My SIM works in any (gsm) phone and my phone works with any SIM. Unless the phone and/or SIM have been locked together by the provider as part of a discount scheme or whatever - thus guaranteeing that people don't take advantage of a cheap phone from provider X without giving X a return on their investment (i.e. the discount they have given you)
It's the general dishonesty of people that has lead providers to do this anyway;)
In the UK (afaik) pre-pay (pay as you go etc) phone are locked to the SIM the come with and the two only work as a package but usually after a year you can get this lock removed.
Contract phones/SIMS are not locked together - because you have a contract that should give the provider their return.
Now you could whinge and say they are screwing with your freedom...
BUT YOU DON'T HAVE TO BUY WHAT THEY ARE SELLING
geddit?
I have two phones and two SIMS (a UK one and an NL one) and the whole lot works interchangably. No IMEI numbers have been fiddled with etc etc and personally speaking if my phone is nicked and the network can disable it, then jolly good. It'll stop the b*stards running a huge bill at my expense.
I don't feel the need to hack the VIN number of my car or the serial numbers of my water/gas/electricity meters.
and I actually like that it's not allowed
I think the IMEI should be hardcoded into the phone (and engraved). Just like a VIN. Phones are expensive and easily stealable so anything that will reduce teh probablilty that it's stolen is fine by me.
I have a mate who does the same thing every night with an Apple laptop running OSX and an external firewire drive.
He doesn't seem to have any problems with speed or stability and the machine had an uptime of a few weeks (has to reboot for the odd install) - including being put to sleep etc to go to work.
I recently checked the thing and it was as happy as a lark
The patent would be on the APPLICATION of that sequence FOR A SPECIFIC purpose. Th patent would not be a blanket "ownership" of the sequence - as, for a start, you have prior art for that:)
Re:Burger King is finally going to beat a competit
on
Apple to Unveil .Mac Today
·
· Score: 4, Interesting
Here's my letter to apple
Hello
I have to say I am extremely disappointed by the annoncement that the free iTools service will become the expensive.Mac (what a silly name) service.
I was under the impression, given to me by Apple, that iTools - anc specifically the mac.com email address, was free for life - this feels like a bait and then charge scam, something I had believed Apple was incapable of stooping to.
I resent being made to pay 100 dollars a year for a free email service (as that's what I use) and I guess I will have to resign myself to tell everyone I know (those same people I have been evangelising Apple and iTools to for years) that my email address is chainging AGAIN. They will all laugh and say things like "I told you so".
I like my computer, but it is becoming harder and harder to justify the hardware expense of a Mac. Slowly but surely you are forcing me to pay for those features (individually) that make a mac "insanely great". I can't afford 100 dollars here and there. I already pay for many other software packages. I can get the functionality that iTools and the other apple specific software elsewhere - often free or shareware. Sure I lose that ease of use, but I am not sure I want to own something from a manufacturer who dangles a carrot in my face - even lets me lick it, and then chanrges me to eat it, when I can go and pick carrots (maybe not such nice ones) from my garden.
This could severely backfire and I suspect will cause a LOT of negative press - I can see now why you were so hasty to chuck out the "rumour" sites. I, for one, will be making damn sure that as many publications as possible report this disgusting move on your part and I will no longer be recommending Apple Macs to my friends and family (I have personally, up to now, converted a large number of people). Whilst I still believe you have a superior product, I cannot condone your actions and I am afraid this will be the last straw.
I need an new computer anyway. It was going to be a mac. It still mightm if you reconsider this rash decision. If not, it's off to Penguin-Land for me.
Yours, with tears in my eyes.
John Savage
PS This will be the end of an era. I have stood by Apple and their "interesting" decisions for well over a decade, until recently the only Mac user in a army of PC clones. I regret that I persuaded all my family and most of my friends into converting to the cause. I guess my (and their) few thousand dollars a year in hardware and software sales isn't worth keeping?
And this is why we employ specialists (usually with PhDs in their field) for a partcular field. Most of us are published.
i.e. the cat-flap specialist (and we have some!) won't get quantum mechanical applications. So, yes, we do have quantum physicists here. Ones who have worked at Cern. We also have fully trained, industrially adept biochemists etc etc. Just look at our recruitment requirements (the requirement to speak, read and write technical English, French and German is a toughie)
The USPTO do have specialists too, however they don't specialise to such a degree - but their main problem is they are given no time for a search due to workload. Together with a shit approach to software patents it's true.
So we don't make arbitraty judgements, people are hired to fit the niche they know and are specialists in and we are encouraged (conferences etc) to remain fully up to date in our field of expertise. When I joined/. (many years ago) I was a research scientist.
Troc
PS (again) to anyone like Rob... if you want to organise a Q&A session I will happily answer the/. questions.
Dammed Swiss keyboard. Because we are european we have to use the same keyboard and the Swiss ones have the easiest (allegedly) selection of extra characters.
This annoys me as it means I have a qwertz keyboard here, with ; and : in odd places. So that's why.
I don't fancy you. Probably. Are you a Natalie Portman/Kylie Minogue lookalike?
Heh, we have a whole book, called the "guidelines" it's a public publication which you can download from our website (convention, guidelines).
Essentially, a novelty destroying document is one which discloses all the features of a claim (or invention) in a single embodiment or example. This can be another patent or any prior publication from anywhere - as long it was public knowledge at some point;)
Usually we have to challenge inventive step - in this we argue that something isn't inventive because someone skilled in the art (but with no inventive ability) WOULD combine the knowledge of two different documents to arrive at the concept.
I know its dry and boring (as are all legal texts) but iy you get a chance, our guidelines and the European Patent Convention do have some info;)
Personally I feel a little cheated if (and this is rare) I don't find a set of prejudicial documents during a search;)
Then I don't work in computing and crap like that.......
Troc
Nope. Bzzzzzt, wrong. If you file for a patent then some months later the application in all it's beauty is published (the "some" depends on where and what system use use).
Whether it ever gets granted and in what state.. well that's another matter.
I am a patent examiner working for the European Patent Office and we operate somewhat differently from the USPTO. For a start, we spend MUCH more time researching a patent (2-3 times as much or more). Secondly we have a much bigger database and full external access to many more.
Then there's this *new* thing the USPTO has started to do - which everyone else has been doing for ever, which is to publish a PATENT APPLICATION before it's been examined or granted. Thish gives people the opportunity (and the right) to submit to us any information they think might be relevant, if they so wish.
So to recap.
1. Patent Applications are published before being granted. 2. That's PUBLICLY published (just try our website;) 3. Most places (i.e. Europe, Japan etc) do actually spend a decent amount of time on a search and, in our case using the largest, fully indexed knowledge database available (The USPTO are trying to buy our system). 4. Please don't tar all of us with the USPTO brush. We all know they are crap - that's why most Americans ask the EPO to examine their internations patent applications.
hohum
Troc
PS I am happy to do some sort of question/answer thing about this if you want.
The KLF Orb The Grid L garnier JM Jarre (no really) Transglobal Underground Members of Mayday
*shrug*
Problem is, what kind of "electronica" do you want?
Just dancy stuff (Carl Cox), Weird ambient stuff (Orb, KLF, Sven Vath), old fashioned stuff (Kraftwerk, JM Jarre), Trancy stuff (anything Goa-esque) or even stuff like Depeche Mode or the synth bands of the eighties (New Order etc etc)
Yeah. I shall write to Greenpeace now! And my member of parliament. This "sun" thing should be stopped before it goes nova. I mean it's giving us all skin cancer, it's why we need air conditioning - which contributes to global warming and has resulted in loads of CFCs in the atmosphere - which has resulted in the holes in the ozone layer - which is allowing the sun's HARMFUL rays onto our litle planet.
That sun thing is the main danger we face for solar-system exploration too, dammed solar flares would just cook an astronauts outside the Van Allen radiation belts. It's uncontrolled fusion reactors like these that will result in the eventual heat-death of the universe.
I think the sun is a Communist, Capitalist plot to sell more sunglasses.;) (for the humo(u)r impaired)
Heh... where I work we are planning to move to 2000 next year-ish.
We currently use OS/2 (no, really) and have just had all our main proprietry apps rewritten into Java so they can be platform independent(ish) and then we can migrate to 2000.
I'm somewhat sceptical. But I also hate OS/2's lack of modern drivers and apps. etc etc. I mean I am typing this using Netscape 4.6 as it's the most modern one we can get (yeah I know there are versions of mozilla etc out there but we have a weird system and they won't install)
Where there is a higher popultion density, you need MORE cells in a given area to serve the higher population density - city cells are often smaller than 1 block in size whereas out in the countryside they can be many miles apart. So Japan (or Holland where I live) need cell densities over the whole country that are similar to those used in the cities in otehr parts of the world.....
Ok, they are still close together so connecting them isn't so hard I guess but I reckon a few cells in Arizona somewhere would be cheaper than setting up a few in manhatten (assuming the locals didn't fill 'em full of buckshot on a Friday night;)
Don't forget that we already have some journeys where train is better. London to Paris for example - 3hrs from Waterloo to Gare du Nord. Sure the 'plane has a shorter journey time, but once you figure in check-in times and travel to/from the airports it's quicker all told - and you can get MUCH more work/reading/sleeping done.
I would think the same would be true of trips between quite a number of European cities.......
I would rather spend 3hrs in a comfortable train than 1hr in an airport, 1hr in a 'plane, 30 mins in an airport and an hour in various taxis at each end.
True enough, a 1G fall will do you little if no harm - and is actually quite pleasant, just look at all the sky divers out there.
The extremely high G landing (probably in the 100's if not 1000's depending on the surface - rising depending on how unyielding the surface etc etc) would I suspect put quite a dent in your day.
Slashdot Mirror
That's so not a valid excuse. The excuse "to see if I can" is often touted here and is bollocks.....
;)
Why did you remove the VIN from your car?
Why did you shoot the President?
Why did you build a Nuke?
Why did you post a pointless story on Slashdot?
Why did you reset the dials on your water meter?
etc
Troc
PS Some of the above are meant to be funny, some aren't. It's up to you now
erm, yeah but
;)
My SIM works in any (gsm) phone and my phone works with any SIM. Unless the phone and/or SIM have been locked together by the provider as part of a discount scheme or whatever - thus guaranteeing that people don't take advantage of a cheap phone from provider X without giving X a return on their investment (i.e. the discount they have given you)
It's the general dishonesty of people that has lead providers to do this anyway
In the UK (afaik) pre-pay (pay as you go etc) phone are locked to the SIM the come with and the two only work as a package but usually after a year you can get this lock removed.
Contract phones/SIMS are not locked together - because you have a contract that should give the provider their return.
Now you could whinge and say they are screwing with your freedom...
BUT YOU DON'T HAVE TO BUY WHAT THEY ARE SELLING
geddit?
I have two phones and two SIMS (a UK one and an NL one) and the whole lot works interchangably. No IMEI numbers have been fiddled with etc etc and personally speaking if my phone is nicked and the network can disable it, then jolly good. It'll stop the b*stards running a huge bill at my expense.
I don't feel the need to hack the VIN number of my car or the serial numbers of my water/gas/electricity meters.
and I actually like that it's not allowed
I think the IMEI should be hardcoded into the phone (and engraved). Just like a VIN. Phones are expensive and easily stealable so anything that will reduce teh probablilty that it's stolen is fine by me.
hohum
Troc
I have a mate who does the same thing every night with an Apple laptop running OSX and an external firewire drive.
He doesn't seem to have any problems with speed or stability and the machine had an uptime of a few weeks (has to reboot for the odd install) - including being put to sleep etc to go to work.
I recently checked the thing and it was as happy as a lark
Troc
It's just a German thing (thank (the) god(s)) - and they don't seem to know why they are called that either.
hohum
troc
The patent would be on the APPLICATION of that sequence FOR A SPECIFIC purpose. Th patent would not be a blanket "ownership" of the sequence - as, for a start, you have prior art for that :)
Troc
Or..
maybe manholes are round because manhole covers are round?
spooky
Troc
I'm English
:)
I have a warped sense of humour
Troc
Here's my letter to apple
.Mac (what a silly name) service.
Hello
I have to say I am extremely disappointed by the annoncement that the free iTools service will become the expensive
I was under the impression, given to me by Apple, that iTools - anc specifically the mac.com email address, was free for life - this feels like a bait and then charge scam, something I had believed Apple was incapable of stooping to.
I resent being made to pay 100 dollars a year for a free email service (as that's what I use) and I guess I will have to resign myself to tell everyone I know (those same people I have been evangelising Apple and iTools to for years) that my email address is chainging AGAIN. They will all laugh and say things like "I told you so".
I like my computer, but it is becoming harder and harder to justify the hardware expense of a Mac. Slowly but surely you are forcing me to pay for those features (individually) that make a mac "insanely great". I can't afford 100 dollars here and there. I already pay for many other software packages. I can get the functionality that iTools and the other apple specific software elsewhere - often free or shareware. Sure I lose that ease of use, but I am not sure I want to own something from a manufacturer who dangles a carrot in my face - even lets me lick it, and then chanrges me to eat it, when I can go and pick carrots (maybe not such nice ones) from my garden.
This could severely backfire and I suspect will cause a LOT of negative press - I can see now why you were so hasty to chuck out the "rumour" sites. I, for one, will be making damn sure that as many publications as possible report this disgusting move on your part and I will no longer be recommending Apple Macs to my friends and family (I have personally, up to now, converted a large number of people). Whilst I still believe you have a superior product, I cannot condone your actions and I am afraid this will be the last straw.
I need an new computer anyway. It was going to be a mac. It still mightm if you reconsider this rash decision. If not, it's off to Penguin-Land for me.
Yours, with tears in my eyes.
John Savage
PS This will be the end of an era. I have stood by Apple and their "interesting" decisions for well over a decade, until recently the only Mac user in a army of PC clones. I regret that I persuaded all my family and most of my friends into converting to the cause. I guess my (and their) few thousand dollars a year in hardware and software sales isn't worth keeping?
Well, Steve has announced it.
:( very annoyed.
Bah.
And this is why we employ specialists (usually with PhDs in their field) for a partcular field. Most of us are published.
/. (many years ago) I was a research scientist.
/. questions.
i.e. the cat-flap specialist (and we have some!) won't get quantum mechanical applications. So, yes, we do have quantum physicists here. Ones who have worked at Cern. We also have fully trained, industrially adept biochemists etc etc. Just look at our recruitment requirements (the requirement to speak, read and write technical English, French and German is a toughie)
The USPTO do have specialists too, however they don't specialise to such a degree - but their main problem is they are given no time for a search due to workload. Together with a shit approach to software patents it's true.
So we don't make arbitraty judgements, people are hired to fit the niche they know and are specialists in and we are encouraged (conferences etc) to remain fully up to date in our field of expertise. When I joined
Troc
PS (again) to anyone like Rob... if you want to organise a Q&A session I will happily answer the
Dammed Swiss keyboard. Because we are european we have to use the same keyboard and the Swiss ones have the easiest (allegedly) selection of extra characters.
:)
This annoys me as it means I have a qwertz keyboard here, with ; and : in odd places. So that's why.
I don't fancy you. Probably.
Are you a Natalie Portman/Kylie Minogue lookalike?
and female (sorry to be sexist and everything)
Troc
PS Don't tell the wife
Heh, we have a whole book, called the "guidelines" it's a public publication which you can download from our website (convention, guidelines). Essentially, a novelty destroying document is one which discloses all the features of a claim (or invention) in a single embodiment or example. This can be another patent or any prior publication from anywhere - as long it was public knowledge at some point ;)
Usually we have to challenge inventive step - in this we argue that something isn't inventive because someone skilled in the art (but with no inventive ability) WOULD combine the knowledge of two different documents to arrive at the concept.
I know its dry and boring (as are all legal texts) but iy you get a chance, our guidelines and the European Patent Convention do have some info ;)
Personally I feel a little cheated if (and this is rare) I don't find a set of prejudicial documents during a search ;)
Then I don't work in computing and crap like that.......
Troc
Nope. Bzzzzzt, wrong. If you file for a patent then some months later the application in all it's beauty is published (the "some" depends on where and what system use use).
Whether it ever gets granted and in what state.. well that's another matter.
Troc
Aha and how do you prove the stuff you find on Google is PRIOR art?
It's very dificult most of the time. Trust me. Quite a lot of us here at the EPO use Google.
Troc
I am sorry but I take that rather personally.
;)
I am a patent examiner working for the European Patent Office and we operate somewhat differently from the USPTO. For a start, we spend MUCH more time researching a patent (2-3 times as much or more). Secondly we have a much bigger database and full external access to many more.
Then there's this *new* thing the USPTO has started to do - which everyone else has been doing for ever, which is to publish a PATENT APPLICATION before it's been examined or granted. Thish gives people the opportunity (and the right) to submit to us any information they think might be relevant, if they so wish.
So to recap.
1. Patent Applications are published before being granted.
2. That's PUBLICLY published (just try our website
3. Most places (i.e. Europe, Japan etc) do actually spend a decent amount of time on a search and, in our case using the largest, fully indexed knowledge database available (The USPTO are trying to buy our system).
4. Please don't tar all of us with the USPTO brush. We all know they are crap - that's why most Americans ask the EPO to examine their internations patent applications.
hohum
Troc
PS I am happy to do some sort of question/answer thing about this if you want.
I could sell you mine but I don't want to.
:)
Yes, I DO have a copy of 1987
Troc
The KLF
Orb
The Grid
L garnier
JM Jarre (no really)
Transglobal Underground
Members of Mayday
*shrug*
Problem is, what kind of "electronica" do you want?
Just dancy stuff (Carl Cox), Weird ambient stuff (Orb, KLF, Sven Vath), old fashioned stuff (Kraftwerk, JM Jarre), Trancy stuff (anything Goa-esque) or even stuff like Depeche Mode or the synth bands of the eighties (New Order etc etc)
hohum
Troc
Yeah. I shall write to Greenpeace now! And my member of parliament. This "sun" thing should be stopped before it goes nova. I mean it's giving us all skin cancer, it's why we need air conditioning - which contributes to global warming and has resulted in loads of CFCs in the atmosphere - which has resulted in the holes in the ozone layer - which is allowing the sun's HARMFUL rays onto our litle planet.
;) (for the humo(u)r impaired)
That sun thing is the main danger we face for solar-system exploration too, dammed solar flares would just cook an astronauts outside the Van Allen radiation belts. It's uncontrolled fusion reactors like these that will result in the eventual heat-death of the universe.
I think the sun is a Communist, Capitalist plot to sell more sunglasses.
Troc
Such large telescopes should be built on the moon. It's a great excuse to go there, they could be huge, we could build interferometers etc etc.
Troc
PS Just not too near the nuclear waste dumps that will explode in 1999. Erm.
Heh... where I work we are planning to move to 2000 next year-ish.
We currently use OS/2 (no, really) and have just had all our main proprietry apps rewritten into Java so they can be platform independent(ish) and then we can migrate to 2000.
I'm somewhat sceptical. But I also hate OS/2's lack of modern drivers and apps. etc etc. I mean I am typing this using Netscape 4.6 as it's the most modern one we can get (yeah I know there are versions of mozilla etc out there but we have a weird system and they won't install)
hohum
Troc
Yes, that's true, but.......
;)
Where there is a higher popultion density, you need MORE cells in a given area to serve the higher population density - city cells are often smaller than 1 block in size whereas out in the countryside they can be many miles apart. So Japan (or Holland where I live) need cell densities over the whole country that are similar to those used in the cities in otehr parts of the world.....
Ok, they are still close together so connecting them isn't so hard I guess but I reckon a few cells in Arizona somewhere would be cheaper than setting up a few in manhatten (assuming the locals didn't fill 'em full of buckshot on a Friday night
Troc
How come I was suddenly an AC?
Bah.
troc
Don't forget that we already have some journeys where train is better. London to Paris for example - 3hrs from Waterloo to Gare du Nord. Sure the 'plane has a shorter journey time, but once you figure in check-in times and travel to/from the airports it's quicker all told - and you can get MUCH more work/reading/sleeping done.
I would think the same would be true of trips between quite a number of European cities.......
I would rather spend 3hrs in a comfortable train than 1hr in an airport, 1hr in a 'plane, 30 mins in an airport and an hour in various taxis at each end.
Troc
"Boooiiiiiiiiiiiiinnnnng", said Zebedee
;)
"Time for Lego"
Troc
True enough, a 1G fall will do you little if no harm - and is actually quite pleasant, just look at all the sky divers out there.
The extremely high G landing (probably in the 100's if not 1000's depending on the surface - rising depending on how unyielding the surface etc etc) would I suspect put quite a dent in your day.
And your head.
And probably the floor.
Troc