Aren't you answering your own question? Google decided to *filter results in the China market*.
No, I'm not answering my own question. Google was seen as complicit in censoring free speech in the China market by agreeing to expand into China, and then agreeing to filter search results. I think that *is* a bad thing, for the record. What I don't understand is why Stallman is being given a "Yay Open Source!" free pass on publicly congratulating & praising these repressive, often-times brutal regimes, who are looking for cheaper and more robust ways to run their prisons and track dissidents -- remember, read the article, it talks about the GOVERNMENTS of Cuba & Venezuela. This is not some great public-spirited gesture by Castro to put a PC in every home. So what I fail to see is how enabling repression ("Better, faster, more robust systems to run your prisons! Beowulf Clusters to track your dissidents' every move!") results in MORE freedom for the citizens of Cuba & Venezuela.
The fact that Stallman isn't going out of his way to be champion to fight *all* the bad things that happens in the world is mainly a choice by him, realizing that one can't find everything bad in the world at the same time.
I'm not asking him to cure the sick, give money to the poor, clothe the naked, and feed the hungry. I'm simply asking him to be consistent on his message that freedom is good, and I invite him to say so to the government of Cuba & Venezuela. Not congratulate them for valuing freedom, which they clearly do not.
This is not "Yays! Linuxes for the Peoples!" This is "Oh nos! Linuxes for your gulags, re-education centers, and government ministries!" The money the government saved will only be plowed right back into the pockets of the governors, or into finding new & creative ways to persecute dissidents & clamp down on "dangerous" freedoms. Or did you really think that the students at the state-run, state-controlled universities will be allowed complete freedom to set up a Cuban version of MySpace where dissidents can meet, plan, and disseminate their ideas?
And, also for the record, is there a single person here on Slashdot who really believes that the governments of Cuba & Venezuela would bat an eyelash about violating the spirit, letter, sanctity, and pure white virginity of the GPL if they thought it would somehow benefit them and give them greater control?
Middle-aged communist bureaucrats and ponytailed young Cuban programmers applauded as the computer scientist from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology insisted that copyright laws violate basic morality; he compared them to laws that would threaten people with jail for sharing or modifying kitchen recipes.
Is there anybody else who finds this deliciously ironic, considering that he's preaching this particular line of rhetoric to the government of Cuba, which regularly and freely represses dissent, jails opponents, and maintains a completely monopoly on the media? Perhaps a better comparison would be Stallman saying that laws on copyright violate basic morality, because it would be like threatening people with jail for sharing unapproved thoughts & news.
Stallman also warned that proprietary software is a security threat because without being able to examine the code, users can't know what it's doing or what "backdoor" holes developers might have left open for future entry. "A private program is never trustworthy," he said.
Not sure I entirely understand how Stallman isn't getting slagged for this, after Google got so roundly derided about its decisions to filter results in the China market... after all, Google is a company, interested in profits. Stallman professes to be all about idealism, and freedom, doesn't he?
First off -- I never said that the idea of putting this system into schools was a good idea. What I said was that the title & summary of this slashdot article are sensationalist garbage intended to increase readership. GO READ THE PATENT APPLICATION. Microsoft is NOT filing a patent on "repossessing school computers". They are filing for a patent on a system for ensuring that attention is being paid to the advertising that is supporting the computer system displaying the ads.
The only reference to schools in the entire application is where they talk about also being able to tie multiple systems to a common owner & set of policies, "such as" a business or school.
I have NOT said that these systems should be allowed in schools. I HAVE said that the patent is NOT about repossessing school computers. In short, your response is without merit, and only shows your complete inability or unwillingness to RTFA.
The key point here is not that the terms "only appear once in the patent," it is that they "DO NOT appear in the context or sense that the article summary & headline suggest." Hence "yellow journalism."
Go actually read through the patent application, and understand what it's talking about. Then come back and try to defend Slashdot's principled editorial practices & groupthink.
You didn't bother to even skim the patent application, did you? I know, I know. "Welcome to Slashdot."
If you're really that weak-minded that being exposed to advertising is going to suddenly change you that drastically, maybe you should just leave the tinfoil hat on.
A subliminal message is a signal or message embedded in another object, designed to pass below the normal limits of perception. These messages are indiscernible to the conscious mind, but are alleged to be perceptible to the subconscious or deeper mind: for example, an image transmitted so briefly that it is only perceived subconsciously, but not otherwise noticed. Subliminal techniques have occasionally been used in advertising and propaganda; the purpose, effectiveness and frequency of such techniques is debated.
Unless you're "subconsciously" using an advertising-financed computer to access sites, view this advertising, and answer questions about it in order to get some sort of "credit" for having watched the ad, then no, we can't just call this subliminal. I'll tell you, I'd love it if we lived in a world were things were automatically whatever I called them, but you see, words have specific meanings.
If you don't like the advertising-supported terminals, you don't have to use them. You're free to continue using your home PC, instead of a public terminal that will allow you 15 minutes of access for viewing a minute worth of ads.
That's up to the USPTO to figure out, or a court when MSFT & Quividi end up in court, if there are substantial patent infringements on either side. I'm not judging the validity of the patent application, I'm simply saying that the summary & article headline are simply sensationalist crap intended to boost Slashdot's advertising revenues.
Slashdot should file a patent on a method & apparatus for boosting advertising revenue by at least 50%:
Find patent application from MSFT.
Complete distort its meaning so that what you say it means is COMPLETELY different from it's actual purpose.
Post purple-prosed distortion to front page of Slashdot, making sure that you hit at least three of the following four topics:
Microsoft -- BAD(tm)
Patents -- BAD(tm)
THINK OF THE KIDS!
Big Brother is Watching!
Wait for the surge of outraged geeks to read the article & comments, boosting your ad hits.
PROFIT!
Finally, a complete list without "6. ???" in it... I think this one's the real deal!
Okay, did you actually go and *read* -- hell, even *SKIM* -- the patent application? They say NOTHING about "tracking eyeballs". The references to cameras indicate that a camera device can be attached to the computer to do things like, verify the presence of a user, or capture an image of the environment, or the user, either automatically or if the user wants it to. I'm not saying there aren't privacy & ethical implications to capturing images of a person, but again, this is sensationalism. The camera is NOT being used to "track eyeballs". (Please, by all means, if you can find the phrase "tracking eye movement", or some similar phrase, in the patent application, prove me wrong.)
Here's what the basis of the patent is about: "When the challenge relating to ad viewing is correctly answered, a value associated with viewing the ad may be credited to a user account, either locally or at a clearinghouse or other repository." In other words... "Use our free internet terminal! Watch 3 ads, and get 10 minutes of usage for free!" How do they determine if you've watched 3 ads? Well, that's what this system is attempting to patent.
If you don't want to be forced to look at advertisements, then simply don't use the systems with this software installed...
Yeah, I'm a little skeptical, too, for several reasons:
I find it hard to believe that, after MULTIPLE calls to Dell, nobody could provide him with a direct contact for a legal department, or some sort of consumer affairs person. Unless he just called to harrass them, and didn't bother asking for someone he could talk to about legal / consumer affairs.
I find it hard to believe that his insurance company would tell him, "Sure, go ahead and call Dell's customer tech support and harrass them because they're Indian and have funny accents. Then post an article about it on the web."
It's a 130 year old farm house. Despite owning a Dell, it's very probable that he had old, out-of-code wiring all over the place, and a lot of dry, dry, dry wood & other building materials. I find it a little difficult to believe that after just a "few hours" of investigation, the Fire Marshal was able to pinpoint that a laptop, battery, or cord was the source of the fire. Having a burned-up laptop is not sufficient to claim that it started the fire. They'll need to investigate burn patterns, figure out where the fire started from, and then find the remains of the laptop to show that something indeed went wrong to cause the laptop to burn up from inside, rather than it simply being melted & burned from the outside by a fire started elsewhere.
If this is true, I feel bad for the guy... but at least he was insured, and I'm sure that if the source of the fire *was* a Dell, Dell will be happy to hand him (or his insurance company) a bunch of cash on the condition that he doesn't talk about it anymore. But it does seem rather vague & incomplete.
While you're correct about dog fighting, technically: "In the United States cockfighting is illegal in Washington, D.C. and all states but New Mexico and Louisiana. It is legal in the U.S. Territories of Puerto Rico, the Virgin Islands and Guam."
So it's entirely possible that at least the cockfighting magazines have a legal leg to stand on, where they are not completely illegal everywhere. IANAL by any means, but it seems like it would only be illegal to buy it and have it if cockfighting is illegal in your state, and perhaps not even then, so long as you're not actually holding matches in your basement?
This is a stupid heading, and a stupid summary. The point of the patent is not, as the headline indicates, to "patent a method for repossessing school computers." The point of the patent is to provide a method for validating that users are actually paying attention to the advertisements that are being displayed. The terms "school" and "repossess" each appear once in the patent application:
[ . . . ] several response are possible, from noting a user's record but taking no action, to a follow up communication with the user, to disabling or even repossessing the computer.[ . . . ]
[ . . . ] Alternately, the policy may extend to a group of computers and correspondingly to a common owner, for example, a business or school.[ . . . ]
Shame on you, submitter & editor. This is NOTHING but sensationalism. The notion of "repossessing" the computer is used as an example of a step that could be taken if the advertising is not being paid attention to. Since the terminal is financed by that advertising, it would make sense to stop paying for it and take it back for redeployment elsewhere. If I'm an advertiser, I'd prefer not to keep paying for a billboard that nobody pays attention to.
The notion of these computers being used by a school is used as an example where the patent discusses tying certain criteria to multiple computers owned by a common owner, "for example," a business or school. So, say you provide some of these adveritising-funded public terminals to an organization, such as a business or school, what you're doing is tying the policy for multiple systems to a common owner.
But the summary & title make it sound like MSFT is targeting school computers as if they could just swoop in, snatch them all up, and resell them on the black market. This is one of the lamest attempts at MSFT-bashing I've seen. Bash them if you must, but for god's sake, bash them for something that's actually a REAL issue, not this crap. What's next? "MSFT submits patent for punching babies, snapping bra straps of young mothers?!"?
I'd say I expect better of the editors, at least, but well... it IS slashdot.
Okay, a basic physics lesson. Distance & time are NOT "interchangeable". They can be related to one another, but they are NOT the same.
Distance = Rate x Time.
A light year is defined as the distance a photon of light would travel in a perfect vacuum in a Julian Year. It is very much a measure of distance, as it is a combination of rate (the speed of light) and time (1 julian year of 31,557,600 seconds, or 365.25 days). Beats measuring the distance in miles.
I am not sure if you can hire an H1-B when there is a local candidate explaining "the foreigner is better."
Maybe not by saying it as such, but if your local candidate isn't qualified for the job, and the foreigner *is*, it's not so hard to say, "Hey, the local candidates aren't qualified." Yes, the law may give "preference" to local candidates with similar qualifications, but it's not very hard to simply say, "Sorry, you're not really a good fit for the team, and we're looking for someone with a little more experience with X, Y, or Z."
And I'm not disagreeing with your point. The person I initially responded to was the one complaining about H1-B candidates "taking our high-paying jobs"... not me. I have a job that pays all right, and I'm perfectly willing to demonstrate my value to my company in order to retain the job. I have no fear that I'm suddenly going to lose my job to someone with an H1-B.
More info about Bonjour, Apple's "zero-configuration networking" tool, is available here.
It's what allows ITunes library sharing automatically on your local network, and can be built into other Windows apps as well. It's kind of a neat feature to allow things like printers, etc. to advertise services on a local network, and it's used pretty extensively on OS X -- Itunes Sharing, IPhoto sharing, printer config, various apps, all use it to advertise services on your local network that other users on the network can discover & connect to easily. Good if you trust the other users on your network (i.e., home network), bad if you walk around with freely discoverable services & no firewall on a public network.:)
Yes, Apple should spend loads of time porting software which implements & supports DRM to a platform & user community that overwhelmingly ranges in attitude from antipathy to violent loathing of anything that falls in the category of DRM. And in doing so, abandon a platform which is going to ship with probably 90+% of the desktop/laptop computers shipping very soon?
Unless I suppoes you also want to test how your cross-platform app runs on Vista Home. (Which will likely be the most widely installed version)
The point is that Microsoft wants you to pay more if you're going to virtualize, period. Whether you're using Mac, Linux, or Windows as the virtualization host, you're going to pay this "Mac Tax" that the original article is whining about.
All of which makes the whole argument of being better than the H1-B candidate stronger, then. If I have to sponsor a guy (or gal) for an H1-B, and pay him the same as I'd pay a local candidate, the only reason NOT to go with a local candidate is if the local candidate, for lack of a better word, sucks. So the notion of the gp comment, that they're "stealing our jobs" and we "shouldn't let them" becomes even more irrelevant.
Seriously, if H1-B salary is high, they take away our well-paid jobs, and we shouldn't let them. If H1-B salary is low, they take away our lowly jobs, and we shouldn't let them too.
Want to "not let them" take away your jobs? Be more valuable to the company than the H1-B applicant is. If someone can go to Redmond and do the same quality work as you for 10% less, why wouldn't they hire the other guy? He's cheaper, and they get the same quality of work.
But, in any case, the idea of paying $400 for Vista Ultimate + $80 for Parallels, just to run the occasional windows only binary on your mac, is incredibly noxious.
So then why not simply load Boot Camp (no $80 Parallels required) plus Vista Home (save $200+ dollars)? For users who do coding, and cross-platform testing, and things of that nature, virtualization is a god-send, because you can run multiple images for testing all on the same piece of hardware. For users who need to, occasionally, run Microsoft Money to manage their checkbook, well, find an alternative that runs on the Mac, or buy a $99 OEM version of XP Home, install it under boot camp, and call it a day.
The entire retarded blog entry of a submission makes no sense. The title is flamebait. The content is monumentally unaware of what virtualization actually is. And this entire discussion is stupid. Virtualization is not a Mac-only technology, and in fact, it's rather late to the Mac platform in any significant way (Parallels & Vmware only came on in a big way when the Intel switch began). If you want to run Windows in a virtualized environment, you have to buy a more expensive version, regardless of whether your virtualization host is Mac, Windows, or GNU/Linux.
On the bad hand one cannot help but wonder what kind of harmful uses this database could be used for.
You list a specific good -- use of the images as a historical resource -- and then you go on to speculate about some potential "maybe-bad" that could come from it. Like what? I seriously fail to see what "harmful" use a database of ground-level views of homes from the road in front of the home could be put to. If they don't trespass on your property to get the photo, and they allow you opt out of the database (which the article states they do provide for), this just seems like so much hand-waving and speculation for no reason.
when you leave your state to the state next door, have you entered a strange foreign land?
Not a "strange" foreign land, but a land in which the laws are, or may very well be, significantly different. I recently moved from Massachusetts to New Hampshire. Lots of things are VERY different in New Hampshire. For instance:
I'm allowed to keep 5.85% more of my paycheck every month, because I don't pay state income tax in NH.
I don't have to tack 5% onto every sale for sales tax most times I purchase something.
For instance, my state-issued driver's license isn't valid for the same amount of time as it was in Massachusetts.
I can buy beer & wine in my local grocery store in NH, but I have to go to a state-run liquor store for any harder liquors.
So is it a "strange foreign land"? No, not in the same way that I'd feel like I was in a strange foreign land if you dropped me down in the middle of Bangkok. But are there very real differences between Massachusetts & New Hampshire? You bet. There are some federal laws which are very much the same, because they apply to ALL states. And then there are the local laws, which aren't very much the same, because they are made at the State House in Concord, NH, rather than at the State House in Boston, MA.
did 9/11 happen to americans? or new yorkers?
is illegal immigration only a problem for texas? or for the usa?
Funny you should pick those two items. Let's look at what the Constitution has to say about them!
The Congress shall have power to [ . . . ] provide for the common defense and general welfare of the United States; [ . . . ]
To establish a uniform rule of naturalization [ . . . ]
To raise and support armies, but no appropriation of money to that use shall be for a longer term than two years;
To provide and maintain a navy;
To make rules for the government and regulation of the land and naval forces;
To provide for calling forth the militia to execute the laws of the union, suppress insurrections and repel invasions;[ . . . ]
(From Article I, Section 8, of the Constitution of the United States of America)
Now, given that the constitution specifically charges the federal legislature with the responsibility to provide for the defense of the USA, as well as setting up a uniform code of naturalization, that specifically makes the two items you mention -- defense & illegal immigration -- federal matters. I'm certain that the argument for a national ID will be strongly based on the "defense" theme, and whether or not that justifies this as a federal matter will be up to far better legal minds than you or I to decide.
You can scream "identity politics" all day long, but the simple fact is this: the Constitution defines (and in many cases, explicitly limits) the powers of the federal government. If the Constitution does not explicitly grant a power to the federal government, or explicitly restrict a power from the states, the assumption is that the state retains the power to decide on that particular matter, unless & until a constitutional basis is shown for federal jurisdiction over the matter. This was such an important concept that they felt the need to add this particular statement as Amendment 10 to the Constitution:
The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the states, are reserved to the states respectively, or to the people.
I just think criminal courts should be left to dealing with people that actually hurts others. I'm sure MySpace was fine.
Yes, you're right, the exploit didn't "hurt" others, if by "hurt" you require physical harm to come to someone. But it did disrupt MySpace's operations (they make lots of money through advertising), and cost them the additional overhead of having their system administrators, etc. having to respond to this -- system administrators (much like a bunch of the people who frequent Slashdot, I'm sure) who have families & lives outside of work, who had to respond to this unexpected incident by spending extra hours at work, delaying other projects they're working on, and cancelling plans they had while they responded to the crisis. I'd say that's reasonably harmful, even if nobody actually had medical bills as a result of this.
I'm sorry, but if this were a system I was responsible for, I'd want to see the book thrown at the little douchebag who made me give up a bunch of my personal time to fix a problem he caused. Probation + community service + a ban on using the internet for "some undisclosed time" isn't so bad. Maybe he'll learn the lesson that you don't fuck with other people's stuff, just because it may be easy to or because you think it's funny.
It seems like you could substitute ANY form of entertainment for the word "games" in that title. The companies chase money... if they see a blockbuster, they're going to rush to produce their own copy of that blockbuster's "formula." Same as with movies. Same as with music. Does it dumb down the landscape? Sure. Does it mark the "end of gaming as we know it"? I don't see why it should. Did Britney Spears & her million clones mark the end of music as we know it? Nope, not at all... it dumbed down commercial radio into a monotonous "sameness", but there's still people out there making interesting & innovative music.
Why do you people feel the need to defend the illegitimate strong arming practices of big businesses?
I won't pretend that I think Microsoft is going to win friends & influence enemies with these tactics -- I think it's a perfectly good way to drive away paying customers by hassling them. But I'll also assert that if the terms of sale clearly give Microsoft the ability to do this to you, then you've no right to cry foul when they say they're going to exercise that ability. If you don't read your license agreement, whose fault is that? The license essentially indicates that you are "renting" the software, not purchasing it -- you are purchasing the right to use it, as described in the license agreement, which seems to state that Microsoft has the authority to audit your use if they feel it necessary.
What's so noble about big businesses picking on smaller ones that you feel inclined to speak up and try to defend such tactics with your ill concieved analogys?
This has nothing to do with "big business" picking on "little business." This has to do with Microsoft putting nasty terms into it's EULA's and then everybody being surprised and crying, "Gracious no, those terms couldn't actually apply to US!" And by the same token, what in your mind magically fumigates a company breaking a licensing agreement by virtue of their being "SMALL" or simply "NOT-MICROSOFT"? (Thought exercise: Would it be okay for a company to violate the GPL in similar fashion, and equally as monstrous for the FSF or similar OSS organization to sue them for violating the GPL? Discuss. Cisco's quite interested in what you have to say.)
If you use the software, you should abide by the terms of the license, whether it's purchased or not. If you don't like the terms of the license, then use an alternative piece of software. Read around here on Slashdot, there's plenty of helpful people pointing out alternatives to Microsoft products that are free as in beer, free as in speech, and which provide functional replacements for any Microsoft product available.
In this case, companies have plenty of choices: Buy the license & abide by the terms; use equivalent free software, or cheaper commercial software; or take Microsoft & the BSA to court when they slap you with an audit and try to convince a court of law that the terms of the licensing contract are somehow unenforceable. Whine that the terms Microsoft wants to sell software on are "evil" if you must, but don't whine that MSFT is "evil" for enforcing the terms of the license agreement you entered into with them voluntarily.
They're much more likely to try it out if they have the CD sitting in front of them.
I hate to be a Negative Nelly, but I think it's far more likely that the teachers and other adults at the school will continue using whatever is loaded on the systems, because that's what they've learned to use, that's what they've been trained on, and they're probably going to be fairly resistant to change. What's the reasoning that makes you think that having the CD means anyone in the school is more likely to give it a try?
Also, we're targeting the students more than the schools themselves, the schools are just a vehicle for distribution.
Okay, so you want the students, not the teachers & administrators. Let me ask this... show of hands: how many people involved with computers from a young age got truly *excited* by the opportunity to use WordPefect, AmiPro, Word, Notepad, or some other text editor? I honestly don't see the distribution of OO.o install CDs as a very compelling way to gain new OSS users. Finish this sentence: "Install this awesome software named OpenOffice.org, and you can _____________" -- What? Write a report? Type your English homework? Deliver a PowerPoint-ish presentation to your Biology class? Would you have actually been turned on by those prospects when you were aged 12 to 18?
I think your heart is in the right place, and I think it's a noble goal. But I don't think your proposed method of winning new converts to the OSS fold is going to gain much traction amongst students. Here's a modest suggestion for a likely alternative:
Pick a full linux distro; Ubuntu, SUSE, Fedora, whatever.
Pack said distro with "Kid-useful" software.
IM software (Kopete? Gaim? Others?)
Modern browser (Firefox? Opera? Others?)
Video & Music support (I'm under the impression there might be some licensing issues... at the *very* least, you better make it as easy as clicking a button to enable these things.)
Email (Thunderbird? Evolution? Others?)
Calendaring + something that works with online calendars like Google's ("Coordinate your calendars with your friends! Send & receive invites!")
Good RSS reader ("Subscribe to your friends' blogs!")
TONS of themes for everything. (Look at MySpace, and tell me kids don't like customizing, even if the results are ass-ugly.
Distribute this kid-useful distro as a LiveCD.
Distribute a set of simple, jargon-free, lucid instructions for installing the LiveCD, clearly pointing out the need to backup & save their data before they overwrite their Windows system. Explain what all the terms mean.
make this liveCD's install default to sensible, secure defaults and explain WHY they are defaulted that way, as well as how to change them.
Include pointers to more docs, useful help forums, and more software. Most kids aren't going to do much with MySQL, PHP, Tomcat, and a full-blown Eclipse / Callisto install. No need to bloat the image with dozens of programming tools, but make it easy to install them if the kids want to take that next step.
Bottom line is, you won't sell kids on the value of Open Source by handing them stodgy office software -- OSS will instead become synonymous with boring drudge work. Handing out office software to kids sounds to me like a guaranteed way to ensure that no kid will touch Linux and Open Source software except the dyed-in-the-wool geeks who would find Linux anyway on their own.
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I'm not asking him to cure the sick, give money to the poor, clothe the naked, and feed the hungry. I'm simply asking him to be consistent on his message that freedom is good, and I invite him to say so to the government of Cuba & Venezuela. Not congratulate them for valuing freedom, which they clearly do not.
This is not "Yays! Linuxes for the Peoples!" This is "Oh nos! Linuxes for your gulags, re-education centers, and government ministries!" The money the government saved will only be plowed right back into the pockets of the governors, or into finding new & creative ways to persecute dissidents & clamp down on "dangerous" freedoms. Or did you really think that the students at the state-run, state-controlled universities will be allowed complete freedom to set up a Cuban version of MySpace where dissidents can meet, plan, and disseminate their ideas?
And, also for the record, is there a single person here on Slashdot who really believes that the governments of Cuba & Venezuela would bat an eyelash about violating the spirit, letter, sanctity, and pure white virginity of the GPL if they thought it would somehow benefit them and give them greater control?
Again, very funny. Because the governments of Cuba & Venezuela are both ALL ABOUT freedom of information for their citizens. Oh, except Venezuela is also cracking down on the freedom of the press, firing judges who dare to challenge its authority, and let's not forget prison conditions... but other than that? Yays Open Sources!!!!
Not sure I entirely understand how Stallman isn't getting slagged for this, after Google got so roundly derided about its decisions to filter results in the China market... after all, Google is a company, interested in profits. Stallman professes to be all about idealism, and freedom, doesn't he?
That's right. Let's "THINK OF THE KIDS!"
First off -- I never said that the idea of putting this system into schools was a good idea. What I said was that the title & summary of this slashdot article are sensationalist garbage intended to increase readership. GO READ THE PATENT APPLICATION. Microsoft is NOT filing a patent on "repossessing school computers". They are filing for a patent on a system for ensuring that attention is being paid to the advertising that is supporting the computer system displaying the ads.
The only reference to schools in the entire application is where they talk about also being able to tie multiple systems to a common owner & set of policies, "such as" a business or school.
I have NOT said that these systems should be allowed in schools. I HAVE said that the patent is NOT about repossessing school computers. In short, your response is without merit, and only shows your complete inability or unwillingness to RTFA.
The key point here is not that the terms "only appear once in the patent," it is that they "DO NOT appear in the context or sense that the article summary & headline suggest." Hence "yellow journalism."
Go actually read through the patent application, and understand what it's talking about. Then come back and try to defend Slashdot's principled editorial practices & groupthink.
You didn't bother to even skim the patent application, did you? I know, I know. "Welcome to Slashdot."
If you're really that weak-minded that being exposed to advertising is going to suddenly change you that drastically, maybe you should just leave the tinfoil hat on.
Unless you're "subconsciously" using an advertising-financed computer to access sites, view this advertising, and answer questions about it in order to get some sort of "credit" for having watched the ad, then no, we can't just call this subliminal. I'll tell you, I'd love it if we lived in a world were things were automatically whatever I called them, but you see, words have specific meanings.
If you don't like the advertising-supported terminals, you don't have to use them. You're free to continue using your home PC, instead of a public terminal that will allow you 15 minutes of access for viewing a minute worth of ads.
Slashdot should file a patent on a method & apparatus for boosting advertising revenue by at least 50%:
- Find patent application from MSFT.
- Complete distort its meaning so that what you say it means is COMPLETELY different from it's actual purpose.
- Post purple-prosed distortion to front page of Slashdot, making sure that you hit at least three of the following four topics:
- Microsoft -- BAD(tm)
- Patents -- BAD(tm)
- THINK OF THE KIDS!
- Big Brother is Watching!
- Wait for the surge of outraged geeks to read the article & comments, boosting your ad hits.
- PROFIT!
Finally, a complete list without "6. ???" in it... I think this one's the real deal!Okay, did you actually go and *read* -- hell, even *SKIM* -- the patent application? They say NOTHING about "tracking eyeballs". The references to cameras indicate that a camera device can be attached to the computer to do things like, verify the presence of a user, or capture an image of the environment, or the user, either automatically or if the user wants it to. I'm not saying there aren't privacy & ethical implications to capturing images of a person, but again, this is sensationalism. The camera is NOT being used to "track eyeballs". (Please, by all means, if you can find the phrase "tracking eye movement", or some similar phrase, in the patent application, prove me wrong.)
Here's what the basis of the patent is about: "When the challenge relating to ad viewing is correctly answered, a value associated with viewing the ad may be credited to a user account, either locally or at a clearinghouse or other repository." In other words... "Use our free internet terminal! Watch 3 ads, and get 10 minutes of usage for free!" How do they determine if you've watched 3 ads? Well, that's what this system is attempting to patent.
If you don't want to be forced to look at advertisements, then simply don't use the systems with this software installed...
- I find it hard to believe that, after MULTIPLE calls to Dell, nobody could provide him with a direct contact for a legal department, or some sort of consumer affairs person. Unless he just called to harrass them, and didn't bother asking for someone he could talk to about legal / consumer affairs.
- I find it hard to believe that his insurance company would tell him, "Sure, go ahead and call Dell's customer tech support and harrass them because they're Indian and have funny accents. Then post an article about it on the web."
- It's a 130 year old farm house. Despite owning a Dell, it's very probable that he had old, out-of-code wiring all over the place, and a lot of dry, dry, dry wood & other building materials. I find it a little difficult to believe that after just a "few hours" of investigation, the Fire Marshal was able to pinpoint that a laptop, battery, or cord was the source of the fire. Having a burned-up laptop is not sufficient to claim that it started the fire. They'll need to investigate burn patterns, figure out where the fire started from, and then find the remains of the laptop to show that something indeed went wrong to cause the laptop to burn up from inside, rather than it simply being melted & burned from the outside by a fire started elsewhere.
If this is true, I feel bad for the guy... but at least he was insured, and I'm sure that if the source of the fire *was* a Dell, Dell will be happy to hand him (or his insurance company) a bunch of cash on the condition that he doesn't talk about it anymore. But it does seem rather vague & incomplete.While you're correct about dog fighting, technically: "In the United States cockfighting is illegal in Washington, D.C. and all states but New Mexico and Louisiana. It is legal in the U.S. Territories of Puerto Rico, the Virgin Islands and Guam."
So it's entirely possible that at least the cockfighting magazines have a legal leg to stand on, where they are not completely illegal everywhere. IANAL by any means, but it seems like it would only be illegal to buy it and have it if cockfighting is illegal in your state, and perhaps not even then, so long as you're not actually holding matches in your basement?
- [ . . . ] several response are possible, from noting a user's record but taking no action, to a follow up communication with the user, to disabling or even repossessing the computer.[ . . . ]
- [ . . . ] Alternately, the policy may extend to a group of computers and correspondingly to a common owner, for example, a business or school.[ . . . ]
Shame on you, submitter & editor. This is NOTHING but sensationalism. The notion of "repossessing" the computer is used as an example of a step that could be taken if the advertising is not being paid attention to. Since the terminal is financed by that advertising, it would make sense to stop paying for it and take it back for redeployment elsewhere. If I'm an advertiser, I'd prefer not to keep paying for a billboard that nobody pays attention to.The notion of these computers being used by a school is used as an example where the patent discusses tying certain criteria to multiple computers owned by a common owner, "for example," a business or school. So, say you provide some of these adveritising-funded public terminals to an organization, such as a business or school, what you're doing is tying the policy for multiple systems to a common owner.
But the summary & title make it sound like MSFT is targeting school computers as if they could just swoop in, snatch them all up, and resell them on the black market. This is one of the lamest attempts at MSFT-bashing I've seen. Bash them if you must, but for god's sake, bash them for something that's actually a REAL issue, not this crap. What's next? "MSFT submits patent for punching babies, snapping bra straps of young mothers?!"?
I'd say I expect better of the editors, at least, but well... it IS slashdot.
Okay, a basic physics lesson. Distance & time are NOT "interchangeable". They can be related to one another, but they are NOT the same. Distance = Rate x Time. A light year is defined as the distance a photon of light would travel in a perfect vacuum in a Julian Year. It is very much a measure of distance, as it is a combination of rate (the speed of light) and time (1 julian year of 31,557,600 seconds, or 365.25 days). Beats measuring the distance in miles.
More info about Bonjour, Apple's "zero-configuration networking" tool, is available here.
:)
It's what allows ITunes library sharing automatically on your local network, and can be built into other Windows apps as well. It's kind of a neat feature to allow things like printers, etc. to advertise services on a local network, and it's used pretty extensively on OS X -- Itunes Sharing, IPhoto sharing, printer config, various apps, all use it to advertise services on your local network that other users on the network can discover & connect to easily. Good if you trust the other users on your network (i.e., home network), bad if you walk around with freely discoverable services & no firewall on a public network.
Yes, Apple should spend loads of time porting software which implements & supports DRM to a platform & user community that overwhelmingly ranges in attitude from antipathy to violent loathing of anything that falls in the category of DRM. And in doing so, abandon a platform which is going to ship with probably 90+% of the desktop/laptop computers shipping very soon?
Capital idea, governor. Splendid.
All of which makes the whole argument of being better than the H1-B candidate stronger, then. If I have to sponsor a guy (or gal) for an H1-B, and pay him the same as I'd pay a local candidate, the only reason NOT to go with a local candidate is if the local candidate, for lack of a better word, sucks. So the notion of the gp comment, that they're "stealing our jobs" and we "shouldn't let them" becomes even more irrelevant.
The entire retarded blog entry of a submission makes no sense. The title is flamebait. The content is monumentally unaware of what virtualization actually is. And this entire discussion is stupid. Virtualization is not a Mac-only technology, and in fact, it's rather late to the Mac platform in any significant way (Parallels & Vmware only came on in a big way when the Intel switch began). If you want to run Windows in a virtualized environment, you have to buy a more expensive version, regardless of whether your virtualization host is Mac, Windows, or GNU/Linux.
- I'm allowed to keep 5.85% more of my paycheck every month, because I don't pay state income tax in NH.
- I don't have to tack 5% onto every sale for sales tax most times I purchase something.
- For instance, my state-issued driver's license isn't valid for the same amount of time as it was in Massachusetts.
- I can buy beer & wine in my local grocery store in NH, but I have to go to a state-run liquor store for any harder liquors.
So is it a "strange foreign land"? No, not in the same way that I'd feel like I was in a strange foreign land if you dropped me down in the middle of Bangkok. But are there very real differences between Massachusetts & New Hampshire? You bet. There are some federal laws which are very much the same, because they apply to ALL states. And then there are the local laws, which aren't very much the same, because they are made at the State House in Concord, NH, rather than at the State House in Boston, MA.Funny you should pick those two items. Let's look at what the Constitution has to say about them!
Now, given that the constitution specifically charges the federal legislature with the responsibility to provide for the defense of the USA, as well as setting up a uniform code of naturalization, that specifically makes the two items you mention -- defense & illegal immigration -- federal matters. I'm certain that the argument for a national ID will be strongly based on the "defense" theme, and whether or not that justifies this as a federal matter will be up to far better legal minds than you or I to decide.
You can scream "identity politics" all day long, but the simple fact is this: the Constitution defines (and in many cases, explicitly limits) the powers of the federal government. If the Constitution does not explicitly grant a power to the federal government, or explicitly restrict a power from the states, the assumption is that the state retains the power to decide on that particular matter, unless & until a constitutional basis is shown for federal jurisdiction over the matter. This was such an important concept that they felt the need to add this particular statement as Amendment 10 to the Constitution:
I'm sorry, but if this were a system I was responsible for, I'd want to see the book thrown at the little douchebag who made me give up a bunch of my personal time to fix a problem he caused. Probation + community service + a ban on using the internet for "some undisclosed time" isn't so bad. Maybe he'll learn the lesson that you don't fuck with other people's stuff, just because it may be easy to or because you think it's funny.
It seems like you could substitute ANY form of entertainment for the word "games" in that title. The companies chase money... if they see a blockbuster, they're going to rush to produce their own copy of that blockbuster's "formula." Same as with movies. Same as with music. Does it dumb down the landscape? Sure. Does it mark the "end of gaming as we know it"? I don't see why it should. Did Britney Spears & her million clones mark the end of music as we know it? Nope, not at all... it dumbed down commercial radio into a monotonous "sameness", but there's still people out there making interesting & innovative music.
This has nothing to do with "big business" picking on "little business." This has to do with Microsoft putting nasty terms into it's EULA's and then everybody being surprised and crying, "Gracious no, those terms couldn't actually apply to US!" And by the same token, what in your mind magically fumigates a company breaking a licensing agreement by virtue of their being "SMALL" or simply "NOT-MICROSOFT"? (Thought exercise: Would it be okay for a company to violate the GPL in similar fashion, and equally as monstrous for the FSF or similar OSS organization to sue them for violating the GPL? Discuss. Cisco's quite interested in what you have to say.)
If you use the software, you should abide by the terms of the license, whether it's purchased or not. If you don't like the terms of the license, then use an alternative piece of software. Read around here on Slashdot, there's plenty of helpful people pointing out alternatives to Microsoft products that are free as in beer, free as in speech, and which provide functional replacements for any Microsoft product available.
In this case, companies have plenty of choices: Buy the license & abide by the terms; use equivalent free software, or cheaper commercial software; or take Microsoft & the BSA to court when they slap you with an audit and try to convince a court of law that the terms of the licensing contract are somehow unenforceable. Whine that the terms Microsoft wants to sell software on are "evil" if you must, but don't whine that MSFT is "evil" for enforcing the terms of the license agreement you entered into with them voluntarily.
Okay, so you want the students, not the teachers & administrators. Let me ask this... show of hands: how many people involved with computers from a young age got truly *excited* by the opportunity to use WordPefect, AmiPro, Word, Notepad, or some other text editor? I honestly don't see the distribution of OO.o install CDs as a very compelling way to gain new OSS users. Finish this sentence: "Install this awesome software named OpenOffice.org, and you can _____________" -- What? Write a report? Type your English homework? Deliver a PowerPoint-ish presentation to your Biology class? Would you have actually been turned on by those prospects when you were aged 12 to 18?
I think your heart is in the right place, and I think it's a noble goal. But I don't think your proposed method of winning new converts to the OSS fold is going to gain much traction amongst students. Here's a modest suggestion for a likely alternative:
- Pick a full linux distro; Ubuntu, SUSE, Fedora, whatever.
- Pack said distro with "Kid-useful" software.
- IM software (Kopete? Gaim? Others?)
- Modern browser (Firefox? Opera? Others?)
- Video & Music support (I'm under the impression there might be some licensing issues... at the *very* least, you better make it as easy as clicking a button to enable these things.)
- Email (Thunderbird? Evolution? Others?)
- Calendaring + something that works with online calendars like Google's ("Coordinate your calendars with your friends! Send & receive invites!")
- Good RSS reader ("Subscribe to your friends' blogs!")
- TONS of themes for everything. (Look at MySpace, and tell me kids don't like customizing, even if the results are ass-ugly.
- Distribute this kid-useful distro as a LiveCD.
- Distribute a set of simple, jargon-free, lucid instructions for installing the LiveCD, clearly pointing out the need to backup & save their data before they overwrite their Windows system. Explain what all the terms mean.
- make this liveCD's install default to sensible, secure defaults and explain WHY they are defaulted that way, as well as how to change them.
- Include pointers to more docs, useful help forums, and more software. Most kids aren't going to do much with MySQL, PHP, Tomcat, and a full-blown Eclipse / Callisto install. No need to bloat the image with dozens of programming tools, but make it easy to install them if the kids want to take that next step.
Bottom line is, you won't sell kids on the value of Open Source by handing them stodgy office software -- OSS will instead become synonymous with boring drudge work. Handing out office software to kids sounds to me like a guaranteed way to ensure that no kid will touch Linux and Open Source software except the dyed-in-the-wool geeks who would find Linux anyway on their own.