I'm only speaking for myself here, but one of the major reasons that I stick with non-free alternatives is the lack of polish. By that I don't really mean that some icon is one pixel off, but rather that OS software in very many cases seem to exist in some not-quite-finished developer snapshot state. Take Inkscape, for example. It is up to version 0.48. Zero point forty-eight - and that's quite accurate, because I wouldn't give it a 1.0 number.

I think that the above is related to the OS development model - release early, release often. Unfortunately that method is incompatible with the "release late, release it right" model. (Please, if anyone reading this runs on the "release early, release it right model" - how's Snow White doing nowadays? You can ask her next time you see her since you're obviously living in some kind of fairy tale.)

It is also incredibly unsexy work to make something polished. Often it requires major restructuring, something OS is very bad at - while OS works great when there are a multitude of small, easy-to-grasp work units, it is worse at tasks that require a deep understanding of the subject and a major reworking.

Despite my complaints above, what I do think OS is excellent at is providing a basic computer system. To think that one can get a netbook for $200 or so and be able to email, browse the web and write documents is just fantastic. With MIT having open courseware, Open Source has truly lowered the barriers for anyone to educate themselves and participate in culture, science and politics.

Now, what to do with Open Source? Well, I think a lot of it comes down to the stated goals of a project. If the purpose of the project is to experiment - say so and don't give people the expectation of production grade software. If the purpose is to provide a commercial grade application - don't let it become a playground of endless rewrites: polish it and release it. Get the thing to a state where you can put a 1.0 label on it and stand up for it - otherwise you're just playing around.

Is it related to "Tit for tat"?

No, he's alive. He was a minor at the time.

I forgot to add this: "If we love our country, we should also love our countrymen."

I've re-ordered your post, because I kind-of agree with the end of it but not the start.

I've found that the more I can trust a person, the more I get done. If we as a society can't trust each other reasonably well, we won't get anything done due to paranoia. Anyway, we've both set our dials here and I don't think we'll be able to convince the other about the optimal setting.

So now for the interesting part:

Which raises an interesting question: How do you verify this on the phone, with very little time, and in one case (gas leak), where your life may be in danger? For that matter, how do you verify a cop badge?

I understand what both of you are saying, and I'd like to add that the truth is a little bit inbetween (and messy).

Sometimes, authority must be trusted and obeyed immediately. A situation would be a soldier in combat receiving orders - there is no time to sit back and ponder. But that only works because commanders are told to build trust among their subordinates - if the soldier doesn't trust the commander, they won't obey.

People trust, for example, someone dressed as a police officer, because real police officers have built up that level of trust. (Conversely, if the real police hasn't built trust among the public, they are not trusted - see your nearest ghetto for examples.) During trust "building", one should be critical. As you say, blindly trusting someone is to be avoided. But sometimes you may be in a situation where you just have to go with the gut feeling, and if you have learned to trust authority during the "building", well, you just might do something very stupid - or something very good.

What pranksters do is to leech off this trust.

In regards to Milgram - it is relevant, but there is a slight difference in that and what happened here. In Milgram, the subjects were told that they were inflicting pain. Here, the subjects were told that their own survival was at stake, or that they were helping someone.

Seems like one of the Pranknet guys (Markle) was jailed for two years for raping a five-year-old. He "warned the girl that he would kill her parents if she did not comply with him".

You'd be surprised at how much you yourself rely on trusting other people, even if you do speak like a stone cold trust no-one badass. You'd also be surprised at how much society relies on the ability of its people to trust each other. This is what pranksters and scammers rely on.

I'd like a society where we trust and help each other. What these people do is to make us all trust each other a bit less and to look at our fellow man with the attitude that "they're going to screw me over, so I'm going to screw them first, ha!" a bit more.

Pranknet are scum, quite simply.

So, given the result with the public so far, what do you think we have?

No, based on what I've seen here on Slashdot, we've tried the whine cellar.

As long as we keep advancing conspiracy theories as our main argument we'll fail to persuade people.

As an example, I have yet to see an argument against the TPB verdict that actually addresses what they were found guilty of. Just hand-waving about how "Google is legal therefore TPB is legal" (despite this being dealt with in the verdict), how, due to TPB being found guilty, the judge and the whole Swedish legal system is obviously bought off by RIAA/MPAA, and so on.

Have you seen the South Park episode about the hippie infestation? The one, you know, where everything bad is blamed on "the Corporations"? In the average person's eyes, we look like the hippies, and we've got to stop doing that.

And by that I mean I'd just grab my concealed weapon and shoot the defendant right there and then.

As it should. Now, we both know you'd only do this for the right reasons, but this would be the same reasoning that a redneck racist juror would use to vote "not guilty" despite proof of guilt beyond reasonable doubt when a black man has been lynched by a white man - after all, laws banning that would, in their opinion, be unjust.

Sorry, I meant to say that I'd go for "hang him".

No, the defendant decided that himself in this case.

While you may be right in that it is unlikely that a fuck-the-system-and-down-with-the-man hippie would survive the jury selection process, I want to state that as a juror you are to uphold the law. While nullification is real, before doing that you have to ask yourself - is this a case where it is worth to take that route? If you are going to go for a "not guilty" despite knowing that the defendant is guilty as sin according to the letter and intent of the law, then you have to understand that you will not be on the side of the law, and if you're not comfortable with that, well, voting "not guilty" isn't that easy.

Personally I'd have gone for "guilty". I'm sorry, but I support the rule of law, and if the law that we as a society have reasonably decided on says that what he did is illegal, then "guilty" is the only reasonable response. In this case, although I do want less copyright, the law is reasonable in protecting works that are only five or so years old from being copied all over the place. I would also have gone for minimum punishment: 30 times $750 will take 5-10 years to pay back for a student, and is certainly enough of a slap to make him understand that it was a very stupid thing to do. Add in lawyer's fees for the winning side and it is a frightening sum for anyone except the ultra-wealthy.

If that makes me authoritarian, then so be it. I just think that applying the law as written, independently of whether I agree with it, is the fairest thing to do. The Peelian principles sum it up as number 5: "Police seek and preserve public favour not by catering to public opinion, but by constantly demonstrating absolute impartial service to the law."

What is the difference between that answer and what the defendant said previously, namely that he had downloaded and uploaded the works in question?

It seems to me that this is what happened:

• Defendant: Yep, I did pirate 30 works, this is how I did it (shows the court).
• Plaintiff: So you admit liability for all 30 works?
• Defendant: Yes.

So the "yes" is basically only a clarification of the previous statement. Which is a statement that he has made outside of court as well, IIRC.

Sure, but are they right? Maybe the argument was wrong back then and maybe it still is wrong now.

This is the issue being debated: How much copyright is fair and good for society? None, a little, a lot or total?