After all these years, Bill Gates still hasn't figured it out.

When you read that article you'll discover that he says Microsoft has free software (as in 'gratis') too, but that is not what Free Software is about. OK, I admit, it will probably be a factor for some people, but you'll only find this to be true in a very few specific cases. The price point is important in the few cases where people have grown tired of illegal software, tired of hunting down cracks, downloading warez from the net, especially since every little stupid tool or programs has a rather high price. For them, an OSS program will be just the tool for the job for an unbeatable price.

Though, for most people who turn to OSS, this will not be the driving factor. The quality will be (i'm not saying all OSS is high quality though), another important feature is that OSS gives power to the user and not to the vendor. These are the two important advantages to 'Free Software' that flow from the fact that the source code is available for the user.

As long as Bill Gates keeps his focus on the free (as gratis) piece of OSS we have nothing to worry about.

This was rather surprising. I remember Quake3 and UT actually running better on Linux, now according to these benchmarks Doom3 really lags behind XP by 25% (for HQ, no AA at 1024x768).

There are some interesting interviews on Mad Penguin with the OOo developers regarding the pending 2.0 release.

The part worth a read is on page 2, where it is explained more in detail what dirty tactics Microsoft is playing. Here is hoping OOo2 gets a lot of good press and publicity, thereby increasing its popularity just enough to stop this massive tie-in MS is looking at with the new release of MS-Office.

You know the world is in serious trouble when you read this. Tell me how this is any different from an Islamist fighting for his believe, his God?

I hope he understands that makes him an extremist as well and it's a very dangerous situation when two extremists are fighting each other. They're both sure 'God' is on their side, so how could they possibly lose? Well, you just have to check your history lessons to see how that ends.

I sometimes wonder how certain people got their jobs as a tech writer, take this guy for example.

It's just mind-bending how he confuses a standard file format with a closed proprietary one because it has the biggest market penetration. It also doesn't matter how many applications can 'read' a document format, but it seems he hasn't figured that out yet either.

Mostly this kind of article isn't worth anybodies time, but there is something going on, I tend to, dare I say it, notice some kind of trend. I won't go into it this time, stay tuned if you want to know more...

A new version of the GPL is in the works. The thing that got the most attention on /. was the fact that the source of web services based on GPL software should be made available.

Well, isn't that a very good idea? With the rise of AJAX applications, which are getting more and more impressive each time. Indeed, since an AJAX application is not distributed, but accessed via your browser, there is no need to make the source available if it is build on existing OSS. And that is a dangerous path, because people who choose for a GPL license want information to be free.

For me personally, the most interesting change is that 'a clause to penalize companies that use software patents against free software and a clause to prevent companies from using digital rights management in free software applications.' and while the part about DRM is explained, nothing is mentioned on patents and what measures they would like to take. Software patents are just another tool for multi billion corps to stay multi billion corps. It is their ultimate weapon, it allows them to kill or neutralize others as they please. The only valid penalty is that patents used in programs making use of GPL code will have to make that patent free for all other programs using the GPL license.

Recently I have been getting the feeling we are going back into time instead of advancing as a human race. The proof is in this article. You should know that I am an atheist, and thus news like this makes me shake my head in disbelieve.

It is scary and hopeful at the same time. Scary, because these kind of stories are becoming more common all the time. Most of the they are time originating from the US. Hopeful, because there are still people who find it reason enough to take this to court.

You should have figured out by now that I can only accept Darwinism as a valid evolutionary process, backed up by science. And science is the key word here people, how can anybody, who has had an decent education still believe in god(s) or the like?

Science is a very broad word, but it has brought us humans where we are now. The common argument of believers (any god) are that science is not able to explain everything. This is true, many questions remain unanswered, but this does not mean we should presume by default it is gods work. Remember in prehistoric times every natural occurrence was a sign of god, ofcourse they did not have science to explain these phenomenas to them and so it was just as easy to explain everything as supernatural. Even in more recent history, and for this we should only go back for 100-80 years, the church was keeping the common folk down with claims of heaven and hell so people would keep quiet and not revolt with fear for the afterlife. This made the church mighty powerful, and since most people still had no education (and could not even read, less pay for education) they didn't know any better then to believe any good or bad was the way god intended and it would be better not to taunt the lord.

Let me get this straight, if you are a Christian and you want to put more believe in your evolutionary theory, that is 100% your right and your freedom of choice (yes, we believe everybody can have his believe, unlike most religions who do not allow other religions to exist). The problem in this case is that it should not be in the general tutoring package. I couldn't care less if they discussed this to death in the Christianity class, but it does not belong in biology which should deal with science only!

I hope they win their court case, they should, but since the judge is appointed by Bush I'm just not so sure.