Not just Linux; it runs on 64 bit Linux. Friend of mine ran it on Ubuntu 64 bit with no issues. (Well, other than he now wants a fruit fucker of his own. Whyfor? Er, I can guess, but I didn't ask..)
I played for about an hour last night. It's supposed to have a duration of about 6 hours (it's episodic, remember). The graphics, sound, writing, voices are all terrific; professional, polished, flawless. The humor falls in line with what you'd expect - hilarious and sometimes subtle. (On Desperation Street make sure you look at each house and the contents of their mailbox.)
Not a single graphics glitch or sound glitch was experienced. Game moves and loads quickly, looks good, has an extremely easy interface to learn.
I have fundamental issues with the authorization that's required for the license - see Bioware/Mass Effect - but at least it's only one time, and it doesn't appear to be tied to your hardware. (A post on the official forums said someone could use their license key on their laptop and their desktop, different operating systems, with no problem.)
The only problem that's annoyed me thus far is the pathfinding. It could use some work -- especially when an item falls into the path of the character.
Still, for $20.00 for 6 hours of laughing my ass off... well worth the cash.
I agree with the above poster, and wish I had moderation points.
I think he does underestimate the requests of the foreign powers. The foreign governments want the Internet to become a single entity ruled under single law - Germany wants no mention of the word Nazi, France wants no mention of white flags, China wants no mention of freedom or pornography, etc.
This is the truly scary part of what turning control over would entail. Sure, there's a difference between technical and political control - but political control eventually corrupts the technical. How long would it be before incredibly stupid mandates begin to filter down?
As for those who are decrying the United States as corrupt and no longer free - you may very well be right. I won't argue that we as a nation have some very serious issues to answer for, and that our current governmental body is severely lacking in many areas, including integrity and honesty. However, do not confuse the American people with the American government. Outright acts of hostility and control will still be met with outrage and political action - most of the problems with our government have been created through subterfuge on our government's part, leaving nothing for the people to focus on.
Honestly, I'd like to know if any United Nations governance body was prepared to handle the issues like spam, virii, identity theft, etc., and how so? What benefit does this transfer of "power" garner the world? Listing things like "connectivity is expensive and the cost should be borne by the rest of the world rather than the third world countries" -- no, I'm sorry, we paid for our connectivity when we needed it. If you want help paying for said connectivity, ask the United Nations for grants, or other companies or organizations for aid. Do not build it into the governing body of the Internet to be abused by all.
I especially like the claim that Internet virii and spam are problems created by the Internet's current governing bodies and the third world countries have to purchase "at great expense" methods of dealing with these issues.
There's an off switch, folks.
The remainder of their problems are similar, in my opinion. Someone thinks that having control will magically solve their problems because they can issue mandates about how people are supposed to behave. Whatever.
If they opened up discussion to the public at large then the various terms of the license used in intermediate versions that were later discarded would inevitably end up in some jackass's license, somewhere, because he liked that additional term. This would sow chaos and confusion as everyone used their own form of the GPL rather than the standard GPL.
I start screaming while I throw shit at the cashier and manager who can't do anything but listen to a fucking computer.
God.
When are people going to learn that policies and rules are not meant to be zero tolerant? The increasing computerization of our society means everyone of us is being pigeonholed into a specific, discrete category with no ability to escape that categorization. Instead, we're forced to "bear" these types of bullshit.
And we, as a society, complain when we aren't allowed to have responsibility or power. Yes, they go hand in hand. We don't trust our teachers to make decisions regarding the promotion or demotion of a student, so we provide them with a hard rule that can't be bent. We don't trust our managers of our stores to ensure they're profitable so we make all the decisions for them, despite the fact that the local situation is better comprehended by a local manager who is competent.
And in all of these situations where we don't allow decisions to be made we place individuals who are braindead and incapable of making those decisions when the systems break. What happens post Christmas when the return system breaks? Do you send everyone away, afraid that you might be letting someone get away with a $30 theft? To protect your $30.00 you're denying hundreds of legitimate customers their money?
FUCK THAT.
You can cart me out screaming and hollering and sue me for abuse. I'm getting tired of the system, and I intend to start fighting back. This is all bullshit. I'm no stranger to being tossed out from stores, or from screaming at the top of my lungs about what a dipshit someone is, so this is just another fucking cherry on the top of the sundae.
(Published at my homepage: http://www.schkerke.com/blog/archive/2004/10/02/42 5.aspx)
The press release came today from the EFF that the bnetd vs. Blizzard case had been put to rest. In essence everything that has been urban myth till now is dispelled. Reading the summary judgment, it looks as if a software producer can place whatever terms they want in their license and force you to agree to it. The case was brought under the DMCA initially and apparently expanded to include breach of contract and agreement at a later time.
The judgment can be found on Freedom To Tinker, at http://www.freedom-to-tinker.com/doc/2004/bnetd_30 sep.pdf. It's an interesting read -- I mostly ignore the case citings and get to the meat of the judgment itself, which can be fairly easily followed. The citings will lose you.
What is particularly disturbing about this case is the fact that it was settled via summary judgment. IBM in SCO vs. IBM is fighting tooth and nail right now to have a summary judgment issued that they have never infringed on SCO's copyrights while working with Linux. According to Groklaw, in order to dispute or dispel a partial summary judgment, you need only show disputed facts. The judge in this case apparently felt there were no disputed facts -- a sad tale indeed.
First, the small print in the system requirements area that says this software is subject to an EULA is enough of a notification to the purchaser that they are not purchasing the software, they are purchasing a license to use the software. I don't consider that a big enough notification then. The limitations and restrictions placed in the EULA also supercede all other copyright, federal, and state laws -- rendering the first sale doctrine and reverse engineering for compatibility moot.
Second, the Court in this matter has never tried to return software to Best Buy. Every game purchaser in the world is familiar with the "return it unopened or exchange it for the same product if opened and defective." Yet returning the software to the store it was purchased from was listed as an option by the Court. This is not a feasible option - no store returns opened software, although I wager if you had a Federal Judge ask the question the stores would chime, "Sure we do!" If you're a young male trying to return the software though you'll be treated like a black man at a white water fountain in the early '50s -- with suspicion, distrust, anger, and outright hatred. (pp. 6-7, "The terms of the EULA and TOU themselves do not appear on the outside packaging. If the user does not agree to the terms of Blizzard's EULAs or Battle.net TOU, he or she may return the game for a full refund of the purchase price within thirty (30) days of the original purchase.") If the court is referring to the option to return the software directly to the publisher let me ask you, have you ever tried that? Not to mention the cost you incur for shipping and the fact the the publisher may still reject your refund.
The fact that the EULA is available nowhere outside the physical media of the CD-ROM also wasn't an issue. The fact that a contract normally requires agreement between both parties wasn't an issue. (In one way I can see this - if actions were taken by both parties that could be taken to reasonably assume they had knowledge of and agreed to the contract then the contract would be binding. This doesn't explain how my son can agree to an EULA at age seven - despite the fact that he can install software. This doesn't explain what happens if you copy the CD-ROM, delete the EULA from the CD-ROM, and install the software with a blank license agreement. This doesn't explain the software that preinstalls things on your machine before you ever even see the license agreement - notably music CDs with their (in)famous copy protection methods.
bnetd was originally brought around by Blizzard's inability to deal with cheaters, hackers, and huge amounts of downtime on Battle.net. I like to thi
I've got copies download of the source code that were hosted on GotDotNet.
This might be Microsoft's implementation of FlexWiki (FlexWiki is a BSD license type, if I remember correctly) but FlexWiki has been available for a while.
Operating systems start, manage, and terminate processes and resources. There have been huge strides in the user interfaces that operating systems have, but the central functionality of the operating system has changed little, if at all.
...they'll soon be sued away by the likes of Microsoft and Apple, both of whom have an established interest in maintaining the status quo.
It sounds like a virtual machine they've created for each host operating system and "virtualized" operating system. While possible - see WINE and the lately not heard from David project - this would require quite a bit of work. Hell, trying to emulate Linux in this way would be a hoot. Which window manager do you want to emulate today?
I think it is mostly vapor. Enderle, the famed SCO analyst, has his hands in it and I immediately distrust anything he works with and endorses.
(I just found out that my sister's ex-boyfriend's brother is one of the major financers of the Phantom. How's that for being close to slime?)
We have many major players rejecting this proposal in public. Is it enough for critical mass?
Sendmail has a plugin available which allows for Sender ID compliance. Which other GPL software will be modified by third parties? This is the joy of GPL software, of course, to maintain it separately from the core. This is also the Achilles' Heel. If Microsoft wanted to do so it could produce the necessary changes for all of these dissenting software packages itself -- and distribute them itself -- and achieve dominance through this method.
The official group declaration would mean little if the availability of the encumbered proposal is enormous and well known.
Most importantly, why wasn't this type of public condemnation available for the various W3C proposals that had patents attached? We cannot pick and choose the fights we engage in - our opposition to patents and intellectual property in standards must be uniform and universal. Once a single standard is accepted despite being weighed down by IP concerns the floodgates will open.
7. I can make my application the ugliest, least capable appllication possible. It won't take full advantage of the end user's screen resolution, it won't take full advantage of their system, and they'll have $3,500.00 keyboards and be happy about it.
There comes a point when you choose to program to a specific functionality level, or you choose to ignore any and functionality levels and design a truly cross platform web application.
Personally, I like having people ENJOY using my applications.
They allow you to save the data with the form, transfer the data to a remote source without any loss, and at the remote site you can process the PDF form with additional software. Individuals can save the form and take it with them to have the data entered, removing the requirement for a connection to the network (ala HTML forms).
Acrobat allows you to easily specify the types of data you want them to allow to input. There's quite a few PDF form creation software packages available as well allowing you to do to this.
We use them at my place of employment and have had only one problem: data entry sections that can widely vary. There's no way to make the section grow or shrink that we've found so if the form creator specified area isn't large enough to hold your data you could be out of luck when you go to print.
In that same vein they don't deal well with ad hoc data being added to the beginning or end of the form as a Word or RTF file would. The purpose of a form is to get away from that sort of data, but it happens.
...is that the Attorney Generals have been lulled into believing that sites and software such as Suprnova and Kazaa are the only uses of software known as P2P.
Unfortunately for us, the consumers the AGs seek to protect, it isn't. One group I work with -- the Firearms HL mod team -- has repeatedly run into problems with providing substantial mirror locations for their releases. Using BitTorrent we were able to provide substantial bandwidth from a large number of providers during the necessary period (one week, roughly) -- without negatively impacting any one site or person.
These uses of P2P software are transient but very real. Modding, one of the largest reasons the gaming community exists and colloborates together in my opinion, has become a large user of BitTorrent and P2P software. You can find any number of their releases online at one time.
The reason these are discounted by the legal field is that they aren't "corporate" or "official." An individual using BitTorrent to some success isn't acting responsibily, or doesn't represent the norm. I find these torrents all the time as I surf the 'Net looking for new, free games and such.
Consider SourceForge -- if it were to disappear, how do you think large distributions would continue to exist? It probably wouldn't be via a large corporate donor; many distributions would rather give up their thumb or die than to bow to a corporate sponsor. No -- they would probably begin to distribute their files via P2P software of some sort with an unofficial network of seeders making efforts to be online.
It is unfortunate that the AGs choose to listen to the "entertainment industries" without soliciting advice or comment from the users of the software. The companies that produce the software may know only of the illicit uses of it but the users of the software are those who find legitimate uses for it.
Modding, independent musicians, shareware authors, graphics artists, and even porn companies can all benefit directly from P2P software. All of them would benefit directly based on their popularity and the willingness of the public at large to seed their software. The more popular your software the easier it is to get ahold of, giving you more users and more funds to continue development making it even more popular -- repeat cycle.
The distribution channel and the control it provides has dried up in the digital arena because of this cycle. This is what scares the large corporations. It isn't the loss of profit. It's the loss of control and the future ability to make profit.
Finally why are we threatening companies that are not directly responsible for these actions? The seeders of illicit software are very easily identified, even with the roadblocks the US Courts have put in place in regards to lawsuits. Why not pursue the individuals who are seeding the files? Existing laws are sufficient to successfully prosecute these people; why do we need to add more crap to our lawbooks just to satisfy a particular situation for a particular lobbying group or groups?
And those laws will only be a complete mess if each and every state passes their own version.
I used a combination of USB 2.0 and Firewire external drives. Maxtor 250Gb were around $230.00 retail (CompUSA purchase); Maxtor 200Gb were around $190.00 retail. The last few I put together were Belkin external USB 2.0 conversion cases with 160Gb drives I had taken from a failed RAID array.
I've got ten drives right now, performance is phenomenal, and I no longer have to worry about my son destroying the CDs or DVDs he plays with. Using Daemon Tools and Alcohol 120% I'm able to emulate the common CD protections and mount images; using scripts I can simplify the task for my son.
I have one drive dedicated as my Vault storage. It's where I keep local repositories of open source code that interests me.
The biggest problem I've run into is merging the drives seamlessly under Windows. Under Linux it's no problem. Symbolic links massed in one central directory takes care of the problem; you can schedule the script to run using cron and create the links so it is always up to date.
Under Windows it is a bit more of a pain in the ass since shortcuts aren't "true" files. A nifty piece of software I found called Winbolic Link lets me make links that behave more like symbolic links do. The only downside is I've yet to find a way to script Winbolic Link but I'm probably going to switch my fileserver over to Linux soon *anyway*.
For what it's worth I have over twenty years of games, both CD and floppy (I have Might & Magic on bootable 5.25", if you can find the drive). "Finding" a game is a disaster for me. Thankfully imaging does exist, and I can still play the original Pool of Radiance when I want.
When you fight a war with sharks keeping the waters clear for you, you have to beware of when the sharks decide that you are a better meal than the scum you're letting float by.
True, but how long does Slashdot keep a copy? Also keep in mind that public domain for one site is not public domain in another. See the UK and "That's All Right." Or in this case the US Government owns the photos and may or may not be in the public domain, but I'd wager that the possibility exists the government might not want... say, Iran looking at these photos for some reason. They block Iran at the proxy and don't tell anyone. Slashdot caches, boom, now they're in trouble.
It is definitely possible, and definitely a worthwhile goal, but in the end the editors here and story submitters aren't qualified to make the decisions involved.
A slashdotting is legal, if a bit rude. Kind of like me giving the bird to someone in Texas(unless they've outlawed that as they have here in Missouri. Road rage. Pfft.). You're directing a huge influx of visitors to the remote site - which is available on the Internet for interested people to view, search, etc.
As for first post mirroring, hell yes. I'd love for CmdrTaco to give away a few subscriptions to folks who would agree to mirror front page news for a temporary time period. They assume the risk, get a free subscription, and maybe a bit of free advertising.
I can see your point, and it may not make a difference to you, but generally it seems that speaking derogatorily of a group is much more tolerated that speaking derogatorily of an individual.
Slashdot may not have the political humor for those jokes but they remain in currency today. Hell, most of us in my department make fun of ourselves and our own problems than anyone else. I, for instance, am a fat lazy Polack with a complexion that more closely matches a teenager than a near thirty year old.
When man loses the ability to laugh he loses the ability to deal with issues of stress. Laughter blows off steam, it provides an out. No matter the source or "correctness" of the feelings cracking a joke about the French, or blacks, or Muslims, or Polacks -- allows the individual to relieve that pressure.
You probably won't agree. I do, because I think "political correctness" is bullshit and is nothing more than a pretty facade that the political machine has put on for us, the American public, in order to buy our votes.
Is it right to tear down another man, for any reason? No. Then again if I were in the presence of a Frenchman I would respect him enough to not crack jokes such as the above, unless I knew he wouldn't mind. Same for a black, a Muslim, or wherever. My world is loose, fast, and fun. Others aren't. It's all about respect, but respect is about *time* and *place* as much as anything else.
Yea, but you're assuming the bias existed only because of the WMD stance. (Which you are correct on, by the way; I am not disputing that.)
The anti French jokes have been a running joke in my circle of friends since I began strategy war gaming eighteen years ago. For us it started when we began attempting to be the first to invade France... because we wouldn't take any losses from fighting white flags.
So... it may be old, but it's good to have running jokes.
Believe it or not, how about copyright issues? Whether one site allows it or not caching those images on a popular site such as Slashdot - especially in circumstances where Slashdot is portraying the site or company in a negative manner - would be a Bad Thing.
Site metrics, robbing the remote site of advertising revenue, blah blah blah. These are all forces that could be brought to bear against Slashdot if they turned to caching stories and/or images from remote sites.
Slashdot Mirror
Not just Linux; it runs on 64 bit Linux. Friend of mine ran it on Ubuntu 64 bit with no issues. (Well, other than he now wants a fruit fucker of his own. Whyfor? Er, I can guess, but I didn't ask..)
I played for about an hour last night. It's supposed to have a duration of about 6 hours (it's episodic, remember). The graphics, sound, writing, voices are all terrific; professional, polished, flawless. The humor falls in line with what you'd expect - hilarious and sometimes subtle. (On Desperation Street make sure you look at each house and the contents of their mailbox.)
Not a single graphics glitch or sound glitch was experienced. Game moves and loads quickly, looks good, has an extremely easy interface to learn.
I have fundamental issues with the authorization that's required for the license - see Bioware/Mass Effect - but at least it's only one time, and it doesn't appear to be tied to your hardware. (A post on the official forums said someone could use their license key on their laptop and their desktop, different operating systems, with no problem.)
The only problem that's annoyed me thus far is the pathfinding. It could use some work -- especially when an item falls into the path of the character.
Still, for $20.00 for 6 hours of laughing my ass off... well worth the cash.
I agree with the above poster, and wish I had moderation points.
I think he does underestimate the requests of the foreign powers. The foreign governments want the Internet to become a single entity ruled under single law - Germany wants no mention of the word Nazi, France wants no mention of white flags, China wants no mention of freedom or pornography, etc.
This is the truly scary part of what turning control over would entail. Sure, there's a difference between technical and political control - but political control eventually corrupts the technical. How long would it be before incredibly stupid mandates begin to filter down?
As for those who are decrying the United States as corrupt and no longer free - you may very well be right. I won't argue that we as a nation have some very serious issues to answer for, and that our current governmental body is severely lacking in many areas, including integrity and honesty. However, do not confuse the American people with the American government. Outright acts of hostility and control will still be met with outrage and political action - most of the problems with our government have been created through subterfuge on our government's part, leaving nothing for the people to focus on.
Honestly, I'd like to know if any United Nations governance body was prepared to handle the issues like spam, virii, identity theft, etc., and how so? What benefit does this transfer of "power" garner the world? Listing things like "connectivity is expensive and the cost should be borne by the rest of the world rather than the third world countries" -- no, I'm sorry, we paid for our connectivity when we needed it. If you want help paying for said connectivity, ask the United Nations for grants, or other companies or organizations for aid. Do not build it into the governing body of the Internet to be abused by all.
I especially like the claim that Internet virii and spam are problems created by the Internet's current governing bodies and the third world countries have to purchase "at great expense" methods of dealing with these issues.
There's an off switch, folks.
The remainder of their problems are similar, in my opinion. Someone thinks that having control will magically solve their problems because they can issue mandates about how people are supposed to behave. Whatever.
IFilm has the "Hot Coffee Movie" that they made to demonstrate that the mod wasn't fake.
It can probably survive a Slashdotting more than a games' fan site.
Hot Coffee
Apparently coffee is slang for sex. *shrug* Whatever.
Same here, they fix the shit and I already finished the game. Glad I played through the stutter ass.
If they opened up discussion to the public at large then the various terms of the license used in intermediate versions that were later discarded would inevitably end up in some jackass's license, somewhere, because he liked that additional term. This would sow chaos and confusion as everyone used their own form of the GPL rather than the standard GPL.
I start screaming while I throw shit at the cashier and manager who can't do anything but listen to a fucking computer.
God.
When are people going to learn that policies and rules are not meant to be zero tolerant? The increasing computerization of our society means everyone of us is being pigeonholed into a specific, discrete category with no ability to escape that categorization. Instead, we're forced to "bear" these types of bullshit.
And we, as a society, complain when we aren't allowed to have responsibility or power. Yes, they go hand in hand. We don't trust our teachers to make decisions regarding the promotion or demotion of a student, so we provide them with a hard rule that can't be bent. We don't trust our managers of our stores to ensure they're profitable so we make all the decisions for them, despite the fact that the local situation is better comprehended by a local manager who is competent.
And in all of these situations where we don't allow decisions to be made we place individuals who are braindead and incapable of making those decisions when the systems break. What happens post Christmas when the return system breaks? Do you send everyone away, afraid that you might be letting someone get away with a $30 theft? To protect your $30.00 you're denying hundreds of legitimate customers their money?
FUCK THAT.
You can cart me out screaming and hollering and sue me for abuse. I'm getting tired of the system, and I intend to start fighting back. This is all bullshit. I'm no stranger to being tossed out from stores, or from screaming at the top of my lungs about what a dipshit someone is, so this is just another fucking cherry on the top of the sundae.
(Published at my homepage: http://www.schkerke.com/blog/archive/2004/10/02/42 5.aspx)
The press release came today from the EFF that the bnetd vs. Blizzard case had been put to rest. In essence everything that has been urban myth till now is dispelled. Reading the summary judgment, it looks as if a software producer can place whatever terms they want in their license and force you to agree to it. The case was brought under the DMCA initially and apparently expanded to include breach of contract and agreement at a later time.
The judgment can be found on Freedom To Tinker, at http://www.freedom-to-tinker.com/doc/2004/bnetd_30 sep.pdf. It's an interesting read -- I mostly ignore the case citings and get to the meat of the judgment itself, which can be fairly easily followed. The citings will lose you.
What is particularly disturbing about this case is the fact that it was settled via summary judgment. IBM in SCO vs. IBM is fighting tooth and nail right now to have a summary judgment issued that they have never infringed on SCO's copyrights while working with Linux. According to Groklaw, in order to dispute or dispel a partial summary judgment, you need only show disputed facts. The judge in this case apparently felt there were no disputed facts -- a sad tale indeed.
First, the small print in the system requirements area that says this software is subject to an EULA is enough of a notification to the purchaser that they are not purchasing the software, they are purchasing a license to use the software. I don't consider that a big enough notification then. The limitations and restrictions placed in the EULA also supercede all other copyright, federal, and state laws -- rendering the first sale doctrine and reverse engineering for compatibility moot.
Second, the Court in this matter has never tried to return software to Best Buy. Every game purchaser in the world is familiar with the "return it unopened or exchange it for the same product if opened and defective." Yet returning the software to the store it was purchased from was listed as an option by the Court. This is not a feasible option - no store returns opened software, although I wager if you had a Federal Judge ask the question the stores would chime, "Sure we do!" If you're a young male trying to return the software though you'll be treated like a black man at a white water fountain in the early '50s -- with suspicion, distrust, anger, and outright hatred. (pp. 6-7, "The terms of the EULA and TOU themselves do not appear on the outside packaging. If the user does not agree to the terms of Blizzard's EULAs or Battle.net TOU, he or she may return the game for a full refund of the purchase price within thirty (30) days of the original purchase.") If the court is referring to the option to return the software directly to the publisher let me ask you, have you ever tried that? Not to mention the cost you incur for shipping and the fact the the publisher may still reject your refund.
The fact that the EULA is available nowhere outside the physical media of the CD-ROM also wasn't an issue. The fact that a contract normally requires agreement between both parties wasn't an issue. (In one way I can see this - if actions were taken by both parties that could be taken to reasonably assume they had knowledge of and agreed to the contract then the contract would be binding. This doesn't explain how my son can agree to an EULA at age seven - despite the fact that he can install software. This doesn't explain what happens if you copy the CD-ROM, delete the EULA from the CD-ROM, and install the software with a blank license agreement. This doesn't explain the software that preinstalls things on your machine before you ever even see the license agreement - notably music CDs with their (in)famous copy protection methods.
bnetd was originally brought around by Blizzard's inability to deal with cheaters, hackers, and huge amounts of downtime on Battle.net. I like to thi
Guess that joke flew over the moderator's head. :)
;P
"I must be dreaming, a corporation is giving up DRM. It's going to suck to wake up in the morning."
Oh well.
It's really going to suck waking up in the morning.
I've got copies download of the source code that were hosted on GotDotNet.
This might be Microsoft's implementation of FlexWiki (FlexWiki is a BSD license type, if I remember correctly) but FlexWiki has been available for a while.
And that's an incorrect definition why?
Operating systems start, manage, and terminate processes and resources. There have been huge strides in the user interfaces that operating systems have, but the central functionality of the operating system has changed little, if at all.
...they'll soon be sued away by the likes of Microsoft and Apple, both of whom have an established interest in maintaining the status quo.
It sounds like a virtual machine they've created for each host operating system and "virtualized" operating system. While possible - see WINE and the lately not heard from David project - this would require quite a bit of work. Hell, trying to emulate Linux in this way would be a hoot. Which window manager do you want to emulate today?
I think it is mostly vapor. Enderle, the famed SCO analyst, has his hands in it and I immediately distrust anything he works with and endorses.
(I just found out that my sister's ex-boyfriend's brother is one of the major financers of the Phantom. How's that for being close to slime?)
We have many major players rejecting this proposal in public. Is it enough for critical mass?
Sendmail has a plugin available which allows for Sender ID compliance. Which other GPL software will be modified by third parties? This is the joy of GPL software, of course, to maintain it separately from the core. This is also the Achilles' Heel. If Microsoft wanted to do so it could produce the necessary changes for all of these dissenting software packages itself -- and distribute them itself -- and achieve dominance through this method.
The official group declaration would mean little if the availability of the encumbered proposal is enormous and well known.
Most importantly, why wasn't this type of public condemnation available for the various W3C proposals that had patents attached? We cannot pick and choose the fights we engage in - our opposition to patents and intellectual property in standards must be uniform and universal. Once a single standard is accepted despite being weighed down by IP concerns the floodgates will open.
>Or Internet Banking (which 9 times out of 10 requires IE, often "for security reasons" [sic])?
US Bank and Citibank's online banking have recently been redesigned for full usage under Mozilla based browsers.
They *used* to give warnings similar to what you say but that has changed in the past six months.
I anticipate more changes will follow.
7. I can make my application the ugliest, least capable appllication possible. It won't take full advantage of the end user's screen resolution, it won't take full advantage of their system, and they'll have $3,500.00 keyboards and be happy about it.
There comes a point when you choose to program to a specific functionality level, or you choose to ignore any and functionality levels and design a truly cross platform web application.
Personally, I like having people ENJOY using my applications.
They allow you to save the data with the form, transfer the data to a remote source without any loss, and at the remote site you can process the PDF form with additional software. Individuals can save the form and take it with them to have the data entered, removing the requirement for a connection to the network (ala HTML forms).
Acrobat allows you to easily specify the types of data you want them to allow to input. There's quite a few PDF form creation software packages available as well allowing you to do to this.
We use them at my place of employment and have had only one problem: data entry sections that can widely vary. There's no way to make the section grow or shrink that we've found so if the form creator specified area isn't large enough to hold your data you could be out of luck when you go to print.
In that same vein they don't deal well with ad hoc data being added to the beginning or end of the form as a Word or RTF file would. The purpose of a form is to get away from that sort of data, but it happens.
...is that the Attorney Generals have been lulled into believing that sites and software such as Suprnova and Kazaa are the only uses of software known as P2P.
Unfortunately for us, the consumers the AGs seek to protect, it isn't. One group I work with -- the Firearms HL mod team -- has repeatedly run into problems with providing substantial mirror locations for their releases. Using BitTorrent we were able to provide substantial bandwidth from a large number of providers during the necessary period (one week, roughly) -- without negatively impacting any one site or person.
These uses of P2P software are transient but very real. Modding, one of the largest reasons the gaming community exists and colloborates together in my opinion, has become a large user of BitTorrent and P2P software. You can find any number of their releases online at one time.
The reason these are discounted by the legal field is that they aren't "corporate" or "official." An individual using BitTorrent to some success isn't acting responsibily, or doesn't represent the norm. I find these torrents all the time as I surf the 'Net looking for new, free games and such.
Consider SourceForge -- if it were to disappear, how do you think large distributions would continue to exist? It probably wouldn't be via a large corporate donor; many distributions would rather give up their thumb or die than to bow to a corporate sponsor. No -- they would probably begin to distribute their files via P2P software of some sort with an unofficial network of seeders making efforts to be online.
It is unfortunate that the AGs choose to listen to the "entertainment industries" without soliciting advice or comment from the users of the software. The companies that produce the software may know only of the illicit uses of it but the users of the software are those who find legitimate uses for it.
Modding, independent musicians, shareware authors, graphics artists, and even porn companies can all benefit directly from P2P software. All of them would benefit directly based on their popularity and the willingness of the public at large to seed their software. The more popular your software the easier it is to get ahold of, giving you more users and more funds to continue development making it even more popular -- repeat cycle.
The distribution channel and the control it provides has dried up in the digital arena because of this cycle. This is what scares the large corporations. It isn't the loss of profit. It's the loss of control and the future ability to make profit.
Finally why are we threatening companies that are not directly responsible for these actions? The seeders of illicit software are very easily identified, even with the roadblocks the US Courts have put in place in regards to lawsuits. Why not pursue the individuals who are seeding the files? Existing laws are sufficient to successfully prosecute these people; why do we need to add more crap to our lawbooks just to satisfy a particular situation for a particular lobbying group or groups?
And those laws will only be a complete mess if each and every state passes their own version.
I used a combination of USB 2.0 and Firewire external drives. Maxtor 250Gb were around $230.00 retail (CompUSA purchase); Maxtor 200Gb were around $190.00 retail. The last few I put together were Belkin external USB 2.0 conversion cases with 160Gb drives I had taken from a failed RAID array.
I've got ten drives right now, performance is phenomenal, and I no longer have to worry about my son destroying the CDs or DVDs he plays with. Using Daemon Tools and Alcohol 120% I'm able to emulate the common CD protections and mount images; using scripts I can simplify the task for my son.
I have one drive dedicated as my Vault storage. It's where I keep local repositories of open source code that interests me.
The biggest problem I've run into is merging the drives seamlessly under Windows. Under Linux it's no problem. Symbolic links massed in one central directory takes care of the problem; you can schedule the script to run using cron and create the links so it is always up to date.
Under Windows it is a bit more of a pain in the ass since shortcuts aren't "true" files. A nifty piece of software I found called Winbolic Link lets me make links that behave more like symbolic links do. The only downside is I've yet to find a way to script Winbolic Link but I'm probably going to switch my fileserver over to Linux soon *anyway*.
For what it's worth I have over twenty years of games, both CD and floppy (I have Might & Magic on bootable 5.25", if you can find the drive). "Finding" a game is a disaster for me. Thankfully imaging does exist, and I can still play the original Pool of Radiance when I want.
When you fight a war with sharks keeping the waters clear for you, you have to beware of when the sharks decide that you are a better meal than the scum you're letting float by.
True, but how long does Slashdot keep a copy? Also keep in mind that public domain for one site is not public domain in another. See the UK and "That's All Right." Or in this case the US Government owns the photos and may or may not be in the public domain, but I'd wager that the possibility exists the government might not want... say, Iran looking at these photos for some reason. They block Iran at the proxy and don't tell anyone. Slashdot caches, boom, now they're in trouble.
It is definitely possible, and definitely a worthwhile goal, but in the end the editors here and story submitters aren't qualified to make the decisions involved.
A slashdotting is legal, if a bit rude. Kind of like me giving the bird to someone in Texas(unless they've outlawed that as they have here in Missouri. Road rage. Pfft.). You're directing a huge influx of visitors to the remote site - which is available on the Internet for interested people to view, search, etc.
As for first post mirroring, hell yes. I'd love for CmdrTaco to give away a few subscriptions to folks who would agree to mirror front page news for a temporary time period. They assume the risk, get a free subscription, and maybe a bit of free advertising.
I can see your point, and it may not make a difference to you, but generally it seems that speaking derogatorily of a group is much more tolerated that speaking derogatorily of an individual.
Slashdot may not have the political humor for those jokes but they remain in currency today. Hell, most of us in my department make fun of ourselves and our own problems than anyone else. I, for instance, am a fat lazy Polack with a complexion that more closely matches a teenager than a near thirty year old.
When man loses the ability to laugh he loses the ability to deal with issues of stress. Laughter blows off steam, it provides an out. No matter the source or "correctness" of the feelings cracking a joke about the French, or blacks, or Muslims, or Polacks -- allows the individual to relieve that pressure.
You probably won't agree. I do, because I think "political correctness" is bullshit and is nothing more than a pretty facade that the political machine has put on for us, the American public, in order to buy our votes.
Is it right to tear down another man, for any reason? No. Then again if I were in the presence of a Frenchman I would respect him enough to not crack jokes such as the above, unless I knew he wouldn't mind. Same for a black, a Muslim, or wherever. My world is loose, fast, and fun. Others aren't. It's all about respect, but respect is about *time* and *place* as much as anything else.
Yea, but you're assuming the bias existed only because of the WMD stance. (Which you are correct on, by the way; I am not disputing that.)
The anti French jokes have been a running joke in my circle of friends since I began strategy war gaming eighteen years ago. For us it started when we began attempting to be the first to invade France... because we wouldn't take any losses from fighting white flags.
So... it may be old, but it's good to have running jokes.
Believe it or not, how about copyright issues? Whether one site allows it or not caching those images on a popular site such as Slashdot - especially in circumstances where Slashdot is portraying the site or company in a negative manner - would be a Bad Thing.
Site metrics, robbing the remote site of advertising revenue, blah blah blah. These are all forces that could be brought to bear against Slashdot if they turned to caching stories and/or images from remote sites.
Actually you missed a better point.
In the movie, I, Robot, updates are delivered automatically to the newest series of robots via connection to US Robotics.