...at least until the new "whoever files first" rules go into effect.
I do not think that is the case. I believe that under both "files first" and "invents first" prior art can cause the patent application to fail. I think the individual hurt by the move to "files first" is the inventor trying to work in secret, trying to postpone filing for the patent in order to maximize the number of years on the market during patent protection and minimize the number of years under development during patent protection.
the community response to beginner questions is "go read the man pages"
Why is this a bad thing?
A couple of sentences later I wrote: "There's nothing wrong with these perspectives, unless you are a beginner just trying out Linux rather than someone who has decided to dedicate themselves to Linux and is willing to invest the extra time."
The problem is that a beginner who is just trying Linux out, who is merely curious, can get turned off quite easily. If he/she had received a more direct and friendly answer and was referred to the man pages secondarily, perhaps "BTW you can find the preceding and a lot more in the man pages", they might have retained interest a little longer.
More importantly man pages seem to be more oriented towards someone who might have a guess or partial knowledge, for example they remember they need to use chmod but they don't recall the parameters. If they don't know what the tool is to change file permissions man is not that helpful. I'm seeing "man "file permissions"" returning "No manual entry for file permissions".
Just go with Ubuntu. Its designed to be friendlier for beginners and there is pretty good documentation on typical end user wants and needs. Some other distros can have more of a by-nerds-for-nerds orientation and the community response to beginner questions is "go read the man pages", or the distros can be more puritanical in nature, no binary drivers etc. There's nothing wrong with these perspectives, unless you are a beginner just trying out Linux rather than someone who has decided to dedicate themselves to Linux and is willing to invest the extra time. Fedora may not be bad for beginners either.
Growing your own food, however, is astonishingly easy. You plant it, make sure it's watered, make sure it's weeded, and it produces nearly all of the time. You don't have to do anything else. It's not rocket science.
Please share your secrets with the farmers. They seem to think it takes a lot more work and is far less predictable.;-)
But the point is that there's nothing in the iPod/iPhone/iPad/etc that uses "future technology". Most of it is off the shelf components (except where patent means they own the rights, but there's usually an off the shelf equivalent).
I think you may be reading too much into "future technology", maybe "new process" would be more accurate. A new process is used to manufacture a newer higher density memory chip. Initially production is limited. If Apple has a lock on the initial production runs they can have a competitive advantage for a little while. Similar story for a new process that yields a higher density screen.
All the major technology companies either outsource (Apple, HP) or own manufacturing facilities in China and other third world countries.
It is not that simple. Sometimes the components, more so for hi tech, are manufactured in the more developed nations and sent to China as components to be assembled. That said, China wants more manufacturing to be done internally and is working towards that end.
... his point (I think what his point is, anyway) is correct, imo and right in line with what I frequently whine about. I can really only speak for the CS/programming and networking/IT stuff, but in those cases, what employers really need and what the four year colleges and universities provide and employers think they need is different...
I think we are all in agreement on that. However the core problem is his HR department, not the universities. If he needs website developers, server administrators and cobol developers then computer science is the ***wrong*** field to be recruiting from. He does not care about algorithms but I do. In various projects I've worked on (desktop productivity apps and games for example) algorithms have sometimes been where things have gone seriously wrong. Consider a modern AAA game, say a MMORG, the folks coding the game require the knowledge(*) of a traditional computer science program, both the practical and the math/theory in topics such a algorithms, networking, databases, etc. They folks doing the website require a very different skill set. The folks building and maintaining the server infrastructure yet another very different skill set. The folks creating the 3D models and arts still another skill set. Each group needs to be recruited from different areas. If a HR department is ignorant enough to think that computer science covers everything related to computers or using computers then the company is screwed, and it is not the university's fault.
(*) On rare occasions a person can be self taught. That said most who believe they are such individuals are mistaken, people often cherry pick the topics that seem of interest or of use and end up with holes in their knowledge and miss connections. Sometimes solutions come from unexpected and unrelated areas.
Four year schools provide a "well rounded" individual who was forced to take a bunch of filler classes that have little to no impact on their ability to write code.
Being able to only code is limiting, possibly even counterproductive. I've coded chemistry applications where I had to communicate effectively with world class research chemists to determine their needs and wants, to make sure our development was heading in the direction they needed. My two quarters of freshman chemistry turned out to be of value with respect to the modeling and visualization aspects. Some advanced math classes turned out to be of value with respect to optimizing the geometry of a molecule (minimizing energy state). And of course the previously maligned math and theory of algorithms turned out to be quite important as well.
And honestly, my personal experience suggests that 90% of the people who come out of either two or four year programs able to design an application or write code that works and isn't completely retarded or configure servers or plan a network were going to be able to based on self study and possibly some mentoring from a more senior developer or admin where they work.
To be honest self study is a given in this field. Especially with respect to things that are transient, that will change or be replaced over time. I find that asking about self study and personal projects is key to the hiring process. A person who has done nothing coding-wise for their own amusement or curiosity is a red flag, possibly a person who got into computers science because someone said it was a good career path, not because the student had an inherent interest in the topic. Perhaps I'm biased but I think the inherent interest is important.
We have that, see trade schools, even community colleges to a degree.
What a crock of shit. Dropping psychology/history/bs requirements does not a tradeschool make. And community colleges, for an AS degree, largely follow the requirements of the first 2 years of most 4 years schools.
I can't speak for your state but in California community colleges do not merely offer 2 year degrees. They also offer many vocationally oriented tracks. While the 2 year degree and transfer to a 4 year tracks include general ed, the vocational tracks do not. For example my local community college offers:
Aviation Maintenance
Emergency Medical
and other non-computer vocational tracks, and on the computer side:
Digital Media Arts and Design
Computer and Technology
Computer Information Systems
Computer Science
Perhaps the web development and server administration needs of the GP would be better served in one of the other three non Computer Science tacks.
We need the OPTION of "pure technology" programs with no filler and no other goals than giving the student customer as much information and training in the field of their choice.
We have that, see trade schools, even community colleges to a degree. Expand these areas, but do not lower the bar on the university system. The point of the university is to produce a more well rounded person who also has those technical skills(*). Believe it or not, some geeks will need to be able to effectively communicate with people in business, the humanities, medicine, science, etc in order to fulfill the computer needs of these groups. They might even need to lead a group of people with diverse backgrounds representing those various fields.
(*) Whether universities are accomplishing this goal is a different conversation.
Last I checked, in the US at least, one could have a copyright in ones pen name, so I'm not really sure why there would be something special about using a CC license.
For reference:
"An author of a copyrighted work can use a pseudonym or pen name. A work is pseudonymous if the author is identified on copies or phonorecords of the work by a fictitious name. Nicknames and other diminutive forms of legal names are not considered fictitious. Copyright does not protect pseudonyms or other names.... But be aware that if a copyright is held under a fictitious name, business dealings involving the copyrighted property may raise questions about its ownership. Consult an attorney for legal advice on this matter." http://www.copyright.gov/fls/fl101.html
Does anyone actually believe the reviews they read on Amazon, anyways? It's pretty easy to tell when someone's fronting a product.
I've noticed that there are a lot of fake negative reviews too. If the book touches on a political or social issue then the opponents of the book's perspective seem to organize a negative review campaign. I've seen books with equal numbers of positive and negative reviews overall, but if you only look at reviewers who are also identified as purchasers of the book then the reviews massively shift to the positive, sometimes 5:1 or 10:1 in favor. The content of the more negative reviews also suggest that they have not read the book, reciting talking points that are in direct contradiction to what the author actually wrote.
File immediately when you haven't raised money yet?
Perhaps you can raise FFF money before filing but are you really proposing that someone make the detailed disclosures Angels and VCs require before filing, before one has any protection? My understanding is that Angles and VCs won't provide much funding, if any, until there is some sort of IP protection, like a patent, in place.
File immediately when you don't know if you have a viable business model yet?
Yes. The first step in the business plan is to protect the IP that everything that follows will be dependent upon.
File immediately when you, as a starting entrepreneur not versed in patent law, don't know the risks of disclosure?
That is what attorneys are for. If someone is starting a business dependent upon IP, that needs outside funding, and they are doing so without consulting an attorney the venture is already at great risk, likely doomed.
However, there are some things in there that they're proposing which will absolutely not help small businesses: switching from "first to invent" to "first to file", for one. Again, the deep pockets and legal departments of large corporations make getting "first to file" much easier for them. They're also getting rid of the one-year grace period after disclosure which, yeah, while it brings us into sync with the rest of the world, but was always a huge boon to small inventors (it really ought to be *longer*). The grace period gives you time to shop your idea around, determine whether there's a good business opportunity, raise investment, etc, and *then* file.
I'm sympathetic to small and local business but I'm having a hard time seeing this change as disastrous. It seems that there is only a problem with the second to invent being the first to file if the actual first to invent is trying to continue working in secret. Postponing filing and working in secret seems to be a ***gamble*** to maximize the time a product on the market has under patent protection. Turning an invention into a marketable product, acquiring investors/funding, etc can take some time but the life of a patent is 20 years. If the proposed change encourages inventors to file immediately and they only get 15 years of protection rather than 18 or so years is that really disastrous?
Prior art is relevant to "first to file" as well as "first to invent". You cannot invent something which already exists, so prior art is an absolute obstacle in either case.
It will be harder to prove you had something, and it doesn't matter, under the new rules, if it's not patented and you get there first, you own the patent.
I don't think you are fully understanding the GP's argument. There are three things:
1. First to market. (prior art)
2. First to invent.
3. First to file.
It seems the GP is arguing that if one person goes to market first then some other person's patent application fails due to prior art. You seem to be focused on the inventor working in secret who is first to invent but not to file, which is only one of various scenarios. Secondly, in this working in secret scenario the inventor ***gambled*** and put off filing despite having an invention, apparently trying to maximize the duration of time in the market under patent protection, not wanting burn some of the patent protection time turning the invention into a marketable product. If the original inventor had not taken this ***gamble*** he/she would not have created the window for the second to invent to file.
If seems that this legislation is far more likely to incentivize the first to invent to file immediately rather than to continue to work in secret. The danger of a second to invent filing seem unlikely unless the first takes the gamble mentioned previously.
Who actually chants "USA! USA! USA!" in America? Is that a southern thing,...
Apparently you missed the coverage of Times Square the day Bin Laden was killed. There was no shortage of New York City residents chanting for the TV cameras.
The laser will become the ultimate defence weapon. Imagine have LASER mounted along your border. They will shoot down anything, instantly. Image roof top boxes in cities that can shoot stff down a mile away. Bombing Baghdad would have been impossible,.
Imagine an enemy with a better laser than can knock out the defensive lasers from beyond their effective range. Imagine an enemy with a technology that can interfere with the defensive lasers target acquisition and aiming. Imagine an enemy with a delivery system (drone ?) that can use nap of the earth flight to avoid being targeted. Imagine more bombs/decoys coming into range than the defensive laser can track, target, fire on and repeat quickly enough.
Interesting times.
Actually more of the same most likely, same human decisions and actions, just different tools.
HTML5 was nowhere to be seen when Silverlight came out. It was needed back then, if only as a competitor for Flash.
To rephrase in the dog food analogy: Silverlight was the MS dog food brand in the Flash era. In the HTML5 era HTML5 is the MS dog food brand. They merely introduced a new brand. Has the Silverlight brand been discontinued, no longer offered or supported?
Given an ISP with a proportionally small number of customers relative to their bandwidth they can manage that, however when the customer base gets proportionally too large that is no longer feasible.
Bullshit. Any large ISP can organize their network as if it was many small ISP's, but in fact do so more efficiently. You clearly have no fucking idea what you are talking about.
Actually you are just not getting it. With a fixed amount of bandwidth it does not matter if it operates as one large unit or several small units once there are "too many" customers. The ratio of bandwidth to customers is not changing, just the infrastructure and overhead. You are assuming they just get more bandwidth. It seems they really just meter the usage.
Apple as a company cares a lot more about their brand image than most. If suddenly Apple had 90% of it's customers who uploaded pirated music being sued because of a service Apple provided - it would be bad. I'd assume that yearly fee you pay goes to the RIAA, because Apple being a hardware company cares little about software when it is driving their hardware sales.
Or maybe only ripped and paid content is allowed? When I watched the keynote I got the impression that ripped content was emphasized. The quote below also may suggest that content must be ripped or purchased somewhere. Stuff downloaded off the internet *may* not be part of Apple's plan.
"iTunes Match
If you want all the benefits of iTunes in the Cloud for music you haven’t purchased from iTunes, iTunes Match is the perfect solution. It lets you store your entire collection, including music you’ve ripped from CDs or purchased somewhere other than iTunes. For just $24.99 a year." http://www.apple.com/icloud/features/
Apple could do something simple like reject MP3s with no appropriate meta data or dupes. If an MP3 was shared maybe only the first to upload will get to use it. Without dupes the RIAA may be thwarted, meta data only shows where the ripping occurred. It does not indicate who owned the CD and who took the MP3 home.
You know, why the hell don't regular employment contracts for regular employees have "golden parachutes"? It doesn't make a hell of a lot of sense for executives to have them.
The problem is that when a company is in trouble they will have a hard time getting a highly skilled executive team to take it over and to try to turn it around. The "golden parachute" was ***supposed*** to get people to take such a career risk. I'm not disagreeing that the concept is overused and inappropriately used, I'm just pointing out that there is some good logic and appropriate scenarios behind the concept.
Being "vested" is something for the peons and middle-level managers (and sometimes for C-level types, when it helps dodge taxes). Top execs in situations like this get the options free and clear. Of course, they don't get the Class A options, but what they do get is already vested.
As the other poster noted, this is not necessarily true. In business school students in entrepreneurship type classes are warned of this sort of thing and advised to hire their own M&A attorneys to review their terms and contracts. This sort of thing is not unheard of. Any shares they already have will probably be diluted to a very small fraction as the structure is engineered.
Slashdot Mirror
I do not think that is the case. I believe that under both "files first" and "invents first" prior art can cause the patent application to fail. I think the individual hurt by the move to "files first" is the inventor trying to work in secret, trying to postpone filing for the patent in order to maximize the number of years on the market during patent protection and minimize the number of years under development during patent protection.
the community response to beginner questions is "go read the man pages"
Why is this a bad thing?
A couple of sentences later I wrote: "There's nothing wrong with these perspectives, unless you are a beginner just trying out Linux rather than someone who has decided to dedicate themselves to Linux and is willing to invest the extra time."
The problem is that a beginner who is just trying Linux out, who is merely curious, can get turned off quite easily. If he/she had received a more direct and friendly answer and was referred to the man pages secondarily, perhaps "BTW you can find the preceding and a lot more in the man pages", they might have retained interest a little longer.
More importantly man pages seem to be more oriented towards someone who might have a guess or partial knowledge, for example they remember they need to use chmod but they don't recall the parameters. If they don't know what the tool is to change file permissions man is not that helpful. I'm seeing "man "file permissions"" returning "No manual entry for file permissions".
Just go with Ubuntu. Its designed to be friendlier for beginners and there is pretty good documentation on typical end user wants and needs. Some other distros can have more of a by-nerds-for-nerds orientation and the community response to beginner questions is "go read the man pages", or the distros can be more puritanical in nature, no binary drivers etc. There's nothing wrong with these perspectives, unless you are a beginner just trying out Linux rather than someone who has decided to dedicate themselves to Linux and is willing to invest the extra time. Fedora may not be bad for beginners either.
... :-)
Now let the flaming begin
Growing your own food, however, is astonishingly easy. You plant it, make sure it's watered, make sure it's weeded, and it produces nearly all of the time. You don't have to do anything else. It's not rocket science.
Please share your secrets with the farmers. They seem to think it takes a lot more work and is far less predictable. ;-)
But the point is that there's nothing in the iPod/iPhone/iPad/etc that uses "future technology". Most of it is off the shelf components (except where patent means they own the rights, but there's usually an off the shelf equivalent).
I think you may be reading too much into "future technology", maybe "new process" would be more accurate. A new process is used to manufacture a newer higher density memory chip. Initially production is limited. If Apple has a lock on the initial production runs they can have a competitive advantage for a little while. Similar story for a new process that yields a higher density screen.
All the major technology companies either outsource (Apple, HP) or own manufacturing facilities in China and other third world countries.
It is not that simple. Sometimes the components, more so for hi tech, are manufactured in the more developed nations and sent to China as components to be assembled. That said, China wants more manufacturing to be done internally and is working towards that end.
... his point (I think what his point is, anyway) is correct, imo and right in line with what I frequently whine about. I can really only speak for the CS/programming and networking/IT stuff, but in those cases, what employers really need and what the four year colleges and universities provide and employers think they need is different ...
I think we are all in agreement on that. However the core problem is his HR department, not the universities. If he needs website developers, server administrators and cobol developers then computer science is the ***wrong*** field to be recruiting from. He does not care about algorithms but I do. In various projects I've worked on (desktop productivity apps and games for example) algorithms have sometimes been where things have gone seriously wrong. Consider a modern AAA game, say a MMORG, the folks coding the game require the knowledge(*) of a traditional computer science program, both the practical and the math/theory in topics such a algorithms, networking, databases, etc. They folks doing the website require a very different skill set. The folks building and maintaining the server infrastructure yet another very different skill set. The folks creating the 3D models and arts still another skill set. Each group needs to be recruited from different areas. If a HR department is ignorant enough to think that computer science covers everything related to computers or using computers then the company is screwed, and it is not the university's fault.
(*) On rare occasions a person can be self taught. That said most who believe they are such individuals are mistaken, people often cherry pick the topics that seem of interest or of use and end up with holes in their knowledge and miss connections. Sometimes solutions come from unexpected and unrelated areas.
Four year schools provide a "well rounded" individual who was forced to take a bunch of filler classes that have little to no impact on their ability to write code.
Being able to only code is limiting, possibly even counterproductive. I've coded chemistry applications where I had to communicate effectively with world class research chemists to determine their needs and wants, to make sure our development was heading in the direction they needed. My two quarters of freshman chemistry turned out to be of value with respect to the modeling and visualization aspects. Some advanced math classes turned out to be of value with respect to optimizing the geometry of a molecule (minimizing energy state). And of course the previously maligned math and theory of algorithms turned out to be quite important as well.
And honestly, my personal experience suggests that 90% of the people who come out of either two or four year programs able to design an application or write code that works and isn't completely retarded or configure servers or plan a network were going to be able to based on self study and possibly some mentoring from a more senior developer or admin where they work.
To be honest self study is a given in this field. Especially with respect to things that are transient, that will change or be replaced over time. I find that asking about self study and personal projects is key to the hiring process. A person who has done nothing coding-wise for their own amusement or curiosity is a red flag, possibly a person who got into computers science because someone said it was a good career path, not because the student had an inherent interest in the topic. Perhaps I'm biased but I think the inherent interest is important.
What a crock of shit. Dropping psychology/history/bs requirements does not a tradeschool make. And community colleges, for an AS degree, largely follow the requirements of the first 2 years of most 4 years schools.
I can't speak for your state but in California community colleges do not merely offer 2 year degrees. They also offer many vocationally oriented tracks. While the 2 year degree and transfer to a 4 year tracks include general ed, the vocational tracks do not. For example my local community college offers:
Aviation Maintenance
Emergency Medical
and other non-computer vocational tracks, and on the computer side:
Digital Media Arts and Design
Computer and Technology
Computer Information Systems
Computer Science
Perhaps the web development and server administration needs of the GP would be better served in one of the other three non Computer Science tacks.
Espionage is a capital crime, but one that very rarely involves an actual death sentence.
Not due to any sense of leniency, its due to the practical ability to trade their captured spies for our captured spies.
We need the OPTION of "pure technology" programs with no filler and no other goals than giving the student customer as much information and training in the field of their choice.
We have that, see trade schools, even community colleges to a degree. Expand these areas, but do not lower the bar on the university system. The point of the university is to produce a more well rounded person who also has those technical skills(*). Believe it or not, some geeks will need to be able to effectively communicate with people in business, the humanities, medicine, science, etc in order to fulfill the computer needs of these groups. They might even need to lead a group of people with diverse backgrounds representing those various fields.
(*) Whether universities are accomplishing this goal is a different conversation.
Last I checked, in the US at least, one could have a copyright in ones pen name, so I'm not really sure why there would be something special about using a CC license.
For reference:
... But be aware that if a copyright is held under a fictitious name, business dealings involving the copyrighted property may raise questions about its ownership. Consult an attorney for legal advice on this matter."
"An author of a copyrighted work can use a pseudonym or pen name. A work is pseudonymous if the author is identified on copies or phonorecords of the work by a fictitious name. Nicknames and other diminutive forms of legal names are not considered fictitious. Copyright does not protect pseudonyms or other names.
http://www.copyright.gov/fls/fl101.html
Does anyone actually believe the reviews they read on Amazon, anyways? It's pretty easy to tell when someone's fronting a product.
I've noticed that there are a lot of fake negative reviews too. If the book touches on a political or social issue then the opponents of the book's perspective seem to organize a negative review campaign. I've seen books with equal numbers of positive and negative reviews overall, but if you only look at reviewers who are also identified as purchasers of the book then the reviews massively shift to the positive, sometimes 5:1 or 10:1 in favor. The content of the more negative reviews also suggest that they have not read the book, reciting talking points that are in direct contradiction to what the author actually wrote.
File immediately when you haven't raised money yet?
Perhaps you can raise FFF money before filing but are you really proposing that someone make the detailed disclosures Angels and VCs require before filing, before one has any protection? My understanding is that Angles and VCs won't provide much funding, if any, until there is some sort of IP protection, like a patent, in place.
File immediately when you don't know if you have a viable business model yet?
Yes. The first step in the business plan is to protect the IP that everything that follows will be dependent upon.
File immediately when you, as a starting entrepreneur not versed in patent law, don't know the risks of disclosure?
That is what attorneys are for. If someone is starting a business dependent upon IP, that needs outside funding, and they are doing so without consulting an attorney the venture is already at great risk, likely doomed.
However, there are some things in there that they're proposing which will absolutely not help small businesses: switching from "first to invent" to "first to file", for one. Again, the deep pockets and legal departments of large corporations make getting "first to file" much easier for them. They're also getting rid of the one-year grace period after disclosure which, yeah, while it brings us into sync with the rest of the world, but was always a huge boon to small inventors (it really ought to be *longer*). The grace period gives you time to shop your idea around, determine whether there's a good business opportunity, raise investment, etc, and *then* file.
I'm sympathetic to small and local business but I'm having a hard time seeing this change as disastrous. It seems that there is only a problem with the second to invent being the first to file if the actual first to invent is trying to continue working in secret. Postponing filing and working in secret seems to be a ***gamble*** to maximize the time a product on the market has under patent protection. Turning an invention into a marketable product, acquiring investors/funding, etc can take some time but the life of a patent is 20 years. If the proposed change encourages inventors to file immediately and they only get 15 years of protection rather than 18 or so years is that really disastrous?
Prior art is relevant to "first to file" as well as "first to invent". You cannot invent something which already exists, so prior art is an absolute obstacle in either case.
It will be harder to prove you had something, and it doesn't matter, under the new rules, if it's not patented and you get there first, you own the patent.
I don't think you are fully understanding the GP's argument. There are three things:
1. First to market. (prior art)
2. First to invent.
3. First to file.
It seems the GP is arguing that if one person goes to market first then some other person's patent application fails due to prior art. You seem to be focused on the inventor working in secret who is first to invent but not to file, which is only one of various scenarios. Secondly, in this working in secret scenario the inventor ***gambled*** and put off filing despite having an invention, apparently trying to maximize the duration of time in the market under patent protection, not wanting burn some of the patent protection time turning the invention into a marketable product. If the original inventor had not taken this ***gamble*** he/she would not have created the window for the second to invent to file.
If seems that this legislation is far more likely to incentivize the first to invent to file immediately rather than to continue to work in secret. The danger of a second to invent filing seem unlikely unless the first takes the gamble mentioned previously.
Yes, that's certainly a productive use of someone's day. Taking all your CDs that have been ripped... and doing it again!
Will iTunes even bother ripping anymore? If *online* it may simply download the files from the store as it would do if synching.
Who actually chants "USA! USA! USA!" in America? Is that a southern thing, ...
Apparently you missed the coverage of Times Square the day Bin Laden was killed. There was no shortage of New York City residents chanting for the TV cameras.
Because an MP3 that is ripped looks a lot different from one that is Torrented.
When you rip with iTunes I believe there is info on the hard drive indicating that the file was ripped locally. Apple may require this.
The laser will become the ultimate defence weapon. Imagine have LASER mounted along your border. They will shoot down anything, instantly. Image roof top boxes in cities that can shoot stff down a mile away. Bombing Baghdad would have been impossible,.
Imagine an enemy with a better laser than can knock out the defensive lasers from beyond their effective range. Imagine an enemy with a technology that can interfere with the defensive lasers target acquisition and aiming. Imagine an enemy with a delivery system (drone ?) that can use nap of the earth flight to avoid being targeted. Imagine more bombs/decoys coming into range than the defensive laser can track, target, fire on and repeat quickly enough.
Interesting times.
Actually more of the same most likely, same human decisions and actions, just different tools.
HTML5 was nowhere to be seen when Silverlight came out. It was needed back then, if only as a competitor for Flash.
To rephrase in the dog food analogy: Silverlight was the MS dog food brand in the Flash era. In the HTML5 era HTML5 is the MS dog food brand. They merely introduced a new brand. Has the Silverlight brand been discontinued, no longer offered or supported?
Given an ISP with a proportionally small number of customers relative to their bandwidth they can manage that, however when the customer base gets proportionally too large that is no longer feasible.
Bullshit. Any large ISP can organize their network as if it was many small ISP's, but in fact do so more efficiently. You clearly have no fucking idea what you are talking about.
Actually you are just not getting it. With a fixed amount of bandwidth it does not matter if it operates as one large unit or several small units once there are "too many" customers. The ratio of bandwidth to customers is not changing, just the infrastructure and overhead. You are assuming they just get more bandwidth. It seems they really just meter the usage.
To avoid redundant comment threads:
http://apple.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=2257244&cid=36520494
Apple as a company cares a lot more about their brand image than most. If suddenly Apple had 90% of it's customers who uploaded pirated music being sued because of a service Apple provided - it would be bad. I'd assume that yearly fee you pay goes to the RIAA, because Apple being a hardware company cares little about software when it is driving their hardware sales.
Or maybe only ripped and paid content is allowed? When I watched the keynote I got the impression that ripped content was emphasized. The quote below also may suggest that content must be ripped or purchased somewhere. Stuff downloaded off the internet *may* not be part of Apple's plan.
"iTunes Match
If you want all the benefits of iTunes in the Cloud for music you haven’t purchased from iTunes, iTunes Match is the perfect solution. It lets you store your entire collection, including music you’ve ripped from CDs or purchased somewhere other than iTunes. For just $24.99 a year."
http://www.apple.com/icloud/features/
Apple could do something simple like reject MP3s with no appropriate meta data or dupes. If an MP3 was shared maybe only the first to upload will get to use it. Without dupes the RIAA may be thwarted, meta data only shows where the ripping occurred. It does not indicate who owned the CD and who took the MP3 home.
You know, why the hell don't regular employment contracts for regular employees have "golden parachutes"? It doesn't make a hell of a lot of sense for executives to have them.
The problem is that when a company is in trouble they will have a hard time getting a highly skilled executive team to take it over and to try to turn it around. The "golden parachute" was ***supposed*** to get people to take such a career risk. I'm not disagreeing that the concept is overused and inappropriately used, I'm just pointing out that there is some good logic and appropriate scenarios behind the concept.
Being "vested" is something for the peons and middle-level managers (and sometimes for C-level types, when it helps dodge taxes). Top execs in situations like this get the options free and clear. Of course, they don't get the Class A options, but what they do get is already vested.
As the other poster noted, this is not necessarily true. In business school students in entrepreneurship type classes are warned of this sort of thing and advised to hire their own M&A attorneys to review their terms and contracts. This sort of thing is not unheard of. Any shares they already have will probably be diluted to a very small fraction as the structure is engineered.