I'm copying this AC comment b/c someone felt it was overrated, although it does present a few very valid points, and a legitimate complaint. The following is not my own comment, but deserves to be read. I would reccomend the moderator (or author) who did this reread the moderation guidelines (updated 9.9, whatever that means).
The FAQ does a wonderful job at answering why they don't mirror commercial sites.
But commercial sites tend to have enough bandwidth because they have money.
But who gets slashdotted the worst? Free software projects (yes, those things that give you the right to freely distribute them) and personal webpages on cablemodem, DSL or other limited bandwidth connections. It may take days or weeks to get the OK to mirror a commercial site because of IP restrictions, but is that really indicitive of what smaller websites would do? Did they even try?
I figured they were just trying to make it something like cat's eyes: when my cat is directly facing me in low light, his eyes glow an incredible green color, almost village of the damned-like. Oh well, Bad CG does explain it a lot better I suppose:-)
I downloaded and have been using OpenBSD for a couple of months now, and I'm definately impressed. If someone would explain the two pizza jokes I've seen here to me I feel as if my OpenBSD experience would be perfect...
Anyway I guess My question would be this- Are you a beer drinker, Theo? If these guys are going to donate pizza, what type of beer would be appropriate and where would I have it shipped?
IIRC the Beta machines never used Macrovision, if you look at thrift shops they can be had for about 10$. Whether the tape mechanism works or not is irrelevent if all you need to do is get the video signal from your DvD to the TV (but if it does, hey, Bonus!) I've been using my Beta to make backups of my movies and have never had a problem with a messed up picture.
No, they would spel it wrong so that they could have "proof" that it wasn't a press-release submitted as a story, and then use that as backup in case their morals were questioned...
Yes but there are limits on what is appropriate to do. Raising the "default" threshold for non-logged in users is very appropriate (which they have done). Linking karma from posts made with the "AC" button checked to the account they were posted with might help even more (they have the ability to do this, make an "AC" post logged in and your ability to moderate that discussion goes away.)
However, and as others have pointed out, when you single out one user it scares the others, even those with no real reason to be scared. It's a bad precedent to set, CmdrTaco agreed with this when he stopped wielding the ability to mass remoderate people (ironically those who were messing with Signal 11).
Not only that, but it definately shows that Michael is letting the abuse get to him. That does him quite a bit of harm, as now his last article seems to be about 75% crap, as opposed to the probably 35% that the other/. authors get. Given his responses here and the general attitude that he gives off, I have a feeling this problem won't go away on its own, and will get much worse if we see more of these "proactive" measures. He should apologize for blowing up, give the account back to where it belongs (signal11@mediaone.net), and begin to understand that you can't seriously post stories on censorship, while taking a "one hand doesn't know what the other..." attitude.
Posted non-anon because this is stuff that matters.
I just downloaded all the packages into one directory and...
Anyway for RedHat and derivitaves try
rpm -Uvh q*
rpm -Uvh k*
And for Slackware, after I aliened the rpms for the release Candidate 2 packages
upgradepkg *.tgz
Couldn't be simpler. Please note that the rpm command will upgrade existing KDE packages. Please consult your documentation (man rpm) for further details.
The reason stated in the article is that they sent out "notice of infringement"(whatever the hell that is) letters instead od C&D's because they didn't want to come off all "heavy handed". What a load of tripe. The real reason is that without entering into a contract (e.g. clicking "agree"-thanks UCITA!) there is no obligation on the users part. And without using any of their s/w to create new drivers there is no infringing on anyone's IP.
The best way to let them know is to place a notice on your website that any correspondence asking you to cease activities, and that is *not* a "cease & desist" notice will be considered as harrasment and will be filed for later use, if the need arises. They're bluffing, call them on it and force their hand.
It's funny you drag that patent out. I was just thinking about how easy or hard it would be to focus the light from the cue:::cat to make a laser pointer powered by the ps/2 port on my computer. As it is I get about a week's worth of power for those cheap laser pointers, and the cat enjoys chasing the damn things so much I wouldn't want to deprive her of her playtime(BTW this is the best way to keep your young cats from waking you up in the middle of the night, chewing on your feet and wanting to play.)
I'm no EE and I don't have that much experience with lasers, but if someone could tell me what such a conversion entails I'd be happy to detail my experiences on my website, and see whether I get a letter from either DC or the original patent holder.
I believe he means your computer hardware, stereo and speakers will all need to be SDMI capable with some way to verify this to the player, or it won't play.
Now, did you ever hear about how guitar players used to get that super distorted, screaming guitar sound at a reasonable volume level? It involved a sealed (soundproofed) box with a speaker and a microphone. Remember, it only has to be cracked once...
releasing the source might not be such a hot idea. Justin would face certain legal action, and any developers who managed to RE the protocol on their own would have to prove that they didn't use any code from AIM (I'm not sure what the status of leaked code would be, but wouldn't it still be copyrighted?). Besides, it wouldn't be as fun to write a compatible IM client with the stuff right there in front of you to work from, it would piss hem off much more to know that we did it without any help:-)
There's either some real happy computer consultants out there for the extra business, or some real unhappy ones, that they either didn't have more banners up.
The difference is that with CD vs. LP there were advantages to upgrading. The "improved" sound quality (I still appreciate the sound of an LP, scratches and all), the lack of hiss and pop, no needle wear. It made quite a bit of sense to upgrade and so the CD took over.
Compared to the audio cassette, which although widely accepted was never quite considered a "premium" music delivery mechanism. The loss of signal with age, tape wear and breakage kept it in the function of auto listening and add-on status to Stereo systems for its lifetime.
Point is, unless there's a tangible payoff to the consumers they won't go for it. My guess is music-DvD's with value added pablum, imbedded lyrics and band photos, all SDMI protected.
It's not a sure thing. Plus how do you know that they *didn't* try to get one?
TV and Magazine journalists would put something in like "Company X was not available for comment at this time". Rob, I say try contacting them and let us know if they blow you off. Should be telling (after all isn't this the DVD player that Jack Valenti said was available for Linux back when he called us theives?)
If these people do wish to sue, I'm sure they have enough resources to harass most people into compliance, whether or not they are in the right.
Here's another solution;
Completely RE the thing. Starting with the hardware. It is what, a photodiode, some chips and a ps/2 passthrough cable? A qualified electrician could get the schematics for "A generic barcode scanning device" onto the web by this afternoon. Write the drivers for "Generic" device, and state boldly on the webpage that although there is no reason why the drivers shouldn't work with the colon-cat, they are not written for it and there are no garauntees, implicit or otherwise to the effect that they will.
Not to mention the fact that the computers, programmers, operators and assorted yes-geeks will probably total as much if not more than an actor and a few models?
As for ATM's try joining a local credit union. Since their business is making *you* money, not them, you won't usually find such silly restrictions as a limit to 10 transactions, outrageous checking fees, and most credit unions provide no fees for transactions from other CU's.
More ontopic, the only thing keeping regular textbook manufacturers from doing this is traditional copyright laws. The right of first sale, specifically. However it doesn't stop the practice of "obsoleting" textbooks every semester or whenever it's economically feasable to print new ones. It also won't stop them from moving more of their textbooks to electronic format, requiring "licensed software" to view, and taking full advantage of the DMCA.
If you're a student, I highly reccomend making a real big stink on campus right now. Flyers are cheap (try printing them in your lab if possible) and nothing gets college students going like a "cause". The earlier students let their universities know they won't support or stand for this, the better chance of nipping it in the bud.
You do have a point about O'Reilly, and and I think the 'troll' moderation was harsh. The point here is that it's a textbook we're talking about. These companies have been running a compleat racket with the college kids for years.
Do you know the difference between the 6th and 7th editions of any given history text? There isn't any difference, other than maybe one or two spelling corrections (that were introduced in the 5th edition) and a new bit of cover art. However the book stores get to refuse to buy back the books, the kids who have them have an incredibly hard time selling them to anyone, and best of all, everyone buys NEW ones.
The cost of producing these new editions was getting to be a nuisance, I'm guessing, and the publishers would love to be able to sell you a new book every time instead of every third semester. Unfortunately, at least in the U.S. the right of first sale prohibits EULA's on books.
The solution is to call it Software, and begin gouging. Normally, in a free market consumers would simply go elsewhere with their money and such schemes would fall. However these texts are often required by professors, who may be getting some form of consideration from publishing companies (i.e. publishing deals, freebies, payola, what-have-you). In order to take this course, you *have* to tolerate this (oh, and this case use a Macintosh, have to wonder what racket is happening there???).
The solution is to publicly embarass the University and professor who are allowing this practice to go on. Post flyers on campus urging other students to avoid that professor or that class if at all possible (sometimes a neighboring community college may have a similar class with less obligations)
AFAIK in Fl. at least being a "right to work" state, it's quite possible that his firing had 'nothing to do' with his whistlebowing activities.
"Hey, Johnny, remember when we told you that failing to put a cover-sheet on those tps reports was a terminable offense? Well..."
"Hey, Susan, our records indicate you've been working %0.05 less effifiently than your coworkers..."
Forget the sexual harrassment suit, wage dispute or other internal conflict you may be enjoying. If a Corp. in Fl. wants you gone, you can count on it happening. Myself and friends have been let go for reasons like "not showing enough initiative", "poor sales"(I was doing stock work at the time), "layoffs due to poor quarterly performance"(company posting record profits, I was hired there a week after my friend was let go, along with 30 other new employes.)
One would think that being involved with NASA would make for better accountability in human resource matters: I'd be willing to bet this guy would never win a suit, and nothing will come of this other than as much bad press as folks can muster about the company that did this
Some instructions would be helpful to augment that suggestion...
1. Don't put the CD on the bottom of the microwave, place it on at least a plate or saucer. I have a coffee cup from a SUN authorized dealer especially for the AOL CD's I get.
2. Set power to full, and the timer to no more than 5 seconds.
3. Stand back if sparks scare you. They are all inside the oven, but can be scary nonetheless.
4. Once you see the big flash/spark you should turn off the Microwave.
Disclaimer-these suggestions may or may not have any basis in anything, you may damage your microwave regardless. Nuke CD's at your own risk and discretion. Author of this comment will not be held liable for any damages consequential or inconsequential. Do not taunt happy-fun flaming-cd. This is not a Spumco product. Grits sold seperately.
And don't forget, thanks to MEEPT, the one and only slaspdash... I remember asking about why it wasn't storing login info after the last server change on slashcode, and noone seemed to know about it... appasrently someone in London registered it.
I still use the temporary card they gave me, never filled out the attached form or anything, and if it ever goes bad I just ask the cashier,"Customer card? I've never been here before, how do I get one?" And I get a new temporary card. I still feel bad that I'm encouraging this behavior on the part of the stores at all, however sometimes there's a huge price difference between card members and non.
Slashdot Mirror
I'm copying this AC comment b/c someone felt it was overrated, although it does present a few very valid points, and a legitimate complaint. The following is not my own comment, but deserves to be read. I would reccomend the moderator (or author) who did this reread the moderation guidelines (updated 9.9, whatever that means).
The FAQ does a wonderful job at answering why they don't mirror commercial sites.
But commercial sites tend to have enough bandwidth because they have money.
But who gets slashdotted the worst? Free software projects (yes, those things that give you the right to freely distribute them) and personal webpages on cablemodem, DSL or other limited bandwidth connections. It may take days or weeks to get the OK to mirror a commercial site because of IP restrictions, but is that really indicitive of what smaller websites would do? Did they even try?
-Anonymous Coward
I figured they were just trying to make it something like cat's eyes: when my cat is directly facing me in low light, his eyes glow an incredible green color, almost village of the damned-like. Oh well, Bad CG does explain it a lot better I suppose :-)
I downloaded and have been using OpenBSD for a couple of months now, and I'm definately impressed. If someone would explain the two pizza jokes I've seen here to me I feel as if my OpenBSD experience would be perfect...
Anyway I guess My question would be this- Are you a beer drinker, Theo? If these guys are going to donate pizza, what type of beer would be appropriate and where would I have it shipped?
IIRC the Beta machines never used Macrovision, if you look at thrift shops they can be had for about 10$. Whether the tape mechanism works or not is irrelevent if all you need to do is get the video signal from your DvD to the TV (but if it does, hey, Bonus!) I've been using my Beta to make backups of my movies and have never had a problem with a messed up picture.
No, they would spel it wrong so that they could have "proof" that it wasn't a press-release submitted as a story, and then use that as backup in case their morals were questioned...
:^)
Yes but there are limits on what is appropriate to do. Raising the "default" threshold for non-logged in users is very appropriate (which they have done). Linking karma from posts made with the "AC" button checked to the account they were posted with might help even more (they have the ability to do this, make an "AC" post logged in and your ability to moderate that discussion goes away.)
/. authors get. Given his responses here and the general attitude that he gives off, I have a feeling this problem won't go away on its own, and will get much worse if we see more of these "proactive" measures. He should apologize for blowing up, give the account back to where it belongs (signal11@mediaone.net), and begin to understand that you can't seriously post stories on censorship, while taking a "one hand doesn't know what the other..." attitude.
However, and as others have pointed out, when you single out one user it scares the others, even those with no real reason to be scared. It's a bad precedent to set, CmdrTaco agreed with this when he stopped wielding the ability to mass remoderate people (ironically those who were messing with Signal 11).
Not only that, but it definately shows that Michael is letting the abuse get to him. That does him quite a bit of harm, as now his last article seems to be about 75% crap, as opposed to the probably 35% that the other
Posted non-anon because this is stuff that matters.
I just downloaded all the packages into one directory and...
Anyway for RedHat and derivitaves try
rpm -Uvh q*
rpm -Uvh k*
And for Slackware, after I aliened the rpms for the release Candidate 2 packages
upgradepkg *.tgz
Couldn't be simpler. Please note that the rpm command will upgrade existing KDE packages. Please consult your documentation (man rpm) for further details.
Do you know what a paradigm is??
The price of a pack of wrigley's spearmint, minus about 5 cents.
The reason stated in the article is that they sent out "notice of infringement"(whatever the hell that is) letters instead od C&D's because they didn't want to come off all "heavy handed". What a load of tripe. The real reason is that without entering into a contract (e.g. clicking "agree"-thanks UCITA!) there is no obligation on the users part. And without using any of their s/w to create new drivers there is no infringing on anyone's IP.
The best way to let them know is to place a notice on your website that any correspondence asking you to cease activities, and that is *not* a "cease & desist" notice will be considered as harrasment and will be filed for later use, if the need arises. They're bluffing, call them on it and force their hand.
It's funny you drag that patent out. I was just thinking about how easy or hard it would be to focus the light from the cue:::cat to make a laser pointer powered by the ps/2 port on my computer. As it is I get about a week's worth of power for those cheap laser pointers, and the cat enjoys chasing the damn things so much I wouldn't want to deprive her of her playtime(BTW this is the best way to keep your young cats from waking you up in the middle of the night, chewing on your feet and wanting to play.)
I'm no EE and I don't have that much experience with lasers, but if someone could tell me what such a conversion entails I'd be happy to detail my experiences on my website, and see whether I get a letter from either DC or the original patent holder.
I believe he means your computer hardware, stereo and speakers will all need to be SDMI capable with some way to verify this to the player, or it won't play.
Now, did you ever hear about how guitar players used to get that super distorted, screaming guitar sound at a reasonable volume level? It involved a sealed (soundproofed) box with a speaker and a microphone. Remember, it only has to be cracked once...
releasing the source might not be such a hot idea. Justin would face certain legal action, and any developers who managed to RE the protocol on their own would have to prove that they didn't use any code from AIM (I'm not sure what the status of leaked code would be, but wouldn't it still be copyrighted?). Besides, it wouldn't be as fun to write a compatible IM client with the stuff right there in front of you to work from, it would piss hem off much more to know that we did it without any help :-)
There's either some real happy computer consultants out there for the extra business, or some real unhappy ones, that they either didn't have more banners up.
The difference is that with CD vs. LP there were advantages to upgrading. The "improved" sound quality (I still appreciate the sound of an LP, scratches and all), the lack of hiss and pop, no needle wear. It made quite a bit of sense to upgrade and so the CD took over.
Compared to the audio cassette, which although widely accepted was never quite considered a "premium" music delivery mechanism. The loss of signal with age, tape wear and breakage kept it in the function of auto listening and add-on status to Stereo systems for its lifetime.
Point is, unless there's a tangible payoff to the consumers they won't go for it. My guess is music-DvD's with value added pablum, imbedded lyrics and band photos, all SDMI protected.
It's not a sure thing. Plus how do you know that they *didn't* try to get one?
TV and Magazine journalists would put something in like "Company X was not available for comment at this time". Rob, I say try contacting them and let us know if they blow you off. Should be telling (after all isn't this the DVD player that Jack Valenti said was available for Linux back when he called us theives?)
If these people do wish to sue, I'm sure they have enough resources to harass most people into compliance, whether or not they are in the right.
Here's another solution;
Completely RE the thing. Starting with the hardware. It is what, a photodiode, some chips and a ps/2 passthrough cable? A qualified electrician could get the schematics for "A generic barcode scanning device" onto the web by this afternoon. Write the drivers for "Generic" device, and state boldly on the webpage that although there is no reason why the drivers shouldn't work with the colon-cat, they are not written for it and there are no garauntees, implicit or otherwise to the effect that they will.
Makes reading about :cue:cat, Earth First!, and Digital:Convergence painful to read.
/.
What do you expect? This is
Not to mention the fact that the computers, programmers, operators and assorted yes-geeks will probably total as much if not more than an actor and a few models?
As for ATM's try joining a local credit union. Since their business is making *you* money, not them, you won't usually find such silly restrictions as a limit to 10 transactions, outrageous checking fees, and most credit unions provide no fees for transactions from other CU's.
More ontopic, the only thing keeping regular textbook manufacturers from doing this is traditional copyright laws. The right of first sale, specifically. However it doesn't stop the practice of "obsoleting" textbooks every semester or whenever it's economically feasable to print new ones. It also won't stop them from moving more of their textbooks to electronic format, requiring "licensed software" to view, and taking full advantage of the DMCA.
If you're a student, I highly reccomend making a real big stink on campus right now. Flyers are cheap (try printing them in your lab if possible) and nothing gets college students going like a "cause". The earlier students let their universities know they won't support or stand for this, the better chance of nipping it in the bud.
You do have a point about O'Reilly, and and I think the 'troll' moderation was harsh. The point here is that it's a textbook we're talking about. These companies have been running a compleat racket with the college kids for years.
Do you know the difference between the 6th and 7th editions of any given history text? There isn't any difference, other than maybe one or two spelling corrections (that were introduced in the 5th edition) and a new bit of cover art. However the book stores get to refuse to buy back the books, the kids who have them have an incredibly hard time selling them to anyone, and best of all, everyone buys NEW ones.
The cost of producing these new editions was getting to be a nuisance, I'm guessing, and the publishers would love to be able to sell you a new book every time instead of every third semester. Unfortunately, at least in the U.S. the right of first sale prohibits EULA's on books.
The solution is to call it Software, and begin gouging. Normally, in a free market consumers would simply go elsewhere with their money and such schemes would fall. However these texts are often required by professors, who may be getting some form of consideration from publishing companies (i.e. publishing deals, freebies, payola, what-have-you). In order to take this course, you *have* to tolerate this (oh, and this case use a Macintosh, have to wonder what racket is happening there???).
The solution is to publicly embarass the University and professor who are allowing this practice to go on. Post flyers on campus urging other students to avoid that professor or that class if at all possible (sometimes a neighboring community college may have a similar class with less obligations)
AFAIK in Fl. at least being a "right to work" state, it's quite possible that his firing had 'nothing to do' with his whistlebowing activities.
"Hey, Johnny, remember when we told you that failing to put a cover-sheet on those tps reports was a terminable offense? Well..."
"Hey, Susan, our records indicate you've been working %0.05 less effifiently than your coworkers..."
Forget the sexual harrassment suit, wage dispute or other internal conflict you may be enjoying. If a Corp. in Fl. wants you gone, you can count on it happening. Myself and friends have been let go for reasons like "not showing enough initiative", "poor sales"(I was doing stock work at the time), "layoffs due to poor quarterly performance"(company posting record profits, I was hired there a week after my friend was let go, along with 30 other new employes.)
One would think that being involved with NASA would make for better accountability in human resource matters: I'd be willing to bet this guy would never win a suit, and nothing will come of this other than as much bad press as folks can muster about the company that did this
1. Don't put the CD on the bottom of the microwave, place it on at least a plate or saucer. I have a coffee cup from a SUN authorized dealer especially for the AOL CD's I get.
2. Set power to full, and the timer to no more than 5 seconds.
3. Stand back if sparks scare you. They are all inside the oven, but can be scary nonetheless.
4. Once you see the big flash/spark you should turn off the Microwave.
And don't forget, thanks to MEEPT, the one and only slaspdash... I remember asking about why it wasn't storing login info after the last server change on slashcode, and noone seemed to know about it... appasrently someone in London registered it.
I still use the temporary card they gave me, never filled out the attached form or anything, and if it ever goes bad I just ask the cashier,"Customer card? I've never been here before, how do I get one?" And I get a new temporary card. I still feel bad that I'm encouraging this behavior on the part of the stores at all, however sometimes there's a huge price difference between card members and non.
Been done.</STINK>