Typically employers make their employees sign an agreement when they are hired that any intellectual property they create while performing their job becomes the intellectual property of the employer and the employee loses the rights to it.
Some agreements are even as strict as to say that anything you create while you are employed becomes the IP of your employer. So if you wrote something at home while you are "off the clock" it would still technically be the property of your employer. Booo!
I truly do love the terms of my current employment. I'm employed as a programmer, and I retain "dual copyright" over all of my own creations. Essentially, while I work here, I am also contractually bound to not compete with them, but should I ever leave I can take all of my own code with me and fork it (any images, product names, documentation, or whatever may need to be scrubbed/changed though, since they're not my work). In return for this, they got all of the code I had written before I started here, giving them a nice jumpstart in areas that they were interested in but weren't too keen on doing all the basic startup stuff for.
It's a win-win situation and should I ever choose to go somewhere else, I'll only accept it under the same terms - I have such a massive collection of libraries that I've written now for various purposes, that it'd be truly painful to have to start them from scratch again... One day (perhaps after I leave my current employer), I also hope to release a large amount of it under the GPL, since there's a few GPL projects I'd love to get my libraries in to and also see what others can do with what I've started.
I believe that in the ATLAS collaboration (one of the LHC experiments) the alphabetical surname to beat is "Aad".
This guy beats that... sadly, not a physicist... or alive anymore. (there certainly may be some people with that surname (or related such as "van Aachen") still around though)
If I do an action that hurts you, than I'm at fault and I could be prosecuted for it. If I say a word that hurts you, that's *your* fault... if you haven't learned by adulthood that "sticks and stones can break my bones, but words will never harm me", that's not my problem.
I agree... I wasn't trying to say that speech should be illegal because it can directly cause "harm" - it can't. It can INDIRECTLY cause harm however by convincing people of certain points of view. The speech itself hurts no-one, the effects of it do.
This is a problem, but it's not a problem with the law, it's a problem with people. I like to think of myself as pretty immune to advertising and "popular opinion", but walk out in any big town (be it Seattle, Tokyo, Berlin or London) and just take a look how many people are wearing overpriced crap that is half the quality and twice the price of other clothes just because it's got a certain label on it. THAT is the power of speech, and when used for something more dangerous than just selling clothing to gullible people, it needs to be regulated.
The government has already successfully regulated your actions by making you too terrified to exercise your rights.
The government hasn't terrorised me in to anything. I wholeheartedly agree with this aspect of the law (note: "THIS aspect"... there are many other laws I don't agree with). If I was "too terrified to exercise my rights", that would imply I wanted to do something but didn't out of fear for some kind of negative action against me. I'm not afraid of doing what I want to do at all.
Make the law completely color-blind, like everything else, and racism will eventually go away. Every time you call out somebody based on skin color, *whether positive or negative*, you're encouraging racism.
Again, I agree... the laws here do NOT single out any specific race, religion, credo, or belief system. "Affirmative action" laws are indeed more harmful than helpful. That's not what we have here.
BTW, how the holy hell are you saying all this and claiming to be a Libertarian?
I never claimed to be libertarian... I said: For example, I am relatively "socialist" in my viewpoints towards... and then: I am however more "libertarian" in my views regarding...
Hell, look at Canada: Mark Steyn can be prosecuted by a special government commission for simply quoting somebody else in his book! In Canada, quoting a radial Imam is equivalent to holding the same opinion yourself. This is where "hate speech" laws lead you!
That may be possible in Canada, and if so I feel very sorry for their screwed up laws. It's not possible here. I can quote Adolf Hitler all day long and not get in any trouble if I choose. The moment I'd get in trouble would be the moment I say something like, "and this is a damn good idea, let's bring back the gas chambers!" (unless it's clear I was joking or in some other way not seriously proposing it, in which case I still wouldn't be in trouble (as a good example: I have a coworker (German) who constantly goes on about driving tanks in to Paris again whenever our daughter company in France gives us grief (far too often), and noone would ever dream of that being a punishable offence))
Yes, this IS restricting the choice of the boss, but I don't feel a society can function well and take care of all its members when such a situation is possible.
So you're telling me that my society (in Washington State) isn't functioning well right now?
Moreover, it's functioning worse than (for example) California's?
Having never been to Washington state, and knowing little about it, I couldn't say. I can assume that there are other factors that will have an influence on how well the society works, but I still stand by my belief that the "at will" employment situation is a negative factor and that without it, you'd be even better off as a society than you are currently.
Like I said though, I really don't know the societal situation there in Washington State and so don't want to speculate on details that I can't possibly know with any level of certainty.
The homeless people on the streets of NYC for example tend to be in pretty bad situations with no obvious way out for them. They can go stay in shelters where crime and violence are worse than their own "communities" on the streets, but despite there being programmes there that are intended to help them, the success rate is extremely low.
First of all, I'm going to sound like a jerk, but I really don't care about New York whatsoever. As far as I'm concerned, that's a completely different country from me-- I'm thousands of miles away and in a vastly, vastly different culture.
And Washington State is thousands of miles away from me, in a vastly, vastly different culture... yet I do still care, because we're all human beings. But I really wasn't ever talking about whether one should care or not, I was discussing societal things in general. I'm happy for you that you live in a society that you like, as do I.
Secondly, homeless people are generally mentally-ill. That doesn't excuse the fact that they're homeless, but it does mean that the current programs to assist them (shelters) are only addressing a small portion of the actual problem.
Many homeless people are mentally ill, but I'd wager that many became that way AFTER becoming homeless, not before. Not all, of course, but definitely a significant number. If the society were geared better towards taking care of low-income people before they become homeless, I'm certain the rate of homelessness would decrease (there would still be those that choose to be homeless due to mental illness or whatever other reasons, but those given the chance to avoid it when they didn't choose to be, wouldn't be)
Well, like I said I'm not German, I just live here... but I don't think anyone really "worships" a royal family anywhere these days. There are quite a few Monarchies here in Europe and in almost all cases, they're pretty much just figureheads.
The British do.
You don't honestly believe that do you? I've never lived there, but I have quite a few friends there and have visited there often. The British Royals aren't significantly different to the no-talent celebrities of the US (as in those that are famous for "being famous" with no skills whatsoever to have made them that way (Paris Hilton immediately springs to mind)). The only real difference is that there's a level of deference and respect rather than all-out media bashing (a "prince smoking pot" gets humorous headlines in almost every newspaper around, but much beyond that might be treated with a bit more caution).
There may be some "upper class" types that still truly consider the royals to be a "great family" or that they "hold the country together" or whatever, but the average citizen of the UK really doesn't think about them in daily life at all, and when they do, it's more in the same vein as when you think about any random ultra-rich person in the US.
You can't love "choice" then also love "job protectionism" in the same breath. What kind of "choice" is it to tell a boss he can't fire somebody?
Well, like I was saying, I think "choice" is extremely important (pretty much the most important thing from an individual's perspective), but like everything in life it's not an "all or nothing" concept. I think a person should be able to be fired for being useless, or no longer needed, or a myriad of other things. But NOT simply because the boss says "I don't like you". Yes, this IS restricting the choice of the boss, but I don't feel a society can function well and take care of all its members when such a situation is possible.
I don't believe there is a single American who has no avenues to improve himself and his life.
Then we definitely differ on opinion here. I believe that most countries have people that this applies to, and unfortunately in the US there are more from my point of view than most other western nations. The homeless people on the streets of NYC for example tend to be in pretty bad situations with no obvious way out for them. They can go stay in shelters where crime and violence are worse than their own "communities" on the streets, but despite there being programmes there that are intended to help them, the success rate is extremely low.
Ugh, Germans. On the one hand, you don't worship a royal family, so that's good.
Well, like I said I'm not German, I just live here... but I don't think anyone really "worships" a royal family anywhere these days. There are quite a few Monarchies here in Europe and in almost all cases, they're pretty much just figureheads.
On the other, you have zero freedom of speech, which is worse.
That's patently untrue. Freedom of speech here is guaranteed by the constitution, as is the freedom of the press (a related and equally important topic)... The reason it's commonly perceived as though freedom of speech is limited here is that it's not the "highest" right that is given. That honour goes to (as in my last post) the inviolability of human dignity. You can NOT use speech to violate human dignity (such as hate speech and so on), as this is breaking a more fundmental right than the right to free speech. Other than this specific case though, all speech is protected. This is a deliberate design to avoid the fact that people are by their natures pretty easy to persuade when not presented with enough variable information about the world around them and only presented with information that shows one point of view (and if you think that's not true, ask yourself why advertising is so successful). This led to the problems with Adolf Hitler's government here and can be seen elsewhere such as the Christian fundamentalists in the US, the Islamic fundamentalists in the middle east, and Apartheid in South Africa not so long ago.
It can be argued that "human dignity" is a pretty broad thing and therefore this interpretation is open to abuse, and I wouldn't necessarily disagree with you, but in practice it seems to be working pretty well right now, and the Germans have learned from their past to be wary of governments that try to impose extreme views...
The "fanatical patriotism" of certain parts the US military (especially the Marine Corps) that leads to obeying even the most ridiculous of orders;
All militaries are like that, at least successful ones. If yours isn't, I hope you don't need to rely on them anytime soon.
The world really isn't that scary of a place that one should have to rely on a military all that often. Of course, it is sadly necessary to have one, but I disagree that the fanatical patriotism is required. A clear-headed understanding that "my commander probably understands the situation better than I do, and therefore if he gives an order I should follow it" should be sufficient. It still at least leaves room for the "there is no way in hell this could ever be the right thing to do, so I won't do it" feeling that I believe is REQUIRED for a soldier to have in some circumstances.
The "at will" employment situation that guarantees people in the lower rungs of society are basically slaves to their bosses' whims to avoid being fired;
I'm in an "at will" state and I love it. I have just as much power as my boss-- you know what? If you're unskilled and ineffective, yes you should be afraid of being fired. If you're skilled, effective and even slightly ambitious your boss should be afraid of you. (Specifically: you leaving.)
This is of course true for any of the "higher" jobs, which I assume you have. I also work in a place where my boss is far more afraid of me leaving than I would ever be of being fired (I'm a software developer for a company that heavily relies on development but isn't specifically a development company), but I was referring more to the "lower" jobs... someone working at McDonalds is never going to have that kind of power over their boss - their job just doesn't justify it. Their bosses can and DO treat them pretty poorly in places with "at will" employment.
Nobody in this state is a slave unless they want to be.
Sorry, but I really think you need to get out and see a bit more of the place you live. While I think "slave" might be going a bit far, it's pretty close when all other avenues are worse than the bad situation you're in.
The security theatre at airports and tourist attractions that basically forces you to do certain things or be denied access
This one I agree with you with.
(which sometimes isn't an option (such as if your "at will" employer has told you to fly somewhere))...
Then grow a pair and tell him you won't go.
In a place with "at will" employment, in a job where you're replacable, this will almost certainly get you fired. Again relating to the above - doesn't really cause a problem for the likes of you or I, but you need to look a bit beyond your own situation.
Look, the government can't help you if you're afraid to stand up for yourself. It's not your nanny, you have live your own life. (Another way the US view of the world contrasts with the UK view, although that's sadly changing: GOVERNMENT!!! SAVE ME FROM UNHEALTHY TRANSFATS!!! I CAN'T STOP SHOVING FOOD IN MY FAT MAW WITHOUT YOU!!!)
I certainly don't disagree with you here. I don't live in the UK or the US and I find this attitude disgusting. Personal responsibility is something that I rank very highly and the kinds of people that ask the government to regulate things that they should be able to self-regulate do bother me a lot.
That said however, my political viewpoints can't really be summed up so easily as "left", "right", or whatever.
For example, I am relatively "socialist" in my viewpoints towards taxation, unemployment and so on. I am happy to pay high taxes to look after the people in my society that aren't doing as well as I am. Some people abuse it, certainly, but to avoid seeing homeless people on th
Interesting idea... I do see several possible problems with it though...
Size: In order to be effective at "grabbing" the debris, it would need to be fairly large... anything small simply won't grab enough junk. "Large" would be a technical challenge, and possibly cause other problems floating around up there.
Water: The ISS doesn't have "waste water" as such... they recycle pretty much everything they can, and extremely effectively. There's no feasible way other than launching a whole lot of water up there, which is an expensive proposition.
Time: Related to "size" but basically, it'd take a very long time for this to have any measurable effect on all the junk up there.
Orbital decay: The idea of the orbit decaying as it picks up junk is of course fine (less through the added mass though, and more through the relative velocities as they impact), but I would be concerned about the maths of this. I get the feeling it'd come down and burn up WAY before it'd collected a useful amount of junk
I've gone through my entire life in the US, and so far I've never been "master" of anybody, and I've never been "servant" of anybody, and that's exactly the way I like it.
Hmmm... while those exact words aren't used, I would perceive many things in the US as being a much stronger master/servant relationship than what I'm personally used to. The "fanatical patriotism" of certain parts the US military (especially the Marine Corps) that leads to obeying even the most ridiculous of orders; The "at will" employment situation that guarantees people in the lower rungs of society are basically slaves to their bosses' whims to avoid being fired; The security theatre at airports and tourist attractions that basically forces you to do certain things or be denied access (which sometimes isn't an option (such as if your "at will" employer has told you to fly somewhere))...
Other than the names, I don't see a huge difference. Just think of when a butler in a fancy British home says that "the master of the house is not home at present", or that he is "the humble servant" - he doesn't really mean "master" and "servant" as you appear to be thinking... he really just means "boss" and "employee".
Actually no, DARPA is, if it was the US Government that was the founder, IPv4 would still be in a committee somewhere:)
Hint: Military trumps government for getting stuff done...
You don't actually know what "the government" is, do you?
I'd agree with the GP. The military is not directly "the government" (unless you live in a place under martial law). They certainly work for the government, but so do school teachers and I wouldn't refer to a school as being "the government".
I consider "the government" to be "that which governs". The military's job is NOT to govern, but to defend the nation (which often takes a myriad of forms depending on where you live) - the government is responsible for directing the military to do this and may often have their fingers in the "how", but not always, and only very rarely down to an actual implementation level.
This can't work for everyone. Some developers are horrible, horrible people. Take a stereotypical nerd for example. Poor hygiene, poor social skills, completely out of touch with reality.
If this describes you, consider not being yourself. Although typically people that are described like this probably aren't self-aware of such things.
I used to work with a guy like that. His body odour was a little obnoxious at times, but other than that I rather liked working with him. Definitely not as much as other co-workers I have or have had, but still not bad to work with. Infinitely preferable to the "I'm a programmer because I thought it'd be really good money" types that I have also worked with. They put the bare minimum of effort in, show up to work extremely hung-over or stoned, and constantly complain that they're not millionaires like they thought they would be (which goes some way to explaining (although not excusing) their alcohol or weed habits)
As a developer, I find my best co-workers are those that are "pretty geeky" in that we all enjoy geeky pasttimes, but still friendly and outgoing enough to do things like suggesting we get together for gaming nights, a few drinks, whatever. I also really like my current office in that one guy has an excellent music collection on his laptop and no-one in my office minds him playing it throughout the day.
From the "work side" of work life, it's of course extremely important to be good at your job, which for a developer should also mean taking pride in your creations - but NOT to the point of not accepting when other people criticise your work. This was the hardest thing for me when I was starting out - accepting that when Q.A. reported something that isn't a bug, it's still important and should be treated as such (such as "this option should be a menu item rather than a button based on how the user is likely to use the app")
Quoting fictional characters is proof of emotional immaturity, a detachment from reality, and also has escapist overtones
I've heard this before, but really don't get it. Quoting a fictional character isn't in and of itself a bad thing. It's just that that character happened to say something particularly interesting/valuable to you. Regardless of whether you heard it from an actor on a TV screen or written in a book, at some point a real human being DID think of it and write it down (the author/script-writer/whatever). There's nothing in particular that makes a fictional character's quote any less valid than a quote from a real person.
The argument could even be made that a quote from a fictional character carries MORE merit than quotes from many real people, as the situations devised for these fictional characters to be in are deliberately "out of the ordinary realms of experience", making the quote more insightful about the reactions of people in extreme situations. Any good author/script-writer/whatever will do their best to put themselves in their characters' positions when writing the characters' dialogues and thus you could consider them to be acting as a kind of basic philosopher attempting to interpret the human reaction to these extreme situations. Not sure I *would* argue that point without more consideration, but I believe it could be argued...
I completely agree with your observation that the problem here is human nature - we aren't very good at accepting (or passing around) information without bias. This therefore taints things in both directions and ends up with ridiculous schisms. The money just makes it that much worse since in our society money is such a powerful social force.
My analogy for the climate change problem is that of parents telling their little kid to eat their spinach. The parents know the spinach is good for the kid, the kid knows it too, but out of spite for his parents the kid avoids eating the spinach at all costs.
Your analogy fits up to the point where you give the reason... I don't think kids refuse to eat their spinach "out of spite for their parents"... they do it because they don't consider the long term value to be worth the short term displeasure. It's similar to why a smoker (such as myself) continues to smoke while knowing all the risks. I know it's extremely harmful for me and is quite likely to kill me in an extraordinarily unpleasant way at some point in my future. However, quitting smoking is a very unpleasant experience also, and I therefore avoid giving up, which is really only avoiding the immediate and short term "very unpleasant experience", and likely replacing it with a later and permanent "extraordinarily unpleasant experience" (i.e. gruesome and painful dying, followed by being permanently dead), but I still can't convince myself to do it.
Parallel ports went out of production at about the same time floppy drives did. Your next computer won't come with a parallel port.
That was kind of what I was saying... A computer that has an inbuilt floppy drive "from factory" probably also has a built in parallel port. None of my current computers have either. I can add both however (PCI Parellel port card, or USB floppy drive for example) should I choose. If the guy I was replying to has a computer with a factory installed floppy drive, there's a fairly good chance he's got a parallel port too...
I don't see floppy drives becoming completely extinct for a long time (although, they will get more expensive, as you say). Equally though, I don't see parallel ports becoming completely extinct either for at least the same amount of time. They're used in a LOT of systems still.
My languages had a genitive before your language's grandparents were born (Classical Greek and Latin).
As my mother tongues are English and Dutch, I'll have to disagree with you. While there's less documentation of them than classical Greek and Latin, the Indo-Germanic languages most certainly DID exist at least at the same time as the Indo-Romance (precursor of Latin) and Indo-Grecian (precursor of Greek), if not slightly EARLIER. There is evidence of a late Indo-European language (precursor to all of the above) that had leanings in the Germanic direction BEFORE any evidence of the Romance languages. Mostly it seemed to lean towards the Eastern Germanic family (which is now extinct - consisting of Gothic, Vandalic, etc), but nevertheless certainly Germanic leanings rather than Romance or Grecian.
I certainly understand the use of the apostrophe for any form of possessive, but to use that in a plural is completely wrong! Even if there were some obscure reason it could potentially be right, it has not happened on the internet as a result of some mass grammatical Renaissance. It's people being lazy.
Correct, it is people being lazy and I do not subscribe to the belief that it is a linguistic renaissance. I was purely pointing out that the apostrophe ONLY symbolises a missing letter in the Germanic languages (English included) and so the usage of it for the missing "e" in "Xbox's" isn't entirely incorrect from a linguistic standpoint. Most probably it was performed in error by the poster, but we can't know that for certain. It's only in very recent history that the Germans have started writing "ich hab's" instead of "ich habe es", and the Dutch write "z'n" instead of "zijn", but both of these are perfectly accepted and for the same reasons.
If you're so educated, why in the world would you further the agenda of laziness and ignorance?
I'm not particularly well educated (at least, not formally), and I am NOT attempting to further any agenda - especially not that of laziness and ignorance. I was not excusing the failure of the poster, but merely pointing out that it MIGHT not have been an error, but instead a clever use of language (I don't believe it was, but my belief is irrelevant - what is relevant is whether it MIGHT have been or not).
As a note, please excuse any grammatical or spelling errors in this post, as well as any courtesy errors, as I have consumed a fairly large quantity of beer tonight with my friends at the local pub.
My languages had a genitive before your language's grandparents were born (Classical Greek and Latin).
As my mother tongues are English and Dutch, I'll have to disagree with you. While there's less documentation of them than classical Greek and Latin, the Indo-Germanic languages most certainly DID exist at least at the same time as the Indo-Romance (precursor of Latin) and Indo-Grecian (precursor of Greek), if not slightly EARLIER. There is evidence of a late Indo-European language (precursor to all of the above) that had leanings in the Germanic direction BEFORE any evidence of the Romance languages. Mostly it seemed to lean towards the Eastern Germanic family (which is now extinct - consisting of Gothic, Vandalic, etc), but nevertheless certainly Germanic leanings rather than Romance or Grecian.
I certainly understand the use of the apostrophe for any form of possessive, but to use that in a plural is completely wrong! Even if there were some obscure reason it could potentially be right, it has not happened on the internet as a result of some mass grammatical Renaissance. It's people being lazy.
Correct, it is people being lazy and I do not subscribe to the belief that it is a linguistic renaissance. I was purely pointing out that the apostrophe ONLY symbolises a missing letter in the Germanic languages (English included) and so the usage of it for the missing "e" in "Xbox's" isn't entirely incorrect from a linguistic standpoint. Most probably it was performed in error by the poster, but we can't know that for certain. It's only in very recent history that the Germans have started writing "ich hab's" instead of "ich habe es", and the Dutch write "z'n" instead of "zijn", but both of these are perfectly accepted and for the same reasons.
If you're so educated, why in the world would you further the agenda of laziness and ignorance?
I'm not particularly well educated (at least, not formally), and I am NOT attempting to further any agenda - especially not that of laziness and ignorance. I was not excusing the failure of the poster, but merely pointing out that it MIGHT not have been an error, but instead a clever use of language (I don't believe it was, but my belief is irrelevant - what is relevant is whether it MIGHT have been or not).
As a note, please excuse any grammatical or spelling errors in this post, as well as any courtesy errors, as I have consumed a fairly large quantity of beer tonight with my friends at the local pub.
Yep - was well aware of that... just wasn't aware there were any completely original unmodified A1000s left in the world! Plenty of A500s, but even those are getting rarer in an unmodified form.
You're a grammar Nazi who doesn't know not to use an apostrophe as a plural? It's "Xboxes". How hard is that? At worst, just use "xboxs". It's more correct than using an apostrophe, which is *never* to be used for pluralization.
Not completely correct sorry... the apostrophe represents a missing letter in ALL cases... including the genitive (possessive). The possessive form in English has evolved from an es ending on words to simply 's. This however is still a skipped letter. Plurals that have an "e" such as "boxes" could therefore theoretically be shortened to "box's" also, just as we skip letters in don't, 'less, 'til and even twice in bo's'n. It's certainly not common or well known to skip the vowel in a plural "es", but it's not exactly "wrong"...
I'm too lazy to provide links right now, but Google "English genitive history" or something like that and you should find things supporting this...
Indeed... even just saying "1.44 megabyte" for those things REALLY bugs me. They're 2 megabyte, and "somewhat less" after formatting, depending on the format used. Being an Amiga user way back then, a high density disk was always "1.7MB plus change" in my mind.
I've got a semi-old (ca 2001) digital oscilloscope. There are only two ways to pull data off it: export a screen shot to a printer via a parallel port, or export to 3.5" floppy (screenshot or raw data).
Couldn't you write a real quick program to "pretend" to be a parallel printer, hook a PC up via parallel to it, and then when you "export to printer" from the scope, the PC saves the file directly? It'd be faster than the floppy, and I expect if you've got a PC with a floppy drive lying around, it's also got a parallel port!
But, really, why spend many thousands of dollars on new equipment just to get around using a floppy drive?
Definitely true... but if you can spend nothing other than a little time writing a program (which would be a fun little project anyway), it'd definitely be faster.
Out of interest, what exactly do you need the floppies for on the Amigas? Any reasonable sized HDD or CDs + WHDLoad, and you're done in my experience... That said though, despite being an Amiga enthusiast I'm not a gamer at all so this really is a genuine question. I assumed WHDLoad could handle pretty much anything, but I may be wrong.
It's ridiculous to assert that the primary creators of value in the sofware business -- those who actually write the software -- should do so for free, while the hangers-on who sell it, support it, and package it should get paid.
Yes, that is a ridiculous assertion, which is why noone asserts it... If my employer wants to package, sell and support my software, they can damn well pay me for it. Doesn't have the slightly bit to do with whether it's free software or not though.
all the work you released for free was used to make billions for a couple of guys
Releasing it for free (no cost) is the choice of the developer. No-one is FORCED to release open source software, for free or otherwise. Under the terms of the GPL, IF I take a piece of GPL software and decide to release it further (generally after modifying it, but not necessarily!), then I must do so under the same terms as the original (e.g. the GPL). Nowhere does it say I have to release it further, and nowhere does it say I can't charge for it.
- I can take GPL software, modify it, and use it myself without ever giving it or my changes to anyone else. I can't see any reason right now why I might do such a thing, but I can if I want.
- I can take GPL software, modify it and sell the results (my CUSTOMERS may then give it out freely if they wish, so this would probably be a bad business model without some other offering such as support or a fancy printed manual, but I COULD do so...)
- I could even do the above WITHOUT modifying it should I desire to.
Other licences are even more permissive, not containing the "must be under the same licence" clause, and these are the ones that tend to cause some big companies to take a lot of code and never share it further. That said though, some still do, and we thank them for it.
The fact that Google has made billions does not mean they made billions "off the free labor of others". They certainly made money using a shared human resource (free software), but every piece of GPL software they've modified and want to distribute further enriches the rest of us "off their backs".
I'm curious to wonder why you think believers of one type or another have never questioned their beliefs before though?
Actually, I don't think that necessarily. I'm well aware that some DO question their beliefs and remain strongly committed to the faith (while others question them and do not remain committed). I also however am pretty sure there's a large number of people out there who have never questioned their beliefs (about ANYTHING... not just their religious convictions!), and those are the ones that I attempt to introduce the concept to.
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Typically employers make their employees sign an agreement when they are hired that any intellectual property they create while performing their job becomes the intellectual property of the employer and the employee loses the rights to it.
Some agreements are even as strict as to say that anything you create while you are employed becomes the IP of your employer. So if you wrote something at home while you are "off the clock" it would still technically be the property of your employer. Booo!
I truly do love the terms of my current employment. I'm employed as a programmer, and I retain "dual copyright" over all of my own creations. Essentially, while I work here, I am also contractually bound to not compete with them, but should I ever leave I can take all of my own code with me and fork it (any images, product names, documentation, or whatever may need to be scrubbed/changed though, since they're not my work). In return for this, they got all of the code I had written before I started here, giving them a nice jumpstart in areas that they were interested in but weren't too keen on doing all the basic startup stuff for.
It's a win-win situation and should I ever choose to go somewhere else, I'll only accept it under the same terms - I have such a massive collection of libraries that I've written now for various purposes, that it'd be truly painful to have to start them from scratch again... One day (perhaps after I leave my current employer), I also hope to release a large amount of it under the GPL, since there's a few GPL projects I'd love to get my libraries in to and also see what others can do with what I've started.
I believe that in the ATLAS collaboration (one of the LHC experiments) the alphabetical surname to beat is "Aad".
This guy beats that... sadly, not a physicist... or alive anymore. (there certainly may be some people with that surname (or related such as "van Aachen") still around though)
GröYter, yes, that is Größter or where ß, which is not beta, is not available, Grösster.
Or when neither "ö" nor "ß" are available, "Groesster" would also be acceptable.
If I do an action that hurts you, than I'm at fault and I could be prosecuted for it. If I say a word that hurts you, that's *your* fault... if you haven't learned by adulthood that "sticks and stones can break my bones, but words will never harm me", that's not my problem.
I agree... I wasn't trying to say that speech should be illegal because it can directly cause "harm" - it can't. It can INDIRECTLY cause harm however by convincing people of certain points of view. The speech itself hurts no-one, the effects of it do.
This is a problem, but it's not a problem with the law, it's a problem with people. I like to think of myself as pretty immune to advertising and "popular opinion", but walk out in any big town (be it Seattle, Tokyo, Berlin or London) and just take a look how many people are wearing overpriced crap that is half the quality and twice the price of other clothes just because it's got a certain label on it. THAT is the power of speech, and when used for something more dangerous than just selling clothing to gullible people, it needs to be regulated.
The government has already successfully regulated your actions by making you too terrified to exercise your rights.
The government hasn't terrorised me in to anything. I wholeheartedly agree with this aspect of the law (note: "THIS aspect"... there are many other laws I don't agree with). If I was "too terrified to exercise my rights", that would imply I wanted to do something but didn't out of fear for some kind of negative action against me. I'm not afraid of doing what I want to do at all.
Make the law completely color-blind, like everything else, and racism will eventually go away. Every time you call out somebody based on skin color, *whether positive or negative*, you're encouraging racism.
Again, I agree... the laws here do NOT single out any specific race, religion, credo, or belief system. "Affirmative action" laws are indeed more harmful than helpful. That's not what we have here.
BTW, how the holy hell are you saying all this and claiming to be a Libertarian?
I never claimed to be libertarian...
I said: For example, I am relatively "socialist" in my viewpoints towards...
and then: I am however more "libertarian" in my views regarding...
Hell, look at Canada: Mark Steyn can be prosecuted by a special government commission for simply quoting somebody else in his book! In Canada, quoting a radial Imam is equivalent to holding the same opinion yourself. This is where "hate speech" laws lead you!
That may be possible in Canada, and if so I feel very sorry for their screwed up laws. It's not possible here. I can quote Adolf Hitler all day long and not get in any trouble if I choose. The moment I'd get in trouble would be the moment I say something like, "and this is a damn good idea, let's bring back the gas chambers!" (unless it's clear I was joking or in some other way not seriously proposing it, in which case I still wouldn't be in trouble (as a good example: I have a coworker (German) who constantly goes on about driving tanks in to Paris again whenever our daughter company in France gives us grief (far too often), and noone would ever dream of that being a punishable offence))
Yes, this IS restricting the choice of the boss, but I don't feel a society can function well and take care of all its members when such a situation is possible.
So you're telling me that my society (in Washington State) isn't functioning well right now?
Moreover, it's functioning worse than (for example) California's?
Having never been to Washington state, and knowing little about it, I couldn't say. I can assume that there are other factors that will have an influence on how well the society works, but I still stand by my belief that the "at will" employment situation is a negative factor and that without it, you'd be even better off as a society than you are currently.
Like I said though, I really don't know the societal situation there in Washington State and so don't want to speculate on details that I can't possibly know with any level of certainty.
The homeless people on the streets of NYC for example tend to be in pretty bad situations with no obvious way out for them. They can go stay in shelters where crime and violence are worse than their own "communities" on the streets, but despite there being programmes there that are intended to help them, the success rate is extremely low.
First of all, I'm going to sound like a jerk, but I really don't care about New York whatsoever. As far as I'm concerned, that's a completely different country from me-- I'm thousands of miles away and in a vastly, vastly different culture.
And Washington State is thousands of miles away from me, in a vastly, vastly different culture... yet I do still care, because we're all human beings. But I really wasn't ever talking about whether one should care or not, I was discussing societal things in general. I'm happy for you that you live in a society that you like, as do I.
Secondly, homeless people are generally mentally-ill. That doesn't excuse the fact that they're homeless, but it does mean that the current programs to assist them (shelters) are only addressing a small portion of the actual problem.
Many homeless people are mentally ill, but I'd wager that many became that way AFTER becoming homeless, not before. Not all, of course, but definitely a significant number. If the society were geared better towards taking care of low-income people before they become homeless, I'm certain the rate of homelessness would decrease (there would still be those that choose to be homeless due to mental illness or whatever other reasons, but those given the chance to avoid it when they didn't choose to be, wouldn't be)
Well, like I said I'm not German, I just live here... but I don't think anyone really "worships" a royal family anywhere these days. There are quite a few Monarchies here in Europe and in almost all cases, they're pretty much just figureheads.
The British do.
You don't honestly believe that do you? I've never lived there, but I have quite a few friends there and have visited there often. The British Royals aren't significantly different to the no-talent celebrities of the US (as in those that are famous for "being famous" with no skills whatsoever to have made them that way (Paris Hilton immediately springs to mind)). The only real difference is that there's a level of deference and respect rather than all-out media bashing (a "prince smoking pot" gets humorous headlines in almost every newspaper around, but much beyond that might be treated with a bit more caution).
There may be some "upper class" types that still truly consider the royals to be a "great family" or that they "hold the country together" or whatever, but the average citizen of the UK really doesn't think about them in daily life at all, and when they do, it's more in the same vein as when you think about any random ultra-rich person in the US.
You can't love "choice" then also love "job protectionism" in the same breath. What kind of "choice" is it to tell a boss he can't fire somebody?
Well, like I was saying, I think "choice" is extremely important (pretty much the most important thing from an individual's perspective), but like everything in life it's not an "all or nothing" concept. I think a person should be able to be fired for being useless, or no longer needed, or a myriad of other things. But NOT simply because the boss says "I don't like you". Yes, this IS restricting the choice of the boss, but I don't feel a society can function well and take care of all its members when such a situation is possible.
I don't believe there is a single American who has no avenues to improve himself and his life.
Then we definitely differ on opinion here. I believe that most countries have people that this applies to, and unfortunately in the US there are more from my point of view than most other western nations. The homeless people on the streets of NYC for example tend to be in pretty bad situations with no obvious way out for them. They can go stay in shelters where crime and violence are worse than their own "communities" on the streets, but despite there being programmes there that are intended to help them, the success rate is extremely low.
Ugh, Germans. On the one hand, you don't worship a royal family, so that's good.
Well, like I said I'm not German, I just live here... but I don't think anyone really "worships" a royal family anywhere these days. There are quite a few Monarchies here in Europe and in almost all cases, they're pretty much just figureheads.
On the other, you have zero freedom of speech, which is worse.
That's patently untrue. Freedom of speech here is guaranteed by the constitution, as is the freedom of the press (a related and equally important topic)... The reason it's commonly perceived as though freedom of speech is limited here is that it's not the "highest" right that is given. That honour goes to (as in my last post) the inviolability of human dignity. You can NOT use speech to violate human dignity (such as hate speech and so on), as this is breaking a more fundmental right than the right to free speech. Other than this specific case though, all speech is protected. This is a deliberate design to avoid the fact that people are by their natures pretty easy to persuade when not presented with enough variable information about the world around them and only presented with information that shows one point of view (and if you think that's not true, ask yourself why advertising is so successful). This led to the problems with Adolf Hitler's government here and can be seen elsewhere such as the Christian fundamentalists in the US, the Islamic fundamentalists in the middle east, and Apartheid in South Africa not so long ago.
It can be argued that "human dignity" is a pretty broad thing and therefore this interpretation is open to abuse, and I wouldn't necessarily disagree with you, but in practice it seems to be working pretty well right now, and the Germans have learned from their past to be wary of governments that try to impose extreme views...
The "fanatical patriotism" of certain parts the US military (especially the Marine Corps) that leads to obeying even the most ridiculous of orders;
All militaries are like that, at least successful ones. If yours isn't, I hope you don't need to rely on them anytime soon.
The world really isn't that scary of a place that one should have to rely on a military all that often. Of course, it is sadly necessary to have one, but I disagree that the fanatical patriotism is required. A clear-headed understanding that "my commander probably understands the situation better than I do, and therefore if he gives an order I should follow it" should be sufficient. It still at least leaves room for the "there is no way in hell this could ever be the right thing to do, so I won't do it" feeling that I believe is REQUIRED for a soldier to have in some circumstances.
The "at will" employment situation that guarantees people in the lower rungs of society are basically slaves to their bosses' whims to avoid being fired;
I'm in an "at will" state and I love it. I have just as much power as my boss-- you know what? If you're unskilled and ineffective, yes you should be afraid of being fired. If you're skilled, effective and even slightly ambitious your boss should be afraid of you. (Specifically: you leaving.)
This is of course true for any of the "higher" jobs, which I assume you have. I also work in a place where my boss is far more afraid of me leaving than I would ever be of being fired (I'm a software developer for a company that heavily relies on development but isn't specifically a development company), but I was referring more to the "lower" jobs... someone working at McDonalds is never going to have that kind of power over their boss - their job just doesn't justify it. Their bosses can and DO treat them pretty poorly in places with "at will" employment.
Nobody in this state is a slave unless they want to be.
Sorry, but I really think you need to get out and see a bit more of the place you live. While I think "slave" might be going a bit far, it's pretty close when all other avenues are worse than the bad situation you're in.
The security theatre at airports and tourist attractions that basically forces you to do certain things or be denied access
This one I agree with you with.
(which sometimes isn't an option (such as if your "at will" employer has told you to fly somewhere))...
Then grow a pair and tell him you won't go.
In a place with "at will" employment, in a job where you're replacable, this will almost certainly get you fired. Again relating to the above - doesn't really cause a problem for the likes of you or I, but you need to look a bit beyond your own situation.
Look, the government can't help you if you're afraid to stand up for yourself. It's not your nanny, you have live your own life. (Another way the US view of the world contrasts with the UK view, although that's sadly changing: GOVERNMENT!!! SAVE ME FROM UNHEALTHY TRANSFATS!!! I CAN'T STOP SHOVING FOOD IN MY FAT MAW WITHOUT YOU!!!)
I certainly don't disagree with you here. I don't live in the UK or the US and I find this attitude disgusting. Personal responsibility is something that I rank very highly and the kinds of people that ask the government to regulate things that they should be able to self-regulate do bother me a lot.
That said however, my political viewpoints can't really be summed up so easily as "left", "right", or whatever.
For example, I am relatively "socialist" in my viewpoints towards taxation, unemployment and so on. I am happy to pay high taxes to look after the people in my society that aren't doing as well as I am. Some people abuse it, certainly, but to avoid seeing homeless people on th
Interesting idea... I do see several possible problems with it though...
I've gone through my entire life in the US, and so far I've never been "master" of anybody, and I've never been "servant" of anybody, and that's exactly the way I like it.
Hmmm... while those exact words aren't used, I would perceive many things in the US as being a much stronger master/servant relationship than what I'm personally used to. The "fanatical patriotism" of certain parts the US military (especially the Marine Corps) that leads to obeying even the most ridiculous of orders; The "at will" employment situation that guarantees people in the lower rungs of society are basically slaves to their bosses' whims to avoid being fired; The security theatre at airports and tourist attractions that basically forces you to do certain things or be denied access (which sometimes isn't an option (such as if your "at will" employer has told you to fly somewhere))...
Other than the names, I don't see a huge difference. Just think of when a butler in a fancy British home says that "the master of the house is not home at present", or that he is "the humble servant" - he doesn't really mean "master" and "servant" as you appear to be thinking... he really just means "boss" and "employee".
Actually no, DARPA is, if it was the US Government that was the founder, IPv4 would still be in a committee somewhere :)
Hint: Military trumps government for getting stuff done...
You don't actually know what "the government" is, do you?
I'd agree with the GP. The military is not directly "the government" (unless you live in a place under martial law). They certainly work for the government, but so do school teachers and I wouldn't refer to a school as being "the government".
I consider "the government" to be "that which governs". The military's job is NOT to govern, but to defend the nation (which often takes a myriad of forms depending on where you live) - the government is responsible for directing the military to do this and may often have their fingers in the "how", but not always, and only very rarely down to an actual implementation level.
This can't work for everyone. Some developers are horrible, horrible people. Take a stereotypical nerd for example. Poor hygiene, poor social skills, completely out of touch with reality.
If this describes you, consider not being yourself. Although typically people that are described like this probably aren't self-aware of such things.
I used to work with a guy like that. His body odour was a little obnoxious at times, but other than that I rather liked working with him. Definitely not as much as other co-workers I have or have had, but still not bad to work with. Infinitely preferable to the "I'm a programmer because I thought it'd be really good money" types that I have also worked with. They put the bare minimum of effort in, show up to work extremely hung-over or stoned, and constantly complain that they're not millionaires like they thought they would be (which goes some way to explaining (although not excusing) their alcohol or weed habits)
As a developer, I find my best co-workers are those that are "pretty geeky" in that we all enjoy geeky pasttimes, but still friendly and outgoing enough to do things like suggesting we get together for gaming nights, a few drinks, whatever. I also really like my current office in that one guy has an excellent music collection on his laptop and no-one in my office minds him playing it throughout the day.
From the "work side" of work life, it's of course extremely important to be good at your job, which for a developer should also mean taking pride in your creations - but NOT to the point of not accepting when other people criticise your work. This was the hardest thing for me when I was starting out - accepting that when Q.A. reported something that isn't a bug, it's still important and should be treated as such (such as "this option should be a menu item rather than a button based on how the user is likely to use the app")
Quoting fictional characters is proof of emotional immaturity, a detachment from reality, and also has escapist overtones
I've heard this before, but really don't get it. Quoting a fictional character isn't in and of itself a bad thing. It's just that that character happened to say something particularly interesting/valuable to you. Regardless of whether you heard it from an actor on a TV screen or written in a book, at some point a real human being DID think of it and write it down (the author/script-writer/whatever). There's nothing in particular that makes a fictional character's quote any less valid than a quote from a real person.
The argument could even be made that a quote from a fictional character carries MORE merit than quotes from many real people, as the situations devised for these fictional characters to be in are deliberately "out of the ordinary realms of experience", making the quote more insightful about the reactions of people in extreme situations. Any good author/script-writer/whatever will do their best to put themselves in their characters' positions when writing the characters' dialogues and thus you could consider them to be acting as a kind of basic philosopher attempting to interpret the human reaction to these extreme situations. Not sure I *would* argue that point without more consideration, but I believe it could be argued...
I completely agree with your observation that the problem here is human nature - we aren't very good at accepting (or passing around) information without bias. This therefore taints things in both directions and ends up with ridiculous schisms. The money just makes it that much worse since in our society money is such a powerful social force.
My analogy for the climate change problem is that of parents telling their little kid to eat their spinach. The parents know the spinach is good for the kid, the kid knows it too, but out of spite for his parents the kid avoids eating the spinach at all costs.
Your analogy fits up to the point where you give the reason... I don't think kids refuse to eat their spinach "out of spite for their parents"... they do it because they don't consider the long term value to be worth the short term displeasure. It's similar to why a smoker (such as myself) continues to smoke while knowing all the risks. I know it's extremely harmful for me and is quite likely to kill me in an extraordinarily unpleasant way at some point in my future. However, quitting smoking is a very unpleasant experience also, and I therefore avoid giving up, which is really only avoiding the immediate and short term "very unpleasant experience", and likely replacing it with a later and permanent "extraordinarily unpleasant experience" (i.e. gruesome and painful dying, followed by being permanently dead), but I still can't convince myself to do it.
on average US taxpayers pay $10/month for everything that NASA does.
Number of US tax payers is about 138 Million... NASA Budget is 18.7 $B(2010). So mathematically the average is closer to $130 per taxpayer...
$18.700.000.000 / 138.000.000 = $135 per person per year.
$135 / 12 (months in a year) = $11 per person per month.
Parallel ports went out of production at about the same time floppy drives did. Your next computer won't come with a parallel port.
That was kind of what I was saying... A computer that has an inbuilt floppy drive "from factory" probably also has a built in parallel port. None of my current computers have either. I can add both however (PCI Parellel port card, or USB floppy drive for example) should I choose. If the guy I was replying to has a computer with a factory installed floppy drive, there's a fairly good chance he's got a parallel port too...
I don't see floppy drives becoming completely extinct for a long time (although, they will get more expensive, as you say). Equally though, I don't see parallel ports becoming completely extinct either for at least the same amount of time. They're used in a LOT of systems still.
My languages had a genitive before your language's grandparents were born (Classical Greek and Latin).
As my mother tongues are English and Dutch, I'll have to disagree with you. While there's less documentation of them than classical Greek and Latin, the Indo-Germanic languages most certainly DID exist at least at the same time as the Indo-Romance (precursor of Latin) and Indo-Grecian (precursor of Greek), if not slightly EARLIER. There is evidence of a late Indo-European language (precursor to all of the above) that had leanings in the Germanic direction BEFORE any evidence of the Romance languages. Mostly it seemed to lean towards the Eastern Germanic family (which is now extinct - consisting of Gothic, Vandalic, etc), but nevertheless certainly Germanic leanings rather than Romance or Grecian.
I certainly understand the use of the apostrophe for any form of possessive, but to use that in a plural is completely wrong! Even if there were some obscure reason it could potentially be right, it has not happened on the internet as a result of some mass grammatical Renaissance. It's people being lazy.
Correct, it is people being lazy and I do not subscribe to the belief that it is a linguistic renaissance. I was purely pointing out that the apostrophe ONLY symbolises a missing letter in the Germanic languages (English included) and so the usage of it for the missing "e" in "Xbox's" isn't entirely incorrect from a linguistic standpoint. Most probably it was performed in error by the poster, but we can't know that for certain. It's only in very recent history that the Germans have started writing "ich hab's" instead of "ich habe es", and the Dutch write "z'n" instead of "zijn", but both of these are perfectly accepted and for the same reasons.
If you're so educated, why in the world would you further the agenda of laziness and ignorance?
I'm not particularly well educated (at least, not formally), and I am NOT attempting to further any agenda - especially not that of laziness and ignorance. I was not excusing the failure of the poster, but merely pointing out that it MIGHT not have been an error, but instead a clever use of language (I don't believe it was, but my belief is irrelevant - what is relevant is whether it MIGHT have been or not).
As a note, please excuse any grammatical or spelling errors in this post, as well as any courtesy errors, as I have consumed a fairly large quantity of beer tonight with my friends at the local pub.
My languages had a genitive before your language's grandparents were born (Classical Greek and Latin).
As my mother tongues are English and Dutch, I'll have to disagree with you. While there's less documentation of them than classical Greek and Latin, the Indo-Germanic languages most certainly DID exist at least at the same time as the Indo-Romance (precursor of Latin) and Indo-Grecian (precursor of Greek), if not slightly EARLIER. There is evidence of a late Indo-European language (precursor to all of the above) that had leanings in the Germanic direction BEFORE any evidence of the Romance languages. Mostly it seemed to lean towards the Eastern Germanic family (which is now extinct - consisting of Gothic, Vandalic, etc), but nevertheless certainly Germanic leanings rather than Romance or Grecian.
I certainly understand the use of the apostrophe for any form of possessive, but to use that in a plural is completely wrong! Even if there were some obscure reason it could potentially be right, it has not happened on the internet as a result of some mass grammatical Renaissance. It's people being lazy.
Correct, it is people being lazy and I do not subscribe to the belief that it is a linguistic renaissance. I was purely pointing out that the apostrophe ONLY symbolises a missing letter in the Germanic languages (English included) and so the usage of it for the missing "e" in "Xbox's" isn't entirely incorrect from a linguistic standpoint. Most probably it was performed in error by the poster, but we can't know that for certain. It's only in very recent history that the Germans have started writing "ich hab's" instead of "ich habe es", and the Dutch write "z'n" instead of "zijn", but both of these are perfectly accepted and for the same reasons.
If you're so educated, why in the world would you further the agenda of laziness and ignorance?
I'm not particularly well educated (at least, not formally), and I am NOT attempting to further any agenda - especially not that of laziness and ignorance. I was not excusing the failure of the poster, but merely pointing out that it MIGHT not have been an error, but instead a clever use of language (I don't believe it was, but my belief is irrelevant - what is relevant is whether it MIGHT have been or not).
As a note, please excuse any grammatical or spelling errors in this post, as well as any courtesy errors, as I have consumed a fairly large quantity of beer tonight with my friends at the local pub.
Yep - was well aware of that... just wasn't aware there were any completely original unmodified A1000s left in the world! Plenty of A500s, but even those are getting rarer in an unmodified form.
You're a grammar Nazi who doesn't know not to use an apostrophe as a plural? It's "Xboxes". How hard is that? At worst, just use "xboxs". It's more correct than using an apostrophe, which is *never* to be used for pluralization.
Not completely correct sorry... the apostrophe represents a missing letter in ALL cases... including the genitive (possessive). The possessive form in English has evolved from an es ending on words to simply 's. This however is still a skipped letter. Plurals that have an "e" such as "boxes" could therefore theoretically be shortened to "box's" also, just as we skip letters in don't, 'less, 'til and even twice in bo's'n. It's certainly not common or well known to skip the vowel in a plural "es", but it's not exactly "wrong"...
I'm too lazy to provide links right now, but Google "English genitive history" or something like that and you should find things supporting this...
Indeed... even just saying "1.44 megabyte" for those things REALLY bugs me. They're 2 megabyte, and "somewhat less" after formatting, depending on the format used. Being an Amiga user way back then, a high density disk was always "1.7MB plus change" in my mind.
I've got a semi-old (ca 2001) digital oscilloscope. There are only two ways to pull data off it: export a screen shot to a printer via a parallel port, or export to 3.5" floppy (screenshot or raw data).
Couldn't you write a real quick program to "pretend" to be a parallel printer, hook a PC up via parallel to it, and then when you "export to printer" from the scope, the PC saves the file directly? It'd be faster than the floppy, and I expect if you've got a PC with a floppy drive lying around, it's also got a parallel port!
But, really, why spend many thousands of dollars on new equipment just to get around using a floppy drive?
Definitely true... but if you can spend nothing other than a little time writing a program (which would be a fun little project anyway), it'd definitely be faster.
Out of interest, what exactly do you need the floppies for on the Amigas? Any reasonable sized HDD or CDs + WHDLoad, and you're done in my experience... That said though, despite being an Amiga enthusiast I'm not a gamer at all so this really is a genuine question. I assumed WHDLoad could handle pretty much anything, but I may be wrong.
It's ridiculous to assert that the primary creators of value in the sofware business -- those who actually write the software -- should do so for free, while the hangers-on who sell it, support it, and package it should get paid.
Yes, that is a ridiculous assertion, which is why noone asserts it... If my employer wants to package, sell and support my software, they can damn well pay me for it. Doesn't have the slightly bit to do with whether it's free software or not though.
all the work you released for free was used to make billions for a couple of guys
Releasing it for free (no cost) is the choice of the developer. No-one is FORCED to release open source software, for free or otherwise. Under the terms of the GPL, IF I take a piece of GPL software and decide to release it further (generally after modifying it, but not necessarily!), then I must do so under the same terms as the original (e.g. the GPL). Nowhere does it say I have to release it further, and nowhere does it say I can't charge for it.
- I can take GPL software, modify it, and use it myself without ever giving it or my changes to anyone else. I can't see any reason right now why I might do such a thing, but I can if I want.
- I can take GPL software, modify it and sell the results (my CUSTOMERS may then give it out freely if they wish, so this would probably be a bad business model without some other offering such as support or a fancy printed manual, but I COULD do so...)
- I could even do the above WITHOUT modifying it should I desire to.
Other licences are even more permissive, not containing the "must be under the same licence" clause, and these are the ones that tend to cause some big companies to take a lot of code and never share it further. That said though, some still do, and we thank them for it.
The fact that Google has made billions does not mean they made billions "off the free labor of others". They certainly made money using a shared human resource (free software), but every piece of GPL software they've modified and want to distribute further enriches the rest of us "off their backs".
I'm curious to wonder why you think believers of one type or another have never questioned their beliefs before though?
Actually, I don't think that necessarily. I'm well aware that some DO question their beliefs and remain strongly committed to the faith (while others question them and do not remain committed). I also however am pretty sure there's a large number of people out there who have never questioned their beliefs (about ANYTHING... not just their religious convictions!), and those are the ones that I attempt to introduce the concept to.