished and right upon boot my screen started to flicker when the grub text was on the screen. It kind of stayed there doing that for a while and then I saw the small white Ubuntu logo for a little while and then and error about not being able to mount one of my drives. I rebooted with the "-generic" kernel image insead of "-386" and everything seemed to be okay. I then went about removing every single kernel image with "-386" and rebooting seems fine now.
Do you not see that by distorting their words to advance your own agenda, and attributing to them malicious intent without any basis in fact, you undermine the very cause which you pretend to champion? Is that what you want to do? Do you really want to undermine the credibility of those who advocate for free and open standards, especially in the public sector?
Thank you. I would have modded you as Informative, but you're already at 5, and I wanted to respond anyway. I'm getting really sick at how often not just the headline is inflammatory and just plain wrong, but even the summary. I can't believe how far some people will go to twist the true nature of a thing until they can claim it stands for its exact opposite. What's even worse is that it gets by people whose only job is to check this stuff out before posting it to the front page of a widely read website. If this is the answer to print journalism dying, then maybe I should start up a subscription to my local newspaper, because the alternative is apparently much worse.
Also, I turned off the classic index just so that I could vote this story down as 'stupid' and tag it as both 'badheadline' and 'badsummary'. I suggest others do the same. Next to just not reading slashdot anymore, it appears it's the only feedback we can supply.
(there are other scenarios that are similar to this, as well.)
Hmm, I see, can you tell me more?
Even ignoring the internal contradiction in your post. There are many more uses for this device than simply getting your kids online during a family vacation when the only alternatives are slapping them and giving them your laptop. That would actually be towards the end of the list for me if I were to start naming uses for a computer that can share a wifi connection. Of course the MiFi eliminates this problem entirely since you don't need a mobile broadband card, or a computer that supports wifi sharing.
How can the DoD release software under a copyleft license when the federal government is incapable of holding copyrights in the first place?
Come on! I like the GPL as much as any other free-software-loving-commie but even I don't think OSS==copyleft. Public domain, along with BSD and MIT type licenses are recognized as open source (heck, software released under them is even recognized as "free" by the free software crowd).
In the unlikely event that you were to die this year, the chance it was of swine flu is one quarter of one tenth of one percent.
You do realize that it's not just about outright death right? I got the flu last year and was miserable for 2 to 3 days. I had never gotten the flu before (or at least not this bad), and I was in for a surprise. I couldn't sleep because I had constant cold night sweats. I would wake up shivering and drenched. And then there's also the fact that viruses are a social disease. Sure, I might not die from it, but I might spread it to others. They'll have a miserable 2 to 3 days at minimum and spread it to others and so on, and maybe some portion of those people *could* die. What's the value of me not passing the flu on to possibly dozens of other people?
I haven't decided if I'll get a flu shot, probably not, but I wouldn't call anyone a
Some of the biggest concerns over using GPLv2 relate to the definitions of "derivative work" and "distribution," which Radcliffe says are used in GPLv2 "in a less than precise fashion."
And...
More recently penned licensing terms like GPLv3 and AGPLv3 avoid this kind of terminology, including interfering turns of phrase such as "to 'propagate' a work" or "to 'convey' a work."
I don't understand how 'propagate' and 'convey' are any better than 'distribute'. It would seem to me that 'distribute' is the better term.
"I think the critical thing to recognize in the differentiation between GPLv2, GPLv3, and AGPLv3 is that there was a very strong effort to purposefully distance ourselves from copyright laws," said Radcliffe. Copyright law is "not stable," he says, and it changes over time. Equally important is that copyright law varies from country to country.
Now this, I understand. If you borrow the phrase 'derivative work', which is defined by copyright laws, and then the definition of 'derivative work' is changed in the copyright laws, does that mean the definition in the GPLv2 has also changed? Or is the definition of the GPLv2's 'derivative work' the same as that defined by copyright laws at the time the GPLv2 was drafted? Or is it some third definition not in any way tied to the copyright law definition? If it's the second or third meaning, then you're probably better off using a different phrase altogether.
I could also see a slight advantage to tying the GPL's definition of 'derivative work' and other phrases to whatever the current copyright law says they are: As copyright laws get more restrictive, the force of the GPL gets stronger. If copyright laws ever relax, then so too does the GPL. As I see it, as long as copyright laws are sane, the need for the GPL lessens.
Slashdot Mirror
These two quotes amount to two of the saddest most uninformed quotes I have ever read. You're a human being just as much as any artist. You have tastes and likes and dislikes. You've been somehow tricked to believe that you, or maybe just other slashdot readers, are somehow disconnected from great art. This is a depressing and ridiculous notion.
Why would the cookie have to be derived from your password? Isn't that generally a bad idea? I thought most web sites generated a completely random token for your cookie when you log in. On their end, they associate that random token with an authenticated session. They don't need the user to have any actual information in the cookie, just a unique ID that they can use to look up data on their end.
Yeah, but the article says that the ISS uses the exact same procedure, just that they can exchange messages a few more times per day and their messages can be larger because they have better bandwidth.
(em, mine) I didn't say IMAP, I said POP. I would agree that with their situation that IMAP would not be ideal. However a once-a-day POP session to get the mail and a once-a-day SMTP session to send their mail should be very similar to their file transfers.
Yes... from the article:
So, once a day they bundle a bunch of emails into a single .OST file and upload it to the shuttle. The astronauts then open that .OST file in their local copy of Outlook. And they have to shut down Outlook while the upload is in progress because of Outlook file locking.
If a 'Loss of Signal' can interrupt a POP session, wouldn't it also interrupt a file upload? Couldn't they just POP into the server on Earth once a day to grab their emails to be stored in a simple mbox or some such? Wouldn't this also eliminate the file locking issue as mboxes and Maildirs are pretty old and stable solutions that don't have this problem? This just sounds like someone wanted to use Microsoft Outlook no matter what and hacked together a procedure to use it even though there are way better approaches. And isn't the whole point of Outlook that it has a built in calendar and meeting request system and network folders? They're not even using those more advanced parts of it, they just need email.
If you even bothered to read the summary, you would know that the Nexus One is having a hard time keeping a 3G signal even in places where other T-Mobile 3G phones pick it up just fine. The Nexus One owners aren't complaining that T-Mobile's 3G coverage is bad (although that's a valid complaint as well), they're complaining that the coverage is even worse with this specific phone.
It may not be an inalienable right guaranteed in the constitution, but it is a de facto right. Additionally, many states elevate it above simply de facto. Try renting an apartment to someone in Massachusetts without electricity http://www.mass.gov/Eeohhs2/docs/dph/regs/105cmr410.pdf (warning, PDF):
The document also goes into outlets and lights for bathrooms and kitchens. And for those who own, I'm guessing there are laws regulating utilities that require them to provide you service.
Setting aside his argument for a second. I don't think comparing GPS maps to subway maps is in any way helpful. Subway maps don't have to be exactly geographically accurate for at least reasons:
I agree, this would be like the CEO of facebook saying, "Hey, if you don't want people seeing photos of you drunk, maybe you shouldn't be posting them to facebook." I think we could all agree that this is a perfectly sane thing to say, and in no way reflects badly on the site operators.
I look at this statement as more of a helpful heads-up from google, "We record things for a lot of reasons: normal webserver logs, debugging errors, saving your searches if you have that option turned on, improving our search algorithm and so on. If the government comes to us with a request for your data under the patriot act, we *have* to give them the data. Every search engine and every other website is under the exact same requirements. If you have info you don't want the government ever getting, then you probably shouldn't search the internet for it."
Man, I am loving these Norwegian news sites. It looks like English and Norwegian have some similar words due to their common Germanic origin. But what's interesting is the fact that there seem to be many more false friends, which makes for amazing headlines like this one: "Innbrudd hos Nicky Hilton - Jeg hater folk som stjeler, twitrer søstera Paris". Which of course I interpret as "Inbred hos Nicky Hilton and her sister Paris hate folks who twitter".
Very likely. It's a spinning rocket. If it's spewing fuel there's every reason why the fuel would distribute itself out along a spiral pattern. There's no reason why it should be lopsided or otherwise messed up. Have you ever played with model rockets? If something is off center, your rocket will launch and spin all around and the smoke trail will be a 'perfect' corkscrew.
The redacted portion of section 3.1.2 references a "Fig. J", yet this figure is not in the document... I would loooove to see what figure J is all about.
Also, the non-redacted section about Diplomatic Pouches (4.1) is interesting. Specifically point E.3:
If they accidentally screen a diplomatic pouch and it tests positive for something, the bag isn't allowed into the secured area... but it's returned to the courier un-investigated. And they'll just be able to bring it on another flight where it won't get screened this time. I get the concept behind diplomatic pouches, but once the veil is pierced I don't think it makes sense to just ignore what you saw, especially once you know something's wrong. What if the courier opened the pouch themselves and showed the screener a ticking bomb and then closed it up again? The screener was never supposed to see that, so what then? Just go about your business?
I really like this triangular based scheme they've got going there. Everyone knows triangles are the sturdiest shape, so this is a good basis for the transfer of money. These techies should let some investment types in on their cool ideas.
Also, let's say I sign up directly from MIT and find one balloon, I get $2,000. Awesome, go me. MIT is out $2,000 for that balloon. If my friend Fred had referred me, I get my $2,000 and Fred gets $1,000. Now MIT is out $3,000 for that same balloon. One can see from this geometric progression that no matter how many referrals a balloon goes through MIT maxes out their payout at no more than $4,000 per balloon or $40,000 total. As long as they only pay out money if they get all 10, they can't lose money on this. But what's to stop me as an individual from noticing that I could just refer myself 10 times or so in series and then get a payout close to $4,000 instead of the $2,000..
Obama's been president for less than a year. Most of Bush's criticisms came three years in after he had already started two wars. You must not actually listen to NPR because I do, and I hear quite a bit of criticisms of the current administration. In addition, for your criticism of public radio to be at all applicable, the two presidents would have to be exactly equal. Or are you saying news outlets should criticize and praise everyone the exact same amount, regardless of what they've actually done? I don't want to go down the road of comparing the relative merits of either president in this post as that is orthogonal to my point, which would be: there isn't an absence of criticism of Obama on NPR, and a difference in criticism wouldn't mean bias anyway.
Furthermore, if you actually listened to NPR you would know that reporting the news is so much more than simply criticizing or praising someone. Actual investigations, real commentary (not partisan bickering), experts from across the field, real conversations; these are what you get from NPR, and what's missing from other news outlets. Every time I listen to a show like "On Point" they've got on 3 or 4 experts in a field (who often have various views) and are having a civil discussion with input and questions from the host, and from the public. They never try to pigeon-hole a subject into a right vs left debate. There's almost always cross cutting concerns and multiple, not just two, viewpoints.
If you really want to know what's wrong with other news outlets, just listen to "On The Media".
The whole point is that *you* have been getting a free ride the whole time up until now. You were polluting to your heart's content without having to pay for what the pollution actually costs. It's called an externality, and as wikipedia says, "In such a case, prices do not reflect the full costs or benefits in production or consumption of a product or service." Now we're just saying that you have to pay for what you've been foisting on everyone else.
Well, how about flash cookies? How do we know they didn't also run some very lightweight flash application just to set a cookie that most people wouldn't know about. Hell, most people don't know about regular cookies. I don't even know where flash stores its cookies or how I would get rid of them (don't you have to navigate to some Adobe site that runs a flash control panel or something?). I'm pretty sure there are some Firefox add-ons to delete flash cookies, and there's probably just a file somewhere in my profile directory, but I never think of it when I delete my other cookies. How about you?
I found this gem from Mark's original post:
Lovely multiplication work there Mark... He goes on to say,
The distribution would obviously favor the larger sites, so of that billion dollars, would the top 1k sites take 500k each and the remaining 99k split the rest ?
First of all, why is this a question? It's your dumb plan, I don't have the answer. It would be like asking "How much manure would you have to fling in people's faces to earn back the cost of buying the manure?" Second of all, everyone's already discussing how idiotic it would be to leave the google index for even $1 million; $500 thousand would even worse. And third,
the remaining 99k split the rest
("the rest" being $500 tousand), so you're saying that you'll get 99,000 sites to leave Google all for just over $5.05 a piece? Let's say I'm the #2 result for the word "shoes" on Google; the #1 result just took their $500 thousand bribe and ran. You really think I'll give up my newly found #1 spot on the most popular search engine for a one time payment of $5.05?
He then goes on to write,
Given the stakes, why stop at $ 1 Billion Dollars ? Would the top 1k most visited sites take a cool $1mm each.
So his actual plan to give the top thousand sites $1 million, actually involves more than just $1 billion, because he still plans on paying the next 99,000 sites something to leave as well. If I owned any stock in any company that Mark Cuban is currently working for or on the board of, I would sell it this second.
Also, if anyone wants to see what this monstrosity looks like now that the site is slashdotted, I got this in the coral cache: http://www.openofficemouse.com.nyud.net/branding/images/OOM-OSS.jpg
It truly is the world of tomorrow... Today!
Okay, well to even the score:
Blank and flickering screens: Yes
Failure to recognize hard drives: Yes
Defaulting to the old 2.6.28 Linux kernel: Don't really know
Failure to get encryption running: Haven't tried
I was in the middle of an upgrade of my Compaq Presario R3000 laptop when I saw this article. The upgrade finished and right upon boot my screen started to flicker when the grub text was on the screen. It kind of stayed there doing that for a while and then I saw the small white Ubuntu logo for a little while and then and error about not being able to mount one of my drives. I rebooted with the "-generic" kernel image insead of "-386" and everything seemed to be okay. I then went about removing every single kernel image with "-386" and rebooting seems fine now.
Thank you. I would have modded you as Informative, but you're already at 5, and I wanted to respond anyway. I'm getting really sick at how often not just the headline is inflammatory and just plain wrong, but even the summary. I can't believe how far some people will go to twist the true nature of a thing until they can claim it stands for its exact opposite. What's even worse is that it gets by people whose only job is to check this stuff out before posting it to the front page of a widely read website. If this is the answer to print journalism dying, then maybe I should start up a subscription to my local newspaper, because the alternative is apparently much worse.
Also, I turned off the classic index just so that I could vote this story down as 'stupid' and tag it as both 'badheadline' and 'badsummary'. I suggest others do the same. Next to just not reading slashdot anymore, it appears it's the only feedback we can supply.
Hmm, I see, can you tell me more?
Even ignoring the internal contradiction in your post. There are many more uses for this device than simply getting your kids online during a family vacation when the only alternatives are slapping them and giving them your laptop. That would actually be towards the end of the list for me if I were to start naming uses for a computer that can share a wifi connection. Of course the MiFi eliminates this problem entirely since you don't need a mobile broadband card, or a computer that supports wifi sharing.
Come on! I like the GPL as much as any other free-software-loving-commie but even I don't think OSS==copyleft. Public domain, along with BSD and MIT type licenses are recognized as open source (heck, software released under them is even recognized as "free" by the free software crowd).
You do realize that it's not just about outright death right? I got the flu last year and was miserable for 2 to 3 days. I had never gotten the flu before (or at least not this bad), and I was in for a surprise. I couldn't sleep because I had constant cold night sweats. I would wake up shivering and drenched. And then there's also the fact that viruses are a social disease. Sure, I might not die from it, but I might spread it to others. They'll have a miserable 2 to 3 days at minimum and spread it to others and so on, and maybe some portion of those people *could* die. What's the value of me not passing the flu on to possibly dozens of other people?
I haven't decided if I'll get a flu shot, probably not, but I wouldn't call anyone a
hysterical idiot freaking out
if they did get one.
From the article:
And...
I don't understand how 'propagate' and 'convey' are any better than 'distribute'. It would seem to me that 'distribute' is the better term.
Now this, I understand. If you borrow the phrase 'derivative work', which is defined by copyright laws, and then the definition of 'derivative work' is changed in the copyright laws, does that mean the definition in the GPLv2 has also changed? Or is the definition of the GPLv2's 'derivative work' the same as that defined by copyright laws at the time the GPLv2 was drafted? Or is it some third definition not in any way tied to the copyright law definition? If it's the second or third meaning, then you're probably better off using a different phrase altogether.
I could also see a slight advantage to tying the GPL's definition of 'derivative work' and other phrases to whatever the current copyright law says they are: As copyright laws get more restrictive, the force of the GPL gets stronger. If copyright laws ever relax, then so too does the GPL. As I see it, as long as copyright laws are sane, the need for the GPL lessens.