From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 X-Spam-Checker-Version: SpamAssassin 3.4.4 (2020-01-24) on polar.synack.me X-Spam-Level: X-Spam-Status: No, score=-2.9 required=5.0 tests=BAYES_00,MAILING_LIST_MULTI autolearn=unavailable autolearn_force=no version=3.4.4 X-Google-Language: ENGLISH,ASCII-7-bit X-Google-Thread: 103376,5cb36983754f64da X-Google-Attributes: gid103376,public X-Google-ArrivalTime: 2004-04-27 19:12:34 PST Path: archiver1.google.com!news1.google.com!news.glorb.com!fr.ip.ndsoftware.net!proxad.net!freenix!enst.fr!melchior!cuivre.fr.eu.org!melchior.frmug.org!not-for-mail From: "Alexander E. Kopilovich" Newsgroups: comp.lang.ada Subject: Re: No call for Ada (was Re: Announcing new scripting/prototyping language) Date: Wed, 28 Apr 2004 06:03:22 +0400 (MSD) Organization: Cuivre, Argent, Or Message-ID: References: NNTP-Posting-Host: lovelace.ada-france.org Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii X-Trace: melchior.cuivre.fr.eu.org 1083118189 59804 212.85.156.195 (28 Apr 2004 02:09:49 GMT) X-Complaints-To: usenet@melchior.cuivre.fr.eu.org NNTP-Posting-Date: Wed, 28 Apr 2004 02:09:49 +0000 (UTC) To: comp.lang.ada@ada-france.org Return-Path: In-Reply-To: ; from "Dmitry A. Kazakov" at Tue, 27 Apr 2004 10:11:23 +0200 X-Mailer: Mail/@ [v2.44 MSDOS] X-Virus-Scanned: by amavisd-new-20030616-p7 (Debian) at ada-france.org X-BeenThere: comp.lang.ada@ada-france.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.4 Precedence: list List-Id: "Gateway to the comp.lang.ada Usenet newsgroup" List-Unsubscribe: , List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , Xref: archiver1.google.com comp.lang.ada:7533 Date: 2004-04-28T06:03:22+04:00 Dmitry A. Kazakov wrote: > >> >Modern science deals also with budgets, management, conferences, grants, > >> >degrees and citations. > >> > >> that's scientific bureaucracy > > > >Call it what you wish, but take into account that vast majority of scientists > >do not oppose it anymore, but participate in all that stuff rather actively. > > As cynical as "people of Ethiopia do not oppose hunger, but actively > participate it". Excellent argument for a live debate - thundery, breathtakingly annoying for the opponent, and distant enough (thus forcing the opponent to extend his logic to an unanticipated area). But for a slow discussion in a mostly technical newsgroup these features aren't very important and therefore the whole argument isn't good here. It will be too trivial to observe that the scientists who participate in conferences, earn degrees and obtain grants aren't too hungry, as a rule; also there are neither signs of prolonged famine in science nor destruction and exhaustion caused by recent wars. But what isn't so trivial and what is actually essential, is that more hungry people (more active participants in hunger, as you put it) in Ethiopia do not hold higher social status, they aren't considered more successful, and do not manage, rule and control other (less hungry) people. > >There is a huge and principal difference between selling your products on open > >market and working for a firm that do that. When you are an individual seller > >you take decisions and see immediate results. > > Where you saw individual software sellers? I'm quite surprised by this question - don't you know, for example, that many authours of shareware products are individual sellers? Don't you know that sufficiently many of those shareware products have significant customer base? > The products we are > developing have weight of many man-years. So what? You are very proud of that, aren't you? You think that only those products that have weight of many man-years have a right to live and/or to be sold? Well, I'd like to remind you that those Microsoft products, which you apparently dislike, most probably have weight of many man-years also. > >You choose the price for your > >product, and you income depends on whether your guess is right. But when you > >work for a firm (not as a top manager, but as a software developer), you do > >not take such decisions, and your salary does not immediately depend on the > >particular results. Yes, it is possible that you may somehow influence your > >firm's decisions regarding product prices and marketing policies in general, > >but this is very far from taking decision yourself. If you try that once then > >you'll see this acute difference. > > What's your point? My point here is that when you take general and final decision about your product, you have to take into account much more factors than if you just influence the decision (note, that multiplicity of factors often precludes high precision and comprehensive analysis). And when you are taking the decision you know that you'll deal with possible consequences. For example, if you product faulted and the user has right to sue for that then s/he will sue *you*. And then you'll spend time in court, you'll spend money for lawyers, and even if you win the case, you still may be ruined. And your competitor can relatively easily provide 10 doubtful cases for you - just to keep you detracted from your business for some time and as a consequence - ruined. > >just create at least one software product and > >sell it yourself - either as a invidividual or as a top manager of a firm, > >regardless of the firm's size. After that you most probably will not be so > >sure that liability for software products is a good thing. > > Strangely enough that they are sure for almost all other things... Nothing strange - they are sure for the things in which they aren't competent and/or experienced, but the sales is exactly the thing for which they have to be somehow competent and experienced (otherwise they went bankrupt too soon). > > quantum mechanics - it is a science, and there are things, which it > >can predict, but there are also severe limitations to its prediction power. > > You are comparing limitations of something with nothing. Something - only for those who knows/understands something, and nothing - for those who knows and understands nothing except of mass-media presentations of the subject. I guess that you have read and understand something, however introductory and scattered, relevant to quantum mechanics in some textbooks, but at the same time I guess that you totally neglected economical sciences, permitting newspapers and TV to educate you in that domain. > >> I meant only the law, which should treat sold software as an insurance > >> contract rather than a "right to use". At least contract parties > >> should have equal rights. > > > >I don't quite understand that: do you mean that some insurance company must > >be always involved as a mandatory third party between a vendor and a user? > >That is, every software product to be legally sold must be insured by some > >insurance firm? Then who will be really (and legally) insured - vendor or > >user? > > No, a vendor has to be liable to the software product it sells. > Because software products are not "consumed" as normal products are, > there seems to be only choice between "right of use" and "insurance" > models. I still can't get why you use term "insurance" here. Vendor and/or seller may or may not provide a warranty, but "insurance" is typically associated with third parties, it is a separate business. > "Right of use" model is what we have now. Its disadvantages > are quite clear: > > 1. It works against quality products; I think you mean that it permits relatively cheap products of some not-the-best quality to appear on the market and compete with costly products of superior quality. > 2. It effectively stops any significant progress by suppressing > competition; What I see in reality is quite rapid progress. One may clain that the progress might be more rapid and more comprehensive if some other rules were in effect. But this is just a supposition, rather unfounded. Yes, some things might went better with other rules, but at the same time some other things (which are tolerable with current rules) might went much worse. > 3. It gives customers no protection from fraud; But that gives vendors protection from dishonest or simply ignorant suits. > 4. It imposes real threat to basic human rights (see DCMA) I can't see how introduction of liability of vendor will prevent or destroy DCMA and alike. Generally, I don't see how can your "insurance" (or liability) decrease or suppress "right of use". I think that you propose to add that liability to "right of use". > >Note that market never chooses immediately and/or forever. It is a big and > >substantially stochasic system, and moreover, it is a multi-dimensional > >system. Sometimes we can see some clear and relatively stable preference and > >we call it a choice (done by the market). > > It is about game rules, which state should impose. Do you think that those rules should make the game well-predictable? > Now the real New Order (=software mess) I repeat that you dangerously (I hope not intentionally) confuse Brave New World with New Order. > >> And, well, who will serve 25 years in jail for cracking > >> proprietary protocols? > > > >There is absolutely no need to crack anything. First, there probably will not > >be anything interesting enough to crack. Second, all those protocols can be > >easily imagined - well, they certainly will not be the same as in real cars, > >but so what? Those parties who will think that the difference is significant > >for them will point on it and provide an information, which will be sufficient > >for adjustment or generalization. We simply should not care about the distant > >sources of that information, it will be sufficient that information is > >provided publicly, and it need not be exact information - it may be just a > >hint. > > You are mistaken. Perhaps. But you are so sure, aren't you?. > (I am working with some of these protocols) So you are in difficult position regarding this matter. Some things are too near to you, distorting the general perspective, and even about those things you can't speak clearly because of NDAs. > >Perhaps you mean car vendors > >here, but why should we bother ourselves with *their* problems? > > Because they decide. They will decide about *their* problems, very well. But they can't effectively decide about the things that aren't in their control or even influence (so far). Alexander Kopilovich aek@vib.usr.pu.ru Saint-Petersburg Russia