Leaving aside my disagreement with your view of the GPL, which I think sometimes is just purposefully wrong-headed, your post still doesn't make much sense.
Microsoft's motives in this matter will be entirely about how much this project can hurt their own bottom line. They may *act* as though software can't ever get written without a financial incentive, but we all know better. If a volunteer, unpaid effort started to get close, you *know* they would be just as hostile to it. And although they can certainly adopt technical counter-measures, legal ones are unlikely to be effective. Prize or no prize, once the code is out there, they can't make it go away.
Your second paragraph is just a non-sequitur. Assuming there is some "cause of Linux" that can be hurt (which I don't myself perceive, any more than I see a "crusade of screwdrivers" or a "jihad of pencils"), it can't be hurt by providing it with resources, a big fat unpopular target and the chance of notoriety.
(The advocates of Linux that *you* seem to be thinking about will still count it a victory even if all you can get on the Xbox is a bash prompt and the developers end up in jail.)
* Suppose Linux itself or some crucial component of GNU (e.g. gcc) thereby got declared an illegal circumvention device?
* Worse, he has a reason to whine to congress and get an amendment to the DMCA removing the "interoperability" clause. Scary.
* Microsoft actually have only $10 billion and desperately need to fabricate $30 billion in losses before the auditors have a closer look.
* He needs to look like the victim instead of the villain for a change. This way he gets to look like the victim and be praised (anonymously) as a hero simultaneously.
Note to the hard of understanding - I don't really think it's likely, so calm down.
1) If it's so blatant why can't you drop another Anonymous Coward post saying "I think I know which product the above poster means...". No link back to you + plausible deniability.
2) If your boss reads slashdot he knows which product you mean and knows you have been threatened with dismissal. So you're busted now anyway. If not, then you aren't even if you blow the whistle.
3) It looks like your worst-case scenario is staying with your current job and having your spirit gradually crushed, rather than getting fired and looking for something better.
So I call your bullshit and raise you 1 dare: let's hear the truth about this.
Let's take the internet first. To make the internet useless to Linux browsers, a significant proportion of websites would have to refuse to serve pages to them. But most of the servers out there are not Windows machines. Will Apache start enforcing invasive identity checks? Uh, I guess not.
But what about file formats that are only readable using Palladium DRM-controlled hardware decryption? Not HTML, text, PDF, MP3, ogg (both Vorbis and Theora), JPEG, PNG, or practically any other file that is any use.
OK, so the internet (or at least the vast majority of it - for all practical purposes the only bits that matter) will still be here.
Now the hardware. Would you buy a more expensive motherboard that lets you do less? Only if you buy a bundled PC+Windows. A huge market, to be sure, but not the whole market.
And now Wal-Mart is selling OS-less PCs, do you think they'll include (A) a cheap motherboard, or (B) a more expensive one? Answers on a postcard to W Gates, Redmond.
Applications then - GPL software not running on Windows is not such a tragedy. If I can't use the software I want on Windows, I won't use Windows. If a company has 500 OpenOffice users and they have the choice of upgrading from WindowsXP to WindowsFU, but that means they have to fork out for 500 copies of OfficeFU, what's the motivation to upgrade?
What about the on-line services that keep track of all your private information for you? You won't be able to use them from Linux. But do you use them now? Do you WANT to use them?
It's not so much that open source is too big. It's just that it's too robust, diverse and slippery to be attacked successfully with such a clumsy weapon.
Greenspun's ideas seem so simple and realizeable but only now we're beginning to look into this direction. Why?
Because everything that is simple for humans is generally unfeasibly hard for AI. In all but a few limited areas, attempts to replace human cognition with AI are just annoying. How about these equally likely suggestions:
Jane, I notice you e-mailed Mary and asked about her kids. Are you interested in goats? You should visit http://goatse.cx.
Jane, some guy called Dave has been phoning you repeatedly. I noticed you haven't any appointments so I gave him your address and invited him over.
Jane, I notice you haven't got any money. I've found 10287 mailing lists dedicated to methods of obtaining money quickly, and subscribed you to them.
You have asked to play this MP3 file. Your bank statements do not contain a record of your paying for the album it came from. I can't let you do that, Jane.
If you think it's really so simple, write a useful AI program. For extra credit attempt it in VB:)
2) Laws are hard to remove once they are in place.
3) The only way to get real discussion on bad laws sometimes is to defy them.
4) It is not unethical per se to break a law. It's just that laws are generally made to prohibit unethical behaviour.
If the letter of the law also has the side-effect of prohibiting some ethical behaviour, what do you do? You do what your conscience permits and take responsibility for your own actions.
By the way, to head off any stupid straw-man arguments like "what if you think it's OK to kill children?", forget it. Stick to the point. If you have a real reason to believe it is OK for big corporations to restrict what ideas humans can think and write and implement in code, let's hear it.
Personally, I think it would be easier to defy the abuse of patents in this way than to defy the abuse of copyright law. It should be harder to make the case that someone is "stealing" something they wrote *themselves*.
Oh well. You could be right, but who cares if they sue Walmart? And Free software thrives without the acclaim of the uninformed news media. It's not a popularity contest, after all. It's about freedom to use the right tool for the job. I am lucky to have a manager who will not be swayed by uninformed opinion anyway. Any software gets in the door on its own merits or not at all.
Whether LindowsOS is the right tool for *any* job is purely a matter of speculation at the moment. My guess is that uptake will be negligible anyway. Slashdot is a great place for intense debate about fuck all - let's wait and see.
And yet the Mac still exists, because most people *aren't that thick*, and like pretty things.
Let's not get hung up about the "stupid" tail of the normal distribution curve. They will always be with us, and neither mocking them nor pandering to them will get us anywhere.
Maybe a few people will like LindowsOS for what it is. Maybe some will learn what's heinous about it and switch to Debian or Mandrake once they are confident enough. But if 99% of the purchasers get fed up with LindowsOS and revert to Windows, so what?
Of course, Scar doesn't die from the fall off the cliff. His Hyaena minions turn on him. Circle of life sort of thing.
Apart from a few details (and reduced bodycount), the underlying theme is just Shakespeare's Hamlet, which your kids will get exposed to in school anyway.
This development is actually a setback: the Post Office, Fire Brigade, local councils and the cast of "The Archers" will not be able to participate fully in surveillance until after November. Maybe some of them will not even get to join in at all.
You neglecting some of our military contributions since WW2. British troops have traditionally been stoic and understanding about the need for US pilots to calibrate their weapons by making bombing runs on friendly troops, although admittedly Canada has taken on more of this duty recently.
OK, but if you are watching the movies on an NTSC TV, you are getting less than 262 real vertical resolution anyway (and shitty colour:)
If you are watching on a big HDTV you can afford a decent player, and if you are ripping your own DivX then you already have a computer to play them on.
Well there is an element of herd immunity. If more of the machines exposed to a virus, trojan or worm are invulnerable to it, the less chance of it spreading to the machines it can infect.
Even if you have a hundred different kinds of systems with weak but different security, the population as a whole is more robust than a monoculture of one kind. Not that I'm advocating that as a security strategy, mind.
So, capitalism is the optimal system, given the conditions of the planet and the nature of man, that is known at this time.
Hopefully one of these factors will change, or a new system will be devised that is closer to ideal than capitalism.
Well, we could have had "Unification" but it costs 6 points and we really needed "Rich home world" and "Creative".:)
I can't believe someone thought this was worth being pedantic about! 'specially since "come" is at least as correct as "cum". Check a dictionary if you care that much.
Low standards of literacy in the porn industry are to blame for the recent 3-letter spelling, I think.
I can address your points, and it's simple: The software and the other content are both covered by copyright, and the physical media by the first-sale doctrine.
I would not dispute that Blizzard have a right to complain if their copyright were being violated or their content presented in such a way as to mis-represent them.
Other than that, they don't have any reasonable grounds for objecting to how either their software or other content is used once it is obtained legally. After all, they got their money didn't they?
So, should Blizzard have the right to control how people use their copyrighted material?
No, because that amounts to control of people.
I think I'll just get ranting again unless I stop now...
Slashdot Mirror
Aaaah! Damn you, gentix! You just made me visualise someone wearing only a white lab coat and geeky specs, who had taken advantage of all 3 offers.
Leaving aside my disagreement with your view of the GPL, which I think sometimes is just purposefully wrong-headed, your post still doesn't make much sense.
Microsoft's motives in this matter will be entirely about how much this project can hurt their own bottom line. They may *act* as though software can't ever get written without a financial incentive, but we all know better. If a volunteer, unpaid effort started to get close, you *know* they would be just as hostile to it.
And although they can certainly adopt technical counter-measures, legal ones are unlikely to be effective. Prize or no prize, once the code is out there, they can't make it go away.
Your second paragraph is just a non-sequitur. Assuming there is some "cause of Linux" that can be hurt (which I don't myself perceive, any more than I see a "crusade of screwdrivers" or a "jihad of pencils"), it can't be hurt by providing it with resources, a big fat unpopular target and the chance of notoriety.
(The advocates of Linux that *you* seem to be thinking about will still count it a victory even if all you can get on the Xbox is a bash prompt and the developers end up in jail.)
Bill Gates.
Try these troll-style ideas on for size:
* Suppose Linux itself or some crucial component of GNU (e.g. gcc) thereby got declared an illegal circumvention device?
* Worse, he has a reason to whine to congress and get an amendment to the DMCA removing the "interoperability" clause. Scary.
* Microsoft actually have only $10 billion and desperately need to fabricate $30 billion in losses before the auditors have a closer look.
* He needs to look like the victim instead of the
villain for a change. This way he gets to look like the victim and be praised (anonymously) as a hero simultaneously.
Note to the hard of understanding - I don't really think it's likely, so calm down.
Bullshit.
1) If it's so blatant why can't you drop another Anonymous Coward post saying "I think I know which product the above poster means...". No link back to you + plausible deniability.
2) If your boss reads slashdot he knows which product you mean and knows you have been threatened with dismissal. So you're busted now anyway. If not, then you aren't even if you blow the whistle.
3) It looks like your worst-case scenario is staying with your current job and having your spirit gradually crushed, rather than getting fired and looking for something better.
So I call your bullshit and raise you 1 dare: let's hear the truth about this.
I hope the diameter of that hole in the front was less than the wavelength of the microwaves.
Or you REALLY don't want to stand in front of it for 15 minutes waiting for your jeans to dry!
I could be wrong about that, but even if some physicist cares to correct me, it's not something I'll be trying any time soon.
Gaaah!
OK, this time with escaped characters.
dd bs=44100 count=120 </dev/zero >/dev/dsp
Otherwise you need to hold down CTRL-@ for a while...
dd bs=44100 count=120 /dev/dsp
f = open("silence.pcm","w")
f.write("\x00\x00" * (60 * 44100))
f.close()
Language - Python
IDE -IDLE
SDL libraries - Pygame
OpenGL - PyOpenGL
Simple GUI - Tkinter
Complex GUI - wxPython
All free, of course, and conveniently packaged for Linux.
Note to budding developers: wait no longer, go for it!
Not yet, but give them time to fuck this up and their stock will be a lot cheaper.
I doubt it too.
Let's take the internet first. To make the internet useless to Linux browsers, a significant proportion of websites would have to refuse to serve pages to them. But most of the servers out there are not Windows machines. Will Apache start enforcing invasive identity checks? Uh, I guess not.
But what about file formats that are only readable using Palladium DRM-controlled hardware decryption? Not HTML, text, PDF, MP3, ogg (both Vorbis and Theora), JPEG, PNG, or practically any other file that is any use.
OK, so the internet (or at least the vast majority of it - for all practical purposes the only bits that matter) will still be here.
Now the hardware. Would you buy a more expensive motherboard that lets you do less? Only if you buy a bundled PC+Windows. A huge market, to be sure, but not the whole market.
And now Wal-Mart is selling OS-less PCs, do you think they'll include (A) a cheap motherboard, or (B) a more expensive one? Answers on a postcard to W Gates, Redmond.
Applications then - GPL software not running on Windows is not such a tragedy. If I can't use the software I want on Windows, I won't use Windows. If a company has 500 OpenOffice users and they have the choice of upgrading from WindowsXP to WindowsFU, but that means they have to fork out for 500 copies of OfficeFU, what's the motivation to upgrade?
What about the on-line services that keep track of all your private information for you? You won't be able to use them from Linux. But do you use them now? Do you WANT to use them?
It's not so much that open source is too big. It's just that it's too robust, diverse and slippery to be attacked successfully with such a clumsy weapon.
- Jane, I notice you e-mailed Mary and asked about her kids. Are you interested in goats? You should visit http://goatse.cx.
- Jane, some guy called Dave has been phoning you repeatedly. I noticed you haven't any appointments so I gave him your address and invited him over.
- Jane, I notice you haven't got any money. I've found 10287 mailing lists dedicated to methods of obtaining money quickly, and subscribed you to them.
- You have asked to play this MP3 file. Your bank statements do not contain a record of your paying for the album it came from. I can't let you do that, Jane.
If you think it's really so simple, write a useful AI program. For extra credit attempt it in VB1) Bad laws get made.
2) Laws are hard to remove once they are in place.
3) The only way to get real discussion on bad laws sometimes is to defy them.
4) It is not unethical per se to break a law. It's just that laws are generally made to prohibit unethical behaviour.
If the letter of the law also has the side-effect of prohibiting some ethical behaviour, what do you do? You do what your conscience permits and take responsibility for your own actions.
By the way, to head off any stupid straw-man arguments like "what if you think it's OK to kill children?", forget it. Stick to the point. If you have a real reason to believe it is OK for big corporations to restrict what ideas humans can think and write and implement in code, let's hear it.
Personally, I think it would be easier to defy the abuse of patents in this way than to defy the abuse of copyright law. It should be harder to make the case that someone is "stealing" something they wrote *themselves*.
Oh well. You could be right, but who cares if they sue Walmart? And Free software thrives without the acclaim of the uninformed news media. It's not a popularity contest, after all. It's about freedom to use the right tool for the job. I am lucky to have a manager who will not be swayed by uninformed opinion anyway. Any software gets in the door on its own merits or not at all.
Whether LindowsOS is the right tool for *any* job is purely a matter of speculation at the moment. My guess is that uptake will be negligible anyway. Slashdot is a great place for intense debate about fuck all - let's wait and see.
And yet the Mac still exists, because most people *aren't that thick*, and like pretty things.
Let's not get hung up about the "stupid" tail of the normal distribution curve. They will always be with us, and neither mocking them nor pandering to them will get us anywhere.
Maybe a few people will like LindowsOS for what it is. Maybe some will learn what's heinous about it and switch to Debian or Mandrake once they are confident enough. But if 99% of the purchasers get fed up with LindowsOS and revert to Windows, so what?
Of course, Scar doesn't die from the fall off the cliff. His Hyaena minions turn on him. Circle of life sort of thing.
Apart from a few details (and reduced bodycount), the underlying theme is just Shakespeare's Hamlet, which your kids will get exposed to in school anyway.
Alas, you have not been paying attention.
This development is actually a setback: the Post Office, Fire Brigade, local councils and the cast of "The Archers" will not be able to participate fully in surveillance until after November. Maybe some of them will not even get to join in at all.
You neglecting some of our military contributions since WW2. British troops have traditionally been stoic and understanding about the need for US pilots to calibrate their weapons by making bombing runs on friendly troops, although admittedly Canada has taken on more of this duty recently.
See that thing way over there in the distance? It's called "the point". You missed it a little.
:)
Eric Flint didn't make any claims about what would be good for Harlan Ellison, or advocate illegal copying of copyrighted work.
If you want to know what he did say, and see the figures that backed it up, go visit www.baen.com. Then you could make informed comments.
Or crawl back under your bridge, I don't mind
OK, but if you are watching the movies on an NTSC TV, you are getting less than 262 real vertical resolution anyway (and shitty colour :)
If you are watching on a big HDTV you can afford a decent player, and if you are ripping your own DivX then you already have a computer to play them on.
The dreamcast option is for others, I think.
Yes, and if you had a *cluster* of heroes who fight trolls that would be .....
Well there is an element of herd immunity. If more of the machines exposed to a virus, trojan or worm are invulnerable to it, the less chance of it spreading to the machines it can infect.
Even if you have a hundred different kinds of systems with weak but different security, the population as a whole is more robust than a monoculture of one kind. Not that I'm advocating that as a security strategy, mind.
But Progress support them too, and they have about as much understanding of software freedom as, uh... Caldera, for example :)
I can't believe someone thought this was worth being pedantic about! 'specially since "come" is at least as correct as "cum". Check a dictionary if you care that much.
Low standards of literacy in the porn industry are to blame for the recent 3-letter spelling, I think.
OK sorry if I ranted a bit there.
I can address your points, and it's simple: The software and the other content are both covered by copyright, and the physical media by the first-sale doctrine.
I would not dispute that Blizzard have a right to complain if their copyright were being violated or their content presented in such a way as to mis-represent them.
Other than that, they don't have any reasonable grounds for objecting to how either their software or other content is used once it is obtained legally. After all, they got their money didn't they?
So, should Blizzard have the right to control how people use their copyrighted material?
No, because that amounts to control of people.
I think I'll just get ranting again unless I stop now...