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<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8" standalone="yes"?> <!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Transitional//EN" "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-transitional.dtd"><html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"><head><meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=UTF-8" /><title>LKML: Florian Weimer: Re: GNU/Linux in a binary world... a doomsday scenario</title><link href="/css/message.css" rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" /><link href="/css/wrap.css" rel="alternate stylesheet" type="text/css" title="wrap" /><link href="/css/nowrap.css" rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" title="nowrap" /><link href="/favicon.ico" rel="shortcut icon" /><script src="/js/simple-calendar.js" type="text/javascript"></script><script src="/js/styleswitcher.js" type="text/javascript"></script><link rel="alternate" type="application/rss+xml" title="lkml.org : last 100 messages" href="/rss.php" /><link rel="alternate" type="application/rss+xml" title="lkml.org : last messages by Florian Weimer" href="/groupie.php?aid=1576" /><script> var _paq = window._paq = window._paq || []; /* tracker methods like "setCustomDimension" should be called before "trackPageView" */ _paq.push(["setDoNotTrack", true]); _paq.push(["disableCookies"]); _paq.push(['trackPageView']); _paq.push(['enableLinkTracking']); (function() { var u="//m.lkml.org/"; _paq.push(['setTrackerUrl', u+'matomo.php']); _paq.push(['setSiteId', '1']); var d=document, g=d.createElement('script'), s=d.getElementsByTagName('script')[0]; g.async=true; g.src=u+'matomo.js'; s.parentNode.insertBefore(g,s); })(); </script></head><body onload="es.jasper.simpleCalendar.init();" itemscope="itemscope" itemtype="http://schema.org/BlogPosting"><table border="0" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0"><tr><td width="180" align="center"><a href="/"><img style="border:0;width:135px;height:32px" src="/images/toprowlk.gif" alt="lkml.org" /></a></td><td width="32">聽</td><td class="nb"><div><a class="nb" href="/lkml"> [lkml]</a> 聽 <a class="nb" href="/lkml/2005"> [2005]</a> 聽 <a class="nb" href="/lkml/2005/12"> [Dec]</a> 聽 <a class="nb" href="/lkml/2005/12/11"> [11]</a> 聽 <a class="nb" href="/lkml/last100"> [last100]</a> 聽 <a href="/rss.php"><img src="/images/rss-or.gif" border="0" alt="RSS Feed" /></a></div><div>Views: <a href="#" class="nowrap" onclick="setActiveStyleSheet('wrap');return false;">[wrap]</a><a href="#" class="wrap" onclick="setActiveStyleSheet('nowrap');return false;">[no wrap]</a> 聽 <a class="nb" href="/lkml/mheaders/2005/12/11/62" onclick="this.href='/lkml/headers'+'/2005/12/11/62';">[headers]</a>聽 <a href="/lkml/bounce/2005/12/11/62">[forward]</a>聽 </div></td><td width="32">聽</td></tr><tr><td valign="top"><div class="es-jasper-simpleCalendar" baseurl="/lkml/"></div><div class="threadlist">Messages in this thread</div><ul class="threadlist"><li class="root"><a href="/lkml/2005/12/5/32">First message in thread</a></li><li><a href="/lkml/2005/12/10/92">Jan-Benedict Glaw</a><ul><li><a href="/lkml/2005/12/10/104">"Jeff V. Merkey"</a><ul><li><a href="/lkml/2005/12/10/109">Jan-Benedict Glaw</a></li><li><a href="/lkml/2005/12/11/46">Bernd Petrovitsch</a></li><li><a href="/lkml/2005/12/11/50">Erwin Rol</a><ul><li><a href="/lkml/2005/12/11/63">Florian Weimer</a><ul><li><a href="/lkml/2005/12/12/114">Alan Cox</a></li></ul></li></ul></li><li class="origin"><a href="">Florian Weimer</a></li><li><a href="/lkml/2005/12/11/146">Helge Hafting</a><ul><li><a href="/lkml/2005/12/12/87">Bernd Petrovitsch</a><ul><li><a href="/lkml/2005/12/12/110">Lee Revell</a></li></ul></li></ul></li><li><a href="/lkml/2005/12/11/159">"Richard M. Stallman"</a></li></ul></li></ul></li></ul></td><td width="32" rowspan="2" class="c" valign="top"><img src="/images/icornerl.gif" width="32" height="32" alt="/" /></td><td class="c" rowspan="2" valign="top" style="padding-top: 1em"><table><tr><td><table><tr><td class="lp">From</td><td class="rp" itemprop="author">Florian Weimer <></td></tr><tr><td class="lp">Subject</td><td class="rp" itemprop="name">Re: GNU/Linux in a binary world... a doomsday scenario</td></tr><tr><td class="lp">Date</td><td class="rp" itemprop="datePublished">Sun, 11 Dec 2005 17:27:35 +0100</td></tr></table></td><td></td></tr></table><pre itemprop="articleBody">* Jeff V. Merkey:<br /><br />> I'm married to a German citizen and I visit Germany for 3-4 week stints <br />> once a year. Last year I went to Aachen and Amsterdam on vacation. <br />> Every computer store I visited sold pirated copies of Windows XP and <br />> Microsoft Office<br /><br />Usually, they sell unlicensed OEM versions, which is fine because you<br />don't need a license to sell CDs once they've legally entered the EU.<br />If Microsoft itself distributed them to <br /><br />Theoretically, the situation is the same in the U.S., but maybe<br />Microsoft has just better means to enforce the OEM/end user price<br />discrimination.<br /><br />> Even the republic countries which have democratic governments are<br />> very much socialist in terms of the lifestyle and the governments,<br />> and the way people live, so it's no surprise the whole concept of<br />> free software and the GPL are so natural to the culture of Europe in<br />> general.<br /><br />Maybe we are all socialist bastards (I doubt it, some of us are too<br />good at playing capitalist), but it's not our respect or disrespect of<br />IP laws that makes a difference. It's things like social security,<br />mandatory health insurance, etc., which are backed by actual law, not<br />very limited private-sector initiatives promoting copyleft schemes.<br /><br />> I have been very dismayed at how FOSS has been used as a vehicle to <br />> promote anti-american attitudes into our own culture.<br /><br />I don't see what's anti-American about free software. I assume that<br />being an American encompasses more than promoting a certain, very<br />narrowly scoped IP-related agenda. On the contrary, putting free<br />speech over IP protection is a very American thing, and most Europeans<br />do not value freedom of speech that high.<br /><br />> It's sad. I have lived in all these places and the only place where<br />> people have guaranteed rights as individuals and true freedom is<br />> America.<br /><br />I'm not sure if Mr Padilla agrees.<br /><br />> I was in Germany in the late 1970's and earlt 1980's when the<br />> Bater-Meinhoffs were killing Americans in the streets and the<br />> Grune-Gehfahr (Green Party) was having demonstrations burning<br />> effigies of Uncle Sam in the Hauptewache District in Frankfurt.<br />> This younger generation has no concept of what they are supporting<br />> or how bad things can get. It is the doom of men that they forget.<br /><br />*shrug* You have your own troubles with militias on the far right<br />(ignoring this WOT thing, which is beyond rational debate anyway).<br /><br />> At any rate, Stallman needs to in the next GPL incorporate<br />> capitalist provisions which will allow FOSS to become a self<br />> sustaining model. The US markets are abandoning Linux as a<br />> commerical offering and Windows is continuing to get stronger and<br />> stronger.<br /><br />So what? The Microsoft monopoly is only a temporary thing. Breaking<br />it shouldn't be the highest-ranked item on the FSF's agenda.<br />Eventually, Microsoft will commit a fatal mistake (or a series of<br />minor ones) which will seal its fate. Free software matters in the<br />long run, and short-term considerations shouldn't alter our course too<br />much.<br />-<br />To unsubscribe from this list: send the line "unsubscribe linux-kernel" in<br />the body of a message to majordomo@vger.kernel.org<br />More majordomo info at <a href="http://vger.kernel.org/majordomo-info.html">http://vger.kernel.org/majordomo-info.html</a><br />Please read the FAQ at <a href="http://www.tux.org/lkml/">http://www.tux.org/lkml/</a><br /><br /></pre></td><td width="32" rowspan="2" class="c" valign="top"><img src="/images/icornerr.gif" width="32" height="32" alt="\" /></td></tr><tr><td align="right" valign="bottom"> 聽 </td></tr><tr><td align="right" valign="bottom">聽</td><td class="c" valign="bottom" style="padding-bottom: 0px"><img src="/images/bcornerl.gif" width="32" height="32" alt="\" /></td><td class="c">聽</td><td class="c" valign="bottom" style="padding-bottom: 0px"><img src="/images/bcornerr.gif" width="32" height="32" alt="/" /></td></tr><tr><td align="right" valign="top" colspan="2"> 聽 </td><td class="lm">Last update: 2005-12-11 17:31 聽聽 [from the cache]<br />漏2003-2020 <a href="http://blog.jasper.es/"><span itemprop="editor">Jasper Spaans</span></a>|hosted at <a href="https://www.digitalocean.com/?refcode=9a8e99d24cf9">Digital Ocean</a> and my Meterkast|<a href="http://blog.jasper.es/categories.html#lkml-ref">Read the blog</a></td><td>聽</td></tr></table><script language="javascript" src="/js/styleswitcher.js" type="text/javascript"></script></body></html>