It's largely mindset. I can see publishing commercial programs that I write with the code - hell, if it's good it's gonna get pirated anyway. I stand to benefit more on public scrutiny and the programmers who use my software saying "why did you do it this way when that way would be better?" So balancing the harm from piracy that's going to happen anyway with the benefit of accountability and programmer input - I would have to say that even for commercial software, Open Source would be the way to go.
But bring in Microsoft. From day one when people were trading punched ribbons with each other of software written by Billy and the Crew our friendly neighborhood Monopolist has had a conniption about piracy that transcended any kind of rational thought. He goes as far as to call his customers pirates. That was only the seed for what was to come. It would seem that every action since then has been an act of revenge. Rather than concentrating on producing a good product, he focused obsessively on anti-piracy (largely to no avail). All his efforts are wasted. Piracy still continues and there's nothing he can do about it. Now, years later he's stuck with a series of lawsuits, and a corporation that's going to be split up and a bundle of worthless software. He'll never open up on his own - he'll have to be forced to open up. And I'm not sure if I want to look at his source - with all the years of slapping software together and cramming on gizmos and garbage to his apps, I can imagine that his code is a jumbled mess.
There will always be those few out there who are unscrupulous and will pirate your software regardless of availability of code. But if you produce a quality product, the damage done will be minimal - most of us don't mind shelling out green for something that actually works. And if you open the code, you have the added benefit of being forced to keep your code clean (ego) _and_ getting more informed input from your customers.
It'd be an interesting experiment to open up something commercial to see what happens - anyone up for it? Corel?
> Napster is now in litigation over these issues > and is pleading that it is not the entity that > is actually stealing the music.
Hee hee, interesting argument. I bet the NRA used that too - it's not the submachine gun that killed the person, but the guy who pulled the trigger. Well, since submachineguns were designed specifically to kill, it would stand to chance that a killer will sooner or later get ahold of it and use it, right?
What's Napster designed for? It's open, relatively unmoderated and espressly designed to transport music. I don't know about you, but the last I checked, I haven't seen any free music with an open license for copying out of all the countless thousands of titles available, so their product was designed from the beginning specifically to transport pirated music. Design the product and the pirates will use it.
It's one thing to write a program to share GPL programs and quite another to share music that is overwhelmingly governed by copyrights. So Napster is guilty not only of promoting piracy, but also of being a hypocrate. A correct approach to what they're doing is to write a program promoting the sharing of new open license music in an effort to free up music and encourage new musicians to produce open license music - but I saw nothing of that on their site or in their software. Additionally, they should have approached other musicians and garnered permission to share their music, but there was nothing concerning that on their site either.
In conclusion - while the killer is guilty of putting 100 rounds of ammunition in a person within about a second or two from a weapon the NRA claims to be "recreational" it's clear that the weapon has a singular purpose of putting people in the ground and should be banned or effectively altered. Nueter Napster - force it to moderate the traffic of music and promote something many of us have forgotten - respect for other people's property and respect for license. If they fail, shut them down. They'll only make it harder for the rest of us. Currently they're giving ample fuel for the RIAA to use against us and unconstitutional laws are being passed by people who are swayed by this kind of fuel. In the end, Napster is shut down anyway and we're still screwed. Better to shut them down before the damage gets too deep...
Hmm, I'm gonna open up a channel for people to share music that may or may not be legit. I'm gonna form a company to make money off my actions and software, which indirectly makes money off possibly pirated music. Then I'm going to wonder why all these musicians are suing me. But here's one group that has given me express permission to let people copy and share music. Cool. But, those bastards - they're making money off my logo! I'll get them, how dare they take something of mine and make money from it.... sound familiar? While Napster has a right to protect it's trademarks, they should tread lightly in the areas hypocrytes fear to tread. They knowingly allow pirated music to flow through their network without the permission of the musicians - hell, they even promote it, and business is good and money flows. Now the shoes on the other foot. A band that has freely given permission is selling products advertising Napster. They should have asked, but then so should Napster. This is why it's important to obtain permission - it's respectfull and it prevents miscommunication and lawsuits - but then we can't have all those hard working lawyers living on the streets, can we...:)
Wouldn't the app called Update Agent for RPM be considered close enough to be prior work? Doesn't it querie the ftp site for updated RPM's and install them (I've never used it - any self-respecting Admin would never arbitrarily apply upgrades like this without knowing exactly what's going where and what's going to be affected by it). I know it's not automatic (thank God), and if Win32 makes their version automatic that's one more reason not to use it. Think of the issues with corrupted files, privacy, etc...
Additionally, I know Quicktime had the pre-downloader that downloaded the rest of the app and installed it for you (I hated that - sometimes I need to install QT on systems with no internet access and they made that impossible). Now Internet Explorer is proving Microsoft as the ultimate copy-cat by doing the same thing. We can rest assured that Microsoft has NOTHING that is original or not a blantant copy of something else, so the thought of them getting a patent for something proves that the paper-pushers at the patent office are more concerned with quota and revenue that with issueing fully researched and justified patents (if that actually exists). How long are we going to let this travesty continue? Either abolish patents or re-create the system and force all current patent holders to re-apply with full research that should have been happening from the beginning, and down with software patents. That's like me patenting a novel because I used "He tenderly kissed her" in it. Sheesh...
There's a difference in the free exchange of information and piracy. What you can and can't do with CD music is usually printed on the back - if you don't like the terms, don't buy the CD. Those terms basically say you can't reproduce the contents of the CD without prior authorization of the producer. So, is everyone publishing music ripped from CD on the Napster contacting the appropriate parties and getting permission? Not. I think this kind of abuse actually hurts the Open Source and Open Information movements by placing a stain of piracy and theft on them. Once again - if you don't like the terms of the agreement - then don't buy the CD. That's why I don't use Microsoft - I disagree with their terms. I'm not about to go out and because I disagree with a license purposefully break it by sending free copies of it over the internet or selling copies of it to friends. Color it how you want, but in short - it's piracy and disrespectfull. Put together a movement for the free transfer of music produced by musicians that have given permission. The music industry may try to fight that too - but at least you've got some honorable grounds to stand on. Napster has no honorable grounds to stand on because of the rampant abuse it has allowed. Napster is a great program - but has fallen into misuse and has given fuel to the corporate big-wigs that don't like Free anything. This really isn't helping our case against stupid patents and unconstitutional legistlation at all. If you disagree with the rules and system, change it rather than break it. If you break it, it will only add justification to these rules and systems. Now these guys will say "See? This is why we need to protect our market with these patents and rules - else everyone will pirate and steal our product." And the judge will agree. Please, let's stop screwing ourselves and focus our energy on changing the regulations, rules, patent system, etc... It will end up being good for all of us.
Let's see, you have driving to work (a particularly barbaric experience of yelling at all the other 'fools' on the street since no one but you have any sense at all), being married (_never_ leave an empty jelly jar in the fridge), being in school (my ears are _not_ big!), the bus ride to and from school (survival of the fittest when it comes to getting a seat), football (gasp - really?), competitive sports in general (except hockey - those guys are _so_ nice and under control), paintball warfare(kill em! kill em!). These guys _really_ need to put this all into perspective. I view karate lessons as more inflamitory and promoting of actual violence than a video game (anyone know _any_ karate student without _any_ ego or tendency to violence? - personal experience here).
Solution then? Ban driving, marriage, school (and school busses), football, sports in general, paintball warfare, etc... sit at home and watch the Partridge Family (but then _that_ could drive some to violence).
Or - perhaps rather than pointing fingers at others, we could point them back at ourselves. It's easy to think your kids are perfect. Heck, mine are. They'll never get into trouble or get into a fight. (NOT!). There will be cases when you will be totally taken by surprise, but in many instances of violence, there are signs and clues - parents should be educated on these clues and taught how to handle them in a loving and nurturing maner (rather than - "you're grounded!"). Instead of spending all this money to fund research on why video games are so bad and responsible for violence (something that will be used in a very biased way to the exclusion of all other possible causes in court), how about a little funding to workshops for parents and kids?
I wonder if there are _any_ Microsoft clusters in that top 500 and if on some miraculous chance there are where they stand... Hmmm, 64 of each running side by side - a new benchmark for Mindcraft to screw up?:)
> In fact, the reason they took the time to > port to NT is because users demanded it.
And Linux users wanting ports of applications to Linux don't count? Unix has always been a superior system for computing and multimedia development (graphics, 3D, Audio, etc...) - only with Linux has it become affordable...
This article wasn't about Microsoft. It was about Linux. Gee, you can already do this with MacOS and a number of commercial Unices like Irix. Big deal - this discussion is about the present and future state of audio editing for Linux.
Microsoft is actually abysmal at multimedia for high and medium end editing - that's why the Avid isn't run on MS. It is resource wasting, slow, uses a pathetic file-system, is unstable and fairly chunky. My multimedia development platform of preference is the Mac (hell - everything on Microsoft is a poor copy of the Mac anyway - be better to use the original than the pathetic gimicy clone), but I'm very excited that my OS preference of Linux is getting some serious attention multimedia-wise.
It would appear that the 'authoritive' author of the article knows diddly about Linux, has never used it and is just making conjectures from technical discussions that clearly went over her (?) head. That someone would claim KDE and GNOME don't have filemanagers is like claiming pigs fly (which I've ONLY seen after a full night of partying). I think the claim is potentially damaging - a graphical filemanager is central to any graphical user interface. Complaints (tactful and professional) should be made so that an errata can be posted. If you respond to the article, please be nice - it doesn't appear to be an attempt to fud, just a misunderstanding...
This has nothing to do with Linux or it's quality. Linux by no means has a monopoly on assholes for users - you'll find them where-ever you go. If that is a determining factor in what OS you choose, then you will _never_ be happy. Ignore the kids and smart-assed remarks and use Linux because _you_ like Linux, not because we're a bunch of nice guys...
...they keep publishing pro-Microsoft articles and the polls keep indicating that Microsoft sucks. Remember their "Do you trust Microsoft?" poll - it was on a pro-W2k article about how M$ promises to put forth more effort to increase security and blah blah - well the poll told the real truth - people who use it know better than to listen to CNN's pro-Microsoft agenda. I have to say, they didn't say anything "Bad" about Linux, but after saying that Redhat (what about the other distros?) and Novell beat W2k hands down, it concludes it's article that W2k is king, and, well, (paraphrased) if you're running some fly-by-night business out of your garage or dorm, Redhat just _might_ be good enough for you. Sheesh - are they that afraid of M$ lawyers?
Of course, in retrospect, if it is not out and out financially rewarding to publish pro-Microsoft articles, it seems that it can be financially damaging to be over-critical. Freedom of speach doesn't exist anymore - express yourself and have a dozen lawyers stuff a lawsuit down your throat. At least their Linux bashing didn't occure really until the end of the article. I guess it's their way of saving their butts - they basically said "W2k really sucks in relation to Linux and Novell, but it's the best in relation to Linux and Novell" - it saves them from having to post a retraction later by including one with the article...:)
BTW - I've been watching the poll - for every 10 votes on W2K, Redhat gets 100. I think the internet is the worst thing to happen to Microsoft - before you didn't know if your problems were just your configuration errors or real bugs - now that people can communicate in mass, it seems that there is a general concensus that Microsoft really does suck and it's not my fault or my configuration error.
But Microsoft does have it's good side - it's something to compare Linux to and gloat.:)
Slashdot Mirror
It's largely mindset. I can see publishing commercial programs that I write with the code - hell, if it's good it's gonna get pirated anyway. I stand to benefit more on public scrutiny and the programmers who use my software saying "why did you do it this way when that way would be better?" So balancing the harm from piracy that's going to happen anyway with the benefit of accountability and programmer input - I would have to say that even for commercial software, Open Source would be the way to go.
But bring in Microsoft. From day one when people were trading punched ribbons with each other of software written by Billy and the Crew our friendly neighborhood Monopolist has had a conniption about piracy that transcended any kind of rational thought. He goes as far as to call his customers pirates. That was only the seed for what was to come. It would seem that every action since then has been an act of revenge. Rather than concentrating on producing a good product, he focused obsessively on anti-piracy (largely to no avail). All his efforts are wasted. Piracy still continues and there's nothing he can do about it. Now, years later he's stuck with a series of lawsuits, and a corporation that's going to be split up and a bundle of worthless software. He'll never open up on his own - he'll have to be forced to open up. And I'm not sure if I want to look at his source - with all the years of slapping software together and cramming on gizmos and garbage to his apps, I can imagine that his code is a jumbled mess.
There will always be those few out there who are unscrupulous and will pirate your software regardless of availability of code. But if you produce a quality product, the damage done will be minimal - most of us don't mind shelling out green for something that actually works. And if you open the code, you have the added benefit of being forced to keep your code clean (ego) _and_ getting more informed input from your customers.
It'd be an interesting experiment to open up something commercial to see what happens - anyone up for it? Corel?
> Napster is now in litigation over these issues
> and is pleading that it is not the entity that
> is actually stealing the music.
Hee hee, interesting argument. I bet the NRA used that too - it's not the submachine gun that killed the person, but the guy who pulled the trigger. Well, since submachineguns were designed specifically to kill, it would stand to chance that a killer will sooner or later get ahold of it and use it, right?
What's Napster designed for? It's open, relatively unmoderated and espressly designed to transport music. I don't know about you, but the last I checked, I haven't seen any free music with an open license for copying out of all the countless thousands of titles available, so their product was designed from the beginning specifically to transport pirated music. Design the product and the pirates will use it.
It's one thing to write a program to share GPL programs and quite another to share music that is overwhelmingly governed by copyrights. So Napster is guilty not only of promoting piracy, but also of being a hypocrate. A correct approach to what they're doing is to write a program promoting the sharing of new open license music in an effort to free up music and encourage new musicians to produce open license music - but I saw nothing of that on their site or in their software. Additionally, they should have approached other musicians and garnered permission to share their music, but there was nothing concerning that on their site either.
In conclusion - while the killer is guilty of putting 100 rounds of ammunition in a person within about a second or two from a weapon the NRA claims to be "recreational" it's clear that the weapon has a singular purpose of putting people in the ground and should be banned or effectively altered. Nueter Napster - force it to moderate the traffic of music and promote something many of us have forgotten - respect for other people's property and respect for license. If they fail, shut them down. They'll only make it harder for the rest of us. Currently they're giving ample fuel for the RIAA to use against us and unconstitutional laws are being passed by people who are swayed by this kind of fuel. In the end, Napster is shut down anyway and we're still screwed. Better to shut them down before the damage gets too deep...
Hmm, I'm gonna open up a channel for people to share music that may or may not be legit. I'm gonna form a company to make money off my actions and software, which indirectly makes money off possibly pirated music. Then I'm going to wonder why all these musicians are suing me. But here's one group that has given me express permission to let people copy and share music. Cool. But, those bastards - they're making money off my logo! I'll get them, how dare they take something of mine and make money from it.... sound familiar? While Napster has a right to protect it's trademarks, they should tread lightly in the areas hypocrytes fear to tread. They knowingly allow pirated music to flow through their network without the permission of the musicians - hell, they even promote it, and business is good and money flows. Now the shoes on the other foot. A band that has freely given permission is selling products advertising Napster. They should have asked, but then so should Napster. This is why it's important to obtain permission - it's respectfull and it prevents miscommunication and lawsuits - but then we can't have all those hard working lawyers living on the streets, can we... :)
Wouldn't the app called Update Agent for RPM be considered close enough to be prior work? Doesn't it querie the ftp site for updated RPM's and install them (I've never used it - any self-respecting Admin would never arbitrarily apply upgrades like this without knowing exactly what's going where and what's going to be affected by it). I know it's not automatic (thank God), and if Win32 makes their version automatic that's one more reason not to use it. Think of the issues with corrupted files, privacy, etc...
Additionally, I know Quicktime had the pre-downloader that downloaded the rest of the app and installed it for you (I hated that - sometimes I need to install QT on systems with no internet access and they made that impossible). Now Internet Explorer is proving Microsoft as the ultimate copy-cat by doing the same thing. We can rest assured that Microsoft has NOTHING that is original or not a blantant copy of something else, so the thought of them getting a patent for something proves that the paper-pushers at the patent office are more concerned with quota and revenue that with issueing fully researched and justified patents (if that actually exists). How long are we going to let this travesty continue? Either abolish patents or re-create the system and force all current patent holders to re-apply with full research that should have been happening from the beginning, and down with software patents. That's like me patenting a novel because I used "He tenderly kissed her" in it. Sheesh...
There's a difference in the free exchange of information and piracy. What you can and can't do with CD music is usually printed on the back - if you don't like the terms, don't buy the CD. Those terms basically say you can't reproduce the contents of the CD without prior authorization of the producer. So, is everyone publishing music ripped from CD on the Napster contacting the appropriate parties and getting permission? Not. I think this kind of abuse actually hurts the Open Source and Open Information movements by placing a stain of piracy and theft on them. Once again - if you don't like the terms of the agreement - then don't buy the CD. That's why I don't use Microsoft - I disagree with their terms. I'm not about to go out and because I disagree with a license purposefully break it by sending free copies of it over the internet or selling copies of it to friends. Color it how you want, but in short - it's piracy and disrespectfull. Put together a movement for the free transfer of music produced by musicians that have given permission. The music industry may try to fight that too - but at least you've got some honorable grounds to stand on. Napster has no honorable grounds to stand on because of the rampant abuse it has allowed. Napster is a great program - but has fallen into misuse and has given fuel to the corporate big-wigs that don't like Free anything. This really isn't helping our case against stupid patents and unconstitutional legistlation at all. If you disagree with the rules and system, change it rather than break it. If you break it, it will only add justification to these rules and systems. Now these guys will say "See? This is why we need to protect our market with these patents and rules - else everyone will pirate and steal our product." And the judge will agree. Please, let's stop screwing ourselves and focus our energy on changing the regulations, rules, patent system, etc... It will end up being good for all of us.
Mike
Let's see, you have driving to work (a particularly barbaric experience of yelling at all the other 'fools' on the street since no one but you have any sense at all), being married (_never_ leave an empty jelly jar in the fridge), being in school (my ears are _not_ big!), the bus ride to and from school (survival of the fittest when it comes to getting a seat), football (gasp - really?), competitive sports in general (except hockey - those guys are _so_ nice and under control), paintball warfare(kill em! kill em!). These guys _really_ need to put this all into perspective. I view karate lessons as more inflamitory and promoting of actual violence than a video game (anyone know _any_ karate student without _any_ ego or tendency to violence? - personal experience here).
Solution then? Ban driving, marriage, school (and school busses), football, sports in general, paintball warfare, etc... sit at home and watch the Partridge Family (but then _that_ could drive some to violence).
Or - perhaps rather than pointing fingers at others, we could point them back at ourselves. It's easy to think your kids are perfect. Heck, mine are. They'll never get into trouble or get into a fight. (NOT!). There will be cases when you will be totally taken by surprise, but in many instances of violence, there are signs and clues - parents should be educated on these clues and taught how to handle them in a loving and nurturing maner (rather than - "you're grounded!"). Instead of spending all this money to fund research on why video games are so bad and responsible for violence (something that will be used in a very biased way to the exclusion of all other possible causes in court), how about a little funding to workshops for parents and kids?
I wonder if there are _any_ Microsoft clusters in that top 500 and if on some miraculous chance there are where they stand... Hmmm, 64 of each running side by side - a new benchmark for Mindcraft to screw up? :)
Mike
> In fact, the reason they took the time to
> port to NT is because users demanded it.
And Linux users wanting ports of applications to Linux don't count? Unix has always been a superior system for computing and multimedia development (graphics, 3D, Audio, etc...) - only with Linux has it become affordable...
This article wasn't about Microsoft. It was about Linux. Gee, you can already do this with MacOS and a number of commercial Unices like Irix. Big deal - this discussion is about the present and future state of audio editing for Linux.
Microsoft is actually abysmal at multimedia for high and medium end editing - that's why the Avid isn't run on MS. It is resource wasting, slow, uses a pathetic file-system, is unstable and fairly chunky. My multimedia development platform of preference is the Mac (hell - everything on Microsoft is a poor copy of the Mac anyway - be better to use the original than the pathetic gimicy clone), but I'm very excited that my OS preference of Linux is getting some serious attention multimedia-wise.
I wonder if it's too late to include it in the RH6.2. Does beta mean no new stuff or major changes?
It would appear that the 'authoritive' author of the article knows diddly about Linux, has never used it and is just making conjectures from technical discussions that clearly went over her (?) head. That someone would claim KDE and GNOME don't have filemanagers is like claiming pigs fly (which I've ONLY seen after a full night of partying). I think the claim is potentially damaging - a graphical filemanager is central to any graphical user interface. Complaints (tactful and professional) should be made so that an errata can be posted. If you respond to the article, please be nice - it doesn't appear to be an attempt to fud, just a misunderstanding...
This has nothing to do with Linux or it's quality. Linux by no means has a monopoly on assholes for users - you'll find them where-ever you go. If that is a determining factor in what OS you choose, then you will _never_ be happy. Ignore the kids and smart-assed remarks and use Linux because _you_ like Linux, not because we're a bunch of nice guys...
...they keep publishing pro-Microsoft articles and the polls keep indicating that Microsoft sucks. Remember their "Do you trust Microsoft?" poll - it was on a pro-W2k article about how M$ promises to put forth more effort to increase security and blah blah - well the poll told the real truth - people who use it know better than to listen to CNN's pro-Microsoft agenda. I have to say, they didn't say anything "Bad" about Linux, but after saying that Redhat (what about the other distros?) and Novell beat W2k hands down, it concludes it's article that W2k is king, and, well, (paraphrased) if you're running some fly-by-night business out of your garage or dorm, Redhat just _might_ be good enough for you. Sheesh - are they that afraid of M$ lawyers?
:)
:)
Of course, in retrospect, if it is not out and out financially rewarding to publish pro-Microsoft articles, it seems that it can be financially damaging to be over-critical. Freedom of speach doesn't exist anymore - express yourself and have a dozen lawyers stuff a lawsuit down your throat. At least their Linux bashing didn't occure really until the end of the article. I guess it's their way of saving their butts - they basically said "W2k really sucks in relation to Linux and Novell, but it's the best in relation to Linux and Novell" - it saves them from having to post a retraction later by including one with the article...
BTW - I've been watching the poll - for every 10 votes on W2K, Redhat gets 100. I think the internet is the worst thing to happen to Microsoft - before you didn't know if your problems were just your configuration errors or real bugs - now that people can communicate in mass, it seems that there is a general concensus that Microsoft really does suck and it's not my fault or my configuration error.
But Microsoft does have it's good side - it's something to compare Linux to and gloat.