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Purchase Your Personal Gene Map

Posted by timothy on from the priceless dept.

dstone writes "Craig Venter, Time Magazine's Person of the Year in 2000 has a new hobby: collecting rich people's DNA. Millionaires are lining up to buy their personal gene maps for the cool price of USD$621,500. The process takes a week and you get some insight into your genetic mutations that may correlate with illnesses, cancers, Alzeimer's, etc. Venter is a high profile character in the genetic sequencing scene and the Human Genome Project. More info on him may be found here(1) , here(2), and here(3) . If you had the pocket change, would you give this man your business?"

10 of 266 comments (clear)

  1. Anybody want to venture a guess by Noose+For+A+Neck · · Score: 3, Funny

    ...as to how long it is until someone patents my genes?

    --

    Software piracy is victimless theft.

    1. Re:Anybody want to venture a guess by micromoog · · Score: 5, Funny

      I wouldn't worry if I were you.

    2. Re:Anybody want to venture a guess by Suicide · · Score: 2, Funny

      I already have. There will be a per child charge, for using my patented material to create a derivative work. Charge will be based on whether or not you'd like to buy the rights to said derivative work outright (allowing your children to have charge free children), or simply borrow it for the single copy (they will have to pay for the patented material received from you passed down to their derivative work, although at a lesser rate).

    3. Re:Anybody want to venture a guess by deprecated · · Score: 2, Funny

      Your jeans are more likely to be pantsed.

  2. Like PT Barnum said by rimcrazy · · Score: 4, Funny

    A sucker is born every minute....

    --
    "TV, a medium as it is neither rare nor well done." Ernie Kovacs
  3. "MAPS TO CELEBRITIES GENES.....$2.00" by Thatto · · Score: 5, Funny

    "Ever wonder which hollywood stars and starlets share common sequences?" Oprah's grandmother's dirty little secret!" "THE RICH AND POWERFUL: Genetically Inclined?"

    no thanks

  4. Re:Well. by delta407 · · Score: 5, Funny
    How long before we're doing this for unborn fetuses
    Yeah, but how many unborn fetuses have six hundred thousand dollars?
  5. Venter's DNA by morcheeba · · Score: 5, Funny

    Craig's company Celera was mapping a suposedly anonymous genome, but then craig admitted it was his dna. As a Celera shareholder, I wonder if that qualifies as a $600k perk that he got.

    --
    HIV Crosses Species Barrier... into Muppets
  6. Not Funny by foo+fighter · · Score: 3, Funny

    I see alot of comments joking about already owning their gene map and about releasing their map under the GPL.

    No, you don't and no, you can't.

    Most of the genes in your body are already patented, trademarked, and/or copyrighted. Those that aren't will be within the next few years.

    We don't own our own bodies.

    I hope that literally scares the shit out of you. It did to me: I locked myself in my bathroom until I could cope with the insanity of some corporation owning the natural devices that construct humans.

    Wired had a very informative article on this some time back. Also, you can Google for the info and you'll find it.

    What really scares me is that I've got at least 80 years left to live. I'm going to be fighting and putting up with a lot of shit before I can finally rest.

    It'd be nice if some of you would give me a hand.

    --
    obviously no deficiencies vs. no obvious deficiencies
  7. Re:I already own this... by isorox · · Score: 3, Funny

    However, if I do all I can to be healthy (i.e., not eating junkfood while laying on my couch all day)

    I stopped that lifestyle a long time ago, I now sit in my nice comfy armchair while eating junk food, much healthier!