You mean stopping their use of SCO for "under-the-table funding, stock-kiting, illegal insider trading, and money-laundering" [SEC's words -- not mine -- obviously they only suspect ATM...].
I think they have trillions so not much chance of running out any time soon. Oh, and they probably make a lot more money in the EU than the maximum amount the EU can fine them
They are not stopping them from competing. Just from expanding their monpoly using illegal means, blackmailing, bribing &c... Read the artciles and info on the EU website.
Ah, yes, but who does it harm if you sue a corporation? So what if an abstract entity goes banckrupt? It doesn't affect the people who were responsible. You can't put a company in jail.
and still deny it the rights of a person
Which rights? Which country? US constituional rights? -- I don't think companies have them? Laws do not normally give rights -- they take them away.
It seems to me that the easiest thing to do here would be to get rid of the concept of companies (see my aunt post).
It's about the right of the individual to innovate vs. large corporations trying to control (read stop) that innovation.
Quite right, and I'd go even further by saying that the only thing that stops the capitalist system being the perfect system it should be (were everyone fairly competes and prices are lowered to their minimum levels &c) is the existence of companies. They go against the capitilist ideal.
(Aside: I'm not quite clear on the details of a communists system but a perfect capitilist system (were their is an infinite number of competitors <voice style="peter jones">which is of course impossible</voice>) is probably the same as a communist system -- but without the problem of having to have someone in charge (who everyone has to trust) to co-ordinate it).
The capitalist system is quite a good idea -- maybe the least worst one -- however it only works if people spend their own money to buy/make things then sell them on themselves. If people can make lots of abstract entities (companies) which are difficult to sue, are not accountable to anyone and which can be bankcrupted without anyone having to pay (except of course all the staff, investors and people they owe money to), the whole system gets messed up -- IMO it is companies not capitalism that causes the racing scenario put foward by RMS in the GNU project manifesto thingy, and if their werrent companies their problem would be little need for regulation.
I agree with what you say and, yes, the/.ers who talk about any open sourcing are just making it up (probably flamebating) -- the EU may stop them bundling MSW Media Player but that is very different as well as fining.
However, surely "The only time windows being opened sourced has been discussed has been by journalists and here on slashdot as a possibility that some of it might be" should read "The only time...has been discussed is on Slashdot and by some journalists who said there was a a possibility that some of it might be after they read about it on/. and didn't have anything better for their articles".;-)
Obviously "If the courts decide against MS Corp. then MS may still be able" should have read "If the courts don't decide afgainst MS...[on the genericness of therit trademark".
[5.] Do as [1] except for UA's that are not gacefully backwards- or forwards-compatible, do not work at all with new versions of HTML and/or implement old version really badly (i.e.: MSIE, MSIE, uuhhh, did I mention MSIE?).
In this case, warn the user that their UA does not conform and give them the option of displaying your site as [2] (or as [3] if you have the time) as well as as [1] -- also maybe a link to upgrade to a HTML 4.01 or XHTML UA.
In other words:
Although, in general UA string sniffing is a Bad Thing (because its opportunities for abuse far outweigh its usefulness), one could put up a notice on the site to users who send an MSIE UA string explaining that MSIE does not display HTML very well and giving them further option -- this makes the UA sniffing clear to the user and lets them over-ride it.
You could make a special version of your site that works in MSIE. Then if the UA string sent by the users UA when they access your site's homepage includes "Internet Explorer" a page could be displayed (written in basic HTML (e.g.: HTML 2.0)) which would say something like this:
The user-agent (UA) string that has been sent by your computer indicates that you are using Microsoft Internet Explorer to view this page. This browser cannot interpret HTML & XHTML (as made by the W3C), and is, therefore, not actually a web browser; however, you may still be able to view this site. Please follow these instructions:
If it is not the case that you are using MSIE, because you have adjusted your UA string to purport that you are using MSIE when you are not (or because you are using Opera which purports to be MSIE by default*), please click on the "View in HTML, XHTML & CSS" link below to view the site in standard HTML.
(* Opera users: to adjust this behaviour, press F12 and select "Identify as Opera" from the pop-up menu.)
If you are using MSIE then please do one of the following:
Download a web browser [include a link to a page with links to download various browsers here if u like or a include a link to the dmoz/yahoo browsers category] so that you can view the webpages on this site properly (and see all the sites features and content).
Click on the "View in mshtml, MSXHTML & MSCSS" link below to view this site in the special Microsoft format for which MSIE was designed to use. NB: This version of the site may be more out-of-date than the canonical (i.e.: official standard) version and some of the styling and features [etc.] from the canonical version of the pages may be missing due to the restrictive nature of Microsoft's format.
Click on the "View in HTML, XHTML & CSS" link below to attempt to view the canonical version of this site. This may cause problems with MSIE and/or the content of the site may be unreadable.
[link]View in HTML, XHTML & CSS [or whatever u like - this links to standard site homepage][/link]
[link]View in mshtml, MSXHTML & MSCSS [or whatever u like - this links to the homepage of the special version of ur site 4 MSIE] [/link]
Opera's default UA string basically reads as "This is Mozilla -- no we're pretending -- we are really MSIE -- ha, ha, we got you again -- it's Opera, LOL".
What happened to the idea of giving accurate nifo in protocols?
Windows is a registered trademark of Microsoft Corporation in the US and most other countries, and is also a generic term (which has been ruled as such in the US) from as far back as the 1950's -- incidentally Microsoft may be generic/descriptive and is also a registered trademark of MS Corp.
X Windows (which predates Microsoft Windows) is now called the X Window System (possibly due to threats from MS Corp.).
Microsoft Corp. do not hold a trademark on Word.
Lindows.com have not actually won yet -- but the courts have implied that they probably will. They have only been allowed to carry on using the name until the court rule on whether Micrsoft Corp. should have their trademark removed. If the courts decide against MS Corp. then MS may still be able to stop Lindows.com from using their name.
Also, Mozilla is not a generic term. It is a trademark invented by Netscape (as the codename for NN and later the real name for Mozilla App Suite)
Just because MS pretend their browser is another browser it does not make the word generic. That is MS are arguably violating the Mozilla Foundation's trademark but the Mozilla Foundation are not bored enough to sue.
It needs to be made clear to the world that these are not real (open) IBM-compatible PC's.
The user will not have control of what there PC does and who it sends their data to, and potentially users will not be able to access their own data or their data will be stored encrypted so they cannot read it. Also, I'd imagine their must be some real compatibility problems with genuine IBM-PC-architecture hardware.
Once this is made clear to the potential users (tell your friends) and the sellers (tell them, boycott them and tell them why, tell their customers as they go into stores), I very much doubt anyone will buy these things.
I'd be interested in how vendors sell these things (are they normal PC's) and what they tell the customers the advantages are to get customers to buy them -- particularly whether they tell the truth.
At risk of staing the obvious, Hardware which no one would normally buy due to its high price, low spec and closed proprietary nature.
The only reason that anyone buys it is because it is the only way to run MacOS which has many followers who think its user-friendly and cool -- not me but each to his own.
(I like everything else about the Firefox rebranding except the corny slogan.)
So MS just ripped that really crappy idea of using reloaded after a piece of software off the Mozilla Foundation -- like all the feature ideas in MSIE really -- except this time the orginal Mozilla idea is already pathetic so they are not taking a good idea of Mozilla and implementing it all wrong so it doesn't work.
unless you're accusing them of coercing or bribing their way to it
Well it seems like a logical conclusion based on the facts.
How else do you explain the fact that they were told by the highest court that on no account could they ever trademark the word because it is generic, then, years later, when they had an effective monopoly, they managed to negotiate with the government to get the word trademarked despite the court ruling.
Also note that the parts of Lindows's court filings that explain how Microsoft managed to get the trademark seemingly illegally have been censored with black ink by the judge (and Lindows are banned from discussing them).
You can sort of see through the ink in places. Take a look at these:
Section II:B (pp. 8-9 of PDF file) (entitled "Statement of Facts: The USPTO Initially Rejected Microsoft's WINDOWS Trademark Application and Reversed Itself Only After Microsoft _____________________________________" )
Section II:C (p. 10) (entitled "Ubiqitous Use of the Term...Demonstrates Continuing Generic Use")
Section IV:A:1:a (p. 13) (entitled "There is No Evidence of Actual Confusion...")
Section III:C:1-2 (pp. 14-16 of PDF) (entitled "Statement of Facts: Microsoft's Registration of the WINDOWS Mark: Microsoft's 7 Year Delay Until 1990 to File/Borland's Protest USPTO's Rejection of Microsoft's Application")
I don't like Lindows either. However, you have missed the point.
Lindows are arguing that "windows" is a generic term for a type of computer software, which of course it is -- think DECWindows, XWindows, &c. The term has been used in the industry since the 1950's.
In other words this is like a car manufacturer trademarking the word, "car".
Patents are a total joke. The only reason everyone is not suing everyone over patents is that no reasonably large companies are going to sue each other because of the surity of mutually assured destruction (i.e.: any reasonably large company can use there patents to bankcrupt any other), and no individual is even going to attempt fighting the big companies.
No. What happened was that the highest trademark court in the US said that Microsoft could not trademark the generic term, windows, in the category of windows system. Well, Duh!
But then MS gained a monopoly and made a few negotions with the US government -- notice in the PDF that details of these in the court proceeding of the Lindows.com case have been blotted out with ink by the judge and are not allowed to be discussed. As a result of these negotiations they were given the trademark, windows, in all sorts of categories including windows systems.
It is very simple. You cannot trademark a generic term. M$'s own dictionary describes "windows" as a generic term for OS windowing systems. In my country (UK), M$ have to specify a generic category which they want to protect their trademark for. They have specified it as windows software for microcomputers. Windows has been used since the 1950's in computing to represent portions of a display. Micro and soft are common abbreviations listed in some dictionaries. Therefore they themselves know that "Micro", "Soft" and "Windows" are clearly generic terms and have no leg to stand on in any attempt to protect either the mark "Windows" or "Microsoft".
Don't feed the trolls, but briefly, the answer is write it in (X)HTML (and CSS for a range of UA types -- visual, aural &c) -- if you really want lots of people to access it make sure it is still in valid (X)HTML but also is rendered reasonably in a few common randomly-chosen UA's or rendering engines (preferably at different sizes and with different default CSS) -- e.g.: Gecko, KHTML, MSHTML, Lynx, w3m, Opera.
If you want the latest features of (X)HTML on your page and certain non-forward-compatible UA's that are not being very actively developed (e.g.: MSIE) display the page broken if more recent features are used, then do some UA sniffing to display a message warning your users of the UA problems and giving them the option of viewing a basic HTML 2.0 version of the pages on the site -- you could use a script to generate this from the main site every so often.
I thought that too. Probably because the guy who did the images (a) could not draw pandas (at least not a recognisable panda that small) and/or (b) thought a panda would confuse people because no one knows that firefox is another name for red panda.
Slashdot Mirror
I think they have trillions so not much chance of running out any time soon. Oh, and they probably make a lot more money in the EU than the maximum amount the EU can fine them
They are not stopping them from competing. Just from expanding their monpoly using illegal means, blackmailing, bribing &c... Read the artciles and info on the EU website.
It seems to me that the easiest thing to do here would be to get rid of the concept of companies (see my aunt post).
Quite right, and I'd go even further by saying that the only thing that stops the capitalist system being the perfect system it should be (were everyone fairly competes and prices are lowered to their minimum levels &c) is the existence of companies. They go against the capitilist ideal.
(Aside: I'm not quite clear on the details of a communists system but a perfect capitilist system (were their is an infinite number of competitors <voice style="peter jones">which is of course impossible</voice>) is probably the same as a communist system -- but without the problem of having to have someone in charge (who everyone has to trust) to co-ordinate it).
The capitalist system is quite a good idea -- maybe the least worst one -- however it only works if people spend their own money to buy/make things then sell them on themselves. If people can make lots of abstract entities (companies) which are difficult to sue, are not accountable to anyone and which can be bankcrupted without anyone having to pay (except of course all the staff, investors and people they owe money to), the whole system gets messed up -- IMO it is companies not capitalism that causes the racing scenario put foward by RMS in the GNU project manifesto thingy, and if their werrent companies their problem would be little need for regulation.
However, surely "The only time windows being opened sourced has been discussed has been by journalists and here on slashdot as a possibility that some of it might be" should read "The only time...has been discussed is on Slashdot and by some journalists who said there was a a possibility that some of it might be after they read about it on /. and didn't have anything better for their articles". ;-)
Obviously "If the courts decide against MS Corp. then MS may still be able" should have read "If the courts don't decide afgainst MS...[on the genericness of therit trademark".
In this case, warn the user that their UA does not conform and give them the option of displaying your site as [2] (or as [3] if you have the time) as well as as [1] -- also maybe a link to upgrade to a HTML 4.01 or XHTML UA.
In other words:
Although, in general UA string sniffing is a Bad Thing (because its opportunities for abuse far outweigh its usefulness), one could put up a notice on the site to users who send an MSIE UA string explaining that MSIE does not display HTML very well and giving them further option -- this makes the UA sniffing clear to the user and lets them over-ride it.
You could make a special version of your site that works in MSIE. Then if the UA string sent by the users UA when they access your site's homepage includes "Internet Explorer" a page could be displayed (written in basic HTML (e.g.: HTML 2.0)) which would say something like this:
What happened to the idea of giving accurate nifo in protocols?
Windows is a registered trademark of Microsoft Corporation in the US and most other countries, and is also a generic term (which has been ruled as such in the US) from as far back as the 1950's -- incidentally Microsoft may be generic/descriptive and is also a registered trademark of MS Corp.
X Windows (which predates Microsoft Windows) is now called the X Window System (possibly due to threats from MS Corp.).
Microsoft Corp. do not hold a trademark on Word.
Lindows.com have not actually won yet -- but the courts have implied that they probably will. They have only been allowed to carry on using the name until the court rule on whether Micrsoft Corp. should have their trademark removed. If the courts decide against MS Corp. then MS may still be able to stop Lindows.com from using their name.
Also, Mozilla is not a generic term. It is a trademark invented by Netscape (as the codename for NN and later the real name for Mozilla App Suite)
Just because MS pretend their browser is another browser it does not make the word generic. That is MS are arguably violating the Mozilla Foundation's trademark but the Mozilla Foundation are not bored enough to sue.
Partcularly note the notice about trading standards investigations and media speculation on the UK Dasani homepage and the spunk link.
The user will not have control of what there PC does and who it sends their data to, and potentially users will not be able to access their own data or their data will be stored encrypted so they cannot read it. Also, I'd imagine their must be some real compatibility problems with genuine IBM-PC-architecture hardware.
Once this is made clear to the potential users (tell your friends) and the sellers (tell them, boycott them and tell them why, tell their customers as they go into stores), I very much doubt anyone will buy these things.
I'd be interested in how vendors sell these things (are they normal PC's) and what they tell the customers the advantages are to get customers to buy them -- particularly whether they tell the truth.
As I'm in the UK, I thought "they have very big coins in the US don't they?"
The only reason that anyone buys it is because it is the only way to run MacOS which has many followers who think its user-friendly and cool -- not me but each to his own.
Doesnt MSIE=MSW XP (at least according to MS).
Maybe MSW XP Reloaded will use the browser reloaded by default. {I wish}
(I like everything else about the Firefox rebranding except the corny slogan.)
So MS just ripped that really crappy idea of using reloaded after a piece of software off the Mozilla Foundation -- like all the feature ideas in MSIE really -- except this time the orginal Mozilla idea is already pathetic so they are not taking a good idea of Mozilla and implementing it all wrong so it doesn't work.
How else do you explain the fact that they were told by the highest court that on no account could they ever trademark the word because it is generic, then, years later, when they had an effective monopoly, they managed to negotiate with the government to get the word trademarked despite the court ruling.
Also note that the parts of Lindows's court filings that explain how Microsoft managed to get the trademark seemingly illegally have been censored with black ink by the judge (and Lindows are banned from discussing them).
You can sort of see through the ink in places. Take a look at these:
Don't you find that suspicious?
Lindows are arguing that "windows" is a generic term for a type of computer software, which of course it is -- think DECWindows, XWindows, &c. The term has been used in the industry since the 1950's.
In other words this is like a car manufacturer trademarking the word, "car".
Patents are a total joke. The only reason everyone is not suing everyone over patents is that no reasonably large companies are going to sue each other because of the surity of mutually assured destruction (i.e.: any reasonably large company can use there patents to bankcrupt any other), and no individual is even going to attempt fighting the big companies.
But then MS gained a monopoly and made a few negotions with the US government -- notice in the PDF that details of these in the court proceeding of the Lindows.com case have been blotted out with ink by the judge and are not allowed to be discussed. As a result of these negotiations they were given the trademark, windows, in all sorts of categories including windows systems.
It is very simple. You cannot trademark a generic term. M$'s own dictionary describes "windows" as a generic term for OS windowing systems. In my country (UK), M$ have to specify a generic category which they want to protect their trademark for. They have specified it as windows software for microcomputers. Windows has been used since the 1950's in computing to represent portions of a display. Micro and soft are common abbreviations listed in some dictionaries. Therefore they themselves know that "Micro", "Soft" and "Windows" are clearly generic terms and have no leg to stand on in any attempt to protect either the mark "Windows" or "Microsoft".
Don't feed the trolls, but briefly, the answer is write it in (X)HTML (and CSS for a range of UA types -- visual, aural &c) -- if you really want lots of people to access it make sure it is still in valid (X)HTML but also is rendered reasonably in a few common randomly-chosen UA's or rendering engines (preferably at different sizes and with different default CSS) -- e.g.: Gecko, KHTML, MSHTML, Lynx, w3m, Opera.
If you want the latest features of (X)HTML on your page and certain non-forward-compatible UA's that are not being very actively developed (e.g.: MSIE) display the page broken if more recent features are used, then do some UA sniffing to display a message warning your users of the UA problems and giving them the option of viewing a basic HTML 2.0 version of the pages on the site -- you could use a script to generate this from the main site every so often.
Thanks very much.
I thought that too. Probably because the guy who did the images (a) could not draw pandas (at least not a recognisable panda that small) and/or (b) thought a panda would confuse people because no one knows that firefox is another name for red panda.
Seriously though, I think this looks like the final name and I like it.
Does anyone have a mirror of the MSWindows binary that does not end in .exe for those of use who cannot download *.exe's?