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Linux users owe Microsoft

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Lavene
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#21 Post by Lavene »

I always send documents in .odt format the first time when sending stuff to public offices. And when I get a mail back stating that they can not read it and that they need it "in office" I rant and rave about how they lock people out, how they force people to buy expensive software etc. And if it's not urgent I save it in every conceivable format and resend the whole thing... as a tarball. Which of course they can not untar and have to scramble their IT people. Hey, it's my tax money... I demand to have some fun... :twisted:

Tina

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#22 Post by Grifter »

I think that sounds like awesome fun lavene (:
Eagles may soar, but weasels don't get sucked into jet engines...

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#23 Post by Bulkley »

Lavene wrote:I always send documents in .odt format the first time when sending stuff . . . .
Hey, me too. It's amazing how open source users get blamed when MS can't open it.

I am beginning to send things in PDF, partly to prevent tampering at the other end.

jjmac
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#24 Post by jjmac »

PingFloyd wrote:

>>
I wonder if it's them being paranoid, or they're trying to be controlling.
>>

I think one feeds on the other. And like true solisticles, they learn nothing from experiance.

Carn't help remember, that when SCO started their claim push, as crazy as everyone said it was ... It still put a few hundred people out of work in Germany at the time, due to small companies hesitating on planed deployments.

Hopefully business will be more immune to the FUD this time, as it seems they are.

One would have thought that a MS exec, would have at least followed the SCO debacle, and at least tried to learn a few of the realities with regard to FOSS. But as mentioned above, they just don't 'get it' ... a monkey can only be a monkey in the end i suppose.

Lavene wrote:
>>
And if it's not urgent I save it in every conceivable format and resend the whole thing... as a tarball. Which of course they can not untar and have to scramble their IT people. Hey, it's my tax money... I demand to have some fun..
>>

hehehe ...

I propose AliG ! to be the official FOSS advocate, in any case involving MS over the next decade.


jm

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simen
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#25 Post by simen »

PingFloyd wrote:This to me sounds like Microsoft's usual behavior of throwing stones while living in a glass house.
Or rather, throwing chairs in a glass house (:
What I also find interesting is how this whole mess is giving GPLv3 some momentum, since Eben Moglen promises that the new version will certainly not allow this kind of antisocial behaviour. A worst case scenario could (if I've understood some of this) leave all software licenced under GPLv2 "tainted" and liable to law suits (or at least FUD). SUSE will certainly not be able to incorporate GPL3-licenced stuff without breaking their agreement with MS. A big question of course is what's going to happen to the kernel, since Torvalds has been adamant against going with GPL3. Maybe this means we'll all be running HURD kernels much sooner than expected?

--Simen

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#26 Post by Lavene »

I think, as sort of a worst case scenario, that a fork of Linux is much more likely than a sudden burst in the HURD development if Linus decides to stick with GPLv2. But hopefully he will ultimately see the danger of not going with v3 and everything will be cool is ice :)

Tina

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#27 Post by Grifter »

Lavene wrote:But hopefully he will ultimately see the danger of not going with v3 and everything will be cool is ice :)

Tina
No I don't think so, I think it's the opposite and he sees danger in gplv3, you can read their comments and debates on www.kerneltrap.org

What bothers me about this whole thing is...

FSF and Moglen all know Linus's stance, and instead of being adamant about the suse-ms thing, they're basically giving in in order to further a political agenda of pushing gpl3 - I think that's being inordinately stupid: this is all just politics - Linux will never go gpl3, and this is FSF and Moglen's way of trying to push the kernel into their fold, but they are too bloody arrogant, it's not going to work, the kernel will stay gpl2, and because of that a lot of programs/developers will stay with gpl2 aswell - which ultimately means that Moglen has opened the flank wide open for evisceration, by abandoning gpl2 instead of fighting for it

This is a game of politics and economic warfare, and ms is very good at this game, and because there's "noone" (of the top brass) left to defend gpl2 the injury will be crippling once the enemy strikes

But that's just my take on it, I hope I'm wrong
Eagles may soar, but weasels don't get sucked into jet engines...

Lavene
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#28 Post by Lavene »

The real problem is, as we often see, lack of communication. Linus don't like Stallman and see him, maybe righfully, as a fanatic. And to some extent I can agree with that. Stallman and the FSF has made their definition of freedom and is not willing to discuss it. Linus on the other hand see that definition as a restriction. He basically says "Here is Linux, it's free... do what you want with it." So if someone wants to implement stuff like DRM it's fine with him. That is his definition of freedom.

FSF can not agree to this of course since DRM by definition is limiting and takes away the users freedom. The paradox is that the FSF/ Stallman definition of freedom in it self is limiting since it clearly say that you can not implement DRM and other 'anti-freedom' stuff.

And since neither of them is willing to listen to the other the standoff will continue.

Tina

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#29 Post by DeanLinkous »

Well, I think v3 could probably be skirted also if someone put their mind to it. But this issue does show that v2 is very easy to skirt around anymore. This issue shows that v2 is old and is not up to todays technology. SO while I don't think this issue specifically screams "v3 now" it should make you realize that v2 is old and full of holes and just does not take into account a lot of newer technology.

I agree with Lavene that communication needs to be improved. Kernel devs have been asked to participate AFAIK and from what I can tell they just dismiss that and claim the FSF doesn't really want input. Yet, if you compare draft one and draft two you can see some things that have really changed.

The "exceptions" clause should be enough to basically *allow* DRM use while still essentially providing for a non-DRM copy as well.

Remember is isn't JUST tivo. Numerous others either aren't providing the tools to build the code or are locking it with a sig and so forth. This isn't JUST about the kernel either so IMO it is silly to say this is just FSF trying to enforce its will on the kernel. It affects all GPL covered software and the kernel just happens to be one of those.

I still wonder if anyone would dare to fork it, boy then the poop would fly! :D

Oh well, wait and see. I personally will be using whatever kernel is v3!

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#30 Post by Grifter »

Who would fork it? Who _could_ fork it? Or maybe more importantly - who would maintain the fork? It's not a small project (:
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#31 Post by DeanLinkous »

Don't know? Maybe it would never be done. Maybe some of the devs would leave v2 and go for the v3 fork? As you said, it isn't a small project so how many devs can they lose to a v3 fork and still maintain v2?

I just think these are all important questions that should be considered.

Can someone simply look at any changes the v2 code implements and use that as *inspiration* to implement those changes in v3? Of course, not direct copying since that brings up other issues.

I am mostly just messing around. I wish the HURD would pick up some steam and a hell of a lot of features or maybe solaris?????

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#32 Post by Lavene »

I just picked this up on slashdot. I haven't read it yet, just quickly skimmed it and it looks like it's worth a look. It's a transcript of a speach RMS just did:
http://www.fsfeurope.org/projects/gplv3 ... transcript

Enjoy (or not) ;)

Tina

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#33 Post by DeanLinkous »

good read!
Went much better than last time I think... :D

jjmac
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v3 and kernel forking (grin)

#34 Post by jjmac »

As long as v3 doesn't null, or void v2 there shouldn't be a problem.

The kernel people all keep their own branches any way. And there isn't much to stop a company providing specialised modules. So it has been a kind of defactoed fork of soughts for along time.

I really doubt if the developers would want the syncing problems involved as well. And it is common in kernel development for 'change' to be treated with a lot of suspicion/scrutiny.

And it seems the encryption thing only involves sw that includes a key to install or exec ... so that wouldn't really involve much. So Linux isn't going to suffer any great acceptance or deployment problems as a result.

The problem of tracking down all the contributors to get approval for a licence change is also a big task.

I don't think it is really an issue of Linux not going with v3 ... just that, like all things kernel related ... they will wait and see how it works first. And probably suggest it should be submitted as a module first (grin)


jm

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#35 Post by Harold »

Novell now has reason to regret their pact with Microsoft...

The Microsoft-Novell Pact: Fish or 'Foul' Posturing

At the Professional Association for SQL Server (PASS) conference the other day in Seattle, Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer picked up the biggest, fattest, slitheriest worm out of that can of worms he opened up when he cut that deal with Novell and got Novell to squirming and wishing he hadn't.

During a Q&A Ballmer was asked if Microsoft was selling out by collaborating with a Linux distributor.

In answering he came out and said Linux "uses our patented intellectual property..."


http://linux.sys-con.com/read/308332.htm

thamarok

#36 Post by thamarok »

wtf?

Lavene
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#37 Post by Lavene »

thamarok wrote:wtf?
Indeed!

So in sumary: Hovsepian does not agree with Ballmer. Ballmer does not agree with Hovsepian. Nor can they agree about exactly what they are (respectfully of course) disagreeing over. And on the sideline stands Eben Moglen and he is disagreeeing with both. And he tells Stallman what his take is on the thing and Stallman completly misinterpret it and blurt out some statements in Tokyo which some journalists misinterpret. The whole mess then lead to articles like the above and slashdot articles like this. So yeah... wtf??

Damn... some times I really have to check that it's actually a true story and not the manuscript of an episode of "Fawlty Towers" or something...

Tina

thamarok

#38 Post by thamarok »

I never had a good feeling after I heard the first time of Micro$oft joining with Novell.

Is it me or are some people trying to get us Linux users off-the-world?

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#39 Post by jjmac »

Lavene wrote:
>>
Damn... some times I really have to check that it's actually a true story and not the manuscript of an episode of "Fawlty Towers" or something...
>>

Ahhh yes, but, Basil will always make much more sense than the bouncing monkey ever will. I think the monkey is a bit more dangerous when left unsupervised though.


jm

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#40 Post by Bulkley »

It seems to me that Linux depends upon the Internet. Linux grew up on the Internet and it propagates over the Internet. None of the blathering about patents and licences means much as long as users can download from wherever. However, if the powers that be sieze controll of the Internet, Linux could be scuppered.

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