It's arguable whether "spring-loaded" folders fit the patent or not. After all, it's not the selecting or moving of the first interface object that triggers them, but the separate action of moving it over the folder.
However, the patent clearly covers other UI actions. And more than just "other elements revealing themselves differently". It also covers brand new elements appearing. Take a look at the images that came with the patent application. It shows someone selecting an email message in a list and beginning to drag it upwards, at which point a brand new "Move to Top" target appears.
It's the beating by an order of magnitude in non-esoteric tasks that's the point. It means there's user pain out there that can be addressed, which means there's a niche market where money can be made.
There's a reason for that. Many years ago, the Wisconsin database group (David DeWitt in particular) authored one of the first popular database benchmarks, the Wisconsin benchmarks. They showed that some databases performed embarrassingly poorly, which made a lot of people really angry. In fact, Larry Ellison got so angry, he tried to get DeWitt fired (Ellison wasn't clear on the concept of tenure). Since then, major databases have a "DeWitt clause" in their end-user license, which says that the name of the database can't be used when reporting benchmark results.
And this years ahead of Microsoft not allowing users to benchmark Vista at all!
I think it's wonderful that Google is making all these web apps for editing spreadsheets, word documents, etc. However, no matter how good these web apps are, they're always going to be limited by being in a browser. I think the ideal situation is one where I can use a web app when I'm away from my computer, but when I'm at my own box, I can use a regular app. In other words, kind of like a common situation with email: webmail when I'm roaming, Thunderbird when I'm not.
To that end, what I would love to see is the ability to mount my Google documents on my box through SMB or somesuch. That would give me the best of both worlds: the flexibility of regular apps on my own box, and access to all my documents through web apps when I'm away. Now that would be seriously cool.
I admit I didn't verify my cousin's facts, since I wasn't exactly there to shop for videogames. Still, the general idea is right, even if the details are a bit hyperbolized. The next time I see him, I'll be sure to decapitate him and sew his head on backwards for exaggerating.
I'm originally from Brazil, and go back every once in a while to visit family. The minimum salary there is on the order of $100/month, and piracy is also an everyday fact of life. My cousin tells me that when you buy a PS2 there, it comes pre-modded and with software to play DVDs from any region as part of the bundle; you actually can't buy a PS2 without it. Of course, the reason for this is because Sony never officially released the PS2 in Brazil (according to my cousin, this is because they knew that piracy was so prevalent as to make legitimate sales there unprofitable). For comparison, whereas a pirated game is roughly $10, an unpirated one is nearly $100.
I would have to disagree strongly. For starters, to use the Jog Dial effectively all one needs is a third party application such as PowerJog. This gives me the ability to do everything from the Jog Dial, from going through menus to clicking on buttons, while adding scrolling functionality to essentially all apps. The only things I still need to my stylus for is Graffiti and AvantGo links.
The memory stick is a godsend for people who use their handhelds to read books (I suggest Smoothy, which uses the Jog Dial to change auto-scrolling speed). I have the entire Lord of the Rings on my CLIE and don't have to pay with reduced space for my apps. Also, there are a handful of programs that are kind of large for keeping in memory but that I still want to pull out every once in a while. For example, I keep LispMe on the Memory Stick so that if I write a Scheme program in MemoPad I can move LispMe on to it just long enough to run it, not taking up any permanent space. I can think of dozens of other uses for the memory stick off the top of my head that do not involve backup, and that's without even waiting for developers to really start working it into their applications.
So the Jog Dial and the MemoryStick remain useful beyond anything the Palm Vx offers. Then we get into opinions:
I like the fact that the CLIE is narrower. It feels nicer in my hand; more like a small notepad (the paper type, people. Remember those? Very high resolution, blue lines accross a white screen-like surface?:) than the Palm Vx, which always felt a little too wide for my taste. The side effect of this is that the screen is much sharper, but not so ridiculous as the m100 which makes everything on it look like spider trails.
As far as accessories go, it is true that the CLIE is currently barren. But so was the Visor when it first came out. Sony is developing tech that allows a MemoryStick to essentially double as a Springboard Module. This in itself is enough to counter arguments about the CLIE not having accessories. And BTW, I personally like the case.:)
Finally, as to video and sound and such, I would like to point out that there are thousands of programs written for the PalmOS that are downloaded every day that the vast majority of people would look at and say "WTF? Who on earth would want to do that?" Fact of the matter is, the strength of PalmOS is that you can make it do anything without sacrificing the ease of use of the basic functions. If you want to play movies or sound and have the space on your handheld, you can, and without really bloating the interface.
Very good point, and I definately agree. That's where things like opinion and religion start influencing your stance; at what stage exactly have you crossed the critical point where there's enough of a potential for it to be considered murder? Some people think contraception is bad for this very reason.
Well, that argument shores up one of the many ways one can claim creating organ factories is immoral. Without staking my claim, let me make an observation: A day old fetus has no brain, yet a large percentage of the people in this country would argue that killing it is unethical. Obviously the "no brain = no soul = no problem" argument does not fly in some cases. To a lot of people it comes down to a definition of where and when life begins. I can easily see someone arguing that since you could have made this a living human being and instead chose to make it an dead body, it is as much murder as abortion.
Well, for starters, the term "cloning" was an extremely bad PR move, as it conjures visions of armies of identical soldiers wreaking havoc on the less scientifically advanced populaces of bad sci-fi movies. If one takes the time to read up on what is actually being done, it becomes obvious that "cloning" is really not as open to the insane abuse a lot of people assume.
More important, however, is the other question brought up in this post (namely whether or not scientists can limit the use of a technology they have developed). Seems to me that would be a resounding "no." Science is not advanced through geniuses re-inventing the wheel. Instead, people build on the work of others before them, often taking it in entirely new directions. Once a techonlogy has been developed it is only a matter of time before it is built upon in a way that the original inventors have no means of controlling. I highly doubt that every discoverer in history that contributed to the knowledge used in nuclear weapons would be happy with how their work is being applied.
Seems to me that if nothing else this sort of techonology brings us closer to the communication ideal, ie being able to contact anyone who wants to be contacted any time you need them. You'll notice, of course, that the web site fails to mention whether or not the phone will only be outgoing (common sense seems to imply that it must be). If that's the case, at the very least it'll still be incredibly convenient. Biggest downside of owning a cell phone in this country is that you pay for incoming calls, so it wouldn't be a huge letdown if this thing only supported outgoing.
Try this site. It mentions that this was once considered an urban legend, but also contains references to proof - such as a Wall Street Journal article and a court case - showing that it is actually true.
Okay, here's the deal with trademarks:
A trademark is only valid so long as the entity registering the trademark continues to defend it. This is why there is a large number of people working for Coca-Cola who go around the country stopping at restaurants and ordering a Coke, then sampling the order and sending it back to the Coca-Cola company for testing. If it turns out they were not served a Coca-Cola, the restaurant is sent a cease-and-desist order. Obviously, the best scenario for a company is for the general populace to start using their trademarked name as a generic product name (Aspirin, Kleenex, etc) but to still nail any distributor that doesn't uphold the trademark.
In summary, even though Despair, Inc does have a trademark on:-(, you are basically allowed to use it until you are told to stop by Despair.
A little late for this thread, true, but consider this:
There is a medical condition called anencephaly, which essentially means to be born with most of the brain missing. Children born like this are still technically alive.
Slashdot Mirror
It's arguable whether "spring-loaded" folders fit the patent or not. After all, it's not the selecting or moving of the first interface object that triggers them, but the separate action of moving it over the folder.
However, the patent clearly covers other UI actions. And more than just "other elements revealing themselves differently". It also covers brand new elements appearing. Take a look at the images that came with the patent application. It shows someone selecting an email message in a list and beginning to drag it upwards, at which point a brand new "Move to Top" target appears.
It's the beating by an order of magnitude in non-esoteric tasks that's the point. It means there's user pain out there that can be addressed, which means there's a niche market where money can be made.
There's a reason for that. Many years ago, the Wisconsin database group (David DeWitt in particular) authored one of the first popular database benchmarks, the Wisconsin benchmarks. They showed that some databases performed embarrassingly poorly, which made a lot of people really angry. In fact, Larry Ellison got so angry, he tried to get DeWitt fired (Ellison wasn't clear on the concept of tenure). Since then, major databases have a "DeWitt clause" in their end-user license, which says that the name of the database can't be used when reporting benchmark results.
And this years ahead of Microsoft not allowing users to benchmark Vista at all!
I think it's wonderful that Google is making all these web apps for editing spreadsheets, word documents, etc. However, no matter how good these web apps are, they're always going to be limited by being in a browser. I think the ideal situation is one where I can use a web app when I'm away from my computer, but when I'm at my own box, I can use a regular app. In other words, kind of like a common situation with email: webmail when I'm roaming, Thunderbird when I'm not.
To that end, what I would love to see is the ability to mount my Google documents on my box through SMB or somesuch. That would give me the best of both worlds: the flexibility of regular apps on my own box, and access to all my documents through web apps when I'm away. Now that would be seriously cool.
I admit I didn't verify my cousin's facts, since I wasn't exactly there to shop for videogames. Still, the general idea is right, even if the details are a bit hyperbolized. The next time I see him, I'll be sure to decapitate him and sew his head on backwards for exaggerating.
I'm originally from Brazil, and go back every once in a while to visit family. The minimum salary there is on the order of $100/month, and piracy is also an everyday fact of life. My cousin tells me that when you buy a PS2 there, it comes pre-modded and with software to play DVDs from any region as part of the bundle; you actually can't buy a PS2 without it. Of course, the reason for this is because Sony never officially released the PS2 in Brazil (according to my cousin, this is because they knew that piracy was so prevalent as to make legitimate sales there unprofitable). For comparison, whereas a pirated game is roughly $10, an unpirated one is nearly $100.
I would have to disagree strongly. For starters, to use the Jog Dial effectively all one needs is a third party application such as PowerJog. This gives me the ability to do everything from the Jog Dial, from going through menus to clicking on buttons, while adding scrolling functionality to essentially all apps. The only things I still need to my stylus for is Graffiti and AvantGo links.
:) than the Palm Vx, which always felt a little too wide for my taste. The side effect of this is that the screen is much sharper, but not so ridiculous as the m100 which makes everything on it look like spider trails.
:)
The memory stick is a godsend for people who use their handhelds to read books (I suggest Smoothy, which uses the Jog Dial to change auto-scrolling speed). I have the entire Lord of the Rings on my CLIE and don't have to pay with reduced space for my apps. Also, there are a handful of programs that are kind of large for keeping in memory but that I still want to pull out every once in a while. For example, I keep LispMe on the Memory Stick so that if I write a Scheme program in MemoPad I can move LispMe on to it just long enough to run it, not taking up any permanent space. I can think of dozens of other uses for the memory stick off the top of my head that do not involve backup, and that's without even waiting for developers to really start working it into their applications.
So the Jog Dial and the MemoryStick remain useful beyond anything the Palm Vx offers. Then we get into opinions:
I like the fact that the CLIE is narrower. It feels nicer in my hand; more like a small notepad (the paper type, people. Remember those? Very high resolution, blue lines accross a white screen-like surface?
As far as accessories go, it is true that the CLIE is currently barren. But so was the Visor when it first came out. Sony is developing tech that allows a MemoryStick to essentially double as a Springboard Module. This in itself is enough to counter arguments about the CLIE not having accessories. And BTW, I personally like the case.
Finally, as to video and sound and such, I would like to point out that there are thousands of programs written for the PalmOS that are downloaded every day that the vast majority of people would look at and say "WTF? Who on earth would want to do that?" Fact of the matter is, the strength of PalmOS is that you can make it do anything without sacrificing the ease of use of the basic functions. If you want to play movies or sound and have the space on your handheld, you can, and without really bloating the interface.
----
Very good point, and I definately agree. That's where things like opinion and religion start influencing your stance; at what stage exactly have you crossed the critical point where there's enough of a potential for it to be considered murder? Some people think contraception is bad for this very reason.
:)
I'll have to try that line, though.
Well, that argument shores up one of the many ways one can claim creating organ factories is immoral. Without staking my claim, let me make an observation: A day old fetus has no brain, yet a large percentage of the people in this country would argue that killing it is unethical. Obviously the "no brain = no soul = no problem" argument does not fly in some cases. To a lot of people it comes down to a definition of where and when life begins. I can easily see someone arguing that since you could have made this a living human being and instead chose to make it an dead body, it is as much murder as abortion.
Well, for starters, the term "cloning" was an extremely bad PR move, as it conjures visions of armies of identical soldiers wreaking havoc on the less scientifically advanced populaces of bad sci-fi movies. If one takes the time to read up on what is actually being done, it becomes obvious that "cloning" is really not as open to the insane abuse a lot of people assume.
More important, however, is the other question brought up in this post (namely whether or not scientists can limit the use of a technology they have developed). Seems to me that would be a resounding "no." Science is not advanced through geniuses re-inventing the wheel. Instead, people build on the work of others before them, often taking it in entirely new directions. Once a techonlogy has been developed it is only a matter of time before it is built upon in a way that the original inventors have no means of controlling. I highly doubt that every discoverer in history that contributed to the knowledge used in nuclear weapons would be happy with how their work is being applied.
Seems to me that if nothing else this sort of techonology brings us closer to the communication ideal, ie being able to contact anyone who wants to be contacted any time you need them. You'll notice, of course, that the web site fails to mention whether or not the phone will only be outgoing (common sense seems to imply that it must be). If that's the case, at the very least it'll still be incredibly convenient. Biggest downside of owning a cell phone in this country is that you pay for incoming calls, so it wouldn't be a huge letdown if this thing only supported outgoing.
Try this site. It mentions that this was once considered an urban legend, but also contains references to proof - such as a Wall Street Journal article and a court case - showing that it is actually true.
Man, gotta love Google.
Okay, here's the deal with trademarks: A trademark is only valid so long as the entity registering the trademark continues to defend it. This is why there is a large number of people working for Coca-Cola who go around the country stopping at restaurants and ordering a Coke, then sampling the order and sending it back to the Coca-Cola company for testing. If it turns out they were not served a Coca-Cola, the restaurant is sent a cease-and-desist order. Obviously, the best scenario for a company is for the general populace to start using their trademarked name as a generic product name (Aspirin, Kleenex, etc) but to still nail any distributor that doesn't uphold the trademark.
:-(, you are basically allowed to use it until you are told to stop by Despair.
In summary, even though Despair, Inc does have a trademark on
Just FYI.
A little late for this thread, true, but consider this:
There is a medical condition called anencephaly, which essentially means to be born with most of the brain missing. Children born like this are still technically alive.