No, it's not. I'm actually using it now to type this response and it is garbage. It's slow (very very slow), it does a lousy job of displaying HTML (well, what do you want from a browser for Christ's sake?) and it took hours to download.
The beta3 of Opera I have on this machine beats Netscape6 on every count and they don't have the nerve to claim it's a release yet!
Which nation is the NCBA refering to in its name? I think I can guess.
One of the big problems with the gTLDs we have is that they were based on the assumption that they were for the U.S. but in reality their namespaces are used globally, which increases clashes.
This is a good illustration why closing down the gTLDs to new registrations would be a better solution than adding more. ICANN are just repeating the mistakes of the original DNS designers without the defence of being pioneers.
...can you get into one article? Intelligent computer, 350000 units sold in first year, unpaid debt that's "easily" repayable, program spelt programme, MI5, super-encryption, HAL sounds too much like Hell, give me a break.
The SSE instructions in the P4 have been making reviewers' lives difficult, it's a bit like the MMX stuff: do you review old code without SSE or do you review new code with it?
The interesting thing is that if you select compatibility then you actually seem to get less speed with the P4 compared to the P3 and Athlon.
I don't think it's too cynical to suggest that this is intentional on Intel's part in order to push take-up of the new instructions. They don't want SSE to take as long to penetrate the market as MMX.
Well, its as ugly as Frankenstien's monster for a start. I literally can't use it because it makes me ill looking at it. Plus, of course, as a desktop it just stinks from a utility point of view. KDE is much better looking but really slow and bloated.
I just use WindowMaker; it works for me and runs fine on all my machines from the P100 to the Celery 500.
A lot of people are saying things like "just use lynx in black and white". Gopher was not about basic presentation, although due to its age that's just what it had, it was about organisation of information. Using Gopher was like using a library, with the information index externally (i.e., not as part of the information) while the web is much more like using a single huge encyclopaedia with lots of cross-indexing.
The gopher systems I remember were much better at finding quality information than the web when you knew what you were looking for, but the web is much better at finding some information on a topic when you're not sure what exactly you need. And porn, of course.
I can't see why there isn't room for both, or why a Gopher client couldn't display an HTML document with it's formatting intact, as a user option. After all, once the Gopher has found a document it's up to the user agent to display that doc in a suitable format.
Since this is usually imponce this is usually impossible to protect with copyright,
No, it is always protected by copyright; without copyright the GPL has no meaning.
What you are saying is "We use other people's work for free but we then have to do likewise. Pity us". Well, no. If you don't like the GPL then don't use GPL code, make your own and you can keep the "IP" to yourself and good luck to you.
The implication of your whine is that you can't use your "IP" well enough to see off other people who use it, even though you understand it better (since you wrote it) and had it before anyone else. Moreover, anyone that does use your "IP" will have to release their code, which you can then use. What is your problem?
That's your loss:- free and crap is still crap and there's no way Moz is going to stop being crap this side of 2002.
Of course people are buying computers to web surf and chat endlessly on
irc, among countless other reasons.
I assume by "people" you mean "people like me". Walk into any office in the world and look at the number of people using irc. Since there are more computers being used in offices than in homes that pretty well knackers your argument.
That intensely stupid statement needs no rebutal.
So you're saying that the web (not the net) is such a useful part of your life that you would find it hard to live without? What the hell do you use it for that's so fantastic? I'd love to know what I'm missing; after using it for about four years I find that I'm visiting about five sites on a regular basis, although one of those is Google and I use that to try to find out specific things like why pppd sometimes refuses to hang up. "Surfing" the web is just a way to get real bored real quick.
computer use and administration is moving from delivering packaged software that has to be
installed and deployed to delivering it as a web-based service
Microsoft and the other dinosaurs are moving that way, sure. But they're doing it because they see it as the only way to fight off the threat of the net. They need a way to stop their software becoming free (in both senses) and are trying to move to this model as a form of lock-in. I don't need it, you don't need it, and Linux sure as hell doen't need it.
I don't actually have anything against dinosaurs, I just used that as an analogy.
It is hard to know where to start. The idea that there is no problem with DNS is fairly mad; I assume you haven't been paying attention for the last three years.
The problem of.com,.org etc is nothing to do with the globalness or otherwise of the owners, it is to do with creating enough namespace for smithsbooks.co.uk and smithsbooks.co.us to exist without smithsbooks.com automatically capturing 90% of all people trying to get the website of their local bookshop. It is this that forces companies outside the US to buy [mywebsite.co.ccTLD] and also [mywebsite.co.COM] (and now they also need to buy [mywebsite.BIZ)], which further pollutes the namespace.
I note that telephone numbers style URLS would work without lawyers getting involved or Nike leaning on people running Greek mythology websites, or McDonalds being given ownership of the name McDonald on a global basis and tough shit if you're Scottish.
As.com gets more and more
saturated,.com itself will naturally split into subdomains, run by whoever owns the domain, and competing amongst themselves
by price and services (It's already happening, really).
Where is it happening already? Why would it work if it did? Do you think the public generally know what to do if they type [siteIwant].com into their browser and get [siteIdontwant].com? Are you suggesting that they'll automatically try [siteIwant].someISP.org and then [siteIwant].someotherISP.org etc. until they get the right one? Is that what you call a working DNS?
Opera is on Beta-2 at the moment, that will fill that gap nicely.
the reason a vast majority of people use computers in the
first place - IT'S BECAUSE OF THE INTERNET!
No, the Internet is a small minority reason people use computers. The vast majority use them to do work, and the majority of them are using Word, Excel, and Powerpoint.
It is true that email is very important for the transport of the documents they produce, but I don't think that's what you meant by using the internet.
No doubt most Linux users will agree it only makes sence to find practical and
revolutionary ways to merge Linux with the web.
I doubt it. The web is cute and all that but if it disapeared overnight I wouldn't miss it. If the net disapeared I would miss it - email is very useful.
I use my computer for work which is imporant to me, none of which I need the web for.
Outside of website-based companies the web has nothing important to offer. I'm counting fun as "not important" here.
if the companies that proposed.xxx and.movie had a sound
business plan and the technical and administrative skills that ICANN felt that would be
needed by a gTLD registry, then they might have been accepted.
It is hard to think of a bunch of web-companies with better business plans than the porn sites; the more popular ones also have the best technical skills and admin systems on the web; they have to to cope with the traffic. So: why no.xxx?
That's why people have palm pilots and address books - to associate
NUMBERS with NAMES.
Use bookmarks (or your Palm pilot!); I don't remember any more URLs than I do phone numbers.
result in numerous "real names" like services - proprietary name-to-number mapping
sites that would be much worse than the current DNS system, which at least is global.
Why worse? The underlying number system would still be global. I have three telephone directories here, one county, one local business and one local general. It works fine and I don't have to use it if I don't want to. If I need non-local numbers I can get them from BT. On the web search engines can provide these services. What's the big deal? The fact that DNS is is global is it's biggest problem. The entire world's namespace needs more than one or two layers of hierarchy and the current DNS isn't giving it that, and never will. Global and useless DNS is still useless.
I'm not saying this is because it was badly designed but it has been badly administered and is beyond repair. It could have worked, it should have worked, but assholes have been in control and fucked it up. Commercial interests will always do this to a system where the URLs are recognisable names (ie trademarks) and where the assignment of the names is not based on geography (whatever happened to.us?). Closing down the TLDs and leaving only the ccTLDs would help a lot, but it's never going to happen, certainly while people like ICANN are in charge.
If you think text names for hosts is a system which will work fine for the next ten years then you're mad. It can't and won't; the trouble that we're having now with the namespace is just going to get worse.
Looking further ahead, imagine a world with 3 billion sites, what are you going to do to DNS to make it work?
Make a counter suggestion, or do you really think that the current system is fine?
people advertise using names of the form 1-800-FOOBAR-7.)
Actually, this never happens in the UK. I don't know why it never caught on but there it is.
And so we rather than try to resolve the dispute, we decide they're not to be trusted with
it, and lose all this?
It's not a matter of trust. You assume that disputes can be resolved. I say they can't. If there are two companies called "Toni's Pizzas" then one of them must backdown. Plus the reality is that lawyers have a vested interest in making suits on domain names and it is wishful thinking to say that this will ever stop or ever be fair. The richest litigant will always have too much power no matter what the rights and wrongs of the case.
In a world with 6 Billion people using the net, names simply don't and can't work. The fact that ICANN is trying crap solutions does not mean that a good solution exists.
...remember apparently random strings of digits.
They wouldn't be that random, if major companies and ISP's make up the first layer of the hierarchy then many numbers will start off the same, much as many phone number prefixes come up over and over again, which makes them into "memory blobs" which are easier to remember.
...but it appears to be throwing the baby out with the bathwater.
I am worried that the baby is in the process of drowning.
Such a move would be
restricting easy access to the net to those of us who are trained
Does having to use a phone book restrict access to the telephone? Web search engines could be complemented by an online phone directory-type system.
How important is the naming system in finding sites at the moment? What percentage of sites are found through their content (ie using search engines) rather than typing in the url? I don't know but the information would be useful for this argument.
IME many (not most) people find sites by typing the name of the site into a search engine (e.g. the type "www.fish4homes.com" into altavista). Sad, but true.
Another solution would be to close down the TLDs (.com,.org etc) and enforce a multi-layered geographical system right down to town level (www.smithsbooks.bangor.ni.uk or www.smithsbooks.islington.london.uk) but: a) no one will run such a system as the amount of checking to enforce it is too much when net useage is growing as it is now, b) it actually leads to names which are probably harder than numbers to remember, and c) still leaves the question of individuals' sites in the same town open to question.
When you think about this, ask yourself "how is the current system going to work when everyone in the 1st world has their own individual webpage which is permanently connected to the net?". This day will come, web connections will come with your 'phone one day and each connection will need a name in the DNS.
No it's not, asshole! IP addresses of hosts within a network change, a naming system needs to stand one layer higher to allow the owner of the network some flexibility. IP addresses have all sorts of problems for use as host names, multiple hosts per IP, multiple IPs per host and so on.
And also because when you just hear about a company 'Underplunder, Inc.' you don't have to suck out of your finger some name, but can just try underplunder.com and you might get your match...
Which is exactly why the current system is breaking down. What if there is another Underplunder Inc? The current system assumes that there is one such name per country plus a handful of "special" ones which get.net,.com or.org. This was fine when the net was small but is just useless under the assumption that everyone has, or can have, their own site. How many names for companies or people are there? There must be duplication in any letter-based system.
The assumption that people can't remember numbers is wrong (well, for most of us, anyway), as shown by telephone numbers, and numbers avoid almost all the problems with the current DNS.
Wake up: DNS is disintegrating as we speak and ICANN is not helping. What do you think is the solution?
The basic problem with DNS is the fact that the host names are in letters, which make up words, which make up names, which make up law suits. Not to mention the simple clashes between genuinely same-named companies and individuals.
I can remember my phone number, even though it is 11 digits long with the UK area code, and my computer can remember numbers much longer than that. This is a hint to the solution. Give hosts numbers rather than names. IP addresses, of course, don't work as they change, so a central register of numbers needs to be set up, which in itself is an issue as power corrupts (see ICANN).
I'm thinking of a system where there is a string of digits separated by dots (eg 1.3412.1823), where the initial number would indicate a continent, then the following groups of numbers would be networks of machines, until the final number (1823 in this example) would be a specific machine in the second last network (3412 in the example).
The original authority would be allowed to assign network numbers in the individual continents for a fairly large one-off lifetime fee. The owners of a network number would then be free to assign numbers within their own space at whatever fee they like, but with the provision that the right to sell subnet numbers gets transferred to anyone they assign a number to. So the owner of 1.3412.1823 could assign 1.3412.1823.1 ,.2,.3 etc to whoever they liked. Such reselling would be required to be on the same on-off lifetime fee basis (although the fee might be different) as the top level authority.
This way the number resolution can still work in much the same way as name resolution does now, with zones of authority and the work of resolving a number to an IP address is shared out as it is now.
With the top level fee being large, the next level would mostly be ISP's who make money back by selling on at a lower fee per number.
The separation between IPs and host "names" is maintained and ALL the crap about who owns trademarks and shit is lost. Think about it: all the disputes are gone, especially if network owners are required to assign in sequential order.
A distributed system for the very top level would be nice to prevent abuse of power, but perhaps the organisation set up to run it could be held in some sort of trust rather than being a private company. IANAL.
I personally think that something needs to be done or there's only about 5 years life left in the web before the whole thing is bogged down in disputes and namespace is saturated.
Bin is not hard coded for the ICANN roots and it is easy to change (very easy) but the difficulty is Windows. Any new DNS system has to face the fact that >80% of computers come with Windows and that the vast bulk of net users today are using Windows. How does a new DNS system get established against that level of pre-installed ICANN-only access?
The second question, even if you just decide to go it alone, is that the current roots will not pass traffic to the new roots, cutting the net in two, because there is now no central authority.
If you are a Dune fanatic, like I am, you've probably already... turned away in disgust at people who try to make a living off the back of dead writers.
Which one? I think Ptah is still locked in a "prior art" suit with Jehovah. And don't even mention the whole Marduk thing (a lot of us think Jehovah only got away with that one 'cause Moses was such a tricky lawyer).
You've always been permitted to patent discoveries.
No, you haven't. It takes a peculiar and spectacular leap of the imagination to allow the patenting of discoveries, otherwise all sorts of thing of finacial use would have been patented. Actually, that's not true; all it really takes is stupidity. Handily enough stupidity is the current official policy of the USPO.
The majority of chemical compounds for which patents have been issued
have been isolated from nature
Actually there are almost no such cases. Chemical patents are normally granted for processes, not for the resultants, or even for a particular set of reactants.
Slashdot Mirror
No, it's not. I'm actually using it now to type this response and it is garbage. It's slow (very very slow), it does a lousy job of displaying HTML (well, what do you want from a browser for Christ's sake?) and it took hours to download.
The beta3 of Opera I have on this machine beats Netscape6 on every count and they don't have the nerve to claim it's a release yet!
TWW
Never. What are you talking about?
Which nation is the NCBA refering to in its name? I think I can guess.
One of the big problems with the gTLDs we have is that they were based on the assumption that they were for the U.S. but in reality their namespaces are used globally, which increases clashes.
This is a good illustration why closing down the gTLDs to new registrations would be a better solution than adding more. ICANN are just repeating the mistakes of the original DNS designers without the defence of being pioneers.
TWW
TWW
Actually, I'm British; we don't spell computer programs "programme". That spelling is used for events or a guide to events.
TWW
TWW
Yes
The interesting thing is that if you select compatibility then you actually seem to get less speed with the P4 compared to the P3 and Athlon.
I don't think it's too cynical to suggest that this is intentional on Intel's part in order to push take-up of the new instructions. They don't want SSE to take as long to penetrate the market as MMX.
TWW
Well, its as ugly as Frankenstien's monster for a start. I literally can't use it because it makes me ill looking at it. Plus, of course, as a desktop it just stinks from a utility point of view. KDE is much better looking but really slow and bloated.
I just use WindowMaker; it works for me and runs fine on all my machines from the P100 to the Celery 500.
TWW
The gopher systems I remember were much better at finding quality information than the web when you knew what you were looking for, but the web is much better at finding some information on a topic when you're not sure what exactly you need. And porn, of course.
I can't see why there isn't room for both, or why a Gopher client couldn't display an HTML document with it's formatting intact, as a user option. After all, once the Gopher has found a document it's up to the user agent to display that doc in a suitable format.
TWW
No, it is always protected by copyright; without copyright the GPL has no meaning.
What you are saying is "We use other people's work for free but we then have to do likewise. Pity us". Well, no. If you don't like the GPL then don't use GPL code, make your own and you can keep the "IP" to yourself and good luck to you.
The implication of your whine is that you can't use your "IP" well enough to see off other people who use it, even though you understand it better (since you wrote it) and had it before anyone else. Moreover, anyone that does use your "IP" will have to release their code, which you can then use. What is your problem?
TWW
You started it (No doubt most Linux users will agree it only makes sence )!
TWW
That's your loss :- free and crap is still crap and there's no way Moz is going to stop being crap this side of 2002.
Of course people are buying computers to web surf and chat endlessly on irc, among countless other reasons.
I assume by "people" you mean "people like me". Walk into any office in the world and look at the number of people using irc. Since there are more computers being used in offices than in homes that pretty well knackers your argument.
That intensely stupid statement needs no rebutal.
So you're saying that the web (not the net) is such a useful part of your life that you would find it hard to live without? What the hell do you use it for that's so fantastic? I'd love to know what I'm missing; after using it for about four years I find that I'm visiting about five sites on a regular basis, although one of those is Google and I use that to try to find out specific things like why pppd sometimes refuses to hang up. "Surfing" the web is just a way to get real bored real quick.
computer use and administration is moving from delivering packaged software that has to be installed and deployed to delivering it as a web-based service
Microsoft and the other dinosaurs are moving that way, sure. But they're doing it because they see it as the only way to fight off the threat of the net. They need a way to stop their software becoming free (in both senses) and are trying to move to this model as a form of lock-in. I don't need it, you don't need it, and Linux sure as hell doen't need it.
I don't actually have anything against dinosaurs, I just used that as an analogy.
TWW
The problem of .com, .org etc is nothing to do with the globalness or otherwise of the owners, it is to do with creating enough namespace for smithsbooks.co.uk and smithsbooks.co.us to exist without smithsbooks.com automatically capturing 90% of all people trying to get the website of their local bookshop. It is this that forces companies outside the US to buy [mywebsite.co.ccTLD] and also [mywebsite.co.COM] (and now they also need to buy [mywebsite.BIZ)], which further pollutes the namespace.
I note that telephone numbers style URLS would work without lawyers getting involved or Nike leaning on people running Greek mythology websites, or McDonalds being given ownership of the name McDonald on a global basis and tough shit if you're Scottish.
As .com gets more and more
saturated, .com itself will naturally split into subdomains, run by whoever owns the domain, and competing amongst themselves
by price and services (It's already happening, really).
Where is it happening already? Why would it work if it did? Do you think the public generally know what to do if they type [siteIwant].com into their browser and get [siteIdontwant].com? Are you suggesting that they'll automatically try [siteIwant].someISP.org and then [siteIwant].someotherISP.org etc. until they get the right one? Is that what you call a working DNS?
Sheesh.
TWW
Opera is on Beta-2 at the moment, that will fill that gap nicely.
the reason a vast majority of people use computers in the first place - IT'S BECAUSE OF THE INTERNET!
No, the Internet is a small minority reason people use computers. The vast majority use them to do work, and the majority of them are using Word, Excel, and Powerpoint.
It is true that email is very important for the transport of the documents they produce, but I don't think that's what you meant by using the internet.
No doubt most Linux users will agree it only makes sence to find practical and revolutionary ways to merge Linux with the web.
I doubt it. The web is cute and all that but if it disapeared overnight I wouldn't miss it. If the net disapeared I would miss it - email is very useful.
I use my computer for work which is imporant to me, none of which I need the web for.
Outside of website-based companies the web has nothing important to offer. I'm counting fun as "not important" here.
TWW
It is hard to think of a bunch of web-companies with better business plans than the porn sites; the more popular ones also have the best technical skills and admin systems on the web; they have to to cope with the traffic. So: why no .xxx?
TWW
Use bookmarks (or your Palm pilot!); I don't remember any more URLs than I do phone numbers.
result in numerous "real names" like services - proprietary name-to-number mapping sites that would be much worse than the current DNS system, which at least is global.
Why worse? The underlying number system would still be global. I have three telephone directories here, one county, one local business and one local general. It works fine and I don't have to use it if I don't want to. If I need non-local numbers I can get them from BT. On the web search engines can provide these services. What's the big deal? The fact that DNS is is global is it's biggest problem. The entire world's namespace needs more than one or two layers of hierarchy and the current DNS isn't giving it that, and never will. Global and useless DNS is still useless.
I'm not saying this is because it was badly designed but it has been badly administered and is beyond repair. It could have worked, it should have worked, but assholes have been in control and fucked it up. Commercial interests will always do this to a system where the URLs are recognisable names (ie trademarks) and where the assignment of the names is not based on geography (whatever happened to .us?). Closing down the TLDs and leaving only the ccTLDs would help a lot, but it's never going to happen, certainly while people like ICANN are in charge.
If you think text names for hosts is a system which will work fine for the next ten years then you're mad. It can't and won't; the trouble that we're having now with the namespace is just going to get worse.
Looking further ahead, imagine a world with 3 billion sites, what are you going to do to DNS to make it work?
Make a counter suggestion, or do you really think that the current system is fine?
TWW
TWW
Actually, this never happens in the UK. I don't know why it never caught on but there it is.
And so we rather than try to resolve the dispute, we decide they're not to be trusted with it, and lose all this?
It's not a matter of trust. You assume that disputes can be resolved. I say they can't. If there are two companies called "Toni's Pizzas" then one of them must backdown. Plus the reality is that lawyers have a vested interest in making suits on domain names and it is wishful thinking to say that this will ever stop or ever be fair. The richest litigant will always have too much power no matter what the rights and wrongs of the case.
In a world with 6 Billion people using the net, names simply don't and can't work. The fact that ICANN is trying crap solutions does not mean that a good solution exists.
They wouldn't be that random, if major companies and ISP's make up the first layer of the hierarchy then many numbers will start off the same, much as many phone number prefixes come up over and over again, which makes them into "memory blobs" which are easier to remember.
I am worried that the baby is in the process of drowning.
Such a move would be restricting easy access to the net to those of us who are trained
Does having to use a phone book restrict access to the telephone? Web search engines could be complemented by an online phone directory-type system.
How important is the naming system in finding sites at the moment? What percentage of sites are found through their content (ie using search engines) rather than typing in the url? I don't know but the information would be useful for this argument.
IME many (not most) people find sites by typing the name of the site into a search engine (e.g. the type "www.fish4homes.com" into altavista). Sad, but true.
Another solution would be to close down the TLDs (.com, .org etc) and enforce a multi-layered geographical system right down to town level (www.smithsbooks.bangor.ni.uk or www.smithsbooks.islington.london.uk) but: a) no one will run such a system as the amount of checking to enforce it is too much when net useage is growing as it is now, b) it actually leads to names which are probably harder than numbers to remember, and c) still leaves the question of individuals' sites in the same town open to question.
When you think about this, ask yourself "how is the current system going to work when everyone in the 1st world has their own individual webpage which is permanently connected to the net?". This day will come, web connections will come with your 'phone one day and each connection will need a name in the DNS.
TWW
No it's not, asshole! IP addresses of hosts within a network change, a naming system needs to stand one layer higher to allow the owner of the network some flexibility. IP addresses have all sorts of problems for use as host names, multiple hosts per IP, multiple IPs per host and so on.
And also because when you just hear about a company 'Underplunder, Inc.' you don't have to suck out of your finger some name, but can just try underplunder.com and you might get your match...
Which is exactly why the current system is breaking down. What if there is another Underplunder Inc? The current system assumes that there is one such name per country plus a handful of "special" ones which get .net, .com or .org. This was fine when the net was small but is just useless under the assumption that everyone has, or can have, their own site. How many names for companies or people are there? There must be duplication in any letter-based system.
The assumption that people can't remember numbers is wrong (well, for most of us, anyway), as shown by telephone numbers, and numbers avoid almost all the problems with the current DNS.
Wake up: DNS is disintegrating as we speak and ICANN is not helping. What do you think is the solution?
TWW
I can remember my phone number, even though it is 11 digits long with the UK area code, and my computer can remember numbers much longer than that. This is a hint to the solution. Give hosts numbers rather than names. IP addresses, of course, don't work as they change, so a central register of numbers needs to be set up, which in itself is an issue as power corrupts (see ICANN).
I'm thinking of a system where there is a string of digits separated by dots (eg 1.3412.1823), where the initial number would indicate a continent, then the following groups of numbers would be networks of machines, until the final number (1823 in this example) would be a specific machine in the second last network (3412 in the example).
The original authority would be allowed to assign network numbers in the individual continents for a fairly large one-off lifetime fee. The owners of a network number would then be free to assign numbers within their own space at whatever fee they like, but with the provision that the right to sell subnet numbers gets transferred to anyone they assign a number to. So the owner of 1.3412.1823 could assign 1.3412.1823.1 , .2, .3 etc to whoever they liked. Such reselling would be required to be on the same on-off lifetime fee basis (although the fee might be different) as the top level authority.
This way the number resolution can still work in much the same way as name resolution does now, with zones of authority and the work of resolving a number to an IP address is shared out as it is now.
With the top level fee being large, the next level would mostly be ISP's who make money back by selling on at a lower fee per number.
The separation between IPs and host "names" is maintained and ALL the crap about who owns trademarks and shit is lost. Think about it: all the disputes are gone, especially if network owners are required to assign in sequential order.
A distributed system for the very top level would be nice to prevent abuse of power, but perhaps the organisation set up to run it could be held in some sort of trust rather than being a private company. IANAL.
I personally think that something needs to be done or there's only about 5 years life left in the web before the whole thing is bogged down in disputes and namespace is saturated.
TWW
The second question, even if you just decide to go it alone, is that the current roots will not pass traffic to the new roots, cutting the net in two, because there is now no central authority.
TWW
TWW
Which one? I think Ptah is still locked in a "prior art" suit with Jehovah. And don't even mention the whole Marduk thing (a lot of us think Jehovah only got away with that one 'cause Moses was such a tricky lawyer).
TWW
No, you haven't. It takes a peculiar and spectacular leap of the imagination to allow the patenting of discoveries, otherwise all sorts of thing of finacial use would have been patented. Actually, that's not true; all it really takes is stupidity. Handily enough stupidity is the current official policy of the USPO.
The majority of chemical compounds for which patents have been issued have been isolated from nature
Actually there are almost no such cases. Chemical patents are normally granted for processes, not for the resultants, or even for a particular set of reactants.
TWW