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Microsoft's Software is Malware

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Re: Microsoft's Software is Malware

#101

Post by Oletros »

eka808 wrote: post #77

And after reading that, let's take a deep breath and think about Android. From my personal opinion, it's not better than and maybe worse : - Obligation of having a G+ account. Disable it is NOT straighforward at all and it will try to recreate himself often. - Personal content publicly uploaded/displayed in G+ account I had the bad surprise, and few friends also to see that the photos taken with my android phone were…

And, by the way, photo upload is opt in, it is disabled by default.

And public sharing us disabled by default.

If they have been uploaded and made public us because you did it.

Re: Microsoft's Software is Malware

#102

Post by dragonwriter »

nivla wrote: post #47
wosos wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think the problem is that they won't allow anyone else to continue working on it

Technically they are not preventing you from working on it, they are just not making it easy by open sourcing it. Personally, I would like to modify my OS and contribute the changes under a liberal license such as MIT but the terms of GPL can make it tricky. However it will be wrong of me to go around demanding older phased out Linux distros to be re-licensed under a more liberal license.

> Technically they are not preventing you from working on it, they are just not making it easy by open sourcing it.

Technically, they are preventing you from legally doing most work on it, since (in the US, at least) creating (not just distributing) a derivative work is an exclusive right under copyright for which they do not license you.

Re: Microsoft's Software is Malware

#103

Post by ksk »

I think the reason why people (who aren't already RMS fans) don't agree with some of his views is that he has not made a good moral argument against proprietary software. The writings[1] on the moral question fail to convince most people, who then reject other positions that build on that foundation. We see some of that whenever people link to his writings.

Even if people do not produce material objects, I think that products of labor especially those can be exchanged for material wealth do require legal protection. (Note that this is separate from Intellectual Property, as in simply thoughts and ideas)

If you want proprietary software to go away, you should pay people to write even more open source software and then give it away. You should not have an agenda that demonizes people trying to earn a living. Calling someones means of living as illegitimate/immoral/unethical is simply going to ensure that they never support you.

[1] http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/why-free.en.html

Re: Microsoft's Software is Malware

#104

Post by oldmanjay »

bitmapbrother wrote: post #90
outside1234 wrote: post #11

All of this is true, but where is the equivalent attack on Google, whose software is essentially entirely designed to spy on you. Isn't that also Malware? Or is this sort of malware ok because it runs the Linux kernel? I really want to support GNU and FSF but they seem to be constantly fighting some 20 year stale war against a company that is in many ways way more open than Google, Facebook, and Apple.

One more thing, Microsoft is a hypocrite. Microsoft employed a number of marketing campaigns to smear Google. They even went so far as to hire Mark Penn, a political smear campaign hitman, to carry out their plans. Now that we know all of the nefarious activities Microsoft has been up to and tried to conceal from the press their actions are even more despicable. From breaking into their users accounts and rifling thr…

What hypocrisy are you referencing? I'm not really questioning the veracity of your list of items, to be clear. I just don't see anything that fits the definition of hypocrisy.

Re: Microsoft's Software is Malware

#105

Post by CyberDildonics »

RyanZAG wrote: post #4

It's all true and yet not true at the same time. Each item on the list has valid business requirements and is needed. For example, the backdoors are required by government, and Microsoft is not above the government and cannot really refuse if it is a legal requirement for national security. They're not exactly designed as backdoors either - mandatory security updates are necessary to prevent the spread of botnets. Th…

> Each item on the list has valid business requirements and is needed.

Is that why Linux and FreeBSD both do the same thing?

Re: Microsoft's Software is Malware

#106

Post by arca_vorago »

What amazes me is that people on HN still continue to rail against RMS and the FSF while blatantly showing their ignorance of the principles they both stand for, and often not even through logically sound arguments.

Personally, I understand the main reasons people have issues with this though, because very often they simply haven't actually taken the time to think of computing as a philosophical choice as well as a practical choice.

As the surveillance and control engine enlarges itself though, those who are more closely aligned with GPLv3-esque ways of computing will have more freedom and control over their systems than others who accept fuedal walled gardens will be, and it is at that point that the walled garden people will start to understand the real impact of what are often considered frivolous arguments like BSD vs GPL.

Enjoy your locked down BSD playstation/iBrain/iHome etc, I for one intend to stick with GNU/GPL, and the FSF, as much as possible. The reality is that we have been locked in so much though that this process takes time and should be started now and not later. For example, in my various workflow pipelines, I still have a handful of apache, mit, and bsd licensed programs, but I have at least dramatically reduced the number of them...

If you haven't taken the time to understand the differences between BSD and GPL you owe it to yourself, as I consider it foundational knowledge for modern computing, the same way I consider history foundational knowledge of current events.

Re: Microsoft's Software is Malware

#107

Post by oldmanjay »

rando289 wrote: post #99
johncolanduoni wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can appreciate the FSF and Stallman without agreeing with everything they say. I think they did a lot to put open source on the map, and make us aware of the dangers with closed source software in certain areas, even if I think that their stance is overzealous.

> they did a lot to put open source on the map Nope nope nope. They've publicly been the biggest voice to erase "open source" from the map since it was coined. All while acknowledging that it has mostly the same goals as the free software movement. http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/open-source-misses-the-point.e...

The unfortunate thing about gnu and the fsf is that they think connotation management and "clever" wordplay are effective marketing strategies.

Re: Microsoft's Software is Malware

#108

Post by johncolanduoni »

rando289 wrote: post #99
johncolanduoni wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can appreciate the FSF and Stallman without agreeing with everything they say. I think they did a lot to put open source on the map, and make us aware of the dangers with closed source software in certain areas, even if I think that their stance is overzealous.

> they did a lot to put open source on the map Nope nope nope. They've publicly been the biggest voice to erase "open source" from the map since it was coined. All while acknowledging that it has mostly the same goals as the free software movement. http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/open-source-misses-the-point.e...

I'm aware of their thoughts on the distinction between open and free software. However these are (a) lost on most people involved in open source and (b) largely irrelevant as far as the FSF's projects being a large part of GNU/Linux, one of the most widely used open source/free software projects, or their dedication to seeing some key legal questions that affect both open source and free software play out in court.

Re: Microsoft's Software is Malware

#109

Post by HelloMcFly »

gkop wrote: post #92

I had the opportunity to try Windows 10 last week. I was surprised to find that Windows now has pop-up advertisements for Office and Bing embedded in the OS itself that recur during day-to-day usage and cannot be dismissed. That seems wild to me. Also, contrary to opinions that I have heard on HN and elsewhere on the web, Windows 10 is typical poor quality Microsoft software, not one of the "good" Windows like XP and…

> I was surprised to find that Windows now has pop-up advertisements for Office and Bing embedded in the OS itself that recur during day-to-day usage and cannot be dismissed.

Where are these? I use Windows 10 at home and work, and what you're referring to doesn't ring a bell at all. I already have Office on both machines though, so that may explain one portion.

Re: Microsoft's Software is Malware

#110

Post by cm2187 »

krylon wrote: post #85
rms_returns wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I personally think that if the users are too dumb and lazy to upgrade themselves to better alternatives (either Windows 8/10 or Linux distros), then you can't blame Microsoft for billing on their slumber. In fairness, even Red Hat might be doing the same thing to their RHEL clients who are "locked" into it and can't move on to Ubuntu or something.

It's not that simple, unfortunately. For run-of-the-mill desktop usage, i.e. Office stuff, eMail, Internet access, yes, not upgrading is either lazy or stupid. But there are quite a few companies out there who have built applications that are critical to their operations and which do not run on versions of Windows more recent than XP. To be fair, that is just as big a problem, relying on proprietary APIs without even…

I work for one of these large companies. Legacy software does play a role. But I think most of the delays have to do with the state of lethargy of the IT dept. I work in a part of the organisation where IT doesn't even have a plan to upgrade us from Windows XP.
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