The way most people keep up to date on network news is through
subscription to a number of mail reflectors (also known as mail
exploders). Mail reflectors are special electronic mailboxes which,
when they receive a message, resend it to a list of other mailboxes.
This in effect creates a discussion group on a particular topic.
Each subscriber sees all the mail forwarded by the reflector, and if
one wants to put his "two cents" in sends a message with the comments
to the reflector.
I have hard to see any significant improvements needed to be done on Linux itself, which is not already being in development. It is the world around which need to improve. If I had the resources I should lobby politicians over the world to make it illegal to sell hardware which is not documented.
It is very annoying when trying to buy hardware and find that not even the chipset is specified.
Such products should just be put in the trash bin directly, not to be sold.
Even worse, manufacturers that change chipsets to something incompatible and preserves the old product name, this is to deceive the customer and should definitely be illegal as other types of frauds are.
Of course I prefer HW whis already on the package and product description at the site can tell that this HW is Linux supported. The chipset used should anyway be declared and it should be well documented.
We (our company) are working on a system to at least enhance the commercial aspect, that is as a buyer your have incentive to prefer products which are well documented. It should imply bad business if you try to fool the customers.
As a customer you should ask yourselves: do I really dare to buy this product?,
as it lacks documentation; no, I go for this product instead, which is proven to work and is well documented. HW manufacturers who don't document their stuff should either go bankrupt or be jailed for fraud.
Maybe I have very old ideas about programming, but... why not fix the fundamental flaws in the software first, before adding features...
(I thought it was only the linux 64 bit version missing, but
fortunately I was wrong)
Notice that, though AmigaDOS could multithread well (except when it crashed, which happened alot because it had no MMU)
True, but there were a lot of extension boards which included MMU, like the Fusion40 (with 68040) board. A friend of mine wrote an MMU handler that had e.g. memory protection, which allowed a lot of crashes to be catched so only that program would have to be killed as in all modern OSes (if the program hadn't destroyed any structures in chip memory (that common DMA area for blitters etc) that couldn't be MMU protected. This MMU handler didn't reach mainstream though, but I think he made a deal with that Canadian company so you could get it when you bought a Fusion 40 accelerator.
I actually used my Amiga with Fusion40 in my research work until 1996 when I started running Linux instead. There are still features I miss from AmigaDOS like the global environment variables.
Same here, I won't buy a technology which I can't use. I do buy DVDs though, I have about 400-500 in my collection, but that's due to a certain crack, otherwise I hadn't started buying them.
I simply say no to DRM technology. I haven't bought any DRM protected music either, not even a CD with the old "copy protection".
No doubt MS and some others will have a few people perminantly assigned to tearing apart applications from others.
Certainly, but there are plenty of people, like 50% of those I know that would gladly tear MS patent applications apart for free.
Are you willing to stake the future of your empire on "reasonably small"? The Third Reich did. Remind me again, what was the mortality rate of the U-boat service post when the allies cracked ENIGMA? 90%? 95%?
The problem with having one encryption scheme that you think is
safe, is that it will fail. As in all business you have to take
into account a certain failure rate.
As in my example I used P(a|t) for a certain scheme to be valid
during a certain time period t. With accurate timing (my bank uses
infininte time for certain codes for instance) going towards femto-to-attoseconds with more accurate devices for one time
passwords you will also significantly decrease the risk to make
decryption attempts useful.
Proably we don't need infinite encryption schemes. I think this encryption thing has gone too far. If a,b,c are independent and there is a certain probability P(a|t), P(b|t), P(c|t) to decrypt each of the schemes within a certain time, when combined the P(a|t)*P(b|t)*P(c|t) can be made reasonable small.
The problem with this approach is that most of them are gibberish.
I have a PhD in computer science and I have two patents (one accepted 1992 and one applied 2005) on my own, but when randomly grabbing a MS patent it often just doesn't make sense.
MS has been spamming USPTO with completely ridiculus patent applications.
An example is this famous "IS NOT" operator patent, this is not gibberish but it is like a bad pub joke
MS USPTO patent application of the IS NOT OPERATOR
An application like this should of course not be accepted, but when they
abuse the system with this kind of applications as well as the gibberish
applications, there is a high probability that some of these will slip through in the process and, voilà, they have yet another patent that
can be used to attack anyone.
OK, In one way one can claim that Microsoft is doing us a favour, to show us how ridiculus the system is, to create arguments for abolishing the patent system, but I have hard to imagine that Microsoft would have an idealistic approach here. They are just plain evil!
It doesn't matter if they invented it, only if they patented it. Which is what's wrong with the whole system.
If I'm right informed that is what is wrong with the system here in Europe,
i.e. first to file, but what is wrong with your system in US is that you have first to invent, despite it has been published long time ago, you can file a patent in US.
I don't say that one system is worse than the other, patents as such have flaws, and are obstacles to innovation. This is extremely visible in the ridiculus software patents we have seen, but it is not only there a problem. We (our company) are actually developing a new business strategy to decrease this problem with patents in general, to counteract the patent obstacle to innovation on consumer products, as they are destroying business and creativity, even though I don't intend to advertise this strategy here and now.
"Microsoft may be afraid to list these supposed violations because it knows the patents can be worked around by the open source community"
Not sure about that. SW pats are often either insanely broad, or useless.
If they actually have patents that are "useful", I would guess that almost
every other software system/kernel would violate them. Thus making the
whole idea even more ridiculus, because then it may be found that Sun, IBM, Apple and so on violates them as well. The when inspecting the patents at Sun, IBM, etc it will be found that MS violates a huge bunch of them.
A battle involving sw pats can't be won. If Microsoft walks this path they are dead, and should be anyway, if they start acting like this. I see this as the first death throes within a dying giant.
Now MS are even helping themselves to be wiped out in a similar fashion.
I think they did some miscalculation (Ballmer should probably do more exercise in throwing chairs, improve something that he is good at, but leading a company, no!)
Even though it is obvious I assume the really scary part is that you can get sued and to defend yourself you have to spend time and money on trials and lawyers, at least in US.
Software patents should be abolished completely, as they are counteracting the purpose of patents, but not only software patents have this flaw. Generally speaking I would say that e.g. patents on consumer products is a an obstacle to innovation.
I'm very disappointed with your actions and claims this summer
by attacking Linux and also GPL in the farsighted way you are doing.
The only logical conclusion I can make from this is that you have
decided to kill your own product, UnixWare.
Whether you win this case or not is not important from that point
of view. You have harmed your own business for all future. UnixWare
is dead. If you win this case, the freedom in this world is gone.
You are creating anarchy, worse than the US patent system causes
due to it's unlimited patentability on software and business
methods.
I don't expect an explanation back from you.
Sincerely yours myname mycompany
I actually recieved an answer containing:
SCO is not trying to destroy UnixWare, we are only trying to protect our
intellectual property. I'm sorry that this runs contrary to your
thinking, but when a company's intellectual property is being
threatened, it has to take action.
My immediate conspiratory consideration then was that
Microsoft gladly supported the trial as it had potential
to harm both UnixWare and the Linux kernel, both
competitors to MS.
At that time the Microsoft mix into this were merely rumours
but last year their support were more or less proven
The writer didn't specify what environment he/she is using. In certain
environments, like MS windows you don't have multiple workspaces by default
and that could be a real obstacle to productivity. I see MS windows users
that open and close applications all the time to not get the screen
to messy.
I normally use eight workspaces in my environment, one for system things,
one for mail, one for encyclopedias and such (always open), one for web
browsing, two for software dev, one for virtual machines and one for office
things, and I have hard to see how multiple monitors could improve anything.
I do most of my work on my laptop (M200 12" 1400x1050 screen) and don't like
to be chained fast to a desk. My laptop is always with me and always on.
I also have several desks (two offices at home) and one office at work
where I also have desktop monitors (connected to different computers through KVM switches). These I use solely for larger jobs
that need to be run for a longer time, as I couldn't have the jobs
runnings through my laptop.
From the writers question I suspect that multiple workspaces, which are
default in environments like gnome, kde etc are not used.
I've been curious for a while about mobile phones versus laptops on planes. We have to turn the phones off, but who even thinks to turn off the 802.11 or Blue Tooth in their laptop? Perhaps the 2.4GHz range doesn't coincide with navigational frequencies or something.
I do, every time, and you, that makes us at least two.
Exactly, I would never ever consider buying anything with DRM (locked music, locked phones etc) and look very carefully and also ask the seller that a certain CD is not copy protected when I buy it. OK, DVD movies is an exception, but thanks to DeCSS that is not a problem. It was after DeCSS I started buying DVD movies, I have about 400 in my collection now.
I have never file shared illegally on the web and I don't mind paying for stuff, but I would never buy anything DRM-protected, I only pay for stuff that is clean.
The best way to support Linux is to support Linux laptop builders, not to throw more money at Dell.
Maybe the Dells are cheaper. Fine, then buy the Dell and throw the Windows away. I think it's ridiculous to buy the Dell and demand refunds.
I agree that we should support Linux laptop builders, but
There may be reasons that I want a specific hardware.
There is no reason that we should be forced to think that
M$ Windows is the normal. It is better that it is an option, which you
pay for. This will make people think what they really want, and this will be beneficial for Linux laptop builders.
Microsoft does not want it to be an option, this is a very good reason why we should work for it becoming an option
Those that want Windows should of course get it, but not for "free"
If you really want to keep others from patenting something you invented "first," put up a webpage, publish a paper, let the world know about your "obvious" invention -- that's how you can do this. Coming back 10 years later when someone else is successful and sitting back and complaining that it was "obvious" because you invented it "first" doesn't do any good at all.
I think you have completely missed the point about what means being obvious. An obvious idea is something you don't bother about publishing. You don't consider it worth the effort. I usually come up about 20 "obvious" ideas every day. If I would start publishing those in the way you suggest, then I wouldn't be able to do my work. I have however, one patent from the beginning of 90ies, a method I considered to be obvious (I just used my recent experience from neural networks and applied it to expert systems) but my boss then encouraged us to apply anyway, today I wouldn't have done so. I have applied for another patent though, that took me 14 years to find out how to deal with the problem, and how to finally make a business model of it. Of course this doesn't prove that it's not obvious for someone else, but due to the complexity of the solution I believe it is not.
Anyway, if I would write up and publish my obvious ideas as you suggest I wouldn't have anything to live from, because it would take to much time. Of course this is tremendously serious problem in computer science as every software developer is also an inventor. I've studied many many software patents, (I had for instance used two for me obvious solutions in my master thesis work, to find out ten years later that these solutions were actually patented at that time...) and come to that inevitable conclusion that software patents do not work. So, regarding software patents obviousness is not a problem, the problem is that software methods can be patented at all.
As another poster talked about the efficiency thing, I'd like to make a quick comment about the spark/gasoline thing -- this company is claiming that they are creating energy, not deriving it from something else.
These people are not physisists, they are describing in layman terms as far as they can understand, that is, it doesn't seem as the energy is derived from e.g. the matter or by some chemical process etc.
You probably know all this, I just wanted to point out that what this company is claiming is very different from saying they can extract energy from some 'undervalued' source. This is really akin to saying you can create matter from nothingness (seeing as E=mc^2 and all) - a very bold claim that will very likely fail.
I can't deduce that from their explanations. Regarding how little they seem to understand about the process (if their observations are true...) I think all you can say is that they claim that the energy is not produced by e.g. deteriorating some material or so. If their claims are true and they would be tapping e.g. the vacuum energy (possibly in a similar way as a heat pump) the E=mc^2, the laws of thermodynamics etc, would still be valid.
>>"Most car AC units have an energy coefficiency of somewhere around 400% - for every one watt of power used four watts of heat are removed. So having greater than 100% isn't impossible."
>
No, AC units (heat pumps) are not more than 100% efficent. This sort of incorrect statement is a mistake of terminology.
OK, for a closed system that would be, but noone has claimed that it has to be a closed system. If you use a heat pump to warm a house from the ground water or from the outside air you are utilizing the heat pump just of that reason that it can efficiently move the outside energy to the inside with less power than is used.
If we were able to tap the free vacuum energy for instance, we would certainly not be looking at the local environment where we gain energy, as a closed system. The "free energy pump" may possibly work according similar principles as a heat pump. That is, by feeding it energy, it would pump the vacuum energy from the "outside" that is from the rest of the universe, and focuse that energy in a similar way as a heat pump does.
With this said I won't say that I'm optimistic that the Steorn principle would work, but it is our responsibility as scientists to give it a chance to be tested.
> absolutely is a loss. Real assets including time, money, and capital equipment went into producing the pirated software that you are now enjoying. If you steal the software and the company gets no money then those real assets that were invested in the creation of the product are lost.
It can only be a loss if the person who copied the software would be a potential buyer. On the other hand, if a person gets used to a certain piece of software and finds out that the software is actually useful, then it is also likely the person would buy it.
What is really annoying though, is when I have to pay for software I don't even want, like MS-windows. This causes a loss
for me, I have a bunch of small unused hard drives with MS-windows that I have been forced to pay for, despite I didn't want them.
So, in this case, Microsoft and the hardware manufacturers are stealing from me, as they do not allow me to buy computers without hard drives (so I can install the drive I want) and operative systems (so I can install the system of my preference). This has to be changed. The customer should have the choice!
Slashdot Mirror
The way most people keep up to date on network news is through subscription to a number of mail reflectors (also known as mail exploders). Mail reflectors are special electronic mailboxes which, when they receive a message, resend it to a list of other mailboxes. This in effect creates a discussion group on a particular topic. Each subscriber sees all the mail forwarded by the reflector, and if one wants to put his "two cents" in sends a message with the comments to the reflector.
The Hitchhikers Guide to the Internet September 1989no comments
I have hard to see any significant improvements needed to be done on Linux itself, which is not already being in development. It is the world around which need to improve. If I had the resources I should lobby politicians over the world to make it illegal to sell hardware which is not documented.
It is very annoying when trying to buy hardware and find that not even the chipset is specified. Such products should just be put in the trash bin directly, not to be sold. Even worse, manufacturers that change chipsets to something incompatible and preserves the old product name, this is to deceive the customer and should definitely be illegal as other types of frauds are.
Of course I prefer HW whis already on the package and product description at the site can tell that this HW is Linux supported. The chipset used should anyway be declared and it should be well documented.We (our company) are working on a system to at least enhance the commercial aspect, that is as a buyer your have incentive to prefer products which are well documented. It should imply bad business if you try to fool the customers.
As a customer you should ask yourselves: do I really dare to buy this product?, as it lacks documentation; no, I go for this product instead, which is proven to work and is well documented. HW manufacturers who don't document their stuff should either go bankrupt or be jailed for fraud.
Maybe I have very old ideas about programming, but... why not fix the fundamental flaws in the software first, before adding features... (I thought it was only the linux 64 bit version missing, but fortunately I was wrong)
Notice that, though AmigaDOS could multithread well (except when it crashed, which happened alot because it had no MMU)
True, but there were a lot of extension boards which included MMU, like the Fusion40 (with 68040) board. A friend of mine wrote an MMU handler that had e.g. memory protection, which allowed a lot of crashes to be catched so only that program would have to be killed as in all modern OSes (if the program hadn't destroyed any structures in chip memory (that common DMA area for blitters etc) that couldn't be MMU protected. This MMU handler didn't reach mainstream though, but I think he made a deal with that Canadian company so you could get it when you bought a Fusion 40 accelerator.
I actually used my Amiga with Fusion40 in my research work until 1996 when I started running Linux instead. There are still features I miss from AmigaDOS like the global environment variables.
Same here, I won't buy a technology which I can't use. I do buy DVDs though, I have about 400-500 in my collection, but that's due to a certain crack, otherwise I hadn't started buying them.
I simply say no to DRM technology. I haven't bought any DRM protected music either, not even a CD with the old "copy protection".
No doubt MS and some others will have a few people perminantly assigned to tearing apart applications from others. Certainly, but there are plenty of people, like 50% of those I know that would gladly tear MS patent applications apart for free.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Milliard
Are you willing to stake the future of your empire on "reasonably small"? The Third Reich did. Remind me again, what was the mortality rate of the U-boat service post when the allies cracked ENIGMA? 90%? 95%?
The problem with having one encryption scheme that you think is safe, is that it will fail. As in all business you have to take into account a certain failure rate. As in my example I used P(a|t) for a certain scheme to be valid during a certain time period t. With accurate timing (my bank uses infininte time for certain codes for instance) going towards femto-to-attoseconds with more accurate devices for one time passwords you will also significantly decrease the risk to make decryption attempts useful.Proably we don't need infinite encryption schemes. I think this encryption thing has gone too far. If a,b,c are independent and there is a certain probability P(a|t), P(b|t), P(c|t) to decrypt each of the schemes within a certain time, when combined the P(a|t)*P(b|t)*P(c|t) can be made reasonable small.
The problem with this approach is that most of them are gibberish.
I have a PhD in computer science and I have two patents (one accepted 1992 and one applied 2005) on my own, but when randomly grabbing a MS patent it often just doesn't make sense.
MS has been spamming USPTO with completely ridiculus patent applications. An example is this famous "IS NOT" operator patent, this is not gibberish but it is like a bad pub joke
MS USPTO patent application of the IS NOT OPERATOR
An application like this should of course not be accepted, but when they abuse the system with this kind of applications as well as the gibberish applications, there is a high probability that some of these will slip through in the process and, voilà, they have yet another patent that can be used to attack anyone.
OK, In one way one can claim that Microsoft is doing us a favour, to show us how ridiculus the system is, to create arguments for abolishing the patent system, but I have hard to imagine that Microsoft would have an idealistic approach here. They are just plain evil!
It doesn't matter if they invented it, only if they patented it. Which is what's wrong with the whole system.
If I'm right informed that is what is wrong with the system here in Europe, i.e. first to file, but what is wrong with your system in US is that you have first to invent, despite it has been published long time ago, you can file a patent in US.
I don't say that one system is worse than the other, patents as such have flaws, and are obstacles to innovation. This is extremely visible in the ridiculus software patents we have seen, but it is not only there a problem. We (our company) are actually developing a new business strategy to decrease this problem with patents in general, to counteract the patent obstacle to innovation on consumer products, as they are destroying business and creativity, even though I don't intend to advertise this strategy here and now.
Not sure about that. SW pats are often either insanely broad, or useless. If they actually have patents that are "useful", I would guess that almost every other software system/kernel would violate them. Thus making the whole idea even more ridiculus, because then it may be found that Sun, IBM, Apple and so on violates them as well. The when inspecting the patents at Sun, IBM, etc it will be found that MS violates a huge bunch of them.
A battle involving sw pats can't be won. If Microsoft walks this path they are dead, and should be anyway, if they start acting like this. I see this as the first death throes within a dying giant.Microsoft has helped SCO to be wiped out
Now MS are even helping themselves to be wiped out in a similar fashion.
I think they did some miscalculation (Ballmer should probably do more exercise in throwing chairs, improve something that he is good at, but leading a company, no!)
Even though it is obvious I assume the really scary part is that you can get sued and to defend yourself you have to spend time and money on trials and lawyers, at least in US.
Software patents should be abolished completely, as they are counteracting the purpose of patents, but not only software patents have this flaw. Generally speaking I would say that e.g. patents on consumer products is a an obstacle to innovation.Dear Sirs,
I'm very disappointed with your actions and claims this summer by attacking Linux and also GPL in the farsighted way you are doing.
The only logical conclusion I can make from this is that you have decided to kill your own product, UnixWare.
Whether you win this case or not is not important from that point of view. You have harmed your own business for all future. UnixWare is dead. If you win this case, the freedom in this world is gone. You are creating anarchy, worse than the US patent system causes due to it's unlimited patentability on software and business methods.
I don't expect an explanation back from you.
Sincerely yours
myname
mycompany
I actually recieved an answer containing:
SCO is not trying to destroy UnixWare, we are only trying to protect our
intellectual property. I'm sorry that this runs contrary to your
thinking, but when a company's intellectual property is being
threatened, it has to take action.
My immediate conspiratory consideration then was that Microsoft gladly supported the trial as it had potential to harm both UnixWare and the Linux kernel, both competitors to MS.
At that time the Microsoft mix into this were merely rumours but last year their support were more or less proven
http://www.groklaw.net/article.php?story=20061008http://www.catb.org/~esr/halloween/halloween10.ht
not funny
The writer didn't specify what environment he/she is using. In certain environments, like MS windows you don't have multiple workspaces by default and that could be a real obstacle to productivity. I see MS windows users that open and close applications all the time to not get the screen to messy.
I normally use eight workspaces in my environment, one for system things, one for mail, one for encyclopedias and such (always open), one for web browsing, two for software dev, one for virtual machines and one for office things, and I have hard to see how multiple monitors could improve anything.
I do most of my work on my laptop (M200 12" 1400x1050 screen) and don't like to be chained fast to a desk. My laptop is always with me and always on.
I also have several desks (two offices at home) and one office at work where I also have desktop monitors (connected to different computers through KVM switches). These I use solely for larger jobs that need to be run for a longer time, as I couldn't have the jobs runnings through my laptop.
From the writers question I suspect that multiple workspaces, which are default in environments like gnome, kde etc are not used.
I've been curious for a while about mobile phones versus laptops on planes. We have to turn the phones off, but who even thinks to turn off the 802.11 or Blue Tooth in their laptop? Perhaps the 2.4GHz range doesn't coincide with navigational frequencies or something.
I do, every time, and you, that makes us at least two.Exactly, I would never ever consider buying anything with DRM (locked music, locked phones etc) and look very carefully and also ask the seller that a certain CD is not copy protected when I buy it. OK, DVD movies is an exception, but thanks to DeCSS that is not a problem. It was after DeCSS I started buying DVD movies, I have about 400 in my collection now.
I have never file shared illegally on the web and I don't mind paying for stuff, but I would never buy anything DRM-protected, I only pay for stuff that is clean.
The best way to support Linux is to support Linux laptop builders, not to throw more money at Dell. Maybe the Dells are cheaper. Fine, then buy the Dell and throw the Windows away. I think it's ridiculous to buy the Dell and demand refunds.
I agree that we should support Linux laptop builders, but
- There may be reasons that I want a specific hardware.
- There is no reason that we should be forced to think that
M$ Windows is the normal. It is better that it is an option, which you
pay for. This will make people think what they really want, and this will be beneficial for Linux laptop builders.
- Microsoft does not want it to be an option, this is a very good reason why we should work for it becoming an option
- Those that want Windows should of course get it, but not for "free"
That were my 5cIf you really want to keep others from patenting something you invented "first," put up a webpage, publish a paper, let the world know about your "obvious" invention -- that's how you can do this. Coming back 10 years later when someone else is successful and sitting back and complaining that it was "obvious" because you invented it "first" doesn't do any good at all.
I think you have completely missed the point about what means being obvious. An obvious idea is something you don't bother about publishing. You don't consider it worth the effort. I usually come up about 20 "obvious" ideas every day. If I would start publishing those in the way you suggest, then I wouldn't be able to do my work. I have however, one patent from the beginning of 90ies, a method I considered to be obvious (I just used my recent experience from neural networks and applied it to expert systems) but my boss then encouraged us to apply anyway, today I wouldn't have done so. I have applied for another patent though, that took me 14 years to find out how to deal with the problem, and how to finally make a business model of it. Of course this doesn't prove that it's not obvious for someone else, but due to the complexity of the solution I believe it is not.
Anyway, if I would write up and publish my obvious ideas as you suggest I wouldn't have anything to live from, because it would take to much time. Of course this is tremendously serious problem in computer science as every software developer is also an inventor. I've studied many many software patents, (I had for instance used two for me obvious solutions in my master thesis work, to find out ten years later that these solutions were actually patented at that time...) and come to that inevitable conclusion that software patents do not work. So, regarding software patents obviousness is not a problem, the problem is that software methods can be patented at all.
These people are not physisists, they are describing in layman terms as far as they can understand, that is, it doesn't seem as the energy is derived from e.g. the matter or by some chemical process etc.
You probably know all this, I just wanted to point out that what this company is claiming is very different from saying they can extract energy from some 'undervalued' source. This is really akin to saying you can create matter from nothingness (seeing as E=mc^2 and all) - a very bold claim that will very likely fail.
I can't deduce that from their explanations. Regarding how little they seem to understand about the process (if their observations are true...) I think all you can say is that they claim that the energy is not produced by e.g. deteriorating some material or so. If their claims are true and they would be tapping e.g. the vacuum energy (possibly in a similar way as a heat pump) the E=mc^2, the laws of thermodynamics etc, would still be valid.
>>"Most car AC units have an energy coefficiency of somewhere around 400% - for every one watt of power used four watts of heat are removed. So having greater than 100% isn't impossible."
> No, AC units (heat pumps) are not more than 100% efficent. This sort of incorrect statement is a mistake of terminology.OK, for a closed system that would be, but noone has claimed that it has to be a closed system. If you use a heat pump to warm a house from the ground water or from the outside air you are utilizing the heat pump just of that reason that it can efficiently move the outside energy to the inside with less power than is used.
If we were able to tap the free vacuum energy for instance, we would certainly not be looking at the local environment where we gain energy, as a closed system. The "free energy pump" may possibly work according similar principles as a heat pump. That is, by feeding it energy, it would pump the vacuum energy from the "outside" that is from the rest of the universe, and focuse that energy in a similar way as a heat pump does.
With this said I won't say that I'm optimistic that the Steorn principle would work, but it is our responsibility as scientists to give it a chance to be tested.
> absolutely is a loss. Real assets including time, money, and capital equipment went into producing the pirated software that you are now enjoying. If you steal the software and the company gets no money then those real assets that were invested in the creation of the product are lost.
It can only be a loss if the person who copied the software would be a potential buyer. On the other hand, if a person gets used to a certain piece of software and finds out that the software is actually useful, then it is also likely the person would buy it.What is really annoying though, is when I have to pay for software I don't even want, like MS-windows. This causes a loss for me, I have a bunch of small unused hard drives with MS-windows that I have been forced to pay for, despite I didn't want them. So, in this case, Microsoft and the hardware manufacturers are stealing from me, as they do not allow me to buy computers without hard drives (so I can install the drive I want) and operative systems (so I can install the system of my preference). This has to be changed. The customer should have the choice!
I would very much like a copy of Larry's speech. ogg is fine!
Thanx beforehand!