Ok so we got a million criminals and only catch hundred, but we're going to make up for it by making those hundred pay for it.
And by the way, let's make up for it by letting those that don't even have a computer, let alone an internet connection, pay. And as usual, the RIAA is leading the way.
Your paranoia or total dislike of our military forces is showing.
You are actually wrong here. I do not hate you, your military or your country. Your country has its flaws, just like mine do. The only entity in the United States (apart from certain unnamed corporations and related organizations) that I certainly dislike is your current president and his administration.
I've not seen any such endorsement on the SIAA site. I'm not accusing you of spreading FUD, but I am extremely interested in verifying for myself that Red Hat, Sun, etc. are actively supporting this bill.
That's one way to make sure the people won't vote wrong way, thought.
Just remember that the french are not known for their passiveness when the government tries to pass laws that people don't agree with. Ever heard of trucks and framing equipment blocking the roads?
Not even the GPL works without protection of the intelectual property.
I have two things to say about this statement:
The GPL depends on copyright, but not trade secrets or patents, for its enforcement, so please be more specific and avoid the use of the catch-all phrase "Intellectual Property".
It is argued that without copyright protection, the GPL would not be necessary, since nothing would protect proprietary software from being copied, just as nothing would protect free software from being ripped off by proprietary software vendors. I'm not sure that I agree with this position though.
I don't see how one is related to the other WRT the laws as written
If the United States would really invade friendly countries to free captured service personnel, I don't think it's to far off to think they would send some Tomahawks against an ISP or hosting company that don't want to follow US orders.
or more likely, you spent countless hours tweaking it
In my experience, this was maybe the case a couple of years ago. Today, I have been able to do most of the things I want without any "hours of tweaking".
Are they going to send in the SEALs or Tomahawk cruise missiles? Hmmm...?
You didn't happen to hear about the so called Hague Invasion Act? This is a US federal law that allows the US guvernment to take "any necessary action" to free US service personnel held by the ICC against the will of the United States.
Still, the analyst says software is an area of technology where the barriers to entry are "minuscule."
That's until certain proprietary software companies manage to persuade their governments to raise them, such as by enacting laws enabling software to be patented. Or just persuading their patent offices to grant software patents, saving the government persuasion until enough patents have been collected.
Have you ever wondered why the new 30GB and 60GB iPods are so thin compared to the previous generations? That's because they already use perpendicular recording.....
They do? Oh, I didn't know, I only have a 4G iPod (20 GB) and I haven't ever seen a new (5G) iPod in real life. But I cannot see why they could not make larger (i.e. thicker) versions too. This isn't just about room to hold your music and videos, it's having room to spare even when you have all your music on the iPod, so that you can use it as an external hard drive for other data as well.
use the applications build in update checker (which doesn't require administrator priveleges)
You can check for updates as a regular user, but you would surely need administrator privileges to install them, unless the application is installed in your home directory (or equivalent).
Firefox, if installed into home/$user directory, will notify user of new version and update if he agrees. Can't be simpler than that.
I know that. This discussion was about the greyed-out update alternative in Linux, which applies to system-wide installations of Firefox
Distributions can also be configured (Ubuntu e.g.) to automatically update when new version pops up in the repostory.
Is that really true, or are you referring to the once-a-day automatic update cron job? The former method would require interrupt-based functionality (server notifies you) while the latter uses polling (you periodically check the server for updates).
why has the same not happened to those that produce and consume other fictional criminal activity, like The Godfather or even the movie Hostel, which I found stomach turning?
The difference is that those are produced by the big movie industry which is in bed with governments all over the western world. The government couldn't really be expected to send their bedfellows to jail, could they?
You know sometimes I wish I could just goto Help -> Check for Updates in Firefox on Linux as easily as I can on MS Windows. It's laughable that the most well known of open source software doesn't function as seemlessly on an open source operating system as it does on a proprietary Microsoft one.
This is because the "Check for updates" in Firefox relies on a well-known security flaw in Windows, namely that every user is running as an administrator, and thus has the authority to modify system files. In Linux, since you are not browsing the web as root, it is perfectly understandable that you cannot update the systemwide installation of Firefox from the browser window. By the way, package management systems would be screwed up if files they "own" suddenly are replaced by other files of (to them) unknown origin. What are they supposed to do if the user tries to uninstall the original package?
Now, it's good that they're going back to the near future, and hopefully making it feel 'gritty' and '10 minutes into the future' again.
Sorry to disappoint you, but you are far off. The first game, Tiberian Dawn, was supposed to take place around 1995. The second game was supposed to take place around 2015 (I specifically remember that it mentioned that 20 years had passed since the first tiberium war). And C&C 3 is supposed to take place in 2047 according to the press release itself. So I assume the sci-fi factor will be many times higher.
It really helps to read the article. But what should I expect, this is Slashdot.:)
I thought the overall atmosphere was pretty cool. The tiberian minerals were taking over the planet with their rapid growth
Yeah, I especially remember the fifth mission on the GDI side of the Firestorm expansion pack. The terrain was almost entirely covered with various forms of Tiberium, the mission took place at night, and the Tiberium was the main light source, in various shades of green and blue. It was a one-man mission, using a Ghoststalker, sneaking around various sleeping Tiberium lifeforms. Very eerie feeling, and very cool. There is no other mission that I remember that well.
Then I think it may differ depending on where you are, but that have never ocurred to me, even though I have asked. I don't know where you are, but I'm in Sweden, and it is sometimes said that Sweden is a Microsoft country.:( I usually get around this by assembling my computers myself, but this is not an option for most people, even if it isn't really hard to learn.
In Earth 21*0 (the only one I'm sure about is 2160 but 2150 probably does as well) there is a sidebar in which you can cycle through your production facilities so you can give new build orders even while you are watching a battle
In essence, you are correct. In Earth 2150 (which I have played very much) the sidebar actually appears only when a building or vehicle with construction capabilities is selected. The exception is while playing the Lunar Corporation, building construction is always available, since buidlings are constructed in orbit. When the Main Base is selected, the sidebar changes to match its production capability, just like for the other sides. And when it is deselected, the building construction sidebar returns.
I seriously doubt that MPlayer is a company. Usually, a company provides some product or service in exchange for money. You don't see very many companies with a "Donate" button on their websites. And I could find no information about how I could buy MPlayer or MPlayer support on the MPlayer website. And Xine does not seem to be a company either, as no such information could be found on its website. It has a sponsors link which, like the "Donate" button, seldom appear on corporate websites.
Most people dont have the knowledge or inclination to look for these applications.
How come they have the "knowledge and inclination" to look for TV sets, refrigerators, cell phones or automobiles, managing to choose between several alternatives based on features, design, price, etc? When it comes to computer software, suddenly it is assumed that no one has the knowledge to choose from more than one alternative, a bit like the election in the former communist bloc. There you could choose between the communist party and the communist party.
With a lot of applications bundled with the operating system, most people are not even made aware of that other (possibly superior) alternatives exist. Since they don't know that alternatives to the bundled applications exist, they cannot make informed decisions about what to use.
I disagree that a monopoly is a market failure. The ultimate goal of a business is to maximize market share, with the peak being 100% or full monopoly.
What is good for a company does not have to be good for the market. So a monopoly is a market failure, even if it is the highest level of success for the company that has the monopoly. A healthy market is one with lots of competition, which brings rapid innovation and falling costs. A monopoly is quite the opposite, since the monopolist does not have to innovate, and can raise prices almost at will.
Slashdot Mirror
Ok so we got a million criminals and only catch hundred, but we're going to make up for it by making those hundred pay for it.
And by the way, let's make up for it by letting those that don't even have a computer, let alone an internet connection, pay. And as usual, the RIAA is leading the way.
Terrorism and child pornography are bad, yes, but attempts to prevent them are not worth the loss of our rights.
<sarcasm>
So you support the terrorists and child pornographers then?
</sarcasm>
Your paranoia or total dislike of our military forces is showing.
You are actually wrong here. I do not hate you, your military or your country. Your country has its flaws, just like mine do. The only entity in the United States (apart from certain unnamed corporations and related organizations) that I certainly dislike is your current president and his administration.
I've not seen any such endorsement on the SIAA site. I'm not accusing you of spreading FUD, but I am extremely interested in verifying for myself that Red Hat, Sun, etc. are actively supporting this bill.
It surely seems to be true:
- The article mentions SIIA halfway down the page.
- The SIIA board membership page lists Mark Webbink as the chair of the board.
So it certainly seems like it. I think that phone calls to everyone I know that uses RHEL would be in order.That's one way to make sure the people won't vote wrong way, thought.
Just remember that the french are not known for their passiveness when the government tries to pass laws that people don't agree with. Ever heard of trucks and framing equipment blocking the roads?
Not even the GPL works without protection of the intelectual property.
I have two things to say about this statement:
I don't see how one is related to the other WRT the laws as written
If the United States would really invade friendly countries to free captured service personnel, I don't think it's to far off to think they would send some Tomahawks against an ISP or hosting company that don't want to follow US orders.
You obviously don't use Gentoo.
That's correct. I use Fedora Core 4 and 5.
or more likely, you spent countless hours tweaking it
In my experience, this was maybe the case a couple of years ago. Today, I have been able to do most of the things I want without any "hours of tweaking".
Are they going to send in the SEALs or Tomahawk cruise missiles? Hmmm...?
You didn't happen to hear about the so called Hague Invasion Act? This is a US federal law that allows the US guvernment to take "any necessary action" to free US service personnel held by the ICC against the will of the United States.
From the article:
Still, the analyst says software is an area of technology where the barriers to entry are "minuscule."
That's until certain proprietary software companies manage to persuade their governments to raise them, such as by enacting laws enabling software to be patented. Or just persuading their patent offices to grant software patents, saving the government persuasion until enough patents have been collected.
Have you ever wondered why the new 30GB and 60GB iPods are so thin compared to the previous generations? That's because they already use perpendicular recording.....
They do? Oh, I didn't know, I only have a 4G iPod (20 GB) and I haven't ever seen a new (5G) iPod in real life. But I cannot see why they could not make larger (i.e. thicker) versions too. This isn't just about room to hold your music and videos, it's having room to spare even when you have all your music on the iPod, so that you can use it as an external hard drive for other data as well.
use the applications build in update checker (which doesn't require administrator priveleges)
You can check for updates as a regular user, but you would surely need administrator privileges to install them, unless the application is installed in your home directory (or equivalent).
Firefox, if installed into home/$user directory, will notify user of new version and update if he agrees. Can't be simpler than that.
I know that. This discussion was about the greyed-out update alternative in Linux, which applies to system-wide installations of Firefox
Distributions can also be configured (Ubuntu e.g.) to automatically update when new version pops up in the repostory.
Is that really true, or are you referring to the once-a-day automatic update cron job? The former method would require interrupt-based functionality (server notifies you) while the latter uses polling (you periodically check the server for updates).
why has the same not happened to those that produce and consume other fictional criminal activity, like The Godfather or even the movie Hostel, which I found stomach turning?
The difference is that those are produced by the big movie industry which is in bed with governments all over the western world. The government couldn't really be expected to send their bedfellows to jail, could they?
if they increase the storage capacity it gives people less incentive to buy a more expensive regular iPod.
Ever heard of PMR? I would guess that a storage capacity bump is due for the larger iPods as well.
Wouldn't it be easy to goto help -> check for updates in Firefox like on Windows? oh wait it's greyed out on Linux.
Read my previous comment about this for an explanation.
You know sometimes I wish I could just goto Help -> Check for Updates in Firefox on Linux as easily as I can on MS Windows. It's laughable that the most well known of open source software doesn't function as seemlessly on an open source operating system as it does on a proprietary Microsoft one.
This is because the "Check for updates" in Firefox relies on a well-known security flaw in Windows, namely that every user is running as an administrator, and thus has the authority to modify system files. In Linux, since you are not browsing the web as root, it is perfectly understandable that you cannot update the systemwide installation of Firefox from the browser window. By the way, package management systems would be screwed up if files they "own" suddenly are replaced by other files of (to them) unknown origin. What are they supposed to do if the user tries to uninstall the original package?
Now, it's good that they're going back to the near future, and hopefully making it feel 'gritty' and '10 minutes into the future' again.
Sorry to disappoint you, but you are far off. The first game, Tiberian Dawn, was supposed to take place around 1995. The second game was supposed to take place around 2015 (I specifically remember that it mentioned that 20 years had passed since the first tiberium war). And C&C 3 is supposed to take place in 2047 according to the press release itself. So I assume the sci-fi factor will be many times higher.
It really helps to read the article. But what should I expect, this is Slashdot. :)
I thought the overall atmosphere was pretty cool. The tiberian minerals were taking over the planet with their rapid growth
Yeah, I especially remember the fifth mission on the GDI side of the Firestorm expansion pack. The terrain was almost entirely covered with various forms of Tiberium, the mission took place at night, and the Tiberium was the main light source, in various shades of green and blue. It was a one-man mission, using a Ghoststalker, sneaking around various sleeping Tiberium lifeforms. Very eerie feeling, and very cool. There is no other mission that I remember that well.
Bullshit.
Then I think it may differ depending on where you are, but that have never ocurred to me, even though I have asked. I don't know where you are, but I'm in Sweden, and it is sometimes said that Sweden is a Microsoft country. :( I usually get around this by assembling my computers myself, but this is not an option for most people, even if it isn't really hard to learn.
In Earth 21*0 (the only one I'm sure about is 2160 but 2150 probably does as well) there is a sidebar in which you can cycle through your production facilities so you can give new build orders even while you are watching a battle
In essence, you are correct. In Earth 2150 (which I have played very much) the sidebar actually appears only when a building or vehicle with construction capabilities is selected. The exception is while playing the Lunar Corporation, building construction is always available, since buidlings are constructed in orbit. When the Main Base is selected, the sidebar changes to match its production capability, just like for the other sides. And when it is deselected, the building construction sidebar returns.
xine and mplayer are both open source companies
I seriously doubt that MPlayer is a company. Usually, a company provides some product or service in exchange for money. You don't see very many companies with a "Donate" button on their websites. And I could find no information about how I could buy MPlayer or MPlayer support on the MPlayer website. And Xine does not seem to be a company either, as no such information could be found on its website. It has a sponsors link which, like the "Donate" button, seldom appear on corporate websites.
Most people dont have the knowledge or inclination to look for these applications.
How come they have the "knowledge and inclination" to look for TV sets, refrigerators, cell phones or automobiles, managing to choose between several alternatives based on features, design, price, etc? When it comes to computer software, suddenly it is assumed that no one has the knowledge to choose from more than one alternative, a bit like the election in the former communist bloc. There you could choose between the communist party and the communist party.
With a lot of applications bundled with the operating system, most people are not even made aware of that other (possibly superior) alternatives exist. Since they don't know that alternatives to the bundled applications exist, they cannot make informed decisions about what to use.
I disagree that a monopoly is a market failure. The ultimate goal of a business is to maximize market share, with the peak being 100% or full monopoly.
What is good for a company does not have to be good for the market. So a monopoly is a market failure, even if it is the highest level of success for the company that has the monopoly. A healthy market is one with lots of competition, which brings rapid innovation and falling costs. A monopoly is quite the opposite, since the monopolist does not have to innovate, and can raise prices almost at will.