Plus! If you're capable enough to write stuff like that, and you use linux, you have far more interesting options, like help develop te OS:) You don't need to stop these people you just gotta direct their energy to something useful.
I know politics is a difficult concept to grasp for your americans, but fascism and communism, tho both extremes, are on opposite sides of the political spectrum.
So since he called the guy a fascist, he definitally is not making him out to be a total communist. Fascism = evil, Communism = evil fascism = communism, is not valid here.
Since all books are copyright protected, I think the contents of them should be encrypted as well. I think we should write all the books into Navarajo (which the americans used as encryption tool in WWII) and then prosecute and jail the last few people who speak that language.
After that if anyone should reverse engineering that then dead language, they should be prosecuted and jailed. You're not allowed to copy the contents of books, so learning the Navarajo language is an illegal action.
Of course, those people who buy books in the right kind of cover, will get their copy along with a Navarajo translator. But you won't get one if you buy the sort of book that falls under the Gnu Publishers License, and that is open cover.
Personally I regret reading reviews that claim there is nothing bad in a book. It immediatally causes me to discard the review as biased. (Which I did in this case, I skimmed it, saw the [this....blank] part and decided not to waste my time reading it). No matter how much you like a writer or how good you think a book is, it is never perfect.
Cheering and all positive reviews are great, but they provided little for the writer and the prospective reader of such an book. Writing down what was imperfect in your opinion helps the writer, and gives the propective reader a chance of his own to discard those things as very minor shortcomings.
The way it looks now, it looks like you wanted to give as positive a message about the book as you could. This will make people worry wether or not you read the book with intend to like it.
I must say that I'm quite appalled by the apparent "I'm smarter then you are"-attitude of your mail. I, myself, am a theoretical physics major, who will be done, early next year.
If anything my study has taught me that unless you're actually doing research in a field, you know very little to nothing about it. So, you had a course about it, what those courses teach you are mainly the mathematical tools, used in such a field.
I've studied for 5 years now and learned a lot. I will never however claim that my opinion on a field I'm not directly active in, carries more weight than that of an interested layman. You don't have to ashamed of the fact that you are intelligent, I know I'm not. But assuming that noone else has a right of an opinion on physics matters is arrogant and presumptious.
As a theoretical physics major, I distanciate myself from Listen up's arrogant tone, and self-indulged message.
Your point is well made, there is however a small difference between Physics and Mathematics. Godel's theorum applies to logical system strong enough to describe themselves, such as a languages and mathematics. What they say is in nuances different from how you popularized it:
Within any logical system that is strong enough to describe itself, logically inconsistent statements can be formed.
This is in language know as the "Lying Kretenzer" paradox. It means that in mathematics you can form the statement which is equal to "this sentence is untrue".
Tarski has done a lot of work on the dillema when it comes to language, in effect proving again that truth can be defined logically consistent again. Much of his 'tricks' could apply to Mathematics as well.
However interesting all this is, the whole point is void for Physics, because Physics, unlike Mathematics is not it's own meta-language. Godel's theorema may say something about consistency of mathematics, but it simply does not apply to Physics. I'm not saying there aren't any other objection that can be made, but this one does not apply to physics.
A good and clear book about Godel's theorema, which is reasonably accesable is: "Godel, Esscher, Bach, An Eternal Golden Braid" I must admit that the writer's name has slipped my mind.
It is very easy to bash hard science as being a moneydrain and not giving anything to society. This is a nearsighted and biased view however. Of course a lot of money is spend on science and the immediate output is not always very useful. But, even though they are not instantaniously clear, science is important for more things than most people realize.
Let's start for instance with something most people on here are interested in: Computers. Microchips have been scaled down very far, a thing that could have not been done without the knowledge and understanding science has of quantummechanics. CD(rom)s use lasertechnology, et infinitum.
I do admit that it takes time, but usually when a new theory arrives, in time, someone will find useful applications for them. It's too easy to claim scientist should shut up. It's too easy to claim they don't deliver, if you don't look into how much theoretical knowledge is behind simple rules for people working in technology.
The basic problem with predictions about science, for the far future, is that a lot of people, make the mistake that science shows a slowly and gradual increase in knowledge. I believe that the author of the article, Weinberg, an extremely capable and knowledgebal physicist with a great reputation, also makes this mistake.
There are of course always long periods in science which are marked by a gradual increase in knowledge. But a lot of the turning points in science have been periods of turbulence for the science. Einstein's theory of relativity, which units gravity and elektromagnetism, was not something any scientist would have predicted in 1899. Quantummechanics basically grew out of a couple of pre-assumptions Bohr made, and when he made them, he hoped he would find more pleasing explanations for some of them later on. Older examples would include the discovery of oxygen, and the appearing of Newton's Principa, which replaced the Aristotelian way of looking at science in the western world.
Doing predictions about science 50 years ahead is a risky business, and I admire Weinberg's courage in doing it. But I think we should realize that it is still possible that we'll see another revolution and another theory, which will answer a lot of questions we are dealing with now, but such a theory would probably ask just as many new questions. This is basically what happened with Relativity and Quantummechanics. It would be naive and arrogant to assume we now know almost everything, and to rule out the possibility of yet another scientific revolution.
For those interested in science in general, and those interesting in philosophy and ideas about science in particular, the following books might provide interesting reading: "Critisism and the growth of knowledge"I.Lakatos & A. Musgrave (1970) Cambridge "The structure of scientific revolutions" T.S. Kuhn (1969) Chicago.
Basically they don't have to release the products allready in cygnus portfolio to the open source community since it reads.
Red hat shares all of its software innovations freely..... (GPL).
So strictly technical all the things cygnus has developed allready don't count as Red Hat's own innovations. But I too am curious to see what will happen with products born from this take over.
In my humble opinion a domain name is an adress, it's a place where you put up your stuff. If they haven't registerd the domain (moved to that adress) I don't see why that would mean you are infringing on their trademark rights.
If you live in a street called lawyers lane, you're not expected to be a lawyer either, are you. I'm currently living in the Goeman Borgesiuslaan, and I'm not expecting to hear from the lawyers of his heirs, even though I freely hand out cards which state I live in the street named after him.
You moved to the adress first, you live there now. Though luck for them imho. I don't think anyone in your position has ever lost a lawsuit. But more then a few opted for a handy amount of money, that's perhaps something to consider. They don't want this lawsuit anymore then you do.
Whatever you do, don't allow them to bluff you into giving them the domainname. It's yours, it's your adress, and you followed all the right rules to acquire it. If they want it, they'll have to do or pay whatever it is worth to you.
I think that by the spirit, if not the letter of the anti-trust law. It's more objectional that the encryption code has been given to some producers of Operating Systems, and not to others.
The DVD forum, violates the rules of good conduct by making deals with Microsoft and others, handing them the encryption code, and then not giving it to the people making linux. This kind of competitionpollution, giving one company an edge over another, is exactly the kind of thing anti-trust laws have been made against.
I think that if the DVD Forum, had made a deal with those making linux, maybe helping in creating a binary for linux, they could have kept the encryption code out of the open source. Their nearsightedness and bias is what has made other do the reverse engineering in the first place.
If you don't deal with eventualities, they will deal with you.
Before beginning my story I'd like to say that I'm a commandline freak. I love command lines, naturally this colours my view of what an OS is.
In my humble opinion a OS is the collection of software needed to communicate with the hardware, and make the hardware work. For me this does not include X-window, or Windows NT/95/98 graphical enviroments (I admit NT is least obvious of the four to not be included in the OS)
Of course, even for windows, things like drivers etc, are part of the OS. But something like explorer is not, because it allready is high enough level to do things you don't specifically tell it to do. Application that take away action/control from the end-user, are exactly that, applications and no part of the OS.
So the OS basically entails in my definition: The runtime system, drivers and a shell to communicate with the user. But specifically not any functionality that shell has beyond receiving, interpretting and excuting commands. In this defenition the "looking good" part of shells is not part of the OS.
I do not think that saying that ESR's view on communism are naive equals saying: "It's allright for the Chinese to abuse and mass-murder there own people." I agree that ESR's statements are naive. I realize that it's very easy to believe that China is all wrong, but this is just as wrong as believing that America, or in my case the Netherlands, is all right.
How wrong China is however is unimportant, if you say linux is free, and it's an open source. Then it should be free for everyone, or you yourself are being inconsistent and undemocratic. If you say, linux is free, except for everyone that doesn't have the same view on the world. Then you yourself are being totalitarian.Linux is free: this means China is free to adopt it as the OS on which they run their adminstration.
Very often people forget that having a democratic system means that you must allow non-democratic voices to exist. The whole defenition of what a democracy is, allows for people that think we should not have democracy to voice that. You can't have high ideals, but then withold from a few people who don't share them, that would make you no better then them.
Saying linux is free for all except for China. Would be the same as saying: There's freedom of speech for all except those who have an opion other then mine. Or the same as saying, You have completely freedom of religion, unless you're not a christian. Saying you want to share your OS with the world, mean that you will also have to share it with those you'd rather not be related too... Anything less will make you loose credit, even more then the Chinese goverment using your programming work.
Yes it does sounds like an excellent thing to use in any enviroment. I still have a few slight worries tho. First of all as you mentioned using it in a hospital setting, I'm worried how much disturbance a transmitter of this kind will have on the often very sensitive medical eletronic equipment.
The second concern is equal, it's also a technical one. All those transmitters would need to have a unique modulation frequency, otherwise what I do on my term might affect your terminal. So then you'd either need to have a transmitter with tweakable frequency, or each computer has a receiver with which only one transmitter goes. In the first case you'll have jokers, scanning to find someone elses frequency, in the latter case you'll have to have an administration of what you allready have in a certain room, in case you want to add more of the same machines.
It's a great technology, and I certainly see it's uses, but there's still the last worry, that we're getting more and more wireless technology, and the air is getting more and more polluted by electro-magnetic fields (low energetic radiation).
Russian military leaders have stated that the russian do not have a fully-automated targetting and firing system for their nuclear arsenal. In other words, the risk for the russian nukes is non-existant, and the White House just assured us that America is OK for Y2K.
This leaves of course still some other countries, like China, France and some smaller nuclear powers. But I cannot phantom a nation stupid enough to have nuclear missile loaded on sharp at the actual change of the millenium.
This is irrelevant since all the changes to redhat will be released under the GPL. And since this is one development a lot of capable people working with linux will want to be on top of, there will be channels to get help through even if Oracle Corp. itself doesn't give the same amount of support.
I would like to start my reply by mentioning that I think Johahn, in my humble opinion touches most of the important points in this situation, and I agree with most of his views on those points.
I disagree however that the chinese goverment will learn to appreciate and/or value individual rights just because they switch to using linux. If anything I think the linux world is more communical then most software companies are. Apart from that, it's not the case that China doesn't accept the fact that individuals can be important. As in any modern country, it's also in China that highly skilled individual rise, to positions of power and prosperity. The difference is that in most western countries, you can disagree with the goverment and STILL rise to power, using exceptional skills.
The matter of the violation of human rights are more severe and pressure has to be kept on the chinese goverment to end those mistreatments. Further problems involving china are of course the occupation of Tibet (a thing mr. Richard Gere won't let us forget) and the Chinese claims that the republic of Taiwan is a part of the people's republic. I'm not saying there isn't a lot of work to do to change China, but it's not relevant when we discuss them using linux. It's one more goverment using linux, and that's a good sign, besides let's take a look at the so-called good-guys.
The United States of America still has states where the death penalty is giving, this is in _direct_ conflict with the international human rights treaty. The NATO is fully aware it's the most powerful military institute in the world, and it attacks sovereign countries without fiat from the United Nations. I myself am from a NATO-country but I feel deep deep deeply ashamed for the fact that the NATO singlehandedly destroyed the foundation on which the UN was build. Isreal occupies large parts of their neighbouring countries, yet claims it's just defending it's borders. France tests nuclear weapons near inhabited islands in the pacific. The list is endless...
Johahn's point about the east european countries trying to become materialistic states, leading to poverty is well made. Together with what I wrote in this note, there's a conclusion to be drawn from it. There is no ideal system, no perfect way of living. We should look critical at ourselves, face and admit our own shortcomings, then and only then shall we be able to face the chinese and help them change the situation in their country for the best. In the current situation the chinese will just get more headstrong, and they are right at that... It's not fair to accuse them of all kinds of abuse, when you're unwilling to face your own faults. A big part of why China is seen as the Evil Republic, is because we, looking at what other countries do wrong, quite randomly named them as the "bad guys"
It is pivotal for the acceptance of Linux as valid alternative to Windows that a reasonable percentage of games will also be available for that platform. Not just the old games but the newest games too, eventhough it's great to go through Castle Wolfenstein again.
Quite a lot of my friends, who do all their work on linux, still have windows installed on a seperate partition just to be able to play games. As long as new games won't be available on linux, it will never be capable of getting a huge market share at the expense of windows. The monopoly position of windows is still untouched if everyone keeps linux NEXT to windows.
There are of course people who will now argue that people are more mature than to pick their operating system on the fact that games are available for that OS. Don't forget that the video-standard battle was finally won by the standard for video-tapes on which more porn was available. It's a bit of a crude paralel, but it does show that seemingly, secondary factor, of pleasurable things available, weighs heavier then one normally thinks.
When I went online about 6 years ago. I made a solemn vow to myself. Or actually I made the vow well over a year later when I had seen online love happen to some friends of mine. I vowed that I would not fall in love with someone over the net.
So all the time I have been online I never considered it a valid medium to meet a prospective partner with. I went out, I still do, twice in most weeks and met girls that way. Of course I met girls online, but I treated them just like I treated the guys I talked with, as friends, sometimes, once I knew them better as people to confide in.
Then one faithfull day, I found out that I felt more then friendship for one of the girls I had been talking with for over a year. I of course tried to ignore it, but our conversations got more and more intimate, and when she admitted to me that she was in love with me, I just felt overjoyed.
To cut a long story short, I visited her this summer (10 months after we confessed our love to eachother) and I will move over there this spring after I've graduated. I know we still have a long way to go, and many barriers to overcome, but we're both very much in love, and hope our relation will last once we're together.
The point I'm trying to make is that you ussually will find love on the last place you expect it. And more importantly you can't force yourself to love someone or NOT love someone for that matter. I have no recipe for love, on- or offline, and I doubt there is one. There's just this simple bit of advise, which is valid both on the net and irl: Be yourself, that the most likely way to find a partner that suits you.
Otis Wildflower wrote ".... am I reading too much in our lunchtime socializing ['these cursed signals']". The answer to that question is quite paradoxal: yes and no.
Whenever a boy and a girl meet they will reach out to eachother. By both Darwin's evolution theory AND by the Christian "go, and multiply", we were put on this earth to procreate. And when a guy and a gal meet, the guy will just pop his eyes and beat his chest, but on her own way the woman will also try to find out wether this new person would be a good father, or if she allready has a partner, wether he's a better father then her current partner. Please note, that for the bigger part this consideration is subconcious, so neither the guy or the woman would be actively considering parenting together.
The signals such a girl would give off, are actually those of sexual (romantic) interest. But, that doesn't automatically mean that she's consciously attracted to the man she is talking with. So the answer to wether you read to much in the signals is yes AND no. There is defenitally an interest in eachother between the two of you, if those signals are given of. However, to turn such an interest into an conscious attraction, you need to put some work in AND you both have to be open to a relation, if your not open for a new relation you won't let this interest become an attraction.
This non-stop searching for the best father shows that man was not made to live monogamously. Does this give us an excuse to cheat on our partner ? NO, it does not, it just means that sometimes not cheating on your partner requires active effort to refrain from giving in to nature. Knowing this weakness is instrumental in being able to cope with seductive offers from others.
So these signal can be explained as saying, that under the right circumstances you and the girl could have a relationship. These signals tell you: "You are a valid partner for me" but they don't neccesarily have to imply more, if the girl isn't free or ready for a relationship. See these signals as a compliment, and as an encouragement to pursue more, but don't rush in without finding out wether she is free and ready to get into a relationsip.
Slashdot Mirror
Interesting point, who is the John Doe, whose genes are being mapped ?
Plus! If you're capable enough to write stuff like that, and you use linux, you have far more interesting options, like help develop te OS :) You don't need to stop these people you just gotta direct their energy to something useful.
I know politics is a difficult concept to grasp for your americans, but fascism and communism, tho both extremes, are on opposite sides of the political spectrum.
So since he called the guy a fascist, he definitally is not making him out to be a total communist. Fascism = evil, Communism = evil fascism = communism, is not valid here.
Since all books are copyright protected, I think the contents of them should be encrypted as well. I think we should write all the books into Navarajo (which the americans used as encryption tool in WWII) and then prosecute and jail the last few people who speak that language.
After that if anyone should reverse engineering that then dead language, they should be prosecuted and jailed. You're not allowed to copy the contents of books, so learning the Navarajo language is an illegal action.
Of course, those people who buy books in the right kind of cover, will get their copy along with a Navarajo translator. But you won't get one if you buy the sort of book that falls under the Gnu Publishers License, and that is open cover.
Personally I regret reading reviews that claim there is nothing bad in a book. It immediatally causes me to discard the review as biased. (Which I did in this case, I skimmed it, saw the [this....blank] part and decided not to waste my time reading it). No matter how much you like a writer or how good you think a book is, it is never perfect.
Cheering and all positive reviews are great, but they provided little for the writer and the prospective reader of such an book. Writing down what was imperfect in your opinion helps the writer, and gives the propective reader a chance of his own to discard those things as very minor shortcomings.
The way it looks now, it looks like you wanted to give as positive a message about the book as you could. This will make people worry wether or not you read the book with intend to like it.
Edwin Oostra
I must say that I'm quite appalled by the apparent "I'm smarter then you are"-attitude of your mail. I, myself, am a theoretical physics major, who will be done, early next year.
If anything my study has taught me that unless you're actually doing research in a field, you know very little to nothing about it. So, you had a course about it, what those courses teach you are mainly the mathematical tools, used in such a field.
I've studied for 5 years now and learned a lot. I will never however claim that my opinion on a field I'm not directly active in, carries more weight than that of an interested layman. You don't have to ashamed of the fact that you are intelligent, I know I'm not. But assuming that noone else has a right of an opinion on physics matters is arrogant and presumptious.
As a theoretical physics major, I distanciate myself from Listen up's arrogant tone, and self-indulged message.
Edwin Oostra
Your point is well made, there is however a small difference between Physics and Mathematics. Godel's theorum applies to logical system strong enough to describe themselves, such as a languages and mathematics. What they say is in nuances different from how you popularized it:
Within any logical system that is strong enough to describe itself, logically inconsistent statements can be formed.
This is in language know as the "Lying Kretenzer" paradox. It means that in mathematics you can form the statement which is equal to "this sentence is untrue".
Tarski has done a lot of work on the dillema when it comes to language, in effect proving again that truth can be defined logically consistent again. Much of his 'tricks' could apply to Mathematics as well.
However interesting all this is, the whole point is void for Physics, because Physics, unlike Mathematics is not it's own meta-language. Godel's theorema may say something about consistency of mathematics, but it simply does not apply to Physics. I'm not saying there aren't any other objection that can be made, but this one does not apply to physics.
A good and clear book about Godel's theorema, which is reasonably accesable is:
"Godel, Esscher, Bach, An Eternal Golden Braid"
I must admit that the writer's name has slipped my mind.
Edwin Oostra
It is very easy to bash hard science as being a moneydrain and not giving anything to society. This is a nearsighted and biased view however. Of course a lot of money is spend on science and the immediate output is not always very useful. But, even though they are not instantaniously clear, science is important for more things than most people realize.
Let's start for instance with something most people on here are interested in: Computers. Microchips have been scaled down very far, a thing that could have not been done without the knowledge and understanding science has of quantummechanics. CD(rom)s use lasertechnology, et infinitum.
I do admit that it takes time, but usually when a new theory arrives, in time, someone will find useful applications for them. It's too easy to claim scientist should shut up. It's too easy to claim they don't deliver, if you don't look into how much theoretical knowledge is behind simple rules for people working in technology.
Edwin Oostra
The basic problem with predictions about science, for the far future, is that a lot of people, make the mistake that science shows a slowly and gradual increase in knowledge. I believe that the author of the article, Weinberg, an extremely capable and knowledgebal physicist with a great reputation, also makes this mistake.
There are of course always long periods in science which are marked by a gradual increase in knowledge. But a lot of the turning points in science have been periods of turbulence for the science. Einstein's theory of relativity, which units gravity and elektromagnetism, was not something any scientist would have predicted in 1899. Quantummechanics basically grew out of a couple of pre-assumptions Bohr made, and when he made them, he hoped he would find more pleasing explanations for some of them later on. Older examples would include the discovery of oxygen, and the appearing of Newton's Principa, which replaced the Aristotelian way of looking at science in the western world.
Doing predictions about science 50 years ahead is a risky business, and I admire Weinberg's courage in doing it. But I think we should realize that it is still possible that we'll see another revolution and another theory, which will answer a lot of questions we are dealing with now, but such a theory would probably ask just as many new questions. This is basically what happened with Relativity and Quantummechanics. It would be naive and arrogant to assume we now know almost everything, and to rule out the possibility of yet another scientific revolution.
For those interested in science in general, and those interesting in philosophy and ideas about science in particular, the following books might provide interesting reading:
"Critisism and the growth of knowledge" I.Lakatos & A. Musgrave (1970) Cambridge
"The structure of scientific revolutions" T.S. Kuhn (1969) Chicago.
Edwin Oostra.
Basically they don't have to release the products allready in cygnus portfolio to the open source community since it reads.
Red hat shares all of its software innovations freely..... (GPL).
So strictly technical all the things cygnus has developed allready don't count as Red Hat's own innovations. But I too am curious to see what will happen with products born from this take over.
DON"T give them any ideas, please!
In my humble opinion a domain name is an adress, it's a place where you put up your stuff. If they haven't registerd the domain (moved to that adress) I don't see why that would mean you are infringing on their trademark rights.
If you live in a street called lawyers lane, you're not expected to be a lawyer either, are you. I'm currently living in the Goeman Borgesiuslaan, and I'm not expecting to hear from the lawyers of his heirs, even though I freely hand out cards which state I live in the street named after him.
You moved to the adress first, you live there now. Though luck for them imho. I don't think anyone in your position has ever lost a lawsuit. But more then a few opted for a handy amount of money, that's perhaps something to consider. They don't want this lawsuit anymore then you do.
Whatever you do, don't allow them to bluff you into giving them the domainname. It's yours, it's your adress, and you followed all the right rules to acquire it. If they want it, they'll have to do or pay whatever it is worth to you.
I think that by the spirit, if not the letter of the anti-trust law. It's more objectional that the encryption code has been given to some producers of Operating Systems, and not to others.
The DVD forum, violates the rules of good conduct by making deals with Microsoft and others, handing them the encryption code, and then not giving it to the people making linux. This kind of competitionpollution, giving one company an edge over another, is exactly the kind of thing anti-trust laws have been made against.
I think that if the DVD Forum, had made a deal with those making linux, maybe helping in creating a binary for linux, they could have kept the encryption code out of the open source. Their nearsightedness and bias is what has made other do the reverse engineering in the first place.
If you don't deal with eventualities, they will deal with you.
I agree that bias and prejudice should be fought at any level. But an article biased towards linux is a nice for a change in mainstream press.
Before beginning my story I'd like to say that I'm a commandline freak. I love command lines, naturally this colours my view of what an OS is.
In my humble opinion a OS is the collection of software needed to communicate with the hardware, and make the hardware work. For me this does not include X-window, or Windows NT/95/98 graphical enviroments (I admit NT is least obvious of the four to not be included in the OS)
Of course, even for windows, things like drivers etc, are part of the OS. But something like explorer is not, because it allready is high enough level to do things you don't specifically tell it to do. Application that take away action/control from the end-user, are exactly that, applications and no part of the OS.
So the OS basically entails in my definition: The runtime system, drivers and a shell to communicate with the user. But specifically not any functionality that shell has beyond receiving, interpretting and excuting commands. In this defenition the "looking good" part of shells is not part of the OS.
Here's the link to another group doing research in this field:
http://www.cf.ac.uk/socsi/gravwave/index.html
And here's a quick overview of the timeline of this field of research:
http://www.gsu.edu/other/timeline/gravity.html
Why does this immediatally cause the Monthy Python' silly walk sketch to surface in my mind.
Okay.... I'm off to patentize believing in a God at the religious patents office of the USPTO.
I do not think that saying that ESR's view on communism are naive equals saying:
"It's allright for the Chinese to abuse and mass-murder there own people."
I agree that ESR's statements are naive. I realize that it's very easy to believe that China is all wrong, but this is just as wrong as believing that America, or in my case the Netherlands, is all right.
How wrong China is however is unimportant, if you say linux is free, and it's an open source. Then it should be free for everyone, or you yourself are being inconsistent and undemocratic. If you say, linux is free, except for everyone that doesn't have the same view on the world. Then you yourself are being totalitarian.Linux is free: this means China is free to adopt it as the OS on which they run their adminstration.
Very often people forget that having a democratic system means that you must allow non-democratic voices to exist. The whole defenition of what a democracy is, allows for people that think we should not have democracy to voice that. You can't have high ideals, but then withold from a few people who don't share them, that would make you no better then them.
Saying linux is free for all except for China. Would be the same as saying: There's freedom of speech for all except those who have an opion other then mine. Or the same as saying, You have completely freedom of religion, unless you're not a christian. Saying you want to share your OS with the world, mean that you will also have to share it with those you'd rather not be related too... Anything less will make you loose credit, even more then the Chinese goverment using your programming work.
Yes it does sounds like an excellent thing to use in any enviroment. I still have a few slight worries tho. First of all as you mentioned using it in a hospital setting, I'm worried how much disturbance a transmitter of this kind will have on the often very sensitive medical eletronic equipment.
The second concern is equal, it's also a technical one. All those transmitters would need to have a unique modulation frequency, otherwise what I do on my term might affect your terminal. So then you'd either need to have a transmitter with tweakable frequency, or each computer has a receiver with which only one transmitter goes. In the first case you'll have jokers, scanning to find someone elses frequency, in the latter case you'll have to have an administration of what you allready have in a certain room, in case you want to add more of the same machines.
It's a great technology, and I certainly see it's uses, but there's still the last worry, that we're getting more and more wireless technology, and the air is getting more and more polluted by electro-magnetic fields (low energetic radiation).
Russian military leaders have stated that the russian do not have a fully-automated targetting and firing system for their nuclear arsenal. In other words, the risk for the russian nukes is non-existant, and the White House just assured us that America is OK for Y2K.
This leaves of course still some other countries, like China, France and some smaller nuclear powers. But I cannot phantom a nation stupid enough to have nuclear missile loaded on sharp at the actual change of the millenium.
This is irrelevant since all the changes to redhat will be released under the GPL. And since this is one development a lot of capable people working with linux will want to be on top of, there will be channels to get help through even if Oracle Corp. itself doesn't give the same amount of support.
I would like to start my reply by mentioning that I think Johahn, in my humble opinion touches most of the important points in this situation, and I agree with most of his views on those points.
I disagree however that the chinese goverment will learn to appreciate and/or value individual rights just because they switch to using linux. If anything I think the linux world is more communical then most software companies are. Apart from that, it's not the case that China doesn't accept the fact that individuals can be important. As in any modern country, it's also in China that highly skilled individual rise, to positions of power and prosperity. The difference is that in most western countries, you can disagree with the goverment and STILL rise to power, using exceptional skills.
The matter of the violation of human rights are more severe and pressure has to be kept on the chinese goverment to end those mistreatments. Further problems involving china are of course the occupation of Tibet (a thing mr. Richard Gere won't let us forget) and the Chinese claims that the republic of Taiwan is a part of the people's republic. I'm not saying there isn't a lot of work to do to change China, but it's not relevant when we discuss them using linux. It's one more goverment using linux, and that's a good sign, besides let's take a look at the so-called good-guys.
The United States of America still has states where the death penalty is giving, this is in _direct_ conflict with the international human rights treaty. The NATO is fully aware it's the most powerful military institute in the world, and it attacks sovereign countries without fiat from the United Nations. I myself am from a NATO-country but I feel deep deep deeply ashamed for the fact that the NATO singlehandedly destroyed the foundation on which the UN was build. Isreal occupies large parts of their neighbouring countries, yet claims it's just defending it's borders. France tests nuclear weapons near inhabited islands in the pacific. The list is endless...
Johahn's point about the east european countries trying to become materialistic states, leading to poverty is well made. Together with what I wrote in this note, there's a conclusion to be drawn from it. There is no ideal system, no perfect way of living. We should look critical at ourselves, face and admit our own shortcomings, then and only then shall we be able to face the chinese and help them change the situation in their country for the best. In the current situation the chinese will just get more headstrong, and they are right at that... It's not fair to accuse them of all kinds of abuse, when you're unwilling to face your own faults. A big part of why China is seen as the Evil Republic, is because we, looking at what other countries do wrong, quite randomly named them as the "bad guys"
It is pivotal for the acceptance of Linux as valid alternative to Windows that a reasonable percentage of games will also be available for that platform. Not just the old games but the newest games too, eventhough it's great to go through Castle Wolfenstein again.
Quite a lot of my friends, who do all their work on linux, still have windows installed on a seperate partition just to be able to play games. As long as new games won't be available on linux, it will never be capable of getting a huge market share at the expense of windows. The monopoly position of windows is still untouched if everyone keeps linux NEXT to windows.
There are of course people who will now argue that people are more mature than to pick their operating system on the fact that games are available for that OS. Don't forget that the video-standard battle was finally won by the standard for video-tapes on which more porn was available. It's a bit of a crude paralel, but it does show that seemingly, secondary factor, of pleasurable things available, weighs heavier then one normally thinks.
When I went online about 6 years ago. I made a solemn vow to myself. Or actually I made the vow well over a year later when I had seen online love happen to some friends of mine. I vowed that I would not fall in love with someone over the net.
So all the time I have been online I never considered it a valid medium to meet a prospective partner with. I went out, I still do, twice in most weeks and met girls that way. Of course I met girls online, but I treated them just like I treated the guys I talked with, as friends, sometimes, once I knew them better as people to confide in.
Then one faithfull day, I found out that I felt more then friendship for one of the girls I had been talking with for over a year. I of course tried to ignore it, but our conversations got more and more intimate, and when she admitted to me that she was in love with me, I just felt overjoyed.
To cut a long story short, I visited her this summer (10 months after we confessed our love to eachother) and I will move over there this spring after I've graduated. I know we still have a long way to go, and many barriers to overcome, but we're both very much in love, and hope our relation will last once we're together.
The point I'm trying to make is that you ussually will find love on the last place you expect it. And more importantly you can't force yourself to love someone or NOT love someone for that matter. I have no recipe for love, on- or offline, and I doubt there is one. There's just this simple bit of advise, which is valid both on the net and irl: Be yourself, that the most likely way to find a partner that suits you.
Otis Wildflower wrote ".... am I reading too much in our lunchtime socializing ['these cursed signals']". The answer to that question is quite paradoxal: yes and no.
Whenever a boy and a girl meet they will reach out to eachother. By both Darwin's evolution theory AND by the Christian "go, and multiply", we were put on this earth to procreate. And when a guy and a gal meet, the guy will just pop his eyes and beat his chest, but on her own way the woman will also try to find out wether this new person would be a good father, or if she allready has a partner, wether he's a better father then her current partner. Please note, that for the bigger part this consideration is subconcious, so neither the guy or the woman would be actively considering parenting together.
The signals such a girl would give off, are actually those of sexual (romantic) interest. But, that doesn't automatically mean that she's consciously attracted to the man she is talking with. So the answer to wether you read to much in the signals is yes AND no. There is defenitally an interest in eachother between the two of you, if those signals are given of. However, to turn such an interest into an conscious attraction, you need to put some work in AND you both have to be open to a relation, if your not open for a new relation you won't let this interest become an attraction.
This non-stop searching for the best father shows that man was not made to live monogamously. Does this give us an excuse to cheat on our partner ? NO, it does not, it just means that sometimes not cheating on your partner requires active effort to refrain from giving in to nature. Knowing this weakness is instrumental in being able to cope with seductive offers from others.
So these signal can be explained as saying, that under the right circumstances you and the girl could have a relationship. These signals tell you: "You are a valid partner for me" but they don't neccesarily have to imply more, if the girl isn't free or ready for a relationship. See these signals as a compliment, and as an encouragement to pursue more, but don't rush in without finding out wether she is free and ready to get into a relationsip.