I think you mean g(x) = (x+n/x)/2. Here's a scheme program to demonstrate it with c as the iteration count. You *nix users probably have guile to test it out. If I knew bc, I'd write it up in that instead.
(define (sqr n c)
(define (s x n c)
(if (zero? c)
x
(s (/ (+ x (/ n x)) 2) n (- c 1))))
(s n n c))
The Times, Places and Manner of holding Elections for
Senators and Representatives, shall be prescribed in each State by the Legislature thereof; but the Congress may at any time by Law make or alter such Regulations, except as to the Places of chusing Senators.
The section you quote isn't for Presidential elections, so the quote is pointless to the discussion. Hence this quote is not justification for Congress passing law about electorial voters. If you can find some in the Constitution, let me know though. Otherwise, you've only shown how Congress is overstepping its bounds.
What you can do with a computer is worth a lot more than what its components are worth. Computers still only cost near their manufacturing cost. The fact is that most copyrighted works *aren't* worth much more than their medium cost, since you either can't legally do much with them or you wouldn't anyways (ie, the same argument that most people don't actually advantage from the freedom of source code directly in free software). You don't use entertainment to expand businesses (exception being entertainment makers and possibly the medium makers). The copyrighted work is rarely a tool (exceptions are things like advertisement slogans).
Blank CDs could even be said to be worth more, as the content possibly expressed on them is greater than that of an already pressed CD. Of course, the opposite side of the coin is that pre-pressed CDs are worth more as pressing a CD takes time, so them doing it saves you time which is worth money.
Copyright is an artificial creation because some signers of the Constitution thought copyright might be necessary to produce artistic and scientific works. It doesn't follow inflation or manufacturing pricing. That was my point, actually. Talking about inflation like it somehow should be a larger factor in cost ignores fundamentally what copyright is. Well, I also used the computer example to show that there were goods that decrease substantially during an inflationary period; ie, I was being a bit misleading the other direction.
In 1984, you could get a 256KB memory computer for $5000. Even the cheap $300 computers today provide 128MB memory (not to mention 20GB+ HD). The difference, of course, is that while computers have gotten much more powerful, involve more competitors, and are substantially cheaper, the record -> CD transition wasn't as much of a technological break-through and less competition occurs. I'd probably be singing a different tune if CDs actually were approaching their cost of manufacturing, like computers..
It grants the creator of the work thr right to control how and when the a copy of the work is created and distributed.
Yes, that's what copyright does, but you're ignoring that the Constitution only lists it as a thing Congress *might* do, not *must* do.
If this right did not exist, there would be drastically less incentive to create, and the public domain would become void of artistic works.
First, you're right in that there would be less incentive to create. But it's not clear that a monetary or non-monetary incentive makes better books. All money seems to guarantee is more books. A higher percentage of garbage might be the only result.
Second, even if copyright were to be abolished right now, all works currently copyrighted would fall into the public domain. All works *already* in the public domain would still be there. So, there's no way that the public domain would become void of artistic works. In fact, the fact that books and the like were written *prior* to the advent of the printing press/copyright would seem to indicate that artistic works would still be created. I have a strong belief that many people are in general artistic.
That before the modern age, most people were illiterate meant that stories and songs were passed along in oral traditions, which greatly limited the range of stories possible (it's harder to pass along n books in oral tradition than written). So, the greatest sign would be that even the poor would still be authors without the help of copyright. Forks of works would be rampant, however, and truly ingenious ideas would spread eventually. Before you say that copyright was the source of such, I'd like to point out that the expanse between the first thought of copyright and most ingenious ideas was many years. It happened that copyright coexisted with the enlightenment, the industrial revolution, and now the information age. It's not at all clear that copyright was the source, as the printing press came first.
What's wrong with laying down conduit once so when fiber goes out of date you don't have to dig up the city again? Beyond that, conduit allows you to rent out space for several companies to lay out wire. At least some states (Hawaii) realize it's a good idea.
The funny thing is, it was probably done for a variety of reasons including making the explorer shell to be more web like (ignoring the previous problem with people double clicking hyperlinks; or should I say, they fixed it by ignoring double clicks most the time in IE) as well as a realization that most non-techies never do anything *but* activate (or possible context-menu click) icons. My point is that most web browsers behave differently than file managers because it's a different paradigm (one's about moving to data, the other to manipulating it & moving to it & all sorts of other things), yet no one bothered to teach people this and instead MS went the other way and just *assumed* people would figure out how web browsers work and tried to convert everyone to it. Of course, that mostly failed (active desktop being a failure and the whole one-click option is still off).. So, no one has fixed the whole consistency issue with a mouse which fundamentally is a problem with being a very finitely inputtable device*.
* Don't mistake this to mean I like the idea of sticking a whole slew of buttons on the mouse. I'm merely pointing out that the consistency issue with a mouse *could* be fixed with various function buttons. Seeing as how horrible an idea that really is, someone needs to come up with a better device than a mouse.
On that note, why should a click, two clicks, and a double click be treated differently? It's actually the third that's the issue, since with all the things that in Windows were made to require double clicking people double click on hyperlinks because they've come to understand a double click is what you use to activate a stand-alone widget (and MS stole this idea from Apple, clearly, who probably got it from PARC).
Fundamentally, a mouse is a pretty horrible tool to do a lot of things. Things like a second or third button and adding a scroll wheel all only attempt to overcome various limitations in control design inherent in trying to use a pointer in a 2D space. It's also a core reason why people are so attached to their keyboard, as it's often the case a lot quicker to just type a number into a spinbox or type in part of a url and arrow down to the right one (or finish it most often since your history has deep urls). Anyways, enough of that rant.:)
There are as yet unresolved issues with the use of binary software with GPL software in general and linux specifically, despite linus' assurances that userspace code doesn't require GPL license compatibility and that he won't enforce that section of the GPL.
What was the link supposed to show again? Modules aren't userland programs. Modules (at least with 2.6.x) have to compile against the kernel source, and that's *clearly* covered under the GPL. The only real question then is whether such use of the kernel code is fair use. Whatever the outcome of that, userland is a wholly separate issue where no linking takes place (headers aren't even needed; you can just use a syscall chart and make your own if you're that paranoid).
That's the whole point, actually. The GPL is designed specifically to remove control from everyone through copyright law.
The GPL licensing terms are very strict and dangerous in terms of source code-ownership vs binary code-distribution and legal obligations.
I'm not sure what your basis is for strictness, but the only restriction the GPL includes is if you use GPL code in your code that if/when you distribute said code as a binary, you provide one of 2 or 3 ways for someone to gain the source under the same terms you got the GPL source. Yes, this is a good deal more restrictive than say the BSD, but at the same time it's a lot *less* restrictive than preventing you from giving out binaries *or* source.
As for "dangerous in terms of source code-ownership", it's not dangerous at all. You own your source code, but you don't have a right to distribute someone else's code except under their provisions. If you don't like it, don't use their code.
We're left to the whims of copyright owners and their good word to decide what is considered a breach and what is 'tolerated'.
You're describing the use of all external software. Look at how SCO is suing IBM over a contract dispute which they bought/inhereted through several generations of companies. If you're that worried about what external copyright owners might do, never use external code; then you just have to worry about being sued because someone external claims you used their code anyways.
As we see more GPL software being used by companies with proprietry code, I think we'll see a nasty side of the GPL rear its head as enforcement starts to kick in from different areas.
"Nasty side"? You mean copyright law? If copyright law didn't exist, there wouldn't be any "nasty side" nor "ownership" nor "enforcement" nor "licenses". Because there exists copyright and the first three are in place to only benefit the original author of a work and no one else, the GPL is designed to counteract all the negative effects of copyright with copyright, through bloody enforcement with lawsuits and all.
It sounds like you're more interested in taking something which you don't own (GPLed works), using it as you please with other works (possibly stuff you licensed from someone else), and you're unhappy that the GPL conflicts with the latter when stuff like BSDed works don't. But, the GPL is all about making things non-proprietary, so no one can claim exclusionary control as fundamentally it's the exclusionary control that is what's causing all your/our problems in the first place.
Linus and others in the "open source" group are pragmatic, though, and realize not everyone is going to change overnight. But, they also realize the best way to guarantee that the Linux kernel behaves well is to have as much information as possible; dumping in binary/closed modules is horribly insecure,
When they started, they were unsafe. So they added a 'fix' like seatbelts.
No, that's not how it happened. A company came along and made the Packard car which promised a whole variety of things like roll cage, seat belts, 3 headlights to see better around curves, etc. The company ended up being attacked by the big auto makers, and it went bankrupt. The whole seat belt thing came about only after the government stepped in when there was a large outcry over I believe the death of James Dean.
Then they added crumple zones, an enhancement to make them safe. Airbags, side impact curtains, rear-sensors for backing up, and so on, and so on.
Now, most of these also were requirements of government; most are also graded to tell consumers just how unsafe cars are. Only the rear-sensor thing seems to be a new, non-requirement option and it's really an extra not a standard feature.
If the stupid driver of the car wants to get drunk and drive backwards 100mph down the freeway with no lights on, do we blame the automobile manufacturer?
No, but the problem is that even when driving as safely as one can, odds are bad that if you're hit by another drive head-on that you'll survive. It took a lot of government regulation to even *have* odds that you'd survive.
So, do you want the government to step in and do a lot of regulation to make sure MS software is safe? Or do you think that Packard/Linux will raise enough awareness that MS will finally have to get off its ass and truly design a secure OS? It seems for the time that Linux is doing the job for now; I only hope that it continues to be true, but until that time I'll continue to use Linux where there might also be security problems but the design normally doesn't offer egregious n-part automated attacks.
That sounds clearly like a violation of the first amendment, as it's clearly not a power of the government to act as censor. To that end, there's nothing really to stop a person to continue infringement after being charged, except threat of even larger civil bills from the other party. The fact that the government will take away your computer and extract money from your pay check though is pretty effective censorship, though. Note that the Constitution says "To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries", yet it doesn't exactly say what that right is. It seems clear to me that whatever the right is, it'd have to not violate the first amendment, and criminal prosecution clearly is a violation.
Perhaps you should watch Thomas L. Friedman's "The Other Side of Outsourcing", where all sorts of companies had tech support setup in India including Dell, as I recall. To overcome the "quality" issue of Indian tech support (as well as telemarketers), they learned to teach their employees how to speak with an appropriate accent and to even have them read the local newspaper so they can talk about the game or whatever else is locally happening.
So, the truth is what another post stated, the only thing that can't (well, won't) be outsourced is the board of directors.
It was pretty clear to me when I first read it because I didn't read it. When I reread it, I realized that one approach to making various systems secure is to deligate privilege to another system, thereby making it impossible to become System Admin and wreck havoc. If you read my other comment along this thread, you'll realize I believe that in the end it'll probably be cheap admins that have to take over the job anyways. I just, from a computer literal point of view, hate the idea of handing over complete control of my system to someone else. But, from a computer novice position it might be rather comforting to know that your system will be properly administrated by someone else, assuming you could overcome the privacy issues. I'm sorry if you took it as a snide remark. If anything, it was a certain amount of fear handing over my system to someone else.:)
Re:SP2 - as secure as any linux distro...
on
XP2 Spotted In The Wild
·
· Score: 4, Interesting
It's actually a problem for both. It's a developer problem because most software really doesn't have a justifiable reason to be run as admin. At the same time, it's a MS problem to bow down to this problem by just making every admins instead of trying to teach users how to run those few programs as admin while *warning* them that said program doesn't really need to be run as admin and to go bug the developer over it or download a new version (the former assuming the developer hasn't released an update yet, the latter if they did).
Heck, for all those cases when a program doesn't need to really be run as admin, Windows could sandbox the program in a pseudo-root and continue to let the program run in such a limited state (which developers might end up trying to work around instead of fixing the inherent problem, but that's a whole other point). There's also the possibility of making up "roles" for users and programs either by default (to further limit, not expand privilege) or easily accessible.
The fact is, Microsoft hadn't until XP SP2 made any measurable attempt to mitigate the security risk to users. And even now, XP SP2 still is more reliant on filtering out possibly bad content and auto updating than educating the user and giving them options to help to secure their setup (auto update and filtering can be good things, don't get me wrong, but they're not end-all solutions and are only stop gaps to a bigger problem). Something like email viruses probably won't stop until a heavy dose of educating the user enough to not run viruses and some degree of lobotomize the system enough to never run a virus.
So, a lot of the problem is still MS's (it's their email client for the most part and their OS which has to be lobotomized to support not running viruses). I'd also say they're pretty well required to teach the user security, given this is a new computer and security is really a key concept an internet connected user needs to understand. But, as part of MS's quest for a stable system for the home user, MS really slacked off over the issue of telling the user they'd have to be admin and they really do need to learn a lot of things if they want their system to continue running smoothly; and it can't be that MS was unaware that security was at all an issue because there actually *are* user accounts and lower privileges in NT/2K/XP; MS just decided to ignore the issue in favor of making it easier on the user who was adding programs. Making it more complex by forcing users to learn security in the short term was less marketable than progressively dealing with security flaws later as well as just crappy design decisions such as leaving various services on and exposed to what would almost certainly be the internet.
Whew..that was a lot to write. And with all my bitching about Windows, I can't say I've personally used any other OS which does a good job of educating the user on what *not* to do while providing them ways to mitigate the possible damage on questionable programs that demand more privilege than they probably deserve (I haven't used OS X, so I can't speak for it; I used be a Windows user but now am a Linux user (except when I admin my mom's machine)). The issue of how to make administrating understandable and easy enough that all home users (or a few, given how much of a pain it is to have to get off every N minutes so someone else can properly install an app or whatever) are both willing and able to do the task is no small order. The fact that MS has for years pushed MS as "great" at administrating when it's only at best marginally better (it's a lot easier to do the granular ACL than doing various crazy groupings) really shows what's true of most companies: they're run more by marketers than engineers. The amount of work necessary to make administrating something anyone is *willing* to do is pretty mind boggling (just look up various research, or contemplate the issue of hundreds of programs, a few users, and how to make sure each program can't do harm to anything even if it *wants* to without pissing off said few users). Windows really isn't the right tool for the job; sadly no tool I know of is yet nor do I think ever will be ready. So, shall Microsoft rent out really cheap admins to everyone to improve security?
Re:SP2 - as secure as any linux distro...
on
XP2 Spotted In The Wild
·
· Score: 5, Interesting
the main problem is running systems with more privileges than they need.
First, let me assume you didn't mean what you said. What you *did* say doesn't make sense, as the only way for a system to run with less privileges would be for it to not even have a System Administrator account while leaving some other system with that authority. That sort of top-down authority over PCs seems quite out there for all sorts of reasons.
So, lets assume you mean "the main problem is users running with more privileges than they need". The problem at core then is *why* they run at higher privilege than necessary. Part of the reason is that Run As and the like are not inconvenient and just not well known. In the process of making the system more "user friendly" Run As and ilk aren't at all discussed. In fact, users added at install are given power user (which can do all sorts of nasty things to applications) or administrator power.
For the complete naive (or to overcome various limitations to Windows sessions, like not being able to do persistent apps in the background (dialup users on at least Win 2k (and possibly Win XP, though having not used it in that capacity I couldn't say), you know what I'm talking about)), this means having one account open either all the time or possible on auto-login. For the less naive (or users who can figure ways to overcome the limitations of Windows), you'll create multiple users, but then all users can still screw up the entire machine with *anything* they run. Yes, physical access does mean you can 0wn a box, but like you pointed out with so many buggy programs it also means very much that non-physical access can 0wn the box too.
My point in all this is, even users who *try* to do some security are still fucked over thanks to MS opting for ease of use and "usability" over reducing privileges, finding a better way to have someone admin the box (and watch users flee when they realize they have to do work; oh, but it's better to go under the MS banner of low/no maintainance, turn a blind eye to the reality that most PC software needs maintained, then moan to all your techie friends that your computer is so slow, keeps crashing, etc), and teaching the user how to run the few necessary programs in "less-secure" mode (anything automatic short of extensive hashing will end up being spoofed and exploited all over, so it's better to rely on the user) while making sure Windows itself is actually designed to handle multiple people using a machine.
But, all those stack protectors should slow down those hackers, hopefully (well, assuming they're done at runtime in a staggard approach to avoid a whole cluster of near-identical hardware all producing the same value; the last thing you want is something predictable), which is at least some small consolation for those who actually update their machine...
This isn't food, it's entertainment, and the government shouldn't get involved in what entertainment costs.
Explain why copyright exists again except to effect the cost of copyrighted works (ie, entertainment)? Or as another post states, what about the legal monopoly makes it a free market of information?
The free market is a way of describing how things behave assuming individual control. The only free part about the free market then is free will. Free markets exist in socialism, capitalism, etc to varying degrees given that no authorative allocation process is 100% efficient and side trading occurs. To that end, mentioning the free market in the positive when in fact copyright inhibits the describable behavior seem disingenuous. P2P is a free market of sorts, but look at how legal most of that is.
Copyright then is just a part of legally mandated monopoly. Why is it then that copyright is so non-regulated? The main excuse I can think of to explain this is that copyright does not provide regional control which is the firm basis for requiring governmental regulation (with a note that this is more a point needed for natural monopolies like utilities); or should I say, it didn't offer regional control until the DMCA. I guess it's time to regulate the MPAA and RIAA.
That brings up an interesting question. It seems to be well established that while there's lots of programmers willing to go out and write programs, the job of making a usable interface (ie, the qa/validation/ui design department) is often shoved into distros*. Is this a sign that no one likes doing QA/Validation/UI Design? Or is merely the thinking that only people paid are willing to do the work? Come forth artists/programmers to make a better UI development interface so we can get lots of free support. Oh, and open source programmers, let in a few UI developers!
*Here, I'm chiefly talking about commercial distros, as most free distros are geared towards geeks, not grannies.
Extreme peace would mean sitting back and letting your friends and family die when an evil person attempts to kill them in front of you. Extreme grace means never shoveling shit, even if that's the only job you can get, because there's no grace in it. Extreme joy means either drugs or ignoring all the bad things that happen to you in life (looking on the "bright side" will leave you somber at times).
You misunderstand what I mean by "ethical balance". What I mean is that people will often take extremes not because the agree fully with the extreme but realize that by taking their extreme stance, people will realize there are people deeply against some belief. The end result is that the majority of people will generally feel that society (and possibly themselves) should reside closer to a median between the two points.
This doesn't fully prevent other extremists, of course, but it does mean you won't follow one zealot purely out of fear (short of everyone becoming zealots, which does happen on some issues) as there's their opponent zealot to just as much scare them. Just as well, extremists bring up speaking points for their side which brings about at least a slightly more balanced discussion.
So, overall, I'm saying it's a combination of information and emotions that tend people towards not becoming extremists. As for "extreme good", the whole point about ethics is defining what "good" is. It's often a question of who something is good for (anti-drinking laws vs more permissive rights, for example). Given that humans are expected through reasoning and sufficient information to make ethical decisions (even though they're encumbered upon their own self-interests which will often go against the good of others), I don't see why a machine couldn't just be made reasonable and then require it to be ethical.
Probably neither, as both extremes rest on a combination of ethical balance (ie, being overzealous in one direction to counteract the zealous of the opposite direction) and sheer illogical assumptions. The majority of people don't behave like Bush or Moore precisely because they're the extreme examples. General humans are much better able to balance in the middle.
So, it's reasonable to say that a robot told to be ethical would realize that acting on unfounded insight is an unethical extreme in itself. And unlike humans, such a robot wouldn't wander off this track because of temptation. The only real problem then is if a community was polarized over an issue. The average would reside in the center leaving the robot an outsider/"double dealer". I'd feel sorry for such a robot only because I have little doubt one group would kill it.
There's the European Gamepark site. Given you can register your Gamepark through them (though it's not necessary under the new Blu firmware), I'd assume they're an official site. However, Gamepark's own English site seems to be down. In any case, have fun.
Get an Atari/NES like system or..go buy a GP32. I think I'll stick with my GP32. Yes, I'm sure that it's good to learn about "efficient programming" and various platform specific features, but the former you learn to some extent regardless while the latter you only really learn if you actually use the destined platform. I'd rather "waste" my money on a more commonly developed system which I can get joy out of anyways because it's a cool little system.
Actually, sudo isn't covered under this patent because sudo doesn't stay upon acting as a "server" for clients to connect to. Xserver might count, given regular users connect to a root-ran Xserver which does stuff a regular user cannot (its xhost list is the "data store" and is rather exclusive). All process separation would likely fall into this category as well, especially the example of having a user ssh process talk to a root ssh process to switch users for someone. Since there's no mention that all the processes have to run on the same machine, telneting in as a non-root from one box into another would count (you're not "normally" allowed to become a user on a remote machine) as would telneting into the machine you're already on (just to be clear, the data store then would be the passwd file, though this example might be considered a stretch since there's su and you can just login physically; of course the patent talks about what one "normally" is authorized to do, but that's semi-stupid given with something like sudo and enough utils, there's nothing you're "normally" unable to gain authorization to that a service would somehow be able to magically be able to provide instead; so either telnet is prior art or the patent doesn't cover anything because there's no field of abnormal functions).
I don't think the fact that he was put on the list was politically motivated - but I am wondering why it took three weeks to make the news...
Did he decide that he wouldn't tell anyone until the issue was resolved?
If he had brought it up in the media, do you think it would have taken three weeks to resolve? The whole point, I assume, was to make it more how a "normal person" would have to go through getting removed from the list (and make sure it wasn't cut short by media scrutiny). Now, it just looks horrible how long it took. As for the RNC and whatever, sure, that's just possibly icing on the cake.
Slashdot Mirror
(bc -l) version:
define sqr(n,c) {
auto x
if (c < 1) {
c = 1
}
x = n
while (c > 0) {
x = (x + n/x)/2
c = c - 1
}
return x
}
gcc version:
#include <stdlib.h>
#include <stdio.h>
float sqr(float n, int c);
int main(int argc, char *argv[])
{
if (argc == 3) {
printf("%f\n", sqr(atof(argv[1]),atoi(argv[2])));
return 0;
}
fprintf(stderr, "Usage: %s <float> <iteration>\n", argv[0]);
return 1;
}
float sqr(float n, int c) {
float x = n;
for (c = (c < 1) ? 1 : c; c > 0; c--)
x = (x + n/x)/2;
return x;
}
other versions:
Feel free to contribute.
I think you mean g(x) = (x+n/x)/2. Here's a scheme program to demonstrate it with c as the iteration count. You *nix users probably have guile to test it out. If I knew bc, I'd write it up in that instead.
(define (sqr n c)
(define (s x n c)
(if (zero? c)
x
(s (/ (+ x (/ n x)) 2) n (- c 1))))
(s n n c))
The section you quote isn't for Presidential elections, so the quote is pointless to the discussion. Hence this quote is not justification for Congress passing law about electorial voters. If you can find some in the Constitution, let me know though. Otherwise, you've only shown how Congress is overstepping its bounds.
What you can do with a computer is worth a lot more than what its components are worth. Computers still only cost near their manufacturing cost. The fact is that most copyrighted works *aren't* worth much more than their medium cost, since you either can't legally do much with them or you wouldn't anyways (ie, the same argument that most people don't actually advantage from the freedom of source code directly in free software). You don't use entertainment to expand businesses (exception being entertainment makers and possibly the medium makers). The copyrighted work is rarely a tool (exceptions are things like advertisement slogans).
Blank CDs could even be said to be worth more, as the content possibly expressed on them is greater than that of an already pressed CD. Of course, the opposite side of the coin is that pre-pressed CDs are worth more as pressing a CD takes time, so them doing it saves you time which is worth money.
Copyright is an artificial creation because some signers of the Constitution thought copyright might be necessary to produce artistic and scientific works. It doesn't follow inflation or manufacturing pricing. That was my point, actually. Talking about inflation like it somehow should be a larger factor in cost ignores fundamentally what copyright is. Well, I also used the computer example to show that there were goods that decrease substantially during an inflationary period; ie, I was being a bit misleading the other direction.
In 1984, you could get a 256KB memory computer for $5000. Even the cheap $300 computers today provide 128MB memory (not to mention 20GB+ HD). The difference, of course, is that while computers have gotten much more powerful, involve more competitors, and are substantially cheaper, the record -> CD transition wasn't as much of a technological break-through and less competition occurs. I'd probably be singing a different tune if CDs actually were approaching their cost of manufacturing, like computers..
Um, no. Copyright is defined in the Constitution.
Copyright is defined, yes, though not in name.
It grants the creator of the work thr right to control how and when the a copy of the work is created and distributed.
Yes, that's what copyright does, but you're ignoring that the Constitution only lists it as a thing Congress *might* do, not *must* do.
If this right did not exist, there would be drastically less incentive to create, and the public domain would become void of artistic works.
First, you're right in that there would be less incentive to create. But it's not clear that a monetary or non-monetary incentive makes better books. All money seems to guarantee is more books. A higher percentage of garbage might be the only result.
Second, even if copyright were to be abolished right now, all works currently copyrighted would fall into the public domain. All works *already* in the public domain would still be there. So, there's no way that the public domain would become void of artistic works. In fact, the fact that books and the like were written *prior* to the advent of the printing press/copyright would seem to indicate that artistic works would still be created. I have a strong belief that many people are in general artistic.
That before the modern age, most people were illiterate meant that stories and songs were passed along in oral traditions, which greatly limited the range of stories possible (it's harder to pass along n books in oral tradition than written). So, the greatest sign would be that even the poor would still be authors without the help of copyright. Forks of works would be rampant, however, and truly ingenious ideas would spread eventually. Before you say that copyright was the source of such, I'd like to point out that the expanse between the first thought of copyright and most ingenious ideas was many years. It happened that copyright coexisted with the enlightenment, the industrial revolution, and now the information age. It's not at all clear that copyright was the source, as the printing press came first.
What's wrong with laying down conduit once so when fiber goes out of date you don't have to dig up the city again? Beyond that, conduit allows you to rent out space for several companies to lay out wire. At least some states (Hawaii) realize it's a good idea.
The funny thing is, it was probably done for a variety of reasons including making the explorer shell to be more web like (ignoring the previous problem with people double clicking hyperlinks; or should I say, they fixed it by ignoring double clicks most the time in IE) as well as a realization that most non-techies never do anything *but* activate (or possible context-menu click) icons. My point is that most web browsers behave differently than file managers because it's a different paradigm (one's about moving to data, the other to manipulating it & moving to it & all sorts of other things), yet no one bothered to teach people this and instead MS went the other way and just *assumed* people would figure out how web browsers work and tried to convert everyone to it. Of course, that mostly failed (active desktop being a failure and the whole one-click option is still off).. So, no one has fixed the whole consistency issue with a mouse which fundamentally is a problem with being a very finitely inputtable device*.
* Don't mistake this to mean I like the idea of sticking a whole slew of buttons on the mouse. I'm merely pointing out that the consistency issue with a mouse *could* be fixed with various function buttons. Seeing as how horrible an idea that really is, someone needs to come up with a better device than a mouse.
On that note, why should a click, two clicks, and a double click be treated differently? It's actually the third that's the issue, since with all the things that in Windows were made to require double clicking people double click on hyperlinks because they've come to understand a double click is what you use to activate a stand-alone widget (and MS stole this idea from Apple, clearly, who probably got it from PARC).
:)
Fundamentally, a mouse is a pretty horrible tool to do a lot of things. Things like a second or third button and adding a scroll wheel all only attempt to overcome various limitations in control design inherent in trying to use a pointer in a 2D space. It's also a core reason why people are so attached to their keyboard, as it's often the case a lot quicker to just type a number into a spinbox or type in part of a url and arrow down to the right one (or finish it most often since your history has deep urls). Anyways, enough of that rant.
I work at a manufacturing company...
Okay, that's an interesting starting point.
There are as yet unresolved issues with the use of binary software with GPL software in general and linux specifically, despite linus' assurances that userspace code doesn't require GPL license compatibility and that he won't enforce that section of the GPL.
What was the link supposed to show again? Modules aren't userland programs. Modules (at least with 2.6.x) have to compile against the kernel source, and that's *clearly* covered under the GPL. The only real question then is whether such use of the kernel code is fair use. Whatever the outcome of that, userland is a wholly separate issue where no linking takes place (headers aren't even needed; you can just use a syscall chart and make your own if you're that paranoid).
What we found, is that the GPL, LGPL and other FSF licenses are very problematic when dealing with the control of code(proprietry or otherwise).
That's the whole point, actually. The GPL is designed specifically to remove control from everyone through copyright law.
The GPL licensing terms are very strict and dangerous in terms of source code-ownership vs binary code-distribution and legal obligations.
I'm not sure what your basis is for strictness, but the only restriction the GPL includes is if you use GPL code in your code that if/when you distribute said code as a binary, you provide one of 2 or 3 ways for someone to gain the source under the same terms you got the GPL source. Yes, this is a good deal more restrictive than say the BSD, but at the same time it's a lot *less* restrictive than preventing you from giving out binaries *or* source.
As for "dangerous in terms of source code-ownership", it's not dangerous at all. You own your source code, but you don't have a right to distribute someone else's code except under their provisions. If you don't like it, don't use their code.
We're left to the whims of copyright owners and their good word to decide what is considered a breach and what is 'tolerated'.
You're describing the use of all external software. Look at how SCO is suing IBM over a contract dispute which they bought/inhereted through several generations of companies. If you're that worried about what external copyright owners might do, never use external code; then you just have to worry about being sued because someone external claims you used their code anyways.
As we see more GPL software being used by companies with proprietry code, I think we'll see a nasty side of the GPL rear its head as enforcement starts to kick in from different areas.
"Nasty side"? You mean copyright law? If copyright law didn't exist, there wouldn't be any "nasty side" nor "ownership" nor "enforcement" nor "licenses". Because there exists copyright and the first three are in place to only benefit the original author of a work and no one else, the GPL is designed to counteract all the negative effects of copyright with copyright, through bloody enforcement with lawsuits and all.
It sounds like you're more interested in taking something which you don't own (GPLed works), using it as you please with other works (possibly stuff you licensed from someone else), and you're unhappy that the GPL conflicts with the latter when stuff like BSDed works don't. But, the GPL is all about making things non-proprietary, so no one can claim exclusionary control as fundamentally it's the exclusionary control that is what's causing all your/our problems in the first place.
Linus and others in the "open source" group are pragmatic, though, and realize not everyone is going to change overnight. But, they also realize the best way to guarantee that the Linux kernel behaves well is to have as much information as possible; dumping in binary/closed modules is horribly insecure,
Compare Microsoft to automobile makers.
Okay, interesting premise.
When they started, they were unsafe. So they added a 'fix' like seatbelts.
No, that's not how it happened. A company came along and made the Packard car which promised a whole variety of things like roll cage, seat belts, 3 headlights to see better around curves, etc. The company ended up being attacked by the big auto makers, and it went bankrupt. The whole seat belt thing came about only after the government stepped in when there was a large outcry over I believe the death of James Dean.
Then they added crumple zones, an enhancement to make them safe. Airbags, side impact curtains, rear-sensors for backing up, and so on, and so on.
Now, most of these also were requirements of government; most are also graded to tell consumers just how unsafe cars are. Only the rear-sensor thing seems to be a new, non-requirement option and it's really an extra not a standard feature.
If the stupid driver of the car wants to get drunk and drive backwards 100mph down the freeway with no lights on, do we blame the automobile manufacturer?
No, but the problem is that even when driving as safely as one can, odds are bad that if you're hit by another drive head-on that you'll survive. It took a lot of government regulation to even *have* odds that you'd survive.
So, do you want the government to step in and do a lot of regulation to make sure MS software is safe? Or do you think that Packard/Linux will raise enough awareness that MS will finally have to get off its ass and truly design a secure OS? It seems for the time that Linux is doing the job for now; I only hope that it continues to be true, but until that time I'll continue to use Linux where there might also be security problems but the design normally doesn't offer egregious n-part automated attacks.
That sounds clearly like a violation of the first amendment, as it's clearly not a power of the government to act as censor. To that end, there's nothing really to stop a person to continue infringement after being charged, except threat of even larger civil bills from the other party. The fact that the government will take away your computer and extract money from your pay check though is pretty effective censorship, though. Note that the Constitution says "To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries", yet it doesn't exactly say what that right is. It seems clear to me that whatever the right is, it'd have to not violate the first amendment, and criminal prosecution clearly is a violation.
Perhaps you should watch Thomas L. Friedman's "The Other Side of Outsourcing", where all sorts of companies had tech support setup in India including Dell, as I recall. To overcome the "quality" issue of Indian tech support (as well as telemarketers), they learned to teach their employees how to speak with an appropriate accent and to even have them read the local newspaper so they can talk about the game or whatever else is locally happening.
So, the truth is what another post stated, the only thing that can't (well, won't) be outsourced is the board of directors.
It was pretty clear to me when I first read it because I didn't read it. When I reread it, I realized that one approach to making various systems secure is to deligate privilege to another system, thereby making it impossible to become System Admin and wreck havoc. If you read my other comment along this thread, you'll realize I believe that in the end it'll probably be cheap admins that have to take over the job anyways. I just, from a computer literal point of view, hate the idea of handing over complete control of my system to someone else. But, from a computer novice position it might be rather comforting to know that your system will be properly administrated by someone else, assuming you could overcome the privacy issues. I'm sorry if you took it as a snide remark. If anything, it was a certain amount of fear handing over my system to someone else. :)
It's actually a problem for both. It's a developer problem because most software really doesn't have a justifiable reason to be run as admin. At the same time, it's a MS problem to bow down to this problem by just making every admins instead of trying to teach users how to run those few programs as admin while *warning* them that said program doesn't really need to be run as admin and to go bug the developer over it or download a new version (the former assuming the developer hasn't released an update yet, the latter if they did).
Heck, for all those cases when a program doesn't need to really be run as admin, Windows could sandbox the program in a pseudo-root and continue to let the program run in such a limited state (which developers might end up trying to work around instead of fixing the inherent problem, but that's a whole other point). There's also the possibility of making up "roles" for users and programs either by default (to further limit, not expand privilege) or easily accessible.
The fact is, Microsoft hadn't until XP SP2 made any measurable attempt to mitigate the security risk to users. And even now, XP SP2 still is more reliant on filtering out possibly bad content and auto updating than educating the user and giving them options to help to secure their setup (auto update and filtering can be good things, don't get me wrong, but they're not end-all solutions and are only stop gaps to a bigger problem). Something like email viruses probably won't stop until a heavy dose of educating the user enough to not run viruses and some degree of lobotomize the system enough to never run a virus.
So, a lot of the problem is still MS's (it's their email client for the most part and their OS which has to be lobotomized to support not running viruses). I'd also say they're pretty well required to teach the user security, given this is a new computer and security is really a key concept an internet connected user needs to understand. But, as part of MS's quest for a stable system for the home user, MS really slacked off over the issue of telling the user they'd have to be admin and they really do need to learn a lot of things if they want their system to continue running smoothly; and it can't be that MS was unaware that security was at all an issue because there actually *are* user accounts and lower privileges in NT/2K/XP; MS just decided to ignore the issue in favor of making it easier on the user who was adding programs. Making it more complex by forcing users to learn security in the short term was less marketable than progressively dealing with security flaws later as well as just crappy design decisions such as leaving various services on and exposed to what would almost certainly be the internet.
Whew..that was a lot to write. And with all my bitching about Windows, I can't say I've personally used any other OS which does a good job of educating the user on what *not* to do while providing them ways to mitigate the possible damage on questionable programs that demand more privilege than they probably deserve (I haven't used OS X, so I can't speak for it; I used be a Windows user but now am a Linux user (except when I admin my mom's machine)). The issue of how to make administrating understandable and easy enough that all home users (or a few, given how much of a pain it is to have to get off every N minutes so someone else can properly install an app or whatever) are both willing and able to do the task is no small order. The fact that MS has for years pushed MS as "great" at administrating when it's only at best marginally better (it's a lot easier to do the granular ACL than doing various crazy groupings) really shows what's true of most companies: they're run more by marketers than engineers. The amount of work necessary to make administrating something anyone is *willing* to do is pretty mind boggling (just look up various research, or contemplate the issue of hundreds of programs, a few users, and how to make sure each program can't do harm to anything even if it *wants* to without pissing off said few users). Windows really isn't the right tool for the job; sadly no tool I know of is yet nor do I think ever will be ready. So, shall Microsoft rent out really cheap admins to everyone to improve security?
the main problem is running systems with more privileges than they need.
First, let me assume you didn't mean what you said. What you *did* say doesn't make sense, as the only way for a system to run with less privileges would be for it to not even have a System Administrator account while leaving some other system with that authority. That sort of top-down authority over PCs seems quite out there for all sorts of reasons.
So, lets assume you mean "the main problem is users running with more privileges than they need". The problem at core then is *why* they run at higher privilege than necessary. Part of the reason is that Run As and the like are not inconvenient and just not well known. In the process of making the system more "user friendly" Run As and ilk aren't at all discussed. In fact, users added at install are given power user (which can do all sorts of nasty things to applications) or administrator power.
For the complete naive (or to overcome various limitations to Windows sessions, like not being able to do persistent apps in the background (dialup users on at least Win 2k (and possibly Win XP, though having not used it in that capacity I couldn't say), you know what I'm talking about)), this means having one account open either all the time or possible on auto-login. For the less naive (or users who can figure ways to overcome the limitations of Windows), you'll create multiple users, but then all users can still screw up the entire machine with *anything* they run. Yes, physical access does mean you can 0wn a box, but like you pointed out with so many buggy programs it also means very much that non-physical access can 0wn the box too.
My point in all this is, even users who *try* to do some security are still fucked over thanks to MS opting for ease of use and "usability" over reducing privileges, finding a better way to have someone admin the box (and watch users flee when they realize they have to do work; oh, but it's better to go under the MS banner of low/no maintainance, turn a blind eye to the reality that most PC software needs maintained, then moan to all your techie friends that your computer is so slow, keeps crashing, etc), and teaching the user how to run the few necessary programs in "less-secure" mode (anything automatic short of extensive hashing will end up being spoofed and exploited all over, so it's better to rely on the user) while making sure Windows itself is actually designed to handle multiple people using a machine.
But, all those stack protectors should slow down those hackers, hopefully (well, assuming they're done at runtime in a staggard approach to avoid a whole cluster of near-identical hardware all producing the same value; the last thing you want is something predictable), which is at least some small consolation for those who actually update their machine...
This isn't food, it's entertainment, and the government shouldn't get involved in what entertainment costs.
Explain why copyright exists again except to effect the cost of copyrighted works (ie, entertainment)? Or as another post states, what about the legal monopoly makes it a free market of information?
The free market is a way of describing how things behave assuming individual control. The only free part about the free market then is free will. Free markets exist in socialism, capitalism, etc to varying degrees given that no authorative allocation process is 100% efficient and side trading occurs. To that end, mentioning the free market in the positive when in fact copyright inhibits the describable behavior seem disingenuous. P2P is a free market of sorts, but look at how legal most of that is.
Copyright then is just a part of legally mandated monopoly. Why is it then that copyright is so non-regulated? The main excuse I can think of to explain this is that copyright does not provide regional control which is the firm basis for requiring governmental regulation (with a note that this is more a point needed for natural monopolies like utilities); or should I say, it didn't offer regional control until the DMCA. I guess it's time to regulate the MPAA and RIAA.
That brings up an interesting question. It seems to be well established that while there's lots of programmers willing to go out and write programs, the job of making a usable interface (ie, the qa/validation/ui design department) is often shoved into distros*. Is this a sign that no one likes doing QA/Validation/UI Design? Or is merely the thinking that only people paid are willing to do the work? Come forth artists/programmers to make a better UI development interface so we can get lots of free support. Oh, and open source programmers, let in a few UI developers!
*Here, I'm chiefly talking about commercial distros, as most free distros are geared towards geeks, not grannies.
Extreme peace would mean sitting back and letting your friends and family die when an evil person attempts to kill them in front of you. Extreme grace means never shoveling shit, even if that's the only job you can get, because there's no grace in it. Extreme joy means either drugs or ignoring all the bad things that happen to you in life (looking on the "bright side" will leave you somber at times).
You misunderstand what I mean by "ethical balance". What I mean is that people will often take extremes not because the agree fully with the extreme but realize that by taking their extreme stance, people will realize there are people deeply against some belief. The end result is that the majority of people will generally feel that society (and possibly themselves) should reside closer to a median between the two points.
This doesn't fully prevent other extremists, of course, but it does mean you won't follow one zealot purely out of fear (short of everyone becoming zealots, which does happen on some issues) as there's their opponent zealot to just as much scare them. Just as well, extremists bring up speaking points for their side which brings about at least a slightly more balanced discussion.
So, overall, I'm saying it's a combination of information and emotions that tend people towards not becoming extremists. As for "extreme good", the whole point about ethics is defining what "good" is. It's often a question of who something is good for (anti-drinking laws vs more permissive rights, for example). Given that humans are expected through reasoning and sufficient information to make ethical decisions (even though they're encumbered upon their own self-interests which will often go against the good of others), I don't see why a machine couldn't just be made reasonable and then require it to be ethical.
Probably neither, as both extremes rest on a combination of ethical balance (ie, being overzealous in one direction to counteract the zealous of the opposite direction) and sheer illogical assumptions. The majority of people don't behave like Bush or Moore precisely because they're the extreme examples. General humans are much better able to balance in the middle.
So, it's reasonable to say that a robot told to be ethical would realize that acting on unfounded insight is an unethical extreme in itself. And unlike humans, such a robot wouldn't wander off this track because of temptation. The only real problem then is if a community was polarized over an issue. The average would reside in the center leaving the robot an outsider/"double dealer". I'd feel sorry for such a robot only because I have little doubt one group would kill it.
There's the European Gamepark site. Given you can register your Gamepark through them (though it's not necessary under the new Blu firmware), I'd assume they're an official site. However, Gamepark's own English site seems to be down. In any case, have fun.
It seems Adam's arrival was early and greatly exaggerated.
Get an Atari/NES like system or..go buy a GP32. I think I'll stick with my GP32. Yes, I'm sure that it's good to learn about "efficient programming" and various platform specific features, but the former you learn to some extent regardless while the latter you only really learn if you actually use the destined platform. I'd rather "waste" my money on a more commonly developed system which I can get joy out of anyways because it's a cool little system.
Actually, sudo isn't covered under this patent because sudo doesn't stay upon acting as a "server" for clients to connect to. Xserver might count, given regular users connect to a root-ran Xserver which does stuff a regular user cannot (its xhost list is the "data store" and is rather exclusive). All process separation would likely fall into this category as well, especially the example of having a user ssh process talk to a root ssh process to switch users for someone. Since there's no mention that all the processes have to run on the same machine, telneting in as a non-root from one box into another would count (you're not "normally" allowed to become a user on a remote machine) as would telneting into the machine you're already on (just to be clear, the data store then would be the passwd file, though this example might be considered a stretch since there's su and you can just login physically; of course the patent talks about what one "normally" is authorized to do, but that's semi-stupid given with something like sudo and enough utils, there's nothing you're "normally" unable to gain authorization to that a service would somehow be able to magically be able to provide instead; so either telnet is prior art or the patent doesn't cover anything because there's no field of abnormal functions).
I don't think the fact that he was put on the list was politically motivated - but I am wondering why it took three weeks to make the news...
Did he decide that he wouldn't tell anyone until the issue was resolved?
If he had brought it up in the media, do you think it would have taken three weeks to resolve? The whole point, I assume, was to make it more how a "normal person" would have to go through getting removed from the list (and make sure it wasn't cut short by media scrutiny). Now, it just looks horrible how long it took. As for the RNC and whatever, sure, that's just possibly icing on the cake.