How else can you verify that all votes are valid? Seriously, it's the same problem, they should be solved the same way.
They are not the same problem.
You register to vote. You go to your assigned voting place. A trained volunteer will validate your name and address. Some states require ID to be presented to vote. You fill out your ballot, pull a lever, or whatever registers your vote and then you leave. Your vote is anonymous, but unless your county uses a paper ballot it's not that hard to match your signature outside the booth with the vote made inside the booth. The premise being that all votes made within the voting booth are consider legal and valid.
A petition involves volunteers loyal to a cause going to a local shopping center to gather signatures. No verification is performed, and nothing prevents them from hiring people to do nothing but sign bogus signatures. The premise being due to the uncontrolled environment surrounding a petition drive you can not assume that all signatures are legal or valid (eg. Signatures from people outside the jurisdiction should not count, etc.).
I don't know how it's moderated Flamebait. As a matter of fact Python is faster at number crunching if you use the appriate libraries (scipy,numpy). These are highly optimized C libraries, and they don't treat numbers as objects.
Let me preface my comment with if the tool is fast enough it should not matter that a different tool is faster...
Python isn't faster than Java for number crunching - that's C. Python is just the glue. I could say the same thing for Java if JNI was being used.
Pure Java beats pure Python.
I use both and with calculation speed not being a factor, Python with NumPy, SciPy, and Matplotlib is hard to beat especially considering how quickly it is to set the calculation up in an interactive python session.
However if the computation is complex or time consuming I use neither. There are packages (and languages) better suited to the task.
"Managed risk" is a intelligent sounding non-scary way of saying "hoping that it doesn't happen again" when there aren't any real disaster plan in place that mitigates the worst case scenario.
You can keep calling my comments "big emotional gestures" but it still doesn't change the facts.
Except the Deepwater Horizon is not the only oil well leaking in the Gulf of Mexico. From the Mobile Press Register dated Jun 7:
The Deepwater Horizon is not the only well leaking oil into the Gulf of Mexico for the last month.
A nearby drilling rig, the Ocean Saratoga, has been leaking since at least April 30, according to a federal document.
While the leak is decidedly smaller than the Deepwater Horizon spill, a 10-mile-long slick emanating from the Ocean Saratoga is visible from space in multiple images gathered by Skytruth.org, which monitors environmental problems using satellites.
Federal officials did not immediately respond when asked about the size of the leak, how long it had been flowing, or whether it was possible to plug it.
In addition, I don't think we can honestly say this is the first major off shore drilling accident in almost 20 years when 3000ft+ drilling hasn't been performed within the Gulf of Mexico that long.
A slide show presentation given at a Offshore Technology Conference on May 2, 2001 by Chris Oynes (the Regional Director of the Minerals Management Service) made it appear that drilling wells beyond the 3,000 ft depth was a relatively new activity in the Gulf of Mexico. In fact the deepest oil well startup given during his presentation was the single Diana / Hoover site at 4,679 ft in 2000.
According to Oynes presentation in 2001, the oil production growth was given at:
1995: 55 million barrels per year
1996: 72 million barrels per year
1997: 108 million barrels per year
1998: 159 million barrels per year
1999: 225 million barrels per year
2000: was estimated to be 217 million barrels per year
The vast majority of these "deepwater oil wells" were within the 500 to 1000 ft leasing areas.
The industry was very excited about the continued growth in oil production that could come from the much deeper oil well sites.
An article from the Oil and Gas Articles dated April 13, 2006 talked about the expanding deepwater drilling within the Gulf of Mexico whose growth accelerated in 2001, and MSNBC ran a similar story in September 2006 which stated:
A trio of oil companies led by Chevron Corp. has tapped a petroleum pool deep beneath the Gulf of Mexico that could boost the nation’s reserves by more than 50 percent. A test well indicates it could be the biggest new domestic oil discovery since Alaska’s Prudhoe Bay a generation ago...
Chevron on Tuesday estimated the 300-square-mile region where its test well sits could hold between 3 billion and 15 billion barrels of oil and natural gas liquids. The U.S. consumes roughly 5.7 billion barrels of crude-oil in a year.
It will take many years and tens of billions of dollars to bring the newly tapped oil to market, but the discovery carries particular importance for the industry at a time when Western oil and gas companies are finding fewer opportunities in politically unstable parts of the world, including the Middle East, Africa and Russia.
I especially like the following from the same article:
The proximity of the Gulf of Mexico to the world’s largest oil consuming nation makes it especially attractive. And it could bring pressure on Florida and other states to relax limits they have placed on drilling in their offshore waters for environmental and tourism reasons.
During the same time period (2006) CNBC ran a story:
Oil gusher in the Gulf of Mexico?
Deep-water test wells in the Gulf of Mexico indicate there may be huge new untapped oil reserves. CNBC asked Brian Hicks of U.S. Global Investors and Branko Terzic at Deloitte and Touche about the impact of the discoveries.
I think lumping the oil drilling performed at depths greater that 1500 feet with the more numerous (and older) drilling at depths between 500 and 1000ft gives the illusion tha
Right... I guess the correct response would be to say "thank you can I have another?"
I see nothing wrong with a moratorium on drilling. Especially since I have yet to see a viable solution to what happens when another blowout at 5000 feet happens again.
Hoping that it doesn't happen again is not an appropriate emergency response plan.
Do you actually care about these people you mention?
Why yes. They include family members. I live, work, and socialize with these people. I only have a 15 minute drive for a front seat at the BP horror show.
As for your other comment, strong words from an anonymous coward. Just because you spend your time hiding in a basement somewhere doesn't mean the rest of us do.
It's a tricky equation which probably can't be solved (correctly) by big emotional gestures.
What you call big emotional gestures is what I call an appropriate response. People outside of the petroleum industry (including myself) did not want these deep water wells. Unfortunately for my neck of the woods, the US just can't control its energy consumption and since most people in the north, west, and mid-west kept saying that domestic oil production should stay out of their backyards that left us on the gulf coast assuming all the environmental risk for the nation's unquenchable appetite for fossil fuels. Hell I've even heard a presidential campaign slogan for the solution for all of our energy problems.. what was it? Oh yea.. Drill baby drill with the subtext "but not in my backyard".
Luckily for the US, Louisiana and Texas are big oil states and would gladly sell their first-born son for the chance to make money with petroleum.
Estimates seem to vary, but from what I can turn up, the oil & gas extraction industry makes up somewhere between 10% to 15% of Louisiana's GDP (though what the ratio of onshore to offshore is I can't say).
Why should I give a rat's ass about Louisiana? They are only looking out for themselves and completely disregard the economic damage that allowing deep water drilling off their coast has done to the neighboring states. Florida even went through the trouble of banning off shore drilling and they too must suffer from the petroleum industry's hubris.
Also, we have to keep in mind that whether or not the moratorium gets enacted has little to no impact on how quickly the current BP spill gets contained and cleaned up. So all your points about other industries are, mostly, moot. Those industries are hurt by the BP spill whether other companies are allowed to continue drilling or not.
Except the petroleum industry is looking for a way off the hook. All of the petroleum companies drilling in the region shared the same bogus emergency response plan. Now we are expected to believe that BP is the exception not the rule. Don't let the pesky facts that drilling is contracted out to companies like Transoceans who own the drilling rigs, and Halliburton who constructed the cement oil-well casing. BP happened to be the one paying the contractors this time.
Just because petroleum companies have the luxury of continuing operations despite the environmental impact, doesn't mean we have to expedite their desire to have to moratorium lifted. I know a lot of shrimpers, condo time sharers, restauranteurs, oyster men, charter boat captains, and the huge number of people who have jobs performing within or supporting the hospitality industry on the gulf coast who wish they could simply go back to work.
Not to say that a moratorium is not an appropriate response. Just that there may be long-term consequences of that decision that do not appear to have considered.
The long term consequences are of the petroleum industry's own fault. BP (and others) should have weighed the risks of something really bad happening against cutting corners during drilling. Consequences include the swift reactive and punitive response of federal and local governments.
Where's the incentive for industries to regulate themselves (which they should do in addition to the government) if they are quickly relieved of the consequences?
You can't run Windows 3.1 apps on Windows 7 if, like most PCs that come with Windows 7, your PC has a 64-bit CPU and a 64-bit operating system.
Well the games I have ran in Windows XP and both the old computer and the netbook is 32 bit or for all intents and purposes run in 32 bit mode. Anyway, the game was designed to run on Windows XP and higher with DirectX.
Why haven't you already bought an external one? Do you not plan on reinstalling the operating system after a couple years?
Well I do own an external CD rom and its old and bulky and I think its silly to have a 10" netbook and carry around a 4 pound brick for the sole purpose of the DRM making sure I'm the legitimate owner which I am.
There is nothing illegal about me fooling the game into thinking that there's a CD-ROM attached to my machine.
I'm willing to take the chance and be civilly disobedient to show the absurdity of attempting to enforce private infringement. I don't pretend to be a law-abiding citizen; I've just had positive experiences from not obeying.
First of all... I'm not that conservative. I live in Alabama and the locals consider me a communistic liberal... Why? Beats me? Maybe I shouldn't of asked for the non-Republican primary ballot.
Anyway, I develop software for a living. However every single line of code I write is free (scientific stuff). I use Linux and other open source software whenever possible which after 5 years of work is almost exclusively (I have a Mac desktop and OS X is an indulgence). I submit patches to board support packages (anonymous kernel developer). I evangelize open source, and its use is increasing at work and at the homes of my colleagues. I'm able to further the cause and I haven't seen the need to be 'civil disobedient' in private. Of course I've been doing this for a very long time. My first public domain program (before GPL) was released in the mid 80's and became part of an up-and-coming collection of programs called SimTel I think...
I'm sorry. You lost me on that one. How does the inability to run NES cartridges (nintendo) on my PS3 (sony) have anything to do with my inability to run a PC Game?
Especially when I already own the title, there is no emulation since the OS is the same, and the only difference between my old system and the netbook is the lack of CD-ROM drive.
The entertainment industry does not have either a) a right to exist...
Wrong.
They have every right to exist. Just like you have a right to be a slashdot commenter.
or b) a right to make money.
Not exactly
It would be more correct to say they have a right to have a chance to make money. No one has a right to profit, but everyone has a right to try to make money as long as it through lawful means.
The MAFIAA wants to have it both ways: it's a free market when it comes to pricing, competition and business practices, but it's draconian laws when it comes to finding ways to support it's aging business model, and force people to pay when there are better alternatives available.
Disingenuous BS.
The music and movie industry wants to appear to want a free market and they want to be able to continue doing business as any business should. You on the other hand, feel entitled to media regardless of its source. There is no changing your mind. Narcissist will alway take the route of least resistance.
The sad thing being that the amount of energy being spent to come up with this hyperbole could be better spent creating your own media or support other independent "open" media and distributing them in the manner that you see fit. Others are doing it. GPL licensed software is a perfect example. So are "open content" being produced with the "Creative Commons", "Open Content License", "Open Publication License", etc.
If you don't like the way the big media studios do business, then compete with them. Only consume "open media". Take the high road and don't even acknowledge their existence which includes no longer file-sharing their crap. Because simply feeling entitled to commit copyright infringement doesn't change anything. They know they have a valuable content (because you share it illegally) and they have a legitimate boogey man to point to when demanding more draconian copyright laws.
Until you make the difficult choice of only using "open content" and stop infringing legitimate copyrights, I and others will not place much value in your opinion. Especially when you spew the crap that was in the parent comment which screams that you're a self absorbed individual who only sponges off others and don't care about the consequences... and you wonder why your ideas don't seem to gain traction.
If you are passionate for the cause then BOYCOTT the movie and music studios. Downloading free copies of their crap does not help the movement.
I don't always agree with his politics but I do share his concerns.
For example from the TFA:
“ACTA threatens, in a disguised way, to punish Internet users with disconnection if they are accused of sharing, and requires countries to prohibit software that can break Digital Restrictions Management (DRM), also known as digital handcuffs,” said Stallman.
I agree that being accused of sharing is not enough to justify disconnection.
However if they are convicted of file sharing then disconnection can be an acceptable punishment though I think it's silly and unenforceable. I'm also against mandatory sentencing guidelines, because they don't take circumstances into account.
Software that break DRM is tool and can be used for legal reasons too. What if I wanted to run a program that I purchased but can't because my netbook doesn't have a CD-ROM drive? I'm not going to share my program so why should I be treated as a criminal?
Where we differ:
I believe that someone who knowingly share a copyrighted file(s) without the consent of the creator has committed copyright infringement and is liable for any punishment related to that infraction (US has laws that make it criminal as well as civil) .
It's still copyright infringement and copyright laws are only as good as the enforcement. I also believe that the current laws are good enough and every attempt "strengthen" them involves taking rights away from the consumer. Take the DRM removal software for example. If I used the software and made the resulting broken DRM file available to others, I am already breaking copyright law. However, if I use it on software that I have a valid EULA for (because I actually paid for it) and keep it to myself then this should remain legal. Also, if I use the DRM to "steal" services by copying files that I did not rightfully purchase then there are already laws against that too.
The corporations are frustrated that they can't stem the tide of piracy and therefore want to make the tools that make it possible illegal. I say too bad for them. They already proven they can find violators so why go after a tool?
I was talking about the earlier time-frame of the early DOS days which were the foundation of later Microsoft "successes"...
A lot of conjecture there.
BTW the DR-DOS issue was Windows 3.1 refusing to run on anything but Microsoft DOS. This was a short lived problem for DR-DOS and had nothing to do with a competing GUI. Don't let the facts ruin your rant.
You've described Apple McIntosh, which came out long before Windows did.
Ummm no. Apple made Apple branded printers which worked great with the Mac. And yes their software also worked well with epson compatible machines, but the best results always came from an Apple branded printer.
Also where was the expansion slot? How do I upgrade my graphics card? Oh yea I can't. But at least in the 80's everything looked good in black and white.
Oh and when did Xerox ever sell a home computer?
They loved money.
Yea because we all know computer manufactures are non-profits and give stuff away... what are you smoking?
Linux is actually a perfect example, and also proof-positive empirical test that shows beyond any doubt that the Microsoft ecosystem is a self-sustaining monopoly and not a result of innovative competition.
You are absolutely correct. Linux is a perfect example. It is not consumer friendly even though Ubuntu does a very good job of making it friendlier. None of the programs consumers want to use (eq. Games) run well or at all on Linux. Therefore Linux still has a very small percentage of the home market.
Again, no. They (particularly Bill) took advantage of utter gullibility of consumers and pushed a "product" so inferior that every C-grade student at any of those universities could do better.
Now we are getting to the root of your problem!
You seem to not care what the end user wants, but keep harping about computer science students. Why? Who cares? Except maybe you.
You keep harping on a "conspiracy" about consumers not picking your favorite OS. The problem being that you rather force users into using your OS. You mock those that don't. You assume that the reason consumers use another OS is because the creator did a better job of forcing them into "vendor lock in".
No one was ever prevented from making an OS that the end user wanted to use. Apple did it.
As for the rest of your comment:
Acknowledging someone's contribution to home computing is not celebrity worshipping. Everything is black-and-white with you. I'm sure you don't worship RMS either...
I remember a few years ago when people were lined up at Best Buy, Circuit City, and EB Games to get the XBox 360. Sony and Nintendo had similar results with their game consoles.
I don't think waiting in line to be the first to get one is limited to Apple products.
Here's a news flash. People wait in line to purchase a book (eg. Harry Potter, Twilight, etc) and to be the first to see a movie (eg. Star Wars, Lord of the Rings).
Waiting in line is not always a bad thing. I waiting in line with my daughter at every Harry Potter book release. It always came out near her birthday and it was fun to speak to other fans of the book. Now that she is grown, I look back fondly to the experience. Especially when she was waiting in line to read a book.
I've waiting in line for WoW Burning Crusades because I had nothing else to do and the EB Games was next door to where I was staying overnight on work travel. However, I usually wait until the next day or so because... well... its a game and there are plenty of copies.
Anyway, people will wait in line for anything these days and I don't see it as a bad thing - in fact we need more. Why? Anything that will get people out of their basements and socialize with other people in person can't be all bad.
Oh quit with the bullshit. While Gates was busy buying a boot-loader and reselling it as an "operating system", every Computer Science University course worth its salt was handing out student assignments that involved writing a multi-tasking, multi-user OS for micro-processor architectures. Gates would have flunked (with a good reason as history amply shows). His earlier "innovation" of a BASIC interpreter was at the time an obvious choice and common-place amongst pretty much all home "computer" vendors.
Umm. Which part of your comment addresses my point about "Like how many operating systems during the 80's and early 90's operated on a "IBM" personal computer running a multitude of different hardware configurations?"
Did I mention multi-user? or multi-tasking? No I did not. Nor did I mention BASIC. I did notice that you couldn't answer the question. Maybe you didn't want to admit that the answer was Microsoft Windows?
To further my point made in my original comment - Microsoft created and marketed an OS that worked with a multitude of hardware. Windows was the first consumer operating system that handled all the different hardware available and freed the application writer from having to worry about printer codes, video codecs, or graphics acceleration. Gone were the days that a home user had to pick up the printer manual and enter the codes for bold and underline into their word processor.
The consumer no longer had to limit their hardware choices to a single computer manufacturer. For example a home user was free to buy any printer they could afford and as long as it said that it worked with Windows on the box the user was pretty sure that it would work when they got it home.
Computer manufacturers loved Windows. They had a user-friendly OS that allowed them to make PC clones and picked the components that fit their intended price/performance. Dell, Compaq, Gateway, Acer, E-Machines, and the huge selection of beige boxes would not have existed without Windows. The only thing the manufacturer had to promise was that it was made for Windows. The large number of computer suppliers drove the price of a home computer down from over $2000 to a much more affordable around $1000 or less. Not to mention the growing number of home computer hobbyists that were able to pick up a Computer Shopper and build a Windows compatible machine.
I think Linux would have an even harder time becoming popular today if it weren't for the abundance of off-the-shelf PC compatible hardware that is being created to satisfy the consumer demand for Microsoft Windows. I bet the thought of Microsoft's influence in providing ready made computer components that ultimately made Linux and other operating systems possible is making your blood boil right about now.
I think you are forgetting that Gates (and Jobs) was not concerned with the Computer Science crowd that you mentioned in your comment. They knew if they made the computer usable by the average consumer, then they could make a fortune and advance home computing. It was more important for them to recognize a need to make a computer that a home user would purchase and use than your requirement that they be technological proficient in their field.
Because Bill Gates recognized the potential of the home computer market. He is both an innovator and rich.
As for your view of charities. Damn if a rich man gives and damn if a rich man doesn't. I don't think Bill Gates gives a rat's ass on how we think he should spend his money. I'm pretty sure there are children in third world countries that are glad he paid for their immunizations.
Anyway I think you are too obsessed with hating Bill Gates and company that you refuse to acknowledge any contributions he and his company has made. Too bad...
Slashdot Mirror
They are not the same problem.
You register to vote. You go to your assigned voting place. A trained volunteer will validate your name and address. Some states require ID to be presented to vote. You fill out your ballot, pull a lever, or whatever registers your vote and then you leave. Your vote is anonymous, but unless your county uses a paper ballot it's not that hard to match your signature outside the booth with the vote made inside the booth. The premise being that all votes made within the voting booth are consider legal and valid.
A petition involves volunteers loyal to a cause going to a local shopping center to gather signatures. No verification is performed, and nothing prevents them from hiring people to do nothing but sign bogus signatures. The premise being due to the uncontrolled environment surrounding a petition drive you can not assume that all signatures are legal or valid (eg. Signatures from people outside the jurisdiction should not count, etc.).
Let me preface my comment with if the tool is fast enough it should not matter that a different tool is faster...
Python isn't faster than Java for number crunching - that's C. Python is just the glue. I could say the same thing for Java if JNI was being used.
Pure Java beats pure Python.
I use both and with calculation speed not being a factor, Python with NumPy, SciPy, and Matplotlib is hard to beat especially considering how quickly it is to set the calculation up in an interactive python session.
However if the computation is complex or time consuming I use neither. There are packages (and languages) better suited to the task.
Voting is not the same as signing a petition.
Petitions are public record and so are the signatures.
How else can we verify that all the signatures are valid?
Not to mention you'll have an actual Java JVM with a mature implementation of JIT and not the Google re-imagining that is Dalvik.
"Managed risk" is a intelligent sounding non-scary way of saying "hoping that it doesn't happen again" when there aren't any real disaster plan in place that mitigates the worst case scenario.
You can keep calling my comments "big emotional gestures" but it still doesn't change the facts.
Except the Deepwater Horizon is not the only oil well leaking in the Gulf of Mexico. From the Mobile Press Register dated Jun 7:
In addition, I don't think we can honestly say this is the first major off shore drilling accident in almost 20 years when 3000ft+ drilling hasn't been performed within the Gulf of Mexico that long.
A slide show presentation given at a Offshore Technology Conference on May 2, 2001 by Chris Oynes (the Regional Director of the Minerals Management Service) made it appear that drilling wells beyond the 3,000 ft depth was a relatively new activity in the Gulf of Mexico. In fact the deepest oil well startup given during his presentation was the single Diana / Hoover site at 4,679 ft in 2000.
According to Oynes presentation in 2001, the oil production growth was given at:
1995: 55 million barrels per year
1996: 72 million barrels per year
1997: 108 million barrels per year
1998: 159 million barrels per year
1999: 225 million barrels per year
2000: was estimated to be 217 million barrels per year
The vast majority of these "deepwater oil wells" were within the 500 to 1000 ft leasing areas.
The industry was very excited about the continued growth in oil production that could come from the much deeper oil well sites.
An article from the Oil and Gas Articles dated April 13, 2006 talked about the expanding deepwater drilling within the Gulf of Mexico whose growth accelerated in 2001, and MSNBC ran a similar story in September 2006 which stated:
I especially like the following from the same article:
During the same time period (2006) CNBC ran a story:
I think lumping the oil drilling performed at depths greater that 1500 feet with the more numerous (and older) drilling at depths between 500 and 1000ft gives the illusion tha
Right... I guess the correct response would be to say "thank you can I have another?"
I see nothing wrong with a moratorium on drilling. Especially since I have yet to see a viable solution to what happens when another blowout at 5000 feet happens again.
Hoping that it doesn't happen again is not an appropriate emergency response plan.
Why yes. They include family members. I live, work, and socialize with these people. I only have a 15 minute drive for a front seat at the BP horror show.
As for your other comment, strong words from an anonymous coward. Just because you spend your time hiding in a basement somewhere doesn't mean the rest of us do.
What you call big emotional gestures is what I call an appropriate response. People outside of the petroleum industry (including myself) did not want these deep water wells. Unfortunately for my neck of the woods, the US just can't control its energy consumption and since most people in the north, west, and mid-west kept saying that domestic oil production should stay out of their backyards that left us on the gulf coast assuming all the environmental risk for the nation's unquenchable appetite for fossil fuels. Hell I've even heard a presidential campaign slogan for the solution for all of our energy problems.. what was it? Oh yea.. Drill baby drill with the subtext "but not in my backyard".
Luckily for the US, Louisiana and Texas are big oil states and would gladly sell their first-born son for the chance to make money with petroleum.
Why should I give a rat's ass about Louisiana? They are only looking out for themselves and completely disregard the economic damage that allowing deep water drilling off their coast has done to the neighboring states. Florida even went through the trouble of banning off shore drilling and they too must suffer from the petroleum industry's hubris.
Except the petroleum industry is looking for a way off the hook. All of the petroleum companies drilling in the region shared the same bogus emergency response plan. Now we are expected to believe that BP is the exception not the rule. Don't let the pesky facts that drilling is contracted out to companies like Transoceans who own the drilling rigs, and Halliburton who constructed the cement oil-well casing. BP happened to be the one paying the contractors this time.
Just because petroleum companies have the luxury of continuing operations despite the environmental impact, doesn't mean we have to expedite their desire to have to moratorium lifted. I know a lot of shrimpers, condo time sharers, restauranteurs, oyster men, charter boat captains, and the huge number of people who have jobs performing within or supporting the hospitality industry on the gulf coast who wish they could simply go back to work.
The long term consequences are of the petroleum industry's own fault. BP (and others) should have weighed the risks of something really bad happening against cutting corners during drilling. Consequences include the swift reactive and punitive response of federal and local governments.
Where's the incentive for industries to regulate themselves (which they should do in addition to the government) if they are quickly relieved of the consequences?
Actually that makes sense. Who's better to make these license plates? A little over qualified... perhaps.
Idiots? They make more money than we do and all they have to do is drive fast and turn left. Who's the bigger idiot?
Well the games I have ran in Windows XP and both the old computer and the netbook is 32 bit or for all intents and purposes run in 32 bit mode. Anyway, the game was designed to run on Windows XP and higher with DirectX.
Well I do own an external CD rom and its old and bulky and I think its silly to have a 10" netbook and carry around a 4 pound brick for the sole purpose of the DRM making sure I'm the legitimate owner which I am.
There is nothing illegal about me fooling the game into thinking that there's a CD-ROM attached to my machine.
Just admit you didn't have that valid of a point.
First of all... I'm not that conservative. I live in Alabama and the locals consider me a communistic liberal... Why? Beats me? Maybe I shouldn't of asked for the non-Republican primary ballot.
Anyway, I develop software for a living. However every single line of code I write is free (scientific stuff). I use Linux and other open source software whenever possible which after 5 years of work is almost exclusively (I have a Mac desktop and OS X is an indulgence). I submit patches to board support packages (anonymous kernel developer). I evangelize open source, and its use is increasing at work and at the homes of my colleagues. I'm able to further the cause and I haven't seen the need to be 'civil disobedient' in private. Of course I've been doing this for a very long time. My first public domain program (before GPL) was released in the mid 80's and became part of an up-and-coming collection of programs called SimTel I think...
Nothing worth doing is accomplished overnight.
I'm sorry. You lost me on that one. How does the inability to run NES cartridges (nintendo) on my PS3 (sony) have anything to do with my inability to run a PC Game?
Especially when I already own the title, there is no emulation since the OS is the same, and the only difference between my old system and the netbook is the lack of CD-ROM drive.
But what if it's an old game that isn't sold anymore and I already owned it years before I bought the netbook?
Which one? The one before the big battle or the one during disembowelment?
Wrong.
They have every right to exist. Just like you have a right to be a slashdot commenter.
Not exactly
It would be more correct to say they have a right to have a chance to make money. No one has a right to profit, but everyone has a right to try to make money as long as it through lawful means.
Disingenuous BS.
The music and movie industry wants to appear to want a free market and they want to be able to continue doing business as any business should. You on the other hand, feel entitled to media regardless of its source. There is no changing your mind. Narcissist will alway take the route of least resistance.
The sad thing being that the amount of energy being spent to come up with this hyperbole could be better spent creating your own media or support other independent "open" media and distributing them in the manner that you see fit. Others are doing it. GPL licensed software is a perfect example. So are "open content" being produced with the "Creative Commons", "Open Content License", "Open Publication License", etc.
If you don't like the way the big media studios do business, then compete with them. Only consume "open media". Take the high road and don't even acknowledge their existence which includes no longer file-sharing their crap. Because simply feeling entitled to commit copyright infringement doesn't change anything. They know they have a valuable content (because you share it illegally) and they have a legitimate boogey man to point to when demanding more draconian copyright laws.
Until you make the difficult choice of only using "open content" and stop infringing legitimate copyrights, I and others will not place much value in your opinion. Especially when you spew the crap that was in the parent comment which screams that you're a self absorbed individual who only sponges off others and don't care about the consequences... and you wonder why your ideas don't seem to gain traction.
If you are passionate for the cause then BOYCOTT the movie and music studios. Downloading free copies of their crap does not help the movement.
Of course, RMS wants all software to be free.
I don't always agree with his politics but I do share his concerns.
For example from the TFA:
I agree that being accused of sharing is not enough to justify disconnection.
However if they are convicted of file sharing then disconnection can be an acceptable punishment though I think it's silly and unenforceable. I'm also against mandatory sentencing guidelines, because they don't take circumstances into account.
Software that break DRM is tool and can be used for legal reasons too. What if I wanted to run a program that I purchased but can't because my netbook doesn't have a CD-ROM drive? I'm not going to share my program so why should I be treated as a criminal?
Where we differ:
I believe that someone who knowingly share a copyrighted file(s) without the consent of the creator has committed copyright infringement and is liable for any punishment related to that infraction (US has laws that make it criminal as well as civil) .
It's still copyright infringement and copyright laws are only as good as the enforcement. I also believe that the current laws are good enough and every attempt "strengthen" them involves taking rights away from the consumer. Take the DRM removal software for example. If I used the software and made the resulting broken DRM file available to others, I am already breaking copyright law. However, if I use it on software that I have a valid EULA for (because I actually paid for it) and keep it to myself then this should remain legal. Also, if I use the DRM to "steal" services by copying files that I did not rightfully purchase then there are already laws against that too.
The corporations are frustrated that they can't stem the tide of piracy and therefore want to make the tools that make it possible illegal. I say too bad for them. They already proven they can find violators so why go after a tool?
Well I guess RMS and I don't differ that much.
A lot of conjecture there.
BTW the DR-DOS issue was Windows 3.1 refusing to run on anything but Microsoft DOS. This was a short lived problem for DR-DOS and had nothing to do with a competing GUI. Don't let the facts ruin your rant.
Ummm no. Apple made Apple branded printers which worked great with the Mac. And yes their software also worked well with epson compatible machines, but the best results always came from an Apple branded printer.
Also where was the expansion slot? How do I upgrade my graphics card? Oh yea I can't. But at least in the 80's everything looked good in black and white.
Oh and when did Xerox ever sell a home computer?
Yea because we all know computer manufactures are non-profits and give stuff away... what are you smoking?
You are absolutely correct. Linux is a perfect example. It is not consumer friendly even though Ubuntu does a very good job of making it friendlier. None of the programs consumers want to use (eq. Games) run well or at all on Linux. Therefore Linux still has a very small percentage of the home market.
Now we are getting to the root of your problem!
You seem to not care what the end user wants, but keep harping about computer science students. Why? Who cares? Except maybe you.
You keep harping on a "conspiracy" about consumers not picking your favorite OS. The problem being that you rather force users into using your OS. You mock those that don't. You assume that the reason consumers use another OS is because the creator did a better job of forcing them into "vendor lock in".
No one was ever prevented from making an OS that the end user wanted to use. Apple did it.
As for the rest of your comment:
Acknowledging someone's contribution to home computing is not celebrity worshipping. Everything is black-and-white with you. I'm sure you don't worship RMS either...
Yea but Sony thanks you for your blu-ray purchases (or rentals).
Well if you use Windows, you may wish to jump off a bridge.
I remember a few years ago when people were lined up at Best Buy, Circuit City, and EB Games to get the XBox 360. Sony and Nintendo had similar results with their game consoles.
I don't think waiting in line to be the first to get one is limited to Apple products.
Here's a news flash. People wait in line to purchase a book (eg. Harry Potter, Twilight, etc) and to be the first to see a movie (eg. Star Wars, Lord of the Rings).
Waiting in line is not always a bad thing. I waiting in line with my daughter at every Harry Potter book release. It always came out near her birthday and it was fun to speak to other fans of the book. Now that she is grown, I look back fondly to the experience. Especially when she was waiting in line to read a book.
I've waiting in line for WoW Burning Crusades because I had nothing else to do and the EB Games was next door to where I was staying overnight on work travel. However, I usually wait until the next day or so because... well... its a game and there are plenty of copies.
Anyway, people will wait in line for anything these days and I don't see it as a bad thing - in fact we need more. Why? Anything that will get people out of their basements and socialize with other people in person can't be all bad.
Humans are funny.
Umm. Which part of your comment addresses my point about "Like how many operating systems during the 80's and early 90's operated on a "IBM" personal computer running a multitude of different hardware configurations?"
Did I mention multi-user? or multi-tasking? No I did not. Nor did I mention BASIC. I did notice that you couldn't answer the question. Maybe you didn't want to admit that the answer was Microsoft Windows?
To further my point made in my original comment - Microsoft created and marketed an OS that worked with a multitude of hardware. Windows was the first consumer operating system that handled all the different hardware available and freed the application writer from having to worry about printer codes, video codecs, or graphics acceleration. Gone were the days that a home user had to pick up the printer manual and enter the codes for bold and underline into their word processor. The consumer no longer had to limit their hardware choices to a single computer manufacturer. For example a home user was free to buy any printer they could afford and as long as it said that it worked with Windows on the box the user was pretty sure that it would work when they got it home.
Computer manufacturers loved Windows. They had a user-friendly OS that allowed them to make PC clones and picked the components that fit their intended price/performance. Dell, Compaq, Gateway, Acer, E-Machines, and the huge selection of beige boxes would not have existed without Windows. The only thing the manufacturer had to promise was that it was made for Windows. The large number of computer suppliers drove the price of a home computer down from over $2000 to a much more affordable around $1000 or less. Not to mention the growing number of home computer hobbyists that were able to pick up a Computer Shopper and build a Windows compatible machine.
I think Linux would have an even harder time becoming popular today if it weren't for the abundance of off-the-shelf PC compatible hardware that is being created to satisfy the consumer demand for Microsoft Windows. I bet the thought of Microsoft's influence in providing ready made computer components that ultimately made Linux and other operating systems possible is making your blood boil right about now.
I think you are forgetting that Gates (and Jobs) was not concerned with the Computer Science crowd that you mentioned in your comment. They knew if they made the computer usable by the average consumer, then they could make a fortune and advance home computing. It was more important for them to recognize a need to make a computer that a home user would purchase and use than your requirement that they be technological proficient in their field.
Because Bill Gates recognized the potential of the home computer market. He is both an innovator and rich.
As for your view of charities. Damn if a rich man gives and damn if a rich man doesn't. I don't think Bill Gates gives a rat's ass on how we think he should spend his money. I'm pretty sure there are children in third world countries that are glad he paid for their immunizations.
Anyway I think you are too obsessed with hating Bill Gates and company that you refuse to acknowledge any contributions he and his company has made. Too bad...