Linux-Advocacy Digest #292, Volume #27 Fri, 23 Jun 00 22:13:04 EDT
Contents:
Re: Why Jeff Szarka Has Zero Credibility When He Claims Problems With Linux (Terry
Porter)
Re: Microsoft Ruling Too Harsh ("Joseph T. Adams")
Re: Microsoft Ruling Too Harsh (Bob Hauck)
Re: Microsoft Ruling Too Harsh (Leslie Mikesell)
Re: Claims of Windows supporting old applications are reflecting reality or
fantasy? (John Wiltshire)
Re: Claims of Windows supporting old applications are reflecting reality or fantasy?
(John Wiltshire)
Re: Claims of Windows supporting old applications are reflecting reality or fantasy?
(John Wiltshire)
Re: What UNIX is good for. (Charles Philip Chan)
Re: Wintrolls in panic! (Charles Philip Chan)
Re: Claims of Windows supporting old applications are reflecting reality or fantasy?
(John Wiltshire)
Re: What UNIX is good for. (void)
Re: Claims of Windows supporting old applications are reflecting reality or fantasy?
(John Wiltshire)
Re: Anti-Human Libertarians Oppose Microsoft Antitrust Action (was: Microsoft Ruling
Too Harsh (Mark S. Bilk)
beowulf commercial market share (Oliver Baker)
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] (Terry Porter)
Subject: Re: Why Jeff Szarka Has Zero Credibility When He Claims Problems With Linux
Reply-To: No-Spam
Date: 24 Jun 2000 08:23:23 +0800
On Thu, 22 Jun 2000 20:57:57 -0400, Jeff Szarka <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
>On 23 Jun 2000 08:17:06 +0800, [EMAIL PROTECTED] (Terry
>Porter) wrote:
>
>>>"hangup on install, scsi problem?"
>>Did you email them, and find out what they did ?
>
>I don't care what they did. Mandrake 7 would not install on my system
>unless I used the expert install mode. This data makes it clear... you
>must be an expert to install Linux.
Well that must make my 17 year old son a "expert".
Kind Regards
Terry
--
**** To reach me, use [EMAIL PROTECTED] ****
My Desktop is powered by GNU/Linux, and has been
up 1 week 3 days 13 hours 53 minutes
** Registration Number: 103931, http://counter.li.org **
------------------------------
From: "Joseph T. Adams" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Crossposted-To:
alt.fan.rush-limbaugh,misc.legal,talk.politics.misc,alt.politics.libertarian,talk.politics.libertarian,alt.politics.economics
Subject: Re: Microsoft Ruling Too Harsh
Date: 24 Jun 2000 00:28:51 GMT
In comp.os.linux.advocacy Henry Blaskowski <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
: In talk.politics.libertarian Joseph T. Adams <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
:> I will concede that many other large corporations in the U.S. as well
:> as the government itself practice fraud with impunity; however, the
:> wrongful actions of one entity do not justify those of another.
: So do you think that business in the US should just be shut down,
: destroying the economy? Because that is the result of a fair
: implementation of the policy that is being used to harass MS.
No. They should be required however to obey the laws against fraud
and coercion, and punished in some manner if they do not.
Joe
------------------------------
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] (Bob Hauck)
Crossposted-To:
alt.fan.rush-limbaugh,misc.legal,talk.politics.misc,alt.politics.libertarian,talk.politics.libertarian,alt.politics.economics
Subject: Re: Microsoft Ruling Too Harsh
Reply-To: bobh{at}haucks{dot}org
Date: Sat, 24 Jun 2000 00:49:36 GMT
On 23 Jun 2000 18:39:14 GMT, Henry Blaskowski
<[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
>In talk.politics.libertarian Bob Hauck <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
wrote:
>Business AND government are driven by special interests. The
>difference is that the government makes 260,000,000 people pay
>for their special interests, whereas businesses only make customers
>pay for theirs.
There are different types of government you know, and which kind we are
talking about greatly affects the validity of your argument.
In theory, the governments of the "western democracies" as they are
called are responsible to the voters who elected them. That it isn't
working quite that way in the US at the moment is something to be
fixed, not an invalidation of the idea of representative government.
>> But the author has not really proven that the decisions were bad.
>
>At this point, there is enough history of gov't intervention into
>free markets to conclude that interference=bad,
Really? It must really suck to live in Scandinavia then. Except by
all accounts it doesn't. Most of the Pacific Rim governments have been
very interventionist and until fairly recently they were held up as
models of capitalist success. I can think of other examples if you
want to play that game.
In short, I don't think you have an open-and-shut case here.
>The more power government has to interfere in private consensual
>contract, the weaker the economy. That consistent history should place
>a heavy burden of proof on the government; they didn't come close in
>this case.
The problem I have with this argument is that it presupposes that the
only determiner of quality of life and the only worthy goal of
government is the "health of the economy". Which is usually defined to
mean the economic health of the capitalists rather than that of
everyone else. I don't buy that. The health of the economy is 1) only
one item of interest in determining quality of life; and 2) not solely
determined by the wealth of business owners.
>> I am not one who believes that coercion is only enabled by threats of
>> violence.
>Me too (to this last sentence), which is why I am opposed to the
>ongoing harrassment of MS.
[quoted last sentence above]
So anything goes as long as we don't use guns or bats? I'm afraid I
don't agree, as that would allow blackmail and extortion as legitimate
business tactics. We'd have to abolish the usury laws and just let the
loan sharks prey on the poor. And so on. No, I don't agree.
>By "true", I mean "not having competitors", which is the only
>meaningful definition of the word.
That's certainly arguable. Your favorite school of economics holds
that to be true, but others don't. I don't believe that the question
has been settled with certainty.
>> I find it hard to believe that a situation of one Goliath and eight
>> dwarves is healthy and won't lead to consumer harm at some point. But
>> that wasn't my point.
>
>But if the Goliath starts to hurt consumers, those other five will
>quickly step in and take market share.
You're using the strawman argument that the monopoly will raise prices
to the stratosphere. That won't be the case in general, in that you
are correct. That doesn't mean the situation is optimal or that
consumers are not paying more than they should be or would be if there
were more effective competition. That does not mean that the dominant
supplier is not using unethical tactics to keep out new market
entrants.
>Well, I don't think you could *ever* prove a case like this, so
>I'd have to agree.
Maybe not, but the reasoning could be a lot more coherent. The article
wasn't even good position advocacy. Arguing that "government is bad"
based on the premise that "government is bad" isn't very impressive.
>but I think he provides a plausible case; certainly more plausible
>than the belief that, without gov't interference, Torvald would
>just give up on Linux and pull it off the internet and everywhere,
Don't you find it interesting that no competitor made a dent in MS
market share until someone gave it away for free? We're back to the
argument that all competitors were stupid. The problem is that MS did
plenty of stuipid things too, yet they prospered.
If the competitor has to do everything perfectly for a period of years
even just to get a toehold, then I think a case can be made that the
market isn't working in a manner that is beneficial to society.
I think we'll just have to agree to disagree on this one. I once
thought I wanted to be a mondo-capitalist libertarian, but I changed my
mind. Which is why I'm posting in comp.os.linux.advocacy and not in
Rush Limbaugh's fan group or the other places this is crossposted to.
--
-| Bob Hauck
-| To Whom You Are Speaking
-| http://www.bobh.org/
------------------------------
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] (Leslie Mikesell)
Crossposted-To:
alt.fan.rush-limbaugh,misc.legal,talk.politics.misc,alt.politics.libertarian,talk.politics.libertarian,alt.politics.economics
Subject: Re: Microsoft Ruling Too Harsh
Date: 23 Jun 2000 20:28:40 -0500
In article <8j0sp7$1jti$[EMAIL PROTECTED]>,
Henry Blaskowski <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
>In talk.politics.libertarian Leslie Mikesell <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
>>>Because you still have the same choices you did as
>>>if MS didn't exist: you can buy a Mac, you can search out a
>>>dealer that will sell you a machine with an unformatted drive,
>>>you can buy a Sun workstation, or you can go without a computer.
>
>> Why should you have to 'search out' a low volume dealer to
>> avoid paying for a software bundle?
>
>Are you going to claim that there is no other product that has a
>main product sold in the chains, and competitors sold in out of
>the way places? Shall they be prosecuted, too?
Yes, if there are other products using monopoly force to demand
bundling with outher products whether it is wanted or not, of
course they should be prosecuted.
Les Mikesell
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
------------------------------
From: John Wiltshire <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Crossposted-To: comp.os.ms-windows.advocacy,comp.os.ms-windows.nt.advocacy
Subject: Re: Claims of Windows supporting old applications are reflecting reality or
fantasy?
Date: Sat, 24 Jun 2000 01:42:29 GMT
On 22 Jun 2000 18:14:20 GMT,
[EMAIL PROTECTED] (Darren Winsper)
wrote:
>On Thu, 22 Jun 2000 08:41:07 GMT, John Wiltshire <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
>> On Wed, 21 Jun 2000 23:10:32 -0400, "Colin R. Day"
>> <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
>
>> >Ask Microsoft. From my EULA:
>> >
>> >Single COMPUTER: The SOFTWARE PRODUCT is licensed with the
>> >COMPUTER as a single integrated product. The SOFTWARE PRODUCT
>> >may only be used with the COMPUTER.
>>
>> That's sufficiently vague to mean about anything. Guess it depends on
>> who has the best lawyers. :-)
>
>I can't really say what MS mean, but I can take a guess. You can buy
>an OEM version of Windows with a motherboard IIRC. Also, from what I
>hear the new Windows "image" CDs OEMs now have to use are tied to a
>particular BIOS.
>
>Those two items seem to indicate that as far as a definition goes, I'd
>say the computer can be defined as the motherboard. If you buy a
>non-OEM version of Windows, I imagine it means only on one system at a
>time.
That sucks. Hope they cop hell on tech support lines when people go
to upgrade their CPU/Motherboard and want their "image" to work.
John Wiltshire
------------------------------
From: John Wiltshire <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Crossposted-To: comp.os.ms-windows.advocacy,comp.os.ms-windows.nt.advocacy
Subject: Re: Claims of Windows supporting old applications are reflecting reality or
fantasy?
Date: Sat, 24 Jun 2000 01:43:32 GMT
On Fri, 23 Jun 2000 16:27:56 +0200, [EMAIL PROTECTED] (Matthias Warkus)
wrote:
>It was the Wed, 21 Jun 2000 10:04:14 GMT...
>...and John Wiltshire <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
>> Ever tried embedding a spreadsheet in a document by dragging
>> and dropping
>
>Why would anyone in their right mind want to do such a thing?
Because it makes sense in a desktop metaphor?
John Wiltshire
------------------------------
From: John Wiltshire <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Crossposted-To: comp.os.ms-windows.advocacy,comp.os.ms-windows.nt.advocacy
Subject: Re: Claims of Windows supporting old applications are reflecting reality or
fantasy?
Date: Sat, 24 Jun 2000 01:52:39 GMT
On Thu, 22 Jun 2000 21:45:02 GMT, Mathias Grimmberger
<[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
>I probably didn't make myself very clear. I meant I won't be impressed
>until it is real textmode. Although that would be more important for the
>"safe mode" option in the boot menu - so I could fix some damaged GDI
>file.
>
>Well, I have a separate rescue installation of NT on any machine I care
>about for that reason. It saved me at least once. And it is the reason I
>think W2K requiring at least 650 MB sucks.
>
>Booting from CD to try and fix a damaged system probably will do.
The CD does boot text mode (ie no GUI). The shell is pretty useless
though - about limited to copying files from CD and playing with
service startups.
>> >> Fortunately the GUI doesn't take up a lot of memory when not used.
>> >> 16k last time I looked.
>> >
>> >Ohh, usage of ressources is not the reason to not do it.
>> >
>> >Having a big hunk of additional code potentially executed is. It may
>> >have bugs endangering the stability of the machine. It may even have
>> >security holes.
>>
>> On a Microsoft product? In a GUI app? Never!!
>
>Hehehehe. I see. :-)
>
>> Point taken, but given the code should never be executed on a system
>> with any decent security, and that the GUI is local machine only it's
>> not that high on the list of bugs to watch out for.
>
>Hmm. RPCs? DCOM? In the future SOAP? What if the admin actually logs in
>at the console?
>
>The only harmless code is code that is not installed. Paranoia is
>mandatory when talking about security.
True. The whole GUI thing is silly. I use terminal server to admin
most machines - plug in console to watch bootup process occasionally.
>> >> Sound - because some server motherboards actually have sound on them?
>> >
>> >Just because the hardware is there shouldn't mean the drivers get
>> >automagically installed. Not on a server anyway (who would have speakers
>> >connected? :-).
>>
>> You don't have the sub woofer on the bottom of the rack? I think the
>> option is nice and no, you don't have to install the sound driver if
>> you don't want to.
>
>This is not that easy with W2Ks plug-and-pray. It didn't ask me about
>it.
I know. You just uninstall it again and choose 'disable' from the
device manager.
>> I guess it does make you happier now to see different kernels
>> (Pro/Server, Enterprise, Datacenter) turning up?
>
>No. It is however inevitable. At least there will be NT/32 and NT/64 for
>purely technical reasons. I have no idea what the differences between
>P/S, Enterprise and Datacenter are at the kernel level.
>From my understanding it's basically the memory tuning. P/S have a
2G/2G split (kernel/user). Enterprise is 1G/3G and can access 36 bits
of addressable memory on Intel machines through EMS like paging.
Datacenter I don't know much about, but seems to have all the
Enterprise stuff as well as lots of tuning for the boxes it is bundled
with. Not sure if you can get a 32 bit version of Datacenter.
>> >> Actually, they do. Generally you do this by taking a set of users
>> >> with similar experience and putting them in front of the system and
>> >> ask them to use it without manuals. MS, Apple and other major
>> >> companies do this a *lot*. Most Linux distros don't. It shows.
>> >
>> >Sure. But MS, Apple and the others AFAIK do not publish their criteria.
>> >Results they publish are tainted in any case. I have no idea what they
>> >actually think and do about usability.
>> >
>> >I only see that it seems to be strongly related to some sales droid's
>> >dreams and beginners. IOW must look flashy and try to guess what you may
>> >want to do. If it guesses wrong things get complicated.
>>
>> Yes. Read the UI guidelines for wizard design - if you don't use an
>> option 90% of the time it gets thrown out.
>
>Now that is braindead. Or I don't understand what "option" actually
>means.
Guess why I don't use wizards most of the time. It makes sense from a
GUI standpoint - hide the less frequently used things - but sometimes
it gets really annoying.
>> Some things like that annoy me so I just find other ways around, like
>> using the command prompt or scripting.
>
>Fear the day MS decides to revive MS Bob and make it the UI of their
>OSs. There will be no way to get a command prompt or script anything.
>:-(
>
>Maybe Apple will beat MS to it, in the name of ease of use.
I think the whole WSH thing is the MS answer to a command shell. On a
side note, found out how to run commands in subshells using cmd.exe,
and that parenthesis could be to mark blocks covering more that one
line. Am totally amazed at the complete lack of documentation for
that very useful feature. Suddenly my scripts look a whole lot less
complicated. :-)
John Wiltshire
------------------------------
Crossposted-To: comp.unix.advocacy
Subject: Re: What UNIX is good for.
From: Charles Philip Chan <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Date: 23 Jun 2000 20:39:11 +0500
>>>>> "Dave" == Dave Vandervies <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes:
> Editor, mail reader, news reader, web browser... Have they put
> in a compiler yet, or does it still call an external program for
> that?
There is the bite compiler for EMacs Lisp. There is also, I think,
actually a kitchensink.el ;-).
>> >>> Hey, I use and like them both. Can't we all just get
>> >>> along?
>> So do I, I use VIM for quicky jobs at the console.
> *ahem* This *is* an advocacy newsgroup, gentlemen; if you're
> going to agree, take it somewhere else. :)
Sorry, I think this is about the end of the thread.
Charles
------------------------------
Subject: Re: Wintrolls in panic!
From: Charles Philip Chan <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Date: 23 Jun 2000 21:08:46 +0500
>>>>> "Roy" == Roy Culley <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes:
> In article <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>,
> Charles Philip Chan <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
>> Seriously, I envy the Sun keyboard.
> Then get yourself one. I use a sun keyboard on my linux pc at
> home. A friend made the adapter box for it. There's a schematic
> for it on the web somewhere. If you are interested I'll drop you
> the email address of the guy that made it for me and he will
> tell you where it is. The sun keyboard is by far the best I have
> used. The 'Open' key is the best 'panic button' I know of. :-)
Please do! Also, who sells the keyboard?
Charles
------------------------------
From: John Wiltshire <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Crossposted-To: comp.os.ms-windows.advocacy,comp.os.ms-windows.nt.advocacy
Subject: Re: Claims of Windows supporting old applications are reflecting reality or
fantasy?
Date: Sat, 24 Jun 2000 02:04:31 GMT
On Thu, 22 Jun 2000 19:57:48 GMT, [EMAIL PROTECTED] () wrote in
comp.os.ms-windows.nt.advocacy:
>On 22 Jun 2000 16:04:49 GMT, James Lee <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
>>In comp.os.ms-windows.advocacy John Wiltshire <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
>[deletia]
>>> Not for the printer, unless you plan on printing continuously. The
>>> modem - maybe. Given the CPU is 99% idle most of the time, using 30%
>>> or so for the modem doesn't seem like too bad a tradeoff to me.
>>
>>The CPU may be 99% idle, but normally when it is printing something,
>>that is also the time that you are doing something useful. That is the
>>time when the printer takes away the cycle that you want. When you are
>>not doing anything useful, the printer is also often not being used,
>>unless you press print, and then walk away for coffee.
>>
>>> What evidence do you have that indicates a Winmodem or Winprinter blow
>>> out the CPU ability of your machine?
>
> The immediate CPU or Load Average isn't the real issue.
> That is the simplistic approach to the situation. What is
> more relevant is how well each part of the system can
> adequately provide services.
>
> Simply put: managing a print queue is not a realtime process,
> whereas intercommunciation between bits of hardware typically
> are.
Fair comment. Makes the concept of Winprinters acceptable
(specifications of protocol being a separate argument) but Winmodems
less appealing unless run as a real-time process.
John Wiltshire
------------------------------
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] (void)
Crossposted-To: comp.unix.advocacy
Subject: Re: What UNIX is good for.
Date: 24 Jun 2000 01:54:39 GMT
On 23 Jun 2000 15:20:26 -0500, Tim Palmer <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
>
>Look at the GNU Website. They dont use GIFs and they tell everyone to not use them
>iether and only for pollittical reasons.
Golly! They have *political* opinions? How weird! Someone should make
sure they watch more television and get a properly apathetic attitude.
--
Ben
220 go.ahead.make.my.day ESMTP Postfix
------------------------------
From: John Wiltshire <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Crossposted-To: comp.os.ms-windows.advocacy,comp.os.ms-windows.nt.advocacy
Subject: Re: Claims of Windows supporting old applications are reflecting reality or
fantasy?
Date: Sat, 24 Jun 2000 02:08:44 GMT
On 22 Jun 2000 16:04:49 GMT, James Lee <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote in
comp.os.ms-windows.nt.advocacy:
>In comp.os.ms-windows.advocacy John Wiltshire <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
>
>> Wrong. Printing through ghostscript means a conversion from GDI calls
>> to postscript and then running a postscript interpreter (ghostscript)
>> to create printer commands. Printing to a winprinter is just a
>> different conversion from GDI to printer commands instead of
>> postscript. Sure it is more resource intensive but not to the extent
>> you describe. Running ghostscript is actually going to be a lot more
>> expensive though strangely enough it is exactly what Unix systems do
>> as a general rule.
>
>The advent of postscript was very impt to the *nix world. It allowed a
>common page description language even if there are different printers.
>It allowed sharing of output files, even if you have different printers.
>It allows you to actually edit it.
>
>In much the same way that Tex/Latex uses a device independent file
>format. It is another layer, but it does abstracts away from the actual
>printer codes. From the dvi files, you can create postscript or pdf.
>
>The same can be said of file formats. Office products can't really be
>shared. StarOffice, Corel, etc had to reverse engineer the file formats
>in order to interoperate. On the other hand, if it were all in rtf or
>html, xml, then people can share common things.
Sure, I know all that. I'm just saying that printing does work in
software in the general case because it is too expensive to do it in
hardware. A printer that could print dvi files directly would be
great, but it's a lot cheaper to run in through Tex, Ghostscript and
out to a PCL5 printer in the general case.
>> Not for the printer, unless you plan on printing continuously. The
>> modem - maybe. Given the CPU is 99% idle most of the time, using 30%
>> or so for the modem doesn't seem like too bad a tradeoff to me.
>
>The CPU may be 99% idle, but normally when it is printing something,
>that is also the time that you are doing something useful. That is the
>time when the printer takes away the cycle that you want. When you are
>not doing anything useful, the printer is also often not being used,
>unless you press print, and then walk away for coffee.
Actually, most people print and then wait for the printer to finish.
Usually when you print something you actually want to do something
with the output. I'm not saying this is always the case, but it's
usually the trigger that makes you print in the first place. If you
are waiting for the printout then you aren't using the CPU.
>> What evidence do you have that indicates a Winmodem or Winprinter blow
>> out the CPU ability of your machine?
>
>The winmodem, yes. I don't have a winprinter, so I don't know.
>But under Win98, every time the modem connects, my mouse cursor freeze
>for about 2 seconds before moving. I have a 380MHz processor.
I figured Winmodems were definitely the worse of the two. What is the
Winmodem like when you are actually connected? It must freeze the
mouse because of some timing issue in the connect?
John Wiltshire
------------------------------
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] (Mark S. Bilk)
Crossposted-To:
alt.fan.rush-limbaugh,misc.legal,talk.politics.misc,alt.politics.libertarian,talk.politics.libertarian,alt.politics.economics,alt.society.liberalism
Subject: Re: Anti-Human Libertarians Oppose Microsoft Antitrust Action (was: Microsoft
Ruling Too Harsh
Date: 24 Jun 2000 02:06:13 GMT
In article <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>, <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
>On 22 Jun 2000 20:51:39 GMT, [EMAIL PROTECTED] (Mark S. Bilk) wrote:
>>>Equality requires slavery.
>>
>>Right-wing Libertarian bullshit. It's slavery to rob
>>employees of a large portion of the value they produce, and
>>thus pay them low salaries, while the wealthy owners and
>>executives are paid 1,000 or 500,000 times as much, for
>>the same number of hours work per day. Yet the alleged
>>"right" of business owners to do this is the central policy
>>of Libertarianism.
Also the policy of opposing public education, housing, and
healthcare; people are just supposed to do without these
things, and if they die, the Libertarians don't care. They
also oppose laws regulating business to provide environmental,
worker, and consumer protection. The only remedy they permit
is lawsuits after the fact, which are expensive, slow, and
permit lots of people to be injured and killed.
>>That's why Libertarianism is anti-human.
>>
>>Belief in Libertarianism requires turning a blind eye to
>>the factual evidence of harm caused by grossly unequal
>>distribution of wealth among people who all work hard.
>>
>>The *actual result* of this maldistribution of wealth is
>>starvation, sickness, and death for many poor people under
>>Capitalism.
>>
>>unregulated Capitalism is worse for people economically
>>than Communism. Both of these systems are coercive and
>>cruel. Social Democracy is much better.
http://www.deja.com/=dnc/[ST_rn=ps]/getdoc.xp?AN=618537352
>The trouble with Social Democracy is that it doesn't put enough value on
>individual freedom. No matter what social and/or political system we adopt,
>individual freedom should be its highest priority.
No, the highest priority should be for everyone to live
well and successfully, *and* to have the maximum amount of
individual freedom consistent with that. This is a very
complex goal, which turns out to require a complex, well
thought-out set of laws, many of which have to be created
on an ad hoc basis.
Actual reality is too complex for people to be well served
by giving one principle absolute priority over all others.
Libertarians, especially the Ayn Rand sect, the so-called
"Objectivists" (who are anything but), attack Liberal poli-
cies on the grounds that they can't be derived by logical
reasoning from such axioms as "Existence exists". (They
derive their own policies this way by very selective
"reasoning".)
In reality, many policies simply have to be instituted on
the basis of the current situation. For example, regula-
tions requiring smog suppressors on automobiles, and anti-
smog additives in gasoline, are required to keep air
pollution down to non-lethal levels. There's just no
other way to do it that doesn't restrict freedom at least
as much.
If individual freedom were given priority over every other
principle, such regulations would be impossible to have,
and we'd be dying like flies. The same applies to public
health, and food safety regulations, along with the taxation
that supports them.
>That was the original
>goal of the Libertarian party, before they aligned themselves with big
>business. Someone should start a new Libertarian party to focus on
>individual freedom. Or infiltrate the present Libertarian party to take it
>away from the big-business faction and restore its original purpose.
Are you sure it ever used to be different? As far as I can
remember, for the last 35 years or so, Libertarians have been
blindly justifying all anti-human business practices, and
blindly opposing all pro-human functions of government (unless
you count police, courts, and the military), and completely
ignoring the actual consequences of their positions. For
example, they've steadfastly supported the tobacco industry,
and opposed any moves to restrict their advertising, or the
use of their products, or even the requiring of no-smoking
sections in restaurants. This has been going on for decades.
500,000 people per year murdered for profit, most induced
to use tobacco as teenagers by totally fraudulent advertising
showing smokers having fun with sexy companions, often in
outdoor settings.
On the plus side, the LP still favors legalizing sex and
drugs, which is very important. Maybe they'll help to even-
tually stop the "war on (some) drugs", the laws against
prostitution, and similar attacks on people for victimless
"crimes" that violate *religious* doctrines against pleasure.
But their economic policies are for the most part going in
the wrong direction, and, as far as I can remember, always
have been.
Links To Reality
http://www.aliveness.com/msb.html
------------------------------
From: Oliver Baker <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Reply-To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Subject: beowulf commercial market share
Date: Sat, 24 Jun 2000 02:07:06 GMT
My guess is that it's hard to define a precise market for Beowulfs,
since my impression is they are not for every application that people
have traditionally used big computers for, but...
Does anybody know an authoritative or at least credible source I can go
to to find out what market share these clusters may have grabbed--in
particular pentium-PC-based clusters? (though I won't be picky).
I'd also like to know stats or just know of examples of private-sector
Beowulfs--let's say of at least 100 CPUs or more. (I know Google says it
has a 4000 cpu linux cluster, but that's practically the only one I've
heard of so far)
I'm writing <sigh> yet another of those alleged oodles of media stories
on Linux. I usually prefer to write news.
__________________________________________________
Oliver Baker
__________________________________________________
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