One thing that does amaze me is the number of people who believe that Microsoft broke the law, but think they should not be punished becaus "It will hurt the industry", or it "Stifle innovation", or "Make my life more complicated". If they broke the law, they broke the law.
I completely agree with you. My friend was pointing out that breaking up MSFT, or punishing them in other ways, may hurt the US economy (this may or may not be true, however). IMHO, this is just all the more reason to stop them before the US economy is even more at their mercy.
If we allow a company that repeatedly broke the law to carry on with business as usual, just for the sole purpose of not damaging our precious economy, then we're entering a very dangerous situation. This would hint that the company, MSFT in this instance, holds within it enough power to alter US legal rulings. This is a scary proposition, in that money and economy hold a higher position then the legislative branch of the government. The law, then, becomes nearly useless. It's one of Murphy's auxiliary rules coming true - The Golden Rule. He who owns the gold makes the rules.
To look from a wider perspective, big change (including economic) usually brings with it some temporary instability and uncertainty, but after the fog clears, it's for the better. For example, look at the US revolution (and no, I'm not comparing the ruling of MSFT to any necessary revolution by the people or anything like that). The colonists, at the price of their comfort and safety, put an end to the British tax and lack of representation by revolting. Sure, things were a mess for awhile, but for the colonists life was much better afterwards.
Jackson didn't make the only goofs in this case. What about the MSFT goofups? For example, the faked video evidence which they claimed was real, and then, after it was made public that it was a forgery, MSFT claimed it was merely a simulation?
Can these attempts to submit fake evidence be carried through to the appeals court(s)? And can the MSFT execs be tried for perjury?
Re:To Paraphrase Michael From Good Times...
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More Napster Updates
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Your teacher is right. I did a (somewhat) science experiement back in high school on subliminal messages. I flashed made-up vocabulary words and definitions on a computer screen subliminally, while the subjects typed in different made-up words and definitions . then i gave them a multiple-choice quiz to match words to meanings, trying to see if the subliminal words had any impact. ANOVA tests showed no significant correlation between test scores of subjects that had messages flashed vs. those that didn't.
Anyway, during the time that I devised the experiment, I gathered up as much info on subliminal messages as I could. My high-school art teacher showed me how subliminal messages can be embedded in magazine ads. Most notably beauty/fashion ads, for example makeup ads in Cosmopolitan. The messages are VERY hard to discern, so much so you'd almost think they weren't there. But after you spot one or two, you can find them more easily. Mostly they say SEX in light delicate thin strokes around the models faces and bodies.
Of course, this could be chance. Ie, random photographic techniques may produce similar 'SEX' marks in any random magazine photograph. I didn't check out too many ads in this way. But most makeup ads that I looked at did have what appeared to be the letters 'SEX'.
If MSFT does move to Canada, what happens to it's US shareholders? I know that Corel is Canadian, yet it trades in the US stock markets. Could the government, should MSFT flee to Canada, prevent US trading of their shares?
And if you're wondering, don't worry. I don't own any shares of MSFT:-)
From the first paragraph of the BladeEnc letter, it is written: Due to threats from large companies, who holds patents on mp3 related technology, to take me to court if I continue to distribute products containing "their" technology, I have decided to remove the BladeEnc binaries from my homepage.
This leads me to wonder about the status of the MP3 protocol. It seems that the companies writing letters to BladeEnc are claiming something about their proprietary MP3 technology (sorry, the letter is kind of vague, plus IANAL). Who actually owns the MP3 protocol? Is it a standard?
If somehow MP3 encoding techniques are deemed to not be standards, but proprietary technology, is this acceptable by law? What I mean is, if one cannot build MP3's openly like this, can those cartels who hold the MP3 status be considered a monopoly (or, more aptly, an oligarcholopy)?
In a general case like this, with something that is supposed to be a standard, it seems almost as bad for several companies to keep competitors (especially open-source ones that won't or can't pay the big dues to become a member) out of the fray than it is for a single company to prevent upstart competition.
Do you remember that lawsuit from a bunch of cow herders, who sued Oprah Winfrey. During one of her shows, someone described some of the ways cows were treated, as well as some of the biological effects of eating beef. Oprah said that she wouldn't eat beef anymore. Fearing the massive loss of business by the Oprah fans, the beef industry sued. Luckily, they lost.
I know this is a common thought, but this is just one step closer to Big Brother. In the novel 1984, one was guilty of sedition if overheard saying anything bad about Big Brother. And let's face it, the corporations of today wield more power than most governments (Or the governments are in the corporations pocketbook, at least). So, by this token, if you get caught defaming the ruling influence (read big businesses), you are now worthy of punishment. This prospect is absolutely ludicrous. I don't know if it's funny to laugh at UCITA's stupidity, or scary to think of UCITA's longterm effects.
I acknowledge that I'm somewhat pessimistic here, but it is a completely absurd if UCITA really offers this provision. At least, looking on the bright side, we can legally force MSFT to stop their FUD campaigns against the Linux businesses.:-)
The ironic part, if this UCITA clause is to be upheld, is that, here in the USA, I'm free to run around denigrate the US government. But I cannot say bad things about Apogee's products. This is now another excuse to substitute in micor$oft and micros~1 for the real company name, for this allows a safety buffer to make fun of a non-existent company vs. a real company.
The article mentions MSFT's response to the cease and desist letter : Microsoft has responded to the cease and desist letter sent by the Digital Divas,
informing the Divas that they didn't feel that 'Digital Diva' was a trademarkable term
I vaguely remember hearing about a similar case several years ago, where the tables were turned. MSFT was suing another company for using the word 'Bookshelf' in their software title, for infringing on MSFT's Bookshelf Encyclopedia software. Can anyone confirm this?
It seems to me that 'bookshelf' is a much more general term than 'Digital Diva'. Is MSFT being hypocritical?
I agree that BASIC is a very simple way to go. I've been in a similar boat as you, when my father taught me the Level-II basic on my TRS-80 when I was 6. (Ack, bill gates wrote my first programming language, the horrors...)
However, since then I've gone to other incarnations of basic throughout the PC's evolution, and then to PASCAL, and then to C. At work, doing lots of analysis, I've learned IDL, which is a language very similar to MATLAB, and seems to be a cross between BASIC and FORTRAN, with some imaging routines built in.
I then discovered Python, which I'm still learning (ie, I've never gotten around to sitting down and doing complicated examples). But, in my limited experience, Python seems to be a BASIC-like language done correctly. Meaning, it's inherently structured, can offer OO techniques, allows easy methods to produce GUI widgets, and is extensible. Best yet, it's free (speech/beer) and multi-platform.
So, IMHO, check out Python if you're interested in teaching your kids BASIC. They can learn it just as quickly, and also not learn the 'wrong' ways of doing things that BASIC inadvertantly brings on.
I agree that this is a logical fallacy. There's two basic data points here. Namely, the increase of Napster's online trading, and the decrease of record sales. It's been awhile since I've done statistics, but, IIRC, to show a correlation with 95% confidence between two events, you need something on the order of 30 trials! This is only 1 friggin' trial.
You may claim that there's multiple data points, spacially separated (ie, different colleges), but they're temporarily the same. (ie, it's the same Napster, in the same market conditions, etc), so you cannot conclude anything useful from this study (IMHO, of course).
Otherwise, they can point to any event in the news, and show a correlation just the same. For example, they could claim that since the MSFT trial started over a year ago, CD sales have been declining. Thus, they conclude, the chaos caused by the trial of the world's largest software house is significantly cutting into CD sales.
Come on! Note that I'm not saying Napster doesn't reduce CD sales, but that there isn't enough data available to implicitly show it (through this study, that is).
That is an interesting question. Is it legal to download an MP3 of an album you've purchases on another medium.
If you buy the CD, then you can rip your own MP3, I think everybody thinks this is legal. However, can you legally download an MP3 and skip the trouble of making it yourself, assuming the site you downloaded from had specific knowledge you purchased the CD? Then, suppose you scratch your CD such that it no longer plays. Are you now entitled to download the MP3? Or are you forced to buy a new CD? Then, to the ultimate question. Are you allowed to legally upgrade to a better format, from an album purchased on an older format? Or must you re-purchse?
For somewhat scary views of the future of space commercialization, check out this link . Deals with pizza hut advertising on a Russian launch vehicle.
About a year ago I found an even better picture of the space shuttle with all sorts of other American megacorporations, but I cannot seem to find that one again...
The question is, which existing distro will they steal.
Steal, schmeal. I believe the question you are asking, is which existing distro they will extend. And this is a real extension, not an embrace/extend/extinguish, as the changes will be open for others. The GPL will see to that.
Re:What are you talking about?
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Linux Failover?
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And if all our customers fuck off because we don't keep them happy, the shareholders are going to love that right? A satisfied customer is a paying customer.
But you said, a few posts up, that your customers want a "tried and tested platform backed by a company that truly cares about their satisfaction." But now you imply that your company doesn't truly care about their satisfaction, but only about truly about their money. Which is it?
I assume you care only enough about their satisfaction as it will bring in the dollars. Ie, you want to barely keep them satisfied enough, such that they'll buy more products. Such is capitalism at its extreme. You choose money over product quality.
Re:You have no clue what you are talking about
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Linux Failover?
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To take that further, aren't they legally obliged to hold their shareholder's interests above those of their customers...
I'm not sure, but if true, I find that prospect somewhat revolting. It's a basic admission that companies care more about money than about quality. Usually smaller companies are okay, but the big conglomerates make me skeptical of the good of capitalism in the big picture.
Re:You have no clue what you are talking about
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Linux Failover?
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No, the average corporate customer we get is more interested in a tried and tested platform backed by a company that truly cares about their satisfaction rather than being at the whims of the "open source" bearded hippy crew and their communist fuhrer.
Hahaha, a sleezy capitalist fearing his/her eventual demise. Anyway, doesn't this 'company' you speak of truly care more about their shareholdrs than about it's customers' satisfaction?
It's funny that you mention that, because ham radio has been the 'internet' for techies for many many decades. It's a bunch of geeks communicating with other geeks, for fun and general techie-ness. and just the act of taking the simple test to get a technicians license kept most of the annoying folks out.
HAM's have been way ahead of the game, too. Long before cell phones, HAM operators were setting up phone patches. so with a little HT (a handheld radio, or Handy-Talky) you could patch through the local repeater and phone your friends. Way cool back in the day.
Then, HAM's have been doing wireless digital transmission for a long time, too. For many decades, HAM's could log, via RTTY and packet radio, into various bulletin boards, some of which connect to the internet.
In QST, that journal of the ARRL, some old timers were criticizing the internet (unjustly so, IMHO) for breeding too many computer-savvy folks that are too complacent with their computers, and thus not wanting to pursue a hobby in radio. Of course, the internet is the new medium, just like ham radio drew people from the realms of horse-riding instead (or other similar analogy).
But it's an interesting history, of an especially interesting and total geek subject:-) Sometimes, the techs treat radio like operating systems. THey spend more time building/tweaking them then they do using them!
But that takes out all the fun of doing a moonbounce;-)
quick, what was the first communications satellite? Nope, not Echo. That's right, it was the moon! For many decades people have been doing moonbounces, or EME (Earth-Moon-Earth).
It's a pretty cool way to talk to someone on the other side of the world (albeit probably one of the least efficient). You can actually notice the delay from the return trip time for the radio signal to travel to the moon and back.
In fact, about a year ago, the ARRL just awarded two hams for doing the first single-yagi to single-yagi moonbounce. A typical EME involves an array of yagi antennas aimed at the moon. Lots and lots of wattage, so a small reflecting amount can hit a receiver sufficiently. In reflecting radio waves, the amount of received power varies inversely as R^4, so the moon being pretty far away makes this vastly difficult.
But that's what makes it all the more fun! (although i must confess, i've never done it, it's one of my goals when I get around to it)...
But seriously, a repeater on the moon is pretty cool, it'll still be a good challenge to key it successfully. Maybe it'll offer real-time pictures of earth for packet download too...
I once knew an EE who claimed that his hardware didn't work correctly because of the presence of fluorescent lighting.
Are you kidding? Fluorescent lights are a HUGE factor in low-noise systems, especially with measurements. Standard practice, in many low-noise environments, is to turn off all lights during noise measurements. Many times these experiments are done in huge faraday cages, with no digital electronics inside, and all AC power sources highly conditioned.
I don't know what hardware your EE was blaming the lighting on, but on some systems it really does matter.
SOI is a silicon process that's been around for several years now. I'm pretty sure that Intel neither invented, nor patented, it. My old high-energy physics lab used the SOI process in some of the front-end detector chips for ATLAS at the LHC at CERN.
Okay, here's my question. What will the weather be like on September 27, 2005, in Baltimore, MD?
This brings to mind a more fundamental and philosophical question - Does your computer (or any one that's possible to build) have enough horsepower to out-calculate that analog computer called reality that we all know and love so very much?
For $200 I just bought a 21164 LX motherboard, with 533MHz ALpha CPU a few weeks ago at ELI computers in Cambridge, MA. This was the last 164LX they had, though. Point is, they will sell you just the motherboard. Not sure if they'll sell just the CPU, though.
But they do have many other alpha motherboards (164pc and 164sx) as well as other models I don't know. Plus, they have many used SPARC's and SGI's around, if you want to expand your hackerdom away from the x86.
If you're in the boston area, they're definitely worth a visit. Their used/salvage area is totally kickass!
It's not just the aerospace industry that needs extreme reliability. Real-time systems are in automobiles, too. For example, if you crash into something in your car, those accelerometers cause an interrupt which BETTER be acknowledged by the firmware to respond and trigger the airbags within X many microseconds.
I explain this in more depth on a different post above, but here is a brief reiteration...
Basically, is Andover not entitled to obtain as much information about the alleged copyright violation as needed, before deciding upon which course of action to pursue? Especially since such actions may have unintended consequences (eg, censoring once implies a responsibility to censor indefintely).
IANAL, so I have no idea what rights Andover and/. have in regards to obtaining information before any action is to be executed.
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I completely agree with you. My friend was pointing out that breaking up MSFT, or punishing them in other ways, may hurt the US economy (this may or may not be true, however). IMHO, this is just all the more reason to stop them before the US economy is even more at their mercy.
If we allow a company that repeatedly broke the law to carry on with business as usual, just for the sole purpose of not damaging our precious economy, then we're entering a very dangerous situation. This would hint that the company, MSFT in this instance, holds within it enough power to alter US legal rulings. This is a scary proposition, in that money and economy hold a higher position then the legislative branch of the government. The law, then, becomes nearly useless. It's one of Murphy's auxiliary rules coming true - The Golden Rule. He who owns the gold makes the rules.
To look from a wider perspective, big change (including economic) usually brings with it some temporary instability and uncertainty, but after the fog clears, it's for the better. For example, look at the US revolution (and no, I'm not comparing the ruling of MSFT to any necessary revolution by the people or anything like that). The colonists, at the price of their comfort and safety, put an end to the British tax and lack of representation by revolting. Sure, things were a mess for awhile, but for the colonists life was much better afterwards.
Just my twopence.
Can these attempts to submit fake evidence be carried through to the appeals court(s)? And can the MSFT execs be tried for perjury?
Anyway, during the time that I devised the experiment, I gathered up as much info on subliminal messages as I could. My high-school art teacher showed me how subliminal messages can be embedded in magazine ads. Most notably beauty/fashion ads, for example makeup ads in Cosmopolitan. The messages are VERY hard to discern, so much so you'd almost think they weren't there. But after you spot one or two, you can find them more easily. Mostly they say SEX in light delicate thin strokes around the models faces and bodies.
Of course, this could be chance. Ie, random photographic techniques may produce similar 'SEX' marks in any random magazine photograph. I didn't check out too many ads in this way. But most makeup ads that I looked at did have what appeared to be the letters 'SEX'.
And if you're wondering, don't worry. I don't own any shares of MSFT :-)
This leads me to wonder about the status of the MP3 protocol. It seems that the companies writing letters to BladeEnc are claiming something about their proprietary MP3 technology (sorry, the letter is kind of vague, plus IANAL). Who actually owns the MP3 protocol? Is it a standard?
If somehow MP3 encoding techniques are deemed to not be standards, but proprietary technology, is this acceptable by law? What I mean is, if one cannot build MP3's openly like this, can those cartels who hold the MP3 status be considered a monopoly (or, more aptly, an oligarcholopy)?
In a general case like this, with something that is supposed to be a standard, it seems almost as bad for several companies to keep competitors (especially open-source ones that won't or can't pay the big dues to become a member) out of the fray than it is for a single company to prevent upstart competition.
Do you remember that lawsuit from a bunch of cow herders, who sued Oprah Winfrey. During one of her shows, someone described some of the ways cows were treated, as well as some of the biological effects of eating beef. Oprah said that she wouldn't eat beef anymore. Fearing the massive loss of business by the Oprah fans, the beef industry sued. Luckily, they lost.
I acknowledge that I'm somewhat pessimistic here, but it is a completely absurd if UCITA really offers this provision. At least, looking on the bright side, we can legally force MSFT to stop their FUD campaigns against the Linux businesses. :-)
The ironic part, if this UCITA clause is to be upheld, is that, here in the USA, I'm free to run around denigrate the US government. But I cannot say bad things about Apogee's products. This is now another excuse to substitute in micor$oft and micros~1 for the real company name, for this allows a safety buffer to make fun of a non-existent company vs. a real company.
I vaguely remember hearing about a similar case several years ago, where the tables were turned. MSFT was suing another company for using the word 'Bookshelf' in their software title, for infringing on MSFT's Bookshelf Encyclopedia software. Can anyone confirm this?
It seems to me that 'bookshelf' is a much more general term than 'Digital Diva'. Is MSFT being hypocritical?
However, since then I've gone to other incarnations of basic throughout the PC's evolution, and then to PASCAL, and then to C. At work, doing lots of analysis, I've learned IDL, which is a language very similar to MATLAB, and seems to be a cross between BASIC and FORTRAN, with some imaging routines built in.
I then discovered Python, which I'm still learning (ie, I've never gotten around to sitting down and doing complicated examples). But, in my limited experience, Python seems to be a BASIC-like language done correctly. Meaning, it's inherently structured, can offer OO techniques, allows easy methods to produce GUI widgets, and is extensible. Best yet, it's free (speech/beer) and multi-platform.
So, IMHO, check out Python if you're interested in teaching your kids BASIC. They can learn it just as quickly, and also not learn the 'wrong' ways of doing things that BASIC inadvertantly brings on.
You may claim that there's multiple data points, spacially separated (ie, different colleges), but they're temporarily the same. (ie, it's the same Napster, in the same market conditions, etc), so you cannot conclude anything useful from this study (IMHO, of course).
Otherwise, they can point to any event in the news, and show a correlation just the same. For example, they could claim that since the MSFT trial started over a year ago, CD sales have been declining. Thus, they conclude, the chaos caused by the trial of the world's largest software house is significantly cutting into CD sales.
Come on! Note that I'm not saying Napster doesn't reduce CD sales, but that there isn't enough data available to implicitly show it (through this study, that is).
Just my twopence.
If you buy the CD, then you can rip your own MP3, I think everybody thinks this is legal. However, can you legally download an MP3 and skip the trouble of making it yourself, assuming the site you downloaded from had specific knowledge you purchased the CD? Then, suppose you scratch your CD such that it no longer plays. Are you now entitled to download the MP3? Or are you forced to buy a new CD? Then, to the ultimate question. Are you allowed to legally upgrade to a better format, from an album purchased on an older format? Or must you re-purchse?
Oh yeah. :-)
That's the one I wanted. Glad that someone was able to find it.
About a year ago I found an even better picture of the space shuttle with all sorts of other American megacorporations, but I cannot seem to find that one again...
Steal, schmeal.
I believe the question you are asking, is which existing distro they will extend. And this is a real extension, not an embrace/extend/extinguish, as the changes will be open for others. The GPL will see to that.
But you said, a few posts up, that your customers want a "tried and tested platform backed by a company that truly cares about their satisfaction." But now you imply that your company doesn't truly care about their satisfaction, but only about truly about their money. Which is it?
I assume you care only enough about their satisfaction as it will bring in the dollars. Ie, you want to barely keep them satisfied enough, such that they'll buy more products. Such is capitalism at its extreme. You choose money over product quality.
I'm not sure, but if true, I find that prospect somewhat revolting. It's a basic admission that companies care more about money than about quality. Usually smaller companies are okay, but the big conglomerates make me skeptical of the good of capitalism in the big picture.
Hahaha, a sleezy capitalist fearing his/her eventual demise. Anyway, doesn't this 'company' you speak of truly care more about their shareholdrs than about it's customers' satisfaction?
HAM's have been way ahead of the game, too. Long before cell phones, HAM operators were setting up phone patches. so with a little HT (a handheld radio, or Handy-Talky) you could patch through the local repeater and phone your friends. Way cool back in the day.
Then, HAM's have been doing wireless digital transmission for a long time, too. For many decades, HAM's could log, via RTTY and packet radio, into various bulletin boards, some of which connect to the internet.
In QST, that journal of the ARRL, some old timers were criticizing the internet (unjustly so, IMHO) for breeding too many computer-savvy folks that are too complacent with their computers, and thus not wanting to pursue a hobby in radio. Of course, the internet is the new medium, just like ham radio drew people from the realms of horse-riding instead (or other similar analogy).
But it's an interesting history, of an especially interesting and total geek subject :-) Sometimes, the techs treat radio like operating systems. THey spend more time building/tweaking them then they do using them!
quick, what was the first communications satellite? Nope, not Echo. That's right, it was the moon! For many decades people have been doing moonbounces, or EME (Earth-Moon-Earth).
It's a pretty cool way to talk to someone on the other side of the world (albeit probably one of the least efficient). You can actually notice the delay from the return trip time for the radio signal to travel to the moon and back.
In fact, about a year ago, the ARRL just awarded two hams for doing the first single-yagi to single-yagi moonbounce. A typical EME involves an array of yagi antennas aimed at the moon. Lots and lots of wattage, so a small reflecting amount can hit a receiver sufficiently. In reflecting radio waves, the amount of received power varies inversely as R^4, so the moon being pretty far away makes this vastly difficult.
But that's what makes it all the more fun! (although i must confess, i've never done it, it's one of my goals when I get around to it)...
But seriously, a repeater on the moon is pretty cool, it'll still be a good challenge to key it successfully. Maybe it'll offer real-time pictures of earth for packet download too...
Are you kidding? Fluorescent lights are a HUGE factor in low-noise systems, especially with measurements. Standard practice, in many low-noise environments, is to turn off all lights during noise measurements. Many times these experiments are done in huge faraday cages, with no digital electronics inside, and all AC power sources highly conditioned.
I don't know what hardware your EE was blaming the lighting on, but on some systems it really does matter.
SOI is a silicon process that's been around for several years now. I'm pretty sure that Intel neither invented, nor patented, it. My old high-energy physics lab used the SOI process in some of the front-end detector chips for ATLAS at the LHC at CERN.
This brings to mind a more fundamental and philosophical question - Does your computer (or any one that's possible to build) have enough horsepower to out-calculate that analog computer called reality that we all know and love so very much?
But they do have many other alpha motherboards (164pc and 164sx) as well as other models I don't know. Plus, they have many used SPARC's and SGI's around, if you want to expand your hackerdom away from the x86.
If you're in the boston area, they're definitely worth a visit. Their used/salvage area is totally kickass!
It's not just the aerospace industry that needs extreme reliability. Real-time systems are in automobiles, too. For example, if you crash into something in your car, those accelerometers cause an interrupt which BETTER be acknowledged by the firmware to respond and trigger the airbags within X many microseconds.
Basically, is Andover not entitled to obtain as much information about the alleged copyright violation as needed, before deciding upon which course of action to pursue? Especially since such actions may have unintended consequences (eg, censoring once implies a responsibility to censor indefintely).
IANAL, so I have no idea what rights Andover and /. have in regards to obtaining information before any action is to be executed.