Ok, I'm blind. I use that term in the sense the NFB uses it (or at least did last time I heard) - non-correctable vision impairment that affects day-to-day life. It is also correct to say I'm legally blind, though not totally blind.
And, I live in a part of the U.S. where inability to drive is a serious hinderance. (That doesn't narrow things down much.)
But I have to say, I think this idea is... well... misguided. I agree with the end goal (better independent mobility for the blind), but the approach is all wrong. It may be that TFA isn't giving a full sense of how this works, and certainly even what they've described is an amazing technological acheivement; but the real problems of a blind driver are orders of magnitude more complex.
Dealing with lane alginment, spotting intersections, parking challenges... those could be handled with an infrastructure investment to make "smart roads" that can talk to the car.
How will the laser range-finder fair with bicycles? Kids running across the road? A wheel, matress, or other random piece of junk that fell off another vehicle? The unexpected?
What happens when all of this active sensing equipment fails for some reason?
By the time you invest enough to solve all of these problems, you could have the car drive itself. I don't see this as a useful "intermediate step" in that direction, as someone else suggested, because the human interface is a more complex challenge than the automated intelligence it replaces - which is why there have already been robots that can drive on a closed track.
In truth, I think it's a sloppy American attitude to think that autonomous living is predicated on driving your own car. The fact that most Americans don't use public trnasportation, along with the resulting low quality of American public transportation (on average), makes the idea of a blind person using public transportation stand out in America as a disparity.
In other words, I don't think we should try to shoehorn blind drivers into the American transportation infrastructure; I think we should build an infrastructure that supports everyone.
2) If you've had to ask why drive-up ATM's have these features, you haven't thought it through. Hint: I don't drive, but I use drive-up ATM's all the time.
It's not what the article says (though certainly there seems to be a bit of slant to it); it's what the article doesn't say.
It doesn't give a single clue as to the basis for the license dispute. They make it sound like the rightsholders just one day woke up and said "you know, I think we'll just stop licensing this to you", which is almost certainly not true.
It's unlikely that this makes a legal difference... but then again the entire article is about how badly Skype needs these licenses, which also makes no legal difference. (Well, I should say probably makes no legal difference, depending on details of how the relationship between the companies and the licensed IP got to where they are... about which TFA again gives no information.)
Funny how every problem that one doesn't have the facts to size, must be easy.
Besidss, the article is too vague to tell if this would work. If the licensing includes patent licensing, then they can't simply replace the code. Either they would have to find a new (presumably innovative -- i.e. not something you can assume will be inexpensive) way to do what the licensed software does while still interoperating with the existing system or they would still need to license the patents.
Probably becuase that's not what "price fixing" means. A consumer fraud investigation of some sort might make sense, though.
From an individual point of view, GP may have a point. I have a fixed cost per month unless my allegedly-peak usage exceeds some limit, and after that my additional allegedly-peak hours come in sizable blocks. The odds of voicemail greetings pushing me over a price increment are slim (especially since I almost never exceed my base amount).
To me the messages are annoying not becuase they cost me money, but because they are annoying.
From a carrier's point of view, the point is that not everyone is on a plan like mine. Some percentage of callers do get charged an extra minute that literally hits their pocket book, and the nickels add up.
On the other hand, and I suppose I'm going to editorialize a bit here: If you're leaving 1:55 voicemail messages, knock it off.
I see you were modded funny, but I have no idea if you were joking...
So I'll go ahead and point out that it's only impossible in a uselessly literal sense.
The practical reality is, without the applicaiton of agg technology, the Earth would not sustain society as we know it today.
If you think it makes you sound cool to be cynical, you might say "that would be a good thing". Suit yourself, but we are where we are -- so you go explain it to the masses who can eat today but can't in your ideal world.
The question was where people get the idea that Apple invented podcasting.
GP's answer -- "the name" -- is the correct answer. That is where people get the idea. In fact the answer is so obvious that the quesiton was foolish. (To be fair, the question was almost certainly rhetorical; that doesn't make it any less foolish. GGP could've spoken more effectively by simply saying 'Apple did not invent podcasting', as others have.)
And yet people jump on GP with all the reasons that the name is not an indicator of who invented the technology, as though that were somehow an argument against what GP said.
"Going for higher, cheaper yield is not always good"...unless you consider 'sustaining an ever-growing population with fixed resources while holding mass starvations in check' to be good.
Getting from point A to point B is far more basic than browsing the web. My day-to-day life is impacted because I can't drive. Nobody's basic day-to-day life is harmed for want of internet service; hell, many people choose not to have it.
So is driving a right rather than a privilege? I should be allowed to drive even though I can't pass the vision test? Someone who has used a vehicle to assult someone, or who repeatedly risks others' lives by driving while severly impaired by alcohol, should still get to drive?
Come to think of it, if it's a right, then a car and fuel should be provided, or at least heavily subsidized. And since I really can't safely drive, the government will have to assign me a driver.
No? I didn't think so. Then I can't imagine why you would think internet access would be a right.
"So he could patent the process of checking to see whether someone is breathing to determine if they're still alive and then sue anyone who's ever done that?"
Emphasis added to point out why the answer is still no. That would be a matter of prior art. If the PTO didn't throw such a patent out, the courts would strike it down.
The problem with these patents isn't prior art. I believe the problem with these patents is obviousness, and a number of others seem to agree. This means that the courts should strike the patent down, but it's not as clear-cut as a prior art situation and may not happen.
Compulsive use of snarky-but-inaccurate analogies is no virtue. It may save you some confusion to realize that I'm not defending the patents here.
There are a lot of things about these high-frequency trading systems that strike me as bad. The market should be a level playing field, and here it clearly is not. If I built a computer that could analyze the data and make the decision at this speed, I still couldn't use it. Who do I have to pay first to get my equipment conneced to the network? Who do I have to pay first for access to the data?
So from that, I'd say regulatory fixes are called for. I don't care about arguments of the good or harm these systems may do, the playing field needs to be level.
But, let's not miss this opportunity to see flaws in the system at a more fundamental level. TFA talks about a loophole in the regulations that should provide transparency, then shows how high-frequency traders defeated strategies used by slower traders who were themselves trying to defeat transparency.
Stock traders are always trying to get or to keep an information edge on the other guy. This is, in a sense, just an extra-dangerous (and apparently extra-effective) way to do it.
I agree that the lack of false positive numbers is somewhere on the scale between fraud and criminal stupidity, as any number other than 0% makes the system effectively useless in a commercial sense.
However, as TFS points out, TFA appears to be aimed at designing new commercial P2P networks rather than modifying the usage of existing networks. If someone builds a network for commercial use and chooses to include this in the architecture of their network, then that isn't vandalism and nobody deserves to be jailed. It's bad business and the network owners deserve the customer relations nightmare they will bring upon themselves.
If it is even possible to use this on existing networks, and if anyone ever does, it is the person using it - not the researchers - who should then be liable for some sort of civil offense. Saying the researchers should be jailed in that case is just another instance - much like DMCA anti-circumvention - of saying that a technology, rather than an action, should be illegal.
It does no such thing. You are assuming the label means something it does not, and was never intended to, mean.
In fact, you're assuming that there is an external definition of the label PII by which the application of that label could be judged, when in fact it is a technical term with no meaning other than that given it by the law.
"Does this mean I can patent the method the body uses to convert O2 to C02 and then sue everyone?"
No, and I don't see the connection. The patent doesn't cover a natural process of the body; it covers the procedure of looking at the results of that natural process.
It doesn't look to my (admittedly untrained) eyes like a valid patent, but that's because it appears obvious. It essentially seems to say, "Want to know if there's too much or too little of a drug in the patient's system? Then check!" My attitude would vary if there's some sophisticated, non-obvious mechanism behind taking the reading of how much drug is in the system, and they invented that method, and that method is spelled out in the patent...
That the patent "recites a natural phenomenon" is a non-issue to me. Every patent can be boiled down to observations about nature. Every patent is an observation about a useful application of natural laws of physics, chemistry, etc.
I don't know that I see this approach as that radically separate from what science has always done. It's never been about "absolute proof", and every scientific fact is subject to further investigation.
So someone theorizes "this complex set of principles could lead to an observed phenomenon" and that is tested; fine. If that generates a useful model of a complex system, that's as good a starting point as any - though that model is still only a model, and is subject to further investigation just like any model used in science. The main danger - as with any science - is over-interpretation (especially since formal logic rejects a fallacy concluding a cause from an effect).
Yet, explaining every aspect of "how" things came to be as they are would say nothing about whether some sort of god was behind it all. Even showing that society would evolve to believe soemthing even were that belief false, would not prove the belief to be false.
I think you've acknowledged as much in your own post, so I guess while this is an interesting side note I don't see how it relates to the agnostic/atheist debate.
Maybe. Now go read the definition of PII as it pertains to privacy law, and you will see that you've just agreed that an IP address could be PII, regardless of NAT.
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Ok, I'm blind. I use that term in the sense the NFB uses it (or at least did last time I heard) - non-correctable vision impairment that affects day-to-day life. It is also correct to say I'm legally blind, though not totally blind.
And, I live in a part of the U.S. where inability to drive is a serious hinderance. (That doesn't narrow things down much.)
But I have to say, I think this idea is... well... misguided. I agree with the end goal (better independent mobility for the blind), but the approach is all wrong. It may be that TFA isn't giving a full sense of how this works, and certainly even what they've described is an amazing technological acheivement; but the real problems of a blind driver are orders of magnitude more complex.
Dealing with lane alginment, spotting intersections, parking challenges... those could be handled with an infrastructure investment to make "smart roads" that can talk to the car.
How will the laser range-finder fair with bicycles? Kids running across the road? A wheel, matress, or other random piece of junk that fell off another vehicle? The unexpected?
What happens when all of this active sensing equipment fails for some reason?
By the time you invest enough to solve all of these problems, you could have the car drive itself. I don't see this as a useful "intermediate step" in that direction, as someone else suggested, because the human interface is a more complex challenge than the automated intelligence it replaces - which is why there have already been robots that can drive on a closed track.
In truth, I think it's a sloppy American attitude to think that autonomous living is predicated on driving your own car. The fact that most Americans don't use public trnasportation, along with the resulting low quality of American public transportation (on average), makes the idea of a blind person using public transportation stand out in America as a disparity.
In other words, I don't think we should try to shoehorn blind drivers into the American transportation infrastructure; I think we should build an infrastructure that supports everyone.
1) That joke was already used in TFS.
2) If you've had to ask why drive-up ATM's have these features, you haven't thought it through. Hint: I don't drive, but I use drive-up ATM's all the time.
It's not what the article says (though certainly there seems to be a bit of slant to it); it's what the article doesn't say.
It doesn't give a single clue as to the basis for the license dispute. They make it sound like the rightsholders just one day woke up and said "you know, I think we'll just stop licensing this to you", which is almost certainly not true.
It's unlikely that this makes a legal difference... but then again the entire article is about how badly Skype needs these licenses, which also makes no legal difference. (Well, I should say probably makes no legal difference, depending on details of how the relationship between the companies and the licensed IP got to where they are... about which TFA again gives no information.)
Funny how every problem that one doesn't have the facts to size, must be easy.
Besidss, the article is too vague to tell if this would work. If the licensing includes patent licensing, then they can't simply replace the code. Either they would have to find a new (presumably innovative -- i.e. not something you can assume will be inexpensive) way to do what the licensed software does while still interoperating with the existing system or they would still need to license the patents.
Probably becuase that's not what "price fixing" means. A consumer fraud investigation of some sort might make sense, though.
From an individual point of view, GP may have a point. I have a fixed cost per month unless my allegedly-peak usage exceeds some limit, and after that my additional allegedly-peak hours come in sizable blocks. The odds of voicemail greetings pushing me over a price increment are slim (especially since I almost never exceed my base amount).
To me the messages are annoying not becuase they cost me money, but because they are annoying.
From a carrier's point of view, the point is that not everyone is on a plan like mine. Some percentage of callers do get charged an extra minute that literally hits their pocket book, and the nickels add up.
On the other hand, and I suppose I'm going to editorialize a bit here: If you're leaving 1:55 voicemail messages, knock it off.
I see you were modded funny, but I have no idea if you were joking...
So I'll go ahead and point out that it's only impossible in a uselessly literal sense.
The practical reality is, without the applicaiton of agg technology, the Earth would not sustain society as we know it today.
If you think it makes you sound cool to be cynical, you might say "that would be a good thing". Suit yourself, but we are where we are -- so you go explain it to the masses who can eat today but can't in your ideal world.
The question was where people get the idea that Apple invented podcasting.
GP's answer -- "the name" -- is the correct answer. That is where people get the idea. In fact the answer is so obvious that the quesiton was foolish. (To be fair, the question was almost certainly rhetorical; that doesn't make it any less foolish. GGP could've spoken more effectively by simply saying 'Apple did not invent podcasting', as others have.)
And yet people jump on GP with all the reasons that the name is not an indicator of who invented the technology, as though that were somehow an argument against what GP said.
"Going for higher, cheaper yield is not always good" ...unless you consider 'sustaining an ever-growing population with fixed resources while holding mass starvations in check' to be good.
The question, which you ignored, is whether driving is a right.
For the record, no court took any license away from me. So apart from dodging the real issue, you are factually wrong.
Getting from point A to point B is far more basic than browsing the web. My day-to-day life is impacted because I can't drive. Nobody's basic day-to-day life is harmed for want of internet service; hell, many people choose not to have it.
So is driving a right rather than a privilege? I should be allowed to drive even though I can't pass the vision test? Someone who has used a vehicle to assult someone, or who repeatedly risks others' lives by driving while severly impaired by alcohol, should still get to drive?
Come to think of it, if it's a right, then a car and fuel should be provided, or at least heavily subsidized. And since I really can't safely drive, the government will have to assign me a driver.
No? I didn't think so. Then I can't imagine why you would think internet access would be a right.
"So he could patent the process of checking to see whether someone is breathing to determine if they're still alive and then sue anyone who's ever done that?"
Emphasis added to point out why the answer is still no. That would be a matter of prior art. If the PTO didn't throw such a patent out, the courts would strike it down.
The problem with these patents isn't prior art. I believe the problem with these patents is obviousness, and a number of others seem to agree. This means that the courts should strike the patent down, but it's not as clear-cut as a prior art situation and may not happen.
Compulsive use of snarky-but-inaccurate analogies is no virtue. It may save you some confusion to realize that I'm not defending the patents here.
There are a lot of things about these high-frequency trading systems that strike me as bad. The market should be a level playing field, and here it clearly is not. If I built a computer that could analyze the data and make the decision at this speed, I still couldn't use it. Who do I have to pay first to get my equipment conneced to the network? Who do I have to pay first for access to the data?
So from that, I'd say regulatory fixes are called for. I don't care about arguments of the good or harm these systems may do, the playing field needs to be level.
But, let's not miss this opportunity to see flaws in the system at a more fundamental level. TFA talks about a loophole in the regulations that should provide transparency, then shows how high-frequency traders defeated strategies used by slower traders who were themselves trying to defeat transparency.
Stock traders are always trying to get or to keep an information edge on the other guy. This is, in a sense, just an extra-dangerous (and apparently extra-effective) way to do it.
I agree that the lack of false positive numbers is somewhere on the scale between fraud and criminal stupidity, as any number other than 0% makes the system effectively useless in a commercial sense.
However, as TFS points out, TFA appears to be aimed at designing new commercial P2P networks rather than modifying the usage of existing networks. If someone builds a network for commercial use and chooses to include this in the architecture of their network, then that isn't vandalism and nobody deserves to be jailed. It's bad business and the network owners deserve the customer relations nightmare they will bring upon themselves.
If it is even possible to use this on existing networks, and if anyone ever does, it is the person using it - not the researchers - who should then be liable for some sort of civil offense. Saying the researchers should be jailed in that case is just another instance - much like DMCA anti-circumvention - of saying that a technology, rather than an action, should be illegal.
"You said that the patent "covers the procedure of looking at the results", which implies that a procedure was specified and patented."
Don't confuse what you infer with what I imply.
You misundstand the pharse "the procedure of". It does not mean the same thing as "the pocedure by which to".
The C in DMCA means "copyright". None of the letters mean "patent".
Just for the record...
Since that is exactly what I said, it is unclear to me what the word 'No' is doing at the front of your sentence.
Glad to help.
It does no such thing. You are assuming the label means something it does not, and was never intended to, mean.
In fact, you're assuming that there is an external definition of the label PII by which the application of that label could be judged, when in fact it is a technical term with no meaning other than that given it by the law.
There's a natural process, akin to digestion, by which you become aware of the level of drug metabolites in your blood?
Or you read one litigants soundbyte and didn't do any fact-checking to see what the patent actually covers?
Don't get me wrong, the patent is garbage IMO - but not for the reasons put forth in TFS.
"Does this mean I can patent the method the body uses to convert O2 to C02 and then sue everyone?"
No, and I don't see the connection. The patent doesn't cover a natural process of the body; it covers the procedure of looking at the results of that natural process.
It doesn't look to my (admittedly untrained) eyes like a valid patent, but that's because it appears obvious. It essentially seems to say, "Want to know if there's too much or too little of a drug in the patient's system? Then check!" My attitude would vary if there's some sophisticated, non-obvious mechanism behind taking the reading of how much drug is in the system, and they invented that method, and that method is spelled out in the patent...
That the patent "recites a natural phenomenon" is a non-issue to me. Every patent can be boiled down to observations about nature. Every patent is an observation about a useful application of natural laws of physics, chemistry, etc.
I guess I don't see why you think a law is broken, just because it puts the label PII on something that does not by itself identify an individual.
In a privacy context, this is generally considered a feature and not a bug.
I don't know that I see this approach as that radically separate from what science has always done. It's never been about "absolute proof", and every scientific fact is subject to further investigation.
So someone theorizes "this complex set of principles could lead to an observed phenomenon" and that is tested; fine. If that generates a useful model of a complex system, that's as good a starting point as any - though that model is still only a model, and is subject to further investigation just like any model used in science. The main danger - as with any science - is over-interpretation (especially since formal logic rejects a fallacy concluding a cause from an effect).
Yet, explaining every aspect of "how" things came to be as they are would say nothing about whether some sort of god was behind it all. Even showing that society would evolve to believe soemthing even were that belief false, would not prove the belief to be false.
I think you've acknowledged as much in your own post, so I guess while this is an interesting side note I don't see how it relates to the agnostic/atheist debate.
...well, yes, until you get to really large (or fast) scales, at which point QM comes into direct conflict with relativity.
I've heard of recent attempts to reconcile the two, but last I heard there was still no universally accepted answer.
No, you're not understanding what the term PII means.
If we agree that IP, with other information, could lead to identity, then IP alone is PII.
PII is a legal term; its meaning is not tied to the intuitive assumptions you appear to be making.
Maybe. Now go read the definition of PII as it pertains to privacy law, and you will see that you've just agreed that an IP address could be PII, regardless of NAT.