This is definitely my second or third post on Slashdot. After not commenting for a long time, I think I'll step in for a bit.
So what is this tolerance stuff that I keep hearing about? As in, tolerate gay marriage. Tolerate all religions. Tolerate points of view that are different from your own. And yet when I come on Slashdot and read this article, and all the (I read at +4) comments, my face turns sour because of the horrendous amount of crap that I see from people here.
Look, you don't believe Christianity, fine. You think the ark idea is crap, and that science proves yadda yadda yadda, fine. At least have the guts to refrain from bashing those who do. It takes a mature individual to let people have their say without exploding in anger or cracking up in laughter. You have to understand that most people have developed for themselves a framework for how they view life. Most/. readers, I'm guessing, are scientifically minded. So they believe in all the things that science has accomplished. Good work. Hooray for you. Then there are those who believe that a God exists and has made everything we see, and created laws that science is discovering and utilizing. Good work, hooray for you. If you were really tolerant, and if you were really following what you believe you should be doing, then you'd have a solid discussion with them based on the facts, based on what you've seen, etc. etc. But... no. All we see are lousy jokes and other definitive statements - "the Bible is crap," "the Bible has contradictions," etc. etc.
I just don't understand how some/. readers can force Christians onto a pedestal ("You have to be perfect, you Christian moron, and aren't you supposed to LOVE everybody?!") and cannot subject themselves to any sort of standards.
If you're going to argue that the Bible has bad teachings, or that it has contradictions, read the Bible yourself before you make a decision. Actually, don't do just that - be a real student and go and find commentaries from Christian writers. Find commentaries from non-Christian writers. (Why commentaries? Have you ever really been able to explore a book without seeing what lots of people thought about it?) Read it with an unbiased eye. If you think you've found a contradiction, then see what the other side has to say. Read it for yourself. If you end up unconvinced the Bible is true, then great. If you don't find contradictions, then great too. Decide for yourself what you want to believe.
What astounds me is how FEW people actually take that offer. Personally, I don't know of anyone who has. Why? Because they're lazy. Too lazy to go and find out things for themselves. In the meantime, they (non-Christians AND Christians) rely on a few lousy articles and information (which are debunked by different people, depending on who you ask), and then post knowingly uninformed, uneducated entries on/. to the approval (and subsequent positive moderation) of their knowingly uninformed, uneducated peers.
Watch people read this comment and ask, "Is the author of this comment a Christian?" If the answer is yes, they immediately go and trash it because suddenly none of my arguments and comments make any sense. "Those moronic Christians, what a bunch of idiots, they must not believe in science..." right?
So maybe I am, or maybe I'm not. I will say that I HAVE taken up my own challenge. That should be enough for you.
This is my guess, and IANAL, but the copyright owner is not the owner of the MP3 or work that is being stolen or whatever. In this case, I'm guessing the RIAA was acting on behalf of Usher, who I presume is the copyright owner of his songs. So it's not the actual creator of the file that matters, but the owner of the copyright whom the RIAA feels they can represent.
Now let's say I publish a piece of music but I make it free to everyone. If the RIAA subpoenaed someone for downloading music that I had made, and if they think that they're going to make money off of representing me somehow... that's just wrong. I think that's where the perjury rule applies.
Still though, you can't help but wonder what we can do against an organization that is so ruthless. Companies that spend millions of dollars on litigating people who have no way of defending themselves (and if they did, would probably run up some serious debt and probably lose or settle out of court) shouldn't be able to get away with the abuse that they have made so prominent on the evening news.
Agreed. If some of those lawyers are indeed avid members of Slashdot, I'd like to hear their personal opinions on
1) The RIAA
2) The MPAA
3) SCO
I would have also liked to hear what they think about the RIAA having permission to issue subpoenas without having to ask a judge. Doesn't this give control of the judicial system to a multimillion dollar corporation who has no interest in justice, but rather profits? Or am I barking up the wrong tree here?
Slashdot Mirror
This is definitely my second or third post on Slashdot. After not commenting for a long time, I think I'll step in for a bit. So what is this tolerance stuff that I keep hearing about? As in, tolerate gay marriage. Tolerate all religions. Tolerate points of view that are different from your own. And yet when I come on Slashdot and read this article, and all the (I read at +4) comments, my face turns sour because of the horrendous amount of crap that I see from people here. Look, you don't believe Christianity, fine. You think the ark idea is crap, and that science proves yadda yadda yadda, fine. At least have the guts to refrain from bashing those who do. It takes a mature individual to let people have their say without exploding in anger or cracking up in laughter. You have to understand that most people have developed for themselves a framework for how they view life. Most /. readers, I'm guessing, are scientifically minded. So they believe in all the things that science has accomplished. Good work. Hooray for you. Then there are those who believe that a God exists and has made everything we see, and created laws that science is discovering and utilizing. Good work, hooray for you. If you were really tolerant, and if you were really following what you believe you should be doing, then you'd have a solid discussion with them based on the facts, based on what you've seen, etc. etc. But... no. All we see are lousy jokes and other definitive statements - "the Bible is crap," "the Bible has contradictions," etc. etc.
I just don't understand how some /. readers can force Christians onto a pedestal ("You have to be perfect, you Christian moron, and aren't you supposed to LOVE everybody?!") and cannot subject themselves to any sort of standards.
If you're going to argue that the Bible has bad teachings, or that it has contradictions, read the Bible yourself before you make a decision. Actually, don't do just that - be a real student and go and find commentaries from Christian writers. Find commentaries from non-Christian writers. (Why commentaries? Have you ever really been able to explore a book without seeing what lots of people thought about it?) Read it with an unbiased eye. If you think you've found a contradiction, then see what the other side has to say. Read it for yourself. If you end up unconvinced the Bible is true, then great. If you don't find contradictions, then great too. Decide for yourself what you want to believe.
What astounds me is how FEW people actually take that offer. Personally, I don't know of anyone who has. Why? Because they're lazy. Too lazy to go and find out things for themselves. In the meantime, they (non-Christians AND Christians) rely on a few lousy articles and information (which are debunked by different people, depending on who you ask), and then post knowingly uninformed, uneducated entries on /. to the approval (and subsequent positive moderation) of their knowingly uninformed, uneducated peers.
Watch people read this comment and ask, "Is the author of this comment a Christian?" If the answer is yes, they immediately go and trash it because suddenly none of my arguments and comments make any sense. "Those moronic Christians, what a bunch of idiots, they must not believe in science..." right?
So maybe I am, or maybe I'm not. I will say that I HAVE taken up my own challenge. That should be enough for you.
I'm guessing their site's been slashdotted... here's the original text:
/usr/src/v er/CSSA-2003-020.0/SRPMS/linux -2.4.13-21S.src.rpm
How to use the 2.4 Linux kernel safely and legally. (Diaries)
By Entendre Entendre
Tue Aug 5th, 2003 at 05:43:46 PM EST
And without paying SCO's extortion license fees.
Originally posted as a comment but so much fun I had to give it a little more promotion.
cd
mkdir silly_sco
wget ftp://ftp.sco.com/pub/updates/OpenLinux/3.1.1/Ser
rpm2cpio linux-2.4.13-21S.src.rpm > sco.cpio
cpio -i --file sco.cpio
bzip2 -d linux-2.4.13.tar.bz2
tar -xf linux-2.4.13.tar
You'll find the license agreement in linux/COPYING
Compile, install, enjoy.
This is my guess, and IANAL, but the copyright owner is not the owner of the MP3 or work that is being stolen or whatever. In this case, I'm guessing the RIAA was acting on behalf of Usher, who I presume is the copyright owner of his songs. So it's not the actual creator of the file that matters, but the owner of the copyright whom the RIAA feels they can represent.
Now let's say I publish a piece of music but I make it free to everyone. If the RIAA subpoenaed someone for downloading music that I had made, and if they think that they're going to make money off of representing me somehow... that's just wrong. I think that's where the perjury rule applies.
Still though, you can't help but wonder what we can do against an organization that is so ruthless. Companies that spend millions of dollars on litigating people who have no way of defending themselves (and if they did, would probably run up some serious debt and probably lose or settle out of court) shouldn't be able to get away with the abuse that they have made so prominent on the evening news.
Agreed. If some of those lawyers are indeed avid members of Slashdot, I'd like to hear their personal opinions on 1) The RIAA 2) The MPAA 3) SCO I would have also liked to hear what they think about the RIAA having permission to issue subpoenas without having to ask a judge. Doesn't this give control of the judicial system to a multimillion dollar corporation who has no interest in justice, but rather profits? Or am I barking up the wrong tree here?