You don't want RMS to compromise. You want him to abandon his ideals and vision. For what exactly?
Sun has very onerous provisions on their java licensing which prevents inclusion of the JDK in a lot of Linux distributions. Why is this good for java? Why is it good for you (the java programmer) that I have to jump trough fifty hoops to install a JDK or a JRE before I can even run your program? Why is it good for you that the java implementation on my linux box is two years out of date and is slow?
How would RMS compromise to make all that better for you? How could Sun compromise to make that better?
The fact that is hasn't been done should tell you how important the GNU and FSF are to linux. Why does it bother you so much to give them a little credit?
"But the more he goes around criticizing other concepts (open source) and other people who make his world possible (Torvalds), if not perfect, the more he will alienate them and the farther away his dream will be."
What an utter bunch of crap this is. So if one disagrees with something Linus does or says what is he supposed to do? Is he not allowed to say that he disagrees with the most holy linus? Linus is not a god, nobody is a god. It's perfectly allowable nay encouraged to speak your mind when you think somebody is doing the wrong thing. That's the way "open source" works.
RMS doesn't call people names, he isn't rude. He does not act like the slashdot hordes who insist on calling him a hippie, freak, smelly, unwashed etc. He talks about his ideas, he carefully explains where his ideals are different and contrasting to other peoples ideas. I have never heard him call anybody names though which is a lot more then you can say about his critics.
"He needs Sun and Java and Torvalds and ESR and Red Hat and everyone else. "
He does? Did you mean that you do? You need them because you want a free operating system that does the things he needs. I don't think he is thinking like you. I don't think he thinks he needs those people.
"t this rate however... calling Linus insufficiently political is not going to win him any more fans. And more fans is exactly what he needs."
GASP!. He called linus insufficiently political!. I bet Linus will never speak to him again.
Thank god Linus is not fragile as you make him out to be. I bet Linus is perfectly capable of being called "insufficiently political" without holding grudges.
GO to it then. You do realize that after you your erection dies down you still will have to clean up your car dont' you? Come to think of it maybe touching all that blood will give you another hard on afterwards. If there is one thing we know about republitards they are fond of killing and death. It's virtually impossible to satiate the bloodlust of somebody like you.
I think you missed the point. Microsoft bought virtual server in order to charge people both for the virtual server software AND the license for windows. Now they are unable to charge people for the virtual server because both Xen and Vmware are free. Sure they are still going to charge a license for each installed windows OS but they do that anyway.
This is another case of open source products causing MS to drop prices. This time down to zero. MS can bleed like this for a long time but not infinately. Eventually they are going to have to figure out how to survive in a world where your competition is giving away what you are trying to sell.
They know they killed netscape that way, they know they could be killed the same way.
"Down the drain how exactly? Yes they put money into it and are now giving it away for free, but this is an investment in much the same way IE was."
With IE the goal was to kill netscape by giving away everything netscape sells. Not the shoe is on the other foot. It's not an investment because XEN is giving away they something they planned to sell.
"What is a million dallars to MS?"
Nothing of course. They have the luxury of having two monopolies and they can dump products on the market using their monopoly profits. In a better world with a better administration they would be back in court because dumping is illegal but in this world and with this administration they get away with it.
I will give up the pissing match when the religious fundamentalists of this world stop pissing on people. Somehow your "stop the pissing match" sounds like a rapist telling the 13 year old girl to "stop squiggling so much".
"Just live your lives the best way you can and let others try to do the same"
Good advice, let's see if Osama bin laden and pat robertson listen to you.
It's a little bit different. In the netscape their aim was to "cut off the airsupply" of netscape by giving away a free browser. In this case they are simply reacting to the fact that RedHat, Novell, IBM etc can now offer XEN out of the box with better performance and scalibility then anything MS has.
What's great about this announcement is that MS paid lots of money for virtual server and now they are forced to not only give it away for free but also provide support for it. That's millions of dollars down the drain for MS, money that could have gone to research, lobbying, advertising, PR, or even given back to the shareholders. Money down the drain, bad for MS, good for the rest of the world.
Is all this legal? Well probably. To be honest in a very real sense it's dumping. No company without a monopoly and monopoly profits could have afforded to spend that kind of money on virtual server and then give it away AND support it. The only reason MS can do it is because they have two established monopolies and they can use the obcene profits they make from their monopolies to fund money losing schemes like this (and virtually every other piece of software they hawk). In a pure market economy this could not work.
Why do americans (you certainly sound american) feel that everybody in africa is dying of hunger and thirst. You do realize that there are people in africa with food, water, clothes, schools, and electricity right? Did you ever think that maybe those people could use a computer?
Your argument can be restated like this "we should not help any african with anything until all africans have clean water and food and are not starving". That's a noble sounding argument but it's wrong. There are people in the US who are starving and homeless too. Should we stop giving to all charities until starvation and homelessness are eliminated?
If you don't know the answer to something, then it's perfectly safe to presume it's because God made it that way.
It's amazing to me how little humanity has progressed over the last few thousand years. In the days of ancient greeks people didn't know how ligtning was made so they said some God was striking an anvil. Same goes for Volcanoes, tidal waves etc, they were all a result of an angry God.
These days God has been reduced to the explanation of the platypus. "look I don't understand this thing, it's proof that god must exist". How pathetic is that?
LOL. Ooooh the republitard is going to beat me up!. I am so scared!. What's the matter ran out of fags to beat up and niggers to drag behind your truck?
When you are in the military and especially under combat you tend to act differently then you normally would. Even if you are not under combat you act different then you do in civillian life. Furthermore vietnam was a very long time ago. People tend to change over time.
Now your VP is actively trying to smear the combat record of one his fellow veterans. Trying demean his record, trying to minimize his sacrifice. The man got shot, he waged combat trying to serve his country. So what if he is a self serving bastard. Does that mean that the people killed are any less dead? Does that mean the wounds he suffered hurt any less? Does that mean that his service somehow counts less then your republitard VP?
I hope you are getting the picture here. Your VP is a disgrace to america and a disgrace to the military. When I was in the military I met a lot of self serving people, a lot of kissasses, a lot of incompetent nincompoops and a lot of assholes too. But you know what? All those people were doing the things they were doing in the process of serving their country and that counts for something. The idiot in the military could have stayed home and been an idiot but he was an idiot serving his country.
Finally is Bush not self serving? The man went to war for personal gain of himself and his close friends for gods sake.
I am trying to explain to you the difference between a republican and a republitard. The guy who doesn't want gays to marry is a republican, your VP is a republitard.
MS doesn't make any money from existing customers. Almost all their income comes from people buying new PCs and getting windows shoved down their throat.
"What if they said "screw you, I'm going home" and stopped officially selling product in the EU?"
That would be a happy day for me. It would mean that nobody in europe could read MS office documents and all web sites in europe would have to work with firefox. Happy Happy day.
"Of course, there would still be "grey-market" sales, and "3rd party" support, etc."
Nah. Most likely thing that would happen is that the EU would stop recognizing MS intellectual property and void all NDAs. At that point windows would pretty much be open source and MS would get the shaft. Their only recourse would be to bribe enough politicians to wage war on europe. I am pretty sure Rumsfeld would salivate to wage war on "old europe" but I don't think that even the biggest war pig in washington would take on that cause.
"As much as many do not like MSFT, this stinks of some sort of politicical extortion, plain and simple."
Well it's aboutpunishing the guilty. Since they are not allowed to put corporations in jail fines are the next best thing.
"The VP of Marketing at my company's husband was in Kerry's unit (Swift Boats) in Vietnam. He just about spits when he hears Kerry's name and says Kerry was the "worst self-serving son of a bitch" he'd served with. So I believe those who've been there and done that."
Kerry went to war, bush didn't. Kerry got shot, bush didn't. Kerry shot people, bush didn't. Kerry completed the terms of his service, bush didn't.
So the VP or your company thinks that Kerry was a self seving son of a bitch does that mean he didn't server his country? Does that mean his wounds were self inflicted. Is bush a self serving son of a bitch?
So you think it's OK to demean the military service of all citizens who are self serving?
"Anyway, why are you running around calling people "republitard" on/.? "
Well because they are republitards that's why. Why not call a spade a spade. I don't believe in that PC bullshit. If you are a republitard then I will call you one.
"My point about you being childish is just that; it doesn't impress any swing voters when you're just calling names."
Since my lifes goal is not to impress you this statement has no effect whatsoever.
"Calling names and bringing out celebrities to tell people how to vote really worked in 2004, didn't it? Go Democrats!"
It worked great for republicans. They called Kerry a coward, they said democrats hate america. They said democrats wanted the US to be hit by terrorists. The only reason democrats didn't win was because they refused to sink down to the level of the republicans. In my opinion they should have gotten down to the gutter and called republicans things worse things. When republicans were saying Kerry was a traitor and a coward they should not have sat back in their seats and said "no he wasn't" They should have hit back at bush even harder. But they didn't and they lost. They will continue to lose as long as they take the high road while the republican party digs for even more slime.
I think they know by now that the republicans have no limits as to how low they will sink. I hope they learned their lessons but maybe I am wrong. If they try to play nice guy again this go around they will lose again.
But then again I am sure Bush will start killining iranians or syrians pretty close to the election to assure a victory too. I don't know how they are going to counter that. Americans love a good old killing spree and will handsomely reward any party which kills brown people especially if they are muslims.
republitard is an excellent word. I made it up too. I think it beautifully represent the kind of guy handing out purple band-aids in the run up to the election mocking Kerry's war record don't you think?
Oh by the way only a republitard thinks that hillary (shouldn't you be saying hitlery like all the other republitards?) will lose because I used the word republitard. How many times have I head hillary clinton described as "pure evil" by republicans on the TV. If a republican can refer to hillary as "pure evil" or "worse threat then osama" on TV I don't think my calling you or the state of OK republitards will have any effect at all.
LOL, I was stationed in Altus AFB OK. I spent two years over there. I still have the T-Shirt front: "Where in the hell is Altus OK" Back:"About ten miles south of blair". When I left Altus I thought "Man I am never going back to that fucking state again" but alas for business reasons I have had the distinct misfortune of having to travel back there many many times.
Fuck man, if you want OK to look good don't tell people to go to that shithole of a town. Tulsa maybe, OKC maybe but Altus?? No freakin way. Having said that even Tulsa is nothing but a sea of white conservative suburbia occationally broken up by strip malls. I have never met so many rabid republitards and religious fundamentalists in my life. Man those people think BBQued bologna is gourmet!
Oh and while there are plenty of stupid people in my state it's nowhere near as many in OK.
Slashdot Mirror
You do know the difference between killin during war and dragging niggers behind your truck and crucifying fags on fenceposts right?
You don't want RMS to compromise. You want him to abandon his ideals and vision. For what exactly?
Sun has very onerous provisions on their java licensing which prevents inclusion of the JDK in a lot of Linux distributions. Why is this good for java? Why is it good for you (the java programmer) that I have to jump trough fifty hoops to install a JDK or a JRE before I can even run your program? Why is it good for you that the java implementation on my linux box is two years out of date and is slow?
How would RMS compromise to make all that better for you? How could Sun compromise to make that better?
The fact that is hasn't been done should tell you how important the GNU and FSF are to linux. Why does it bother you so much to give them a little credit?
"But the more he goes around criticizing other concepts (open source) and other people who make his world possible (Torvalds), if not perfect, the more he will alienate them and the farther away his dream will be."
What an utter bunch of crap this is. So if one disagrees with something Linus does or says what is he supposed to do? Is he not allowed to say that he disagrees with the most holy linus? Linus is not a god, nobody is a god. It's perfectly allowable nay encouraged to speak your mind when you think somebody is doing the wrong thing. That's the way "open source" works.
RMS doesn't call people names, he isn't rude. He does not act like the slashdot hordes who insist on calling him a hippie, freak, smelly, unwashed etc. He talks about his ideas, he carefully explains where his ideals are different and contrasting to other peoples ideas. I have never heard him call anybody names though which is a lot more then you can say about his critics.
"He needs Sun and Java and Torvalds and ESR and Red Hat and everyone else. "
He does? Did you mean that you do? You need them because you want a free operating system that does the things he needs. I don't think he is thinking like you. I don't think he thinks he needs those people.
"t this rate however... calling Linus insufficiently political is not going to win him any more fans. And more fans is exactly what he needs."
GASP!. He called linus insufficiently political!. I bet Linus will never speak to him again.
Thank god Linus is not fragile as you make him out to be. I bet Linus is perfectly capable of being called "insufficiently political" without holding grudges.
GO to it then. You do realize that after you your erection dies down you still will have to clean up your car dont' you? Come to think of it maybe touching all that blood will give you another hard on afterwards. If there is one thing we know about republitards they are fond of killing and death. It's virtually impossible to satiate the bloodlust of somebody like you.
I think you missed the point. Microsoft bought virtual server in order to charge people both for the virtual server software AND the license for windows. Now they are unable to charge people for the virtual server because both Xen and Vmware are free. Sure they are still going to charge a license for each installed windows OS but they do that anyway.
This is another case of open source products causing MS to drop prices. This time down to zero. MS can bleed like this for a long time but not infinately. Eventually they are going to have to figure out how to survive in a world where your competition is giving away what you are trying to sell.
They know they killed netscape that way, they know they could be killed the same way.
"Down the drain how exactly? Yes they put money into it and are now giving it away for free, but this is an investment in much the same way IE was."
With IE the goal was to kill netscape by giving away everything netscape sells. Not the shoe is on the other foot. It's not an investment because XEN is giving away they something they planned to sell.
"What is a million dallars to MS?"
Nothing of course. They have the luxury of having two monopolies and they can dump products on the market using their monopoly profits. In a better world with a better administration they would be back in court because dumping is illegal but in this world and with this administration they get away with it.
"GIVE UP THE PISSING MATCH!"
I will give up the pissing match when the religious fundamentalists of this world stop pissing on people. Somehow your "stop the pissing match" sounds like a rapist telling the 13 year old girl to "stop squiggling so much".
"Just live your lives the best way you can and let others try to do the same"
Good advice, let's see if Osama bin laden and pat robertson listen to you.
It's a little bit different. In the netscape their aim was to "cut off the airsupply" of netscape by giving away a free browser. In this case they are simply reacting to the fact that RedHat, Novell, IBM etc can now offer XEN out of the box with better performance and scalibility then anything MS has.
What's great about this announcement is that MS paid lots of money for virtual server and now they are forced to not only give it away for free but also provide support for it. That's millions of dollars down the drain for MS, money that could have gone to research, lobbying, advertising, PR, or even given back to the shareholders. Money down the drain, bad for MS, good for the rest of the world.
Is all this legal? Well probably. To be honest in a very real sense it's dumping. No company without a monopoly and monopoly profits could have afforded to spend that kind of money on virtual server and then give it away AND support it. The only reason MS can do it is because they have two established monopolies and they can use the obcene profits they make from their monopolies to fund money losing schemes like this (and virtually every other piece of software they hawk). In a pure market economy this could not work.
Why do americans (you certainly sound american) feel that everybody in africa is dying of hunger and thirst. You do realize that there are people in africa with food, water, clothes, schools, and electricity right? Did you ever think that maybe those people could use a computer?
Your argument can be restated like this "we should not help any african with anything until all africans have clean water and food and are not starving". That's a noble sounding argument but it's wrong. There are people in the US who are starving and homeless too. Should we stop giving to all charities until starvation and homelessness are eliminated?
If you don't know the answer to something, then it's perfectly safe to presume it's because God made it that way.
It's amazing to me how little humanity has progressed over the last few thousand years. In the days of ancient greeks people didn't know how ligtning was made so they said some God was striking an anvil. Same goes for Volcanoes, tidal waves etc, they were all a result of an angry God.
These days God has been reduced to the explanation of the platypus. "look I don't understand this thing, it's proof that god must exist". How pathetic is that?
LOL. Ooooh the republitard is going to beat me up!. I am so scared!. What's the matter ran out of fags to beat up and niggers to drag behind your truck?
Here let me explain to you some more.
When you are in the military and especially under combat you tend to act differently then you normally would. Even if you are not under combat you act different then you do in civillian life. Furthermore vietnam was a very long time ago. People tend to change over time.
Now your VP is actively trying to smear the combat record of one his fellow veterans. Trying demean his record, trying to minimize his sacrifice. The man got shot, he waged combat trying to serve his country. So what if he is a self serving bastard. Does that mean that the people killed are any less dead? Does that mean the wounds he suffered hurt any less? Does that mean that his service somehow counts less then your republitard VP?
I hope you are getting the picture here. Your VP is a disgrace to america and a disgrace to the military. When I was in the military I met a lot of self serving people, a lot of kissasses, a lot of incompetent nincompoops and a lot of assholes too. But you know what? All those people were doing the things they were doing in the process of serving their country and that counts for something. The idiot in the military could have stayed home and been an idiot but he was an idiot serving his country.
Finally is Bush not self serving? The man went to war for personal gain of himself and his close friends for gods sake.
I am trying to explain to you the difference between a republican and a republitard. The guy who doesn't want gays to marry is a republican, your VP is a republitard.
MS doesn't make any money from existing customers. Almost all their income comes from people buying new PCs and getting windows shoved down their throat.
Bush doesn't care if anybody likes him or not. He only cares that they can't hurt him and that he can make them suffer when he wants to.
Bush can make them suffer. Not by bombardment (that's being saved for Iran in the run up to the election) but by waging trade wars.
People who vote for bush because they are convinced that if the fags get married their marriages will suffer are republicans.
People who hand out purple band-aids and say Kerrys wounds were self inflicted and not serious are republitards.
You VP who goes around shitting on fellow vietnam vets' service record is a especially vile republitard.
"What if they said "screw you, I'm going home" and stopped officially selling product in the EU?"
That would be a happy day for me. It would mean that nobody in europe could read MS office documents and all web sites in europe would have to work with firefox. Happy Happy day.
"Of course, there would still be "grey-market" sales, and "3rd party" support, etc."
Nah. Most likely thing that would happen is that the EU would stop recognizing MS intellectual property and void all NDAs. At that point windows would pretty much be open source and MS would get the shaft. Their only recourse would be to bribe enough politicians to wage war on europe. I am pretty sure Rumsfeld would salivate to wage war on "old europe" but I don't think that even the biggest war pig in washington would take on that cause.
"As much as many do not like MSFT, this stinks of some sort of politicical extortion, plain and simple."
Well it's aboutpunishing the guilty. Since they are not allowed to put corporations in jail fines are the next best thing.
"The VP of Marketing at my company's husband was in Kerry's unit (Swift Boats) in Vietnam. He just about spits when he hears Kerry's name and says Kerry was the "worst self-serving son of a bitch" he'd served with. So I believe those who've been there and done that."
/.? "
Kerry went to war, bush didn't. Kerry got shot, bush didn't. Kerry shot people, bush didn't. Kerry completed the terms of his service, bush didn't.
So the VP or your company thinks that Kerry was a self seving son of a bitch does that mean he didn't server his country? Does that mean his wounds were self inflicted. Is bush a self serving son of a bitch?
So you think it's OK to demean the military service of all citizens who are self serving?
"Anyway, why are you running around calling people "republitard" on
Well because they are republitards that's why. Why not call a spade a spade. I don't believe in that PC bullshit. If you are a republitard then I will call you one.
"My point about you being childish is just that; it doesn't impress any swing voters when you're just calling names."
Since my lifes goal is not to impress you this statement has no effect whatsoever.
"Calling names and bringing out celebrities to tell people how to vote really worked in 2004, didn't it? Go Democrats!"
It worked great for republicans. They called Kerry a coward, they said democrats hate america. They said democrats wanted the US to be hit by terrorists. The only reason democrats didn't win was because they refused to sink down to the level of the republicans. In my opinion they should have gotten down to the gutter and called republicans things worse things. When republicans were saying Kerry was a traitor and a coward they should not have sat back in their seats and said "no he wasn't" They should have hit back at bush even harder. But they didn't and they lost. They will continue to lose as long as they take the high road while the republican party digs for even more slime.
I think they know by now that the republicans have no limits as to how low they will sink. I hope they learned their lessons but maybe I am wrong. If they try to play nice guy again this go around they will lose again.
But then again I am sure Bush will start killining iranians or syrians pretty close to the election to assure a victory too. I don't know how they are going to counter that. Americans love a good old killing spree and will handsomely reward any party which kills brown people especially if they are muslims.
republitard is an excellent word. I made it up too. I think it beautifully represent the kind of guy handing out purple band-aids in the run up to the election mocking Kerry's war record don't you think?
Oh by the way only a republitard thinks that hillary (shouldn't you be saying hitlery like all the other republitards?) will lose because I used the word republitard. How many times have I head hillary clinton described as "pure evil" by republicans on the TV. If a republican can refer to hillary as "pure evil" or "worse threat then osama" on TV I don't think my calling you or the state of OK republitards will have any effect at all.
BTW my Airman days are long time gone.
Doesn't this also incentivise (god I hate that word) MS to purposly break their OS?
If you could use a plant and then are denied the use of that plant then somebody has taken something away from you. That's stealing.
If I was the chinese and I wanted to conduct industrial espionage wouldn't I target phones instead of PCs?
So be it. I have no problems with losing the american market. Linux isn't for everybody.
LOL, I was stationed in Altus AFB OK. I spent two years over there. I still have the T-Shirt front: "Where in the hell is Altus OK" Back:"About ten miles south of blair". When I left Altus I thought "Man I am never going back to that fucking state again" but alas for business reasons I have had the distinct misfortune of having to travel back there many many times.
Fuck man, if you want OK to look good don't tell people to go to that shithole of a town. Tulsa maybe, OKC maybe but Altus?? No freakin way. Having said that even Tulsa is nothing but a sea of white conservative suburbia occationally broken up by strip malls. I have never met so many rabid republitards and religious fundamentalists in my life. Man those people think BBQued bologna is gourmet!
Oh and while there are plenty of stupid people in my state it's nowhere near as many in OK.