hackers, is Steven Levy's "Hackers: Heroes of the Computer Revolution". I believe it was in its first edition when I read it (in '93?), so it's been a while. I might not quite remember the details like the name of Tech Model Railroad Club.
Never heard of the Tech Model Railroad Club by name, but I have heard of the nature of the efforts. Of course, Bill Gates' story of BASIC interpreter is famous. So he came across a wrong business model -- charging people for software itself. Well, to be fair, a business model that was wrong if you wanted to produce quality software while making money. It's amazing how many people turn this into a causality argument. Let me give you an analogy. If we had no laws whatsoever, we would not all be dead because there are murderers in the world. So let's not have any laws. Doesn't sit right, does it? Well, that's because causality arguments don't work for situations which have many causes. The best you can hope for is the probability arguments. Which means you have to talk about what type of system would produce a more beneficial trend... how to nudge things in the right direction. Software was developed without patents. Sure. But to almost every mathematician to whom I speak about this argument, the programmers' position is just downright obnoxious. It amounts to saying that mathematicians' work must be given away freely (or for some nominal flat fee -- which is what grants are) so that programmers can make money off of it. A working patent system would eliminate need for (most) trade secrets. I agree that the system is broken. But I am pretty sure it is because business methods are patentable.
As for RSA, you'll have to explain that one. Given that the people behind it were clearly profit-driven:
By the time RSA was making money from RSA, rather than from venture capital, the main reason that RSA was in wide use was PGP... and RSA managed to screw PGP up in the process. The history of RSA is a mess of acquisitions and speculation. it stands to reason to believe that they would not try to make a working product out of it unless they could make money off of it. Innovation (as well as discovery) happens for 2 reasons: vision (of the insightful) and accident (of the curious wanderers). The latter will happen with or without any financial motivation. The former takes more than an idea. It also takes a vigorous drive. You cannot possibly suggest that without that company the banking system would have advanced as it did.
You can move the world *and* get the Fields medal.
Name one person who created a new industry from the work for which he was awarded a Fields medal.
...bah. this is all just bickering. I am sorry. I am tired of this argument now. I think we both understand each others' positions. But I'd rather go do something useful now.
The probability that you win a few million pound by buying a single lottery ticket is much much higher than then probability that you solve the travelling salesman problem in polynomial time. You (and I do mean you -- not one) will never know.
FYI, French economy is (within 2-5% points) the size of the economy of California. Given that, can you explain how the French banks can have the turn over large enough to compete with the US banking system? And the US dollar not backed by bs. It is backed by manufacturing capacity of the US and the Saudi Oil. For all the stories that you hear of US manufacturing capacity decreasing due to companies moving outside of the borders, it is still larger than that of any nation in the world.
President Nixon tried that. It didn't work out too well for him. What? You haven't heard? He got away home free despite defrauding the entire banking system of the US by removing the gold backing from the US dollar. All he had to do was divert the public attention with some wiretapping scandal.
Without patents there only be copycats, like 80-90% of OSS right now, all clones of commercial software with very little innovation.
You must be joking. KDE is years ahead of anything else. fvwm desktop had virtual desktops when MS Windows was still struggling with the idea of a single desktop. These are not just technical innovations. These are innovations in how computers may be used.
I am all for software patents, but give OSS its due or I won't have a choice but to call you a hypocrate. The applications you must have in mind are Office and such. Well, ok those might have similar feel to them. But that's a very limited scope of what computers are used for today. C'mon, the only reason MS Monopoly is still not giving ground is lack of drivers for proprietory hardware on Linux.... man I am on a roll.
I think I am about to start a flame war with the opposite spectrum of slashdot than the one with which I was parrying in the morning. 2 wars: with the freedom-to-use and freedom-to-own camps. Both in the same article. I guess Slashdot editors decided to give people something to amuse themselves with this friday. What were they thinking with that question?
Not even for a crack at the Fields medal? Would I care for a shiny medal instead of a chance to move the world? I am not a 12-year-old.
Can you point to a single software patent that has worked the way you think they should? Certainly RSA comes to mind.
Ah, the causility argument. Cute. Boneheadedly wrong (I warned that I'd be burning karma on this one), but cute. As a tool for promoting useful science and arts, IP increases probability that a someone will chose to spend time of their life on generating useful ideas. People do settle into life-styles that support their lives. So if less money is made by generating ideas, less people will spend time generating useful ideas (because they have to make a living doing something else). It's not about absolute possiblities vs impossibilities. It's about establishing tendencies in the right or wrong direction. Even if tendencies in the wrong direction existed, good ideas would be generated. Just not as much and not as often. And for concretes, if you don't think RSA has changed the world, you are just plain high. As for the whole research-is-done-in-academia-for-its-own-sake arguments. It's often true. It is also often true that people start out on a certain research path hoping to make big bucks with a new idea (I've known such people personally) and when the idea doesn't work they settle for publishing in academia. Again, I am not saying all academic papers are of such nature (most aren't), but if this trend exists, then the profit potential is still a motive for a lot of good work. Without it, less good work will be done.
So if your financial gain is the issue (that everyone else should suffer to further), shouldn't you have checked that 35 U.S.C. 101 contained "algorithm" in addition to "process, machine, manufacture, or composition of matter" before entering the field and number-crunching all the way to your degree; i.e. consequently have chosen something else, such as rock music or becoming a movie star (see, Cipher in The Matrix was facing that question too...
I said that it's boring as far as papers go. I didn't say it's the most boring thing in the world (you know -- like being anything but a mathematician). On a more trolling note, math is the beginning of all knowledge. So it's earning potential when fully explored (something that is rarely accomplished) is much higher than that of any other profession. But if you think that I have no right to negotiate a fee for my unique work, then you are trying to usurp it. And without proper authorship ip protection of an idea my work can be used by anyone without paying a fee. Or I could just figure it out and never publish it because I can explore it on my own for its profit potential (it has implications in AI producing better-than-actual intelligence). Or not. But without assurances that my idea will be mine, you'll never see its benefits. To answer your question with a question, "who's john galt?"
An algorithm is an abstract concept unrelated to physical laws of the universe. This is easily an argument for software patents. Abstractions are result of human creativity (and often its method). As such they are original and useful science (to some they even art). Therefore, they pass the litmus test for patentability directly established by The Constitution.
I'll come squarely on the anti-slashdot side on this one. Software patens must continue to exist. Maybe in a better-defined way, but if they are abolished, software will be hindered severely. I am a mathematician. I may have an idea of how to SOLVE the travelling salesman problem in polynomial time.... Again, not prove that it's impossible, but solve it. It's not my direct are of expertise. So I would need to invest at least a year to iron the details of my idea. I have no intentions of doing it just to publish a paper. Plainly, it's too boring a subject for a paper. I would only do it for financial gain. Without software patents no financial gain can be made from solving an outstanding problem of this magnitude.... that is none for the person who would solve the problem. All the leprecons who'd "implement" the solution would stand to earn large amounts of money. To summarize: no patents=no solution to an outstanding problem. I am aware of all the points on the other side of this argument. They amount to the argument that "business method" patents should be abandoned -- not software patents.
The "R" rating is given by a private organization (athough they might be a non-profit).
Government is not composed of well-wishing wisemen. It is composed of the bored beauracrats secure in their job regardless of their performance. Anyone who says otherwise is blowing smoke in your eyes. This is true of every government of every nation. Aka, "the worst of the people join the leading party because they are the worst of the people". To trust these people to make decisions that will protect well-being of the children better than even the most mediocre of parents is at best misguided. It has the effect of undermining normal parent/child relationships in 99% of the cases in order to provide some partial benefit to the remaining 1%. I don't like those odds.
"We" do. But "we" are not Chinese. What they do is their business. If "we" make it ours, than we only have 2 choices when we disagree with them: stop interacting or try to change them. The latter is almost guaranteed to be a road to war. The former is still meddling that is not likely to be tolerated even by the intended beneficiaries. Enough world revolutions. Trade causes cultural exchange which allows both partners to borrow each other's better qualities.
I was going to put it the other way: since they are sovereign they can't really be made to answer for it. Any law without well-established and functioning enforcement mechanism is a law in-name only.
Censorship is good in one case only; To protect children. I personally think in that case it is protection. Think-of-the-children is a common tag line on slashdot for a reason. It is used to justify all kinds of trade offs of liberty for security. Parents must protect their children. The government should not and MUST NOT assume the position of a parent. Standards of "normal" vary and the government has no business protecting children from vulgar language any more than it has protecting them from "wrong" religions.
So now you're talking about a steady stream? Putting another $10M of goods/resources out on one of these things each day? That sounds like it is getting to be a really HEAVY supply chain. You're 'floating $300M worth of stuff at any one time, if it's a 30 day trip. Alright, I'll agree to divide the skin of the bear which has yet to be caught (since the boat does not yet exist). The early stage chain could be a ship leaving once a week. Or even once a month. And then arriving (after 6 months) once a week (or once a month if that's the choice). The whole point of slow shipping scheme is to eliminate shipping cost by increasing upfront cost. Isn't that a familiar business model in natural resources exploration? Exploration and prospecting takes a long time, but it is tolerated because a steady stream of supply is assumed to be possible after the initial cost is paid. Going along with your assumption, $10 million a month (or even a week) is either $60 mil or $260 mil. But that's not the loss. It's just the amount tied up ONCE. More precisely, the average of that amount is tied up for 6 months. So it's either $30 million or $130 million. Again, only once -- not perpetually. This is hardly a significant amount for a country like China. Heck, it's probably not a significant amount for a country like Vietnam. But China is more likely to attempt the scheme since they are the most in need of resources and the least likely to become victims of piracy.
Not that I think that people who want Nazi paraphernalia are completely sane well-adjusted individuals, but questioning the Holocaust is illegal in Germany and selling Nazi paraphernalia (on Ebay, for instance) is illegal in France. These are very much examples of censorship of (rather cookie) ideas by two of EU's largest members. Are they planning to do away with their domestic restrictions on Nazi propaganda when it comes to the Internet? It's fun to wag your finger at a trade partner who is beating you in the market place, but are they really willing to test the dangerous waters of truly free speech?
No? When was the last time you showed at McDonald's and were told that they were out of food? The market perfects the delivery system. Manufacturers plan how much resources they'll use based (among other things) on the value of futures contracts. So, yes, they do buy them in a steady stream. The extractors of resources extract them based on the futures prices as well. This will just create another efficiency-increasing player: the slow shipper. Futures market exists precisely to eliminate disrepencies in demand and supply.
You are thinking too concretely about the present-day business model. Presumably, it exists because it is most economical under the current technological conditions. If technological conditions make a different model more economical, market players will emerge to take advantage of it and they will become more efficient the players who didn't take advantage of it. The players in this case would be the shipping companies and insurance companies. The ownership of the ore does not need to be retained by those who use it. As a matter of fact, the end-point manufacturers probably buy futures contracts on the ore that they plant to use 3 months from now anyway. This creates a profit opportunity for a shipper to take advantage of high fuel prices and to lease these new boats in the hopes that the long term flat delivery cost (leasing and operating no-fuel ships) will save more than the value of fuel spent during the same time by competing shippers. To be clear, 6 months is only 20% of 6 years (assuming the return trip also takes 6 months). So if the total value of owning 1 shipment of ore for 6 months does not exceed 20% of the savings on fuel of the 6 shipments that can be made in 6 years, then the enteprice at least breaks even. Any savings better than that make it profitable.
Again, if a steady stream is established, it would be a one time delay. Just picture one ship taking off every week and one arriving every week. It would be an essentially self-propelled pipeline. Only the initial delivery would be 6 months from the initial arrival. Ie, this pipe would have high bandwidth but also a high latency. Spare the "tube" jokes, please (been done). As for reliability, if there is money to be made in making these things reliable, they will be made reliable. The only reason that cars are not made more reliable is that there is money in servicing them.
First, I am talking about natural resources -- not end products. Few of the end products would ever need to come back because those who provide natural resources are generally poorer than those who manufacture. Second, you miscalcuated when you said that you would always have to wait for 3 months. If a steady stream of supply is established where this is done, then the 3 months delay would only occur once. And the cost of one 3 months delay spread over an ever-increasing period of savings goes to zero as time goes to infinity. Third, natural resources (oil, ores, wood) would not spoil over a period of 3 months. As a matter of fact, let's be honest the route to keep an eye on is not Hawaii to Japan. It is west coast to China. That's 6 months (assuming same levels of engine/generator efficiencies as in this model). Still, a 6 months one time delay is nothing.
Or worse, yet, it's a dream for outsourcers. Scaling this would allow to move natural resources around the planet at virtually no cost. So the dream of high-paying heavy industry jobs would be gone. Worse? Better? Depends on your politics, I guess. Neil Stephenson actually figured it would be the balloons that would do the trick. Maybe at some point they will.
Slashdot Mirror
Never heard of the Tech Model Railroad Club by name, but I have heard of the nature of the efforts. Of course, Bill Gates' story of BASIC interpreter is famous. So he came across a wrong business model -- charging people for software itself. Well, to be fair, a business model that was wrong if you wanted to produce quality software while making money. It's amazing how many people turn this into a causality argument. Let me give you an analogy. If we had no laws whatsoever, we would not all be dead because there are murderers in the world. So let's not have any laws. Doesn't sit right, does it? Well, that's because causality arguments don't work for situations which have many causes. The best you can hope for is the probability arguments. Which means you have to talk about what type of system would produce a more beneficial trend... how to nudge things in the right direction. Software was developed without patents. Sure. But to almost every mathematician to whom I speak about this argument, the programmers' position is just downright obnoxious. It amounts to saying that mathematicians' work must be given away freely (or for some nominal flat fee -- which is what grants are) so that programmers can make money off of it. A working patent system would eliminate need for (most) trade secrets. I agree that the system is broken. But I am pretty sure it is because business methods are patentable.
Name one person who created a new industry from the work for which he was awarded a Fields medal.
I am tired of all the causality arguments. Motivation shifts... nudges (shapes?) trends. It doesn't produce possibilities or impossibilities.
FYI, French economy is (within 2-5% points) the size of the economy of California. Given that, can you explain how the French banks can have the turn over large enough to compete with the US banking system? And the US dollar not backed by bs. It is backed by manufacturing capacity of the US and the Saudi Oil. For all the stories that you hear of US manufacturing capacity decreasing due to companies moving outside of the borders, it is still larger than that of any nation in the world.
You must be joking. KDE is years ahead of anything else. fvwm desktop had virtual desktops when MS Windows was still struggling with the idea of a single desktop. These are not just technical innovations. These are innovations in how computers may be used.
I am all for software patents, but give OSS its due or I won't have a choice but to call you a hypocrate. The applications you must have in mind are Office and such. Well, ok those might have similar feel to them. But that's a very limited scope of what computers are used for today. C'mon, the only reason MS Monopoly is still not giving ground is lack of drivers for proprietory hardware on Linux.... man I am on a roll.
I think I am about to start a flame war with the opposite spectrum of slashdot than the one with which I was parrying in the morning. 2 wars: with the freedom-to-use and freedom-to-own camps. Both in the same article. I guess Slashdot editors decided to give people something to amuse themselves with this friday. What were they thinking with that question?
Ah, the causility argument. Cute. Boneheadedly wrong (I warned that I'd be burning karma on this one), but cute. As a tool for promoting useful science and arts, IP increases probability that a someone will chose to spend time of their life on generating useful ideas. People do settle into life-styles that support their lives. So if less money is made by generating ideas, less people will spend time generating useful ideas (because they have to make a living doing something else). It's not about absolute possiblities vs impossibilities. It's about establishing tendencies in the right or wrong direction. Even if tendencies in the wrong direction existed, good ideas would be generated. Just not as much and not as often. And for concretes, if you don't think RSA has changed the world, you are just plain high. As for the whole research-is-done-in-academia-for-its-own-sake arguments. It's often true. It is also often true that people start out on a certain research path hoping to make big bucks with a new idea (I've known such people personally) and when the idea doesn't work they settle for publishing in academia. Again, I am not saying all academic papers are of such nature (most aren't), but if this trend exists, then the profit potential is still a motive for a lot of good work. Without it, less good work will be done.
I said that it's boring as far as papers go. I didn't say it's the most boring thing in the world (you know -- like being anything but a mathematician). On a more trolling note, math is the beginning of all knowledge. So it's earning potential when fully explored (something that is rarely accomplished) is much higher than that of any other profession. But if you think that I have no right to negotiate a fee for my unique work, then you are trying to usurp it. And without proper authorship ip protection of an idea my work can be used by anyone without paying a fee. Or I could just figure it out and never publish it because I can explore it on my own for its profit potential (it has implications in AI producing better-than-actual intelligence). Or not. But without assurances that my idea will be mine, you'll never see its benefits. To answer your question with a question, "who's john galt?"
http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=470808&cid=22601160
I'll come squarely on the anti-slashdot side on this one. Software patens must continue to exist. Maybe in a better-defined way, but if they are abolished, software will be hindered severely. I am a mathematician. I may have an idea of how to SOLVE the travelling salesman problem in polynomial time.... Again, not prove that it's impossible, but solve it. It's not my direct are of expertise. So I would need to invest at least a year to iron the details of my idea. I have no intentions of doing it just to publish a paper. Plainly, it's too boring a subject for a paper. I would only do it for financial gain. Without software patents no financial gain can be made from solving an outstanding problem of this magnitude.... that is none for the person who would solve the problem. All the leprecons who'd "implement" the solution would stand to earn large amounts of money. To summarize: no patents=no solution to an outstanding problem. I am aware of all the points on the other side of this argument. They amount to the argument that "business method" patents should be abandoned -- not software patents.
The "R" rating is given by a private organization (athough they might be a non-profit).
Government is not composed of well-wishing wisemen. It is composed of the bored beauracrats secure in their job regardless of their performance. Anyone who says otherwise is blowing smoke in your eyes. This is true of every government of every nation. Aka, "the worst of the people join the leading party because they are the worst of the people". To trust these people to make decisions that will protect well-being of the children better than even the most mediocre of parents is at best misguided. It has the effect of undermining normal parent/child relationships in 99% of the cases in order to provide some partial benefit to the remaining 1%. I don't like those odds.
"We" do. But "we" are not Chinese. What they do is their business. If "we" make it ours, than we only have 2 choices when we disagree with them: stop interacting or try to change them. The latter is almost guaranteed to be a road to war. The former is still meddling that is not likely to be tolerated even by the intended beneficiaries. Enough world revolutions. Trade causes cultural exchange which allows both partners to borrow each other's better qualities.
I was going to put it the other way: since they are sovereign they can't really be made to answer for it. Any law without well-established and functioning enforcement mechanism is a law in-name only.
Not that I think that people who want Nazi paraphernalia are completely sane well-adjusted individuals, but questioning the Holocaust is illegal in Germany and selling Nazi paraphernalia (on Ebay, for instance) is illegal in France. These are very much examples of censorship of (rather cookie) ideas by two of EU's largest members. Are they planning to do away with their domestic restrictions on Nazi propaganda when it comes to the Internet? It's fun to wag your finger at a trade partner who is beating you in the market place, but are they really willing to test the dangerous waters of truly free speech?
No? When was the last time you showed at McDonald's and were told that they were out of food? The market perfects the delivery system. Manufacturers plan how much resources they'll use based (among other things) on the value of futures contracts. So, yes, they do buy them in a steady stream. The extractors of resources extract them based on the futures prices as well. This will just create another efficiency-increasing player: the slow shipper. Futures market exists precisely to eliminate disrepencies in demand and supply.
You are thinking too concretely about the present-day business model. Presumably, it exists because it is most economical under the current technological conditions. If technological conditions make a different model more economical, market players will emerge to take advantage of it and they will become more efficient the players who didn't take advantage of it. The players in this case would be the shipping companies and insurance companies. The ownership of the ore does not need to be retained by those who use it. As a matter of fact, the end-point manufacturers probably buy futures contracts on the ore that they plant to use 3 months from now anyway. This creates a profit opportunity for a shipper to take advantage of high fuel prices and to lease these new boats in the hopes that the long term flat delivery cost (leasing and operating no-fuel ships) will save more than the value of fuel spent during the same time by competing shippers. To be clear, 6 months is only 20% of 6 years (assuming the return trip also takes 6 months). So if the total value of owning 1 shipment of ore for 6 months does not exceed 20% of the savings on fuel of the 6 shipments that can be made in 6 years, then the enteprice at least breaks even. Any savings better than that make it profitable.
Again, if a steady stream is established, it would be a one time delay. Just picture one ship taking off every week and one arriving every week. It would be an essentially self-propelled pipeline. Only the initial delivery would be 6 months from the initial arrival. Ie, this pipe would have high bandwidth but also a high latency. Spare the "tube" jokes, please (been done). As for reliability, if there is money to be made in making these things reliable, they will be made reliable. The only reason that cars are not made more reliable is that there is money in servicing them.
First, I am talking about natural resources -- not end products. Few of the end products would ever need to come back because those who provide natural resources are generally poorer than those who manufacture. Second, you miscalcuated when you said that you would always have to wait for 3 months. If a steady stream of supply is established where this is done, then the 3 months delay would only occur once. And the cost of one 3 months delay spread over an ever-increasing period of savings goes to zero as time goes to infinity. Third, natural resources (oil, ores, wood) would not spoil over a period of 3 months. As a matter of fact, let's be honest the route to keep an eye on is not Hawaii to Japan. It is west coast to China. That's 6 months (assuming same levels of engine/generator efficiencies as in this model). Still, a 6 months one time delay is nothing.
Or worse, yet, it's a dream for outsourcers. Scaling this would allow to move natural resources around the planet at virtually no cost. So the dream of high-paying heavy industry jobs would be gone. Worse? Better? Depends on your politics, I guess. Neil Stephenson actually figured it would be the balloons that would do the trick. Maybe at some point they will.