Blackmoor Vituperative

Hey Fantasmo fans!

Due to a number of scheduling issues, Fantasmo will be held on a special night in September. This time around we will be unleashing our films on Saturday, 2005-09-24, 19:30 (at Chesapeake Central Library, as always). As a special treat to get you in the mood for Halloween and Monsterfest, Team Fantasmo is proud to bring you the sequels to both Count Yorga Vampire and Blacula (screened at Fantasmo Episode 2). If you loved the first ones (and we know you did), the sequels are even better!

Scheduled Films:

19:30 – The Return of Count Yorga (1971) – Robert Quarry turns in another terrific performance as the pompous count, this time stalking prey at a neighboring orphanage. Only his Van-Helsingesque nemesis (again played by Roger Perry) stands in his way. This time the suspense and horror are doubled (and noticeably so is the budget)! Rated PG.

21:15 – Scream Blacula Scream (1973) – William Marshall reprises his signature role as the African prince made into a vampire by none other than Dracula himself. When a voodoo priest makes the unfortunate mistake of resurrecting Blacula, havoc ensues on the L.A. streets. This time around, Marshall is joined on screen by 70’s icon Pam Grier (Quentin Tarantino’s Jackie Brown) as a voodoo priestess who tries to help him lift his curse. Featuring top-notch performances, another great soundtrack, and non-stop action, you can’t afford to miss this one! Rated PG.

For more info, call (757) 382-6591 or check out the web site at www.chesapeake.lib.va.us.

Be sure not to miss these masterworks on the big screen — the way they were meant to be seen!

Coming Saturday October 8 – Fantasmo Episode 7: Monsterfest Edition

Here’s a thought for today:

Historically, “who is right?” is usually a rhetorcial question. What matters is who has the power to impose their opinion on others. Being right doesn’t deflect bullets, defend your property, keep your family safe from thieves and cutthroats, or ensure that you can speak your mind and worship or not as you see fit. The people who wrote the Bill Of Rights understood this. It seems that not many people today do.

It does not matter if you are right or wrong, if you can’t prevent people from imposing their opinions on you. For most of human history, it wasn’t even a question worth asking: might made right.

As Ash once said, “Good… bad… I’m the guy with the gun.”

John Carroll over at ZDNet has an article about what it would take for Linux and open source software can compete with the Microsoft “ecosystem”. His first two points are pretty reasonable. In fact, I think they’re common wisdom by now:

1. More consistency: Ecosystems are essentially standards that extend across software markets. They simplify development by lowering costs, shortening development timeframes and leveraging knowledge across markets.

For Linux to build a proper ecosystem, more thought needs to be applied to what technology will be present on every instance of Linux. That’s going to be hard, as one of the things that appeals to so many users of Linux is its technology agnosticism. … For instance, choose whether every system must include KDE or Gnome (but not both). Decide that every instance of Linux must ship with Corba, and which Corba ORB it should use. Every version of Linux should ship with Java or .NET….

2. Greater spread: I noted in my original post that ecosystems are only as valuable as their spread. That means that Linux cannot confine itself to markets where it is currently popular. Linux needs to spread, and that means they need to get more popular in desktops, handhelds, cell phones, music players, media technology, etc.

No stunning news there.

From here, however, Carroll veers into the Twilight Zone:

3. Detente with the world of proprietary software: Now for the controversial stuff. The single biggest force holding back the growth of open source software are the Free Software vigilantes who view proprietary software as tantamount to slavery. That puts open source in the productive category of nations that prevent the female half of the population from working. Open source programmers do great things, but proprietary software can benefit from both the efforts of open source programmers AND the efforts of those who create for financial gain.

That’s a waste. Philosophically, open source should move closer to Eric Raymond (who understands that there is a role for proprietary software) and away from Richard Stallman (who is on record as saying programmer’s should make less money).

Yes, Stallman is a flake. You’ll get no argument from me there. And no, he obviously shouldn’t be setting policy for the open source movement. He had a great idea, and he’s due credit for that, but just because the gods reach down and touch a band and they have one of the best songs ever (e.g., How Soon Is Now by The Smiths) doesn’t mean that you should listen to that band for the rest of your life.

But Carroll is missing the central element of what makes open source software “open source” — the license requires it. You can’t combine GPL and patented software into one product. The GPL is sometimes compared to a virus. It’s not: patents are the virus, and the GPL is the cure. Compromising with the world of proprietary, patented software would destroy the world of open source software.

4. Encourage a paying market atop your products: … Of course, there is nothing which officially stops companies from selling Linux software. There is a barrier, however, that derives from a culture that expects low-cost, if not free, open source products.

This is partly derived from the difficulties of deriving revenue from software as such when the secret sauce is published for all the world to see. Lots of people gloss over that problem by noting that there are lots of other ways to make money from software besides sales. Even so, it’s worth noting that the web of companies that build software for Windows (and who form a large part of the appeal of Microsoft’s platforms) are attracted by the profits to be generated by a pool of buyers with a demonstrated willingness to pay.

A similar buying culture needs to be built for the open source world. That will require, of course, jettisoning the “free software” philosophy which drove the movement in its early days.

So in order for open source software to compete with the Microsoft hegemony, it needs to stop being open source. Thank you for that pearl of wisdom, Mr. Quisling.

Here is a man who physically embodies the concept of “not getting it”.

I don’t know if kids today even know his name (I feel like such an old fogey sometimes), but Bob Hope in his prime was hilarious. His humor was clever and, for its time, pretty erudite. He was the Dennis Miller of his generation, really. Check out this clip from the 1940 movie Ghost Breakers.

I am not sure I would be this brave, but I’m sure glad that someone is.

Patricia Santangelo is in many ways the embodiment of the suburban mom.

She is the mother of five children, ranging in age from 6 to 19. She is divorced, living in Wappingers Falls after growing up in Yorktown and Putnam County. At 42, she works as a property manager for a real estate company and is trying to get her own business off the ground….

Santangelo was sued by several record companies in U.S. District Court in White Plains in February. The record companies said Santangelo’s home computer and Internet account were used to illegally trade copyrighted song files. The record companies say people like Santangelo are destroying the multibillion-dollar industry….

Record companies have filed about 13,300 similar federal lawsuits against Internet users across the country since September 2003…. None of the cases has gone to trial.

Opponents of the record companies’ lawsuits have said they hoped someone would challenge the companies’ tactics in court rather than settle.

“If this particular woman is willing to go to trial, that’s something new,” said Jason Schultz, a staff attorney with the Electronic Frontier Foundation, a digital rights advocacy group that opposes the lawsuits. “The threat is so great that most people don’t even risk it.”…

U.S. District Judge Colleen McMahon will decide the issue.

McMahon already has had a glimpse of the case from a conference May 6, before Santangelo had a lawyer. The judge told Santangelo she should get an attorney….

“I would love to see a mom fighting one of these,” the judge said.

(from The Joural News, Taking on record companies)

Way to go, Patricia.

The Zotob attacks could have been prevented by proper Windows patching, or they could have easily been prevented for less by using Linux in the first place.

(from eWeek, Zotob Madness and the Real Cost of Windows vs. Linux)

I don’t run Windows on any server, and haven’t for several years (nor has any competent system administrator, in my opinion). In fact, there’s only one reason I even use Windows on the desktop, anymore: Adobe Photoshop. But with Adobe’s pernicious “treat your customers like criminals” features in recent versions of Photoshop, that may not continue much longer.

I’m not the only one wondering what’s taking so long to release OpenOffice 2.0.

The MPAA has apparently frowned on some material that Lions Gate Films released to web sites, advertising its upcoming movie Saw 2. Lions Gate is in the process of requesting that web sites remove the MPAA-disapproved material.

Personally, I think that’s pathetic. Isn’t it bad enough that RIAA and the MPAA are tools of media robber barons doing their damnedest to destroy the public domain and fair use, subverting our legal system and corrupting our legislators to do it? The suggestion that the MPAA has any say in what is posted on any web site anywhere makes the bile rise up in the back of my throat. The whole MPAA rating system is an anachronistic holdover from the days of Reefer Madness. It is ludicrous that anyone pays attention to it or feels compelled to knuckle under to the MPAA’s ridiculously outdated mandates.

It’s the 21st century, for pete’s sake. It’s time for the MPAA to go the way of the buggy whip and the steam-powered car.

Fox has a long history of cancelling brilliant shows. I do not know why. Okay, I know why: it’s a cost/benefit thing. Anyway, some of these cancelled shows are available on DVD. One of the best series that was prematurely cancelled was the Adrian Pasdar vehicle, Profit, and it’s available on DVD. Profit was ahead of its time, and it’s too bad that Fox did not allow the show time to find its audience. Ah, well. The DVD includes all of the aired episodes, as well as four unaired episodes.

Microsoft’s Internet Explorer has become a sort of intelligence test: if you are still using it, you fail the test.

Internet Explorer’s laundry list of vulnerabilities and Firefox‘s growing popularity have made many users consider their browser alternatives. If you’ve had enough of dealing with IE’s security flaws and decide to make a switch, this article from Tech Republic demonstrates two ways you can disable IE for your users.