Compenguin writes: "Justin of Nullsoft released three new pieces of free (as in speech and in beer) software, an installer, a pinger/grapher, and a throttlable file copier. They all use the zlib license. The source is available now, marking the first time nullsoft has actually released source to their "Open Source" products *Cough*Gnutella*Cough*."

e-gold writes: "See www.cryptome.org for a scoop on some Japanese CIA intel. John Young (an architect) does a better job at journalism on the Web than the VAST majority of paid "Web journalists," so this is par for the course for him. I'm glad to have hoisted a beer with him this summer." It's not so much the document itself but the FBI's reaction to it that's interesting. For some reason, the FBI in New York City is none too swift when it comes to threatening Web sites. Note that as I write this, cryptome.org is down, but there's no reason to think the site was pulled - it was mentioned on the AP wire, which seems to have been enough to beat it down to its knees.

Spoing dropped this bit of informative info into the bin: "Last week, a friend of mine griped that he didn't know of an easy way -- short of getting Adobe Capture and paying per-use licence fees -- of creating searchable PDFs. I scoffed, and told him I've done it many times, and it was free -- as in beer and speech. Dumbfounded, he pushed me to show him how, and I did; print to a Postscript file, and run ps2pdf on it...done! Since every document could be output as Postscript, his problem was solved. If he wanted to batch process the documents, he could set up a few scripts to simplify the task. While he was impressed, he ended up asking what seemed like an easy question; 'Can you do the same with a scanned image?'" And therein lies the question...

dewboy asks: "We're trying to set up a rack of SBC's (Single Board Computers) that will allow us to plug a certain number of SBC's into a backplane which will provide power. All interfaces (mouse, keyboard, VGA, Enet, etc) are on the faceplates of the cards, so all they really need is power. All we've been able to find so far are chasses that support a single SBC and a (4-20 slot) backplane. What we'd like is a chassis that supports 20 SBC's. Has anyone found anything like this?"

HerbieTMac writes: "Intel and HP are releasing HP's IA-64 emulator for Linux later this week. Particularly interesting is that this emulator will be free (as in beer) for download from Intel's and HP's Web sites."

This is not a diatribe about copyleft. It's an exploration of ways "music delivery" has changed over the last three decades, and why these changes have led to a commonly-held belief that music can be downloaded or exchanged without paying a dime to the artists who wrote and played the songs. (more below)

More information below -- for your edification and amusement -- on black holes (if they exist), Napster (a happy outcome for once), comparitive computer languages (after Chris Rijk's Java / C comparison) and more. Even a (gasp) positive statement about Microsoft. Hope you enjoy it.

Frequent book reviewer and genuine Englishman Duncan Lawie sent us this first-person account of UK Linux Expo 2000. Proof (not that it was needed) that not only is Linux continuing to grow in the UK as elsewhere, but that the disconnect between suits and geeks remains as evident as ever. Read below for good news and medium news -- thankfully, that seems to be as bad as it gets for this transmission.

semis asks: "It's interesting to see the number of free-beer (free for non-profit) software that is popping up. From StarOffice to the recently reported CAD software Cycas, the number of free-beer software packages is rapidly increasing. Sure -- this is good, until/if the OSs get market share, then happy hour finishes and the free-beer becomes expensive-beer. Is this trend a Good Thing (tm) or will it see our beloved OSs lose their open-source vision and simply become the new medium for commercial software?"

Our original interview with two SCO Presidents somehow turned into responses from just one, returned long after they were promised. Anyway, here are answers to your questions about SCO from David McCrabb, President of their Server Division.

Bob Bruce writes: "There will be a BSD BOF (Birds Of a Feather meeting) at Spring Comdex, on Wednesday April 19 from 5:30 p.m. to 7:30 p.m. The BOF is at the Essex Inn at Grant Park, Chicago. You do not need to be a Comdex attendee to come along, everyone is welcome." Read on for more details.

troc writes: Here's the "info on this year's Linux Beer Hike sponsored by SuSE (and others). It's a European event, where Linux users wander around a nice hilly area, drink beer and exercise their minds of an evening doing Linuxy stuff. " I wanted to go last year, but my flabby ass probably shouldn't be goin' on ye old hacker hike ;)

The Mayor asks: "I'm looking at starting a development project that will include an Open Source(tm) component. I'm looking for a Web-based defect/bug tracker. I can't use SourceForge, as I'd like to use the same system for both our Open Source(tm) products and our proprietary products. I'd prefer a free product (as in beer), as this is for a startup company. I'm leaning towards Bugzilla, but I'd like to get the opinions of our esteemed readers..."

Joe "Zonker" Brockmeier writes, "Kirrily 'Skud' Robert, CEO of Netizen [and part-time freshmeat appindex maintainer], gives Linux job-seekers a few tips on landing a job with a Linux-friendly company. Netizen is an Australian Open Source and Internet training and consultancy company." It's a fun read, but eminently practical. Among her advice: Have opinions on beer, get involved in open-source projects, keep track of your source code ... just not necessarily in that order.

It's been a week now since ApacheCon 2000 ended. There's been some discussion over the events, with the release of Apache 2.0a being the main topic of conversation. But AC2K was more than just the venue that 2.0a was announced. It was an important and noteworthy conference in it's own right. If you're curious about what happened at AC2K, read on.

The Open Source movement has produced some of the world's finest software through the cooperation of developers worldwide. While it may be the most effective way of writing software the planet has ever seen, it creates its own communication challenges, as well. The days of private, closed-door meetings in pretty offices are over; disputes of all kinds are dealt with publically.

Brian De Palma can direct fun movies, even good movies, but never go into one of his movies expecting too much. Written by the brothers who gave us Predator and Wild Wild West, his awful latest Mission to Mars opened this weekend. YRO authors Michael and Jamie were so appalled by this piece of work that they insisted on panning it together, and Jon Katz added his own, slightly hopeful voice to the flaying. Read more for serious spoilers ...

Repton writes, "Another one from CNET's News.com: A commission set up by the government to look into ways to keep youngsters from Internet smut has realized that they have no funding. This is a sad state of affairs, but somehow I don't feel too much sympathy." Perhaps people "charged with evaluating high-tech tools and other methods to keep online pornography away from children," but on a beer budget, should enjoy a few hours reading through the Censorware Project's Web site. At a library in Utah, say.

Rockhead writes: "Just saw this over at MacWeek. It looks like Deneba will be porting Canvas, their graphics, layout and kitchen-sink program, to Linux. The free beta is expected on the Deneba Web site early next month. Whoopee!" Let's hope that the release of free-beer proprietary vector programs spurs, rather than impedes, progress on KIllustrator and Sketch, both of which look great but incomplete at this point, but hold great promise in expanding Linux's meager selection of vector-drawing tools. Canvas also has some page-layout abilities -- looks like Deneba is seeing Adobe's free FrameMaker download for Linux, and raising.

Scott Draeker writes, "Here are my responses to the questions you sent, and a few others that had been posted." All we can say in return is, "Thanks, Scott. We really appreciate the time you took to do this."