Gmail supports retrieval of mail via POP3 for free. So there's nothing to stop someone from using GPG and similar support already included in or available for a wide variety of e-mail clients such as Outlook, Thunderbird, Evolution, Eudora, etc.
Thank you. I agree, and that was the point I was trying to illustrate.
If you've got enough money, IBM (or one of its resellers) will be more than happy to sell you one of their high-end workstations or servers. Ditto for countless other purveyors of enterprise-class equipment.
I don't understand this fascination with encryption. Why do people use it. Is it because you're hiding something illegal? It's kiddie porn isn't it? Be honest!
Nope. It's secret terrorist plots to overthrow the tyrannical American Government!
Actually, no. More women under the age of 65 than their male counterparts use the Internet, according to Pew Internet. If you take into account all women and men of all age groups, then women still trail men by a few percentage points.
If anything, you could say that men and women use the Internet about equally.
Now, I'm almost positive that at least 80% of Slashdot readers are male, though there are an increasing number of females on this site. Many of them I think hide and don't reveal that they are female, so the statistics might be different than most of us suspect.
Why can't you have local stores run shops on the web?
They can and do. Probably 75-80% of the retailers participating in Pricewatch are running their Web shops out of their normal brick-and-motar mom-and-pop computer shops.
Ditto for some other types of Web stores, including some that sell coffee-making supplies and equipment, herbs and cyrstals, auto parts, etc.
It's increasingly common that Web shops are online storefronts for brick-and-mortar businesses.
Oh, did I mention that it should demonstrate the ability to SCREW over OPEC, Government, and Corporations?
Ya know, this fuel-cell thingy has an Ethernet port on it. So if someone could find a way to add a really slick, totally anonymous P2P client on the thing, and it could demonstrate the ability to also SCREW over the RIAA, MPAA, Disney, all makers of DRM, and maybe some spammers, too, we would just be ALL set, now wouldn't we?
I think this is a subtle but neat sidestep by the GPL authors. Let's say IBM tivo-ises it's hardware, and only 'TPM approved' apps will run. They stand to get exposed as enemies of Free Software amongst the user community.
Not only that, but it depends on usage. What RMS is saying is that even if a product is used by consumers 'only occasionally' -- which seems to imply that that ANY use by consumers deems the product not covered under the 'commercial use only' tivoization exception clause.
For example, I know guys who have IBM x-Series workstations and servers running at home. Does this mean IBM can't tivoize the x-Series?
Right. Circuit City is a retailer. Their industry is the same as Wal*Mart, CompUSA, etc. They are not a 'tech' company anymore than RadioShack, Wal*Mart or Amazon.com.
However, most of the jobs that are being cut in these companies are unskilled, low-paying jobs. Everywhere I look sysadmins, DBAs, network admins, developers and systems analysts are in high demand -- IOW, the higher-paying, higher-skilled jobs in the tech industry.
I disagree. I think their current strategy on this is going to be denying the existence of Free Software and keeping the media as quiet as possible about it. Every time Microsoft attacks Free Software (usually "Linux") there ends up being lots of news stories about it, as there recently was when they made that recent patent threat. Every time one of those stories gets published, it ends up looking like they're a bit scared of Linux being decent competition.
What cave have you been living in? This talk of yours is sooo 10 years ago.
Microsoft is done trying to deny the existence of Free Software. Some of their latest talk includes "building bridges with the Open Source community".
Microsoft is scared of Linux and the patent threat is but their latest salvo. GPLv3 will squash this thing altogether and Novell will either be out of business or will be forced to rescind or modify its agreement with Microsoft.
Or, perhaps, making noise about patents is really cheap, so they are doing it because it is really cheap?
Playing with patents is a little bit like playing with nukes. As soon you fire a patent salvo, there's another company that's likely violating your patent that's gonna fire a hit back at you. The reason being that patent lawsuits between major companies almost always end in mutually-assured destruction. And you might even get sued by a third party, as a 'preemptive strike' or a 'defensive offense' (think 'Iraq War'). Look at this fictional scenario: Microsoft sues Acme Devices over FAT patent. IBM is violating the FAT patent. So, IBM pre-emptively sues Microsoft over one of its 10 gazillion patents on almost anything. This avoids the court validating the FAT patent as good and prevents Microsoft from suing IBM later.
If it gets too crazy, you get a virtual 'cosmic scramble' of patent lawsuits going on. Not a good scenario.
My question is simply: is Microsoft sitting around scratching its head, or has it already started on the next level of play...?
Yes. Microsoft has developed a culture that almost exactly matches that of one of its principle founders, Chairman and Chief Software Architect, Bill Gates. As Gates did while playing poker in college, Microsoft always has more than one strategy that it's pursuing. There's almost certainly plan B, and its not going to be pretty.
Are we going to see those 235 patents handed over to the community
No. The '235 patents' are far more valuable if they aren't revealed than if they are. Microsoft knows that if these patents were listed, then various groups including the FSF, EFF, PubPat and others will be challenging the validity of those patents in court. The FAT patent is just the start...
or are we instead going to see "IP Bridges" as the next great Product to come out of Redmond?
The 'next great product' to come out of Redmond will almost certainly be something to either further discredit Free Software / Open Source / Linux. Anything to drive people to Windows and away from Linux and GPL software in particular.
I did e-mail the letters to the respective e-mail addresses.
However, I *will* get an open letter published -- with more actual substance -- in a major trade rag if I have to write letters to the editor of every major trade rag on the planet.
I would write another OpenLetter, but at this point, I give up. They won't respond.
Brad Smith & Co: If you're listening at all, just give up the threats or sue us. Piss or get off the pot. Otherwise, maybe some open source developers might get fed up and sue YOU for slander and libel.
You had an existing business relationship with the company, so different rules apply to this situation. They weren't trying to cold-call you to sell you something; they were just maintaining their existing accounts.
Yes, actually. Hacking tools like nmap, ethereal, dictionary crackers (i.e., cracklib), etc. are absolutely necessary in securing a network. There is no way I could lock down a network without scanning to see what ports are open or determine the security of traffic on a network without a packet sniffer. Heck, packet sniffers are useful in determining problems in misbehaving networked applications. How could I check the security of my users' passwords without a dictionary cracker?
Hacking tools are more like guns: make them illegal and only the criminals will have them.
You're talking about *rich* cut and paste. The OP was talking about cut and paste. Still works today. Highlight the text, point in the new text input area, click the middle button. Done.
Slashdot Mirror
And it just keeps getting cheaper. Pretty soon, I expect Kellogg's to start stuffing a couple of gigs into boxes of Froot Loops.
Hmmm.... MarsImageAnalysis@Home ?
That's what I keep saying.
I wrote e-mails as an interested open source/free software developer to Microsoft's Lead Counsel, Brad Smith, but he keeps ignoring me.
Who wants to sue Microsoft for slander of title?
Gmail supports retrieval of mail via POP3 for free. So there's nothing to stop someone from using GPG and similar support already included in or available for a wide variety of e-mail clients such as Outlook, Thunderbird, Evolution, Eudora, etc.
Thank you. I agree, and that was the point I was trying to illustrate.
If you've got enough money, IBM (or one of its resellers) will be more than happy to sell you one of their high-end workstations or servers. Ditto for countless other purveyors of enterprise-class equipment.
Nah, they'll just start sending 'Soldier of Fortune Magazine'-type ads at you.
Nope. It's secret terrorist plots to overthrow the tyrannical American Government!
Oh, wait! I wasn't supposed to say that, was I?
Actually, no. More women under the age of 65 than their male counterparts use the Internet, according to Pew Internet. If you take into account all women and men of all age groups, then women still trail men by a few percentage points.
If anything, you could say that men and women use the Internet about equally.
Now, I'm almost positive that at least 80% of Slashdot readers are male, though there are an increasing number of females on this site. Many of them I think hide and don't reveal that they are female, so the statistics might be different than most of us suspect.
They can and do. Probably 75-80% of the retailers participating in Pricewatch are running their Web shops out of their normal brick-and-motar mom-and-pop computer shops.
Ditto for some other types of Web stores, including some that sell coffee-making supplies and equipment, herbs and cyrstals, auto parts, etc.
It's increasingly common that Web shops are online storefronts for brick-and-mortar businesses.
Ya know, this fuel-cell thingy has an Ethernet port on it. So if someone could find a way to add a really slick, totally anonymous P2P client on the thing, and it could demonstrate the ability to also SCREW over the RIAA, MPAA, Disney, all makers of DRM, and maybe some spammers, too, we would just be ALL set, now wouldn't we?
I got one. How about:
"American Standard Solid-FUel Cell Kickstart System" (ASS-FUCKS)?
Not only that, but it depends on usage. What RMS is saying is that even if a product is used by consumers 'only occasionally' -- which seems to imply that that ANY use by consumers deems the product not covered under the 'commercial use only' tivoization exception clause.
For example, I know guys who have IBM x-Series workstations and servers running at home. Does this mean IBM can't tivoize the x-Series?
Right. Circuit City is a retailer. Their industry is the same as Wal*Mart, CompUSA, etc. They are not a 'tech' company anymore than RadioShack, Wal*Mart or Amazon.com.
However, most of the jobs that are being cut in these companies are unskilled, low-paying jobs. Everywhere I look sysadmins, DBAs, network admins, developers and systems analysts are in high demand -- IOW, the higher-paying, higher-skilled jobs in the tech industry.
What cave have you been living in? This talk of yours is sooo 10 years ago.
Microsoft is done trying to deny the existence of Free Software. Some of their latest talk includes "building bridges with the Open Source community".
Microsoft is scared of Linux and the patent threat is but their latest salvo. GPLv3 will squash this thing altogether and Novell will either be out of business or will be forced to rescind or modify its agreement with Microsoft.
Playing with patents is a little bit like playing with nukes. As soon you fire a patent salvo, there's another company that's likely violating your patent that's gonna fire a hit back at you. The reason being that patent lawsuits between major companies almost always end in mutually-assured destruction. And you might even get sued by a third party, as a 'preemptive strike' or a 'defensive offense' (think 'Iraq War'). Look at this fictional scenario: Microsoft sues Acme Devices over FAT patent. IBM is violating the FAT patent. So, IBM pre-emptively sues Microsoft over one of its 10 gazillion patents on almost anything. This avoids the court validating the FAT patent as good and prevents Microsoft from suing IBM later.
If it gets too crazy, you get a virtual 'cosmic scramble' of patent lawsuits going on. Not a good scenario.
Microsoft knows its playing with fire.
Gee, Uncle Chill, it must have taken forever to transfer those divx/xvid'ed VHSes via a 300 bps modem!!!
You can see webcam and even streaming video shots of the Battery Tunnel on New York's Metropolitan Transit Authority website. Don't know why they would ban cameras, there's nothing to see really.
Yes. Microsoft has developed a culture that almost exactly matches that of one of its principle founders, Chairman and Chief Software Architect, Bill Gates. As Gates did while playing poker in college, Microsoft always has more than one strategy that it's pursuing. There's almost certainly plan B, and its not going to be pretty.
No. The '235 patents' are far more valuable if they aren't revealed than if they are. Microsoft knows that if these patents were listed, then various groups including the FSF, EFF, PubPat and others will be challenging the validity of those patents in court. The FAT patent is just the start...
The 'next great product' to come out of Redmond will almost certainly be something to either further discredit Free Software / Open Source / Linux. Anything to drive people to Windows and away from Linux and GPL software in particular.
I'm betting on it.
How do you think password strength policies work? On Linux, for example, cracklib is actually used to test the password against a known dictionary.
I did e-mail the letters to the respective e-mail addresses.
However, I *will* get an open letter published -- with more actual substance -- in a major trade rag if I have to write letters to the editor of every major trade rag on the planet.
I would write another Open Letter, but at this point, I give up. They won't respond.
Brad Smith & Co: If you're listening at all, just give up the threats or sue us. Piss or get off the pot. Otherwise, maybe some open source developers might get fed up and sue YOU for slander and libel.
You had an existing business relationship with the company, so different rules apply to this situation. They weren't trying to cold-call you to sell you something; they were just maintaining their existing accounts.
Yes, actually. Hacking tools like nmap, ethereal, dictionary crackers (i.e., cracklib), etc. are absolutely necessary in securing a network. There is no way I could lock down a network without scanning to see what ports are open or determine the security of traffic on a network without a packet sniffer. Heck, packet sniffers are useful in determining problems in misbehaving networked applications. How could I check the security of my users' passwords without a dictionary cracker?
Hacking tools are more like guns: make them illegal and only the criminals will have them.
You're talking about *rich* cut and paste. The OP was talking about cut and paste. Still works today. Highlight the text, point in the new text input area, click the middle button. Done.