Honestly, Microsoft is placing the product for the people like me who won't buy a tablet because I already have a laptop and the iPad keyboard is complete shit for anything I want to do. For typing a complete keyboard (not some crappy slow screen thing) is necessary and I type a lot, and I type fast... I can't stand the interface. Thus, it is a more hybrid device close to what I want that will do a little more than iPad but much much lighter and more portable than said laptop. They made a product for a market that isn't being addressed, and honestly.. I think it was the best place to put it out -- right between androids & iPads, and laptops. If you can give me a full blown laptop with the portability of an iPad I no longer care about iPad.

I would speculate that they are not using any type of sniffing/firewall monitoring to do this due to the volume of the traffic (it would just tank modern implementations..) so they are probably using their DNS servers + some sort of transparent proxy to do it (just so they can piece together URL). Basically, I doubt this will work if you use your own DNS server (which I do at home for this reason... generally not good for providers to see your DNS anyway...) since they would have to use selective monitoring such as this to avoid legal problems. If they never see you hit up the pirate bay then they probably aren't monitoring the rest of the communication at all.

They don't have to. They can leave the GPL code as is, add GPL w/library exemption (since it is their work) to the tack on (remember GPL prevents you from limiting rights not expanding them..), and link their code to the new interface. This is exactly what every single program that links to the standard library (GCC) is currently doing regardless of it's license. Thus, they only have to "GPL" their glue code and connect to the glue -- the glue would be GPL and the proprietary module would only interface that thus no GPL violation -- the interface can be open source since it doesn't cause a problem. If it worked as suggested by you it would be impossible to link anything in Linux without it automatically becoming GPL since technically everything 'links against' the kernel libraries by extension. GPL lets you fork and branch the code all you'd like the GPL specifically states you can modify the software you just have to distribute the code.

At least that's what I learned when the word "Microsoft" is in any of their reports. I would assume that it is that way with everything else too... They're like the Fox News of the tech industry -- it's all about who pays the most.

Nvidia doesn't need Linux or to make drivers for it at all. The top two environments are OSX and Windows and it can ignore Linux completely if it must leaving you with some shitty integrated video adapters. Between negotiating terms or heavily modifying the driver to fit the GPL taint (probably removing functionality) and whatever else it may simply ignore the new functionality since while advantageous it wouldn't effect the position of NVidia at the top of the video heap and most of the cards that would take advantage can't compete with Nvidia anyway. The bug is really in how Linux is licensed not in what NVidia is doing, but there is nothing stopping Nvidia from taking linux sources removing all of the bits it doesn't like and licensing the changes with the library exception and plugging its kernel module into that effectively creating their own branch over which GPL cronies have no say over since this is all GCC has really done by creating the standard library. As long as Nvidia plugs into these 'changed' hooks and not the originals everything still works.

I too have had this problem with contemplating licensing software or documents I create. GPL is great in concept, but why is _IT_ tainting a third party developed software? Nvidia in this case isn't the problem it is the stupid licensing terms of the kernel that are preventing linking to libraries and whatnot required to access the functionality. This concept of GPL tainting other licenses is the problem -- do we have have to bring out the book to write a file to the disk, or everytime we want to create a simple module for personal use go through the license dance? Nvidia drivers are proprietary because nothing would stop their competitors from reverse engineering their hardware via it's interfaces and this 'advantage' is what keeps them in business -- the other factor being that several of the technologies they use themselves are licensed from other companies and they do not have permission to distribute. The weakness here is that Linux is probably not using the GPL the way GCC does (aka you have a library exclusion... you can link your programs with the stdlib and things are fine...) Nvidia won't cower to linux it will just start ignoring it, so how 'bout we put out the olive branch now because having 3D acceleration is pretty nice, and AMD's drivers are always shit? Isn't anyone just happy they even have good drivers from Nvidia on linux period? By this definition no non-GPL software can use these kernel features so wouldn't that make the concept actually non-free... as in.. you no longer have a choice? I understand the problem GPL attempts to address, but it should not be venturing in this realm.

Seriously, I can't even directly compare Radeon to GeForce cards because they're functionally crippled due to the fact that game developers are ignoring them in Windows and the binary driver is completely borked in Linux so no kudos THERE either. Then there is that issue that every single time I buy one of these cards they spontaneously flame-out. Speed isn't everything and they've been stomped in the drivers and support by NVidia for years. Radeon's all fail to render graphics properly even to this day and it is especially noticeable in side-by-side comparisons. They have some nerve charging $500 for what is likely as much a piece of turd as the rest of their offerings.

I think the real dilemma is the psyche of the average consumer. Let's face it how many people need a cloud? It's a luxury that you're getting by subsidizing various evil empires. It's not always what you get, but rather what you endorse. I rather give an ethical company with less service the same money for a reduced service than give a corrupt one anything. Amazon provides these same services for most uses and I don't feel morally complicated by using them. They do not profit by me viewing ads or leaking my information everywhere. Some of the onus is on the user though -- blocking cookies, using tools like Collusion to see what sites are doing, and installing adblocking and hosts files. If they never get the impression they do not profit on you -- so think about that. Google search is certainly king, but you could use Duck Duck Go which is more like a search aggregation which wraps Google and others and filters the badness off of them. (Check their about page... they're really good...)

I agree, but Google originally sold itself as an ethical cyber-citizen. Now it just comes off as a scam.

Sorry... Couldn't resist. :)

There probably was a time when Google was a beneficent geek Mecca but it has morphed into a tyrannical beast. Apple and Google both make my list of disappointing companies whom have decided to use their new found power for evil. Everything Google has been doing has been concerned with undermining privacy or stifling innovation and frankly other than being forced to YouTube (for lack of alternates) I won't have anything to do with their products personally. It's time to let these power hungry money grubbing shitheads die -- they are not what they sold us in the beginning anymore.

Hacks happen. Every system can and will be hacked no matter what you do theoretically given enough time. You have to have the assumption that it will happen so that the "damage" when it does is minimal. Most of the time when this happens I would say that it does because of zero-day exploit crap on system software. So what exactly are these people doing wrong? That's the problem... probably nothing.. they're as dependent on the coders of their MySQL server as you are on the coders of your OS. You can control your code, but you typically have little to no control of the underlying systems. People don't hack your application they hack on the backend stuff...

They do not have to adhere to the information standards that financial companies do... And, it's probably good.. because some of the smaller gaming companies could never afford it.

My handy reference guide for online gaming:

1) Change all your information to complete and utter BS. Store your BS information somewhere so you can parrot it back if you have to call support.
2) Pay with game cards. If you can pick them up at Walmart even better. But, you can buy codes online.
3) Nothing to lose now... So you don't care if they are hacked.

Just my 2 cents.

It's not ethnic cleansing if they're trying to kill you, it's called self-defense! Stop giving these retards a home, and a forum. Shut 'em down. They can believe whatever they want until they start shaking their fists at folks.If we dropped one bomb every time one of these guys started threatening people I'm sure it'd stop really fast. They are doing it because >we are allowing it. You don't want to get taken out? Don't stand with the fist shaker. It's not about religion it's about their constant threats and terror campaigns.