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Now that I read it, it wasn't even that article. It started something like "Everything Bill Gates has sold you will be obsolete" and it had the BeOS guy standing by a BeBox.

http://swpat.ffii.org/log/intro/index.en.html

Software Patents in Europe: A Short Overview

A patent is a right to monopolize an invention. A would-be inventor specifies a scope of activities from which he wants to exclude others (the claims), and submits it to the Patent Office, which evaluates whether these claims depict an invention within the sense of the law and whether the invention is correctly disclosed and industrially applicable (formal examination). Some patent offices will moreover examine whether the invention is new and non-obvious (substantive examination). If the application passes the examination hurdles, the Patent Office grants the applicant exclusive rights to produce and market the invention for a period of 20 years.

Programming is similar to writing symphonies. When a programmer writes software, he weaves together thousands of ideas (algorithms or calculation rules) into a copyrighted work. Usually some of the ideas in the programmer's work will be new and non-obvious according to the (inherently low) standards of the patent system. When many such ideas are patented, it becomes impossible to write software without infringing on patents. Software authors are thereby deprived of their copyright; they live under permanent threat of being blackmailed by holders of large patent portfolios. As a result, less software is written and fewer new ideas appear.

The core patent law in Europe is the European Patent Convention (EPC) of 1973. In Article 52, the Convention states that discoveries, scientific theories, mathematical methods, rules, methods of thought, business methods, and computer programs are not inventions in the sense of patent law. There is a reason for that: in the legal tradition patents have been for concrete applications of natural science ("technical inventions"), whereas patents on software cover abstract ideas. When patents are applied to software, the result is such that instead of patenting a specific mousetrap, you patent any "means of trapping mammals" (or, for an actual example, any "means of trapping data in an emulated environment").

In 1986 the European Patent Office (EPO) started granting patents on computer programs in violation of the EPC , allowing claims on software distinguished only by the use of the following phrasing:

"1. process for using a computer, characterised by ..."

Unchecked in this practice, in 1998 they began granting claims that literally contradicted the law , allowing patents on software for claims that used the following phrasing:

"2. computer program, characterised by that [with its help a process according to claim 1 can be executed]."

The number of patents on software that the EPO has granted in this manner is estimated at more than 30,000, and this practice has been increasing at a rate of 3,000 per year.

Most of these patents are broad and trivial and not significantly different from corresponding types of patents that the US and Japan have been allowing.

Given the damaging effects of these kinds of patents, not to mention their illegality, one might expect the EPO would be subject to pressure to bring its practice in acc

So the US doesn't have a problem then? :-)

I think that is a misprint, current displays have a lifespan of ~10,000, and that is currently limited by the blue LEDs, the red and green last ~20,000 hours, so after 10,000 the color balance starts to degrade pretty rapidly. BTW Seiko Epson recently unveiled a 40 inch OLED display. So this is definitely something that is feaseable now.

I'd kill Mike before Bill.

Daniel Lyons of Frobes is up there with Laura Didio and Rob Enderle when it comes to having a clue about anything. These people are mostly pens for hire who will do or say anything to make a buck. I would highly encourage the Slashdot editors to put these people on ignore.

Also, I read somewhere... probably here, about a company that created a wearable one like in TNG as a cummunication device. The company has sold them to hospitals. See an article here http://www.forbes.com/technology/2004/03/16/cx_ah_ 0316chips.html --- Let's see what our moderators score this one as :P

Here's a bit about Fat line. I'm not CS either, just a story that struck me as interesting.

I think we're talking at cross purposes regarding application. I regard, for example, CFD as applied science (not a knock-down, I worked in that field myself). I don't recall patents on things like the use of Guass' Theorem to help approximate differential systems by algebraic systems. But it worries me that we may see that kind of patent in future years.

I think that perhaps engineers are maligned scientists.

I for one encourage MS, because, in this field, they have the best chance of actually doing it and doing it well.

I guess that's why .. "The home and entertainment division that includes the Xbox video game machine had an operating loss of $394 million on $1.27 billion in revenue."

What other market segment does Nintendo have to fall back on? Do you think they could make massive losses year after year propped up by something else?

Sure, they're all greedy multinational corps etc. but MS definately has unfair leverage here, no matter how smart/effective you think their activities are.

Quote:

If captured and converted, the gas would make (after conversion losses) 250 billion barrels of synthetics, from clean-burning diesel to jet fuel. That's like finding another Saudi Arabia.

Don't know if anyone noticed the "feedback" bit at the bottom, but there's a link to another review on the Seiko Epson 40" OLED display.

http://www.forbes.com/business/businesstech/newswi re/2004/05/18/rtr1374939.html

Given your scenario of 15 people (yes, I know you just picked a number at random, so I'm not picking on that), it might take 15 years.

However, how long would it take a community of crackers to find an exploit?

The news that Cisco has had its router software ripped-off is relatively old news (!). Cisco sued Huawei Technologies for ripping off their router. I'll give you a hint: if you're using a router from Huawei, you use the Cisco manual.

Nobody believes in the mythical "man-month" anymore (ie, throw twice as many people at a task and it'll get done in half the time... WRONG), but with 15 THOUSAND people looking at this, I think they'd be able to not only find flaws in the code, but find flaws in the underlying architecture of how the software works (ie, protocol weaknesses). And these people would be looking to "mess with the internet," not just rob Cisco. 8/

Google makes money, and VA doesn't.

You know, I was really was starting to take seriously the "delayed gratification" justfication for offshore outsourcing...until I saw this article yesterday:

REUTERS: U.S. CEO pay rose 27% in 2003 -- Study

Lesson of the Day: US workers have to endure unemployment lines and dry lectures about enduring short-term pain for (nebulous) future prosperity - but CEOs get to reward themselves right now with an unprecedented pay raise! Horray!

[Yes, I realize that CEO pay is largely determined by their Board of Directors...of course, who do you think sits on those Boards? If you said "other CEOs" - dingdingdingding!]

I think I should mention here this link: America's 25 Fastest-Growing Big Companies. They're mostly oil companies - e.g. seven out of the top 10 on the list.

Pffl. Do you honestly think the percentage of GDP that is government spending has changed significantly in three years?

Yes. Do they not have newspapers where you live or something? One would hope you at least heard about Sept. 11th?

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The stuff I see in these photos is about the same as some people pay good money for. I've seen FAR worse on some porn websites.

Besides the obvious stupidity of the post - There is a financial cost to what is happening here too...


"White House breakdown of $87 bln anti-terror money

"- In Iraq, about $51 billion will support ongoing military operations"

They've fired most of the people that work for a living. There's way too much management left.

Check this article about our execs salaries and performance relative to those of companies like Cisco.

It will never come back without swapping out all of the upper management and that will never happen.

>>if you choose to measure in terms of total company assets, the way Forbes does when they compile their Global 500 list, Citigroup wins. They've got assets worth over $1 trillion.
>Except it isn't a Global 500 list, it only includes US based companies

The Forbes Global 500 list isn't a global 500 list?

>Mizuho is bigger than Citigroup
Not according to Forbes' data. You might be right if the exchange rate has changed things that much since they compiled their list.

"Biggest" depends on how you calculate it, of course (assets, sales, profits, market value, etc.) but Citigroup is at the top of Forbes' composite Forbes Global 2000 list. They are also at the top of the list ranked by assets. (Mizuho is #2.) Mizuho is not at the top of any list.

According to Forbes:
Wal-Mart has the most sales in the world.
ExxonMobil has the largest profits in the world. Microsoft is #6.
Citigroup has the most assets in the world. Mizuho is #2; Deutche Bank is #7.
General Electric has the highest market value in the world. Microsoft is #2.

I can't find any solid evidence for a decline.

Microsoft Sells 210 Million Copies of Windows XP The number mostly based on new OEM system installs, currently running about 10 million a month, up from 9 million a month last July. Figure in corporate licensing, academic distributions, etc., and the number of legit, licensed, XP installs alone must be over 300-350 million.

The Google Zeitgeist tells much the same story, 90% all queries to Google come from systems running Windows, 47% from systems running XP. Not a bad showing for a three year old O/S.

If it is the MS trials you are reffering too, you obviously have your head shoved up way to far up your MCSE ass.

There were some trademark related ones, or threats of, over Java. They were just enforcing the fact that people can't call something Java or 100% Java compatible unless it's been tested as such. This is a good thing for the developer community that needs to rely on the claims of something being 100% pure java.

The only one I found regarding patents was related to Kingston which Sun later dropped. A stupid decision to start the suit in my opinion.

You want to talk about big patent lawsuits you're looking at the wrong tech company identified by three letters. Even MS is taking big blue's cue and building a patent portfolio to start raising revenue.

Read this interesting bit on how IBM tried to bully Sun out of $10 million in it's early days."

My own introduction to the realities of the patent system came in the 1980s, when my client, Sun Microsystems--then a small company--was accused by IBM of patent infringement. Threatening a massive lawsuit, IBM demanded a meeting to present its claims. Fourteen IBM lawyers and their assistants, all clad in the requisite dark blue suits, crowded into the largest conference room Sun had.

The chief blue suit orchestrated the presentation of the seven patents IBM claimed were infringed, the most prominent of which was IBM's notorious "fat lines" patent: To turn a thin line on a computer screen into a broad line, you go up and down an equal distance from the ends of the thin line and then connect the four points. You probably learned this technique for turning a line into a rectangle in seventh-grade geometry, and, doubtless, you believe it was devised by Euclid or some such 3,000-year-old thinker. Not according to the examiners of the USPTO, who awarded IBM a patent on the process.

After IBM's presentation, our turn came. As the Big Blue crew looked on (without a flicker of emotion), my colleagues--all of whom had both engineering and law degrees--took to the whiteboard with markers, methodically illustrating, dissecting, and demolishing IBM's claims. We used phrases like: "You must be kidding," and "You ought to be ashamed." But the IBM team showed no emotion, save outright indifference. Confidently, we proclaimed our conclusion: Only one of the seven IBM patents would be deemed valid by a court, and no rational court would find that Sun's technology infringed even that one.

An awkward silence ensued. The blue suits did not even confer among themselves. They just sat there, stonelike. Finally, the chief suit responded. "OK," he said, "maybe you don't infringe these seven patents. But we have 10,000 U.S. patents. Do you really want us to go back to Armonk [IBM headquarters in New York] and find seven patents you do infringe? Or do you want to make this easy and just pay us $20 million?" After a modest bit of negotiation, Sun cut IBM a check, and the blue suits went to the next company on their hit list.

In corporate America, this type of shakedown is repeated weekly. The patent as stimulant to invention has long since given way to the patent as blunt instrument for establishing an innovation stranglehold.

Gary Reback

You're not quite right:

1. You can copy the songs you purchase an unlimited number of times. (To CD, or to any number of iPods)

2. They don't cost as much as CD's, I spent $17 on Cake's "Prolonging the Magic" CD at Borders because it wasn't on iTunes, and when they finally did put it on iTunes, it costs $9.99..If only I had been more patient. These rumors of a price hike are false anyway, as Apple is denying them.

You complain about only having 5 years to listen to them, which doesn't make any sense. You replace your computer every year? So de-authorize the computer before you get rid of it, and it won't count towards your 5 computer limit. My guess is that you've never even tried the iTMS.

See for example how Via makes some living selling cheap C3 CPUs. Yes, they're not fast chips. But here's how it works: some poor chinese wants to get a computer. He/she can't pirate a CPU, and can't afford to pay 400$ for a top of the line Intel chip. So he/she gets a 40$ VIA chip instead.

Which in turn keeps some people employed at VIA.

That's how it would work for software too.

No, not really. There's a big difference in job generation between manufactured goods and services. If an entirely new software product is created because those people can't pirate from Microsoft anymore, you create a few jobs... but not many. If you simply broaden existing markets, you create practically zero jobs.

If Via needs to make low-end chips for some markets, they have to make capital investments in the assembly line and assign workers to build those chips for as long as they're making them. If Open Office needs to be translated into Chinese, they hire a translator or two on contract for a little while, and bring them back every so often when they add functionality to the interface. Maybe they even hire one full-time, but that's *one job*.

Just think about this: Microsoft has 55,000 employees, and they are by far the largest software vendor in the world. Intel, which makes a whole lot of the processors out there, but isn't anywhere near as dominant in the market as Microsoft, has 78,700 employees.

But that isn't what people are buying at Walmart or anywhere else.

Sales of OEM XP systems are running at about 10 million a month, up from 9 million a month last July. Microsoft Sells 210 Million Copies of Windows XP.

There is nothing more likely to alienate the average Joe from Linux than the bland assumption that all he really needs and wants is e-mail and a browser. That's what a system administrator hopes to see when he looks at Joe in the office (and why he is usually regarded with noticeably less affection than Osama Bin Laden) but, after hours, Joe and his kids are free to kick back and refuse to be locked down. "Where do you want to go today?"

Just a clarification for the editor who missed something HUGE:

AMD outsold Intel in RETAIL desktop sales. Dell is obviously not retail. Here's a better read.

So, when will Dell begin carrying AMD?

According to AMD CEO Hector Ruiz, it's only a matter of time until Dell puts Opteron in their servers. Of course, that's news to Dell, who are currently an exclusive Intel shop and haven't announced any change in that policy.

If I were the CEO of a chip company looking to court one of the most successful PC makers to use my processors, I probably wouldn't do so with a comment like this:

"I've always thought that Dell does not like to be a leader in technology, that they were a strong follower...But I didn't realize they were going to be dead last"

And yet that's what Ruiz said at a recent press conference.

Microsoft Sells 210 Million Copies of Windows XP . The number, based mostly on OEM installs, equates to about 10 million OEM system sales a month, up from 6 million a month last July. That does not leave much breathing room for any newbie oriented OEM Linux distro.

Wal-Mart's add copy describes Sun's JDS desktops as dedicated Star Office machines "based on Linux."

Eliot Spitzer does a lot of good internet work, like suing spammers and enforcing privacy rights, and today he will announce a settlement with five major music labels to force them to pay illegally-withheld royalties to musicians. He's got my vote when he runs for governor.

This probably won't be seen by many people at this point but what the heck.

My own introduction to the realities of the patent system came in the 1980s, when my client, Sun Microsystems--then a small company--was accused by IBM of patent infringement. Threatening a massive lawsuit, IBM demanded a meeting to present its claims. Fourteen IBM lawyers and their assistants, all clad in the requisite dark blue suits, crowded into the largest conference room Sun had.

The chief blue suit orchestrated the presentation of the seven patents IBM claimed were infringed, the most prominent of which was IBM's notorious "fat lines" patent: To turn a thin line on a computer screen into a broad line, you go up and down an equal distance from the ends of the thin line and then connect the four points. You probably learned this technique for turning a line into a rectangle in seventh-grade geometry, and, doubtless, you believe it was devised by Euclid or some such 3,000-year-old thinker. Not according to the examiners of the USPTO, who awarded IBM a patent on the process.

After IBM's presentation, our turn came. As the Big Blue crew looked on (without a flicker of emotion), my colleagues--all of whom had both engineering and law degrees--took to the whiteboard with markers, methodically illustrating, dissecting, and demolishing IBM's claims. We used phrases like: "You must be kidding," and "You ought to be ashamed." But the IBM team showed no emotion, save outright indifference. Confidently, we proclaimed our conclusion: Only one of the seven IBM patents would be deemed valid by a court, and no rational court would find that Sun's technology infringed even that one.

An awkward silence ensued. The blue suits did not even confer among themselves. They just sat there, stonelike. Finally, the chief suit responded. "OK," he said, "maybe you don't infringe these seven patents. But we have 10,000 U.S. patents. Do you really want us to go back to Armonk [IBM headquarters in New York] and find seven patents you do infringe? Or do you want to make this easy and just pay us $20 million?" After a modest bit of negotiation, Sun cut IBM a check, and the blue suits went to the next company on their hit list.

In corporate America, this type of shakedown is repeated weekly. The patent as stimulant to invention has long since given way to the patent as blunt instrument for establishing an innovation stranglehold.

Gary Reback

How do you like dem apples?

They already did.

Someone linked to this when we had the article about the Bombardier Embrio, another cool concept employing segway-type gyroscopic action.

article from Forbes

You also might find this article from the Washington Post educational.

I was reading the other day about who made early investment in Google. I was surprised to find out that an guy from India (who is also on board of direcors) named Ram Shriram was one of the early investors. His firm sherpalo's website says "...having been integral to helping build some of the foremost online companies, including Netscape, Amazon, and Google.com.
Forbes magazine also has an article on the early investor's in Google

Apparently Paul Allen has a 20 billion debt to shake off. Now that's retarded (if it's true).

Ah, but we CAN put a price on freedom! In fact, I think the going rate is about $111 billion.

And the value of love? Billions. In fact, even gay love is worth $16.8 billion.

So fear not - our capitalist society can put a price on EVERYTHING!

First, you have to obtain a copy of THE COMPLETE WORKS OF METALLICA and listen to it. (You can download the music (~280mb) using BitTorrent, by clicking here.

Second, you need to succeed in posting an RIAA "first post" on slashdot.org, a popular "news for thieves" website

Third, you need to join the official RIAA irc channel #RIAA on irc.riaa.com, and apply for membership.

Fourth, you need to pay the nonrefundable RIAA MEMBERSHIP FEE of FIVE MILLION UNITED STATES DOLLARS (US$5,000,000)
Talk to one of the ops or any of the other members in the channel to sign up today!

If you are having trouble locating #RIAA, the official RECORDING INDUSTRY ASSOCIATION OF AMERICA irc channel, you might be on a wrong irc network. The correct network is lawsuitnet, and you can connect to irc.riaa.com as our official server. If you do not have an IRC client handy, you are free to use the RIAA Java IRC client by clicking here.


If you have mod points and would like to support RIAA, please moderate this post up.

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| _________._______a_______aj#0s_____aWY!400.___ |
| __ad#7!!*P____a.d_______#!-_#0i___.#!__W#0#___ |
| _j#'_.00#,___4#dP______j#,__0#Wi___*00P!_"#L,_ |
| _"#ga#9!01___"#01______"4Lj#!_4#g_________"01_ |
| __"#,_________*@`_________`___-!^_____________ |
| __#1_,%________$^_____________________________ |
| __J1__$%______________________________________ |
| __jk___58___RECORDING INDUSTRY_ASSOCIATION____ |
| _______________OF_AMERICA_____________________ |
| ______________________________________________ | (c) RIAA 2003, 2004
` _______________________________________________'

Pharmaceuticals have been the most profitable sector for a long time. In 2002 the industry had 18.5% profits, while the fortune 500 averaged around 3% Also notice that while R&D costs for the industry are very high, they spend more on marketing than R&D

PC World

Forbes

FT.com (A good one!)

It's funny, but I don't think the medium (necessarily) dictates how trustworthy a site is, but rather the site's standards reflect its trustworthiness.

As you mentioned, the New York Times wasn't very careful about catching that guy who just made up his stories. Forbes is another publication that has failed to exercise reasonable editorial control over their writers (*cough*Daniel Lyons*cough*) who was allowed to publish some lame attempt at character assassination. Ironically, it was directed at PJ of Groklaw fame who had chided him for just parroting press releases from SCO instead of doing research. Surprise, surprise, his article was also weak and poorly researched. He cited trolls as a source, for crying out loud (worse, by trolls I mean the obscene & idiotic ones, not merely those who try to make opposing views into flamebait). Frankly, I feel that Forbes does some of the shoddiest research ever. You could skip them entierly and just read the PR Newswire directly.

But I grant you, Slashdot itself is pretty much just a rumor mill most of the time, yet we (hopefully) all know by now to take the stories here with a grain of salt, as the articles are generally a bit sensational.

There are only a handful of sources online that I trust all that much, frankly. I like Google news for giving me a broad overview of the news (since I can get stories from many sources, I can usually filter out much of the bias). The Christian Science Monitor may have been started by Mary Baker Eddie's odd little sect, but it's a rather good newspaper because it was founded to have high journalistic ethics, since the church who founded it disliked the sensational pieces about their sect.

Last but not least, I appreaciate Groklaw. Not only has PJ sit on some stories until she could get a second source for confirmation (as good journalists are supposed to do...), but she links to all the PDFs and other documents so that no one, not even SCO, has to take her word for it.

• Halfbakery.com - a lively discussion of partly-baked ideas
• Smartfunusa.com - Cartoons by Kiva Sutton
• Idea-x.net - idea exchange software
• ShouldExist
• Global Ideas Bank
• ThinkCycle
• yet2.com
• Idea Exchange
• brainhead.com
• Ideas Happen - contest site for 18-29 year olds
• I Called It! - site for posting predictions
• openideas.net
• BrainFlower - revolutionary idea exchange
• Ideas by Creativity Pool
• Idea a day - "Where ideas are free."
• The Idea Oven
• Prior-Art-O-Matic - truly random product ideas
• Totally Absurd Inventions - America's goofiest patents
• Forbes
• Springwise.com - Springwise is an inspiring free newsletter that tracks emerging why-not ideas from all around the world
• Trendwatching.com - Trendwatching is a second free newsletter that lives up to its name

Some guy (Bill Gates for example) comes along and offers 6 times the current share price for Google stock in an acquisition deal.

Hmmm, maybe that's what Microsoft really plans to do with that $53 billion cash hoard, now that they're settling lawsuits like it's going out of style. Even though Google's execs aren't interested, maybe the shareholders won't mind getting their hands on Bill's billions...

really?

I work full time in the IT department at Geneseo. We've pushed out a lot of wireless, but there's always demand for more. Wireless is like crack here... Even one of our bars has two APs in it!!

While we don't rank as high on it, Forbes also has a Wireless Ranking

Looking at the article you mentioned, there seems to be little(if any?!) overlap between it and intels highly impatial, not-based-on-centrino-sales research.
Wake Forest isn't even mentioned...
i smell conspiracy

Ahem....Eolas?

Well, why dont you invest lots of money like SourceForge into servers and making it as good as it can be, I mean being over-loaded with people such as you who then complain that its starting to suck, well ofcourse it is and if its a problem you should help those good people out and donate resources to them.

from article:
"Organizing messages from your inbox is also different with Gmail. Gmail's approach is to use labels, instead of folders, which allows messages to have overlapping types."

This sounds very similar to the VFolder feature present in Evolution.

At least in Britain, Dasani is tap water. Another article goes on to say that if the bottle doesn't say "source" or "spring", its probably tap water.

Now Dasani is not the same as Dannon. Coke struck a deal with France's Groupe Danone to distribute Dannon brand water. That's probably tap water. This is easier to read and shows Coke markets Evian as its premium water, Dasani in the middle, and Dannon at the bottom which sells for less than the market average.

I don't like San Diego water. I hate Los Angeles water, even though both are canal water from the concrete aqueduct. I don't care for Fremont, CA water either. Yet 25 miles north in Berkeley and Oakland, the water is great. Probably because that's where I grew up and lived until recently. San Francisco can keep its Hetch Hetchy water to itself as its also not very good.

Umm "Dude" no it doesnt
AVGas is typically has a 100 Octane rating (r+m)/2
Jet A, Jet a-1 and Jet b run from 100 - 130 Octane ratings
Fightercraft effectively run kerosine aka jet a-1 with additives at 130 Octane+ ratings. so I don't know where you buy your fuel but if you are snagging 100+ octane rated fuels let me know 'cause I will increase the compression on my STS or add a paxton centrifugal supercharger and come visit. For more information on fuel grades check out our friends at the Royal Dutch Shell Oil company's .ca division

Chanute urged the brothers to try for some of the aviation prizes that were being offered for flights of specified times and distances, which would have established their dominance in the public's mind. They refused. "We would have to expose our machine more or less, and that might interfere with the sale of our secrets," they wrote to a friend in January 1906. "We appreciate the honor and the prestige that would come with the winning of a prize...but we can hardly afford at the present time to jeopardize our other interests in doing it."