And we are supposed to trust them when they don't even bother getting a site up running XP as the OS?
Aaaargh. Win2K is a server OS. Windows XP is a desktop OS. Why would you use a desktop OS to host a website? That's almost as asinine as expecting palm.com to be running on an array of palm pilots.
Anyway, the campaign was about Big Iron data servers, not web servers.
"how is preventing me to listen to a CD an incentive to buy it????"
\begin{ObviousRedundantRepeatedJoke}
Obviously, you haven't heard Celine Deon sing.
\end {ObviousRedundantRepeatedJoke}
Be glad there is no story moderation
on
April Fools Wrap Up
·
· Score: 4, Interesting
Otherwise all of CmdrTaco's stories would be at -1 after today from his karma being beaten to the ground for all the troll stories that were posted today.
Interestingly, I noticed one story (about the retiring carrier pigeons) that was a true story posted today. Any others?
I found it very interesting that the new privacy policy so explicitly specifies what will happen if they are acquired. Something has to be in the works.
Given their recent behavior, it sounds rather like they are trying to fit into the AOL culture.
The whole "Wen Ho Lee fiasco" was a lot of FUD by the FBI to coverup the fact that they knew nothing about how nuclear secrets were stolen.
Yes, he broke a lot of regulations by allowing his daughter to login, copying data onto floppies to keep safe, etc. I know his daughter and we used to play the same MUD and she used to login to his account in order to get a better network connection yet they made it out as if he was letting Chinese secret agents into his account instead.
Actually, I have no problem with reducing the term for works that were created under the shorter terms. i.e. when something was created in 1960, the copyright law allowed for 28 years so I have no problem with the copyright expiring on those works.
However, I do have a problem with applying it to works that were created when the allowed period was longer. So a work made in 2000 would remain under copyright for as long as the laws in the year 2000 allowed.
I'm probably wasting my breath by saying it here but I'll do so anyway.
Revert the term of copyright to 14 years, immediately and retroactive to all existing works.
I like this one. At least the first part. I have serious doubts about the ethicality of making it retroactive. Someone who created content (or bought it - but let's not delve into that) and released it under the assumption that it would be protected for whatever period copyrights were at the time would legitimately feel screwed by the country going back on its promise.
Recognize moral rights in the works authors create, like every other civilized country on the planet. Make it immediate and retroactive to all existing works.
Huhh? What laws in other countries does this reference? What's this "moral right"? Does the guy I paid to help build my house have a "moral right" to my house?
Prohibit any corporation from owning a copyright. Corporations create nothing; they're consensual hallucinations and exist at our pleasure. I don't know about you, but I'm not much pleased any more.
That's the point where I realize I should dismiss this as probably the ranting of someone with the intelligence of a pre-pubescent crack-addict.
Corporations serve several purposes and are very crucial to our economy. It's amazing how few demagogues realize this. I, as an author want the ability to sell my copyrights for money - to corporations. When you take away my ability to do that you're taking away some of the value of my creation to me. The bottomline is that artists will get shittier contracts and compensations because they can give less away.
Our economy thrives on separation of roles. Taking this away will force the author to be in the business, not only of creating content, but also that of distributing, marketing and promoting it. That is as much in societies interests as prohibiting anyone from getting a job and "giving away" the fruits of their labor is.
I hate to talk about Microsoft products - especially on Slashdot...
However, where I work we use Sharepoint Portal Server. I upload documents to the website. Reviewers add comments, can see comments other people have added and can even chip in or reply to any of those comments. I review the comments, update the document (and reupload still keeping all the comments), close comments, etc.
Works great for me. I'd like to see paper do that.
but if MS thinks the Universities are going to create a course like "The.NET Code", they're dreaming.
In my day I think I had a class on the Unix operating system. I see no reason why a university wouldn't offer a similar class if the students were interested.
Copyright grants Microsoft a monopoly on Windows(tm). Copyright does not grant Microsoft a monopoly on OSes. Anyone is free to write a new OS.
Again, there is a difference between a monopoly being granted (e.g. utilities) and a monopoly on someones creation. The latter is not considered a monopoly, btw. Copyright law has very specific advantages. It was designed to offer an incentive to creaters to release their content being granted a limited term monopoly on its distribution with the understanding that it will become free after a period of time (of course our stupid politicians have completely subverted that by extending them for 72 years)
We cant wage a two month war and then leave all of a sudden telling ourselves that our work here is done and now this nation would pull itself together towards a road to peace. This country is far from being over from the civil war.
I totally agree with you on this. In fact, I believe we should do to Afghanistan what the Alies did to Germany and Japan after WWII. Now, instead of war-ravaged countries that hate us, they are two of the strongest economies in the world and also two of the strongest allies of the West.
Re:Can't legal action be used?
on
Spy v. Spy
·
· Score: 2
This has nothing to do with EULAs. If your wife installs a secret camera to watch what you're doing while on your computer, do you sue the camera company?
The software has a very specific purpose which it performs. I wouldn't blame the company if someone decided to install it on your computer without your permission.
Re:Mmmm.. FUN! And a legal nightmare..
on
Spy v. Spy
·
· Score: 5, Insightful
if the spyware was installed by someone who doesnt own the computer
In that case, shouldn't you sue the person who installed it rather than the company who makes the software? Didn't we all agree that there was nothing wrong with writing DeCSS or Napster or other software - it was only the person using it for illegal purposes who was at fault?
There's a HUGE difference between Microsoft and Verizon.
One is a monopoly that was granted by government fiat. A natural consequence of that is that the government has the authority to regulate it and impose restrictions. Verizon didn't build its monopoly by building a unique business model or providing unique service. Its monopoly was granted to it by the government.
Microsofts "monopoly", on the other hand was built without government assistance.
You have no way to obtain phone, power or water without the utility (government regulations see to that). You can always obtain an OS without Microsoft.
Also, Microsoft was not cutting off the supply to Gateway. It was not "raising" the prices either. Gateway could always buy Windows at the full retail price at the time of retail availability. There is a cap on the price which is the retail price - a price at which several million people buy the product.
Are you trying to say that because Microsoft has this "monopoly" that it owes the government nothing for, it should be required to offer a discount to Gateway just because it asks for it?
I'm curious, however about how you decode the numbers i.e. sstst --> 2, sstts --> 3, etc. It isn't binary and I can't think of an alternate representation that matches. (I verified with one of my own letters that you didn't just make it up).
Thanks
Re:this reminds me of a trick for telemarketers
on
He Writes Back
·
· Score: 3, Informative
You're only hurting the poor sob making minimum wage dialing all those numbers - you're not hurting the company paying them to do that - who you have your real gripe with.
I just say "put me on your don't call list" and hang up.
And now I'd like to complain about the increasing retard-ification of our society. How can people be unable to choose a few non-obvious passwords (hell, just some random sequences of alphanumeric characters will do) and remember them with a mnemonic device? Why must we create an authentication system geared to the stupid so they can easily exist among us? Maybe they'd smarten up if they chose "password" as their password and had their checking account cleaned out for the third time as a result.
You sound just like my father when he heard they allowed us to use calculators in school. In his day there were no calculators allowed. You did everything in your head. In engineering school he used log tables.
I think he was wrong and so are you. We used scientific calculators in engineering school instead of log tables. I was learning structural mechanics and complex differential equations instead of the most efficient way to add or multiply numbers on paper. I don't consider myself any stupider for that. Whether or not I knew how to multiply two 7 digit numbers was immaterial to whether or not I knew how to compute the stress on a truss. (Yes, I do know how to use a log table efficiently but that hasn't helped me once in the last 10 years)
Machines serve a purpose - they perform the mundane and boring tasks freeing humans to achieve higher goals.
There is nothing wrong with making it easier for someone to work the cash registers. There's nothing wrong with shortening the learning curve by putting pictures of the items on the buttons. There's nothing wrong with speeding up the job by not making the clerks have to calculate the change. There's nothing wrong with reducing the risk of errors by spitting the change out automatically.
Just because you can do something without a machine doesn't mean it's stupid to use a machine to do it. I imagine our ancestors who spent days chopping down a single tree probably thought we were lazy for using a chainsaw instead. I imagine their ancestors before them thought they were lazy because they used bicycles to get to work instead of walking uphill in the snow.
Slashdot Mirror
yeah, but where do you think he's gonna find a lawyer in heaven?
He can't. Everyone knows all the lawyers are in hell.
And we are supposed to trust them when they don't even bother getting a site up running XP as the OS?
Aaaargh. Win2K is a server OS. Windows XP is a desktop OS. Why would you use a desktop OS to host a website? That's almost as asinine as expecting palm.com to be running on an array of palm pilots.
Anyway, the campaign was about Big Iron data servers, not web servers.
The drunk people are the customers, who are rarely called upon to wash their own glasses
Maybe Taco should carry more money with him the next time he goes to the bar so he doesn't have to wash glasses to work his tab off.
"how is preventing me to listen to a CD an incentive to buy it????"
\begin{ObviousRedundantRepeatedJoke}
Obviously, you haven't heard Celine Deon sing.
\end {ObviousRedundantRepeatedJoke}
Otherwise all of CmdrTaco's stories would be at -1 after today from his karma being beaten to the ground for all the troll stories that were posted today.
Interestingly, I noticed one story (about the retiring carrier pigeons) that was a true story posted today. Any others?
Yet another case for allowing people to rate stories.
On April 2nd, all of CommanderTaco's stories will automatically bet posted at -1 because of his karma from being modded down as a troll today.
rm -f /bin/laden
/bin/laden".
In order to completely destroy him and his organization, you should change that to "rm -rf
I found it very interesting that the new privacy policy so explicitly specifies what will happen if they are acquired. Something has to be in the works.
Given their recent behavior, it sounds rather like they are trying to fit into the AOL culture.
How do you delete your address and phone number information from Yahoo? I tried and it said an address and phone number was required.
So did you actually delete the info or did you just change it to some made up ones?
I hate the SOBs
The whole "Wen Ho Lee fiasco" was a lot of FUD by the FBI to coverup the fact that they knew nothing about how nuclear secrets were stolen.
Yes, he broke a lot of regulations by allowing his daughter to login, copying data onto floppies to keep safe, etc. I know his daughter and we used to play the same MUD and she used to login to his account in order to get a better network connection yet they made it out as if he was letting Chinese secret agents into his account instead.
Actually, I have no problem with reducing the term for works that were created under the shorter terms. i.e. when something was created in 1960, the copyright law allowed for 28 years so I have no problem with the copyright expiring on those works.
However, I do have a problem with applying it to works that were created when the allowed period was longer. So a work made in 2000 would remain under copyright for as long as the laws in the year 2000 allowed.
I'm probably wasting my breath by saying it here but I'll do so anyway.
Revert the term of copyright to 14 years, immediately and retroactive to all existing works.
I like this one. At least the first part. I have serious doubts about the ethicality of making it retroactive. Someone who created content (or bought it - but let's not delve into that) and released it under the assumption that it would be protected for whatever period copyrights were at the time would legitimately feel screwed by the country going back on its promise.
Recognize moral rights in the works authors create, like every other civilized country on the planet. Make it immediate and retroactive to all existing works.
Huhh? What laws in other countries does this reference? What's this "moral right"? Does the guy I paid to help build my house have a "moral right" to my house?
Prohibit any corporation from owning a copyright. Corporations create nothing; they're consensual hallucinations and exist at our pleasure. I don't know about you, but I'm not much pleased any more.
That's the point where I realize I should dismiss this as probably the ranting of someone with the intelligence of a pre-pubescent crack-addict.
Corporations serve several purposes and are very crucial to our economy. It's amazing how few demagogues realize this. I, as an author want the ability to sell my copyrights for money - to corporations. When you take away my ability to do that you're taking away some of the value of my creation to me. The bottomline is that artists will get shittier contracts and compensations because they can give less away.
Our economy thrives on separation of roles. Taking this away will force the author to be in the business, not only of creating content, but also that of distributing, marketing and promoting it. That is as much in societies interests as prohibiting anyone from getting a job and "giving away" the fruits of their labor is.
I hate to talk about Microsoft products - especially on Slashdot...
However, where I work we use Sharepoint Portal Server. I upload documents to the website. Reviewers add comments, can see comments other people have added and can even chip in or reply to any of those comments. I review the comments, update the document (and reupload still keeping all the comments), close comments, etc.
Works great for me. I'd like to see paper do that.
But seriously, pirates hurt software companies just as bad, if not worse than the music industry
Hmm.. interesting point. So how long before the software industry starts asking for a fee to be imposed on all blank media purchases to offset their losses due to piracy?
Hmm...
IP address: 217.204.238.51
Host name: nigerianfraudwatch.org
Alias:
pccorner-3.dsl1.easynet.co.uk
Third-world country is right. I hear they're not even circumcised. The savages!
This story has nothing to do with MS. It's about Merill Lynch replacing their Unix boxen with Linux on the servers.
Please read the article before posting again.
but if MS thinks the Universities are going to create a course like "The .NET Code", they're dreaming.
In my day I think I had a class on the Unix operating system. I see no reason why a university wouldn't offer a similar class if the students were interested.
You're confusing issues here.
Copyright grants Microsoft a monopoly on Windows(tm). Copyright does not grant Microsoft a monopoly on OSes. Anyone is free to write a new OS.
Again, there is a difference between a monopoly being granted (e.g. utilities) and a monopoly on someones creation. The latter is not considered a monopoly, btw. Copyright law has very specific advantages. It was designed to offer an incentive to creaters to release their content being granted a limited term monopoly on its distribution with the understanding that it will become free after a period of time (of course our stupid politicians have completely subverted that by extending them for 72 years)
We cant wage a two month war and then leave all of a sudden telling ourselves that our work here is done and now this nation would pull itself together towards a road to peace. This country is far from being over from the civil war.
I totally agree with you on this. In fact, I believe we should do to Afghanistan what the Alies did to Germany and Japan after WWII. Now, instead of war-ravaged countries that hate us, they are two of the strongest economies in the world and also two of the strongest allies of the West.
This has nothing to do with EULAs. If your wife installs a secret camera to watch what you're doing while on your computer, do you sue the camera company?
The software has a very specific purpose which it performs. I wouldn't blame the company if someone decided to install it on your computer without your permission.
if the spyware was installed by someone who doesnt own the computer
In that case, shouldn't you sue the person who installed it rather than the company who makes the software? Didn't we all agree that there was nothing wrong with writing DeCSS or Napster or other software - it was only the person using it for illegal purposes who was at fault?
There's a HUGE difference between Microsoft and Verizon.
One is a monopoly that was granted by government fiat. A natural consequence of that is that the government has the authority to regulate it and impose restrictions. Verizon didn't build its monopoly by building a unique business model or providing unique service. Its monopoly was granted to it by the government.
Microsofts "monopoly", on the other hand was built without government assistance.
You have no way to obtain phone, power or water without the utility (government regulations see to that). You can always obtain an OS without Microsoft.
Also, Microsoft was not cutting off the supply to Gateway. It was not "raising" the prices either. Gateway could always buy Windows at the full retail price at the time of retail availability. There is a cap on the price which is the retail price - a price at which several million people buy the product.
Are you trying to say that because Microsoft has this "monopoly" that it owes the government nothing for, it should be required to offer a discount to Gateway just because it asks for it?
I'm impressed (of course)
I'm curious, however about how you decode the numbers i.e. sstst --> 2, sstts --> 3, etc. It isn't binary and I can't think of an alternate representation that matches. (I verified with one of my own letters that you didn't just make it up).
Thanks
You're only hurting the poor sob making minimum wage dialing all those numbers - you're not hurting the company paying them to do that - who you have your real gripe with.
I just say "put me on your don't call list" and hang up.
And now I'd like to complain about the increasing retard-ification of our society. How can people be unable to choose a few non-obvious passwords (hell, just some random sequences of alphanumeric characters will do) and remember them with a mnemonic device? Why must we create an authentication system geared to the stupid so they can easily exist among us? Maybe they'd smarten up if they chose "password" as their password and had their checking account cleaned out for the third time as a result.
You sound just like my father when he heard they allowed us to use calculators in school. In his day there were no calculators allowed. You did everything in your head. In engineering school he used log tables.
I think he was wrong and so are you. We used scientific calculators in engineering school instead of log tables. I was learning structural mechanics and complex differential equations instead of the most efficient way to add or multiply numbers on paper. I don't consider myself any stupider for that. Whether or not I knew how to multiply two 7 digit numbers was immaterial to whether or not I knew how to compute the stress on a truss. (Yes, I do know how to use a log table efficiently but that hasn't helped me once in the last 10 years)
Machines serve a purpose - they perform the mundane and boring tasks freeing humans to achieve higher goals.
There is nothing wrong with making it easier for someone to work the cash registers. There's nothing wrong with shortening the learning curve by putting pictures of the items on the buttons. There's nothing wrong with speeding up the job by not making the clerks have to calculate the change. There's nothing wrong with reducing the risk of errors by spitting the change out automatically.
Just because you can do something without a machine doesn't mean it's stupid to use a machine to do it. I imagine our ancestors who spent days chopping down a single tree probably thought we were lazy for using a chainsaw instead. I imagine their ancestors before them thought they were lazy because they used bicycles to get to work instead of walking uphill in the snow.