Didn't the New York Stock Exchange move over to Linux because Microsoft couldn't provide a good, low-latency RT kernel? They begged Microsoft, wanted to stay with Microsoft, and Microsoft couldn't provide them with a solution
No. They are still running Windows. They are also running Linux.
The big stock exchanges have a variety of largely independent systems, for different functions, and different kinds of markets. They moved one such systems from mainframes to Windows (running Cobol!) several years ago, and are still using it. More recently, they moved a different system to Linux.
You're missing the point, which is that you're not free to produce a non-compatible implementation. Regardless of how useful that would be, the FSF view is that you should be free to do so
The CP won't cover you if you produce a non-compatible implementation. That just leaves the OIN, estoppel, and laches (assuming there are valid patents in the first place, and that your deviation from the standard didn't take you out of the scope of those patents).
Right, they've committed themselves to not sue fully compatible [microsoft.com] implementations of ECMA 334 and 335. That's far from all of.Net and the "fully compatible" clause means it violates the FSFs freedom 1, the freedom to "change it to make it do what you wish"
This is not a problem. Let's first consider the ECMA parts of Mono. There are safe for all of the following reasons:
Community Promise.
Mono is one of the Linux technologies that is covered by OIN, so if anyone dared sue over them, there would be some serious patent retaliation.
One of the inventors on Microsoft's patents and Microsofts director of IP have said projects like Mono are OK. This sets up a pretty good estoppel argument if Microsoft were to sue.
There's also a pretty good laches defense, because Microsoft has long been aware of Mono, and even encouraged it.
Now let's consider versions of.NET and C# since the version standardized by ECMA. Those portions would not be covered by the CP. What's the risk there? First question, are there even patents covering them? The changes since ECMA as far as I know are evolutionary changes that are similar to things in many other languages commonly used on Linux. We have no reason to believe there even are patents from Microsoft covering these. If Microsoft does have a patent covering them, that patent is also likely to cover similar things in Java, Python, Ruby, etc. Microsoft could do a lot more damage to Linux suing over Python than they could over Mono. Also, there's still the OIN and laches defenses for sure, and probably the estoppel defense.
Finally, there are the Mono ports of Windows-specific things, like WinForms, ADO.NET, and such. These are the ones with some risk. They may be under OIN's protection. I don't think we'd have the estoppel argument, because I don't think any Microsoft spokesperson has ever said they are OK. Still some laches, though.
Conclusion: if you want to use C#/Mono to write Linux applications, just use GTK# for your GUI instead of WinForms, use the database connector from your database vendor instead of ADO.NET, and you have no more need to fear patents than you would if you had written in any other common Linux language that isn't C.
Not that these are any better, but the Mighty Mouse sucked
I admire your extraordinary ability to tell how well a mouse will work without actually trying it.
So many years being mocked for having one button, and then, spitefully, they eschew that one in favor of some wonky touch pad setup. Did it ever occur to these people that it's nice to have tactile response? Call me old fashioned, but when I click, I want to hear and feel a click, and when I press a key, I want it to move downward and make a little clack
Have you ever actually used a Mighty Mouse? It does have tactile response. You hear and feel a click. It moves downward and makes a clack.
Why do you think this has anything to do with Tesla? There is much more to electricity than even Tesla knew--and more than one way to transmit wireless power. Do you have any reason to think that out of all the different ways to do this, they are using the one Tesla experimented with?
So is spyware is already "banned" by privacy laws, why do we need this separate P2P legislation?
When spyware uploads your tax return, there is no way that is an accident, and it is also likely that the spyware didn't get on your system with your permission. Spyware is covered by existing laws because it is trying to do something bad.
P2P software is generally on your system because you wanted it there. When it uploads your tax return, it is most likely an accident. The P2P software is not doing something bad--it's doing exactly what you installed it to do. You just botched the configuration, or didn't realize that there was a need to configure it.
Hence, laws against spyware are not applicable. This law isn't about banning P2P. It's about making sure the people who install P2P software are aware of the consequences, so they can use it safely, which is quite different from what the spyware laws do.
Without knowing the questions, this is meaningless. Most people don't want ads, period. If the question was "do you want to receive targeted ads?", then of course most people said no. Targeted ads are still ads. Nothing surprising there. The important question is whether people would rather have targeted ads or non-targeted ads, when they see ads.
...and he got modded up.
"News for Nerds" used to mean the kind of nerds that were like Lisa Simpson and Martin Prince. Now the typical Slashdot nerd is more likely to be the Milhouse van Houten kind of nerd.
The map data in Google Maps isn't Google's. Google licenses it from someone else. That license has restrictions on how the data can be used. For example, it can't be used for turn-by-turn GPS navigation, which is why all such programs on the iPhone come with their own map data.
I suspect that the terms of the license Google has includes a clause that requires Google to vigorously protect the data. Even if there is no such requirement in the license, so that Google could just step back and leave it to the upstream to pursue Cyanogen, Google may not want to do that, out of fear that the upstream might decide it is easier to just cut Google off.
Plenty of people who aren't fat have trouble getting around on their feet. Many old people, for example--and they make up a large and increasing fraction of the Japanese population.
There is currently a new bridge being built over state route 520, which runs right through the Microsoft campus. This is being done to alleviate congestion on the 40th Street bridge. This new bridge will basically link two Microsoft parking lots. It will be a public road but leads to no place of interest if you're not a Microsoft employee. Guess who pays for the construction costs? Hint: it's not Microsoft.
You sure managed to cram a lot of inaccuracies in such a short statement. A few corrections.
The majority of the projected users are not from Microsoft. The majority will be from the other 600 high tech firms and other companies in the Overlake area of Redmond, and the thousands of homes there.
Microsoft is paying half the cost.
The project is one that regional planners have long thought was necessary to deal with both the current and the projected future growth in the regions, but that they had trouble funding until Microsoft offered to pay half. The Puget Sound Regional Council, when it evaluated the technical merits of hundreds of projects as potential recipients of stimulus money, gave this project a perfect score.
At least for stores in California, a non-compete clause would be irrelevant, as those aren't enforceable under California law except in cases like the sale of a business.
TFA states that they can regain control a certain period after the grant of rights had been made, but is this just a normal end of the contract or do they have to buy it back?
Neither. It's part of copyright law.
For works copyrighted before 1978, copyright law says that the original copyright owner, 56 years after selling or otherwise transferring the rights, can take them back. The details change for works after 1978, but the basic idea is the same--authors and artists get a chance to change their mind some fairly large number of years after they sell or otherwise transfer their rights. The idea is that artists, early in their careers when they are unknown, often sell some of their best work for very low amounts, and then they become famous and the value of their works skyrockets--and they don't get any of that. So, the authors of the copyright law gave them a second chance to get their works back so the artists in their old age, or their survivors, benefit. These termination rights are interesting in that copyright says that the artist cannot surrender them. If when the artist sells his work, the contract says the author will not exercise termination rights when they vest, that contract term is void.
BTW, this applies to software copyrights. This could have some interesting implications when major free software starts getting around 35 years old.
This article provides much more detail. The "Interplanetary Transport Network" article at Wikipedia contains references and links to more, if that isn't good enough.
Big deal.
Gravitational assist orbits are known from the dawn of space time.
It helps and guess what, yes all the probes that were sent to mars do take advantage of such orbits
You appear to have misunderstood what the article is about.
This cuts both ways. Juries are also free to ignore a just law. Juries made heavy use of this power in the South from the end of the Civil War up until rather late in the 20th century, to convict black defendants who should have been acquitted, and to acquit white defendants who should have been convicted.
This is one of the main reasons jurors are not told of the nullification power. No one has thought of a good way to tell them about it that would not lead to abuse of it. The best anyone has come up with is to not tell them, instead leaving it to the individual jury to discover on their own when confronted with a case where applying the letter of the law would be so unjust that they can't bring themselves to do it, despite having taken an oath that they would.
Proponents of nullification often overlook the problems with it. For instance, it violates the principle that all should be equal before the law. If X and Y commit the same acts, and are both charged under the same law (a law that most think is OK, but, say 10% oppose), and X is convicted but Y is acquitted because by chance he got one of th 10% on his jury, that's pretty damn unjust for X.
If a law is unjust in general, that can be dealt with through the legislative process, and if the legislature won't act, it can dealt with by electing better legislators, and if that doesn't work, the referendum process can be used. Where nullification is appropriate is when you have a law that is find almost all the time, but due to a unique set of circumstances, it would be unjust to follow it in a particular case.
Did the iPhone suddenly invent mobile internet access?
Effectively, it did. See below.
Web access has been a standard feature of every cell phone and PDA sold in the world (certainly in Europe and Asia) since years before the iPhone even existed.
Said web access pretty much uniformly sucked. When the iPhone came out, and provided mobile web access that was not painful to use, usage skyrocketed. Google, for instance, reported at one point that they were getting something like 50 times more hits from iPhone than from all other mobile devices combined. This was at a time when iPhone was still new and didn't have anywhere near the market share it does now.
In a high profile case, such as the OJ case, where even a determined juror would have trouble avoiding the media reports on the case, the jury will be sequestered. What that means is the jury is put up in a hotel when court is not in session, and their access to newspapers and TV is limited.
Slashdot Mirror
But without boycottnovell, where would we learn such interesting facts as Apple switched from PPC to Intel because Jobs wanted to support Vista, or that Slashdot always takes the Microsoft party line.
Without BN, I could have scoured every reliable source in the world, and never have learned those obscure facts.
Didn't the New York Stock Exchange move over to Linux because Microsoft couldn't provide a good, low-latency RT kernel? They begged Microsoft, wanted to stay with Microsoft, and Microsoft couldn't provide them with a solution
No. They are still running Windows. They are also running Linux.
The big stock exchanges have a variety of largely independent systems, for different functions, and different kinds of markets. They moved one such systems from mainframes to Windows (running Cobol!) several years ago, and are still using it. More recently, they moved a different system to Linux.
You're missing the point, which is that you're not free to produce a non-compatible implementation. Regardless of how useful that would be, the FSF view is that you should be free to do so
The CP won't cover you if you produce a non-compatible implementation. That just leaves the OIN, estoppel, and laches (assuming there are valid patents in the first place, and that your deviation from the standard didn't take you out of the scope of those patents).
Right, they've committed themselves to not sue fully compatible [microsoft.com] implementations of ECMA 334 and 335. That's far from all of .Net and the "fully compatible" clause means it violates the FSFs freedom 1, the freedom to "change it to make it do what you wish"
This is not a problem. Let's first consider the ECMA parts of Mono. There are safe for all of the following reasons:
Now let's consider versions of .NET and C# since the version standardized by ECMA. Those portions would not be covered by the CP. What's the risk there? First question, are there even patents covering them? The changes since ECMA as far as I know are evolutionary changes that are similar to things in many other languages commonly used on Linux. We have no reason to believe there even are patents from Microsoft covering these. If Microsoft does have a patent covering them, that patent is also likely to cover similar things in Java, Python, Ruby, etc. Microsoft could do a lot more damage to Linux suing over Python than they could over Mono. Also, there's still the OIN and laches defenses for sure, and probably the estoppel defense.
Finally, there are the Mono ports of Windows-specific things, like WinForms, ADO.NET, and such. These are the ones with some risk. They may be under OIN's protection. I don't think we'd have the estoppel argument, because I don't think any Microsoft spokesperson has ever said they are OK. Still some laches, though.
Conclusion: if you want to use C#/Mono to write Linux applications, just use GTK# for your GUI instead of WinForms, use the database connector from your database vendor instead of ADO.NET, and you have no more need to fear patents than you would if you had written in any other common Linux language that isn't C.
Not that these are any better, but the Mighty Mouse sucked
I admire your extraordinary ability to tell how well a mouse will work without actually trying it.
So many years being mocked for having one button, and then, spitefully, they eschew that one in favor of some wonky touch pad setup. Did it ever occur to these people that it's nice to have tactile response? Call me old fashioned, but when I click, I want to hear and feel a click, and when I press a key, I want it to move downward and make a little clack
Have you ever actually used a Mighty Mouse? It does have tactile response. You hear and feel a click. It moves downward and makes a clack.
If physics worked the way you think it does, lasers wouldn't work.
Why do you think this has anything to do with Tesla? There is much more to electricity than even Tesla knew--and more than one way to transmit wireless power. Do you have any reason to think that out of all the different ways to do this, they are using the one Tesla experimented with?
So is spyware is already "banned" by privacy laws, why do we need this separate P2P legislation?
When spyware uploads your tax return, there is no way that is an accident, and it is also likely that the spyware didn't get on your system with your permission. Spyware is covered by existing laws because it is trying to do something bad.
P2P software is generally on your system because you wanted it there. When it uploads your tax return, it is most likely an accident. The P2P software is not doing something bad--it's doing exactly what you installed it to do. You just botched the configuration, or didn't realize that there was a need to configure it.
Hence, laws against spyware are not applicable. This law isn't about banning P2P. It's about making sure the people who install P2P software are aware of the consequences, so they can use it safely, which is quite different from what the spyware laws do.
Without knowing the questions, this is meaningless. Most people don't want ads, period. If the question was "do you want to receive targeted ads?", then of course most people said no. Targeted ads are still ads. Nothing surprising there. The important question is whether people would rather have targeted ads or non-targeted ads, when they see ads.
...and he got modded up. "News for Nerds" used to mean the kind of nerds that were like Lisa Simpson and Martin Prince. Now the typical Slashdot nerd is more likely to be the Milhouse van Houten kind of nerd.
Are you auditioning for a "Bing" commercial?
The map data in Google Maps isn't Google's. Google licenses it from someone else. That license has restrictions on how the data can be used. For example, it can't be used for turn-by-turn GPS navigation, which is why all such programs on the iPhone come with their own map data.
I suspect that the terms of the license Google has includes a clause that requires Google to vigorously protect the data. Even if there is no such requirement in the license, so that Google could just step back and leave it to the upstream to pursue Cyanogen, Google may not want to do that, out of fear that the upstream might decide it is easier to just cut Google off.
Plenty of people who aren't fat have trouble getting around on their feet. Many old people, for example--and they make up a large and increasing fraction of the Japanese population.
There is currently a new bridge being built over state route 520, which runs right through the Microsoft campus. This is being done to alleviate congestion on the 40th Street bridge. This new bridge will basically link two Microsoft parking lots. It will be a public road but leads to no place of interest if you're not a Microsoft employee. Guess who pays for the construction costs? Hint: it's not Microsoft.
You sure managed to cram a lot of inaccuracies in such a short statement. A few corrections.
The project is one that regional planners have long thought was necessary to deal with both the current and the projected future growth in the regions, but that they had trouble funding until Microsoft offered to pay half. The Puget Sound Regional Council, when it evaluated the technical merits of hundreds of projects as potential recipients of stimulus money, gave this project a perfect score.
At least for stores in California, a non-compete clause would be irrelevant, as those aren't enforceable under California law except in cases like the sale of a business.
TFA states that they can regain control a certain period after the grant of rights had been made, but is this just a normal end of the contract or do they have to buy it back?
Neither. It's part of copyright law.
For works copyrighted before 1978, copyright law says that the original copyright owner, 56 years after selling or otherwise transferring the rights, can take them back. The details change for works after 1978, but the basic idea is the same--authors and artists get a chance to change their mind some fairly large number of years after they sell or otherwise transfer their rights. The idea is that artists, early in their careers when they are unknown, often sell some of their best work for very low amounts, and then they become famous and the value of their works skyrockets--and they don't get any of that. So, the authors of the copyright law gave them a second chance to get their works back so the artists in their old age, or their survivors, benefit. These termination rights are interesting in that copyright says that the artist cannot surrender them. If when the artist sells his work, the contract says the author will not exercise termination rights when they vest, that contract term is void.
BTW, this applies to software copyrights. This could have some interesting implications when major free software starts getting around 35 years old.
This article provides much more detail. The "Interplanetary Transport Network" article at Wikipedia contains references and links to more, if that isn't good enough.
Big deal. Gravitational assist orbits are known from the dawn of space time. It helps and guess what, yes all the probes that were sent to mars do take advantage of such orbits
You appear to have misunderstood what the article is about.
Here's an article on this that is a bit more technical.
This cuts both ways. Juries are also free to ignore a just law. Juries made heavy use of this power in the South from the end of the Civil War up until rather late in the 20th century, to convict black defendants who should have been acquitted, and to acquit white defendants who should have been convicted.
This is one of the main reasons jurors are not told of the nullification power. No one has thought of a good way to tell them about it that would not lead to abuse of it. The best anyone has come up with is to not tell them, instead leaving it to the individual jury to discover on their own when confronted with a case where applying the letter of the law would be so unjust that they can't bring themselves to do it, despite having taken an oath that they would.
Proponents of nullification often overlook the problems with it. For instance, it violates the principle that all should be equal before the law. If X and Y commit the same acts, and are both charged under the same law (a law that most think is OK, but, say 10% oppose), and X is convicted but Y is acquitted because by chance he got one of th 10% on his jury, that's pretty damn unjust for X.
If a law is unjust in general, that can be dealt with through the legislative process, and if the legislature won't act, it can dealt with by electing better legislators, and if that doesn't work, the referendum process can be used. Where nullification is appropriate is when you have a law that is find almost all the time, but due to a unique set of circumstances, it would be unjust to follow it in a particular case.
Did the iPhone suddenly invent mobile internet access?
Effectively, it did. See below.
Web access has been a standard feature of every cell phone and PDA sold in the world (certainly in Europe and Asia) since years before the iPhone even existed.
Said web access pretty much uniformly sucked. When the iPhone came out, and provided mobile web access that was not painful to use, usage skyrocketed. Google, for instance, reported at one point that they were getting something like 50 times more hits from iPhone than from all other mobile devices combined. This was at a time when iPhone was still new and didn't have anywhere near the market share it does now.
In a high profile case, such as the OJ case, where even a determined juror would have trouble avoiding the media reports on the case, the jury will be sequestered. What that means is the jury is put up in a hotel when court is not in session, and their access to newspapers and TV is limited.
Key parts of this software are available as free software.
.
How is the image of the Coliseum shown in either of the linked articles not a 3D model of said building?
They are using the photos to get relative position information on the things in the photo. That information would not be subject to copyright.