If I followed it correctly, they compared trade secret laws to copyright. By fair use, scholarly discussion, criticism, and excerpts are allowed of copyrighted material, which would totally reveal most trade secrets in no time. The only way to keep a trade secret under copyright law would be to KEEP IT SECRET.
They also said the right to a fair trial didn't take precedence over the right to free speech. Wow. That doesn't sound like how I've heard things practiced. Today I heard that many people were being held as material witnesses to the terrorist attack, and had not been allowed to tell anyone they were being held.
Another comparison that occurred to me as I read the ruling was that trade secretes are like selling a car with hood shut, and requiring car buyers to sign an agreement never to open the hood. Car companies could do that. What would be their recourse if someone actually opened the hood?
A company with a monopoly product has a product that all customers have to use if they want to survive. A company with a monopoly product should not abuse their existing monopoly, and they should not extend their existing monopoly into other areas.
Abusing their existing monopoly. Exclusive licenses should not be allowed. Any license that has a clause that is equivalent to "if (exclusive) then..." should not be allowed. This is easy. This isn't being enforced! Why?
Extending existing monopoly. It means that anything that the company delivers that depends on their monopoly has to interact with that through a public interface that they don't control. I don't know if such a rule would speed up progress or slow it down. I know I finish projects much faster when I'm allowed to change all the code involved, rather than coordinating several groups plus an interface committee. Hum. Well, this rule isn't being enforce either.
Spam works because there's almost no cost for annoying people and large reward for the small percentage that fall for it.
To stop spam from being sent, it has to be made unprofitable. The EFF's recommendation, make it easier to delete it, doesn't change the cost model. It doesn't limit the amount of spam sent.
Can't we fine the senders of spam $10 or so per complaint? Or a similar proportional fine on the company being advertised? That would make it unprofitable to annoy more people than you please.
Y'know, advertisers already have these big databases of many of our actions and interests. They do a surprisingly bad job of using it. How often have I seen advertisements for new nbody integration techniques? Never. How often do I get advertisements for female viagra? All the time.
I wonder if I would dislike junk mail if all of it was relevant. I probably would, but it's hard to know. I've only experienced irrelevant junk mail.
A smart card that stored all my zillions of application/username/passwords, and a smartcard reader on anything that required me to remember a username/password, would be great. I wouldn't have to remember all that stuff. All my passwords would be collected on my smartcard, not on a piece of paper under my bed, not in Hailstorm's databases.
That's a different issue from reporting the same unique id everywhere you go. The same card could do that as well (or not).
Notes on computers have at least one advantage over notes on paper. Computers have "grep".
I recall one course taught entirely from lecture notes where the professor didn't define terms until two chapters after she started using them. I did rather poorly. Hum, one such term was 'k', so I suppose grep wouldn't have helped me much either. But for most terms, grep helps a lot.
There are a few things that need to be done and need to be changed because of this attack. Most have to do with tracking down the orchestrators and changing the rights and responsibilities of airplane passengers.
But for most of us, for most of what we do, this changes nothing. I wasted an inordinate amount of time following the lack of closure of the US presidential election, and for what? I should have sold all my stocks instead. Or fixed some bugs.
Go back to work. Keep society functioning. Except for very few of you, tracking down terrorists is someone else's job.
The reason I write software and put it in the public domain is to make the world a better place. That's the goal in life, right?
I've got only so much time. I want to use it to improve the world as much as possible. I get more bang for the buck writing software (that many people can use) than building physical things (that only one person can use). My software gets used most when I give it away free. So, I write software and give it away free.
How does one do that, without activating the worm?
I got lots of these, but when I save the attachments and poke at them with emacs, it's all gibberish. Almost everything is Word documents. I haven't been brave enough / familiar enough with Word to dare looking at the attachments in Word.
I think it's fun getting these Sircam worms, so long as I don't actually infect my machine with them, and so long as they're not too big. Makes me feel like I'm part of a community, with common experiences and everything.
It's the "obvious" principle that gets me. Take a class of grad students in the appropriate field, describe to them the problem, and let them work on it a day. They'll come back with one main solution, two or three lesser ones, and a couple off the wall. The one main solution and two or three lesser solutions qualify as "obvious" and shouldn't be patentable. We've all seen cases where such solutions were patented anyhow.
The crux of Martin's message today is that the revolution CASE began
that allowed computers to partly program themselves-- rather than depend
entirely upon slow, expensive, error-prone humans-- will accelerate
logarithmically in the near future.
I know that was a thinko, but logarithmic growth is a good description of the growth rate I've seen in software development methodologies.
I haven't watched TV in years either. I don't find it insulting, though. How could I? Not having watched it in years, I'm not in a position to hold any opinion about it at all.
Here's a business plan for getting paid for writing software but also guaranteeing that everything useful becomes open source.
Software comes in many versions, it looks like a tree, and each branch takes so long to create. Developers charge by the hour so each branch will cost so much. The developer puts the software on an ASP. The ASP charges users a flat monthly fee. The ASP lets people use any revision over the net, but not look at the code or binaries. The ASP tracks what users use and pays the developers of whatever gets used. Once any root-to-leaf has been paid off in the version tree, that version becomes open source, free.
I remember a science fiction story in some anthology that placed a futuristic Disneyworld on Pluto. A reborn finance minister was growing up his new body there, he had temporary gills and it was all oceans and desert islands. It got bombed and the fake sky fell. Nothing vaguely comical about the story.
But you're right. Disneyworld. Pluto. World. Mickey's dog. Bah, I didn't get that for YEARS. Ack what an awful pun.
I know nobody asked me, here's my two cents. (BTW, isn't this instant worldwide publication stuff great?)
This is how IP law should work for software.
If I write it from scratch then I can do what I want with it.
If I write it from scratch then you can't sell it without my permission.
I'm allowed to write it from scratch.
It turns out that software isn't as nonobvious as it seems. For example, the incredibly nonobvious orbit-integration algorithms I found in 2000 were exactly the same as the ones someone else found in 1990, and those were the same as ones someone else found in the 1973. This is the norm. It's happened to me over and over and over again.
Software patents should not exist. Authors should start with all rights to their code. Software patents claim that authors have no rights to their code if their code reinvents something that a previous author patented. It is extremely common for code to reinvent things that have been coded (and patented) before. Therefore software patents should not exist.
?p?I know he pushes for unpopular things all the time. Sometimes he has to back down, sometimes he doesn't. But all those unpopular things (including drilling for oil in Alaska and the 1.6T tax cut) are things that he actually wants. Reducing CO2 emissions seems like something he wouldn't want, since it conflicts with a vibrant oil industry, which he clearly does want.
?p?Has Bush pushed for anything that was both unpopular and which he didn't want?
Is the expression "Woah, bad acid!!!" specific to Carnegie Mellon students from around 1986? Or did it ever catch on beyond that?
Here's how I remember it. Someone in Pittsburgh was handing out children's stick-on tattoos laced with LSD and some other evil stuff that caused, hum, I think it was comas. After that the phrase "Woah, bad acid!!!" showed up in chalk on sidewalks for awhile. It meant having something bad happen to you after (because of) doing something stupid. For example, it's an appropriate thing to say when your code crashes because you dereferenced a null pointer.
would this make bomb making easier?
on
Fission in a Box
·
· Score: 1
I'm under the impression that the US government keeps track of all nuclear fuel. I know I've seen reports that Iraq has x-kilograms of fuel which they obtained from y and z.
If nuclear power plants became small, it would become much harder to track it all. That might imply that it would become much easier for Joe Terrorist to build an atomic bomb. Is that so?
Really? The administration will take an unpopular stance that they intend to step down from later, to distract from their real goals? Sounds uncharacteristically subtle to me.
I'm working on a distributed index. That is, the index itself is distributed. It's harder to take down the index than the data being indexed. I have a spec. The index nodes are lists in HTML pages.
According to this article, I'd be a contributory but not vicarious infringer. I might be exempt because it's a generic data structure, not specially suited to any type of data over any other. In fact it's better at static data than quickly-disappearing contraband.
My main question: are there other distributed index projects going on? If there are, I've reinvented the wheel enough times already, thank you.
Slashdot Mirror
If I followed it correctly, they compared trade secret laws to copyright. By fair use, scholarly discussion, criticism, and excerpts are allowed of copyrighted material, which would totally reveal most trade secrets in no time. The only way to keep a trade secret under copyright law would be to KEEP IT SECRET.
They also said the right to a fair trial didn't take precedence over the right to free speech. Wow. That doesn't sound like how I've heard things practiced. Today I heard that many people were being held as material witnesses to the terrorist attack, and had not been allowed to tell anyone they were being held.
Another comparison that occurred to me as I read the ruling was that trade secretes are like selling a car with hood shut, and requiring car buyers to sign an agreement never to open the hood. Car companies could do that. What would be their recourse if someone actually opened the hood?
A company with a monopoly product has a product that all customers have to use if they want to survive. A company with a monopoly product should not abuse their existing monopoly, and they should not extend their existing monopoly into other areas.
Abusing their existing monopoly. Exclusive licenses should not be allowed. Any license that has a clause that is equivalent to "if (exclusive) then ..." should not be allowed. This is easy. This isn't being enforced! Why?
Extending existing monopoly. It means that anything that the company delivers that depends on their monopoly has to interact with that through a public interface that they don't control. I don't know if such a rule would speed up progress or slow it down. I know I finish projects much faster when I'm allowed to change all the code involved, rather than coordinating several groups plus an interface committee. Hum. Well, this rule isn't being enforce either.
Why is the US agreeing to this?
To stop spam from being sent, it has to be made unprofitable. The EFF's recommendation, make it easier to delete it, doesn't change the cost model. It doesn't limit the amount of spam sent.
Can't we fine the senders of spam $10 or so per complaint? Or a similar proportional fine on the company being advertised? That would make it unprofitable to annoy more people than you please.
I wonder if I would dislike junk mail if all of it was relevant. I probably would, but it's hard to know. I've only experienced irrelevant junk mail.
What if we allowed universal public databases of everyone's movements, but disallowed junk mail, telemarketing, and spam?
A smart card that stored all my zillions of application/username/passwords, and a smartcard reader on anything that required me to remember a username/password, would be great. I wouldn't have to remember all that stuff. All my passwords would be collected on my smartcard, not on a piece of paper under my bed, not in Hailstorm's databases.
That's a different issue from reporting the same unique id everywhere you go. The same card could do that as well (or not).
Do I go to British Broadcasting because it gives an independent viewpoint? Um, no actually, it's just their website is so much faster than cnn.com.
I recall one course taught entirely from lecture notes where the professor didn't define terms until two chapters after she started using them. I did rather poorly. Hum, one such term was 'k', so I suppose grep wouldn't have helped me much either. But for most terms, grep helps a lot.
But for most of us, for most of what we do, this changes nothing. I wasted an inordinate amount of time following the lack of closure of the US presidential election, and for what? I should have sold all my stocks instead. Or fixed some bugs.
Go back to work. Keep society functioning. Except for very few of you, tracking down terrorists is someone else's job.
The reason I write software and put it in the public domain is to make the world a better place. That's the goal in life, right?
I've got only so much time. I want to use it to improve the world as much as possible. I get more bang for the buck writing software (that many people can use) than building physical things (that only one person can use). My software gets used most when I give it away free. So, I write software and give it away free.
Um, isn't cloning human beings illegal?
How does one do that, without activating the worm? I got lots of these, but when I save the attachments and poke at them with emacs, it's all gibberish. Almost everything is Word documents. I haven't been brave enough / familiar enough with Word to dare looking at the attachments in Word.
I think it's fun getting these Sircam worms, so long as I don't actually infect my machine with them, and so long as they're not too big. Makes me feel like I'm part of a community, with common experiences and everything.
Prolog *cough* Prolog
Most hardware shouldn't be patentable either.
It's the "obvious" principle that gets me. Take a class of grad students in the appropriate field, describe to them the problem, and let them work on it a day. They'll come back with one main solution, two or three lesser ones, and a couple off the wall. The one main solution and two or three lesser solutions qualify as "obvious" and shouldn't be patentable. We've all seen cases where such solutions were patented anyhow.
The crux of Martin's message today is that the revolution CASE began that allowed computers to partly program themselves-- rather than depend entirely upon slow, expensive, error-prone humans-- will accelerate logarithmically in the near future.
I know that was a thinko, but logarithmic growth is a good description of the growth rate I've seen in software development methodologies.
I haven't watched TV in years either. I don't find it insulting, though. How could I? Not having watched it in years, I'm not in a position to hold any opinion about it at all.
Here's a business plan for getting paid for writing software but also guaranteeing that everything useful becomes open source.
Software comes in many versions, it looks like a tree, and each branch takes so long to create. Developers charge by the hour so each branch will cost so much. The developer puts the software on an ASP. The ASP charges users a flat monthly fee. The ASP lets people use any revision over the net, but not look at the code or binaries. The ASP tracks what users use and pays the developers of whatever gets used. Once any root-to-leaf has been paid off in the version tree, that version becomes open source, free.
Whaddya think?
Oh jeesh.
I remember a science fiction story in some anthology that placed a futuristic Disneyworld on Pluto. A reborn finance minister was growing up his new body there, he had temporary gills and it was all oceans and desert islands. It got bombed and the fake sky fell. Nothing vaguely comical about the story.
But you're right. Disneyworld. Pluto. World. Mickey's dog. Bah, I didn't get that for YEARS. Ack what an awful pun.
I know nobody asked me, here's my two cents. (BTW, isn't this instant worldwide publication stuff great?)
This is how IP law should work for software.
It turns out that software isn't as nonobvious as it seems. For example, the incredibly nonobvious orbit-integration algorithms I found in 2000 were exactly the same as the ones someone else found in 1990, and those were the same as ones someone else found in the 1973. This is the norm. It's happened to me over and over and over again.
Software patents should not exist. Authors should start with all rights to their code. Software patents claim that authors have no rights to their code if their code reinvents something that a previous author patented. It is extremely common for code to reinvent things that have been coded (and patented) before. Therefore software patents should not exist.
?p?I know he pushes for unpopular things all the time. Sometimes he has to back down, sometimes he doesn't. But all those unpopular things (including drilling for oil in Alaska and the 1.6T tax cut) are things that he actually wants. Reducing CO2 emissions seems like something he wouldn't want, since it conflicts with a vibrant oil industry, which he clearly does want. ?p?Has Bush pushed for anything that was both unpopular and which he didn't want?
Is the expression "Woah, bad acid!!!" specific to Carnegie Mellon students from around 1986? Or did it ever catch on beyond that?
Here's how I remember it. Someone in Pittsburgh was handing out children's stick-on tattoos laced with LSD and some other evil stuff that caused, hum, I think it was comas. After that the phrase "Woah, bad acid!!!" showed up in chalk on sidewalks for awhile. It meant having something bad happen to you after (because of) doing something stupid. For example, it's an appropriate thing to say when your code crashes because you dereferenced a null pointer.
I'm under the impression that the US government keeps track of all nuclear fuel. I know I've seen reports that Iraq has x-kilograms of fuel which they obtained from y and z.
If nuclear power plants became small, it would become much harder to track it all. That might imply that it would become much easier for Joe Terrorist to build an atomic bomb. Is that so?
Really? The administration will take an unpopular stance that they intend to step down from later, to distract from their real goals? Sounds uncharacteristically subtle to me.
I'm working on a distributed index. That is, the index itself is distributed. It's harder to take down the index than the data being indexed. I have a spec. The index nodes are lists in HTML pages.
According to this article, I'd be a contributory but not vicarious infringer. I might be exempt because it's a generic data structure, not specially suited to any type of data over any other. In fact it's better at static data than quickly-disappearing contraband.
My main question: are there other distributed index projects going on? If there are, I've reinvented the wheel enough times already, thank you.
What's the RGB hex for Internet gray?