The way patents work in much of the business world is that big companies cross-license their patent portfolios, essentially promising not to sue each other for all the moronic patents each other holds (I'm oversimplifying a little, but you get the idea). This is pretty effective for them.
I wonder if open-source should look into the same thing.
Even lacking a cross-licensing agreement, the fact that EFF would have a portfolio of moronic patents to smack people back with might give companies trying to sue open source pause, because they would know a big counter-suit was coming.
It would take the teeth out of MS's patent claims. The only companies this doesn't work against are patent trolls.
Obviously, the licensing on the patents should be such that they are freely available for use unless a company sues an open source product. Perhaps patents are not licensable in this way, but a far as I can tell, you can license stuff in any crazy way you want, just about.
Yes, patents are evil, but until they go away, open source would do well to be able to wield the same weapon as everybody else. Obviously, open source would need somebody with deep pockets to file the patents, but I think it's worth pursuing.
1) TSA employees who got the internal memo about the blog launch and dropped by to post positive things, and citizens who are really mad about the liquids screening policy and 2) people about to added to the no-fly list.
How is using a different file format helping me to read older formats?
.. use OpenOffice. You don't even have to leave the comforting confines of Windows. As far as I can tell, this patch only stops MS Office from opening these files, not anything else.
I agree, this could really work in surprising ways. It would obviously encourage people to browse. Currently, I go to iTunes looking for something specific, and immediately get back off. And DRM means I limit what I do get.
It could get also get people like me who want to rebuy old, not-so-popular stuff to find a price they're comfortable with. It could reinvigorate stale music catalogs.
It's now censorship when people choose not to fund you based on your previous "work?" Puh-lease. Lots of guys are getting funds to try to debunk theories about global warming. At some point you just have to accept responsibility for being a poor scientist, regardless of your views.
I'll explain how this might affect a user like you, because at first it doesn't seem like much of a restriction: just mention UC Berkley in any advertisements featuring BSD.
What could be simpler!
And then seventy five other shmoes copied the provision.
So now my voluteer website saying, "I'll help anyone, anywhere install BSD for free!!!!" needs to say:
"I'll help anyone, anywhere install BSD* for free!!!!
This product includes software developed by the University of California, Berkeley and its contributors. This product includes software developed by the alteran, who considers himself extremely l33t. This product includes software developed by the University of Utah and its contributors. This product includes software developed by Inman Software Corp, and its employees, to be used freely as long as this statement is attached. Inman Software Corp acknowledges the work of many of its contractors, who may have also contributed code to this product. This product includes software developed by the Grossman Progammers and Associates. Use of this software is fully authorized for all purposes as long as this statement is enclosed. This product includes software developed by the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and its contributors. This product includes software developed by the University of North Carolina at Greensboro and its contributors. This product includes software developed by the University of North Carolina at Tweetsie and its contributors. etc., etc.
You get the idea, but pretend I make this list TEN TIMES longer.
Of course, when you got your copy of this software, you saw something like what I showed you above, right? Because if you didn't, well, you're running your software illegally. If you didn't, please erase it. (See, that's an effect right there!)
And that's just the beginning. Anyone advertising/distributing BSD needs to READ EVERY DAGGUM LICENSE and figure out which shmoes need to be credited on every scrap of paper or HTML mentioning BSD. Or just be illegal-- their choice. And because there are so many contributors, any one of which could insert a new program and provision at any time, which means every update needs to be rechecked.
No one is going to do this. They are just going to give up, or ignore the law-- both of which ultimately hurt free software.
I understand how someone living in a rural area might want build-out requirements for cable francising. But let's face it-- TV viewing and internet access are NOT phone service or electricity.
Living in rural areas with our current lifestyle incurrs a lot of societal costs in terms of pollution and infrastucture expenses. Rural development uses more land. Rural areas create more transportation costs, most indirect causes of which are born disproportunately by urbanitees. I could go on. In short, EVERYONE pays for those expenses, NOT just the folks living out in rural areas. It is not only unfair to ask urban dwellers to finance these inequities, it also creates an artificial incentive to develop rural areas and encroach on natural preserves.
It's bad policy. For phone and electric, I'm willing to hold keep my peace and underwrite expensive outlays to rural areas-- these are necessities, and I'm willing to take a hit so that other people can have those necessities. But to incurr those costs for entertainment seems a bit much-- particularly since for broadband and TV, viable alternatives do, in fact, exist. Sure, there aren't as many choices, but that applies to everything out in the country, from everything from stores to restuarants to places of worship.
I think you make a good point here, but don't blame the graphic artists. My experience is that PHBs (pointy-headed bosses) force most of the "I want a slightly bigger font two pixels to the left" kind of nonsense that makes for bad HTML. By and large, all the graphics artists I know who have been out of school for more than fifteen minutes all argue for less nonsense.
O'Gara would do well to read Dvorak and learn how to generate hits, money, and readership by following Dvorak's lead.
O'Gara's stalking of PJ is inefficient and wastes resources. Note how Dvorak doesn't even TRY to use facts, just throws out a bunch of baseless opinions. Note how Dvorak embraces controversy by implicating the entire Linux community, calling us all nutjobs and extremists, even though a majority of Linux users outside of Slashdot probably don't even know who O'Gara or PJ is. O'Gara should note how Dvorak consciously ignores the main point of the controversy (stalking of PJ by O'Gara), and thereby firing up a bunch of self-righteous anger. His coup de gras is putting the blame on Linux users-- red meat for the Microsofties, and just making Linuxians see red. Everybody wins!
"Don't you wish some days you could just toss that Windows computer out the, er, window and try something else? Something where viruses and worms weren't everyday occurrences, where you didn't have to suffer through lockups and crashes every few days? Where the screen wasn't cluttered with pop-up ads and strange spyware programs, snooping on your every move?"
I find it interesting that the newspaper on Microsoft's home turf, where Microsoft pumps hundreds of millions (if not billions) into the local economy, feels free to speak so negatively about MS software. If Seattle isn't full of passionate Microsoft devotees, what city is?
If anyone here reads the Seattle Times, is this typical?
It has come to my attention that something in your house may belong to me.
You are breaking the law by having my possession. I am willing to rent it to you for $200 a year, or $700 if you use it commercially.
Obviously, I cannot identify the item because you would give it back to me. I am willing to prove that the item is there, however. Send me a list of every single possession in your house, and I will tell you whether it is somewhere in the list.
Please contact me about payment or I will send this case to my contigency counsel, who will litigate you until you pay.
In the meantime, be aware that I will be spreading lies about you, your family, and anything else you happen to care about.
Will someone please mod Mouth Of Sauron's post up? Frankly, I disliked reading the Chronicles of Thomas Covenant (including Lord Foul's Bane) because I didn't get or enjoy the whole anti-hero thing. But the books are well-written and poignant, and the comments above are an incisive analysis, the kind of post Slashdot could use more often.
Actually, it's worse. Even MS doesn't require its customers to upgrade to its latest OS in order to keep getting OS security patches. Hell -- they patched Win98 for ~ 6 years.
And if Apple is serious about releasing a new version of OS X EVERY YEAR, you'll have to buy it every year or risk vulnerabilities. That's just crazy -- some people are running SERVERS on this stuff.
This is too ridiculous for them to be serious. Either someone has misunderstood something or Apple is going to backtrack quickly.
You know it's easy to think of dictionaries as having always been here, but the quintessential dictionary of the English language, the Oxford English Dictionary (OED), was published in 1923, almost ONE HUNDRED YEARS AFTER Webster's dictionary.
We could argue for years over when dictionary-writing became serious, but most people would probably cite Samuel Johnson's dictionary, published in 1755, about 75 years before Websters. Note that it included only spellings, not definitions.
My real point is this -- it's just an incorrect assumption to think of this as an example of Americans changing things for the sake of change.
Think about it-- we're still measuring stuff in feet, quarts, and pounds, for God's sake.
At the point when Webster created his dictionary, the concept that there WAS such a thing as a "correct" spelling was just beginning to take hold.
There's lots of real things to blame on the United States-- you don't have to make up false stuff. And when you do, well -- aren't you doing exactly what annoys you the most about Americans in the first place?
"Or do those motel Bibles really say you can take them home if you want?"
Yes, they DO say you can take them if you want. That's what the Gideons do -- provide free Bibles in the hope that you'll actually read them. The Gideons were way into "information wants to be free" long before Free Software / Open Source.
Uhm... wrong. When TiVo's off, it's pretty much in what computer users think of as sleep mode. There's no sliding buffer when it's off, it just starts the buffer from when you turned it back on.
"But many govt. entities will already have huge investments in 3rd party line of business applications that are Windows-only. Replacing _these_ kinds of programs (not office and email), and the subsequent loss of productivity and poor customer service is what makes retraining expensive."
Maybe this is where something like Crossover Office is REALLY useful. As long as these third party apps don't use the more obscure undocumented parts of the Windows API, they've got a pretty good chance of operating fine through Crossover Office.
Slashdot Mirror
Yes. Shoulda used preview. Argh. Fortunately, it seems like everybody got the joke even though I mangled it.
The way patents work in much of the business world is that big companies cross-license their patent portfolios, essentially promising not to sue each other for all the moronic patents each other holds (I'm oversimplifying a little, but you get the idea). This is pretty effective for them.
I wonder if open-source should look into the same thing.
Even lacking a cross-licensing agreement, the fact that EFF would have a portfolio of moronic patents to smack people back with might give companies trying to sue open source pause, because they would know a big counter-suit was coming.
It would take the teeth out of MS's patent claims. The only companies this doesn't work against are patent trolls.
Obviously, the licensing on the patents should be such that they are freely available for use unless a company sues an open source product. Perhaps patents are not licensable in this way, but a far as I can tell, you can license stuff in any crazy way you want, just about.
Yes, patents are evil, but until they go away, open source would do well to be able to wield the same weapon as everybody else. Obviously, open source would need somebody with deep pockets to file the patents, but I think it's worth pursuing.
The categories are actually:
1) TSA employees who got the internal memo about the blog launch and dropped by to post positive things, and citizens who are really mad about the liquids screening policy and
2) people about to added to the no-fly list.
As far as I can tell, this patch only stops MS Office from opening these files, not anything else.
There's definitely a lot of humor in the series.
If you get "Up Your Arsenal," make sure to listen to the loudspeaker announcements at the Zeldrin Airport.
75 year old takes a hammer to Comcast.
I agree, this could really work in surprising ways. It would obviously encourage people to browse. Currently, I go to iTunes looking for something specific, and immediately get back off. And DRM means I limit what I do get.
It could get also get people like me who want to rebuy old, not-so-popular stuff to find a price they're comfortable with. It could reinvigorate stale music catalogs.
An intriguing idea.
>> more to the point, what is to stop me from "selling" my free
>> versions when the band gets popular? What if I give them away?
> Er, maybe a sense of morals or ethics?
Well, as long as he wasn't selling COPIES, it'd be perfectly legal, not to mention moral and ethical.
Just like anything else you buy that goes up in resell value.
Isn't Groklaw hosted on iBiblio? Hard to believe they can't handle slashdot's traffic. Something must be up with their boxen.
It's now censorship when people choose not to fund you based on your previous "work?" Puh-lease. Lots of guys are getting funds to try to debunk theories about global warming. At some point you just have to accept responsibility for being a poor scientist, regardless of your views.
Here's a link explaining the problem.
http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/bsd.html
I'll explain how this might affect a user like you, because at first it doesn't seem like much of a restriction: just mention UC Berkley in any advertisements featuring BSD.
What could be simpler!
And then seventy five other shmoes copied the provision.
So now my voluteer website saying, "I'll help anyone, anywhere install BSD for free!!!!" needs to say:
"I'll help anyone, anywhere install BSD* for free!!!!
This product includes software developed by the University of California, Berkeley and its contributors.
This product includes software developed by the alteran, who considers himself extremely l33t.
This product includes software developed by the University of Utah and its contributors.
This product includes software developed by Inman Software Corp, and its employees, to be used freely as long as this statement is attached. Inman Software Corp acknowledges the work of many of its contractors, who may have also contributed code to this product.
This product includes software developed by the Grossman Progammers and Associates. Use of this software is fully authorized for all purposes as long as this statement is enclosed.
This product includes software developed by the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and its contributors.
This product includes software developed by the University of North Carolina at Greensboro and its contributors.
This product includes software developed by the University of North Carolina at Tweetsie and its contributors.
etc., etc.
You get the idea, but pretend I make this list TEN TIMES longer.
Of course, when you got your copy of this software, you saw something like what I showed you above, right? Because if you didn't, well, you're running your software illegally. If you didn't, please erase it. (See, that's an effect right there!)
And that's just the beginning. Anyone advertising/distributing BSD needs to READ EVERY DAGGUM LICENSE and figure out which shmoes need to be credited on every scrap of paper or HTML mentioning BSD. Or just be illegal-- their choice. And because there are so many contributors, any one of which could insert a new program and provision at any time, which means every update needs to be rechecked.
No one is going to do this. They are just going to give up, or ignore the law-- both of which ultimately hurt free software.
And, of course, its users.
I understand how someone living in a rural area might want build-out requirements for cable francising. But let's face it-- TV viewing and internet access are NOT phone service or electricity.
Living in rural areas with our current lifestyle incurrs a lot of societal costs in terms of pollution and infrastucture expenses. Rural development uses more land. Rural areas create more transportation costs, most indirect causes of which are born disproportunately by urbanitees. I could go on. In short, EVERYONE pays for those expenses, NOT just the folks living out in rural areas. It is not only unfair to ask urban dwellers to finance these inequities, it also creates an artificial incentive to develop rural areas and encroach on natural preserves.
It's bad policy. For phone and electric, I'm willing to hold keep my peace and underwrite expensive outlays to rural areas-- these are necessities, and I'm willing to take a hit so that other people can have those necessities. But to incurr those costs for entertainment seems a bit much-- particularly since for broadband and TV, viable alternatives do, in fact, exist. Sure, there aren't as many choices, but that applies to everything out in the country, from everything from stores to restuarants to places of worship.
Why should broadband/TV access be any different?
I think you make a good point here, but don't blame the graphic artists. My experience is that PHBs (pointy-headed bosses) force most of the "I want a slightly bigger font two pixels to the left" kind of nonsense that makes for bad HTML. By and large, all the graphics artists I know who have been out of school for more than fifteen minutes all argue for less nonsense.
>99.9% of the blue-screens on Windows are probably due to buggy device drivers.
Not that I'm expecting you to defend MS here, but I thought microkernals were supposed to stop buggy drivers from bringing down the OS, period.
Either the MS implementation is bad, or microkernal design isn't all it's cracked up to be-- or both.
O'Gara would do well to read Dvorak and learn how to generate hits, money, and readership by following Dvorak's lead.
O'Gara's stalking of PJ is inefficient and wastes resources. Note how Dvorak doesn't even TRY to use facts, just throws out a bunch of baseless opinions. Note how Dvorak embraces controversy by implicating the entire Linux community, calling us all nutjobs and extremists, even though a majority of Linux users outside of Slashdot probably don't even know who O'Gara or PJ is. O'Gara should note how Dvorak consciously ignores the main point of the controversy (stalking of PJ by O'Gara), and thereby firing up a bunch of self-righteous anger. His coup de gras is putting the blame on Linux users-- red meat for the Microsofties, and just making Linuxians see red. Everybody wins!
You are not a Jedi yet, Ms. O'Gara.
The opening paragraph:
"Don't you wish some days you could just toss that Windows computer out the, er, window and try something else? Something where viruses and worms weren't everyday occurrences, where you didn't have to suffer through lockups and crashes every few days? Where the screen wasn't cluttered with pop-up ads and strange spyware programs, snooping on your every move?"
I find it interesting that the newspaper on Microsoft's home turf, where Microsoft pumps hundreds of millions (if not billions) into the local economy, feels free to speak so negatively about MS software. If Seattle isn't full of passionate Microsoft devotees, what city is?
If anyone here reads the Seattle Times, is this typical?
Dear Mr. Darl McBride,
It has come to my attention that something in your house may belong to me.
You are breaking the law by having my possession. I am willing to rent it to you for $200 a year, or $700 if you use it commercially.
Obviously, I cannot identify the item because you would give it back to me. I am willing to prove that the item is there, however. Send me a list of every single possession in your house, and I will tell you whether it is somewhere in the list.
Please contact me about payment or I will send this case to my contigency counsel, who will litigate you until you pay.
In the meantime, be aware that I will be spreading lies about you, your family, and anything else you happen to care about.
Sincerely,
--alteran
Will someone please mod Mouth Of Sauron's post up? Frankly, I disliked reading the Chronicles of Thomas Covenant (including Lord Foul's Bane) because I didn't get or enjoy the whole anti-hero thing. But the books are well-written and poignant, and the comments above are an incisive analysis, the kind of post Slashdot could use more often.
Actually, it's worse. Even MS doesn't require its customers to upgrade to its latest OS in order to keep getting OS security patches. Hell -- they patched Win98 for ~ 6 years.
And if Apple is serious about releasing a new version of OS X EVERY YEAR, you'll have to buy it every year or risk vulnerabilities. That's just crazy -- some people are running SERVERS on this stuff.
This is too ridiculous for them to be serious. Either someone has misunderstood something or Apple is going to backtrack quickly.
You know it's easy to think of dictionaries as having always been here, but the quintessential dictionary of the English language, the Oxford English Dictionary (OED), was published in 1923, almost ONE HUNDRED YEARS AFTER Webster's dictionary.
We could argue for years over when dictionary-writing became serious, but most people would probably cite Samuel Johnson's dictionary, published in 1755, about 75 years before Websters. Note that it included only spellings, not definitions.
My real point is this -- it's just an incorrect assumption to think of this as an example of Americans changing things for the sake of change.
Think about it-- we're still measuring stuff in feet, quarts, and pounds, for God's sake.
At the point when Webster created his dictionary, the concept that there WAS such a thing as a "correct" spelling was just beginning to take hold.
There's lots of real things to blame on the United States-- you don't have to make up false stuff. And when you do, well -- aren't you doing exactly what annoys you the most about Americans in the first place?
"Or do those motel Bibles really say you can take them home if you want?"
Yes, they DO say you can take them if you want. That's what the Gideons do -- provide free Bibles in the hope that you'll actually read them. The Gideons were way into "information wants to be free" long before Free Software / Open Source.
Uhm... wrong. When TiVo's off, it's pretty much in what computer users think of as sleep mode. There's no sliding buffer when it's off, it just starts the buffer from when you turned it back on.
In a way this is too bad. The irony of this lawsuit being spearheaded by a guy named "Ransom" would be wonderful.
"But many govt. entities will already have huge investments in 3rd party line of business applications that are Windows-only. Replacing _these_ kinds of programs (not office and email), and the subsequent loss of productivity and poor customer service is what makes retraining expensive."
Maybe this is where something like Crossover Office is REALLY useful. As long as these third party apps don't use the more obscure undocumented parts of the Windows API, they've got a pretty good chance of operating fine through Crossover Office.
It's certainly testable...
Could you please post this 150 times?