RE: Vengeance Against Adobe
Declan McCullagh wrote: Here's a prediction: This case will never come close to generating the same amount of publicity, by at least two orders of magnitude. Folks on the Net have a bad habit of overemphasizing how important these cases are. This is not important to the people in DC who count. I couldn't agree with you more, nevertheless my point still stands that disincentives do exist and the Federal Baby Incinerators don't need yet another incrementally damaging error on their rap sheet. S a n d y
Re: Vengeance Against Adobe
At 11:47 PM -0500 7/23/01, [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: On Mon, 23 Jul 2001, Tim May wrote: Adobe will be suffering for a long time to come. While it is a consummation devoutly to be wished, I predict that the backlash will be gone in a mere matter of weeks, if not days. Let's face it: the people most likely to be Adobe *customers* are anything but hungry. A fat customer is an apathetic customer... Let us also be honest and admit that the very people Adobe products target are also the least likely to understand this whole thing, and often even less likely to care--or if they do, they might even agree with Adobe. After all, they are (mostly) content producers (Illustrator, Photoshop etc) who have intellectual property interests themselves. Let's face it, many if not most of the Free Software types are going to use The Gimp over Photoshop. kIllustrator over Illustrator, and well, I don't know what they'll use in place of Pagemaker, but I'd be happy to find out.
Re: Vengeance Against Adobe
Here's a prediction: This case will never come close to generating the same amount of publicity, by at least two orders of magnitude. Folks on the Net have a bad habit of overemphasizing how important these cases are. This is not important to the people in DC who count. It has never been mentioned in the WSJ, the Washington Post, the Washington Times. Even the SJMN -- the hometown paper! -- has been running largely wire copy in its news coverage. I did a quick L/N search and the only network/cable TV coverage seems to have been a brief mention on CNN. Compare that to the kind of publicity the other two cases received, and there's no contest. Face it: The DMCA was designed to punish precisely what Elcomsoft was doing. There's no comparison between that and WHL or RJ. -Declan On Mon, Jul 23, 2001 at 10:00:30PM -0700, Sandy Sandfort wrote: Declan McCullagh wrote: But the Feds won't back down as readily as Adobe, I wager. They don't have to worry about what programmers think, they don't have to worry about what Wall Street thinks (at least DOJ doesn't), they don't have to worry about slipping revenue in a soft economy and users turning to non-Adobe tools. In short, they have a different incentive structure... True, it may be different, but it is an incentive structure (or, more accurately, a disincentive structure). For example, I don't thing the Federal Baby Incinerators really want to create another Wen Ho Lee or Richard Jewel fiasco. They already have enough egg on their face. S a n d y
RE: Vengeance Against Adobe
J.A. Terranson wrote: Do you *honestly* think they [Federal Baby Incinerators] give a shit? Are you really *that* naive? Yeah, guess so. I think the Feebs really don't like to get called on the carpet. Their power and privilege are at stake. Of course they don't want that threatened. Do you *honestly* think they want to see their prerogatives reduced? I don't. S a n d y
Re: Vengeance Against Adobe
Right. The organizing tools available to activists nowadays are substantial. Free software including email-to-web gateways like mhonarc, front ends based on Slash, mailing lists running majordomo or mailman, back ends based on MySQL, launch-and-forget websites running Linux and Slash -- all these allow programmer-activists to launch online campaigns in minutes. But the Feds won't back down as readily as Adobe, I wager. They don't have to worry about what programmers think, they don't have to worry about what Wall Street thinks (at least DOJ doesn't), they don't have to worry about slipping revenue in a soft economy and users turning to non-Adobe tools. In short, they have a different incentive structure and it's one where programmer-types are much less influential. Sklyarov is still in jail, and not one legislator has called for a repeal of the DMCA (one, perhaps, has criticized it mildly). In my Wired article that will appear tomorrow, I write: That leaves the Free-Dmitry contingent wary of celebrating -- and free to target the U.S. government, which may not back down to pressure from irate programmers as quickly as a firm that's based in the heart of Silicon Valley. At least there's one consolation for Adobe: They're no alone, and can take a proud if somewhat humbled seat next to Intel and Microsoft. :) -Declan On Mon, Jul 23, 2001 at 09:26:31PM -0700, Tim May wrote: Something's that interesting is the _speed_ and _strength_ of the reactions against companies when they cross some line. Adobe's use of police state measures to have a minor critic (by their own later admission) yanked out of a conference is not likely to be forgotten quickly. I expect this will have consequences when they eventually resume college recruiting. Adobe will likely face sneers and derisive laughter when it shows up on college campuses next spring to recruit. My old employer, Intel, has also caught the wrath of the community a couple of times. Notably when they briefly tried to add a processor I.D. They retreated, though Microsoft was not deterred a few years later from planning their own registration features. (This system has a different printer attached to it than when it was Officially Registered with the Borg Mothership. We have concluded that you are a possible software pirate. Windows XP, Microsoft Office, Outlook Express, and Internet Explorer have been disabled. Contact our office during normal business hours and attempt to explain why we should reauthorize you. Have a Microsoft day!) Like Niven's flash crowd effect, the slash dot, mailing list, and online news services are making the anger of the users a terrible swift sword. Adobe became a pariah in a matter of days. Adobe will be suffering for a long time to come. (Note to our FBI monitors: This is NOT a threat against Adobe. Note to Cypherpunks: With feebs like the Feebs out there, one can never assume that ordinary figures of speech will be understood.) --Tim May -- Timothy C. May [EMAIL PROTECTED]Corralitos, California Political: Co-founder Cypherpunks/crypto anarchy/Cyphernomicon Technical: physics/soft errors/Smalltalk/Squeak/agents/games/Go Personal: b.1951/UCSB/Intel '74-'86/retired/investor/motorcycles/guns
RE: Vengeance Against Adobe
On Mon, 23 Jul 2001, Reese wrote: At 07:34 PM 7/23/01, [EMAIL PROTECTED] (aka J.A. Terranson wrote: To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] cc: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Why do you send to two lists? Why do you care? Fuck off Reese. -- Yours, J.A. Terranson [EMAIL PROTECTED] If Governments really want us to behave like civilized human beings, they should give serious consideration towards setting a better example: Ruling by force, rather than consensus; the unrestrained application of unjust laws (which the victim-populations were never allowed input on in the first place); the State policy of justice only for the rich and elected; the intentional abuse and occassionally destruction of entire populations merely to distract an already apathetic and numb electorate... This type of demogoguery must surely wipe out the fascist United States as surely as it wiped out the fascist Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. The views expressed here are mine, and NOT those of my employers, associates, or others. Besides, if it *were* the opinion of all of those people, I doubt there would be a problem to bitch about in the first place...
Re: Vengeance Against Adobe
At 11:03 AM -0700 7/24/01, Ray Dillinger wrote: On Mon, 23 Jul 2001 [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: While it is a consummation devoutly to be wished, I predict that the backlash will be gone in a mere matter of weeks, if not days. Let's face it: the people most likely to be Adobe *customers* are anything but hungry. A fat customer is an apathetic customer... It would take a *lot* to alienate Adobe's customers on a substantial enough basis to affect Adobe. Most of them probably haven't even heard about this debacle and if they did, wouldn't care. But Adobe has one other check on its behavior -- it lives in the valley and *HAS TO* attract really bright geeks to work there. Really bright geeks have probably heard about this and are angry about it. This will hurt them in recruiting, and (unconfirmed rumor) maybe it has already cost them somebody they can't replace. This, by the way, was exactly what I said in my articles: that Adobe's ability to _recruit_ will be affected by this P.R. black eye. Someone mutated the point into a claim that Adobe's product sales would be affected, which is doubtful. --Tim May -- Timothy C. May [EMAIL PROTECTED]Corralitos, California Political: Co-founder Cypherpunks/crypto anarchy/Cyphernomicon Technical: physics/soft errors/Smalltalk/Squeak/agents/games/Go Personal: b.1951/UCSB/Intel '74-'86/retired/investor/motorcycles/guns
Re: Vengeance Against Adobe
At 9:56 PM -0700 7/23/01, Eric Cordian wrote: Tim writes: Adobe's use of police state measures to have a minor critic (by their own later admission) yanked out of a conference is not likely to be forgotten quickly. I expect this will have consequences when they eventually resume college recruiting. Adobe will likely face sneers and derisive laughter when it shows up on college campuses next spring to recruit. Adobe's pulling back on Dmitry doesn't change the fact that the company lied in saying what was being distributed was copyrighted Adobe software. Despite the EFF's effusive praise of Adobe, I don't plan to use any Adobe software in the future. Is there a workable freeware alternative to Distiller?
Re: Vengeance Against Adobe
At 1:58 AM -0700 7/24/01, Petro wrote: At 11:47 PM -0500 7/23/01, [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: On Mon, 23 Jul 2001, Tim May wrote: Adobe will be suffering for a long time to come. While it is a consummation devoutly to be wished, I predict that the backlash will be gone in a mere matter of weeks, if not days. Let's face it: the people most likely to be Adobe *customers* are anything but hungry. A fat customer is an apathetic customer... Let us also be honest and admit that the very people Adobe products target are also the least likely to understand this whole thing, and often even less likely to care--or if they do, they might even agree with Adobe. Let me be clear about something: I wasn't predicting a significant boycott against Adobe products. Most corporate purchasers pick their tools based on what they need, not based on ideology. If they need InDesign or Photoshop, that's what they'll buy. My comments were about Adobe's _recruiting_ efforts. I expect lingering effects of this episode to affect their ability to recruit. I stand by that prediction. --Tim May -- Timothy C. May [EMAIL PROTECTED]Corralitos, California Political: Co-founder Cypherpunks/crypto anarchy/Cyphernomicon Technical: physics/soft errors/Smalltalk/Squeak/agents/games/Go Personal: b.1951/UCSB/Intel '74-'86/retired/investor/motorcycles/guns
RE: Vengeance Against Adobe
Anybody know how much grease Adobe has in Russia? ~Aimee
Re: Vengeance Against Adobe
At 10:21 PM + 7/24/01, Dr. Evil wrote: Photoshop? We have the gimp. Illustrator? We have Kontour. These products are all as good as or better than the competing Adobe products, and they're all free. I won't argue about Kontour, since I haven't used it yet, but xpdf still doesn't render was well as Acrobat, and there is no *WAY* the Gimp, as good as it is, can compete in Photoshops markets. It may be nice for dinking around with web pages, but when it comes to pantone color and process color work, well, last time I checked, it didn't do 4-color at all, much less High Color (6 color process).
Re: Vengeance Against Adobe
I know of people who refuse to buy Intel-based machines on principle. Some are Sun users, some are Mac users, some think they are bypassing Intel by using AMD Athlons. Yes, I'm one. AMD all the way. Anyway, it's cheaper and has better performance. And the anti-Microsoft efforts are legendary. Alternative OSes, Star Office, etc. If some people will go to these lengths to avoid MS products, imagine the programmers they are missing out on. (I understand that there are still tens of thousands who work for MS. The interesting regime is at the margins, in the five sigmas zone.) Yes, I'm one. Linux or *BSD. It's cheaper and better than Windows. I admit that MS Office is the best office suite around, but I'm doing ok with Star Office and Koffice. Konqueror is a better browser than IE, too. Adobe products are much more replacable than MS products. Acroread? We have xpdf and some others. PS interpreter? We have gs. Photoshop? We have the gimp. Illustrator? We have Kontour. These products are all as good as or better than the competing Adobe products, and they're all free. They can all be modified in any way I need. xpdf and gs can be patched to ignore encryption (although I guess that's a felony now). Now, lets see, what did we need Adobe for again? I can't think of anything! (This, and fears that Adobe salesmen and engineers may be arrested for violating _Russian_ laws, e.g., the European laws (I have read about) that make it a crime to sell a software product which cannot be backed-up. And if not this law, they may find something else to arrest and Adobe person for. Trading cards. Adobe escalated the war. Now Adobe realizes what can of worms they have opened.) I would imagine that Dmitri has the typical geeky programmer personality (ok, making very broad stereotypes here), which tends more towards playful than vicious... but what if he doesn't? What if he is vicious, vengeful and irrational? Russia is quite a violent place. Adobe's people in Russia could be in a lot of danger from this. I hope not, because violence is bad and the people to blame are probably a few lawyers and executives and some FBI agents and a lot of legislators, none of whom are in Russia, but people act irrationally sometimes.
Re: Vengeance Against Adobe
Tim wrote: Likewise, I know of even some Cypherpunks who have left their employers for ideological reasons. And if some have _left_ jobs, the effects are likely greater on the _recruiting_ side (where the costs of a decision are much less). Absolutely. More than that, I try to never take a job unless I'd be willing to do it for free. All free-market principles aside, if you're just in it for the paycheck, what's the point? I'd rather do something I love that's meaningful to me than just make a pile. Even better not to have to choose at all. (Not there yet, so #1 it is...) This won't be too interesting to all the venerable greybeards out there, but you'd be surprised what kind of work you can end up with by taking an unpaid volunteer internship first. If there aren't any available, find someone to talk to, create a work plan and propose one yourself. If you can scrape by, trading your free labor for experience isn't always a bad bargain...it's worked for me more than once, and I sometimes I eventually ended up on the payroll. And I know I never would have got where I am without building up my resume that way. Also, even if you find yourself unemployed or stuck in a 9 to 5 rut, sitting in on college classes to gain skills (programming, networking, higher math etc.) gets you experience that'll move you toward doing more of what you want. Most professors aren't too uptight about letting you sit in for free, it's probably a refreshing change to teach somebody who's there because they want to be. That's my two cents, anyway... Has anyone ever been in the position of turning down work because you didn't want to apply for clearance? I seem to remember some people here saying they already have it, was it a hard decision for you? I don't really have a problem with the idea of facing a background check (though I don't imagine anyone looks forward to it), it's the pre-publication review board requirement that bothers me. ~Faustine.
RE: Vengeance Against Adobe
Faustine wrote: All free-market principles aside, if you're just in it for the paycheck, what's the point? I'd rather do something I love that's meaningful to me than just make a pile. Even better not to have to choose at all. (Not there yet, so #1 it is...) Have faith. I think that you can have both in a manner analogous to the Robert Heinlein quote: It may be better to be a live jackal then a dead lion, but it is better still to be a live lion. And usually easier. S a n d y
RE: Vengeance Against Adobe
Declan McCullagh wrote: But the Feds won't back down as readily as Adobe, I wager. They don't have to worry about what programmers think, they don't have to worry about what Wall Street thinks (at least DOJ doesn't), they don't have to worry about slipping revenue in a soft economy and users turning to non-Adobe tools. In short, they have a different incentive structure... True, it may be different, but it is an incentive structure (or, more accurately, a disincentive structure). For example, I don't thing the Federal Baby Incinerators really want to create another Wen Ho Lee or Richard Jewel fiasco. They already have enough egg on their face. S a n d y
Re: Vengeance Against Adobe
On Monday, July 23, 2001, at 11:05 PM, Declan McCullagh wrote: True. And I'll agree with you, this time -- I think the Feds will, in the end, drop this case, if the protests continue. And I'll bet the Feds drop it because their corporate backer, Adobe, has abandoned them. They don't like to be left twisting slowly in the wind. And the more Adobe now tries to spin their role, the more the Feds are left twisting. The AG will likely say Fuck that noise (in his own Christian lingo) and the case will quietly go away. BTW, I certainly have never argued the case would receive even 1% of the attention the Wen Ho Lee or Richard Jewel cases got. But it seems to be getting about the same level of attention that Intel's processor ID proposal got (modulo differences in the issues). The more lasting effect is not what Joe and Alice Sixpack think of Adobe (Huh?), but how it energizes parts of the hacker community. A bunch of hackers are now likely to expand the cracking of Adobe's ebooks by leaps and bounds. It'll be a badge of honor --Tim May
Re: CDR: RE: Vengeance Against Adobe
On Mon, 23 Jul 2001, Sandy Sandfort wrote: I couldn't agree with you more, nevertheless my point still stands that disincentives do exist and the Federal Baby Incinerators don't need yet another incrementally damaging error on their rap sheet. Do you *honestly* think they give a shit? Are you really *that* naive? S a n d y -- Yours, J.A. Terranson [EMAIL PROTECTED] If Governments really want us to behave like civilized human beings, they should give serious consideration towards setting a better example: Ruling by force, rather than consensus; the unrestrained application of unjust laws (which the victim-populations were never allowed input on in the first place); the State policy of justice only for the rich and elected; the intentional abuse and occassionally destruction of entire populations merely to distract an already apathetic and numb electorate... This type of demogoguery must surely wipe out the fascist United States as surely as it wiped out the fascist Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. The views expressed here are mine, and NOT those of my employers, associates, or others. Besides, if it *were* the opinion of all of those people, I doubt there would be a problem to bitch about in the first place...
Re: Vengeance Against Adobe
True. And I'll agree with you, this time -- I think the Feds will, in the end, drop this case, if the protests continue. -Declan On Mon, Jul 23, 2001 at 10:23:10PM -0700, Sandy Sandfort wrote: Declan McCullagh wrote: Here's a prediction: This case will never come close to generating the same amount of publicity, by at least two orders of magnitude. Folks on the Net have a bad habit of overemphasizing how important these cases are. This is not important to the people in DC who count. I couldn't agree with you more, nevertheless my point still stands that disincentives do exist and the Federal Baby Incinerators don't need yet another incrementally damaging error on their rap sheet. S a n d y
Re: Re: Vengeance Against Adobe
On 07/23/2001 - 23:55, Tim May wrote: On Monday, July 23, 2001, at 11:05 PM, Declan McCullagh wrote True. And I'll agree with you, this time -- I think the Feds will, in the end, drop this case, if the protests continue. And I'll bet the Feds drop it because their corporate backer, Adobe, has abandoned them. They don't like to be left twisting slowly in the wind. And the more Adobe now tries to spin their role, the more the Feds are left twisting. The Feds may be in a maze of twisty little press releases, all different, but if they drop it, I'd bet it's not Adobe 'abandoning them, but Adobe *asking* them to drop it, quietly in the back room, trying to stop bad PR against Adobe. It doesn't really bother the Feds - they can get credit for being responsive to urgent requests, they've gotten publicity for busting yet another hacker copyright thief, and they don't have to take any heat for backing down because they can spin it all as Adobe's Dropping Charges. If they *do* continue, it's because they're getting pressure from other DMCA pushers - they'll need to do a bit more spin, but they can handle it, and most of the people who would object already didn't respect them. Won't bother their public image much. My guess - a couple more days in custody, and they kick him out of the US. X-Authenticated-User: idiom ~~~ Thanks; Bill Stewart [EMAIL PROTECTED]
