First of all, the 1980s called and they want their copy protection techniques back. I doubt this was novel and non-obvious even in 1990, unless you subscribed to the very broad notion that if A,B, and D have been done, as have A,B, and C, and A,C, and D, and B,C and D, then doing A,B,C, and D is still novel and non-obvious.
Second, nearly all product activation nowadays is non-infringing. The system described in this patent is one in which some critical portion of the program code is withheld and not provided until registration time. Most product activation systems do not work that way; the entire program is provided and activation just requires a code. That sort of system is specifically mentioned in the patent as prior art (and covered by patent 4,740,890, which I believe is expired), and therefore not covered by the patent.
Just like there isn't anything wrong with buying property on the corner of main st and McDonald in hopes a certain large company will want to buy it.
Land speculation and patent trolling really aren't comparable. If the land speculator could create a piece of land ab nihilo and place it in the way of his victim, then it might be comparable.
The problem is with allowing software and business patents.
All business patents and nearly all software patents are ridiculously bad. But not all ridiculously bad patents fall into those categories.
Oh, and 'On the internet' is perfectly valid patent. Just like taking a widget and finding a technology you add to. You have to allow that for patenting.
No, I don't. Just like if someone invents a new kind of nail, you don't have to allow for patents for fastening all sorts of things together with the new nail (just like you could with the old nail), hitting the new nail with a hammer to embed it into materials, etc. Not all combinations of technologies are sufficiently novel and non-obvious to be patent-worthy.
What I read is you train the best (foreign) doctors, have the most (expensive) research institutes, and develop most of the (expensive) new medicines. This things do cost a metric shit ton of money. Except you're the only ones stupid enough to pay for it all.
That's right. The US does all that, then the socialist medical care systems elsewhere demand the result cheaply (or not at all). So the US companies do what's rational, place the lion's share of the cost on the US and make a little extra from the socialist systems.
So what happens if the US institutes socialized medicine and that stops working? No more subsidized research and medications for the US or anyone else, that's what.
On electronics, I think extended warranties are pretty much always a bad idea, because of the effective depreciattion. I could have spent a few hundred for an extended warranty for my $3000 TV a few years ago.... but if it breaks today, worst case I can spend another less than $1000 for a better TV. Same goes for computers; by the time the computer is out of its regular warranty, one can buy an equivalent or better model cheaper if it breaks. So the possible payoff of the extended warranty is much less than would appear based on the retail price of the product.
For durable goods, a service contract might be a better idea, but in my case I'm reasonably confident of my ability to diagnose and repair a lot of the common things which go wrong, so I still skip them. If you're not at all handy, the extended warranty might be worth it.
There's also the inconvenience. Getting a new device is usually much easier than jumping through the hoops required to get warranty service. And often faster, too.
And a lot of times, extended warranties (particularly when not from the manufacturer) are simply complete ripoffs. For instance, I once got a digital watch as a gift, with extended warranty from the store (Sears, to name names). Which in the small print excluded case, crystal, battery, and band. Aside from the battery, that pretty much covers everything likely to break. Sure enough, the case did break where it attached to the band -- not from abuse, either. I brought it to the store and they pointed out the warranty didn't cover the band. I pointed out the band was fine and it was just where it attached that it was broken... fortunately they didn't recognize that that was part of the case.
and the parallel holds, since the end of the real wild west consisted of the feds moving into lawless lands and taking over from vigilante, ad hoc systems of justice, just like this proposal. that was pretty much the historical end of the real wild west
Well, except some of the main figures of Wild West lore -- Wyatt and Morgan Earp, to name two -- were Feds. Lawless and crooked Feds, but Feds nevertheless.
Why do Americans always seem to have this attitude? It always seems like they want all the benefits from being part of international organisations, but none of the responsibilities.
A lot of us wouldn't mind giving up the purported benefits as well, actually.
One quite shocking example: the only two countries that are not signatories to the Convention on the Rights of the Child are Somalia and the US (and Somalia has announced plans to ratify it soon). I mean for God's sake, what possible objection could the US have against a treaty aiming to prevent the organised sale of children into slavery and child prostitution??
Yeah, and what American could be against USA PATRIOTism, right? A country shouldn't sign or ratify a treaty based on it's title or claimed purpose. In any case, the US HAS ratified the protocol on the sale of children into slavery and child prostitution. Furthermore, the US is a signatory (but not ratifier) of the convention proper.
Sorry, but I fail to see how 'going without insurance' would fit the definition of 'choice'.
Let's say I have $1000. I can pay it for health insurance premiums, or I can go without health insurance and spend the money on whores instead. That's 'choice'.
If the government tells me I have to use the money for health insurance (the "individual mandate") or they'll take it away, that's not choice.
Maybe the rich kids are undermedicated. Maybe if Britney Spears and Lindsay Lohan had gotten the powerful anti-psychotics they needed, they'd not have had as much trouble.
There's no way you can use Google all day from your own computer and have your searches remain anonymous; you're going to, in the normal course of doing things, do searches which can be traced back to you. And there's no way to type "how to blow goats" into any google search box without google knowing that someone is interested in blowing goats. The only way to keep stuff private from Google is not to search for it (or use other Google services). The only way to keep stuff anonymous is to completely separate that stuff from other things you do. Which means at the least not doing it from your computer or any computer or network traceable to you.
Of course. "There's a time and place for this..." almost always means "I oppose this completely, but since that's obviously unacceptable, I'll claim otherwise and oppose each time and place you might try specifically". Thus if you oppose the cops at the scene, they'll say you should just cooperate and sue later, but when you sue later they'll say you waived your rights by cooperating.
The 1990s called, they want their complaint back
on
The Limits To Skepticism
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· Score: 4, Interesting
That was once the rallying cry of the AGW "consensus" -- that skeptics didn't publish in peer reviewed journals. The skeptics, however, managed to do so. The response of the "consensus"? As seen in the leaked emails, they attempted to prevent the studies from being published and to boycott the journals which published them. So enough about the "peer review" stuff. Number one, it's been done. And number two, it's quite disingenuous to demand peer reviewed articles while working behind the scenes to prevent them from being published.
On the other side, there was another great discussion about listening to music while programming. They referred to a study (at MIT, I think) where two groups were given a series of puzzles to solve. One group while listening to music, the other while not listening to music. Here's the rub: all of the puzzles had a "brute force" solution and a much simpler "aha!" solution. None of the people listening to music found the "aha!" solutions, and about half of the people not listening to music did.
Now apply the lesson of that study to the ubiquity of music in general. Perhaps all this music is in effect turning off our brains.
I'm saying that if the cops want to beat you, you will be beaten.
That's not the question. The question is whether or not you have a moral duty to submit to being beaten by the cops, to refrain from resisting even in so much as dodging or blocking a blow.
If you're violent, you A) guarantee yourself rough treatment, and B) lose credibility in the courts and the media, making your case for justice harder.
If they're beating you and you're not violent, they'll claim you were violent and everyone of import will at least pretend to believe them. You have no credibility in the courts anyway (unless you're already some sort of VIP), and the media generally won't care unless there's some really good video.
How about engaging this like intelligent reasonable people that like to build up empirical arguments? Isn't that what we nerds are good at?
Yeah. Which is one reason we don't do so well in real-world politics -- office or otherwise. It's not about reason or empiricism. It's about power. The boss has it, the programmers don't. The best the programmer can do is reduce the granularity of the boss's power -- that is, force him to make a choice of letting the programmer have it his way, or firing him.
Right, it's a vicarious infringement case. One of the earliest vicarious infringement cases was about a flea market operator who sold space to vendors who sold infringing material; the operator was found liable despite being unaware of the infringement, because he profited from the infringement and had the ability to prevent it (by kicking out the offending vendors).
This case is even weaker, because Google does not have the ability to prevent the infringement, but in general the courts will accept any old secondary infringement theory; they love widening the scope of copyright.
GP is right: the time and place to oppose arrest is afterward, in a court of law or the court of public opinion.
This high-sounding language translates to "There is no time and place to oppose arrest" for most of us. Because the courts of law are their territory as surely as the streets are if not more so, and most people just aren't important enough to get to the court of public opinion... let alone to get anything out of public opinion.
And telling the cops not to enforce the law against a recalcitrant suspect when the cops are in the right is likewise anathema to the rule of law.
No one is telling them not to enforce the law. Just not to beat the suspect.
Moreover, I have never said that cops should escape punishment for their actions, only that the proper venue for resolving the dispute about whether the cops were in the right or the wrong is most certainly not on the street. Wrongful arrest, excessive force and deprivation of rights (S1983) are all actions you can take in a court to vindicate any (putative) wrong.
Dream on. Unless someone unrelated to the cops got it on videotape or you're some sort of VIP, you'll never get YOUR day in court. Oh, you'll be in court all right, for all the charges they pile on you. You might get out of them. But "take it to court" translates to "STFU" when it comes to cops.
The best thing that could happen to him would be the footage being "lost". Since I'm sure they have clear retention and chain of custody policies, it would indicate that it was "lost" for a reason and be a *very* strong indicator to a jury that something is amiss.
You might think so, but it's not so. The jury will believe the cop unless evidence is presented beyond a shadow of doubt that the cop is lying. And sometimes even then. And if the judge will slant the instructions so the jury pretty much has to convict, e.g. "If he put up his arm to block a blow from a police officer, that's resisting arrest". The loss of the footage probably won't even be revealed to the jury.
Right. When that fist or nightstick is headed towards your face, don't throw up your arm to protect yourself, just take the hit. We have advanced dental science in America; once you get out of prison your teeth can be made almost as good as new. In fact, it's recommended that with every kick or punch, you say "Thank you sir may I have another".
Asshole.
Allowing cops to beat on people with no punishment for them and punishment for their victims even if the cops were in the wrong -- that's what's really anathema to the rule of law. That's rule of men, men with badges.
Slashdot Mirror
No, it's not. It expresses only desire, not intention. And furthermore it doesn't refer to an identifiable person.
First of all, the 1980s called and they want their copy protection techniques back. I doubt this was novel and non-obvious even in 1990, unless you subscribed to the very broad notion that if A,B, and D have been done, as have A,B, and C, and A,C, and D, and B,C and D, then doing A,B,C, and D is still novel and non-obvious.
Second, nearly all product activation nowadays is non-infringing. The system described in this patent is one in which some critical portion of the program code is withheld and not provided until registration time. Most product activation systems do not work that way; the entire program is provided and activation just requires a code. That sort of system is specifically mentioned in the patent as prior art (and covered by patent 4,740,890, which I believe is expired), and therefore not covered by the patent.
Land speculation and patent trolling really aren't comparable. If the land speculator could create a piece of land ab nihilo and place it in the way of his victim, then it might be comparable.
All business patents and nearly all software patents are ridiculously bad. But not all ridiculously bad patents fall into those categories.
No, I don't. Just like if someone invents a new kind of nail, you don't have to allow for patents for fastening all sorts of things together with the new nail (just like you could with the old nail), hitting the new nail with a hammer to embed it into materials, etc. Not all combinations of technologies are sufficiently novel and non-obvious to be patent-worthy.
That's right. The US does all that, then the socialist medical care systems elsewhere demand the result cheaply (or not at all). So the US companies do what's rational, place the lion's share of the cost on the US and make a little extra from the socialist systems.
So what happens if the US institutes socialized medicine and that stops working? No more subsidized research and medications for the US or anyone else, that's what.
Hmm
1) Eastern District of Texas
2) Continuation patent
3) "On the Internet" patent
OK, stop there... confirmed patent troll.
On electronics, I think extended warranties are pretty much always a bad idea, because of the effective depreciattion. I could have spent a few hundred for an extended warranty for my $3000 TV a few years ago.... but if it breaks today, worst case I can spend another less than $1000 for a better TV. Same goes for computers; by the time the computer is out of its regular warranty, one can buy an equivalent or better model cheaper if it breaks. So the possible payoff of the extended warranty is much less than would appear based on the retail price of the product.
For durable goods, a service contract might be a better idea, but in my case I'm reasonably confident of my ability to diagnose and repair a lot of the common things which go wrong, so I still skip them. If you're not at all handy, the extended warranty might be worth it.
There's also the inconvenience. Getting a new device is usually much easier than jumping through the hoops required to get warranty service. And often faster, too.
And a lot of times, extended warranties (particularly when not from the manufacturer) are simply complete ripoffs. For instance, I once got a digital watch as a gift, with extended warranty from the store (Sears, to name names). Which in the small print excluded case, crystal, battery, and band. Aside from the battery, that pretty much covers everything likely to break. Sure enough, the case did break where it attached to the band -- not from abuse, either. I brought it to the store and they pointed out the warranty didn't cover the band. I pointed out the band was fine and it was just where it attached that it was broken... fortunately they didn't recognize that that was part of the case.
Billy Mays didn't need no stinking dynamic range compression. Billy Mays was always at full volume in real life.
Well, except some of the main figures of Wild West lore -- Wyatt and Morgan Earp, to name two -- were Feds. Lawless and crooked Feds, but Feds nevertheless.
A lot of us wouldn't mind giving up the purported benefits as well, actually.
Yeah, and what American could be against USA PATRIOTism, right? A country shouldn't sign or ratify a treaty based on it's title or claimed purpose. In any case, the US HAS ratified the protocol on the sale of children into slavery and child prostitution. Furthermore, the US is a signatory (but not ratifier) of the convention proper.
Let's say I have $1000. I can pay it for health insurance premiums, or I can go without health insurance and spend the money on whores instead. That's 'choice'.
If the government tells me I have to use the money for health insurance (the "individual mandate") or they'll take it away, that's not choice.
Maybe the rich kids are undermedicated. Maybe if Britney Spears and Lindsay Lohan had gotten the powerful anti-psychotics they needed, they'd not have had as much trouble.
There's no way you can use Google all day from your own computer and have your searches remain anonymous; you're going to, in the normal course of doing things, do searches which can be traced back to you. And there's no way to type "how to blow goats" into any google search box without google knowing that someone is interested in blowing goats. The only way to keep stuff private from Google is not to search for it (or use other Google services). The only way to keep stuff anonymous is to completely separate that stuff from other things you do. Which means at the least not doing it from your computer or any computer or network traceable to you.
Of course. "There's a time and place for this..." almost always means "I oppose this completely, but since that's obviously unacceptable, I'll claim otherwise and oppose each time and place you might try specifically". Thus if you oppose the cops at the scene, they'll say you should just cooperate and sue later, but when you sue later they'll say you waived your rights by cooperating.
That was once the rallying cry of the AGW "consensus" -- that skeptics didn't publish in peer reviewed journals. The skeptics, however, managed to do so. The response of the "consensus"? As seen in the leaked emails, they attempted to prevent the studies from being published and to boycott the journals which published them. So enough about the "peer review" stuff. Number one, it's been done. And number two, it's quite disingenuous to demand peer reviewed articles while working behind the scenes to prevent them from being published.
Now apply the lesson of that study to the ubiquity of music in general. Perhaps all this music is in effect turning off our brains.
That's not the question. The question is whether or not you have a moral duty to submit to being beaten by the cops, to refrain from resisting even in so much as dodging or blocking a blow.
If they're beating you and you're not violent, they'll claim you were violent and everyone of import will at least pretend to believe them. You have no credibility in the courts anyway (unless you're already some sort of VIP), and the media generally won't care unless there's some really good video.
Yeah. Which is one reason we don't do so well in real-world politics -- office or otherwise. It's not about reason or empiricism. It's about power. The boss has it, the programmers don't. The best the programmer can do is reduce the granularity of the boss's power -- that is, force him to make a choice of letting the programmer have it his way, or firing him.
Unfortunately, they wouldn't be OUR homes. They'd be the homes of $1/hour Elbonians.
Right, it's a vicarious infringement case. One of the earliest vicarious infringement cases was about a flea market operator who sold space to vendors who sold infringing material; the operator was found liable despite being unaware of the infringement, because he profited from the infringement and had the ability to prevent it (by kicking out the offending vendors).
This case is even weaker, because Google does not have the ability to prevent the infringement, but in general the courts will accept any old secondary infringement theory; they love widening the scope of copyright.
This high-sounding language translates to "There is no time and place to oppose arrest" for most of us. Because the courts of law are their territory as surely as the streets are if not more so, and most people just aren't important enough to get to the court of public opinion... let alone to get anything out of public opinion.
No one is telling them not to enforce the law. Just not to beat the suspect.
Dream on. Unless someone unrelated to the cops got it on videotape or you're some sort of VIP, you'll never get YOUR day in court. Oh, you'll be in court all right, for all the charges they pile on you. You might get out of them. But "take it to court" translates to "STFU" when it comes to cops.
You might think so, but it's not so. The jury will believe the cop unless evidence is presented beyond a shadow of doubt that the cop is lying. And sometimes even then. And if the judge will slant the instructions so the jury pretty much has to convict, e.g. "If he put up his arm to block a blow from a police officer, that's resisting arrest". The loss of the footage probably won't even be revealed to the jury.
1000 yards away with a zeroed-in rifle and an escape route.
Right. When that fist or nightstick is headed towards your face, don't throw up your arm to protect yourself, just take the hit. We have advanced dental science in America; once you get out of prison your teeth can be made almost as good as new. In fact, it's recommended that with every kick or punch, you say "Thank you sir may I have another".
Asshole.
Allowing cops to beat on people with no punishment for them and punishment for their victims even if the cops were in the wrong -- that's what's really anathema to the rule of law. That's rule of men, men with badges.
No, I'm saying the numbers (CRI, color temperature, and lumens) do matter, but _small_ differences in brightness don't matter.