It's worth remembering that the primary benefit of a single government is simply a common legal and economic framework with some security tossed in. One doesn't need much of a government to provide that.
I fully agree here. At the same time I assert that the joined government of Germany and France could easily be smaller than the sum of the two separate ones.
The ability to engage in large projects just isn't very valuable.
To you it isn't, to me it is. Not that they are the most important ones, but having the option/capability when needed is very valuable.
And where's the value in standardization of schools, anthems, and whatnot? I don't see it.
Schools standardisation is about mobility. Again, your education (both university and the more basic part) should be considered compatible in another state. The EU often failed in this and sometimes still does, but it's getting better. It's about putting less barriers to people to move around, about personal freedom.
Please note that I'm not for wholesale centralisation, because federalism goes perfectly fine with unification. You keep some things at state level (and the regional and municipal alike), but what's the point nowadays for Germany and France to keep separate militaries, but e.g. Texas and California don't have each their own air force? And there really is no reason for electricity tolls between these two, but this goes hand in hand with them being separate countries.
But what of the accomplishments of the US requires a large national government? I'd say the military power. If it's split between four entities as your example, it's never going to be as effective, even each entity puts together a military as powerful, simply because the countries might often work at cross purposes.
Far more than just the military, basically most of the infrastructure. Example: I often hear disrespect towards the UPS, and correct me if I'm wrong on this, but I assume you can simply send a letter to your friend whether he's at the other end of the city or at the other coast. Until recently you had to add extra stamps for cross border mail in nearly all EU member states, and it took 4-5 extra days (even if the letter was just to someone right across the border, 30km distance). Small things like that, but huge in number, and all slowing down mobility, interaction, development.
The moon landing is achievable now by smaller countries than the US was at the time of Apollo. For example, the US had a real GDP (adjusted for inflation) of $2.8 trillion (in current dollars) per year in 1960 right before the start of Apollo. There are three countries, China, Germany, and Japan which have larger economies than that now. So right there, we have four countries with sufficient economic power to repeat Apollo as it was, a massive surge of spending for ten years. They also have the industrial capability as well. Brazil, France, Italy, and the UK aren't far off economically.
So this implies that without the investments of the USA and Russia, we'd have the moon landing 40 or 50 years later? You may accuse me of drinking too much of Tyson's koolaid, but I do believe what he says. So we'd have a more stretched out scientific development, or simply put: slower progress. I'd much rather have what the US did, thankyouverymuch.
And frankly, there's better ways to do Apollo. I think we'll see rather bare-bones private attempts starting about twenty years from now. They won't be spending the equivalent of $150-200 billion to repeat Apollo, but trying a less ambitious but more economically viable approach.
I strongly disagree here. SpaceX, Boeing, etc. are mainly commercialising and rationalising existing knowledge and experience, and if it weren't for NASA, they'd have to make the same huge inv
Do this with a friend: place your phone on your open palm. Let your friend repeatedly hit your hand from below, not too hard, but enough to make the phone jump 1-2 cm. You probably won't have any troubles preventing the phone from dropping on the floor. Now take two or three pens, stick them between the fingers of your clenched fist and make sure they are somewhat parallel. Place your phone on them and let your friend hit the sticks from below. You probably don't want to do that, as your phone would land on the floor pretty soon. Using sticks that better approximate your hand, or even better, a display dummy hand, won't help much.
It's not replicating the mechanical arrangement of your joints, but doing something useful with it. The instantaneous sensory feedback your hand gives you about it's own position and the probable position of the phone (pressure, slight air movement, etc), a good deal of which isn't exactly conscious, is quite hard for us to replicate today (with the resources most robotics teams have). Computers still struggle with the fuzzy matching your hand-eye coordination provides to your muscles in order to move in the right direction. Add to that the visual tracking problem you mentioned, and it turns into quite a feat.
Funny that we're so far apart that each seems to consider the other's viewpoint untenable.
I assume you're a US citizen. Imagine what your country would look like today if the USA and the CSA both decided to be better off without each other. Or even earlier, if the midwest were to split off separately from (New) France and form a standalone country. And if Texas had chosen to stay independent in 1845. Imagine a Northern American continent with New York, Illinois, Texas and California in four different countries. Would the achievements of todays USA be matched by now? Some maybe, but I think it'd look rather bleak for the moon landing and similar great feats and they quite probably wouldn't sum up to the powerhouse the USA is today. (cynics may now throw in that on the up side, we wouldn't have all that hassle with it)
Now bear with me: imagine if we unified the USA and Canada over night. Merge the constitutions, resolve law discrepancies and whatnot. A New Yorker is already closer in mentality and culture to a Quebecian than to a citizen of Houston. The Canadian laws are easily livable since they're already lived with by millions of very similar people, there is nothing intrinsic preventing that. Just work hard at the merger and give it a honest and hard try. The majority of the reasons against this are irrational (like nationalism) and those that make sense are usually short-term problems. But... what would that bigger country look like in 100 years? I can't tell you exactly, but for inspiration take a look at the USA itself, at Qin's China, at the Swiss Federation, Germany, etc, pp.
Different economic agenda? They should have that since they have different regional interests. And as in the US, it's a great way to test policies rather than just throw them on an unsuspecting public, EU-style, and really generate a lot of hope that it works this time.
Currently different EU member states' foreign policies are working against each other over resource offers from both Russia and China. It's identified as a problem by many politicians. There is a terrible inefficiency that could be avoided if they were more coordination and a common interest, instead of prioritising one's own state.
Different school programs? They should have that since it allows for experimentation. The perfect school doesn't exist so why do just one system? Different "national" sports teams? You do realize that not every sport can be reasonably played everywhere?
Where I live, the schools are organised in a highly federal way. You get a coherent primary, secondary and middle school legislation for at most a million people (in most cases much less) at a time. This is good and helps specialise for regional needs as well as test new systems, BUT doesn't take away from the fact that every regional system converges to a precisely defined, standardised Matura/Abitur (see it as a "high school diploma"). Imagine if your high-school education was declared incompatible two states (in the USA) further. That's what often happens in the EU, and we need to push unification in this area a lot further.
Basically it's a pyramid scheme: you need to optimise some things at municipal level, then at the regional, then at the "national" for a few million people. But as seen with bigger nations, why stop there? That would be just foolish. Point is, further coordination in many areas requires structures usually found inside a country. So if we actually do the improvements, work together, coordinate, merge things for efficiency and rationalise, etc. We end up being a single country in all but name. But the most reasonable way to create those unified-country structures is to... unify the countries!
So, with all this in mind, I really can't fathom how someone could claim the unification of the EU to be something not worthwhile. Well-meaning of the Europeans assumed, of course.
Sorry for packing too much in the last sentence, with "orthogonal and detrimental" I mean that it's orthogonal in it's rate of appearance (aka independent), and it's detrimental to the result of the unification.
I do greatly enjoy the Euro and the European unification that has happened so far. There is still a lot of room for improvement, and most of it means more unification and standardisation.
Why not divide your country up into it's regions, then municipalities. Give each of them a different coinage, traffic laws, customs regulations, infrastructure policies, economic agenda, school programmes, "national" sports teams, anthems, you-name-the-other-200-things... congratulations, you have made your former country a far worse place. In hindsight, it's a no-brainer that we have unified whatever political unification happened so far in world history*. It's silly obvious, really. Yet still there are people who insist that it's not worth it. Sure, there are usually short-term complications, but avoiding wars is by far not the only benefit.
* Yup, even with Yugoslavia and the USSR, where it first brought many decades of benefits. If you want to discuss that more extensively, be my guest. Just as a quick note, dictatorial discrimination of minorities is orthogonal and detrimental to unification.
Take olymplic athletes (just to employ a recent topic). Most of them quite probably outmatch you in willpower and determination, they train their bodies to crazy levels and can perform things we can only dream of. From an evolutionary point of view (let's focus on phyical traits and success), they are simply superior beings compared to those two humans that are you and me. Do you think they view themselves "above" you? Some actually do, but if you choose not to push yourself to the limits like they do, how can you complain that this bothers you? Do you think they despise you? I don't see how this matters, they made the choice to pursue success/perfection in their specific area "at all cost". You didn't (I assume boldly here...) and could say that pure chance has "genetically engineered" them to be like this (physically and psychologically)*, but then you have no excuse for not allowing other people to influence their fate and that of their children themselves instead of leaving it to luck.
Now substitute with successful nerds, small business owners that made it big, then switch to people who were born rich/influential because this doesn't make a difference in practise, or... people who were genetically engineered babies!
This divide between more successful humans and less fortunate ones already exists today. Interestingly, the former ones are usually looked up to (including the rich-born)! Not every genetically altered human will be better than every one of your "naturals" (who rely on chance), and for society, the clear downside of allowing this gap to be more pronounced (with possibly dystopic consequences, or maybe no really bad ones at all, but I agree that it will lead to complications in some areas) is met by the advantage of greatly improving the average, plus reducing suffering due to birth disabilties.
* simplifying here, of course the environment plays a role too, but you can wrap that with the "luck" blanket.
I was pretty convinced that your questions were rhetorical, but that "It's a hard sell" at the end made me unsure. Are you really asking?!
By it's very definition, Free Software is as much a "tool" for geeks as Free Speech is one for journalists. It's a very useful basic principle. Not absolutely necessary, as we have countries without any appreciable Free Speech where still thousands of journalists make a living and produce myriads of stories, and we also have lots of software that doesn't classify as free-as-in-freedom, but both still aren't what you'd call a tool.
If you really want, you may say that the policy of Open Source is a tool for geeks, but that's a stretch depending on the definition. And about geeks... what has the internet done for humanity? Also, what impact has Turing's work had, and that of all those who came after him?
Microsofts alleged patent claims are considered FUD. So far, they have never shown anything plausible and always pulled out when in danger that they might have to.
About the other AC's question on malware targeting: yes, yes it will become a target. The current security model is on par (permission separation, PolicyKit, Apparmor) or a bit more advanced (SELinux) than what Windows has to offer today, but we all know that breaches have shifted from exploiting loopholes to social engineering people. So once Joe and his wife switch to Ubuntu in masses, interesting times are ahead. I'm actually curious to see how my operating system of choice copes with this.
First off, thanks for that nonconventional piece of thought.
"but to ensure that the constituents of the very influential body politic (in a democratic society) are capable of interacting effectively with their world."
This is the ideal of education in democracy, and it is proven false by empirical reality--that people do not act out of rational deliberation but according to incentives. Thus, this ideal of education needs to be scrapped, along with democracy.
I think we agree that democracy theoretically works best the more citizens are mature, educated, sensible, etc. Now the problem is that you haven't offered any better alternatives along with your critique. Looking back at history, would an ant-colony society with many specialized narrow-minded workers and a small elite suit the human nature better? Free-for-all communities where everyone follows their moods simply don't work and quickly degenerate into societies with a huge power gradient. Then maybe a traditional India style caste system where (smarter?) parts of the population enjoy more rights, privileges but also obligations? Wouldn't seem to fit with all that freedom-fighting we've been doing and still are. I'd very much like to guarantee that the next Einstein gets a chance to go to university, and so far the only notable systems where he can't fall through the cracks are democracy and communism.
Government that is limited to only the role of prosecuting a very short list of truly victim-ful (as opposed to victimless crimes--most of what is currently illegal) crimes solves the problem of needing a rational populace, which can't exist anyway, because WE ARE NOT RATIONAL!
But what are we? Granted, the Enlightenment goals of a thoroughly educated populace are still a wee little bit off... but why do you exclude the possibility of having the vast majority significantly more educated than it is right now? Because we possess emotions and urges, besides our intellect?
I believe that everyone *should* partake of intellectual exercises that might not be their particular cup of tea, just for the value of the mental development these challenges provide. But my love affair with my own brilliance stops at the point where most people conclude that "therefore, everyone else should be forced by government to do what I think is good."
That there is one of the fundamental problems with society at present (actually--since the dawn of civilization).
Yes, another case of 'where to draw the line'. I assume you do agree that the government should force everyone to get a driving license before trying out the highway. How about the government forcing people to learn how to read? If no, please elaborate, I'd be curious. If yes, why not more of that (e.g. algebra, to stay on topic) and up to which point exactly.
It depends on where we as a society want to go with our development. Those who haven't given up on democracy, a mature population and Enlightenment root for more algebra;)
Let's cut with the wasting of people's adolescence by forcing them to take algebra or what we--most likely all on the right half of the IQ distribution--think is good for them. Oh how arrogant of us! We are of above average intelligence, so we certainly know what's best for others. It's an insidiously seductive self-deception that almost no one can resist. It is the defining reason why intelligence != wisdom.
Yes, but... but... we know what's best for them! On the other hand, if I can show you that working together is of huge benefit in the long term, if the "dumber" allow themselves to be taught by the "smarter" and raise the average, wouldn't you agree that this is better for the species than letting the "dumber" follow the whims of their fancy? You're doing it with your children (my pardon if I'm making things up here), one of and eligibilities being that you're more experienced and (for n
Hmm, the sentences before the part you're quoting make the cynical treatment of the issue pretty evident. You should read on, you might find yourself in agreement with what's there;)
Note: never directly reply to someone you have positively identified as troll (aka feeding), especially if it's APK... there will be no reasonable discussion and he's wasting a shitload of time twisting words (everyone may spend their time as they see fit though). I even will not be going to read all that text in reply to your posting, because I'm sure there isn't anything worthwhile in there.
The UID thing is trivial enough for everyone to see, assuming the average/.er still has a working intellect as they used to. Those actually interested usually skim through the account posting history to check if there's a rhetorical or topical connection between two accounts.
And the moderation system seems to work as expected, seeing how your initially downmodded comments are up again.
Seems like you're being trolled by someone with mod points copy-pasting the same ad hominem stuff anonymously and downvoting reasonable replies. Don't worry, it'll correct itself.
Personally my French writing sucks and I'm thankful for people pointing out possible corrections - they help me improve. Reading a correct and nicely formulated writeup is simply more efficient than having to figure out what the author is trying to convey. It's the editors' job to pay attention to that, so yes, your kind is welcome here.
To be honest: no, it saves me having to resize the browser to a slimmer shape.
There's a good reason why newspapers have, after some decades, figured out that slim columns are much easier and faster to read. And once you get used to diagonal reading, it's simply more efficient to take the time and resize the browser (I'm reading Slashdot right now on a 1024px width browser, on a 1920px width monitor, and it's a shame they have fixed the min-width)...
To get back to Google+: yes, they certainly could use the right "third" (for me it's about 60% empty width with a maximised browser) for something meaningful, like widgets or a second column, but personally I wouldn't really care about that, as long as they don't make the main text any wider. Going with the charity principle, one could say that the current layout gives the benefits of slim columns and a cleaned up interface that focuses on the content.
The FSF's version of freedom is equivalent to nanny-state socialism. They've basically decided that their idea of playing nice needs to be enforced by big stick, and will happily trample over anything and everything that does something they dislike.
Please put such remarks at the end of your postings, if at all. It helps a lot to not induce a feeling of "oh dear, another childish rant" and thus a negative disposition in the reader for the rest of your text.
In this particular case, Ubuntu wants to place a bootloader that will allow you to load ANY operating system, bypassing the "security" features they dislike in the new UEFI. Ubuntu wishes to ensure that users can boot any operating system they like and run any software they want. Their concern is that the GPLv3 makes provisions by which the FSF could, in this case as the owner of GRUB2, deem that a machine that won't let them replace GRUB2 with something else is in violation of the GPLv3. At that point, they can demand that Ubuntu surrender its encryption keys used to provide secure bootloader verification--which then allows anyone to sign any bootloader they want, thus negating any security features you could leverage out of the bootloader (for example, intentionally instructing it to boot only signed code--keeping the chain trusted, rather than booting a foreign OS as is the option).
Exactly. However, in practice there are a few questions: will Canonical care about making other OSs work with their bootloader? Will Microsoft omit the possibility of leveraging SecureBoot to impose more and more stringent conditions over time? Basically, does the perceived advantage outweigh the possible disadvantages? Think about it: Canonical says "the FSF might go nuclear" right here and thus plays it "safe", so why shouldn't we say "Microsoft might go nuclear" and play it safe as well (by not supporting SecureBoot)?
The point of contention is where the FSF gets to demand Ubuntu hand over their encryption keys for this particular application because they've decided it's 'unfair' that users don't have the option to replace a bootloader. The GPLv3 is a restrictive license agreement whose provisions do in fact allow the copyright holder to make certain demands about HOW their software is used. Most people fixate on the "Free" part because you're free to distribute and modify the software; but you are also "Obligated" to publish your modifications in source form if published in any form.
I don't really understand this perspective. By the word "use" we mean "run", not "distribute". The "HOW" in this case is: in order to distribute this software, you must comply with it's conditions. The FSF says it will not enforce the full set of conditions now or at any later point in time (=demanding the keys), but Canonical/Mark are afraid they still might if their mood changes. Of course, "may not distribute" leads to "may not _use_ in packages that we distribute";)
The GPLv3 brings restrictions on how you can use the software, such that you must be able to modify it--the hardware you use the software on must be configured to allow the use of modified software (or any other software). 'Jailbreaking' is not a thing with GPLv3 because the vendors would have to supply a way to run custom software. If the Linux Kernel was GPLv3, then you wouldn't have to root any phones to install Cyanogenmod: vendors would be required to provide an official method for the end user to replace the software with custom versions.
Now wouldn't it be awesome if this was considered normal by the vendors? How about we work towards such a world?
The Affero versions of the GPL family of licenses go even further: if you USE a modified version of the software, you must publish its source. That means if you modify an AGPL Web server and use it to serve your Web site, you have to put up the Web server's source code.
You're making a good argument, but first let me point out that this is quite a flawed interpretation of the GPL...
In the GPL world in which I am a contributor, I say you may freely use and distribute my work providing that:
You do not remove my attribution ( my copyright notice under the general terms of GPL).
You do not sell my work without my expressed written permission.
I'm allowed to take any GPL'd program and sell it for any price I wish. This is explicitly allowed and endorsed by the GPL, which is a commercial but non-proprietary (aka Free) license. I do have to respect the four freedoms and pass them on to the receiver, but price is not a criterion here.
You MUST return to me, the copyright holder, all code that changes my code so that I may decide to whether or not to include it in my original code.
I can take any GPL'd project and make as many changes as I want, then use the program in any way I want, all while not sending a single byte of my changes back to the original author. The license is activated when I distribute the software. Anectodally, I know of a company who uses modified GPL code internally without contributing back, figuring that they don't need upstream sync.
By the way, your first point, while not incorrect, is not something from the GPL itself, but an inherent mechanism of most countries' copyright system.
If someone violates those conditions what should the consequences be?
In handling GPL transgressions, it has been the SFLC's and FSF's policy to not "harm" and "punish" the perpetrator, but show them the way to compliance (i.e. put your changes on a public server) and be done with it. I do agree that this is what the consequences should be.
Throughout time we have made agreements that dictate the norms of social behavior and we as a society have enforced those agreements with forms of, punishment, retribution, etc. Everything from the scarlet "A" to getting you right hand "removed" to killing the person. I think that for the most part in our modernity we have strove to use the threat of punishment as a deterrent to keep people from breaking those social contracts.
This is the obvious and traditional way. It has been well tried and proven, so it's hard to attack a model working so well with regard to human psychology...
So the question is how do we as a society deter these sorts of violations and what kind of threat is sufficient enough to prevent anyone from doing it? Simply saying he "pirating" of copyrighted works is not against social norms will be rejected out of hand because in point of fact it is because someone worked hard to produce that work or funded its creating as an investment ad deserves the opportunity to realize a return for their investment and labor, if they so choose, without that opportunity being taken from them before the term of the protection from such taking has expired.
1. Maybe we should ask ourselves the underlying question: is it moral to create an artificial scarcity on something that can be copied and distributed with negligible time, effort and cost? Most people probably agree that it actually is, but they are highly influenced by the physical, tangible world and don't think in digital/virtual terms. But afaict the complementary group is growing, especially among young people. (here, just keep in mind that law roughly follows the majority opinion/morals)
2. Is it moral to forbid, for example, a group of people singing happy birthday for a friend at a restaurant? I think most people will agree that the current copyright system especially in the USA is out of bounds and the punishments are way overblown. This is a completely different issue than the previously mentioned, but they're often mixed and lead to stupid arguments when the free thinkers from the previous point meet with "material
Somehow I cannot connect this to the reality I live in. If people really behaved like you assume in this posting, communism would work flawlessly. Basically, what you're proposing is exactly the cartel system we currently have in Mexico, minus that little bit of government influence that is left. They are handling disputes via "private arbitration" just fine, and those who see it as their "right" to pursue restitution and retribution at their own measure are doing it as well. Not that I'd ever want to live there... Or can you show me a counterexample?
From Einstein's letter to Max Born, 1926: "Die Theorie liefert viel, aber dem Geheimnis des Alten bringt sie uns kaum näher. Jedenfalls bin ich überzeugt, daß der Alte nicht würfelt."
Translated: "The theory offers a lot, but hardly brings us closer the the old guy's secret. Anyway, I'm convicted that the old guy doesn't play dice."
Einstein never said "God does not play dice", but rather used a slightly derogatory term to describe the metaphor of finding the world formula. Other quotes by Einstein, easily verifiable:
"It seems to me that the idea of a personal God is an anthropological concept which I cannot take seriously. I also cannot imagine some will or goal outside the human sphere. Science has been charged with undermining morality, but the charge is unjust. A man’s ethical behavior should be based effectually on sympathy, education, and social ties and needs; no religious basis is necessary. Man would indeed be in a poor way if he had to be restrained by fear of punishment and hope of reward after death."
"The word God is for me nothing more than the expression and product of human weaknesses, the Bible a collection of honorable but still primitive legends which are nevertheless pretty childish."
You should check your own facts before attempting to correct others.
Honestly, I thought this was common knowledge.
Yes, the standard template suggested by the FSF is GPLv2+, however this is only an example.
Why not do a quick scan over SourceForge, Alioth or Launchpad and tell me how many people use the default "only an example" template and how many take the additional 2 seconds to delete those couple of words. I did something similar a while ago and can tell you: vanishingly few remove them. With this knowledge, you should reread my previous comment and realise that there isn't much to argue about.
It plays no part in the legal interpretation of the GPLv2 license. There is no difference between "GPLv2" and "GPLv2 only".
As demonstrated by jbolden above, simply dropping the GPLv2 file into the project folder automatically offers the project under any later version. Now if you, which is the standard behaviour, additionally include the disclaimer, you probably aren't going to type it by hand, but copy&paste it from the FSF's site or the license appendix. Again, this gives you "or any later" by default, which nearly all projects keep...
You made a blatantly false assertation, unless with "many other projects use GPLv2 exclusively" you meant "Many! Like, not just 5, but 20 or 30 or maybe even more!"
It's about the "letter of the GPL" vs "spirit of the GPL", and how the former has now caught up with the latter since the playing field changed (cue: Tivo). The whole point of licensing code as Free Software is not to license it just for the code's sake, but to protect the usage of that code.
I hope this addresses your first three question marks...
As for "... companies realize that they have been screwed...", why would that be?
The GPLv3 is designed to support commercial usage. It is however not designed to support proprietary usage. These two concepts are orthogonal. * As already posted, Apple would be perfectly fine to continue using SAMBA (GPLv3), since there is not a single technical/legal reason against it with their current usage pattern. This of course may change in case they move OSX to a more iOS-like model...
* Of course there are companies who tie those two closely together. We can only hope that they go out of business soon </inflammatory>;)
So you are trying to claim that there couldn't possibly be a company out there making billions by selling GPL software they didn't write themselves? And not even to talk about a bunch of such companies...
(Sure... Oracle, IBM and Red Hat sell the services, but the GPL does not have the effect of ruining any mechanism for monetising the software. It just requires a smarter business model.)
This is incorrect. GPLv2 is by default "or any later version", not GPLv2 only. Some very few (most notably the Linux kernel) projects single-license their code under GPLv2 ("GPLv2 only"), but this is not required, and nearly all projects use GPLv2+ as specified in the standard template.
Fixed that for you... check your facts. (it's not hard, really)
The GPLv3 is designed to support commercial usage. It is however not designed to support proprietary usage. These two concepts are orthogonal.
As we can easily see that from the iOS ecosystem, Apple dreams of a proprietary world, and thus they want to weaken and remove their perceived "obstacles" for getting there. They would be perfectly fine to continue using SAMBA (GPLv3), since there is not a single technical/legal reason against it with their current usage pattern. However, they are on a crusade against the GPLv3 (for understandable reasons... it doesn't fit their business model), hence the FUD campaign.
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It's worth remembering that the primary benefit of a single government is simply a common legal and economic framework with some security tossed in. One doesn't need much of a government to provide that.
I fully agree here. At the same time I assert that the joined government of Germany and France could easily be smaller than the sum of the two separate ones.
The ability to engage in large projects just isn't very valuable.
To you it isn't, to me it is. Not that they are the most important ones, but having the option/capability when needed is very valuable.
And where's the value in standardization of schools, anthems, and whatnot? I don't see it.
Schools standardisation is about mobility. Again, your education (both university and the more basic part) should be considered compatible in another state. The EU often failed in this and sometimes still does, but it's getting better.
It's about putting less barriers to people to move around, about personal freedom.
Please note that I'm not for wholesale centralisation, because federalism goes perfectly fine with unification. You keep some things at state level (and the regional and municipal alike), but what's the point nowadays for Germany and France to keep separate militaries, but e.g. Texas and California don't have each their own air force?
And there really is no reason for electricity tolls between these two, but this goes hand in hand with them being separate countries.
But what of the accomplishments of the US requires a large national government? I'd say the military power. If it's split between four entities as your example, it's never going to be as effective, even each entity puts together a military as powerful, simply because the countries might often work at cross purposes.
Far more than just the military, basically most of the infrastructure.
Example: I often hear disrespect towards the UPS, and correct me if I'm wrong on this, but I assume you can simply send a letter to your friend whether he's at the other end of the city or at the other coast. Until recently you had to add extra stamps for cross border mail in nearly all EU member states, and it took 4-5 extra days (even if the letter was just to someone right across the border, 30km distance). Small things like that, but huge in number, and all slowing down mobility, interaction, development.
The moon landing is achievable now by smaller countries than the US was at the time of Apollo. For example, the US had a real GDP (adjusted for inflation) of $2.8 trillion (in current dollars) per year in 1960 right before the start of Apollo. There are three countries, China, Germany, and Japan which have larger economies than that now. So right there, we have four countries with sufficient economic power to repeat Apollo as it was, a massive surge of spending for ten years. They also have the industrial capability as well. Brazil, France, Italy, and the UK aren't far off economically.
So this implies that without the investments of the USA and Russia, we'd have the moon landing 40 or 50 years later?
You may accuse me of drinking too much of Tyson's koolaid, but I do believe what he says. So we'd have a more stretched out scientific development, or simply put: slower progress. I'd much rather have what the US did, thankyouverymuch.
And frankly, there's better ways to do Apollo. I think we'll see rather bare-bones private attempts starting about twenty years from now. They won't be spending the equivalent of $150-200 billion to repeat Apollo, but trying a less ambitious but more economically viable approach.
I strongly disagree here. SpaceX, Boeing, etc. are mainly commercialising and rationalising existing knowledge and experience, and if it weren't for NASA, they'd have to make the same huge inv
Do this with a friend: place your phone on your open palm. Let your friend repeatedly hit your hand from below, not too hard, but enough to make the phone jump 1-2 cm. You probably won't have any troubles preventing the phone from dropping on the floor.
Now take two or three pens, stick them between the fingers of your clenched fist and make sure they are somewhat parallel. Place your phone on them and let your friend hit the sticks from below. You probably don't want to do that, as your phone would land on the floor pretty soon. Using sticks that better approximate your hand, or even better, a display dummy hand, won't help much.
It's not replicating the mechanical arrangement of your joints, but doing something useful with it. The instantaneous sensory feedback your hand gives you about it's own position and the probable position of the phone (pressure, slight air movement, etc), a good deal of which isn't exactly conscious, is quite hard for us to replicate today (with the resources most robotics teams have). Computers still struggle with the fuzzy matching your hand-eye coordination provides to your muscles in order to move in the right direction.
Add to that the visual tracking problem you mentioned, and it turns into quite a feat.
Funny that we're so far apart that each seems to consider the other's viewpoint untenable.
I assume you're a US citizen. Imagine what your country would look like today if the USA and the CSA both decided to be better off without each other. Or even earlier, if the midwest were to split off separately from (New) France and form a standalone country. And if Texas had chosen to stay independent in 1845. Imagine a Northern American continent with New York, Illinois, Texas and California in four different countries. Would the achievements of todays USA be matched by now? Some maybe, but I think it'd look rather bleak for the moon landing and similar great feats and they quite probably wouldn't sum up to the powerhouse the USA is today. (cynics may now throw in that on the up side, we wouldn't have all that hassle with it)
Now bear with me: imagine if we unified the USA and Canada over night. Merge the constitutions, resolve law discrepancies and whatnot. A New Yorker is already closer in mentality and culture to a Quebecian than to a citizen of Houston. The Canadian laws are easily livable since they're already lived with by millions of very similar people, there is nothing intrinsic preventing that. Just work hard at the merger and give it a honest and hard try.
The majority of the reasons against this are irrational (like nationalism) and those that make sense are usually short-term problems.
But... what would that bigger country look like in 100 years? I can't tell you exactly, but for inspiration take a look at the USA itself, at Qin's China, at the Swiss Federation, Germany, etc, pp.
Different economic agenda? They should have that since they have different regional interests. And as in the US, it's a great way to test policies rather than just throw them on an unsuspecting public, EU-style, and really generate a lot of hope that it works this time.
Currently different EU member states' foreign policies are working against each other over resource offers from both Russia and China. It's identified as a problem by many politicians. There is a terrible inefficiency that could be avoided if they were more coordination and a common interest, instead of prioritising one's own state.
Different school programs? They should have that since it allows for experimentation. The perfect school doesn't exist so why do just one system? Different "national" sports teams? You do realize that not every sport can be reasonably played everywhere?
Where I live, the schools are organised in a highly federal way. You get a coherent primary, secondary and middle school legislation for at most a million people (in most cases much less) at a time. This is good and helps specialise for regional needs as well as test new systems, BUT doesn't take away from the fact that every regional system converges to a precisely defined, standardised Matura/Abitur (see it as a "high school diploma"). Imagine if your high-school education was declared incompatible two states (in the USA) further. That's what often happens in the EU, and we need to push unification in this area a lot further.
Basically it's a pyramid scheme: you need to optimise some things at municipal level, then at the regional, then at the "national" for a few million people. But as seen with bigger nations, why stop there? That would be just foolish. Point is, further coordination in many areas requires structures usually found inside a country. So if we actually do the improvements, work together, coordinate, merge things for efficiency and rationalise, etc. We end up being a single country in all but name. But the most reasonable way to create those unified-country structures is to... unify the countries!
So, with all this in mind, I really can't fathom how someone could claim the unification of the EU to be something not worthwhile. Well-meaning of the Europeans assumed, of course.
Sorry for packing too much in the last sentence, with "orthogonal and detrimental" I mean that it's orthogonal in it's rate of appearance (aka independent), and it's detrimental to the result of the unification.
I do greatly enjoy the Euro and the European unification that has happened so far. There is still a lot of room for improvement, and most of it means more unification and standardisation.
Why not divide your country up into it's regions, then municipalities. Give each of them a different coinage, traffic laws, customs regulations, infrastructure policies, economic agenda, school programmes, "national" sports teams, anthems, you-name-the-other-200-things ... congratulations, you have made your former country a far worse place.
In hindsight, it's a no-brainer that we have unified whatever political unification happened so far in world history*.
It's silly obvious, really. Yet still there are people who insist that it's not worth it. Sure, there are usually short-term complications, but avoiding wars is by far not the only benefit.
* Yup, even with Yugoslavia and the USSR, where it first brought many decades of benefits. If you want to discuss that more extensively, be my guest. Just as a quick note, dictatorial discrimination of minorities is orthogonal and detrimental to unification.
Take olymplic athletes (just to employ a recent topic). Most of them quite probably outmatch you in willpower and determination, they train their bodies to crazy levels and can perform things we can only dream of. From an evolutionary point of view (let's focus on phyical traits and success), they are simply superior beings compared to those two humans that are you and me.
Do you think they view themselves "above" you? Some actually do, but if you choose not to push yourself to the limits like they do, how can you complain that this bothers you?
Do you think they despise you? I don't see how this matters, they made the choice to pursue success/perfection in their specific area "at all cost". You didn't (I assume boldly here...) and could say that pure chance has "genetically engineered" them to be like this (physically and psychologically)*, but then you have no excuse for not allowing other people to influence their fate and that of their children themselves instead of leaving it to luck.
Now substitute with successful nerds, small business owners that made it big, then switch to people who were born rich/influential because this doesn't make a difference in practise, or ... people who were genetically engineered babies!
This divide between more successful humans and less fortunate ones already exists today. Interestingly, the former ones are usually looked up to (including the rich-born)!
Not every genetically altered human will be better than every one of your "naturals" (who rely on chance), and for society, the clear downside of allowing this gap to be more pronounced (with possibly dystopic consequences, or maybe no really bad ones at all, but I agree that it will lead to complications in some areas) is met by the advantage of greatly improving the average, plus reducing suffering due to birth disabilties.
* simplifying here, of course the environment plays a role too, but you can wrap that with the "luck" blanket.
I was pretty convinced that your questions were rhetorical, but that "It's a hard sell" at the end made me unsure. Are you really asking?!
By it's very definition, Free Software is as much a "tool" for geeks as Free Speech is one for journalists.
It's a very useful basic principle. Not absolutely necessary, as we have countries without any appreciable Free Speech where still thousands of journalists make a living and produce myriads of stories, and we also have lots of software that doesn't classify as free-as-in-freedom, but both still aren't what you'd call a tool.
If you really want, you may say that the policy of Open Source is a tool for geeks, but that's a stretch depending on the definition.
And about geeks... what has the internet done for humanity? Also, what impact has Turing's work had, and that of all those who came after him?
You didn't miss much, here's the cached article
In my opinion it's a lousy written piece with half of the sentences being there for the sole purpose of filling white space.
The real world does not have a frame rate
Careful.
Microsofts alleged patent claims are considered FUD. So far, they have never shown anything plausible and always pulled out when in danger that they might have to.
About the other AC's question on malware targeting: yes, yes it will become a target. The current security model is on par (permission separation, PolicyKit, Apparmor) or a bit more advanced (SELinux) than what Windows has to offer today, but we all know that breaches have shifted from exploiting loopholes to social engineering people. So once Joe and his wife switch to Ubuntu in masses, interesting times are ahead.
I'm actually curious to see how my operating system of choice copes with this.
First off, thanks for that nonconventional piece of thought.
"but to ensure that the constituents of the very influential body politic (in a democratic society) are capable of interacting effectively with their world."
This is the ideal of education in democracy, and it is proven false by empirical reality--that people do not act out of rational deliberation but according to incentives. Thus, this ideal of education needs to be scrapped, along with democracy.
I think we agree that democracy theoretically works best the more citizens are mature, educated, sensible, etc.
Now the problem is that you haven't offered any better alternatives along with your critique.
Looking back at history, would an ant-colony society with many specialized narrow-minded workers and a small elite suit the human nature better? Free-for-all communities where everyone follows their moods simply don't work and quickly degenerate into societies with a huge power gradient.
Then maybe a traditional India style caste system where (smarter?) parts of the population enjoy more rights, privileges but also obligations? Wouldn't seem to fit with all that freedom-fighting we've been doing and still are.
I'd very much like to guarantee that the next Einstein gets a chance to go to university, and so far the only notable systems where he can't fall through the cracks are democracy and communism.
Government that is limited to only the role of prosecuting a very short list of truly victim-ful (as opposed to victimless crimes--most of what is currently illegal) crimes solves the problem of needing a rational populace, which can't exist anyway, because WE ARE NOT RATIONAL!
But what are we? Granted, the Enlightenment goals of a thoroughly educated populace are still a wee little bit off... but why do you exclude the possibility of having the vast majority significantly more educated than it is right now? Because we possess emotions and urges, besides our intellect?
I believe that everyone *should* partake of intellectual exercises that might not be their particular cup of tea, just for the value of the mental development these challenges provide. But my love affair with my own brilliance stops at the point where most people conclude that "therefore, everyone else should be forced by government to do what I think is good."
That there is one of the fundamental problems with society at present (actually--since the dawn of civilization).
Yes, another case of 'where to draw the line'. I assume you do agree that the government should force everyone to get a driving license before trying out the highway. How about the government forcing people to learn how to read? If no, please elaborate, I'd be curious. If yes, why not more of that (e.g. algebra, to stay on topic) and up to which point exactly.
It depends on where we as a society want to go with our development. Those who haven't given up on democracy, a mature population and Enlightenment root for more algebra ;)
Let's cut with the wasting of people's adolescence by forcing them to take algebra or what we--most likely all on the right half of the IQ distribution--think is good for them. Oh how arrogant of us! We are of above average intelligence, so we certainly know what's best for others. It's an insidiously seductive self-deception that almost no one can resist. It is the defining reason why intelligence != wisdom.
Yes, but... but... we know what's best for them!
On the other hand, if I can show you that working together is of huge benefit in the long term, if the "dumber" allow themselves to be taught by the "smarter" and raise the average, wouldn't you agree that this is better for the species than letting the "dumber" follow the whims of their fancy? You're doing it with your children (my pardon if I'm making things up here), one of and eligibilities being that you're more experienced and (for n
Hmm, the sentences before the part you're quoting make the cynical treatment of the issue pretty evident. You should read on, you might find yourself in agreement with what's there ;)
Note: never directly reply to someone you have positively identified as troll (aka feeding), especially if it's APK... there will be no reasonable discussion and he's wasting a shitload of time twisting words (everyone may spend their time as they see fit though).
I even will not be going to read all that text in reply to your posting, because I'm sure there isn't anything worthwhile in there.
The UID thing is trivial enough for everyone to see, assuming the average /.er still has a working intellect as they used to. Those actually interested usually skim through the account posting history to check if there's a rhetorical or topical connection between two accounts.
And the moderation system seems to work as expected, seeing how your initially downmodded comments are up again.
Seems like you're being trolled by someone with mod points copy-pasting the same ad hominem stuff anonymously and downvoting reasonable replies. Don't worry, it'll correct itself.
Personally my French writing sucks and I'm thankful for people pointing out possible corrections - they help me improve. Reading a correct and nicely formulated writeup is simply more efficient than having to figure out what the author is trying to convey. It's the editors' job to pay attention to that, so yes, your kind is welcome here.
Just commenting to undo moderation, freak misclick while moving around windows ;)
To be honest: no, it saves me having to resize the browser to a slimmer shape.
There's a good reason why newspapers have, after some decades, figured out that slim columns are much easier and faster to read.
And once you get used to diagonal reading, it's simply more efficient to take the time and resize the browser (I'm reading Slashdot right now on a 1024px width browser, on a 1920px width monitor, and it's a shame they have fixed the min-width)...
To get back to Google+: yes, they certainly could use the right "third" (for me it's about 60% empty width with a maximised browser) for something meaningful, like widgets or a second column, but personally I wouldn't really care about that, as long as they don't make the main text any wider.
Going with the charity principle, one could say that the current layout gives the benefits of slim columns and a cleaned up interface that focuses on the content.
The FSF's version of freedom is equivalent to nanny-state socialism. They've basically decided that their idea of playing nice needs to be enforced by big stick, and will happily trample over anything and everything that does something they dislike.
Please put such remarks at the end of your postings, if at all. It helps a lot to not induce a feeling of "oh dear, another childish rant" and thus a negative disposition in the reader for the rest of your text.
In this particular case, Ubuntu wants to place a bootloader that will allow you to load ANY operating system, bypassing the "security" features they dislike in the new UEFI. Ubuntu wishes to ensure that users can boot any operating system they like and run any software they want. Their concern is that the GPLv3 makes provisions by which the FSF could, in this case as the owner of GRUB2, deem that a machine that won't let them replace GRUB2 with something else is in violation of the GPLv3. At that point, they can demand that Ubuntu surrender its encryption keys used to provide secure bootloader verification--which then allows anyone to sign any bootloader they want, thus negating any security features you could leverage out of the bootloader (for example, intentionally instructing it to boot only signed code--keeping the chain trusted, rather than booting a foreign OS as is the option).
Exactly. However, in practice there are a few questions: will Canonical care about making other OSs work with their bootloader? Will Microsoft omit the possibility of leveraging SecureBoot to impose more and more stringent conditions over time?
Basically, does the perceived advantage outweigh the possible disadvantages? Think about it: Canonical says "the FSF might go nuclear" right here and thus plays it "safe", so why shouldn't we say "Microsoft might go nuclear" and play it safe as well (by not supporting SecureBoot)?
The point of contention is where the FSF gets to demand Ubuntu hand over their encryption keys for this particular application because they've decided it's 'unfair' that users don't have the option to replace a bootloader. The GPLv3 is a restrictive license agreement whose provisions do in fact allow the copyright holder to make certain demands about HOW their software is used. Most people fixate on the "Free" part because you're free to distribute and modify the software; but you are also "Obligated" to publish your modifications in source form if published in any form.
I don't really understand this perspective. By the word "use" we mean "run", not "distribute". The "HOW" in this case is: in order to distribute this software, you must comply with it's conditions. The FSF says it will not enforce the full set of conditions now or at any later point in time (=demanding the keys), but Canonical/Mark are afraid they still might if their mood changes. ;)
Of course, "may not distribute" leads to "may not _use_ in packages that we distribute"
The GPLv3 brings restrictions on how you can use the software, such that you must be able to modify it--the hardware you use the software on must be configured to allow the use of modified software (or any other software). 'Jailbreaking' is not a thing with GPLv3 because the vendors would have to supply a way to run custom software. If the Linux Kernel was GPLv3, then you wouldn't have to root any phones to install Cyanogenmod: vendors would be required to provide an official method for the end user to replace the software with custom versions.
Now wouldn't it be awesome if this was considered normal by the vendors? How about we work towards such a world?
The Affero versions of the GPL family of licenses go even further: if you USE a modified version of the software, you must publish its source. That means if you modify an AGPL Web server and use it to serve your Web site, you have to put up the Web server's source code.
You're making a good argument, but first let me point out that this is quite a flawed interpretation of the GPL...
In the GPL world in which I am a contributor, I say you may freely use and distribute my work providing that:
I'm allowed to take any GPL'd program and sell it for any price I wish. This is explicitly allowed and endorsed by the GPL, which is a commercial but non-proprietary (aka Free) license.
I do have to respect the four freedoms and pass them on to the receiver, but price is not a criterion here.
I can take any GPL'd project and make as many changes as I want, then use the program in any way I want, all while not sending a single byte of my changes back to the original author. The license is activated when I distribute the software. Anectodally, I know of a company who uses modified GPL code internally without contributing back, figuring that they don't need upstream sync.
By the way, your first point, while not incorrect, is not something from the GPL itself, but an inherent mechanism of most countries' copyright system.
If someone violates those conditions what should the consequences be?
In handling GPL transgressions, it has been the SFLC's and FSF's policy to not "harm" and "punish" the perpetrator, but show them the way to compliance (i.e. put your changes on a public server) and be done with it. I do agree that this is what the consequences should be.
Throughout time we have made agreements that dictate the norms of social behavior and we as a society have enforced those agreements with forms of, punishment, retribution, etc. Everything from the scarlet "A" to getting you right hand "removed" to killing the person. I think that for the most part in our modernity we have strove to use the threat of punishment as a deterrent to keep people from breaking those social contracts.
This is the obvious and traditional way. It has been well tried and proven, so it's hard to attack a model working so well with regard to human psychology...
So the question is how do we as a society deter these sorts of violations and what kind of threat is sufficient enough to prevent anyone from doing it? Simply saying he "pirating" of copyrighted works is not against social norms will be rejected out of hand because in point of fact it is because someone worked hard to produce that work or funded its creating as an investment ad deserves the opportunity to realize a return for their investment and labor, if they so choose, without that opportunity being taken from them before the term of the protection from such taking has expired.
1. Maybe we should ask ourselves the underlying question: is it moral to create an artificial scarcity on something that can be copied and distributed with negligible time, effort and cost?
Most people probably agree that it actually is, but they are highly influenced by the physical, tangible world and don't think in digital/virtual terms. But afaict the complementary group is growing, especially among young people. (here, just keep in mind that law roughly follows the majority opinion/morals)
2. Is it moral to forbid, for example, a group of people singing happy birthday for a friend at a restaurant?
I think most people will agree that the current copyright system especially in the USA is out of bounds and the punishments are way overblown. This is a completely different issue than the previously mentioned, but they're often mixed and lead to stupid arguments when the free thinkers from the previous point meet with "material
Somehow I cannot connect this to the reality I live in. If people really behaved like you assume in this posting, communism would work flawlessly.
Basically, what you're proposing is exactly the cartel system we currently have in Mexico, minus that little bit of government influence that is left.
They are handling disputes via "private arbitration" just fine, and those who see it as their "right" to pursue restitution and retribution at their own measure are doing it as well. Not that I'd ever want to live there...
Or can you show me a counterexample?
An incredibly widespread misconception...
From Einstein's letter to Max Born, 1926:
"Die Theorie liefert viel, aber dem Geheimnis des Alten bringt sie uns kaum näher. Jedenfalls bin ich überzeugt, daß der Alte nicht würfelt."
Translated:
"The theory offers a lot, but hardly brings us closer the the old guy's secret. Anyway, I'm convicted that the old guy doesn't play dice."
Einstein never said "God does not play dice", but rather used a slightly derogatory term to describe the metaphor of finding the world formula.
Other quotes by Einstein, easily verifiable:
"It seems to me that the idea of a personal God is an anthropological concept which I cannot take seriously. I also cannot imagine some will or goal outside the human sphere. Science has been charged with undermining morality, but the charge is unjust. A man’s ethical behavior should be based effectually on sympathy, education, and social ties and needs; no religious basis is necessary. Man would indeed be in a poor way if he had to be restrained by fear of punishment and hope of reward after death."
"The word God is for me nothing more than the expression and product of human weaknesses, the Bible a collection of honorable but still primitive legends which are nevertheless pretty childish."
You should check your own facts before attempting to correct others.
Honestly, I thought this was common knowledge.
Yes, the standard template suggested by the FSF is GPLv2+, however this is only an example.
Why not do a quick scan over SourceForge, Alioth or Launchpad and tell me how many people use the default "only an example" template and how many take the additional 2 seconds to delete those couple of words. I did something similar a while ago and can tell you: vanishingly few remove them.
With this knowledge, you should reread my previous comment and realise that there isn't much to argue about.
It plays no part in the legal interpretation of the GPLv2 license. There is no difference between "GPLv2" and "GPLv2 only".
As demonstrated by jbolden above, simply dropping the GPLv2 file into the project folder automatically offers the project under any later version. Now if you, which is the standard behaviour, additionally include the disclaimer, you probably aren't going to type it by hand, but copy&paste it from the FSF's site or the license appendix. Again, this gives you "or any later" by default, which nearly all projects keep...
You made a blatantly false assertation, unless with "many other projects use GPLv2 exclusively" you meant "Many! Like, not just 5, but 20 or 30 or maybe even more!"
It's about the "letter of the GPL" vs "spirit of the GPL", and how the former has now caught up with the latter since the playing field changed (cue: Tivo).
The whole point of licensing code as Free Software is not to license it just for the code's sake, but to protect the usage of that code.
I hope this addresses your first three question marks...
As for "... companies realize that they have been screwed ...", why would that be?
The GPLv3 is designed to support commercial usage. It is however not designed to support proprietary usage. These two concepts are orthogonal. *
As already posted, Apple would be perfectly fine to continue using SAMBA (GPLv3), since there is not a single technical/legal reason against it with their current usage pattern. This of course may change in case they move OSX to a more iOS-like model...
* Of course there are companies who tie those two closely together. We can only hope that they go out of business soon </inflammatory> ;)
So you are trying to claim that there couldn't possibly be a company out there making billions by selling GPL software they didn't write themselves? And not even to talk about a bunch of such companies...
(Sure... Oracle, IBM and Red Hat sell the services, but the GPL does not have the effect of ruining any mechanism for monetising the software. It just requires a smarter business model.)
This is incorrect. GPLv2 is by default "or any later version", not GPLv2 only. Some very few (most notably the Linux kernel) projects single-license their code under GPLv2 ("GPLv2 only"), but this is not required, and nearly all projects use GPLv2+ as specified in the standard template.
Fixed that for you... check your facts. (it's not hard, really)
The GPLv3 is designed to support commercial usage. It is however not designed to support proprietary usage. These two concepts are orthogonal.
As we can easily see that from the iOS ecosystem, Apple dreams of a proprietary world, and thus they want to weaken and remove their perceived "obstacles" for getting there.
They would be perfectly fine to continue using SAMBA (GPLv3), since there is not a single technical/legal reason against it with their current usage pattern. However, they are on a crusade against the GPLv3 (for understandable reasons... it doesn't fit their business model), hence the FUD campaign.