Yes, the money still moves around the money-go-round (love the term, BTW), but the fact is that traded something productive for a bunch of lawyers talking. If we had that productive thing, then the money spent later would be even more effective. You're not just moving money around, you're experiencing an opportunity cost.
That's the Broken Window Fallacy. Money not wasted on lawsuits could be spend on something else, specifically something else that provides the economy (and the involved company) with more utility. If IBM didn't have to spend millions defending itself, it could go spend that money on hurrying up 65 nm production of the Cell processor, or building a bigger super-computer, or making improvements to AIX or Linux.
The "Linux Game Market" for any given game is the set of people who are all of the following:
Run Linux as a desktop
Are interested in games
Are willing to put non-free software on their free Linux system
Have some $ to spend on a game
Think pirating software is wrong.
Think YOUR game is worth spending $ on.
You missed one. Namely - "Don't already have the game under Windows and can't get it to work under WINE". That's the big one, because people won't spend another $50 if they already have a solution. As WINE improves, and as virtualization adds hardware graphics support (which could be coming to some extent in a year's time), there's going to be less incentive for a native version.
What was difficult to get working was the PC software, not the Zune itself. No, the install process has nothing to do with the ease-of-use of the Zune itself.
THE SOFTWARE IS A PART OF THE ZUNE. There is no distinction necessary. It came in the box, and is necessary for correct operation of the Zune. If the software install fails, and you have to do a bunch of stuff to get it to install (which may or may not be commonplace, but did happen to the author), then you have to do a butt-load of work to USE the Zune. If it's hard to use the Zune because the software sucks, then that's an ease-of-use issue.
If you want to use the Zune as more than just a paperweight, you need the software. Therefore, the software needs to work for the Zune to be easy to use.
Zune shipped with an installer that has problems. That says nothing about the ease of use of the product itself.
The column is aimed at consumers, not nerds. If consumers can't get the Zune working, and they can get an iPod working, in their minds, it's the Zune's fault, whether it's due to a crappy installer, or whatever.
The copyright will be owned by their estate, or pass to their children. The code is still under copyright for about 100 years after their death. The main problem is that you have to hunt down the dead coder's will, figure out who then has control of his copyrights, and then try to explain it to a person who may well know nothing about programming, and convince them to sign the form or whatever.
Then you have to re-implement all the code that you can't get relicensed, either because you can't track down the original owner, or you can't get them to agree to the change. That's going to be a lot of code, and may introduce a fair few bugs.
All of that skips the really hard part: Figure out who owns what code. For a given module, let's say that A writes the first version, B updates it, and then C fixes a bug. You need A's permission to relicense the module at all, and you need B and C's permission if you don't want to start with the older version. If you get C's permission, but not B's, you're out of luck. And I'm sure that any given kernel module has 5 or more contributors.
That's good. Now when my secretary sends me an Internets, it can drive a dumptruck through the tubes to my computer. That'll fix the clogged pipes problem.
XP will be supported fully for 2 years after the release of Vista, and will get extended support for 5 years after that. Companies can get XP security updates until 2014.
Does anyone else find it funny that after all the delays to Vista, the RTM was delayed by like 2 weeks? I mean, they "launch" to major businesses at month's end, I'm glad they're getting the code out a bit before the launch.
Yes, but that doesn't help with determining the authenticy or source of the email, does it? That might prove that they were read, but unless he had read them pretty recently, they're not going to be in a cache (assuming he does a lot of browsing and/or cleans it regularly.
As part of a massive court settlement in the mid-90s, Microsoft paid Apple for a cross-licensing deal on all software-related patents. They did this to settle a lawsuit that had been going on since the beginning of Windows, since Apple owns patents on stuff like menus and stuff, and they also claim that MS stole the "look and feel" of the originial Mac OS. So they paid Apple off to get a cross-licensing deal and also help prop it up when it was struggling, so that MS would look like less of a monopoly. Therefore, any functionality Apple's BSD-inherited or GNU-inherited code uses would not subject them to a lawsuit.
The BSDs are completely re-implemented Unix and are (on the kernel and systems level) more a cousin to Linux than a brother, that part is true. But patents don't cover implementations, they cover functionality. For instance, if your system uses a double or triple click, no matter where or how or who wrote the code, it violates a certain patent owned by either MS or Apple. It doesn't matter if the code is open-source or closed source or possibly tainted by someone else's IP, it all still violates the patent. BSD is only safe in the sense that it isn't supported by or sold by large companies like Linux is, and so there may not be a lot of money in going after it.
Also, they keep full power over the iPod/iTunes brand. By having some cheap crap clone player with "Made for iTunes" that is of lower quality than an iPod, they hurt the iTunes brand because it is associated with something that isn't as good as their stuff. That happened with the clones, where Apple's clone manufacturers basically used cheap parts and put together crappy computers in a lot of instances, and then sold them at lower than Apple's prices, which hurt Apple's bottom line and also had busted crap out there being associated with Mac OS 7.5 - 8.x
>>That sounds like a banal world where only 'big stadium rock' bands can survive.
I "work" in concert promotion and production about 10-15 hours a week. I can say that even the smallest band might frequently get a few hundred dollars for a night, and it's not unusual that a band only popular in a region or state might get $3000 for a night, especially if they're willing to do a bit of driving. Doing two shows of that size a week would net a decent yearly sum. Additionally, they can sell a decent amount of merchandise at those shows. I know a band that was paid $800 or $1000 for a show, and then made $200 in CD sales. It's no Dave Matthews Band type money, but it's not something to sneeze at.
US judge: pay up.
Linux company in country with unfriendly patent laws: kiss my hairy....
Sounds nice, but in a lot of the world, particulary a lot of the world with money, that won't work as easily. Eliminating US money and US developers who aren't willing to move overseas is going to do a lot of damage, even if people in more progressive countries are unfazed. And the way the whole thing is going, it won't be long until you have to enforce US patents to trade with the US, and that progressive country will see us geeks on one side and millions/billions of dollars on the other, and it's gonna go with the money.
Right, so's basically *any* operating system company, including Microsoft, Apple, and Sun. To use the often-overused car analogy, a lot of those patents are like patenting the location of a shift lever or the number of cylinders in a car. Such very general patents have been ruled to be void time and again.
And I sure hope that a lot of these do get tossed. However, as you'll recall from RIM v. NTP, the patent got tossed but RIM still had to pay umpteen million dollars. The major commercial companies cross-license, but Linux doesn't (having nothing to cross-license with, and also hating the very idea). So even if 195 of the 200 or so revelant patents get tossed, Microsoft only needs to register one as valid.
If they cut Linux use in half, they've won. They don't need to eliminate Linux, but if they can decrease the amount of money going into OSS, and if they can cut down on the number of developers, they'll slowly strangle Linux. They don't need to make Linux completely impossible to use/install, they just have to make it harder.
The author seems to be implying that because Microsoft has made an alliance with a Linux vendor they all of the sudden own all open source software ever created and can just sue people for patent infringement at will.
Microsoft already owns these patents. It's pretty obvious that OSS is violating them. Microsoft hasn't sued before out of fear of pissing off the federal government - this would bring back the spectre of the anti-trust suits. So this agreement doesn't make the patent suits any more or less possible, it just makes MS less afraid to file them.
But I don't see how they can actually make that work. That is, if MS were to buy a company that makes wheels, I don't think they could go to court subsequently and successfully sue people who are buying non-MS-licensed wheels. Or am I just being naive - does MS have the legal clout to effectively say that as long as they provide a product, no one else can legally provide that product? And if they can do that, what's stopping them from just providing a "Microsoft licensed" version of all the IP that's currently public domain?
Microsoft owns patents on A LOT of software stuff. So does Apple, and does IBM. Microsoft and Apple have patent licensing deals - "you can use my patents, and I can use yours", which between the two of them cover stuff like menus, double-clicks, and pretty much every thing else in computers. They also have patents that cover all sorts of file types. Linux could violate anything from a few dozen to over a hundred of these patents. There's no way around them aside from not using stuff like double-clicks. Apple doesn't want to sue anyone in the OSS field, because they use a lot of open stuff, like WebKit (KHTML), Samba, a lot of their kernel, etc. Microsoft, however, has a lot of patents. They can't sue for Apple's patents, or other patents they've licensed, but they have a fair few they could deploy.
In short, if a tire company owned a patent on some part of the tire, then other companies would have to either pay for a license, not use the method, or get sued.
You're right, there isn't. In fact, you used to (like in the 1800s) sign your ballot. I think the Civil Rights Acts or the Voting Rights Act says something on the subject though.
Slashdot Mirror
Yes, the money still moves around the money-go-round (love the term, BTW), but the fact is that traded something productive for a bunch of lawyers talking. If we had that productive thing, then the money spent later would be even more effective. You're not just moving money around, you're experiencing an opportunity cost.
That's the Broken Window Fallacy. Money not wasted on lawsuits could be spend on something else, specifically something else that provides the economy (and the involved company) with more utility. If IBM didn't have to spend millions defending itself, it could go spend that money on hurrying up 65 nm production of the Cell processor, or building a bigger super-computer, or making improvements to AIX or Linux.
The "Linux Game Market" for any given game is the set of people who are all of the following:
Run Linux as a desktop
Are interested in games
Are willing to put non-free software on their free Linux system
Have some $ to spend on a game
Think pirating software is wrong.
Think YOUR game is worth spending $ on.
You missed one. Namely - "Don't already have the game under Windows and can't get it to work under WINE". That's the big one, because people won't spend another $50 if they already have a solution. As WINE improves, and as virtualization adds hardware graphics support (which could be coming to some extent in a year's time), there's going to be less incentive for a native version.
What was difficult to get working was the PC software, not the Zune itself. No, the install process has nothing to do with the ease-of-use of the Zune itself.
THE SOFTWARE IS A PART OF THE ZUNE. There is no distinction necessary. It came in the box, and is necessary for correct operation of the Zune. If the software install fails, and you have to do a bunch of stuff to get it to install (which may or may not be commonplace, but did happen to the author), then you have to do a butt-load of work to USE the Zune. If it's hard to use the Zune because the software sucks, then that's an ease-of-use issue.
If you want to use the Zune as more than just a paperweight, you need the software. Therefore, the software needs to work for the Zune to be easy to use.
Zune shipped with an installer that has problems. That says nothing about the ease of use of the product itself.
The column is aimed at consumers, not nerds. If consumers can't get the Zune working, and they can get an iPod working, in their minds, it's the Zune's fault, whether it's due to a crappy installer, or whatever.
The copyright will be owned by their estate, or pass to their children. The code is still under copyright for about 100 years after their death. The main problem is that you have to hunt down the dead coder's will, figure out who then has control of his copyrights, and then try to explain it to a person who may well know nothing about programming, and convince them to sign the form or whatever.
Then you have to re-implement all the code that you can't get relicensed, either because you can't track down the original owner, or you can't get them to agree to the change. That's going to be a lot of code, and may introduce a fair few bugs.
All of that skips the really hard part: Figure out who owns what code. For a given module, let's say that A writes the first version, B updates it, and then C fixes a bug. You need A's permission to relicense the module at all, and you need B and C's permission if you don't want to start with the older version. If you get C's permission, but not B's, you're out of luck. And I'm sure that any given kernel module has 5 or more contributors.
Apple is cross-licensed with MS. IBM isn't, and Red Hat, HP and other developers have some relevant patents.
That's good. Now when my secretary sends me an Internets, it can drive a dumptruck through the tubes to my computer. That'll fix the clogged pipes problem.
Actually, OEMs can sell XP for 12 months after Vista comes out, and you can get it retail for 24.
Planned obsolescence.
XP will be supported fully for 2 years after the release of Vista, and will get extended support for 5 years after that. Companies can get XP security updates until 2014.
You should be aiming your anger at CNN, for using the DMCA to remove commentary critical of it from the Net.
Does anyone else find it funny that after all the delays to Vista, the RTM was delayed by like 2 weeks? I mean, they "launch" to major businesses at month's end, I'm glad they're getting the code out a bit before the launch.
Yes, but that doesn't help with determining the authenticy or source of the email, does it? That might prove that they were read, but unless he had read them pretty recently, they're not going to be in a cache (assuming he does a lot of browsing and/or cleans it regularly.
As part of a massive court settlement in the mid-90s, Microsoft paid Apple for a cross-licensing deal on all software-related patents. They did this to settle a lawsuit that had been going on since the beginning of Windows, since Apple owns patents on stuff like menus and stuff, and they also claim that MS stole the "look and feel" of the originial Mac OS. So they paid Apple off to get a cross-licensing deal and also help prop it up when it was struggling, so that MS would look like less of a monopoly. Therefore, any functionality Apple's BSD-inherited or GNU-inherited code uses would not subject them to a lawsuit.
The BSDs are completely re-implemented Unix and are (on the kernel and systems level) more a cousin to Linux than a brother, that part is true. But patents don't cover implementations, they cover functionality. For instance, if your system uses a double or triple click, no matter where or how or who wrote the code, it violates a certain patent owned by either MS or Apple. It doesn't matter if the code is open-source or closed source or possibly tainted by someone else's IP, it all still violates the patent. BSD is only safe in the sense that it isn't supported by or sold by large companies like Linux is, and so there may not be a lot of money in going after it.
Also, they keep full power over the iPod/iTunes brand. By having some cheap crap clone player with "Made for iTunes" that is of lower quality than an iPod, they hurt the iTunes brand because it is associated with something that isn't as good as their stuff. That happened with the clones, where Apple's clone manufacturers basically used cheap parts and put together crappy computers in a lot of instances, and then sold them at lower than Apple's prices, which hurt Apple's bottom line and also had busted crap out there being associated with Mac OS 7.5 - 8.x
>>That sounds like a banal world where only 'big stadium rock' bands can survive.
I "work" in concert promotion and production about 10-15 hours a week. I can say that even the smallest band might frequently get a few hundred dollars for a night, and it's not unusual that a band only popular in a region or state might get $3000 for a night, especially if they're willing to do a bit of driving. Doing two shows of that size a week would net a decent yearly sum. Additionally, they can sell a decent amount of merchandise at those shows. I know a band that was paid $800 or $1000 for a show, and then made $200 in CD sales. It's no Dave Matthews Band type money, but it's not something to sneeze at.
>>these bands were popular a while ago.
What's your point? They were at one point popular, which happens to be the time the guy managed them.
US judge: pay up. Linux company in country with unfriendly patent laws: kiss my hairy....
Sounds nice, but in a lot of the world, particulary a lot of the world with money, that won't work as easily. Eliminating US money and US developers who aren't willing to move overseas is going to do a lot of damage, even if people in more progressive countries are unfazed. And the way the whole thing is going, it won't be long until you have to enforce US patents to trade with the US, and that progressive country will see us geeks on one side and millions/billions of dollars on the other, and it's gonna go with the money.
Right, so's basically *any* operating system company, including Microsoft, Apple, and Sun. To use the often-overused car analogy, a lot of those patents are like patenting the location of a shift lever or the number of cylinders in a car. Such very general patents have been ruled to be void time and again.
And I sure hope that a lot of these do get tossed. However, as you'll recall from RIM v. NTP, the patent got tossed but RIM still had to pay umpteen million dollars. The major commercial companies cross-license, but Linux doesn't (having nothing to cross-license with, and also hating the very idea). So even if 195 of the 200 or so revelant patents get tossed, Microsoft only needs to register one as valid.
>>Besides, Micro$oft tried to pull a cute trick liek that in 2000/2001 with SCO.
The difference is that Linux was innocent of SCO's charges, but is clearly guilty of the patent charges.
If they cut Linux use in half, they've won. They don't need to eliminate Linux, but if they can decrease the amount of money going into OSS, and if they can cut down on the number of developers, they'll slowly strangle Linux. They don't need to make Linux completely impossible to use/install, they just have to make it harder.
The author seems to be implying that because Microsoft has made an alliance with a Linux vendor they all of the sudden own all open source software ever created and can just sue people for patent infringement at will.
Microsoft already owns these patents. It's pretty obvious that OSS is violating them. Microsoft hasn't sued before out of fear of pissing off the federal government - this would bring back the spectre of the anti-trust suits. So this agreement doesn't make the patent suits any more or less possible, it just makes MS less afraid to file them.
But I don't see how they can actually make that work. That is, if MS were to buy a company that makes wheels, I don't think they could go to court subsequently and successfully sue people who are buying non-MS-licensed wheels. Or am I just being naive - does MS have the legal clout to effectively say that as long as they provide a product, no one else can legally provide that product? And if they can do that, what's stopping them from just providing a "Microsoft licensed" version of all the IP that's currently public domain?
Microsoft owns patents on A LOT of software stuff. So does Apple, and does IBM. Microsoft and Apple have patent licensing deals - "you can use my patents, and I can use yours", which between the two of them cover stuff like menus, double-clicks, and pretty much every thing else in computers. They also have patents that cover all sorts of file types. Linux could violate anything from a few dozen to over a hundred of these patents. There's no way around them aside from not using stuff like double-clicks. Apple doesn't want to sue anyone in the OSS field, because they use a lot of open stuff, like WebKit (KHTML), Samba, a lot of their kernel, etc. Microsoft, however, has a lot of patents. They can't sue for Apple's patents, or other patents they've licensed, but they have a fair few they could deploy.
In short, if a tire company owned a patent on some part of the tire, then other companies would have to either pay for a license, not use the method, or get sued.
You're right, there isn't. In fact, you used to (like in the 1800s) sign your ballot. I think the Civil Rights Acts or the Voting Rights Act says something on the subject though.