...back at version 3 (or before), when the flaws that everyone parrots existed. It was a nice distro regardless.
Installing it was as easy as putting the disc in, turning the computer on, making at most TWO very clear choices, and when it finally booted to the desktop, things looked pretty good.
I believe the "user runs as root" flaw has since been abolished, and I hear it is now pretty easy to turn it back into Debian once installed.
I don't know if it is one of the best distros, but once it escapes its stigma, it just might be.
Any bad image associated with LinSpire is probably due to its antagonistic CEO.
A vulnerability appears in IE or Outlook, and the Internet is swamped for MONTHS with exploits while MSFT twiddles their thumbs, or tries to make a patch that won't break the OS.
In the world of Mozilla, people get pissed if it takes longer than a week.
The problem of ignorant unpatched users still exists, but having people migrate to something that has a more diligent security team is definitely a step in the right direction. It even helps the IE users. Malware writers are wasting time on multiple browsers, now.
This is the Richard Stallman approach and can only conceivably work in something like software, or any field like it where a new invention can occur because the inventor did it just for fun or necessity, or basically without intention of a big return. Any form of research & development that demands more resources and manpower than a few curious individuals can provide (in other words: nearly all) NEEDS a working patent system. Otherwise your researchers don't get compensated for all that time they put into the project. You expect them to walk away pleased simply that they helped further science? Nobody is that self-actualized unless they're already filthy rich.
Recall that patents are TEMPORARY. Someone researches a new doohickey, builds it, patents it, and gets all the return he can demand from it *for a time*. Then, after he has earned back a profit from their investment, the idea is now free for others to build upon without legal hassles, and the original researcher is very encouraged to innovate again. In fact he is driven to, because that other invention doesn't make him special anymore. He can't just sit on his thumbs and absorb money forever. That's what the patent system is FOR. To help motivate new inventions. We don't need to abolish it, it needs reform.
Your scheme of abolishing intellectual property only works in a perfect Gene Roddenberry fantasy world where money is never an object. Whether the IP system is there or not, your self-actualized people are going to create the things they're going to create anyway. Why remove the only incentive for those less motivated? You would sacrifice the majority of inventions, just so the remaining ones get into the public domain faster? That sounds kind of selfish.
I have a few inventions floating around in my head; my roommate and I plan on trying to get one or two of them published and developed. Our sole incentive: our good ideas could *make us some money* by helping a lot of people out. Why the HELL would we come up with a device, go through the hassle of publishing and patenting it, and just give it away to every company that wanted to sell a knockoff? Doesn't make sense to me.
I don't want to insult you, Archie, but I think perhaps your view of the intellectual property situation has not been fully thought out.
"If you don't want to create jobs... there is a tendency to develop open source."
What kind of jobs, Mr. Gates? Point-of-sale software programming jobs seems to be the only possibility--a mere fraction of programming jobs out there--which just happens to be the business that you are in. It diminishes Bill's field and invigorates the industries that have anything to do with customization, localization, and face-to-face service and support.
"[Open source] doesn't guarantee upward compatibility or do that kind of integration [for seamless computing to work]."
"We certainly will have open-source apps that compete with and that run on Windows. But when it comes to a guarantee or having someone who stands behind your software, [open source] is typically not something done in a capital approach."
Hail, Prince of the Obvious! More obvious information: Microsoft doesn't exactly specialize in guarantees either. Open Source doesn't do all those things, but companies can. Bill's statment is like me saying that closed-source doesn't guarantee free croissants. Of course it doesn't, but Microsoft sure would if it meant keeping Linux out of Paris.
As for the integration thing, he's right. Open Source environments don't integrate like Microsoft does. And is probably better off for it. Isn't that what got us into all this IE trouble in the first place? How frenzied integration is somehow an advantage is a mystery to me.
He's stating a few half-truths and presuming that his fragment of the truth leads everyone to his MSFT-centric conclusions. He makes about as much sense as a Linux zealot might. His only advantage is that he knows the business vocabulary that will get the attention of the bureaucrats. That, and he's Bill Fucking Gates and what he says goes. Outside of Slashdot, the man is perceived as a technological messiah.
I've used PowerDVD on Windows. I hate its interface, it is feature-impaired, and unstable. With Xine + libdvd*, I have SO MANY MORE FUNCTIONS. I can take screenshots of a movie without getting just a black screen; I can navigate the film in any direction and speed, and I can use key commands for just about all of that. It's faster, too, and far easier to acquire. Sorry CyberLink. This is far too little; way too late. I wouldn't condone purchasing a commercial DVD player anyway.
They're trying to show support for Linux, but for some reason I still see them and most other proprietary software vendors as ignorant, crapware-distributing bastards. We don't want/need anything from people like CyberLink. They are wasting their time on a product that WILL fail--and probably make the "Linux market" look non-existant.
Perhaps the most important thing is that DVD drives that come with PowerDVD will probably have the Windows AND Linux version. In such a case, it looks to me like another baby step in getting the support of hardware manufacturers.
You're probably right that a similar story to your Tom Clancy novel could be portrayed in a two hour flick. In defense of books, however, there would be numerous things you would miss out on. As far as chronological events, perhaps the amount of recollection would be as you describe, but I think a habitual reader (such as myself) recalls a great deal more from a book than what a movie even portrays. I just finished reading Isaac Asimov's Foundation, and I could tell you a LOT of things about the story, the thoughts of the characters, the chronology of the plot and the motivations that guided it. It's enough to fit a lengthy miniseries, and it's about a quarter the thickness of Tom Clancy's iceberg of a paperback Rainbow Six. One thing you'll never get out of a film without it crowding everything else out is an engaging, fully detailed account of a character's thoughts that never breaks the action's stride. Refer to Orson Scott Card's Shadow series. A good author can make a thought process riveting.
The singular trait that makes novels special in my mind is the length of time involved. Not only is a book a quiet, private way to relax, but the reader also has time to ponder the meaning of each bit of the author's tale at his or her own pace, not being bound to the pace of the film.
I'm not about to parrot "TV BAD!" like a lot of readers, elitists, and elitist readers. Arthur C. Clarke (one of THE greatest scifi authors of all time) seems to think television is the best invention to serve culture since pen and ink. But I don't think he'll want it to replace his hundreds of novels;)
And oh yeah, what you said about reading's memetic aspects is very true--but the problem you describe sounds like a product of an already lowered population of readers, not a cause. Join a book club or something--hang out in the library and pounce (figuratively) on someone at the Tom Clancy shelf (or in my case, the scifi section). The reader population is small, but it isn't nil.
I believe Americans are reading (even writing!) MORE thanks to the Internet. Now all we have to do is pound it into these kids' heads at school that they have to be COMPETENT readers and writers if they aren't going to sound like dumbasses in their emails to future employers.
And where is the FBI actually using this to spy on 'average people'? And can you come up with any particular reason why they might give a crap about what the 'average person' is reading?
In other words, the only way to be worry-free about the FBI making your life miserable is to lay low, never do anything controversial, and don't let your aspirations or convictions lead you to do anything that might get you noticed. If the President stands up and publicly tears apart a copy of the Bill of Rights and reinstates slavery, don't protest in any way. It would get you noticed, and that would be awful.
Not that I'm surprised at Congress' decision. People, especially those running a government, instinctively respond to things of this nature with fear. Fear is what got the PATRIOT Act written in the first place; fear is what passed it. And once its powers are solidified, if I may modify a line from one Grand Moff Tarkin, fear--fear of an investigative enema from the FBI--will keep the citizens in line. Perhaps one day we can live in a perfect reproduction of Orwell's 1984.
In a world like that, the libraries are perfectly safe. All the potentially controversial books have already been burned.
They were thoroughly convicted here (they even lied in court), and they never changed. They get convicted of the same in the EU, which surprises nobody, and Ballmer claims to be shocked, *shocked* that the EU would do such a despicable thing. He goes on moaning as though he's been wronged. Is he fooling ANYBODY?
This is an honest question, because I'm not sure but hope my hunch is correct: Is there *anyone* in the industry who gives one lick of credence to Microsoft's bitching about the ruling? Is there anyone who doesn't see directly through these press releases? Anyone who doesn't see this as a poorly contrived attempt at looking innocent?
SHUT UP AND RELEASE THE DAMN PATCH. Quit gibbering, make up your minds, and support your product--or don't support it. According to the EULA it's your perogative. Just--keep it out of the press if nothing is actually happening.
If MS can't just chill out and act like an honest business, I don't see why they deserve any customers.
Attention OEMs, hardware manufacturers, game and application developers: YOU HAVE THE POWER TO END THIS.
Open Source: Best damn thing for the economy
on
Evaluating Open Source
·
· Score: 3, Insightful
It lowers the barrier of entry. Small local businesses can thrive in an environment like this, and anyone is eligible to obtain the necessary knowhow and skill to get a job or start a business in the field.
I have pretty much one criterion in my mind regarding economics in the USA. If it ups the barrier of entry: automatically bad. It divides the haves and have-nots into perpetually irreconcilable camps. If it lowers the barrier of entry, any perceived "loss" or "recession" is due to the fatcats getting outdone by nimble startups or their own customers. In other words: automatically good.
Lowering the barrier diminishes corporate power; diminished corporate power means diminished corporate influence on government; and that means more power to the REAL PEOPLE.
Does this make the theory of a "big crunch" any more likely than before? I'm guessing not.
The theory which I understood to be most prominent at present was one of an accelerating, expanding galaxy. Eventually, all galaxies would be moving away from one another so swiftly it would be impossible to see one galaxy from another. Every galaxy would sputter and die in a universe its inhabitants would perceive as utterly empty.
Does the discovery that black holes are more prominent than before just mean that the pace of destruction of said galaxies will only be any different? Or does it do anything to reverse the present theory? It's possible there's no change at all. Any galaxies like this that were seen (in the article) were behaving that way billions of years ago. Who knows what's going on now.
Also, I wonder what could trigger the Milky Way's black hole into an "active" state. Heck, it may already have happened, but it would take about 50,000 years for us to see it.
I resent that! I endure Win98 when I must use Windows, and enjoy using Linux whenever I can. I do this because 1) yes, I live cheaply and 2) I'm no pirate.
Their claims will only get weirder until either MSFT finally gets it, adapts, or dies.
It makes me grin whenever these ludicrous press releases come out of Microsoft. Don't get angry when they spew this crap. Don't even get annoyed. Just smile knowingly, nod, and keep on telling people about the Better Way. If Microsoft does its marketing job well enough, their influence will diminish considerably.
I had always wanted the video game medium would rise to be recognized as as much of a storytelling medium as movies. Games like Freespace2, Max Payne, Half-Life, Metal Gear Solid (2), and others are very story-driven and the gaming experience becomes even more immersive with competent voice acting and good writing. (If you want to be contentious about Max Payne/MGS2 that's fine. They got way too damn trippy for me, too.)
I certainly hope that things get to a point where stories are told well through video games on a regular basis, providing yet another great outlet for creativity. I would love to do something similar to a literary analysis of a game like Half-Life, with its stream of consciousness gameplay drawing the participant totally into the story, or of Freespace2's provision of a grunt-soldier point of view of a vast galactic war. Tension in the MGS story is heightened by the player's perpetual need not to be seen.
What better way to immerse someone in your story than to allow them to interact in it and participate? Video games have much more potential than "movie spinoff product." I daresay that today they have more potential even than movies.
If this sounds incredibly weird, remember I'm an English student and I kind of have a vested interest in videogames becoming a semi-literary medium:)
Enterprise never appealed that much to me, but apparently there are some very intense fans and there must be a good reason for that.
Firefly didn't float my boat either, but I seem to recall it getting good reviews.
Farscape was constantly gaining new fans for its four year run. And I paid really close attention to the events surrounding Farscape. It was the show that pulled SCIFI out of relative obscurity among cable stations, their most popular show, yet they tried like hell to get it canceled. They jerked its time slot around when they stopped liking it, surrounded it with lackluster programming (Invisible Man being an exception), and as far as advertising goes, did their best to pretend it didn't exist.
Looks like the same thing is happening with Enterprise. The devoted fans (basically a captive audience for advertisers, read: A GOOD THING) saved the show it appears, and yet the network is screwing up its time slot to drive its popularity down. If you don't want to air the show, just fsckin' say so and send it to another network.
Is there a petition out there to bring back the NextGen crew for another few movies? ST:TNG was some of the best Trek ever.
So I hope the response from this PR stunt that registers on their radar is that we appreciate OSS-esque gestures (that's really all they've been, really: gestures) but need something substantial before their image truly changes.
Open sourcing IE or explorer to community improvements would be absolutely immense. IE could rocket past even Firefox and the ignorant masses of AOL types out there would have a real web browser by default. Microsoft seems as interested in fixing IE themselves as they were with WTL. Maybe this IE thing CAN happen!:)
I just want to say this is great news regarding MSFT. Let's encourage this behavior, just in case a Microserf is browsing Slashdot.
Microsoft still has a long way to go in my book before I can even consider trusting them as a company, but clearly some of its individuals "get it" and are taking steps. If it's OSI compatible, I feel much less wary. One thing that could really sway me is making certain critical file formats (like Word/Excel) open. And oh yeah, stop trying to hijack the Internet. That would be nice.
Large software corporations will decline, but I see no reason people like Intel, AMD, IBM and other hardware manufactureres should not be just as huge as they are today. Hardware companies, if they so chose, would be able to lead an acqueduct project for whatever new hardware concoction they're dreaming of, and hire a bunch of programmers to do it. Heck, they could (collectively?) sponsor a development lab full of paid OSS programmers dedicated to pushing the limits of hardware.
I think you might have it backwards anyway. I remember the software industry *following* the hardware industry. The PC gaming arena was stagnating because 3dfx saw no purpose in improving its Voodoo2 3D accelerator. When folks like ATi and nVidia started eating their lunch, advancements in PC games took off.
Slashdot Mirror
...back at version 3 (or before), when the flaws that everyone parrots existed. It was a nice distro regardless.
Installing it was as easy as putting the disc in, turning the computer on, making at most TWO very clear choices, and when it finally booted to the desktop, things looked pretty good.
I believe the "user runs as root" flaw has since been abolished, and I hear it is now pretty easy to turn it back into Debian once installed.
I don't know if it is one of the best distros, but once it escapes its stigma, it just might be.
Any bad image associated with LinSpire is probably due to its antagonistic CEO.
A vulnerability appears in IE or Outlook, and the Internet is swamped for MONTHS with exploits while MSFT twiddles their thumbs, or tries to make a patch that won't break the OS.
In the world of Mozilla, people get pissed if it takes longer than a week.
The problem of ignorant unpatched users still exists, but having people migrate to something that has a more diligent security team is definitely a step in the right direction. It even helps the IE users. Malware writers are wasting time on multiple browsers, now.
This is the Richard Stallman approach and can only conceivably work in something like software, or any field like it where a new invention can occur because the inventor did it just for fun or necessity, or basically without intention of a big return. Any form of research & development that demands more resources and manpower than a few curious individuals can provide (in other words: nearly all) NEEDS a working patent system. Otherwise your researchers don't get compensated for all that time they put into the project. You expect them to walk away pleased simply that they helped further science? Nobody is that self-actualized unless they're already filthy rich.
Recall that patents are TEMPORARY. Someone researches a new doohickey, builds it, patents it, and gets all the return he can demand from it *for a time*. Then, after he has earned back a profit from their investment, the idea is now free for others to build upon without legal hassles, and the original researcher is very encouraged to innovate again. In fact he is driven to, because that other invention doesn't make him special anymore. He can't just sit on his thumbs and absorb money forever. That's what the patent system is FOR. To help motivate new inventions. We don't need to abolish it, it needs reform.
Your scheme of abolishing intellectual property only works in a perfect Gene Roddenberry fantasy world where money is never an object. Whether the IP system is there or not, your self-actualized people are going to create the things they're going to create anyway. Why remove the only incentive for those less motivated? You would sacrifice the majority of inventions, just so the remaining ones get into the public domain faster? That sounds kind of selfish.
I have a few inventions floating around in my head; my roommate and I plan on trying to get one or two of them published and developed. Our sole incentive: our good ideas could *make us some money* by helping a lot of people out. Why the HELL would we come up with a device, go through the hassle of publishing and patenting it, and just give it away to every company that wanted to sell a knockoff? Doesn't make sense to me.
I don't want to insult you, Archie, but I think perhaps your view of the intellectual property situation has not been fully thought out.
I was wondering if anyone else did that.
I'm also fond of making up something random every time, like sicklecell@nemia.com
Because unfortunately, not everyone with a desire to get away from Windows has $800 lying around.
You can switch to Linux for $0 + a little time.
What kind of jobs, Mr. Gates? Point-of-sale software programming jobs seems to be the only possibility--a mere fraction of programming jobs out there--which just happens to be the business that you are in. It diminishes Bill's field and invigorates the industries that have anything to do with customization, localization, and face-to-face service and support.
"[Open source] doesn't guarantee upward compatibility or do that kind of integration [for seamless computing to work]."
"We certainly will have open-source apps that compete with and that run on Windows. But when it comes to a guarantee or having someone who stands behind your software, [open source] is typically not something done in a capital approach."
Hail, Prince of the Obvious! More obvious information: Microsoft doesn't exactly specialize in guarantees either. Open Source doesn't do all those things, but companies can. Bill's statment is like me saying that closed-source doesn't guarantee free croissants. Of course it doesn't, but Microsoft sure would if it meant keeping Linux out of Paris.
As for the integration thing, he's right. Open Source environments don't integrate like Microsoft does. And is probably better off for it. Isn't that what got us into all this IE trouble in the first place? How frenzied integration is somehow an advantage is a mystery to me.
He's stating a few half-truths and presuming that his fragment of the truth leads everyone to his MSFT-centric conclusions. He makes about as much sense as a Linux zealot might. His only advantage is that he knows the business vocabulary that will get the attention of the bureaucrats. That, and he's Bill Fucking Gates and what he says goes. Outside of Slashdot, the man is perceived as a technological messiah.
I've used PowerDVD on Windows. I hate its interface, it is feature-impaired, and unstable. With Xine + libdvd*, I have SO MANY MORE FUNCTIONS. I can take screenshots of a movie without getting just a black screen; I can navigate the film in any direction and speed, and I can use key commands for just about all of that. It's faster, too, and far easier to acquire. Sorry CyberLink. This is far too little; way too late. I wouldn't condone purchasing a commercial DVD player anyway.
They're trying to show support for Linux, but for some reason I still see them and most other proprietary software vendors as ignorant, crapware-distributing bastards. We don't want/need anything from people like CyberLink. They are wasting their time on a product that WILL fail--and probably make the "Linux market" look non-existant.
Perhaps the most important thing is that DVD drives that come with PowerDVD will probably have the Windows AND Linux version. In such a case, it looks to me like another baby step in getting the support of hardware manufacturers.
If only this technology were available two years ago, Elvis wouldn't have had to go through all that trouble.
The singular trait that makes novels special in my mind is the length of time involved. Not only is a book a quiet, private way to relax, but the reader also has time to ponder the meaning of each bit of the author's tale at his or her own pace, not being bound to the pace of the film.
I'm not about to parrot "TV BAD!" like a lot of readers, elitists, and elitist readers. Arthur C. Clarke (one of THE greatest scifi authors of all time) seems to think television is the best invention to serve culture since pen and ink. But I don't think he'll want it to replace his hundreds of novels ;)
And oh yeah, what you said about reading's memetic aspects is very true--but the problem you describe sounds like a product of an already lowered population of readers, not a cause. Join a book club or something--hang out in the library and pounce (figuratively) on someone at the Tom Clancy shelf (or in my case, the scifi section). The reader population is small, but it isn't nil.
I believe Americans are reading (even writing!) MORE thanks to the Internet. Now all we have to do is pound it into these kids' heads at school that they have to be COMPETENT readers and writers if they aren't going to sound like dumbasses in their emails to future employers.
And where is the FBI actually using this to spy on 'average people'? And can you come up with any particular reason why they might give a crap about what the 'average person' is reading?
In other words, the only way to be worry-free about the FBI making your life miserable is to lay low, never do anything controversial, and don't let your aspirations or convictions lead you to do anything that might get you noticed. If the President stands up and publicly tears apart a copy of the Bill of Rights and reinstates slavery, don't protest in any way. It would get you noticed, and that would be awful.
Not that I'm surprised at Congress' decision. People, especially those running a government, instinctively respond to things of this nature with fear. Fear is what got the PATRIOT Act written in the first place; fear is what passed it. And once its powers are solidified, if I may modify a line from one Grand Moff Tarkin, fear--fear of an investigative enema from the FBI--will keep the citizens in line. Perhaps one day we can live in a perfect reproduction of Orwell's 1984.
In a world like that, the libraries are perfectly safe. All the potentially controversial books have already been burned.
They were thoroughly convicted here (they even lied in court), and they never changed. They get convicted of the same in the EU, which surprises nobody, and Ballmer claims to be shocked, *shocked* that the EU would do such a despicable thing. He goes on moaning as though he's been wronged. Is he fooling ANYBODY?
This is an honest question, because I'm not sure but hope my hunch is correct: Is there *anyone* in the industry who gives one lick of credence to Microsoft's bitching about the ruling? Is there anyone who doesn't see directly through these press releases? Anyone who doesn't see this as a poorly contrived attempt at looking innocent?
SHUT UP AND RELEASE THE DAMN PATCH. Quit gibbering, make up your minds, and support your product--or don't support it. According to the EULA it's your perogative. Just--keep it out of the press if nothing is actually happening.
If MS can't just chill out and act like an honest business, I don't see why they deserve any customers.
Attention OEMs, hardware manufacturers, game and application developers: YOU HAVE THE POWER TO END THIS.
my response is: "sh*t yeah!"
On to reading...
It lowers the barrier of entry. Small local businesses can thrive in an environment like this, and anyone is eligible to obtain the necessary knowhow and skill to get a job or start a business in the field.
I have pretty much one criterion in my mind regarding economics in the USA. If it ups the barrier of entry: automatically bad. It divides the haves and have-nots into perpetually irreconcilable camps. If it lowers the barrier of entry, any perceived "loss" or "recession" is due to the fatcats getting outdone by nimble startups or their own customers. In other words: automatically good.
Lowering the barrier diminishes corporate power; diminished corporate power means diminished corporate influence on government; and that means more power to the REAL PEOPLE.
I think once you brought it home, problems like that would solve themselves.
Does this make the theory of a "big crunch" any more likely than before? I'm guessing not.
The theory which I understood to be most prominent at present was one of an accelerating, expanding galaxy. Eventually, all galaxies would be moving away from one another so swiftly it would be impossible to see one galaxy from another. Every galaxy would sputter and die in a universe its inhabitants would perceive as utterly empty.
Does the discovery that black holes are more prominent than before just mean that the pace of destruction of said galaxies will only be any different? Or does it do anything to reverse the present theory? It's possible there's no change at all. Any galaxies like this that were seen (in the article) were behaving that way billions of years ago. Who knows what's going on now.
Also, I wonder what could trigger the Milky Way's black hole into an "active" state. Heck, it may already have happened, but it would take about 50,000 years for us to see it.
I resent that! I endure Win98 when I must use Windows, and enjoy using Linux whenever I can. I do this because 1) yes, I live cheaply and 2) I'm no pirate.
Their claims will only get weirder until either MSFT finally gets it, adapts, or dies.
It makes me grin whenever these ludicrous press releases come out of Microsoft. Don't get angry when they spew this crap. Don't even get annoyed. Just smile knowingly, nod, and keep on telling people about the Better Way. If Microsoft does its marketing job well enough, their influence will diminish considerably.
But does this thing perform similarly to a similarly powered PPC?
Sigh. If only Apple would port the thing themselves. Add a windows compatibility layer and you've got one hell of a competitor to Microsoft.
I had always wanted the video game medium would rise to be recognized as as much of a storytelling medium as movies. Games like Freespace2, Max Payne, Half-Life, Metal Gear Solid (2), and others are very story-driven and the gaming experience becomes even more immersive with competent voice acting and good writing. (If you want to be contentious about Max Payne/MGS2 that's fine. They got way too damn trippy for me, too.)
:)
I certainly hope that things get to a point where stories are told well through video games on a regular basis, providing yet another great outlet for creativity. I would love to do something similar to a literary analysis of a game like Half-Life, with its stream of consciousness gameplay drawing the participant totally into the story, or of Freespace2's provision of a grunt-soldier point of view of a vast galactic war. Tension in the MGS story is heightened by the player's perpetual need not to be seen.
What better way to immerse someone in your story than to allow them to interact in it and participate? Video games have much more potential than "movie spinoff product." I daresay that today they have more potential even than movies.
If this sounds incredibly weird, remember I'm an English student and I kind of have a vested interest in videogames becoming a semi-literary medium
Enterprise never appealed that much to me, but apparently there are some very intense fans and there must be a good reason for that.
Firefly didn't float my boat either, but I seem to recall it getting good reviews.
Farscape was constantly gaining new fans for its four year run. And I paid really close attention to the events surrounding Farscape. It was the show that pulled SCIFI out of relative obscurity among cable stations, their most popular show, yet they tried like hell to get it canceled. They jerked its time slot around when they stopped liking it, surrounded it with lackluster programming (Invisible Man being an exception), and as far as advertising goes, did their best to pretend it didn't exist.
Looks like the same thing is happening with Enterprise. The devoted fans (basically a captive audience for advertisers, read: A GOOD THING) saved the show it appears, and yet the network is screwing up its time slot to drive its popularity down. If you don't want to air the show, just fsckin' say so and send it to another network.
Is there a petition out there to bring back the NextGen crew for another few movies? ST:TNG was some of the best Trek ever.
So I hope the response from this PR stunt that registers on their radar is that we appreciate OSS-esque gestures (that's really all they've been, really: gestures) but need something substantial before their image truly changes. Open sourcing IE or explorer to community improvements would be absolutely immense. IE could rocket past even Firefox and the ignorant masses of AOL types out there would have a real web browser by default. Microsoft seems as interested in fixing IE themselves as they were with WTL. Maybe this IE thing CAN happen! :)
I just want to say this is great news regarding MSFT. Let's encourage this behavior, just in case a Microserf is browsing Slashdot.
Microsoft still has a long way to go in my book before I can even consider trusting them as a company, but clearly some of its individuals "get it" and are taking steps. If it's OSI compatible, I feel much less wary. One thing that could really sway me is making certain critical file formats (like Word/Excel) open. And oh yeah, stop trying to hijack the Internet. That would be nice.
Large software corporations will decline, but I see no reason people like Intel, AMD, IBM and other hardware manufactureres should not be just as huge as they are today. Hardware companies, if they so chose, would be able to lead an acqueduct project for whatever new hardware concoction they're dreaming of, and hire a bunch of programmers to do it. Heck, they could (collectively?) sponsor a development lab full of paid OSS programmers dedicated to pushing the limits of hardware.
I think you might have it backwards anyway. I remember the software industry *following* the hardware industry. The PC gaming arena was stagnating because 3dfx saw no purpose in improving its Voodoo2 3D accelerator. When folks like ATi and nVidia started eating their lunch, advancements in PC games took off.
Corporatarchy?
Or if you ask Mussolini, Fascist.