ryran - Slashdot User

Comment Re:Defensive patents (Score 2, Insightful) 191

by ryran on Friday March 20, 2009 @11:20AM (#27269653) Attached to: Red Hat Claims Patent On SOAP Over CGI

Thanks for posting the link! It should've been posted along with the article. .... Although I had never read it before, I already knew what it [much more explicitly] states: Red Hat cares about the community -- they owe everything to the community; they're not trying to extort the community. Having a firm grasp on the history of things, and having worked with Red Hat employees a lot, it's hard for me to understand how people can't see that.

Microsoft, Massachusetts, and IT 233

Posted by ScuttleMonkey on Monday June 19, 2006 @07:42AM from the big-business-and-politics-go-together-so-well dept.

Andy Updegrove writes "A big story in Massachusetts last week was the announcement by Microsoft that it would give $30 million in software to Bay State high schools and universities. Less noticed was the fact that an important economic stimulus bill adopted by the legislature lacked the amendment that sought to gut the power of the State CIO to set any new IT policies that might require compliance with certain standards (like ODF) or favor open source software. Should these two dots be connected, and if so, how? After all, why would Microsoft reward Massachusetts for taking no action to curtail an IT policy that favored ODF and rejected Microsoft's own XML format, especially after Microsoft has by all accounts lobbied so aggressively to bring about a change? As it happens, the fact is that the game isn't over yet: I've learned that the IT policy language hasn't been permanently defeated — its just been shifted out of sight to an 'outside section' of the current budget bill."

Comment ORLY? (Score 1) 400

by ryran on Tuesday May 16, 2006 @08:42AM (#15341835) Attached to: Trojan Deletes Your Porn, Music & Warez

pfft. nowhere near as cool as w32/hoots-a. (http://www.metafilter.com/mefi/51637)

Can Ordinary PC Users Ditch Windows for Linux? 1483

Posted by Zonk on Monday May 15, 2006 @07:40AM from the do-or-do-not-there-is-no-try dept.

Carl Bialik from WSJ writes "Mark Golden, a reporter for Dow Jones Newswires, tried to switch from Windows to Linux, and found it too complex for his liking. He writes: 'For me, though, using the Linux systems didn't make sense. I often send documents and spreadsheets between my home PC and the one at work, which uses Microsoft Office. And the files are sometimes complex. Meanwhile, for both personal and professional computer use, I want access to all multimedia functions. While solutions may exist to almost every problem I encountered, I was willing to invest only a limited amount of time as a system administrator. Claims by some Linux publishers that anybody can easily switch to Linux from Windows seem totally oversold.'"

Google's Love For Small Businesses 318

Posted by Zonk on Sunday May 14, 2006 @01:21PM from the no-one-is-small-on-the-internet dept.

bariswheel writes "The Fearless Frog is at it again: In his latest post, Cringely aims to slap some sense into Microsoft, Apple, and IBM altogether. From the article: 'What counts is that for Microsoft the platform is the PC while for Google the platform is the Internet and nobody can hope to control the Internet -- not Microsoft OR Google. Google is making a ton of money from people [small/medium sized businesses] who never were even in business before. This is not only a fundamental change in how advertising is done; it is a fundamental change in how BUSINESS is done.'"

Google Violates Miro's Copyright? 651

Posted by CmdrTaco on Sunday April 23, 2006 @09:21AM from the you-gotta-be-kidding-me dept.

Anonymous Coward writes "In a homage to Joan Miro on his birthday, Google changed its logo as to spell out the word "Google" in Miro's style. Google has a history of changing its logo in order to commemorate events and holidays of particular significance. In this case, the homage was not well received by the Miro family or the Artists Rights Society which represents them, as reported by the Mercury News. According to Theodore Feder, president of the ARS, "There are underlying copyrights to the works of Miro, and they are putting it up without having the rights". The ARS demanded that Google removed the logo, and Google complied, though not without adding that it did not believe it was in violation of copyright. The ARS has raised similar complaints regarding Google's tribute to Salvador Dali in 2002. "It's a distortion of the original works and in that respect it violates the moral rights of the artist," Feder said." It seems to me that the art world has a glorious history of incorporating prior art into modern creations. It's amusing to me that ARS doesn't understand that.

Antarctic Subglacial Lakes May Not be Isolated 40

Posted by samzenpus on Thursday April 20, 2006 @04:05AM from the stop-touching-my-lake dept.

core plexus writes "Plans to drill deep beneath the frozen wastes of the Antarctic, to investigate subglacial lakes where ancient life is thought to exist, may have to be reviewed following a discovery by a British team. In a Letter to Nature they report that rivers the size of the Thames have been discovered which are moving water hundreds of miles under the ice. The finding challenges the widely held assumption that the lakes evolved in isolated conditions for several millions years and thus may support microbial life that has evolved 'independently'. It has been suggested that if microbes exist in the lakes, they could function in the same way as those in the subsurface ocean of Jupiter's moon Europa or within subsurface water pockets on Mars."

Britannica Attacks - Nature Returns Fire 217

Posted by Hemos on Monday April 03, 2006 @06:52AM from the of-course-one-island-loses-to-nature dept.

An anonymous reader writes "Just in case you missed it, Nature has replied to Britannica's criticism of the Nature Britannica-Wikipedia comparison. I think it is fair to say Nature is not sympathetic to Britannica's complaints." The original piece regarding the accuracy comparison, along with the response from Britannica.

Microsoft Joins OpenDocument Alliance 256

Posted by Zonk on Tuesday March 28, 2006 @12:26PM from the hey-no-one-invited-me dept.

Jim writes "Microsoft has joined a committee that has a key role in the ratification of OpenDocument as an international standard, leading to accusations that it intends to sabotage the process. Microsoft has denied this accusation, claiming that the only reason why Microsoft employee Jim Thatcher has joined the group was to get involved in the ISO standardisation of its own file format." From the article: "'There sits Microsoft, waiting, like a spider,' wrote Jones, in a posting on her site. 'I am imagining ODF plodding along, with Microsoft asking questions, fine-combing through the comments, did you mean this or that?, getting bogged down in minutia until, lo and behold, either Microsoft's XML makes it as an ISO standard first, or they arrive neck and neck.'" More information here on a subject we touched on in a recent Slashback. update a few readers have asked for the clarification that MSFT has not joined ODF, but rather the "INCITS/V1 Technical Committee"

Changes in HDD Sector Usage After 30 Years 360

Posted by CowboyNeal on Friday March 24, 2006 @02:07AM from the new-and-improved dept.

freitasm writes "A story on Geekzone tells us that IDEMA (Disk Drive, Equipment, and Materials Association) is planning to implement a new standard for HDD sector usage, replacing the old 512-byte sector with a new 4096-byte sector. The association says it will be more efficient. According to the article Windows Vista will ship with this support already."

How Palm's Treo Got Boost From BlackBerry Lawsuit 135

Posted by samzenpus on Thursday March 23, 2006 @11:46AM from the one-man's-misery-is-another's-pleasure dept.

Carl Bialik from WSJ writes "Palm ramped up its marketing campaign for its Treo smartphone while rival Research in Motion was embroiled in a patent fight, the Wall Street Journal reports. 'The result: at least 1,500 new inquiries about the Treo in the past few months from corporate customers, resulting in 600 free trials, Palm says. In total, Palm says it has more than doubled its number of sales leads since October. "The doors have been opening," says Ed Colligan, Palm's chief executive. At a November staff meeting, Mr. Colligan says he told his staff to "step things up. We have to go back and knock on doors and respond as fast as we can." ... Internally, Palm executives say they believe that the Treo will outsell BlackBerrys by the end of this year.'"

Mozilla Firefox 2.0 Alpha Peeking Out (Or Not) 216

Posted by Hemos on Monday March 20, 2006 @08:05AM from the take-a-walk-on-the-wild-side dept.

anadgouda writes "Mozilla Firefox 2.0 alpha is released. The links for download were not available directly on Mozilla.com website. Being Alpha, all features might not work and most of the plugins might not be compatible." Reading thru the comments, it appears there's some disparity as to whether or not this is actually just a naming scheme that they use; but let me reiterate that there has been no official announcement from Mozilla, so take with a giant grain of salt. Some good screenshots at OSdir.

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