Apple sued Microsoft based on a look-n-feel copyright suit. And Apple lost, which means by rhetorical reverse estoppel, you can't blame them for defending themselves against the same sort of thing now.
A patent has never been expected to provide enough information to produce the result--only enough information to describe it sufficiently for identification.
From the US Patent Office web site:
The specification must include a written description of the invention and of the manner and process of making and using it, and is required to be in such full, clear, concise, and exact terms as to enable any person skilled in the technological area to which the invention pertains, or with which it is most nearly connected, to make and use the same.
Knee-jerk reactions like this just go to show that people with an agenda will use anything to support their agenda, even if the simplest check reveals it doesn't do so. Anyone remember when Mayor David Dinkens used a stabbing to call for gun control?
So, who has jumped on the VA Tech bandwagon: Gun control proponents (obviously) Gun control opponents ("let them shoot back") Violent game opponents ("It was just like a first-person shooter") People who want more funding for mental health programs. People who just want to put weirdos in nuthouses Security people ("A rent-a-cop in every classroom keeps everyone safe. Oh, and us employed") Security consultants (obviously) Drug warriors (he must have been high to do that) Drug legalization proponents (if he'd just smoked a little weed he'd have had a better perspective)
OK, I made the last two up. But Ariana Huffington (who falls into several other categories) validated "drug warriors" for me, though referring to legal drugs.
The model is way older than Polaroid. King Gillette usually gets the credit, and his company (founded in 1901) keeps doing it to this day. Err, that's "give away the razor and sell the blades", not "add another blade and call it innovation".
I am assuming you are going for an obviousness angle on this, and this IS NOT HOW OBVIOUSNESS WORK! I cannot say that enough. Do you not think these companies had a room of specialists to solve a problem and then work to file a patent? More than one person or one group of people might have the same idea, but that does not make it obvious and it should not make it unpatentable.
Of course it should. If when given the problem, some substantial proportion of experts in the field would come up with the patented solution, the solution is either not novel (the experts knew it already) or obvious (given the problem and their expert knowledge, the solution immediately followed).
Well, shit, if there's something wrong with computer scientists, why the hell should anyone want more women to become such?
You throw around that term "misogynistic" far too easily. Your stereotypical geek who can't get laid isn't "misogynistic" -- he doesn't have contempt or hate for women, he simply doesn't know how to act around them. Among real computer science students, it runs the gamut, but misogyny is certainly not the rule. I will grant that it is probably quite uncomfortable for women to be in classes with a bunch of guys who are (obviously) interested in her but who don't know or can't pull off the socially acceptable ways to show (or even conceal) it. But that doesn't make them misogynists.
As for the Aspergers claims, methinks it's simply the fashionable disease-of-the-week. At one time it was ADD or ADHD. The prevalance of claims of having it is more "medical student's syndrome" than anything else... not to mention a proclivity on the part of psychiatrists to label as pathology what are normal variations of behavior.
Ethanol can be made from petroleum. Cheaper from that than from corn, IIRC. The only reason ethanol as a fuel additive is made from corn is the Archer Daniels Midland company's enormous lobbying power.
There was reasonably little programming emphasis in the C.S. curriculum at the University of Maryland, College Park, circa 1990. I don't think I took a single programming langauge course there (though they were offered).
Math and theory were plentiful -- there was a course crosslisted with the Mathematics department on formal logic, there were algorithm and data-structure classes, there was a class on the theory of programming languages, a computer architecture course which I dropped but I remember had stuff on Hamming codes in it.
Still, despite this lack of emphasis on programming, few women. Way less than 28%.
I don't recall the upper-level (not to be confused with advanced -- there's very little advanced math at the undergraduate level) math courses being full of women either, so I don't think shifting the program more towards theory is going to help.
Whatever replacement they could come up with will eventually be claimed to be harmful in some way, possibly in some way worse than deca. So coming up with a substitute is not really a good game plan.
You don't evacuate or "lock down" a 40,000 student university campus because a murderer is on the loose. You sure as hell do let people know he's out there.
You don't need $100,000 to get a lawyer and pay bail for a single charge of calling in a bomb threat. You don't even need the lawyer to make bail.
The school made an understandable screw-up, the cops did a crappy job investigating, but there had to be more screw-ups involved -- like his parents assuming his guilt, or a judge having him held without bail -- for that to result in more than 72 hours of jail time.
they're considering people with great leadership and academic skills but who may not have had much experience programming yet.
WTF does leadership have to do with computer science? The Business Administration program is down the hall and to the left, and the Naval Acadamy is thataway (pointing roughly southeastward).
First of all, this only matters if you think EULAs have worth outside of toilet paper. Second, the actual language of the EULA is
"USE WITH VIRTUALIZATION TECHNOLOGIES. You may not use the software installed on the licensed device within a virtual (or otherwise emulated) hardware system"
So if I install it on a real machine and then run it within a virtual machine on that device, I'm violating the license. But if I install it on a virtual machine to begin with, the license ends up being self-contradictory.
If you play poker for a living, you can deduct the entry fees as an ordinary business expense. If you don't, you can deduct entry fees up to the amount of any gambling winnings for that year as a miscellaneous expense not subject to the 2% (of adjusted gross income) limit.
If you win the lottery you can deduct the cost of the ticket, but it's probably not significant.
ROTFL. Who says, Congress? George Bush? They can impose _legal_ duties on me, but that's just might, not right. There's no answer to "why" there.
Decides? The law clearly states they are taxable income, the IRS just says they aren't going to bother with small fry.
Certainly not all eBay transactions are taxable income. From the IRSs own website:
If your online auction sales are the Internet equivalent of an occasional garage or yard sale, you generally do not have to report the sales. In a garage sale, you generally sell household items you purchased over the years and used personally. If you paid more for the items than you sell them for, the sales are not reportable. Losses on personal use property are not deductible, either.
Furthermore, except for the eBay fees (income to eBay), nothing occurs on eBay which the IRS is entitled to data about. The close of the auction on eBay isn't the income-producing event. I've had auctions close on eBay where no money at all changed hands (because the winning bidder was a fraudster).
So, what we have here is:
Many if not most sales on eBay are the equivalent of a garage sale and are _not_ required to be reported in any way shape or form.
The auction itself is not an income-generating event; there's no income until the bid is collected
For business sellers who buy at garage sales and sell on eBay, there's no way to verify their costs, so in this case even the collection data would be insufficient
Yet the IRS wants reporting of every sale on eBay anyway. It's a massive invasion of privacy (granted, in a field where privacy has already been heavily eroded), and for fairly little gain.
If you make a profit on eBay, you can certainly deduct the costs of eBay and Paypal. You can deduct the cost of your camera; You can depreciate the fixed costs over some period of time, or take it all at once as a Section 179 deduction. That's assuming you treat it as a business. If you treat it as a hobby they can screw you into a wall, taxing your gross hobby income but not letting you deduct the expenses unless they are more than 2% of your total income.
Slashdot Mirror
Right. Here's the ONLY thing Steve Jobs should be saying to Federal Investigators:
Apple sued Microsoft based on a look-n-feel copyright suit. And Apple lost, which means by rhetorical reverse estoppel, you can't blame them for defending themselves against the same sort of thing now.
Knee-jerk reactions like this just go to show that people with an agenda will use anything to support their agenda, even if the simplest check reveals it doesn't do so. Anyone remember when Mayor David Dinkens used a stabbing to call for gun control?
So, who has jumped on the VA Tech bandwagon:
Gun control proponents (obviously)
Gun control opponents ("let them shoot back")
Violent game opponents ("It was just like a first-person shooter")
People who want more funding for mental health programs.
People who just want to put weirdos in nuthouses
Security people ("A rent-a-cop in every classroom keeps everyone safe. Oh, and us employed")
Security consultants (obviously)
Drug warriors (he must have been high to do that)
Drug legalization proponents (if he'd just smoked a little weed he'd have had a better perspective)
OK, I made the last two up. But Ariana Huffington (who falls into several other categories) validated "drug warriors" for me, though referring to legal drugs.
Personally, I blame Microsoft and SCO.
Now if you DO practice archery on Sunday, they'll probably issue an ASBO.
The model is way older than Polaroid. King Gillette usually gets the credit, and his company (founded in 1901) keeps doing it to this day. Err, that's "give away the razor and sell the blades", not "add another blade and call it innovation".
Of course it should. If when given the problem, some substantial proportion of experts in the field would come up with the patented solution, the solution is either not novel (the experts knew it already) or obvious (given the problem and their expert knowledge, the solution immediately followed).
Well, shit, if there's something wrong with computer scientists, why the hell should anyone want more women to become such?
You throw around that term "misogynistic" far too easily. Your stereotypical geek who can't get laid isn't "misogynistic" -- he doesn't have contempt or hate for women, he simply doesn't know how to act around them. Among real computer science students, it runs the gamut, but misogyny is certainly not the rule. I will grant that it is probably quite uncomfortable for women to be in classes with a bunch of guys who are (obviously) interested in her but who don't know or can't pull off the socially acceptable ways to show (or even conceal) it. But that doesn't make them misogynists.
As for the Aspergers claims, methinks it's simply the fashionable disease-of-the-week. At one time it was ADD or ADHD. The prevalance of claims of having it is more "medical student's syndrome" than anything else... not to mention a proclivity on the part of psychiatrists to label as pathology what are normal variations of behavior.
Ethanol can be made from petroleum. Cheaper from that than from corn, IIRC. The only reason ethanol as a fuel additive is made from corn is the Archer Daniels Midland company's enormous lobbying power.
There was reasonably little programming emphasis in the C.S. curriculum at the University of Maryland, College Park, circa 1990. I don't think I took a single programming langauge course there (though they were offered).
Math and theory were plentiful -- there was a course crosslisted with the Mathematics department on formal logic, there were algorithm and data-structure classes, there was a class on the theory of programming languages, a computer architecture course which I dropped but I remember had stuff on Hamming codes in it.
Still, despite this lack of emphasis on programming, few women. Way less than 28%.
I don't recall the upper-level (not to be confused with advanced -- there's very little advanced math at the undergraduate level) math courses being full of women either, so I don't think shifting the program more towards theory is going to help.
Would that be THIS melamine:
o dfda.html
http://www.news.cornell.edu/stories/March07/petfo
Whatever replacement they could come up with will eventually be claimed to be harmful in some way, possibly in some way worse than deca. So coming up with a substitute is not really a good game plan.
This should certainly make those battery fires more interesting.
Oh, wait, that's not a bright side. Except literally.
Actually, big companies don't have money delivered by dump truck. Rather, they have it pneumatically delivered, via a series of tubes.
You don't evacuate or "lock down" a 40,000 student university campus because a murderer is on the loose. You sure as hell do let people know he's out there.
You don't need $100,000 to get a lawyer and pay bail for a single charge of calling in a bomb threat. You don't even need the lawyer to make bail.
The school made an understandable screw-up, the cops did a crappy job investigating, but there had to be more screw-ups involved -- like his parents assuming his guilt, or a judge having him held without bail -- for that to result in more than 72 hours of jail time.
He was only arrested (and released) precisely because he's so famous. Had he been some nobody, he'd probably have been arrested and vanished.
First of all, this only matters if you think EULAs have worth outside of toilet paper. Second, the actual language of the EULA is
"USE WITH VIRTUALIZATION TECHNOLOGIES. You may not use the software installed on the licensed device within a virtual (or otherwise emulated) hardware system"
So if I install it on a real machine and then run it within a virtual machine on that device, I'm violating the license. But if I install it on a virtual machine to begin with, the license ends up being self-contradictory.
According to TFA: "We had a meeting a few weeks ago with the Internet Industry Association (about the new guidelines) but we're yet to hear back.
Yeah. The IIA is probably still working on getting "Sod off, wankers!" translated into legalese.
Yes, 2% of your TOTAL income. And the IRS doesn't need ski masks; suits, ties, and ledgers are quite sufficient.
If you play poker for a living, you can deduct the entry fees as an ordinary business expense. If you don't, you can deduct entry fees up to the amount of any gambling winnings for that year as a miscellaneous expense not subject to the 2% (of adjusted gross income) limit.
If you win the lottery you can deduct the cost of the ticket, but it's probably not significant.
Furthermore, except for the eBay fees (income to eBay), nothing occurs on eBay which the IRS is entitled to data about. The close of the auction on eBay isn't the income-producing event. I've had auctions close on eBay where no money at all changed hands (because the winning bidder was a fraudster).
So, what we have here is:
- Many if not most sales on eBay are the equivalent of a garage sale and are _not_ required to be reported in any way shape or form.
- The auction itself is not an income-generating event; there's no income until the bid is collected
- For business sellers who buy at garage sales and sell on eBay, there's no way to verify their costs, so in this case even the collection data would be insufficient
Yet the IRS wants reporting of every sale on eBay anyway. It's a massive invasion of privacy (granted, in a field where privacy has already been heavily eroded), and for fairly little gain.If you make a profit on eBay, you can certainly deduct the costs of eBay and Paypal. You can deduct the cost of your camera; You can depreciate the fixed costs over some period of time, or take it all at once as a Section 179 deduction. That's assuming you treat it as a business. If you treat it as a hobby they can screw you into a wall, taxing your gross hobby income but not letting you deduct the expenses unless they are more than 2% of your total income.