Simple. In all cases of them being deceptive, it's just that, pure deception. With the assumption of guilt on the part of everyone who might download. Not all cases of downloads are illegal however.
Not all deceptions are illegal or actionable. Using a P2P network for receipt of material lacks several necessary conditions to establish a contract.
Even if it was deemed actionable, what would one do? They are using P2P networks exactly the way they were intended, they are hiding the identity of the source of the transmissions.
When you are using black market channels for distribution, it's difficult to make accountable those who might make misrepresentations.
Remember in Independence Day, the Jeff Goldblum character could upload nasty viruses into alien technology with any laptop. Not sure the interface, but maybe you just have to have the laptop close to the alien tech.
True. Relevance? Terrorists want to create terror, they commit acts that are indisputably heinous and despised by all reasonable people around the world. Fine. Why does this make them more likely to use biological agents against military forces? And how does it make those agents more effective?
It's called asymetrical warfare. Bio-weapons may not be effective in conventional warfare scenarios, but when your adversary has no fear of death and wants to "win" by spreading terror, then bio-weapons may come into play.
Regardless of the fact of the ineffective nature of bio-weapons, you can't always count on your adversary acting rationally.
*I* would never hire *you*, with that in the contract.
Well, *you* may be shortsighted. If you can't really gain anything from owning the copyright to the source, and community development will benefit *you* directly, then it may be in *your* best interests to allow the release of the source to the work publicly.
And, it will not happen if too many Linux developers continue to imagine that their development model is what they're selling. It isn't.
The point you are missing is that MOST Linux developers are not selling anything. They are just developing software for their own needs.
This tends to create a system that is more developer friendly because it meets the needs of developers well. The theory is that a very developer friendly system will ultimately be a very good platform for developing any software.
I'm not sure how successful this has been, but that's what we have. Don't ask Linux developers to be salesmen, they won't like you very much. Now, there are those who are trying to sell the wares these developers have created, and it may be that they will speak for users and be able to leverage this good development platform, but I guess we'll just have to wait and see how this plays out.
So far, there's some indication that it's worked well in some areas, for example server software and appliances, and less well in others, such as desktop software.
What does this stupendous cosmic power do? Create replicas of whoever the people on the nearby space station dream about. Like Clooney's dead wife.
This is a bit like using a Jedi Knight and her light saber to get at a can of soup.
The best Science Fiction, IMO, puts the familiar against a backdrop of the strange. How can we possibly understand the motivations of a planetary intelligence with this cosmic power? Maybe it's Solaris' idea of an experiment, or perhaps entertainment of some sort. I suppose our pets wonder why we use our cosmic powers to eat celery or watch TV. No, our pets are more sensible than amateur movie reviewers and don't bother to wonder at things they can't understand.
What is happening here is strange in the extreme and is just a given. What's interesting is how the characters deal with it.
Which just brings us back to the fact that this isn't really a science fiction movie. It's a character study.
Gee, maybe it's both a science fiction movie AND a character study? Are they necessarily mutually exclusive? What's the problem? Not the requisite lack of depth in the characters for a science fiction movie?
They are primarily an ISP, not a content provider.
It's more complicated that this. AOL is an ISP and a content provider. It's one of their value ads that makes them more attractive than NetZero or local ISPs. You may not like any of their content, but I can tell you from experience that my then-5 yr old daughter really liked the kid's section some years ago when I took the free month and used to ask why we didn't get AOL for years.
Remember also that TW isprimarily a content provider. If AOL/TW is to remain together, then this providing TW content only to AOL subscribers is a natural move.
Not that it's a good business plan, but, in for a dime in for a dollar, I guess. People get committed to the direction they've taken. It's either this or just spin off AOL and that might be a painful admission of failure for some in the AOL/TW boardroom.
True that active content is overused, but it can really be helpful when you don't want to roundtrip to the server just to calc some numbers...
How often do you really need numbers recalculated on the screen from a web page? I've not seen a use for JS or ASP or even Java that I'm willing to give up the security of my system over.
If you simply must have roll-overs, on-screen recalcs and other such fluff, then, by all means, install an application in one of these languages on your system. Such an application can be written to hit the generic Web application without interactive features such that it's useable by those of us who don't expose ourselves to that nonsense.
I'll accept that it's possible to make a secure scripting environment in a web browser, but seeing all the pain and cost it's taking us to get there is just not worth it as far as I'm concerned.
My biggest complaint was that he seemed to get everything handed to him. Maybe in the movie they skipped out on how horrible his life was before learning he is a wizard, but after that everything is shoved towards: vault full of money, free bird, wonderful broomstick, inate wizard powers, invisibility cloak. Hell, he even "buys" his first friend on the train!
Well, this is supposed to be fantasy for children.
The movies don't do a good job of showing the day-to-day challenges that he faces at Hogwarts. You see a little of that in how Professor Snape and even McGonagall treat him in class.
But, ultimately, this is a story of a poor orphaned boy who has a terrible life finding out that he is actually a powerful and revered Wizard, transported into a magical place where he has incredible adventures.
He got free stuff, dotted on by the teachers, minimal amount of trouble - if any - for breaking the rules, etc.
Yes, he doesn't get in much trouble for breaking the rules. I thought the trip with Hagrid into the Dark Forest at night as punishment was a rather thin plot device. Either the Forest was far too dangerous, as in fact it almost proved to be, or it was just a fun adventure. I don't see it as appropriate punishment.
Secondly, in the first movie (and the first book, too) Harry doesn't really do anything, he just gets towed through the events by the plot and by the people around him.
This is an unfair criticism, in my opinion.
We just watched the first movie again last night in preparation for seeing the second movie with my 11 year old today. I'm reminded of quite a bit that Harry does in this story.
Harry makes decisions and acts on them that risks what he could reasonably consider to be grounds for expulsion from Hogwarts in several places. Remember that expulsion from Hogwarts would put him back under the stairs on Privet Lane.
For example:
Taking off after Malfoy on the broom.
Wondering around the school at night with his invisibility cloak in search of clues about Nicholas Flamel. While we can see that Dumbledore probably gave him that cloak, Harry wouldn't know this at this point and couldn't expect any protection for his flaunting of rules.
Recall also that it was Harry's decision to go protect the Sorcerer's Stone, which he had been warned would risk death.
I'm not a big Harry Potter fan, that would be my 11 year old daughter in my family. If I had to order them, I wouldn't place the first book as my favorite. I would agree that Harry shows less initiative in the first book when compared to the later books, but this actually makes sense considering his suddenly learning about his heritage and falling into the fantastic world of Hogwarts. That would overwhelm any 11 year old, don't you think?
If Harry had shown any more initiative, it would have strained credibility. Granted, this is Fantasy, but you still have to construct a world that can be rationalized.
Didn't see your reply here. I guess it's never too late.
That's not a program, that's data!
In many turn-key, heavily tested systems, there's often really no distinction between data and program, because they are always tested together and often embedded in systems without file systems for extra reliability.
Ahhh, you lost the point of the silly senator's letters, to make it impossible for contractors to use GPL in any government work. Don't confuse that with distribution issues. The military should be free to use GPL'd software as they please.
Go back and actually read what I wrote. I never implied that the Military shouldn't use GPLd or other free software. I was just pointing out to the poster that there was a great deal (not "very little") GPLd software released to the Free Software Community alredy funded by the US Government.
Actually, their income is more than $2 Billion/Month. I looked it up and while $1 Billion/Month is high for net profit, it does appear that they have been doing between $0.6 and $0.7 Billion/Month for the last two years.
Also, I believe they make quite a bit just off their huge cash reserves. I'm not sure that this is reflected in those profit figures I gave above and may be enough to boost the accumulation rate well over $1 Billion/Month.
And when Bill's stock dips because of all the
negative publicity, that cash pile will have to
be used to prop up the stock price or else
Bill will have to actually start paying his
employees rather than just offer them stock
options.
This could get interesting.
Has anyone written up the implication for
MicroSoft if their stock loses value? Would
be an interesting read.
Follow the stock market much?
MSFT is down more than 50% since it's high in late 1999. That's never caused them to seriously dip into their cash reserves.
In any case, any bad publicity they might receive from various civil actions will be more than counter-balanced by the fact that the DOJ case is over now.
1) No real motion to do anything about Microsoft's monopoly on the desktop. They (MS) already bought most of the legal system to insure the ruling stands, regardless if it is legal or not.
So don't expect any of that to change, now or in the future. Yes, the legal system in the US is that bad, even after Enron.
On what do you base this cynicism about the US legal system?
In the Microsoft case, for example, there's been nothing but well thought-out opinions handed down, thus far. I even agree that Penfield showed the appearance of inpropriety.
NASA hasn't ever had a hardware problem. Or a software problem. Ever. Every problem can be directly tied to one specific person being a fscking moron. The closest you could come is that Mars probe that crashed because of mismatched units. And that was just poor communication among the software guys.
A poor communication among the software guys that results in improper units being used in a program isn't a software problem?
If that wasn't a software problem, what was it?
All software problems are defects in design or implementation, they all go back to a miscommunication or mistake among some software people somewhere.
I'm thinking that such a system might include logic capturing refueling intervals, speed and manueverability data for the ship. These could be used to help deduce deployment capabilities and schedules. Enemies could more easily put parameters around where a Yorktown class vehicle could be deployed in how much time.
Additionally, the software might contain information regarding placement of fueling tanks on such a ship, which would help enemies targetting weapons.
I could be wrong, I don't really know anything about such Ship control applications, do you, really?
In any case, the Yorktown could use GPL software for the basis for such a system, but I think the paranoia of the military would preclude them from making releases. They wouldn't have to, you know. There's nothing in the GPL that requires you to release source, only that you make available source to anyone you give binaries to. I can't see the Military providing executables. So, they could use GPL, but they wouldn't really be releasing softare under the GPL, which I think is really at issue here.
Now consider all the Navy's work from design to implementiation. Now consider that the Navy is just one branch of the enormous US Military, which literally supports whole cities of people on land and at sea. Now consider that the Navy is just one branch of the enormous US Military, which literally supports whole cities of people on land and at sea. Then consider that the US Military only accounts for one fourth of the US Federal Budget and realize how much software goes to the federal government each year that you will never see, but will pay for again and again.
Very little can be thought of as vast but visible next to the incomprehsibly large.
I suppose it is very little compared to the total amount of software written for the Military.
I was, however, excluding from consideration all software that would not normally be licensed or otherwise released, like software that is not released to entities outside of the US Military or software that could contain State Secrets, etc.
The Yorktown's propulsion system software would only be released to those who had Yorktown class ships. Inspection of said software could aid people in sabotage of Yorktown class ships or might contain operational details that would be of benefit to someone engaging a Yorktown class ship in battle.
I think you're talking about software here that was never intended for any kind of release.
I suppose there are probably some software tools and business software programs, like in the areas of logistics, task management and office tools that the Military might develop that could get widespread release, but I can't imagine that this would be a terribly large body of software.
Actually I don't think GPL is a good choice for releasing software in scientific community, but I will admit there isn't a much better choice.
What is bad about the GPL for releasing software in the scientific community?
I wish there was a way to add to GPL something like "if you make improvements to this software and publish the results of those, you must also publish the improved version of the software'.
I'd like to understand your problem. Is it that people are not required to provide changes unless they provide binaries? Interesting. So, would you say that the GPL is not restrictive enough for scientific researchers?
If this is your problem, I think you'd find a more restrictive license difficult to draft. You'd have to carefully define 'research' and 'publish' for purposes of such a license.
The GPL removes much of the motivation for keeping source changes secret, but not the one where people want to keep their changes a secret for purposes of academic competition. I would think that this motivation would be counter-balanced by the desire of researchers to have their results duplicated. This would require that the mechanisms of their research be made public, which I think would include their source code.
It should be noted though in scientific community a license is not really necessary, asking politely is more than enough in almost all cases.
One case where researchers are likely to keep their methods secret is their hope to commercialize some aspect of the research. The GPL addresses this well, I would think.
Very little code financed by the Federal government is ever licensed under either of these two licenses - the choice is basically agency-proprietary (the Federal agency asked for the rights in the contract, and kept them) or company-proprietary (the agency didn't ask for the rights, and the contractor kept them).
NASA uses and produces software under the GPL license.
Anynumberofofprojects funded by NSF, and other Governmental Agency, grants end up licensing software under the GPL.
There is an aspect to this discussion that I don't think gets enough play. The GPL is a great boon to academics who don't have to purchase costly software, and risk throwing obstacles in the way of those who would reproduce their work, or reinvent wheels. This boon comes with the very small cost that the software so produced should be shared with others. I think that this is in harmony with the spirit of Scientific Research, the "standing on the shoulders of Giants" as Newton said.
No accounting for taste, I guess. Zooropa is my favorite U2 album. Fresh, exploring interesing themes and interesting. It's the most experimental of all their work.
On the other hand, I cannot stand The Joshua Tree. Bloated, overproduced and taking itself entirely too seriously.
Slashdot Mirror
Huh? I think you'll find that GCC is most certainly licensed exclusively under the GPL.
I think you need some education on what the GPL requires. The GNU FAQ explicitly covers the question of whether programs compiled with GCC are GPL'd (they are not).
Not all deceptions are illegal or actionable. Using a P2P network for receipt of material lacks several necessary conditions to establish a contract.
Even if it was deemed actionable, what would one do? They are using P2P networks exactly the way they were intended, they are hiding the identity of the source of the transmissions.
When you are using black market channels for distribution, it's difficult to make accountable those who might make misrepresentations.
Remember in Independence Day, the Jeff Goldblum character could upload nasty viruses into alien technology with any laptop. Not sure the interface, but maybe you just have to have the laptop close to the alien tech.
It's called asymetrical warfare. Bio-weapons may not be effective in conventional warfare scenarios, but when your adversary has no fear of death and wants to "win" by spreading terror, then bio-weapons may come into play.
Regardless of the fact of the ineffective nature of bio-weapons, you can't always count on your adversary acting rationally.
Well, *you* may be shortsighted. If you can't really gain anything from owning the copyright to the source, and community development will benefit *you* directly, then it may be in *your* best interests to allow the release of the source to the work publicly.
GNU/Linus
GigsVT used the word correctly. Learn what words mean, not what you think they mean.
The point you are missing is that MOST Linux developers are not selling anything. They are just developing software for their own needs.
This tends to create a system that is more developer friendly because it meets the needs of developers well. The theory is that a very developer friendly system will ultimately be a very good platform for developing any software.
I'm not sure how successful this has been, but that's what we have. Don't ask Linux developers to be salesmen, they won't like you very much. Now, there are those who are trying to sell the wares these developers have created, and it may be that they will speak for users and be able to leverage this good development platform, but I guess we'll just have to wait and see how this plays out.
So far, there's some indication that it's worked well in some areas, for example server software and appliances, and less well in others, such as desktop software.
This is a bit like using a Jedi Knight and her light saber to get at a can of soup.
The best Science Fiction, IMO, puts the familiar against a backdrop of the strange. How can we possibly understand the motivations of a planetary intelligence with this cosmic power? Maybe it's Solaris' idea of an experiment, or perhaps entertainment of some sort. I suppose our pets wonder why we use our cosmic powers to eat celery or watch TV. No, our pets are more sensible than amateur movie reviewers and don't bother to wonder at things they can't understand.
What is happening here is strange in the extreme and is just a given. What's interesting is how the characters deal with it.
Gee, maybe it's both a science fiction movie AND a character study? Are they necessarily mutually exclusive? What's the problem? Not the requisite lack of depth in the characters for a science fiction movie?
It's more complicated that this. AOL is an ISP and a content provider. It's one of their value ads that makes them more attractive than NetZero or local ISPs. You may not like any of their content, but I can tell you from experience that my then-5 yr old daughter really liked the kid's section some years ago when I took the free month and used to ask why we didn't get AOL for years.
Remember also that TW is primarily a content provider. If AOL/TW is to remain together, then this providing TW content only to AOL subscribers is a natural move.
Not that it's a good business plan, but, in for a dime in for a dollar, I guess. People get committed to the direction they've taken. It's either this or just spin off AOL and that might be a painful admission of failure for some in the AOL/TW boardroom.
How often do you really need numbers recalculated on the screen from a web page? I've not seen a use for JS or ASP or even Java that I'm willing to give up the security of my system over.
If you simply must have roll-overs, on-screen recalcs and other such fluff, then, by all means, install an application in one of these languages on your system. Such an application can be written to hit the generic Web application without interactive features such that it's useable by those of us who don't expose ourselves to that nonsense.
I'll accept that it's possible to make a secure scripting environment in a web browser, but seeing all the pain and cost it's taking us to get there is just not worth it as far as I'm concerned.
Well, this is supposed to be fantasy for children.
The movies don't do a good job of showing the day-to-day challenges that he faces at Hogwarts. You see a little of that in how Professor Snape and even McGonagall treat him in class.
But, ultimately, this is a story of a poor orphaned boy who has a terrible life finding out that he is actually a powerful and revered Wizard, transported into a magical place where he has incredible adventures.
Yes, he doesn't get in much trouble for breaking the rules. I thought the trip with Hagrid into the Dark Forest at night as punishment was a rather thin plot device. Either the Forest was far too dangerous, as in fact it almost proved to be, or it was just a fun adventure. I don't see it as appropriate punishment.
This is an unfair criticism, in my opinion.
We just watched the first movie again last night in preparation for seeing the second movie with my 11 year old today. I'm reminded of quite a bit that Harry does in this story.
Harry makes decisions and acts on them that risks what he could reasonably consider to be grounds for expulsion from Hogwarts in several places. Remember that expulsion from Hogwarts would put him back under the stairs on Privet Lane.
For example:
Recall also that it was Harry's decision to go protect the Sorcerer's Stone, which he had been warned would risk death.
I'm not a big Harry Potter fan, that would be my 11 year old daughter in my family. If I had to order them, I wouldn't place the first book as my favorite. I would agree that Harry shows less initiative in the first book when compared to the later books, but this actually makes sense considering his suddenly learning about his heritage and falling into the fantastic world of Hogwarts. That would overwhelm any 11 year old, don't you think?
If Harry had shown any more initiative, it would have strained credibility. Granted, this is Fantasy, but you still have to construct a world that can be rationalized.
In many turn-key, heavily tested systems, there's often really no distinction between data and program, because they are always tested together and often embedded in systems without file systems for extra reliability.
Go back and actually read what I wrote. I never implied that the Military shouldn't use GPLd or other free software. I was just pointing out to the poster that there was a great deal (not "very little") GPLd software released to the Free Software Community alredy funded by the US Government.
Source.
Also, I believe they make quite a bit just off their huge cash reserves. I'm not sure that this is reflected in those profit figures I gave above and may be enough to boost the accumulation rate well over $1 Billion/Month.
This could get interesting.
Has anyone written up the implication for MicroSoft if their stock loses value? Would be an interesting read.
Follow the stock market much?
MSFT is down more than 50% since it's high in late 1999. That's never caused them to seriously dip into their cash reserves.
In any case, any bad publicity they might receive from various civil actions will be more than counter-balanced by the fact that the DOJ case is over now.
So, $1 Billion to Sun, $3 Billion to the EU, $1 Billion to AOL, and let's be really generous and say $7 Billion covers all the rest and their lawyers.
If the lawsuits take more than a year, and they will, they'll still have more than they started with.
So don't expect any of that to change, now or in the future. Yes, the legal system in the US is that bad, even after Enron.
On what do you base this cynicism about the US legal system?
In the Microsoft case, for example, there's been nothing but well thought-out opinions handed down, thus far. I even agree that Penfield showed the appearance of inpropriety.
The poster said they'd never had hardware problems, which I suspected as classifying problems as EITHER a software problem or a hardware problem.
If a miscommunication among software guys that results in a bug isn't a software problem, then what exactly is a software problem?
A poor communication among the software guys that results in improper units being used in a program isn't a software problem?
If that wasn't a software problem, what was it? All software problems are defects in design or implementation, they all go back to a miscommunication or mistake among some software people somewhere.
I could be wrong, I don't really know anything about such Ship control applications, do you, really?
In any case, the Yorktown could use GPL software for the basis for such a system, but I think the paranoia of the military would preclude them from making releases. They wouldn't have to, you know. There's nothing in the GPL that requires you to release source, only that you make available source to anyone you give binaries to. I can't see the Military providing executables. So, they could use GPL, but they wouldn't really be releasing softare under the GPL, which I think is really at issue here.
I suppose it is very little compared to the total amount of software written for the Military.
I was, however, excluding from consideration all software that would not normally be licensed or otherwise released, like software that is not released to entities outside of the US Military or software that could contain State Secrets, etc.
The Yorktown's propulsion system software would only be released to those who had Yorktown class ships. Inspection of said software could aid people in sabotage of Yorktown class ships or might contain operational details that would be of benefit to someone engaging a Yorktown class ship in battle.
I think you're talking about software here that was never intended for any kind of release.
I suppose there are probably some software tools and business software programs, like in the areas of logistics, task management and office tools that the Military might develop that could get widespread release, but I can't imagine that this would be a terribly large body of software.
What is bad about the GPL for releasing software in the scientific community?
I'd like to understand your problem. Is it that people are not required to provide changes unless they provide binaries? Interesting. So, would you say that the GPL is not restrictive enough for scientific researchers?
If this is your problem, I think you'd find a more restrictive license difficult to draft. You'd have to carefully define 'research' and 'publish' for purposes of such a license.
The GPL removes much of the motivation for keeping source changes secret, but not the one where people want to keep their changes a secret for purposes of academic competition. I would think that this motivation would be counter-balanced by the desire of researchers to have their results duplicated. This would require that the mechanisms of their research be made public, which I think would include their source code.
One case where researchers are likely to keep their methods secret is their hope to commercialize some aspect of the research. The GPL addresses this well, I would think.
NASA uses and produces software under the GPL license.
Any number of of projects funded by NSF, and other Governmental Agency, grants end up licensing software under the GPL.
There is an aspect to this discussion that I don't think gets enough play. The GPL is a great boon to academics who don't have to purchase costly software, and risk throwing obstacles in the way of those who would reproduce their work, or reinvent wheels. This boon comes with the very small cost that the software so produced should be shared with others. I think that this is in harmony with the spirit of Scientific Research, the "standing on the shoulders of Giants" as Newton said.
No accounting for taste, I guess. Zooropa is my favorite U2 album. Fresh, exploring interesing themes and interesting. It's the most experimental of all their work.
On the other hand, I cannot stand The Joshua Tree. Bloated, overproduced and taking itself entirely too seriously.