IANAL, but if I understand things correctly (I'm sure lawyers in the crowd will correctly) Novell customers are in deep trouble if Microsoft ever decides to make patent lawsuits.
Novell basically agreed that there are infringing patents in SUSE Linux (otherwise, what are they licensing per SUSE license?). Novell customers who use the Microsoft coupons have agreed that this is the case also, so they are infringing.
But the N-M protects them, so they don't have anything to worry about for 5 years (the life of the agreement).
However, the N-M agreement excludes a large number of products which they are likely using. So if a Microsoft patent appears in both a covered and excluded product in SUSE, Novell customers are on the hook. And since they can't plead ignorance, they're a much easier target than someone use uses a non-SUSE distribution, in much the same way that SCO's customers were their first targets.
Now I don't think that Microsoft would dare file a patent lawsuit against Linux or Novell...there are too many interested parties in Linux that have patents and it would risk a patent Armageddon, but if you use SUSE Linux, it would be safer if you avoided the Microsoft coupon.
Very true. In a perfectly free market, there would be no IP, not even weak copyright, since it's an artificial government enforced concept. So from the start this group is hypocritical.
Copyright is a good thing: it's what gives the GPL its "must remain free" condition and allows the BSD license it to be more than public domain by retaining the names of the original contributors. If people put their hard work into making something, why shouldn't they at least get credit (and perhaps allow you to make a living based on the reputation of your work)? Anyone that is pro-FOSS and anti-copyright is a hypocrite, whether they know it or not.
But when copyright becomes so strong that you need a team of lawyers to hunt down 99 year old great grand mothers, and when a whole technology is created to treat you as a criminal and restrict your rights to use work that you purchased 20 years ago, and when private police forces can order ISPs to violate privacy or remotely shut down computers that *might* be infringing or leave you open to rootkit vulnerabilities or companies resell you the same thing over and over again because you aren't allowed to format shift or works of knowledge and cultural history are allowed to die because the copyright holder is out of reach or wants it to die if he can't make any money off it, you know something is out of wack.
What many of these "strong copyright" companies don't realize is that people are lazy and people generally want to see themselves "as good people". This is true, even in jails where you'll find people say "I might be a thief but at least I'm not a murderer" or "I'm a murderer but at least I'm not a rapist", etc.
Make it easy for people to get your content and make it easy for people to feel good about themselves about doing "the right thing" and people will. They'll pay you any reasonable amount and if you treat them well, the majority will even promote you or even help out in some way and be loyal customers.
BTW, it's not about unrestricted corporate activity either. If one corporation, violated copyright, there'd be hell to pay too (witness the BSA police). I'm not sure what to call it, but such one-sided lobbying by the power elite (on the left, right, or center) is precisely the thing any good democrasy must guard against.
Microsoft is in violation of 100,000 patents that I own, but I'm too busy to document even a single patent.
And naming even a single patent would be just spreading FUD because, as I've said, I'm too busy now innovating to sue at this moment. If the infringing code could be rewritten, I'd say something because I know Microsoft respects IP and I don't want people violating my IP unintentionally. But since the code it can't be rewritten without using my IP, so I'm actually doing Microsoft a favour by keeping quiet.
But tell you what, since I know even mentioning Microsoft's violation can cause uncertainty, I'll license each of my patents to Microsoft for the low low price of 1 dollar per patent, payable once every month. As stated, I'm too busy to sue anyone using Microsoft products at the moment, so Microsoft customers are safe...for now. But who knows what will happen to people who by unlicensed Microsoft projects in the future.
> Hate Microsoft, hate Apple, but those organizations do not treat potential customers as primordial slime
I'm having a hard time understanding your point. Most people who use Linux don't do so because they hate Microsoft and Apple.
Hate is not a motivation to do anything. Hate is a motivation to *not* do something or to tear it down. You could be perfectly happy hating both Microsoft and Apple if you're a Blackberry user or a BeOS user or a BSD user or a Solaris user.
Quite simply, Most people who use Linux use Linux because they love Linux. Period.
And unless you've been sleeping, a great deal of work in making Linux more user friendly. It's the whole mission of some distros (e.g. Ubuntu).
BTW, I don't know where you got the idea that people think Microsoft and Apple treats potential customers as primordial slime. Microsoft treats people as a revenue source and the more money they can extract, the better, even if it means treating your customers like criminals (witness the DRM), getting people to buy the same things ever and over again even if they don't need it (e.g. planned obsolescence) , and even if it means trapping them through intentional vendor lock in. Apple is a bit different. They're in it for the money too (after all, it's a free market), but they have a bit of the Oracle arrogance that they're better than anyone else and if you don't like "the Apple way" you've been brainwashed and need re-education. It's not just about the money.
Both Microsoft and Apple do satisfy they're customers to some extent (otherwise they'd be bankrupt), but if you're tired of the "you are a criminal but you're trapped with us so pay up whenever we want" attitude from the post-Bill Gates Microsoft and you just don't like "the Apple way", you have to find a home *somewhere*.
If you're one of these OS refuges, and like openness, being treated as an equal partner in the development process, and don't want to have to deal with planned obsolescence or vendor lock in nightmares, Linux is a good place to go. If Linux isn't good enough for you, and the other alternatives aren't either, you have some hard choices to make.
Now getting back to the article, here's my comments:
> 1 - On the whole, users aren't all that dissatisfied with Windows
Not quite. There's quite a bit of disatisfaction, but most people don't know of any alternatives other than the Mac, but unless they're surrounded by Mac users and/or use a Mac at work, chances are they wouldn't go through the pain of switching. And let's face it, people are busy with *real life*. People are lazy and would rather go to the beach than do their taxes and investigate alternatives. The only difference between these two options is that the government forces you to do one but not the other. If the highly publicized Mac has problems cracking the market, Linux would doubly so.
> 2 - Too many distros
Nope. Most of those distros are special case distros that only geeks know about. When it comes down to it, most non-geeks who know about Linux have only heard of RedHat or Novell or maybe Ubuntu (thanks mostly to Dell and free Ubuntu giveaways). Most users would try one of these three distros and assume that all the others are the same and either switch to Linux based on this one experience or balk at Linux, possibly forever.
> 3 - People want certainty that hardware and software will work
Linux works for most hardware out there *out of the box*, often better than Windows XP. This is especially true with Ubuntu. Granted, there are some areas where (mostly newer) hardware isn't as well supported, but the same can be said for Vista. The key difference between Vista and a distro like Ubuntu is that the Vista hardware is preselected and preinstalled whereas the user needs to install Ubuntu and hope (unless they've done their research) that everything works (it likely will, but no guarentees). Thanks to Dell and a few other computer makers, th
Once you move out of the rights given to you by copyright law (basically, the right to view for personal use, making fair use excerpts, and fair use copying -- backups and time shifting and format shifting and viewing, copyright expiration after a given time) you move into contract law supplemented by copyright law.
I don't sign contracts when I buy music or videos so your scenario doesn't apply. Here's a more accurate scenario:
Them: "Hey, want to buy a movie?" You: "Sure, how much?" Them: "$100,000,000.00. and we'll sign over all rights to the movie, including redistribution and royalties." You: "I don't need all of that. Don't you have anything cheaper?" Them: "Sure. We have a streaming version that allows you to watch it for 5 cents a minute, but you'll have to sign a contract stating you'll forgo your fair use rights." You: "I just want a copy with all the freedom copyright law gives me." Them: "$50" You: "No thanks, too much." Them: "Sorry. That's how much the market is willing to pay and we're here to make money. Are you sure you don't want the 5 cent a minute deal?" You: "No thanks. I think I'll start looking for indie artists or wait for it to become less popular so I can get it on sale." Them: "Okay. Unfortunately, we don't have any indie artists yet but we're working on it. As for the DVD, it's a very hot item so you'll have to wait a long time for a discount. But if you want to wait, we welcome your business. Be sure to come back to us when you do decide to buy. We might have a few indie artists by them you might be interested in."
That's the way it's supposed to work and how it was envisioned when copyright laws were created. It's just business, clean, simple, and efficient. No confrontation, no hard feelings, no unfairness on either side, no teams of lawyers and copyright police hunting down 95 year old grand mothers because they *might* have possibly violated copyright law, and no hords of copyright violators who feel justified in ignoring copyright because they're treated like criminal scum even if they comply strictly with the law.
> I don't blame the creator of the profile. I don't blame the Obama campaign, > either -- centralized control is necessary for presidential campaigns today.
Personally I don't see any drama here. Both are needed in politics and other areas (e.g. TV shows, Linux Distribution help, etc). The official site gives official information and the unofficial site gives speculation and material that an official "stuffy" site wouldn't be able to. If the unofficial site was made official, another unofficial site would ultimately spring up.
Sure. More than a few couples have done this successfully.
The trick is to find couples with the right personality types. For instance, introverted couples with a deep passion for some solitary pursuit (e.g. music, programming, writing, video games) would likely fair a lot better than extroverted couples that need to socialize and do group activities.
As far as non-pre-installations go, it won't change a thing. Linux will keep growing at it's moderate pace no matter happens at Dell, so there's little to fear.
As far as pre-installations, yes it could either open the flood gates to Linux pre-installation and consequently increased driver support or seriously set it back.
Will it succeed? It depends on what systems they offer and at what prices. My 4 year old 2GHz system is due for an upgrade some time late this year. It works perfectly and is snappier than my parents dual core 3G machine running XP but I'm interested in KVM and interested in getting rid of NVidia in favour of the Intel XGL graphics and I wouldn't mind having my USB port in the front (as most new computers these days) rather than the back and a few other minor reasons. I had thought of buying a locally assembled as I always do (you can ensure that you get Linux compatible parts and the prices are good). I was not even considering Dell. But this announcement changes everything. If Dell offers a good reasonably priced system with the features I want, I'll go for Dell.
> The problem, in my opinion, with software patents isn't with the fact that they're software -- in my mind, software ought to > be patented,... -- but that they're typically of very poor quality, shoddily researched, and overbroad.
It's more fundamental than that. I understand that you're trying to find a middle ground, but there is none (at least none that is "obvious":-]). It's a
Here are four things to consider:
(1) How many people actually look at patent to come up with ideas? If no-one does, then how is it helping with innovation? What exactly is the purpose of software patents other than a way for lawyers and patent trolls to get paid for disrupting innovation?
(2) If I independently discover/reinvent the patent, then why should why should I have to pay someone else for the privilege of using *my* idea? Reinvention has nothing to do with obviousness. Sometimes the time is right for non-obvious inventions. Examples of this indepentent invention/rediscovery include quantum mechanics, light bulb, telephone, combustion engine, airplane, television, transistor, and integrated circuit. See http://goliath.ecnext.com/coms2/summary_0199-61065 42_ITM for a fuller description.
(3) Relating to (2), suppose you allow independent reinvention as an exception. What happens if I want to tell people about *my* idea for free? I can't (and may get sued if I do). Free speach and society loses.
(4) Software patents are supposed to protect "the little guy" but since big corps can afford to have millions of patents, it's almost certain that they have something that "the little guy" violates (or may potentially violate) and force "the little guy" to cross-license, enabling the big corps to "steal" (if you believe patents are IP) the idea. Even if "the little guy" doesn't violate any patents, it's possible for the big corps to drag the case out in court until "the little guy" is bankrupt (e.g. just look at how long SCO dragged the case out against another big corp), making it virtually impossible for "the little guy" to enforce the patent but very easy for big corps to freeze out competition.
So basically, even when you have legitimate innovation, software patents serve no good purpose and are harmful. If you have a legitimate innovation then trade secrets are a better alternative that doesn't mess with any of the above problems.
Software patents are a lot like DRM and both are like making a bed with an elastic sheet that's too small for the bed. It looks possible to have "perfect software patents" or "perfect DRM" or "to make the bed", and you may be able to tie down three of the sides, but as soon as you try to tied down the forth side either one of the other three sides come loose or the whole thing falls apart.
I agree 100% with Mr King and add that many people write in order to understand why people do the things they do. They want to see things through their eyes and live through the experiences that lead up to a "nut job end" so that ultimately they can become better more compassionate human beings or better able to see the warning signs when people start to get lost or just to form their own opinions instead of parroting the reaction they're "supposed to have".
The last thing we need to do is to discourage this sort of wisdom seeking. The world is already too full of superficial reactionaries that mindlessly see the world through safe "society approved"[TM] labels like "nut job", "terrorist", "communist", "capitalist", "fanatic", "cultist",....
> In 1000 tests, there will be 10 false positives.
This isn't necessarily bad. You just need to use the right tool for the right job.
Imagine, you have three tests. Test 1 is cheap and quick, but gives 1% false positives (almost no false negatives). Test 2 is moderately priced and a bit bit slower, but gives.1% false positives (almost no false negatives). Test 3 is pricey and gives a turn-around time of 1 day, but gives.0001% false positives (almost no false negatives).
You're in charge of security. You care about letting innocent people free just as much as you care about punishing the guilty and you care about customer service, finances, and efficiency of processes. What do you do?
Your post seems to indicate that you'd use Test 3 or have no test at all, but one case is just throwing your hands up in the air and giving up while the other is just drowning your process in expensive bureaucracy, but neither are optimal strategies. A more optimal strategy is to use the following approach.
Use test 1. If you pass, go on your merry way. If you fail, you're not necessarily guilty of anything (this must be in the training manual) but you need more further testing, so use test 2. If you pass, go on your merry way. If you fail, you're not necessarily guilty of anything (this must be in the training manual) but you need more further testing, so use test 3. If you pass, go on your merry way. If you fail, you're not necessarily guilty of anything but let the police handle it to be sure.
Of course, if there are less than a.0001% chance that someone is actually guilty of anything, you really need to think about if you need to be screening at all because even this more efficient use of testing costs quite a bit of money and customer inconvenience. That money, time, and customer inconvenience could be better spend on other areas that help improve safety.
The cure for obsolescence is to simply come up with a lossless format and stick to it. It doesn't matter what it is, just stick with it. If movie formats are in flux, then go with a standard that has endured the test of time, TIFF (it lasted 20 years and is still going strong) and convert each frame into a TIFF image. If the movie industry is worried about "leaking movies", they can just encrypt each frame with another old standard, and stick to that encryption.
There really is no need to keep changing formats for your archiving. When you have billions or trillions of movies and music to manage and preserve, you have no time to monkey around with the digital fashion business. Leave the fashion industry to the consumer side.
Personally, from what I've read in his manifestos and the news, he wasn't picked on, but he did have a profound sense of isolation and a profound sense of desperation. He was too introverted for business school so switched to literature but wasn't talented there either. No-one seemed to understand him no matter how many people tried (and several did if you read the reports...he wasn't abandoned by society). He had no future, no hope for a future, and he felt could understand him and since so many had tried to reach him but failed, there didn't seem much hope that anyone could reach him.
Basically, he was at an agonizing dead end. What some call "a dark night of the soul" and others call "hitting bottom".
There are at least 7 places to go from there:
1) He could do something drastic to change his life. When you have nothing to lose, you have no fear of the consequences and you're immune to criticism because there's nothing "they" can do to you that's not already done. More than a few great people started off with the mantra "Oh yeah, well I'll show them".
2) He could luck out...either find people who can connect to him (the internet is great that way) or find a passion that could absorb his time and keep his mind off his isolation.
3) He could become more spiritual and realize that even in suffering there is meaning, and that while there is life, there is hope. It sounds corny, but people have gone through a lot worse and have come through it.
4) He could just give up life and go quietly.
5) He could just numb himself to everything with drugs or alcohol.
6) He could just give up life and go in a "blaze of glory", either by living recklessly with a death wish.
7) He could just give up life and go in a "blaze of glory", either by lashing out and taking down as many people with him as possible.
Most people see themselves to options 1-6, but option 7 is definitely an option if the person *completely* looks outside himself through hatred and jeolosy instead of inwards at his own deficiencies. If there's nothing inside, there's no fear, no pain, no pride, no empathy, no love, no loneliness, no remorse, just raw hatred, and final payback becomes the reason you were born, and getting back at "them" in the name of all those like you becomes the meaning of your life.
At least that's my theory. Only he would know for sure.
I've dealt successfully with people who were at the end of their rope and willing to either give in or were so obsessed with "them" that they were stuck in a downward spiral. I don't know if my experience is valid of 7s, but if my experience holds true, the best way to deal with 7s is to be empathetic and to use the socratic method and patient nonjudgmental listening to slowly chip away at his vendetta (without telling them what they should think) and redirecting his passion to (1) or some place else more constructive, because what other people do with their lives doesn't matter nearly as much as what you do with your own. This would only works if you know the source of their vendetta and I'm not sure that was clear to those around him, so I'm not sure if I could have helped any differently than those closest to him.
> it's just a battle of Sun versus Microsoft, which none of them deserves to win.
No. It's a battle between ODF and OOXML.
ODF was approved over a long drawn out process that took the input from various companies and can be implemented by multiple companies and open source projects. It reuses existing standards wherever possible. ODF is open to criticism and has already included revisions to include support for disabilities and generally specified formulas. Hopefully, it'll absorb China's format too. The official version of ODF is what's specified in the standard (regardless what OpenOffice implements), so you can be sure of a level playing field.
OOXML, OTOH, was rubber stamped by ECMA (that was one of the conditions of the submission) and fastracked to the ISO despite the objections of a record number of countries. It reinvents stands wherever possible, forces the implementation of bugs in the standards (i.e. implement the Y2K bug), has references to external specifications that are not being standardized, and has cute phrases like "Do this the way Word95 did it" without specifying what that means. The official version of OOXML is what Microsoft implements (regardless what ISO specifies), so you can be sure of an uneven playing field with Microsoft being 2 steps ahead of everyone else.
Given these two document formats, ODF clearly deserves to win.
I appreciate your position and I've argued it myself and when I finally upgrade (my 5yo 2GHz Pentium Linux box works better than most modern XP machines, so there's no reason to upgrade other than KVM), I'll move to an Intel Motherboard that supports open source 3D acceleration.
That being said, you're making three big assumptions:
1) The biggest one is that users are too stupid to appreciate the value of open source drivers. They might be uninformed or naive or lazy enough to buy proprietary hardware initially or have a legacy system like myself, but sooner or later they will get hit with one of these situations.: - Their drivers will not be supported any more (see http://lwn.net/Articles/229838/ ) turning them into expensive paperweights, - Or that the driver is supported but removes a feature you depended on (see http://reviews.cnet.com/4531-10921_7-6651889.html ) - Or that the driver adds an annoying feature (http://news.com.com/TiVo+extends+ad+features/2100 -1041_3-5792956.html) - Or that the driver has a bug that won't be fixed soon so you have to live with it until they get around to fixing it. (http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20070206-878 4.html) - Or that all open source drivers contain a feature they're salivating over but closed source drivers don't because the company hasn't gotten around to implementing it yet. (e.g. NVidia support for XGL was extremely slow in coming, or Rockbox versus all the proprietary music player firmware) - Or the manufacturer installs a rootkit that threatens the security and privacy of your computer (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2005_Sony_BMG_CD_cop y_protection_scandal)
When any of these happen, the user will have to face the music and the next time they upgrade, all things being equal, they'll pick the open source version. If they've been bitten bad enough, they might even go for the "Ultra-free version of Gutsy Gibbon" (that goodness it'll exist) so they don't accidentally select proprietary firmware (or at least be aware of how exposed they are to potential threats so when they upgrade, they'll know what to change).
2) You're also assuming that people who are considering Ubuntu already have computers that only needs free drivers and they have the knowledge to know why things don't work and either know how to choose hardware that does work and choose to throw out their old card in favour of a free card or at minimum know how to install non-free drivers to get things to work. If new users don't have a clue how to do all of these, they'll just give up and you've lost a potential Ubuntu user. Without more Ubuntu users, case (1) will not happen so no additional pressure on manufacturers will happen.
3) You're assuming that even if the user is keen on learning so as to avoid the problem of (2) that they'll stick around long enough to realize that all the pain associated with Linux is dwarfed by all the gain Linux has to offer. Like it or not, all operating systems have a learning curve and all have annoyances that you tend to accept and forget about once you experience the benefits of the OS. If you can get people past the pain-pleasure break even point, you'll keep them. If you can't, they'll go. As with (2), this means that case (1) will not happen so no additional pressure on manufacturers will happen.
> Downloading a copyrighted work is against the law.
Not necessarily. (1) says downloading *without a copyright holder's permission* is against the law. There's a big difference, and one that plays right into the RIAA's hands. Many artists *want* there songs copied since they are free advertising for their live concerts (where they make the real money). Look at YouTube and examine the number of videos that have been put on by the original artists if you want evidence of how even mainstream non-indie artists recognize this fact.
Secondly, in countries such as Canada, downloading music is allowed by copyright law and sneakernet personal use copying is allowed but uploading is s definite no-no (NB: since Bittorrent does both, using it for P2P is unwise in Canada) and copying for profit (i.e. what used to be called piracy in the pre-internet days) is definitely illegal. I don't know how this meshes with WIPO but since Canada has a blank media tax that's in theory distributed to the artists and since most countries have taken a lenient attitude towards "for personal use copying of tapes" I'm guessing it works out.
> Why would any company willingly give up any competitive advantage? That's business suicide.
Not really. The key phrase you're forgetting is "core competencies". Companies collaborate outside their core competencies all the time. It's a great way of lowering costs without giving their competitors the edge (since their competitive advantage is not being shared).
Here are some examples where collaborating outside your core competencies makes sense: 1) Software companies to collaborate an a common installer. The installer is important but no-one buys software because the "installer is cool", so collaborating with your competitors is a no-brainer. 2) Integration consultants collaborating on making open source software more flexible. Integration consultants, by definition, write very little software. Their skill is in their head and being able to tie software together. The more software they can tie together, the more business they get and the less software they can tie together the more likely one of their clients will want to buy a prepackages solution or build from scratch. Collaboration makes sense here too. 3) Your farming business wastes a lot of money getting water from a river ten kilometers away. There are seven competitors between you and the stream. You have two choices -- go it alone or collaborate. If you go it alone (assuming it's possible), you'd spend a bundle and take a lot of time and but not gain much competitive advantage over the competitor closest to the river. If you collaborate, you can spend less and use the savings to improve your farming efficiency. Which would you choose?
You're forgetting one thing. Most people don't need 100% of the features in an application like AutoCad and it's often possible to bootstrap other applications.
Here's one approach you could duplicate AutoCad: 1) Modify Blender (or some such 3D modelling app that's more appropriate) to save and load AutoCAD-compatible files. Yes Blender is a pain if you want to do AutoCAD-type work, but at least it allows you to get the job done. 2) Add the most important (missing) AutoCad features to Blender. 3) Add component libraries to Blender to include as many as the AutoCAD libraries as possible. 4) Add AutoCad-type scripting to Blender 5) Improve the user interface of Blender to be more like AutoCAD 6)...[you get the picture]...
It may take a few releases and a few years, but an AutoCAD-capable clone should be possible.
Compare a video clip that has Nixon saying "I am NOT a crook" with one that says "I am a crook". Compare a copy of the US constitution which removes the "due process of law" provision with one that doesn't.
Both are 99.9% similar and both may be popular on Bittorent as spoofs, but neither is what you'd want.
Besides the other reasons stated (the N-M deal, the GPL depends on US-specific concepts), the GPL v2 is incompatible with more free software licenses than it needs to be and this leads to some license fragmentation.
The GPL v3 attempts to fix this problem by adding a "permissions clause" which allows the original license owner to add other permissions (e.g. the LGPL is now the GPL plus some permissions) and by adjusting the license to be more compatible with the free software norm (e.g. the Apache license is now almost compatible with the GPL v3. The patent clauses are now compatible, unfortunately the Apache indemnity clause was a bit too strong for the GPL community to swallow. ).
This "permissions clause" makes it easy for the average user to understand how different flavours of the GPLv3 can combine -- just drop incompatible permissions and end up with the common subset (which would be no less restrictive than the GPL v3).
This could allow you to define the CPL, PHP license, Mozilla license, etc as GPL + some permissions and either get rid of the original license or publish "equivalent GPL+permissions versions" of these licenses along side the orignal (simpler) license so as to make it obvious how you can combine code from your license with other licenses.
Contrary to what is claimed, the war between Compiz and Beryl was productive. It did three things: 1) Forced David and friends to restructure his development process to be more like Beryl's 2) Forced Quinn and friends to realize that maybe David was right on some issues 3) Allowed Beryl to experiment with alternative ways of developing Compiz without destroying Compiz's approach.
Okay, maybe the conflict was a bit less civilized that than it could have been, but sometimes you need a good fight to raise the issues and so you can look for ways to solve them. You can't fix what you won't even acknowledge. The approach taken before the split up was disfunctional and didn't give people what they wanted. It's likely the new approach will be a lot better since it'll allow David to focus on what he's best at and Quinn to focus on what he's best at without stepping on each other's feet.
I don't own Windows or a Mac, so I wouldn't be able to buy. If Apple created a web interface to purchase DRM-free content and plugged iTunes as "a more integrated way to manage DRM-free and DRMed content and a way of getting DRMed content" they'd be able to capture the Linux market and capture the market for Windows users who don't want to install random software on their computer (e.g. people who don't have an iPod so don't want some other software messing up their music player music loader).
Th key thing to not is that their tests don't substantiate their conclusion: > These results indicate that a virtualized server running a typical web application may experience > a 43% loss of total capacity when compared to a native server running on equivalent hardware.
This may lead to people believing that virtualiz]ation just isn't worth the advantages. The key problem is that there are several virtualization schemes. Off the top of my head, I can list:
* Xen
* KVM
* Linux-VServer
* OpenVZ
* User Mode Linux
* lguest Each has it's pros and cons in terms of overhead, maintenance, and performance. Generalizing based on one VMWare configuration, is just plain foolish.
Let's not forget the old chroot approach that gives you 90% of the advantages of virtualizing web servers with few of the disadvantages.
The key thing to do is to pick the right technique for the right task.
> Essentially Torvalds replaced a clause allowing for future upgrades with nothing whatsoever, > which means that it's going to be very, very, very hard indeed to ever upgrade the license > of the Linux kernel, no matter how necessary.
Not necessarily. It all depends on how code in the kernel is licensed. There are several files in the kernel that are "GPL 2 or above" and several that are MIT/BSD licensed and several that are LGPL.
Currently, the kernel is "GPL 2 only" because mixing a single "GPL 2 only" file with any of the other licenses mentioned above makes the whole kernel "GPL 2 only".
The key question is: What percentage of the code is GPL 2 only? (I believe LWN.net did an analysis a few months back, but unfortunately I can't find a reference. Does anyone have one?)
If the percentage of GPL 2 only code is small (say 5%) and it's in a noncritical area or can be rewritten quickly or relicensed by the original authors (i.e. they're still around like Linus is) or replaced with other sources like the FreeBSD code or the Solaris kernel (when it goes GPLv3), then changing over to GPL v3 (or at least GPL 2 or above) should be fast.
But even if this were the case, I wouldn't expect any immediate changes. The GPL v3 needs to be out in the field and kernel developers need to feel comfortable with it and see advantages for it (e.g. Solaris-Linux code sharing) before they'd even consider a switch. That could take a few years.
Slashdot Mirror
IANAL, but if I understand things correctly (I'm sure lawyers in the crowd will correctly) Novell customers are in deep trouble if Microsoft ever decides to make patent lawsuits.
Novell basically agreed that there are infringing patents in SUSE Linux (otherwise, what are they licensing per SUSE license?). Novell customers who use the Microsoft coupons have agreed that this is the case also, so they are infringing.
But the N-M protects them, so they don't have anything to worry about for 5 years (the life of the agreement).
However, the N-M agreement excludes a large number of products which they are likely using. So if a Microsoft patent appears in both a covered and excluded product in SUSE, Novell customers are on the hook. And since they can't plead ignorance, they're a much easier target than someone use uses a non-SUSE distribution, in much the same way that SCO's customers were their first targets.
Now I don't think that Microsoft would dare file a patent lawsuit against Linux or Novell...there are too many interested parties in Linux that have patents and it would risk a patent Armageddon, but if you use SUSE Linux, it would be safer if you avoided the Microsoft coupon.
That's just my uninformed opinion.
---
Beware of Microsoft Geeks bearing gifts
Very true. In a perfectly free market, there would be no IP, not even weak copyright, since it's an artificial government enforced concept. So from the start this group is hypocritical.
Copyright is a good thing: it's what gives the GPL its "must remain free" condition and allows the BSD license it to be more than public domain by retaining the names of the original contributors. If people put their hard work into making something, why shouldn't they at least get credit (and perhaps allow you to make a living based on the reputation of your work)? Anyone that is pro-FOSS and anti-copyright is a hypocrite, whether they know it or not.
But when copyright becomes so strong that you need a team of lawyers to hunt down 99 year old great grand mothers, and when a whole technology is created to treat you as a criminal and restrict your rights to use work that you purchased 20 years ago, and when private police forces can order ISPs to violate privacy or remotely shut down computers that *might* be infringing or leave you open to rootkit vulnerabilities or companies resell you the same thing over and over again because you aren't allowed to format shift or works of knowledge and cultural history are allowed to die because the copyright holder is out of reach or wants it to die if he can't make any money off it, you know something is out of wack.
What many of these "strong copyright" companies don't realize is that people are lazy and people generally want to see themselves "as good people". This is true, even in jails where you'll find people say "I might be a thief but at least I'm not a murderer" or "I'm a murderer but at least I'm not a rapist", etc.
Make it easy for people to get your content and make it easy for people to feel good about themselves about doing "the right thing" and people will. They'll pay you any reasonable amount and if you treat them well, the majority will even promote you or even help out in some way and be loyal customers.
BTW, it's not about unrestricted corporate activity either. If one corporation, violated copyright, there'd be hell to pay too (witness the BSA police). I'm not sure what to call it, but such one-sided lobbying by the power elite (on the left, right, or center) is precisely the thing any good democrasy must guard against.
Microsoft is in violation of 100,000 patents that I own, but I'm too busy to document even a single patent.
And naming even a single patent would be just spreading FUD because, as I've said, I'm too busy now innovating to sue at this moment. If the infringing code could be rewritten, I'd say something because I know Microsoft respects IP and I don't want people violating my IP unintentionally. But since the code it can't be rewritten without using my IP, so I'm actually doing Microsoft a favour by keeping quiet.
But tell you what, since I know even mentioning Microsoft's violation can cause uncertainty, I'll license each of my patents to Microsoft for the low low price of 1 dollar per patent, payable once every month. As stated, I'm too busy to sue anyone using Microsoft products at the moment, so Microsoft customers are safe...for now. But who knows what will happen to people who by unlicensed Microsoft projects in the future.
> Hate Microsoft, hate Apple, but those organizations do not treat potential customers as primordial slime
I'm having a hard time understanding your point. Most people who use Linux don't do so because they hate Microsoft and Apple.
Hate is not a motivation to do anything. Hate is a motivation to *not* do something or to tear it down. You could be perfectly happy hating both Microsoft and Apple if you're a Blackberry user or a BeOS user or a BSD user or a Solaris user.
Quite simply, Most people who use Linux use Linux because they love Linux. Period.
And unless you've been sleeping, a great deal of work in making Linux more user friendly. It's the whole mission of some distros (e.g. Ubuntu).
BTW, I don't know where you got the idea that people think Microsoft and Apple treats potential customers as primordial slime. Microsoft treats people as a revenue source and the more money they can extract, the better, even if it means treating your customers like criminals (witness the DRM), getting people to buy the same things ever and over again even if they don't need it (e.g. planned obsolescence) , and even if it means trapping them through intentional vendor lock in. Apple is a bit different. They're in it for the money too (after all, it's a free market), but they have a bit of the Oracle arrogance that they're better than anyone else and if you don't like "the Apple way" you've been brainwashed and need re-education. It's not just about the money.
Both Microsoft and Apple do satisfy they're customers to some extent (otherwise they'd be bankrupt), but if you're tired of the "you are a criminal but you're trapped with us so pay up whenever we want" attitude from the post-Bill Gates Microsoft and you just don't like "the Apple way", you have to find a home *somewhere*.
If you're one of these OS refuges, and like openness, being treated as an equal partner in the development process, and don't want to have to deal with planned obsolescence or vendor lock in nightmares, Linux is a good place to go. If Linux isn't good enough for you, and the other alternatives aren't either, you have some hard choices to make.
Now getting back to the article, here's my comments:
> 1 - On the whole, users aren't all that dissatisfied with Windows
Not quite. There's quite a bit of disatisfaction, but most people don't
know of any alternatives other than the Mac, but unless they're surrounded
by Mac users and/or use a Mac at work, chances are they wouldn't go through
the pain of switching. And let's face it, people are busy with *real life*.
People are lazy and would rather go to the beach than do their taxes and
investigate alternatives. The only difference between these two options is
that the government forces you to do one but not the other. If the highly
publicized Mac has problems cracking the market, Linux would doubly so.
> 2 - Too many distros
Nope. Most of those distros are special case distros that only geeks know about.
When it comes down to it, most non-geeks who know about Linux have only heard
of RedHat or Novell or maybe Ubuntu (thanks mostly to Dell and free Ubuntu giveaways).
Most users would try one of these three distros and assume that all the others
are the same and either switch to Linux based on this one experience or balk at Linux,
possibly forever.
> 3 - People want certainty that hardware and software will work
Linux works for most hardware out there *out of the box*, often better than Windows XP.
This is especially true with Ubuntu. Granted, there are some areas where (mostly newer)
hardware isn't as well supported, but the same can be said for Vista. The key difference
between Vista and a distro like Ubuntu is that the Vista hardware is preselected and
preinstalled whereas the user needs to install Ubuntu and hope (unless they've done
their research) that everything works (it likely will, but no guarentees). Thanks to
Dell and a few other computer makers, th
Here's the problem with your argument.
Once you move out of the rights given to you by copyright law (basically, the right to view for personal use, making fair use excerpts, and fair use copying -- backups and time shifting and format shifting and viewing, copyright expiration after a given time) you move into contract law supplemented by copyright law.
I don't sign contracts when I buy music or videos so your scenario doesn't apply. Here's a more accurate scenario:
Them: "Hey, want to buy a movie?"
You: "Sure, how much?"
Them: "$100,000,000.00. and we'll sign over all rights to the movie, including redistribution and royalties."
You: "I don't need all of that. Don't you have anything cheaper?"
Them: "Sure. We have a streaming version that allows you to watch it for 5 cents a minute, but you'll have to sign a contract stating you'll forgo your fair use rights."
You: "I just want a copy with all the freedom copyright law gives me."
Them: "$50"
You: "No thanks, too much."
Them: "Sorry. That's how much the market is willing to pay and we're here to make money. Are you sure you don't want the 5 cent a minute deal?"
You: "No thanks. I think I'll start looking for indie artists or wait for it to become less popular so I can get it on sale."
Them: "Okay. Unfortunately, we don't have any indie artists yet but we're working on it. As for the DVD, it's a very hot item so you'll have to wait a long time for a discount. But if you want to wait, we welcome your business. Be sure to come back to us when you do decide to buy. We might have a few indie artists by them you might be interested in."
That's the way it's supposed to work and how it was envisioned when copyright laws were created. It's just business, clean, simple, and efficient.
No confrontation, no hard feelings, no unfairness on either side, no teams of lawyers and copyright police hunting down 95 year old grand mothers because they *might* have possibly violated copyright law, and no hords of copyright violators who feel justified in ignoring copyright because they're treated like criminal scum even if they comply strictly with the law.
> I don't blame the creator of the profile. I don't blame the Obama campaign,
> either -- centralized control is necessary for presidential campaigns today.
Personally I don't see any drama here. Both are needed in politics and other areas (e.g. TV shows, Linux Distribution help, etc). The official site gives official information and the unofficial site gives speculation and material that an official "stuffy" site wouldn't be able to. If the unofficial site was made official, another unofficial site would ultimately spring up.
Sure. More than a few couples have done this successfully.
The trick is to find couples with the right personality types. For instance, introverted couples with a deep passion for some solitary pursuit (e.g. music, programming, writing, video games) would likely fair a lot better than extroverted couples that need to socialize and do group activities.
As far as non-pre-installations go, it won't change a thing. Linux will keep growing at it's moderate pace no matter happens at Dell, so there's little to fear.
As far as pre-installations, yes it could either open the flood gates to Linux pre-installation and consequently increased driver support or seriously set it back.
Will it succeed? It depends on what systems they offer and at what prices. My 4 year old 2GHz system is due for an upgrade some time late this year. It works perfectly and is snappier than my parents dual core 3G machine running XP but I'm interested in KVM and interested in getting rid of NVidia in favour of the Intel XGL graphics and I wouldn't mind having my USB port in the front (as most new computers these days) rather than the back and a few other minor reasons. I had thought of buying a locally assembled as I always do (you can ensure that you get Linux compatible parts and the prices are good). I was not even considering Dell. But this announcement changes everything. If Dell offers a good reasonably priced system with the features I want, I'll go for Dell.
> The problem, in my opinion, with software patents isn't with the fact that they're software -- in my mind, software ought to ... -- but that they're typically of very poor quality, shoddily researched, and overbroad.
5 42_ITM for a fuller description.
> be patented,
It's more fundamental than that. I understand that you're trying to find a middle ground, but there is none (at least none that is "obvious":-]). It's a
Here are four things to consider:
(1) How many people actually look at patent to come up with ideas? If no-one does, then how is it helping with innovation? What exactly is the purpose of software patents other than a way for lawyers and patent trolls to get paid for disrupting innovation?
(2) If I independently discover/reinvent the patent, then why should why should I have to pay someone else for the privilege of using *my* idea? Reinvention has nothing to do with obviousness. Sometimes the time is right for non-obvious inventions. Examples of this indepentent invention/rediscovery include quantum mechanics, light bulb, telephone, combustion engine, airplane, television, transistor, and integrated circuit. See http://goliath.ecnext.com/coms2/summary_0199-6106
(3) Relating to (2), suppose you allow independent reinvention as an exception. What happens if I want to tell people about *my* idea for free? I can't (and may get sued if I do). Free speach and society loses.
(4) Software patents are supposed to protect "the little guy" but since big corps can afford to have millions of patents, it's almost certain that they have something that "the little guy" violates (or may potentially violate) and force "the little guy" to cross-license, enabling the big corps to "steal" (if you believe patents are IP) the idea. Even if "the little guy" doesn't violate any patents, it's possible for the big corps to drag the case out in court until "the little guy" is bankrupt (e.g. just look at how long SCO dragged the case out against another big corp), making it virtually impossible for "the little guy" to enforce the patent but very easy for big corps to freeze out competition.
So basically, even when you have legitimate innovation, software patents serve no good purpose and are harmful. If you have a legitimate innovation then trade secrets are a better alternative that doesn't mess with any of the above problems.
Software patents are a lot like DRM and both are like making a bed with an elastic sheet that's too small for the bed. It looks possible to have "perfect software patents" or "perfect DRM" or "to make the bed", and you may be able to tie down three of the sides, but as soon as you try to tied down the forth side either one of the other three sides come loose or the whole thing falls apart.
Stephen King perspective on Mr Cho's writings:
....
http://www.ew.com/ew/article/0,,20036014,00.html
Basically, what someone writes says little about their state of mind.
I agree 100% with Mr King and add that many people write in order to understand why people do the things they do. They want to see things through their eyes and live through the experiences that lead up to a "nut job end" so that ultimately they can become better more compassionate human beings or better able to see the warning signs when people start to get lost or just to form their own opinions instead of parroting the reaction they're "supposed to have".
The last thing we need to do is to discourage this sort of wisdom seeking. The world is already too full of superficial reactionaries that mindlessly see the world through safe "society approved"[TM] labels like "nut job", "terrorist", "communist", "capitalist", "fanatic", "cultist",
> In 1000 tests, there will be 10 false positives.
.1% false positives (almost no false negatives). .0001% false positives (almost no false negatives).
.0001% chance that someone is actually guilty of anything, you really need to think about if you need to be screening at all because even this more efficient use of testing costs quite a bit of money and customer inconvenience. That money, time, and customer inconvenience could be better spend on other areas that help improve safety.
This isn't necessarily bad. You just need to use the right tool for the right job.
Imagine, you have three tests.
Test 1 is cheap and quick, but gives 1% false positives (almost no false negatives).
Test 2 is moderately priced and a bit bit slower, but gives
Test 3 is pricey and gives a turn-around time of 1 day, but gives
You're in charge of security. You care about letting innocent people free just as much as you care about punishing the guilty and you care about customer service, finances, and efficiency of processes. What do you do?
Your post seems to indicate that you'd use Test 3 or have no test at all, but one case is just throwing your hands up in the air and giving up while the other is just drowning your process in expensive bureaucracy, but neither are optimal strategies. A more optimal strategy is to use the following approach.
Use test 1.
If you pass, go on your merry way.
If you fail, you're not necessarily guilty of anything (this must be in the training manual) but you need more further testing, so use test 2.
If you pass, go on your merry way.
If you fail, you're not necessarily guilty of anything (this must be in the training manual) but you need more further testing, so use test 3.
If you pass, go on your merry way.
If you fail, you're not necessarily guilty of anything but let the police handle it to be sure.
Of course, if there are less than a
The cure for obsolescence is to simply come up with a lossless format and stick to it. It doesn't matter what it is, just stick with it. If movie formats are in flux, then go with a standard that has endured the test of time, TIFF (it lasted 20 years and is still going strong) and convert each frame into a TIFF image. If the movie industry is worried about "leaking movies", they can just encrypt each frame with another old standard, and stick to that encryption.
There really is no need to keep changing formats for your archiving. When you have billions or trillions of movies and music to manage and preserve, you have no time to monkey around with the digital fashion business. Leave the fashion industry to the consumer side.
Personally, from what I've read in his manifestos and the news, he wasn't picked on, but he did have a profound sense of isolation and a profound sense of desperation. He was too introverted for business school so switched to literature but wasn't talented there either. No-one seemed to understand him no matter how many people tried (and several did if you read the reports...he wasn't abandoned by society). He had no future, no hope for a future, and he felt could understand him and since so many had tried to reach him but failed, there didn't seem much hope that anyone could reach him.
Basically, he was at an agonizing dead end. What some call "a dark night of the soul" and others call "hitting bottom".
There are at least 7 places to go from there:
1) He could do something drastic to change his life. When you have nothing to lose, you have no fear of the consequences and you're immune to criticism because there's nothing "they" can do to you that's not already done. More than a few great people started off with the mantra "Oh yeah, well I'll show them".
2) He could luck out...either find people who can connect to him (the internet is great that way) or find a passion that could absorb his time and keep his mind off his isolation.
3) He could become more spiritual and realize that even in suffering there is meaning, and that while there is life, there is hope. It sounds corny, but people have gone through a lot worse and have come through it.
4) He could just give up life and go quietly.
5) He could just numb himself to everything with drugs or alcohol.
6) He could just give up life and go in a "blaze of glory", either by living recklessly with a death wish.
7) He could just give up life and go in a "blaze of glory", either by lashing out and taking down as many people with him as possible.
Most people see themselves to options 1-6, but option 7 is definitely an option if the person *completely* looks outside himself through hatred and jeolosy instead of inwards at his own deficiencies. If there's nothing inside, there's no fear, no pain, no pride, no empathy, no love, no loneliness, no remorse, just raw hatred, and final payback becomes the reason you were born, and getting back at "them" in the name of all those like you becomes the meaning of your life.
At least that's my theory. Only he would know for sure.
I've dealt successfully with people who were at the end of their rope and willing to either give in or were so obsessed with "them" that they were stuck in a downward spiral. I don't know if my experience is valid of 7s, but if my experience holds true, the best way to deal with 7s is to be empathetic and to use the socratic method and patient nonjudgmental listening to slowly chip away at his vendetta (without telling them what they should think) and redirecting his passion to (1) or some place else more constructive, because what other people do with their lives doesn't matter nearly as much as what you do with your own. This would only works if you know the source of their vendetta and I'm not sure that was clear to those around him, so I'm not sure if I could have helped any differently than those closest to him.
> it's just a battle of Sun versus Microsoft, which none of them deserves to win.
No. It's a battle between ODF and OOXML.
ODF was approved over a long drawn out process that took the input from various companies and can be implemented by multiple companies and open source projects. It reuses existing standards wherever possible. ODF is open to criticism and has already included revisions to include support for disabilities and generally specified formulas. Hopefully, it'll absorb China's format too. The official version of ODF is what's specified in the standard (regardless what OpenOffice implements), so you can be sure of a level playing field.
OOXML, OTOH, was rubber stamped by ECMA (that was one of the conditions of the submission) and fastracked to the ISO despite the objections of a record number of countries. It reinvents stands wherever possible, forces the implementation of bugs in the standards (i.e. implement the Y2K bug), has references to external specifications that are not being standardized, and has cute phrases like "Do this the way Word95 did it" without specifying what that means. The official version of OOXML is what Microsoft implements (regardless what ISO specifies), so you can be sure of an uneven playing field with Microsoft being 2 steps ahead of everyone else.
Given these two document formats, ODF clearly deserves to win.
I appreciate your position and I've argued it myself and when I finally upgrade (my 5yo 2GHz Pentium Linux box works better than most modern XP machines, so there's no reason to upgrade other than KVM), I'll move to an Intel Motherboard that supports open source 3D acceleration.
0 -1041_3-5792956.html)8 4.html)p y_protection_scandal)
That being said, you're making three big assumptions:
1) The biggest one is that users are too stupid to appreciate the value of open source drivers. They might be uninformed or naive or lazy enough to buy proprietary hardware initially or have a legacy system like myself, but sooner or later they will get hit with one of these situations.:
- Their drivers will not be supported any more (see http://lwn.net/Articles/229838/ ) turning them into expensive paperweights,
- Or that the driver is supported but removes a feature you depended on (see http://reviews.cnet.com/4531-10921_7-6651889.html )
- Or that the driver adds an annoying feature (http://news.com.com/TiVo+extends+ad+features/210
- Or that the driver has a bug that won't be fixed soon so you have to live with it until they get around to fixing it. (http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20070206-87
- Or that all open source drivers contain a feature they're salivating over but closed source drivers don't because the company hasn't gotten around to implementing it yet. (e.g. NVidia support for XGL was extremely slow in coming, or Rockbox versus all the proprietary music player firmware)
- Or the manufacturer installs a rootkit that threatens the security and privacy of your computer (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2005_Sony_BMG_CD_co
When any of these happen, the user will have to face the music and the next time they upgrade, all things being equal, they'll pick the open source version. If they've been bitten bad enough, they might even go for the "Ultra-free version of Gutsy Gibbon" (that goodness it'll exist) so they don't accidentally select proprietary firmware (or at least be aware of how exposed they are to potential threats so when they upgrade, they'll know what to change).
2) You're also assuming that people who are considering Ubuntu already have computers that only needs free drivers and they have the knowledge to know why things don't work and either know how to choose hardware that does work and choose to throw out their old card in favour of a free card or at minimum know how to install non-free drivers to get things to work. If new users don't have a clue how to do all of these, they'll just give up and you've lost a potential Ubuntu user. Without more Ubuntu users, case (1) will not happen so no additional pressure on manufacturers will happen.
3) You're assuming that even if the user is keen on learning so as to avoid the problem of (2) that they'll stick around long enough to realize that all the pain associated with Linux is dwarfed by all the gain Linux has to offer. Like it or not, all operating systems have a learning curve and all have annoyances that you tend to accept and forget about once you experience the benefits of the OS. If you can get people past the pain-pleasure break even point, you'll keep them. If you can't, they'll go. As with (2), this means that case (1) will not happen so no additional pressure on manufacturers will happen.
> Downloading a copyrighted work is against the law.
Not necessarily. (1) says downloading *without a copyright holder's permission* is against the law. There's a big difference, and one that plays right into the RIAA's hands. Many artists *want* there songs copied since they are free advertising for their live concerts (where they make the real money). Look at YouTube and examine the number of videos that have been put on by the original artists if you want evidence of how even mainstream non-indie artists recognize this fact.
Secondly, in countries such as Canada, downloading music is allowed by copyright law and sneakernet personal use copying is allowed but uploading is s definite no-no (NB: since Bittorrent does both, using it for P2P is unwise in Canada) and copying for profit (i.e. what used to be called piracy in the pre-internet days) is definitely illegal. I don't know how this meshes with WIPO but since Canada has a blank media tax that's in theory distributed to the artists and since most countries have taken a lenient attitude towards "for personal use copying of tapes" I'm guessing it works out.
> Why would any company willingly give up any competitive advantage? That's business suicide.
Not really. The key phrase you're forgetting is "core competencies". Companies collaborate outside their core competencies all the time. It's a great way of lowering costs without giving their competitors the edge (since their competitive advantage is not being shared).
Here are some examples where collaborating outside your core competencies makes sense:
1) Software companies to collaborate an a common installer. The installer is important but no-one buys software because the "installer is cool", so collaborating with your competitors is a no-brainer.
2) Integration consultants collaborating on making open source software more flexible. Integration consultants, by definition, write very little software. Their skill is in their head and being able to tie software together. The more software they can tie together, the more business they get and the less software they can tie together the more likely one of their clients will want to buy a prepackages solution or build from scratch. Collaboration makes sense here too.
3) Your farming business wastes a lot of money getting water from a river ten kilometers away. There are seven competitors between you and the stream. You have two choices -- go it alone or collaborate. If you go it alone (assuming it's possible), you'd spend a bundle and take a lot of time and but not gain much competitive advantage over the competitor closest to the river. If you collaborate, you can spend less and use the savings to improve your farming efficiency. Which would you choose?
You're forgetting one thing. Most people don't need 100% of the features in an application like AutoCad and it's often possible to bootstrap other applications.
...[you get the picture]...
Here's one approach you could duplicate AutoCad:
1) Modify Blender (or some such 3D modelling app that's more appropriate) to save and load AutoCAD-compatible files. Yes Blender is a pain if you want to do AutoCAD-type work, but at least it allows you to get the job done.
2) Add the most important (missing) AutoCad features to Blender.
3) Add component libraries to Blender to include as many as the AutoCAD libraries as possible.
4) Add AutoCad-type scripting to Blender
5) Improve the user interface of Blender to be more like AutoCAD
6)
It may take a few releases and a few years, but an AutoCAD-capable clone should be possible.
99.9% similar may be significantly different.
Compare a video clip that has Nixon saying "I am NOT a crook" with one that says "I am a crook".
Compare a copy of the US constitution which removes the "due process of law" provision with one that doesn't.
Both are 99.9% similar and both may be popular on Bittorent as spoofs, but neither is what you'd want.
Besides the other reasons stated (the N-M deal, the GPL depends on US-specific concepts), the GPL v2 is incompatible with more free software licenses than it needs to be and this leads to some license fragmentation.
The GPL v3 attempts to fix this problem by adding a "permissions clause" which allows the original license owner to add other permissions (e.g. the LGPL is now the GPL plus some permissions) and by adjusting the license to be more compatible with the free software norm (e.g. the Apache license is now almost compatible with the GPL v3. The patent clauses are now compatible, unfortunately the Apache indemnity clause was a bit too strong for the GPL community to swallow. ).
This "permissions clause" makes it easy for the average user to understand how different flavours of the GPLv3 can combine -- just drop incompatible permissions and end up with the common subset (which would be no less restrictive than the GPL v3).
This could allow you to define the CPL, PHP license, Mozilla license, etc as GPL + some permissions and either get rid of the original license or publish "equivalent GPL+permissions versions" of these licenses along side the orignal (simpler) license so as to make it obvious how you can combine code from your license with other licenses.
Nothing's stopping you from trying:c le_id=44177&in_page_id=2
http://www.metro.co.uk/weird/article.html?in_arti
Contrary to what is claimed, the war between Compiz and Beryl was productive. It did three things:
1) Forced David and friends to restructure his development process to be more like Beryl's
2) Forced Quinn and friends to realize that maybe David was right on some issues
3) Allowed Beryl to experiment with alternative ways of developing Compiz without destroying Compiz's approach.
Okay, maybe the conflict was a bit less civilized that than it could have been, but sometimes you need a good fight to raise the issues and so you can look for ways to solve them. You can't fix what you won't even acknowledge. The approach taken before the split up was disfunctional and didn't give people what they wanted. It's likely the new approach will be a lot better since it'll allow David to focus on what he's best at and Quinn to focus on what he's best at without stepping on each other's feet.
I don't own Windows or a Mac, so I wouldn't be able to buy. If Apple created a web interface to purchase DRM-free content and plugged iTunes as "a more integrated way to manage DRM-free and DRMed content and a way of getting DRMed content" they'd be able to capture the Linux market and capture the market for Windows users who don't want to install random software on their computer (e.g. people who don't have an iPod so don't want some other software messing up their music player music loader).
Th key thing to not is that their tests don't substantiate their conclusion:
> These results indicate that a virtualized server running a typical web application may experience
> a 43% loss of total capacity when compared to a native server running on equivalent hardware.
This may lead to people believing that virtualiz]ation just isn't worth the advantages. The key problem is that there are several virtualization schemes. Off the top of my head, I can list:
* Xen
* KVM
* Linux-VServer
* OpenVZ
* User Mode Linux
* lguest
Each has it's pros and cons in terms of overhead, maintenance, and performance. Generalizing based on one VMWare configuration, is just plain foolish.
Let's not forget the old chroot approach that gives you 90% of the advantages of virtualizing web servers with few of the disadvantages.
The key thing to do is to pick the right technique for the right task.
> Essentially Torvalds replaced a clause allowing for future upgrades with nothing whatsoever,
> which means that it's going to be very, very, very hard indeed to ever upgrade the license
> of the Linux kernel, no matter how necessary.
Not necessarily. It all depends on how code in the kernel is licensed. There are several files in the kernel that are "GPL 2 or above" and several that are MIT/BSD licensed and several that are LGPL.
Currently, the kernel is "GPL 2 only" because mixing a single "GPL 2 only" file with any of the other licenses mentioned above makes the whole kernel "GPL 2 only".
The key question is: What percentage of the code is GPL 2 only? (I believe LWN.net did an analysis a few months back, but unfortunately I can't find a reference. Does anyone have one?)
If the percentage of GPL 2 only code is small (say 5%) and it's in a noncritical area or can be rewritten quickly or relicensed by the original authors (i.e. they're still around like Linus is) or replaced with other sources like the FreeBSD code or the Solaris kernel (when it goes GPLv3), then changing over to GPL v3 (or at least GPL 2 or above) should be fast.
But even if this were the case, I wouldn't expect any immediate changes. The GPL v3 needs to be out in the field and kernel developers need to feel comfortable with it and see advantages for it (e.g. Solaris-Linux code sharing) before they'd even consider a switch. That could take a few years.