Maximizing profits IS a corporation's only responsibility, and that is the way it should be.
A corporation is a tool for making money. Period. That's neither good nor bad, it's just a tool. It is not a person. It is not ethical or unethical, moral or immoral, any more than a hammer is.
The problem is that there is this quasi-religion that has grown up around corporations, fostered by corporate-sponsored economists and think tanks, based on the belief that giving them total free reign will produce a shower of benefit upon us all. Enacting special legislation on their behalf will increase the shower to a deluge. Anything which restricts their freedom or makes them responsible for their actions will bring disaster on us all. Nuts.
Maximizing profits is wonderful. But expecting anything else from a corporation is stupid. That is not their function.
A brief look at the Caldera lawsuit page shows a lot of relevant court documents posted. Someone unfamiliar with the case might be mislead into thinking that this is a pretty thorough picture of what is oing on in the case.
Glaringly absent are the depositions of Otis Wilson and Randall Davis. Otis Wilson, former head of AT&T's Unix licensing thoroughly shoots down the Caldera/bogoSCO contract nonsense. Randall Davis, possibly THE leading authority on software opyright issues wipes out all claims of SysV Unix copyright infringement in Linux, whether by IBM or anyone else.
The SCO vs IBM case is, has been, and always will be a fraudulent lawsuit.
Groklaw reports that MessageLabs has identified the worm as originating in Russia. http://www.messagelabs.com/news/virusnews/detail/d efault.asp?contentItemId=733®ion=america Not likely coming from U.S. Linux enthusiasts at all. Just Russian entrepeneurs and a red herring.
Hopefully,this will be a trend in software development. Not necessarilly government sponsorship, but commissioning software to fill a common need. Note that the developers are getting PAID to write GPL software. Judging by the timeline, probably not an insubstantial amount. Now picture an organization, call it the Business Software USERS Alliance. Members pool resources to commission needed software. Developers bid for contracts. Bids are selected by price and ability to perform. Add a bounty system for bugs and security flaws, where hackers get paid instead of sued or jailed. Add a tax writeoff for contributing to GPL software (funds and/or code). Think of software as infrastructure, the highway system, not the cars. Now think of IP, especially software patents, as real property, lying in the route of a proposed highway. Are we making progress yet?
Win4Lin allows you to actually install Windows 9x on your Linux system onto the ext2 file system. You run your own copy of Windows as a process under Linux. You then install Office or whatever your *must have* app is and off you go. Now you can run W9x apps on a secure file system without NT. This is supposed to be a middle solution in between VMWare and Wine. I'm going to try this out with Win95 OSR2 and Office97 and see how it flies. If it works out I have some customers in mind... Information at www.trelos.com.
If I have made more money than other men it is because I have stood on the shoulders of giants while my legal team imprisoned and castrated them. -Billy Hank Windows III
This is what I have assumed all along. The pirating issue is economically absurd at present and for the immediate future. Has anyone inquired about licensing the technology for a Linux player? What would the cost be? Is there any information on what the license fees are for M$ players? Would a license fee for a Linux player be prohibitive? Would the idea be rejected out of hand? How about an e-mail campaign in the nature of "Hey, this DVD stuff looks really cool. If you had a *NIX version I would be very interested....". Perhaps finding a consumer freindly federal judge (is their such an animal?) and seeking an injunction against the further distribution of DVD players which violate fair use of copyrighted materials would be interesting.......
Most definitely not a lawyer, but there is nothing wrong with my sense of smell.
Just how old are these standards that M$ is co-opting? And all this wonderful new stuff only works fully with other W2K machines. It requires bigger hardware than 4.0. Novell, on the other hand, can integrate W2K with other platforms. Novell may benefit hugely from companies who are hesitant about becoming totally locked into a W2K system. W2K hardware compatibility compares favorably with Linux of several years back, say RH4.0. By 2001 it should a real kickass system. The improvements are vast, but outweighed by the deliberate incompatibilties. 40% technology, 60% corporate maneuvering. Don't forget UCITA. Do you honestly believe that the remote disabling hooks are not in place in W2K? Are they utterly safe against crackers? Trust Bill. Trust Him with your livelihood. Trust Him with your life. "If I have seen further than other men it is because I have stood on the shoulders of giants." -Isaac Newton "If I have made more money than other men it is because I have stood on the shoulders of giants while my legal team imprisoned and castrated them." -Bill Hank Gate$ III
I've gone through Net Essentials, Win98, NT4WS, and NT4Server. Now I'm gonna become a former MCP. Fine with me. Think I'll mail M$ a CheapBytes CD and tell them I am upgrading from 4.0 already. Where I live the biggest networks around are in resorts connecting a couple motels to a central server. The local ISP's run BSD and Linux... Couldn't see much use for Enterprise anyhow. I live in a small town and "Hey, this guy fixed my problem" has gotten me more business than having MCP on my card. My big sales pitch when someone asks me about setting up a NT sever is "Well, if you REALLY think that's what you need OK but for the price of the sever software and client licenses I can set you up with a server installation, support, AND throw in the hardware!
"If I have seen further than other men it is because I have stood on the shoulders of giants." -Isaac Newton
"If I have made more money than other men it is because I have stood on the shoulders of giants while my legal team imprisoned and castrated them." -Bill Hank Gate$ III
Wishware my ass. Wishware is a Window$ product with up to eight virual desktops so you dont have to keep max-minimizing windows do do anything. A GUI that is not tied to the kernel so the GUI crashes the whole system. One with a choice of GUI's. Or the choice not to have a GUI. One with Open Source drivers that can be debugged so they don't crash...errr destabilize the system. Or be proved not to be buggy and the system itself is inherently unstable. With open source libraries instead of a mess of proprietary DLL's that disable each other's programs. One with a license that gives you rights instead of explaining you have none. One that cames with a free office suite. One that comes with a multitude of programming tools. Yeah, wish in one hand and defecate in the other, see which fills up first.......
"If I have seen further than other men it is because I have stood ont the shoulders of giants." -Isaac Newton
"If I have made more money than other men it is because I have stood on the shoulders of giants while my my legal team imprisoned and castrated them." -William Henry the Third
I love it, sort of. Bill Joy predicts the possible extinction of the human race due to uncontrolled technica advances, but is a little vague on the specifics. Immediately the keen minds at/. begin to work out the details. It's the beauty of the hack that counts, after all.....
"If I have made more money than other men it is because I have stood on the shoulders of giants while my legal team imprisoned and castated them." -Bill
Having internet access could definitely be a means for people to in impoverished countries to take care of those *other* problems. While owning a computer may be an unbelievable extragance for an individual or family, it could be quite feasible for a community. Take a group of alpaca herders in the Andes. They sell alpaca rugs to buyers from Cuzco for a pittance (especially from the alpaca's point of view), who sells them to another buyer in Lima, who sells them to someone in New York or Miami, who sells them to a retailer. Give them a web page and they can take orders from around the globe. Now this village in the Andes is the home of Urubamba.com, your one stop shopping headquarters for alpaca rugs. Bye the way, now they can quit growing coca. Picture a similar scenario for African woodcarvers making exquisite ebony figurines for sale to cruise ship tourists. What they sell for $5 ends up for $150 in Pier1 Imports. An over simplification, I know, but this is how e-commerce works.
If I have seen farther than other men it is because I have stood on the shoulders of giants. -Isaac Newton
If I have made more money than other men it is because I have stood on the shoulders of giants, while my legal team imprisoned and castrated them. -Bill (last name omitted out of fear)
I am all for having Linux CD's distributed in any way possible. My first experience with Linux was from a CD that was laying around in a A+ certification classroom, Redhat 4.0 I think. I picked it up, started browsing and got hooked. Next I bought the Complete Idiot's book by Ricart which came with Calera 1.3. A few month's later I was running a samba server in a MCSE class. If it wasn't for that RedHat CD laying in a pile of other CD's on a desk in a computer lab I'd probably be just another M$ clone. Yeah, I bought Linksys because it said Linux compatible, and I'm running two triple boot boxes at home with it. If it had just said it was the NE2000 driver on the box the install would have been a breeze. I have 98 & NT installed because I get paid to support them. I use Linux exclusively for my own work/play except for my cheapo digital camera. Any one know of a driver for Largan Mini 350?
Isaac Newton: "If I have seen farther than other men it is because I have stood on the shoulders of giants."
Bill Gates: "If I have made more money than other men it is because I have stood on the shoulders of giants while my legal team imprisoned and castrated them."
Probably just overwhelmed by slashdots trying to access the site. I went there no problem and read a large portion of the summary when this was first posted.
By the way, does anyone know the Arabic word for "detonator"? What would happen if it was included in every posting on the net?
1. You own your computer. You paid for it, it is in your homeor business, and it is your property.
2. Your computer is composed of hardware, firmware, and software.
3. If any part of your computer is defective you have the right to have that part repaired or replaced free of charge within a reasonable time after purchase.
4. You have the right to know about any real or potential defect in your computer, whether it is hardware, firmware, or software. Any attempt to conceal these defects or to prevent you from obtaining information about these defects should be punishable by law.
5. You should have the same rights to any media on your computer that you do to any other media in your home or business. "Digital" media deserves the same copyright protection as any other media, no more, no less.
6. Any provision of any license, contract, or sales agreement which patently violates your rights is void from the outset.
7. You have the right to privacy in your own home or in the conduct of your business. You have the right to be aware of and approve or deny any communication to or from your home or business. Any product which initiates any communication or action on your computer without your knowledge, approval, or control violates your rights and security. Distribution of such a product constitutes dissemination of a virus.
8. Any product which you purchase for your computer which interferes with the functionality of another product is defective. If the interference is by design it constitutes a criminal act on the part of the distributor.
9. You have the right to use any and all means to examine, dissasemble, and analyze any product on your computer to determine if it introduces any security or incompatibility issues and the right (responsibilty?)to report your findings to others.
10. You have the right to disable or remove any "feature" or component of any product on your computer which you find undesirable for any reason and to communicate to others the means for doing so.
Am I a nut case or does any of this sound reasonable?
Slashdot Mirror
Maximizing profits IS a corporation's only responsibility, and that is the way it should be.
A corporation is a tool for making money. Period. That's neither good nor bad, it's just a tool.
It is not a person. It is not ethical or unethical, moral or immoral, any more than a hammer is.
The problem is that there is this quasi-religion that has grown up around corporations, fostered by corporate-sponsored economists and think tanks, based on the belief that giving them total free reign will produce a shower of benefit upon us all. Enacting special legislation on their behalf will increase the shower to a deluge. Anything which restricts their freedom or makes them responsible for their actions will bring disaster on us all. Nuts.
Maximizing profits is wonderful. But expecting anything else from a corporation is stupid. That is not their function.
A brief look at the Caldera lawsuit page shows a lot of relevant court documents posted. Someone unfamiliar with the case might be mislead into thinking that this is a pretty thorough picture of what is oing on in the case.
Glaringly absent are the depositions of Otis Wilson and Randall Davis. Otis Wilson, former head of AT&T's Unix licensing thoroughly shoots down the Caldera/bogoSCO contract nonsense. Randall Davis, possibly THE leading authority on software opyright issues wipes out all claims of SysV Unix copyright infringement in Linux, whether by IBM or anyone else.
The SCO vs IBM case is, has been, and always will be a fraudulent lawsuit.
Microsoft provides the SCOG $millions in loan cum licensing deal to attack their No. 1 threat, Linux.
Microsoft touts EV1 in Win2003/Linux case study.
Netcraft names EV1 the top Win2003 hosting provider.
EV1 has amazingly low, low pricing for Win2003 servers.
EV1 buys SCO IP license just days before Q1 conference call, and on the day of the PIPE and Boies deals deadline.
Coincidence or Conspiracy? Let the DoJ make the call.
Groklaw reports that MessageLabs has identified the worm as originating in Russia. http://www.messagelabs.com/news/virusnews/detail/d efault.asp?contentItemId=733®ion=america
Not likely coming from U.S. Linux enthusiasts at all. Just Russian entrepeneurs and a red herring.
Hopefully,this will be a trend in software development. Not necessarilly government sponsorship, but commissioning software to fill a common need. Note that the developers are getting PAID to write GPL software. Judging by the timeline, probably not an insubstantial amount. Now picture an organization, call it the Business Software USERS Alliance. Members pool resources to commission needed software. Developers bid for contracts. Bids are selected by price and ability to perform. Add a bounty system for bugs and security flaws, where hackers get paid instead of sued or jailed. Add a tax writeoff for contributing to GPL software (funds and/or code). Think of software as infrastructure, the highway system, not the cars. Now think of IP, especially software patents, as real property, lying in the route of a proposed highway. Are we making progress yet?
Lost sig...no reward
Win4Lin allows you to actually install Windows 9x on your Linux system onto the ext2 file system. You run your own copy of Windows as a process under Linux. You then install Office or whatever your *must have* app is and off you go. Now you can run W9x apps on a secure file system without NT. This is supposed to be a middle solution in between VMWare and Wine. I'm going to try this out with Win95 OSR2 and Office97 and see how it flies.
If it works out I have some customers in mind...
Information at www.trelos.com.
If I have made more money than other men it is because I have stood on the shoulders of giants while my legal team imprisoned and castrated them.
-Billy Hank Windows III
This is what I have assumed all along. The pirating issue is economically absurd at present and for the immediate future. Has anyone inquired about licensing the technology for a Linux player? What would the cost be? Is there any information on what the license fees are for M$ players? Would a license fee for a Linux player be prohibitive? Would the idea be rejected out of hand? How about an e-mail campaign in the nature of "Hey, this DVD stuff looks really cool. If you had a *NIX version I would be very interested....". Perhaps finding a consumer freindly federal judge (is their such an animal?) and seeking an injunction against the further distribution of DVD players which violate fair use of copyrighted materials would be interesting.......
Most definitely not a lawyer, but there is nothing wrong with my sense of smell.
Just how old are these standards that M$ is co-opting? And all this wonderful new stuff only works fully with other W2K machines. It requires bigger hardware than 4.0. Novell, on the other hand, can integrate W2K with other platforms. Novell may benefit hugely from companies who are hesitant about becoming totally locked into a W2K system. W2K hardware compatibility compares favorably with Linux of several years back, say RH4.0. By 2001 it should a real kickass system. The improvements are vast, but outweighed by the deliberate incompatibilties. 40% technology, 60% corporate maneuvering. Don't forget UCITA. Do you honestly believe that the remote disabling hooks are not in place in W2K? Are they utterly safe against crackers? Trust Bill. Trust Him with your livelihood. Trust Him with your life. "If I have seen further than other men it is because I have stood on the shoulders of giants." -Isaac Newton "If I have made more money than other men it is because I have stood on the shoulders of giants while my legal team imprisoned and castrated them." -Bill Hank Gate$ III
I've gone through Net Essentials, Win98, NT4WS, and NT4Server. Now I'm gonna become a former MCP.
Fine with me. Think I'll mail M$ a CheapBytes CD and tell them I am upgrading from 4.0 already.
Where I live the biggest networks around are in resorts connecting a couple motels to a central server. The local ISP's run BSD and Linux... Couldn't see much use for Enterprise anyhow. I live in a small town and "Hey, this guy fixed my problem" has gotten me more business than having MCP on my card. My big sales pitch when someone asks me about setting up a NT sever is "Well, if you REALLY think that's what you need OK but for the price of the sever software and client licenses I can set you up with a server installation, support, AND throw in the hardware!
"If I have seen further than other men it is because I have stood on the shoulders of giants."
-Isaac Newton
"If I have made more money than other men it is because I have stood on the shoulders of giants while my legal team imprisoned and castrated them."
-Bill Hank Gate$ III
Wishware my ass. Wishware is a Window$ product with up to eight virual desktops so you dont have to keep max-minimizing windows do do anything. A GUI that is not tied to the kernel so the GUI crashes the whole system. One with a choice of GUI's. Or the choice not to have a GUI. One with Open Source drivers that can be debugged so they don't crash...errr destabilize the system. Or be proved not to be buggy and the system itself is inherently unstable. With open source libraries instead of a mess of proprietary DLL's that disable each other's programs. One with a license that gives you rights instead of explaining you have none. One that cames with a free office suite. One that comes with a multitude of programming tools. Yeah, wish in one hand and defecate in the other, see which fills up first.......
"If I have seen further than other men it is because I have stood ont the shoulders of giants."
-Isaac Newton
"If I have made more money than other men it is because I have stood on the shoulders of giants while my my legal team imprisoned and castrated them."
-William Henry the Third
I love it, sort of. Bill Joy predicts the possible extinction of the human race due to uncontrolled technica advances, but is a little vague on the specifics. Immediately the keen minds at /. begin to work out the details. It's the beauty of the hack that counts, after all.....
"If I have made more money than other men it is because I have stood on the shoulders of giants while my legal team imprisoned and castated them."
-Bill
Having internet access could definitely be a means for people to in impoverished countries to take care of those *other* problems. While owning a computer may be an unbelievable extragance for an individual or family, it could be quite feasible for a community. Take a group of alpaca herders in the Andes. They sell alpaca rugs to buyers from Cuzco for a pittance (especially from the alpaca's point of view), who sells them to another buyer in Lima, who sells them to someone in New York or Miami, who sells them to a retailer. Give them a web page and they can take orders from around the globe. Now this village in the Andes is the home of Urubamba.com, your one stop shopping headquarters for alpaca rugs. Bye the way, now they can quit growing coca. Picture a similar scenario for African woodcarvers making exquisite ebony figurines for sale to cruise ship tourists. What they sell for $5 ends up for $150 in Pier1 Imports. An over simplification, I know, but this is how e-commerce works.
If I have seen farther than other men it is because I have stood on the shoulders of giants.
-Isaac Newton
If I have made more money than other men it is because I have stood on the shoulders of giants, while my legal team imprisoned and castrated them.
-Bill (last name omitted out of fear)
I am all for having Linux CD's distributed in any way possible. My first experience with Linux was from a CD that was laying around in a A+ certification classroom, Redhat 4.0 I think. I picked it up, started browsing and got hooked.
Next I bought the Complete Idiot's book by Ricart which came with Calera 1.3. A few month's later I was running a samba server in a MCSE class. If it wasn't for that RedHat CD laying in a pile of other CD's on a desk in a computer lab I'd probably be just another M$ clone. Yeah, I bought Linksys because it said Linux compatible, and I'm running two triple boot boxes at home with it.
If it had just said it was the NE2000 driver on the box the install would have been a breeze. I have 98 & NT installed because I get paid to support them. I use Linux exclusively for my own work/play except for my cheapo digital camera. Any one know of a driver for Largan Mini 350?
Isaac Newton: "If I have seen farther than other men it is because I have stood on the shoulders of giants."
Bill Gates: "If I have made more money than other men it is because I have stood on the shoulders of giants while my legal team imprisoned and castrated them."
Probably just overwhelmed by slashdots trying to access the site. I went there no problem and read a large portion of the summary when this was first posted.
By the way, does anyone know the Arabic word for "detonator"? What would happen if it was included in every posting on the net?
Computer owner's Bill of Right's
1. You own your computer. You paid for it, it is in your homeor business, and it is your property.
2. Your computer is composed of hardware, firmware, and software.
3. If any part of your computer is defective you have the right to have that part repaired or replaced free of charge within a reasonable time after purchase.
4. You have the right to know about any real or potential defect in your computer, whether it is hardware, firmware, or software. Any attempt to conceal these defects or to prevent you from obtaining information about these defects should be punishable by law.
5. You should have the same rights to any media on your computer that you do to any other media in your home or business. "Digital" media deserves the same copyright protection as any other media, no more, no less.
6. Any provision of any license, contract, or sales agreement which patently violates your rights is void from the outset.
7. You have the right to privacy in your own home or in the conduct of your business. You have the right to be aware of and approve or deny any communication to or from your home or business. Any product which initiates any communication or action on your computer without your knowledge, approval, or control violates your rights and security. Distribution of such a product constitutes dissemination of a virus.
8. Any product which you purchase for your computer which interferes with the functionality of another product is defective. If the interference is by design it constitutes a criminal act on the part of the distributor.
9. You have the right to use any and all means to examine, dissasemble, and analyze any product on your computer to determine if it introduces any security or incompatibility issues and the right (responsibilty?)to report your findings to others.
10. You have the right to disable or remove any "feature" or component of any product on your computer which you find undesirable for any reason and to communicate to others the means for doing so.
Am I a nut case or does any of this sound reasonable?