Archive for May, 2005

Apple’s treachery

Sunday, May 1st, 2005

Apple continuously boasts on its web site how so
much of OS X and its software apps are based on open source
software.  Safari is their poster-child for oss.  I'm not
entirely sure why they repeatedly mention it.  Perhaps it makes
them appear innocent and wholesome.  I know plenty of librarians (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Librarian)
who see it as a cute and naively open source alternative to Windows
while also still cuter than Linux (http://www.linux.org).

Well, the truth is, OS X and Safari are anything but free, and they do
little to nothing to contribute to the free software projects from
which they so liberally borrow code.  KDE (http://www.kde.org) developers have
repeatedly complained about how Apple is not revealing the CVS history
of their changes to KHTML (the KDE (http://www.kde.org)-based browser engine that powers
Safari), so their changed sources are essentially useless towards
reintegration back into Konqueror (the KDE (http://www.kde.org) KHTML-based browser).

I still maintain that the best way to promote intellectual freedom and
growth, especially in libraries, is to run and distribute free
software.  Besides, what message would I send to my kids if I
promoted hardware (Macs) and software (OS X, etc.) that they could
never afford?

Slashdot reports (http://apple.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=05/04/29/1556252&from=rss):

Zack Rusin writes: 'All I'm asking for is that all the clueless people stop talking about the cooperation (http://www.kdedevelopers.org/node/view/1002)
between Safari/Konqueror developers and how great it is. There's
absolutely nothing great about it. In fact it doesn't exist.'

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Microsoft Cars

Sunday, May 1st, 2005

Bill Gates and the leader of Ford Motor co. recently outlined how, in the future, software would prevent cars from crashing and allow them to fix themelves (http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/05121/496752.stm).

Now, just imagine, you're driving your new Ford Escort, complete with
Microsoft (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft) AutoWindows for cars.  Suddenly, your car stops,
flashes a blue screen on the windshield and says:

The temperature outside has changed, please restart AutoWindows in order for the changes to take effect.

Later on, the car displays a balloon message, The are unused icons on your dashboard.

Then, you sell your car after a few years.  When the new owner
starts driving, it shuts down and displays a warning, Warning:
unauthorized use of this vehicle is prohibited by the End User License
Agreement.  Please activate your copy of AutoWindows.

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