> The people PJ exposes fight dirty. They try all sorts of tricks to discredit Groklaw, chief among them is posting awful things anonymously.
First off, there are posts elsewhere showing exactly what sort of comments get deleted. They were comments like "Red Hat is a CCIA member." That was the whole post. It linked to the CCIA membership page. It was removed with no comment, presumably because it ran counter to the story presented.
Is that "awful"? If that post was wrong, and I'm not sure how the CCIA could get its own members wrong, wouldn't the better approach be to fight incorrect information with correct information?
> The idea being they can then smear Groklaw by pointing to these abusive posts as indicative of the Groklaw community. I've seen a bunch of these posts over the years and I've reported them to PJ so she can delete them.
Yes, there are also actual trolls online. I have *no* problem with PJ deleting those posts. Ever. But they're not part of some conspiracy, they're everywhere.
You're changing the topic, though. We're talking about censoring people who disagree. You're talking about people who post "awful" things. These are NOT the same thing, unless you use a strange definition of "awful" that might also reasonably cover many posts to the "corrections here" threads.
I, myself, have covered Groklaw extensively on Slashdot and supporting them. I wrote plenty of stories about how bad OOXML was, too, for that matter. I've been posting stories since the very early days, long before SCO filed suit against IBM. I'm very much in favor of FOSS. I hate software patents and have also advocated for their abolition. I can give you a long diatribe on the Curry-Howard correspondence and how the IEEE-USA president's statement in support of them was factually incorrect about mathematics if you want. In short, I'm not a "troll" and I can prove it.
It's only the censoring of disagreement I'm against. I have no problem with censoring abuse and profanity. Bringing them up is creating a straw man.
The Immaculate Conception refers to the birth of Mary (a child conceived without the taint of original sin). The Virgin Birth refers to the birth of Jesus (a child born to a virgin). They are not at all the same thing. You are approximately the 6,696,844,874th person to get them confused.
For those wondering about the calculation: 6,697,254,041 - world population (from Google) - 409,166 Catholic priests (source) - 1 (me) --------------------- 6,696,844,874
You could have simply verified one of the claims made: that he submitted legislation to let people remove DRM for lawful purposes (It's the Fair Use Act of 2007). Now, it's perfectly reasonable to check up on people. But you need to do that in spite of their biases, not just because of them. If you never check up on the people you agree with, you have no basis for thinking you know what you think you know.
So ad hominem is NOT warranted, despite what you claim. This is the internet. You can look up things as much as you want to. If the one and only thing you can figure out is the political persuasion of the person speaking, if you can't find even one single fact about something--anything!--to call the conclusions into doubt except their political leaning, nobody should take you seriously. Ever. Until you reform your ways.
Why? Because you've proven to be a lazy thinker. You took a mental shortcut and didn't even bother to check if it was warranted or not. You said that it's "completely rational to double-check anything they say" but didn't bother doing that (or even trying to!).
By your own definition, you are not behaving rationally.
If it helps you any, I'm not a Republican, Democrat or Libertarian (though I may have voted for some). I simply hate seeing people promote logical fallacies. Boucher had his flaws, but he really was one of the best in Congress on tech issues (that's a VERY low bar to clear, mind you). I know because I read all the news, figure out the things people agree on (even if they disagree about the implications of those things), and do a bit of fact checking to see who is lying. (Everyone is, sometimes. The trick is knowing when.)
Verizon has delegated enough authority to let the UAE write SSL certificates impersonating any site which will get automatically accepted by most browsers, so don't you think it's getting hard to know if your communications are actually secure from eavesdropping?
Part of the problem of secure communications is that there are too many governments who don't want people to have them because people can (and do) plot nefarious things with them.
They've tried that, but all that's been proven so far is that several types of proof won't work, rather than proving that it's impossible to prove. The first few sections of this paper itself go into detail about why this proof isn't one of the kinds of proof that won't work, incidentally.
For anyone interested in the details, you can find a lot more on this wiki, where a lot of mathematicians are weighing in on the proof and its potential flaws. Mathematicians are gathering from all over to examine this paper because it's so interesting. Even if one of the serious objections that have been raised so far kills it, it contains some novel ideas that will get people thinking.
They've also been gathering the news coverage and such, so it's probably the best place to find up-to-date information about this proof. It seems to have sparked quite a lot of interest for a paper that hasn't even been properly published.
> To you, it's okay to flat-out lie about Apple on Slashdot because it reinforces your existing opinions.
I would like to note that you did not, because you cannot, say that I was wrong about the fact that the submission correctly stated that the copied drawing was not part of the claimed invention. Instead, you told me what you believe my opinions are, with the implication that you disapprove of what you believe them to be. You then referenced non-specific "flat-out lie[s]", as if it were impossible for a submission to be accurate in part and inaccurate in part.
Why not rail against those things you believe to be untrue instead of attacking anyone who points out that the submission is at least partly correct?
> Slashdot should just stop accepting any patent-related stories until it gets an editor who can grasp the concept that you have to read the claims and specification to know what is covered, not just glance at the pretty pictures.
Did you actually read the Slashdot submission? You know, the one where they wrote: "Even though it's true that the figures are just illustrations of a possible UI and not a part of the claimed invention, [...]" (emphasis added)
Or do you automatically post the same comment to every Slashdot story about patents expecting to be right most of the time?
If not, maybe I should patent that idea. Then I could autopost "Is Google evil now?" to every Google story, "Did the editors even READ the story they linked to?" to every kdawson story, and save us all a lot of time...
Sorry to hijack the FP, but I wanted to direct everyone's attention to the response from FutureTap, the makers of "Where To?"
Here are the relevant parts:
Now some folks argued we might have a deal in place with Apple. I can assure you: we don't. The story was equally surprising for us as for many others.
[...]
I'm not a lawyer. I can't really judge whether the inclusion of a 1:1 copy of our start screen in someone else's patent is legal. I just have to say, it doesn't feel right. (If you can recommend a good, affordable patent lawyer, please let us know.) The perspective of an endless legal battle, however, is not very intriguing for a small company like us that aims to throw all its power into improving existing and developing new apps. So we definitely hope there'll be an easy solution. Perhaps it's just a flaw in the filing that can be fixed easily. If someone from Apple Legal reads these lines, you're welcome to discuss.
In summary, this episode once more reinforces my personal aversion against software patents. In my opinion they discriminate against smaller developers who can't afford building a huge legal department to defend against such patent cases and to research existing patent mine fields.
What do you think about the case? Are we overreacting? Please let us know in the comments, we're glad to hear your thoughts.
A) You can be more than one thing. I say he's a reporter because he's reporting on the story. I note that you say 'lobbyist' but forget what he lobbied for: he lobbied *against software patents* Which is why I don't understand PJ's sudden apology for them, trying to make these claims in IBM's patents, which cover software running on otherwise non-infringing hardware, as being anything but software patents. I mean, she really did say something to the effect of "there's hardware in there too" without bothering to explain why that's relevant or how TH could possibly infringe upon those given that they do not, in fact, manufacture any hardware.
B) I read that other story. PJ buried plenty of facts (like the CCIA/Red Hat link) until people made a big stink about it (she finally let through some anon who posted it, after telling people to quit posting it).
I didn't say that she buried the story, only the facts she didn't like. And I've given you specific facts which got moderated out of existence.
C) You quoted Groklaw saying, in part: "So, why doesn't Florian and the folks he is lobbying for release the earlier letter from Bowler, in which he apparently expressed that he was unaware that "IBM has intellectual property rights in this area"?"
This is wrong on so many levels.
ONE is that Florian didn't release the letters, though he did link to them and report on them (the letters are on turbohercules.com, Florian's site is fosspatents.blogspot.com please check your facts next time).
TWO is that Florian isn't doing any lobbying work in this case (please provide documentation, not mere allegations, if you believe otherwise). If reporting someone's side of the story is "lobbying" now, I'm going to have to refer to PJ as an "IBM lobbyist" (i.e. someone who lobbies on IBM's behalf), because we're no longer requiring that a lobbyist be paid by the organization they support if you want to say that he's a TH lobbyist.
THREE they certainly DID release the letters PJ complains about them not having released, so the information there (and the allegations of contradiction) are old and incorrect (this was back when we had letters #3 & #4 only; letters #1 & #2 were released later).
In short, PJ rushed to judgment and got the facts all wrong because she didn't wait to hear the whole story. Just like you. Now you're parroting old, outdated information that never got properly updated, that chides them for not releasing letters which they DID release (and which I've linked for you), allegations of contradiction which are NOT borne out when you check the dates on when they were written and realize that IBM disclosed the patents in question after they complained that they had not.
So... if Florian is all "spin" for having gotten the whole story and having reported on it, what shall I say of PJ, who rushed to judgment and has a page full of inaccurate statements which she has not bothered to update (in spite of having issued MANY updates for other reasons)?
PJ is entitled to her own opinion, but she's not entitled to her own facts. Please go examine the dates that things were written and compare them to the dates on the letters. They don't add up because the cart got put before the horse. People learned of the last two letters first, only to make all sorts of accusations that turned out to be untrue (which they won't retract now that they've been proven wrong). Which is sad, because back in the SCO days, we gave even SCO a chance to prove things.
Nowadays, she resorts to smear jobs that she learned how to do from watching SCO. I mean, she writes things like, "[b]ut if you wanted
> This guy is claiming that IBM is being monopolistic for not changing their own software license to what turbohercules has asked for.
No, they complained that they were illegally tying hardware and software in a market they have a monopoly on. They asked them to mitigate the issue by changing the license, so that they wouldn't have to go to court. You may remember that the EU also punished Microsoft for this. IBM has to follow EU law if they want to do business in the EU.
> Meanwhile, turbohercules is shitting their pants, saying oh! IBM threatened us! (advised by Florian on that, notably) When they have done absolutely nothing in court.
Advised by? Florian is just a reporter, actually. One with better information on the workings of the EU government than most US-centric types (*cough*PJ*cough*) who appear think that only US law matters. TH said that IBM FUDed them, which they did. IBM invented FUD and then others, like Microsoft and SCO, learned from IBM's once legendary technique. Don't get me wrong, IBM is way better than they used to be. But IBM was a convicted monopolist subject to several consent decrees LONG before Microsoft ever became one.
The fact is, TH tried to make nice and do business. IBM told them to get bent and tossed a bit of FUD their way about Hercules being an infringing platform. They didn't have to do that. They could have just ignored the letter. They could have responded with a single word: "no." The only reason I can fathom for them doing this is that they see TH as a threat. And they weren't much of a threat until they got miffed at IBM for being a jerk and decided to complain to the EU.
> I post a lot on slashdot. Is it any surprise that some of my words are used more than once?
You may not realize it, but you use it in almost every post replying to Florian.
> Do you have any idea how many times you've posted?
About 700 times. Slashdot used to tell us this, but it doesn't seem to any more.
> Florian is all spin. He should be shut down before he tries to mislead people with his false statements. There are plenty of other people who pay attention when he posts too.
Speaking of misleading people, I assume that you ignored the part where you appeared to confuse Florian Meuller with some other Florian because you realized your mistake?
Now then, it's true the Florian posts a lot of facts that people would rather keep quiet about. It's also true that he's a leader in the fight against software patents in the EU. Something all FOSS contributors should be grateful for.
If it were up to people like PJ, it seems that you couldn't mention that Red Hat is a CCIA member, or that IBM listed three pledged patents in letter #4, even after being reminded of that pledge (and notified that Hercules is under an OSI-approved license). You can say that it doesn't violate IBM's pledge and I'll respond that it doesn't matter legally because there are over a hundred other patents that IBM could assert against anyone. But the fact remains that they listed those three (which could easily have been omitted) for whatever reason, and that they had no reason not to be aware of both the pledge and the license of Hercules.
I'm sorry, but Florian has posted a lot of facts with sources and citations. You're entitled to your own opinion, but not your own facts. And the fact remains that PJ has tried to bury some of these facts and any discussion of them on Groklaw. You're free to come to your own conclusions, but I don't like this whole thing where we can't mention inconvenient truths any more because certain people don't want to hear them.
My point is that telling folks to shut up or to go away isn't the answer.
> I admit no such thing. First, I do not believe that a private conversation (which these letters were) between two parties in any way shape or form can constitute an 'attack' on a third party, absent some actual action against the third party.
You don't seem to understand what an admission is. You don't get to play Humpty-Dumpty and pretend that your words mean something other than what you say. The plain meanings of your words say things you, apparently, did not intend to. Thus, they are admissions.
Now then, as I said, it was FUD. Fear, uncertainty & doubt. They have fear, because they believe that IBM doesn't like them. They have uncertainty because they don't know, exactly, what IBM will do, only what they might do. They have doubt because there's good reason to doubt that they could face IBM's lawyers without significant expenditures. If you read the letters, the disclosure in French at the bottom shows that they're a company with very little money.
> Secondly, your treatment of the word infringement strikes me as the same way some people treat the word cancer - if it not said out loud then it doesn't exist. IBM saying that Hercules infringes their patents is not what makes it infringe, and IBM not saying it infringes their patents does not make it non-infringing. The only two things that matter are: does it actually infringe (IBM thinks so and I am not aware of any claims to the contrary), and has IBM done anything about it (no).
You can elect not to sue infringers, you cannot elect not to have cancer. If you remember, the Linux kernel also infringed many of those IBM patents, which is why IBM wrote that pledge, removing the infringement.
> You can rail against 'software' (which these aren't) patents all you want, but in this case patents did exactly what they were supposed to - encourage progress and keep out freeloaders.
Well, "software patent" is a vague term, so I'm going to define them as "patents containing claims that read on software, even when that software is running on hardware that, but for the software, would not be infringing." If you disagree with that definition, please give me your own, but I have to believe that if you have a piece of commodity hardware that isn't infringing upon the patent and if you add software to that non-infringing hardware and suddenly come up with a device that infringes some claim in a patent, you have a software patent. Because we've already decided that the hardware isn't infringing, it must be the software that is. Now, you could try to say that it's the combination of the two that's infringing, I suppose, but that makes no sense, because software needs hardware to run it.
So, how can a piece of software infringe upon them if these aren't software patents? Given that TurboHercules buys commodity hardware, how the hell can it infringe upon any of the hardware patent claims? Either everyone who buys ordinary computers infringes upon IBM patents (and IBM should be going to the hardware makers to hammer out a cross-licensing agreement), or they license them to Intel & co. and the patents are exhausted.
And there most certainly are software patents in there (that is, there are patent claims which appear to cover software). Let's take a look at US Patent 5825627, shall we? It's #65 on the list IBM gave, for those following along at home.
In claim one, it covers, "A computer system capable of translating a plurality of non-native instructions to a plurality of native instructions"... in short, it covers a computer system running software that translates one bytecode to another using a certain setup. Well, to be technical it doesn't care *how* the computer system does this, it merely covers any system "capable" of doing that, including both software
I read through your old comments, just to see where the "debunking" was.
You... linked to Groklaw. There's not much debunking. Almost everything else you said was some kind of insult. Or it told him to read the article, even though he wrote long replies that you avoided addressing any of the issues raised by. You never actually understood his argument. He's talking about the patents and so you say that the copyrights are the real problem. Then he tells you there's more than one problem (i.e. both of them create legal issues) and then you talk past him for many, many posts, because you never want to address whatever he's talking about.
But after all your talk about "insubstantiated" arguments, your only source cited that I could find was a Groklaw article that he responded to. But maybe my eyes glazed over after the millionth time you wrote "go away" and I missed something. I guess you don't have time to respond fully or something. Except that you clearly have enough time to follow this guy like a stalker. No, seriously, I can look at your comment history and compare it to his pretty easily. It doesn't help to understand your arguments, though, because you always lead people on dead ends, when you bother to cite anything at all.
What's there, exactly? An old SCO story that has no visible connection to Florian Meuller at all. Wait... but there is a "Florian Weimer" there, who posts quite a bit. You do realize that those are DIFFERENT people... right? Hell, Florian itself is a common name. Even Florian Meuller is a common name (not unlike, say, "Pamela Jones"). But I can't find any comments from Florian Meuller over there, let alone a "connection", unless someone mod-bombed them down to -1. So maybe you can help us figure out what this alleged connection is, rather than give us a "go look over here" type of answer because you don't have time to explain what we're even looking for.
As far as I can tell, you're just some guy who stalks Florian Meuller (and possibly anyone else named Florian) on Slashdot and tells them to go away endlessly. No, seriously. Do you have ANY idea how many times you've posted the words 'go away'?
Incidentally, I've made my arguments elsewhere in this story, such as here. I thought I wouldn't leave you guessing where to find the substance.
> In particular, they see nothing wrong with the fact that TH infringes IBM patents, and IBM therefore does not recognize them as a legitimate competitor.
So you admit that when they called the Hercules emulator an "infringing platform", that they were attacking an OSS-licensed product, right? Because TH couldn't infringe upon IBM's patents by using Hercules without Hercules being infringing, given that they use only it and commodity hardware. If you want to point out a hardware patent, I'll mention that AMD/Intel licenses any relevant patents for, and in doing so, the doctrine of patent exhaustion comes into play. Meaning that because you bought patent-covered parts made by someone with a patent license, you can't be sued for using them.
So when did we become so pro-software-patent around here, anyhow? Or are you going to pull a PJ and tell us that microcode is actually hardware, not code, proving that you have no idea what it is? Yes, it's pretty bare metal, but it's not like software running on another platform can create new hardware out of nothing, right? Put another way, maybe you can just tell me how using software can infringe upon a hardware patent? Via business methods? Are those better than software patents? Are they even valid, post Bilski?
I know she's tried to make it into an "attack" on the GPL, but... it makes no sense. She essentially argues that we have to support the right of people who write copyright licenses to permit *any* crazy restriction, however ridiculous, because a court might, theoretically do what? Decide that the GPL is too restrictive because it gives people more rights than they have under copyright law? And it ignores the fact that the courts don't care about our support of whatever, nor do they need it in order to rule whichever way they want to. Put another way, it's sort of like saying that we have to be quiet about riding in the back of the bus, because the courts might decide that we have no right to ride on the bus at all. But I think that's wrong, because you'll never get any rights if spend your whole life sitting quietly on the back of the bus.
So she wants us to support IBM. When they're FUDing a company trying to help people use OSI-approved open source software. Using software patents. Forget the pledge. I don't even care whether or not it applies. It doesn't change a thing, legally, when they have so many non-pledged patents.
Whatever. I used to support her, but she's looking for a new crusade these days. Seems like no one told her how the last few turned out...
> Sorry, but you are entirely incorrect. In the letter where the 173 patents are mentioned is a list of each and every patent, including the patent number and title of the patent. This letter is directly linked to in the Groklaw article.
You're talking about letter #4. They're talking about letter #2.
Everybody only remembers letters #3 & #4, because we saw them first (#3 asks them to identify the infringement, letter #4 is the list of patents).
But in letter #1, TH asks IBM to consider a business proposal. In letter #2, IBM calls the Hercules emulator an "infringing platform" without elaborating what they infringe or how. Letter #3, incidentally, is the one that requests that they identify how they're infringing and that they please consider adding those patents to their pledge, given that the Hercules emulator is QPL-licensed OSS.
Letter #4, of course, is where IBM gives a list and, after being reminded of that pledge (and that Hercules is under an OSI-approved license), lists three patents previously pledged. I won't claim that breaks the pledge (it doesn't really matter). But I will claim that's a deliberate insult, given the context of the prior discussions.
> That has nothing to do with the court system - it actually loses money on each case, whether patent, criminal, or civil.
Well, they COULD let people transfer things to a more reasonable jurisdiction (i.e. one where at least one of the parties and some of the witnesses are based). Then again, the patent trolls have set up shop there, so they're local now and it doesn't do much good. There was a lot of press once, about how a ruling might allow for transfer to another jurisdiction, but it doesn't seem to have done much good.
No, they shouldn't. That's exactly what the RIAA wants. They want to monopolize all the money being made from music.
What they should *really* do is to compare all of the RIAAs songs with one another to point out exactly how unoriginal they are (especially if they compare them to old songs where the lyrics arrangement, if not the recording rights, should be in the public domain). After all, there's not much that's truly original and Hollywood was founded by people evading Edison's patent enforcers.
Given their attitudes, they would start a war of litigation amongst themselves, leaving them with less money and fewer lawyers to bother the rest of us with. Also, it would be interesting to point out exactly where certain haughty folks got their ideas from. There are only just so many notes and with the small number required for a court to find infringement, I can't help but think that they'd infringe upon *something.*
A map of who has "stolen" (to borrow their word) from whom would be quite interesting, as well.
Here's the amicus brief written by the IEEE-USA president Professor Lee A. Hollaar. I direct your attention to footnote #28, which reads in relevant part:
It is unfortunate for purposes here that the early developers of programming language made their calculation-and-assignment statements look like mathematical equations so that they would seem familiar to scientists and engineers. But the common programming statement I = I + 1, which increments the value stored at location I, is essentially nonsense as a mathematical equation. Similarly, a computer program is a series of calculation-and-assignment statements that are processed sequentially, not a set of simultaneous mathematical equations that are solved for their variables.
(Freshly transcribed from the PDF; feel free to check for typos.)
Yes, I wrote it wrong when I said 1+1 instead of I+1 before. But however you write it, we're dealing with the successor function (either in general, or the successor of 1). It's related to the second Peano axiom as a function that helps us define the natural numbers (and thereby, the integers, rationals, reals, etc.).
But you knew that already, right? That's why you just threw up a [citation needed] rather than actually respond?
I suppose you must be two of a kind, with him calling the correspondence between programs and mathematics "cosmetic" rather than actually addressing it. To be fair, I suppose that proving the Curry Howard correspondence wrong would be a bit more of a challenge.
I mean, how do you disprove it or consider it "cosmetic" when the fine folks at MetaMath are writing out the foundations of mathematics as a computer program?
If you simulate a physical process on a computer, say, the sun going nova, you can look out the window and the sun will still be there (it hasn't actually gone nova). If you "simulate" a mathematical process on a computer, you end up with the same result as if you'd done it by hand (assuming you don't screw up).
> I saw the allegations by Google, but not sure if there are any evidence to back it.
It was proven when Verizon's lawyers were forced to withdraw the clips. They wouldn't have done that for such an embarrassing reason if they didn't have to.
I believe that Ars Technica had good coverage of it.
> See, you were previously arguing about 35 USC 112. Now, all of a sudden, you've abandoned that argument and are instead arguing about 35 USC 101.
You could have just said "enablement" and "patentable subject matter," but you were trying to show off and talk down to us, right? No, I won't believe you if you try to tell me all lawyers talk that way. Ray Beckerman doesn't. You were a jerk to him, too.
> Since that seems to be a horrible mischaracterization of his comments, I'm going to have to say [Citation needed].
There's a nice story about it on Groklaw talking about computation theory for lawyers (there's also a text copy of his comment, which did indeed play off a confusion between assignment and equality, by saying that "1+1=2" is somehow invalid mathematically, but not on a computer, where it describes adding two numbers together).
Google is your friend. Who is asking whom to do their homework now?
> This doesn't explain why you, a former-IEEE member, can't understand a flow chart sufficiently to implement it in software.
I can, if the damn flow chart doesn't leave things out. I'm saying that source code doesn't leave them the opportunity to leave things out (but flow charts do) and that it's a lot more obvious if someone gives you broken source code. I mean, it either compiles and runs or it doesn't.
> Sure, and someone who's skilled in the art can determine that.
Yeah, if they spend an awful lot of money in court to prove that the patent fails the enablement requirements. Oh, sorry, you won't understand me unless I say 35 U.S.C. 112 first paragraph, now, will you?
> See, patents aren't supposed to be written to enable "one of Xenographic's skill in the art", but "one of ordinary skill in the art." > "Lawyers like you" sounds almost sneering here.
Funny how that works, huh? It's almost like I read the snide tone of your post ("everyone here is a moron but me") and repeated it back to you, having already known that you were a jerk from your past conversations with Ray Beckerman, among others. This might surprise you, but some of us don't forget people's names.
Considering that I've managed to work on everything from zinc fingers to electronics to numerical analysis, I'm not really that impressed that you can manage more than one technical domain. You'd think that programming since you were 6 was special or something.
And after claiming I mischaracterized the IEEE-USA's amicus brief, you seem quite adept at mischaracterizing my argument as well. Does legalese so warp one's conception of the English language that it's no longer possible to understand anything else? Maybe I should try another language to see.
Well, PJ did remove the letters (at least, the PDF-to-text of them). She doesn't have copies anywhere that I can see, actually. And doesn't she usually at least save information like that? Why does she avoid doing so now? Even if she didn't like that one, she could do her own, you know.
That comment is currently vanished, but I'll put the text up at the end of this comment.
For the record, I don't buy the Psystar bit, either. If it's a whole legal conspiracy to harm the rights of authors, why is Google Book Search not included, given that all the actual authors are up in arms because the settlement is opt-out not opt-in? No, I think Google is doing the right thing. But I have a hard time seeing someone go on about a conspiracy against the rights of authors who says Psystar is part of it and Google isn't, given that there's a huge difference between the scale of what they're doing.
Mind you, I prefer the free flow of information. That's why I support Google, Psystar, and TH's side of things.
It's also why I don't trust PJ for burying information like this when it suits her.
Here are the four letters as text, if anyone wants them.
TurboHercules
[address, telephone & email information redacted]
La Défense, le 29 juillet 2009
[ED: La Défense is a place in France. The date is July 29, written in French.]
Daniel Chaffraix, President
IBM France
Tour Descartes, La Défense 5,
2 avenue Gambetta
92400 Courbevoie, France
Dear Mr Chaffraix,
As President of the recently formed company TurboHercules S.A.S., I am writing to request your consideration for our innovative business model based on the IBM mainframe ecosystem. TurboHercules is the commercial arm of the open sources Heracles project--a software program that implements the instruction set of IBM mainframes on Intel-based servers such as IBM's System x products. I was the original creator of the Hercules emulator ten years ago. Since then it has been continuously updated by a talented, world-wide team of mainframe programmers.
TurboHercules is fully capable of running current versions of IBM's modern 64-bit operating systems such as z/OS, z/VM, and z/VSE as well as its older 31-bit and 24-bit operating systems. [ED: 31-bit is NOT a typo.] Unlike the old Plug Compatible Mainframes, TurboHercules' highly innovative mainframe-compatible systems are implemented with modern software virtualization techniques instead of hardware.
TurboHercules seeks to establish a commercial business that offers customers a choice in mainframe-compatible platforms, while contributing to the long-term health of the IBM mainframe ecosystem. Because the lasting success of the IBM mainframe platform is the prerequisite of our own success, it is very important to us to secure IBM's approval for our business model.
Specifically, we would like you to consider making available to your mainframe customers a license for IBM operating systems on the TurboHercules platform. TurboHercules S.A.S., as the commercial entity, would provide support for a complete turnkey system based on these licenses. The pricing, conditions and limitations of that license would be at the sold discretion of IBM on reasonable and fair terms. We propose to focus on the secondary workloads such as training, demonstrations, pre- and post-processing, data prepa
And you never answered the question: how many patents have you ever actually attempted to implement from the description?
Or maybe I should just reverse course and say that any patent lawyer who doesn't understand the Curry-Howard correspondence is incompetent? It shows that all software is a mathematical formula. And no, the president of IEEE-USA's amicus brief did NOT do anything but hand wave the response to that. His reply was on the order of yeah, it exists, but I disagree with it because I don't know the difference between assignment and equality and I don't think the math people do either (seriously, he said that 2=1+1 with the = being assignment is meaningless in mathematics, even though it relates to the successor function used to construct the integers!). And maybe he thinks he's some kind of bad ass because he aced high level differential equations and did better than some folks in the math program. Problem is, almost none of the math you do in the engineering curriculum is even in the right field to understand Curry-Howard. What would I know, though? It's not like I went through *both* the engineering and mathematics curricula (or like I was once an IEEE member)...
But you're just going to go on ahead and pretend that all failures of enablement on bad patents are the programmer's fault, right?
The advantage of source code is that you can't leave stuff out and have it still work (or even compile, sometimes).
You leave out a stop codon in your sequence and things will go wrong. You leave a part out of your machine and it won't work.
And nobody will doubt that it's because you left something out, because it's easy to compare the two.
But you sure as hell *can* leave out important details in flow charts. But it's kinda hard to compare the two, so you can always just blame the programmer for not implementing details you left out.
I was pretty sure that we weren't supposed to have to reverse engineer everything in order to understand a patent that met the enablement requirements. But lawyers like you have probably made that requirement almost as meaningless as the obviousness requirements.
Slashdot Mirror
> The people PJ exposes fight dirty. They try all sorts of tricks to discredit Groklaw, chief among them is posting awful things anonymously.
First off, there are posts elsewhere showing exactly what sort of comments get deleted. They were comments like "Red Hat is a CCIA member." That was the whole post. It linked to the CCIA membership page. It was removed with no comment, presumably because it ran counter to the story presented.
Is that "awful"? If that post was wrong, and I'm not sure how the CCIA could get its own members wrong, wouldn't the better approach be to fight incorrect information with correct information?
> The idea being they can then smear Groklaw by pointing to these abusive posts as indicative of the Groklaw community. I've seen a bunch of these posts over the years and I've reported them to PJ so she can delete them.
Yes, there are also actual trolls online. I have *no* problem with PJ deleting those posts. Ever. But they're not part of some conspiracy, they're everywhere.
You're changing the topic, though. We're talking about censoring people who disagree. You're talking about people who post "awful" things. These are NOT the same thing, unless you use a strange definition of "awful" that might also reasonably cover many posts to the "corrections here" threads.
I, myself, have covered Groklaw extensively on Slashdot and supporting them. I wrote plenty of stories about how bad OOXML was, too, for that matter. I've been posting stories since the very early days, long before SCO filed suit against IBM. I'm very much in favor of FOSS. I hate software patents and have also advocated for their abolition. I can give you a long diatribe on the Curry-Howard correspondence and how the IEEE-USA president's statement in support of them was factually incorrect about mathematics if you want. In short, I'm not a "troll" and I can prove it.
It's only the censoring of disagreement I'm against. I have no problem with censoring abuse and profanity. Bringing them up is creating a straw man.
The Immaculate Conception refers to the birth of Mary (a child conceived without the taint of original sin). The Virgin Birth refers to the birth of Jesus (a child born to a virgin). They are not at all the same thing. You are approximately the 6,696,844,874th person to get them confused.
For those wondering about the calculation:
6,697,254,041 - world population (from Google)
- 409,166 Catholic priests (source)
- 1 (me)
---------------------
6,696,844,874
You could have simply verified one of the claims made: that he submitted legislation to let people remove DRM for lawful purposes (It's the Fair Use Act of 2007). Now, it's perfectly reasonable to check up on people. But you need to do that in spite of their biases, not just because of them. If you never check up on the people you agree with, you have no basis for thinking you know what you think you know.
So ad hominem is NOT warranted, despite what you claim. This is the internet. You can look up things as much as you want to. If the one and only thing you can figure out is the political persuasion of the person speaking, if you can't find even one single fact about something--anything!--to call the conclusions into doubt except their political leaning, nobody should take you seriously. Ever. Until you reform your ways.
Why? Because you've proven to be a lazy thinker. You took a mental shortcut and didn't even bother to check if it was warranted or not. You said that it's "completely rational to double-check anything they say" but didn't bother doing that (or even trying to!).
By your own definition, you are not behaving rationally.
If it helps you any, I'm not a Republican, Democrat or Libertarian (though I may have voted for some). I simply hate seeing people promote logical fallacies. Boucher had his flaws, but he really was one of the best in Congress on tech issues (that's a VERY low bar to clear, mind you). I know because I read all the news, figure out the things people agree on (even if they disagree about the implications of those things), and do a bit of fact checking to see who is lying. (Everyone is, sometimes. The trick is knowing when.)
You wrote:
> Why do you only single out Apple out of all of Foxconn's customers?
In reply to someone who wrote:
> While I'm not faulting Apple anymore than -- say -- Samsung or Sony
How is that being "singled out"?
He hates the unethical behavior. You imply that what he said means that he hates Apple.
What gives?
Verizon has delegated enough authority to let the UAE write SSL certificates impersonating any site which will get automatically accepted by most browsers, so don't you think it's getting hard to know if your communications are actually secure from eavesdropping?
Part of the problem of secure communications is that there are too many governments who don't want people to have them because people can (and do) plot nefarious things with them.
They've tried that, but all that's been proven so far is that several types of proof won't work, rather than proving that it's impossible to prove. The first few sections of this paper itself go into detail about why this proof isn't one of the kinds of proof that won't work, incidentally.
Terrence Tao has a blog post on why a P=NP proof can't be relativisable if you're interested. Incidentally, there are several other classes of proof that won't separate P from NP.
For anyone interested in the details, you can find a lot more on this wiki, where a lot of mathematicians are weighing in on the proof and its potential flaws. Mathematicians are gathering from all over to examine this paper because it's so interesting. Even if one of the serious objections that have been raised so far kills it, it contains some novel ideas that will get people thinking.
They've also been gathering the news coverage and such, so it's probably the best place to find up-to-date information about this proof. It seems to have sparked quite a lot of interest for a paper that hasn't even been properly published.
>> And to prove his point I'm going to send Eric Schmidt 14 pictures of my ass.
> And his response will be: "You again?"
Mr. Goatse, I assure you that we're entirely too familiar with you and your work.
> To you, it's okay to flat-out lie about Apple on Slashdot because it reinforces your existing opinions.
I would like to note that you did not, because you cannot, say that I was wrong about the fact that the submission correctly stated that the copied drawing was not part of the claimed invention. Instead, you told me what you believe my opinions are, with the implication that you disapprove of what you believe them to be. You then referenced non-specific "flat-out lie[s]", as if it were impossible for a submission to be accurate in part and inaccurate in part.
Why not rail against those things you believe to be untrue instead of attacking anyone who points out that the submission is at least partly correct?
> Slashdot should just stop accepting any patent-related stories until it gets an editor who can grasp the concept that you have to read the claims and specification to know what is covered, not just glance at the pretty pictures.
Did you actually read the Slashdot submission? You know, the one where they wrote: "Even though it's true that the figures are just illustrations of a possible UI and not a part of the claimed invention, [...]" (emphasis added)
Or do you automatically post the same comment to every Slashdot story about patents expecting to be right most of the time?
If not, maybe I should patent that idea. Then I could autopost "Is Google evil now?" to every Google story, "Did the editors even READ the story they linked to?" to every kdawson story, and save us all a lot of time...
Sorry to hijack the FP, but I wanted to direct everyone's attention to the response from FutureTap, the makers of "Where To?"
Here are the relevant parts:
A) You can be more than one thing. I say he's a reporter because he's reporting on the story. I note that you say 'lobbyist' but forget what he lobbied for: he lobbied *against software patents* Which is why I don't understand PJ's sudden apology for them, trying to make these claims in IBM's patents, which cover software running on otherwise non-infringing hardware, as being anything but software patents. I mean, she really did say something to the effect of "there's hardware in there too" without bothering to explain why that's relevant or how TH could possibly infringe upon those given that they do not, in fact, manufacture any hardware.
B) I read that other story. PJ buried plenty of facts (like the CCIA/Red Hat link) until people made a big stink about it (she finally let through some anon who posted it, after telling people to quit posting it).
I didn't say that she buried the story, only the facts she didn't like. And I've given you specific facts which got moderated out of existence.
C) You quoted Groklaw saying, in part: "So, why doesn't Florian and the folks he is lobbying for release the earlier letter from Bowler, in which he apparently expressed that he was unaware that "IBM has intellectual property rights in this area"?"
This is wrong on so many levels.
ONE is that Florian didn't release the letters, though he did link to them and report on them (the letters are on turbohercules.com, Florian's site is fosspatents.blogspot.com please check your facts next time).
TWO is that Florian isn't doing any lobbying work in this case (please provide documentation, not mere allegations, if you believe otherwise). If reporting someone's side of the story is "lobbying" now, I'm going to have to refer to PJ as an "IBM lobbyist" (i.e. someone who lobbies on IBM's behalf), because we're no longer requiring that a lobbyist be paid by the organization they support if you want to say that he's a TH lobbyist.
THREE they certainly DID release the letters PJ complains about them not having released, so the information there (and the allegations of contradiction) are old and incorrect (this was back when we had letters #3 & #4 only; letters #1 & #2 were released later).
In short, PJ rushed to judgment and got the facts all wrong because she didn't wait to hear the whole story. Just like you. Now you're parroting old, outdated information that never got properly updated, that chides them for not releasing letters which they DID release (and which I've linked for you), allegations of contradiction which are NOT borne out when you check the dates on when they were written and realize that IBM disclosed the patents in question after they complained that they had not.
So... if Florian is all "spin" for having gotten the whole story and having reported on it, what shall I say of PJ, who rushed to judgment and has a page full of inaccurate statements which she has not bothered to update (in spite of having issued MANY updates for other reasons)?
PJ is entitled to her own opinion, but she's not entitled to her own facts. Please go examine the dates that things were written and compare them to the dates on the letters. They don't add up because the cart got put before the horse. People learned of the last two letters first, only to make all sorts of accusations that turned out to be untrue (which they won't retract now that they've been proven wrong). Which is sad, because back in the SCO days, we gave even SCO a chance to prove things.
Nowadays, she resorts to smear jobs that she learned how to do from watching SCO. I mean, she writes things like, "[b]ut if you wanted
> This guy is claiming that IBM is being monopolistic for not changing their own software license to what turbohercules has asked for.
No, they complained that they were illegally tying hardware and software in a market they have a monopoly on. They asked them to mitigate the issue by changing the license, so that they wouldn't have to go to court. You may remember that the EU also punished Microsoft for this. IBM has to follow EU law if they want to do business in the EU.
> Meanwhile, turbohercules is shitting their pants, saying oh! IBM threatened us! (advised by Florian on that, notably) When they have done absolutely nothing in court.
Advised by? Florian is just a reporter, actually. One with better information on the workings of the EU government than most US-centric types (*cough*PJ*cough*) who appear think that only US law matters. TH said that IBM FUDed them, which they did. IBM invented FUD and then others, like Microsoft and SCO, learned from IBM's once legendary technique. Don't get me wrong, IBM is way better than they used to be. But IBM was a convicted monopolist subject to several consent decrees LONG before Microsoft ever became one.
The fact is, TH tried to make nice and do business. IBM told them to get bent and tossed a bit of FUD their way about Hercules being an infringing platform. They didn't have to do that. They could have just ignored the letter. They could have responded with a single word: "no." The only reason I can fathom for them doing this is that they see TH as a threat. And they weren't much of a threat until they got miffed at IBM for being a jerk and decided to complain to the EU.
> I post a lot on slashdot. Is it any surprise that some of my words are used more than once?
You may not realize it, but you use it in almost every post replying to Florian.
> Do you have any idea how many times you've posted?
About 700 times. Slashdot used to tell us this, but it doesn't seem to any more.
> Florian is all spin. He should be shut down before he tries to mislead people with his false statements. There are plenty of other people who pay attention when he posts too.
Speaking of misleading people, I assume that you ignored the part where you appeared to confuse Florian Meuller with some other Florian because you realized your mistake?
Now then, it's true the Florian posts a lot of facts that people would rather keep quiet about. It's also true that he's a leader in the fight against software patents in the EU. Something all FOSS contributors should be grateful for.
If it were up to people like PJ, it seems that you couldn't mention that Red Hat is a CCIA member, or that IBM listed three pledged patents in letter #4, even after being reminded of that pledge (and notified that Hercules is under an OSI-approved license). You can say that it doesn't violate IBM's pledge and I'll respond that it doesn't matter legally because there are over a hundred other patents that IBM could assert against anyone. But the fact remains that they listed those three (which could easily have been omitted) for whatever reason, and that they had no reason not to be aware of both the pledge and the license of Hercules.
I'm sorry, but Florian has posted a lot of facts with sources and citations. You're entitled to your own opinion, but not your own facts. And the fact remains that PJ has tried to bury some of these facts and any discussion of them on Groklaw. You're free to come to your own conclusions, but I don't like this whole thing where we can't mention inconvenient truths any more because certain people don't want to hear them.
My point is that telling folks to shut up or to go away isn't the answer.
> I admit no such thing. First, I do not believe that a private conversation (which these letters were) between two parties in any way shape or form can constitute an 'attack' on a third party, absent some actual action against the third party.
You don't seem to understand what an admission is. You don't get to play Humpty-Dumpty and pretend that your words mean something other than what you say. The plain meanings of your words say things you, apparently, did not intend to. Thus, they are admissions.
Now then, as I said, it was FUD. Fear, uncertainty & doubt. They have fear, because they believe that IBM doesn't like them. They have uncertainty because they don't know, exactly, what IBM will do, only what they might do. They have doubt because there's good reason to doubt that they could face IBM's lawyers without significant expenditures. If you read the letters, the disclosure in French at the bottom shows that they're a company with very little money.
> Secondly, your treatment of the word infringement strikes me as the same way some people treat the word cancer - if it not said out loud then it doesn't exist. IBM saying that Hercules infringes their patents is not what makes it infringe, and IBM not saying it infringes their patents does not make it non-infringing. The only two things that matter are: does it actually infringe (IBM thinks so and I am not aware of any claims to the contrary), and has IBM done anything about it (no).
You can elect not to sue infringers, you cannot elect not to have cancer. If you remember, the Linux kernel also infringed many of those IBM patents, which is why IBM wrote that pledge, removing the infringement.
> You can rail against 'software' (which these aren't) patents all you want, but in this case patents did exactly what they were supposed to - encourage progress and keep out freeloaders.
Well, "software patent" is a vague term, so I'm going to define them as "patents containing claims that read on software, even when that software is running on hardware that, but for the software, would not be infringing." If you disagree with that definition, please give me your own, but I have to believe that if you have a piece of commodity hardware that isn't infringing upon the patent and if you add software to that non-infringing hardware and suddenly come up with a device that infringes some claim in a patent, you have a software patent. Because we've already decided that the hardware isn't infringing, it must be the software that is. Now, you could try to say that it's the combination of the two that's infringing, I suppose, but that makes no sense, because software needs hardware to run it.
So, how can a piece of software infringe upon them if these aren't software patents? Given that TurboHercules buys commodity hardware, how the hell can it infringe upon any of the hardware patent claims? Either everyone who buys ordinary computers infringes upon IBM patents (and IBM should be going to the hardware makers to hammer out a cross-licensing agreement), or they license them to Intel & co. and the patents are exhausted.
And there most certainly are software patents in there (that is, there are patent claims which appear to cover software). Let's take a look at US Patent 5825627, shall we? It's #65 on the list IBM gave, for those following along at home.
In claim one, it covers, "A computer system capable of translating a plurality of non-native instructions to a plurality of native instructions" ... in short, it covers a computer system running software that translates one bytecode to another using a certain setup. Well, to be technical it doesn't care *how* the computer system does this, it merely covers any system "capable" of doing that, including both software
Those statements were made at different times. The fact of whether or not IBM had yet identified the patents in question changed during that time.
If I said "Sarah Palin is not the president of the USA", would you call me a liar if she were later elected?
I read through your old comments, just to see where the "debunking" was.
You... linked to Groklaw. There's not much debunking. Almost everything else you said was some kind of insult. Or it told him to read the article, even though he wrote long replies that you avoided addressing any of the issues raised by. You never actually understood his argument. He's talking about the patents and so you say that the copyrights are the real problem. Then he tells you there's more than one problem (i.e. both of them create legal issues) and then you talk past him for many, many posts, because you never want to address whatever he's talking about.
But after all your talk about "insubstantiated" arguments, your only source cited that I could find was a Groklaw article that he responded to. But maybe my eyes glazed over after the millionth time you wrote "go away" and I missed something. I guess you don't have time to respond fully or something. Except that you clearly have enough time to follow this guy like a stalker. No, seriously, I can look at your comment history and compare it to his pretty easily. It doesn't help to understand your arguments, though, because you always lead people on dead ends, when you bother to cite anything at all.
Why don't we take an example of that dead-ending from this very post for illustration? You say "I guess I should pull up old comments again, where you are clearly the party to this entire scenario."
What's there, exactly? An old SCO story that has no visible connection to Florian Meuller at all. Wait... but there is a "Florian Weimer" there, who posts quite a bit. You do realize that those are DIFFERENT people... right? Hell, Florian itself is a common name. Even Florian Meuller is a common name (not unlike, say, "Pamela Jones"). But I can't find any comments from Florian Meuller over there, let alone a "connection", unless someone mod-bombed them down to -1. So maybe you can help us figure out what this alleged connection is, rather than give us a "go look over here" type of answer because you don't have time to explain what we're even looking for.
As far as I can tell, you're just some guy who stalks Florian Meuller (and possibly anyone else named Florian) on Slashdot and tells them to go away endlessly. No, seriously. Do you have ANY idea how many times you've posted the words 'go away'?
Incidentally, I've made my arguments elsewhere in this story, such as here. I thought I wouldn't leave you guessing where to find the substance.
> In particular, they see nothing wrong with the fact that TH infringes IBM patents, and IBM therefore does not recognize them as a legitimate competitor.
So you admit that when they called the Hercules emulator an "infringing platform", that they were attacking an OSS-licensed product, right? Because TH couldn't infringe upon IBM's patents by using Hercules without Hercules being infringing, given that they use only it and commodity hardware. If you want to point out a hardware patent, I'll mention that AMD/Intel licenses any relevant patents for, and in doing so, the doctrine of patent exhaustion comes into play. Meaning that because you bought patent-covered parts made by someone with a patent license, you can't be sued for using them.
So when did we become so pro-software-patent around here, anyhow? Or are you going to pull a PJ and tell us that microcode is actually hardware, not code, proving that you have no idea what it is? Yes, it's pretty bare metal, but it's not like software running on another platform can create new hardware out of nothing, right? Put another way, maybe you can just tell me how using software can infringe upon a hardware patent? Via business methods? Are those better than software patents? Are they even valid, post Bilski?
I know she's tried to make it into an "attack" on the GPL, but... it makes no sense. She essentially argues that we have to support the right of people who write copyright licenses to permit *any* crazy restriction, however ridiculous, because a court might, theoretically do what? Decide that the GPL is too restrictive because it gives people more rights than they have under copyright law? And it ignores the fact that the courts don't care about our support of whatever, nor do they need it in order to rule whichever way they want to. Put another way, it's sort of like saying that we have to be quiet about riding in the back of the bus, because the courts might decide that we have no right to ride on the bus at all. But I think that's wrong, because you'll never get any rights if spend your whole life sitting quietly on the back of the bus.
So she wants us to support IBM. When they're FUDing a company trying to help people use OSI-approved open source software. Using software patents. Forget the pledge. I don't even care whether or not it applies. It doesn't change a thing, legally, when they have so many non-pledged patents.
Whatever. I used to support her, but she's looking for a new crusade these days. Seems like no one told her how the last few turned out...
> Sorry, but you are entirely incorrect. In the letter where the 173 patents are mentioned is a list of each and every patent, including the patent number and title of the patent. This letter is directly linked to in the Groklaw article.
You're talking about letter #4. They're talking about letter #2.
Everybody only remembers letters #3 & #4, because we saw them first (#3 asks them to identify the infringement, letter #4 is the list of patents).
But in letter #1, TH asks IBM to consider a business proposal. In letter #2, IBM calls the Hercules emulator an "infringing platform" without elaborating what they infringe or how. Letter #3, incidentally, is the one that requests that they identify how they're infringing and that they please consider adding those patents to their pledge, given that the Hercules emulator is QPL-licensed OSS.
Letter #4, of course, is where IBM gives a list and, after being reminded of that pledge (and that Hercules is under an OSI-approved license), lists three patents previously pledged. I won't claim that breaks the pledge (it doesn't really matter). But I will claim that's a deliberate insult, given the context of the prior discussions.
> That has nothing to do with the court system - it actually loses money on each case, whether patent, criminal, or civil.
Well, they COULD let people transfer things to a more reasonable jurisdiction (i.e. one where at least one of the parties and some of the witnesses are based). Then again, the patent trolls have set up shop there, so they're local now and it doesn't do much good. There was a lot of press once, about how a ruling might allow for transfer to another jurisdiction, but it doesn't seem to have done much good.
No, they shouldn't. That's exactly what the RIAA wants. They want to monopolize all the money being made from music.
What they should *really* do is to compare all of the RIAAs songs with one another to point out exactly how unoriginal they are (especially if they compare them to old songs where the lyrics arrangement, if not the recording rights, should be in the public domain). After all, there's not much that's truly original and Hollywood was founded by people evading Edison's patent enforcers.
Given their attitudes, they would start a war of litigation amongst themselves, leaving them with less money and fewer lawyers to bother the rest of us with. Also, it would be interesting to point out exactly where certain haughty folks got their ideas from. There are only just so many notes and with the small number required for a court to find infringement, I can't help but think that they'd infringe upon *something.*
A map of who has "stolen" (to borrow their word) from whom would be quite interesting, as well.
Here's the amicus brief written by the IEEE-USA president Professor Lee A. Hollaar. I direct your attention to footnote #28, which reads in relevant part:
(Freshly transcribed from the PDF; feel free to check for typos.)
Yes, I wrote it wrong when I said 1+1 instead of I+1 before. But however you write it, we're dealing with the successor function (either in general, or the successor of 1). It's related to the second Peano axiom as a function that helps us define the natural numbers (and thereby, the integers, rationals, reals, etc.).
But you knew that already, right? That's why you just threw up a [citation needed] rather than actually respond?
I suppose you must be two of a kind, with him calling the correspondence between programs and mathematics "cosmetic" rather than actually addressing it. To be fair, I suppose that proving the Curry Howard correspondence wrong would be a bit more of a challenge.
I mean, how do you disprove it or consider it "cosmetic" when the fine folks at MetaMath are writing out the foundations of mathematics as a computer program?
If you simulate a physical process on a computer, say, the sun going nova, you can look out the window and the sun will still be there (it hasn't actually gone nova). If you "simulate" a mathematical process on a computer, you end up with the same result as if you'd done it by hand (assuming you don't screw up).
> I saw the allegations by Google, but not sure if there are any evidence to back it.
It was proven when Verizon's lawyers were forced to withdraw the clips. They wouldn't have done that for such an embarrassing reason if they didn't have to.
I believe that Ars Technica had good coverage of it.
> See, you were previously arguing about 35 USC 112. Now, all of a sudden, you've abandoned that argument and are instead arguing about 35 USC 101.
You could have just said "enablement" and "patentable subject matter," but you were trying to show off and talk down to us, right? No, I won't believe you if you try to tell me all lawyers talk that way. Ray Beckerman doesn't. You were a jerk to him, too.
> Since that seems to be a horrible mischaracterization of his comments, I'm going to have to say [Citation needed].
There's a nice story about it on Groklaw talking about computation theory for lawyers (there's also a text copy of his comment, which did indeed play off a confusion between assignment and equality, by saying that "1+1=2" is somehow invalid mathematically, but not on a computer, where it describes adding two numbers together).
Google is your friend. Who is asking whom to do their homework now?
> This doesn't explain why you, a former-IEEE member, can't understand a flow chart sufficiently to implement it in software.
I can, if the damn flow chart doesn't leave things out. I'm saying that source code doesn't leave them the opportunity to leave things out (but flow charts do) and that it's a lot more obvious if someone gives you broken source code. I mean, it either compiles and runs or it doesn't.
> Sure, and someone who's skilled in the art can determine that.
Yeah, if they spend an awful lot of money in court to prove that the patent fails the enablement requirements. Oh, sorry, you won't understand me unless I say 35 U.S.C. 112 first paragraph, now, will you?
> See, patents aren't supposed to be written to enable "one of Xenographic's skill in the art", but "one of ordinary skill in the art."
> "Lawyers like you" sounds almost sneering here.
Funny how that works, huh? It's almost like I read the snide tone of your post ("everyone here is a moron but me") and repeated it back to you, having already known that you were a jerk from your past conversations with Ray Beckerman, among others. This might surprise you, but some of us don't forget people's names.
Considering that I've managed to work on everything from zinc fingers to electronics to numerical analysis, I'm not really that impressed that you can manage more than one technical domain. You'd think that programming since you were 6 was special or something.
And after claiming I mischaracterized the IEEE-USA's amicus brief, you seem quite adept at mischaracterizing my argument as well. Does legalese so warp one's conception of the English language that it's no longer possible to understand anything else? Maybe I should try another language to see.
Well, PJ did remove the letters (at least, the PDF-to-text of them). She doesn't have copies anywhere that I can see, actually. And doesn't she usually at least save information like that? Why does she avoid doing so now? Even if she didn't like that one, she could do her own, you know.
That comment is currently vanished, but I'll put the text up at the end of this comment.
For the record, I don't buy the Psystar bit, either. If it's a whole legal conspiracy to harm the rights of authors, why is Google Book Search not included, given that all the actual authors are up in arms because the settlement is opt-out not opt-in? No, I think Google is doing the right thing. But I have a hard time seeing someone go on about a conspiracy against the rights of authors who says Psystar is part of it and Google isn't, given that there's a huge difference between the scale of what they're doing.
Mind you, I prefer the free flow of information. That's why I support Google, Psystar, and TH's side of things.
It's also why I don't trust PJ for burying information like this when it suits her.
Yeah, well those flow charts sometimes look a little like this.
And you never answered the question: how many patents have you ever actually attempted to implement from the description?
Or maybe I should just reverse course and say that any patent lawyer who doesn't understand the Curry-Howard correspondence is incompetent? It shows that all software is a mathematical formula. And no, the president of IEEE-USA's amicus brief did NOT do anything but hand wave the response to that. His reply was on the order of yeah, it exists, but I disagree with it because I don't know the difference between assignment and equality and I don't think the math people do either (seriously, he said that 2=1+1 with the = being assignment is meaningless in mathematics, even though it relates to the successor function used to construct the integers!). And maybe he thinks he's some kind of bad ass because he aced high level differential equations and did better than some folks in the math program. Problem is, almost none of the math you do in the engineering curriculum is even in the right field to understand Curry-Howard. What would I know, though? It's not like I went through *both* the engineering and mathematics curricula (or like I was once an IEEE member) ...
But you're just going to go on ahead and pretend that all failures of enablement on bad patents are the programmer's fault, right?
The advantage of source code is that you can't leave stuff out and have it still work (or even compile, sometimes).
You leave out a stop codon in your sequence and things will go wrong. You leave a part out of your machine and it won't work.
And nobody will doubt that it's because you left something out, because it's easy to compare the two.
But you sure as hell *can* leave out important details in flow charts. But it's kinda hard to compare the two, so you can always just blame the programmer for not implementing details you left out.
I was pretty sure that we weren't supposed to have to reverse engineer everything in order to understand a patent that met the enablement requirements. But lawyers like you have probably made that requirement almost as meaningless as the obviousness requirements.