This whole thing seems silly. The source code for Busybox, and all of the utilities that can be integrated into it, is already readily available. So, what is Verizon supposedly "withholding?" (Never mind the fact that the GPL, because it constitutes a "contract to make a contract," is invalid.)
Saying that the users of a Web site have some right to its source code is the same thing as saying that if you are a customer of a store, you have a right to have a key to it. Actually, it's worse than that, because the FSF's license doesn't even require that you PURCHASE anything from the Web site or even visit it! As we all know, the FSF's goal -- the same goal as that of Richard Stallman -- is to do everything it can to ensure that no one who writes software can make any money by doing so. This is nasty and spiteful. Someone who codes a good or innovative Web site deserves to be rewarded for it -- especially since so many out there are so awful!
Ironically, the FSF is engaging in RIAA-like tactics itself. It has just announced a new license, called the AGPL, which attempts to impose requirements upon companies which "play" GPLed applications over the Net. That's right: If you are an ASP, the FSF wants to require you to give away your software to the public if you're running GPLed code. This is not much different from the RIAA's demands. So, it seems to me that the pot is calling the kettle black here.
Oops.... The above was badly formatted because Slashdot ran the lines together. My bad; I should have previewed. here's the message as I meant it to be displayed:
I'm going to be a bit blunt here, but I think that what I'm going to say is well-deserved and is certainly backed up by the facts. It appears that Vuze has based its business plan on not buying sufficient bandwidth to deliver its products and then taking the bandwidth from the ISPs of its customers. It states as much in its petition to the FCC, where it writes:
"Torrent technologies make use of resources -- bandwidth, storage, and processing power -- on a decentralized basis, allowing large data transfers to be made more efficiently and cost-effectively than ever before. Torrent technologies leverage the power of many individual computers by enabling each computer interested in a piece of content to obtain small pieces of it from multiple other computers, and simultaneously play the same role to others who seek the same content in the future.
"Accordingly, a distributor of content need not have many large central servers to store and send a file each time an Internet user is interested in a particular piece of content; instead, the content distributor need only have a handful of servers that operate as initial "seed servers" for the content, and can then rely on the distributed computing capacity of all of the individual user computers (the "swarm") that have that have agreed to be used as a "seed" for others."
In the above, it also glosses over the fact that its software turns users' computers into servers, violating -- in the overwhelming majority of cases -- the ISP's terms of service.
Vuze then goes on to misrepresent the characteristics of the BitTorrent protocol:
"For both downloading and uploading content, torrent technology uses fewer resources than traditional non-P2P protocols such as HTTP because distributed computing permits uploads and downloads to be resumed mid-way rather than restarted, and transmission errors can easily be fixed without resending an entire file."
The fact is that BitTorrent is not more efficient than HTTP or FTP. It is sometimes faster, but to attain this speed it consumes more resources than a simple file transfer. In fact, because one must transmit as much as one receives, it at least doubles the use of the ISP's backbone resources and of the user's allocated bandwidth. What's more, due to the lack of caching, it is many times less efficient because the same file must be sent many times across the Internet backbone instead of once. And the assertion, above, that downloads cannot be resumed is flat wrong. Virtually all FTP clients now provide means by which to resume interrupted downloads (which are rare in any case). And because HTTP can be cached, even an HTTP download which is restarted from scratch does not consume additional backbone resources because the cache will have received the entire file and can retransmit it to the end user.
Again, it appears that Vuze is so unwilling to "pay its freight" to deliver content to customers that it is willing to file a deceptive -- and, in some places, patently false -- petition with the FCC. Such tactics, in my opinion, deserve no sympathy.
I'm going to be a bit blunt here, but I think that what I'm going to say is well-deserved and is certainly backed up by the facts. It appears that Vuze has based its business plan on not buying sufficient bandwidth to deliver its products and then taking the bandwidth from the ISPs of its customers. It states as much in its petition to the FCC, where it writes:
"Torrent technologies make use of resources -- bandwidth, storage, and processing power -- on a decentralized basis, allowing large data transfers to be made more efficiently and cost-effectively than ever before. Torrent technologies leverage the power of many individual computers by enabling each computer interested in a piece of content to obtain small pieces of it from multiple other computers, and simultaneously play the same role to others who seek the same content in the future.
"Accordingly, a distributor of content need not have many large central servers to store and send a file each time an Internet user is interested in a particular piece of content; instead, the content distributor need only have a handful of servers that operate as initial "seed servers" for the content, and can then rely on the distributed computing capacity of all of the individual user computers (the "swarm") that have that have agreed to be used as a "seed" for others."
In the above, it also glosses over the fact that its software turns users' computers into servers, violating -- in the overwhelming majority of cases -- the ISP's terms of service.
Vuze then goes on to misrepresent the characteristics of the BitTorrent protocol:
"For both downloading and uploading content, torrent technology uses fewer resources than traditional non-P2P protocols such as HTTP because distributed computing permits uploads and downloads to be resumed mid-way rather than restarted, and transmission errors can easily be fixed without resending an entire file."
The fact is that BitTorrent is not more efficient than HTTP or FTP. It is sometimes faster, but to attain this speed it consumes more resources than a simple file transfer. In fact, because one must transmit as much as one receives, it at least doubles the use of the ISP's backbone resources and of the user's allocated bandwidth. What's more, due to the lack of caching, it is many times less efficient because the same file must be sent many times across the Internet backbone instead of once. And the assertion, above, that downloads cannot be resumed is flat wrong. Virtually all FTP clients now provide means by which to resume interrupted downloads (which are rare in any case). And because HTTP can be cached, even an HTTP download which is restarted from scratch does not consume additional backbone resources because the cache will have received the entire file and can retransmit it to the end user.
Again, it appears that Vuze is so unwilling to "pay its freight" to deliver content to customers that it is willing to file a deceptive -- and, in some places, patently false -- petition with the FCC. Such tactics, in my opinion, deserve no sympathy.
--Brett Glass, LARIAT.NET
The purpose of GPL3 is the same as that of earlier versions: to "get at" folks that Richard Stallman and the FSF do not like. Much of it is spiteful and is directed specifically against people who have been "too successful" -- that is, programmers who have been able to make money by writing and selling software. (Heaven forbid that anyone should be able to be successful in that way.) Alas, it will not affect Microsoft, which pretty much everyone admits will not be harmed by the GPL. It'll only affect little guys like us who otherwise might have a chance. It's ironic, but the FSF has effectively become an ally of Microsoft by going after its nascent competition. Sad.
So, let me get this straight: RMS has come out against measures which would ensure that inventions which people patented were truly new and not copies of prior art. In other words, if he has his way, it will be more likely that patents which will be issued which don't represent truly novel inventions. This is a good thing?
The FSF which has been threatening for years to modify the GPL so that anyone who OFFERS A SERVICE (e.g. an ASP) that uses GPLed software must abide by all sorts of special rules and restrictions. What is this but "pay per use" -- exactly what DRM does?
One essential part of the fiber install process, at least for Verizon, is to cut the copper. Why? Because thanks to rules drafted by politicians to whom Verizon has contributed megabucks, Verizon is obliged to allow competitors to rent and use the copper, but not the fiber. Let Verizon run fiber to your home and you're stuck with them forever. It's a Faustian bargain.
Verizon offers its own Internet service to every exchange; it's not surprising that it wants to make sure that no other ISP can do the same. Strictly an anticompetitive move.
I love the header "Liberty or Death for the Program." Essentially, what it says is that the so-called "liberty" of the program (which is an absurd concept; a program isn't a thinking being and cannot have liberty) is more important than PEOPLE's liberties.
I've been charged for ridiculously large numbers of clicks on a site for which I know there's a relatively limited market. I also checked my server logs and saw that the number of visits was nowhere near the number of clicks Google claimed. When I complained to Google, they stonewalled.
The government is allowed to take your house on behalf of a big corporation. But a corporation can't be required to request its monopoly infrastructure -- ON WHICH THE LOCAL GOVERNMENT HAS GIVEN IT A MONOPOLY -- at a fair price.
At least the Supreme Court is being consistent. Corporations are getting everything they want, and John Q. Citizen can just go hang.
The article cited above says that the court ruled that "judges should defer to the expertise of the Federal Communications Commission." But the FCC isn't any more expert than anyone else -- certainly not than the ISP that brought the case. And many inside it face political pressure to kowtow to (guess who?) the same big corporations.
We're living in the New Gilded Age, folks. Corporations get whatever they want and the individaul loses.
--Brett Glass
Schools have the right to keep order in class. They don't have the right to restrict activities such as speech outside of class (remember, the kids take the computers home). Quite a few court cases have affirmed students' rights to do things that administrators and teachers do not like (including posting Web sites in which they criticize the school).
That setting isn't part of the PPP negotiation and therefore cannot be dictated by the server. It's set on the client. Windows has a simple box in the client configuration that says "Use default gateway on remote network" that one can check or uncheck. MacOS X does not. It always does wrong thing (it routes EVERYTHING through the VPN tunnel). So, your boss gets to see everything you browse, all of your webmail, etc.
The article above states that WiFi is WiMAX's "shorter range cousin." In fact, the fundamental physics say that, given the FCC limits on signal strength and modulation schemes, neither can go farther than the other. WiMAX is slightly better at handling clients that are widely distributed geographically, but most of the claims that it is hugely better than WiFi or will go farther are simply hype. What's more, it's sure to be more expensive than WiFi.
Remember, the GPL isn't about keeping *your* code "free", it's about making *other people's* work GPLed.
Exactly. The GPL is not at all about freedom, but rather about taking away others' work and freedom. Remember what inspired it: Stallman wanted to keep people from leaving academia to make a decent living at programming.
Until now, MacOS X's PPTP implementation has been largely useless because it routes ALL network traffic through the VPN connection instead of letting your ordinary Internet traffic use the connection you already have. Thus, if you tunnel into your office, your ordinary Web browsing goes through the office and then BACK out to the Internet while the VPN is established. Is this fixed in "Tiger?" Nothing on Apple's Web site says.
"There are times when Bruce Perens can be a real idiot, and this is one of those times."
What Bruce's statements demonstrate is that, like Stallman, he sees GPLed software as a way of intentionally undermining programmers' livelihoods. According to statements by both Stallman and Perens, they consider programmers are "evil" unless they give away their work.
Linus, having worked in the real world at a real company facing real tough competition from the Big Guys (Intel and AMD), understands that people who work hard are justified in demanding that they be paid for their work. Linus personally wanted to give Linux away, and chose the GPL largely by accident -- because he saw it on the C compiler he was using. Had he looked more thoroughly into the various alternatives, or understood the full agenda behind the GPL, he might well have chosen Larry Wall's Artistic License or the BSD License. Of course, once he released Linux under the GPL (though he did modify it to allow binary drivers), he was stuck. What this incident shows it that Linus isn't a "Stallmanista." He doesn't have it in for his fellow programmers, as Stallman and Perens do. Which is a good thing, IMHO.
The software didn't refuse to install on the system because it was running Windows 98. It refused because the system was not running Internet Exploder 6.
Of course, one shouldn't put it past Microsoft to refuse to support machines that are still happily running Windows 98. Gotta force customers to upgrade their OS (and pay more money), even if the hardware isn't up to running the latest bloatware....
One flaw in the review cited in the article above that it compares the products by noting the number of items they reported. By this metric, the best antispyware program would be one that reported each bit of each spyware file or registry entry individually..... "160 million bits of PUS [Microsoft's own acronym, which stands for "potentially undesirable software] found!"
Needless to say, it's better to compare apples to apples.
I just attempted to install Microsoft AntiSpyware on a machine from which Internet Exploder had been mostly removed via the utility Win98 Lite. It refused to install, insisting upon the presence of Internet Exploder 6. The machine in question uses Mozilla, with which we're quite happy. It appears that Microsoft is tying yet another product to the use of Internet Exploder 6, probably in violation of the recent DoJ Consent Decree. Will the Bush Justice Department do anything?
Slashdot Mirror
This whole thing seems silly. The source code for Busybox, and all of the utilities that can be integrated into it, is already readily available. So, what is Verizon supposedly "withholding?" (Never mind the fact that the GPL, because it constitutes a "contract to make a contract," is invalid.)
Saying that the users of a Web site have some right to its source code is the same thing as saying that if you are a customer of a store, you have a right to have a key to it. Actually, it's worse than that, because the FSF's license doesn't even require that you PURCHASE anything from the Web site or even visit it! As we all know, the FSF's goal -- the same goal as that of Richard Stallman -- is to do everything it can to ensure that no one who writes software can make any money by doing so. This is nasty and spiteful. Someone who codes a good or innovative Web site deserves to be rewarded for it -- especially since so many out there are so awful!
Ironically, the FSF is engaging in RIAA-like tactics itself. It has just announced a new license, called the AGPL, which attempts to impose requirements upon companies which "play" GPLed applications over the Net. That's right: If you are an ASP, the FSF wants to require you to give away your software to the public if you're running GPLed code. This is not much different from the RIAA's demands. So, it seems to me that the pot is calling the kettle black here.
Oops.... The above was badly formatted because Slashdot ran the lines together. My bad; I should have previewed. here's the message as I meant it to be displayed:
I'm going to be a bit blunt here, but I think that what I'm going to say is well-deserved and is certainly backed up by the facts. It appears that Vuze has based its business plan on not buying sufficient bandwidth to deliver its products and then taking the bandwidth from the ISPs of its customers. It states as much in its petition to the FCC, where it writes:
"Torrent technologies make use of resources -- bandwidth, storage, and processing power -- on a decentralized basis, allowing large data transfers to be made more efficiently and cost-effectively than ever before. Torrent technologies leverage the power of many individual computers by enabling each computer interested in a piece of content to obtain small pieces of it from multiple other computers, and simultaneously play the same role to others who seek the same content in the future.
"Accordingly, a distributor of content need not have many large central servers to store and send a file each time an Internet user is interested in a particular piece of content; instead, the content distributor need only have a handful of servers that operate as initial "seed servers" for the content, and can then rely on the distributed computing capacity of all of the individual user computers (the "swarm") that have that have agreed to be used as a "seed" for others."
In the above, it also glosses over the fact that its software turns users' computers into servers, violating -- in the overwhelming majority of cases -- the ISP's terms of service.
Vuze then goes on to misrepresent the characteristics of the BitTorrent protocol:
"For both downloading and uploading content, torrent technology uses fewer resources than traditional non-P2P protocols such as HTTP because distributed computing permits uploads and downloads to be resumed mid-way rather than restarted, and transmission errors can easily be fixed without resending an entire file."
The fact is that BitTorrent is not more efficient than HTTP or FTP. It is sometimes faster, but to attain this speed it consumes more resources than a simple file transfer. In fact, because one must transmit as much as one receives, it at least doubles the use of the ISP's backbone resources and of the user's allocated bandwidth. What's more, due to the lack of caching, it is many times less efficient because the same file must be sent many times across the Internet backbone instead of once. And the assertion, above, that downloads cannot be resumed is flat wrong. Virtually all FTP clients now provide means by which to resume interrupted downloads (which are rare in any case). And because HTTP can be cached, even an HTTP download which is restarted from scratch does not consume additional backbone resources because the cache will have received the entire file and can retransmit it to the end user.
Again, it appears that Vuze is so unwilling to "pay its freight" to deliver content to customers that it is willing to file a deceptive -- and, in some places, patently false -- petition with the FCC. Such tactics, in my opinion, deserve no sympathy.
--Brett Glass, LARIAT.NET
I'm going to be a bit blunt here, but I think that what I'm going to say is well-deserved and is certainly backed up by the facts. It appears that Vuze has based its business plan on not buying sufficient bandwidth to deliver its products and then taking the bandwidth from the ISPs of its customers. It states as much in its petition to the FCC, where it writes: "Torrent technologies make use of resources -- bandwidth, storage, and processing power -- on a decentralized basis, allowing large data transfers to be made more efficiently and cost-effectively than ever before. Torrent technologies leverage the power of many individual computers by enabling each computer interested in a piece of content to obtain small pieces of it from multiple other computers, and simultaneously play the same role to others who seek the same content in the future. "Accordingly, a distributor of content need not have many large central servers to store and send a file each time an Internet user is interested in a particular piece of content; instead, the content distributor need only have a handful of servers that operate as initial "seed servers" for the content, and can then rely on the distributed computing capacity of all of the individual user computers (the "swarm") that have that have agreed to be used as a "seed" for others." In the above, it also glosses over the fact that its software turns users' computers into servers, violating -- in the overwhelming majority of cases -- the ISP's terms of service. Vuze then goes on to misrepresent the characteristics of the BitTorrent protocol: "For both downloading and uploading content, torrent technology uses fewer resources than traditional non-P2P protocols such as HTTP because distributed computing permits uploads and downloads to be resumed mid-way rather than restarted, and transmission errors can easily be fixed without resending an entire file." The fact is that BitTorrent is not more efficient than HTTP or FTP. It is sometimes faster, but to attain this speed it consumes more resources than a simple file transfer. In fact, because one must transmit as much as one receives, it at least doubles the use of the ISP's backbone resources and of the user's allocated bandwidth. What's more, due to the lack of caching, it is many times less efficient because the same file must be sent many times across the Internet backbone instead of once. And the assertion, above, that downloads cannot be resumed is flat wrong. Virtually all FTP clients now provide means by which to resume interrupted downloads (which are rare in any case). And because HTTP can be cached, even an HTTP download which is restarted from scratch does not consume additional backbone resources because the cache will have received the entire file and can retransmit it to the end user. Again, it appears that Vuze is so unwilling to "pay its freight" to deliver content to customers that it is willing to file a deceptive -- and, in some places, patently false -- petition with the FCC. Such tactics, in my opinion, deserve no sympathy. --Brett Glass, LARIAT.NET
The purpose of GPL3 is the same as that of earlier versions: to "get at" folks that Richard Stallman and the FSF do not like. Much of it is spiteful and is directed specifically against people who have been "too successful" -- that is, programmers who have been able to make money by writing and selling software. (Heaven forbid that anyone should be able to be successful in that way.) Alas, it will not affect Microsoft, which pretty much everyone admits will not be harmed by the GPL. It'll only affect little guys like us who otherwise might have a chance. It's ironic, but the FSF has effectively become an ally of Microsoft by going after its nascent competition. Sad.
He's actually more of a Karl Marx. Sounded good on paper, but actually caused a lot of harm.
So, let me get this straight: RMS has come out against measures which would ensure that inventions which people patented were truly new and not copies of prior art. In other words, if he has his way, it will be more likely that patents which will be issued which don't represent truly novel inventions. This is a good thing?
The FSF which has been threatening for years to modify the GPL so that anyone who OFFERS A SERVICE (e.g. an ASP) that uses GPLed software must abide by all sorts of special rules and restrictions. What is this but "pay per use" -- exactly what DRM does?
One essential part of the fiber install process, at least for Verizon, is to cut the copper. Why? Because thanks to rules drafted by politicians to whom Verizon has contributed megabucks, Verizon is obliged to allow competitors to rent and use the copper, but not the fiber. Let Verizon run fiber to your home and you're stuck with them forever. It's a Faustian bargain.
Verizon offers its own Internet service to every exchange; it's not surprising that it wants to make sure that no other ISP can do the same. Strictly an anticompetitive move.
I love the header "Liberty or Death for the Program." Essentially, what it says is that the so-called "liberty" of the program (which is an absurd concept; a program isn't a thinking being and cannot have liberty) is more important than PEOPLE's liberties.
Hello, honey? I'm calling to let you know that I fell and broke my leg, and I need a doctor before I... Hello? Hello?
I've been charged for ridiculously large numbers of clicks on a site for which I know there's a relatively limited market. I also checked my server logs and saw that the number of visits was nowhere near the number of clicks Google claimed. When I complained to Google, they stonewalled.
The government is allowed to take your house on behalf of a big corporation. But a corporation can't be required to request its monopoly infrastructure -- ON WHICH THE LOCAL GOVERNMENT HAS GIVEN IT A MONOPOLY -- at a fair price. At least the Supreme Court is being consistent. Corporations are getting everything they want, and John Q. Citizen can just go hang. The article cited above says that the court ruled that "judges should defer to the expertise of the Federal Communications Commission." But the FCC isn't any more expert than anyone else -- certainly not than the ISP that brought the case. And many inside it face political pressure to kowtow to (guess who?) the same big corporations. We're living in the New Gilded Age, folks. Corporations get whatever they want and the individaul loses. --Brett Glass
Schools have the right to keep order in class. They don't have the right to restrict activities such as speech outside of class (remember, the kids take the computers home). Quite a few court cases have affirmed students' rights to do things that administrators and teachers do not like (including posting Web sites in which they criticize the school).
Student use of email, chatting, IM, and game playing is a direct violation of the KASD computer policy.
It seems to me that this is a violation of the Constitutional rights to freedom of speech, freedom of assembly, and freedom of association.
That setting isn't part of the PPP negotiation and therefore cannot be dictated by the server. It's set on the client. Windows has a simple box in the client configuration that says "Use default gateway on remote network" that one can check or uncheck. MacOS X does not. It always does wrong thing (it routes EVERYTHING through the VPN tunnel). So, your boss gets to see everything you browse, all of your webmail, etc.
The article above states that WiFi is WiMAX's "shorter range cousin." In fact, the fundamental physics say that, given the FCC limits on signal strength and modulation schemes, neither can go farther than the other. WiMAX is slightly better at handling clients that are widely distributed geographically, but most of the claims that it is hugely better than WiFi or will go farther are simply hype. What's more, it's sure to be more expensive than WiFi.
Exactly. The GPL is not at all about freedom, but rather about taking away others' work and freedom. Remember what inspired it: Stallman wanted to keep people from leaving academia to make a decent living at programming.
Until now, MacOS X's PPTP implementation has been largely useless because it routes ALL network traffic through the VPN connection instead of letting your ordinary Internet traffic use the connection you already have. Thus, if you tunnel into your office, your ordinary Web browsing goes through the office and then BACK out to the Internet while the VPN is established. Is this fixed in "Tiger?" Nothing on Apple's Web site says.
"There are times when Bruce Perens can be a real idiot, and this is one of those times." What Bruce's statements demonstrate is that, like Stallman, he sees GPLed software as a way of intentionally undermining programmers' livelihoods. According to statements by both Stallman and Perens, they consider programmers are "evil" unless they give away their work. Linus, having worked in the real world at a real company facing real tough competition from the Big Guys (Intel and AMD), understands that people who work hard are justified in demanding that they be paid for their work. Linus personally wanted to give Linux away, and chose the GPL largely by accident -- because he saw it on the C compiler he was using. Had he looked more thoroughly into the various alternatives, or understood the full agenda behind the GPL, he might well have chosen Larry Wall's Artistic License or the BSD License. Of course, once he released Linux under the GPL (though he did modify it to allow binary drivers), he was stuck. What this incident shows it that Linus isn't a "Stallmanista." He doesn't have it in for his fellow programmers, as Stallman and Perens do. Which is a good thing, IMHO.
The software didn't refuse to install on the system because it was running Windows 98. It refused because the system was not running Internet Exploder 6. Of course, one shouldn't put it past Microsoft to refuse to support machines that are still happily running Windows 98. Gotta force customers to upgrade their OS (and pay more money), even if the hardware isn't up to running the latest bloatware....
One flaw in the review cited in the article above that it compares the products by noting the number of items they reported. By this metric, the best antispyware program would be one that reported each bit of each spyware file or registry entry individually..... "160 million bits of PUS [Microsoft's own acronym, which stands for "potentially undesirable software] found!" Needless to say, it's better to compare apples to apples.
I just attempted to install Microsoft AntiSpyware on a machine from which Internet Exploder had been mostly removed via the utility Win98 Lite. It refused to install, insisting upon the presence of Internet Exploder 6. The machine in question uses Mozilla, with which we're quite happy. It appears that Microsoft is tying yet another product to the use of Internet Exploder 6, probably in violation of the recent DoJ Consent Decree. Will the Bush Justice Department do anything?