Should be true of cars and clothes, no?

You clearly misunderstand GPL. It makes no requirement as to charging or not, only source distribution.

I think the Android market share issue is overblown. Most of those devices aren't the quality of product that any American company would sell: they're low end Chinese 2.3 phones. More important, is Dell doesn't have a lot of credibility in the Android space. The fact that Android is popular doesn't mean anything for Dell's bottom line if they can't move the devices. Dell, Samsung, HTC, etc aren't in existence to fight the good fight and help Android rule the world. Their purpose is to profit for their shareholders. I think Dell realizes it's best to be a big fish in a small pond than an underfed fish in an ocean filled with whales like Samsung. And even though the Windows pond is small for mobile, Dell is a big fish in the other Windows pond, and they've had tons of success shipping those devices, for a long freaking time.

Keep in mind that Dell is one of the few "mainstream" PC manufacturers that will sell you a top-line laptop with a Linux distro preinstalled and supported:
http://www.dell.com/us/soho/p/xps-13-linux/pd.aspx

So why stop selling Android devices (most popular mobile OS) and move to a platform that many don't think will go anywhere? Dell isn't known for Android; they're a trusted name in Windows machines. I've never seen a Dell Android phone or tablet in the wild. There's a good reason for that. Personally I think their Windows 8 devices will flop too, but they'll probably sell more of them than they do Android devices.

Maybe not, but I'm thinking poster was referring to the Galactic Republic Senate (or at least I hope so)

http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Galactic_Senate

I own both an S3 and an iPhone 5. I'm having a difficult time finding apps for the S3 that match what the apps I've grown to depend on in iOS. It's easy to quote statistics, but they don't tell me anything. I don't care if there's 700,000 apps if I can't find a good 100% replacement for an app like OmniFocus or Downcast. I've found a crapton of the same types of app on Android: a quick search on Google Play for "flashlight" returned 10,000 results (probably not all 10,000 are the same type of app, but search the first few dozen results so far shows me they are all apps that do the same thing) (To be fair, App Store returned a bunch as well: about 1200, 1/8 of the number as on Android)

I actually own both an iPhone 5 and an S3. I've had 4 iPhones, and purchased the S3 b/c I wanted a test phone for mobile development. My plan: I'll make whatever seems the better phone my primary line.

My opinion: the S3 seems to be a superior phone. However, there are some really top notch apps on iOS, and I'm finding poor substitutes so far on Google Play (both free and paid). (TweetBot, Things, Downcast, and OmniFocus come to mind) Some of the "same" apps available on both are very poor on Android. Some of my favorite games aren't on Android (PopCap titles). Even where I've found identical apps, often there's no "Pro" version on Android that I can (re)purchase to get rid of ads.

Bottom line: the S3 is s superior device, and I love Android's features, but it's all about the apps. I'm really cheering for the S3, but I think it'll be at least a year before the ecosystem catches up. :-(

You obviously haven't worked with some of the developers I've worked with

See you've been modded up to 5 while remaining an Anonymous COWARD. Hey mods, "Insightful" doesn't mean the same as, "I agree with you! Right on!" (which there is no mod status for)

The arrested who can't bond out (either too expensive or no bond available) commonly site in jail for several months - 8 months isn't unheard of. Add to the fact that most attorneys will advise a waiver of speedy trial in order to prepare their client's case. (Who is in better shape in a speedy trial: a single attorney with a single assistance or the DA's office, with dozens of assistant DAs and paralegals?)

Does an illegitimate government have to keep writing checks?

There's several million welfare recipients who consider that government very legitimate. About 2 million inmates are also locked up by the states that rely on federal funds. Start taking away the poor's carrots and start releasing murderers and rapists, and I'm pretty sure that the rights of a computer cracker will be the least of your worries.

While there could be the same internals with new sandboxing, the lack of backwards compatibility for old apps along with new development models suggests to me a LOT of rewrite.

I was told I can could get Linux on a phone a couple of years ago. I assumed that meant it would be impervious to malware, that I'd have to edit text files using a text mode editor, that I'd have to spend hours tweaking the window manager just to get a GUI, and that I'd have to recompile the kernel to enable new features.

You just noticed that? A significant number of submissions (and on some days, a majority) do the exact same thing.

I remember when Slashdot submissions required some original thought, and the quality of your submission might determine if it was picked over others submitting the same link.

Much of the fault falls on Slashdot editors. It should take less than ten seconds to reject a submission based on a copy-and-paste summary. Of course, that'd harm their page views for ads, so gotta keep the stories coming no matter what, right?

That's why a laugh when I see any discussion about the evils of corporate greed. Impartial with regard to Google? Maybe if the big G wasn't a primary source of revenue. This isn't new however. About ten years ago, I made a hobby of grabbing screenshots of Slashdot where they were pimping Microsoft in banner ads - sometimes even on the same page as articles about MS. A couple are here:

http://web.archive.org/web/20020929185648/http://www.mr-bill.net/

Pretty sure this is more a lobby issue, and less a party issue.

I realize that on Slashdot, "GOP is derp, Democrats are magic unicorns" is the way we're supposed to think. However, from an ideological perspective, the GOP is more closely aligned with the ethos that could back copyright reform than the Democratic party: GOP cares about things like defense spending and big oil, and takes a "get off my lawn" attitude. Democratic party is backed by entertainment and software industries pretty heavy.

I'm not saying the Democratic platform is inferior or anything like that. Rather than check my brain at the door and say "Republicans are dumb" to throngs of derpalicious applause, I recognize that each party has very distinct ideologies. The Republican one is more closely aligned with what is necessary for copyright reform. I know it might sicken some Slashdotters to have to admit that they agree with (some parts of) the Republican party on something, but when ideology exists along a continuum (or probably better, thought of as a three dimensional matrix), its inevitable that a 2 party system will result in one or the other having conflicting values for any given person.

I'll be the first to admit, however, that the Republican party would be better served by a split. Right wing over there (Christian activists, opposed to social policy, shoot em up warmongers), those that are pro business and fiscal conservatives over here. I know the Libertarian party already meets the needs of the latter group, but I think party change needs to happen from within, as opposed to be recruited away. Of course, this is probably a pipe dream, as a fractured Republican party would have difficulty winning any elections without major election reform (do away with primaries, popular vote only, etc)

Eliminate all Chinese phones: where does Android stand then.

Here's my point: if iOS were easily pirated, 90% of China's smartphones would be iOS, not Android. China doesn't care about open source, "walled gardens" (think about the irony), or which corporation is evil. After all, what's more popular in China on the desktop: Windows or Linux? Windows is on every PC, only it's pirated. I promise that were it possible, it would be no different with iOS.