Summary: In a talk about intellectual monopolies, Joseph Stiglitz explains what those trade provisions really are about
THE following talk, just highlighted by our regular contributor Fewa, is described as follows: “Nobel Prize-winning economist Joseph Stiglitz speaks about his book, “Making Globalization Work.” This event took place on October 13, 2006, at Google’s Mountain View, CA, headquarters as part of the Authors@Google series.”
Other than the media, it is often said that the schooling systems are means for preparing the population to accept the point of view of those in power; it includes the patent system. People will hopefully use alternative sources of information like the Internet to learn how things really work and what their purpose is in practice. █
“Patent monopolies are believed to drive innovation but they actually impede the pace of science and innovation, Stiglitz said. The current “patent thicket,” in which anyone who writes a successful software programme is sued for alleged patent infringement, highlights the current IP system’s failure to encourage innovation, he said.”
This is it folks! We’re almost there for openSUSE 11.2. Time to grab the final 11.2 release candidate and shake out any remaining bugs to get the lizard ready for release. This release includes an updated kernel, Samba, Firefox, and more.
Stephen Shaw (decriptor) and Bryen Yunashko (suseROCKS) have completed their tenure on the Board, and their seats are up for election. There is also a new seat available to be occupied by a non-Novell member.
The KDE 4 experience in openSUSE has been enhanced daily, and while the desktop environment itself has matured significantly since the last release, there has been a constant focus to provide an outstanding delivery of it in openSUSE 11.2.
The highlights include: the openSUSE DVD preselected to KDE 4.3; new Firefox KDE integration; OpenOffice.org KDE 4 integration; consistent KDE artwork; all other standard applications fully ported to KDE 4, including KNetworkManager, Amarok, DigiKam, K3b, Konversation and more.
One blogger calls OpenSUSE 11.2 “the Perfect KDE Distribution.”
OpenSUSE 11.2 comes with a lot of programs that support social networks (i.e. Twitter, Facebook, …etc). Firefox is the king in the area. But if you do not like the default webbased interfaces, you can use other applications like:
* Choqok: New KDE twitter and identi.ca client.
* Kopete: The KDE client now has additional support for Facebook IM protocol.
* Social plasmoids: KDE 4.3 comes with plasmoids for Twitter/identi.ca and openDesktop.
Many major releases of GNU/Linux are coming shortly and this new roundup includes OpenSUSE.
Welcome to the GNU/Linux Educational Server. Here you will find collections of useful courses to help you better use the applications found on the Linux distributions. There are also forums, chatrooms, courses, and help materials at your disposal.
At the front page it states: “This site is generously sponsored by openSUSE-Education project.”
That’s actually a positive contribution from Novell.
SUSE (SLES/SLED)
Here is a somewhat scripted and cocky new video from Ron Hovsepian, Novell’s CEO. We’ve seen more of this type of videos recently — ones where Novell seniors publicly suck up to Intel.
The use of the Teradata software on EC2 is free and good for working with up to one terabyte of data. Teradata runs under Novell Suse Linux Enterprise Server 10.
Samsung, which signed a Microsoft patent deal similar to Novell’s, is still receiving some press for its Microsoft-taxed Linux phones. Some reporters love comparing everything to Apple, which is the wrong thing to do because the target markets are very different.
The 360 service replaces the current Vodafone Live! service and also allows users to back up the entire contents of their phone online, configure the phone’s home screen and manage contacts – in a similar way to Windows Phone’s My Phone service or MobileMe on the iPhone. It will be available across the Vodafone range, and to users on other networks too. Vodafone also confirmed that an iPhone app is in the pipeline.
Jeremy was asked to take part in the Free Software Foundation’s video campaign entitled “I use Free Software, and I support Free Software”, which launches on Monday, and decided to do something targeted at Windows users, and salesman-like :-).
Ellen Ko spent half a day coaching him through “about 20 bloody takes, most of which were disastrous and ended up with me screaming into the camera after screwing it up one way or another.”
Summary: New articles/posts about Vista 7 and some experiences that got captured in video (as Ogg)
THE previous post contained some new links that compare Vista 7 to GNU/Linux or put these two sides in context. It is not worth spending much time speaking about Microsoft’s launch parties and other such bogus celebrations. Here is just one perspective:
Early adopters always take a hit. But the same problems with Windows continue even though 7 was supposed to be the resolution for the mess that Vista was. When you take into account all the forced compliance issues with Vista and now 7 it does make you wonder if Microsoft has a hand in selling hardware like wireless cards, printers and scanners. In the past Microsoft has done many shady things like being sued for monopolies, paying for good press, bench mark fraud, and flooding the internet with so called “reviews” written by employees.
People once relied on PCs for e-mail, for instance, but many now get their messages on smart phones and Web browsers through services such as Hotmail or Gmail. Developers are putting their juice into making iPhone apps rather than PC software, or into so-called cloud applications, which run online instead of in Windows.
Has Microsoft built a faster train while the rest of the industry is making planes and automobiles?
It said it had been “demonised” and repeatedly denied doing things which have been attributed to Vista. It attributed photos of it wearing a T-shirt saying “The Wow™ starts NOW!” to youthful foolishness. Windows 7 also decried the leak of Microsoft’s latest dismal quarterly results on Wikileaks, saying the contents were complete fiction and a breach of private matters between the Microsoft National Party and the financial authorities.
Our reader ‘Goblin’ has found various videos that already show people having problems with Vista 7. Here are 3 examples. █
Summary: Large assortment of Novell news from the past week
IT HAS not been a packed week for Novell, not judging by the news anyway. This week we combine some elements of SUSE with the rest of the bunch. Novell’s business is also mentioned in this new report.
Summary: The Linux Foundation has officially begun embracing Free video; The BBC dumps Real
ABOUT A day ago, the Linux Foundation took its big step forward and uploaded videos from LPC, not before Ogg versions were made available. We linked to the news a few hours ago, but given the value of what the Linux Foundation has done this time around, it’s worth praising in a separate post. Here for example is the talk from Linus Torvalds — a first among many that we shall post daily.
In other important news, last year we shared this video which shows why BBC media is so Windows oriented. Well, the BBC is now getting rid of RealPlayer options, so it is time to pressure for Ogg or Dirac support from the Beeb.
When streaming services are evaluated against these measures, we take into account where different formats might need to be implemented, evolved or deprecated.
Well, now is the time to adopt the freest format of all. It is neither Windows nor Real, that’s for sure. █
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