Slashback: Discipline, License, Name-calling 352
Every day, in every way, I am becoming a better and better Lt. Junior Grade. alanjstr writes "The Baltimore Sun reports 'The Naval Academy has disciplined 85 students who used a military Internet connection to illegally swap copyrighted music and movies, but it stopped short of carrying out its threat to impose the maximum penalties of expulsion or court-martial, an academy document shows.' It goes on to say that the raid was spurred less by the RIAA and more by the threat of losing the internet connection due to the enormous amount of bandwidth consumed. The academy had given students several warnings before raiding the dorm rooms. Some of the hard drives seized last November were found to contain one or two copyrighted files, while others ran into the hundreds or thousands."
I bet they could make a better agreement with Xiph.org Magnetic Confinement writes "In an effort to make life more difficult for civic-minded Mac users, NPR has decided to drop Quicktime from its available streams. Nothing specific on their webpage addresses it, just some suspicious vacancies remain. Their helpdesk response is officially:
'NPR.org had been offering some of its audio in the Apple QuickTime format under an arrangement with Apple QuickTime. We regret that we were unable to reach mutually acceptable terms for a new arrangement with Apple QuickTime. As a result, NPR is unable to continue offering its content in this format.You can also contact Apple QuickTime directly at: quicktime@apple.com
Weston
NPR Online'"
A note that got lost in the bin for too long ... JulesVD writes "Microsoft has agreed to tweak its Windows XP operating system in response to recent feedback from the Justice Department over its antitrust settlement with the federal government. (See news on Yahoo!) Microsoft will give more prominent display to a button in Windows that allows computer users to remove the company's Internet Explorer browser, company spokesman Jim Desler said. The Justice Department is overseeing Microsoft's compliance with the settlement. Placement of the button in a hard-to-reach spot in Windows was one of several complaints Microsoft's rivals made to the department last year."
Proportionality isn't just for the personals. You may still be boggling (I am) at the recently announced RIAA suits alleging that colleges and college students are liable for billions of dollars in damages to the music industry for facilitating online file trading. Reader Derek Lomas writes in with another editorial indicating "growing support at Yale for legal alternatives".
Even biggerness. The Gathering is billed by some as the the world's largest computer party. MC68040, though, writes "I'd like to remind everyone to have a look at dreamhack, that 'also' is the largest LAN in Sweden twice a year ... Which had over 5000 participants in 2001 and even more in 2002.. *arhem* Biggest you say?"
If you want to fight about "LAN party" vs. "Computer party," leave me out of it!
How about calling it "900t"? An anonymous reader writes "As previously reported, mozilla.org's Phoenix browser has been renamed to Firebird. This hasn't pleased supporters of the Firebird relational database project. In an Australian LinuxWorld article, one of their administrators calls the name change "one of the dirtiest deeds I've seen in open source so far." In a MozillaZine article, the same person accused mozilla.org of "theft" and "corporate bullying". They don't explain how it was different when they picked a name that was already used by a BBS, financial software manufacturer, Fenix IDE and games company. Meanwhile, IBPhoenix, an organisation that supports the development of the Firebird database, has put up a protest page, encouraging people to spam the MozillaZine forums (even though MozillaZine had nothing to do with the decision) and send masses of email to many Mozilla developers (most of whom were not involved in selecting the new name). I find it rather hypocritical that the Firebird database people are accusing Mozilla of "the filthiest of dirty tricks" while at the same time advocating the harassment of many Mozilla developers."
Point of clarification. batkid writes "In response to the article 'Microsoft pirating their own software,' Seems like MS is taking it pretty seriously. I got the following response from Microsoft (I am a faculty member, but the response should be the same to students).
April 9, 2003RE: Visual Studio .NET Professional Edition and Windows XP Professional software distributed during the Microsoft Faculty Seminars
Dear Faculty Member, Thank you for attending the recent Microsoft Faculty Seminar. The purpose of this letter is to clarify questions concerning the legal use of the Visual Studio .NET Professional and Windows XP Professional software distributed to faculty who attended the Seminar. The software received is governed by the electronic license embedded in the product set up that appears prior to installation and no additional documentation is required.
Notwithstanding language on the CD label for the copies of Visual Studio .NET Professional Edition and Windows XP Professional Edition that you received during your attendance at the Seminar, which appeared to indicate that a separate license document was required in order for you to legally use the software, this letter will confirm that use by you of the software received is governed by the electronic license embedded in the product setup that appears prior to installation.
You are required to agree to accept the terms and conditions of this license prior to proceeding with the products' installation. Acceptance by you of these "Click to Accept" licenses is the only license required for your use of the copies of Visual Studio.NET Professional Edition and Windows XP Professional Edition received. We recommend that you keep a copy of this letter in your personal files for future reference."
Thanks for passing that along.
What if Masterlock security was assured this way? Monday, you read that security researchers Billy Hoffman and Virgil Griffith (known as Vergil and Acidus) were were prevented from speaking at a security conference by means of a Cease and Desist order from Blackboard, Inc.. The two planned to talk about security flaws found in Blackboard's Transaction System.
In a mail posted at Declan McCullagh's Politech mailing list, David Yaskin of Blackboard responds to the criticism that the company's legal action has drawn. John R. Hall has posted a FAQ explaining some particulars of the Blackboard Transaction System which Virgil and Acidus aren't at liberty to discuss, as well as contradicting some claims that Yaskin makes in the posted email.
Hey, I could use one of those... (Score:5, Funny)
*Ctrl-C*
*Ctrl-V*
*Prints Letter*
*Launches Gnutella*
Me too! (Score:3, Funny)
Left mouse click...
Middle mouse click...
lpr...
Launches Gnutella...
What the %^&#, this requires WINDOWS?!
Launches Gnutella again...
Why blame NPR? (Score:5, Insightful)
How do we know Apple wasn't being unreasonable in the terms they wanted?
BTW, those Phoenix database people sound really mature.
Re:Why blame NPR? (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Why blame NPR? (Score:2, Informative)
Re:Why blame NPR? (Score:5, Informative)
Where did you get that from? According to the QTSS FAQ [apple.com]:
Both QuickTime Streaming Server 4 and Darwin Streaming Server 4 are free, with no per-stream license fees.
So, no, it doesn't seem like licensing fees were the issue.
BECAUSE IT'S FREE (Score:5, Interesting)
Maybe because Quicktime streaming server is freely downloadable [apple.com].
Well, okay, you've got to have OS X Server to get that one, but if you don't want to even run OS X Server, guess what? Darwin streaming server [apple.com] is both open source and runs on Linux, Solaris, OS X(server or regular, 10.1.x or better), AND WINDOWS(both win2k and NT).
If -that- isn't good enough for you, there's no shortage of MP3 streaming servers. If THAT isn't good enough, there's ogg-vorbis.
Something smells, folks. MS -bought- their way into this one, probably via strong-arming or simply bribing with free hardware+licenses. By the way, PBS dropped Quicktime recently too.
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
QSS not only for OS X Server (Score:3, Informative)
Adware in Qicktime? (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Firebird (Score:5, Interesting)
"How about calling it "900t"? [snip] In an Australian LinuxWorld article, one of their administrators calls the name change "one of the dirtiest deeds I've seen in open source so far." [that article quoted me, btw]
[snip]
"In a MozillaZine article, the same person accused mozilla.org of "theft" and "corporate bullying". They don't explain how it was different when they picked a name that was already used by a BBS, financial software manufacturer, Fenix IDE and games company."
I did post a comment about these other "Firebird" projects, which all except one are either more recent than ours, or are long defunct. The BBS project (a year older than our project) is a Chinese bulletin board, scarcely to be considered as being in the same space the way an open source browser and an open source database are...
"Meanwhile, IBPhoenix, an organisation that supports the development of the Firebird database, has put up a protest page, encouraging people to spam the MozillaZine forums"
This is a patent LIE - hence, no doubt, the poster's desire to stay anonymous. The readers were invited to write, not "encouraged to spam". As background to why the need to do so, our private emails to the Mozilla people at the start of all this have gone unanswered. What else could we do?
"(even though MozillaZine had nothing to do with the decision)"
Another misrepresentation. The announcement was made on the Mozillazine talkback forum and feedback was expressly invited.
" and send masses of email to many Mozilla developers"
Another outright lie. The suggestion was "You might like to write to..."
"(most of whom were not involved in selecting the new name)" The announcement said "we". Absent better information, how could anything be assumed except that the whole Mozilla team made the decision, since that was how it was announced.
"I find it rather hypocritical that the Firebird database people are accusing Mozilla of "the filthiest of dirty tricks" while at the same time advocating the harassment of many Mozilla developers."
I find it highly hypocritical that an anonymous poster would construct a spin like this -- and rather depressing that Craig Ringer and others are buying the spin.
Helen Borrie
Firebird Project [sourceforge.net] Admin
The Blackboard Presentation (Score:5, Informative)
Don't worry. It opens in Open Office Impress just fine!
Re:The Blackboard Presentation (Score:4, Insightful)
I am following this closely because my college has installed the Blackboard system to provide all-hours card access to dorms and after-hours access to academic buildings. All of the readers are bolted into concrete or brick, or are installed on steel posts. You would have to do more physical damage to the building or the post to gain access to the supposedly insecure RS-485 drops than you would to simply force the door open. My school, however, has not extended this system to anything using real money, perhaps because they are aware of the flaws and want to limit the risks, or perhaps because the damn thing is so motherfucking expensive.
One thing that really detracts from the credibility of this "security analysis" is that in the PowerPoint presentation, someone is circled using paintbrush, identified by name, and labelled "piece of shit" or something like that. Apparently this is one of the guys that insists the system is secure. It may not be, but you can't expect anyone to take you seriously if you put crap like that into your presentation.
Re:The Blackboard Presentation (Score:3, Insightful)
My point is this... (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:The Blackboard Presentation (Score:2)
Dishonest statistics (Score:5, Insightful)
The kid in this joke arrives at the figure that he does because the way he does it counts a good portion of time twice. (IE: Sleep and weekends overlaps...)
The RIAA I think is counting things twice when it obtains these "Billion Dollar" figures. I think that it counts the number of P2P transactions and multiplies it by the cost of an album. This dispite people downloading songs that they would never buy. In fact, one could further inflate the figures by including incompleted transactions as a full one.
Billions of Dollars? Baloney.
Re:Dishonest statistics (Score:4, Insightful)
The Music Industry is a big thing. However, my arguement to the exageration of these figures is that the music industry has supposedly taken "billions in losses". Even a behemoth like that would feel billions in losses and it would be visible. The airlines are having rough times and its obvious, it's not that they are trying to screw anyone it just seriously looks like they are in a great hurry to fix things and are making mistakes.
All the music industry has done is file suit, but the state of the industry doesnt say "we are fighting a loosing battle". If they lost billions where are the record labels that are dropping production or cutting wages to try to save the ship.
Thats just my 2 billion cents.
-bort
Re:Dishonest statistics (Score:4, Interesting)
Anyone got numbers for the amount they collect via CDR tax?
Re:Dishonest statistics (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Dishonest statistics (Score:2, Troll)
3 kinds of lies (Score:3, Funny)
"Lies, damned lies, and statistics," Disraeli [btwebworld.com]
Re:Dishonest statistics (Score:3, Funny)
Blackboard (Score:3, Interesting)
Sinapse (Score:5, Interesting)
Oh my (Score:4, Insightful)
Does anyone else find that laughable?
Re:Oh my (Score:2)
Or maybe they're planning for when the graudate and have $150,000 in student loans to pay off.
Re:Oh my (Score:5, Funny)
Yes, but where can you buy CDs for only $15? Enquiring minds want to know!
Re:Oh my (Score:4, Informative)
License issues with QT? (Score:2, Redundant)
That's strange, the quicktime streaming server is opensource and free. Were they using a proprietary, licensed format to deliver the audio? If so, why not just switch to low-bitrate MP3, which QTSS [apple.com] supports w
Re:License issues with QT? (Score:3)
Maybe they wanted a little payola themselves.
This kind of pisses me off because I recently started using QT to listen to NPR since my schedule changed and I wasn't in my car during the evening news broadcasts anymore.
RE: MP3... I have no frigg'n idea why people turn their backs on free standards that will actually save them money is both the short term and the long run.
It's not
Re:License issues with QT? (Score:2)
Re:License issues with QT? (Score:3, Informative)
At that rate, for a mix of music and voice I feel that it's a close race between WMA, and Qdesign Music 2 Pro; with Qdesign edging out WMA for stereo audio at that rate (WMA has less high range - it sounds like the encoder filters out higher pitches to reduce noise before it encodes).
For a mix of music and voice, both Speex and Qualcomm Pure Voice are out, as while they wou
Phoenix-Firebird...... (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Phoenix-Firebird...... (Score:2)
My favorite...
Citroen!
Screaming Dinosaur (Score:3, Funny)
Or, how about what the automotive world refers to the Firebird as(screaming/flaming chicken car), with a Mozilla twist?
I can see it now: "Screaming Dinosaur 7.0! Now featuring the Mullet theme, complete with AC/DC background music. Cinderblocks available as add-on module(please note, Cinderblock module disables browser completely, installs junk on your desktop)"
gotta love the military (Score:5, Funny)
Just goes to show how educated some naval personell are about computer technology. I mean MULTIgigabyte drives?!? Holy shit man, that's a lot of storage!!!
*note sarcasm above*
Re:gotta love the military (Score:2)
Mind you, I'm not sure how anyone gets over 1000 proprietary songs in Mp3. I've got a lot of *free* music (legal), but there's not enough RIAA-owned/popular music out there for me to pirate 3Gb worth.
Re:gotta love the military (Score:2)
Re:gotta love the military (Score:2)
The majority of this wasn't downloaded, but encoded using parallel bladeenc (www.mpi.nd.edu/~jsquyres/bladeenc/) from various sources, my own CD collection for the most part.
Sad thing is, when I upgraded the SSAs from the 32550WC drives they came with (2.1G disks) to the hodge-podge of 9G drives that I spent a couple ebay-weeks collecting,
Re:gotta love the military (Score:2)
Re:gotta love the military (Score:2, Funny)
No, no. It just goes to show what kind of crap PC hardware most military members get to run at work that "multigygabyte" would be considered enormous.
Re:gotta love the military (Score:2)
Re:gotta love the military (Score:2)
Then there are the professors from various departments who hate using the internet.
Lesson? It's got nothing to do with them being in the military, it is just the way some people are.
RIAA is grasping for headlines (Score:2, Interesting)
I mean, unless the student is very rich family, along the lines of Bill Gates rich, the RIAA would never see the money. And, on a appeal, the settlement would be thrown out on the fact that the amount, millions and millions of dollars is too much for anyone to pay.
I am still curious if the RIAA is just doing this for headlines, or to scare people from sharing music.
Re:RIAA is grasping for headlines (Score:2)
Two forces at work here, you tell me which has more sway.
1) Rich people ($$$ Profit)
2) Rich people have the money to mount a legal defence (--- big losses)
Re:RIAA is grasping for headlines (Score:2)
Re:RIAA is grasping for headlines (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:RIAA is grasping for headlines (Score:2, Interesting)
But, I think we are also forgetting that the RIAA said a few years ago that they would not sue any person directly like this. But that is so
Comment removed (Score:5, Informative)
hello from around the block. (Score:2)
Skepticism Abounds (Score:5, Insightful)
Why is it so hard to pick an original name? (Score:4, Insightful)
Is it really that hard to pick an original name and then run a few searches to make sure there are no similar products with that name?
For example, why not pick something from another language that fits the product well? Something like 'gaiyuu' (Japanese: foreign travel) or 'michiyuki' (Japanese: going down the road)...
Seriously...it seems ridiculous the amount of trouble these people have coming up with original names...
IMHO.
YES!! I'm so stupid!! (Score:2)
Heh...oops. ^^;;
Thunderbird not that great either. (Score:2)
Re:Why is it so hard to pick an original name? (Score:2, Funny)
Bart: Ohh, I wish I programmed an [open source email client.]
Lisa: You did, you named it "Stampy".
Re:Why is it so hard to pick an original name? (Score:5, Funny)
That may be why they're calling it Firebird.
Sheesh, confusing a Ford with a GM... People have been lynched for less...
Re:Why is it so hard to pick an original name? (Score:2)
Speaking as one born and raised in the South, I have to agree with this sentiment -- scary as it may be.
Re:Why is it so hard to pick an original name? (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Why is it so hard to pick an original name? (Score:2)
Re:Why is it so hard to pick an original name? (Score:3, Funny)
I'm all for this name, only because their ad slogan could be:
"Yozizza? Foshizza. . ."
1000s of copyrighted files (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:1000s of copyrighted files (Score:4, Interesting)
You see, I'm the author of many of the files, and as such, I hold instant copyright. Quoting from US government copyright office: [copyright.gov]
I'll bet we're all guilty of possession of copyrighted Slashdot images in our browser caches. I hope they don't mind.Microsoft anti-trust (Score:5, Funny)
It's Cromulent! (Score:2)
Sounds like they embiggened it a bit too much.
Re:It's Cromulent! (Score:2)
Thats unpossible.
Oh, please (Score:5, Informative)
I guess most people have come to expect this from slashdot, but it should be pointed out all the same. It's too bad everyone (me included) puts up with it.
From the slashdot writeup:
From the linked article [ibphoenix.com] (slightly summarised):
Listing the eight technical project leaders at the end might have been a tad excessive, but I'd hardly call that "encouraging people to spam the mozillazine forums" or harrassing mozilla developers in the way that slashdot makes out to be. It looks like an ordinary informational page to tell people how they can contact the people who are able to make a decision.
Re:Oh, please (Score:3)
Oh how many times has been heard
the slashdot war cry "email them".
When in violent passion the nerd
mixed flammible breath and igniting pen.
And opon corporations came the herd
of emails in flooding streams unbroken.
In crafty demise the corps did gird
slashdot with the purchased by OSDN.
Now email storms are thought obsurd
and fuel for the flame to the nerd is returned.
Re:Oh, please (Score:2)
Re:Oh, please (Score:2)
I agree, but in this case the write-up mostly plagiarizes a post on MozillaZine. The misleading posts on /. are frequently deceptive, but not as often orignially deceptive.
Masterlock (Score:2, Informative)
This is not new.
Vidar
Re:Masterlock-Richard Feynman ring a bell? (Score:2)
Re:Masterlock (Score:5, Informative)
Having had a coworker who was a professional locksmith, I can say that absolutely everything you said is wrong. Point by point:
tumbler locks only have 10 height levels at most
Wrong. They have many, many possible height levels. They are completely analog devices. Any locksmith should be able to make pins that are whatever height he wants, completely analog. Its not just like they have a box of pins, only available in 10 different lengths.
Less secure tumbler locks will allow each individual tumbler to move independantly of the rest.
Wrong. All(that I know of) tumbler locks allow individual tumblers to move independently, otherwise you wouldn't be able to insert or remove the key(duuuh.)
oh and most locks also have a master key that will work on every lock of that type, not just the specific tumbler combination given to your door specifically.
Again, WRONG. Only if the key is set up with several separate pins in each tumbler. Otherwise, there is only ONE position where all the pins will clear.
It is simply amazing how such a simple, very plain and ordinary device is completely misunderstood and given an almost magical status. Locks are VERY simple devices. Even picking them isn't rocket science, just methodical and you need a ton of practice. Most of the tricks used by lock-pickers are very obvious once you see how a lock works.
"Analog" (Score:3, Informative)
They have many, many possible height levels. They are completely analog devices.
Analog devices have noise. Therefore, analog devices are built with tolerances, and on a given brand of lock, these tolerances may allow for only about ten distinct height levels per pin.
RIAA Statistics (Score:2, Insightful)
Click Here to Remove Internet Explorer ... (Score:5, Funny)
Errrrrmm... (Score:2)
He claims that streaming would not involve illegal copying, but I have to question if he really knows what he's talking about. Just because certain players will stream from certain sources does not stop anyone from redirecting those streams to disk and storing them there for as long as they want...
Failing that, there's always the good old high-qualit
Contact Xiph.org (Score:2)
Trustworthy Computing? (Score:2, Interesting)
This sounds to me like an argument that might be made by people trying modchip X-Boxes - "It's too hard to circumvent Microsoft's way of doing things!"
Is it just me, or does legal wrangling over the placement of a button just seem kind of silly?
Mike Pettit, a spokesman for Procomp, an anti-Microsoft computer industry trade group, said the latest modification w
Re:Trustworthy Computing? (Score:3, Funny)
Heheheheh.... Another hax0rish post... (Score:2)
Since when? There's no shrinkwrap EULA that says I need to agree to your EULA.
The only time I agree to any licensing is when I click on the "OK" button. Now, seriously, how many people have reverse engineered the installer _BEFORE_ actually installing and set it up so that it installs even if you say you Disagree?
If I don't agree to the EULA, but still manage to install
Firebird? Feh... (Score:5, Funny)
namespace collisions (Score:2)
So an organisation that shared the name with the current browser (Phoenix) is upset that the new name change is close the the product they support (Firebird)?
And there's a Fenix (Phoenix?) IDE named "Firebird" as well?
Jesus, the software community's run out
MS just dumping WMP (Score:5, Informative)
Well, at least they answered someone- I tried asking PBS why they dropped quicktime(also quite recently) for their TV episodes, and didn't get ea reply. I even offered to help implement open-source, free alternatives...since I live quite close to WGBH, one of the biggest PBS stations in the country.
In any case, this is bull- the software to stream quicktime is FREE, and you can use any codec you want- it doesn't have to be proprietary sorenson, for example.
Further, if cost was an issue, then they could stream ogg-vorbis, since there are no royalties, period. Sure, users would have to install a plugin, but that doesn't stop thousands upon thousands of sites forcing me to install Flash. It could certainly be offered as a choice.
I suspect what happened was MS either coerced them into switching(that's what they did in my old company- they said they'd look the other way on license violations if they went 100% MS. Sure enough, new policy came out right after the audit saying "solaris and linux will be dropped, MS win2k will be used everywhere") or MS gave them everything, maybe even gave them free hardware and server licenses.
It is positively disgusting that our public radio and TV companies are switching to just ONE, PROPRIETARY format.
blackboard scares me... (Score:3, Informative)
current implementation:
reader to NP: this guy says he wants a coke
NP to reader: give him a coke
how it is hacked:
intercept the NP to reader command and resend "give him a coke" to the reader. free coke.
fixed implementation:
reader to NP: this guy says he wants a coke
NP to reader: give him a coke, lets call it UNIQUE_KEY
reader to NP: can i give this guy a coke and call it UNIQUE_KEY?
NP to reader: if this challenge already occured respond "no, you already did", otherwise, respond "yes, give him a coke" and log the UNIQUE_KEY
problem is the current hardware can not be upgraded to do handshaking or challenges like that. if you have programmed for paypal's IPN, it works as correctly described above and seems like the obvious solution... i can't figure out what these guys were thinking **for 19 years**!
I thinks the button should be hard to find (Score:2, Insightful)
Oh, and is it just me, or is this pathetic? Microsoft used illegle tactics to destroy several companies, and dominated the industry with those tactics to the point where the only way an even potential competitor could make it was by circumventing the
'Firebird' was the best they could come up with? (Score:2)
Still, I won't complain that they changed the name... you have no idea how hard it is to *properly* spell "Phoenix" after eighteen years of "Phoenyx."
We've considered renaming The Phoenyx, since (1) the name was come up with back in the day when you had to remember a number, not a domain name
Time to live in international waters? (Score:2)
I'm in man I'm ni. (Score:2)
You are required to agree to ac
Blackboard has put an official response on the web (Score:5, Informative)
A modest proposal (Score:3, Funny)
How about calling it "900t"? An anonymous reader writes "As previously reported, mozilla.org's Phoenix browser has been renamed to Firebird. This hasn't pleased supporters of the Firebird relational database project. In an Australian LinuxWorld article, one of their administrators calls the name change "one of the dirtiest deeds I've seen in open source so far." In a MozillaZine article, the same person accused mozilla.org of "theft" and "corporate bullying". They don't explain how it was different when they picked a name that was already used by a BBS, financial software manufacturer, Fenix IDE and games company. Meanwhile, IBPhoenix, an organisation that supports the development of the Firebird
I'd like to suggest that all Open Source disputes over program names be settled through trial by combat in the old English tradition.
If this works, perhaps this method can be used to settle all trade name disputes.
Alternately, a version of this adapted to the programmer community can be tried.
Set up a server on a static IP. One side tries to keep it running, the other side tries to h4ck it down, who defends and who attacks settled by coin flip.
NPR is part of PBS (Score:3, Interesting)
<BR>
<BR>
This email is to discuss a recent decision by NPR, which I note on it's website says "In partnership with PBS".
NPR.org has announced* it will stop using QuickTime for online
As a past supporter to PBS in my hometown, Sacramento, I find it less than 'public' for an otherwise public resource such as NPR to adopt what I feel is a restrictive posture towards their online community.
I also notice that the PBS website still supports QuickTime as a available format for viewing video online. I would like to believe that if PBS can continue to support more than one choice of online video, NPR would be able to follow suit.
If PBS/NPR is going to request financial support from the community at large, it should perhaps consider those funds come from people with various choices that not only apply to politics, etc, but to information access methods as well. If I felt that PBS/NPR was only going to support a Microsoft environment in the future, I would be less apt to provide financial support....and I'm sure others will be thinking along similar lines.
Regards,
.....
Why NPR really did this... (Score:4, Interesting)
Safari will, instead of opening these files with RealPlayer, Quicktime or downloading them to a desiganted directory, will open them up directly with Disk Copy-- an operation that wil surely fail.
And because NPR uses javascript to decide what kind of stream to serve up, it's rather difficult to cut and paste a link directly into one of the audio streaming clients. I suppose you could uncheck the "open safe files automatically,", and control click the downloaded file, select "Open With RealOne Player" and enjoy the results, but that solution is rather complicated.
NPR blames Apple [npr.org] for this. I'm sure that in the confusion, angry Safari users have jammed already strained technical support queues. So NPR does the only sensible thing-- it seeks petty revenge by dropping Quicktime.
Thanks MS for the license-free software! (Score:3, Interesting)
2. Ignore sticker that says separate license required, as MS says to.
3. Wait for cat to walk on keyboard during installation and agree to on-screen license agreement.
4. ???
5. Profit!
Re:NPR streams (Score:2)
Agreed. While our local station does the windows media format, Car Talk and PHC archives are only in realvideo/realaudio formats. Therefore we endure the really painful convoluted obsticle course that is downloading a free unix version of RealPlayer.
Re:NPR streams (Score:2)
You can also use the official RealPlayer with ESD, and tee the audio output to an MP3 re-encoder, and send that to Icecast.
Re:NPR streams (Score:2)
My attempts as of a month ago were unsuccessful. Do you have any generaly guidance to getting this to work?
Available NPR stream (Score:5, Informative)
We carry BBC, Morning Edition, The Connection, Here & Now, Fresh Air, All Things Considered, Talk of the Nation, On Point, Wait Wait Don't Tell Me, Car Talk, et al... :)
And we originate most of those.
-T
Re:Remove IE? I think not. (Score:3, Informative)
Note that "IE" is a fairly small program, almost nothing more than a GUI wrapper around the MSHTML rendering engine that is used within Windows in several places as well as many third party apps and even an app that I've written myself.
You probably could remove iexplore.exe with no real harm to the rest of your windows use, but you would not beding yourself a favor by uninstalling the MSHTML
Re:The Military And Masterlock (Score:3, Insightful)