> This is true under current 4th amendment interpretations, but severely curtailed by statutes that are still in force.
The reasoning goes back to old law which is based on the idea that when you mail a letter, you have no expectation of privacy regarding with respect to the outside of the envelope, however the contents of the envelope are protected unless a warrant specific to the person involved is authorized by a judge.
So packet headers and phone call metadata really wouldn't seem protected under this precedent. However contents should be. For IP that really means even looking at email headers should be forbidden without a warrant.
Now the idea that the executive isn't bound by the 4th Amendment is preposterous. By common law it certainly is. What do people think the Magna Carta is about? This was settled 898 years ago. The authors of the Constitution surely believed what they wrote was binding on every member of the Federal Government.
Elon Musk has it right when he points out that Silly Valley is a great concentration of brainpower pursuing small ideas because of the ease of cashing in on them.
Maybe their will be more innovation in the internet space. After all it's attracting a lot of talent.
But really there are bigger problems. But because they are bigger it seems few want to take them on.
NPEs have one or more of the following characteristics.
Not the original patent assignee
Not one of the inve ntors
Doesn't sell a product of technology using the patent
Doesn't sell a product that competes with a product that uses the patent
Doesn't sell a product using a patent cited by or otherwise related to the patent
Engages in no activities that would to commercialization of the patent
Avoids all activities that could result in countersuits from patent holders
Gets major share of revenues from patent infringement claims
I agree that there are a massive number of bad patents being issued. A lot of that has to due with broken processes in the patent system - including the specialized court of appeals that was originally established to eliminate venue shopping but turned into a fount of radical ideas as to what a patent should cover.
Until the fundamentals of what a valid patent is are made robust, re-examination isn't going to help. There will still be crap patents considered valid. Also the idea that re-examination is going to cure the costs of legal machinations is unrealistic. The whole re-examination thing is already a playground for legal abuse.
I don't consider the inventor, or the company he works for to be an NPE.
> it should be trivially cheap and easy to have all legal proceedings
Cheap and easy, and legal proceedings are two mutually incompatible phrases.
Another step in the right direction would be to ban software and business process patents. That's where 90% of the bullshit is anyway. Nothing of value would be lost.
is apparently there is no way to prove who is telling the truth.
These things have a way of coming out over time, and I expect this will be a lesson on what not to do going forward, no matter what happens to the actors on this stage.
Maybe that's the real long term benefit of what Snowden did.
The problem is that lots of small companies are running on shoestrings. Any requirement to hire a law firm to defend against a lawsuit = death. It doesn't matter if the patent gets rejected on re-examination, the small company is toast.
My last two jobs ended abruptly due to someone bringing a lawsuit. Boom see ya it's been real.
What has to happen is ending lawsuits from non-practicing entities. These companies have no skin in the game. They can't be countersued because they make nothing.
It was actually good news for Myriad, not just non-terrible news. While they did lose some parts of their patent, the core test is still protected.
In addition the way the decision was stated settles the entire field of biotech patents in such a way as to give certainty that there will be lots of opportunity for patentable inventions in the field, AND that R&D activities on isolated human DNA will be able to continue without threat of patent suits.
It isn't just Myriad stock that is up today. The stock market index for the WHOLE BIOTECH INDUSTRY is up substantially.
Slashdot Mirror
China v US would be like Zerg v Protoss.
Oh bullshit. The US is the #1 manufacturing country on the planet, or damn close to it.
http://shopfloor.org/2011/03/u-s-manufacturing-remains-worlds-largest/18756
http://www.cbn.com/cbnnews/finance/2011/January/US-Manufacturing-Remains-No-1-in-World/
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/03/14/china-us-manufacturing_n_835470.html
In terms of worker productivity it isn't close. The average US worker produces almost 10 times as much value as the average Chinese worker.
Prior 1700 or so there were periods of time where China was the strongest and most advanced nation. World domination is a stretch through.
You may have that expectation, but it has never been accepted as reasonable in the United States, going back to court cases in the early 19th century.
Trying to hide now that the light is on.
So in one type of place the internet content is controlled based on political affiliation, the other by company fiefdom.
It's hard to see a major difference. Hopefully the courts will realize this and through these suits out on their arse.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jarndyce_v_Jarndyce
Would be a great topic for another novel for a modern Dickens.
> This is true under current 4th amendment interpretations, but severely curtailed by statutes that are still in force.
The reasoning goes back to old law which is based on the idea that when you mail a letter, you have no expectation of privacy regarding with respect to the outside of the envelope, however the contents of the envelope are protected unless a warrant specific to the person involved is authorized by a judge.
So packet headers and phone call metadata really wouldn't seem protected under this precedent. However contents should be. For IP that really means even looking at email headers should be forbidden without a warrant.
Now the idea that the executive isn't bound by the 4th Amendment is preposterous. By common law it certainly is. What do people think the Magna Carta is about? This was settled 898 years ago. The authors of the Constitution surely believed what they wrote was binding on every member of the Federal Government.
So you had your chance for BOTH at the mid term elections.
Now you are whining. Too late.
Remove Obama and you get Joe Biden as President.
The electrical consumption of the the Utah installation is estimated roughly at $40 million/y. At 0.07 per kwhr that's roughly 500 million kwh / yr.
Google as a company is believed to use about 2 billion kWh / yr.
So we can probably say just Google will have 4x the data of this site.
I find it odd that there are claims this is new information. Didn't Vitruvius describe it in his De Architectura, written about 15 BC?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/De_architectura
Perhaps the story is confusing the known composition with some mechanism that the new study discovered.
The others are not really innovative.
Elon Musk has it right when he points out that Silly Valley is a great concentration of brainpower pursuing small ideas because of the ease of cashing in on them.
Maybe their will be more innovation in the internet space. After all it's attracting a lot of talent.
But really there are bigger problems. But because they are bigger it seems few want to take them on.
I would be surprised if the NSA could bridge bridge an air gap unless they get real close to your hardware.
NPEs have one or more of the following characteristics.
I agree that there are a massive number of bad patents being issued. A lot of that has to due with broken processes in the patent system - including the specialized court of appeals that was originally established to eliminate venue shopping but turned into a fount of radical ideas as to what a patent should cover.
Until the fundamentals of what a valid patent is are made robust, re-examination isn't going to help. There will still be crap patents considered valid. Also the idea that re-examination is going to cure the costs of legal machinations is unrealistic. The whole re-examination thing is already a playground for legal abuse.
I don't consider the inventor, or the company he works for to be an NPE.
> it should be trivially cheap and easy to have all legal proceedings
Cheap and easy, and legal proceedings are two mutually incompatible phrases.
Another step in the right direction would be to ban software and business process patents. That's where 90% of the bullshit is anyway. Nothing of value would be lost.
is apparently there is no way to prove who is telling the truth.
These things have a way of coming out over time, and I expect this will be a lesson on what not to do going forward, no matter what happens to the actors on this stage.
Maybe that's the real long term benefit of what Snowden did.
The problem is that lots of small companies are running on shoestrings. Any requirement to hire a law firm to defend against a lawsuit = death. It doesn't matter if the patent gets rejected on re-examination, the small company is toast.
My last two jobs ended abruptly due to someone bringing a lawsuit. Boom see ya it's been real.
What has to happen is ending lawsuits from non-practicing entities. These companies have no skin in the game. They can't be countersued because they make nothing.
This decision puts up a big neon sign "you can use BRCA if you come up with a different form."
Before you were stuck because there is no getting around the patent on the isolated human gene.
Some have called it the narrowest scope for patenting of genetic material in the world.
If you find it you can use the natural form.
> Creating cDNA is not a creative act.
Umm your sentence is self-contradictory.
It was actually good news for Myriad, not just non-terrible news. While they did lose some parts of their patent, the core test is still protected.
In addition the way the decision was stated settles the entire field of biotech patents in such a way as to give certainty that there will be lots of opportunity for patentable inventions in the field, AND that R&D activities on isolated human DNA will be able to continue without threat of patent suits.
It isn't just Myriad stock that is up today. The stock market index for the WHOLE BIOTECH INDUSTRY is up substantially.
This is really a great decision that benefits everyone, in the following ways.
1. Isolated DNA is not patentable. This allows R&D on DNA to proceed unencumbered.
2. Commercial development of technologies using synthetic DNA derivatives for useful products is encouraged by allowing patent coverage.
And 50% of people are dumber than the average person.
Frightening, isn't it?
Is really the best union.
I wish them luck with this. Maybe it will lead to more reasonable employment contracts for the rest of us.