The PC version has crisper graphics and more details, but I'd be fine with playing the 360 version. It's not something that would want to make me run out and buy more hardware.
Also, those were all shots without action. Somebody posted a response video with actions shots comparing the PS3 to the PC, and while the PC is better, the PS3 looks fine to me too.
As I said, there's been diminishing returns on hardware. It used to be the jump between generations was huge, like between the PS1 and PS2. Things were already looking pretty good during the PS2 era, and the jump to PS3 wasn't nearly as much. Here's a comparison of all three generations: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FbkC2rsiU30
Anyways, one of the big reasons the consoles won me over was because I knew that if I bought a game it would just work. Crysis was (in)famous for being a measure of how powerful your hardware was, as in, "Can it run Crysis?"
I take the opposite view. I've seen developers who avoid frameworks because they were Not Invented Here, and then spend a lot of their time re-inventing their own framework.
That's not to say that some frameworks aren't bloated and hideous and not worth the cost (the original Java Enterprise Edition comes to mind).
If I sold you a computer with a copy of Windows, a copy of Apache configured to serve only to localhost, and a copy of MediaWiki, would I be breaking the law? MediaWiki is GPL software, and it communicates with the Internet Explorer component of Windows through a socket.
Probably, if MediaWiki was considered an important part. If you could drop MediaWiki from the distribution with negligible effect, then I would say no.
United States copyright law makes a distinction between a derivative work and a collective work, and I take "mere aggregation" to refer to such a collective work.
The license explicitly mentions collective works:
"Thus, it is not the intent of this section to claim rights or contest your rights to work written entirely by you; rather, the intent is to exercise the right to control the distribution of derivative or collective works based on the Program."
GIMP for Windows doesn't work when I take away Windows. So is GIMP for Windows based on Windows in a copyright law sense?
No, because you never distribute Windows as part of GIMP. We've already covered this ground. That you are allowed to write to an interface is settled case law, and I am not claiming that writing to the interface creates a derivative work or a greater work unless you distribute them as part of a whole.
If I sell you a computer that has a copy of Windows and a copy of GIMP installed, along with an archive of the GIMP source tree, have I broken the law?
It's the same answer that was given for MediaWiki.
Or let's try another tack: What if C starts working again when I take away A and add V?
If you don't distribute GPL'd A then that's fine. But to claim you haven't created a greater work when C doesn't even function without A and you ship A is specious. If you don't want the GPL to apply, then ship a non-GPL replacement.
that's easiest to demonstrate when the coupling is narrowed to well-defined message passing
The license, quite smartly, doesn't talk about message passing or any other mechanism. It even acknowledges that the works "can be reasonably considered independent and separate works in themselves", which is what you are talking about. "But when you distribute the same sections as part of a whole which is a work based on the Program, the distribution of the whole must be on the terms of this License"
The license explicitly covers what you are trying to claim -- independence through loose coupling. You are ignoring all that and latching on to "mere aggregation".
The output of a program is generally not a derivative work of the program itself.
I agree, that is generally true, but that wasn't the basis of my argument.
If the application-level protocol over such a pipe or socket is documented in plain language, it's no different from a non-free web browser connecting to a GPL HTTP server, or running a non-free program in a GPL terminal emulator, or vice versa.
There's a huge difference, and it involves copyright. When you connect to a server, the GPL bits remain on the server. When you distribute the GPL bits along with your bits, then the terms of the GPL come into play.
I am unaware of any cases that have been tried, but I'd imagine the judge would distinguish between a larger work from an aggregate by looking at the degree of coupling.
I agree with the direction you are taking, but not your conclusions.
If the output of one program is defined simply as "that which the other program accepts", then the programs might as well be one work. But if the format of the data sent over the interface is clean enough that a programmer can develop a replacement for the program on either side of the interface, then the programs are more likely to be seen as independent.
It doesn't matter if a replacement could be developed. What counts is that you distributed a GPL component to do the job. My take on the coupling issue is this:
Let's say you ship A and B components as part of a whole work C, and A is GPL and B proprietary: C = A + B. If C doesn't work when you take away A, then you have created a work based on A, and the GPL applies, and claims of "mere aggregation" are specious.
This belief comes straight from the GPL, version 2:
"If identifiable sections of that work are not derived from the Program, and can be reasonably considered independent and separate works in themselves, then this License, and its terms, do not apply to those sections when you distribute them as separate works. But when you distribute the same sections as part of a whole which is a work based on the Program, the distribution of the whole must be on the terms of this License, whose permissions for other licensees extend to the entire whole, and thus to each and every part regardless of who wrote it."
What I don't understand is how the FSF came to their absurd position when the license is so well written to fit the purpose without getting caught up in ridiculous libraries, pipes, or command technicalities.
You can include the FSF in the list of authors of GPL programs who disagree with your interpretation.
Yes, I'm aware of this and find this interpretation bizarre in that it is ad hoc and overly specific, whereas the license is written in general terms on principles and isn't limited to technical mechanisms. In particular, any library can be wrapped by command lines or pipes -- why is it that a library that has been wrapped in this way suddenly "mere aggregation"? It doesn't make sense.
At least they have the good sense to say this: "This is a legal question, which ultimately judges will decide."
A common example would be the way many proprietary router web interfaces execute GPL utilities and receive their output via pipes or similar mechanisms.
There's been lots of lawsuits around BusyBox. I don't to what extent they require source releases. You could also read about Jin vs IChessU:
"He also said that they are planning to wrap Jin in a layer that would allow it to be controlled via a socket. This would allow IChessU to write any additions "outside" of Jin, without releasing the source to them. I told Alexander that I believe this would still, most likely, be violating the GPL (GPL FAQ on aggregation)."
The above, perhaps strangely, uses that entry as opposite to "mere aggregation".
Anyways, what really counts is what the license says, what the copyright holder thinks (only he has grounds to sue), and what a judge decides. My interpretation is based on what I believe is a straightforward reading of the license that also follows the intent of the license.
Yeah, life is swell as a lowest common denominator.
It's actually the greatest common denominator. It doesn't have the same propaganda value, though, does it?
Only you DO get framerate drops on modern games, don't you? Also texture popups, cramped environments, minimal detail, and shoddy AI.
I've played Grand Theft Auto 4 on the PS3 and was impressed with the detail, environment, and fluid character movements. I don't know about the AI, it's not chess. The "smart" AI in shooter games isn't computationally expensive.
The thing is, there's been diminishing returns for a long time now in gaming tech. Go ahead and compare games between eras, and the difference between something like a PS2 and a PS3 is tiny compared to previous jumps, like from the PS1 to PS2.
So I put firefox back on those machines, and I was impressed that everything just works, and it's plenty fast. I'm sure it's because I've only got two extensions installed
If those two extensions are NoScript and AdBlock then that would explain it. I've been running with these for years and haven't had memory leaks or slowness problems that other people have complained about.
The Singularity is an even bigger deal, and further out.
The Singularity is a bunch of hype. For one, exponential curves are not guaranteed to keep on going (see the brick wall with respect to processor speeds post 2002). Two, the technological future is always somewhat unpredictable. And three, we've been living in an age where "smarter humans" already have been created -- it's the Internet, where humanity has been working together as a super-intelligent organism.
His deep insight that true chaos devolves from ordered deterministic processes (e.g. cellular automatia) across all of nature is nothing short of astounding.
Considering the price of computers these days and the diminishing returns on graphic cards, I'd say $50 is the sweet spot.
Seriously, the games were already looking pretty amazing not long after 2000. Just how much better does a game look with this year's model versus a card from three years ago?
Even if I were foolish enough to buy into the whole security through obscurity angle
What's foolish about this? If I have all the security plans and an exploit is found (as they have been time and time gain), then you are vulnerable. If an additional layer of obscurity was applied on top of that, you are a harder target.
If there was a real need for something to get done then it would be worth an interruption
Most of the email I get is in the form of information dispersed to groups that is not worth an interruption. Not everything requires immediate action.
I would gladly take those 10% as phone calls or chat windows because I know that the message that needs to get across is worth while for me to listen to.
I won't, because I prefer the time to organize my thoughts and reply coherently instead of being put on the spot. I also don't want to be interrupted if I'm really busy with something and it's not urgent. Not everything is high priority.
If you take out the amount of useless emails a day you receive, at least for me that's sitting around the 90% mark.
Any message not specifically addressed to me, but instead addressed to a group, gets filtered into its own folder and read at my leisure. The ones addressed to me I see right away and have to option of replying to right away or not.
If something concerns a team of people then have a meeting.
You really don't need to interrupt and synchronize a group of people with a meeting every time there's some bit of information you want disseminated.
If we did a naive reading of the GPL as you did, then it wouldn't be possible to run proprietary software without released source code on Linux.
False. The user has the right to download proprietary software and run it on their GPL system. It's when the distributor bundles up some GPL parts and proprietary parts, and then ships it as a whole work that the GPL applies.
It's true that pretty much everybody ignores this aspect of the GPL and claims "mere aggregation", and even the vast majority of authors of GPL programs do not care about or believe in this interpretation of the license, but that doesn't mean it isn't in the license as written.
Chat programs or just the normal phone will trump email 100% of the time.
I don't want to be interrupted in real-time unless there's a real need. It's that simple. What's ironic is that you're posting this on a forum, which is essentially a form of email -- asynchronous, read and reply at your own leisure.
Slashdot Mirror
The PC version has crisper graphics and more details, but I'd be fine with playing the 360 version. It's not something that would want to make me run out and buy more hardware.
Also, those were all shots without action. Somebody posted a response video with actions shots comparing the PS3 to the PC, and while the PC is better, the PS3 looks fine to me too.
As I said, there's been diminishing returns on hardware. It used to be the jump between generations was huge, like between the PS1 and PS2. Things were already looking pretty good during the PS2 era, and the jump to PS3 wasn't nearly as much. Here's a comparison of all three generations: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FbkC2rsiU30
Anyways, one of the big reasons the consoles won me over was because I knew that if I bought a game it would just work. Crysis was (in)famous for being a measure of how powerful your hardware was, as in, "Can it run Crysis?"
I take the opposite view. I've seen developers who avoid frameworks because they were Not Invented Here, and then spend a lot of their time re-inventing their own framework.
That's not to say that some frameworks aren't bloated and hideous and not worth the cost (the original Java Enterprise Edition comes to mind).
If I have lost the argument
You did. Every point you made was countered, and I provided direct quotations from the license that refuted your arguments.
then the strategy described in my silly tactic would be a way for you to make a lot of money.
I'm not going to make a "lot of money" by claiming rights to a patch, nor am I doing to do "homework" for you. I'm done with this discussion.
In other words, you lost the argument and have now shifted to silly tactics.
If I sold you a computer with a copy of Windows, a copy of Apache configured to serve only to localhost, and a copy of MediaWiki, would I be breaking the law? MediaWiki is GPL software, and it communicates with the Internet Explorer component of Windows through a socket.
Probably, if MediaWiki was considered an important part. If you could drop MediaWiki from the distribution with negligible effect, then I would say no.
United States copyright law makes a distinction between a derivative work and a collective work, and I take "mere aggregation" to refer to such a collective work.
The license explicitly mentions collective works:
"Thus, it is not the intent of this section to claim rights or contest your rights to work written entirely by you; rather, the intent is to exercise the right to control the distribution of derivative or collective works based on the Program."
GIMP for Windows doesn't work when I take away Windows. So is GIMP for Windows based on Windows in a copyright law sense?
No, because you never distribute Windows as part of GIMP. We've already covered this ground. That you are allowed to write to an interface is settled case law, and I am not claiming that writing to the interface creates a derivative work or a greater work unless you distribute them as part of a whole.
If I sell you a computer that has a copy of Windows and a copy of GIMP installed, along with an archive of the GIMP source tree, have I broken the law?
It's the same answer that was given for MediaWiki.
Or let's try another tack: What if C starts working again when I take away A and add V?
If you don't distribute GPL'd A then that's fine. But to claim you haven't created a greater work when C doesn't even function without A and you ship A is specious. If you don't want the GPL to apply, then ship a non-GPL replacement.
that's easiest to demonstrate when the coupling is narrowed to well-defined message passing
The license, quite smartly, doesn't talk about message passing or any other mechanism. It even acknowledges that the works "can be reasonably considered independent and separate works in themselves", which is what you are talking about. "But when you distribute the same sections as part of a whole which is a work based on the Program, the distribution of the whole must be on the terms of this License"
The license explicitly covers what you are trying to claim -- independence through loose coupling. You are ignoring all that and latching on to "mere aggregation".
Anybody have a link to the full lecture?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ti3mtDC2fQo
Wrong. .com, .net, .org, .mil, .edu are all US domains. That's one of the perks of coming up with the Internet.
Yup, pretty cool. Here's Neil Tyson talking about naming rights: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6oxTMUTOz0w
The output of a program is generally not a derivative work of the program itself.
I agree, that is generally true, but that wasn't the basis of my argument.
If the application-level protocol over such a pipe or socket is documented in plain language, it's no different from a non-free web browser connecting to a GPL HTTP server, or running a non-free program in a GPL terminal emulator, or vice versa.
There's a huge difference, and it involves copyright. When you connect to a server, the GPL bits remain on the server. When you distribute the GPL bits along with your bits, then the terms of the GPL come into play.
I am unaware of any cases that have been tried, but I'd imagine the judge would distinguish between a larger work from an aggregate by looking at the degree of coupling.
I agree with the direction you are taking, but not your conclusions.
If the output of one program is defined simply as "that which the other program accepts", then the programs might as well be one work. But if the format of the data sent over the interface is clean enough that a programmer can develop a replacement for the program on either side of the interface, then the programs are more likely to be seen as independent.
It doesn't matter if a replacement could be developed. What counts is that you distributed a GPL component to do the job. My take on the coupling issue is this:
Let's say you ship A and B components as part of a whole work C, and A is GPL and B proprietary: C = A + B. If C doesn't work when you take away A, then you have created a work based on A, and the GPL applies, and claims of "mere aggregation" are specious.
This belief comes straight from the GPL, version 2:
"If identifiable sections of that work are not derived from the Program, and can be reasonably considered independent and separate works in themselves, then this License, and its terms, do not apply to those sections when you distribute them as separate works. But when you distribute the same sections as part of a whole which is a work based on the Program, the distribution of the whole must be on the terms of this License, whose permissions for other licensees extend to the entire whole, and thus to each and every part regardless of who wrote it."
What I don't understand is how the FSF came to their absurd position when the license is so well written to fit the purpose without getting caught up in ridiculous libraries, pipes, or command technicalities.
You can include the FSF in the list of authors of GPL programs who disagree with your interpretation.
Yes, I'm aware of this and find this interpretation bizarre in that it is ad hoc and overly specific, whereas the license is written in general terms on principles and isn't limited to technical mechanisms. In particular, any library can be wrapped by command lines or pipes -- why is it that a library that has been wrapped in this way suddenly "mere aggregation"? It doesn't make sense.
At least they have the good sense to say this: "This is a legal question, which ultimately judges will decide."
A common example would be the way many proprietary router web interfaces execute GPL utilities and receive their output via pipes or similar mechanisms.
There's been lots of lawsuits around BusyBox. I don't to what extent they require source releases. You could also read about Jin vs IChessU:
"He also said that they are planning to wrap Jin in a layer that would allow it to be controlled via a socket. This would allow IChessU to write any additions "outside" of Jin, without releasing the source to them. I told Alexander that I believe this would still, most likely, be violating the GPL (GPL FAQ on aggregation)."
The above, perhaps strangely, uses that entry as opposite to "mere aggregation".
Anyways, what really counts is what the license says, what the copyright holder thinks (only he has grounds to sue), and what a judge decides. My interpretation is based on what I believe is a straightforward reading of the license that also follows the intent of the license.
This means if you own all three consoles
Most people just buy a single console.
Yeah, life is swell as a lowest common denominator.
It's actually the greatest common denominator. It doesn't have the same propaganda value, though, does it?
Only you DO get framerate drops on modern games, don't you? Also texture popups, cramped environments, minimal detail, and shoddy AI.
I've played Grand Theft Auto 4 on the PS3 and was impressed with the detail, environment, and fluid character movements. I don't know about the AI, it's not chess. The "smart" AI in shooter games isn't computationally expensive.
The thing is, there's been diminishing returns for a long time now in gaming tech. Go ahead and compare games between eras, and the difference between something like a PS2 and a PS3 is tiny compared to previous jumps, like from the PS1 to PS2.
As I said. Microsoft is a has-been.
And it was already demonstrated that they are not. You are predicting that they will be, but until it happens it's just a prediction.
Google will be a has-been shortly.
More worthless predictions.
So I put firefox back on those machines, and I was impressed that everything just works, and it's plenty fast. I'm sure it's because I've only got two extensions installed
If those two extensions are NoScript and AdBlock then that would explain it. I've been running with these for years and haven't had memory leaks or slowness problems that other people have complained about.
The Singularity is an even bigger deal, and further out.
The Singularity is a bunch of hype. For one, exponential curves are not guaranteed to keep on going (see the brick wall with respect to processor speeds post 2002). Two, the technological future is always somewhat unpredictable. And three, we've been living in an age where "smarter humans" already have been created -- it's the Internet, where humanity has been working together as a super-intelligent organism.
Being bitten by them is annoying enough. Fuck 'em.
His deep insight that true chaos devolves from ordered deterministic processes (e.g. cellular automatia) across all of nature is nothing short of astounding.
That you think this was his deep insight is exactly the problem with Wolfram's book. No proper credits to earlier research, and megalomaniacal claims right in the title. Look up Mandelbrot (fractals) and Lorenz (butterfly effect) and even earlier work by others: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chaos_theory#History and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Digital_physics#History.
Considering the price of computers these days and the diminishing returns on graphic cards, I'd say $50 is the sweet spot.
Seriously, the games were already looking pretty amazing not long after 2000. Just how much better does a game look with this year's model versus a card from three years ago?
Even if I were foolish enough to buy into the whole security through obscurity angle
What's foolish about this? If I have all the security plans and an exploit is found (as they have been time and time gain), then you are vulnerable. If an additional layer of obscurity was applied on top of that, you are a harder target.
If there was a real need for something to get done then it would be worth an interruption
Most of the email I get is in the form of information dispersed to groups that is not worth an interruption. Not everything requires immediate action.
I would gladly take those 10% as phone calls or chat windows because I know that the message that needs to get across is worth while for me to listen to.
I won't, because I prefer the time to organize my thoughts and reply coherently instead of being put on the spot. I also don't want to be interrupted if I'm really busy with something and it's not urgent. Not everything is high priority.
If you take out the amount of useless emails a day you receive, at least for me that's sitting around the 90% mark.
Any message not specifically addressed to me, but instead addressed to a group, gets filtered into its own folder and read at my leisure. The ones addressed to me I see right away and have to option of replying to right away or not.
If something concerns a team of people then have a meeting.
You really don't need to interrupt and synchronize a group of people with a meeting every time there's some bit of information you want disseminated.
Pepper spray not included.
You've managed to combine link-speak with xkcd-speak, both of which I hate. Now get off my lawn!
So, it's random as far as Aspect can tell. [..] There is no random. There is only random enough.
I'd rephrase this as, "Truly random according to current theory."
If we did a naive reading of the GPL as you did, then it wouldn't be possible to run proprietary software without released source code on Linux.
False. The user has the right to download proprietary software and run it on their GPL system. It's when the distributor bundles up some GPL parts and proprietary parts, and then ships it as a whole work that the GPL applies.
It's true that pretty much everybody ignores this aspect of the GPL and claims "mere aggregation", and even the vast majority of authors of GPL programs do not care about or believe in this interpretation of the license, but that doesn't mean it isn't in the license as written.
I'm afraid you'll never be CEO material. :)
Chat programs or just the normal phone will trump email 100% of the time.
I don't want to be interrupted in real-time unless there's a real need. It's that simple. What's ironic is that you're posting this on a forum, which is essentially a form of email -- asynchronous, read and reply at your own leisure.