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Why Bill Gates Wants 3,000 New Patents
theodp writes "The NY Times looks at Microsoft's newly acquired passion for patents and wonders: What would Thomas Jefferson think if he were around to visit Microsoft's campus, seeing software patents stacked like pyramids of cannonballs? Jefferson might also be shocked by Microsoft's summer crop of patent apps, which includes Creating a note related to a phone call, Adding and removing white space from a document and Identifying when baseball is exciting. Gotta meet that quota of 60 fresh, nonobvious patentable ideas a week!"
Seriously, I know all you foreigners are not gonna agree with it nor are most of the Americans. But baseball is always exciting. There is no other sport that during the season you can watch your favorite team everyday except for the 8 days they get off during the season. No other sport has as many "plays" as baseball. Baseball has roughly 300 "plays", meaning that there is a pitched ball 300 times per game. Football maybe has 60 plays per game. There is also not nearly as much history in other sports as there is in Baseball, and by other sports I mean the big 5 (baseball, hockey, football, soccer and basketball). The game's been almost unchanged for 150 years. What about "The shot heard round the world", or Cal Ripken playing in 2637 consecutive games. Hank Aaron hitting 755 home runs. Or even the everyday things like a 100 mph fastball or a curveball that breaks 3 feet. Or even the split second diving play at third or climbing the fence to rob a homerun. I know this is a rant, but baseball is always exciting. There is no clock, the offence reacts to the defence, there are no fouls(I mean penalties), they play everyday, and who can't root for their favorite team even if its been years since they won the world series? If you think baseball is boring it's because you don't understand the game.
Oh, and FK Microsoft for trying to shorten sports.....that is why we have ESPN isn't it?