Investigators in Yemen yesterday uncovered evidence suggesting the bomb attack on the warship USS Cole had been a meticulously organised conspiracy, which a leading US terrorism expert said may have been the first joint operation between Osama bin Laden and Saddam Hussein.
Blah blah blah, prior art, who cares? Apparently IPIX and the Patent Office apparently do not. IPIX has been doing this for YEARS.
I got a Nikon Coolpix 700 a couple of years ago, and it came with a IPIX viewer! After inquiring to IPIX as to the cost of the IPIX generator, I found out their license is based PER PICTURE!!! They've got to be out of their f*****g minds! I've played around with Apple's QuickTime VR 3D viewer (http://www.apple.com/quicktime/products/qt/overvi ew/qtvr.html) and Dersch's Panorama tools and I've had many ideas on what to do with a Coolpix fisheye lens and the panorama software, but figured it was a matter of time before IPIX would seek and destroy everyone in it's path.
In the meantime, everyone talks about prior art, make those NO IPIX websites, blah blah blah for YEARS and what is the result? IPIX is still seeking and destroying anything which walks talks or smells like a patent infringement. And this is what gets me, IPIX goes after not just companies that produce competing software, but the USERS of the technology. That's like getting a patent on a paintbrush, and then going out and shutting down all artists until they fork up royalties PER PICTURE, NOT JUST A ONE TIME FEE people! What the f**k ever happened to the first amendment? How can it be beneficial to the people of the United States that this situation is allowed to occur in the first place?
The majority of the users of IPIX apparently are large companies. At least those are the only websites I've found that have have any significant IPIX content. IPIX is basically saying, "yeah, it's going to cost you a bundle to use this technology, and if you try anything else, we're going to sue you. What are you going to do about it?" Well, is there anything we can do about it? If there is, let's quit whining about it and do something.
I believe we better do something about this, because this per usage license could be the model of things to come. And if other companies see what IPIX is doing and the only thing geeks and other people can do is create NO IPIX websites and bitch about it on Slashdot, we'll see a LOT more per picture/playback/etc licenses in the future!
will eventually eliminate the desktop and command line for the consumer already? I heard it's called the XBox.
Seriously, what's wrong with having the OS on the disk and just either plunking down the app on the CD into the machine? You have a known, capable hardware platform to write to and can control the entire OS config. No desktop, the app comes up immediately. File storage, updates, or server side programs can be done by plugging the box into a network. A seven year old can handle this.
Of course, there will always be situations where a PC is required (unusual hardware, configurable software), but for the average user, all you need is a browser, email, word processor, and Quicken. Why can't this be done on the X-Box on a network?
You want to know why software sucks? This is why today's software sucks:
Frank Lloyd Wright in today's software design environment
Imagine Frank joining a building design team as a newhire on Monday. He attends a design meeting:
Boss: Hey everyone, we have a newhire whose name is Frank Lloyd Wright who's a software engineer.
Frank: Hi everyone.
Boss: So let's kick off some issues on our new Fallingwater project...
Engineer #1 (John): Hey, we've been building functional cinder block outhouses for decades now using the functional method, and dammit, it worked for the last 30 years. Ignore that last project we worked on where we had to knock down the whole house just to add another bathroom. I see no reason to use any other method of designing this building and you can't tell me any new design method will work.
Engineer #2 (Joe): I've just read this book on designing building by patterns. Listen to just me as I tell you how to design this whole building. At least wait until I get to Chapter 3.
Frank: Um, I had this vision of using an architecture where every part of the building has a specific purpose, there were specific interfaces between the components, and they all fit beautifully together, along with the external environment. I've done a number of projects that...
Engineer #3 (James): [butting in] That's fine Frank, but we have to build this building in the same manner as the last building, so we don't have to change the documentation.
Boss: (who just happens to like #1): I think John has the right track for building this Fallingwater project. Let's get together two days from now to see how things are progressing. Let's keep working on that design document we've been doing for the last year and a half.
Next design meeting (two days later):
Boss: Hey everyone. Before I start, let me say Frank is leaving us to work at another company starting next week. Let's have a going away lunch tomorrow, OK? Let's continue...
I don't know about anyone else, but I plan to buy a few pre-CPRM hard drives, if this standard is implemented. I'll just keep my existing system for as long as it holds up.
What's the cost of a drive now? $100? I could buy a few that would last a while...
(off topic opinion) Given how the music industry killed consumer DAT with copy protection in the hardware, the PC will probably go the same way. The PC market as it exists has reached saturation point and has one foot in the grave already. CPRM will put the consumer multimedia PC market totally into the grave.
Guess those greedy record company bastards who give you $18 CDs (remember when those lying bastards said "oh yes, when we ramp up production, CDs will cost the same as LPs"). Now they're playing hardball with file sharing technology to keep their obscenely fat profits.
That's analogous to saying "you're not buying a car, you're buying a driving experience" or "you're not buying spam, you're buying a dining experience:)" I don't understand how people try to justify stealing property because of blurring the idea behind the product (IP), the product itself (P), and the original company's profit from the product itself (not the IP).
Designing a car or whatever takes a certain amount of IP, and then a whole lot of manufacturing to create a tangible product. Now, we can take the ideas (IP) and make our own car, and that's done all the time (as we can write our own software to do the same type of game). This is going to take a stretch, but just suppose there existed a machine that can take dirt or any matter, decompose it to subatomic particles, and reorganize the matter to make an exact duplicate of that car. Now, is it stealing the original car? No. Now for the big question: is it denying the original car manufacturer the money they would have gotten for the car sale? An absolute yes. I feel THIS is the heart of the matter: denying an exchange of money for a good or service and getting the good or service anyway is EXACTLY the same as stealing the money from the company in the first place, as you are taking money away from the company.
Substitute "software" for "car" and arrive at the same conclusion.
So, what does all this mean? We should NOT ask if you could take intellectual property, as I would agree IP should be free. I think this question is just a smoke screen. We SHOULD ask, instead, if you should deny the profit of the original manufacturer of software by copying the bits and using them in place of a cash transaction to buy the software. In this question, my answer is no.
BTW, just because software is either some groupings of magnetic fluctuations on a magnetic medium or pits in some polycarbonate, it doesn't mean it's not tangible property. It has to be coupled with a computer to produce a tangible effect (in some cases as a CNC machine or robot, a physical effect). Look at it this way, cold medicine by itself is just some chemical that doesn't appear to do much. It doesn't seem to react to anything. BUT, ingest it and the body will metabolize it and interact with it to do very tangible effects. THAT's why we shell out cash at the drug store for it. Same way with software. Would you suggest that just because the cold medicine doesn't appear to do anything, we can just take it from the store?
Slashdot Mirror
And the third link has the following text:
Investigators in Yemen yesterday uncovered evidence suggesting the bomb attack on the warship USS Cole had been a meticulously organised conspiracy, which a leading US terrorism expert said may have been the first joint operation between Osama bin Laden and Saddam Hussein.
My what a difference 10 years make...
I got a Nikon Coolpix 700 a couple of years ago, and it came with a IPIX viewer! After inquiring to IPIX as to the cost of the IPIX generator, I found out their license is based PER PICTURE!!! They've got to be out of their f*****g minds! I've played around with Apple's QuickTime VR 3D viewer (http://www.apple.com/quicktime/products/qt/overvi ew/qtvr.html) and Dersch's Panorama tools and I've had many ideas on what to do with a Coolpix fisheye lens and the panorama software, but figured it was a matter of time before IPIX would seek and destroy everyone in it's path.
In the meantime, everyone talks about prior art, make those NO IPIX websites, blah blah blah for YEARS and what is the result? IPIX is still seeking and destroying anything which walks talks or smells like a patent infringement. And this is what gets me, IPIX goes after not just companies that produce competing software, but the USERS of the technology. That's like getting a patent on a paintbrush, and then going out and shutting down all artists until they fork up royalties PER PICTURE, NOT JUST A ONE TIME FEE people! What the f**k ever happened to the first amendment? How can it be beneficial to the people of the United States that this situation is allowed to occur in the first place?
The majority of the users of IPIX apparently are large companies. At least those are the only websites I've found that have have any significant IPIX content. IPIX is basically saying, "yeah, it's going to cost you a bundle to use this technology, and if you try anything else, we're going to sue you. What are you going to do about it?" Well, is there anything we can do about it? If there is, let's quit whining about it and do something.
I believe we better do something about this, because this per usage license could be the model of things to come. And if other companies see what IPIX is doing and the only thing geeks and other people can do is create NO IPIX websites and bitch about it on Slashdot, we'll see a LOT more per picture/playback/etc licenses in the future!
will eventually eliminate the desktop and command line for the consumer already? I heard it's called the XBox.
Seriously, what's wrong with having the OS on the disk and just either plunking down the app on the CD into the machine? You have a known, capable hardware platform to write to and can control the entire OS config. No desktop, the app comes up immediately. File storage, updates, or server side programs can be done by plugging the box into a network. A seven year old can handle this.
Of course, there will always be situations where a PC is required (unusual hardware, configurable software), but for the average user, all you need is a browser, email, word processor, and Quicken. Why can't this be done on the X-Box on a network?
Sentence:
Boss: Hey everyone, we have a newhire whose name is Frank Lloyd Wright who's a software engineer.
Should Read:
Boss: Hey everyone, we have a newhire whose name is Frank Lloyd Wright who's an architect.
Sorry. Damn.
You want to know why software sucks? This is why today's software sucks:
Frank Lloyd Wright in today's software design environment
Imagine Frank joining a building design team as a newhire on Monday. He attends a design meeting:
Boss: Hey everyone, we have a newhire whose name is Frank Lloyd Wright who's a software engineer.
Frank: Hi everyone.
Boss: So let's kick off some issues on our new Fallingwater project...
Engineer #1 (John): Hey, we've been building functional cinder block outhouses for decades now using the functional method, and dammit, it worked for the last 30 years. Ignore that last project we worked on where we had to knock down the whole house just to add another bathroom. I see no reason to use any other method of designing this building and you can't tell me any new design method will work.
Engineer #2 (Joe): I've just read this book on designing building by patterns. Listen to just me as I tell you how to design this whole building. At least wait until I get to Chapter 3.
Frank: Um, I had this vision of using an architecture where every part of the building has a specific purpose, there were specific interfaces between the components, and they all fit beautifully together, along with the external environment. I've done a number of projects that...
Engineer #3 (James): [butting in] That's fine Frank, but we have to build this building in the same manner as the last building, so we don't have to change the documentation.
Boss: (who just happens to like #1): I think John has the right track for building this Fallingwater project. Let's get together two days from now to see how things are progressing. Let's keep working on that design document we've been doing for the last year and a half.
Next design meeting (two days later):
Boss: Hey everyone. Before I start, let me say Frank is leaving us to work at another company starting next week. Let's have a going away lunch tomorrow, OK? Let's continue...
I don't know about anyone else, but I plan to buy a few pre-CPRM hard drives, if this standard is implemented. I'll just keep my existing system for as long as it holds up.
What's the cost of a drive now? $100? I could buy a few that would last a while...
(off topic opinion) Given how the music industry killed consumer DAT with copy protection in the hardware, the PC will probably go the same way. The PC market as it exists has reached saturation point and has one foot in the grave already. CPRM will put the consumer multimedia PC market totally into the grave.
Guess those greedy record company bastards who give you $18 CDs (remember when those lying bastards said "oh yes, when we ramp up production, CDs will cost the same as LPs"). Now they're playing hardball with file sharing technology to keep their obscenely fat profits.
That's analogous to saying "you're not buying a car, you're buying a driving experience" or "you're not buying spam, you're buying a dining experience :)" I don't understand how people try to justify stealing property because of blurring the idea behind the product (IP), the product itself (P), and the original company's profit from the product itself (not the IP).
Designing a car or whatever takes a certain amount of IP, and then a whole lot of manufacturing to create a tangible product. Now, we can take the ideas (IP) and make our own car, and that's done all the time (as we can write our own software to do the same type of game). This is going to take a stretch, but just suppose there existed a machine that can take dirt or any matter, decompose it to subatomic particles, and reorganize the matter to make an exact duplicate of that car. Now, is it stealing the original car? No. Now for the big question: is it denying the original car manufacturer the money they would have gotten for the car sale? An absolute yes. I feel THIS is the heart of the matter: denying an exchange of money for a good or service and getting the good or service anyway is EXACTLY the same as stealing the money from the company in the first place, as you are taking money away from the company.
Substitute "software" for "car" and arrive at the same conclusion.
So, what does all this mean? We should NOT ask if you could take intellectual property, as I would agree IP should be free. I think this question is just a smoke screen. We SHOULD ask, instead, if you should deny the profit of the original manufacturer of software by copying the bits and using them in place of a cash transaction to buy the software. In this question, my answer is no.
BTW, just because software is either some groupings of magnetic fluctuations on a magnetic medium or pits in some polycarbonate, it doesn't mean it's not tangible property. It has to be coupled with a computer to produce a tangible effect (in some cases as a CNC machine or robot, a physical effect). Look at it this way, cold medicine by itself is just some chemical that doesn't appear to do much. It doesn't seem to react to anything. BUT, ingest it and the body will metabolize it and interact with it to do very tangible effects. THAT's why we shell out cash at the drug store for it. Same way with software. Would you suggest that just because the cold medicine doesn't appear to do anything, we can just take it from the store?