What is Digg?43 Comments
- Agret, on 10/12/2007, -1/+25Because the machines have so much DRM they only run what the creators allow them to.
- inactive, on 10/12/2007, -1/+17No don't use pirated software, this makes situation worest, insted switch to linux.
- blapierre, on 10/12/2007, -2/+15Why would free/open source software no longer exist?
- TonySki, on 10/12/2007, -0/+10I totally thought of 1984 when I read this.
- TheWriteGuy, on 10/12/2007, -0/+9This article is more scary than funny. :-(
Happy Halloween. - sockpuppets, on 10/12/2007, -4/+13You've got a comment like "hai everybady good evening free magazine send me any way happy wises" to focus on and instead you get all grammar nazi on that instead?
Lol. - ISurfTooMuch, on 10/12/2007, -0/+9Because, if software patents are implemented, big software developers can patent everything under the sun and lock everyone else out. I'm not just talking about specific code; I'm talking about concepts. Take the scroll bar, for example. One could argue that specific code for implementing this should be protected, but what about the simple concept of a scroll bar? The same goes for dialog boxes, cursors, windows (the things you see on the screen, not the OS), and any other concept that is used in software developent. If this is done, it would be impossible to develop software of any kind without violating someone's patent. Large companies holding lots of patents will join patent pools, which allow members to use each other's patents. Small developers would be shut out, since they'd have no patents of their own to use as leverage.
- chieffy, on 10/12/2007, -3/+11I know the difference between "where", "were" and even "we're". It was just an over looked typo that the spell checker didn't pick up. Editing your own work is usually harder than editing someone else's. Sorry.
- chieffy, on 10/12/2007, -0/+7It depends on how optimistic you are I guess. I'd like to think we will overcome DRM and free/open source software will become dominant instead. Free software really is for the masses so why not leave proprietary software to the minorities who need something special. It makes sense to have to pay for something that only YOU and a few others need. But, it doesn't make sense using proprietary software for anything else.
- inactive, on 10/12/2007, -0/+7And even beyond just free software, I always stress technology freedom in general. If technology is going to become so ubiquitous that we're all going to merge with our machines, I would like a teeny bit of control over them myself, thank you.
You think it's bad now. The next field to advance is medicine. What about when we clone as easily as we bake a cake, create new organs from our own preserved stem cells, modify our genes so we screen out diseases, and extend our lives into the thousands of years. Do you think people will care about equal opportunity to access technology benefits then? Or will death simply be something that only happens to the 98% of the population who don't happen to be CEOs in the monopoly?
I honestly wonder. Apparently there is no humiliation, no cruelty so severe that it can provoke a body of people to stand up for themselves anymore. - Kirium, on 10/12/2007, -0/+7It would be a funny article if the human scum from the Intellectual Property sections of MAFIAA/Big Business/Monopo-Corporations weren't sitting in their well-appointed offices saying to themselves "Hey.... That's a great idea..."
- thirdman, on 10/12/2007, -4/+10Could just be a typo rather than a misspelling...
- ga7sh, on 10/12/2007, -0/+5well, Bill Gates did tell Steve Ballmer that 'you survive, because you make people need what you have. And then they have no place else to go.'
- rende, on 10/12/2007, -0/+5chieffy: totally agree. eventually free/open software will overtake the rest. i think the only thing limiting its growth at the moment is piracy.
- inflatablepig, on 10/12/2007, -11/+16It's should be 'where', not 'were'. Were is past tense as in "We were going to spell correctly, but our education prevented it, and my computer only does spell-check, not illiterate-check."
I remember a day when people could actually form a sentence with words like it's, know, you're and their without using the wrong definition of said words. Oh 2003, WHERE have you gone? - inactive, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3Oh, God, this is funny. Attention: THIS is a satire article. Not that ShellytheRepublican thing everybody was calling satire a couple of days back.
If Harlan Ellison wasn't a technophobe, he'd write stories like this. - williamdyer, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3@rick
Anyone objecting to this future will be treated as a suspected terrorist. Only terrorists want to communicate and compute without the benevolent eye of the government looking over their shoulder. - ConceptJunkie, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3Oh it would still exist, but it would be illegal.
- MovingToFreedom, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2Hi, truffle. I wrote the article and wanted to say thanks for your frank criticism. I like your replacement "Did you know?" snippet and if I were writing the article right now and had the choice, I might prefer yours.
I don't think my reader is an idiot. For myself I sometimes enjoy my satire more subtle and sometimes over the top. It seems to me a lot of the serious arguments in support of strict IP control and how to charge for delivered content are pretty over the top.
For example, Cory Doctorow mentions an MPAA vice-president who said in a DRM negotiation: "Watching a show that's being received in one room while you're sitting in another room has value, and if it has value, we should be able to charge money for it." (http://www.boingboing.net/2006/09/15/amazon_unbox_to_cust.html). That's how these people think. They don't want fair use. They don't want an ounce of consumer surplus going uncharged.
So anyway, I was just aiming for some gentle humor and silliness. I'm sorry it didn't meet your requirements :-)
Scott - jsusanka, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2might be funny but it is where we are heading and where microsoft would love to take you if we don't wake up
- Ratteler, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2I will have organized a terror unit to kill all patent holders and their family's way before it get this far. And if not me... I'm sure some one will. People can only be ***** so hard by the elite before the backlash comes round and has their heads on the chopping block.
... and we are SO overdue. - dwhitbeck, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2Satire, yes. True, maybe. Of course even today, you don't own the software, only a license to use it.
- Veretax, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1I must disagree. Proprietary software has its place in a lot more ways than open source. The two technology based will never disappear there will always be some of each or the other.
- MovingToFreedom, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1What? You don't like helpful money-saving ideas? :-)
- MovingToFreedom, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1@Rick: That's not especially reassuring. Cell phones and their associated plans are annoying. I don't think that's exactly what you're getting at, but what you're describing is a similar idea -- a platform that you don't control where you're at the mercy of large providers. Where we're just cows to be milked. Something similar with standard phone service is where my local provider, Sprint, kept gradually increasing the rate for voice mail and caller id until one day I saw they had been bumped up to $8 each. $8 for caller id?! I cancelled both and bought a cheapo digital answering machine. I miss caller id, but I'm not going to pay $100 a year for it. (However I do get satisfaction from saving more each month than the machine cost.) If providers run all of our software and we don't have alternatives (like the cheapo answering machine), then we could very well find ourselves in a future scenario with ridiculous software "rental" costs.
- Highstand, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1A future with RealPlayer?!?!? Buffering.........
- truffle, on 10/12/2007, -1/+2http://art-bin.com/art/omodest.html
Authors of parody articles like this would do well to review "A Modest Proposal" by Jonathan Swift.What makes this article a timeless example of Parody is how true it reads - you can believe that Swift's proposal is intended to be serious when it is actually a scathing political commentary.
I stop reading paraody articles as soon as the tone becomes obviously untrue. Can you imagine a software monopolist releasing an article like this including soundbytes like "did you know there was once a free software movement?"
Try being a little less over the top. It's really not that hard, for example:
"Did you know?
Before the Intellectual Property Advancement Convention was signed in 2014, retractively extending software patents to 100 years, software developers were relatively unprotected and had little opportunity to recoup the costs of their investments. Without this protection much of the software innovations that better our lives would never have been discovered!"
Your reader is not an idiot. Let them read the article and find their own meaning. This article is not hillarius it is lame and obvious. - brenbart, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1Funny article... I thought it was going to go along the lines of "hey don't rent that software, try the totally new concept One-Time Fee software"
Which makes me think of the joke "If the telephone was just invented all the email/IM users would think it was the greatest thing since sliced bread. Imagine, just being able to pick up a 'phone' and talk to someone." - bdpf, on 10/12/2007, -3/+3Scared Old Man...
2056, I'll be in my grave..
My grand kids will be using my computers on their own private net with old free open source programs, running on the old gear, worrying about repair costs and spare parts.
Do you have any old computers you don't want? I want to start stockpiling computers for spare parts.
Do your share, quite filling up land fills. Pull the batteries from the motherboard and mothball them for future use, on your own private net.
So what if there slow. There paid for with non-rental software, with a solid collection of open source programs. Don't forget to maintain your CD's with good back ups.
Use double router and triple server boxes to Grand Mamma M$ from peeping at your private net or the open source police will get you. - saxjazman9, on 10/12/2007, -1/+1ROFL
- JQP123, on 10/12/2007, -1/+1I think that open source and commercial will co-exist. Neither has the ability to eliminate the other. I also think that the "doomsday" scenario presented by this article is unrealistic. Patents have existed for a long time. If they haven't destroyed the market for planes, trains and automobiles, I doubt they will destroy software either.
- ISurfTooMuch, on 10/12/2007, -1/+1I agree. The article would have been made more effective if a little more subtlety had been used.
Still, software patents are a real threat, and anyone who ignores them does so at their peril. - MovingToFreedom, on 10/12/2007, -1/+1Whoa... easy. There are a lot of regular people making their living from patents and copyrights, and even if we're just talking about "elites," your comment is a bit disturbing. I'm sure (I hope!) you don't mean this and are just venting, but it may be helpful to moderate your comments in the interests of reasoned debate :-)
The article presents a ridiculous extrapolation of an out-of-control IP regime, but the current situation is one that we've created as a society, even if it has been overly influenced by some special-interest and privileged groups. We'll work out solutions in a much more peaceful way, I think. Things will end up in a much better place, even if there is some short term pain as we sort out the issues. - RicktheBrick, on 10/12/2007, -1/+1In the future computers will be sold like cell phones are sold today. The hardware will be free when one signs a contract for the service which will include all the software and entertainment. Winzip will be long forgotten since the user will not even be permitted to have storage as all storage will be at the ISP. Downloads will be as fast as if one did have a local hard drive. The computer hardware will have a backup device which will automaticly turn on if the primary device fails. It will notify the ISP and will be replace for free as will all upgrades. Yes there will be a monthly fee but one will never have to even think about the hardware or software as all will be provided by the ISP. As for service the computer will save the user more than the cost. It will ensure that everything in the user's home is running properly and at the lowest cost to the user. It will be able to have an intelligent conversation with the user and will ensure the user's health by notifing 911 when the user needs help.
- soratobou, on 10/11/2007, -0/+0Your just jealous that their more creative than you. Its human nature everywere you no.
- noGoodNamesLeft, on 10/12/2007, -3/+3TonySki: "I totally thought of 1984 when I read this."
1984: "If you want a vision of the future, imagine Lionel Richie, Phil Collins and Nik Kershaw stamping on a human face - forever." - slayerboy, on 10/12/2007, -4/+2and I thought I was nickle-and-dimed every month with my bills back in 2006! whew....them were the good ol days.....NOT!
- trigger0219, on 10/12/2007, -5/+2I don't believe you. M$ hasn't come out with any new office product since then, how could your thesis have changed since then?
- randomboy, on 10/12/2007, -14/+5#1 use pirated software
- TonySki, on 10/12/2007, -16/+2Bury this.
- alagusenthil, on 10/12/2007, -33/+1hai everybady good evening free magazine send me any way happy wises
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