I ain't catholic, or even particularly religious, but I think cast her as God was blasphemous. God as a woman? Fine. God as Alanis Morisette? Puh-LEEZ!
I don't have the article on me at the moment, but IIRC the caller ID info is sent on something like a 300 baud modem signal mux'd with the ring (ring_caller-ID_ring). That's why you have to wait sometimes 2 or three rings to get the info. All they have to do is
1) Tell the telco they want Caller ID blocking (disables telco caller ID info)
2) Send the *spoofed* info between rings with the appropriate format
3) Profit! (i know there should have been ???)
Doesn't work that way. It's a 1200bps burst between the 1st and 2nd rings. I'd like for you to explain how they would send a spoofed data burst when they're not connected to the loop. You see, when you dial a number you're only connected to the telco switch. The telco switch connects to the line you're calling and sends a 1sec 90v pulse every 3sec, and IT puts the 1200bps burst in itself. The ringing noise you hear on your end is just an audio tone played on YOUR circuit by the telco switch to let you know that it's sending the ring signal. You're not physically connected to the other line until the other side gets picked up and the switch ties the two lines together. Pushing a 1200bps burst into the telco switch does absolutely nothing.
You've given these guys guns and dropped them on foreign soil, they should be at least minimally trustworthy.
Hah! As a former "guy dropped on foreign soil with a gun" myself, I would say that only 60-70% of my fellow soldiers were trustworthy for anything outside their trained military duties. I'd trust 'em all with my life, without doubt; but there was always one guy out of three that you wouldn't trust alone for an hour with your wheels, your wife, or your wallet.
Patent is far too broad to cover something like software algorithms
It would be ever worse of algorithms were copyrightable!
No, it wouldn't.
Patents at least expire in 20 years, but copyright is forever (less one day).
Cripes, people, learn the difference between the two. Copyrights and patents aren't the same thing with different terms of expiration. They're related, but conceptually different. Copyright is what prevents me from cutting and pasting the contents of a romance novel (or copying the executable file of MS Word) and selling it as my own work. I am free to write my own romance novel (or word processor) because I'm not copying someone else's work. It's called "copyright" for a reason, i.e. the right to make copies.
Patents, on the other hand, are short term monopolies on methods and processes. You would not (to construct a bizarre example) be able to patent MS Word; rather, you'd patent the concept of a word processor itself. The problem with algoriths and source code is that it straddles the line between machines and written work: it is the code that makes the machine perform the process. Because of this, the USPTO has been instructed to treat an algorithm as a machine that performs a process. This is a bad move, in my opinion. Code has more in common with mathematical formulas (non patentable) than machines (patentable). I think what the original poster meant was that specific algorithm code should be copyright protected, and the algorithms themselves should be unpatentable.
Cut their funding my 50% for a year. See if they repeat it.
Above all else this requires of the authority/government to ignore political cost or any form of backlash.
The people who do the hiring and run the place aren't the ones who suffer when funding is cut. My wife works at the University of California and when her department's funding was cut by 70%, they mostly laid off administrative staff. None of the directors got laid off, nor did anyone in HR get laid off. Funding cuts aren't going to hurt the right people. Additionally, a subjectively applicable weapon like that will be used by the enforcing authority to bludgeon departments it doesn't like to death.
The guy who wrote the software should be cleared under SvsB.
Actually, since he's CANADIAN, a US Supreme Court decision doesn't really affect him, nor are the desires of the RIAA directly relevant. It's probably a provision of Canadian copyright law.
OK then, think of it this way: you have a team of 5 heart surgeons and 3 housekeepers. Do you put all 8 of them in the operating theater for your heart surgery, or do you have the 3 housekeeper do something useful (e.g. pick up laundry) rather than standing around in scrubs jostling the anesthesiologist? The DOJ has a lot of people that do a lot of things. If anything, I say we fire the "IP theft goon squad" rather than send them after "terrorists".
Your comment might be construed as saying "Ashcroft may be a bad guy, but he's not Catholic", implying that being Catholic would make him somehow worse.
Was that your intention?
To me it sounded like the opposite: an objection to associating Ashcroft with catholics via the "Pope Ashcroft" thing, i.e. the OP implied "Ashcroft bad and catholic" and the GP poster said "bad, sure; but catholic? no."
she's made a statement about opening Word files in a hex editor that implies that the results of opening a WordPerfect file in a hex editor would be different, and didn't even check it!!!
Heh. Well, as she said it herself: "I am reliably informed that if you open a Word document in a hex editor, you see a forest of gibberish". In other words, "I know nothing about what this means, but I know someone who thinks they do, so I'm going to cite it as 'proof'".
Has everyone forgotten the horrid episode IV-and-a-half, also known as 'Star Wars Holiday Special'?
Episode I was definitely not the first sub-par installment (in our chronology at least).
AAAAAAAAARGH! I had literally forgotten all about it! I vividly remember each and every time I saw Ep IV, V, and VI in the theater, but it took several minutes of perusing this site before the horror came flooding back. I remember being utterly appalled when I watched it, and I was only nine. Thank you SO much for bringing back this horrible repressed memory.
Clear? Why, you're in luck! We can help you get "clear". Brain coloration is caused by fragments of an ancient space god who was blown up eons ago by H-bombs! These fragments make your brain un-clear. Please now enjoy taking a sham personality test that tells you you need to give us lots of money to remove the space god fragments. Thank you
Are you so sure about that? Heck, on a flight of 200 people, I'd be willing to bet less than 20 think about doing something, and less than 5 take action.
Am I sure about that? Yes. Look at FLight 93 on 9/11. On a flight with only 33 passengers, enough of them stood up and confronted the hijackers to monkey wrench their plans and force them to nose-in on an empty field. I have no doubt that among a flight of 200 people enough would stand up and have any would-be hijackers hogtied and spitting out broken teeth before he could finish saying "this is a hijacking".
Send me one (err 5) of those GPS thingies and let me pay for the miles I actually drive - and tell me if city or highway is cheaper, because it doesn't make a difference in time to work whether I'm on the highway or the city streets! Woohooo!!!
You know, you'd probably end up getting about the same rates as you would otherwise. I suspect the "GPS discount" probably doesn't amount to much more than %10, even if you drive the car 0 miles.
"Language is the uniting factor in society because it is the basis for complex thought"
No, I can learn how to make a gun, plow a field, fetch water from a well from an Asian person with whom I have no common language - almost as easily as I could with an English speaking person.
Try getting him to teach you anything like calculus, ethics, or theoretical physics without a common language. Simple manufacturing, plowing, or bucket-hauling are not "complex thought".
Can you back that statement up? Please provide a link.
It's called "sovereign immunity". The Federal Tort Claims Act makes allowances for suits based on federal employee negligence, but I doubt any federal court would consider anything the USPTO does negligent enough to qualify as a valid FTCA suit.
I'd be willing to overlook the common misuse of "LCD" with "display" if it's prefaced with "an", as in "an El See Dee display". But beginning it with "a" makes it a clear case of saying "a Liquid Crystal Display display", which is just plain wrong.
If Microsoft wins this I'd really like to see them sue the USPTO to recover their legal fees. Until the USPTO is held accountable for granting patents on work that is either obvious or has prior art, they won't make any changes.
Sadly, you cannot sue the federal government unless granted special dispensation to do so....such dispensation is available only from the federal government itself. strange but true.
Operating system kernels, C compilers, web browsers, and word processors are no longer scarce because we have linux, gcc, mozilla, and open office.
Bzzt, wrong! Over 90% of the world still uses MS Office/Windows for their wordprocessing and operating system needs and is willing to pay for it.
Scarcity and rate of adoption are totally unrelated. 90% of the world actively tries to keep flies out of their dwelling, but this refusal to accept them doesn't make flies scarce. Scarcity is about availability, not usage.
That's true, however we have many "internets". An internet, small "i", is any routed network using the Internet Protocol (IP). Private IP networks, many corporate LANs and WANs, and in fact any other private IP-based network that doesn't have a routed connection to the Internet, big "I".
True, but if you describe a private IP based network as "an internet", most people will not catch the distinction and wonder why they can't get AOL Instant Messenger to work. The sheer size and common usage of the public internet has essentially established squatters rights on the word itself. This was inevitable. Its proper name "Internet" is spelled the same as the word (formerly) used to describe any internetwork of computers, "internet".
We refer to it as the Internet. Corporations have intranets. The capitalization conveys meaning. Wired's usage is wrong.
There are scores of unique things which don't have their names capitalized. The earth. The sun. The internet is now one of those things. Initially, it was named the Internet because it wasn't unique.
"Internet" was only capitalized in order to differentiate it from other large internetworks of computers back in the early days. Due to the fact that "the internet" itself has become the de facto wide scale global network, relegating the other networks to obscurity or supplanting them entirely, capitalization is unnecessary. The vast size of the internet has essentially given it "ownership" of the word. It is the internet now.
Slashdot Mirror
I ain't catholic, or even particularly religious, but I think cast her as God was blasphemous. God as a woman? Fine. God as Alanis Morisette? Puh-LEEZ!
1) Tell the telco they want Caller ID blocking (disables telco caller ID info)
2) Send the *spoofed* info between rings with the appropriate format 3) Profit! (i know there should have been ???)
Doesn't work that way. It's a 1200bps burst between the 1st and 2nd rings. I'd like for you to explain how they would send a spoofed data burst when they're not connected to the loop. You see, when you dial a number you're only connected to the telco switch. The telco switch connects to the line you're calling and sends a 1sec 90v pulse every 3sec, and IT puts the 1200bps burst in itself. The ringing noise you hear on your end is just an audio tone played on YOUR circuit by the telco switch to let you know that it's sending the ring signal. You're not physically connected to the other line until the other side gets picked up and the switch ties the two lines together. Pushing a 1200bps burst into the telco switch does absolutely nothing.
Hah! As a former "guy dropped on foreign soil with a gun" myself, I would say that only 60-70% of my fellow soldiers were trustworthy for anything outside their trained military duties. I'd trust 'em all with my life, without doubt; but there was always one guy out of three that you wouldn't trust alone for an hour with your wheels, your wife, or your wallet.
It would be ever worse of algorithms were copyrightable!
No, it wouldn't.
Patents at least expire in 20 years, but copyright is forever (less one day).
Cripes, people, learn the difference between the two. Copyrights and patents aren't the same thing with different terms of expiration. They're related, but conceptually different. Copyright is what prevents me from cutting and pasting the contents of a romance novel (or copying the executable file of MS Word) and selling it as my own work. I am free to write my own romance novel (or word processor) because I'm not copying someone else's work. It's called "copyright" for a reason, i.e. the right to make copies.
Patents, on the other hand, are short term monopolies on methods and processes. You would not (to construct a bizarre example) be able to patent MS Word; rather, you'd patent the concept of a word processor itself. The problem with algoriths and source code is that it straddles the line between machines and written work: it is the code that makes the machine perform the process. Because of this, the USPTO has been instructed to treat an algorithm as a machine that performs a process. This is a bad move, in my opinion. Code has more in common with mathematical formulas (non patentable) than machines (patentable). I think what the original poster meant was that specific algorithm code should be copyright protected, and the algorithms themselves should be unpatentable.
The people who do the hiring and run the place aren't the ones who suffer when funding is cut. My wife works at the University of California and when her department's funding was cut by 70%, they mostly laid off administrative staff. None of the directors got laid off, nor did anyone in HR get laid off. Funding cuts aren't going to hurt the right people. Additionally, a subjectively applicable weapon like that will be used by the enforcing authority to bludgeon departments it doesn't like to death.
Actually, since he's CANADIAN, a US Supreme Court decision doesn't really affect him, nor are the desires of the RIAA directly relevant. It's probably a provision of Canadian copyright law.
Dear god, is such a thing even POSSIBLE?
Change that bowl of rice to a bowl of "freedom fries" and you've described the US congress!
1. Get heart surgery done.
and 2. Pick up laundry.
I tend to prioritize the first one.
OK then, think of it this way: you have a team of 5 heart surgeons and 3 housekeepers. Do you put all 8 of them in the operating theater for your heart surgery, or do you have the 3 housekeeper do something useful (e.g. pick up laundry) rather than standing around in scrubs jostling the anesthesiologist? The DOJ has a lot of people that do a lot of things. If anything, I say we fire the "IP theft goon squad" rather than send them after "terrorists".
Was that your intention?
To me it sounded like the opposite: an objection to associating Ashcroft with catholics via the "Pope Ashcroft" thing, i.e. the OP implied "Ashcroft bad and catholic" and the GP poster said "bad, sure; but catholic? no."
Heh. Well, as she said it herself: "I am reliably informed that if you open a Word document in a hex editor, you see a forest of gibberish". In other words, "I know nothing about what this means, but I know someone who thinks they do, so I'm going to cite it as 'proof'".
AAAAAAAAARGH! I had literally forgotten all about it! I vividly remember each and every time I saw Ep IV, V, and VI in the theater, but it took several minutes of perusing this site before the horror came flooding back. I remember being utterly appalled when I watched it, and I was only nine. Thank you SO much for bringing back this horrible repressed memory.
I prefer clear.
Clear? Why, you're in luck! We can help you get "clear". Brain coloration is caused by fragments of an ancient space god who was blown up eons ago by H-bombs! These fragments make your brain un-clear. Please now enjoy taking a sham personality test that tells you you need to give us lots of money to remove the space god fragments. Thank you
-L. Ron's House of Robots
Am I sure about that? Yes. Look at FLight 93 on 9/11. On a flight with only 33 passengers, enough of them stood up and confronted the hijackers to monkey wrench their plans and force them to nose-in on an empty field. I have no doubt that among a flight of 200 people enough would stand up and have any would-be hijackers hogtied and spitting out broken teeth before he could finish saying "this is a hijacking".
You know, you'd probably end up getting about the same rates as you would otherwise. I suspect the "GPS discount" probably doesn't amount to much more than %10, even if you drive the car 0 miles.
No, I can learn how to make a gun, plow a field, fetch water from a well from an Asian person with whom I have no common language - almost as easily as I could with an English speaking person.
Try getting him to teach you anything like calculus, ethics, or theoretical physics without a common language. Simple manufacturing, plowing, or bucket-hauling are not "complex thought".
Heh. Judging by some of those usenet postsw, people who believe zero isn't real need only look in the mirror!
It's called "sovereign immunity". The Federal Tort Claims Act makes allowances for suits based on federal employee negligence, but I doubt any federal court would consider anything the USPTO does negligent enough to qualify as a valid FTCA suit.
I'd be willing to overlook the common misuse of "LCD" with "display" if it's prefaced with "an", as in "an El See Dee display". But beginning it with "a" makes it a clear case of saying "a Liquid Crystal Display display", which is just plain wrong.
Sadly, you cannot sue the federal government unless granted special dispensation to do so....such dispensation is available only from the federal government itself. strange but true.
Bzzt, wrong! Over 90% of the world still uses MS Office/Windows for their wordprocessing and operating system needs and is willing to pay for it.
Scarcity and rate of adoption are totally unrelated. 90% of the world actively tries to keep flies out of their dwelling, but this refusal to accept them doesn't make flies scarce. Scarcity is about availability, not usage.
Yes.
Heh. This answer alone is enough to put you on my friends list!
True, but if you describe a private IP based network as "an internet", most people will not catch the distinction and wonder why they can't get AOL Instant Messenger to work. The sheer size and common usage of the public internet has essentially established squatters rights on the word itself. This was inevitable. Its proper name "Internet" is spelled the same as the word (formerly) used to describe any internetwork of computers, "internet".
There are scores of unique things which don't have their names capitalized. The earth. The sun. The internet is now one of those things. Initially, it was named the Internet because it wasn't unique. "Internet" was only capitalized in order to differentiate it from other large internetworks of computers back in the early days. Due to the fact that "the internet" itself has become the de facto wide scale global network, relegating the other networks to obscurity or supplanting them entirely, capitalization is unnecessary. The vast size of the internet has essentially given it "ownership" of the word. It is the internet now.
Google already has the domain "gmail.com". We're talking about registering the TRADEMARK.