Go read the IP FAQ. You clearly don't realize what legal issues are involved. This isn't about common sense - if it were, I'd agree with you completely. This is about the way the law works right now. Lego stands to lose some serious money if they don't protect their name.
My preferred solution is to give Nogas the explicit permission to use "LegOS" - they've protected their trademark and been the good guys. The only problem is if LegOS turns out to suck rocks and gives Lego (the company) a bad name by association. That doesn't seem too likely.
Right...like you don't obviously lie to him under oath. You don't fabricate evidence. You don't tell him he's too stupid to understand the issues. You don't repeatedly appeal even his minor decisions.
Microsoft would not let any sort of decision like this rest until the Supremes decided it. That's a decade away. That's two presidential elections away. That's time to reorganize the business in such a way that any expected remedies will be useless, or actually helpful, as with the consent decree of 1994, which gave MS knowledge of the PC industry, the buying practices of system purchasers, the effectiveness of advertising campaigns, etc.
Funny...I remember doing tech support for Windows 95 at a major OEM in the late 90s and having DLL problems that most have never dreamed of. Imagine installing the OS, installing an upgrade to the OS (USB support), installing a motherboard driver (AGP, I think), installing a video card driver, and installing a hard disk controller driver. Imagine having a broken system if you installed them in the wrong order. THAT is what I think of when I think of Microsoft. The fact that they permitted mere applications to overwrite crucial OS code was unforgivable.
On what concerns LegOS. It is very hard to confuse a name with its purpose because, apart of its relation to Lego Mindstorms, this thing is useless. This is EXACTLY why use of the LegOS name is so dangerous. It's not like Noga is marketing an OS for artificial limbs; if he were, there'd be no problem, since under US trademark law, his product would be in a different category from the Lego toys.
But his "product" is VERY closely related to the product that Lego sells. The name is an obvious derivative of "Lego" or "legos" - none of that wink, wink, nudge, nudge routine now; anyone who says they believe the bit about naming it after his surname is either a liar or a moron. So you have a case of an unauthorized entity making use of Lego's trademark, in the very market that Lego has their trademark.
Bottom line - Hasbro could come out with a line of building bricks and call them Lego bricks. When sued for trademark violation by Lego, they could reasonably claim that they were not violating Lego's trademark, because Lego had lost their trademark when they failed to defend it.
Yes, it sucks that the world is like that. yes, it sucks that there are shark who will eat you if they can. But it is completely reasonable to smack upside the head the man next to you who is yelling "Yoohoo, Mr. Sharkie, over here!"
I give Lego a great deal of credit for NOT smacking him, but instead asking him politely to stop. Noga's disingenuousness and unwillingness to understand the harsh reality of the world is apalling. Just because he doesn't like the way IP law works, he wants to ignore it, even if it harms the very company that's given him such a cool toy.
Go read the IP FAQ (if you haven't already) and see if what I've said doesn't make sense. IANAL, but I am a pessimist.
"Fines as a cost of doing business" is a concept you're missing. Appeals and lawsuits as a delaying tactic is another. Destroying competition faster than the government (executive or judicial branch) can react is another.
Why did the 2nd monkey fall out of the tree?
Stapled to the 1st monkey.
Why did the 3rd monkey etc.
Peer pressure
---------
What's the difference between a duck?
It has one foot the same
---------
I've got this great joke! Ask me if my name is Sam. Go on, ask me!
Is your name Sam?
No. (Delivered deadpan. Alternatively use facial expression to imply asker is a mental defective)
Naw...even at terminal velocity, they don't do much more than go *splat*. Air raid sirens would warn innocent civilians to hide under indoors under tables and away from skylights and the like.
If we target law schools and legal firms, we can probably overwhelm them with the volume and mass of attorneys we drop as well as reduce their ability to retaliate.
Whatever country you go to in the world, you have to obey their laws. The US is no exception. If you send your representatives to the US to do business, they must abide by the laws governing US businesses or suffer the consequences. WHile it's true that Sony proper might not be affected by a US decision, the courts could demand that all Sony assets in the US be seized or frozen.
However, this is all moot, because there is a Sony Inc. in the US. Nyah.
You are able to bring suit against your father, you know. If you are able to own property, you are able to sue for damages to that property. Lawsuits are for when people refuse to do what they should and you petition the state to force them to do what's right.
In 'new' democracies people still believe the lie that those with money/power will permit their lives to be controlled by those without money/power. Go read Orwell's 1984. Talk to citizens of any major Western democracy. The 'man on the street' has NO influence over national policy except when he is the target of a mass propaganda campaign and votes accordingly.
But Cryptonomicon isn't science fiction; it's not even speculative fiction. It's a techno-thriller and historical novel, in the tradition of Dirk Pitt.
the US would arrest a drug dealer from Columbia, a terrorist from Iraq, or a child pornographer from China
Those are some really loaded words. "Drug dealing" is outlawed in Colombia (due to US efforts). Terrorism in Iraq is illegal (blow up a building there and see what happens). I don't know, but I would hope that taking pictures of children in sexual positions is just as bad in China as it is in the US.
HOWEVER...the Russian programmer under discussion didn't violate Russian law; he violated US law. Consider the following...
If a Colombian pharmacist dispensed morphine to a patient, but didn't follow US regulations, would we arrest him when he came to the US? If a Colombian storekeeper gave drugs to children, drugs which in the US require a prescription but which in Colombia don't, would we arrest him?
If an Iraqi soldier fired a missile at a US jet, would we arrest that soldier when he came to the US? More likely we would give him asylum. If an Iraqi citizen blew up an Iraqi building, we'd likely give him a medal when he came here. If an Iraqi citizen blew up a US building, he'd be on US soil, violating US law...of course we'd arrest him.
If a hypothetical Chinese photographer took pictures of babies without their clothes on because of a hypothetical custom of doing so to represent the babies' purity, should the photographer be arrested? If a hypothetical 19-year-old man married a hypothetical 14-year-old girl, with her consent, (because of a hypothetical tradition of fertile young women marrying virile young-but-older men), and if he took explicit pictures of her, for their own use and enjoyment, and if he behaved toward her as a man should behave toward his wife, would we arrest the man when he came to the US?
If someone drives faster than 70 mph (the fastest legal speed in my state) on a Montana highway, can my state highway patrol arrest them? If I drive with a blood alcohol level of.08 (not illegal in my state), can your state police arrest me because it's illegal in their state? What if I wait until I'm sober, drive to your state, and then talk about driving almost-drunk in my state?
My point is simply that if something is NOT morally wrong (whatever that means to you), and if it is NOT illegal for a foreigner in their own land, and if NO ONE (except corporate attorneys) understands exactly what behavior constitutes a crime, then is it right to arrest foreigners for acts committed in their homeland, when they've violated no laws on US soil?
DUH, you moron! You obviously haven't kept up with the latest advances on the cold fusion front! The zinc is a chemical catalyst, while the limestone's porous physical structure provides a reaction surface and neutron shield that permits the S to fuse with H. Thus:
Good call and best comment I've seen so far. CORPORATIONS do not make decisions; PEOPLE make decisions. The question then becomes "What power group within the company believes that they benefits by withholding this information?" All human endeavours is political; those who don't think they're playing politics are merely playing politics badly.
When you patent something, you make its design public knowledge. No one can use that knowledge without your permission. Thus refusing to document an API because it's patented is inherently contradictory.
Teaching scientific facts is a little like making people learn the multiplication tables out ot 50 digits. MUCH more important is a deep understanding of the scientific method and of current scientific models and how they were developed. The goal is not to teach facts but to teach a framework. The facts are, of course, part of the framework - the foundation, actuall - can't build theories without observations. However, if the goal is for every child to be able to write "The sky is blue because oxygen diffuses light with a wavelength of 123 nanometers more than light with a wavelength of 456 nanometers" you may as well teach them that the earth was made by gods who sprang from the liver of the sky-cow. Without the framework it's pointless.
Hear, hear! Fiction, no matter what kind, is someone's fantasy of what would be kinda neat. It is almost 100% guaranteed to be non-factual in sme way. Poetry looks and sounds nifty and can make you think, but is still someone's opinion.
Science is fact. Learning science is learning how to determine facts and separate them from speculation.
Yup. Given that the author is a science professor, I found that his tirade to teach the masses more science, to turn science degrees into the minimum requirement for a job in the 21st century just a little bit self serving.
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Go read the IP FAQ. You clearly don't realize what legal issues are involved. This isn't about common sense - if it were, I'd agree with you completely. This is about the way the law works right now. Lego stands to lose some serious money if they don't protect their name.
My preferred solution is to give Nogas the explicit permission to use "LegOS" - they've protected their trademark and been the good guys. The only problem is if LegOS turns out to suck rocks and gives Lego (the company) a bad name by association. That doesn't seem too likely.
Right...like you don't obviously lie to him under oath. You don't fabricate evidence. You don't tell him he's too stupid to understand the issues. You don't repeatedly appeal even his minor decisions.
Microsoft would not let any sort of decision like this rest until the Supremes decided it. That's a decade away. That's two presidential elections away. That's time to reorganize the business in such a way that any expected remedies will be useless, or actually helpful, as with the consent decree of 1994, which gave MS knowledge of the PC industry, the buying practices of system purchasers, the effectiveness of advertising campaigns, etc.
Funny...I remember doing tech support for Windows 95 at a major OEM in the late 90s and having DLL problems that most have never dreamed of. Imagine installing the OS, installing an upgrade to the OS (USB support), installing a motherboard driver (AGP, I think), installing a video card driver, and installing a hard disk controller driver. Imagine having a broken system if you installed them in the wrong order. THAT is what I think of when I think of Microsoft. The fact that they permitted mere applications to overwrite crucial OS code was unforgivable.
On what concerns LegOS. It is very hard to confuse a name with its purpose because, apart of its relation to Lego Mindstorms, this thing is useless.
This is EXACTLY why use of the LegOS name is so dangerous. It's not like Noga is marketing an OS for artificial limbs; if he were, there'd be no problem, since under US trademark law, his product would be in a different category from the Lego toys.
But his "product" is VERY closely related to the product that Lego sells. The name is an obvious derivative of "Lego" or "legos" - none of that wink, wink, nudge, nudge routine now; anyone who says they believe the bit about naming it after his surname is either a liar or a moron. So you have a case of an unauthorized entity making use of Lego's trademark, in the very market that Lego has their trademark.
Bottom line - Hasbro could come out with a line of building bricks and call them Lego bricks. When sued for trademark violation by Lego, they could reasonably claim that they were not violating Lego's trademark, because Lego had lost their trademark when they failed to defend it.
Yes, it sucks that the world is like that. yes, it sucks that there are shark who will eat you if they can. But it is completely reasonable to smack upside the head the man next to you who is yelling "Yoohoo, Mr. Sharkie, over here!"
I give Lego a great deal of credit for NOT smacking him, but instead asking him politely to stop. Noga's disingenuousness and unwillingness to understand the harsh reality of the world is apalling. Just because he doesn't like the way IP law works, he wants to ignore it, even if it harms the very company that's given him such a cool toy.
Go read the IP FAQ (if you haven't already) and see if what I've said doesn't make sense. IANAL, but I am a pessimist.
Or for the pendantic...
What would that be? The people who dangle?
</pedantic>
"Route step, march!"
"Fines as a cost of doing business" is a concept you're missing. Appeals and lawsuits as a delaying tactic is another. Destroying competition faster than the government (executive or judicial branch) can react is another.
Why did the 2nd monkey fall out of the tree?
Stapled to the 1st monkey.
Why did the 3rd monkey etc.
Peer pressure
---------
What's the difference between a duck?
It has one foot the same
---------
I've got this great joke! Ask me if my name is Sam. Go on, ask me!
Is your name Sam?
No. (Delivered deadpan. Alternatively use facial expression to imply asker is a mental defective)
Actually, you win a war by destroying your enemy's will to wage war. The mind is the first, last, and only battlefield.
Naw...even at terminal velocity, they don't do much more than go *splat*. Air raid sirens would warn innocent civilians to hide under indoors under tables and away from skylights and the like.
If we target law schools and legal firms, we can probably overwhelm them with the volume and mass of attorneys we drop as well as reduce their ability to retaliate.
Move every justice...for great big *splat*
Whatever country you go to in the world, you have to obey their laws. The US is no exception. If you send your representatives to the US to do business, they must abide by the laws governing US businesses or suffer the consequences. WHile it's true that Sony proper might not be affected by a US decision, the courts could demand that all Sony assets in the US be seized or frozen.
However, this is all moot, because there is a Sony Inc. in the US. Nyah.
...this is the funniest thing I've read all day...I think you should submit this to Scott Adams for potential inclusion in Dilbert...
And use specific examples. Find political web sites that are banned, particularly campaign sites. Nothing like hitting them at home...
You are able to bring suit against your father, you know. If you are able to own property, you are able to sue for damages to that property. Lawsuits are for when people refuse to do what they should and you petition the state to force them to do what's right.
In 'new' democracies people still believe the lie that those with money/power will permit their lives to be controlled by those without money/power. Go read Orwell's 1984. Talk to citizens of any major Western democracy. The 'man on the street' has NO influence over national policy except when he is the target of a mass propaganda campaign and votes accordingly.
But Cryptonomicon isn't science fiction; it's not even speculative fiction. It's a techno-thriller and historical novel, in the tradition of Dirk Pitt.
the US would arrest a drug dealer from Columbia, a terrorist from Iraq, or a child pornographer from China
.08 (not illegal in my state), can your state police arrest me because it's illegal in their state? What if I wait until I'm sober, drive to your state, and then talk about driving almost-drunk in my state?
Those are some really loaded words. "Drug dealing" is outlawed in Colombia (due to US efforts). Terrorism in Iraq is illegal (blow up a building there and see what happens). I don't know, but I would hope that taking pictures of children in sexual positions is just as bad in China as it is in the US.
HOWEVER...the Russian programmer under discussion didn't violate Russian law; he violated US law. Consider the following...
If a Colombian pharmacist dispensed morphine to a patient, but didn't follow US regulations, would we arrest him when he came to the US? If a Colombian storekeeper gave drugs to children, drugs which in the US require a prescription but which in Colombia don't, would we arrest him?
If an Iraqi soldier fired a missile at a US jet, would we arrest that soldier when he came to the US? More likely we would give him asylum. If an Iraqi citizen blew up an Iraqi building, we'd likely give him a medal when he came here. If an Iraqi citizen blew up a US building, he'd be on US soil, violating US law...of course we'd arrest him.
If a hypothetical Chinese photographer took pictures of babies without their clothes on because of a hypothetical custom of doing so to represent the babies' purity, should the photographer be arrested? If a hypothetical 19-year-old man married a hypothetical 14-year-old girl, with her consent, (because of a hypothetical tradition of fertile young women marrying virile young-but-older men), and if he took explicit pictures of her, for their own use and enjoyment, and if he behaved toward her as a man should behave toward his wife, would we arrest the man when he came to the US?
If someone drives faster than 70 mph (the fastest legal speed in my state) on a Montana highway, can my state highway patrol arrest them? If I drive with a blood alcohol level of
My point is simply that if something is NOT morally wrong (whatever that means to you), and if it is NOT illegal for a foreigner in their own land, and if NO ONE (except corporate attorneys) understands exactly what behavior constitutes a crime, then is it right to arrest foreigners for acts committed in their homeland, when they've violated no laws on US soil?
DUH, you moron! You obviously haven't kept up with the latest advances on the cold fusion front! The zinc is a chemical catalyst, while the limestone's porous physical structure provides a reaction surface and neutron shield that permits the S to fuse with H. Thus:
4H2SO4 => 4Cl (4S+4H) + 2H2O + 7O2
Good call and best comment I've seen so far. CORPORATIONS do not make decisions; PEOPLE make decisions. The question then becomes "What power group within the company believes that they benefits by withholding this information?" All human endeavours is political; those who don't think they're playing politics are merely playing politics badly.
When you patent something, you make its design public knowledge. No one can use that knowledge without your permission. Thus refusing to document an API because it's patented is inherently contradictory.
Great letter until you got insulting...
Yup...witness this from the barking dog:
"...exposure may cause little pain or go unnoticed, but the resulting edema several days later may cause death."
Teaching scientific facts is a little like making people learn the multiplication tables out ot 50 digits. MUCH more important is a deep understanding of the scientific method and of current scientific models and how they were developed. The goal is not to teach facts but to teach a framework. The facts are, of course, part of the framework - the foundation, actuall - can't build theories without observations. However, if the goal is for every child to be able to write "The sky is blue because oxygen diffuses light with a wavelength of 123 nanometers more than light with a wavelength of 456 nanometers" you may as well teach them that the earth was made by gods who sprang from the liver of the sky-cow. Without the framework it's pointless.
Hear, hear! Fiction, no matter what kind, is someone's fantasy of what would be kinda neat. It is almost 100% guaranteed to be non-factual in sme way. Poetry looks and sounds nifty and can make you think, but is still someone's opinion.
Science is fact. Learning science is learning how to determine facts and separate them from speculation.
Yup. Given that the author is a science professor, I found that his tirade to teach the masses more science, to turn science degrees into the minimum requirement for a job in the 21st century just a little bit self serving.