I agree 100%. Workings towards copyright reform is a much better use of this money than giving it to copyright owners. Doing the latter just encourages more people to hang on to their works in the hopes that one day somebody will buy them out. If people don't want to release their works then let it rot. It's the message that counts, and with the Internet there's no shortage of that.
Well, who do you believe? The administration or the operatives? I'd like to listen to all the voices. Certainly the guy who headed up the unit whose whole mission was Osama deserves to be heard, and not dismissed as a nutjob.
They're just covering their bases in case something unexpected happens - a delay in the launch, the delivery truck crashes on the way to the store and burns up, etc.
Or there's a huge demand and some enterprising employees / store owners decide to sell them for more money on Ebay or in bundles. Inflated prices on a hot toy at Christmas time and all.
"Michael F. Scheuer, a 22-year veteran with the CIA, created and served as the chief of the agency's Osama bin Laden unit at the Counterterrorist Center."
There was an interesting reply from a fellow Googler on the latest blog. I wish I could link to it, but I don't see any way, so I'll just repost it here:
Patrick said...
I'm a tech lead on a project at Google. We very recently started using Scrum to see whether we could get better at producing more of what our customers wanted faster. I was the one who sold management on the idea; it didn't come from above, so don't blame them. So far this is working pretty well.
I understand that this is a personal blog, and Steve's giving his opinion. Still, it bothers me because it gives what seems like a pretty inaccurate view of Google and what little I know about agile development (sorry, I don't think it merits a capital 'A'; it seems faintly ludicrous to me; maybe that's the sort of thing that bothers him too).
As far as Google: there's been a lot of talk here about the "Google way", which sounds a heck of a lot like "Google methodology" to me. If there is one, I don't know what it is, and I've been working here almost three years. Different groups use different approaches -- some are design top-heavy, some are totally XP (though they are the minority), and some just lump new functionality in until they decide it's done. Groups do what works for them, and nobody much seems to mind.
My point is: "Google" does not mean "doesn't do agile." It doesn't mean anything remotely like that. We have an "intergrouplet" (a semi-formal organization of engineers supporting an aspect of engineering life, like documentation or the build system) devoted to agile, and upper management (who are not stupid people) supports the spread of agile ideas. So yes, we do agile at Google, big A and little a.
I spent a lot of time talking to people in that intergrouplet before we started trying Scrum. The attitude I got was, "Well, here's what the books say, here's what we've tried, and here's what seems to work pretty well for us." Which is what I wanted to know. I'm not interested getting a certification; I'm interested in making my group happier and more productive, and if there's an idea that will help me do that, I'll try it. Many of the agile ideas seem to fall in that category. We're trying a few now, and if they work out we'll try more later. If not, we'll drop them. Maybe that means we're not really doing official Scrum; but if it works, who cares?
What bothered me in these posts was the idea that anybody who used agile was either a gullible mark, or an unscrupulous consultant, or both. I'm not a consultant, and I don't think I'm that gullible. When I first saw Steve's post on "Good Agile, Bad Agile," I thought, great, here's somebody who's opinions I respect, and I'm going to learn something. What I got seemed like pretty wild, unsubstantiated ranting about why agile is bad, without reference to any specifics, or any discussion of particular agile ideas he didn't like. The one specific I do remember him disliking was pair programming, but the argument seemed to be, "Pair programming sounds stupid to me; therefore, it is stupid." I'd be very happy to hear why it's not a good idea, or anecdotal evidence about how it failed, but that's not the kind of thing that's going to convince me of anything other than his strong personal dislike of pair programming, the same way that some people don't like science fiction or folk rock.
(I really wish, by the way, that Steve had described what experience he had with agile development; he said he'd tried it, but not what actually happened. Did he have to do daily standup meetings? Did his group do pair programming? Did they have regular meetings with the customers? Why didn't it work? That's a post I very badly want to read.)
I was depressed and frustrated by these posts, because they're getting a lot of play, and the lesson people I talk to seem to be getting isn't, "It's okay to say no to Agile," but "Agile is stupid, so don't waste your ti
Trend in China - more freedom. Trend in the US - less freedom. That is my point.
If that was your original point, I wouldn't have quibbled. After all, if one is near the bottom of freedom and the other is near the top, it's easier for both to move towards the middle. However, it turns out your main rant was not for individual freedoms, but as to how your anti-US message was accepted by the locals:
In fact, I feel far more free to express myself here than I did back in the States, with its citizen watchdogs doing their best at every turn to censor me.
And
My comment about feeling freer to express myself here in China has a lot to do with finding sympathetic ears when I bemoan US imperialism.
Ok, so you're a conspiracy nut. You have the freedom to espouse such theories in the US. How would similar ones accusing the Chinese government of wrong doing play out in China?
And wow, shocking, your anti-US message didn't play over well with the locals in South Dakota, but the people in China are sympathetic. How much freedom you have! As much as you have a right to an opinion, people have a right to tell you to piss off. There's no censorship here.
It isn't as though I like the Chinese government better, but at least Chinese people don't go around bragging about how "free" they are.
Certainly more free than the Chinese. Trying to compare the two just makes you look silly.
In fact, I feel far more free to express myself here than I did back in the States, with its citizen watchdogs doing their best at every turn to censor me.
Examples? Or are you just ranting?
Of course, no proxy server ever works for more than a few days before it gets added to the "list".
While freedoms in the US (and elsewhere) are always under attack, I can still browse the web without going through a national firewall. Hell, I can even read conspiracy sites telling me that that 9/11 was perpetrated by the government. Your comparison of freedom in China vs the US is ludicrous.
Even his staement about the need to get in and "milk" a service was classic Microsoft that misses the value of a social network, which is in expansion and not squeezing it to death.
That's taken out of context. He said it has to be milked if it is a hit-based phenomenon (fad). It's an open question of whether today's popular site will still be popular tomorrow.
Though it was funny to hear him completely bash the YouTube deal in one paragraph and then completely backpedal in the next.
It's even worse. What happened with the 360 is that some people with preorders went months without getting a system, because of shortages and employees/store owners selling on ebay for profit.
However, now developers are making games on a HDTV's and don't realize that some things that are made super fine, such as text, can't be made out on a regular set.
This pisses me off to no end, to the point that I stopped playing games on my 360. That developers don't make sure that their games play well on standard definition is poor workmanship.
No, and I never will. The thought of eating food that smells like feet is too disgusting, no matter how good it might taste. There's too many good cheeses to eat to wander down that path.
And what about network services (such as webpages)?
If you send back GPL'd bits to the client, then that's 'distribution'. If the GPL software is merely a tool on the backend that send back content you wrote, without including GPL'd libraries, then that's 'use'. Fairly simple. Follow the bits. A static web page has an implied license to copy for stuff like browsing, web proxies, web search engines, etc. However, hosting others' copyright works yourself is not allowed withour permission, though it gets murky with "fair use" (Google cache, Slasdhot mirrors, etc). This page just scratches the surface: Copyright on the Internet
If you take the game I wrote, I think it's ok to modify it to adapt to the gaming gadget you made. You don't want to release the code for that modification because you don't want to help the eventual competition, or that glue code would reveal details of your hardware. So far, so good.
Not good, if you believe in the intent of the GPL. There's no doubt that the modifier in this case is making a derivative work.
Maybe the solution to this situation is to release the source files of the game core and the back end code as different licenses?
I'd use the LGPL in your example and not the GPL. Provide hooks that somebody can write a wrapper for. If they have to change your code, then you are entitled to get those changes back. But if all they do is call your code, then they get to keep their code. Personally, I think more developers would choose the LGPL if they really understood the ramifications of GPL vs LGPL.
Every single moderated group disappeared over time because moderation
DOES
NOT
WORK.
Trivially false. I see that comp.lang.c.moderated is still around.
Now if it [Slashdot] would only drop the moderation nonsense, it would turn the corner and start to work as a discussion medium again.
Slashdot would be totally unreadable without moderation. There's just too many users. It's not perfect, but it works pretty well, especially compared to how a newsgroup of Slashdot's size would look. Could you imagine wading through the thousands of comments that get posted to Slashdot every day in a standard newsreader? Friend/foe doesn't cut it.
Personally, I just -6 all funny comments, and read follow-up replies to comments marked 3 or higher that interest me. It gives me a good mix of comments.
The UI should be seperate from the core anyway, so its not like it is hard to write three seperate UIs.
Oh come on, its a large drain of resources to write the UI three times and then to keep them in sync. That's the whole point of cross-platform libraries. Some of them (like SWT) even use the native widgets when they are available, so that the app behaves and looks like its native platform.
Maybe it's better not to rely on interpretations of words that were passed on secondhand thousands of years ago, and then translated into other languages and cherry picked for content, and finally missing all the context of living in those times. Maybe we can just decide for ourselves what is moral.
I cannot understand why anyone would email a photograph to a company to help them out.
Why do people submit Slashdot stories? Slashdot makes money, and I bet most submitters get no compensation, despite the Slashdot community griping about the occasional ad-whore.
The answer is people want to share; it's just human nature. If you're sitting on something that you can't sell yourself, then why not give it to somebody who can? You get the kicks knowing that other people are seeing something you helped spread.
Want it bad enough? Pay for it. It's a free market, and Nintendo is in this to make money. Nintendo should sell them on Ebay until the demand drops, and then flood the stores.
Slashdot Mirror
I agree 100%. Workings towards copyright reform is a much better use of this money than giving it to copyright owners. Doing the latter just encourages more people to hang on to their works in the hopes that one day somebody will buy them out. If people don't want to release their works then let it rot. It's the message that counts, and with the Internet there's no shortage of that.
Yes, Comic Book Guy's vote is clearly more important than your average Joe.
Well, who do you believe? The administration or the operatives? I'd like to listen to all the voices. Certainly the guy who headed up the unit whose whole mission was Osama deserves to be heard, and not dismissed as a nutjob.
Or there's a huge demand and some enterprising employees / store owners decide to sell them for more money on Ebay or in bundles. Inflated prices on a hot toy at Christmas time and all.
I guess that depends on what you call "appropriate". This CIA guy doesn't agree:
http://www.washingtontimes.com/op-ed/20060704-1100 04-4280r.htm
"Michael F. Scheuer, a 22-year veteran with the CIA, created and served as the chief of the agency's Osama bin Laden unit at the Counterterrorist Center."
There was an interesting reply from a fellow Googler on the latest blog. I wish I could link to it, but I don't see any way, so I'll just repost it here:
Patrick said...
I'm a tech lead on a project at Google. We very recently started using Scrum to see whether we could get better at producing more of what our customers wanted faster. I was the one who sold management on the idea; it didn't come from above, so don't blame them. So far this is working pretty well.
I understand that this is a personal blog, and Steve's giving his opinion. Still, it bothers me because it gives what seems like a pretty inaccurate view of Google and what little I know about agile development (sorry, I don't think it merits a capital 'A'; it seems faintly ludicrous to me; maybe that's the sort of thing that bothers him too).
As far as Google: there's been a lot of talk here about the "Google way", which sounds a heck of a lot like "Google methodology" to me. If there is one, I don't know what it is, and I've been working here almost three years. Different groups use different approaches -- some are design top-heavy, some are totally XP (though they are the minority), and some just lump new functionality in until they decide it's done. Groups do what works for them, and nobody much seems to mind.
My point is: "Google" does not mean "doesn't do agile." It doesn't mean anything remotely like that. We have an "intergrouplet" (a semi-formal organization of engineers supporting an aspect of engineering life, like documentation or the build system) devoted to agile, and upper management (who are not stupid people) supports the spread of agile ideas. So yes, we do agile at Google, big A and little a.
I spent a lot of time talking to people in that intergrouplet before we started trying Scrum. The attitude I got was, "Well, here's what the books say, here's what we've tried, and here's what seems to work pretty well for us." Which is what I wanted to know. I'm not interested getting a certification; I'm interested in making my group happier and more productive, and if there's an idea that will help me do that, I'll try it. Many of the agile ideas seem to fall in that category. We're trying a few now, and if they work out we'll try more later. If not, we'll drop them. Maybe that means we're not really doing official Scrum; but if it works, who cares?
What bothered me in these posts was the idea that anybody who used agile was either a gullible mark, or an unscrupulous consultant, or both. I'm not a consultant, and I don't think I'm that gullible. When I first saw Steve's post on "Good Agile, Bad Agile," I thought, great, here's somebody who's opinions I respect, and I'm going to learn something. What I got seemed like pretty wild, unsubstantiated ranting about why agile is bad, without reference to any specifics, or any discussion of particular agile ideas he didn't like. The one specific I do remember him disliking was pair programming, but the argument seemed to be, "Pair programming sounds stupid to me; therefore, it is stupid." I'd be very happy to hear why it's not a good idea, or anecdotal evidence about how it failed, but that's not the kind of thing that's going to convince me of anything other than his strong personal dislike of pair programming, the same way that some people don't like science fiction or folk rock.
(I really wish, by the way, that Steve had described what experience he had with agile development; he said he'd tried it, but not what actually happened. Did he have to do daily standup meetings? Did his group do pair programming? Did they have regular meetings with the customers? Why didn't it work? That's a post I very badly want to read.)
I was depressed and frustrated by these posts, because they're getting a lot of play, and the lesson people I talk to seem to be getting isn't, "It's okay to say no to Agile," but "Agile is stupid, so don't waste your ti
If that was your original point, I wouldn't have quibbled. After all, if one is near the bottom of freedom and the other is near the top, it's easier for both to move towards the middle. However, it turns out your main rant was not for individual freedoms, but as to how your anti-US message was accepted by the locals:
And
Ok, so you're a conspiracy nut. You have the freedom to espouse such theories in the US. How would similar ones accusing the Chinese government of wrong doing play out in China?
And wow, shocking, your anti-US message didn't play over well with the locals in South Dakota, but the people in China are sympathetic. How much freedom you have! As much as you have a right to an opinion, people have a right to tell you to piss off. There's no censorship here.
Certainly more free than the Chinese. Trying to compare the two just makes you look silly.
Examples? Or are you just ranting?
While freedoms in the US (and elsewhere) are always under attack, I can still browse the web without going through a national firewall. Hell, I can even read conspiracy sites telling me that that 9/11 was perpetrated by the government. Your comparison of freedom in China vs the US is ludicrous.
That's taken out of context. He said it has to be milked if it is a hit-based phenomenon (fad). It's an open question of whether today's popular site will still be popular tomorrow.
Though it was funny to hear him completely bash the YouTube deal in one paragraph and then completely backpedal in the next.
It's even worse. What happened with the 360 is that some people with preorders went months without getting a system, because of shortages and employees/store owners selling on ebay for profit.
Tell that to the Blackberry people. You mention Microsoft. They've lost and paid plenty of lawsuits.
This pisses me off to no end, to the point that I stopped playing games on my 360. That developers don't make sure that their games play well on standard definition is poor workmanship.
No, and I never will. The thought of eating food that smells like feet is too disgusting, no matter how good it might taste. There's too many good cheeses to eat to wander down that path.
But, to each their own :)
If you send back GPL'd bits to the client, then that's 'distribution'. If the GPL software is merely a tool on the backend that send back content you wrote, without including GPL'd libraries, then that's 'use'. Fairly simple. Follow the bits. A static web page has an implied license to copy for stuff like browsing, web proxies, web search engines, etc. However, hosting others' copyright works yourself is not allowed withour permission, though it gets murky with "fair use" (Google cache, Slasdhot mirrors, etc). This page just scratches the surface: Copyright on the Internet
Distribution. See FSF vs D-Link.
Not good, if you believe in the intent of the GPL. There's no doubt that the modifier in this case is making a derivative work.
I'd use the LGPL in your example and not the GPL. Provide hooks that somebody can write a wrapper for. If they have to change your code, then you are entitled to get those changes back. But if all they do is call your code, then they get to keep their code. Personally, I think more developers would choose the LGPL if they really understood the ramifications of GPL vs LGPL.
Trivially false. I see that comp.lang.c.moderated is still around.
Slashdot would be totally unreadable without moderation. There's just too many users. It's not perfect, but it works pretty well, especially compared to how a newsgroup of Slashdot's size would look. Could you imagine wading through the thousands of comments that get posted to Slashdot every day in a standard newsreader? Friend/foe doesn't cut it.
Personally, I just -6 all funny comments, and read follow-up replies to comments marked 3 or higher that interest me. It gives me a good mix of comments.
It boggles the mind that anybody would actually purchase and consume such a cheese. More gross details here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Limburger_cheese
Well, being an Eclipse user, but not a Mac user, I'm curious. Could you highlight some of the differences?
Oh come on, its a large drain of resources to write the UI three times and then to keep them in sync. That's the whole point of cross-platform libraries. Some of them (like SWT) even use the native widgets when they are available, so that the app behaves and looks like its native platform.
Wow, that sucks. Interesting info, thanks for posting.
I hate you mod commanders. God forbid someone's allowed to voice a thoughtful, yet contrarian point of view.
Maybe it's better not to rely on interpretations of words that were passed on secondhand thousands of years ago, and then translated into other languages and cherry picked for content, and finally missing all the context of living in those times. Maybe we can just decide for ourselves what is moral.
Why do people submit Slashdot stories? Slashdot makes money, and I bet most submitters get no compensation, despite the Slashdot community griping about the occasional ad-whore.
The answer is people want to share; it's just human nature. If you're sitting on something that you can't sell yourself, then why not give it to somebody who can? You get the kicks knowing that other people are seeing something you helped spread.
Want it bad enough? Pay for it. It's a free market, and Nintendo is in this to make money. Nintendo should sell them on Ebay until the demand drops, and then flood the stores.