Once it's out, it's out. You can't make an invention public and patent it later.
That's test number 1 of all Patent Laws. Has the invention been shared in a public way.
That is why there is the "patent pending" on so many products you see out there. You have to file for patent first, then you can disclose your invention. One year later, once they approve your patent, it becomes retroactive to the date of the filing.
Anyone in business will tell you that there is no such thing as a rock solid NDA. NDAs are only meant to scare people off. It usually would cost you way too much money to get it enforced when the need arises.
If this guy has problems coming up with 20K to patent his invention I don't see how the best NDA in the world would protect him.
It is sad to read two reviews of Lindoze and none of them addresses the alleged out of the box MS code compatibility. None of the reviewers even tried to install MsOffice.. In my mind that was the most spectacular claim we've been hearing about for months. A bit more research would be appreciated. Instead we get a guy whining about his out of a dumpster single frequency monitor (he was okay at least) and the other dude complains that his eyes hurt.
I really wonder a) what refresh rate is OEM Windows set to out-of-the-box and b) what percentage of AOL users know how to change their refresh rate under Windows, let alone have a clue what a monitor refresh rate is.
AT&T does the filter thing in Toronto, and Videotron does so here in Montreal. Of course if you're lucky enough to have a 1999 highspeed installation, you probably don't have the filter. But if you moved since, there's no way around it.
I'm surprised AT&T USA didn't pick that up. And I'm especially surprised it took so much time for you guys to notice.
Or... wait a minute, maybe this isn't really news?
Here in Canada all they do is install a filter on your cable if you're an Internet-only subscriber. The effect is that you only get the first 3 or 4 analog channels, all the rest is cut off. If you have $50 to spare, you can somehow convince them to 'forget' the filter.
The cool thing about a server/dumb terminal model is that none of the client terminals need to have anything beyond basic capabilities. Anything besides input and display is handled quite capably (in theory anyway) by the server. Data storage and processing occurs on Ye Olde Giant Box.
From the original post: Brenda from Marketing needs something with more graphics capabilities for banner ads.
Sounds like a graphic card could do lots here. Sounds like the Olde Giant Box gets onto some Limitationz here my friend.
The parent post is an obvious example why you should never outsource to a country like India or China. Besides promoting cheap labor and capitalistic exploitation of third-world countries, you will never get the results that you expect. Go get a good software development book. Mythical man-month might give you some clues.
And this is yet another case where people confuse business, profits and social good conscience. Africa has next to no Internet infrastructure, why would Western companies pay money to lay pipe and connect us to.. NOTHING? I don't see any sense in this article, this post in general and why it made to the front page. Why would I, as a customer, subsidize Africa's connection?
This is just a bunch of enterpreneurs complaining. Of course the world is a tough place, there's no such thing as free lunch.
If I was to build a fat pipe to connect my cottage in northern Canada to the rest of the world, can I reasonnably argue that UUNET shall pay for half of my connection?
Come on, this is nonsense !
Ten years ago a 14.4K dialup would run around US$35 a month. This was certainly expensive, but like anywhere, early adopters did pay the price, in turn this helped finance the infrastructures and now, many years later, I have broadband for $25 a month !
It's not the connection that is important, it's the additionnal content/information that you're able to obtain from making such a connection possible. So far Africa's content is mainly spam, Thawte and casinos. Are we willing to PAY for that?
And that's where the problem lies. If you look at the current patent system in most Western countries, it is about protecting process, not ideas. Even the infamous business patents protect a process by which a business objective is achieved. When I went to law school, our intellectual property prof always insisted about the difference between patents and ideas. And then suddenly the legislator introduced these patents on software ideas..
The problem with software patents is that you're not really protecting a mean of solving a problem, you're actually protecting the very idea that such or such problem exists and that it should be solved by some automated process. This is wrong. If I invent and patent an embedded microwave window defroster, it doesn't prevent you from inventing a different approach to solve the same problem. In the software world I would prevent you from addressing such problem in the first place.
And this in my view goes against innovation, disclosure and publig good, all honorable objectives for which the patent system was created in the first place.
This is indirect abuse and would not be allowed
on
Abusing the GPL?
·
· Score: 1
The principle behind most occidental law systems is that one cannot do indirectly what the law doesn't clearly allow him to do.
The same applies to contracts. In this case the spirit of the GPL prevails. The objective being not only to be able to recompile and 'port' your crippled source tree, but allow the community to learn from your project and improving on it by going through a readable source code. A crippled version thereof clearly destroys the community aspect of the GPL and I don't think that the FSF will overlook this argument when dealing with your company's case.
Obfuscation is a mean to cut the GPL's legs and arms, and I don't see a court of justice (even in the US) allowing that kind of misuse.
As long as someone is able to prove that the obfuscation was done in a mechanical way (and that doesn't necessarily imply the use of a computer) by application of a definable algorithm your company's strategy won't fly.
It all depends on the standard that you impose on compliance. Let's just say that you apply article 4's sanctions only if at the time you started your legal proceding the culprit was still not abiding to the GPL.
This minimizes foot dragging as the party at fault cannot wait 2 hours before showing up in court to comply with the license. The standard being the copyright holder's start of proceedings, you have no way to know when it could happen and hence would be taking a huge risk of having article 4's sanctions apply to you.
Thus you would keep deterrence while making article 4 a little bit more "community compliant".
I agree that article four makes sens in the context you present. The GPL needs a strong deterrent in order to enforce our rights over free software. It's all about us controlling the distribution of the software and making sure that we have enough discouraging mechanisms at our disposition in order to have our rights respected.
My problem in this situation is about the repercussions that such a case could have on GPL in a corporate businesses. I won't go into details here as the next thread already covers the subject, but it is extremely dangerous for GPL copyright holders to be able to retaliate in such a way.
If NuSphere was agressively refusing to publish it's source code, MySQL AB would be entitled to taking them to court. However that's not what happened here. MySQL AB is exercising its rights RETROACTIVELY.. isn't that a little bit twisted?
I personnaly believe that article 4 should only apply to ongoing GPL infractions, as a last resort weapon in shutting bad spirits down. It should NEVER be applied for past actions.
If someone already has complied with article 3, hence obtained the right to redistribution, they should not lose it. Article 4 should be specific in its application to cases where GPL redistribution was never complied with.
In the same way, if the gov't decriminalizes an act today, it cannot then turn around and keep on punishing those that committed what was a crime yesterday.
Once you give something, you shouldn't be able to take it away.
I strongly believe that this situation rose up from a domain/influence dispute. Free software and the free software community should not suffer over corporate agendas.
Alot has happened in the MySQL AB vs. Nusphere fight. First Nusphere took the mysql.org domain and acted as if they were the not-for-profit corp behind the software. MySQL AB was right to be frustrated about the situation. But for what we know, this question got resolved, as mysql.org now points to the original mysql.com site and WHOIS reports MySQL AB as the owner.
So where do we go from here? These guys believe that they can enforce article 4 of the GPL against Nusphere for an infraction to the GPL that occured in the past and which has been corrected since then as Nusphere published its source code. I personnaly believe this is not The Right Way. It totally goes against the spirit of the GPL: software must be free, and although we want to protect the original copyright holder, we must not discriminate against the users.
Many people could try to profit from the GPL in an illegal way, does it mean that we can put them on a blacklist? If they decided to change their attitude and in turn abide to the license, I don't see why we would still punish them. They can be a valuable ressource in improving the software, even though it clearly goes against MySQL AB's agenda.
Hey, if you're going to act that way, why did you release it under the GPL in the first place? By retaliating the way they do MySQL AB makes me wonder who between them and NuSphere has the weakest principles.
Using the GPL as a tool for revenge is definitely not what Stallman & followers originally intended.
Of course, MySQL AB could and should sue NuSphere for misrepresentation, moral copyright infrigment and dubious corporate conduct. They should seek damages, which they are fully entitled to under their country's Copyright Act. I for one find it unacceptable to simply lock Nusphere out.
It is sad to see that the first judicial test of the GPL is witness to such a hijacking. And the worst thing: the FSF has it's arms in the mud upto the shoulders.
This is one of these situations where Stallman actually should open his big mouth like he usually does.
I don't think that the judge will let that injonction go through. Their case is too weak to achieve that. Anyways in the worst case, what will prevent Nusphere from starting another company?
It doesn't really matter. This decision clearly states that by enforcing laws the government cannot prevent people from demonstrating their dissatisfaction towards a company's services (or lack thereof).
Here is the link to the full decision. There is a convenient short version in the first few pages. Have a read.
have a look at iSunPower for an equivalent solar device. As you'll notice, like in the present case it's far from being sufficient to really charge a 25W/h laptop. Not just yet...
5 minutes give you 20 minutes of lifetime??
on
Foot-Powered Laptop
·
· Score: 1
Anybody noticed that there seems to be a problem with the claims presented here?
It seems odd that the charging rate of a personal electromechanical device could exceed that of the power grid, no?
Especially when you notice that the foot pump only produces 6 watts (max) while last time I checked my laptop easily drains above 15 watts of energy.
Slashdot Mirror
google cache
Once it's out, it's out. You can't make an invention public and patent it later.
That's test number 1 of all Patent Laws. Has the invention been shared in a public way.
That is why there is the "patent pending" on so many products you see out there. You have to file for patent first, then you can disclose your invention. One year later, once they approve your patent, it becomes retroactive to the date of the filing.
Anyone in business will tell you that there is no such thing as a rock solid NDA. NDAs are only meant to scare people off. It usually would cost you way too much money to get it enforced when the need arises.
If this guy has problems coming up with 20K to patent his invention I don't see how the best NDA in the world would protect him.
The price is a little steep at $1,499.99, but it's still nice to see a major car audio manufacturer delivering what the public wants.
Especially when said car audio manufacturer is the biggest proponent of audio cd protection schemes.
It is sad to read two reviews of Lindoze and none of them addresses the alleged out of the box MS code compatibility. None of the reviewers even tried to install MsOffice.. In my mind that was the most spectacular claim we've been hearing about for months. A bit more research would be appreciated. Instead we get a guy whining about his out of a dumpster single frequency monitor (he was okay at least) and the other dude complains that his eyes hurt.
I really wonder a) what refresh rate is OEM Windows set to out-of-the-box and b) what percentage of AOL users know how to change their refresh rate under Windows, let alone have a clue what a monitor refresh rate is.
AT&T does the filter thing in Toronto, and Videotron does so here in Montreal. Of course if you're lucky enough to have a 1999 highspeed installation, you probably don't have the filter. But if you moved since, there's no way around it.
I'm surprised AT&T USA didn't pick that up. And I'm especially surprised it took so much time for you guys to notice.
Or... wait a minute, maybe this isn't really news?
Here in Canada all they do is install a filter on your cable if you're an Internet-only subscriber. The effect is that you only get the first 3 or 4 analog channels, all the rest is cut off. If you have $50 to spare, you can somehow convince them to 'forget' the filter.
Is this news? ow, it's Slashdot..
you said:
The cool thing about a server/dumb terminal model is that none of the client terminals need to have anything beyond basic capabilities. Anything besides input and display is handled quite capably (in theory anyway) by the server. Data storage and processing occurs on Ye Olde Giant Box.
From the original post:
Brenda from Marketing needs something with more graphics capabilities for banner ads.
Sounds like a graphic card could do lots here. Sounds like the Olde Giant Box gets onto some Limitationz here my friend.
Nice theory.
What are you implying? One more word and we'll have to sue you, take your site down and carnivore your mail account inside out.
Would you like some penguin mints with that?
The parent post is an obvious example why you should never outsource to a country like India or China. Besides promoting cheap labor and capitalistic exploitation of third-world countries, you will never get the results that you expect. Go get a good software development book. Mythical man-month might give you some clues.
And this is yet another case where people confuse business, profits and social good conscience. Africa has next to no Internet infrastructure, why would Western companies pay money to lay pipe and connect us to.. NOTHING? I don't see any sense in this article, this post in general and why it made to the front page. Why would I, as a customer, subsidize Africa's connection?
This is just a bunch of enterpreneurs complaining. Of course the world is a tough place, there's no such thing as free lunch.
If I was to build a fat pipe to connect my cottage in northern Canada to the rest of the world, can I reasonnably argue that UUNET shall pay for half of my connection?
Come on, this is nonsense !
Ten years ago a 14.4K dialup would run around US$35 a month. This was certainly expensive, but like anywhere, early adopters did pay the price, in turn this helped finance the infrastructures and now, many years later, I have broadband for $25 a month !
It's not the connection that is important, it's the additionnal content/information that you're able to obtain from making such a connection possible. So far Africa's content is mainly spam, Thawte and casinos. Are we willing to PAY for that?
Bunch of corporate spin-doctors.
No, they actually sit in cafes, bars, restaurants and other public places and ... TALK.
Brought to you by citizens for a mute and honest society.
As long as John Katz is forced to purchase his Slashvertisements like anybody else.
But the term Pigeon Prank (tm) patented process would be more appropriate.
Now patents are about ideas.
And that's where the problem lies. If you look at the current patent system in most Western countries, it is about protecting process, not ideas. Even the infamous business patents protect a process by which a business objective is achieved. When I went to law school, our intellectual property prof always insisted about the difference between patents and ideas. And then suddenly the legislator introduced these patents on software ideas..
The problem with software patents is that you're not really protecting a mean of solving a problem, you're actually protecting the very idea that such or such problem exists and that it should be solved by some automated process. This is wrong. If I invent and patent an embedded microwave window defroster, it doesn't prevent you from inventing a different approach to solve the same problem. In the software world I would prevent you from addressing such problem in the first place.
And this in my view goes against innovation, disclosure and publig good, all honorable objectives for which the patent system was created in the first place.
The principle behind most occidental law systems is that one cannot do indirectly what the law doesn't clearly allow him to do.
The same applies to contracts. In this case the spirit of the GPL prevails. The objective being not only to be able to recompile and 'port' your crippled source tree, but allow the community to learn from your project and improving on it by going through a readable source code. A crippled version thereof clearly destroys the community aspect of the GPL and I don't think that the FSF will overlook this argument when dealing with your company's case.
Obfuscation is a mean to cut the GPL's legs and arms, and I don't see a court of justice (even in the US) allowing that kind of misuse.
As long as someone is able to prove that the obfuscation was done in a mechanical way (and that doesn't necessarily imply the use of a computer) by application of a definable algorithm your company's strategy won't fly.
And now maybe you would care to explain when it is you developped this thong fetish, and how often do you search for thong images online?
:)
It all depends on the standard that you impose on compliance. Let's just say that you apply article 4's sanctions only if at the time you started your legal proceding the culprit was still not abiding to the GPL.
This minimizes foot dragging as the party at fault cannot wait 2 hours before showing up in court to comply with the license. The standard being the copyright holder's start of proceedings, you have no way to know when it could happen and hence would be taking a huge risk of having article 4's sanctions apply to you.
Thus you would keep deterrence while making article 4 a little bit more "community compliant".
In that case maybe this shouldn't be presented as a GPL issue? The FSF doesn't seem to agree with you on that one though..
I agree that article four makes sens in the context you present. The GPL needs a strong deterrent in order to enforce our rights over free software. It's all about us controlling the distribution of the software and making sure that we have enough discouraging mechanisms at our disposition in order to have our rights respected.
My problem in this situation is about the repercussions that such a case could have on GPL in a corporate businesses. I won't go into details here as the next thread already covers the subject, but it is extremely dangerous for GPL copyright holders to be able to retaliate in such a way.
If NuSphere was agressively refusing to publish it's source code, MySQL AB would be entitled to taking them to court. However that's not what happened here. MySQL AB is exercising its rights RETROACTIVELY.. isn't that a little bit twisted?
I personnaly believe that article 4 should only apply to ongoing GPL infractions, as a last resort weapon in shutting bad spirits down. It should NEVER be applied for past actions.
If someone already has complied with article 3, hence obtained the right to redistribution, they should not lose it. Article 4 should be specific in its application to cases where GPL redistribution was never complied with.
In the same way, if the gov't decriminalizes an act today, it cannot then turn around and keep on punishing those that committed what was a crime yesterday.
Once you give something, you shouldn't be able to take it away.
I strongly believe that this situation rose up from a domain/influence dispute. Free software and the free software community should not suffer over corporate agendas.
Alot has happened in the MySQL AB vs. Nusphere fight. First Nusphere took the mysql.org domain and acted as if they were the not-for-profit corp behind the software. MySQL AB was right to be frustrated about the situation. But for what we know, this question got resolved, as mysql.org now points to the original mysql.com site and WHOIS reports MySQL AB as the owner.
So where do we go from here? These guys believe that they can enforce article 4 of the GPL against Nusphere for an infraction to the GPL that occured in the past and which has been corrected since then as Nusphere published its source code. I personnaly believe this is not The Right Way. It totally goes against the spirit of the GPL: software must be free, and although we want to protect the original copyright holder, we must not discriminate against the users.
Many people could try to profit from the GPL in an illegal way, does it mean that we can put them on a blacklist? If they decided to change their attitude and in turn abide to the license, I don't see why we would still punish them. They can be a valuable ressource in improving the software, even though it clearly goes against MySQL AB's agenda.
Hey, if you're going to act that way, why did you release it under the GPL in the first place? By retaliating the way they do MySQL AB makes me wonder who between them and NuSphere has the weakest principles.
Using the GPL as a tool for revenge is definitely not what Stallman & followers originally intended.
Of course, MySQL AB could and should sue NuSphere for misrepresentation, moral copyright infrigment and dubious corporate conduct. They should seek damages, which they are fully entitled to under their country's Copyright Act. I for one find it unacceptable to simply lock Nusphere out.
It is sad to see that the first judicial test of the GPL is witness to such a hijacking. And the worst thing: the FSF has it's arms in the mud upto the shoulders.
This is one of these situations where Stallman actually should open his big mouth like he usually does.
I don't think that the judge will let that injonction go through. Their case is too weak to achieve that. Anyways in the worst case, what will prevent Nusphere from starting another company?
pertools will bring you the thruth.
It doesn't really matter. This decision clearly states that by enforcing laws the government cannot prevent people from demonstrating their dissatisfaction towards a company's services (or lack thereof).
Here is the link to the full decision. There is a convenient short version in the first few pages. Have a read.
have a look at iSunPower for an equivalent solar device. As you'll notice, like in the present case it's far from being sufficient to really charge a 25W/h laptop. Not just yet...
Anybody noticed that there seems to be a problem with the claims presented here?
It seems odd that the charging rate of a personal electromechanical device could exceed that of the power grid, no?
Especially when you notice that the foot pump only produces 6 watts (max) while last time I checked my laptop easily drains above 15 watts of energy.
how do you guys moderate? Look 10 stories above, this is redundant.