"e) They may impose software patent retaliation, which means permission for use of your added parts terminates or may be terminated, wholly or partially,"
The draft of Version 3 of the GPL is comptable with CDDL and similar GPL2 incompatable free software licences, this is very good news for developing software that uses components from for example, say FSF and Sun.
I am/was/will be a user of OSWD (the open source bit rather than the tacky commerical section). I have quite a few of the zips on my hard disk, others users may do too if they search enough. How about someone puts a new site up - GNUwebdesign or whatever and we can send them all in.
Contact the user known as 'Haran' too, he wrote all the best XHTML ones.
Lets make a law saying that all our elected officials are required to have a live webcam feed 24/7/365 from their offices, cars and houses.
In this most democratic form of the 'Big Brother show', we would be able to hold our elected officials directly accountable. We would see what lobbyists are met, how long a lunch break they take, how ethically they shop, if they are really recycling and so on.
>"but then they might as well put up a big sign: "for free money - sue a Lloyds insured company!""
Well sometimes it good not to have money so no-one will bother to sue you!
>"they'll want to discourage such lawsuits as much as possible."
More seriously though, I agree with you. Once something has been decided in court then it tends to stick around.
Eventually free software(/open source) such as LAMP servers (to continue the example) will so be prevalent and so much part of the infrastructure that spurious lawsuits will drop off once the pressure has been released, although that may be ten years away yet.
A lot of course depends on GPL v3 and whether most free software and open source licences of the future include a patent and lawsuit etc self-destruction clause (think of the CDDL).
SCO's latest offering that they have excremented, OpenServer 6, contained KDE, Apache, Mozilla, Samba, Perl, PHP, MySQL, as well as other free/open source software.
If all the above had a "Intellectual Property" self-destruction clause then SCO would have had to choose between either (mis)claiming that Linux kernel contained 'their' "Intellectual Property" or using these packages.
This seems fair to me. Currently they are claiming that GPL is invalid and wrong yada yada, yet they are taking full advantage of it - weasels!
At $60 a server, say there are 50 million Apache servers out there (some LAMP some FreeBSD-AMP etc) and there is only going to be more over time (growth of the internet etc). If 2% buy the licence from Lloyds (or from someone else) then that is $60 million per year. That money can defend up to 30 small patent infringement court cases (under $2 million) or 2 to 3 SCO size cases per year, every year.
That is far more protection than, say, LAMP will ever need for legal fees, at least in the long run. It will be good profit for Lloyds, and will make CEOs sleep better because they have paid a few more people for GNU/Linux, (no-one values what they get for free).
Software is going in two directions. For technical users (those able to understand software and customize it e.g. Google, Slashdot readers and so on), software has become a commodity. For some others, especially companies with weak management, software is a 'Giffen good'. When the proverbial fæces hits the fan, the CEO wants to explain to shareholders that they bought the most expensive solution possible.
Indeed I have been convinced for a while that the relatively low total cost of ownership has put companies off free software. Adding "Intellectual property" insurance (something you get very little of with proprietary software) will help to increase the cost of free software and speed its adoption.
The PowerPC platform, rightly or wrongly is seen as better than Intel on all technical grounds but not on economic grounds i.e. the PowerPC is better but costs far more than a bland Intel - not least because of economies of scale (e.g. one figure says that Intel/AMD 98.6% of the market).
I'm a GNU/Linux user (Gentoo as it happens), given the choice between a PowerPC or an IntelPC all other things being equal, I would choose PowerPC over PC everytime - even though I would run GNU/Linux on either platform.
BTW, Linus Torvolds himself runs GNU/Linux on a PowerPC.
If IBM etc licences a the PowerPC to generic Chinese companies who mass produce them then GNU/Linux PowerPC could be a viable commercial option against Wintel.
"Accepting such a position with a direct Microsoft competitor like Google violates the narrow noncompetition promise Lee made when he was hired as an executive," Microsoft said in its lawsuit.
In civilised countries you cannot sign away your statutory rights. However in America you are "free" to make yourselves a load of slaves in the interest of your fascist industrial complex. (fascist in the sense of there being no separation between business and government).
Crazy, time for you yanks to stand up for a free labour market with any noncompetition being illegal as anti-competitive; rather than the communist-style system you have now.
Microsoft as a near monopoly needs no protection from the state, indeed we all need protection from it.
Graphically (i.e Windows, X) based OS for the blind, e.g. Jaws etc, are the stupidist piece of crap. Think about it:
The computer runs on text > then represents it with graphics > then the assistive technology attempts to represent the graphics with text > the text is spoken.
When you get a windows error message the user is stuffed.
Occam's Razor would suggest that for blind people a better solution would be:
Command Line > spoken aloud.
Links/elinks/links2 can be used for Internet Other Bash apps can be used: Vi, Emacs, MP321 whatever you want.
>Just install ubuntu, firefox, thunderbird on the
>machines, and place a windows Longhorn [top secret]
>wallpaper on the desktop, and tell you boss you got >the latest windows W4r3z on the computer,
Laugh but I've seen it work. Go for Fedora in this case because their update system looks a bit like Windows update, although any distro will do.
The XP background is called bliss.bmp and you may find a lookalike on the google. Add some desktop shortcuts with Windows like names and then leave it with them. Don't forget a few stupid card games - that is actually key to acceptance.
Once they have written a letter and checked their email, then they are passed the fear stage already. Then tell them that they are using the latest big thing and that is far better, then show them that it has twenty games pre-installed. Leave them playing tux racer or pingus.
Also good is the
FSF/UNESCO Free Software Directory
http://directory.fsf.org/
Which allows you to search for free and legal alternatives under different categories. Good for finding out the names of things.
It is a very difficult situation, you may need to consider another job. Get into a union if you can.
How about suggesting that there are free and legal alternatives and install that instead? Or just install it and say that "I couldn't install Word but this is much better and is the latest big thing"
Use OpenOffice 2.0 instead of Word, Gimp instead of Photoshop and so on. All well known programs have two or three alternatives - one of which will provide a windows binary (look for win32).
Best thing is to cultivate a reputation as a Free Software ( www.gnu.com/philosophy ) fanatic and people won't dare ask you for Windows software.
"People will still use old software on their old hardware, and when they get new hardware (and they will) they'll get new software."
I agree but that underlines my point. People who are not technical will not bother to upgrade even if they could figure out how.
"Do you really think those people are going to buy a Longhorn update in a box? You get Longhorn when you buy a new computer after 2006. And, on average, people buy a new computer every four years."
Indeed, but my point is that for many users and orgs, there is no point in upgrading their hardware at the moment.
Considering that Longhorn will require 512MB of RAM; while most non-technical users just surf the web, read email and type the odd letter whigh requires say 128MB at most; I can't really see why these people should bother upgrading their hardware.
Governments, schools and firms certainly won't bother to upgrade if they need to.
The only thing missing is security upgrades, which Microsoft do not provide for old hardware (since by default has to run an old version).
There is a huge missing market here, new software for old hardware. That IE 7 won't work on 2000 shows that Microsoft seem poised to sleep through this opportunity as they did with servers.
"And it's strange that anyone from the UK would be able to post to this discussion without feeling some kind of shame, haven't your camera operators already been disciplined for using them to ogle women?"
Okay I am that person. The camera operators get to see me naked, big deal. My doctor can too. Sitting in front of a computer both at home and a work means my body isn't that exciting anyway.
You have got to grow up about it. Nudity does not always have to be sexual. Take a sauna in Finland where you get to sit with naked old relatives. You soon learn that all nudity is not sexual!
As someone already pointed out, with the alternative being a cavity search, bring on those X-rays.
Back to the guns, the only people I have ever seen with guns are clay-pigeon shooters and Heathrow cops. I like it that way.
Don't forget that Britain is very small with a huge amount of people. I live in one of the biggest cities in Europe and in seconds dozens of police can be here. Do I need a gun? No.
In England it is quite simple, if you own a handgun then you are breaking the law. This makes things very simple. It also means that some criminals are less likely to carry guns since the police here stop and search certain groups (Black, Irish, Muslims) very often indeed (but without Xrays). It is very sad and unfair that certain groups get picked out but it gets the job done apparently.
I am sorry that you think that I have to be ashamed to be from the UK. I realise that it is a sin not to be born American, I repent profusely. All I can say to that is we don't need guns when we have George Galloway...
You are misinformed on many points. Get a better laywer I think.
The GPL is not holding the GNU/Linux OS itself back, only people who want to hoard the code. If you use the software only in-house then there are some limited exceptions within the GPL, so you again should get a better lawyer.
"no business will ever be able to use it. "
Well IBM and many other companies have been able to get on with it. The GPL divides smart and innovative people from the cut and paste brigade. If you can't make a profit then it is your own stupid fault.
"Its draconian requirements"
You are clearly confused and are reading the situation backwards. A normal software license gives you no rights to use the code at all.
The GPL however gives you all the rights but one: you do not have the right to remove the rights of others. You can use the code that has been created at much expense only if you do not attempt to make free software unfree.
No one is forcing you to use GPL'd code. If you want to buy in code to save time then you have to pay for it. The cost for GPL'd software is that you have to share improvements.
There is no such thing as a free lunch, stop crying about it and get on with your life.
I run an ad-free aggregator about the Bible ( Biblioblog ) and make no money from it in any way, it is just a free service that tries to be helpful to people interested in the topic.
I agree with the above poster (BoldAC), RSS feeds that contained headlines only mixed with Ads would be deleted from my source list straight away.
As for feeds with the entire post (or a good amount of one) with ads, I would have to consider it carefully.
So far, RSS feeds are often offered by sites without explicit terms or conditions; and all the authors of the blogs that have been added to my site so far have been grateful for the extra traffic and qudos, as well as the knowledge that my site is an automatic backup of last resort.
All feeds on my site are ordered by date rather than from source. Therefore, all the feeds are automatically cut up upon arrival so to speak.
What do I do with all the left over Ads? Nothing I assume, especially if they are all rather off-topic. For example, the adwords term 'Biblical' gives nothing to do with biblical studies but instead ebay and amazon.
So if a blog author demands his ads to be kept, I would probably just click 'delete feed'. After all, God is Love;)
I have a drupal site, but have recently messed around with mambo. I would say the former is quicker to get up and running but I would agree with you that the latter is probably better in features and looks.
However for my next project I will probably look for a CMS that uses perl or python or something. PHP is a bit fluffy really for bigger projects.
Slashdot Mirror
Indeed, I agree 100%! (please Mod back up)
"But truth be told I like building my own PCs and having the extra options that goes along with that."
Yeah that is the reason that I do not have as much Apple hardware as non-Apple hardware, Apple stuff is very restricted.
If I may shamelessly plug a little bit. I have already talked elsewhere about "OS X on Non-Apple hardware" as well as the closing of the forums in Would Jesus run OS X on a white box?.
Another useful view on this matter is provided by Hisram. Also see Javier blog, for a more Apple-friendly take on the situation.
"e) They may impose software patent retaliation, which means permission
for use of your added parts terminates or may be terminated, wholly or
partially,"
The draft of Version 3 of the GPL is comptable with CDDL and similar GPL2 incompatable free software licences, this is very good news for developing software that uses components from for example, say FSF and Sun.
I am/was/will be a user of OSWD (the open source bit rather than the tacky commerical section). I have quite a few of the zips on my hard disk, others users may do too if they search enough. How about someone puts a new site up - GNUwebdesign or whatever and we can send them all in.
Contact the user known as 'Haran' too, he wrote all the best XHTML ones.
On the DR-DOS website, on this page : http://www.drdos.com/products/drdos81.htm
w ww.drdos.com/products/drdos80.htm+&hl=en&lr=&strip =0
Compare this page to the Google cached version:
http://66.249.93.104/search?q=cache:7Tlnhc5cJbEJ:
The difference is that now it says:
Portions are licensed under GPL (SYS v2.6 and FDXXMS v.92) or other licenses.
Lets make a law saying that all our elected officials are required to have a live webcam feed 24/7/365 from their offices, cars and houses.
In this most democratic form of the 'Big Brother show', we would be able to hold our elected officials directly accountable. We would see what lobbyists are met, how long a lunch break they take, how ethically they shop, if they are really recycling and so on.
>"but then they might as well put up a big sign: "for free money - sue a Lloyds insured company!""
Well sometimes it good not to have money so no-one will bother to sue you!
>"they'll want to discourage such lawsuits as much as possible."
More seriously though, I agree with you. Once something has been decided in court then it tends to stick around.
Eventually free software(/open source) such as LAMP servers (to continue the example) will so be prevalent and so much part of the infrastructure that spurious lawsuits will drop off once the pressure has been released, although that may be ten years away yet.
A lot of course depends on GPL v3 and whether most free software and open source licences of the future include a patent and lawsuit etc self-destruction clause (think of the CDDL).
SCO's latest offering that they have excremented, OpenServer 6, contained KDE, Apache, Mozilla, Samba, Perl, PHP, MySQL, as well as other free/open source software.
If all the above had a "Intellectual Property" self-destruction clause then SCO would have had to choose between either (mis)claiming that Linux kernel contained 'their' "Intellectual Property" or using these packages.
This seems fair to me. Currently they are claiming that GPL is invalid and wrong yada yada, yet they are taking full advantage of it - weasels!
Who is up for the 'SCO went-bust mega-party'?
At $60 a server, say there are 50 million Apache servers out there (some LAMP some FreeBSD-AMP etc) and there is only going to be more over time (growth of the internet etc). If 2% buy the licence from Lloyds (or from someone else) then that is $60 million per year. That money can defend up to 30 small patent infringement court cases (under $2 million) or 2 to 3 SCO size cases per year, every year.
That is far more protection than, say, LAMP will ever need for legal fees, at least in the long run. It will be good profit for Lloyds, and will make CEOs sleep better because they have paid a few more people for GNU/Linux, (no-one values what they get for free).
Software is going in two directions. For technical users (those able to understand software and customize it e.g. Google, Slashdot readers and so on), software has become a commodity. For some others, especially companies with weak management, software is a 'Giffen good'. When the proverbial fæces hits the fan, the CEO wants to explain to shareholders that they bought the most expensive solution possible.
Indeed I have been convinced for a while that the relatively low total cost of ownership has put companies off free software. Adding "Intellectual property" insurance (something you get very little of with proprietary software) will help to increase the cost of free software and speed its adoption.
Maybe you should try Gentoo, it updates all my software everyday while I'm alseep, just set a cron to do
emerge --sync && emerge world && shutdown -h now
[Ducks for cover]
Is it really all about OSX ?
The PowerPC platform, rightly or wrongly is seen as better than Intel on all technical grounds but not on economic grounds i.e. the PowerPC is better but costs far more than a bland Intel - not least because of economies of scale (e.g. one figure says that Intel/AMD 98.6% of the market).
I'm a GNU/Linux user (Gentoo as it happens), given the choice between a PowerPC or an IntelPC all other things being equal, I would choose PowerPC over PC everytime - even though I would run GNU/Linux on either platform.
BTW, Linus Torvolds himself runs GNU/Linux on a PowerPC.
If IBM etc licences a the PowerPC to generic Chinese companies who mass produce them then GNU/Linux PowerPC could be a viable commercial option against Wintel.
From the Article:
"Accepting such a position with a direct Microsoft competitor like Google violates the narrow noncompetition promise Lee made when he was hired as an executive," Microsoft said in its lawsuit.
In civilised countries you cannot sign away your statutory rights. However in America you are "free" to make yourselves a load of slaves in the interest of your fascist industrial complex. (fascist in the sense of there being no separation between business and government).
Crazy, time for you yanks to stand up for a free labour market with any noncompetition being illegal as anti-competitive; rather than the communist-style system you have now.
Microsoft as a near monopoly needs no protection from the state, indeed we all need protection from it.
>I am compelled to erase your hard drive right now!
It is rather handy actually. It erases Windows for you, can you make a few more to get us through the rest of the Gentoo install!
Graphically (i.e Windows, X) based OS for the blind, e.g. Jaws etc, are the stupidist piece of crap. Think about it:
The computer runs on text > then represents it with graphics > then the assistive technology attempts to represent the graphics with text > the text is spoken.
When you get a windows error message the user is stuffed.
Occam's Razor would suggest that for blind people a better solution would be:
Command Line > spoken aloud.
Links/elinks/links2 can be used for Internet
Other Bash apps can be used: Vi, Emacs, MP321 whatever you want.
>Just install ubuntu, firefox, thunderbird on the >machines, and place a windows Longhorn [top secret] >wallpaper on the desktop, and tell you boss you got >the latest windows W4r3z on the computer, Laugh but I've seen it work. Go for Fedora in this case because their update system looks a bit like Windows update, although any distro will do. The XP background is called bliss.bmp and you may find a lookalike on the google. Add some desktop shortcuts with Windows like names and then leave it with them. Don't forget a few stupid card games - that is actually key to acceptance. Once they have written a letter and checked their email, then they are passed the fear stage already. Then tell them that they are using the latest big thing and that is far better, then show them that it has twenty games pre-installed. Leave them playing tux racer or pingus.
Sorry the link is
/. going to get a post correction feature?
http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/
When is
Also good is the FSF/UNESCO Free Software Directory http://directory.fsf.org/ Which allows you to search for free and legal alternatives under different categories. Good for finding out the names of things.
It is a very difficult situation, you may need to consider another job. Get into a union if you can.
How about suggesting that there are free and legal alternatives and install that instead? Or just install it and say that "I couldn't install Word but this is much better and is the latest big thing"
Use OpenOffice 2.0 instead of Word, Gimp instead of Photoshop and so on. All well known programs have two or three alternatives - one of which will provide a windows binary (look for win32).
Best thing is to cultivate a reputation as a Free Software ( www.gnu.com/philosophy ) fanatic and people won't dare ask you for Windows software.
Good luck.
>For many years, Photographers have used test shots
>of women, they nicknamed her Shirley for no reason
>I've ever been able to figure out.
There is also the Lenna picture, see the wikipedia for the background story.
But how can I block all incoming mail with an autoreply saying that I do not accept hotmail?
Tips for GNU/Linux please.
"People will still use old software on their old hardware, and when they get new hardware (and they will) they'll get new software."
I agree but that underlines my point. People who are not technical will not bother to upgrade even if they could figure out how.
"Do you really think those people are going to buy a Longhorn update in a box? You get Longhorn when you buy a new computer after 2006. And, on average, people buy a new computer every four years."
Indeed, but my point is that for many users and orgs, there is no point in upgrading their hardware at the moment.
Considering that Longhorn will require 512MB of RAM; while most non-technical users just surf the web, read email and type the odd letter whigh requires say 128MB at most; I can't really see why these people should bother upgrading their hardware.
Governments, schools and firms certainly won't bother to upgrade if they need to.
The only thing missing is security upgrades, which Microsoft do not provide for old hardware (since by default has to run an old version).
There is a huge missing market here, new software for old hardware. That IE 7 won't work on 2000 shows that Microsoft seem poised to sleep through this opportunity as they did with servers.
Will anyone but Linux fill the gap?
"And it's strange that anyone from the UK would be able to post to this discussion without feeling some kind of shame, haven't your camera operators already been disciplined for using them to ogle women?"
Okay I am that person. The camera operators get to see me naked, big deal. My doctor can too. Sitting in front of a computer both at home and a work means my body isn't that exciting anyway.
You have got to grow up about it. Nudity does not always have to be sexual. Take a sauna in Finland where you get to sit with naked old relatives. You soon learn that all nudity is not sexual!
As someone already pointed out, with the alternative being a cavity search, bring on those X-rays.
Back to the guns, the only people I have ever seen with guns are clay-pigeon shooters and Heathrow cops. I like it that way.
Don't forget that Britain is very small with a huge amount of people. I live in one of the biggest cities in Europe and in seconds dozens of police can be here. Do I need a gun? No.
In England it is quite simple, if you own a handgun then you are breaking the law. This makes things very simple. It also means that some criminals are less likely to carry guns since the police here stop and search certain groups (Black, Irish, Muslims) very often indeed (but without Xrays). It is very sad and unfair that certain groups get picked out but it gets the job done apparently.
I am sorry that you think that I have to be ashamed to be from the UK. I realise that it is a sin not to be born American, I repent profusely. All I can say to that is we don't need guns when we have George Galloway...
"let anyone who's proven his or her ability and willingness to train to carry a weapon aboard an aircraft do so."
Guns + Planes = Cabin depressurisation
Specialised weapons are required for planes. So letting every dirty Harry wanabee to take a gun on board is hardly sensible.
How do you tell who is a terrorist and who are the "good people". Better to get rid of all the guns. That is why I feel safer in the UK.
You are misinformed on many points. Get a better laywer I think.
The GPL is not holding the GNU/Linux OS itself back, only people who want to hoard the code. If you use the software only in-house then there are some limited exceptions within the GPL, so you again should get a better lawyer.
"no business will ever be able to use it. "
Well IBM and many other companies have been able to get on with it. The GPL divides smart and innovative people from the cut and paste brigade. If you can't make a profit then it is your own stupid fault.
"Its draconian requirements"
You are clearly confused and are reading the situation backwards. A normal software license gives you no rights to use the code at all.
The GPL however gives you all the rights but one: you do not have the right to remove the rights of others. You can use the code that has been created at much expense only if you do not attempt to make free software unfree.
No one is forcing you to use GPL'd code. If you want to buy in code to save time then you have to pay for it. The cost for GPL'd software is that you have to share improvements.
There is no such thing as a free lunch, stop crying about it and get on with your life.
I run an ad-free aggregator about the Bible ( Biblioblog ) and make no money from it in any way, it is just a free service that tries to be helpful to people interested in the topic.
;)
I agree with the above poster (BoldAC), RSS feeds that contained headlines only mixed with Ads would be deleted from my source list straight away.
As for feeds with the entire post (or a good amount of one) with ads, I would have to consider it carefully.
So far, RSS feeds are often offered by sites without explicit terms or conditions; and all the authors of the blogs that have been added to my site so far have been grateful for the extra traffic and qudos, as well as the knowledge that my site is an automatic backup of last resort.
All feeds on my site are ordered by date rather than from source. Therefore, all the feeds are automatically cut up upon arrival so to speak.
What do I do with all the left over Ads? Nothing I assume, especially if they are all rather off-topic. For example, the adwords term 'Biblical' gives nothing to do with biblical studies but instead ebay and amazon.
So if a blog author demands his ads to be kept, I would probably just click 'delete feed'. After all, God is Love
I have a drupal site, but have recently messed around with mambo. I would say the former is quicker to get up and running but I would agree with you that the latter is probably better in features and looks.
However for my next project I will probably look for a CMS that uses perl or python or something. PHP is a bit fluffy really for bigger projects.