Now if you want to argue that it was a sin of inaction, that someone high up knew an attack was coming and chose to do nothing, that might be plausible, since less people would need to be involved. I wouldn't rule it out completely, though my faith in humanity would be shattered if it were the case. I'm not inclined to believe even that much.
Well, if it's going to upset you, then you probably shouldn't think about it at all.
In global terms, some part of the internet is 'always on'. But regionally, usage varies over 24 hrs.
And, yes, latency slows down P2P to the point where it's faster to use FTP.
Nobody is trying to argue that P2P is always faster than FTP. Please do not create straw men.
But of course, that would mean that the content provider would have to pay for its bandwidth and not try to fob the cost off on the ISP.
With P2P, the content provider still pays for its bandwidth. The only difference is that the user allocates some of his or her bandwdth (which he or she is also paying for) to help distribute the content.
Nobody is using bandwidth that they have not paid for. Nobody is getting 'fobbed off'.
The vast majority of BitTorrent traffic is still pirated media.
No; upload capacity at the edges is not underutilized at all.
Even at 4am?
Also, this capacity is not "already paid for." It was an investment that is still being paid back.
Sorry, I should have said that it was a sunk cost.
As for latency: yes, it is a big issue for P2P
So you claim. And yet BitTorrent works fine using data served at the edge of the network.
As usual, we see in this case that P2P is a solution looking for a problem. In fact, it is really only good at solving one problem: the one it was invented to solve. That is, making it difficult to stop people from pirating music, software, and media.
People use BT for legal purposes too (as I am sure you are aware). Being able to share the burden of distribution is useful to a lot of people.
It's also currently massively under-utilised in terms of upload capacity. This capacity is already paid for, so putting it to use should increase efficiencies and reduce costs.
If I steal your product, that implies that I want it. Do I want it badly enough that I would pay for it if there was no possible way to steal it? Maybe, maybe not, but the product clearly has some value to me, since I was willing to go through the trouble and risk of stealing it.
Yes, but we are not talking about stealing, unless you can prove otherwise. We are talking about copyright infringement.
That was kind of the point.
However, if I'm buying someone else's product instead, that implies that your game has no value to me.
No, it implies that the other person's product has more value.
"The company has forecast Eee PC shipments at around 5 million units this year. Based on the 6-to-4 ratio the company predicts, Asus could ship around 3 million Windows Eee PCs and 2 million Linux ones."
but that wouldn't solve the real problems we have with copyrights, patents, and trademarks.
Understanding the problem (that ideas cannot be 'owned' and should not be treated ethically or legally as property) is the first step to solving it.
Since there can be no natural monopolies on ideas, what else could we be talking about other than artificial monopolies created by law?
The problem is that the terminology leads people to think that a monopoly is granted on an idea (ie, that the idea can be 'owned' like property). A business monopoly is a monopoly on the provision of a product or service.
The only reason for labelling ideas as "intellectual property" is to create a false equivalence with the pre-existing concept of physical property.
To turn the argument around, what on earth is the justification for labelling ideas as 'property' - especially when it is so likely to mislead?
Even if we assume that IP refers to a variety of government-created business monopolies (which is what we are normally talking about), the term is still hopelessly misleading.
The Zimbra Public License requires that the code displays the Zimbra logo. Yahoo's acquisition would mean that the trademark was owned by MS - allowing MS to exercise complete proprietary control over Zimbra code - and effectively nullify any user freedoms granted by the license.
Context Free is a program that generates images from written instructions called a grammar. The program follows the instructions in a few seconds to create images that can contain millions of shapes. The program itself is GPLed and available here.
As you can see from the link below, some of the results from this project are stunning.
The Open Source movement is nothing more than a selfish group of little people with a narrow scope and no plan.
In my experience, Open Source people are mostly Free Software advocates who have modified their terminology in order to make their sales pitch more effective.
Their are typically very community-minded, and un-selfish (by the standards of most people).
They are more interested in driving adoption than RMS, who prefers to focus on promoting an understanding of the principles of Software Freedom.
Generally speaking, Open Source folks have the same goal as the Free Software community, but differ in their preferred means.
Microsoft's business model is profoundly dependent on blocking competition. In a sense, its market dominance not only facilitates this approach, but necessitates it.
It normally achieves this by using software to lock the user in and the competitors out. Success depends on (stealthily) restricting customers' and competitors' freedom.
Almost all vendors (including Apple and Amazon) play this game - but none of them are as committed or well-practiced as MS.
That's why MS can't and won't abandon market-restricting technologies like DRM.
Slashdot Mirror
There was some discussion recently about the possibility of building an open source photosynth - and creating an 'open voxel space' map of the planet.
Anyone know if there's been any progress on this?
http://lists.burri.to/pipermail/geowanking/2008-June/005373.html
Now if you want to argue that it was a sin of inaction, that someone high up knew an attack was coming and chose to do nothing, that might be plausible, since less people would need to be involved. I wouldn't rule it out completely, though my faith in humanity would be shattered if it were the case. I'm not inclined to believe even that much.
Well, if it's going to upset you, then you probably shouldn't think about it at all.
Some questions:
Do you think there are Freddie Scappaticcis-type informers in Al Qaeda?
How do you think US intelligence agencies maintain high-level assets within terrorist organisations?
Do you think American intelligence services ever allow terrorist attacks to go ahead?
Beautifully put. Somebody please parent mod up!
The Internet is "always on."
In global terms, some part of the internet is 'always on'. But regionally, usage varies over 24 hrs.
And, yes, latency slows down P2P to the point where it's faster to use FTP.
Nobody is trying to argue that P2P is always faster than FTP. Please do not create straw men.
But of course, that would mean that the content provider would have to pay for its bandwidth and not try to fob the cost off on the ISP.
With P2P, the content provider still pays for its bandwidth. The only difference is that the user allocates some of his or her bandwdth (which he or she is also paying for) to help distribute the content.
Nobody is using bandwidth that they have not paid for. Nobody is getting 'fobbed off'.
The vast majority of BitTorrent traffic is still pirated media.
And your point is?
No; upload capacity at the edges is not underutilized at all.
Even at 4am?
Also, this capacity is not "already paid for." It was an investment that is still being paid back.
Sorry, I should have said that it was a sunk cost.
As for latency: yes, it is a big issue for P2P
So you claim. And yet BitTorrent works fine using data served at the edge of the network.
As usual, we see in this case that P2P is a solution looking for a problem. In fact, it is really only good at solving one problem: the one it was invented to solve. That is, making it difficult to stop people from pirating music, software, and media.
People use BT for legal purposes too (as I am sure you are aware). Being able to share the burden of distribution is useful to a lot of people.
Internet bandwidth is most expensive at the edges
It's also currently massively under-utilised in terms of upload capacity. This capacity is already paid for, so putting it to use should increase efficiencies and reduce costs.
latency to other users is the longest
Latency is not an issue for most P2P apps.
The strangest thing of all is that you paid them to treat you like that.
If I steal your product, that implies that I want it. Do I want it badly enough that I would pay for it if there was no possible way to steal it? Maybe, maybe not, but the product clearly has some value to me, since I was willing to go through the trouble and risk of stealing it.
Yes, but we are not talking about stealing, unless you can prove otherwise. We are talking about copyright infringement.
That was kind of the point.
However, if I'm buying someone else's product instead, that implies that your game has no value to me.
No, it implies that the other person's product has more value.
What was your point again?
Xubuntu runs really well on the Eee. Compiz is super slick and makes the small screen much more usable.
"The company has forecast Eee PC shipments at around 5 million units this year. Based on the 6-to-4 ratio the company predicts, Asus could ship around 3 million Windows Eee PCs and 2 million Linux ones."
http://www.computerworld.com/action/article.do?command=viewArticleBasic&articleId=9068258
but that wouldn't solve the real problems we have with copyrights, patents, and trademarks.
Understanding the problem (that ideas cannot be 'owned' and should not be treated ethically or legally as property) is the first step to solving it.
Since there can be no natural monopolies on ideas, what else could we be talking about other than artificial monopolies created by law?
The problem is that the terminology leads people to think that a monopoly is granted on an idea (ie, that the idea can be 'owned' like property). A business monopoly is a monopoly on the provision of a product or service.
Using the term "Intellectual Property" distracts from what we're really talking about: Trademarks, Copyrights, and Patents.
It's much worse than that.
"Intellectual Property" is a propaganda term designed to imply that ideas should be treated like physical property.
It is designed to confuse people, in order to facilitate the growth and extension of business monopolies.
The only reason for labelling ideas as "intellectual property" is to create a false equivalence with the pre-existing concept of physical property.
To turn the argument around, what on earth is the justification for labelling ideas as 'property' - especially when it is so likely to mislead?
Even if we assume that IP refers to a variety of government-created business monopolies (which is what we are normally talking about), the term is still hopelessly misleading.
Better to do away with it altogether.
Commercial TV companies work for the people who pay their wages - the advertisers.
The BBC also works for the people who their wages - the government.
I know some people view the BBC as some kind of utopian ideal, but ultimately they are as compromised as any other form of corporate media.
Don't mistake subtlety for neutrality.
Well at least we agree that speculation is driving recent price rises.
in general speculation has a price-smoothing effect
It can also cause bubble markets (cf tech bubble, property bubbles, etc).
A years-long steady rise in price can only be due to a few factors
Except we're not talking a steady long-term rise - we're talking about a rapid short-term rise.
Bubbles can easily last for a few years.
Biofuels may be a factor, but the main reason for the recent dramatic increases in food prices is market speculation:
http://canadianpress.google.com/article/ALeqM5ijCOI0Z2vYTwRJMmi_BIgz9kXXog
It's worse than that.
The Zimbra Public License requires that the code displays the Zimbra logo. Yahoo's acquisition would mean that the trademark was owned by MS - allowing MS to exercise complete proprietary control over Zimbra code - and effectively nullify any user freedoms granted by the license.
Context Free is a program that generates images from written instructions called a grammar. The program follows the instructions in a few seconds to create images that can contain millions of shapes. The program itself is GPLed and available here.
As you can see from the link below, some of the results from this project are stunning.
Context Free Art gallery.
The Open Source movement is nothing more than a selfish group of little people with a narrow scope and no plan.
In my experience, Open Source people are mostly Free Software advocates who have modified their terminology in order to make their sales pitch more effective.
Their are typically very community-minded, and un-selfish (by the standards of most people).
They are more interested in driving adoption than RMS, who prefers to focus on promoting an understanding of the principles of Software Freedom.
Generally speaking, Open Source folks have the same goal as the Free Software community, but differ in their preferred means.
As I mentioned elsewhere, the BBC named it as one of the 'technologies of the year' - The technology with impact 2007
Certainly the approachess mentioned in TFA seem to be limited.
There is, however, another technology which seems to be much more promising.
"WiTricity, a portmanteau for wireless electricity, is a term coined initially by Dave Gerding in 2005 and used by a MIT research team led by Prof. Marin Soljai in 2007,[1][2] to describe the ability to provide electrical energy to remote objects without wires. WiTricity is based on strong coupling between electromagnetic resonant objects to transfer energy wirelessly between them."
The BBC website named it as one of their 'technologies of the year' - The technology with impact 2007
Why include 'deprecated features' in a new standard anyway? Why not just remove them altogether?
Bullshit.
You can seen from this link that the Castro edit was made by 130.22.190.5 - the Gitmo IP.
Microsoft's business model is profoundly dependent on blocking competition. In a sense, its market dominance not only facilitates this approach, but necessitates it.
It normally achieves this by using software to lock the user in and the competitors out. Success depends on (stealthily) restricting customers' and competitors' freedom.
Almost all vendors (including Apple and Amazon) play this game - but none of them are as committed or well-practiced as MS.
That's why MS can't and won't abandon market-restricting technologies like DRM.