Thanks for the correction. I guess my biased view came from the fact that I live in the lawyer capital of the US. Of my ~20 lawyer friends that I can readily think of, only 2 work for a law firm. The rest work for advocacy groups, the government, or teach. Of course, these types of jobs don't pay as well as a good law firm.
Of yes, one lawyer friend defends the scum of our city. He once told me that getting paid by his clients can sometimes be problematic.
Many of you are viewing this strictly from a CS perspective. While there is great demand for CS professionals, the other high tech/physical science fields are not doing as well. Employment in physics related work has been absolutely devastated during this past decade. Some engineering fields (ME for instance) are not doing that great. The earth sciences has been absolutely stagnant for longer than a decade.
Part of this decline is simply due to the end of the Cold War. Defense spending on basic & applied research, and on engineering development has remained flat or gone down. Much of this decrease simply balances out the wild increases (i.e., deficit spending) during the Reagan presidency.
Students capable of entering high tech fields are not stupid. They abandon fields when they see a decline in available jobs. This produces a time lag between when the decline in jobs starts and when the decline in the number of graduates starts. Duh!
Back around 1990, the National Academy of Science published a report that there was to be a massive shortage of high tech graduates during the 90's. Congress swallowed this facade, hook, line, and sinker; this spawned H1-B. Unfortunately, the NAS results were simply based on population projections, they did not take into account the number of jobs that were to be available. Duh!
Like I said, ppl capable of entering high tech are not stupid. Some skip college and enter the work force writing code. Others migrate to other disciplines (bio, business, law) where the pickings are better.
Lawrence Lessig is the Berkman Professor for Entrepreneurial Legal Studies at Harvard Law School. I first found out about him while exploring the Berkman Center for Internet and Society web site after seeing the posting about the H20 project. Since then, I have been reading everything that Lawrence Lessig has written.
You can check out some of the stuff he has written by 1st going to Lessig web site. I especially recommend the various articles that he has written for the Industry Standard. I truly believe that you will enjoy reading his well thought out essays.
IMHO, Lessig is the type of advocate that the OSS movement has underutilized.
A set of standards does not perclude the inclusion of other libraries nor is it a stagnant set of rules. With time, new additions or changes to the standard set will occur. If done properly, lots of the older standards will still be included with a particular distro. However, these older stuff will likely be declared as being obsolete; usually this means that eventually the obsolete stuff will be eliminated.
When SGI changed from IRIX4.X to IRIX5.X, the internal binary format of their libraries changed. To help ease the transition period when one had to recompile all of their software, the older libraries were still distributed (optional installation). Now with IRIX6.X, their are three sets of libraries (old 32 bit, new hybrid 32/64 bit, and 64 bit). Quite a mess especially when one also considers additional stuff to handle the various MIPS processors. However, old code still works.
You are correct about having the standards determined by consensus, not be decree. However, that is what the ongoing work to establish a standard is all about.
This article is written from the perspective (and experience?) of the "average" older computer user. I have seen this type of person in the workplace many times. Here's their profile.
About 10-15 yrs ago, they are forced to switch from his typewriter to a PC; they hated it. Over time, they painstakingly gain experience with the crap from Redmond. Now they are in their comfort zone; scared to death that they might be forced to learn something new. These people, if they are mediocre, feel threatened by their youthful co-workers who are extremely productive and capable of doing things that they can't. Too young to retire, too old to start anything new.
The problem is that in many cases, these people are middle-management. They make decisions that will affect your life.
The purpose of an IPO is to raise money so that a company can expand. Investors will buy stock if they believe that the company can make a profit. So the question becomes, how does RH intend to make money? The means of making money constitute assets that might appeal to another company.
RH is positioning themselves to provide consulting and services for installation and maintenance of Linux. I believe that this means service contracts. Those contracts represent assets.
If RH is successful in packaging and selling Linux, their "brand name" becomes an asset. Profits from the sales of Linux represent assets.
Suppose that I am a major distributor of a proprietary software package that runs on Linux. I now wish to expand and distribute a "complete" package of my software with the OS. Do I start from scratch, or do I buy a "branded" name company?
In all fairness, I don't believe that RH would be a prime candidate for a hostile takeover bid. However, people must remember the computer industry has had cases when a small companies get swallowed up by another. Ever hear of a company called Computer Associates?
Well, if you do go public, you do run the risk of a possible hostile takeover bid. Usually this occurs when the sum of your assets exceeds the value of your outstanding stock. Certain computer companies (I don't mean MS) have been known to "grow" using this acquisition method.
Ironically, one way to force somebody to take responsibility for their actions is to sue them. The usual suspects are the parents, schools, local government, and police. In most cases, the parents don't have enough money to make it worthwhile. For the others, it is somewhat difficult to document that the schools, gov, or police showed gross negligence.
Hence, as a recent case(s) has shown, the victim's families then go after the folks with the deeper pockets. The targets are the recording, movie, and computer game industries. The press then reports this, thereby creating a lot of "debate" about the negative effects of things like Doom and slasher movies. What the press then fails to mention is that these targets were chosen because they have lots of money.
I agree with your general premise that a big problem is that nobody is willing to take responsibility for their actions. However, the threat of a lawsuit has a chilling effect on those who would be willing to apologize and to accept blame. This vicious circle must be broken if a meaningful solution to these types of problems is to achieved.
I don't want to be totally apologetic but the timing of this Oz censureship posting could not have come at a worst time. The shooting in Colorado has caused emotions to run fairly high in the US. Needless to say, the discussion and debate has not necessarily been level-headed.
Central to all of this is the explosive issue of gun control and the Bill of Rights of the U.S. Constitution. Most Americans probably know only three part of the 10 part BOR's; free speech, right to bear arms, and the right to remain silent. Unfortunately, the internet censorship issue falls within the domain of free speech (in the US), and hence, this Aus. censureship issue is being swept into the vortex that surround the Colorado massacre.
Also remember that the *only* thing keeping the CDA from being fully implemented are court rulings that this bill violates the US Constitution (1st Ammendment, free speech).
Once again, sorry. But emotions are running pretty hot in the US right now.
Very well written and thought out; I wish I had wrote it myself. There is one key point that is forgotten at times that would like to add. The empowerment of the individual at the expense of the government essentially means that the government has implicit trust that the people will do the right thing. This trust forces the people to address the *root* of any problem that we face. Not by legislation, but by looking at the foundation of American society. It is easy for the government to pass a law that superficially "solves" an issue. However, unless the fundamental problem is addressed, it will still remain festering till another crisis arises.
When the government loses this trust that the American people can find a solution to a problem, it essentially is saying that our society has failed.
I have to agree that Americans can be somewhat schizo when it comes the Bill of Rights. However, the BOR's is the one thing that keeps this heterogeneous country, which is an incredible mixture of people from around the world, from self-imploding. The BOR's keeps America from bouncing from one extreme to another depending on the latest whims of the people. America survives despite the "good" intentions of it's citizenry. And these include the stupid people.
As for looking down on other lowly nations, I wonder about that sometimes because Americans are essentially immigrants from these lowly nations. Perhaps, this looking down is due to the fact that established Americans judge a foreign country by the immigrants or tourists from those countries. These people can't speak English, have strange customs, strange food, etc... I would also guess that if your neighbor was Canada, you too would gain a feeling of superiority.:)
As for television, the founding fathers did not foresee the establishment of the Fed. Communication Commission. OTOH, the censorship on TV in the US is easing up (thank you R. Murdoch and the Fox TV Channel).
And for your last point, America needs to be very careful about implementing laws that supress the rights of minority groups. In fact, the US needs to be very careful not to pass laws that infringe on the BOR's. I cringe everytime there is talk about laws prohibiting the burning of the US flag, or about allowing prayer in public schools.
I enjoyed the interview with Lucas, tentatively perused the main article (don't want to many details), and simply adored the $!@^#% picture of Gates that kept popping up. For more on Star Wars, check out theonion web site. It seems that another Bill (Clinton) is already standing in line to see the movie.
Oh no! I'm afraid that your niece has somehow learned the principle of embrace and extend. She obviously got the embrace part down cold. Now good old Tux will probably be just another face in her stuffed animal collection. Hopefully with time she will eventually learn about "open source" stuffed animals and toys, and the benefits of sharing.:)
Being an uncle is one of the best jobs in the world.
That's a very interesting point that you make about the non-coverage of the Mexico deal. I guess it would not stroke the ego of the typical American to learn that a perceived "less educated" country is going to use a "very complex" OS in their schools. This point shoud be remembered the next time some American PHB spouts off about Linux being too complex.
Well, just like Animal Farm the mantra mysteriously changes (IIRC), "Four legs good, two legs better.":) This, of course, has other implications. A gnu has four legs...
Before ppl start flaming away at ZD (which is now a reflex action), take the time and look at the schedule for this conference. The three keynote speakers are, ESR, Love, and O'Reilly. No real surprises here. As far as the various panels, I get the impression that the conference will be a favorable one.
Remember that PHB's want to hear from other PHB's. The more enlightened one's (for instance, the CIO of Burlington Coat Factory) have implemented Linux; hopefully, their experience has been a good one. The sheep (the other PHB's) will then follow their lead and go bleating back to their bosses. Sort of like Animal Farm: Four legs good (linux), two legs bad (NT).
Finally, our favorite ZD writer is not listed in the schedule.
I believe that there is general consensus that Unix is Unix is Unix. The fundamentals are the same, and knowledge of one variation can be easily transfered to another flavor of Unix.
As another illustration of this, consider the case of SunOs vs. Solaris. SunOS4.X was primarily based on BSD4.3 while Solaris is based on SYS V.4. When companies made the switch from SunOS to Solaris, did they fire all their sysadmins and replace them with ppl more experienced with SYSV? Or did those old Sun sysadmin make the transition to this "new" OS?
On a similar note, what happened when SGI switched from NeWS to X/Motif? Or what happens everytime there is a major update to the "same" OS, like HP-UX9 to HP-UX10?
Get "This Stupid Century"
on
The Mushroom
·
· Score: 1
As previously noted, this is essentially a copy of theonion except that it uses video game related stories, the basic color is different, and the stories aren't as funny as the ones in theonion. Ahhh, there is nothing like "open source" web pages.
On a related note, I recently bought a copy of theonion's "This Stupid Century"; this book is composed of fake front pages from "The Onion" newspaper. Do not read through this book at your local bookstore as you'll then look like an idiot just like me. Strange ppl will stare at you as you stand there laughing to yourself. Buy the book and take it home! It really helps if you know and appreciate key events in 20th century history and culture. For instance, do you find this headline to be funny? "Al Jolson Mistakenly Lynched by the KKK."
What disturbs me about this article is the author's separation of Unix and Linux. By doing so, it is implied that Unix is this monolithic OS and that Linux is different. The last time I checked, IRIX, HP-UX, AIX, Solaris, etc... each had their own distinctive quirks. It is not as bad as the differences between BSD4.3 and SYSV ten years ago, but there are differences.
Fortunately, some of the quotes pointed out that Linux can serve as a very good means of educating yourself about networking, security, etc... This should have been the main focus of the article. The fundamentals of Unix/Linux OS's are the same. Once you have mastered these fundamentals, moving from one flavor of Unix to another is relatively easy. I realize that becoming an omnipotent master of a particular flavor of Unix does take time and experience. However, having proficiency in another variation of Unix makes this transition quicker and more efficient. But only if you RTFM!:)
Some clueless HR managers probably don't realize the fundamental similarity between the various unices. "I'm sorry, we are looking for a person with experience with HP-UX, but you are only an expert on Linux." I take the attitude that if you could master one form of Unix, you could probably master another one.
Standard Oil was a oil monopoly at about the turn of the century. What got them into trouble was the establishment of associate companies that they incorporated into a trust. They then had a stranglehold on transporting their oil, end distribution, financing, etc... This type of business institution was prevalent 100 yrs ago and led T. Roosevelt, among others, to develop trust busting legislation. Ironically, Roosevelt was a Republican.
To add to the rest of your comments, there is another way that a monopoly can be maintained. A monopoly can use it's dominant position in one realm, to kill competition in another. It then extends it domain further establishing it's strength.
Many of the comments have forgotten or are unaware of what the DoJ anti-trust case is about. Microsoft has been accused of using it's monopoly position as the desktop OS to unfairly compete in another field. In this case, the other field is application software or more specifically, web browsers. That is why much of the DoJ case has focused on MS's contracts that tied in Windows with IE (e.g., IE icon placement, no Netscape installation). Additional evidence was presented to illustrate that these predatory practices was not exclusively related to just web browsers.
Hence, if MS is found guily, the DoJ would likely propose a solution to prevent MS from using it's desktop OS monopoly to unfairly compete in another field (applications). The breakup of MS is one obvious solution (i.e., separate the OS from everything else). Unfortunately, I don't remember the DoJ presenting any evidence concerning patents nor hardware specifications. Therefore, RMS's 2nd & 3rd points may be irrelevant.
As for the 1st point, some evidence of MS software manipulation was presented (e.g., by Apple, Sun, and Intel). Hence, it is possible that the DoJ would consider opening up the code. The states involved in the case have also raised this possibility.
Finally, don't forget that being a monopoly is not illegal. However, being a monopoly means that you must abide by a different set of rules that don't necessarily apply to the rest of the industry.
I once tried to comprehend astronomical distances, but it only made my head hurt. However, 44 light years is not so bad. Let's see, Hitler's Olympic game speech must be on the way back by now; it should arrive in about 25 years.
Incidently, cnn.com reported today that astronomers using the Hubble telescope have identified something that is 13 billion light years away. Try to comprehend that distance! (without the use of any mind altering substance, of course). Furthermore, suppose our universe was just an atom in the fingernail of some alien beast...:)
How About: Cube made of an endless pipe, inc.
on
SGI Name Change
·
· Score: 2
I believe it's suppose to be an endles pipe-looking thingy!:-) The problem is that you view it in static 2-D. At least since I 1st worked on a Personal Iris about 10 yrs ago, SGI has had a demo program that displayed the pipes. By moving the mouse with one of the button pressed, you could make that thing rotate in real-time while it did the rendering (lighted polygons). Not so impressive today, but back then it was pretty slick.
I used to view the SGI pipes as sort of a 3-D version of the Sun logo. I don't know if SGI had this in mind, but to me it seemed like a way to differentiate between the two companies.
This was an outstanding article, one that is rare to find among the Mac advocacy sites. I also think that this is just a precursor of things to come mainly because of MacOSX. Kind of tough to bash an OS (Linux) that is a kissing cousin of your future OS.
Now for the silly stuff. Some of the previous posters have expressed their preference for lucy over miss mac. I would like to point out that miss mac's picture is in b/w. Hence it is obvious that it must be the "before" picture taken prior to 1987 (i.e., pre-MacII). I'm positive that the "after" picture would, uh, kick your socks off.
Slashdot Mirror
Thanks for the correction. I guess my biased view came from the fact that I live in the lawyer capital of the US. Of my ~20 lawyer friends that I can readily think of, only 2 work for a law firm. The rest work for advocacy groups, the government, or teach. Of course, these types of jobs don't pay as well as a good law firm.
Of yes, one lawyer friend defends the scum of our city. He once told me that getting paid by his clients can sometimes be problematic.
Many of you are viewing this strictly from a CS perspective. While there is great demand for CS professionals, the other high tech/physical science fields are not doing as well. Employment in physics related work has been absolutely devastated during this past decade. Some engineering fields (ME for instance) are not doing that great. The earth sciences has been absolutely stagnant for longer than a decade.
Part of this decline is simply due to the end of the Cold War. Defense spending on basic & applied research, and on engineering development has remained flat or gone down. Much of this decrease simply balances out the wild increases (i.e., deficit spending) during the Reagan presidency.
Students capable of entering high tech fields are not stupid. They abandon fields when they see a decline in available jobs. This produces a time lag between when the decline in jobs starts and when the decline in the number of graduates starts. Duh!
Back around 1990, the National Academy of Science published a report that there was to be a massive shortage of high tech graduates during the 90's. Congress swallowed this facade, hook, line, and sinker; this spawned H1-B. Unfortunately, the NAS results were simply based on population projections, they did not take into account the number of jobs that were to be available. Duh!
Like I said, ppl capable of entering high tech are not stupid. Some skip college and enter the work force writing code. Others migrate to other disciplines (bio, business, law) where the pickings are better.
Lawrence Lessig is the Berkman Professor for Entrepreneurial Legal Studies at Harvard Law School. I first found out about him while exploring the Berkman Center for Internet and Society web site after seeing the posting about the H20 project. Since then, I have been reading everything that Lawrence Lessig has written.
You can check out some of the stuff he has written by 1st going to Lessig web site. I especially recommend the various articles that he has written for the Industry Standard. I truly believe that you will enjoy reading his well thought out essays.
IMHO, Lessig is the type of advocate that the OSS movement has underutilized.
A set of standards does not perclude the inclusion of other libraries nor is it a stagnant set of rules. With time, new additions or changes to the standard set will occur. If done properly, lots of the older standards will still be included with a particular distro. However, these older stuff will likely be declared as being obsolete; usually this means that eventually the obsolete stuff will be eliminated.
When SGI changed from IRIX4.X to IRIX5.X, the internal binary format of their libraries changed. To help ease the transition period when one had to recompile all of their software, the older libraries were still distributed (optional installation). Now with IRIX6.X, their are three sets of libraries (old 32 bit, new hybrid 32/64 bit, and 64 bit). Quite a mess especially when one also considers additional stuff to handle the various MIPS processors. However, old code still works.
You are correct about having the standards determined by consensus, not be decree. However, that is what the ongoing work to establish a standard is all about.
This article is written from the perspective (and experience?) of the "average" older computer user. I have seen this type of person in the workplace many times. Here's their profile.
About 10-15 yrs ago, they are forced to switch from his typewriter to a PC; they hated it. Over time, they painstakingly gain experience with the crap from Redmond. Now they are in their comfort zone; scared to death that they might be forced to learn something new. These people, if they are mediocre, feel threatened by their youthful co-workers who are extremely productive and capable of doing things that they can't. Too young to retire, too old to start anything new.
The problem is that in many cases, these people are middle-management. They make decisions that will affect your life.
The purpose of an IPO is to raise money so that a company can expand. Investors will buy stock if they believe that the company can make a profit. So the question becomes, how does RH intend to make money? The means of making money constitute assets that might appeal to another company.
RH is positioning themselves to provide consulting and services for installation and maintenance of Linux. I believe that this means service contracts. Those contracts represent assets.
If RH is successful in packaging and selling Linux, their "brand name" becomes an asset. Profits from the sales of Linux represent assets.
Suppose that I am a major distributor of a proprietary software package that runs on Linux. I now wish to expand and distribute a "complete" package of my software with the OS. Do I start from scratch, or do I buy a "branded" name company?
In all fairness, I don't believe that RH would be a prime candidate for a hostile takeover bid. However, people must remember the computer industry has had cases when a small companies get swallowed up by another. Ever hear of a company called Computer Associates?
Well, if you do go public, you do run the risk of a possible hostile takeover bid. Usually this occurs when the sum of your assets exceeds the value of your outstanding stock. Certain computer companies (I don't mean MS) have been known to "grow" using this acquisition method.
Ironically, one way to force somebody to take responsibility for their actions is to sue them. The usual suspects are the parents, schools, local government, and police. In most cases, the parents don't have enough money to make it worthwhile. For the others, it is somewhat difficult to document that the schools, gov, or police showed gross negligence.
Hence, as a recent case(s) has shown, the victim's families then go after the folks with the deeper pockets. The targets are the recording, movie, and computer game industries. The press then reports this, thereby creating a lot of "debate" about the negative effects of things like Doom and slasher movies. What the press then fails to mention is that these targets were chosen because they have lots of money.
I agree with your general premise that a big problem is that nobody is willing to take responsibility for their actions. However, the threat of a lawsuit has a chilling effect on those who would be willing to apologize and to accept blame. This vicious circle must be broken if a meaningful solution to these types of problems is to achieved.
I don't want to be totally apologetic but the timing of this Oz censureship posting could not have come at a worst time. The shooting in Colorado has caused emotions to run fairly high in the US. Needless to say, the discussion and debate has not necessarily been level-headed.
Central to all of this is the explosive issue of gun control and the Bill of Rights of the U.S. Constitution. Most Americans probably know only three part of the 10 part BOR's; free speech, right to bear arms, and the right to remain silent. Unfortunately, the internet censorship issue falls within the domain of free speech (in the US), and hence, this Aus. censureship issue is being swept into the vortex that surround the Colorado massacre.
Also remember that the *only* thing keeping the CDA from being fully implemented are court rulings that this bill violates the US Constitution (1st Ammendment, free speech).
Once again, sorry. But emotions are running pretty hot in the US right now.
Very well written and thought out; I wish I had wrote it myself. There is one key point that is forgotten at times that would like to add. The empowerment of the individual at the expense of the government essentially means that the government has implicit trust that the people will do the right thing. This trust forces the people to address the *root* of any problem that we face. Not by legislation, but by looking at the foundation of American society. It is easy for the government to pass a law that superficially "solves" an issue. However, unless the fundamental problem is addressed, it will still remain festering till another crisis arises.
When the government loses this trust that the American people can find a solution to a problem, it essentially is saying that our society has failed.
I have to agree that Americans can be somewhat schizo when it comes the Bill of Rights. However, the BOR's is the one thing that keeps this heterogeneous country, which is an incredible mixture of people from around the world, from self-imploding. The BOR's keeps America from bouncing from one extreme to another depending on the latest whims of the people. America survives despite the "good" intentions of it's citizenry. And these include the stupid people.
As for looking down on other lowly nations, I wonder about that sometimes because Americans are essentially immigrants from these lowly nations. Perhaps, this looking down is due to the fact that established Americans judge a foreign country by the immigrants or tourists from those countries. These people can't speak English, have strange customs, strange food, etc... I would also guess that if your neighbor was Canada, you too would gain a feeling of superiority.:)
As for television, the founding fathers did not foresee the establishment of the Fed. Communication Commission. OTOH, the censorship on TV in the US is easing up (thank you R. Murdoch and the Fox TV Channel).
And for your last point, America needs to be very careful about implementing laws that supress the rights of minority groups. In fact, the US needs to be very careful not to pass laws that infringe on the BOR's. I cringe everytime there is talk about laws prohibiting the burning of the US flag, or about allowing prayer in public schools.
I enjoyed the interview with Lucas, tentatively perused the main article (don't want to many details), and simply adored the $!@^#% picture of Gates that kept popping up. For more on Star Wars, check out theonion web site. It seems that another Bill (Clinton) is already standing in line to see the movie.
Oh no! I'm afraid that your niece has somehow learned the principle of embrace and extend. She obviously got the embrace part down cold. Now good old Tux will probably be just another face in her stuffed animal collection. Hopefully with time she will eventually learn about "open source" stuffed animals and toys, and the benefits of sharing.:)
Being an uncle is one of the best jobs in the world.
That's a very interesting point that you make about the non-coverage of the Mexico deal. I guess it would not stroke the ego of the typical American to learn that a perceived "less educated" country is going to use a "very complex" OS in their schools. This point shoud be remembered the next time some American PHB spouts off about Linux being too complex.
I predict that the Mexicans will run gnome.:)
Well, just like Animal Farm the mantra mysteriously changes (IIRC), "Four legs good, two legs better.":) This, of course, has other implications. A gnu has four legs...
Before ppl start flaming away at ZD (which is now a reflex action), take the time and look at the schedule for this conference. The three keynote speakers are, ESR, Love, and O'Reilly. No real surprises here. As far as the various panels, I get the impression that the conference will be a favorable one.
Remember that PHB's want to hear from other PHB's. The more enlightened one's (for instance, the CIO of Burlington Coat Factory) have implemented Linux; hopefully, their experience has been a good one. The sheep (the other PHB's) will then follow their lead and go bleating back to their bosses. Sort of like Animal Farm: Four legs good (linux), two legs bad (NT).
Finally, our favorite ZD writer is not listed in the schedule.
FWIW, I did a search for the word Linux on the FNAL web site. One hit was a calendar announcement from last year.
WEDNESDAY, November 11
2:30 UNIX Users' Meeting - Now Includes Linux - 1 West
No flames intended, but any marketing director would tell you that it should read, "New and Improved! Now Includes Linux!":)
I believe that there is general consensus that Unix is Unix is Unix. The fundamentals are the same, and knowledge of one variation can be easily transfered to another flavor of Unix.
As another illustration of this, consider the case of SunOs vs. Solaris. SunOS4.X was primarily based on BSD4.3 while Solaris is based on SYS V.4. When companies made the switch from SunOS to Solaris, did they fire all their sysadmins and replace them with ppl more experienced with SYSV? Or did those old Sun sysadmin make the transition to this "new" OS?
On a similar note, what happened when SGI switched from NeWS to X/Motif? Or what happens everytime there is a major update to the "same" OS, like HP-UX9 to HP-UX10?
As previously noted, this is essentially a copy of theonion except that it uses video game related stories, the basic color is different, and the stories aren't as funny as the ones in theonion. Ahhh, there is nothing like "open source" web pages.
On a related note, I recently bought a copy of theonion's "This Stupid Century"; this book is composed of fake front pages from "The Onion" newspaper. Do not read through this book at your local bookstore as you'll then look like an idiot just like me. Strange ppl will stare at you as you stand there laughing to yourself. Buy the book and take it home! It really helps if you know and appreciate key events in 20th century history and culture. For instance, do you find this headline to be funny? "Al Jolson Mistakenly Lynched by the KKK."
What disturbs me about this article is the author's separation of Unix and Linux. By doing so, it is implied that Unix is this monolithic OS and that Linux is different. The last time I checked, IRIX, HP-UX, AIX, Solaris, etc... each had their own distinctive quirks. It is not as bad as the differences between BSD4.3 and SYSV ten years ago, but there are differences.
Fortunately, some of the quotes pointed out that Linux can serve as a very good means of educating yourself about networking, security, etc... This should have been the main focus of the article. The fundamentals of Unix/Linux OS's are the same. Once you have mastered these fundamentals, moving from one flavor of Unix to another is relatively easy. I realize that becoming an omnipotent master of a particular flavor of Unix does take time and experience. However, having proficiency in another variation of Unix makes this transition quicker and more efficient. But only if you RTFM!:)
Some clueless HR managers probably don't realize the fundamental similarity between the various unices. "I'm sorry, we are looking for a person with experience with HP-UX, but you are only an expert on Linux." I take the attitude that if you could master one form of Unix, you could probably master another one.
Standard Oil was a oil monopoly at about the turn of the century. What got them into trouble was the establishment of associate companies that they incorporated into a trust. They then had a stranglehold on transporting their oil, end distribution, financing, etc... This type of business institution was prevalent 100 yrs ago and led T. Roosevelt, among others, to develop trust busting legislation. Ironically, Roosevelt was a Republican.
To add to the rest of your comments, there is another way that a monopoly can be maintained. A monopoly can use it's dominant position in one realm, to kill competition in another. It then extends it domain further establishing it's strength.
Many of the comments have forgotten or are unaware of what the DoJ anti-trust case is about. Microsoft has been accused of using it's monopoly position as the desktop OS to unfairly compete in another field. In this case, the other field is application software or more specifically, web browsers. That is why much of the DoJ case has focused on MS's contracts that tied in Windows with IE (e.g., IE icon placement, no Netscape installation). Additional evidence was presented to illustrate that these predatory practices was not exclusively related to just web browsers.
Hence, if MS is found guily, the DoJ would likely propose a solution to prevent MS from using it's desktop OS monopoly to unfairly compete in another field (applications). The breakup of MS is one obvious solution (i.e., separate the OS from everything else). Unfortunately, I don't remember the DoJ presenting any evidence concerning patents nor hardware specifications. Therefore, RMS's 2nd & 3rd points may be irrelevant.
As for the 1st point, some evidence of MS software manipulation was presented (e.g., by Apple, Sun, and Intel). Hence, it is possible that the DoJ would consider opening up the code. The states involved in the case have also raised this possibility.
Finally, don't forget that being a monopoly is not illegal. However, being a monopoly means that you must abide by a different set of rules that don't necessarily apply to the rest of the industry.
I once tried to comprehend astronomical distances, but it only made my head hurt. However, 44 light years is not so bad. Let's see, Hitler's Olympic game speech must be on the way back by now; it should arrive in about 25 years.
Incidently, cnn.com reported today that astronomers using the Hubble telescope have identified something that is 13 billion light years away. Try to comprehend that distance! (without the use of any mind altering substance, of course). Furthermore, suppose our universe was just an atom in the fingernail of some alien beast...:)
I believe it's suppose to be an endles pipe-looking thingy!:-) The problem is that you view it in static 2-D. At least since I 1st worked on a Personal Iris about 10 yrs ago, SGI has had a demo program that displayed the pipes. By moving the mouse with one of the button pressed, you could make that thing rotate in real-time while it did the rendering (lighted polygons). Not so impressive today, but back then it was pretty slick.
I used to view the SGI pipes as sort of a 3-D version of the Sun logo. I don't know if SGI had this in mind, but to me it seemed like a way to differentiate between the two companies.
This was an outstanding article, one that is rare to find among the Mac advocacy sites. I also think that this is just a precursor of things to come mainly because of MacOSX. Kind of tough to bash an OS (Linux) that is a kissing cousin of your future OS.
Now for the silly stuff. Some of the previous posters have expressed their preference for lucy over miss mac. I would like to point out that miss mac's picture is in b/w. Hence it is obvious that it must be the "before" picture taken prior to 1987 (i.e., pre-MacII). I'm positive that the "after" picture would, uh, kick your socks off.