Nice article. I like this bit:
The East River's powerful tides have been wreaking havoc with the giant turbine blades since the first two were installed in December.
"But the good thing is that there's more power in the East River than we thought."
Oh, and please spare me the five page on treatise on the difference between 'theft' and copyright infringement. Who needs 5 pages? Stealing physical property is clearly illegal and with good reason. The ability to display a web page in any manner the user sees fit is a fundamental property of the web. I browse without scripts enabled, no background colors, and a predetermined font. It just so happens that no scripts disables many ads. Oh, and I also have AdBlocker installed for the rest.
The web was around for awhile before it became big business. That doesn't mean the web has to conform to big business.
As a porn connoisseur, I would like to point out that anybody that surfs for porn with Internet Explorer is a fucking idiot. I don't use it any more, but years ago I used IE exclusively for browsing porn. All you had to do was set your internet security to High, which removed all the scripting, Flash, and ActiveX crap. Killed all the ads too. No plugins needed.
If you don't go to the store in the first place you are committing theft! At one point in time I actually used to feel a little bit guilty about not being much of a consumer. I thought about all those little shops, and wondered how they could make ends meet selling crap. I somehow wondered if it wasn't my social duty to be interested in more of their crap. Yeah, I got over it:)
A professional player was beat by a computer in 9x9. Not consistently, but still quite an impressive feat given the state of computer go just a couple of years ago. This same computer has made it to 3k on KGS in 19x19.
As for 37x37, for one it sounds like a game that humans wouldn't want to play. Too long! The endgame would take hours! Even if they did want to play it, what makes you think humans would be good at it? Go knowledge developed over centuries. And what makes you think the computer wouldn't be able to adapt as fast as the humans?
Deep Blue could have consulted verbally with chess experts just as Kasparov did. Devil's Advocate: Does the computer have to play its moves with robotic arms, too? Isn't Kasparov's brain being modified by discussing with experts? Now if they were messing with the program during the game, with human experts giving it advice, that would be a different story.
All that being said, IBM should have made the program unbeatable without interference during the match. That they didn't diminishes their achievement (but doesn't invalidate it).
I don't think Microsoft can get away with the same shenanigans they pulled in times past. Full me once, shame on you. Full me over and over and over again, well God damn boy, are you stupid or what? Every big move by Microsoft is eventually used to perpetuate their Windows monopoly. Anybody who doesn't want to support that monopoly would be insane to embrace Silverlight. There are plenty of alternatives.
The terms are designed to protect just the library, because the library author generally has no concern with protecting the work in which it's embedded, but the effect is often to require those terms to be applied to the combined work's license. Ok, fair enough. In that respect those license terms are indeed viral. And it's true that all these viral aspects depend on copyright; however, copyright doesn't necessitate viral licenses, as evidenced by BSD-like licenses.
And I understand why you want to fight back against the label "viral", but you should acknowledge the GPL was a very clever and deliberate tactic designed to promote a particular license, in a viral like way (with all the caveats you already mentioned).
Finally, I agree that companies like Microsoft use the viral term as FUD, but not everybody who uses that term does. So while I think the general message of your post was a good one, throwing in stuff like "It's not even the slightest bit confusing, except when made deliberately so by FUDsters." is a bad way to present your argument. These issues are confusing, and there are many viewpoints. I would guess you have spent a significant amount of time puzzling through/reading about/discussing the finer points of copyright and the GPL. I know I have.
True, but I fail to see the relevance here. I only mentioned the GPL-requiring-copyright issue because your post seemed somewhat anti-copyright, but it wasn't my main point.
Most licensed software requires you to abide by some specified terms regarding the derived work, since it incorporates the licensor's software. I agree to a certain extent. However, the terms only apply to that specific portion, not the software as a whole. The GPL is distinct in the way it spreads itself, like a virus, especially when compared to other open source alternatives. I don't use the viral term in a bad way. It was a brilliant idea.
I'm not implying that there isn't choice, and I understand that code you own copyright to can be relicensed as you see fit. I also agree that people often misuse or confuse the viral nature, but then that is also true for words like "free software" or "open source".
There is, of course, a way that they aren't violating linux copyrights: They may simply be using the Linux Kernel to get the hardware into a known state prior to loading the VMkernel. Say I'm a customer. I want their ESX product. I don't care if it works via a bootloader or whatever, I just want the product for what it does as a whole. So, ESX ships their product to me, and as part of that shipment it includes a modified Linux kernel to do it's job. The Linux kernel is GPL software. The ESX product does not ship under the GPL. ESX is in violation.
Now, if ESX does not ship with a Linux kernel, and merely works with my existing Linux kernel, then there would be no case for violating the GPL.
The GPL is not viral. Copyright is viral. First of all, the GPL needs copyright or there would be nothing preventing me from distributing binary-only derivatives of free software. Second, claiming that copyright is viral is a bit silly when everything by default is under copyright.
You can't take any copyrighted work and incorporate it into a new work of your own without permission from the copyright holder (excepting Fair Use). The work you incorporated "infects" your work. But most licensed software allow me to release my code under my own license. With GPL, it wants me to release all my code as GPL, and once I've done that I can't take it back. Finally, there are other licenses like the BSD license that require no restrictions on my code at all.
It's viral because it spreads itself, just like viral marketing. It says "Hey I'm really great, but if you want to incorporate me you have to follow my principles". And so some people follow those principles and become GPL, making more great software that people might want to incorporate, and so on. So yes, it's definitely viral. It was a rather brilliant idea, actually.
It's hard to tell the difference between satire and just the same old ludicrous arguments you accuse others of. Especially when you make statements like "There's a reason C++ is so dominant in development of just-about-everything(tm)." I can't tell if you believe this is true or not. From the tone of your post you just sound like a C++ zealot railing against those who disparage your language.
If you really were going for satire, sorry, it doesn't work. I don't think you'll read my post and laugh at yourself, either.
Perhaps he's slowly accumulating a group of evangelists who bought the hype? I follow the D newsgroup. I don't use the language myself, but I'm intrigued by it and like to watch its development. To answer your question, yes, D has quite a lot of strong community support. If there is any competition at all for a C++ successor that isn't C++0x, D is it.
There's a reason C++ is so dominant in development of just-about-everything(tm). I think you're far over-estimating how many people use C++. C++ lost to Java in the enterprise. Tons of applications are written in VB or C# nowadays. Tons of stuff is written in PHP, Ruby, Python, Perl, etc. And C is still the lingua franca of programming languages.
The C holdouts. C is good if you don't need all the complexity of C++ and want portability, small size, and speed.
The Java people. These folks believe that, if you're going to get more complicated than C, you may as well go all out. Java removed a lot of the complexity of C++, and a whole class of memory bugs.
The idealists. Finally, these folks believe that there is some other, ideal language that roughly nobody uses for anything A language has to start somewhere. Unless you think "C++ forever", a great new language will come from idealists.
I hope this provides some insight into this small subset of the programming community. Do some research on language numbers. C++ is still a major player, but there are other major players. Really, the only stranglehold C++ has is in game development.
A wrapper isn't modification or linking. But arguably a wrapper distributed with a GPL'd program constitutes a "work based on the Program". That's why so many companies are releasing GPL'd software and offering a non-GPL'd commercial license.
If this wasn't the case, then double-clicking on a GPL application in Windows Explorer would constitute a GPL violation on the part of Microsoft. That's different, because Microsoft is not distributing GPL applications as part of Windows.
Who cares what OSI defines Open Source as? A lot of people do because the OSI pushed and marketed a definition for it, and many go by that definition. You are right that the term "open source" can be misused, but if you do so you stand a good chance of being publically called out on it. That's why Microsoft and other companies look to get their licenses officially approved by the OSI.
OSI does NOT define what GPL mean or what GNU mean when they say open source GPL license. You are really confused. Who said OSI defines what GPL means? And the GNU folks would never call their software open source. They use the term "free" or "freedom" software. "open source" was a term pushed by people who wanted to disassociate themselves from Stallman's rigid politics. The "open source" crowd believed that closed and open software could co-exist, where as Stallman thinks closed software is evil.
Open source is orthogonal to public domain. QED. Nonsense. Imagine there's some public domain source code. Is it not open source? Just because a public domain binary can exist doesn't exclude public domain source from being open source. BSD-licensed source code is open source, is it not? You can also compile BSD-licensed source into binary too. Now do you claim that the BSD-license is orthogonal to open source?
That you can see the source code. Nothing more, nothing less. This is the literal definition, and the one most normal people (as well as MS) subscribe to. Microsoft makes it a point to use the term "Shared Source". There is no "literal definition" for such an ill-defined term. You can accept OSI's definition, since they have done all the marketing of that term and it has a lot of mindshare, or you can accept that people interpret it differently, in which case nearly anything goes, including public domain.
That it means the same thing as "Free Software" -- i.e., licensed in such a way to preserve freedom -- except that it may or may not be copyleft. This is the OSI definition. Now that is complete bullshit. The OSI definition of open source does not "preserve freedom". It fully supports licenses that let derived versions become closed source -- like the BSD license.
In neither case does it mean "public domain," Your 0/3. Public domain qualifies as "open source" as defined by the OSI. The OSI meaning of open source is an umbrella one, that includes the GPL, BSD, public domain, etc.
As far as links, I need to remember the actual case to search for it, but I clearly remember him admitting being wrong on more than one occasion and apologising. Maybe somebody else can find a link or you'll find one later, but without an archived email the evidence is lacking. There's plenty of archived examples of Linus being an arrogant ass. I'd love to see him just once admit he was wrong. It doesn't seem within his personality.
Selfselecting lists on one special subject suck. Going through this story, it describes the linux kernel list very well. The people that manage to stick around are self-selected. Maybe Linus should look outside his little world and actually look at different perspectives?
You may get flamed, but someone generally looks at it. It seems in this case that desktop problems lingered for years and efforts to fix the problems were met with a lot of resistance. Then in a complete turnaround the gatekeeper says "good idea!", does his own thing, and wham, it gets slammed into the kernel.
Every single one of them has had something turned down in flames and an alternative merged as well (in some cases Linus admitting that he made the wrong choice later). I'm curious. Can you provide a single link where Linus admitted to making a wrong choice after one of the flame wars?
Slashdot Mirror
"But the good thing is that there's more power in the East River than we thought."
The web was around for awhile before it became big business. That doesn't mean the web has to conform to big business.
A professional player was beat by a computer in 9x9. Not consistently, but still quite an impressive feat given the state of computer go just a couple of years ago. This same computer has made it to 3k on KGS in 19x19.
As for 37x37, for one it sounds like a game that humans wouldn't want to play. Too long! The endgame would take hours! Even if they did want to play it, what makes you think humans would be good at it? Go knowledge developed over centuries. And what makes you think the computer wouldn't be able to adapt as fast as the humans?
All that being said, IBM should have made the program unbeatable without interference during the match. That they didn't diminishes their achievement (but doesn't invalidate it).
And I understand why you want to fight back against the label "viral", but you should acknowledge the GPL was a very clever and deliberate tactic designed to promote a particular license, in a viral like way (with all the caveats you already mentioned).
Finally, I agree that companies like Microsoft use the viral term as FUD, but not everybody who uses that term does. So while I think the general message of your post was a good one, throwing in stuff like "It's not even the slightest bit confusing, except when made deliberately so by FUDsters." is a bad way to present your argument. These issues are confusing, and there are many viewpoints. I would guess you have spent a significant amount of time puzzling through/reading about/discussing the finer points of copyright and the GPL. I know I have.
I'm not implying that there isn't choice, and I understand that code you own copyright to can be relicensed as you see fit. I also agree that people often misuse or confuse the viral nature, but then that is also true for words like "free software" or "open source".
Now, if ESX does not ship with a Linux kernel, and merely works with my existing Linux kernel, then there would be no case for violating the GPL.
It's viral because it spreads itself, just like viral marketing. It says "Hey I'm really great, but if you want to incorporate me you have to follow my principles". And so some people follow those principles and become GPL, making more great software that people might want to incorporate, and so on. So yes, it's definitely viral. It was a rather brilliant idea, actually.
It's hard to tell the difference between satire and just the same old ludicrous arguments you accuse others of. Especially when you make statements like "There's a reason C++ is so dominant in development of just-about-everything(tm)." I can't tell if you believe this is true or not. From the tone of your post you just sound like a C++ zealot railing against those who disparage your language.
If you really were going for satire, sorry, it doesn't work. I don't think you'll read my post and laugh at yourself, either.
Wikipedia has the answer you are looking for.
I wonder how many people just call Microsoft directly without returning it to the retail store?