Messages

76

Developer's Corner / Re: The Inversion of the Open Source - Big Corporation Divide?

« on: September 26, 2010, 09:11 PM »

Dick Tracy internet wristwatch, anyone?!

-zridling (August 04, 2010, 11:30 PM)

More likely contact lenses and brain controlled user interface. Along with people becoming dumber and dumber.

Today, whatever hits the top in google is the truth for most people.

77

Developer's Corner / Re: Simple Public License (SimPL)

« on: September 26, 2010, 03:16 PM »

I have nothing against GPL, but I do have an issue on their advocates using the term "Free Software, as in freedom." to describe their license.

GPL imposes a restriction on the use of the source. Since it imposes a restriction is not free as in freedom, because restrictive is the opposite of free.

Thus all the GPL being "Free Software", is just propaganda based on a lie. Is like, we are protecting your freedom, btw take this ball and chain, it will help us to better protect your freedom.

Anyway, I like this SimplePL license because it does not hide its meaning. Nor does it claim to be protecting your freedom while imposing restrictions on you.

78

Developer's Corner / Re: Programming prizes on the rise: The risks of entering

« on: September 26, 2010, 02:57 PM »

This not only true of programming contest, but design contest.

Several years ago (in the 80s) a civil engineer friend entered an attraction blueprint contest sponsored by Disney. He did not won, but they use his blueprints to make an attraction anyway, without paying him nothing, or even placing a plaque or something that he could use to say, I made the blueprints of this. The catch as that when entering the contest he didn't notice in the small print that ALL enterings became property of Disney.

The lesson here, be sure to read the fine print before entering a contest.

79

Developer's Corner / Re: Why computer programs should not be patentable -- in easy-to-understand terms

« on: September 26, 2010, 02:47 PM »

I do believe in patents, but for a limited time. 5 to 10 years at most.

Not for 30, 50, 85, 100, etc that are now.

80

Developer's Corner / Re: Choosing Free Licenses for Software, Hardware, and Aesthetic works - Flowchart

« on: September 26, 2010, 01:59 PM »

Interesting but incomplete.
They forgot to mention the BSD license and the Apache license, as well as closed source free-ware, and non distributable open source (open for the buyer of the software to make modifications but not to distribute of make a fork).

81

Living Room / Re: Zen Magnets vs Buckyballs Comparison/Voicemail-Reply Video

« on: September 25, 2010, 07:02 PM »

What a bully (the CEO of buckyballs).

Glad they responded threat intelligently.

BTW I wonder how many people sent email to the CEO. After all he left his email on the phone

82

The Getting Organized Experiment of 2009 / Re: Why Trying to be Productive is a Huge Waste of Time

« on: September 20, 2010, 01:56 PM »

I kind of agree, if the job or project is something creative. Creativity is something that needs inspiration. And, emotional activities cannot be scheduled. Same thing applies to things you want to do, no one needs a reminder.

But, in defense of the to-do list, there are things that need to be done, and you don't want to do and thus postpone forever. Doing your taxes, cleaning your house, writing a report that no one will read.

This is the purpose of to-do list. To remind you to do something that you don't want to do, but must be done anyway.

If it has a deadline, write it down so you don't miss it. If it does not have a deadline write it so you don't forget it.

As of time wasting. Unless you have terrible memory, you only need to check your to do list 2 times a day.

In the morning, to remind you whats yet to be done.
In the evening to take out what was done and add any new things to do.

As of planning every minute of your day: Unless you are a total control freak, you wont be happy with that.

The purpose of life is living it, not slaving yourself for someone else.

83

Living Room / Re: On Wikipedia, Cultural Patrimony, and Historiography

« on: September 13, 2010, 01:59 AM »

History is created by the victor.

Government only purpose is to protect the Government. Church only purpose is to protect the Church. The press only purpose is to protect their money. All organizations care about themselves more than of the truth.

Lets face it, in todays words a "reliable source" is a fallacy. You can never be sure of a source.

84

Living Room / Re: On the Web: Google net neutrality stance gives Net’s future to corporations

« on: August 11, 2010, 07:23 PM »

Instead of all this. Why no simply get government to recognize freedom of speech on any type of media and not just written paper.

That would mean that if provider A, blocks B, then B would have cease and desist case against A.  The same if its government the one blocking B, as government itself cannot go against the constitution. Being that the constitution is the only thing that, somehow, legitimizes government in the first place.

But then again, it would also apply to wireless and Verizon and Google do not want that.

The blood that makes a corporation live is money, thus a corporation would never represent the peoples interest.

85

Living Room / Re: New Government Rules make Jailbreaking Legal

« on: August 02, 2010, 03:30 PM »

One thing I would like is the ability to users to have their own encryption key on their devices, and disallow the seller to hold the key. Making it impossible to install anything without the user consent.

Think of it like this. If you own a house, you have the key and not whoever sold you the house. If you own a car, you have the key, the dealer does not have it. Then why when you buy a phone, the seller have the key and you not?

Another thing I would like to see (as phones are computers now) is the ability to choice an operating system to put on.

As for other companies doing the same. Is like defending a wife beater just because someone else also beats his wife.

.

86

Living Room / Re: Richard Stallman Answers Your Questions

« on: August 02, 2010, 03:18 PM »

I do not know who said this:
"Emacs is a good Operating System, the only thing it needs is a good editor".
Or something similar

87

Developer's Corner / Re: The Inversion of the Open Source - Big Corporation Divide?

« on: July 30, 2010, 07:00 PM »

I notice that since day one on GPL'ed Open source. If wonder if they explain GPL like this:

"You will be doing all the development and support, and will I use your software for free and make a profit without paying you anything."

That is basically the deal with opensource, except that in some cases you can get other people to volunteer into improving the software. You work for big companies, but you don't notice it and don't get paid for doing so.

On top of that companies like Apple can get away of using the open source and closing the platform by abusing the DRM act. Code that is not signed by them, do not run. And you need to A. buy overpriced hardware from apple. B. Pay $99 a year for entering the club. C. Receive apples blessing for your application. D. Give apple a cut of everything you make.  All while Apple gets the software for free.

Unfortunately, it seem that this will become the norm.

88

Developer's Corner / Re: The Hacking Business Model -- not just about the code

« on: July 22, 2010, 10:46 AM »

This is so wrong is so many areas that I have not time to cover them.  Lets just say is mot fair at all to whoever is risking the money, and not good for company growth and lasting. At the end you want the company to last otherwise you will find yourself looking for a new job, this model does not seem to allow for this.

I suggest Instead:

Create a cooperative. Let employees buy shares of the cooperative. Contrary to a corporation, on a cooperative you get only one vote independent of how many shares you have. And employees that have THEIR OWN MONEY, tied to the company would like that company to succeed. Instead of a CEO, subdivide the decisions on cabals. With the directive taken from one person from each cabal. And require that the person of each cabal change every year.

 

89

Living Room / Re: Slashdot Question: How to Recover Stolen Laptop if you Know Thief's IP Address?

« on: July 13, 2010, 11:45 AM »

I really doubt the police will do anything about it. Is interstate, thus the jurisdiction is of the FBI. And since its worth less than $50k, the FBI would not likely do anything.

90

Living Room / Re: App Culture vs. Free Culture

« on: July 12, 2010, 12:01 PM »

The article forgot:

- The cheating factor. Apple restricts the use of some of its API only to  Apple. If your application uses those parts of their API, its not accepted. Unless you are google.


Capitalism only works where there is no party controlling the market. So concentrating too much decision power on a company that might also be your competitor is always a bad idea. Is like having the bad parts of Comunism (one party decides what goes on), without having any of the good parts.

BTW: Whats up with EVERY web site REQUIRING to register to post comments. I guess that freedom of speech is not a popular this days. (without the option of anonimity without need to lie, freedom of speech cannot exist).

91

Living Room / Re: How Steam turned a pirate into a paying customer

« on: July 07, 2010, 09:29 PM »

The article forgot to mention that price is not always lower on steam than buying the dvd, have that on mind before making a purchase.

For example right now "Fallout 3 game of the year edition" cost $49.99 on steam, But you can find the dvd edition new on amazon from $37.99, and "Oblivion Game of the year" cost 24.99 while I got the same game on dvd for 19.95 from target.

Bottom line, do not assume that just because is streaming, is cheaper.

92

Living Room / Re: FARK creator doesn't believe in the wisdom of crowds

« on: July 05, 2010, 11:31 AM »

The vote of the fools and of the wise count the same. Since there are more fools than wise, the result of a democracy is almost always foolishness. This explain the world we live in, where appearance of value is worth more than value.

I mean in the whole sense. From political ,we elect crooks every year based on propaganda, to economical : In capitalism the value of a product is based on how much people think is worth, instead of how much it took to manufacture it and how useful is.

However the problems remains, who and how determines what is wise from what is not.

93

Living Room / Re: Dell knowingly shipped millions of defective computers?

« on: July 05, 2010, 10:55 AM »

This happens when a company becomes too big and hubris sets in.

Lawsuits are not a deterrent as following a lawsuit takes money and at the end is the lawyers that win big. Instead there should be laws that criminalize when people knowingly sell faulty equipment without first disclosing it to the buying party.

There are far too many CEO's out-there that are far more criminal than any person in jail. (BP execs come to mind)

94

General Software Discussion / Re: SIGIL, free ePub editor

« on: June 15, 2010, 11:36 AM »

There is a portable version of lyx/tex

http://code.google.com/p/lytex/

This makes installing both easier.

95

Living Room / Re: How The Mainstream Media Stole Our News Story Without Credit

« on: June 06, 2010, 07:19 PM »

Usually you see the news months after you already read it on the Internet. Mainstream news usually just buy the news. Is rare for them to do something original. Specially technology ones.

That is why CNN news looked like a briefing from the pentagon when Bush and Cheney where lying about the weapons of mass destruction. And why the 911 was never properly investigated as mainstream only focused on the official version and nothing more.

Sure, you need to take everything from the Internet with a grain of salt. But this is also true for mainstream news. 

96

Living Room / Re: New flash player vulnerability (affects Adobe Reader as well)

« on: June 06, 2010, 07:09 PM »

The vulnerability is caused due to an unspecified error. No more information is currently available.

followed by

NOTE: The vulnerability is reportedly being actively exploited.

How can you don't know what causes the vulnerability, yet know that is actively exploited?
Who reported that is was actively exploited?
Has anyone been able to duplicate the vulnerability? If so, who?

If none of this can be answer, then:
How do we know is is not a report paid for? It wouldn't be the first time happening.

97

Jibz's Tools / Re: Dina for Linux/X11 - solved !

« on: May 20, 2010, 11:06 PM »

This worked for me on ubuntu 10 LTS

[Select]

sudo mkdir /usr/share/fonts/Dina
sudo cp Dina-PCF.tar.gz /usr/share/fonts/Dina
cd /usr/share/fonts/Dina
sudo tar -xvf Dina-PCF.tar.gz
sudo rm Dina-PCF.tar.gz
sudo rm /etc/fonts/conf.d/70-no-bitmaps.conf
sudo fc-cache -f -v

The last 2 lines I got from here:
http://www.alanbriol...ts-on-ubuntu-jaunty/


@bpcw001 Thank you for passing this to linux.  I really like this font.

98

Living Room / Re: A Very Simple Ethical Principle for Search: Google Fails Miserably

« on: May 02, 2010, 01:33 PM »

There is an old saying that freedom of speech only applies to the owner of the newspaper.

I think this apply here, fair engine search hits apply only to the owner of the search engine. . There will always be favoritism, thinking that it will not happen, is just naive. A private company lives to make profit. Irrelevant of ethics.

I do however hate when government plays favoritism. When that happens, I see taxes for what they really are. An extortion payment. If you don't pay something bad will happen to you. Just like the mafia asking for payment for protection. Except that with the mafia you actually get protection,and with government you only get threats.

99

General Software Discussion / Re: Here we go again with false positive antivirus actions bricking computers

« on: April 26, 2010, 11:07 AM »

Why not simply require each executable to be digitally signed?
And whats the point of having an anti-virus that will act as a virus itself?

100

Developer's Corner / Re: Documentary on the Absurdity of Software Patents

« on: April 21, 2010, 10:49 AM »

The solution is simple. Eliminate patents and get rid of the lawyers.
But it wont happen, since most politicians and all judges are lawyers.

[edit]
BTW:
What they meant at the end is what would happen if patent where placed on the way music is written. How the 5th symphony would have sound if Beethoven could not use things that were used  and patented before he wrote it.