Oh come on, this problem was solved ages ago by the pr0n industry! There are bots and hacks and silly software floating around all of the pr0n sites which do nothing but try to catch silly little tricks like sharing your password with your friends. A lot of time these hacks are implemented by clueless operators and applied willy-nilly. I'm sure that Salon can do a better job of making sure that only registered users get the content they paid for.
Many people wonder why Microsoft would even bother trying to patent such an obvious thing. Back in the day of this patent application, M$ was very far back in the software patent race. They just hadn't paid attention to patents, while companies like IBM and Motorola, with huge patent portfolios and a corporate culture that rewarded patent disclosures, sailed ahead with huge numbers of trivial software patents.
M$ noticed this and probably instutited the same sort of incentives that the other major corporations use to get patents: reward disclosure, and reward success. Thus, this patent which is anticipated by hundreds of existing programs and web sites, but none of them ever bothered to submit a patent application.
In addition to there being a ton of pre-existing programs to do exactly the claimed invention, many of the claims fail on other grounds. Adding "simultaneous read/write" to a claim does not make is any less obvious. Enumerating the detailed database fields does not make it any less obvious. It just shows that they hired good attorneys who knew how to coax details out of the applicants in order to fatten up their claims.
How do you access the patent history? It would be interesting to see if the patent was modified during the application, ala RAMBUS, to see if it runs afoul of the new rulings that prevent you from extending your claims during the application process.
In the US it is *not* a copyright issue. It is an employer/employee/state issue. There is no general answer, except that if you live in progressive states, (CA and WA for sure, others also), that have passed laws prohibiting agreements like that, you are basically free and clear. Otherwise, it doesn't matter, the employer *owns* you.
Names are not as important as places. It is literally *impossible* to give advice without knowing what laws apply in the locale in question. It is entirely possible that the IP agreement was completely null and void from the get-go, depending on where you live!
Your options depend heavily on exactly *where* you live and work. If this is a US company, which state is it in? If it is CA, WA, or a few others, IP agreements are NULL AND VOID. Search the old Slashdot files for the last time this question was asked and follow the links in that discussion for a list of states which have laws preventing IP agreements from being enforceable. If you live in a country other than US or in a state with enforceable IP agreements, good luck! You will need it!
I finally got around to changing my Moz 0.8 prefs to eliminate animations and popups. The release notes explain how to do it and it makes a huge difference. Now, I no longer have to wait for the/. banner ads to load. I see the first image briefly, then nothing!
As soon as Mozilla 0.9 comes out with the UI for enabling this released, expect to see a lot more use of the feature. I may decide to experiment with it a little. Currently, I have animations set to "none", so I do not see anything at all in the ad space. I will try setting it to "once" and see what effect that has. Basically, I expect to have to wait longer (loading all frames vs. loading only the first frame). Probably the ad will remain motionless at the top.
This does affect my previous comment about collecting your banners in a page for easy browsing. I think that is still useful, but if more people take up the idea of controlling animation inside the browser, it will affect the ad-page display. I really do want to be able to find useful ads collected in one place, but loading that page would be hell on bandwidth if everything was animated. When I want to go back and find a specific ad to click on, I don't want to wait forever for every single ad to load its stupid boxing tux or whatever.
So, if Moz-based browsers take over the world, or if IE contains any of these ad-busting features, then advertisers will really have to re-think their methods. I find ads occasionally useful, but I prefer to be able to browse the ads at my liesure, rather than interrupting my surfing to click through. Find a way to present ads so I can mentally note the interesting ones, then give me a way to easily come back later and click-through on only the interesting ads when I am in the mood for shopping.
I want to second the idea of finding a way to note interesting ads for later perusal. That is, after all, the way that print ads work. You read the magazine for the features first and make mental notes of interesting ads for later use. I get frustrated by the fact that I rarely want to click through and ad, but there are times when I remember seeing something interesting in an ad, but can't remember or figure out the reference. Then, you either have to wait for the ad to reappear or try random search strings in Google to try to find something similar.
Click through on ads is so low because it is a major interrruption in the flow of surfing. I come to/. to read the articles. Every once in a while I see an ad at the top and no new articles to read and the ad is just interesting enough to click on (some Think Geek product or other...)
Since the print world allows browsing of ads, just like you can browse the features in a magazine, the e-world needs an ad browsing feature. Maybe a special ad-browser per site that allows you to quickly find the ad you were really interested in. Then, you wouldn't have to interrupt your surfing to click-through. Just continue surfing, mentally noting the ad. Go back later to the ad page and find the one that caught your eye earlier.
Mozilla 0.8 has good control over popups. Read the release notes about special prefs that you have to manually enable. They are still working on the UI for these new prefs. Maybe there will be a UI by 1.0?
Contracting is definitely not for those who absolutely depend on a regular pay check. When you are exploring becoming an independent contractor, you have to take a lot of factors into account, such as building in overhead time to market yourself, time to take (unpaid) vacations, paying your own medical insurance, etc.
You may want to look into working for an agency. They will do all the marketing, will often pay you competively, either salaried with benefits or hourly without benefits. The best thing to me is that the agency does the marketing, freeing you to simply program. AIC is an example of a national agency with this model. Other agencies exist in other areas of the country, check the want-ads.
One thing to be very careful of if you intend to moonlight is to make sure that your current employer does not have a no-compete clause that you have already signed that prevents this! Make sure you haven't signed away your rights to explore contracting, or you may just have to leave your current job before you can even start...
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Oh come on, this problem was solved ages ago by the pr0n industry! There are bots and hacks and silly software floating around all of the pr0n sites which do nothing but try to catch silly little tricks like sharing your password with your friends. A lot of time these hacks are implemented by clueless operators and applied willy-nilly. I'm sure that Salon can do a better job of making sure that only registered users get the content they paid for.
M$ noticed this and probably instutited the same sort of incentives that the other major corporations use to get patents: reward disclosure, and reward success. Thus, this patent which is anticipated by hundreds of existing programs and web sites, but none of them ever bothered to submit a patent application.
In addition to there being a ton of pre-existing programs to do exactly the claimed invention, many of the claims fail on other grounds. Adding "simultaneous read/write" to a claim does not make is any less obvious. Enumerating the detailed database fields does not make it any less obvious. It just shows that they hired good attorneys who knew how to coax details out of the applicants in order to fatten up their claims.
How do you access the patent history? It would be interesting to see if the patent was modified during the application, ala RAMBUS, to see if it runs afoul of the new rulings that prevent you from extending your claims during the application process.
The entire community has already moved on to freedb.org. No one (except winamp) uses cddb anymore.
In the US it is *not* a copyright issue. It is an employer/employee/state issue. There is no general answer, except that if you live in progressive states, (CA and WA for sure, others also), that have passed laws prohibiting agreements like that, you are basically free and clear. Otherwise, it doesn't matter, the employer *owns* you.
Names are not as important as places. It is literally *impossible* to give advice without knowing what laws apply in the locale in question. It is entirely possible that the IP agreement was completely null and void from the get-go, depending on where you live!
Your options depend heavily on exactly *where* you live and work. If this is a US company, which state is it in? If it is CA, WA, or a few others, IP agreements are NULL AND VOID. Search the old Slashdot files for the last time this question was asked and follow the links in that discussion for a list of states which have laws preventing IP agreements from being enforceable. If you live in a country other than US or in a state with enforceable IP agreements, good luck! You will need it!
As soon as Mozilla 0.9 comes out with the UI for enabling this released, expect to see a lot more use of the feature. I may decide to experiment with it a little. Currently, I have animations set to "none", so I do not see anything at all in the ad space. I will try setting it to "once" and see what effect that has. Basically, I expect to have to wait longer (loading all frames vs. loading only the first frame). Probably the ad will remain motionless at the top.
This does affect my previous comment about collecting your banners in a page for easy browsing. I think that is still useful, but if more people take up the idea of controlling animation inside the browser, it will affect the ad-page display. I really do want to be able to find useful ads collected in one place, but loading that page would be hell on bandwidth if everything was animated. When I want to go back and find a specific ad to click on, I don't want to wait forever for every single ad to load its stupid boxing tux or whatever.
So, if Moz-based browsers take over the world, or if IE contains any of these ad-busting features, then advertisers will really have to re-think their methods. I find ads occasionally useful, but I prefer to be able to browse the ads at my liesure, rather than interrupting my surfing to click through. Find a way to present ads so I can mentally note the interesting ones, then give me a way to easily come back later and click-through on only the interesting ads when I am in the mood for shopping.
Click through on ads is so low because it is a major interrruption in the flow of surfing. I come to /. to read the articles. Every once in a while I see an ad at the top and no new articles to read and the ad is just interesting enough to click on (some Think Geek product or other...)
Since the print world allows browsing of ads, just like you can browse the features in a magazine, the e-world needs an ad browsing feature. Maybe a special ad-browser per site that allows you to quickly find the ad you were really interested in. Then, you wouldn't have to interrupt your surfing to click-through. Just continue surfing, mentally noting the ad. Go back later to the ad page and find the one that caught your eye earlier.
Mozilla 0.8 has good control over popups. Read the release notes about special prefs that you have to manually enable. They are still working on the UI for these new prefs. Maybe there will be a UI by 1.0?
You may want to look into working for an agency. They will do all the marketing, will often pay you competively, either salaried with benefits or hourly without benefits. The best thing to me is that the agency does the marketing, freeing you to simply program. AIC is an example of a national agency with this model. Other agencies exist in other areas of the country, check the want-ads.
One thing to be very careful of if you intend to moonlight is to make sure that your current employer does not have a no-compete clause that you have already signed that prevents this! Make sure you haven't signed away your rights to explore contracting, or you may just have to leave your current job before you can even start...