Funny... not a one in Los Angeles. I've never seen the ad outside of the paper (and then, only one). Kind of strange for the #2 size city in the nation.
I'm having a hard time finding evidence of IBM's billion dollar commitment.
I'm guessing that the billion dollar commitment is in things that are "linux-related" and not really so visible. Things like DB2, which runs on linux. That's a big chunk of change right there, and it could be filed under the billion dollar margin simply because it'll run on linux.
There is a lot of stuff in their website's linux section, but not so much that it represents a billion dollar investment. I'm really betting that number translates mainly in to proprietary programs and such that we don't really care about, rather than actually putting out stuff like SMIT for linux.
While you're right about things being murky, you do have to remember that the University does fund a great deal, including lab space, supplies, and even simple administrative stuff like waste disposal (critical for biohazard), mail, phone, and internet. While salaries don't really come from anything but grants and Teaching Assistant stipends, the University does provide a lot of important stuff.
I totally agree that the inventor should get a significant cut of the pie (I'm biased though, being an undergrad lab assistant;-) you can't cut out the University because they are critical for a lot of reasons.
I agree with this. Not answering the phone is one of the best things you can do. I'm not so good with email (those damn debian lists) but not picking up the phone is great.
What's really amazing to me is that people will pick up the phone no matter what. Hop out of the shower to get it. Run out of the bathroom frantically. Stop having sex to talk to whoever is calling. Strange.
Sure I provided evidence. What do you think that post was with the list of companies that you seem to be forgetting? You can't tell me IBM, Apple, etc. weren't partners. Nor can you tell the other posters who provided more companies who got screwed that there's no evidence. I don't know why you refuse to acknowledge that Microsoft has given quite a number of companies the shaft, but if you choose to see the world that way, that's your business.
Your hatred will make you strong... I guess. That's what the Emperor said anyway, right?
Ok, I don't know where you get this "hatred of Microsoft" thing from on me, but the fact that you keep pushing it even in the face of actual evidence that is contrary to what you have to say makes me question your interests.
If you want to trust the shark, then go ahead, be my guest. I don't hate sharks any more than I hate Microsoft, but I don't trust sharks any more than I trust Microsoft either. Microsoft does know what it's doing, and what it's doing is making money the best way it knows how. I don't fault them for that, but that doesn't mean I, or American Express, should trust them either.
You have, of course, failed to even address my initial question, as to why American Express is taking the risk of getting in to bed with Microsoft. Microsoft does have a history of screwing over its partners, as I mentioned, and who's to say AMEX isn't capable of screwing over Microsoft if they want any more than Apple or Sun was? Microsoft is in the service game now, and American Express provides a service. I wouldn't be surprised if, at some point, Microsoft decides to get in to the credit game (hey, they're always expanding in to new markets) in order to keep tight control on their service platform. That's not to say it will happen, but who's to say it won't?
Now, if you want to go and lambast me for my "hatred" then please, go right on ahead. But I'd also like it if you could try and answer my questions rather than throw names at me.
Intel. Remember Wintel? Why is Intel so pro Linux now that they're bailing out SuSE?
Another is Apple. Yes, they were very much in bed together during the development of the Mac. These days it's knife the baby.
Sun. Java got twisted by Microsoft quite nicely.
There was also the bootloader story the other day, in which the article talked about the OEMs who got preassured by MS in to only having Windows on their computers.
I'm sure there are others, I'm not so up on the history of MS (I know more about Apple). But I hope this justifies things to you enough.
The fact is, all the companies you mentioned are small fish, and the small fish are what MS plays nice with or buys out. They're no threat. But when it's a big company that could potentially hold some power over MS, they get fucked over big time. American Express is a big company that's rolling in both money and brand name. As such, they actually have something to worry about in a partnership with MS.
I was thinking less about people getting their cards #'s stolen than about providing a service. When you tie yourself to another company to survive, you're pretty much dependant on them to keep doing whatever it is they're doing. I know less about the history of PC's, but Apple has screwed over a ton of businesses based on them (the clones, Quickdraw GX, etc.) in the past. These companies got screwed because they were too dependant on Apple.
Now, AMEX isn't going down because of MS or anything, but what they are doing is putting themselves in a very vulnerable position. They are basically hitching their entire online effort to Hailstorm if they go through with this, which will be a pretty big chunk of revenue someday.
Say MS decides to screw them out of Hailstorm 3 or 5 years down the line, what do they do then? AMEX may be big, but they're certaintly not capable of deploying their own version of Hailstorm. Getting in to bed with MS is a risky proposition at best, even if you're a big company.
I don't really know why any large company would sign on for Hailstorm. No one really wants to be tied to any specific vendor for such an important part of their business. Granted, they're already tethered via their desktop PC's, but incorporating Hailstorm in to your business plan? You're basically putting your chance of profit in the hands of MS, who has a well known history of screwing over its own partners.
The problem, as I see it, is that American Express and others can beat their competitors to the punch by being a part of Hailstorm, providing services no one else does, but that goes with extreme risk. I guess that's why they haven't signed a contract with MS yet. It's a tough one for any company.
If I were hacking Big Mouth Billy Bass to put Linux on it, I'd replace that annoying "Take Me To The River" sample with the classic "Hello, this is Linus Torvalds, and I pronounce Linux as Leenux."
Of course, that would probably get old really fast, just like the standard sample. Plus, no one really wants to hear Linus say the same thing every day (except maybe his kids, who want to hear the "scary module under the bed" story every night).
I'd really like to replace the current sample with the Talking Heads cover of the same song. Much better. Maybe give Big Mouth Billy a Big David Byrne Suit too.
Hey, try out OSX server and say that. I admit, it's probably not quite up to snuff with 2k, but I woulnd't rule it out. I had really good uptimes with the old version.
I disagree with this. While OSX has plenty of people excited, and does have the cool factor, you talk to anyone using it and you'll find battlescars. No one is wholly pleased with the product (including me), and while it is good and exciting, the bugs do hurt. A lot.
Linux also has problems, and they're very different than the ones in OSX. I can't do a single click program install in linux the way I can in OSX, but my floppy drive has no problems (a real OSX problem for my work.) This is to say that neither OS is perfect at all, and both could use improvement.
But to say people aren't excited about linux and are excited by OSX is a load of garbage. When I show people Linux it definitely scores cool points with them. More so than OSX, which has been running really slow on our legacy iMacs.
Despite the appearance of OSX and darwin, people keep using Linux, despite it's less simple and unified interface, because they have faith in it, same as you say about OSX users. More so than Apple, because many of us have been burned by Apple in the past and know that no one can screw us over in the Linux world.
I would disagree that OSX has the mindshare of everyone, because most every consumer who looks at it says "Cool, but it's not a PC, I can't run it, I'm not going to run it." You should see the problems we have trying to get people to use one of the three iMacs with OSX rather than the one PC here. It may be pretty, and it may have some good stuff under the hood, but it's not in the mindshare of "most everyone" any more than Linux is.
All in all, I think people are as excited about Linux as they are about OSX. While they may focus on doing different things well, if all you're judging on is "OSX looks cool" then you're not really measuring the level of excitement for linux. Just look at the posts on/. for the excitement over KDE 2.2, or the new kernel releases for example. This stuff is exciting, and the people who know about it are just as excited by linux developments as are Mac people by OSX developments.
Apple has done a really good job on OSX, and I'm looking forward to it getting much better, but to say it's generating excitement where linux is not is absurd. Linux has developed so much in the past two years since I started using it, and it will develop even more in the coming years, and I guarantee as it lands on more and more machines you'll see the excitement build, hopefully in the mainstream as well.
I agree with this. While you've got some brain-dead design decisions on Windows (Outlook) Linux users aren't immune to viruses. Just because you use Linux doesn't mean you should go downloading and executing untrusted code or random files that are sent to you.
Does anyone else find it interesting that the two companies who are prime examples of consumer lock-in (AIM/Windows & Office) are the most distrusted companies on the 'net? Both have the "walled garden" approach, and while all the suits seem to be talking up how great the idea is, this speaks differently.
Perhaps this study just goes to show that, while they may be complacent, people aren't completely blind to what these companies are potentially denying them.
Freedom and empowerment is more important than a friendly "You've got mail". The problem is that in order to be empowered in the sense of having access to the net, many people are willing to go the easy route (i.e. AOL) and it puts them at someone else's mercy. Same idea applies to many of Microsoft's customers.
People sacrifice complete freedom and empowerment for the ease and extra free time gained by using AOL and Microsoft's products. And while many are quite satisfied with the choice (as the AOL rep stated in the article) it doesn't take away distrust of what may potentially happen or be happening to them. That's still fertile ground I think.
The thing is, a very very very large chunk of research is government funded, including research done by drug companies. That doesn't force the work to be in the public domain in the end though, it's just meant to further research as a whole.
Perhaps if the length of the patent corresponded inversely to the amount of public money spent on the patent, then the mess would be a little less.
From what I understood, a major component of KDE's speed issues is C++ linking, which is an ld.so problem. ld is part of the whole gnu compiler collection system by the way.
Waldo Bastian wrote an excellent paper on the subject of KDE's speed a couple of months ago.
A lot of KDE's speed issues have been hacked at in the new 2.2 release, but the ld issues are still being worked on.
So before you go blaming all of KDE's problems on the current bug reports in one small portion of a big big project, please read the literature at hand.
How can they truly demonstrate the MP3.com is responsible for putting these songs up on Napster? Granted, if they did create this "bootleg library" then they're liable for the infringement there, but how can the songs there be linked to the ones that are proliferating "virally"?
I get the feeling that this one will have MP3.com paying a hefty fine over the library they created, but hopefully they can fight off this viral thing, which is pretty absurd. Even if they distributed the songs to people illegally, they didn't force anyone to throw them on Napster, if those versions on Napster even came from them in the first place.
My girlfriend actually has a wonderful comic edition of Rime of the Ancient Mariner by Coleridge that she loaned to me when I had to read it for an English class. I love the poem, but the illustrated version really brought it to life and made it funny. The style was like Mad Magazine (or Sergio Argonnes' Groo) and made it a much more enjoyable read.
Those "The Cartoon Guide to [Sex, Physics, Biology, History, etc]" seem to be selling well, which is a testament to the idea too.
Slashdot Mirror
Funny... not a one in Los Angeles. I've never seen the ad outside of the paper (and then, only one). Kind of strange for the #2 size city in the nation.
I'm guessing that the billion dollar commitment is in things that are "linux-related" and not really so visible. Things like DB2, which runs on linux. That's a big chunk of change right there, and it could be filed under the billion dollar margin simply because it'll run on linux.
There is a lot of stuff in their website's linux section, but not so much that it represents a billion dollar investment. I'm really betting that number translates mainly in to proprietary programs and such that we don't really care about, rather than actually putting out stuff like SMIT for linux.
While you're right about things being murky, you do have to remember that the University does fund a great deal, including lab space, supplies, and even simple administrative stuff like waste disposal (critical for biohazard), mail, phone, and internet. While salaries don't really come from anything but grants and Teaching Assistant stipends, the University does provide a lot of important stuff.
;-) you can't cut out the University because they are critical for a lot of reasons.
I totally agree that the inventor should get a significant cut of the pie (I'm biased though, being an undergrad lab assistant
No no no... making her scream means you're doing a good job ;-)
I agree with this. Not answering the phone is one of the best things you can do. I'm not so good with email (those damn debian lists) but not picking up the phone is great.
What's really amazing to me is that people will pick up the phone no matter what. Hop out of the shower to get it. Run out of the bathroom frantically. Stop having sex to talk to whoever is calling. Strange.
Sure I provided evidence. What do you think that post was with the list of companies that you seem to be forgetting? You can't tell me IBM, Apple, etc. weren't partners. Nor can you tell the other posters who provided more companies who got screwed that there's no evidence. I don't know why you refuse to acknowledge that Microsoft has given quite a number of companies the shaft, but if you choose to see the world that way, that's your business.
Cool! Great project by the way. Cool idea. The default Billy Bass is so annoying, it's great that you can hack it.
Your hatred will make you strong... I guess. That's what the Emperor said anyway, right?
Ok, I don't know where you get this "hatred of Microsoft" thing from on me, but the fact that you keep pushing it even in the face of actual evidence that is contrary to what you have to say makes me question your interests.
If you want to trust the shark, then go ahead, be my guest. I don't hate sharks any more than I hate Microsoft, but I don't trust sharks any more than I trust Microsoft either. Microsoft does know what it's doing, and what it's doing is making money the best way it knows how. I don't fault them for that, but that doesn't mean I, or American Express, should trust them either.
You have, of course, failed to even address my initial question, as to why American Express is taking the risk of getting in to bed with Microsoft. Microsoft does have a history of screwing over its partners, as I mentioned, and who's to say AMEX isn't capable of screwing over Microsoft if they want any more than Apple or Sun was? Microsoft is in the service game now, and American Express provides a service. I wouldn't be surprised if, at some point, Microsoft decides to get in to the credit game (hey, they're always expanding in to new markets) in order to keep tight control on their service platform. That's not to say it will happen, but who's to say it won't?
Now, if you want to go and lambast me for my "hatred" then please, go right on ahead. But I'd also like it if you could try and answer my questions rather than throw names at me.
Most prominent is IBM. Enough said there.
Intel. Remember Wintel? Why is Intel so pro Linux now that they're bailing out SuSE?
Another is Apple. Yes, they were very much in bed together during the development of the Mac. These days it's knife the baby.
Sun. Java got twisted by Microsoft quite nicely.
There was also the bootloader story the other day, in which the article talked about the OEMs who got preassured by MS in to only having Windows on their computers.
I'm sure there are others, I'm not so up on the history of MS (I know more about Apple). But I hope this justifies things to you enough.
The fact is, all the companies you mentioned are small fish, and the small fish are what MS plays nice with or buys out. They're no threat. But when it's a big company that could potentially hold some power over MS, they get fucked over big time. American Express is a big company that's rolling in both money and brand name. As such, they actually have something to worry about in a partnership with MS.
I was thinking less about people getting their cards #'s stolen than about providing a service. When you tie yourself to another company to survive, you're pretty much dependant on them to keep doing whatever it is they're doing. I know less about the history of PC's, but Apple has screwed over a ton of businesses based on them (the clones, Quickdraw GX, etc.) in the past. These companies got screwed because they were too dependant on Apple.
Now, AMEX isn't going down because of MS or anything, but what they are doing is putting themselves in a very vulnerable position. They are basically hitching their entire online effort to Hailstorm if they go through with this, which will be a pretty big chunk of revenue someday.
Say MS decides to screw them out of Hailstorm 3 or 5 years down the line, what do they do then? AMEX may be big, but they're certaintly not capable of deploying their own version of Hailstorm. Getting in to bed with MS is a risky proposition at best, even if you're a big company.
I don't really know why any large company would sign on for Hailstorm. No one really wants to be tied to any specific vendor for such an important part of their business. Granted, they're already tethered via their desktop PC's, but incorporating Hailstorm in to your business plan? You're basically putting your chance of profit in the hands of MS, who has a well known history of screwing over its own partners.
The problem, as I see it, is that American Express and others can beat their competitors to the punch by being a part of Hailstorm, providing services no one else does, but that goes with extreme risk. I guess that's why they haven't signed a contract with MS yet. It's a tough one for any company.
If I were hacking Big Mouth Billy Bass to put Linux on it, I'd replace that annoying "Take Me To The River" sample with the classic "Hello, this is Linus Torvalds, and I pronounce Linux as Leenux."
Of course, that would probably get old really fast, just like the standard sample. Plus, no one really wants to hear Linus say the same thing every day (except maybe his kids, who want to hear the "scary module under the bed" story every night).
I'd really like to replace the current sample with the Talking Heads cover of the same song. Much better. Maybe give Big Mouth Billy a Big David Byrne Suit too.
Hey, try out OSX server and say that. I admit, it's probably not quite up to snuff with 2k, but I woulnd't rule it out. I had really good uptimes with the old version.
That's what you get for making us wait forever for all your game systems!
And for not releasing any RPG's during the NES era!
And for dumbing down what RPG's you did release!
And for not releasing the Linux kit for the PS/2 here!
And for giving us all that tentacle pr0n! *shudder*
And most of all... that's for the fan abuse at the end of Evangelion!
So there!
I disagree with this. While OSX has plenty of people excited, and does have the cool factor, you talk to anyone using it and you'll find battlescars. No one is wholly pleased with the product (including me), and while it is good and exciting, the bugs do hurt. A lot.
/. for the excitement over KDE 2.2, or the new kernel releases for example. This stuff is exciting, and the people who know about it are just as excited by linux developments as are Mac people by OSX developments.
Linux also has problems, and they're very different than the ones in OSX. I can't do a single click program install in linux the way I can in OSX, but my floppy drive has no problems (a real OSX problem for my work.) This is to say that neither OS is perfect at all, and both could use improvement.
But to say people aren't excited about linux and are excited by OSX is a load of garbage. When I show people Linux it definitely scores cool points with them. More so than OSX, which has been running really slow on our legacy iMacs.
Despite the appearance of OSX and darwin, people keep using Linux, despite it's less simple and unified interface, because they have faith in it, same as you say about OSX users. More so than Apple, because many of us have been burned by Apple in the past and know that no one can screw us over in the Linux world.
I would disagree that OSX has the mindshare of everyone, because most every consumer who looks at it says "Cool, but it's not a PC, I can't run it, I'm not going to run it." You should see the problems we have trying to get people to use one of the three iMacs with OSX rather than the one PC here. It may be pretty, and it may have some good stuff under the hood, but it's not in the mindshare of "most everyone" any more than Linux is.
All in all, I think people are as excited about Linux as they are about OSX. While they may focus on doing different things well, if all you're judging on is "OSX looks cool" then you're not really measuring the level of excitement for linux. Just look at the posts on
Apple has done a really good job on OSX, and I'm looking forward to it getting much better, but to say it's generating excitement where linux is not is absurd. Linux has developed so much in the past two years since I started using it, and it will develop even more in the coming years, and I guarantee as it lands on more and more machines you'll see the excitement build, hopefully in the mainstream as well.
I agree with this. While you've got some brain-dead design decisions on Windows (Outlook) Linux users aren't immune to viruses. Just because you use Linux doesn't mean you should go downloading and executing untrusted code or random files that are sent to you.
Does anyone else find it interesting that the two companies who are prime examples of consumer lock-in (AIM/Windows & Office) are the most distrusted companies on the 'net? Both have the "walled garden" approach, and while all the suits seem to be talking up how great the idea is, this speaks differently.
Perhaps this study just goes to show that, while they may be complacent, people aren't completely blind to what these companies are potentially denying them.
Freedom and empowerment is more important than a friendly "You've got mail". The problem is that in order to be empowered in the sense of having access to the net, many people are willing to go the easy route (i.e. AOL) and it puts them at someone else's mercy. Same idea applies to many of Microsoft's customers.
People sacrifice complete freedom and empowerment for the ease and extra free time gained by using AOL and Microsoft's products. And while many are quite satisfied with the choice (as the AOL rep stated in the article) it doesn't take away distrust of what may potentially happen or be happening to them. That's still fertile ground I think.
The thing is, a very very very large chunk of research is government funded, including research done by drug companies. That doesn't force the work to be in the public domain in the end though, it's just meant to further research as a whole.
Perhaps if the length of the patent corresponded inversely to the amount of public money spent on the patent, then the mess would be a little less.
How much you want to bet the letters begin with "I send you this file to ask your advice"?
From what I understood, a major component of KDE's speed issues is C++ linking, which is an ld.so problem. ld is part of the whole gnu compiler collection system by the way.
Waldo Bastian wrote an excellent paper on the subject of KDE's speed a couple of months ago.
A lot of KDE's speed issues have been hacked at in the new 2.2 release, but the ld issues are still being worked on.
So before you go blaming all of KDE's problems on the current bug reports in one small portion of a big big project, please read the literature at hand.
How can they truly demonstrate the MP3.com is responsible for putting these songs up on Napster? Granted, if they did create this "bootleg library" then they're liable for the infringement there, but how can the songs there be linked to the ones that are proliferating "virally"?
I get the feeling that this one will have MP3.com paying a hefty fine over the library they created, but hopefully they can fight off this viral thing, which is pretty absurd. Even if they distributed the songs to people illegally, they didn't force anyone to throw them on Napster, if those versions on Napster even came from them in the first place.
How much you want to bet there'll be a few "NASA Ate My Balls" pages thrown up over this?
Now we're going to have third graders screaming their heads off at each other about the merits of emacs vs. vi and Gnome vs. KDE!
/. accounts!
If you thought the arguments were juvenile and immature before, just wait until those first graders get
Good luck guys. Hope it all goes well. Thanks for all the great work!
My girlfriend actually has a wonderful comic edition of Rime of the Ancient Mariner by Coleridge that she loaned to me when I had to read it for an English class. I love the poem, but the illustrated version really brought it to life and made it funny. The style was like Mad Magazine (or Sergio Argonnes' Groo) and made it a much more enjoyable read.
Those "The Cartoon Guide to [Sex, Physics, Biology, History, etc]" seem to be selling well, which is a testament to the idea too.