Welcome to the Second Life Forums Archive

These forums are CLOSED. Please visit the new forums HERE

Linden Lab and reverse engineering (libsecondlife)

Jesse Malthus
OMG HAX!
Join date: 21 Apr 2006
Posts: 649
08-07-2006 15:23
From: Cocoanut Cookie
As long as the horse keeps its mouth open (i.e., tells us what it is doing), I won't be too upset.

I will always believe, however, that a system of law whereby some people are above the law is no law at all.

coco

We have public mailing lists for this reason.
And there really is no system of law, only LR's benevolent dictatorship.
_____________________
Ruby loves me like Japanese Jesus.
Did Jesus ever go back and clean up those footprints he left? Beach Authority had to spend precious manpower.
Japanese Jesus, where are you?
Pragmatic!
Maklin Deckard
Disillusioned
Join date: 9 Apr 2005
Posts: 459
08-07-2006 15:28
From: Cocoanut Cookie
As long as the horse keeps its mouth open (i.e., tells us what it is doing), I won't be too upset.

I will always believe, however, that a system of law whereby some people are above the law is no law at all.

coco


My full agreement on that last sentence, Coco. LL spends too much time placing certain projects and their participants above the 'law' as written and agreed to when we sign up

(But then again, every code-monkey I ever worked with or around, both salary and contract, has been a prima donna that thought they were above corporate rules...so the libSL folks thinking they are above SL's rules and seeing nothing wrong with being placed above the rules is HARDLY surprising).
Jesse Malthus
OMG HAX!
Join date: 21 Apr 2006
Posts: 649
08-07-2006 15:41
From: Maklin Deckard
My full agreement on that last sentence, Coco. LL spends too much time placing certain projects and their participants above the 'law' as written and agreed to when we sign up

(But then again, every code-monkey I ever worked with or around, both salary and contract, has been a prima donna that thought they were above corporate rules...so the libSL folks thinking they are above SL's rules and seeing nothing wrong with being placed above the rules is HARDLY surprising).

At the risk of offending, may I ask what you do for a living? (so that I may use it for an ad hominiem attack later on :D)
Seriously, I have run into prima donna coders, and they are the exception and not the rule.
_____________________
Ruby loves me like Japanese Jesus.
Did Jesus ever go back and clean up those footprints he left? Beach Authority had to spend precious manpower.
Japanese Jesus, where are you?
Pragmatic!
Jesse Malthus
OMG HAX!
Join date: 21 Apr 2006
Posts: 649
08-07-2006 15:55
From: Maklin Deckard
Oh, you are one of those that buys into King Phil's snake oil about platform vs game. Its no more a platform that WoW...that's just BS Phillip uses to snow the Venture Capitalists and the techie types....oh my, I am spending hours making vittual things on a platform! I'm SOOO muchy better than those people that log on and play mere games. its all ego stroking...this is nothing but a glorified game with a few business add-ons...it is hardly a platform by all but the most loose and optimistic definitions..

I heardily disagree. Does any other "game" have a feature-ritch Domain Specific Programming Language? I doubt it.
From: someone

GPL is not free, it comes with many unpleasant gotchas. Free is 'here you go, do as you like' not 'here you go, and you have to distribute souce, and using it inother things makes them GPL, and...' Orwellian definition of free, those strings and all.

And I have read the GPL, you leave out its viral nature that can poison other software....I can't WAIT till the lindens screw up and use GPL code by accident and get caught (or a malicious linden infects them on purpose) and have to rollback or release source. Thankfully, as you said, this lib is BSD, so its safe from that at least.

You're mistaking free as in beer and free as in libre. Those "hinderance" are actually anti-henderances. They make sure that once code goes free that it stays free.
The Linden engineers are not that stupid, and they make sure that all their code is licenced appropriatly.
_____________________
Ruby loves me like Japanese Jesus.
Did Jesus ever go back and clean up those footprints he left? Beach Authority had to spend precious manpower.
Japanese Jesus, where are you?
Pragmatic!
Maklin Deckard
Disillusioned
Join date: 9 Apr 2005
Posts: 459
08-07-2006 16:20
From: Jesse Malthus
I heardily disagree. Does any other "game" have a feature-ritch Domain Specific Programming Language? I doubt it.

You're mistaking free as in beer and free as in libre. Those "hinderance" are actually anti-henderances. They make sure that once code goes free that it stays free.
The Linden engineers are not that stupid, and they make sure that all their code is licenced appropriatly.


Pretty much every text-based MU* since the beginning of time has had a programming language. A programming language used to make toys is not a justification for calling SL a platform...especially since LSL is crude as hell compared to the languages in some of the old games. Hell, I had an old EA game that had a programming language inside...still a game. That's nothing more than techie elitism...it has a programming language so it can't be a mere game - it has to be important since programming is important.


Hindrances are anti-hindrances. Freedom is slavery. Free means strings attached. Sorry, too Orwellian for me.
Maklin Deckard
Disillusioned
Join date: 9 Apr 2005
Posts: 459
08-07-2006 16:26
From: Jesse Malthus
At the risk of offending, may I ask what you do for a living? (so that I may use it for an ad hominiem attack later on :D)
Seriously, I have run into prima donna coders, and they are the exception and not the rule.


Network admin. ANd I have never met a coder that DIDN'T have an attiude from hell, and the OS supporters are the worst of those. I can pretty much ID the coders in this thread based on their responses so far, I've heard MANY of them at work.
Dr Tardis
Registered User
Join date: 3 Nov 2005
Posts: 426
08-07-2006 17:41
Jesse, this is obviously going to go nowhere.

Maklin has a chip on his shoulder. Until he gets over it and actually engages in honest discussion, rather than just trying to justify his irrational hatred of progammer-types, there's nothing you or I will do to convince him of anything. He's right, everyone else is wrong, and that's that.

Continuing this conversation simply gives Maklin more space to bash open source software and programmers in general, so I'm going to end it here.

I respectfully withdraw from this conversation. I'll talk to others, but it's obvious that Maklin doesn't want to talk. He just wants to beat his drum.

I'm fine with that: I don't ask that everyone like me. I do appreciate it when people stop to listen to what I actually SAY instead of what they think I said, but there's nothing I can do about other peoples closed-mindedness.

Good day.
Sator Canetti
Frustrated Catgirl
Join date: 20 Sep 2005
Posts: 130
08-07-2006 17:52
For everyone who still cries "ToS" and doesn't pay attention to the fact LL has explicitly given it's approval, lets try an analogy.

I download a song, say... Metallica, cause they hate downloads so much. I've violated copyright law in doing so.

But, if I contact Metallica, tell them I'd like to rip my own Cd's and store them on the computer... even if such might be illegal normally, by having the approval from the copyright holder, I can now do so without repercussion. I have been explicitly granted privileges beyond the standard agreement.

Now, lets bring this back to LL.

If they reverse engineer the protocols and such, they may have violated the Terms of Service.

If they go to Linden Labs, tell them they would like to reverse engineer Second Life and distribute this freely... even if such might be against Terms of Service normally, by having the approval of the software vendor, they can now do so without repercussion. They have been explicitly granted privileges beyond the standard agreement.

So, to recap. If Linden Labs wishes to allow things that are normally not allowed in the Terms of Service, they can. Especially when it comes to the Intellectual Property in the software.

I fully support the libsl team in their efforts, and hope that they generate some great results.
_____________________
"Have gone to commit suicide. Intend to return from grave Friday. Feed cat." -- A memo by Spider Jerusalem in Transmetropolitan

"Some people are like Slinkies; not really good for anything, but they still bring a smile to your face when you push them down a flight of stairs."

If you're reading this signature, I've probably just disagreed with you. Welcome to the club :D
Jesse Malthus
OMG HAX!
Join date: 21 Apr 2006
Posts: 649
08-07-2006 18:04
From: Dr Tardis
Jesse, this is obviously going to go nowhere.

Maklin has a chip on his shoulder. Until he gets over it and actually engages in honest discussion, rather than just trying to justify his irrational hatred of progammer-types, there's nothing you or I will do to convince him of anything. He's right, everyone else is wrong, and that's that.

Continuing this conversation simply gives Maklin more space to bash open source software and programmers in general, so I'm going to end it here.

I respectfully withdraw from this conversation. I'll talk to others, but it's obvious that Maklin doesn't want to talk. He just wants to beat his drum.

I'm fine with that: I don't ask that everyone like me. I do appreciate it when people stop to listen to what I actually SAY instead of what they think I said, but there's nothing I can do about other peoples closed-mindedness.

Good day.

You are correct, and I think I will do the same.
Absolutist attitudes always make conversations into arguments.
Good day as well.
_____________________
Ruby loves me like Japanese Jesus.
Did Jesus ever go back and clean up those footprints he left? Beach Authority had to spend precious manpower.
Japanese Jesus, where are you?
Pragmatic!
1 2 3 4 5 6 7