02.21.14

Good Advocacy by the Linux Foundation Stresses the Jobs Effect, But Should Mention GNU Also

Posted in BSD, GNU/Linux, Kernel at 6:50 am by Dr. Roy Schestowitz

Summary: Skills involving BSD, GNU, and other toolsets deserve coverage (at least by name) in the context of Free/Open Source software

THERE was recently a lot of coverage about jobs in Free/Open Source software (FOSS) and days or weeks later the Linux Foundation weighed in with its press release [1] about a study it had funded to frame this as a “Linux” boom. The Linux Foundation is run and managed by branding experts like Zemlin (they don't always do branding right) and marketing people, so this should not be shocking. The only problem is, they rewrite history to make it look as though only Linux counts (the big lie which gives the Linux Foundation power at the expense of camps like GNU/FSF). I am not an opponent of the Linux Foundation; I am a big fan of Linux, but I also care about accuracy and truth in reporting — something which the marketing community is unable, by definition, to care about.

Looking at the sort of headlines generated by the Linux Foundation’s latest marketing drive (e.g. 2-8]), it’s all about “Linux” but not about the rest of the stack (FOSS). The Linux Foundation is not the only entity which does this by the way. But what they call “Linux skills” often means command-line skills and basically familiarity with GNU utilities, not Linux (the kernel does not have many utilities of interest). Some tools, like OpenSSH, are from BSD. If we mislead the public by collectively referring to all those small programs as “Linux”, then we not only do a disservice to other projects but we also reinforce the philosophy of Linux, which does not stress or insist so much on freedom.

To give example of better actions from the Linux Foundation (as of late), it shared a story about a Pennsylvania high school adopting GNU/Linux and it generated some good headlines [9]. Its marketing staff issued a somewhat provocative, stereotypes-reinforcing (connoting Linux with scarce social/love life) Valentine’s post [10], not to mention today’s Facebook promotion [11] (people have openly complained about the Linux Foundation’s support for surveillance like Facebook for years). On the other hand, the Linux Foundation sets up new conferences that are named only after the kernel [12] (even when the conferences cover things beyond it [13]), which is another matter worth mentioning.

Ultimately, it would be fair to stress, not only the Linux Foundation calls/labels “Linux” a much broader system, exploiting a common misunderstanding/misconception. The Linux Professional Institute (LPI) too is doing that [14]. It often teaches GNU, but students are led to believe that it’s all “Linux”. We can do better than that. █

Related/contextual items from the news:

1. 2014 Linux Jobs Report: Demand for Linux Expertise Drives Hiring Priorities

2. Hiring managers desperately hunt for Linux talent: Report

   With hiring managers beefing up their plans to bring aboard talent with Linux skills over the next six months, a bright future awaits those professionals who know Linux.

   Tech recruitment firm Dice and The Linux Foundation have released the 2014 edition of the Linux Jobs Report. The two found that the growing demand for Linux talent is “driving salaries for Linux above industry norms.”

3. gNewSense Reviewed, Thanking Packagers, and Linux Jobs

4. Linux skills helping professional move forward – 2014 Linux Jobs Report

5. Keep Learning Linux—It’s The Future

6. Linux professionals are in high demand in technology job market

   Today in Open Source: Download the free 2014 Linux Jobs Report.

7. Demand for Linux Professionals is Growing

8. Demand for Linux skills rises

9. Pennsylvania high school adopts Linux, rolls out laptops to students

   Penn Manor High School in Lancaster, Pennsylvania will embrace the open source Linux platform, installing it on more than 1,700 laptops. Every student at Penn Manor HS received an Acer TravelMate laptop powered by the Ubuntu 13.10 OS – and the student body was encouraged to explore the OS and push its limits.

10. What Does Your Linux Candy Heart Say?

    How does the penguin community celebrate February 14 every year? Is it with a box of chocolates? Maybe if it’s sitting next to our keyboards alongside multiple coffee mugs. What about little Necco Sweethearts? Those “luv you” messages seem a little too general to fully express the amorous thoughts of those with Linux already seeded deep in their hearts.

11. Leaked: Linux’s Look Back Facebook Video

    After trying to conceal its Facebook posts from the world for nearly a decade, Linux’s Look Back Facebook video leaked today.

12. Linux Foundation Announces Schedule for Annual Collaboration Summit

13. Dive into the world of Linux and free software at SCALE 12x this weekend in Los Angeles

14. Linux certifications closer to Kosovo

    The Linux Professional Institute (LPI), the world’s premier Linux certification organisation, announced that Master Affiliate for the Western Balkans Region LPI-Greece recently appointed CACTTUS as LPI Sub-Affiliate for Kosovo, a company which has a strong experience in the market of Kosovo in technology and trainings.

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Latest Examples of Public Sector Moves to Free Software

Posted in Europe at 5:51 am by Dr. Roy Schestowitz

Summary: European software policy as detailed by recent news

UK

• Linux users still obstructed from Parliamentary debates

  Parliament is still treating Linux users as though they aren’t citizens. It’s website, for them, is like the door of an exclusive Soho gentleman’s club.

  If you aint got Microsoft, you aint getting in – though we might give you a second chance if you go home and change that boho suit.

  Video broadcasts of Parliamentary proceedings are designed to be watched by people with Microsoft software.

• There’s no better time for governments to go open source

  The UK government has revealed that it is considering ditching Microsoft software for open source alternatives. Cabinet minister Frances Maude has said he wants to see a range of software being adopted by the thousands of civil servants that work across departments and believes that this could save millions. Indeed, since Maude spoke out on the matter, it has been suggested that the government has spent more than £200 million on Microsoft products since 2010 alone.

• That’s Not Lock-in. THIS is Lock-in

  That pales into insignificance with what is going on in the government of the UK. Although they have been making some good noises lately, they are in a deep hole.

• Lottie Dexter should quit – and take the Year of Code board with her

  Tom Morris did some digging and found that only three members of the 23-member board appear to actually be programmers or have a technical background. So a campaign to drive home the importance of programming skills is predominantly made up of people who lack those very same skills.

  [...]

  A more obvious example of what George Monbiot calls the captive state would be hard to find. This is just a cabal of private businesses looking for a government subsidy to ensure their future profits. Corporate welfare, in other words.

Europe

• ETSI: ‘Open source clouds worth considering’

  Open source software is creating ‘tried-and-tested’ solutions addressing interoperability, portability and security, writes ETSI, the European Telecommunications Standards Institute, in its December 2013 report on standards for cloud computing. Future specifications and standards may derive from open source projects, the standardisation organisation suggests.

France

• French local politicians support free software

  Already 58 candidates for the municipal elections in France have signed April’s Free Software Pact, stating that they will support the use of free and open source software. Free software advocacy group April began its support campaign in early January. “Many candidates are keen to announce their support and to detail their plans for freedom in the digital age”, the group comments.

• Free software campaign for European elections

  France’s free software advocacy group April has launched a campaign to get candidates for the European elections of 22 – 25 May 2014 to state their support for these type of software solutions. The Free Software Pact campaign is Europe-wide and the group is inviting free and open source enthusiasts to help contact as many candidates as possible.

Belgium

• Open source for Flanders’ Open Data Platform

  The government of the Flanders region in Belgium is using open source for its new open data forum, opened this week Tuesday. The site host is running Linux, web server Apache and content management system Joomla for the open data knowledge exchange website.

• Walloon e-government should prefer open source

  For their e-government services and their websites, public administrations in Belgium’s Walloon region should prefer to use standards and open source software solutions, recommends André Blavier, an ICT expert working for the Agence Wallonie de Télécommunications (AWT), a government agency. Yet an even bigger priority for the Walloon government is making its data publicly available. “Open data will help development digital public services, and create a more transparent government.”

Holland

• Dutch towns Typo3 association model for others

  TYPO3gem, the user group of Dutch municipalities using the TYPO3 content management system, is becoming a model for other groups of public administrations using open source solutions, according to a study published by the Open Source Observatory and Repository last week. Examples include the group of towns using Drupal, an alternative content management system, and a number of municipalities using zaaksysteem.nl, a case management solution.

Germany

• Berlin: IT centralisation thwarts open source

  Berlin will not switch to open source operating systems for its workstations, the German Linux Magazine reports. The administration of the German city state again dismissed a request by the opposition party Bündnis 90/Greens to replace outdated proprietary desktop systems by open source. Such a switch clashes with the city’s efforts to centralise the IT infrastructure.

Switzerland

• Canton of Bern parliament votes for open source

  Unanimous bar one abstention, the parliament of the Swiss Canton of Bern yesterday voted in favour of a bill to exploit ‘synergies in its software use”. The law instructs the canton’s public administrations to increase their use of open source, make their own software publicly available and, when starting new IT projects, give priority to this type of solutions. The measure is expected to result in financial savings.

Denmark

• Danish towns share IT PM tool as open source

  A group of five Danish municipalities are making available as open source KITOS, their IT project management solution, announces OS2, the Danish online community for public administrations and open source. The solutions will be web-based, letting municipalities manage their IT projects, systems and contracts.

South America

• Argentina,Venezuela Strengthen Ties on Free Software

  Caracas, Feb 7 (Prensa Latina) Experts from Venezuela and Argentina shared experiences on software developed on the basis of free software, as part of the efforts to spread awareness among the population, specialized sources confirmed today.
  According to the Nacional Center for Information of Technology (CNTI), development teams operating systems Huayra (Argentina) and Canaima GNU / Linux (Venezuela) met by videoconference to strengthen the work in this area.

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In Another Attempt to Derail British ODF Policy Microsoft Calls Its Systematic Bribery “Internationally Recognised”

Posted in Europe, Fraud, Microsoft, Open XML, OpenDocument at 5:37 am by Dr. Roy Schestowitz

Microsoft wants us to embrace the criminal’s standard, not a real standard

Summary: Microsoft strikes back against the British government for ‘daring’ to consider something other than proprietary software with proprietary formats

CRIMINAL organisation Microsoft, which is renowened for its illegal activities and collusion with other criminal entities, is calling its syndicates in the UK to go retaliate against British politicians who favour Free/libre software, fair competition, British companies, and real standards. This was predicable because it happened before (e.g. watering down of policies). It’s Microsoft’s way of “doing business”. Corruption is the de facto standard when it comes to Microsoft deals with the British government (various departments). We included evidence in over 100 posts over the years.

Microsoft’s latest retribution attempts are centred around the requirement of a standard. Microsoft wants us to believe that its crime-riddled proprietary formats, collectively referred to as OOXML, are in any way ‘standard’. They’re not. Not even in the UK. They’re corruption. Recall that even Britain’s BSI faced lawsuits over this corruption, as we covered in old posts such as:

• BSI Gets Sued After Microsoft’s OOXML Corruptions Worldwide
• OOXML Fiasco: More Legal Action Against the BSI Possible
• ISO’s and BSI’s Trouble Has Just Gotten Greater
• British Standards Institute (BSI) Under Fire After Possible ‘Inside Job’
• OOXML Roundup; BSI’s Sellout Did Not Go Unnoticed
• The BSI Has Been Corrupted by Microsoft — Another Chink in ISO’s armor
• Renewed Push in the United Kingdom for Truth About OOXML+BSI
• The BSI Has Been Corrupted by Microsoft — Another Chink in ISO’s armor
• BSI: Got Microsoft

Having been found to be bribing governments (probably as big as China's, not just banana republics), Microsoft should watch carefully its next move in the UK. If it attempts to bribe officials again (even ‘soft’ bribery), then it will receive a lot of blowback but no jail time, as it’s exempted from punishment for such crimes and Ballmer ran away on time.

Microsoft says that choosing ODF “sets a worrying precedent because government is, in effect, refusing to support another internationally recognised open standard,” referring to OOXML in the latter part. Well, everyone who watched this carefully knows the huge levels of corruption involved there, including bribed officials, rigged voted, etc. Nobody really considers OOXML “internationally recognised”; except Microsoft boosters and fake ‘journalists’ perhaps. Those know are informed recognise it as an internationally-recognised case of systematic crime by Microsoft. Here is a summary of just some of these crimes (counted up to an early point in time).

The British press says “Microsoft hits back at government’s open source plans,” noting that “Microsoft has urged its partners to pay closer attention to what it describes as the government’s “ill-considered” proposals to move to a more open IT model.”

Here again we see Microsoft acting by proxy. We saw that before. Whenever some Free software house (small business) in the UK receives some business from the government Microsoft sends out its proxies/partners as though they are some kind of “task forcex” (Microsoft terminology), commissioned to destroy any traces of non-Microsoft in the public sector. It’s an act of cleansing and it’s very well designed and occrdinated by the Redmond-based convicted monopolist.

“Last month,” the article gives context, “the government hinted it was considering moving away from technology such as Microsoft Office in favour of open-source offerings in an effort to break supplier “oligopoly”.”

Yes, indeed, and what’s wrong with that?

“According to Microsoft,” says the article, “the government is currently undergoing a consultation on plans to mandate the use of Open Document Formats (ODF) and to ditch Microsoft-developed Open XML (OOXML).”

Yes, indeed, because that’s the ethical and technical thing to do. We are going to take part in this consultation and we are going to urge our readers (especially British readers) to do the same. Microsoft is certainly going to use its proxies to bombard those in the consultation (sometimes it infiltrates those who assess the process, too, in addition to sending template letters to ‘DDOS’ the process, occasionally with sockpuppets) and the words from Microsoft are especially appalling because OOXML is a story of bribery and corruption, OOXML is not really a standard. Marketing, deception, revisionism, personal attacks etc. are going to be used by Microsoft to try to make it look like ODF is all about IBM and OOXML is ‘the’ standard. In reality, it’s not an international standard but an international case of crime (that tte European Commission was assigned to handle). Hundreds of examples can be given to show this, including bribery, entryism, retribution, bullying, etc. If OOXML was a real “open” standard, then how come when I leaked it (as if one needs to ‘leak’ standards) Microsoft and its cronies threatened litigation against me? So much for “open”… they were hiding the technical flaws and the fact that it’s just a scam (cannot be implemented by anyone but Microsoft, which also did not implement it, ever).

A Cabinet Office representative stated in response to Microsoft’s comments: “As part of our long-term economic plan, we’re committed to opening up government procurement to a wider range of suppliers. We want to see a greater range of software used and for departments to choose what is right for them and the users of their services.”

Simon Phipps, who back in the days of these Microsoft crime worked at Sun, calls for people to participate in the consultation. Any Updegrove, who was at the forefront back then as well, says “[t]he deadline is next Wednesday – make sure you’re heard!” We will be writing a letter and we urge others to do the same, possibly over the weekend. Talking about Microsoft’s crime and the rogue process should not be a taboo; justice has a lot to do with it. If the UK moves to ODF and embraces Free software, then other nations will use that as an example and follow suit. █

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‘Cloud’ Watch: ownCloud, CloudStack, OpenStack, Hadoop and More

Posted in News Roundup at 4:54 am by Dr. Roy Schestowitz

Summary: ‘Cloud’, ‘stack’, and all that hype over servers which mostly run Free software and GNU/Linux

Oprating Systems

• As the desktop moves to the cloud, Microsoft is running behind again

  And what’s funny is that Microsoft, the company that lays claim to the desktop in business with the Office/Windows franchise is getting left behind by the likes of Google and Amazon.

• January 2014 Web Server Survey

• 10 Reasons Why Ruby Hosting is Best on OpenShift

  The idea of PaaS came from the Ruby land and nowadays the market there is quite saturated. OpenShift came from a polyglot by design and Ruby is very well supported. Let’s take a look why OpenShift is a great option for a Ruby developer.

• Red Hat Advances OpenShift Enterprise Platform-as-a-Service

  Red Hat is officially releasing the next generation of its on-premises OpenShift platform-as-a-service (PaaS) cloud solution. OpenShift Enterprise 2.0 brings new data center and networking features that expand on the initial promise of the first release of the OpenShift Enterprise platform in 2012.

• Dell and Red Hat Could Co-Engineer Success in the Cloud

  As 2014 gets underway, one of the biggest stories in all of open source has to be the transformation going on at Red Hat as it moves from being squarely Linux-focused to becoming a big player in the cloud computing space. As The Register notes, the company has “scraped up its Linux, virtualization, OpenStack and cloud management businesses into a new infrastructure-as-a-service (IaaS) unit.”

ownCloud

• Getting to Know ownCloud

  As the new year begins, many people are focused on cloud computing, and that includes people who are focused on building out their own individual cloud environments. As we covered here, you can go beyond what services such as Dropbox and Box offer by leveraging ownCloud, an open source platform that lets you set up your own cloud computing instance, which means you don’t have to have your files sitting on servers that you don’t choose, governed by people you don’t know.

• ownCloud 6 Community Edition Officially Released with Innovative Features

  ownCloud, Inc. is proud to announce today, December 11, that the Community Edition of its highly anticipated ownCloud 6 open source DIY (Do It Yourself) cloud server software is now available for download/upgrade with an improved design.

• ownCloud 6 Community Edition Officially Released with Innovative Features

  ownCloud, Inc. is proud to announce today, December 11, that the Community Edition of its highly anticipated ownCloud 6 open source DIY (Do It Yourself) cloud server software is now available for download/upgrade with an improved design.

• I have been fooling around

  My conclusion is clearly ‘enthusiasm’. I will certainly be using ownCloud as my private cloud server from now on and I can see some very cool ideas coming in the future. I’m exited about WebODF working with ODF documents using JavaScript and I can see many useful things to use it for. I can clearly see ownCloud useful for small business and e.g., schools and NGOs.

• Open Source ownCloud Project Puts IT in File Synchronization Control

  One of the most obvious reasons that services such as Dropbox or Box are so popular with end users is that most internal IT organizations simply haven’t had a way to offer that capability. End users were acquiring mobile computing devices by the millions and they simply needed a way to share files.

CloudStack

• ShapeBlue Offering Commercial Support for Apache CloudStack

  It’s been nearly two years since Citrix contributed its CloudStack open source cloud computing platform to the Apache Software Foundation, a move that gave the platform a leg up in the competitive open source cloud computing race. And, CloudStack continues to gain rapid adoption with large scale deployments around the world. In October, Apache announced the arrival of version 4.2 online, as we covered here.

• Announcing Apache CloudStack 4.2.1

OpenStack

• Red Hat, With Dell, Could Provide Much Needed OpenStack Direction

• Dell pushes enterprise with OpenStack deal

  Dell’s Director of Cloud and Big Data solutions answers questions “why OpenStack?” and “Why partner with Red Hat to offer OpenStack solutions?”

• OpenStack’s New Icehouse Version is Coming in April

• How OpenStack parallels the adoption of Linux

  In spite of its considerable momentum, there are still skeptics about whether OpenStack will ultimately succeed. My colleague tackled some of that skepticism in a blog post last year and I’m not going to rehash those arguments here. Rather, I’m going to make some observations about how OpenStack is paralleling, and will likely continue to parallel, the adoption of another open source project that I think we can all agree has become popular and successful—namely Linux. [1]

• Short Stack: How OpenStack should engage AWS, OpenStack grows up

• OpenStack Retools to Engage More Cloud User Feedback, Interoperability

  How do you get more users to contribute ideas to an open-source cloud effort? The OpenStack Foundation has a plan.

• Analyzing how contributions to OpenStack can be made easier

• What do you know about OpenStack?

  OpenStack is a set of software tools for building and managing cloud computing platforms for public and private clouds. Backed by some of the biggest companies in software development and hosting, as well as thousands of individual community members, many think that OpenStack is the future of cloud computing. OpenStack is managed by the OpenStack Foundation, a non-profit which oversees both development and community-building around the project.

• IBM Delivers Jumpgate, an API Bridge Between OpenStack and Public Clouds

  IBM has jumped through a number of hoops with its cloud computing strategy in the past couple of years. The company–which had been firmly in the OpenStack camp–eventually decided to spend billions to buy SoftLayer for its cloud computing infrastructure tools and services. Since then, it has committed billions more to its SoftLayer investment, and many have seen IBM as having completely dropped its original commitment to OpenStack.

• Short Stack: Data as a Service takes off, top OpenStack vendors jockey for position

• Open Stack Adoption Fun Facts & Surprises

Hadoop

• Enterprises Ask More from Hadoop, Need More Skilled Practitioners

  At enterprises around the world, as the Big Data trend spreads out, you can hardly talk technology anymore without the conversation focusing on Hadoop, the star open source framework for drawing insights from large data sets. We’ve also reported that the job market is very healthy for people with Hadoop and Big Data skills.

• Cray brings Hadoop to supercomputing

  Cray has released a package designed to allow XC30 users to easily deploy Hadoop

• Why elephants never forget big data

  Hortonworks is down at the watering hole, blowing its trumpet and enjoying a period of positive development.

  Just in case you missed the elephantine reference, Hortonworks (named after the elephant in Horton Hears A Who!) is a commercial vendor of Apache Hadoop, the open source platform for distributed processing of big data sets across clusters of computers.

• The Questions for Hadoop Moving Forward

  In the beginning – October, 2003 to be precise – there was the Google File System. And it was good. MapReduce, which followed in December 2004, was even better. Together, they served as a framework for Doug Cutting’s original work at Yahoo, work that resulted in the project now known as Hadoop in 2005.

  After being pressed into service by Yahoo and other large web properties, Hadoop’s inevitable standalone commercialization arrived in the form of Cloudera in 2009. Founded by Amr Awadallah (Yahoo), Christophe Bisciglia (Google), Jeff Hammerbacher (Facebook) and Mike Olson (Oracle/Sleepycat) – Cutting was to join later – Cloudera oddly had the Hadoop market more or less to itself for a few years.

Misc.

• Elasticsearch Couples Analytics to Big Data Search

• HP vs AWS : An open source battle for two worlds

• OpenSaaS and the future of government IT innovation

• 2014 Technology Predictions Series: Think Big Analytics on Big Data

• Are Cloud Operating Systems the Next Big Thing?

  You may have heard the new buzz word “Cloud Operating System” a few times in the last few months.

• Time for Netflix to Embrace Open Source Cloud Partners?

• A timely call for a secure yet open cloud

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02.20.14

Security News: Education, DDoS, Linksys, SpamAssassin Release…

Posted in News Roundup at 12:39 pm by Dr. Roy Schestowitz

Summary: Some security-related news of interest

• Security technology to help students in future careers

  The same applies to TrueCrypt and GPG — the more people who use these tools “the safer we all are,” Judd said. The NSA, for example, may notice an encrypted email and try to decrypt it, but there’s a possibility it may just include lunch plans, he said.

• Dear Asus router user: You’ve been pwned, thanks to easily exploited flaw

  An Ars reader by the name of Jerry got a nasty surprise as he was browsing the contents of his external hard drive over the weekend—a mysterious text file warning him that he had been hacked thanks to a critical vulnerability in the Asus router he used to access the drive from various locations on his local network.

  [...]

  Taken together, the attacks are a sign that routers and other Internet-connected devices are being subject to the same in-the-wild attacks that have plagued PCs—and in some cases Macs—for years. Readers are advised to lock down their routers by installing any available firmware updates, changing any default passwords, and ensuring that remote administration, Cloud, and FTP options are set to off if they’re not needed.

• Massive DDoS Attack Leveraged Network Timing Protocol: CloudFlare

• Yubico Extends Two-Factor Authentication to CERN

• Bizarre attack infects Linksys routers with self-replicating malware

• Subject: ANNOUNCE: Apache SpamAssassin 3.4.0 available

• Top spam-killer server program SpamAssasin gets new release

  If you really hate spam, and you run your own e-mail servers, you’ll be glad to know that Apache has released a new version of its award-winning, open-source anti-spam program SpamAssassin.

• Effective Spam and Malware Countermeasures – Network Noise Reduction Using Free Tools

• GoDaddy owns up to role in epic Twitter account hijacking

  GoDaddy has acknowledged that one of its employees fell victim to a social engineering attack allowing a hacker to take over a customer’s domain names and eventually extort a coveted Twitter user name from him. PayPal, which the victim claimed also played a role in the attack, denied the accusations.

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Anti-’Terror’ Squads for the War on Sharing

Posted in Intellectual Monopoly at 11:58 am by Dr. Roy Schestowitz

Summary: The state-sanctioned forces are being (mis)used to crack down on those who are challenging the real criminals, even when it comes to copyright

ON NUMEROUS occasions before we covered the war on digital sharing, which has basically justified surveillance, back doors, classification of particular software as “illegal” and certain digital data as “theft” or whatever. What we have here is a war waged by corporations and governments (those in power) on the increasingly connected and digitalised population. It’s neo-feudalism, or put more simply: digital oppression.

One story that we covered before was the violent raid on Kim Dotcom’s house. As expected, and as we saw in Britain just now (regarding David Miranda), those in power give a stamp of approval to violent/fearsome overreach (zealous actions) that misuse the label “terrorism” to basically harass, imprison, strip, rob, discredit and terrify or not terrorise law-abiding citizens whom those in power don’t like. In New Zealand, the disgraceful raids have just been given a blessing by a state-controlled court [1] and the host sued [2] as if merely hosting a sharing site (which was not even found guilty of anything) makes one a criminal. Another new report from New Zealand [3] shows that the US lobby (copyright monopoly/cartel) is currently making appalling new moves in Australia, threatening to make copyright infringement (meaning downloading, e.g. to cache, a copyrighted image in the browser) the equivalent of some kind of crime like substance abuse. This is beyond disgusting, it’s corruption. The system is corrupt and it’s clear who it is serving. The oligarchs, people who manage from their Manhattan apartments a conglomerate like CBS (a US-based propaganda channel/network), pretend that there is some issue like “struggling” networks [5] at stake even when the numbers contradict these claims and then, arguing that they fight for survival, they are fighting against free speech, dissemination of information, and free culture. It’s class war. It’s a war against people.

If there was justice there would be raids. Those Manhattan apartments would be raided and those behind the copyright cartel would be put in prison for many years for colluding, conspiring, and abusing state powers. No government (with army and police) should exist for the purpose of delivering corporate welfare and corporal punishment against innocent citizens. █

Related/contextual items from the news:

1. Kim Dotcom Raid Warrants Legal, Court of Appeal Rules

   The New Zealand Court of Appeal has this morning ruled that the search warrants used by police during the raid on Kim Dotcom’s mansion contained errors, but were valid.

2. LeaseWeb Sued For Hosting Megaupload and Other “Pirate” Websites

   Megaupload’s former hosting provider LeaseWeb has been sued for copyright infringement at a federal court in California. A complaint filed by adult magazine publisher Perfect 10 accuses the hosting provider of servicing several “pirate” websites. The publisher also holds LeaseWeb liable for the infringements of Megaupload, demanding up to $188 million in damages.

3. Pat Pilcher: Aussies to get three strikes law and Internet blockade?

   The Aussies are looking at an Internet blockade and setting up a 3 strikes law as the Abbott Government seeks to crack down on piracy.

   The move was signalled by Aussie Attorney-General George Brandis, who said he would make ISPs block access to piracy related websites and set up a 3 strikes law.

4. CBS Admits Aereo Supreme Court Win Wouldn’t Hurt CBS, Might Make Things Better For Everybody

   Last year CBS joined a number of broadcasters in whining incessantly about how if Aereo was allowed to continue living, the “struggling” networks would be forced to pull their content from over the air broadcasts and move to cable. It’s part of a long, long history of broadcasters pretending that if things don’t go just they way they want them to, they’ll surely go out of business. The threat to pull broadcasts was aimed at scaring Congress into passing protectionist legislation, and as we noted at the time it’s something CBS should just shut up and do — given the public could probably come up for better uses for their spectrum.

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Free Software News Roundup: Careers, Liberations, and Lots More

Posted in News Roundup at 11:32 am by Dr. Roy Schestowitz

Summary: Recent news stories about Free/Open Source software (FOSS)

• Open source internships make great career starters

  For most students, an internship presents a major opportunity to learn and grow in a real-world environment. Interns who join an open source company or project also seem to learn a lot about themselves along the way. Recently, I asked some former Red Hat interns—both newly hired and long-time Red Hat associates—what lessons they learned by working in an open source culture and what advice they have for our next group of interns.

• The Trend To “Open Source” Software And What It Means For Businesses And Consumers

  Wikipedia defines “open-source” software as computer software with its source code made available and licensed with a license in which the copyright holder provides the rights to study, change and distribute the software to anyone and for any purpose. Translated into English this just means it’s free to anyone who wants to download it. Linux, Mozilla Firefox, and Google’s Android are open source operating systems and are available and easy to download even for computer illiterates like myself.

• Plan 9 is open sauced

  The University of California, Berkeley, has been authorised by Alcatel-Lucent to open sauce all Plan 9 software under the GNU General Public License, Version 2.

• Good Enough Is Great

  The takeaway from this presentation should be that , not necessarily because of the usual claims of superior quality (Many eyes make fewer bugs etc.) but because FLOSS emphasizes Freedom and flexibility. I agree with FLOSS being the right way to do IT but I still believe the FLOSS that users will use from solid distros like Debian will be featureful and of high quality as well as being Free. The Debian developers filter out most of the crud included in the depressing statistics of median number of developers and such. It’s a part of their social contract: “We will give back to the free software community

• 5 ways open source is transforming tech in 2014

  For the last decade we’ve watched an epic contest unfold between open source and proprietary technology, and 2014 is the year that this dynamic will radically transform. The lines between open source and proprietary are becoming irrevocably blurred as proprietary firms pour resources into open source development and open source companies dial in their revenue models. Above all else, the open source community is producing the technologies businesses need to be competitive in the data-rich 21st century.

• OpenStreetMap competes in the Olympics, SourceForge revamps, and more

• Report and results from our Youth In Open Source Week

• Get started in open source online and offline

• Why Open Source Is Disappearing From Open Source Companies

• Open source startups: Don’t try to be Red Hat

  VCs are realizing the next billion-dollar software company won’t make money from software, but from what open source enables it to deliver

• Open source alternatives for small businesses

  These were some of the questions asked by Amandeep, a New Delhi based owner of a small scale clothing company, when I pitched to him a few open source solutions that could make his day-to-day operations more efficient. For someone without any IT background (but a sharp business sense), these were brilliant and relevant questions. The answers to these questions won’t just help Amandeep, but if shared broadly may help reduce the apprehension of a significant number of small scale business owners, especially in India. My interactions have shown that a lot of these businesses are looking to grow, enhance their productivity, and most importantly, save costs.

• Scientific analysis and visualization is better with open source

  Marcus Hanwell is a physicist by training, but his background in science led him down a different path than most reseachers. Today he is a contributer to a number of open source projects aimed at helping the scientific community better analyze and visualize their data. If you’ve got a question about finding the right open source tool for a scientific application, Marcus can point you in the right direction.

• Open Source Storage Buying Guide

  Red Hat is perhaps the most recognized player in the entire open source field. As addition to promoting its operating systems, the company has been involved in storage for quite some time. Red Hat Storage is an open platform that is available for on-premise, public clouds such as Amazon, and hybrid cloud deployment. Pricing is by annual subscription based on the number of storage nodes.

• The Day the Light Came On for Eddie…

  He went on to tell me how he had looked up “Linux” on the Internet and became interested in the “free” part of software. It took him a bit to get his head around the fact that people from around the globe are contributing to FOSS for not much more than the spirit of kinship and giving. From that moment, in Eddie Baker’s eyes software became more than things you click on to make other things happen.

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No Need for Microsoft Inside GNU/Linux, Demand for Microsoft/Windows is Diminishing

Posted in GNU/Linux, Microsoft, Mono at 11:21 am by Dr. Roy Schestowitz

Summary: Eradicating the Microsoft APIs (e.g. Mono, MonoGame, Unity 3D) now that the world of computing — including gaming — is moving to standards (like OpenGL), Free software (in some cases, for some parts), and GNU/Linux

THERE ARE plenty of jobs in FOSS because Windows and by extension Microsoft are becoming irrelevant to many. Well, even a former Microsoft employee who founded a gaming company is now using GNU/Linux as the de facto (default) platform, which is based on Debian (Steam OS). In its own bizarre way, Valve now makes some source code of Steam visible (not copyleft), too. The world is quickly changing.

What we found baffling is that the other day something called MonoGame, calling itself “an open source implementation of the Microsoft XNA 4.x Framework,” made a headline [1] (Unity 3D hardly makes headlines anymore). Why would anyone still pursue Microsoft APIs when developing for different platforms? Mono is a dying project with Microsoft connections, so anything which incorporates Mono tends to be either from Microsoft, a Microsoft partner, or something along those lines.

As new reports help show [2-4], the world of management and development is moving towards GNU/Linux and away from Windows and Microsoft lock-in. We don’t need to prop Microsoft up by increasing dependence on it. It’s not just a patent risk but also loss of control or autonomy.

While some people suggest installing Windows alongside Steam OS [5], it seems evident that Steam OS is quickly improving [6] and attracting/foostering more GNU/Linux interest from game developers [7] (the portfolio of games for GNU/Linux is quickly broadening [8]). Some rivals are becoming Free software [9,10] (announcements this week), signalling a wonderful trend.

The world is changing. We don’t need to include Microsoft in it. █

Related/contextual items from the news:

1. Ethan Lee Othwerwise Known As Flibitijibibo Proposes A Full Fork Of MonoGame

2. Linux Jobs Report: Linux Pros Work For the Love of Linux, Cutting-Edge Tech

   Linux professionals are well paid and highly sought after by job recruiters, but that’s not why they chose their careers. They are motivated by their love of Linux and working with the latest, cutting edge technology, according to the annual Dice.com and Linux Foundation Linux Jobs Report released today.

3. Linux job market heats up

   Dice, the leading career site for technology and engineering professionals, and The Linux Foundation, the nonprofit organization dedicated to supporting the growth of Linux and collaborative development, has just released the 2014 Linux Jobs Report (PDF Link). The two found that “The explosive demand for Linux talent is intensifying.”

4. As Tech Jobs Increase, Linux Skills Top Priority List for Hiring Managers

   US News & World Report recently published its annual ranking of the world’s “100 Best Jobs,” which orders the best occupations by demand, salary and employment rate, among other factors. For the very first time, Software Developer ranked #1 on the list, and systems administrator positions, from computer systems analyst to database administrator and more, ranked among the top 20.

5. Why you should dual-boot SteamOS and Windows 7

6. Steam OS, client update brings audio improvements

   Valve has pushed yet another update to its stable version which brings many audio related improvements. Some of the GNU/Linux client and Steam OS related improvements include addition of “an auto-detect step for audio outputs when booting SteamOS for the first time. You can change the selected output device using the Audio option under settings,” according to changelog.

7. CD Projekt RED Considering The Witcher 3 For Linux If SteamOS Takes Off

8. Valve introduces ‘Steam Tags’ for easier sorting and discovery

9. Godot Game Engine Is Now Open Source

   Good news developers, Godot Engine is now open source for you to tinker with. Could this be a real alternative to Unity for developers who want to develop games directly on Linux?

10. Nothing to Hide goes Open Source

    Nothing to Hide is a queer game that is being developed by an indie developer called Nicky Liow following an even more queer approach to distribution. He intends to keep the game as open to public as possible, as such the game, even though it is still in its initial state of development, has all of its assets like the art, sound and even the code open to the public, accessible and ready to be modified as they see fit, no strings attached.

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