Mir's GPLv3 License Is Now Raising Concerns

[Luke]

Reason to block carrier cacheing/compressing http

Why would it be? http is a plaintext protocol, you should not expect it to be unreadable by third parties.
Use https for anything you find sensitive, it's made in that purpose.

I would compare sending http to sending a postcard by courier. If the courier duplicates the postcard and keeps a copy, that is considered an aggressive act. This is what happens when a carrier duplicates https and caches it. If you need to cache http, you have your browser's own cache. If someone pays the mailman to read and report on the contents of every postcard leaving a certain mailbox, that is a serious aggressive act. This is what happens when "advertising partners" of carriers-or the cops/FBI-either pay for or simply demand contents from carriers. They could theoretically compress http on the fly without storing or logging, but doing this requires rerouting traffic through a server to do this-a server that could keep a "pen register" of your entire surfing history or even keyword search the contents of your work. For that matter such a server could be hooked into PRISM or another such program.

There is a way to clear a carrier cache so you can forcibly reload a changed page: break and remake your connection to them. Other than that, never connect by http to any site offering https. That goes double for logins.

There is only one defense against deep packet inspection: https or other modes of encryption. Unlike image compression, this does not require client side code. Compression of https-which requires decryption and re-encryption, HAS been done by carriers, but only by using special browsers that are preset to accept their ssl certificate instead of the original one. Firefox, etc will complain if they get a Verizon or AT&T certificate when loading say, Hushmail. When using self-signed HTTPS sites (like many activist sites) by wireless carrier, you must check the certificate to ensure your carrier hasn't attempted a "man in the middle attack." This is because Firefox will already be popping up the "invalid certificate" warning, so you must actually read the certificate to ensure it does not suddenly come from your carrier. Best to store known good self-signed certificates. As for online banking/shopping, don't do that at all. To trust those requires betting that the hacker who wrote the bank's security software is a better hacker than the guy working at your carrier who is supplementing his income by intercepting online banking credentials.

Yes, I do in fact regard using the Internet at all as engaging in electronic warfare with those who would use electronic means to do you harm. Do not do so where you cannot afford to take losses, and never "bareback the network!" In fact, I would compare all carriers and the entire Internet backbone to a sexual partner who you don't want to dump but shows obvious signs of multiple infections. Never trust the network, wrap it up in all the encryption and privacy protection the site you are working can handle!

[Luke]

NSA can retain but cannot read encrypted email

And then we find out... "Using online anonymity services such as Tor or sending encrypted e-mail and instant messages are grounds for US-based communications to be retained by the National Security Agency even when they're collected inadvertently, according to a secret government document published Thursday." http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2...eps-your-data/

That won't matter if they can't be read and especially if they can't read, can't be traced to their source, and can't be traced to their destination. In my case, I assume that attaching my name to a communication will cause it to be retained anyway, so what this does is to blind the enemy to content and destination. With Tor they may get nothing but "Elvish" from between two Tor nodes. Yes, I consider the Dept of Homeland Security to be the enemy. Expect no mercy from Homeland Security, and never try to get on their good side hoping they won't snoop on your data. Instead, use the best tools we have to fight them. Use encrypted email, use https(which there is evidence NSA can't break in transit), use Tor, use PGP/GPG. Close Facebook and Google accounts, block tracking servers.

Think: if all the Web used https, if all users shut down accounts with things like Google and Facebook, if all email was encrypted end to end with GPG or PGP and every connection to the network was a Tor node, with Tor used all the time, every time, the whole NSA surveillance program would "go dark" and entirely cease to function. Their only counter would be to tell telecoms to drop encrypted packets, and we could response with encrypted wifi "mesh networks" that bypass the telecoms entirely, requiring only hardware and users. There are more than enough always-on smartphones that if each one was a mesh networked "Tor phone" with no telecom connection at all, coverage in urban and suburban areas would be nearly continuous. Use of a Tor style protocol plus encryption would neutralize the effectiveness of malicious mesh network nodes the NSA would surely deploy. Hams could then fill in the gaps by radio.

That leaves one question: What operating system do we want on our Tor Phones in five years?

[spacetoilet]

Ubuntu. It's the only one with a chance anyway.

you like sucking off canonical dont you?

[dee.]

Ubuntu. It's the only one with a chance anyway.

Yes, of course, when we're worried about privacy, we want the OS that makes deals with 3rd parties to send them everything you type in your app launcher...

On another note: good grief man, are you so delusional, so blindly following the shuttleworth dogma that you seriously present Ubuntu as "only one with a chance" from all the smartphone OS'es? Seriously? Come on, you gotta be trolling...

Sailfish and Tizen are both going to run Ubuntu phone to the ground. Part of the reason is that both of them support running Android apps and can thus leverage the existing app ecosystem, while Ubuntu is being silly and not supporting Android apps. When devs have to choose "hmm, should I develop an app for Ubuntu, or for Android/Tizen/Sailfish", I think the answer is going to be obvious...

[prodigy_]

Nothing new here.

Canonical has been exploiting and abusing the FOSS community for years. They accept contributions but they give nothing in return. I don't think they've ever contributed anything significant to upstream. They invent their own solutions to everything. They lie when they see fit and they're ready to annoy and harm their users in any possible way if there's profit in it.

They're a typical Apple-like corporation that cares about money and only about money.

[marek]

Come on people, companies just want to make money. At least be glad they want to make money by improving the Linux ecosystem, which is like the best thing that can happen to this operating system. They could have decided to license some other OS and keep all their code closed. The only significant difference between Mir and X/Mesa/Wayland licensing that I see is that only Canonical can both modify and sell Mir as closed source, but everybody on this planet can do that with X/Mesa/Wayland. For example, Mesa or its significant portion is used and sold as part of closed source products by companies like VMWare and Unity Technologies.

[GreatEmerald]

Come on people, companies just want to make money. At least be glad they want to make money by improving the Linux ecosystem, which is like the best thing that can happen to this operating system.

They're not improving the Linux platform, they're fragmenting it.

[chithanh]

OMG they want to make money! You said the dirty word: money! Stallman isn't interested in making money and neither should you.

I understand that this is meant to be ironical. But such misconceptions exist and I don't know where they originate from. The FSF and Stallman say that a requirement for free software is that you have freedom 0 (use the software for any purpose), which includes making money using the software as you see fit.

They're not improving the Linux platform, they're fragmenting it.

- It's good to have 3000 different distribution 10 Desktop environment but not 2 different Graphic Server. (or you can do it but not Canonical)

'nuff said.

[prodigy_]

For example, Mesa or its significant portion is used and sold as part of closed source products by companies like VMWare and Unity Technologies.

Mesa uses MIT license, not GPL. And MIT license just screams "I don't care", so nobody cares. But GPL is supposed to protect open source from this kind of crap.

Perhaps it's time for GPLv4. And perhaps it should be a little less parasite-friendly.

[valeriodean]

I only support the mission of linux to dethrone windows. Right now Ubuntu has largest linux market share and thus I support it, since it has the biggest chance. That is all. I don't care about linux too much as I use windows just as well, and also don't care too much of the free software principles. They sound nice in theory, just like communism does, but reading what people say, it seems it's more and more of a religion for a lot of people. Claiming that the open source development model is superior to all others isn't exactly based on fact or scientifically proven. At most it's a hypothesis that remains to be proven. But for a lot of linux user it became a way of life, an assumption, without any kind of proof, just because it sounds good to their hippie minds. Thus, a religion was born.

As much as I would like windows dethroned, I'm not sure linux is really the one to do it. Not sure if I want Stallman hippies in power. Like in Syria right now, Assad might be bad but I'm not sure FSA would be better if they get in power.

What you said try to make sense but fail.
You "support the mission of linux to dethrone MS Window" but you "don't care too much of the free software principles" and in the same time you "don't care about linux too much".
So, your point is to support the dethrone process for the sake of dethrone something?
If the free software principles does not means nothing to you, then why hoping to dethrone Windows? Because it is time to change one proprietary OS with another one just for see another logo in the computer discount shop?

But for a lot of linux user it became a way of life, an assumption, without any kind of proof, just because it sounds good to their hippie minds. Thus, a religion was born.

Or, more simple, you are not able to recognize the importance that the freedom principles and the "knowledge is power" have for the development of the human society.
Try to think more distance than you egoistic needs and more distance in the timeline than the next two days: free access to the knowledge (about IT matters it means doc and source code) and the possibility to share the workload, the knowledge, the happiness, the bad moments... this is the real power of mankind.

Do you need a kind of proof?
There is a reason why the human society shown an impressive rate of progress in the last century compared the the whole past.
In the past only few people had the access to the knowledge and the resources to create something.
Now many more people can study and give their contribute to the human progress and you can see the consequences: a tons of discovery in a tons of different fields in the same time, years by years.