ZDNet has a column asking why BSD licenses are considered more business-friendly than the GPL, and asking if the BSD license can build more momentum.

ZDNet reports that the U.S. Supreme Court will hear an “important patent case that could make it easier
to develop knockoff products without running afoul of patent laws.

On Monday, the court said it will consider whether to overturn a lower court ruling that limits a
patent’s scope.”

ftp://ftp.kernel.org/pub/linux/kernel/people/alan/2.4/. Intermediate diffs are available from http://www.bzimage.org.

2.4.5-ac16
o Drop the shmem/removepage changes to see if they(me)
are cuaisng the instabilities in ac15
o Fix bug in pci_init_module causing serial crash (me)
| Figured out by Niels Jensen
o Alpha build fixes for keyboard change (Jay Thorne)
o Tidy up imsttfb driver (Paul Mundt)
o Fix tdfxfb warning (Steven Walter)
o Fix fat fs build on ARM (Russell King)
o Fix catc help text (Brad Hards)
o Fix missing unlock_kernel in fs/locks.c (Andrey Savochkin)
o Minixfs alloc_branch fixes (Al Viro)
o Support bootflag extension (me)
| Experimental
o Add EMC Symmetrix to the sparselun list (Alar Aun)
o Update the ioc3 ethernet (Ralf Baechle)
o Add ataraid to the known root names (Arjan van de Ven)
o Further Sony Pi driver upgrades (Stelian Pop)
o Add geometry queries to the ataraid driver (Arjan van de Ven)
o Add ALi IRDA FIR support (Benjamin Kong)
o Fix gameport compile failures (Keith Owens)
o Fixes IrLMP states stuck in CONN_PEND state (Jean Tourrilhes)
o Small cris config fixes (Andrzej Krzysztofowicz)
o Fix some potential irlan bugs/stack abuse (Ted Unangst)
o Fix OSS API bug in USB audio (Bruce Nesbitt)
o Update the MIPS64 core (Ralf Baechle,
Thiemo Seurer, and others)
o Update the MIPS32 core (Ralf Baechle, Kevin Kissell,
Carsten Langgaard, Justin Carlson,
Jun Sun)
o Add a driver for the AU1000 ethernet (P Popov)
o Fix security problems with i810 and MGA drm (Jeff Hartmann)
o Use a saner computation for maxthreads (Rik van Riel)
o Update matroxfb, support G100 SGRAM (Petr Vandrovec)
o Fix hang in scsi generic with cdrdao (Doug Gilbert)
o Correct aha152x abort fix (Jüergen E. Fischer)

Posted at LWN.net: The latest version of pilot-link is now available. This is a final
release for this version (no more -pre# versions in the 0.9.5 cycle). You
can pick it up on the pilot-link website directly.

The Austin American-Stateman has a feature story about IBM’s Linux Technology Center in Austin, Texas, and what IBM’s goals are.

eWeek has a story on how you could lose control of your server with Microsoft’s new IIS security problem. One security expert says half of all IIS servers are vulnerable.

ZDNet has a feature on the Open-Source Freenet. “While the first generation of file-trading technologies fights over Napster’s leavings, more radical
Net programmers are still committed to building a wholly anonymous, virtually untraceable way of
communicating and trading files online. Chief among these is Freenet, an open-source project
viewed by many as the ultimate inheritor to Napster’s original promise of free online file
swapping.”

4Front Technologies is happy to announce
the release of the RealAudio[TM] plugin for X MultiMedia System.

The RealAudio plugin will allow XMMS users to playback audio on Linux and
other UNIX operating systems and will enable users to add effects such as
QSound iQTM or Spatializer StreamFX[TM] to the RealAudio stream. Currently
QSound iQ is only available in the Windows version of RealPlayer8. With the
ability to add effects and view graphical visualization of the RealAudio stream,
XMMS now provides a more enhanced RealAudio player than the standard UNIX
player that Real Networks distributes.

The plugin is released with source code under GPL. However, it requires the
RealAudio SDK and the RealPlayer8 to be downloaded and installed from Real
Network’s website. The binary distributions only require the RealPlayer to be
downloaded and installed from Real Networks’s website at http://www.real.com.

The RealAudio Plugin currently only provides audio playback via XMMS. The
plugin plays the RealAudio streams via XMMS’s output plugins and hence it will
be able to playback audio via any of the output plugins like OSS, ESD or aRTs.
The RealAudio streams can also be mixed with other formats such as wav, mp3.
The following is a list of RealAudio formats supported by the plugin:

o RealAudio8 Audio
o MP3 audio
o RealAudio G2 audio
o Wav audio
o RealAudio 3.0 audio
o Live streams
o RealAudio 2.0 audio

“With the release of the RealAudio playback support, XMMS can now be called a
true media player”, said Dev Mazumdar, President of 4Front Technologies which
develops XMMS under an Open Source model.

“We will continue to develop the RealAudio plugin to support RealVideo playback
and other formats such as SMIL that RealPlayer supports. The most interesting
feature of this plugin is the ability to add 3D audio effects such as OSS/3D,
QSound, Spatializer and others that make XMMS a media player on par with Real
Network’s RealPlayer8 for Windows and MacOS. Having the plugin released under
GPL will ensure that other developers will be able to contribute and enhance
XMMS’s RealAudio support”, added Mr. Mazumdar.

The RealAudio plugin for XMMS can be accessed via CVS at
http://cvs.xmms.org/index.cgi/rmxmms/

ABOUT X MULTIMEDIA SYSTEM:
The X Multimedia System (XMMS) is developed by 4Front Technologies under the
GNU Public License (GPL) and has a large world-wide developer base that
contributes plugins and enahancements. XMMS is a cross platform multimedia
player that support MP3, Ogg, Wave, CD, MOD, MIDI, and digital audio and Mpeg1,
AVI, Mpeg2 video formats. The XMMS plugin API is published under a BSD license
that permits proprietary binary-only plugins or plugins that are GPL/LGPL/Open
Source compliant.

XMMS is distributed with all the major Linux and FreeBSD distributions. It has
become the de-facto media player and has won world-wide acclaim as being one of
the best media players for UNIX and Linux. XMMS has won numerous awards from
Slashdot, Linux Magazine, Linux Journal and others. More information on XMMS
is available at http://www.xmms.org.

ABOUT 4FRONT TECHNOLOGIES:
4Front is a privately held company with development facilities in California,
Finland and Sweden. 4Front’s main focus is on developing audio solutions for
the UNIX, Linux and embedded Systems marketplace. 4Front is the developer of
Open Sound System and is released under a BSD like license. Open Sound System
has become the “de-facto” audio API that is now distributed with Linux and
FreeBSD kernel sources and licensed by companies like SCO, Wind River Systems,
Hewlett Packard and endorsed by SUN Microsystems.

Open Sound System provides a cross-platform audio API with device drivers for
over 250 brand name sound cards from vendors like Creative Labs, Yamaha, Cirrus
Logic, MIDIMan, ESS Technologies, CMedia and others. More information on Open
Sound System and 4Front Technologies is available at http://www.opensound.com.

–XX–

Copyright (C) 2001, 4Front Technologies. All rights reserved.

Open Sound System is a trade mark of 4Front Technologies.

XMMS and X MultiMedia System are trade marks of 4Front Technologies

Linux is a registered trade mark of Linus Torvalds

UNIX is a registered trade mark of X/Open Company Ltd.

RealAudio is a trade mark of Real Networks, Inc.

All other trade marks that appear in this document are acknowledged
and owned by their respective owners.
“

– by Tina Gasperson –
The Zone is a popular gaming spot that is part of Microsoft’s MSN cadre of sites. Most of the pages within run on IIS servers — nothing surprising here. But one area of The Zone is churning away on Linux with Apache/1.3.9 (Unix) mod_fastcgi/2.2.2, according to Netcraft.com.The “zonestats” feature allows gamers to self-track their gaming abilities in several different categories. A year ago, Microsoft bought the company that created the software, called ngstats, and the domains ngworldstats.com, and netgamesusa.com, and both sites now redirect to stats.zone.com — but they’re still running Linux. Microsoft also hired four of the core developers of the ngstats project.

An old “about” page for NetGamesUSA states:

"NetGames USA is quickly becoming the trusted name in game 
play statistics, tournaments, rankings and ladder systems for today's
hottest PC gaming titles. It was founded in 1998 by a 
dedicated group of computer gaming enthusiasts who also
happened to be very capable professional network, computer, and 
software design engineers. NetGames USA was created to augment the 
capabilities of PC computer games by providing the community and game
developers alike with software and systems that make playing games
that much more fun.

"Our roots are well grounded in the gaming industry as two of 
NetGames USA's participants are founding and active members in the PC
Game mod group Orange Smoothie Productions. We understand what gamers
want and need because we are gamers ourselves.

"NetGames USA is experiencing rapid growth and excited
interest by teaming up with today's top developers and freely
providing them and their game players with the best gameplay scoring
and statistics tracking software and systems available anywhere for
both off and online game play through its ngStats and ngWorldStats
software and systems. Additionally, our ngTCS[tm] - Tourney Control
System continues to provide professional PC gaming leagues and events
with the most powerful automated control software available for
operating competitive gaming tournaments."

At the bottom of the page is a link to www.netgamesusa.com. Before the page is redirected to stats.zone.com, a bit of text flashes and then disappears as the redirection is executed. That text reads:

"This page should vanish now.

"Wi not trei a holiday in Sweden this yer?
See the loveli lakes
The wonderful telephone system
And mani interesting furry animals
Including the majestik moose
A moose once bit my sister
No realli! She was karving her initials on the moose
with the sharpened end of an interspace toothbrush
given her by Svenge - her brother-in-law - an oslo dentist
and star of many Norwegian movies: 'The Hot Hands of an Oslo Dentist',
'Fillings of Passion', 'The Huge Molars of Horst Nordfink' ...

"The creators of this stats software have now been sacked."

NewsForge is still attempting to contact the creators of the software, but in the meantime, an IRC interview log from January 2001, at shackes.com gives some background. One of the creators, Jason Keimig, who also created the Linux IP Spoofer, talked enthusiastically about Microsoft’s acquisition of NetGamesUSA in June 2000, and about his role in the new direction for the software he helped create. Keimig said that he was “responsible for pushing ZoneStats to new levels, for tighter integration with a broad range of gaming titles, and a tight integration with additional technologies we are currently developing.”

Later in the interview, Keimig said, “As an outsider coming into Microsoft, I myself was a bit leery of what ‘the borg’s’ plans were for us.”

Keimig also runs Orange Smoothie Productions, a Quake team that has its roots in the University of Kansas.

No new insights from guru Alan Cox, just a list of the latest fixes.

2.2.20pre4
o        Fix small corruption bug in 82596               (Andries Brouwer)
o        Fix usb printer probing                                 (Pete Zaitcev)
o        Fix swapon/procfs race                          (Paul Menage)
o        Handle ide dma bug in the CS5530                (Mark Lord)
o        Backport 2.4 ipv6 neighbour discovery changes   (Dave Miller)
o        FIx sock_wmalloc error handling                         (Dave Miller)
o        Enter quickack mode for out of window TCP data  (Andi Kleen)
o        Fix Established v SYN-ACK TCP state error       (Alexey Kuznetsov)
o        Sparc updates, ptrace changes etc               (Dave Miller)
o        Fix wrong printk in vdolive masq                (Keitaro Yosimura)
o        Fix core dump handling bugs in 2.2              (Al Viro)
o        Update hdlc and synclink drivers                (Paul Fulghum)
o        Update netlink help texts                       (Magnus Damm)
o        Fix rtl8139 keeping files open                  (Andrew Morton)
o        Further sk98 driver updates. fix wrong license  (Mirko Lindner)
         text in files
o        Jonathan Woithe has moved                       (Jonathan Woithe)
o        Update cpqarray driver                          (Charles White)
o        Update cciss driver                             (Charles White)
o        Don't delete directories on an fs that reports  (Ingo Oeser)
         then 0 size when doing distclean
o        Add support for the 2.4 boot extensions to 2.2  (H Peter Anvin)
o        Fix nfs cache locking corruption on SMP                 (Craig Hagan)
o        Add missing check to cdrom readaudio ioctl      (Jani Jaakkola)
o        Fix refclock build with newer gcc               (Jari Ruusu)
o        koi8-r fixes                                    (Andy Rysin)
o        Spelling fixes for documentation                (Andries Brouwer)