do scientists know have firm belief in something that they once doubted?
I think the importance of this is that a spectral analysis is being performed of an extrasolar planet. This has never been done before, and if it turns out to be practical, it will open the door to learning about the chemical makeup of planets in other star systems. Up until now, the best anyone had managed was to determine the mass of such planets, not their chemical compositions.
Imagine if she lost. People could get sued for posting résumés that contained copyrighted words.
This is nitpicking I know, but you meant "trademark", not "copyright". People throw these words around carelessly enough here that I think a clarification is in order:
Trademark
A symbol used by a company to distinguish itself or its product, such as the words "playmate" and "Playboy". A trademark can't be used by another party to advertise a product or service which might be mistaken for that of the holder of the trademark. Failure actively to defend a trademark will result in the loss of the right to prevent others from using the mark. The trademark holder is not allowed to prevent use of the mark which would not result in people mistaking the user for the trademark holder.
Copyright
The monopoly the government grants to the author of a work, giving the author the right to prevent others from copying the work. Certain types of copying are exempt - this is known as "fair use". Works similar to the copyrighted work, but which were developed independently of the copyrighted work, are not considered to be copies of the similar work for the purpose of copyright enforcement.
Patent
A monopoly granted to inventors to be compensated for the use of their inventions. Traditionally, inventions had to be either physical devices or methods for creating something physical, but in recent years the Patent Office has allowed patents to be issued for algorithms. Independently invented devices which are similar to the patented device are subject to the patent monopoly, even if the invention was completely independent of the patent holder's invention.
I visited the PG web pages looking for a PG banner ad to put on some web pages I'm designing, but there weren't any there. I think it'd be a good idea to design some and make them available from the PG web sites, to make it easier for others to support PG through advertizing. I'd make them myself, but graphic design isn't my forte.
I've been waiting for search engines to advance to the point where it would be possible to search by topic, rather than by keywords. This sounds like it's a step toward doing just that. I'm wondering, though, just how big a step it is. The idea seems straight-forward enough that it seems surprising that this isn't being done already.
Assuming that the patent isn't abused to suppress the technology, just how big an advance is this? It would be nice if it were possible to index much of the web by subject automatically. Next we'll just need an algorithm to automate ranking pages according to quality.:)
Slashdot Mirror
I think the importance of this is that a spectral analysis is being performed of an extrasolar planet. This has never been done before, and if it turns out to be practical, it will open the door to learning about the chemical makeup of planets in other star systems. Up until now, the best anyone had managed was to determine the mass of such planets, not their chemical compositions.
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Assuming that the patent isn't abused to suppress the technology, just how big an advance is this? It would be nice if it were possible to index much of the web by subject automatically. Next we'll just need an algorithm to automate ranking pages according to quality. :)
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