OSNews contributor Thom Holwerda posted his end of 2004 best of list, filled with lots of OS-related highs and lows for the year. I particularly like his “Best Computer News Site.
OSNews contributor Thom Holwerda posted his end of 2004 best of list, filled with lots of OS-related highs and lows for the year. I particularly like his “Best Computer News Site.
i have to agree with thom’s decision about ubuntu. it is a great linux distribution.
Just for contrast, check out the worst of 2004, that way you know what to avoid:
http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,1759,1735287,00.asp
Never liked Big Macs.The link seems to unite the Big Mac lovers.
MacOsX is a very good OS,but it’s a bit to coincidental to see Safari being chosen as best browser.
MacOsX is a very good OS,but it’s a bit to coincidental to see Safari being chosen as best browser.
I must say i have to agree with that.
I do agree that the Best Surprise is Ubuntu. Like the author, it did restore my faith in Desktop Linux.
Best Desktop OS: FreeBSD 5.*. Ports, easy kernel compilation, optimization via make world. Besides better hardware support, what more could a man want?
Best secondary OS: GNU/Linux. All hype aside this OS is a really good, and great alternative for *BSD. Check it out if you haven’t yet.
OS Surprise of the year: Ubuntu definitely, unfortunately the same cannot be said for it’s userbase (Gentoo anyone).
Best DE of the year: GNOME gets my pick, with XFCE a close second (still waiting for 4.2 final). What can I say GNOME is the DE to beat on *NIX enviroments. KDE, better luck next year.
Best browser of the year: Firefox, this was definitely firefox’s year. We saw wide adoption of firefox on all major platforms.
Best IM Client: GAIM, probably the only viable cross platform IM solution.
Best E-Mail Client: Evolution 2.0, a great step above the original. Sadly it still misses some of the features that other OSS E-Mail clients offer.
“(150 CDs, 200 LPs; All legal and paid for– like one is supposed to)”
I’m insinuating that I don’t like stealing music, that’s all. That’s not news to the regulars around here.
The list should have been called “What I like in OS X and other stuff”.
A backlight keyboard is not such a great thing : my eyes already suffer enough with my monitor. What’s next, a fluorescent mouse ?
I’m insinuating that I don’t like stealing music, that’s all.
Copyright infringement is not the same as “stealing” – legally _or_ morally, no matter how much the media companies and their cheerleaders would like it to be.
“The list should have been called “What I like in OS X and other stuff”.”
Because I mention Panther and Safari? Can’t stand it that I don’t like FireFox like the rest of the tech world?
A backlight keyboard is not such a great thing : my eyes already suffer enough with my monitor. What’s next, a fluorescent mouse ?
I do like it. And that’s why its on the list. And no, I use a trackball.
Copyright infringement is not the same as “stealing” – legally _or_ morally, no matter how much the media companies and their cheerleaders would like it to be.
I disagree. Sooth your mind all you want.
I use Safari instead of Firefox too. It’s more stable (at least on the Mac) and it seems to fit in better with the OS. I too prefer to use Apple apps over other apps, simply because they seem to fit in better with Mac OS X. Having said that, Firefox has as clean of an interface yet it still manages to have tons more features and is infinitely more configurable than Safari. Plus, you can use it on a multitude of platforms. It’s my browser of choice on non-Mac platforms (although I like Konqueror when I’m using KDE, just ’cause it fits in with KDE better than Firefox does).
A Grand Don’t Come For Free is good. It has some really good tunes on it and the lyrics are pretty intelligent and witty but the music is a bit of a let down and it fails in comparison to Original Pirate Material. There’s no way I could ever choose a best album of the year but A Grand Don’t Come For Free certainly isn’t it.
“I’m insinuating that I don’t like stealing music, that’s all.”
Well since ‘The Streets’ is scarcely ‘music’, that’s not an issue.
if BeOS wins secondary OS, how can it not win Hobby OS too?
YAHTZEE!
my picks for album of the year…Franz Ferdinand (Franz Ferdinand) and More Adventurous (Rilo Kiley).
Your list is much more thought out. Not putting firefox on top involves living in a cave; I just think with the market share firefox gained this year, it should get best of the year even if it’s not the best. Know what I mean? It gets a lot of points for doing what no one has before, taking market share from Microsoft.
Not putting firefox on top involves living in a cave; I just think with the market share firefox gained this year, it should get best of the year even if it’s not the best.
This was my *personal* list! How can you decide what should be on top of my *personal* list??
This was my *personal* list! How can you decide what should be on top of my *personal* list??
—
its called criticism. expect some when you post a list with safari and beos
From the article:
In The Netherlands, MSN Messenger has a market share of literally 100%.
Here in the suburbs of Chicago, AIM has a market share of pretty much 100%. Me and one of my friends are probably the only Jabber users within a 30 mile radius. Because I like Jabber better (AIM is annoying; too many bells and whistles and gizmos without the best features of Jabber!) I use a multi-protocol IM client. GAIM is the best I’ve used on any operating system, though it’s not without its faults.
Anyways, I think it would be interesting to see a map indicating which protocol is used in certain areas. What happens when areas overlap? Do they overlap? What’s the dominant protocol in Beijing? It may not have any practical use, but it would sure be interesting.
And my pick for best album of 2004 is Funeral by The Arcade Fire.
Best Desktop OS: Totally agree. Well not totally, I think that Zeta won’t do, only original BeOS.
Ubuntu definitely caught me too. I’ torn between Ubuntu and Gentoo, so I triple-boot at the moment.
Zeta: I’m not even happy with the development they do. Assuming that all the instabilities are my own fault, the Preferences app sucks ass, as does JukeBox, and the themes.
MSN: That’s interesting, because as far as I can see, in Austria ICQ is near 100%. I would also be very interested in an “IM world map”.
I like your keyboard. I think the beacklight is totally unnecessary, but what I like about it is that it’s smaller than a regular keyboard, while the keys have the same size. I have an SK-2690 (that’s the german model of the SK-2500), it’s a no-name thing that cost no more than 10 €, but it’s very comfortable.
Best vaporware: Solaris 10, Open source Java (anything from Sun
, and the ‘user-friendly Linux desktop for home users’.
Most disappointing software of the year after hypes: Firefox. Reason: not complete regarding features, not release / stable / 1.0 quality. LAMP is also very overhyped, but oh well…
Most interesting innovation (not invention): Project Utopia and the various DBFS implementations.
Best IT-related journalism website: Webwereld.nl (Dutch), Advogato.org (English).
ITdiot of the year: Laurens-Jan Brinkhorst (EU government nomination, because of his spam and software patents standpoints; Say A, do B. Say A, say B.).
Most interesting science-related invention: Uses electropulses to stimulate the tongue, after which a blind or otherwise visually impaired person is able to (more or less) overcome visual disadvantages and ‘see’ for 1 (one) day.
Actually, i find AMSN quite the suck. Unbelievably slow and high on resources. I think its because of TCL/TK. Nicotine is also one of these bloated apps which uses Python/GTK2. I use Bitlbee + Irssi for MSN. Very stable and easy on resources. As for e-mail client, i use Mutt, and basically Mutt only however i just had a look on Evolution 2.x and its awesome.
Nicotine barely uses any CPU resources on my XP 1700+, and it feels very snappy. Azureus on the other hand usually consumes 4-5% CPU an the interface has a lag (that’s with Sun’s Java).
And I don’t see why Ubuntu should not be the ‘user-friendly Linux desktop for home users’. The only thing which is not so nice is that existing partitions aren’t included in fstab automatically, and some users are afraid of the console output on boot, but I guess both these issues will be fixed with the next release. I already converted 5 ‘Joe Average home users’, and they’re all happy with it.
I like your keyboard. I think the beacklight is totally unnecessary,
There’s an on/off key for the backlight.
“I already converted 5 ‘Joe Average home users’, and they’re all happy with it”
I just converted…. My parents to Ubuntu! I was about to reinstall Windows on their machine, a PIV 2.8 HT, but somehow it wouldn’t start the Windows install. So I gave them Ubuntu, set it up properly and they’re very much happy with it.
Nicotine barely uses any CPU resources on my XP 1700+, and it feels very snappy.
* How long do you run it? It feels relatively snappy when i first started it up. After 1 day however…
* How much virtual memory does it use at which moments?
* What do you use it for?
I use it together with NFS and after 1 day its barely not useful anymore on about roughly ~35% of what your CPU is able to process at max, for you. Basically i’m not able to use Firefox and Nicotine at 1 time in such situation with 256 MB RAM. I also actually share (legal content with permission from authors). Its because the huge amounts of virtual memory which gets swapped out that its slow, but it also uses a lot of resources of the CPU.
The authors actually acknowledge this. A less resource-hungry, though feature-incomplete program which implements the SLSK protocol is available, called ‘Museek’.
Azureus on the other hand usually consumes 4-5% CPU an the interface has a lag (that’s with Sun’s Java).
Not sure what the issue is, but you haven’t stated which Sun Java version you use. Try it on Windows XP with Sun Java 1.5. It works surprisingly well. I’m not really sure why Java GUI seems slow and when exactly (which TK?) and why it seems Java is faster on Windows than on *NIX.
And I don’t see why Ubuntu should not be the ‘user-friendly Linux desktop for home users’.
Simple: Its my list and i haven’t tried Ubuntu yet. I know several people who, after being happy with software such as Firefox, are trying to get a hold on Ubuntu. So far i haven’t seen negative responses to it; however that doesn’t tell very much.
As for keyboard: QWERTY is a disadvantage.
My room mates run now both FreeBSD and Linux,and i haven’t heard a single complain ever since,besides having a little less spare time. 🙂
Copyright infringement is not the same as “stealing” – legally _or_ morally, no matter how much the media companies and their cheerleaders would like it to be.
I disagree. Sooth your mind all you want.
then you are morally inferior.
comparing stealing, armed robbery and casual murder to non-profit online music sharing does nothing else than blurs the line between direct harming of other people and theoretical harming of sales.
Moral arguments are all personally, and you can’t discuss themselves; you can argue what they’re based on, or their implications. Laws are not personal though; they count for personae.
The law makes specific distinction between copyright infringement (schending van auteursrecht — auteurswet 1912) and stealing (wegnemen met het oogmerk op wederrechtelijke toe-eigening — wetboek van strafrecht). Its not even remotely similar. Its no shame when you don’t understand it, but in reality (possibly beyond one’s understanding) there certainly is a difference.
To put it in simple terms, think about it this way: There’s an author of a work which is copyrighted. If you take the painting with the aim of making it your property, thats obviously something different as going to the painting and making a 1 on 1 copy of it; Stealing a computer with a harddisk with unique data is something different than without permission copying that unique data. To steal something, you take the original copy and leave the owner of that copy with nothing, with the intention of becoming the owener yourself; see how that doesn’t correlate with wegnemen and see how one who infringes another’s copyright doesn’t mean they claim ownership? And ehm, what the hell were you thinking WIPO is for, for example? You think they have anything to say about international laws regarding ‘stealing’? Heck, no.
Click here to learn more about the Dutch law http://www.recht4all.nl/wetten/wetten.htm AFAIK there’s no EU law regarding this since its all arranged on national levels. The USA has a similar set-up as well.
Moral arguments are all personally, and you can’t discuss themselves; you can argue what they’re based on, or their implications. Laws are not personal though; they count for personae.
There is a lot philosophical wrestling around morality, but some moral arguments have their origin in biology and exist in every human society, not just in western one. Humans are social animals and tend to separate things to good (social behaviour) and bad (unsocial behaviour). [Matt Ridley, The Origins of Virtue: Penguin Books, 1998].
Laws are just some generally approved codes for right and wrong but they are not the origin of right and wrong. As government is not the origin of society.
“Morally inferior” -claim was a pre-emptive strike, but one without civilian casualties.
I actually agree with that, but knowing Thom, i know that argument doesn’t make sense to him given he doesn’t appear to question authority very much. That’s why i quoted the law, which distinction he’ll agree with after he studied it…
😉
Nevertheless we aim for the same. Beyond that, i think the argument from me holds water (to me) because i think the distinction of the law makes sense not because its the law which makes the distinction, but because i approve the distinction arguments itself. Hence the law supports your (and actually, our) arguments but as i said, the moral arguments probably don’t count for him.
deep waters, deep waters
but since law agrees with common sense, then system must be working.
I like that tiny keyboard too – I’ve seen it pop up under various rebrandings here in Canada. What I’d *really* like, though, is a WIRELESS version of it. Anyone seen one?
Of course I realize that there’s a disticntion between the two concepts you just posted– contrary to what some say, I’m not stupid.
It’s not that I follow what the record companies or BREIN/BAF says, it’s just that *I* find downloading/copying music illegally is quite similair to stealing. This has nothing to do with laws, record companies, or dpi knowing me (whut?). It’s a personal thing. I find it stealing, and you can quote a million laws, but that won’t change me finding it like stealing.
I always like to compare copying music to not paying your taxes. Both certainly ain’t stealing. BUT, you could say that *not* paying taxes is stealing from the government (whether local or state). Following this logic, copying illegal music, and *not* buying the actual album, is also stealing, however, not from the government, but from the artist and record company.
This of course stands apart from whether CDs are too expensive, since finding something expensive is not a justification for stealing.
“I find it stealing…”
Then you’re an idiot. Stealing and ‘duplicating’ (which is exactly what a P2P application does) are two different things by dictionary definition. Why are you unable to grasp that?
Hehe. Reverse psychologic doesn’t work if the target got the intention
It’s not that I follow what the record companies or BREIN/BAF says, it’s just that *I* find downloading/copying music illegally is quite similair to stealing. This has nothing to do with laws, record companies, or dpi knowing me (whut?). It’s a personal thing. I find it stealing, and you can quote a million laws, but that won’t change me finding it like stealing.
This doesn’t explain your viewpoint though. We already know your viewpoint, but we do not know your reasoning. Some of us have explained our reasoning (you haven’t adressed why mine is ‘wrong’ according to you, you merely repeat something which is obvious already). Now its up to you to explain yours; and you don’t really have to say that this is your ‘opinion’ or ‘belief’ i got it that far. I want toys which you’re playing with behind this wall.
I always like to compare copying music to not paying your taxes. Both certainly ain’t stealing. BUT, you could say that *not* paying taxes is stealing from the government (whether local or state). Following this logic, copying illegal music, and *not* buying the actual album, is also stealing, however, not from the government, but from the artist and record company.
Funny, so does FIOD-ECD. They use exactly that very argument. Your reasoning assumes that the copyright infringer (thats how the person is defined because thats what he or she’s doing wrong according to the law; we have to resort to some kind of definition to make it easy) would have bought the copyright protected product otherwise; this is not always the case for various reasons (too expensive,not good enough quality, not enough diversity on media layer, not free enough), this is not always even possible (not sold anymore, no DRM on OS).
But ehm, let me set this straight for once and for all: this compare is your reasoning?
since finding something expensive is not a justification for stealing.
Thats a moral. Someone who can’t pay for food whereas doesn’t get help from anyone is, according to my morals, justified to steal food and/or money for food in that sense that i’d wish he/she wouldn’t get cought or otherwise be in a unbenificial situation because of what he/she has done. This be my moral standpoint, because food is one of the 3 vital/primary life conditions.
To put it Foxy, some say that comfort is a secondary life condition in the Western world
downloading/copying music illegally
Downloading (or copying data by downloading) of data on regards of copyrighted material is not illegal in the Netherlands, nor in Canada, nor on most likely other countries which i’m not able to specify though. The downloader (or copier of data by downloading) is not commiting copyright infringement; the person who commits the crime is the uploader; he/she commits copyright infringement by not sticking to the $license of the copyrighted work.
Just getting the facts straight here. I’m looking forward to your reponse to paragraph #2.
Hey Thom! I’m with you on BeOS and Ubuntu. I prefer Camino on the Mac tho’. I have three computers in my office: 1 old p2b-d with BeOS R5, 1 K7VME with Ubuntu, and my good old G4 (last model just before the G5s came).
As far as reusing copyrighted works… I work at the company mentioned in the subject… Copyrighted works can be very specific about duplication. Our particular bailiwick are journals, magazines and newspapers but I suppose the same principles apply to other forms of copyrighted materials. Go, read. And don’t blame me for the current appearance of our website… I was not involved in that particular project.
(I find it difficult to navigate).
Mike
Copyright 101
In a typical day, it is likely that you and those around you will use copyright-protected materials that are owned by others. Whether you copy an article from a newspaper for use in a meeting or the classroom, use third-party data found on the Web in a presentation or research paper, or email colleagues content from an industry report, it is important to be aware of what is protected by copyright and what you can lawfully use.
In the United States , copyright law is derived from specific language in the Constitution and exists to foster creativity and spur the distribution of new and original works. The law grants publishers, writers, other types of creators, and other types of copyright holders the exclusive right to reproduce, perform, distribute, translate, and publicly display their original works. Simply stated, unless your situation meets one of the exceptions outlined in the Copyright Act, you must get explicit permission from the copyright holder or its agent before you can lawfully reuse or reproduce a copyright-protected work.
” always like to compare copying music to not paying your taxes. Both certainly ain’t stealing. BUT, you could say that *not* paying taxes is stealing from the government (whether local or state).”
No, you just *couldn’t*. Or rather, you could, but you’d be wrong. Sure, the two have something in common, but they simply are not the same. The act of stealing – theft – is quite clearly and simply defined as the act of taking possession of an object from another party without their consent. This is its legal definition but its also just simply the definition of the word. Making an illegal copy is *not* stealing because it does not involve depriving anyone of their own rightfully held property. If you don’t do that, ipso facto, you cannot possibly be ‘stealing’ anything. By all means, say they are similar, but it is impossible to correctly describe copyright infringement or non-payment of taxes as ‘theft’ (non-payment of taxes is closer, as you are depriving the government of income it can lawfully expect, but you’re *NOT* taking money it already possessed out of its possession).
Thom Holwerda (IP: —.cable.quicknet.nl)
Both certainly ain’t stealing. BUT, you could say that *not* paying taxes is stealing from the government (whether local or state). Following this logic, copying illegal music, and *not* buying the actual album, is also stealing, however, not from the government, but from the artist and record company.
I could be wrong but isn’t it so that something has to be in your pocession before it can be stolen?
dpi (IP: —.ipv4.freeshell.bofx.net)
Downloading (or copying data by downloading) of data on regards of copyrighted material is not illegal in the Netherlands, nor in Canada, nor on most likely other countries which i’m not able to specify though.
If you buy something of which you know it must have been stolen or aquired illegally,it’s just as illegal as stealing it yourself.Everybody knows if he/she has paid or not for something.Ripping a dvd and distribute it ,for free or not,is just as illegal as aquiring such a copy.
No, dpi is right. The law in Canada explicitly does *not* make it illegal to download copyrighted material from the internet. There has been a court case on the matter which gave a quite clear and explicit judgement stating this.
If you buy something of which you know it must have been stolen or aquired illegally,it’s just as illegal as stealing it yourself.Everybody knows if he/she has paid or not for something.Ripping a dvd and distribute it ,for free or not,is just as illegal as aquiring such a copy.
Nope, it works different. As i said, the downloader doesn’t commit a crime by the downloading. It is true that, if a downloader downloads copyrighted material without owning a license, he/she may not legally own that material but that is not about downloading. The law doesn’t say something like ‘downloading is illegal’ or ‘downloading of copyrighted work is illegal’. And btw, i have done this in the past. I have CDs here of old games which are not working well anymore; ie. the CDs are broken. This means i’m legally entitled to own a copy of the game for my own purpose (by e.g. downloading a copy from the Internet), because i own a license.
This means i’m legally entitled to own a copy of the game for my own purpose (by e.g. downloading a copy from the Internet), because i own a license.
Not if the source is illegal! If you downloaded from person X, who uploaded it to a server, he is in offence, and so are you by downloading that material, because the copy you downloaded is illegal.
However, you are right about having the right to own several copies for personal usage. Just as long as you copied them from your own medium, and as long as you don’t upload them. “Unauthorized copying, lending, or public broadcasting of this xxxxx is prohibited.”
Not if the source is illegal! If you downloaded from person X, who uploaded it to a server, he is in offence, and so are you by downloading that material, because the copy you downloaded is illegal.
Wrong. The copy i download is not ‘illegal’. There are 2 seperate crimes which can be commited:
1) Distributing copyrighted material without permission of the author as you state in the last line of your second paragraph. This is the crime the uploader might commit (and is his/her responsibility), however it doesn’t mean the ‘copy is illegal’. We seem to agree on this point.
2) Copying material from a source while not owning being legally entitled to own such copy (e.g. not owning a license to own or run it). The fact the uploader might have not been legally entitled to spread that copy (to someone, or me) doesn’t matter. That doesn’t make the copy somehow ‘illegal’. This is the crime the downloader might commit (and is his/her responsibility).
According to the law, 1 is not responsible for 2; 2 is not responsible for 1.
Thus, if i download a copy of Warcraft 2 from the Internet, which i should because i own a (broken, legal) copy of the game, i’m doing something fully legal.
For more accurate information, consult Christiaan Alberdink-Thijm’s new book on copyright laws. Its very interesting.
Actually, it seems like you somehow think:
1) SomeoneA copies X.
2) SomeoneA spreads X thus making it illegal (putting X into state Y).
3) SomeoneB manages to get a copy of X from SomeoneA.
4) Since X is in state Y, its illegal.
But that’s not how it works! There is no such thing as a ‘state’ in which copyrighted work is in. One could own an illegal copy, copy it to someone else, and that someone else could then be legally entitled to owning that copy!
The cursive part is what you got wrong. The ‘illegal’ aspect is owning a copy you’re not legally entitled to. You got it right that FIOD-ECD are the people who seek after people who do that en masse, but this state may vary from situation to situation, nevermind who had the copy before you had or nevermind from whom you had that copy.
Really, its not some kind of virus or contaminitation…