Some thoughts: Free Unix! Or, as they say it today, "Free Windows"! Would anyone like a little Wine with their cheese?
As you can see, even back in the day, there was a vested interest in copying ideas of commercial systems rather than some real innovation. Again, it's always nice to throw stones at Microsoft when your own house is made of glass...
For some reason if I write down a complex formula that defines my top-secret trading strategy, is should not be allowed for others to copy it or there would be serious repercussions. But, on the other hand, if I write a program that solves this complex formula, Stallman et. al will be defending your right to copy and freely distribute that program. I'm all for a free exhange of ideas and building upon other ideas out there, but essentially repackaging a commercial OS (UNIX) and giving it out for free is just ridiculous.
It would really be nice of Stallman, et. al had stuck with the following:
Why I Must Write GNU I consider that the golden rule requires that if I like a program I must share it with other people who like it. I cannot in good conscience sign a nondisclosure agreement or a software license agreement.
So that I can continue to use computers without violating my principles, I have decided to put together a sufficient body of free software so that I will be able to get along without any software that is not free.
Yeah, GPL 3.0 should be great...nothing like tarnishing that golden rule by requiring everyone to participate. You do realize how extreme a position it is to claim: "I have decided to put together a sufficient body of free software so that I will be able to get along without any software that is not free." What he should have said is that he will try to ensure that all software he runs has been created for "free" within academia (now you know what idealogues your hard earned college tuition supports) and among hobbyists (who cannot dedicate their full time in order to create anything professional anyway).
Yeah, and I was just beginning to wonder if I could get a whole bunch of software developers to work for free implementing my ideas. They could live on air and water, both of which are or should be 100% free (TODO: address it in GPL v4.0). Furthermore, I'm going to implement a UNIX copycat, and since I look like a GNU, I'll make sure my UNIX gets named appropriately. Oh, and by the way, since I have the resources of no better an ivory tower than MIT, I'll definitely use them because those undergrads sure don't. Hah, take that Microserfs, you'll see in time that anything that is commercial and currently has a price tag will no longer be in the not so distant future! By the way, on a side note, I could really use donations...because were you thinking I'd actually be able to find quality devs who'd the grunt work for me without getting paid?
>Which begs the question of what our system is trying to do in the first place
Which also begs the question of why you are using "begs the question" incorrectly like that? Grammar Nazi has been sighted...
>get with the times, should be a tracking link to your torrent.
What is a torrent, to an average computer user? Maybe you should get with the times and give a regular link to your personal webspace URL or something so anyone can open it in the browser. A torrent requires a client on their end, and most don't have it installed.
I think it worth mentioning that the Free Software philosophy is fundamentally against big business and arguably anti-capitalist. Thus, RMS is labeled a Socialist, and from all appearances, he should be proud of that classification. Of course, the cards are currently stacked against RMS and his group, and so it IS a war (for him).
Open Source (the whole "open-source can beat out closed-source for the market") is a bit more pragmatic and fundamentally is willing to work within a capitalist system. Hence, why large corporations can push OSS and even pay for development of less glamorous, but important, pieces of OSS.
I'd say the Open Source philosophy is more realistic and definitely more interesting than the Free Software philosophy. So, I'd side more with Linus and point out that (for servers anyway), Linux has definitely proved itself and browsers like Firefox (which I use all the time and highly recommend) have gained significance and interest. Also, as far as free goes, lots of people use Apache and Java so they must be doing something right. Furthermore, I and the millions of others who are currently running a Microsoft OS don't have to be flamed because we're locked into "the evil empire." After all, if free software is indeed better than its commercial counterpart, than maybe RMS et al. should stop GREASING THE TRACKS via a newer restrictive GPL v3 license.
I'd compare RMS within the FSF/OSS genre to Pat Robertson within the religious right or Michael Moore for the far left. They need to be replaced as spokesmen for their specific agendas. Oh, and take that pencil-drawn Gnu and destroy it if you want to be taken seriously...
There is no single class lecture on iTunes on Stanford's page. The faculty lectures are public-access lectures that have been recorded (audio-only) on campus and contain no class information. The "Heard on Campus" part is a bunch of PR material that has shown up on iTunes, including speeches by famous people (Steve Jobs, the Dalai Lama, etc.) and Stanford presidential speeches for all of you into that kinda thing. The entire presentation is a massive PR stunt between Apple and Stanford U. So, you can take the hype and chuck that as well...
And as for the free content for UC Berkeley courses, we have only 100-level (or lower) classes which are basically prerequisites for a UC Berkeley education. I'm sorry to say that if you were looking for course content, you'll need to look elsewhere.
So this leaves MIT, which actually does have a lot of content (although it depends on what is put up by the professor), like this page if you are interested in Computer Language Engineering (upper-level, apparently).
From the article you linked: "Google objected to the government's subpoena, saying it would reveal trade secrets by providing the data and disclose personally identifiable information about its users. In response, the government said it would keep the data secret and that the request wasn't for personal information."
Google is really starting to tick me off. Please see my previous post and its responses documenting my personal case (and apparently others) where my searches when logged into my Google account and the personalized homepage have been logged despite the fact that I NEVER OPTED IN! Once I found a way to opt out, I did promptly, but I never was given notice of this fact when I signed up and it appears they changed their privacy policy without me knowing it. Yeah, sure, I should check the link but seriously, that is responsible (or even evil).
And now, Google is saying "it would reveal trade secrets by providing the data and disclose personally identifiable information about its users." Yeah, you mean users like me who NEVER WANTED MY HISTORY RECORDED! Perhaps spying on my Internet habits qualifies as trade secrets. I'm seriously thinking of never again logging into Google account online again because they have LOST MY TRUST. Sorry...someone has to say this.
Unfortunately, as another person mentioned:
"thats funny, it wasn't the default option for me at first. i thought they werent going to be evil like that. then they changed it and started doing it without telling me. i just lost my faith in google. time to change my start page."
Furthermore, if you claim that the privacy policy NOW is the same as when I signed up, you have NO way to prove that. So, they changed the privacy policy evidently - that is evil because they NEVER TOLD ME!
Google recently ticked me off bigtime! I've had a Google account for a long time (for Google Groups, Gmail) and that was fine. However, now I just noticed they have logged my searches without me ever opting in. In fact, I expressly didn't want this and never have. So, they have made personalized searches an opt-out process. That has gotten me very incensed and I'm not even sure I want the Google personalized homepage anymore.
Talk about lack of privacy considerations...
Good thing you never learned order of operations. First (), then * and/, then + and -, etc. Oh, and learn how to spell Excel - it really is like kicking yourself when you're down.
There definitely is a left in America, and it resides somewhere around Holywood. The fact that you are not even aware of that is amazing. Family-friendly (G to PG-13) movies still do way better than the R-rated and others that Holywood tends to love. This is why Titanic, not Brokeback Mountain, is at the top of the all-time list and Shrek2/E.T. over {insert recent Oscar nominee here}. If you say Michael Moore is not left, then you are definitely clueless. He in fact was against the US fight in Afghanistan, which is about as far-left in pacificism as most. The ACLU wins most of their cases, because they can hand-pick judges who will side with them. Also, as far as where they stand, they side with NARAL and other pro-abortion groups who have a significant lobby but not significant support of the population. There is a religious right, right, middle, left, and militant left. The fact that you aren't aware of the entire left side of the aisle (where you evidently sit) is mind-boggling.
I'd definitely consider biting if I knew this could be the case. There is VS.NET which I use at work (C# primarily) which I really need to run on the machine at times. However in 80%+ of cases, I'd just stick with the OS X.
I could even move from Outlook to Apple's Mail app as it's likely at least as good and less of a memory hog (I hope). I'd like a fast machine to crunch VS.NET though...
Ah well, wishful thinking.
It would be ridiculously stupid for MS to make a total rewrite of their OS. Especially in the face of growing competition, the newest product is likely to bomb by such a move because of delay in time to market. Furthermore, it's not bad that it's a mass of spaghetti code if each piece there has a specific purpose to close security holes, and rather than rewriting, they ought to simply refactor and make the code liveable if indeed it is "so bad". However, they and users have tested out many bugs that have affected many of the OSes so that you really open yourselves up to an entirely new series of attack vectors at release of brand-new code. I have to concur with Joel on Software on this thought. Netscape bombed when they attempted an entire rewrite, Excel systematically slaughtered Lotus 1-2-3 in the middle of Lotus' rewrite apparently, and Apple may be one counterexample rather than indication of the general trend.
Yahoo! Widgets has really seemed to catch on pretty quickly at my workplace. I have the calendar widget (works w/ Outlook, great to have), CPU usage widget (which ironically adds its own usage albeit rather small), stock ticker (downloaded from their webpage), and weather widget. I also have the photo widget and iTunes controller, but they get in the way after a while. I love them as a diversion or just to check whether I need the umbrella going out and they are more lightweight than the old Konfabulator I used to know, and I'm less embarrased to tell others about it because it doesn't 'Konfabulator' sounds stupid IMHO. So far, I've had a couple really think the weather widget is cool, and my coworker and boss quickly have installed the stock widget and/or weather widget. I prefer it at work (and not home) where I have a machine with 2 GB of RAM to throw around and lots of resources. And they look cool and I'm tempted to code up some in the near future. All you'd need is one killer widget and people would flock to it, I'd think. I'd think a Soduku widget would be cool, since I've been into that recently...and its the perfect thing you could just come back to (or reload) later.
If any of you think that your Wiki submissions will actually be taken seriously should dream on. His staff is checking the entries for Vandalism, which will definitely ensure an unbiased view on the issues. Furthermore, he's already made up his mind on the issues otherwise he'd not be running against Hatch.
Apparently, he already has gotten support of Boing Boing. Oh, and he supports the EFF. So line up Slashdotters...cuz he's got your pet issue covered.
Google is hardly innovating in the AJAX-space. Except for their Google Maps image load feature, there's not all that much that's interesting. Gmail has gone in a dissapointing direction - RSS newsfeeds (??), no real AJAX innovation with drag/drop or right-click or anything. Oh, and Microsoft's Birds-eye view totally kicked the pants off the standalone Google Earth. However, I fail to see the whole excitement in creating an AJAX portal...talk about a has-been concept with some new window-dressing. Why either MS or Google are wasting their time on that is still rather unclear...unless if they take it to the next level somehow.
Today's swimming pool could turn into an ocean in a million years! Maybe a prophet or fortune teller could enlighten us further in subsequent comments?
... a stupid idea. For those who like to read their RSS feeds already I'll just ignore it and forward it with all GMail stuff to Outlook like I've been doing. Gmail is nice for the simple fact that it provides a location where I can find all my mail in one place. Other than that it's a bit too basic...
Microsoft has their own copycat service available online? You'd think with their large amount of data in Streets/Trips, they should be able to one-up this. Oh, and next time I go to Portland Oregon (never!), I'll be sure to use this. Why not publish the story when they do a real city like NYC, LA, etc. where it's not quite so simple. Take NYC for example: Shall we take PATH, MTA subway, bus, LIRR, or cab? And how about - "which is fastest" rather than "which is cheapest?" Crank your teraflops at that one, Google.
Maybe you should step back and think about this. I know some people as a knee-jerk reaction will accuse Microsoft off the bat. However, why doesn't anyone ask the obvious question of why Google chose to run their Desktop Search in a browser, especially IE? Obviously, they were aware of the fact that IE has a huge installation base and isn't known for pristine security. You're obviously asking for problems off the bat - and now we have some. Notice that MSN Desktop Search doesn't have this issue.
Note: I use neither MSN or Google Desktop Search. I much prefer Copernic Desktop Search because it doesn't run in a browser and has better preview and more refined search capabilities. And the stale Google Desktop Search links really pissed me off - I've never had that happen in CDS.
People have all kinds of problems with Claria because it used to create these evil popups. Well, Google, in a much more surreptitious manner keeps profiles of all who sign up for their services. Oh, and Google uses cookies to track logged-in users and using its toolbar tracks the sites users visit when logged out of other Google services (Gmail and such). So, Google is doing it in a much more hidden manner than Claria had in the past. That is also mentioned in Wired. Before you so quickly diss Claria, do keep in mind the kind of data mining Google does.
From the Wired article explaining why Google News will remain in beta and not be ad-based, it's quite ironic that they scrape many news pages in a single location and then go out of their way to send a cease-and-desist letter to Julian Bond, a British programmer who had created customized RSS feeds from Google News.
Ironically, the letter informed Bond that Google does not permit "webmasters to display Google News headlines on their sites."
For shame, Google - it would be nice if you would in fact "do no evil" rather than simply say it.
Slashdot Mirror
Some thoughts:
Free Unix! Or, as they say it today, "Free Windows"! Would anyone like a little Wine with their cheese?
As you can see, even back in the day, there was a vested interest in copying ideas of commercial systems rather than some real innovation. Again, it's always nice to throw stones at Microsoft when your own house is made of glass...
For some reason if I write down a complex formula that defines my top-secret trading strategy, is should not be allowed for others to copy it or there would be serious repercussions. But, on the other hand, if I write a program that solves this complex formula, Stallman et. al will be defending your right to copy and freely distribute that program. I'm all for a free exhange of ideas and building upon other ideas out there, but essentially repackaging a commercial OS (UNIX) and giving it out for free is just ridiculous.
It would really be nice of Stallman, et. al had stuck with the following: Why I Must Write GNU I consider that the golden rule requires that if I like a program I must share it with other people who like it. I cannot in good conscience sign a nondisclosure agreement or a software license agreement.
So that I can continue to use computers without violating my principles, I have decided to put together a sufficient body of free software so that I will be able to get along without any software that is not free.
Yeah, GPL 3.0 should be great...nothing like tarnishing that golden rule by requiring everyone to participate. You do realize how extreme a position it is to claim: "I have decided to put together a sufficient body of free software so that I will be able to get along without any software that is not free." What he should have said is that he will try to ensure that all software he runs has been created for "free" within academia (now you know what idealogues your hard earned college tuition supports) and among hobbyists (who cannot dedicate their full time in order to create anything professional anyway).
Yeah, and I was just beginning to wonder if I could get a whole bunch of software developers to work for free implementing my ideas. They could live on air and water, both of which are or should be 100% free (TODO: address it in GPL v4.0). Furthermore, I'm going to implement a UNIX copycat, and since I look like a GNU, I'll make sure my UNIX gets named appropriately. Oh, and by the way, since I have the resources of no better an ivory tower than MIT, I'll definitely use them because those undergrads sure don't. Hah, take that Microserfs, you'll see in time that anything that is commercial and currently has a price tag will no longer be in the not so distant future! By the way, on a side note, I could really use donations...because were you thinking I'd actually be able to find quality devs who'd the grunt work for me without getting paid?
>Which begs the question of what our system is trying to do in the first place Which also begs the question of why you are using "begs the question" incorrectly like that? Grammar Nazi has been sighted...
>get with the times, should be a tracking link to your torrent. What is a torrent, to an average computer user? Maybe you should get with the times and give a regular link to your personal webspace URL or something so anyone can open it in the browser. A torrent requires a client on their end, and most don't have it installed.
You expect too much of people...
I think it worth mentioning that the Free Software philosophy is fundamentally against big business and arguably anti-capitalist. Thus, RMS is labeled a Socialist, and from all appearances, he should be proud of that classification. Of course, the cards are currently stacked against RMS and his group, and so it IS a war (for him).
Open Source (the whole "open-source can beat out closed-source for the market") is a bit more pragmatic and fundamentally is willing to work within a capitalist system. Hence, why large corporations can push OSS and even pay for development of less glamorous, but important, pieces of OSS.
I'd say the Open Source philosophy is more realistic and definitely more interesting than the Free Software philosophy. So, I'd side more with Linus and point out that (for servers anyway), Linux has definitely proved itself and browsers like Firefox (which I use all the time and highly recommend) have gained significance and interest. Also, as far as free goes, lots of people use Apache and Java so they must be doing something right. Furthermore, I and the millions of others who are currently running a Microsoft OS don't have to be flamed because we're locked into "the evil empire." After all, if free software is indeed better than its commercial counterpart, than maybe RMS et al. should stop GREASING THE TRACKS via a newer restrictive GPL v3 license.
I'd compare RMS within the FSF/OSS genre to Pat Robertson within the religious right or Michael Moore for the far left. They need to be replaced as spokesmen for their specific agendas. Oh, and take that pencil-drawn Gnu and destroy it if you want to be taken seriously...
There is no single class lecture on iTunes on Stanford's page. The faculty lectures are public-access lectures that have been recorded (audio-only) on campus and contain no class information. The "Heard on Campus" part is a bunch of PR material that has shown up on iTunes, including speeches by famous people (Steve Jobs, the Dalai Lama, etc.) and Stanford presidential speeches for all of you into that kinda thing. The entire presentation is a massive PR stunt between Apple and Stanford U. So, you can take the hype and chuck that as well...
And as for the free content for UC Berkeley courses, we have only 100-level (or lower) classes which are basically prerequisites for a UC Berkeley education. I'm sorry to say that if you were looking for course content, you'll need to look elsewhere.
So this leaves MIT, which actually does have a lot of content (although it depends on what is put up by the professor), like this page if you are interested in Computer Language Engineering (upper-level, apparently).
You know, this website is taking an awefully long time to load in Firefox. Even the browser is fighting the return to its IE overlord...
From the article you linked: "Google objected to the government's subpoena, saying it would reveal trade secrets by providing the data and disclose personally identifiable information about its users. In response, the government said it would keep the data secret and that the request wasn't for personal information."
Google is really starting to tick me off. Please see my previous post and its responses documenting my personal case (and apparently others) where my searches when logged into my Google account and the personalized homepage have been logged despite the fact that I NEVER OPTED IN! Once I found a way to opt out, I did promptly, but I never was given notice of this fact when I signed up and it appears they changed their privacy policy without me knowing it. Yeah, sure, I should check the link but seriously, that is responsible (or even evil).
And now, Google is saying "it would reveal trade secrets by providing the data and disclose personally identifiable information about its users." Yeah, you mean users like me who NEVER WANTED MY HISTORY RECORDED! Perhaps spying on my Internet habits qualifies as trade secrets. I'm seriously thinking of never again logging into Google account online again because they have LOST MY TRUST. Sorry...someone has to say this.
Unfortunately, as another person mentioned: "thats funny, it wasn't the default option for me at first. i thought they werent going to be evil like that. then they changed it and started doing it without telling me. i just lost my faith in google. time to change my start page."
Furthermore, if you claim that the privacy policy NOW is the same as when I signed up, you have NO way to prove that. So, they changed the privacy policy evidently - that is evil because they NEVER TOLD ME!
Google recently ticked me off bigtime! I've had a Google account for a long time (for Google Groups, Gmail) and that was fine. However, now I just noticed they have logged my searches without me ever opting in. In fact, I expressly didn't want this and never have. So, they have made personalized searches an opt-out process. That has gotten me very incensed and I'm not even sure I want the Google personalized homepage anymore. Talk about lack of privacy considerations...
Good thing you never learned order of operations. First (), then * and /, then + and -, etc. Oh, and learn how to spell Excel - it really is like kicking yourself when you're down.
There definitely is a left in America, and it resides somewhere around Holywood. The fact that you are not even aware of that is amazing. Family-friendly (G to PG-13) movies still do way better than the R-rated and others that Holywood tends to love. This is why Titanic, not Brokeback Mountain, is at the top of the all-time list and Shrek2/E.T. over {insert recent Oscar nominee here}. If you say Michael Moore is not left, then you are definitely clueless. He in fact was against the US fight in Afghanistan, which is about as far-left in pacificism as most. The ACLU wins most of their cases, because they can hand-pick judges who will side with them. Also, as far as where they stand, they side with NARAL and other pro-abortion groups who have a significant lobby but not significant support of the population. There is a religious right, right, middle, left, and militant left. The fact that you aren't aware of the entire left side of the aisle (where you evidently sit) is mind-boggling.
I'd definitely consider biting if I knew this could be the case. There is VS.NET which I use at work (C# primarily) which I really need to run on the machine at times. However in 80%+ of cases, I'd just stick with the OS X. I could even move from Outlook to Apple's Mail app as it's likely at least as good and less of a memory hog (I hope). I'd like a fast machine to crunch VS.NET though... Ah well, wishful thinking.
It would be ridiculously stupid for MS to make a total rewrite of their OS. Especially in the face of growing competition, the newest product is likely to bomb by such a move because of delay in time to market. Furthermore, it's not bad that it's a mass of spaghetti code if each piece there has a specific purpose to close security holes, and rather than rewriting, they ought to simply refactor and make the code liveable if indeed it is "so bad". However, they and users have tested out many bugs that have affected many of the OSes so that you really open yourselves up to an entirely new series of attack vectors at release of brand-new code. I have to concur with Joel on Software on this thought. Netscape bombed when they attempted an entire rewrite, Excel systematically slaughtered Lotus 1-2-3 in the middle of Lotus' rewrite apparently, and Apple may be one counterexample rather than indication of the general trend.
Sun + Apple = Snapple ... or perhaps iSun - iBecause iApple iLoves iTo iUse i
Yahoo! Widgets has really seemed to catch on pretty quickly at my workplace. I have the calendar widget (works w/ Outlook, great to have), CPU usage widget (which ironically adds its own usage albeit rather small), stock ticker (downloaded from their webpage), and weather widget. I also have the photo widget and iTunes controller, but they get in the way after a while. I love them as a diversion or just to check whether I need the umbrella going out and they are more lightweight than the old Konfabulator I used to know, and I'm less embarrased to tell others about it because it doesn't 'Konfabulator' sounds stupid IMHO. So far, I've had a couple really think the weather widget is cool, and my coworker and boss quickly have installed the stock widget and/or weather widget. I prefer it at work (and not home) where I have a machine with 2 GB of RAM to throw around and lots of resources. And they look cool and I'm tempted to code up some in the near future. All you'd need is one killer widget and people would flock to it, I'd think. I'd think a Soduku widget would be cool, since I've been into that recently...and its the perfect thing you could just come back to (or reload) later.
If any of you think that your Wiki submissions will actually be taken seriously should dream on. His staff is checking the entries for Vandalism, which will definitely ensure an unbiased view on the issues. Furthermore, he's already made up his mind on the issues otherwise he'd not be running against Hatch.
Apparently, he already has gotten support of Boing Boing. Oh, and he supports the EFF. So line up Slashdotters...cuz he's got your pet issue covered.
Google is hardly innovating in the AJAX-space. Except for their Google Maps image load feature, there's not all that much that's interesting. Gmail has gone in a dissapointing direction - RSS newsfeeds (??), no real AJAX innovation with drag/drop or right-click or anything. Oh, and Microsoft's Birds-eye view totally kicked the pants off the standalone Google Earth. However, I fail to see the whole excitement in creating an AJAX portal...talk about a has-been concept with some new window-dressing. Why either MS or Google are wasting their time on that is still rather unclear...unless if they take it to the next level somehow.
Today's swimming pool could turn into an ocean in a million years! Maybe a prophet or fortune teller could enlighten us further in subsequent comments?
... a stupid idea. For those who like to read their RSS feeds already I'll just ignore it and forward it with all GMail stuff to Outlook like I've been doing. Gmail is nice for the simple fact that it provides a location where I can find all my mail in one place. Other than that it's a bit too basic...
Microsoft has their own copycat service available online? You'd think with their large amount of data in Streets/Trips, they should be able to one-up this. Oh, and next time I go to Portland Oregon (never!), I'll be sure to use this. Why not publish the story when they do a real city like NYC, LA, etc. where it's not quite so simple. Take NYC for example: Shall we take PATH, MTA subway, bus, LIRR, or cab? And how about - "which is fastest" rather than "which is cheapest?" Crank your teraflops at that one, Google.
to keep 'rootkit' out of the dictionary this year?
Maybe you should step back and think about this. I know some people as a knee-jerk reaction will accuse Microsoft off the bat. However, why doesn't anyone ask the obvious question of why Google chose to run their Desktop Search in a browser, especially IE? Obviously, they were aware of the fact that IE has a huge installation base and isn't known for pristine security. You're obviously asking for problems off the bat - and now we have some. Notice that MSN Desktop Search doesn't have this issue.
Note: I use neither MSN or Google Desktop Search. I much prefer Copernic Desktop Search because it doesn't run in a browser and has better preview and more refined search capabilities. And the stale Google Desktop Search links really pissed me off - I've never had that happen in CDS.
People have all kinds of problems with Claria because it used to create these evil popups. Well, Google, in a much more surreptitious manner keeps profiles of all who sign up for their services. Oh, and Google uses cookies to track logged-in users and using its toolbar tracks the sites users visit when logged out of other Google services (Gmail and such). So, Google is doing it in a much more hidden manner than Claria had in the past. That is also mentioned in Wired. Before you so quickly diss Claria, do keep in mind the kind of data mining Google does.
From the Wired article explaining why Google News will remain in beta and not be ad-based, it's quite ironic that they scrape many news pages in a single location and then go out of their way to send a cease-and-desist letter to Julian Bond, a British programmer who had created customized RSS feeds from Google News.
Ironically, the letter informed Bond that Google does not permit "webmasters to display Google News headlines on their sites."
For shame, Google - it would be nice if you would in fact "do no evil" rather than simply say it.