I believe there are a handful of games on steam that are dual licensed, but I don't use steam so I can't verify it.

I tend to see this move similarly to when Corel made a Linux distribution. Steam is being orders of magnitude smarter about it and so probably won't fail the way Corel did, but it's essentially the same from my point of view. When selling a suite of software, there are certain advantages in being able to control the OS. Corel thought they were essentially going to be able to get a free (as in beer) OS and control the platform from top to bottom the way MS does. This would allow them to sell entire office solutions without having to deal with MS. Having their own OS, even if it was free software, would allow them to lock in their customers.

In a similar way, Steam can build a Steam system that works they way they want it to. It gives them the control to fix or modify things that aren't working for them. However, they are being considerably smarter about it. For example, they aren't trying to control everything from top to bottom. Corel just couldn't get out of their proprietary mind-set and decided they had to create their own distro. Steam is building on the work of others and ceding control in areas where they don't care. They are working with others to meet their goals, dramatically cutting their costs in the process. In some ways, they understand the point of open source better.

Now, they are still trying to sell proprietary software on top of that platform. The argument for open source gaming is a lot weaker because it's difficult point to people who have a successful business model. I'm a free software advocate and I think we have a lot of work to do in this area. But I don't think Steam will actually impede progress. If they are successful in creating a kind of proprietary gaming appliance/platform on top of free software, it will make it easier for free software games to get into the market. Right now free software games are just not commercially successful because we haven't developed the business models. (Don't get me wrong. There are very successful free software games. They just don't make millions of dollars).

This is where I differ from RMS slightly. I really believe his original approach to software freedom advocacy was the best: write code. People like Steam are adopting free software platforms because they exist and the business practices are proven. Companies are starting to understand the point that collaboration in areas that aren't their core business gets them where they want to go faster. We need more code and we especially need more proven business models. Morality may be our motivation, but it can not be our method. Steam entering this sphere gives us somewhere to go.

See this is the tricky part. Free software is a movement dedicated towards customers. It grants more freedoms to customers than they otherwise would have. If you buy (or are given for free) software that is Free as in "freedom", you can do more things than you can with software that is not Free. Though somewhat ironic, more developers care about free software than non-developers. Partially this is because the freedoms that you get as a customer are mostly useful if you are a developer. As many developers are also customers, they understand these freedoms more than non-developers.

The open source world is very similar to the free software world. The main difference is that open source advocates noticed early on that not only did software freedom help customers, but it led to many advantages for the original developer. Many open source advocates sold the idea as being "pragmatic" for developers. It doesn't mean that customers don't also get benefits, but the main selling point was "pragmatism" and value for the original developers.

So we have a situation where users customers can benefit from software freedom, and the original developers can benefit from open development using a consortium-like model with low barriers to entry. Unfortunately, there are some losers. These are the businessmen who insist on adhering to business models that are incompatible with free and open source software. There are others who complain that many free software models do not allow them piggy back on the work of the original authors to produce competing, closed products. Hopefully those losers will start to see the benefits and adjust their approaches.

I swear that one of the biggest problems that Gnome Shell runs into is that they don't put the documentation in an obvious place. As far as I know this is it: https://live.gnome.org/GnomeShell/CheatSheet

I agree with you. I didn't like 3.0. I went to KDE for quite a while, but I really like 3.4 now. What seems to have happened is that a lot of necessary functionality was originally implemented as extensions and over time it has migrated into the mainline code. I really like Gnome Shell extensions because they are really simple to implement. The tweakability that most people are missing is there. But again, it's really not obvious how easy it customize your desktop using extensions: https://extensions.gnome.org/

If there was a built in tutorial mode along with an extension installer (maybe you only need a clickable link to the web page), I think Gnome Shell would become much more popular.

Actually, I'm using Gnome Shell on my Ubuntu netbook and I've run into quite a few problems. My main reason for choosing Gnome Shell over Unity is that I can't stand click to focus. I don't particularly hate Unity except that it's completely unusable for me if they don't add focus follows mouse capability. But the problem is that even in Gnome Shell on my Ubuntu box I run into all sorts of focus based problems. The firefox awesome bar (or whatever it's called) doesn't work most of the time (it won't redraw) for example. Windows also just seem to lose focus and I have to click around to get it back. I can't say for sure that it's an Ubuntu problem except that my desktop, which is running Sabayon, has no problems at all.

Over time I've gotten more and more disappointed with Ubuntu. They seem to be targeting it to a particular type of user, which isn't me. I have no problem with that and I even thing it's great for a distro to go after a specific market. The problem is that they seem to break everything that they aren't interested in. I can't just ignore what they are doing and do my own thing. Lately my advice to people thinking of using Ubuntu is to only use it if they like what Ubuntu is doing. If not, choose a different distro because rolling your own solution in Ubuntu is likely to break. Or at least that's my experience these days.

Skype is essentially running SIP under the hood (slight differences, but essentially the same). The supernodes aren't usually involved in signalling because NAT can be traversed using other methods. However, the supernodes will carry voice traffic. I have no idea what the initial poster means by "MiTM attack". Normally when you are talking about man in the middle, you are talking about spoofing one of the ends. I suspect that's not what they meant because why would you want to do that.... I suspect they simply meant that the voice conversation can be recorded, which is true.

But it's pretty tin-foil-hat for me anyway. Just because the pieces seem to fit doesn't mean it's true. You'd have to actually look for evidence.

Yeah. The main issue is that in many countries capital gains are taxed at a much lower rate than salary. And while there are a lot of regulations regarding when an executive can sell options that they hold, I've noticed that there isn't usually a lot of scrutiny about when options are granted. What's astounding to me is that the information is all public, so it's easy for anyone to look at. You'll see options granted after large write offs, or you'll see companies over fill their sales channels (creating a higher than expected profit for a quarter) and then correct it later (creating a lower than expected profit for a quarter) right before they grant options to executives. And nobody calls them on it. It's easy to see if you follow high tech companies regularly (and actually read their reports). Anyway, it makes it relatively easy for companies to pay their executives on the backs of the shareholders while at the same time allowing them to avoid taxes.

I have mentioned this before, but not only is it easy to fall into a cultural ghetto, it's hard to get out. I'm also an expat in Japan. I used to hang out with other expats, but then slowly drifted over to hanging out with Japanese people. The expat community is kind of difficult sometimes because people come and go all the time. As my Japanese got better, I naturally spent more and more time with people who were going to be there for the long haul. Several people were angry with me and accused me of being a "Japan-o-phile" (wtf?) or of being someone I'm not (presumably Japanese...) When I finally got married to a Japanese woman, several of my expat "friends" dropped me for good.

It's sounds bizarre saying it so plainly because when you live through it it's not really obvious what's going on. But communities like this are often quite hostile to the native population and get really upset if you don't agree with their stance. If you "go native", it's like you are betraying your own kind. It's completely insane, but it exists and you have to deal with it. Eventually I just walked out. I don't hang out with a single non-Japanese person on a regular basis any more. Not everybody is able to do that, and so the ghetto grows.

No offense, but your argument boils down to, "I've never seen anything successful and therefore nothing successful can be done". 10 years ago "bounty systems like Kickstarter" were rare and those that were around were not successful. Even free to play games were rare because the idea of selling in-game items had not been tried. Who would think that someone would pay for a digital flower?

New business models require forward thinking people. Money people are not usually forward thinking. They like to copy the success of others. But just to get you thinking, imagine a multi-player game which has updates every 2 weeks. If you don't have the latest copy you can't play with others. An automatic update subscription costs $48 a year billable in increments. Yes you can wait a few days and find someone willing to give it to you for free, but wouldn't you rather pay for a subscription? Single player serialized content has similar potential if it is well made. Other ideas include sponsored development, where official clients and official downloads are paid by advertising. The sale of vanity items in multiplayer games can fund development. You can even write games whose only intent is to create a brand for selling merchandise (ala Hello Kitty in Japan)

There are lots of other possibilities. In my mind, a business model where you pay $30 million up front and "finish" building the game before you sell anything won't work in a free software world. But nobody says you have to do things that way.

Until the latest copyright change, Canada didn't have fair use -- it had fair dealing (similar, but different concepts).

The last copyright act specifically had a section about educational use which described how an educational institute had to do things. However, these educational institutes were restricted to universities. IIRC, other schools like high schools were not included. Looking at the copyright act, I would have bet my last dollar that photocopying in a high school was *not* allowed (not even under fair dealing), but that's why IANAL.

The one thing that confuses me about this whole story is that the copyright act just changed (like 2 weeks ago). Are these rulings based on the new act (it seems unlikely)? If they aren't, I suspect the ruling is moot. In fact, I'm confused why the supreme court even agreed to look at this given the proposed changes to the act.

I suspect this was the crux of the issue. A movie wants to use a song, so they get the rights to use it in their movie. Obviously this is going to be a lump sum payment. However, the rights holders of the recording may have been arguing that they should *also* get a cut of the ticket price (i.e. a percentage of gross revenue) for "performance rights". The movie industry isn't going to go for that. So this was likely a fight between two big media companies. It likely wouldn't have affected movie viewers in any way.

I haven't looked at the original case, so I don't know if that's really what it boils.

Just want to chip in a bit with respect to "it is not a crime". A lot of people think that because it is illegal it is a crime. But there is an important distinction. In a crime, the *state* charges you, takes you to court, etc. Also you can go to jail. Civil infractions like copyright infringement are pursued by the party that was damaged, not the state. Your punishment, should you lose the court case, is financial -- You won't go to jail and you won't have a criminal record. This is also why it is not "stealing" (which is a crime).

The wording is important. Many special interest groups would like to make copyright infringement a crime. That way the state would pay for following it up. There could be jail time involved. People could get a criminal record for it. These special interest groups would like it to be "stealing", which is why they are purposely using that term now. If they can get the general public to accept that copyright infringement is "stealing" and hence a crime, it will be much easier to change the law.

Personally, I don't like the way many copyright laws are written, but I support copyright. I think there are a lot of places where we can improve copyright law, but I believe that making it a crime is not a good idea. As civil law, if I break the law but the copyright holder doesn't suffer any damages as a result, there is little point in suing me. For example, in countries without fair use, I might want to rip a DVD and put it on my file server. It would be illegal, but it doesn't result in any damages, so nobody will sue me. That is a reasonable balance, IMHO. But if it were a crime, I may be charged even if what I'm doing isn't damaging anyone. Even worse, because the state pursues it, the copyright hold has no say in the matter and can't stop proceedings if the state decides to go ahead.

They also have no incentive to begin to understand the scientific method. Reports of amazing discoveries followed up by scandals and retractions leads to more sales than waiting to see if anyone is able to duplicate the results.

Having said that, there are occasional media figures who have a very solid grasp of science. It's unfair to paint everyone with the same brush. But the general state of affairs is somewhat grim and I don't see it getting much better.

Passion is important, but so is effectiveness. It seems obvious that the more time I spend doing something and the more attention I give to it, the more I will progress. However, this is not true. Programming is a task of the mind. If you are not alert, there will be things that slip by you. I'm not talking about bugs, I'm talking about missing the abstractions that make you a better programmer. Not only that, but the mind requires time to sift through the information you're giving it. You actually need time to forget what you are doing in order to reinforce it.

I highly recommend that you limit the time you spend at the keyboard. You will progress faster as a programmer. You need activities that allow your mind to wander. This will consolidate what you are doing. I actually quit my job as a programmer and now only spend about 2-3 hours a day (if that) programming. In the 5 years that I've done that my programming ability has improved at a much faster pace than when I was working 70 hour weeks. Because I have so little time, I'm focused and aware of what I am doing. Because I am not tired, my ability is much higher and I discover things faster. Because I give my brain time, the concepts coalesce faster.

Anyway, give it a try sometime. I think you'll be surprised.

Actually, it's a bit worse than you portray. If the boot loader is locked, you can't load load a new OS. Since they don't give you root access, you either have to hack the machine to install certain applications, or you can't install them. Not only that, but there are applications installed by default that you can't uninstall. One of the apps my carrier installed (an ebook buying service) has permissions set to allow it to turn on my GPS, track my location, self start, forbid me from stopping it and read my phone state, including contacts. I can't remove it without rooting the phone.

I got sick of all this crap. I'm buying a new phone in a few months and I will definitely make sure that it does not have a locked bootloader and it is supported by Cyanogenmod.

Mine is. I don't think it's an unusual situation. It's an ASUS motherboard (can't remember the model). It wasn't actually disabled, just #2 on the boot list, so unless the hard drive failed it would never boot from the CD. USB wasn't on the boot list at all. Easy to change, but I had to do it.