On Wed, 2009-04-22 at 12:11 -0700, m0gely wrote: > Michael Robinson wrote: > >>> The government could step in... <snip> > > > > I've heard this argument before and I'm not buying it. The government > > which recognizes copyright could step in and retroactively change the > > rules. > > You don't buy it? What planet are you from? Wanna know a big reason why > nvidia drivers aren't open sourced? Ask SGI. These things simply are. > Your reaction is like a kid plugging his ears yelling "LALALALA can't > hear you! Give me a cookie!" You can't have the government going around > retro activating laws which affect billions (trillions?) of dollars of > industry over the last several decades to satisfy the one guy on the > planets' infatuation with running old Windows games in WINE or on the > ever-so-popular-please-kill-me-know ReactOS.
This comment is hilarious. First off, WINE is popular with more people than ReactOS is. Second off, there is more to think about than just games. Third off, if ReactOS remains behind the latest version of Windows in software and driver support, it will create a problem of sorts. This problem is somewhat lessened when free alternatives are created, but Freecraft is a good example of what doesn't work. How about Autocad and programs like it from the dos era that are very useful, are there any free alternatives that are comparable? If the only answer to dealing with the problems of copyright is OSS, how do you pay talented programmers enough money to get them to develop open source GPL'ed software? IBM wanted Postfix and that's a unique example of a paid for open source program, but can that be replicated over and over again? As far as the trillions of dollars argument goes, I strongly disagree. That is a number pulled out of thin air. I'm not saying do away with all copyrights. I'm simply saying, put a 1 decade time limit on software copyrights. If you can't make a profit on a copyrighted piece of software in 10 years time, it's not a very worthwhile piece of software. The 50 years idea is ludicrous. Copyrighting something beyond the lifetime of it's author and/or the owning company is also ludicrous. The trouble is, the current copyright regime in the U.S. and around the world creates permanent monopolies. Question, why hate ReactOS? ReactOS is simply an attempt to make an open source Windows NT compatible operating system. Can you prove that it's better to just develop WINE further? Do you know how to get more software producing companies to write for Linux? If the software, like Rick Rocket for example, is proprietary, does it really make any difference that it's written for Linux instead of Windows? Seems to me that any copyrighted software creates major headaches for the public. I'm not just one person who is interested in old games and other old programs. Many people are interested in old software of various types. New computers may be cheaper than they have been historically, but they are still expensive and not everyone wants to put up with the latest DRM and other crap in Vista. For all the time Vista has been out, a lot of people are either sticking with XP or going to Ubuntu. If the retroactive part would be too much, I don't think it would be, non retroactive reforms could be pursued. Windows Vista if a 1 decade time limit were imposed today would still be copyrighted. Windows XP which came out in 2002 would still be copyrighted. Windows 2000 would still be copyrighted. However, all versions of Windows prior to Windows 2000 would not be copyrighted. Microsoft could still sell Vista and in the not too distant future Windows 7, though they might have to compete with older versions of Windows which someone else could pick up and develop. There is supposed to be some competition. For the majority of software programs today, you simply have to run either Mac OS X or Windows XP/Vista. There are a lot of programs for Linux, but few programs are designed for Linux relatively speaking. Go to the local convenience store, where is the Linux software? Where is the Linux compatible hardware? A lot of hardware will work with Linux, but my I/OMAGIC USB2 DVD Writer for example doesn't. Saying that people who are interested in old software that is not freeware are pirates is harsh. Built in obsolence is a nasty and cruel practice. It creates a lot of junk as people go out and buy new computers every 3-5 years. A software pirate to me is someone who goes after a program that a company is still making money on and tries to sell copies of it without paying for them. There is some evidence that software piracy makes the author of the software more money in the long run if the price for a legal copy is reasonable. _______________________________________________ PLUG mailing list [email protected] http://lists.pdxlinux.org/mailman/listinfo/plug
