trelane

20 ms·

271.
by trelane 1y ago
The WRT54g led to a variety of user-serviceable firmware worldwide, including dd-wrt and openwrt. It gave, and continues to give, new life to otherwise wifi devices that shipped with a abandoned propeietary software. It was a revolution in
272.
by trelane 1y ago
You might not care, but your downstream users might care about being locked in.
273.
by trelane 1y ago
Yep. Microsoft loves open source. Free Software and especially user freedom, not so much.
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by trelane 1y ago
The key is that "permissive" is passive voice. It's more permissive for corporations in that they are allowed to use it to tie their customers even tighter to them. Compare this with "restrictive" (for corporation
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by trelane 1y ago
Look up the WRT54g sometime https://sfconservancy.org/copyleft-compliance/enforcement-st...
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by trelane 1y ago
I suspect that damages may also play a role in practical resolution of infringement. There is a large difference between "they didn't put in a sentence that they needed to," and "we have 30 users who didn't get the
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by trelane 1y ago
It is in a roundabout way also about collaboration with upstream, since the users (or those working for them) are fully empowered to be developers if they so choose. And the upstream and buy the product and get the same rights as a user.
278.
by trelane 1y ago
The GPL and Free Software, yes. Open Source not so much. The term "open source" was originally coined to make Free Software more easily understandable to newbies. Pretty much right away, though, it was used to water down Free Soft
279.
by trelane 1y ago
We don't need yet another license, especially not a use license. Just use a GPL, the version (LGPL, GPL, or AGPL) depending on what you are concerned with. > Open source has been weaponized against us. This was always going to b
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by trelane 1y ago
On the other side, some people hoped that picking a "corporate-friendly" license would make megacorps good citizens. It has worked out poorly.
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by trelane 1y ago
Because they listen to fear mongering or would prefer to ask nicely that megacorps be kind to their users instead of just using a tool with legal teeth.
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by trelane 1y ago
Yeah, giving massive corporations a free ride has been incredibly successful for corporations. For their users not so much.
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by trelane 1y ago
Depends on your definition of "user"/"use" and "distribution" really. If the service provider is the "user," and performing actions with it on behalf of the ultimate user is "use," an
284.
by trelane 1y ago
This is a huge difference. The GPL and its flavor are explicitly not about use . They place zero restrictions on use. Unlike, say, just about all proprietary software. It only governs distribution and especially prevents distributors f
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by trelane 1y ago
The biggest thing that GPL et al. enable is that customers are not locked in to their provider. It's not as much about the collaboration by the vendor per se, though users would likely prefer it, and are themselves able to collaborate
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by trelane 1y ago
Seems relevant: https://www.thefp.com/p/the-truth-about-banned-books
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by trelane 1y ago
That is a lot of what to know. I don't doubt that at least as important is who you know, and especially how well they know you.
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by trelane 1y ago
The findings in TFA are much more politically neutral than the knee jerk HN "republicans bad" commenters seen to believe. Which is something many of you should pause and reflect on. braces for the downvotes
289.
by trelane 1y ago
Now I want to use the dictionary file to figure the actual probability of a letter appearing in a TLA. It's not nearly 1/26.
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by trelane 1y ago
I am always skeptical of claims that some workers are just lazy bums skimming money. I don't think most folks graduate college and think, "You know what sounds amazing? Sitting at a desk doing nothing five days a week!" I e
291.
by trelane 2y ago
I see the disconnect. Full disclosure: I have been doing The Internet for well over 30 years. :) "including the title" was intended to attach to the line count. Some may include the page title (h1 heading in HTML) in the lines at
292.
by trelane 2y ago
Dunno why you are getting downvoted. You're completely correct. It is literally the third line on the page, including the title! That sentence is, to quote TFA, > It is important to understand why the PS3 failed.
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by trelane 2y ago
It didn't have to be this way, but anti-trust is not the sole reason.
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by trelane 2y ago
Also, it would require democrats and republicans working together for the common good, which is not a thing anymore.
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by trelane 2y ago
> The giants are so giant, it's almost impossible to compete with them in the consumer mass market Chicken, egg
296.
by trelane 2y ago
Depends on how you like to code. I have two full screen frames on their own monitors with 5 or 6 side-by-side windows, and a stack of three vertical split windows on one side. I like to have the side-by-side windows looking at different fil
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by trelane 2y ago
> You can choose not to contribute your changes back to permissively-licensed software, but in actual practice most people do contribute them. They contribute some things, sure. But the also don't contribute some things. It is
298.
by trelane 2y ago
We are currently talking about GCC, where they would have gotten the source prior to LLVM. > They got software that’s open under a different license that otherwise would have just been purely proprietary This is not a given, even outsi
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by trelane 2y ago
> other licenses that gave even more freedom and flexibility That gave vendors more freedom and flexibility (to lock their software away from their customers.) As usual, customers got less freedom and flexibility.
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by trelane 2y ago
The question is less what's upstream than what's not.

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