So the UK office puts out a funny-gram on 30 April and it takes the headquarters over 10 days to say it was a joke? This after the "release" was carried by everyone from/. to major news carriers? Sure, it was amusing but it was obviously being taken seriously by the press. They should have come out with the laugh and the "oh, hey - they were just kidding" memo a lot sooner.
Agreed. Considering that most folks acknowledge there's no perfect solution to the spam issue right now, you've got to start somewhere. Clean up your own back yard first and then worry about the neighbors'.
You can teach a "how-to" on filling out forms without actually processing them and granting patents. This isn't someone handing out a little platic pair of pilot's wings to kid who fly - this is a real, live patent number with the force of law behind it. The fact that the applicant was 7 or that he has no intention of pressing the claim is irrelevant. At best, this makes for an annoyance and a public one at that. At worst, I'd be willing to go so far as to say someone in the USPTO abused his position. It's not like I can have MY daughter go ahead and fill out the forms and get her patent for folding her shirts listed with a real number for all the world to see. If what you say is true, then I agree no real harm was done, but I question the propriety of using a government office for your own personal schoolroom for your kids.
I did just that this morning and I strongly recommend to all the rest of/. to do the same. It doesn't take many letters for members of Congress to sit up and take notice.
Making the application was certainly something nice for his kids. Maybe it was even a Civics lesson for them and I would applaud that if it was. Some 1st-hand interaction with areas of our government that most never think about can't be all bad, in this sense.
No, the USPTO gets all the credit for the outrage. This was a ridiculous application on its face and should have been immediately declined.
Good letter. I wrote one to my members of Congress this morning, too. Either it's a real patent and should be the catalyst for investigation or it's the sign of a compromised web server, IMHO.
Tempting... very tempting indeed.
But, you're right. It's wrong, and would actually hurt other folks who needed the bandwidth for legit uses. Besides, it might start a "shooting war" in Cyberspace. The script kiddies with their DoS tools are bad enough, we don't need corporations using them, too. If MS or Sun or the local Mom-n-Pop ISP decided to use that as a competitive tool, we'd all be in real trouble real quick.
Still...
Actually, I've had several conversations with folks in the Asian sector of the Net. (Never when I needed it, mind you, such as during a complaint investigation.) While they say they understand the problem and they tell me they'll fix it, they never seem to. Spam, DoS attacks, port scans, obvious hack attempts - we may as well be talking to the wall for all the help we get from them. Blocking them appears to be the only way. When enough of them are blocked, perhaps they'll begin true cooperation.
I do NOC work for one of the major backbone providers and we are forced to try to work with several of these ISP's who promote the spamming. We never hear back from these folks in problem investigations. Blocking them appears to be the only answer.
Hey, call it "more-ethical-than-thou" or whatever, but I have to call into question your premises. If one "could not" buy the software, where's he getting the copy from? If he can get his hands on a pirated copy, he can likely get them on a legal one, too. If he's not allowed to have a copy, then that's something he needs to take up with his government, not the author of the software.
If he "would not" buy it, then what's he using it for? If it's of so little value to him, he shouldn't bother using it. If he needs to use it, then it's got value, and he should pay for that value, plain and simple.
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So the UK office puts out a funny-gram on 30 April and it takes the headquarters over 10 days to say it was a joke? This after the "release" was carried by everyone from /. to major news carriers? Sure, it was amusing but it was obviously being taken seriously by the press. They should have come out with the laugh and the "oh, hey - they were just kidding" memo a lot sooner.
Agreed. Considering that most folks acknowledge there's no perfect solution to the spam issue right now, you've got to start somewhere. Clean up your own back yard first and then worry about the neighbors'.
You can teach a "how-to" on filling out forms without actually processing them and granting patents. This isn't someone handing out a little platic pair of pilot's wings to kid who fly - this is a real, live patent number with the force of law behind it. The fact that the applicant was 7 or that he has no intention of pressing the claim is irrelevant. At best, this makes for an annoyance and a public one at that. At worst, I'd be willing to go so far as to say someone in the USPTO abused his position. It's not like I can have MY daughter go ahead and fill out the forms and get her patent for folding her shirts listed with a real number for all the world to see. If what you say is true, then I agree no real harm was done, but I question the propriety of using a government office for your own personal schoolroom for your kids.
I did just that this morning and I strongly recommend to all the rest of /. to do the same. It doesn't take many letters for members of Congress to sit up and take notice.
Making the application was certainly something nice for his kids. Maybe it was even a Civics lesson for them and I would applaud that if it was. Some 1st-hand interaction with areas of our government that most never think about can't be all bad, in this sense. No, the USPTO gets all the credit for the outrage. This was a ridiculous application on its face and should have been immediately declined.
Good letter. I wrote one to my members of Congress this morning, too. Either it's a real patent and should be the catalyst for investigation or it's the sign of a compromised web server, IMHO.
Tempting... very tempting indeed.
But, you're right. It's wrong, and would actually hurt other folks who needed the bandwidth for legit uses. Besides, it might start a "shooting war" in Cyberspace. The script kiddies with their DoS tools are bad enough, we don't need corporations using them, too. If MS or Sun or the local Mom-n-Pop ISP decided to use that as a competitive tool, we'd all be in real trouble real quick.
Still...
Actually, I've had several conversations with folks in the Asian sector of the Net. (Never when I needed it, mind you, such as during a complaint investigation.) While they say they understand the problem and they tell me they'll fix it, they never seem to. Spam, DoS attacks, port scans, obvious hack attempts - we may as well be talking to the wall for all the help we get from them. Blocking them appears to be the only way. When enough of them are blocked, perhaps they'll begin true cooperation.
I do NOC work for one of the major backbone providers and we are forced to try to work with several of these ISP's who promote the spamming. We never hear back from these folks in problem investigations. Blocking them appears to be the only answer.
If he "would not" buy it, then what's he using it for? If it's of so little value to him, he shouldn't bother using it. If he needs to use it, then it's got value, and he should pay for that value, plain and simple.