I've been saying for months that there's no good way for Microsoft to handle the spyware problem. And by "there's no good way" I mean there's nothing that they could do that wouldn't make someone angry. They could have:
not entered the spyware scanning/blocking/removal arena. This would leave MS reliant on 3rd parties to make their operating system secure. If the 3rd parties do a less-than-effective job, Windows reputation as "insecure" keeps growing. People will ask, "why doesn't Microsoft do anything about this?"
offered a spyware protection suite for a price. It's, shall we say, ethically problematic. I might go as far as to say this reeks of racketeering, like the old neighborhood protection schemes. 'Yeah, we try to use our monopoly to make it so you pretty much HAVE to use our operating system and web browser, but if you use them, you'll get infested with spyware. Oh, wait... you want a computer that works?! Well, that's gonna cost you."
offered a spyware protection suite for free. Then someone's going to scream 'anti-trust' because "they're leveraging their market position to drive out competitors".
However, I do think the situation is different from Internet Explorer and Messenger and WMP. First, this antispyware shouldn't be delivering "content". In fact, they have no real interest in creating or maintaining a monopoly in the field of spyware removal. As far as I can tell, only have an interest in protecting users from spyware, since spyware running rampant on the Windows platform risks losing customers.
Additionally, it appears that AntiSpyware will be a free download, but there has been no statement that it will ship already bundled with the OS. There's also no indication that it will have the problem of being impossible to remove once installed. If you remember, nobody had a problem with Microsoft creating IE, Messenger, or WMP. I don't remember anyone complaining even when they were offered for free. It was when Windows shipped with them already installed, without any supported means to uninstall them, that people started suing MS.
Yeah, I'd agree that eye-candy isn't bloat in cases where the load put on the computer is small and the value of the visual feedback to the user-experience is high. OSX's "Expose" comes to mind...
But I'm not sure I would count the "indiana jones buttons that puff..." as 'useful visual feedback'. A number of the examples used in the article seem like they'd probably be useless, such as a background wallpaper of a field, and having the blades of grass react to the cursor as though it's a wind blowing through the field. Sounds neat enough, but I'm not sure how useful it'd be.
However, I'm not sure the distinction matters terribly at this stage of the game. If we're talking about the X-Windows system, we're talking about "what you have the capability to do" and not "what features the DE will have". In other words, just because it would be possible to X.org to render backgrounds with grass rendered real-time in 3D doesn't mean the Gnome developers would ever be forced to implement it.
It sounds about right that people developing X-Windows would implement really flexible 3D capabilities that would enable those developing desktop environments to do all sorts of things, both useful and useless. Leave it up to the DE designers to decide which is which.
This isn't talking about an OS, just window rendering. Providing hardware acceleration won't force DE designers to use snazzy effects, but it will make it so any snazzy effects they do use will be able to take advantage of modern hardware to render things quickly and efficiently.
Um, except that there's a moment in the trailer where something is going on with this neck. His head tilts back, and another face pops up from underneath. I suspect that's where his second head comes into play. If they just hadn't done the CGI yet, they wouldn't put shots of him in the trailer (besides, it'd be late in the game to not have any CGI shots of him completed).
Wouldn't the big organisation be better off donating to things like spybot?
Not unless they can control the direction that Spybot takes. For example, there's not "spybot server" that allows you to push updates, monitor scanning results, and generally remotely admin hundreds of computer's spyware scanning at once. So it's not really an "enterprise product".
On the other hand, if Spybot were released under the GPL, it might be worthwhile for somebody to pay programmers to work on it so as to develop some feature or another, and this might include enterprise features.
Frankly, I don't find it surprising that Microsoft would charge for an enterprise solution, since it will have extra features that many enterprises would find "worth it". I also doubt they'd include the sort of invisible whitelists you're talking about, since it would make businesses far less likely to pay for it, as well as contributing to the bad reputation of the security of Windows.
Essentially, they are providing "it" (spyware protection) to everyone for free. They're just providing additional centralized management features to enterprises for a price.
I like this anti-spyware program (was Giant's). I use it in place of adaware and spybot (which i used previously).
I like the software, too. I'm not sure it catches everything, but it seems to do a pretty good job. Plus, for the features present in Microsoft/Giant Antispyware alone, I had been running a whole host of free tools (spybot, adaware, spywareguard, spywareblaster, hijackthis!). I thought it was good software when made by the Giant Company, and so a free (and hopefully improved) version should be a nice thing to have.
It is very nice of MS to offer this program "free"...
Well, like I said, it's nice that it's free, but I wouldn't say that Microsoft is "being nice" by releasing it. They're merely protecting their business interests. People/businesses really are looking at OSX and Linux more and more as feasible alternatives to Windows, and with all the frustration people are experiencing associated with spyware, Microsoft is looking at a problem that could potentially be huge. They have a much better chance of maintaining their market dominance if they can demonstrate that Windows is a secure platform and that Microsoft is committed to keeping up with new security threats.
BTW, I'm not complaining. I'm not saying, "Microsoft if evil because they're only doing this to keep their OS on top!" I don't think it's bad for a business to try to please their customers for the sake of long-term profitability (which this seems to be). What I have a hard time with is when businesses try to screw their customers for the sake of perceived profitability (which MS seems to do as well). In neither case, however, is Microsoft being "nice".
I hope MS doesn't turn around and start charging once the competition is eliminated.
Well, if we use IE as an indicator, they won't start charging, they'll just halt development.
Kidding (mostly). The thing is, it's in Microsoft's best interest to provide security tools to consumers. It seems this may be different from many of their other products, in that it's a utility-- a support for the OS. When a large percentage of Windows users are so infected with spyware that their computers won't work anymore, other operating systems will start looking mighty good. So I'm pretty sure that (for the time being) Microsoft is genuinely interested in helping consumers protect themselves from spyware.
I think some of the sibling posts to mine give some good reasons why IE's "making broken pages work" is not good:
in the abstract, there's the possibility of security holes.
a web browser over-interpreting the "intention" of the web designer makes it harder for the web designer to actually control what's displayed
sometimes rendering broken code "properly" means the browser is also rendering properly code "broken"
makes for lazy coders
encourages people to disregard standards, meaning designers won't code for other browsers, meaning other browsers won't render the page properly
Now, I'll grant you that the last two are sort of... well, reasons why you might want YOU to have a browser that makes broken pages work and EVERYONE ELSE to have a more proper browser, if you catch my meaning. However, like I said, "for certain things and in some instances".
Having worked as a web designer and maintaining a couple websites currently, when it comes to development, I want a browser that will show me what I've coded and let me know immediately if there's a problem. I specifically don't want the browser to hide my mistakes, especially if other browsers won't hide the mistakes or will hide them differently. So there's a "certain instance".
Technically, Mr. Gates is right. The whole Open Source idea is a communist idea, not in terms of Soviet Russia (where software owns you) but in terms of a community of workers all banding together to produce their own labor, instead of selling themselves to the capitalists.
I would submit that there's some truth to that, but in a sense that was *not* what Marx and Engles were talking about. Communism was supposed to be a new order that swept the world swept out the existing order.
However, there have been some who have argued that many of the Marxist goals could be accomplished within a capitalist society. Essentially, people might work for the common good and not-be alienated from their work on an individual level without sweeping societal restructuring. In another way of putting it, communism isn't a new world order, it's merely a state of mind.
And it is in this sense that communism can and does exist in America today without even being anti-capitalistic. I might work on something, not because I get paid, but because i feel the work needs to be done. However, I might also be paid for that work, and the capitalistic economy might thrive because of the work that I've done.
On the other hand, this is not an accepted definition of "communism" in most circles.
Of course, we all can't know exactly what the top-execs are really thinking, what's PR and what's for real, but I for one am glad to hear Novell has at least an rookie programmer with that sort of optimism about FOSS. I just hope your attitude is indicative of the general tone over there.
All public indications are that Novell's participation in open-source communities is in earnest, and they've been releasing some pretty good stuff to GPL (YaST, Ximian Exchange connector, now this). I'm really hoping y'all over at Novell succeed in showing that it's possible to play nice, contribute to FOSS, and still get past that old "2) ????" step and see some profit. It could provide a good contrast to other companies who seem to feel like they need to screw over everyone else and stifle their competition in order to succeed.
The problem is that Microsoft uses the IE html renderer to create portions of the Windows UI. Therefore, having IE 7 decoupled from the OS would probably mean that they'd need to incorporate a second and independent html renderer into the OS, or create some other means to create simple visual layouts for their GUI. Given the Microsoft argument to several courts of law that this would be an impossible feat, I don't believe they'll do it voluntarily and without prompting.
"Public domain" doesn't mean that you can't charge for it. I can take some public domain song recordings, put it on a CD, and sell the CD. However, if someone copies the song from that CD, I have little recourse, since they haven't infringed on any copyright.
Similarly, just because some software is GPLed doesn't mean I can't charge for it. There are restrictions, like I basically have to make sure the source code is available for free, but that doesn't mean I can't charge for for the product. I can download Fedora Core 3, burn it to DVD, and sell the DVDs. Perfectly fine and legal, and not even unethical. (Though leading people to believe that Fedora was expensive proprietary software and selling it for $500 a disc would be unethical, selling them for a couple dollars a piece, charging for materials and some effort for downloading/burning/packaging/shipping is totally fine) I can also charge for support or for access to high-speed servers to download the GPLed software.
Now, I'm not sure about the specific case of the Wikipedia. The wikipedia software itself is libre as well as the content. So if I use the wikipedia software for some purpose, does that require that the content I put in it is also under the GNU Free Documentation License, or does it just mean that if I want to distribute an altered version of the wikipedia software, that altered version must be GPL? In other words, can I use the wikipedia scripts, to post information to be distributed under a different license? I don't see an obvious reference on the Wiki site.
However, what I do see is a wikipedia page on "GNU Free Documentation License":
The license is designed for software documentation and other reference and instructional materials. It stipulates that any copy of the material, even if modified, carry the same license. Those copies may be sold but, if produced in quantity, have to be made available in a format which facilitates further editing.
So the license specifically gives the right to sell GNU free documents (with certain strings attached).
He squirmed a lot on the disclaimer of fitness thing, too. He's totally correct that pretty much all software (OSS included) makes this disclaimer, but he didn't really adress the issue that the barrier of responsibility is much lower for something thats provided gratis than for a commercial product.
And I think the real issue here is that Microsoft tries to make "lack of support" an issue with Linux. They've tried in the past to give themselves positive spin based on the claim, "Well, with us, you have a real company standing behind the software. FOSS doesn't offer that."
I'd really like to know if it is conceivable that MS would actually offer a "Windows" window manager to run atop linux. No reason they couldn't, and I'd sure as hell buy it for the windows boxes I have to run at work.
It's occurred to me before that this might someday become a Windows strategy-- to do what Apple did, taking a free OS and throwing a bunch of proprietary stuff on top. Or why couldn't they... not only make a Windows-looking DE, but one that ran Windows applications, and sell it for Unix-alike operating systems. (that was your question, right?)
I'm not sure exactly whether any of this would make business sense, but even selling a Microsoft WINE clone seems like an interesting idea. I mean, if they didn't have to GPL it, they could make some money off of it.
However, it would lend credibility to Linux as an OS as well as make it easy to run Linux apps, which eases a transition away from using Microsoft products in general, so I don't suppose they'll do it.
It's one of those thigns that ought not to be necessary, since veryone ought to check their code, but is quite nice in reality.
One possible quibble about this: sometimes you don't want broken things to "work properly". I know this will sound silly to some, but for certain things and in certain instances, it's better for broken things to be broken.
Sure public domain information should be free, as in belonging to the public domain. However, if someone hosts that information on their servers and provides interesting/useful means of searching and accessing that info, they're within their rights to charge for it. I don't just mean legally, but ethically too. At that point, they aren't charging for the info, they're charging for the service.
If it's not worth it, don't pay for their service, and find another means of accessing that same info. (If it's public domain, someone else is bound to have it.)
Well, just because there are other search engines doesn't mean it's different from Microsoft. There are other operating systems, and other web browsers, and other office suites.
But still, I think you're right that there's a difference: there isn't really anticompetitive behavior. First, Google has yet to create any means whereby it's difficult to use other search engines. For example, if Google made their search engine in such a way that you had to choose either to be indexed by Google or to be indexed by others, that might be considered Microsoft-like behavior. But also Google's services don't force you into using other Google services. There's no reason why you couldn't use Gmail for your web-mail, Lycos for your search engine, Blogger for you blog, and Mapquest for your maps. Using Google desktop search doesn't force you to use Google Maps in any way that I'm aware of.
So they aren't really using dominance in one area to force people to use their other products. At most, they're using their good reputation in one area to lend respectability to their attempts to develop other areas.
Additionally, I believe that Microsoft's competition in the console world is a method of protecting their PC dominance. One of the reasons home users might run a Windows PC instead of Mac or Linux is that the PC game industry focuses almost entirely on Windows. How many times has some Mac fan-boy posted the line on/. "Buy a Mac and a PS2, you'll be happier"?
Plus, it has been clear for some time that Sony is aiming to have the Playstation take on more and more functionality, including DVR and MP3 playback and such. Maybe web browsing? Who knows.
My point is, as it becomes more practical to incorporate more complex functionality into game consoles, the game consoles themselves will take customers away from the desktop PC market. So what's Microsoft's natural reaction? Release a game console themselves which consists basically of a modified desktop PC running a modified version of Windows.
If Microsoft wants to stay a monopoly on the desktop, they need to monopolize all areas of computer manufacturing so that they can make their products fail to interoperate with anything non-Microsoft. This means owning the server market, portable device market, game consoles, DVRs, web TVs, and if there's going to be computer built into your refrigerator or portipotty, they'll want to own that market, too.
It is a great place for discussion, however. Well, sometimes anyway-- when people aren't so hostile and defensive that they're unwilling to discuss, it's a good place for discussion.
Linus Torvald's, for example, didn't originally set out to make something that anyone would want to use.
Yeah, notice the word "originally" in your own sentence. Do you read your own sentences? I'm sure Linus originally wrote programs that only displayed "hello world". But what's Linus doing now?
I can't speculate on every possible motive or every possible developer.
Yeah, that was kinda my point. It's open. You're saying "the developers aren't interested in..." but you're talking about a lot of developers with a lot of different motivations.
Insofar as it is GPL'd, anyone is free to fork the project.
Yeah, and if it were true, as you suggest, that the GIMP developers are not interested in making a good and usable program, but were merely screwing around, than I would sincerely hope someone more serious would fork it. Luckily, I don't believe that's the case.
You seem to think that the point of OSS is, by default, a kind of masturbation for hobbyist geeks, which I believe is particularly the image it needs to shed.
I don't recall saying anything bad about the GIMP's interface. Anything I did say of the sort was probably _general_ and/or *conditional*. (i.e. "*If* there's a complaint about _a piece of software_, the developers should pay attention.")
I have a feeling that people this deep into the thread are reading my posts out of the context of my earlier posts. Essentially what I said was, it's not fair to expect general users to fix their own software. The complaint, "the GIMP's UI sucks!" is not constructive criticism and is not helpful. However, responses "then build your own" or "then don't use it" are not necessarily helpful in situations where constructive criticism is being offered.
Again, I think it's important to characterize my statements properly. If the common consensus is, "Photoshop has a better UI," I do not believe that this means the GIMP's UI should be made to look like Photoshop's. However, if that is the general consensus among users, then this is an indication of a problem with the UI. When you're talking about a UI being fit for mass consumption, perception is reality. If people don't like it and find it annoying an unintuitive, then that is a problem. (Notice I didn't claim that there is a problem with the GIMP's UI. I only said "IF the common consensus is...") In such a case, for the sake of the OSS community, for the sake of OSS advocates, and for the sake of *users* using the software, I would hope such problems are addressed.
It does not need to be fixed by any given GIMP developer, but I would hope, in such a case, that some developer with more skills than I have (since my only skills are in building cakes) would take up the task. Turning your nose up at user feedback, in cases when it happens, is not more helpful to making better software than following the whim of every silly user who makes a suggestion. *Good software* is not something that only 733t h4x0r5 know how to use without rewriting source code.
And for those who can't take a hint, I am NOT saying OSS is not good software. I'm NOT saying the GIMP is not good software. I'm saying this snobbish attitude that those who can't figure out a poorly designed GUI don't deserve to use OSS-- the only benefit of that attitude is to the ego of those spouting it. I'm making the general argument that things are quite the other way around. If a desktop/productivity app has an uncomfortable GUI, it's not the user who's sub-standard for being unable to rewrite it to his liking, it's the original developer who's done a sub-standard job of designing his GUI. And creating a good GUI design pretty much requires listening to user feedback.
Unless you can show that the OSS developers (GIMP developers in particular) that are complaining AND refuse to accept suggestions, this whole topic is moot.
As pronobozo said: Open Source "Community" Are you really going to pretend to have the authority to spout this "If you don't like it, don't use it, but don't complain" stuff and then turn around and say, "But who ever said...?"
You are making a very general argument using a specific subset of people that is only vaguely defined here.
Yes. I am making a general argument. User feedback with worth paying attention to.
Insofar as the *nix world is a "small user-base," I am pretty sure they are happy with it. Last I checked, the GIMP developers have explicity stated that their target audience is *nix users.
Yes, *nix has a small user base of people doing photo editing and graphic design. Perhaps they're happy with targeting *nix users, but don't rule out the possibility that they might want the *nix userbase to grow. Also don't rule out the possibility that they would like to make their software usable by a larger portion of the *nix userbase.
A Windows or OS X port of The GIMP is little more than a side-effect of the GTK+ libraries being ported/portable.
I wouldn't tell that to the programmers who port it over.
Considering that The GIMP is targetted to *nix users, I doubt developers care much about Photoshop/Windows/Mac users.
Hmmmm.... so they don't want more people to use their program? They don't want the street-cred of professionals being wowed by their work? They aren't in favor of lending Linux credibility as a usable/professional platform by showing a high-quality design app that comes in the default install of most distros? If that the case, then I hope someone branches it soon so that the developers can scratch their own itches in peace.
OSS is "supposed to be" something that any number of geeks can tinker with unless otherwise stated.
That's all well and good except for the fact that it's *open*. Once you have a community and public contributers, what it's "supposed to be" gets opened up to those contributers and that community. No single person/group is in control, or isn't that the point? Especially so when you're dealing with something like the GIMP, where it's being distributed as the standard photo manipulation tool for many distros and DEs. I'd say that makes the GIMP fair game for criticism. If they wanted their program to be their own little project without anyone complaining, here's an easy suggestion: don't distribute it. Don't GPL it. If you do, post it anonymously on some server and never touch it again. (But note I said *IF*! "If they wanted...")
No, the GIMP is no longer "something for geeks to tinker with", nor is Firefox or OOo or Gnome. They're pieces of software for users to use. They're pieces of software people depend on. And they are ambassadors for the community at large.
And lets not forget where you came into this conversation. Let's summarize:
GUY1: I suggest some changes to the GIMP!
GUY2: I think the GIMP's UI sucks!
GUY3: If you don't like it, shut up and fix it!
ME: A lot of people in the open source community say that, but I don't think it's helpful to OSS. (note: I'm not criticizing OSS, just the people in the community who say that)
Except that I was using a metaphor paired with sarcasm to point out the ridiculousness of what you were saying. First of all, there's the question of whether building cars/applications is appropriately an object of art or engineering. I would say, optimally, it's both. However, your suggestion that UIs should be creative and innovative only takes into account the artistic function. As far as engineering goes, it's often a much better approach to use common components. That's what I was referring to in my first post. We shouldn't always be trying to reinvent the wheel. We should constantly be taking what works, throwing away what doesn't, and fine tuning the whole package to get it working optimally.
Besides, what the article mentions is not at all analogous to suggesting all motor vehicles on the road should use the same engine. It's a little more like suggesting that all cars made by honda should have the same steering wheel, stick shift, and dashboard configurations. We are talking about the UI, after all. However, even this analogy isn't really proper. When I use a car, I usually use the same car all the time, or at least for long periods at a time. However, if I'm a graphic designer using a vector app, photo editor, and layout program, I'm probably switching between the different programs pretty regularly.
Therefore, our metaphor would probably be most accurate if we imagined that we had to drive different cars, depending on whether we're driving in the suburbs vs. in a city vs. in the country vs. on the highway. So, if you're driving around a country road and you want to get on the highway, you have to get out of your car and get in a "highway car". Same thing if you're driving around the city and want to venture out into the suburbs. Now, the suggestion that we standardize the UIs on these apps is most comparable to suggesting that, in all these different cars, we keep the dashboard/steering-wheel/stick-shift configuration the same, so that in the middle of driving on the highway, you don't need to hunt for the speedometer. You don't have to sit and try to remember with position on your stick is 3rd gear in your city car, because 3rd gear is always the same. Is that really so unreasonable?
Some of the other suggestions in the article are comparable to suggesting, "Since you're switching cars so often, wouldn't it be nice if we made an easy way to load and unload your cargo to and from the various cars?" Again, sounds like a reasonable suggestion.
So, while it is true that it's possible to over-standardize and try to fit square pegs in round holes, I'm not sure that's what the article is doing. In fact, I think that's closer to what *you* are doing, by trying to characterize standards as standardly destructive.
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- not entered the spyware scanning/blocking/removal arena. This would leave MS reliant on 3rd parties to make their operating system secure. If the 3rd parties do a less-than-effective job, Windows reputation as "insecure" keeps growing. People will ask, "why doesn't Microsoft do anything about this?"
- offered a spyware protection suite for a price. It's, shall we say, ethically problematic. I might go as far as to say this reeks of racketeering, like the old neighborhood protection schemes. 'Yeah, we try to use our monopoly to make it so you pretty much HAVE to use our operating system and web browser, but if you use them, you'll get infested with spyware. Oh, wait... you want a computer that works?! Well, that's gonna cost you."
- offered a spyware protection suite for free. Then someone's going to scream 'anti-trust' because "they're leveraging their market position to drive out competitors".
However, I do think the situation is different from Internet Explorer and Messenger and WMP. First, this antispyware shouldn't be delivering "content". In fact, they have no real interest in creating or maintaining a monopoly in the field of spyware removal. As far as I can tell, only have an interest in protecting users from spyware, since spyware running rampant on the Windows platform risks losing customers.Additionally, it appears that AntiSpyware will be a free download, but there has been no statement that it will ship already bundled with the OS. There's also no indication that it will have the problem of being impossible to remove once installed. If you remember, nobody had a problem with Microsoft creating IE, Messenger, or WMP. I don't remember anyone complaining even when they were offered for free. It was when Windows shipped with them already installed, without any supported means to uninstall them, that people started suing MS.
But I'm not sure I would count the "indiana jones buttons that puff..." as 'useful visual feedback'. A number of the examples used in the article seem like they'd probably be useless, such as a background wallpaper of a field, and having the blades of grass react to the cursor as though it's a wind blowing through the field. Sounds neat enough, but I'm not sure how useful it'd be.
However, I'm not sure the distinction matters terribly at this stage of the game. If we're talking about the X-Windows system, we're talking about "what you have the capability to do" and not "what features the DE will have". In other words, just because it would be possible to X.org to render backgrounds with grass rendered real-time in 3D doesn't mean the Gnome developers would ever be forced to implement it.
It sounds about right that people developing X-Windows would implement really flexible 3D capabilities that would enable those developing desktop environments to do all sorts of things, both useful and useless. Leave it up to the DE designers to decide which is which.
So... I'm not sure your comment is on-topic.
Um, except that there's a moment in the trailer where something is going on with this neck. His head tilts back, and another face pops up from underneath. I suspect that's where his second head comes into play. If they just hadn't done the CGI yet, they wouldn't put shots of him in the trailer (besides, it'd be late in the game to not have any CGI shots of him completed).
Not unless they can control the direction that Spybot takes. For example, there's not "spybot server" that allows you to push updates, monitor scanning results, and generally remotely admin hundreds of computer's spyware scanning at once. So it's not really an "enterprise product".
On the other hand, if Spybot were released under the GPL, it might be worthwhile for somebody to pay programmers to work on it so as to develop some feature or another, and this might include enterprise features.
Frankly, I don't find it surprising that Microsoft would charge for an enterprise solution, since it will have extra features that many enterprises would find "worth it". I also doubt they'd include the sort of invisible whitelists you're talking about, since it would make businesses far less likely to pay for it, as well as contributing to the bad reputation of the security of Windows.
Essentially, they are providing "it" (spyware protection) to everyone for free. They're just providing additional centralized management features to enterprises for a price.
I like the software, too. I'm not sure it catches everything, but it seems to do a pretty good job. Plus, for the features present in Microsoft/Giant Antispyware alone, I had been running a whole host of free tools (spybot, adaware, spywareguard, spywareblaster, hijackthis!). I thought it was good software when made by the Giant Company, and so a free (and hopefully improved) version should be a nice thing to have.
It is very nice of MS to offer this program "free"...
Well, like I said, it's nice that it's free, but I wouldn't say that Microsoft is "being nice" by releasing it. They're merely protecting their business interests. People/businesses really are looking at OSX and Linux more and more as feasible alternatives to Windows, and with all the frustration people are experiencing associated with spyware, Microsoft is looking at a problem that could potentially be huge. They have a much better chance of maintaining their market dominance if they can demonstrate that Windows is a secure platform and that Microsoft is committed to keeping up with new security threats.
BTW, I'm not complaining. I'm not saying, "Microsoft if evil because they're only doing this to keep their OS on top!" I don't think it's bad for a business to try to please their customers for the sake of long-term profitability (which this seems to be). What I have a hard time with is when businesses try to screw their customers for the sake of perceived profitability (which MS seems to do as well). In neither case, however, is Microsoft being "nice".
Well, if we use IE as an indicator, they won't start charging, they'll just halt development.
Kidding (mostly). The thing is, it's in Microsoft's best interest to provide security tools to consumers. It seems this may be different from many of their other products, in that it's a utility-- a support for the OS. When a large percentage of Windows users are so infected with spyware that their computers won't work anymore, other operating systems will start looking mighty good. So I'm pretty sure that (for the time being) Microsoft is genuinely interested in helping consumers protect themselves from spyware.
- in the abstract, there's the possibility of security holes.
- a web browser over-interpreting the "intention" of the web designer makes it harder for the web designer to actually control what's displayed
- sometimes rendering broken code "properly" means the browser is also rendering properly code "broken"
- makes for lazy coders
- encourages people to disregard standards, meaning designers won't code for other browsers, meaning other browsers won't render the page properly
Now, I'll grant you that the last two are sort of... well, reasons why you might want YOU to have a browser that makes broken pages work and EVERYONE ELSE to have a more proper browser, if you catch my meaning. However, like I said, "for certain things and in some instances".Having worked as a web designer and maintaining a couple websites currently, when it comes to development, I want a browser that will show me what I've coded and let me know immediately if there's a problem. I specifically don't want the browser to hide my mistakes, especially if other browsers won't hide the mistakes or will hide them differently. So there's a "certain instance".
I would submit that there's some truth to that, but in a sense that was *not* what Marx and Engles were talking about. Communism was supposed to be a new order that swept the world swept out the existing order.
However, there have been some who have argued that many of the Marxist goals could be accomplished within a capitalist society. Essentially, people might work for the common good and not-be alienated from their work on an individual level without sweeping societal restructuring. In another way of putting it, communism isn't a new world order, it's merely a state of mind.
And it is in this sense that communism can and does exist in America today without even being anti-capitalistic. I might work on something, not because I get paid, but because i feel the work needs to be done. However, I might also be paid for that work, and the capitalistic economy might thrive because of the work that I've done.
On the other hand, this is not an accepted definition of "communism" in most circles.
All public indications are that Novell's participation in open-source communities is in earnest, and they've been releasing some pretty good stuff to GPL (YaST, Ximian Exchange connector, now this). I'm really hoping y'all over at Novell succeed in showing that it's possible to play nice, contribute to FOSS, and still get past that old "2) ????" step and see some profit. It could provide a good contrast to other companies who seem to feel like they need to screw over everyone else and stifle their competition in order to succeed.
Anyway, have fun storming the castle!
The problem is that Microsoft uses the IE html renderer to create portions of the Windows UI. Therefore, having IE 7 decoupled from the OS would probably mean that they'd need to incorporate a second and independent html renderer into the OS, or create some other means to create simple visual layouts for their GUI. Given the Microsoft argument to several courts of law that this would be an impossible feat, I don't believe they'll do it voluntarily and without prompting.
...of course, give me a minute and I could make that page say that nine-times invented tabbed browsing...
Similarly, just because some software is GPLed doesn't mean I can't charge for it. There are restrictions, like I basically have to make sure the source code is available for free, but that doesn't mean I can't charge for for the product. I can download Fedora Core 3, burn it to DVD, and sell the DVDs. Perfectly fine and legal, and not even unethical. (Though leading people to believe that Fedora was expensive proprietary software and selling it for $500 a disc would be unethical, selling them for a couple dollars a piece, charging for materials and some effort for downloading/burning/packaging/shipping is totally fine) I can also charge for support or for access to high-speed servers to download the GPLed software.
Now, I'm not sure about the specific case of the Wikipedia. The wikipedia software itself is libre as well as the content. So if I use the wikipedia software for some purpose, does that require that the content I put in it is also under the GNU Free Documentation License, or does it just mean that if I want to distribute an altered version of the wikipedia software, that altered version must be GPL? In other words, can I use the wikipedia scripts, to post information to be distributed under a different license? I don't see an obvious reference on the Wiki site.
However, what I do see is a wikipedia page on "GNU Free Documentation License":
So the license specifically gives the right to sell GNU free documents (with certain strings attached).
And I think the real issue here is that Microsoft tries to make "lack of support" an issue with Linux. They've tried in the past to give themselves positive spin based on the claim, "Well, with us, you have a real company standing behind the software. FOSS doesn't offer that."
It's occurred to me before that this might someday become a Windows strategy-- to do what Apple did, taking a free OS and throwing a bunch of proprietary stuff on top. Or why couldn't they... not only make a Windows-looking DE, but one that ran Windows applications, and sell it for Unix-alike operating systems. (that was your question, right?)
I'm not sure exactly whether any of this would make business sense, but even selling a Microsoft WINE clone seems like an interesting idea. I mean, if they didn't have to GPL it, they could make some money off of it.
However, it would lend credibility to Linux as an OS as well as make it easy to run Linux apps, which eases a transition away from using Microsoft products in general, so I don't suppose they'll do it.
One possible quibble about this: sometimes you don't want broken things to "work properly". I know this will sound silly to some, but for certain things and in certain instances, it's better for broken things to be broken.
If it's not worth it, don't pay for their service, and find another means of accessing that same info. (If it's public domain, someone else is bound to have it.)
But still, I think you're right that there's a difference: there isn't really anticompetitive behavior. First, Google has yet to create any means whereby it's difficult to use other search engines. For example, if Google made their search engine in such a way that you had to choose either to be indexed by Google or to be indexed by others, that might be considered Microsoft-like behavior. But also Google's services don't force you into using other Google services. There's no reason why you couldn't use Gmail for your web-mail, Lycos for your search engine, Blogger for you blog, and Mapquest for your maps. Using Google desktop search doesn't force you to use Google Maps in any way that I'm aware of.
So they aren't really using dominance in one area to force people to use their other products. At most, they're using their good reputation in one area to lend respectability to their attempts to develop other areas.
Plus, it has been clear for some time that Sony is aiming to have the Playstation take on more and more functionality, including DVR and MP3 playback and such. Maybe web browsing? Who knows.
My point is, as it becomes more practical to incorporate more complex functionality into game consoles, the game consoles themselves will take customers away from the desktop PC market. So what's Microsoft's natural reaction? Release a game console themselves which consists basically of a modified desktop PC running a modified version of Windows.
If Microsoft wants to stay a monopoly on the desktop, they need to monopolize all areas of computer manufacturing so that they can make their products fail to interoperate with anything non-Microsoft. This means owning the server market, portable device market, game consoles, DVRs, web TVs, and if there's going to be computer built into your refrigerator or portipotty, they'll want to own that market, too.
It is a great place for discussion, however. Well, sometimes anyway-- when people aren't so hostile and defensive that they're unwilling to discuss, it's a good place for discussion.
Yeah, notice the word "originally" in your own sentence. Do you read your own sentences? I'm sure Linus originally wrote programs that only displayed "hello world". But what's Linus doing now?
I can't speculate on every possible motive or every possible developer.
Yeah, that was kinda my point. It's open. You're saying "the developers aren't interested in..." but you're talking about a lot of developers with a lot of different motivations.
Insofar as it is GPL'd, anyone is free to fork the project.
Yeah, and if it were true, as you suggest, that the GIMP developers are not interested in making a good and usable program, but were merely screwing around, than I would sincerely hope someone more serious would fork it. Luckily, I don't believe that's the case.
You seem to think that the point of OSS is, by default, a kind of masturbation for hobbyist geeks, which I believe is particularly the image it needs to shed.
I have a feeling that people this deep into the thread are reading my posts out of the context of my earlier posts. Essentially what I said was, it's not fair to expect general users to fix their own software. The complaint, "the GIMP's UI sucks!" is not constructive criticism and is not helpful. However, responses "then build your own" or "then don't use it" are not necessarily helpful in situations where constructive criticism is being offered.
Again, I think it's important to characterize my statements properly. If the common consensus is, "Photoshop has a better UI," I do not believe that this means the GIMP's UI should be made to look like Photoshop's. However, if that is the general consensus among users, then this is an indication of a problem with the UI. When you're talking about a UI being fit for mass consumption, perception is reality. If people don't like it and find it annoying an unintuitive, then that is a problem. (Notice I didn't claim that there is a problem with the GIMP's UI. I only said "IF the common consensus is...") In such a case, for the sake of the OSS community, for the sake of OSS advocates, and for the sake of *users* using the software, I would hope such problems are addressed.
It does not need to be fixed by any given GIMP developer, but I would hope, in such a case, that some developer with more skills than I have (since my only skills are in building cakes) would take up the task. Turning your nose up at user feedback, in cases when it happens, is not more helpful to making better software than following the whim of every silly user who makes a suggestion. *Good software* is not something that only 733t h4x0r5 know how to use without rewriting source code.
And for those who can't take a hint, I am NOT saying OSS is not good software. I'm NOT saying the GIMP is not good software. I'm saying this snobbish attitude that those who can't figure out a poorly designed GUI don't deserve to use OSS-- the only benefit of that attitude is to the ego of those spouting it. I'm making the general argument that things are quite the other way around. If a desktop/productivity app has an uncomfortable GUI, it's not the user who's sub-standard for being unable to rewrite it to his liking, it's the original developer who's done a sub-standard job of designing his GUI. And creating a good GUI design pretty much requires listening to user feedback.
Unless you can show that the OSS developers (GIMP developers in particular) that are complaining AND refuse to accept suggestions, this whole topic is moot.
As pronobozo said: Open Source "Community" Are you really going to pretend to have the authority to spout this "If you don't like it, don't use it, but don't complain" stuff and then turn around and say, "But who ever said...?"
You are making a very general argument using a specific subset of people that is only vaguely defined here.
Yes. I am making a general argument. User feedback with worth paying attention to.
Insofar as the *nix world is a "small user-base," I am pretty sure they are happy with it. Last I checked, the GIMP developers have explicity stated that their target audience is *nix users.
Yes, *nix has a small user base of people doing photo editing and graphic design. Perhaps they're happy with targeting *nix users, but don't rule out the possibility that they might want the *nix userbase to grow. Also don't rule out the possibility that they would like to make their software usable by a larger portion of the *nix userbase.
A Windows or OS X port of The GIMP is little more than a side-effect of the GTK+ libraries being ported/portable.
I wouldn't tell that to the programmers who port it over.
Considering that The GIMP is targetted to *nix users, I doubt developers care much about Photoshop/Windows/Mac users.
Hmmmm.... so they don't want more people to use their program? They don't want the street-cred of professionals being wowed by their work? They aren't in favor of lending Linux credibility as a usable/professional platform by showing a high-quality design app that comes in the default install of most distros? If that the case, then I hope someone branches it soon so that the developers can scratch their own itches in peace.
OSS is "supposed to be" something that any number of geeks can tinker with unless otherwise stated.
That's all well and good except for the fact that it's *open*. Once you have a community and public contributers, what it's "supposed to be" gets opened up to those contributers and that community. No single person/group is in control, or isn't that the point? Especially so when you're dealing with something like the GIMP, where it's being distributed as the standard photo manipulation tool for many distros and DEs. I'd say that makes the GIMP fair game for criticism. If they wanted their program to be their own little project without anyone complaining, here's an easy suggestion: don't distribute it. Don't GPL it. If you do, post it anonymously on some server and never touch it again. (But note I said *IF*! "If they wanted...")
No, the GIMP is no longer "something for geeks to tinker with", nor is Firefox or OOo or Gnome. They're pieces of software for users to use. They're pieces of software people depend on. And they are ambassadors for the community at large.
And lets not forget where you came into this conversation. Let's summarize:
Besides, what the article mentions is not at all analogous to suggesting all motor vehicles on the road should use the same engine. It's a little more like suggesting that all cars made by honda should have the same steering wheel, stick shift, and dashboard configurations. We are talking about the UI, after all. However, even this analogy isn't really proper. When I use a car, I usually use the same car all the time, or at least for long periods at a time. However, if I'm a graphic designer using a vector app, photo editor, and layout program, I'm probably switching between the different programs pretty regularly.
Therefore, our metaphor would probably be most accurate if we imagined that we had to drive different cars, depending on whether we're driving in the suburbs vs. in a city vs. in the country vs. on the highway. So, if you're driving around a country road and you want to get on the highway, you have to get out of your car and get in a "highway car". Same thing if you're driving around the city and want to venture out into the suburbs. Now, the suggestion that we standardize the UIs on these apps is most comparable to suggesting that, in all these different cars, we keep the dashboard/steering-wheel/stick-shift configuration the same, so that in the middle of driving on the highway, you don't need to hunt for the speedometer. You don't have to sit and try to remember with position on your stick is 3rd gear in your city car, because 3rd gear is always the same. Is that really so unreasonable?
Some of the other suggestions in the article are comparable to suggesting, "Since you're switching cars so often, wouldn't it be nice if we made an easy way to load and unload your cargo to and from the various cars?" Again, sounds like a reasonable suggestion.
So, while it is true that it's possible to over-standardize and try to fit square pegs in round holes, I'm not sure that's what the article is doing. In fact, I think that's closer to what *you* are doing, by trying to characterize standards as standardly destructive.
If you knew anything about either metaphors, you'd see why you're stupid.