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They argued that anything different from the Federal Circuit's test would erase the "predictability" they have come to expect in the patent application process and would inject too much subjectivity into deciding what is obvious.

"Changes to such settled rules of law involve numerous policy considerations, which should be left to Congress rather than the courts," attorneys for 3M, General Electric, Procter & Gamble, DuPont, and Johnson & Johnson wrote in their brief.

So you've mentioned one instance where the original manufacturer hasn't done such a good job of making their batteries safe.

As I also mentioned, it is not the first such incident, see for example http://blogs.techrepublic.com.com/networking/?cat= 201

Any examples of third party batteries being unsafe? FM transmitters can short out and melt their casings too, but I have no problem using a third party FM transmitter on my iPod.

Nokia claims that all cases of phones from their brand exploding or setting themselves on fire were caused by 3rd party batteries. While they have an obvious stake in making such a claim, it seems that all cases investigated by them did indeed turn out to involve 3rd party batteries. See for example http://www.snopes.com/horrors/techno/cellcharge.as p

From the relatively few incidents with li-ion batteries despite their inherent instability, is the result of proper management of the technology, and as long as you do that, they are quite safe and fine. This includes making very sure you are using the proper battery pack for your device. Whomever you trust for providing that is absolutely upto you.

I think this discussion is pretty much at it's end. You like AAs, that's fine. For a lot of things I like built in battery packs, that's fine too. Isn't it nice we can both get what we want?

Choice is fine, but devices with artificially limited lifetime cause enough problems (waste being one) to argue against using them, hence I disagree that internal battery packs are 'fine' in general. The ipod with its battery replacement programs and from what you say good 3rd party battery packs and such, is the exception, not the rule in this (but then, as some teens around me clearly demonstrate, for now Apple doesn't have to make current ipods unusable after a while in order to keep selling newer models to the same people)

Anyway.. guess you are right, no point in discussing this any further.

MP3 players existed before the iPod and they were *commodity hardware* no less. Apple said "Screw that, this is a style item, not a pocket radio", and made the MP3 player *cool*, then charged a couple hundred dollars more than the Asian consumer electronics giants were charging. And proceeded to beat the living who-hah out of them. (The original iPod was $400 back in 2001. The Nomad Jukebox, which also had a hard drive, sold for about $250. Ever heard of it? Me neither. There were dozens of flash-based MP3 players, all capping at $250. Some of the popular models were in the $160 range.)

See generally http://news.com.com/Apples+iPod+spurs+mixed+reacti ons/2100-1040_3-274821.html for a blast from the past.

So here is the problem for Zune: there was a "portable MP3 player market". It was tiny. There is still a "portable MP3 player market", and its still tiny. And then there is an iPod market. Apple owns the concept like Nintendo used to own "video game console" (come on, how many of you have mothers who said that the Playstation was "The new Nintendo?").

Novell has not provided any useful precedent or other legal ammunition that ANYONE can use in ANY court case. We didn't acknowledge that there are any MS patents infringed by Linux. So this court case you're screaming about is totally unaffected by the Novell/MS deal. Microsoft has been spreading FUD that Linux infringes MS IP for years -- nothing changed in that respect here.

Another point I want to make. Open Source Risk Management is a company that makes its money by selling insurance on Linux IP infringement. So if you're worried that Linux infringes someone's IP, you buy their products. Two years ago OSRM went off and funded a study by Dan Ravicher -- whose PubPat is in my view a great organization -- that looked at Linux to determine whether it actually violates anyone's software patents. Then in August of 2004 (a few months after Bruce Perens joined their board, I might add), OSRM published a study stating that Linux infringes 283 patents, 27 from Microsoft. You can read about it here:
http://news.com.com/Group+Linux+potentially+infrin ges+283+patents/2100-7344_3-5291403.html

Here is a company that sells Linux IP insurance and therefore directly benefits financially from people's fear over Linux patent FUD, so they publish these ominous statements about Linux infringing hundreds of patents! This is realy work done by real people to examine specific patents and determine whether Linux infringes them or not.

On the other hand you have Novell who make NO such statement, who directly contradict Microsoft in the press when Ballmer goes off and says things like this.

So pardon me, but I think it's worth looking at the whole picture here.

It fails my check 1. Browser synchronization.

Until it obtains such a feature, I have no need to try it.

Actually something similar is already in the works and I agree that browser synchronization is a HUGE bonus for firefox. The following is a quote from an interview with Wium Lie who is CTO at Opera:

"You can start, for example, reading a CNET article on your laptop in the morning and then, as you run out and catch a bus or subway, you can continue reading that article on your phone; the data can follow you. We're not quite there yet, but that's another point that's going to be a focus in our development--to try to synchronize data between the mobile world and the stationary world." http://news.com.com/For+Opera%2C+smaller+really+is +better/2008-1032_3-6124184.html

So, Opera will soon have something similar.

To be honest, I wasn't very impressed with how it didn't support my bank's site (even when changing the browser agent) -- but for some reason they support Konqueror even.

How did it fail? This sounds more like a problem with how the website was coded and not a problem with Opera itself. I think it is a case of your banks website not supporting Opera, not Opera not supporting your banks website.

I was a relatively early adopter of Firefox, I liked it because of the multiform support, tabbed browsing, etc. I have a triple boot system, with Vista RC2, XP, and Mandriva - and Firefox 2.0 has been crashing/hanging within minutes of any browsing session, with no discrimination for the platform I am on. Needless to say, previous versions didn't have the issue. I have a psychical aversion to downgrading (I'm American, we aren't trained for that kind of thing), but I guess I will have to go back to 1.5 soon. I have also found myself using IE or opera when I am doing something that I really don't want to lose.

I'm a EE, and I know enough coding to break stuff, and piss off the CS dept., but I have no desire whatsoever to debug a browser. With that in mind, I've seen, as have the rest of you here at /., a major push to get everyone possible using FOSS. So here's my point - The community can't have it both ways with FOSS:
1: Either this type of software should only be used by those who have the ability and/or desire to fix what is or could become broken
or
2: the community, having pushed the use of FOSS into the less-technical world, should take responsibility for what they have created and promoted.

The reality right now is that the 'community' seems to want both - they want the market share - and they are very quick to run away when a product doesn't work as advertised - and don't try to say that Firefox in particular isn't advertised. Try searching for 'Firefox 2.0' crashes...Basically every response will lead you here.

Since Firefox really is the poster child of the FOSS movement, they need to be very careful not to make Microsoft's case for them.

Did Microsoft hold secret talks with Novell prior to any public announcement to any agreement?

If so, I would hope openSUSE developers would be more concerned about this, rather than a clearly *open* offer from Shuttleworth. I used SUSE for several years prior to Novell coming into the SUSE picture, before I switched to Ubuntu Linux.

I said it before and I'll say it again, I think Mr. Shuttleworth is brilliant.

Look, if Microsoft wanted to bring Windows and Linux together, why didn't they do it when they partnered with Corel around six years ago? (if, indeed, it was a partnership, correct me if I'm wrong please) Does anyone remember Corel Linux? It, like Ubuntu, was a Debian based Linux distribution, with an easy to use graphical installer! And this was around six years ago! (There was even a Corel Linux for Dummies book, check Amazon dot com and see for yourself) Anyone who wants to gain an enlightened perspective can google about Corel Linux and Microsoft and inform themselves. Here are a few important articles:

"Corel Sells Out To Microsoft"

"Interview: Corel's Linux VP on the Microsoft deal" @ CNN 10/16/2000

"Microsoft Faces New Antitrust Probe Over Corel Deal"

"Government lawyers want to know more about a deal in which Microsoft gave Corel, perhaps best known for its WordPerfect program, $135 million in exchange for 24 million shares of Corel stock last October." "After the investment, Corel announced it would retreat from developing software designed to run on the Linux operating system, which competes with Microsoft's Windows operating system." - quotes source

"Microsoft Litigation" List - Educate yourself

I ask you: Who do YOU trust?

Do you want open meetings and discussions? Isn't that what an open source community thrives on? Or do you want secret meetings?

For those of you who would rather crack chair throwing or developer jokes and ignore the issue, read for yourself in an interview with Bill Gates dated 11/17/2006 where he mentions Novell, indemnification, and the word pioneering all in the same reponse to a question:

"Gates on Vista, Linux and more"

History repeats itself, and I believe, in my opinion, we're seeing it happen right now. IMO the Corel/Microsoft events in history should not be ignored. In fact, I suggest they be looked at again closely and compared to the present Novell/Microsoft events for educational purposes. :) Google for yourself and see, there are a lot of juicy articles out there on this. And yes, I know about Xandros, my point is about where Corel Linux was headed.

And to think, only 3 weeks ago Chinese officials tried to convince the UN that the Chinese government does not censor the internet.

So Larry Ellison's New Internet Computer (NIC) concept was simply ahead of its time? http://news.com.com/Ellisons+NIC+Co.+to+shut+down/ 2100-1042_3-1012119.html "The devices, which had no hard drive and ran off a version of Linux stored on a CD-ROM, initially sold for $199 without a monitor." "The NIC Co. was the last company truly promoting the concept of a Web-surfing appliance as an alternative to a low-cost PC. It was an idea that flourished briefly in the late 1990s, with 3Com, Sony, Gateway, Compaq Computer and Netpliance all pushing such devices. However, all eventually pulled the plug after limited sales."

The other shoe has dropped indeed.

Ballmer's remarks through this fiasco are evasive enough, but at least seem to be comprehensible. Bullying us into thinking, "OMG! If I use Linux, the MicroNazis will come to my door with a bill for such-a-bunch-a-dollars!" Please, Mr. B. The latest stats on school dropouts don't speak for all of us.

Speaking of dropouts, I peeked at this interview with Bill Gates and-- is it just me, or does he not make a lick of sense? It's so filled with contra-semantics and double-speak that I can't make heads or tails of what he's really saying. If MS wants him to lead their projects, then they're being led by senility.

Now that the smoke is clearing, I can get behind Novell's take on this; inter-operability is the key to making everything work in the end. (stuff works... goo-ood.)

When it comes down to it, having a working PC, and having the stuff you need to work on a PC work, is what really matters.

Ballmer's little "made ya look!" trick has done nothing but cause a huge ruckus. It's as FUD as FUD can get.

I might even re-install OpenSuSE after all is said and done. (using Gnome this time)

To all of the Ebay resellers that endured week long lines, biting cold, searing heat, slings and arrows of outrageous fortune, all for ownership of a PS3 that they might sell it for 400% of retail price before Christmas, I say unto thee: Ha ha! Pwn3d n00bz!

Nah. The shipments will likely be very small, on the order of 10 or fewer consoles per store (more likely around 2-5 consoles). Given the demand and Sony's inability to satisfy, I think the ebayers will be fine at least through the holiday season and possibly as long as next spring.

We saw what happened when Microsoft had a problem with chip suppliers for the Xbox 360. That was just memory chips. Sony's having a problem getting blue lasers for the BD drives as well as suffering under low yields for Cell chips (some reports have yields as low as 10-20%, though I doubt it's truly that bad). It will take a miracle for Sony to hit their estimate of 2 million consoles on the market by end of this year, and even if they do a fair number of those will fall after the holiday.

GoNintendo/CNet have different news:

Nintendo will bring approximately 2 million Wii game consoles to the U.S. by the end of the year, a wave of machines that could help the company gain ground in the console wars.

All 2 million aren't in the U.S. right now. However, Nintendo plans to restock U.S. distributors and retailers on a weekly basis, according to the company. The console will next launch in Japan on December 2 and in Europe on December 8. Earlier this month, Nintendo said it would ship around 400,000 consoles into Japan this year.

In all, 4 million will ship this year.

Of the three console makers, Nintendo so far seems to have done the most thorough job in getting retailers and distributors stocked. The $250 Wii console, which went on sale over the weekend, was available in several retail outlets. Some early buyers are selling consoles on eBay, but generally current bidding is in the $300 to $400 range with games and extras.

What about this? ... one day as non-volatile memory based on carbon nanotubes becomes more prevalent and cheaper they'll slap that on the "CPU" die as well... Remember this company? Nantero. What you'll have in the mobile market is a CPU core, a GPU core, and probably a good 512MB non-volatile memory all in one die. Also, with stuff like the PPC chip PA Semi is working on, see here, we'll probably see pcie, sata, gigabit ethernet controllers built-in as well. So what do you have? ... quite the small system with low latency and power consumption. And for a bonus, you'll probably eventually have carbon-nanotube memory off-die as well in place of a hard drive. So those "yeah, that's fake" computers we see in movies that look like a medical tricorder with gigs of storage, will actually be real. Now, of course, this is years off, but I like the direction. I especially like the idea of 10's to 100's of gigs in a single carbon-nanotube based DIMM (or whatever is out then) or flash-drive replacement. Then we can finally shed hard drives, optical drives, and the like for purely non-mechanical devices (w/ the exception of course that tape-backups and such will likely still be present, but less so for the consumer market).

OK, time to stop dreaming and get back to work.

Judge: Craigslist not liable for ad content
By Mike Hughlett
Tribune staff reporter

November 16, 2006

The popular Craigslist Web site is not legally liable for allegedly discriminatory housing ads posted by its users, a federal judge in Chicago ruled in a case pitting landmark Internet and fair housing laws against each other.

The decision was a victory for online civil liberties supporters. It was a setback for housing civil rights advocates, though they still found some hope in the judge's ruling.

The Chicago Lawyers' Committee for Civil Rights Under Law sued San Francisco-based Craigslist in February, claiming that during a six-month period, the site published more than 100 housing ads in Chicago that violated the federal Fair Housing Act.

Those ads included such declarations as "Non-women of Color NEED NOT APPLY" and "African Americans and Arabians tend to clash with me so that won't work out."

The 1968 Fair Housing Act bars housing discrimination, and newspapers and other publishers of ads deemed discriminatory can be held liable for violating the law.

But the 1996 Communications Decency Act, in an attempt to promote unfettered free expression online, shields Web forums from liability for ads and opinions posted by their users.



Internet giants back Craigslist

That's what Craigslist argued in its defense in the Chicago case, and it was joined in friend-of-the-court filings by such Internet giants as Amazon.com, eBay, Google, Yahoo and AOL.

The Chicago Lawyers' Committee has a heavyweight ally, too, though not through a formal court briefing. The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development has said the ban on discriminatory ads applies to Web postings like those on Craigslist.

The battle boils down to the definition of a publisher.

The decency act says that a provider of an "interactive computer service" can't be treated as a publisher of information it gets from others.

Craigslist is indeed an interactive computer service, a conduit of information provided by others, Judge Amy St. Eve said in a written opinion that effectively dismisses the case.

Thus, under the 1996 communications law, Craigslist can't be treated as a publisher, she wrote in the decision, which was filed Tuesday and then circulated Wednesday by attorneys involved in the case.

The Chicago Lawyers' Committee plans to appeal St. Eve's ruling, or to ask the judge to reconsider her decision.

In a statement, Craigslist said St. Eve's decision is "a win for the general public's ability to self-publish content such as free classified ads on the Internet." Craigslist noted, too, that it has "industry leading standards" in policing its site for offensive ads.

Internet law experts weren't surprised by St. Eve's decision, because judges have usually ruled in favor of Web forums like Craigslist, citing the decency act's broad protection.

"It's very clear under these precedents that Craigslist shouldn't be held liable for ads provided by third parties," said Kurt Opsahl, a lawyer with the Electronic Frontier Foundation, a technology and civil liberties group. The organization filed a friend-of-the-court briefing on behalf of Craigslist.



Not a total victory

The Chicago Lawyers' Committee took solace in parts of St. Eve's opinion.

Craigslist argued that the decency act grants it immunity from any sort of lawsuit stemming from its users' postings. Web outfits like Craigslist have commonly made such claims of "unlimited" immunity--and judges have usually agreed.

MSN, a subsidiary of Microsoft, has a vested interest in seeing third-world kids using not an OLPC laptop, but the new Microsoft Xbox Live Learning Edition, with a 6-omegahurtz quad-core CPU, 64 dedicated DirectX fragment shaders, Windows Embedded and DirectX, .NET framework, and Media Center and Zune connectivity.

Don't laugh -- it could happen.

No, really, according Alberto Gonzalez they do! Not really but according to the RIAA/MPAA, file sharing is the same as selling full on bootlegs.

Actually, the dig was at Windows XP SP2 in particular - not just Windows generally.

If these bots have control over 'the most secure Windows yet', then that is worthy of note.

Mark

PS Yes, I know the link is from 2004 - but they've not released anything since, so it must still be true, right?

This is getting really old and although many here will probably disagree, it will eventually have an impact. I can just hear my legal department now "We keep hearing case after case of Linux infringing on someone's IP. We better ban it. Microsoft is a big secure company that would never do anything like that and if they did, there is no way the effects of it could ever impact the end user"...Oh wait.. .. Scratch that.

Linux had a lot of that rep even before it was 'portable' to anything but an x86. And there's research to show that the code itself is just plain well written. But yeah, that certainly helps.

Google bought what could be the future of the internet's video content distribution. It could compete with TV in a few years. Shows might be available for sale there with Google's micropayments. Etcetera.

It's a risk, yes, but a calculated gamble.

It's not particularly expensive, Yahoo bought Broadcast.com in the billions (5bn, though I don't know how much of that was overinflated stock) and that seems to be a total dud:

http://news.com.com/Yahoo+completes+Broadcast.com+ acquisition/2100-1023_3-228762.html

Also covered by CNet

"I'm from Europe and the unspoken truth here is that the EU officials are severely corrupt"

Acutally you have it the wrong way round, it's MS and its lobbiests who are doing the corrupting. Batting on their side is also Charlie McGreevey a member of one of the most corrupt goverments in Europe. he's also behind the repeated attempts to get a US style patent system introduced into Europe.

was EU corruption (Score:5, lies)

IBM SOnt and Toshiba Co-designed the Cell processor. IBM for its part is already getting good use out of it in thier supercomputing ventures. http://news.com.com/IBM+to+build+Opteron-Cell+hybr id+supercomputer/2100-1010_3-6112439.html I have alwys thought that sony got screwed with the cell. It was clearly designed for supercomputing tasks in mind which is why it has such high performance but such poor branch prediction. Sony could ahve gotten a faster processor for less money by going with a more conventional architecture but, as usual, they are trying to reinvent the wheel.

I imagine you'll see a browser sync that is integrated with the my.opera domain that also integrates the mobile web environment, which will be a nice step forward in sync (Reference CNet news: For Opera, smaller really is better)

It will work because cell phones are not like landline phones.

First of all, cell phones have screens. Often large color screens allowing many lines of text or graphics/videos. Wired phones could pretty much only push ads through audio recordings. Screens open up many more avenues for ad delivery without getting overly annoying.

Cell phones also know where you are and what stores are near you at any particular moment. Not only that, but we store a lot of information about ourselves on cells. Combined, they could produce highly relevant and profitable targeted ads. If everybody starts using their phones to access their debit cards like in Japan, the cell provider could even have evidence of effectiveness.

The calender app could place notices of sales in local stores. Have a reminder for your dad's birthday next week? May we suggest this drill bit set. Order online now through this link for guaranteed on-time delivery!

A phone could show a banner whenever an alarm is turned off (coffee ads in the morning, movie listings in the evening, whatever). Banners could also be slipped in unobtrusively when you silence your phone, turn it off, plug it in to its charger, etc.

People could also opt in for extras. Be subjected to a 15 second audio ad and get 5 extra anytime minutes! Fill out this fifteen minute survey and get this ringtone, free!

If you don't think there would be any takers, just ask this woman http://news.com.com/2061-10786_3-5770822.html.

But I must clear something up here. I do not recall all the gory details of the Roxio lawsuit, and I am not a lawyer (so I may have some of this wrong), but they were not sued for using freedb. They were sued for contract violation and/or trademark infringement. I'm not sure how you could sue someone just for using freedb.

Didn't IBM indicate they would open source parts of theirs if Sun open sourced theirs?
http://news.com.com/IBM+urges+Sun+to+make+Java+ope n+source/2100-1007_3-5165427.html

Xbox360 may be in my future depending on what the new games look like.
Yeah, they are probably going to be great if the first Xbox developers "are achieving a level of visual detail you really get in 'Toy Story.'"

GeForce 8: 128 Stream Processors
Sparc T1: 8 Cores w/4 threads (Maximum thoroughput: 32 simultaneous processes)
16 Core POWER5
Cell Processor: 1 Primary + 8 Sub-Processors

Intel Promises 80 cores

We're at a LOT more than "four".

Take hydrogen. The day someone figures out how to easily produce hydrogen the days of energy monopolies are over - anyone with access to water (or whatever the raw material turns out to be) can do it.

That's not going to happen. The most plentiful source of hydrogen on the planet is water. No one is going to be able to figure out a system that uses less engerdy to split the molecules than you get in return by burning the hydrogen or using it in fuel cells.

True, current technology widely available isn't able to generate more electricity from hydrogen than the energy required to generate the hydrogen from water, however some places can produce hydrogen relatively cheaply. Iceland being one such place. With the volcano there they are able to use geothermal energy to hydrolyze water. In the US, maybe in other countries as well, there's research going on to use algae to produce hydrogen or other fuels such as biodiesel. University of New Hampshire has the UNH Biodiesel Group working on Widescale Biodiesel Production from Algae.

Novell is due to receive USD $348 million in up-front payments.

So, using one of the ignorant examples above, it would like a bully pays you and agrees not to bully you anymore, and then offers that same deal to other people that might be afraid of him as well. It's still a bad analogy.

People want to know what Microsoft is getting out of the deal? I'll quote you from this article: Microsoft makes Linux pact with Novell

The companies said Thursday they will collaborate on development of specific technologies, for example to help Microsoft's Windows, a proprietary operating system, work with Novell's Suse Linux, which is based on open-source code. On the business side, they will promote each other's products.

Collaborate means they will help each other. Microsoft is trying to increase their revenue in the server market in my opinion. I saw a different article earlier about how IBM sponsored a survey that shows that Linux is more popular in servers than Windows, or something like that. It also says they will promote each other's products. You want to know what MS is getting out of it and why they would give Novell money, there's a big part of your answer. Novell is also battling with IBM Red Hat for server share. Getting an endorsement from MS and freeing the end-user from potential IP issues will probably help Novell make strides against Red Hat.

The impetus for the arrangement was to make it easier for software buyers to run both Windows and Linux-based systems, Hovsepian said.

The companies will work together on optimizing their virtualization technologies, said Jeffrey Jaffe, Novell's chief technology officer. Novell will offer a version of Suse Linux Enterprise Server with optimized virtualization features for Windows Server Longhorn; Microsoft, in turn, will sell a version of the upcoming Windows server product that is optimized to run the Novell software in a virtual environment, he said. Neither company, however, will sell the other's operating-system product.

Windows is trying to get it's software onto Linux systems via virtualization and Novell would obviously like to get their software onto a server that is running Windows or possibly have their software used in place of Red Hat.

Microsoft is taking a significant step toward being a better open-source citizen,[improved image, might lead to selling more licenses] RedMonk analyst Stephen O'Grady said. And among Linux companies, Novell is likely to receive a significant boost in attention and credibility, and Red Hat will have to further defend its position as the de facto Linux supplier.Novell could get more market share in the form of virtualization on a Windows server, and may take some market share from Red Hat

Additionally, Microsoft will officially recommend Suse Linux Enterprise for people who want to run both Windows and Linux. It will distribute coupons for maintenance and support for Novell's Suse Linux Enterprise Server operating system. Microsoft and Novell will help each other's customers with support, transferring people over to the other company's help staff if needed.

I think it's pretty clear what both sides expect to gain from this. I think there's potential for this to affect Novell in some bad way that haven't forseen, but I don't see how this can have a negative impact

Will it still be relevent if Intel delivers 80 cores in five years as they promise? Or will history repeat itself and we'll have our 80 cores plus specialized "math coprocessors" again?

Attorney John Lear's new offices in the Major George Downey Mansion will be the testing ground for the system. Lear, who specializes in gas and oil law, stumbled upon the idea last year while investigating alternatives to traditional heating and cooling systems.

The project includes each utility installing a new boiler, fuel handling system and auxiliary equipment to tie into existing turbine generators. The project will use biomass from a tree farm in Aitkin, as well as right of way clearings.

Biomass is organic matter (such as wood) that can be processed into energy for heat, liquid fuels or power generation. Biomass can be combusted directly to produce steam for electricity or it can be converted into a gas to power a turbine.

The boilers will produce 20 megawatts of biomass electricity in Hibbing and 15 megawatts in Virginia.

The two utilities, working jointly as the Laurentian Energy Authority, hold a contract to sell 35 megawatts of biomass power to Xcel Energy.

And, of course, this only works on mice. Why is it that mice always get the best treatments?

They talk about, and link to an article going into detail on the application of this in humans.

Most big companies look at patents not as an offensive weapon, but more as a defensive weapon against someone else patenting the stuff and then suing them over it.

Earlier this year they purchased DMarc Broadcasting, a Newport Beach, Calif., company that works with radio advertisers in the sales, scheduling, delivery and reporting of radio ads.

"Endless September" technically ended last year, as these articles state:

http://news.com.com/AOL+shutting+down+newsgroups/2 100-1032_3-5550036.html
http://www.metafilter.com/mefi/38978

However, AOL users discovered the "Google Groups" interface to Usenet newsgroups, and there are surely more clueless AOL users (sorry for the redundancy) posting to Usenet through Google than there were posting "directly" to Usenet through AOL's interface in 1993. Thus, your date of "Monday, September 4815, 1993" is more-or-less correct.

It's fortunate that (AFAIK) no Usenetian has ridden on the Space Shuttle - his or her insistence that the date is always a day in September 1993 would have been too confusing for all others involved.

Everyone always chides Google on focussing on too many projects, but they are still focussing on their core business. They are also getting into Print Advertising as well:

http://news.com.com/Google+takes+ad+sales+to+print /2100-1024_3-5844889.html

So the bottom line is that they're an advertising company with lots of side projects.

I'll try to resist the IBM nazi link. Ah crap I failed.

IBM also has one of the largest patent portfolios ever assembled. Right now, somewhere in Redmond, a Microsoft programmer is infringing on IBM patents. If MS wants to play rough, IBM will play rough. Here's a couple articles on IBM, open source, and patents:

http://www-03.ibm.com/press/us/en/pressrelease/191 01.wss
http://news.com.com/IBM+offers+500+patents+for+ope n-source+use/2100-7344_3-5524680.html

You're just trolling by asking about the US, but Cuba is a valid one that I was going to question myself. At the recent UN summit on internet access, it was alleged that "Zero percent of Cubans are connected to the Internet because of the censorship hold that the authorities there have over their people.

I would have to go back and look this up, but after the Cable Companies won (overall) in the Brand X case and the SCOTUS said they did not have to be classified as common carriers, the DSL companies petitioned the FCC, and two months later the fcc reclassified DSL carriers as well, so they were no longer beholden to common carrier rules. there was a one-year carry over, where they would continue under the old rules, which, i think, just passed.

This news.com story pretty much sums it up from summer of 05

this ground was covered a few years ago in (what I think was) a correct decision by a federal court where a disabled person brought suit against Southwest Airlines for its web site. The court said, under the law, the world of online does not count as a place of public accomodation. The ADA was written very clearly to cover physical locations. It gives a list of places that fall under this definition, like a barbershop, auditorium, bakery, etc.

Whether or not the online world should fall under the ADA may be a legitimate question, but that is not the same as what the current law is. If new rules are to be issued, let that be changed through the public deliberative process, so that all the details can come out and be thought about first.

the related story: here in this article

There was the famous layoff at Wired News, where they laid off all the reporters and kept some of the editors.

Of course, what happened is that press releases took over. Wired Magazine is now a version of the Sharper Image catalog. Who needs reporters? Content is what fills in the space between the ads. And if you just use press releases for that, nobody notices.

"It's possible that Thursday's deal between Microsoft and Novell could conflict with a provision in the General Public License (GPL), according to Eben Moglen, the attorney for the Free Software Foundation that created and oversees the Linux license. "If you make an agreement which requires you to pay a royalty to anybody for the right to distribute GPL software, you may not distribute it under the GPL," Moglen told CNET News.com Thursday. Section 7 of the GPL "requires that you have, and pass along to everybody, the right to distribute software freely and without additional permission." Article from CNET: http://news.com.com/2061-10795_3-6132156.html

"If you make an agreement which requires you to pay a royalty to anybody for the right to distribute GPL software, you may not distribute it under the GPL," Moglen told CNET News.com Thursday. Section 7 of the GPL "requires that you have, and pass along to everybody, the right to distribute software freely and without additional permission."

The article points out that there isn't agreement in the tech community for net neutrality. See this article:

"Tech manufacturers rally against Net neutrality"
http://news.com.com/Tech+manufacturers+rally+again st+Net+neutrality/2100-1028_3-6117241.html?tag=nl

It says that some companies support it and some don't. We know Google and Ebay support net neutrality, but the article states, "more than 100 companies from the networking and communications sector, including Cisco Systems, Nortel Networks and Qualcomm, [said it was] too soon to enact network neutrality legislation."

One of the reasons this issue isn't so cut and dry is because a lot of us in the tech industry fear that by regulating the Internet we could be creating an environment that does has the opposite effect of the positive benefits of requiring neutrality. The argument goes that since corporations have such a large stake in the outcomes of regulatory control, they will over time turn the regulation to their favor through political pressure, lobbyists, and other means. I fear that creating so-called net neutrality through regulation could ultimately turn against us. There is a very good essay I would recommend to get a better idea of the potential dangers of regulating net neutrality:

"Net Neutrality" - Digital Discrimination or Regulatory Gamesmanship in Cyberspace?
http://www.cdt.org/speech/net-neutrality/20040112t hierer.pdf

In summary, there isn't unanimity among techs about whether regulating net neutrality is good or not so it makes sense that it wasn't included as one of the issues.

Bribed examiners?

Give me a break.

Don't be so sure.. This is anonymous so it's only indicative but it does show how corruption could happen. And for one of the most important patents ever:

It's widely known that Alexander Graham Bell beat Elisha Gray to the patent office by a mere two hours with his application to patent the telephone. However, ten years after Bell's patent was issued, patent examiner Zenas Wilber admitted in a sworn affadavit that he had taken a $100 bribe from Bell, had taken a loan from Bell's patent attorney, and had given Bell the complete details of Gray's caveat. Hmmmm....
Source: Inventor's Digest, July/August 1998, pages 26-28.

As I said, it's just too easy, there's no checks and balances and there's too much money (i.e. incentive) and anonymity/ambiguity (i.e. no risk) involved.

Good luck writing to your representative.

Thanks.

In the mean time I think the review process is a major step forward.

Well, it's better than nothing but I think it's going to have only a minor effect because it doesn't address a root cause of the problem, that it's far easier to have a bad patent issued than it is to stop one. We'll see.

---

The USA and Europe should harmonize their software patent laws with China and India.

He comes in at 53.33% (click on Alaska on the map), which while the lowest in Alaska is far from the lowest overall. In fact, it's above the senate average of 43.30%.

Consider the Senate Methodology

3. Prohibit Internet gambling. This isn't really a tech vote. This is a moral socio-economic vote. c|net wanted Senators to vote to allow (not to prohibit) Internet gambling... because it's on the Internet?!

5. Increasing paperwork for Internet Sellers. What's the amendment that c|net wanted a no vote against? "To require persons selling tangible personal property via the Internet to disclose to purchasers that they may be subject to State and local sales and use taxes on the purchases." That's it. Simply inform the buyer that he or she may have to pay taxes in other districts. You see, when you buy in meatspace, this part of the transaction is automagic. Not so in virtual space. Again, I don't see it as being a major technological issue vote.

11. Free Trade Bill. No, seriously. If you voted for free trade, you demonstrated your prowess as a technologist? Give me a freaking break.

12. Over-ruling state anti-SPAM with the CAN-SPAM. Now, you might not think that the legislation is tough enough, but I think it is fair to say that the pro-technology approach to Internet regulation is to not have 50 different sets of regulations within the United States.

16. For curbs on class-action lawsuits. Again, WTF? This isn't a technology issue per se. This is a judicial process issue. To put it in this list is asinine.

But, what wasn't on this list?
  * Judicial approvals
  * Regulatory approvals (think FCC, et al)
  * Committee membership
  * Interaction with lobbyists and money acceptance from PACs.

It's a dumb list, at least on the Senate side. I didn't even bother to check out the House side.