It can also be argued that early Shareware programs, like Doom and the various Apogee games [sic].
By "early Shareware" you really should be referring to PC-Talk, PC-Write, etc., which is when the term "shareware" was coined. And at that time, there was very clearly a difference, and an intentional one, between "shareware" and "freeware". The former was closed-source, freely distributed but you were expected to pay if you used it (mostly enforced by the honor system); the latter was also usually closed-source (althoughon rare occasions source was available), freely distributed, but with a license that did not stipulate payment. Doom and the Apogee games came later, and were distributed essentially as teasers: you get Level 1-n for free, but then if you want Levels n-z you have to pay.
Does anybody other than possibly corporate users actually pay for WinZip?
Yes. Why the note of bewilderment? I paid my own money for a WinZip license many years ago, well before I convinced my company to pony up for a corporate license as well. I also paid my own money for Textpad, which is in this thread as well.
Why, you may ask? Because it's the right thing to do, and because the terms of their license say I should. Nico Mak created a good piece of software, which was unique for a number of years; he certainly seized an opportunity that Phil Katz ignored. He asks to be paid for it, so that's what I do. When the plumber comes to my house, he also expects to be paid, so I pay him. That's the way the economy works.
What's a somewhat unfortunate outcome of the F/OSS movement now is that the high motives of people too numerous to list lead most others to assume that *all* software should be/is free as in beer, which leads to the spectacle of parasites like you saying "Jeez, why the hell should I pay for it, it works just fine". Whereas those of us who actually remember and believed in "Shareware" recognize the difference between "free" and "not free".
Hard to believe that's it's almost 20 years since I sent a check to Vern Buerg.
the ONLY people you have to give your social security number too are your employer and your department of motor vehicles
You state that as an accepted fact, when until a few years ago, you didn't have to give your SSN to the DMV. But you don't question this at all, which is the "slippery slope" argument in a nutshell. Tell me, what does a driver's license have to do with my earnings history or my (possibly illusory, the way things are going) government pension? Absolutely nothing. Yet the DMV's now require the SSN, and nobody actually says "what the fsck for?" And they require it for a passport, and who knows what's next?
Besides, how much do YOU believe in the data security practices of the DMV?
So I know I'll get modded Offtopic or Flamebait or something, but I can't help wondering for how long the braindead mods will keep marking these idiotic comments as "Funny". I mean, considering that "Soviet Russia" ceased to exist well before Slashdot was born.
a consortium of European research institutions and open source software companies have paired up
If a total of 10 institutions (yes, I read TFA) "pair up", that means they divide into 5 groups. I know it would be way too much to expect timothy to actually come up with his own words, as opposed to pasting from the article, so I guess this commentary is directed at the original author.
You post your resume and academic history on the Web, link to it from Slashdot, but don't want to be bothered with registering for a free NYTimes.com account? Hello?!
"Amsterdam Vallon" is a known troll, although I haven't seen him around in a while. I'd easily bet that there's not even a hint of a germ of truth anywhere in the GP post.
No wonder it's intelligent and no particular surprise it mentions Slashdot -- the article was written by James Fallows, who as a long-time writer for The Atlantic was also a long-time technophile, or at least one who appreciated the productive uses of technology. I venerated him because he was a very public user and proponent of Lotus Agenda, a product which was unfortunately orphaned way back when and whose intelligence and functionality have never been duplicated.
every phone line has to remain available for calls to 911...for free
Who pays for this "free"? If the majority of the population of your state went VoIP, and didn't spend a dime with the RBOCs or the cell co's, where does that "free" money come from?
But I have a hard time seeing what additional government serives VoIP users need to pay for.
Let's assume you're VoIP only -- you long ago got rid of your landline phone, and with VoIP, since you sit at home all the time, you got rid of your cell phone, too. So now you're sitting there reading Slashdot and chatting with some other nerd over Skype, and you realize the grease from your frying pan flared up and your kitchen is on fire. You call 911, and.... but wait, you can't...
And, in reading that article, you can ponder how similar the Ars Technica article is, yet with no attribution nor copyright notice. Can you "plagiarism", folks?
In a country in which a substantially larger portion of the population believes in the Virgin Birth than in evolution through natural selection, and which has just this week demonstrated that majority, why should anyone be surprised?
Not singling you out, but to all the people complaining about inaccuracies... this is Forbes!! not the journal of the ACM or the IEEE or anything. This is like complaining about slipshod fact-checking in the Weekly World News, fer chrissake.
Slashdot Mirror
RTFA. It says that Starbuck's doesn't care, doesn't meter, doesn't track.
Please explain sugar or tobacco subsidies.
Simply run everything over port 80, as suggested in RFC 3093, the Firewall Enhancement Protocol.
What moron modded this as Flamebait? An American company with a global market donates $2.5 million to disaster relief, and you call that flamebait?
By "early Shareware" you really should be referring to PC-Talk, PC-Write, etc., which is when the term "shareware" was coined. And at that time, there was very clearly a difference, and an intentional one, between "shareware" and "freeware". The former was closed-source, freely distributed but you were expected to pay if you used it (mostly enforced by the honor system); the latter was also usually closed-source (althoughon rare occasions source was available), freely distributed, but with a license that did not stipulate payment. Doom and the Apogee games came later, and were distributed essentially as teasers: you get Level 1-n for free, but then if you want Levels n-z you have to pay.
Yes. Why the note of bewilderment? I paid my own money for a WinZip license many years ago, well before I convinced my company to pony up for a corporate license as well. I also paid my own money for Textpad, which is in this thread as well.
Why, you may ask? Because it's the right thing to do, and because the terms of their license say I should. Nico Mak created a good piece of software, which was unique for a number of years; he certainly seized an opportunity that Phil Katz ignored. He asks to be paid for it, so that's what I do. When the plumber comes to my house, he also expects to be paid, so I pay him. That's the way the economy works.
What's a somewhat unfortunate outcome of the F/OSS movement now is that the high motives of people too numerous to list lead most others to assume that *all* software should be/is free as in beer, which leads to the spectacle of parasites like you saying "Jeez, why the hell should I pay for it, it works just fine". Whereas those of us who actually remember and believed in "Shareware" recognize the difference between "free" and "not free".
Hard to believe that's it's almost 20 years since I sent a check to Vern Buerg.
You state that as an accepted fact, when until a few years ago, you didn't have to give your SSN to the DMV. But you don't question this at all, which is the "slippery slope" argument in a nutshell. Tell me, what does a driver's license have to do with my earnings history or my (possibly illusory, the way things are going) government pension? Absolutely nothing. Yet the DMV's now require the SSN, and nobody actually says "what the fsck for?" And they require it for a passport, and who knows what's next?
Besides, how much do YOU believe in the data security practices of the DMV?
So I know I'll get modded Offtopic or Flamebait or something, but I can't help wondering for how long the braindead mods will keep marking these idiotic comments as "Funny". I mean, considering that "Soviet Russia" ceased to exist well before Slashdot was born.
NT for PowerPC. Be still, my heart!
Which Article and Section, please?
If a total of 10 institutions (yes, I read TFA) "pair up", that means they divide into 5 groups. I know it would be way too much to expect timothy to actually come up with his own words, as opposed to pasting from the article, so I guess this commentary is directed at the original author.
You post your resume and academic history on the Web, link to it from Slashdot, but don't want to be bothered with registering for a free NYTimes.com account? Hello?!
Apparently they don't teach you how to spell, though.
Why, "Neuroses", of course... Just depends on your pronunciation.
"Amsterdam Vallon" is a known troll, although I haven't seen him around in a while. I'd easily bet that there's not even a hint of a germ of truth anywhere in the GP post.
No wonder it's intelligent and no particular surprise it mentions Slashdot -- the article was written by James Fallows, who as a long-time writer for The Atlantic was also a long-time technophile, or at least one who appreciated the productive uses of technology. I venerated him because he was a very public user and proponent of Lotus Agenda, a product which was unfortunately orphaned way back when and whose intelligence and functionality have never been duplicated.
Well, appalling, maybe ... from reading TFA. The schmuck drinks Miller. Bleh!
Whaaa? Dozens (I'm too lazy to count) of posts on Lotus Improv and no mentions of Javelin?
I worked with a guy once who submitted a 27-page letter of resignation...
Who pays for this "free"? If the majority of the population of your state went VoIP, and didn't spend a dime with the RBOCs or the cell co's, where does that "free" money come from?
Let's assume you're VoIP only -- you long ago got rid of your landline phone, and with VoIP, since you sit at home all the time, you got rid of your cell phone, too. So now you're sitting there reading Slashdot and chatting with some other nerd over Skype, and you realize the grease from your frying pan flared up and your kitchen is on fire. You call 911, and.... but wait, you can't...
And, in reading that article, you can ponder how similar the Ars Technica article is, yet with no attribution nor copyright notice. Can you "plagiarism", folks?
In a country in which a substantially larger portion of the population believes in the Virgin Birth than in evolution through natural selection, and which has just this week demonstrated that majority, why should anyone be surprised?
Of course not, they're not even a newspaper.
N.B. "Tabloid" refers to a physical format. The New York Post is a tabloid, the New York Times is a broadsheet.
Not singling you out, but to all the people complaining about inaccuracies ... this is Forbes!! not the journal of the ACM or the IEEE or anything. This is like complaining about slipshod fact-checking in the Weekly World News, fer chrissake.