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For fuck's sake, I'll fucking link to it. http://www.scribd.com/doc/109883662/When-the-Most-Personal-Secrets-Get-Outed-on-Facebook-From-WSJ-October-12-2012-Issue

And for shits and giggles: C0 CE FE 84 C2 27 F7 5B D0 7A 7E B8 46 50 9F 93 B2 38 E7 70 DA CB 9F F4 A3 88 F8 12 48 2B E2 1B

Actually, a quick Google search on "cigarettes cognitive ability" turned up a lot, along these lines:

Weiser M, Zarka S, Werbeloff N, Kravitz E, Lubin G. Cognitive test scores in male adolescent cigarette smokers compared to non-smokers: a population-based study. Addiction 2010; 105 (2): 358-63.

Conclusion
Controlled analyses from this large population-based cohort of male adolescents indicate that IQ scores are lower in male adolescents who smoke compared to non-smokers and in brothers who smoke compared to their non-smoking brothers. The IQs of adolescents who began smoking between ages 18–21 are lower than those of non-smokers. Adolescents with poorer IQ scores might be targeted for programmes designed to prevent smoking.

http://www.scribd.com/doc/35952518/Cognitive-test-scores-in-male-adolescent-cigarette-smokers-compared-to-non-smokers-a-population-based-study

Groklaw suggests, rather shockingly, that Apple's lawyers might have been a little selective in how they presented some of this evidence to the court, by picking little parts of it that offered a different shade of nuance."

The primary thing this tells us is that Groklaw is so biased on this matter that they aren't thinking straight. Let's apply just a bit of common sense:

These are Samsung documents. Apple obviously does not have the power to hide the contents of Samsung's own documents. As is commonly the case, some court documents were redacted for the public to protect the proprietary interests of the companies involved (Samsung, in this case). That does not mean that the jury did not get to see them. It appears that Samsung now thinks it is in its interest to make the documents public.

Groklaw is trying to get us to believe that the jury's decision that Samsung intentionally copied Apple was based entirely on an out-of-context quite from this document. There's something a bit fishy there. If Apple quoted something from Samsung's documents out of context, wouldn't Samsung's lawyers have been at pains to quote the correct context? You'd think so, wouldn't you? Unless, of course, this document was not actually as pivotal as Groklaw (and presumably Samsung) now would like us to believe. Could it be that the jury did not base its judgment solely--or even primarily--on this document? Could it be that the jury saw much more compelling evidence that Samsung's copying was intentional?

Say for instance a detailed Samsung report comparing Samsung's product to Apple's feature by feature and recommending that Samsung emulate Apple's design choices?

Or perhaps emails showing that Google warned Samsung that its products were infringing upon Apple's designs?

This is kind of sad. Groklaw did some nice reporting on the SCO lawsuit. But when it comes to Apple and Samsung, they seem to have gone off the rails.

I looked again, and didn't find anything from this year. So my memory could be incorrect.

But there's Maclay and Forward, from 2004. There are more recent examples but I will not have time to hunt them up today.

Granted, it's only a thought experiment, and it doesn't generate practical energy even then, in this form. But hey... fusion isn't practical yet, either.

To be clear: I did not claim anybody had found anything practical. Only that there may be ways to do it.

Don't know if he's owned by CIA, MI[5-6] or Mossad.

Recycled bits from Sept, 2011:

David Leigh/Guardian is working in the interest of CIA/MI6 and looking not to collaborate with WikiLeaks, but to ensnare him for prosecution.

Clue: DL Insisting on seeing the actual files

Clue: DL Pressing for the GPG passphrase

Clue: DL Publishing the ENTIRE proceeding and passphrase in a book

Dumbshit-Borg is either a long-time mole or was "turned"

Clue: D-B had full access to all unredacted material

Clue: D-B acrimoniously split with Assange/WikiLeaks over ego-boundary shit and speculative "risk" issues

Clue: D-B in his schism is part of the probable exposure of these cables - portrayed as an "accident", while he was unilaterally and admittedly sabotaging WikiLeaks

Clue: D-B can now say "I told you so" over this exposure of sources - pointing to this as evidence, rather than a situation he perpetrated

The US Army Counterintelligence Agency said in 2008 that WikiLeaks was"a potential force protection, counterintelligence, OPSEC, and INFOSEC threat to the US Army" and PLANNED OPERATIONS to neutralise/discredit WikiLeaks:

"The identification, exposure, or termination of employment of or legal actions against current or former insiders, leakers, or whistleblowers could damage or destroy this center of gravity and deter others from using Wikileaks.org to make such information public."

http://www.scribd.com/doc/28385794/Us-Intel-Wikileaks

Question: Do you think that the Agency makes these declarations in vain, for their entertainment value?

Question: Do you think they are alone, and that there are not equivalent planned and current operations by the CIA, etc.?

Question: Are the combined actions of DL and D-B implausible as the intended outcome of a counter-WikiLeaks strategy, set in motion by one or more intelligence agencies, including US Army Counterintelligence?

Think about it. Once they set this down IN PRINT, internally, and don't have a "positive" outcome? Sombody goes through the ringer.

This is likely all a setup. One with a scenario that is similar to the one indicated here, if not completely identical. It is one where where David Leigh and Dumbshit-Borg are either pathetic and self-serving dupes, or sickening quislings.

Either way, this is a noose fabricated of intentional actions with plausible deniability. Identify WikiLeaks with Assange's personality, and attack the personality. Attack the credibility of WikiLeaks methodology while distracting from their effectiveness and success in exposing filth, corruption and illegal government action.

A lot of companies (and unions) supported SOPA: http://www.scribd.com/doc/76259944/SOPA-Supporters

Therefore, why are you upset now?

Do you use a MasterCard or VISA? Do you watch ABC, follow pro football or basketball, buy books published by Random House, HarperCollins or McGraw-Hill, are a paying member of any of a dozen unions, buy any products made by Revlon, Pfizer, LOreal, Sony and a hundred other companies?

According to your logic, if any of the above is true, you should not be upset if a group of random hackers shuts down your website and causes you financial harm.

You're forgetting that Glide was arguably the best API around at the time. That's why so many games supported it. I owned a lot of different 3D accelerators and the only ones that I can remember being worth anything back in 98 were the 3Dfx Voodoo cards and the Rendition Verite cards. Further, the software renderer in Unreal was actually quite good.

Glide was only supported by a single manufacturer. For an interesting read on Unreal 1 tech and various bugs and issues with various cards take a look here. It details things like lines of code required to support DirectX, Glide, OpenGL etc. I have fond memories of my Voodoo 3 2000. I also owned a 5500 (didn't buy it new) and the glorious Sound Blaster AWE64. And I'll agree with you that the Unreal Software renderer was very good and supported (nearly?) everything the hardware one did. It's a tough sell to say hardware will be slower than software (on identical setups).

Sales numbers don't usually reflect upon quality.

Very true! But, awards and peoples' (professional and amateur) reviews do which is why I mentioned them. Failing that there are always screenshots, which may not tell the entire story but help validate claims.

As far as Quake engines, Unreal surpassed id Tech 2 in every way. id Tech 3 surpassed Unreal in many ways, but was not as much of a technological leap as Unreal was from Q2. The comparison shots you've linked aren't equal because they show Q3 at maximum detail, while the UT shot is clearly someone playing with settings turned way down.

Surpassed them in every way? Perhaps you're not aware that when Unreal was released it featured poorly performing netcode and no OpenGL support (Directly from Tim Sweeny's own mouth and low hanging wiki fruit). Quake II came out before Unreal and ID Tech 2 beat them to the punch with multicolored lighting. Unreal's strengths were Unreal Script and their texture technology (which only worked with Glide, even then it was problematic thread lamenting the fact circa 2000). As far as the screenshots I didn't cherry pick them, you're welcome to find some better vintage shots along with hardware specs.

Games had been using redbook audio for years by then (ie. Mechwarrior 2, Super Street Fighter II, Little Big Adventure, FX Fighter, etc.), but it wasn't always the best choice because you couldn't have seamless transitions for dynamic music as you could with MIDI and MOD like formats.

Red book audio is not the same as an API provided by the Operating System. A specification enables you to write an implementation whereas an API is already implemented. Needless to say it isn't 3D nor is it specific to games, it's the specification for audio CDs developed by Phillips and Sony describing the CD's physical specifications, such as the tracks, sector and block layout, coding, and sampling etc.

"One of the best ever made" is not the same thing as "the best ever made". And I disagree with you about Mario. Star Control II is my personal choice for best ever.

I'll raise you a Robotron 2084.

But how did Windows get to that point? It didn't always have that huge library of applications and it wasn't always familiar to people. It gained popularity despite being a worse product than competitors (ie. GEOS and OS/2) in much the same way as Half-Life.

I provided some examples, which I'll refine and add to: it ran on a wide variety of hardware, it was easy to develop for, it ran DOS games which many people had and were quite familiar with (didn't require you to buy new everything). Dire

Most benchmarks i have seen have much better speed up than 4%. eg http://www.scribd.com/doc/363677/Benchmarks-AMD64-in-32bit-mode-vs-64bit-mode-Ubuntu
Those LFS benchmarks are comparing build times. ie building a 64bit exectuable on a 64bit system is 4% faster than building a 32bit executable on a 32bit system. by that logic you should compile everything with -O0 or -O1 because thats much quicker to build.
The plausible explanation that i have heard for the big speed up is that for x86_64 you can assume that the CPU has things like SSE2, where as if you build i386 packages you might want to support older chips pentium 2 or 3, or chips like the via that lack some newer instructions. if you build everything with -march=native then you can enable the extended instruction sets on 32bit, but given the context of the discusion debian can't enable SSE2 on their i386 packages.

Great! But don't forget that you cannot distribute the output of X-Code without adhering to the license; for example, any Quicktime functionality you develop is permitted to run "only on supported Mac OS X and/or Windows platforms with QuickTime installed".

Any other examples, in the Xcode license, of redistribution restrictions of that sort? The only other such stuff I see on the version of the Xcode license on Scribd is "if you redistribute the Javascript "Apple Classes" from Dashcode, follow the license", "don't use the "System Provided Images" in ways Apple doesn't approve of" ("images" here meaning "pictures", so some of that is probably trademark protection), "don't use Location Services without asking the user's permission" (personally, I rather like that restriction), and "maybe we'll add some other things in the future that have additional licensing terms". The rest is largely restrictions on modifying/redistributing/etc. the "Developer Software" itself.

the problem is the technology doesn't work, and the people selling it are shysters. a related problem is there is not one single drivable prototype.

Here's the problem:
* compressed air is a horrible energy carrier, with energy density less than lead acid batteries. the entire storage tank holds less than a gallon of gasoline's worth.
* they lie about the range, but in realistic driving scenarios it's less than 50km.

who wants a car like that, especially for $10k? why not just get a real car?
http://www.scribd.com/doc/24826820/Compressed-Air-Vehicles-A-Drive-Cycle-Analysis-of-Vehicle-Performance-Environmental-Impacts-and-Economic-Costs

that's what prophet Jobs called the smaller Samsung tablets when they were announced.

And according to the US sales numbers Samsung had to release during the trial, not only didn't they sell well at all compared to the iPad, they were also outsold by the Tab 10.1s as soon as they came out.

The data sheet (in particular p. 203-ish) talks about the workarounds required to work around PHY bugs and other USB hardware. Doesn't look particularly complex.

What Picasso (and Jobs) meant by "Great artists steal" was that:

* mediocre people copy designs without understanding them or improving them
* great artists take designs and add enough to them that everybody forgets about the original

Apple is clearly in the second category - 0.1% of the public remembers the Xerox Star, almost no one bought Windows tablets, etc.

I would have to put Samsung in the first category. Look at their 2010 iPhone analysis where most of its recommendations boil down to "iPhone does this better - we should copy it".

Android's category is debatable.

Sweden allows these kinds of interviews to be done via video conference and Assange has suggested the interview take place with him inside of the embassy. The fact that Sweden is so ardent about bringing him in person is highly suspect.

Exactly. I found this evaluation of the prosecution very interesting, link provided by Pav in post #41046379. Points 17-19 cover why a remote interview shouldn't be an issue.

And "excuse me sir would you like to buy a kilo of isopropyl bromide" which is a biography of a guy who probably contributed to more EPA superfund sites than any other dude on the planet.

http://www.scribd.com/doc/92823392/Excuse-Me-Sir-Would-You-Like-to-Buy-a-Kilo-of-Isopropyl-Bromide

Are brain cells somehow becoming an endangered species even here on Slashdot?

Swedish legal protocol has been compromised so badly in this case it's hard to imagine a trial happening even if the guy IS guilty, but don't believe me, here's the considered opinion of a retired Swedish prosecutor. Read it... it's informative. This situation could EASILY be solved by interviewing Assange in the UK according to Sven-Erik, and according to evidence on the public record. Why the insistance on extradition in this case? The guy might be an asshat sometimes, but that doesn't deserve a ticket to gitmo... and this whole thing feels very bad. I think the average citizen in the west has been lied to enough that some healthy skepticism is long overdue, and frankly I'd be happier to see it err on the side of paranoia than apathy.

I could argue against you here, saying he was not charged etc etc. But why should I when the former Swedish head prosecution does it much better:

http://www.scribd.com/doc/48396086/Assange-Case-Opionion-Sven-Erik-Alhem

Yes, Samsung did in fact DIRECTLY copy Apple. It's not just the design of the exterior. It's the user interface, which Apple spent years and probably tens of millions researching before they released the first version of the device.

http://www.scribd.com/doc/102317767/Samsung-Relative-Evaluation-Report-on-S1-iPhone

Sorry, I looked though your link and all I see are screenshots showing how Apple and Samsung are DIFFERENT.

They do it because they fear a sudden increase in the amount of collateral available. What else do you think they do at these meetings?

http://www.scribd.com/fullscreen/20314099?access_key=key-4eycbxhjsddno95zqkv

Yes, Samsung did in fact DIRECTLY copy Apple. It's not just the design of the exterior. It's the user interface, which Apple spent years and probably tens of millions researching before they released the first version of the device.

http://www.scribd.com/doc/102317767/Samsung-Relative-Evaluation-Report-on-S1-iPhone

Apple doesn't have a problem with competition, where other companies make original stuff and pit it against Apple's products. They have a problem with "copytition," where other companies just stamp out slavish knockoffs of Apple products and ride on their coattails.

I suggest you look at the 130+ page Samsung-produced document comparing features and appearance of elements of the iPhone to what Samsung was working on at the time. On pretty much every page, the suggestion is made to change the Samsung phone to make it more like the iPhone.

I'd say it's pretty damning evidence.

ugh... his health care solution is a nightmare though (not that Romney will offer anything better - his Massachusetts plan was basically the same). Hopefully you're saying we needed one, which we did. I get a kick out of how Republicans forced him to add tax provisions into the system (to pay for part of it), then chide him for raising taxes. But the 20% profit max is bad for business, and inane parts like this and the provision where life saving drugs cost money but life ending drugs are free? wtf?

Here's a wonderful chart of Obamacare

It is interesting that you find the user experience better, because the Samsung team apparently didn't. In fact, they created a 260 page document pointing out just how much better the user experience was on the iPhone, and recommending that the iPhone approach be implemented.

When people say "look at all phones post-iPhone to see that they all copied Apple" they're generally referring to a large rectangle with round corners, and a large touch screen.

No, they are primarily referring to the user interface. If you recall, before the iPhone, smart phone user interfaces were horrendous. The iPhone showed that an easy to use interface with some thought put into it could sell the phone based on the user experience. Other companies saw the value of putting more effort into their GUIs. It is not that these companies ripped of the iPhone user experience (although Apple is arguing that Samsung went out of their way to do so), but that the iPhone is considered the catalyst that led to the current state of usable smart phones.

I think that you can see elements of inspiration from the iPhone in the newer phone UI's, but I don't think that these phone UI's blatantly copied the iPhone. However, I suspect that if Apple had never shown the value of good user experience, we'd still have a smart phone market with a lot of mediocre user interfaces.

Now, back to the case in point, I think it is fairly obvious that Samsung ripped off the iPhone GUI. For those of you who didn't bother with the article, this has nothing to do with rounded corners or the external appearance of the phone (although a lot of commenters and moderators on this story seem to think so. Rather, this is a 260 page document showing screen shots of the iPhone UI, showing how the corresponding panels in the Samsung UI are more difficult to use, and then recommending to change to the iPhone design and behavior.

I'm not too sure. I think mister Linebarger is one of those that are overappreciated, like E.E. Doc Smith and RAH.
Even though they wrote their spit shined hero stories well, they also did receive their well deserved appreciation for them.

I'd rather go with Harry Martinson and Cyril M. Kornbluth.
What, you haven't heard of them? Goes to show that they're underappreciated.

I wouldn't say so. Samsung presented evidence of phones that were in development before the iphone was announced that looked very similar to the iphone. They came out afterwards, but were in development beforehand.

So, despite the fact that the linked document contains 260 slides showing side-by-side comparisons of the difference between the iPhone and the Samsung GUIs, with recommendations that Samsung implement the iPhone approach, which they then did, you are going to tell us that in fact Samsung already had a very similar phone and didn't copy the iPhone?

Yeah true.

The actual complaint is here:
https://www.scribd.com/doc/101954002/EA-v-Zynga-Complaint-Final

It's about copying the art and the exact interface of the game. Take a brief look at the complaint to see lots of comparison pictures.

For example, SimsSocial has 8 possible skin tones for characters, and Zynga copied them down to the exact RGB values (!!). Items such as refrigerators, TVs, etc. are so similar that their outlines match up almost completely when they're overlaid on top of each other. I hate EA as much as the next Slashdotter, but this is pretty compelling stuff.

Check out the complaint document and then think again about what you posted:

http://www.scribd.com/doc/101954002/EA-v-Zynga-Complaint-Final

It's amazing how similar everything is. Wall to floor proportions. The exact same 8 RGB values for character skin tones. The exact same set of character roles, with different names. The exact same character poses in the artwork for these roles. Same contents in starter home. Etc...

Just check out that document.

Here's the legal complaint (from the Ars link): http://www.scribd.com/doc/101954002/EA-v-Zynga-Complaint-Final

Looks like the Zynga game is a complete ripoff.

This is just wrong. Sweden puts it in table salt,

Are you sure your information isn't dated? WHO Data.

Yeah, we have the Boston study, but I'm skeptical that they adequately controlled for lead paint.

FYI, a bunch of references at the bottom of this article.

I'm 47. I haven't had one, ever. I don't know what it's like to have one. Compare and contrast to my parents who had mouths full of metal by the time they hit 20 years old.

Yup, and mine too. Caries have decreased over time, independent of fluoridation. Studies listed at previous link.

Their competitor's hardware is truly a masterpiece of engineering, and if you're an engineer you may find it to be beautiful. I always thought they should ditch the custom VM, provide some kernel modules and ioctls for the special hardware functionality and do all their programming in C or C++, though. It's kind of hard going back to something like PLEX after programming with pretty much any other language from 1960 on.

The axe (heh heh) their competitor has to grind with Hauwei may very well be a legitimate one. There always were some shenanigans going on. Unfortunately I really don't have a lot of power over what phone switches get used anywhere, so there's not much I can do about it. I do think this possibly-unfair competition has driven more feature development than we might have seen had Hauwei not been playing their little game. So maybe in the end it's not all bad, even if it's not particularly good.

I don't often respond to AC's, but when I do, I prefer to usurp AC's point.

Fashion... that's a good idea. I like that.

No, really... it makes more sense than other allegories. Think about it, people buy clothes; some for function, some for style. People buy software; some for sheer functionality (Linux packages, some PC offerings) and others for more stylish flair. (most Mac software, also some PC offerings but Adobe comes to mind the most)

Every new season, it seems there's a new fashion. Designers and textile plants keep striving to stay on the cutting edge. Every so often, it seems that some software bundle is being upgraded. However, developers aren't always striving to stay ahead, but only to be different enough to keep from being sued. Starting to see the similarities now?

And by the by... clothing may not be patented, but zippers are... so are snaps... even cuff-links. Still, point taken. These patents do nothing to protect the design of clothes that feature them nor prevent others from innovating their own fasteners, they simply prevent others from manufacturing the exact-same fastener mechanism.

So, why would the software business model suffer if there were no patents? Frankly, I don't think it would because it--and every user bound by their efforts--suffers for it now. It would remove this bass-ackward economy of patent litigation and infringement maneuvering, a sub-economy that should (IMHO) be outlawed by the UN. Competition without the fear of patent mongers would foster innovation at a faster pace and drive the larger firms to keep up with the smaller, agile indie developers. They pound their files in an earnest display of defending their innovation, when the line between true innovation and simple tropes or conventions becomes increasingly thinner. In fashion, you can tell when it's a knock-off... so guess what? We can tell when an app is a knock-off of a more popular app, too! Ultimately, it comes down to the label; whether it's sewed into the hem or printed on the CD.

So, it begs the question of why this patent system still exists? It's easy, really. The largest developers and the largest stakeholders in tech are so afraid of having to rapidly react to competitors that they move their legal teams instead. They know a dedicated partnership or legal firm is going to move much faster than it would take to compete with actual innovation. They can fire off a C&D faster than a gold CD.

We hear this rallying cry from the behemoths, "too big to fail," when it should be, "too ponderously slow to compete." (Hello, Mr. Ballmer)

IANAL, but let the litigation fall back to where it belongs; contract law. Every EULA has a clause about reverse-engineering or hacking the software. If there's an infringement, then let it be covered by that clause. Let the so-called "patents" (e.g., a 'right-click' or context menu, a vertical scrollbar without calling it a 'vertical scrollbar', et al) be diminished to a more-fitting role; as fashions past.

The burden of proof with software should be a simple test: Is it ripping-off an original? True, that would have to be coined in legal terms that must take about five pages to be fully

Only halved? I thought these things were supposed to have a 70% reduction according to the earlier surveys. Oh wait, those surveys are complete rubbish, as is most data on this sort of thing. The surveys for how much this sort of thing would reduce filesharing are all over the place; according to the IFPI, the French version, Hadopi, would cause 71% reduction in unlawful file-sharing, whereas a ZdNet.fr survey put it at 4%. Then there was a really fun Hollywood-sponsored survey from Australia that found 74% would stop infringing - unfortunately, in the fine detail, it turned out only 11% were actually committing copyright infringement on a regular basis, so at least 15% of people don't infringe regularly, but wouldn't stop even if threatened by their ISP.

This is definitely one of those "detailed-study-complete-with-full-figures-and-methodology or it didn't happen" situations.

However, it is interesting to see that the RIANZ are claiming that half isn't enough, and that more needs to be done. It mirrors my concerns about these laws elsewhere (particularly in the UK, obviously) that they have no criteria for success or failure, nor any real way to measure effectiveness. It means that once implemented the RIAA/Rianz/BPI are free to say "This is working, so we need more!" or "This isn't working, so we need more!" or "We're not sure whether or not this is working, so we need more!" no matter what actually happens, and we're back to copyright enforcement for the sake of copyright enforcement.

Fortunately in the EU these sorts of charges to ISPs were declared unlawful, so copyright owners are being forced to meet most of the bill for the UK three-strikes program (although subscribers will have to pay an arbitrary £20 to appeal allegations made against them).

The one good thing about the UK version, though, is that the government were persuaded that, once the three-strikes law is in force, someone should actually look into whether or not such a law is needed or will do any good, so in a year or so, after over 1m letters being sent (and however many lawsuits and prosecutions), we may actually get some independent and reliable data on this whole "online infringement of copyright" thing.

[Disclaimer: I 'work' as a lobbyist in this area and am currently in the middle of consultation work on the UK version of this sort of thing - so I'm rather biased. For anyone in the UK interested in this, the Ofcom consultation is available here and closes on Thursday.]

for those who are interested. I'm looking forward to reading it this weekend.

http://www.pnas.org/content/early/2012/07/11/1203177109

And in the interest of academic freedom for those without access to PNAS, the full text: Point process modelling of the Afghan War Diary.

Analyses appreciated.

"For the iPhone design, alternative smartphone designs include: front surfaces that are not black or clear; front surfaces that are not rectangular, not flat, and without rounded corners; display screens that are more square than rectangular or not rectangular at all; display screens that are not centered on the front surface of the phone and that have substantial lateral borders; speaker openings that are not horizontal slots with rounded ends and that are not centered above the display screen; front surfaces that contain substantial adornment; and phones without bezels at all or very different looking bezels that are not thin, uniform, and with an inwardly sloping profile. "[A]lternate tablet computer designs include: overall shapes that are not rectangular with four flat sides or that do not have four rounded corners; front surfaces that are not completely flat or clear and that have substantial adornment; thick frames rather than a thin rim around the front surface; and profiles that are not thin relative to the D’889 or that have a cluttered appearance."

Actually, Obama's Administration claims he can approve ACTA by Executive Agreement because it does not change any US law.

http://www.scribd.com/doc/84365507/State-Department-Response-to-Wyden-on-ACTA

Here is the text, 193 pages, I went through it quickly.

You are correct, the chief justice talks about taxes, while the remaining ones also add this is justified under the commerce clause.

So it will have to be attacked later on, first on the fact that since it is a tax, it's an unconstitutional tax, it's neither a direct apportioned tax, nor is it a uniform excise tax. Gov't doesn't have ability to tax in whichever way it wants, the taxes still have to be constitutional.

Secondly, as a commerce clause - well this again, assumes that the gov't can regulate business itself rather than act of buying something, so a business cannot be forced to provide a specific product, but the act of selling / buying over state lines can be regulated.

The mandate is way beyond any business regulations, mandate is the exact opposite of commerce - it regulates ABSENCE of commerce.

We do know that gov't has already crossed the line of unconstitutionality long ago (and the courts too), they did fine a farmer for NOT engaging in commerce.

However you are not a business, presumably you are an individual. Regulating YOUR LACK OF ACTIONS is different than even regulating lack of actions of a business.

Can you be required to work and if you are not working, can you be taxed... oh, sorry... fined for not working?

So smart guy

Gee... I really want you to like me... but since you're trolling me I'll simply direct you to the court ruling and tell you to go fuck yourself.

In the first place, get your tone filter adjusted... :)

And in the second, just because a court said "X is infringing" doesn't mean they got it right. It just means they bought Apple's specious argument. The idea that the sales of the iPad are significantly harmed or that Apple is even noticing the impact beyond their ego is beyond silly. Thus, the logic that the harm to Apple is greater than the harm to Samsung when their harm is being kicked out of the largest market on the planet is laughable.

The idea the judge felt that it was absolutely necessary to prevent Samsung from selling their tablet to prevent this "harm" prior to a trial for final determination is also laughable and makes me wonder about her impartiality.

So smart guy

Gee... I really want you to like me... but since you're trolling me I'll simply direct you to the court ruling and tell you to go fuck yourself.

Worse, the iPad isn't even the same as the original registered design.

Here's the design: http://www.scribd.com/doc/61944044/Community-Design-000181607-0001

Here's an iPad: http://www.tablettweet.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/01/dimensions_20100127.jpg

The roundness of the corners, the width of the bezels, the thickness of the pad...all completely different.

Apple is arguing over exactly this sort of detail but they don't even follow it themselves. The Samsung is at least as different from the registered design as the iPad is.

Blah blah blah blah

Your attempt to use the powerful rhetoric of your people to persuade me or others will not help you.

I don't know if that's true, since I didn't bother to read

Obviously, you must be very well informed. Why did you even bother posting a response? You should try to avoid these kinds of compulsions.

Go read the iPad patent.

Go read the ruling, ... if you are able. It's unfortunate that you lack any awareness by not reading anything, but maybe if you apply yourself you'll be able to gleem some understanding of how the world actually works.

Ask your self this: Why did Apple's lawyers have to photoshop the picture of the Samsung tablet so they could hold it up in court as 'evidence' of infringement.

Also, if you see the registered design it's about as vague as you can get. Nowhere does it specify the roundness of the corners, the bezel, the aspect ratio, etc. It's just a very rough pencil sketch.

Here ya go: http://www.scribd.com/doc/61944044/Community-Design-000181607-0001

Look at that then look at a picture of an iPad. Check the bezels, etc., they're not even the same as the original 'design'. The actual iPad is probably as far from that sketch as the Samsung is.

The Apple will fail first. The cheap plastic ones will survive better (the case might break but the circuits will be more protected because of the absorbtion of the plastic). Alluminium might look great but that's not the best material for survavibility in a drop test.
There is an exception to that : a laptop with a SSD will always survive longer to that test since the HDD will be the first thing to break.

Apple is the most expensive brand of laptop and isn't even the most reliable, as shown by studies such as this one:
http://www.scribd.com/doc/53733771/Square-Trade-Laptop-Reliability-1109

Apple do a bit better than the average, but their laptops cost much more. The study also says that premium laptops (>$1000) last longer. Given that Apple only sells premium laptops, we could except them to win hands down but isn't even the case as both Asus and Toshiba get a better score, and both of them sell cheap laptops.

I found the complaint online: http://www.scribd.com/doc/97976578/Gioconda-Law-Group-PLLC-v-Arthur-Wesley-Kenzie-Complaint

Easiest way to get started is to build web apps in Javascript built on Google spreadsheets (Google Script). All you need is a web browser, and access to Google Drive.
Go to Google Drive, create a spreadsheet. In your spreadsheet, go to Tools/Script Editor. This will open a web based editor in your browser, and you can start programming. Click on Publish/Deploy as a web app, and now you're set. Build anything from simple functions used within your spreadsheet to full fledged web apps with a user interface. Easy as pie.

The pretty good book on Google Script will get you started in no time.

The interpretation of the data in the study you linked to has been questioned, and alternate possibilities have been mentioned. There is even a reply towards the bottom. Linking to a single study, article, or what have you, will likely not conclusively prove anything given the amount of bias circulating around on either side (and the bias of the people linking to these studies/articles). It's not such a clear-cut issue (which is the impression I got from you). If we were talking about the theory of gravity, I believe such confidence would not be misplaced, but I believe it's dangerous to give the illusion that it has been proven either way without a doubt here.

I still believe that education, rather than censorship, is a good idea.

Sorry, you can't "selectively" cite the parts of the study that support your argument while ignoring the bits that disagree with your fundamental premise.

Allow me to further explain my original intentions. Imagine that someone comes to two conclusions:
1) 1 + 1 = 2. To me, this conclusion is logical and I believe their explanation makes sense.
2) 1 + 2 = 4. They, to me, did not arrive at this conclusion using valid logic, and their explanation is inconclusive at best.

If the issue of 1 + 1 being 2 were to come up, despite the fact that I don't agree with everything they say, I could cite their first conclusion. I needn't agree with everything they say in order to do that.

I would make some snarky comment about Apple fans' inability to grasp basic logic, but fortunately, Apple fan Old_dOg has helped me track down the incompatibility to section 7.3 of the Apple IOS developer's agreement, so clearly, not all Apple fans live in a logic-free zone. How you can possibly blame the FSF for section 7.3 of Apple's own document is beyond me. Nor has anyone yet offered any reasonable justification for the terms of section 7.3.

You're correct that Apple is entititled to run their app store any way they wish. That doesn't mean that someone cannot criticize the way they run their store, however.

Hmm, it looks like I was not looking at the developer aggreement. There is a mention of GPL there, but dont think there is any exclusionary language there.

http://www.scribd.com/doc/97758216/20100127-iPhone-Dev-Agr

http://www.scribd.com/doc/97758244/Ios-Program-Standard-Agreement-20111004

Hmm, it looks like I was not looking at the developer aggreement. There is a mention of GPL there, but dont think there is any exclusionary language there.

http://www.scribd.com/doc/97758216/20100127-iPhone-Dev-Agr

http://www.scribd.com/doc/97758244/Ios-Program-Standard-Agreement-20111004