Microsoft wouldn't have got where they are now unless they produced usable products. And their perceived cost for most people is zero ("it comes with the computer").
If Skype can build up a near-monopoly with a their current product and pricing, they will be in a good position to do something very different in the future.
- Skype is not standards-compliant, allowing it and any vulnerability to pass through corporate firewalls.
And how would this be different if Skype was standards compliant?
It wouldn't. Until someone reported the vulnerability and it got fixed. This tends to happen very slowly with closed-source software. The same problem exists in Windows and any other closed-source software.
Skype is a useful tool. That's all I've got to say about that.
How about saying this: the phone system is useless unless everyone can talk to everyone else. If Skype could rise to a dominant position in the market - and what business isn't trying to do that - they would have a stranglehold on the market by virtue of their use of secret proprietory technology. No-one could inter-operate with them, except on their own terms.
We've seen how bad this is in the computer software market. Do we want to set off down the same slippery slope in the telephone market?
Well, try replacing "Skype" by "Microsoft" in the article, and try replacing "closed-source proprietory voip protocol" by "closed-source proprietory office document format".
Skype isn't a monopoly (yet), but it obviously would like to be one at some time in the future - what business wouldn't? And it's putting all the right pieces in place to be just as evil a monopoly as Microsoft.
I haven't tried it on a laptop, but a while back I tried to install Windows on my desktop machine.
-The installer did not recognize my webcam, my scanner or my printer. For each of these, I had to search for the manufacturer's website, download a separate driver, install it and reboot. I couldn't find a driver for my scanner which would work with the latest version of Windows. Hardware support is awful.
- It wanted to install using the whole hard drive, wiping out all my Linux partitions.
- It did not correctly set up dual boot with Linux.
Sadly, it looks like Windows is not ready for this Linux user.
Yes, I know all about this rubbish with the fingerprints and so on. My point is: why is this being done? It was never necessary before.
If I were a terrorist visiting the US, how would all this stuff help? I needn't carry my weapons through customs: it's easy enough to get guns and such-like there, from what I've heard.
Yes, the old enemy wore uniforms. The new one doesn't. You can't tell who are the new enemy by looking at them. So you can't tell who are the new enemy by looking at their passports, can you?
Back in the 70s, people used to come to this country (the UK) from Ireland and set off bombs here. But no-one ever bothered to set up any passport checks for travellers from Ireland.
I remember crossing the "Iron Curtain" back when we were supposed to be permanently 5 minutes away from nuclear war with the countries on the other side of it.
The guards would just glance at my passport and wave me through. Same coming back.
This is just symptomatic of the bureaucratic fantasy that you can do "security" by asking people questions. It's like the "did you pack your own suitcase" question at the airport. Of course everyone is going to say "yes" even if they didn't, but the people asking the question haven't worked that out.
So why doesn't the Constitutional right to free speech extend to to this situation? The people who drew up the First Amendment wanted people to have free speech, right? So why did they limit the rule in this way?
Perhaps they just didn't consider this situation. In those days, the legal contraints on that sort of thing always came from the government. Nobody would have envisaged a future where your rights are constrained by a mass of private contracts, as they are today.
If the constitution were working as it was intended, wouldn't there be another amendment by now setting out the right to free speech unconstrained by any private corporation?
XP activation prevents you from "copying" XP: you can only use it on one machine. Microsoft have a perfect right to do this, so they've done it.
Blu-ray prevents you from copying the disk: you can't even copy it to your hard drive. It's just the same amout of restriction. No copies.
Bill wants people to make one copy on their hard drive, because he wants to sell copies of Windows that will play that copy. Tough. If the "no copies at all" rule is good enough for Windows XP, it should be good enough for everyone else.
What? Bill Gates thinks that the protection scheme under Blu-Ray is very anti-consumer? Is this the same Bill Gates who is responsible for the copy protection schema for Windows XP?
If nuclear power is so great, we should encourage every country to use it. We wouldn't want to be striving to save the world ourselves, while other countries are just pumping out pollution, would we? That would be stupid.
So we must encourage Iran, North Korea and so on to build as many nuclear power stations as they like.
The problem is that the Java language was designed to be interpreted. Compiling it into a fast native executable requires a lot of effort. I've tried using gcc on an i386 and it doesn't do the job well.
Sun must have put a lot of effort into the hotspot compiler, but its performance gains come at the expense of a lot of memory usage.
It's a common unit in Britain. Hence the spoof website.
From what I've heard, most American units are the same size as ours, except that their pints are smaller. That's because we drink beer by the pint, and we're thirstier than they are.
I always thought that Americans were just plain ignorant about European geography. Now I know it's because you've been going round telling them that Madrid is close to London.
Slashdot Mirror
So having 50% of those people die of bird flu next year would be a step in the right direction, then?
If Skype can build up a near-monopoly with a their current product and pricing, they will be in a good position to do something very different in the future.
It wouldn't. Until someone reported the vulnerability and it got fixed. This tends to happen very slowly with closed-source software. The same problem exists in Windows and any other closed-source software.
Skype is a useful tool. That's all I've got to say about that.
How about saying this: the phone system is useless unless everyone can talk to everyone else. If Skype could rise to a dominant position in the market - and what business isn't trying to do that - they would have a stranglehold on the market by virtue of their use of secret proprietory technology. No-one could inter-operate with them, except on their own terms.
We've seen how bad this is in the computer software market. Do we want to set off down the same slippery slope in the telephone market?
Skype isn't a monopoly (yet), but it obviously would like to be one at some time in the future - what business wouldn't? And it's putting all the right pieces in place to be just as evil a monopoly as Microsoft.
We had them some time ago, but they seem to have given up selling them: see Tivo UK. They were never very popular.
-The installer did not recognize my webcam, my scanner or my printer. For each of these, I had to search for the manufacturer's website, download a separate driver, install it and reboot. I couldn't find a driver for my scanner which would work with the latest version of Windows. Hardware support is awful.
- It wanted to install using the whole hard drive, wiping out all my Linux partitions.
- It did not correctly set up dual boot with Linux.
Sadly, it looks like Windows is not ready for this Linux user.
If I were a terrorist visiting the US, how would all this stuff help? I needn't carry my weapons through customs: it's easy enough to get guns and such-like there, from what I've heard.
Back in the 70s, people used to come to this country (the UK) from Ireland and set off bombs here. But no-one ever bothered to set up any passport checks for travellers from Ireland.
The guards would just glance at my passport and wave me through. Same coming back.
So why is it any different now?
Oh, but the crime rate with legal firearms is way down. So there's some benefit there.
I bow to your superior knowledge. You have obviously been involved with more enterprise-class database systems than I have.
This is just symptomatic of the bureaucratic fantasy that you can do "security" by asking people questions. It's like the "did you pack your own suitcase" question at the airport. Of course everyone is going to say "yes" even if they didn't, but the people asking the question haven't worked that out.
But if your database is really big enough to need Oracle, then MySQL certainly won't be in the running as an alternative.
I was disapointed by the small size of the beers when I went to Cologne, until I found that you can also order it by the barrel.
If it looks like crap then it's crap. Fscking around with numbers like 480i and 720p doesn't make it look any better.
Perhaps they just didn't consider this situation. In those days, the legal contraints on that sort of thing always came from the government. Nobody would have envisaged a future where your rights are constrained by a mass of private contracts, as they are today.
If the constitution were working as it was intended, wouldn't there be another amendment by now setting out the right to free speech unconstrained by any private corporation?
Blu-ray prevents you from copying the disk: you can't even copy it to your hard drive. It's just the same amout of restriction. No copies.
Bill wants people to make one copy on their hard drive, because he wants to sell copies of Windows that will play that copy. Tough. If the "no copies at all" rule is good enough for Windows XP, it should be good enough for everyone else.
What? Bill Gates thinks that the protection scheme under Blu-Ray is very anti-consumer? Is this the same Bill Gates who is responsible for the copy protection schema for Windows XP?
So we must encourage Iran, North Korea and so on to build as many nuclear power stations as they like.
Ah! Another Captain Scarlet fan!
Sun must have put a lot of effort into the hotspot compiler, but its performance gains come at the expense of a lot of memory usage.
That's nothing. They have used underwear vending machines in Japan.
From what I've heard, most American units are the same size as ours, except that their pints are smaller. That's because we drink beer by the pint, and we're thirstier than they are.
The correct unit to use when explaining the size of countries is the size of wales
I always thought that Americans were just plain ignorant about European geography. Now I know it's because you've been going round telling them that Madrid is close to London.