The article brings up an interesting point: is software goods or is it a service?
To software companies, this would seem to be a tough choice. Microsoft is saying that it's a good, but when you buy their product, you're essentially buying a contract to use it (the EULA), not the software itself - this makes it more like a service, doesn't it?
If software were a service, then software lisences would be more valid, but if it were a good, then they're saying you really do own the software, and it's then your right to use it how you want to (within the law, of course).
If this is the case, then obviously MS wants it both ways. However, what if the WTO decides software is goods? Would that not give someone ammunition to destroy all software lisences out there? I don't really know, because you'll start getting into copyrights at some point, but it's an interesting paradox nonetheless.
Man's unique agony as a species consists in his perpetual conflict between the desire to stand out and the need to blend in.
It took me a bit to completely understand your argument. It seems a little bit off-topic. What evilad was trying to say is that free trade takes away a government's ability to control industry. Read his reply that is also in this thread: it explains that mega-corporations which are most served by free trade are themselves primarily self-serving, and have little regard for civil and human rights. At least, there will always be those businesses who don't care, just as there will be those that don't, but who do you think would gain the advantage?
You're trying to say that legislating something without understanding it is a Bad Thing, and I couldn't agree more, but that has little to do with whether online transactions should be duty-free. Maybe I missed something, but I just can't see how allowing duty and government imposed restriction on the internet have anything to do with each other.
I first thought your entire post was a slippery-slope, but that's because I didn't understand what you were saying. You made your argument well, and I agree with it, but I don't see how it fits into this thread. Apologies if I simply missed something. It's late.
Man's unique agony as a species consists in his perpetual conflict between the desire to stand out and the need to blend in.
I don't think the original poster intended to say open source is the only way. The problem with having a closed-source non-[beer]free browser is, of course, that it's closed-source and non[beer]-free. In other words, it's not coming as an option in [your choice of distribution here].
A browser is an important part of most any workstation, so it's also important to have an open-source browser at your disposal. There are a few in the works, as we all know, but I believe the poster's comment was intended to say, essentially, this:
Don't get complacent and give up on mozilla and Konquorer and whatever else is in development because there's a good browser available. We still need a good, stable, free browser for Linux (LYNX is great, but you know what I mean). We need to keep after the free browsers whether there's a good closed alternative or not.
Man's unique agony as a species consists in his perpetual conflict between the desire to stand out and the need to blend in.
Law enforcement has the legal right, AFAIK, to search an apartment that you are renting without a warrant, provided the land lord lets them in. It is the landlord's property, not yours.
This isn't much different, because he's essentially renting the space for his website from the provider. It's their property, and they have the legal right to remove you and your material from it. Law enforcement cannot ORDER them to take it down without due process, but they can request it.
Where it *might* go into being illegal would be the tactics the FBI and US Attourney geneal used on the ISP, but I wouldn't know all the subtelties of that.
Again, IANAL and AFAIK.
Man's unique agony as a species consists in his perpetual conflict between the desire to stand out and the need to blend in.
I have to say, I have no idea. I've thought about it a bit, and I guess what I came up with is this, which is totally my opinion, since it seems everyone has a differing opinion.
To me, neither geek nor nerd are derogatory, but they differ in meaning, since I readily consider myself both...
A nerd refers to one who is highly adept and passionate about something, or many things. Like "Computer Nerd" is someone really into computers. However, a geek doesn't refer at all to the same thing, but more to social ability (or lack thereof). So, as a nerd and a geek, I'm very passionate and skilled in what I do, yet very inept socially.
That's what I get from the words.
Man's unique agony as a species consists in his perpetual conflict between the desire to stand out and the need to blend in.
In my high school a couple of years ago, there was a very explosive situation between two groups of people, known as 'freaks' (which I was part of), and 'wiggars' (which was relatively common at the time to refer to white people who acted as a black stereotype). Freaks would be distingushed by their taste in music and quite often their choice of hair color.
The term 'freak' was used by the 'wiggars' as a derogatory term, but it took only a couple of weeks for the term to be used in a complimentary way between different freaks. The only difference is that if we were called a freak by someone who wasn't, we would still consider it complimentary - we adpoted the term as a valid way to classify ourselves.
Man's unique agony as a species consists in his perpetual conflict between the desire to stand out and the need to blend in.
Does anyone know the details of microsoft's OEM pricing scheme? Besides the obvious bully tactics, what does it amount to, on average, per computer for it to come pre-installed with Windows '98?
Would OEMs, especially the ones not in bed with M$, be able to bring lawsuit against M$ to recover damages? Or purchasers of those OEMs products?
When I worked for a local computer store (actually worked in 2 different ones), we got maybe $10 or so less than retail, but charged the retail price to the customer, even if it came preinstalled. That IS a consumer cost. I'm not sure how big OEMs get charged, but if the cost is relegated to the consumer in ANY WAY, one would think that the consumer would be able to recover those costs.
Of course, not many would bother if it comes down to a couple bucks/computer, triple damages, minus a third for the lawyers cut: you'd get many $10 out of it.
Man's unique agony as a species consists in his perpetual conflict between the desire to stand out and the need to blend in.
This just gave me an idea. I wonder if it would be plausible to release a slashdot monthly magazine? Have a bunch of dedicated/.ers compile the months big stories and summarize the important comments and threads. Hey, I'd probably buy it. Just a thought:)
Man's unique agony as a species consists in his perpetual conflict between the desire to stand out and the need to blend in.
I've considered making a slashdot-like site, but focusing on more than technology. It would feature user submitted (as well as volunteer staff) articles and essays on just about anything. I was planning the focus to be on political and social issues. Each article would of course have comment sections etc.
I never really got around to doing it, and probably never will. However, if I could donate my time and skills in programming and writing to a non-profit magazine (online and/or dead-tree) I would not hesitate.
It sounds like a great idea, provided you could garner enough interest, and could have an idealistic enough leader to not be affected by any corporate sponsorship (donations etc.)
Man's unique agony as a species consists in his perpetual conflict between the desire to stand out and the need to blend in.
This reminds me of Margaret Atwood's "Handmaid's Tale," if anyone's read it. In one part of the book, the main character and another handmaid are looking in the window at computers which do nothing but print pre-programmed prayers (how's that for alliteration?)
Man's unique agony as a species consists in his perpetual conflict between the desire to stand out and the need to blend in.
The typical child between the ages of 2 and 18 consumes an average of 5.5 hours of media daily outside school, with television the clear favorite ahead of computers, video games, music and reading, a study shows.
Those 5.5 hours break down as follows:
2 hours, 46 minutes of Television 49 minutes of computer games 48 minutes listening to recorded music 44 minutes reading 39 minutes listening to the radio
The story doesnt mention how long kids spend on the internet, exactly, but I remember from seeing the report on television that it was something around 15 minutes/day.
I don't really have a point, but if one hour a day playing a video game is really that bad, 2 hours 46 minutes in front of the tv is twice as worse.
Man's unique agony as a species consists in his perpetual conflict between the desire to stand out and the need to blend in.
All this talk in the interview about opening the APIs, and opening the source code, it just doesn't seem that probable. Here's the idea that struck me while reading this:
Create an independent standards organization to control the window's API (like ANSI, the IETF, etc). This way, competing companies have open access to the API specification, and can easily create a product that still runs ALL windows applications.
You could set it up like Sun's Java standards - that is, to extend the standard, you have to submit it to them first, where they can choose to approve it.
This doesn't, however, solve the problem of 'extend and extinguish,' because M$ could still try to extend the API JUST like they did with Java, but I would surmise that lawsuits-a-plenty would ensue if they attempted to do so.
This could also mean easily implementing windows compatibility in Linux (the WINE project wouldn't have to reverse engineer anything anymore).
What do you think about this solution?
Man's unique agony as a species consists in his perpetual conflict between the desire to stand out and the need to blend in.
If this clustering software from Turbolinux is that shit hot, it'll be assimilated
AFAIK, the problem with clustering software is the US government won't allow exports. Linus won't let anything in the kernel that isn't exportable, so such a fork will remain until the US decides clustering tech isn't a weapon.
Man's unique agony as a species consists in his perpetual conflict between the desire to stand out and the need to blend in.
Whose finger do you want on the ALT-CONTROL-DELETE button?
Sorry to say this, but I would feel much safer with the government looming over my computer's shoulder than some multi-billion dollar mega-corporation. At least with the government, I have some recourse should my rights be violated.
Obviously, though, the best answer to this question is ME which can easily be achieved - by using linux instead.:)
Man's unique agony as a species consists in his perpetual conflict between the desire to stand out and the need to blend in.
In case anyone is worried that their representatives don't listen to electronic mail, the ACLU's website feature faxes a copy of what you write, rather than using email. I personally have used this feature a couple of times, and have always recieved a response from my congressman (though, my senators chose to ignore it, for whatever reason. probably because they have a lot more constituents).
Even so, if you are going to write your reps, I would suggest writing a snail-mail letter as well. The style in which you write it us up to you, and probably depends on the issue at hand. If it personally affects you, hand-written might be preferable. If that's too much of a pain, ACLU's free-fax system is Good Enough - better than doing nothing at all.
Man's unique agony as a species consists in his perpetual conflict between the desire to stand out and the need to blend in.
You want a strong, international, governing body? Are you CRAZY?
One organization, with real power over every single person in the entire population of the planet. Listen, there's a reason our bill of rights says the states are supposed to have all the power. A centralized government is *always* worse. Simply put, the farther the process gets from the people (ie. the more people the process is intended to serve), the less the individual matters.
This is why you have people trying to put wire-tapping ability in your routers, and cell-phones. The individual matters less than the group, which means that our rights are worth sacrificing for... something else (like reducing crime), and someone else (the would-be victim, which is increasingly some multi-billion dollar corporation, and not some innocent on the street. All we do for the latter is "hire more cops!" who then go out and harass more african-americans).
Well, that's america, but it's the same everywhere. Look at the EU! France no longer has a right to protect it's people from possibly infected and life-threatening meat from britian. There was this thing a couple months ago out of europe about a global and compulsory rating system for the web.
I'm really babbling now. You get my point. Please flame me repeatedly if I misunderstood what you said.
Man's unique agony as a species consists in his perpetual conflict between the desire to stand out and the need to blend in.
I agree, nothing wrong with the goal.. but there is something wrong when the goal is mis-stated. TRUSTe is not interested in privacy. We know that, now. Just last night, I went to a site with the little TRUSTe seal, and thought, good, I'm safe with this site. A bit naive, I admit, but undoubtedly a common response among most netizens.
The problem is not with TRUSTe's goal, but their appearant goal to consumers. Most consumers see them as a privacy watchdog group, who won't give their seal out to sites which will violate their privacy. They don't think of them as a "policy enforcement agency" or some such. That's rather counter-intuitive to begin with.
In fact, even on their website, they don't state that as their goal. They really don't state a specific goal at all, other than "Building a web you can believe in (tm)." How general is that?
Man's unique agony as a species consists in his perpetual conflict between the desire to stand out and the need to blend in.
The stock market doesn't act as rationally as you imply. The original poster likely observed, and IMO quite correctly, that if this ruling came out while the stock market was still open, you'd have what we tend to call "investor panic," which would affect more than just MSFT. The entire tech stock arena would be hit, and hit hard. With the weekend to cool off, investors have a chance to listen to the analysts, and make clear rational decisions about what they sell come monday morning.
Let's say your MAC address is part of your IP address, as IPv6 will have. You go to a website that asks for your name and other personal information. They put your MAC address in a big file along with all your other information and start selling it off to tons of other sites. All of a sudden the entire corporate, privacy un-trusted internet knows who you are without you even telling them.
IPv6 addresses will also be assigned in blocks, no? Even if that one part of your address can only be traced to your card manufacturer, your entire IP can still be traced back to you through your ISP, whether it's IPv4 or 6. Only this way, since MAC addresses are globally unique in the hardware, the FBI comes and confiscates your computer, notices your MAC is the same as who they're looking for, and they have irrefutable evidence that they are who they say you are. Some might say this is a good thing, but even if it were, the first part isnt worth the advantages of the second.
but i have to say it's pretty true. The part I'm offended about is that they chose to talk about this as if the women didn't want to attract geeks, but the tips that I read would apply to women who want to attract anyone who doesnt have a low self-esteem. Sure, geeks tend to be the most pervasive low self-esteem group (which is arguably because of women like the ones this article is targeting), but there are many other non-geeks/nerds with low self-esteem as well.
Take me, for instance. Granted, I'm a geek now, but all during high school I was definitely not belonging to this class. I've always had a low self-esteem. And I tend to attract women who also have low self-esteem, and be attracted to them in return more often than not. I've always seen the popular pretty gurls as fake, preppy, ditzy, what have you.. essentially making up excuses for why I wouldnt want to be with someone I can't have anyway.
I'm always saddened when psychiatric/psychological studies like the one in the article are used for purposes such as this article. I suppose it can help some people, but I think the information from this study should be used in the field of psychology itself, and not in cosmoesque settings. But hey, this is america. Whatever sells.
I saw a report on this on CNN this morning, before I saw it on slashdot. I guess CNN viewers [slashdotted] the site before we even got a chance. Looks like we have competition;)
Let me make it clear that I don't think Bill Gates is evil. I don't think his motivations are selfish. I merely think that he is misguided. He thinks that he knows best and he uses this belief to justify what he does, in effectively forcing the world to adopt the standards which his company has developed, under his supervision, not because he wants to be rich or powerful, but because he believes that he knows best than everyone else.
Land, except in very rare circumstances, has nothing associated with it that associates it with a particular company. Until it's purchased by a company, buildings are put on it, and signs are put up to say "this is ours" the land has nothing to do with anyone.
Domain names are different, because they're names. They can be associated with a company even if that domain name is not yet owned.
That's where the analogy is flawed, I believe. You don't see companies suing one another for buying a block of IP Addresses as there is nothing intrinsic in IP addresses that associate with a particular company until they're bought.
Maybe someone can come up with a working analogy, but because of this, I don't think the land/DNS analogy will work.
Slashdot Mirror
To software companies, this would seem to be a tough choice. Microsoft is saying that it's a good, but when you buy their product, you're essentially buying a contract to use it (the EULA), not the software itself - this makes it more like a service, doesn't it?
If software were a service, then software lisences would be more valid, but if it were a good, then they're saying you really do own the software, and it's then your right to use it how you want to (within the law, of course).
If this is the case, then obviously MS wants it both ways. However, what if the WTO decides software is goods? Would that not give someone ammunition to destroy all software lisences out there? I don't really know, because you'll start getting into copyrights at some point, but it's an interesting paradox nonetheless.
Man's unique agony as a species consists in his perpetual conflict between the desire to stand out and the need to blend in.
You're trying to say that legislating something without understanding it is a Bad Thing, and I couldn't agree more, but that has little to do with whether online transactions should be duty-free. Maybe I missed something, but I just can't see how allowing duty and government imposed restriction on the internet have anything to do with each other.
I first thought your entire post was a slippery-slope, but that's because I didn't understand what you were saying. You made your argument well, and I agree with it, but I don't see how it fits into this thread. Apologies if I simply missed something. It's late.
Man's unique agony as a species consists in his perpetual conflict between the desire to stand out and the need to blend in.
A browser is an important part of most any workstation, so it's also important to have an open-source browser at your disposal. There are a few in the works, as we all know, but I believe the poster's comment was intended to say, essentially, this:
Don't get complacent and give up on mozilla and Konquorer and whatever else is in development because there's a good browser available. We still need a good, stable, free browser for Linux (LYNX is great, but you know what I mean). We need to keep after the free browsers whether there's a good closed alternative or not.
Man's unique agony as a species consists in his perpetual conflict between the desire to stand out and the need to blend in.
Law enforcement has the legal right, AFAIK, to search an apartment that you are renting without a warrant, provided the land lord lets them in. It is the landlord's property, not yours.
This isn't much different, because he's essentially renting the space for his website from the provider. It's their property, and they have the legal right to remove you and your material from it. Law enforcement cannot ORDER them to take it down without due process, but they can request it.
Where it *might* go into being illegal would be the tactics the FBI and US Attourney geneal used on the ISP, but I wouldn't know all the subtelties of that.
Again, IANAL and AFAIK.
Man's unique agony as a species consists in his perpetual conflict between the desire to stand out and the need to blend in.
To me, neither geek nor nerd are derogatory, but they differ in meaning, since I readily consider myself both...
A nerd refers to one who is highly adept and passionate about something, or many things. Like "Computer Nerd" is someone really into computers. However, a geek doesn't refer at all to the same thing, but more to social ability (or lack thereof). So, as a nerd and a geek, I'm very passionate and skilled in what I do, yet very inept socially.
That's what I get from the words.
Man's unique agony as a species consists in his perpetual conflict between the desire to stand out and the need to blend in.
"FREAK"
In my high school a couple of years ago, there was a very explosive situation between two groups of people, known as 'freaks' (which I was part of), and 'wiggars' (which was relatively common at the time to refer to white people who acted as a black stereotype). Freaks would be distingushed by their taste in music and quite often their choice of hair color.
The term 'freak' was used by the 'wiggars' as a derogatory term, but it took only a couple of weeks for the term to be used in a complimentary way between different freaks. The only difference is that if we were called a freak by someone who wasn't, we would still consider it complimentary - we adpoted the term as a valid way to classify ourselves.
Man's unique agony as a species consists in his perpetual conflict between the desire to stand out and the need to blend in.
Would OEMs, especially the ones not in bed with M$, be able to bring lawsuit against M$ to recover damages? Or purchasers of those OEMs products?
When I worked for a local computer store (actually worked in 2 different ones), we got maybe $10 or so less than retail, but charged the retail price to the customer, even if it came preinstalled. That IS a consumer cost. I'm not sure how big OEMs get charged, but if the cost is relegated to the consumer in ANY WAY, one would think that the consumer would be able to recover those costs.
Of course, not many would bother if it comes down to a couple bucks/computer, triple damages, minus a third for the lawyers cut: you'd get many $10 out of it.
Man's unique agony as a species consists in his perpetual conflict between the desire to stand out and the need to blend in.
Man's unique agony as a species consists in his perpetual conflict between the desire to stand out and the need to blend in.
I've considered making a slashdot-like site, but focusing on more than technology. It would feature user submitted (as well as volunteer staff) articles and essays on just about anything. I was planning the focus to be on political and social issues. Each article would of course have comment sections etc.
I never really got around to doing it, and probably never will. However, if I could donate my time and skills in programming and writing to a non-profit magazine (online and/or dead-tree) I would not hesitate.
It sounds like a great idea, provided you could garner enough interest, and could have an idealistic enough leader to not be affected by any corporate sponsorship (donations etc.)
Man's unique agony as a species consists in his perpetual conflict between the desire to stand out and the need to blend in.
Man's unique agony as a species consists in his perpetual conflict between the desire to stand out and the need to blend in.
The typical child between the ages of 2 and 18 consumes an average of 5.5 hours of media daily outside school, with television the clear favorite ahead of computers, video games, music and reading, a study shows.
Those 5.5 hours break down as follows:
2 hours, 46 minutes of Television
49 minutes of computer games
48 minutes listening to recorded music
44 minutes reading
39 minutes listening to the radio
The story doesnt mention how long kids spend on the internet, exactly, but I remember from seeing the report on television that it was something around 15 minutes/day.
I don't really have a point, but if one hour a day playing a video game is really that bad, 2 hours 46 minutes in front of the tv is twice as worse.
Man's unique agony as a species consists in his perpetual conflict between the desire to stand out and the need to blend in.
Create an independent standards organization to control the window's API (like ANSI, the IETF, etc). This way, competing companies have open access to the API specification, and can easily create a product that still runs ALL windows applications.
You could set it up like Sun's Java standards - that is, to extend the standard, you have to submit it to them first, where they can choose to approve it.
This doesn't, however, solve the problem of 'extend and extinguish,' because M$ could still try to extend the API JUST like they did with Java, but I would surmise that lawsuits-a-plenty would ensue if they attempted to do so.
This could also mean easily implementing windows compatibility in Linux (the WINE project wouldn't have to reverse engineer anything anymore).
What do you think about this solution?
Man's unique agony as a species consists in his perpetual conflict between the desire to stand out and the need to blend in.
If this clustering software from Turbolinux is that shit hot, it'll be assimilated
AFAIK, the problem with clustering software is the US government won't allow exports. Linus won't let anything in the kernel that isn't exportable, so such a fork will remain until the US decides clustering tech isn't a weapon.
Man's unique agony as a species consists in his perpetual conflict between the desire to stand out and the need to blend in.
Whose finger do you want on the ALT-CONTROL-DELETE button?
Sorry to say this, but I would feel much safer with the government looming over my computer's shoulder than some multi-billion dollar mega-corporation. At least with the government, I have some recourse should my rights be violated.
Obviously, though, the best answer to this question is ME which can easily be achieved - by using linux instead. :)
Man's unique agony as a species consists in his perpetual conflict between the desire to stand out and the need to blend in.
Even so, if you are going to write your reps, I would suggest writing a snail-mail letter as well. The style in which you write it us up to you, and probably depends on the issue at hand. If it personally affects you, hand-written might be preferable. If that's too much of a pain, ACLU's free-fax system is Good Enough - better than doing nothing at all.
Man's unique agony as a species consists in his perpetual conflict between the desire to stand out and the need to blend in.
This sounds like a conspiracy to me.
Man's unique agony as a species consists in his perpetual conflict between the desire to stand out and the need to blend in.
You want a strong, international, governing body? Are you CRAZY?
One organization, with real power over every single person in the entire population of the planet. Listen, there's a reason our bill of rights says the states are supposed to have all the power. A centralized government is *always* worse. Simply put, the farther the process gets from the people (ie. the more people the process is intended to serve), the less the individual matters.
This is why you have people trying to put wire-tapping ability in your routers, and cell-phones. The individual matters less than the group, which means that our rights are worth sacrificing for... something else (like reducing crime), and someone else (the would-be victim, which is increasingly some multi-billion dollar corporation, and not some innocent on the street. All we do for the latter is "hire more cops!" who then go out and harass more african-americans).
Well, that's america, but it's the same everywhere. Look at the EU! France no longer has a right to protect it's people from possibly infected and life-threatening meat from britian. There was this thing a couple months ago out of europe about a global and compulsory rating system for the web.
I'm really babbling now. You get my point. Please flame me repeatedly if I misunderstood what you said.
Man's unique agony as a species consists in his perpetual conflict between the desire to stand out and the need to blend in.
The problem is not with TRUSTe's goal, but their appearant goal to consumers. Most consumers see them as a privacy watchdog group, who won't give their seal out to sites which will violate their privacy. They don't think of them as a "policy enforcement agency" or some such. That's rather counter-intuitive to begin with.
In fact, even on their website, they don't state that as their goal. They really don't state a specific goal at all, other than "Building a web you can believe in (tm)." How general is that?
Man's unique agony as a species consists in his perpetual conflict between the desire to stand out and the need to blend in.
The stock market doesn't act as rationally as you imply. The original poster likely observed, and IMO quite correctly, that if this ruling came out while the stock market was still open, you'd have what we tend to call "investor panic," which would affect more than just MSFT. The entire tech stock arena would be hit, and hit hard. With the weekend to cool off, investors have a chance to listen to the analysts, and make clear rational decisions about what they sell come monday morning.
Let's say your MAC address is part of your IP address, as IPv6 will have. You go to a website that asks for your name and other personal information. They put your MAC address in a big file along with all your other information and start selling it off to tons of other sites. All of a sudden the entire corporate, privacy un-trusted internet knows who you are without you even telling them.
IPv6 addresses will also be assigned in blocks, no? Even if that one part of your address can only be traced to your card manufacturer, your entire IP can still be traced back to you through your ISP, whether it's IPv4 or 6. Only this way, since MAC addresses are globally unique in the hardware, the FBI comes and confiscates your computer, notices your MAC is the same as who they're looking for, and they have irrefutable evidence that they are who they say you are. Some might say this is a good thing, but even if it were, the first part isnt worth the advantages of the second.
but i have to say it's pretty true. The part I'm offended about is that they chose to talk about this as if the women didn't want to attract geeks, but the tips that I read would apply to women who want to attract anyone who doesnt have a low self-esteem. Sure, geeks tend to be the most pervasive low self-esteem group (which is arguably because of women like the ones this article is targeting), but there are many other non-geeks/nerds with low self-esteem as well.
Take me, for instance. Granted, I'm a geek now, but all during high school I was definitely not belonging to this class. I've always had a low self-esteem. And I tend to attract women who also have low self-esteem, and be attracted to them in return more often than not. I've always seen the popular pretty gurls as fake, preppy, ditzy, what have you.. essentially making up excuses for why I wouldnt want to be with someone I can't have anyway.
I'm always saddened when psychiatric/psychological studies like the one in the article are used for purposes such as this article. I suppose it can help some people, but I think the information from this study should be used in the field of psychology itself, and not in cosmoesque settings. But hey, this is america. Whatever sells.
I saw a report on this on CNN this morning, before I saw it on slashdot. I guess CNN viewers [slashdotted] the site before we even got a chance. Looks like we have competition ;)
Let me make it clear that I don't think Bill Gates is evil. I don't think his motivations are selfish. I merely think that he is misguided. He thinks that he knows best and he uses this belief to justify what he does, in effectively forcing the world to adopt the standards which his company has developed, under his supervision, not because he wants to be rich or powerful, but because he believes that he knows best than everyone else.
The road to hell is paved with good intentions.
Land, except in very rare circumstances, has nothing associated with it that associates it with a particular company. Until it's purchased by a company, buildings are put on it, and signs are put up to say "this is ours" the land has nothing to do with anyone.
Domain names are different, because they're names. They can be associated with a company even if that domain name is not yet owned.
That's where the analogy is flawed, I believe. You don't see companies suing one another for buying a block of IP Addresses as there is nothing intrinsic in IP addresses that associate with a particular company until they're bought.
Maybe someone can come up with a working analogy, but because of this, I don't think the land/DNS analogy will work.
now i know how shakespeare was always so poetic