Editing 743: Infrastructures
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==Explanation== | ==Explanation== | ||
− | [[Cueball]] has sent an essay to | + | [[Cueball]] has sent an essay to a fellow. While the essay itself was good, his fellow was worried because the essay was in a .doc format, the {{w|Proprietary Software|proprietary format}} that old versions of {{w|Microsoft Word}} used [compared to the newer .docx format (circa 2007)]. The fellow advises Cueball to use a format based on an open standard (one example being the ODF format (file extensions <code>.odt</code>, <code>.ods</code>, <code>.odp</code>, etc.) used in {{w|OpenOffice}} and {{w|LibreOffice}}, both {{w|free software}} ([http://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl.html/ referring to freedom, not price])). However, Cueball, who does not appreciate the fellow's ideology, argued that the fellow is making petty fights about the details of software instead of simply bothering that the software works (which is, in essence, a primordial purpose of software). Given that open-source software tend to lack the familiarity, features, support and reach of their proprietary variants, not working with proprietary formats in extreme cases, Cueball has *some* justification for his stance. |
− | + | The bearded fellow brings up that he is just concerned at the current proprietary software infrastructure that forces users to use software in a specific way, penalizing them for sharing the software or even looking at the source code in order to learn how the program works so nicely or even how to code nicely in the first place. Cueball makes a retort that his fellow has [http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/no-word-attachments.html an arrogance that crowds out his perspective] while claiming that he is {{w|Autism|autistic}}. (Autistic people do have a tendency to have intense fixations to things, even things that other people would find mundane or even odd. They also tend to have trouble knowing the problems of the world outside of themselves, having them lack perspective of things at times. Even so, Cueball's remark suggests that he thinks that "autistic" is just another word for "retarded" which is another word for "stupid", a double-fallacy.) | |
− | + | Seven years later, Cueball runs to the fellow clamoring about Facebook's heavy policies about its complete control about the information its users submit. Since both, Microsoft and Facebook, have a lack of transparency about their services and take away a lot of control from the user, the fellow retorts with playing "the world's tiniest open-source violin." While "[http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/WorldsSmallestViolin playing the world's smallest violin]" is a [http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=World%27s+Smallest+Violin sarcastic expression] that denotes that the speaker will not give pity to the recipient, the title text reveals that the fellow does have ''actual'' violin software available for torrent. | |
− | + | The title text references the following services that are compatible with the "free software" ideology: | |
+ | * [http://www.creativecommons.org Creative Commons licenses] use existing copyright law to permit someone to share a work (in this case, a song) anywhere if the sharer attributes credit to the creator of the work. There are also options for allowing modification, derivative works, and commercial usage. | ||
+ | * The "seed" to which the fellow mentioned is a reference to the {{w|BitTorrent}} protocol, an infrastructure that allows users to share files for others to download directly from them (rather than from a server). Essentially, the user packs a description of the files in a torrent file, then "seeds" the torrent file using a program made for torrenting (for example, {{w|μTorrent}}). People who want to download the files would first download the corresponding torrent file, and open it in a torrenting program to "leech" (download) the original files. After the files referred by the torrent file are downloaded, the "leechers" can "seed" them too, so that more people can download the files from them in turn. Since the user is in control of the upload and download, torrenting is an option of choice for those in support of free software. | ||
+ | * [http://joindiaspora.com joindiaspora.com] (formerly joindiaspora.net) is the central host of {{w|Diaspora (social network)| Diaspora*}}, an open-source alternative to Facebook which puts the user in control of how his information is used. (There is a bit of irony here, since Cueball went to the fellow due to his own problems with how Facebook handled his information.) | ||
− | The | + | The problem with the lack of open source and Facebook is also the subject of [[1390: Research Ethics]]. |
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==Transcript== | ==Transcript== | ||
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:[Inset, the bearded fellow rubs his index and middle fingers against his thumb.] | :[Inset, the bearded fellow rubs his index and middle fingers against his thumb.] | ||
:Bearded Fellow: ''It's the world's tiniest open-source violin.'' | :Bearded Fellow: ''It's the world's tiniest open-source violin.'' | ||
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{{comic discussion}} | {{comic discussion}} | ||
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[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]] | [[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]] | ||
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[[Category:Programming]] | [[Category:Programming]] | ||
[[Category:Social networking]] | [[Category:Social networking]] |