That option would be better than nothing, I suppose, but it'd remove whole categories of usage for me.
The original poster suggested making it a toggle on/off option. So, when you're visiting friends, just enable text messages, pick up the messages with your friends' phone numbers, then turn it off again.
I'm assuming that the "turn-it-off" option would mean "do not accept any messages", rather than "accept messages and hold them until I re-enable again"...
Another option ought to be, if you have messages backed up because your phone is full, you should be able to go to the cell company's website and view/delete messages. Skytel does this for pagers - unless they've patented it, there's no reason for everyone else not to do it.
Not my way, the corporation's way. Microsoft are trying to own every computer in the world, SCO is trying to own Unix, McDonald's are trying to own fast-food joints and the 'Mc' prefix and nevermind thousands of years of usage by the clans in Scotland...
If patents and trademarks and copyright continue to expand as they are doing, pretty soon it'll be illegal to just about anything without a license. I just hope nobody manages to get a patent on sex...
You could say that Burger King and Wendy's stole the idea of a fun, plastic burger joint from McDonald's and are unfairly profiting from their evil deed. But when it comes to burger joints, we accept that the consequence of a competitive market is less profit for the first mover (McDonald's)
It has to be
said: if McDonald's had patented, trademarked or copyrighted the 'plastic burger joint', they'd be suing Burger King and Wendy's, and never mind the competitive market...
It also has to be said, that if Rowling has registered "Harry Potter" as a trademark, then she has to fight anyone diluting that trademark. Just like anyone else defending their trademarks - defend it or lose it.
Oh, I agree with all you say. I was just trying to point out that if SCO's outrageous claims regarding derivative works were upheld, then maybe someone else had the same claim over them. That maybe, in fact, Honywell-Bull owns SCO, which would be really, really peachy...
In a FUD sense, all they have to do is threaten to come around to IBM's customers to see how many AIX licenses they have, and therefore how many Unix licenses they need to buy.
We're all agreed that this is about FUD, and maybe stock pump-n-dump, right? So the threat of checking out IBM's customers is designed to stampede IBM into folding sooner. Of course, when IBM folds, it's gonna be in the sense of a giant redwood falling onto the lumberjack, because SCO is almost certainly violating a subset of IBM's 30,000 patents...
Just suppose for a moment that SCO is right in that all variations of Unix really are derivative works, and that therefore they own the copyrights...
Unix, as an operating system, was clearly not the first ever operating system in the world. Multics, for example, predates Unix, and is even a direct ancestor, in that some of the Multics crowd went on to produce Unix. From www.multicians.org:
1.4. Influence on other systems
1.4.1. Unix Ken Thompson and Dennis Ritchie, the inventors of Unix, worked on Multics until Bell Labs dropped out of the Multics development effort in 1969. The Unix system's name is a pun on Multics attributed to Brian Kernighan. Some ideas in Multics were developed further in Unix.
So, to a certain extent, doesn't that make Unix a derivative work of Multics, and therefore, using SCO's own logic, the Unix copyrights really belong to Honeywell (or whoever now owns Multics...)
The only problem is, the way SCO tried to shake the IBM money tree is likely to cause a big branch to fall on their heads - the IBM Patent Enforcement branch, to be precise.
SCO may want to be bought out, but they picked the wrong potential buyer to harass...
and perhaps relaxed electronic emmissions requirments (since this is being approved by the government)
And that's the important thing that some people here are forgetting - they don't have to give a damn about emissions, provided they don't interfere with the next island. The next question is, just how lumpy is Niue, and are the lumps big enough to significantly attenuate the signals?
You'd think that Sequent's copyrights (now held by IBM) would let them do whatever they want, but this is erroneous: The Unix license grants these rights to SCO, and IBM can distribute implementations of these technologies only according to the terms of the System V license.
I think you missed one little detail in there - when IBM acquired Sequent, they also acquired the RCU patent which then begs the question: how does the RCU patent relate to the "derived work" status SCO is claiming?
That rustling noise you can hear is the sound of IBM's patent-enforcement platoon preparing for the first volley of lawsuits against SCO...
Any review, reproduction, retransmission, dissemination or other use of, or taking of any action in reliance upon, this information by persons or entities other than the intended recipient is prohibited.
On the other hand, if you drop out some of the excess words, you're left with:
Any... retransmission... of this information by
persons... other than the intended recipient is prohibited.
which I'm sure any reasonably competent attorney would interpret as implicit permission to retransmit, provided that it's done by the intended recipient, because obviously, if the sender doesn't want any retransmission at all the note would read:
For your eyes only. Do not allow anybody else to read
IANAL, though, so maybe I'm wrong. It's exactly this kind of phrase-twisting that gets everyone in trouble...
I agree with what you say, but the question still stands - how few letters can reasonably be claimed to be infringing? Would a medieval RTS called Raft be considered to be infringing? Never mind, I'm sure whatever we agree on is guaranteed to be different to some lawyers opinion, and that's what really counts, isn't it?
Apparently, McDonald's believe they have the sole right to use the two letter prefix 'Mc', judging by the threat of legal action against Mary Blair and her McMunchies sandwich shop back in 1996. She sells cold meats and cold sandwiches and has a Scottish Thistle and St.Andrews flag on her sign.
The McDonald clan is fighting back, though. Lord McDonald, head of the McDonald clan, has appointed a clan member, one Ronald W McDonald, to be Sergeant-Major at
Arms of the Guardians of Clan Donald: the linear descendant of the chief's bodyguard. The Guardians of Clan Donald aim to uphold and protect the dignity and honour of the ancient and honourable name of Clan Donald by all legal mean
If you don't defend your trademark (and those that may dilute your trademark) you lose it
Sure, but how far can you take it? How small a fragment of your trademarked name can you defend? *Craft, *raft, *aft, War*, W*craft ? Suppose Microsoft produced a game in the same genre as Warcraft, with a similar kind of theme, and called it Witchcraft. Would Blizzard be justified in sending them a cease-and-desist? Suppose MS's Warcraft-alike game wasn't based on solid ground, but instead was somehow always aloft, and they called it Aircraft? Only one letter difference - C-n-D? And of course, the sequel would be Aircraft II... Where would the madness end?
Imagine Blizzard C-n-D'ing the Navy for using *craft carriers - warlike theme, virtually god-like powers, attack and defence, etc - a clear violation of Blizzard's trademarked name..
Actually, it could be worse than that - suppose the auto-destruct sequence was tripped when you "download" email that contains copyrighted material... There's a whole new can of DoS worms to open. Simply email some copyrighted stuff to people you don't like and watch their computers implode.
First, of course, there needs to be a completely foolproof "watermarking" scheme that can definitively identify copyrighted material. That might work, eventually, for music and maybe for compiled software, but I think it would be chancy at best for anything distributed as source. The whole "make it implode" idea has to hinge on some reliable method of tracking copyrighted material.
Well, I don't think they've actually involved the judicial system, yet... They've threatened to, if IBM doesn't bend over and take it, but they haven't yet gone that far. I suspect they know that IBM will not only file for discovery on all the alleged infringing source, but they'll also show up in court with 47 filing cabinets of documents explaining in nauseating detail why SCO is wrong.
They may not have sued anybody yet, but they've already tried extortion:
1) Settle this and fork over some cash, or we'll sue Linus Torvalds; 2) Settle this and fork over $1Bn; and now: 3) Settle this and fork over $3Bn.
They've also made claims about IBM and AIX that may be unfounded (== libel), and using those claims, they've told IBM's customers that they may be operating illegally as well.
By now, SCO has lost all hope of being bought out, and shortly they'll be facing the collective corporate wrath of the Fortune 500 companies.
The issue isn't whether or not Linux had SMP support.
The issue is whether or not the source code in Linux was written by SCO or not.
To be strictly accurate, this case is about whether IBM was responsible for SCO's alleged SMP code being ported to Linux.
If the Linux Kernel commits show that: 1) Linux got SMP before IBM was involved; and/or 2) that the developer(s) who submitted the SMP code had no connection with IBM, then SCO's immediate case against IBM falls apart.
I mean, it's possible that SCO's code could reach Linux some other way, not just via IBM, right? I'm not saying it did, just that it's possible. If it can be proved that Linux' SMP code is in no way related to IBM, then SCO has just dug their grave a little deeper - at the very least, IBM can counter-sue for libel, slander (probably), illegal restraint of trade and attempted extortion. Add to that 100's of IBM's patents SCO are probably violating, I'd say they're most definitely fucked
SCO won't let anyone see which parts to rewrite without signing the NDA which, in essence, is written in such a way that anyone signing it probably couldn't do kernel work ever again. The NDA also prohibits any comment other than, "yeah, that looks like it matches".
No, it means that the guys who normally write the long-winded press releases are busy preparing 42 filing cabinets worth of documents to submit to the court when SCO finally quits stalling and actually gets a court date.
Accoding to an interview at Byte with Chris Sontag, SCO's VP, Linux is used by terrorists, and therefore IBM's Linux efforts are equivalent to selling arms to terrorists. Because of this, Sontag expects the US govt. to support his case against IBM and Linux as part of the war on terror.
Good luck there, SCO - using that logic, the US Govt is also supporting terrorists by printing and circulating dollar bills. What, you think terrorists won't use dollars? You're kidding, right? How else are they gonna buy stuff from Smith&Wesson and/or Colt? Oh yeah, the US Govt is also supporting terrorists by allowing arms manufacturers to continue to sell arms.
No, that's not really my opinion, I was just taking Sontag's reasoning to the logical ridiculous conclusion.
In related news, SCO's HQ disappeared last night. Witnesses claim to have heard a "whooshing noise", followed by a loud bang. A govt spokesman stunned the press by announcing that, in fact, UFOs do exist and were seen on radar as they abducted "a relatively unimportant building" from Lyndon, UT.
A weight sensor in the floor in front of the checkin desk ought to be cheaper to install. By the time passengers actually reach the airplane, cargo handlers could have loaded or unloaded enough cargo to keep the plane in safe limits. Even a fully loaded plane carries some cargo.
Having separate air for a quarantine area would also be challenging. I suppose quarantined passengers could be asked to wear a full NBC suit, on the assumption that clothing designed to keep bugs out could also do a reasonable job of keeping them in...
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The original poster suggested making it a toggle on/off option. So, when you're visiting friends, just enable text messages, pick up the messages with your friends' phone numbers, then turn it off again.
I'm assuming that the "turn-it-off" option would mean "do not accept any messages", rather than "accept messages and hold them until I re-enable again"...
Another option ought to be, if you have messages backed up because your phone is full, you should be able to go to the cell company's website and view/delete messages. Skytel does this for pagers - unless they've patented it, there's no reason for everyone else not to do it.
Nope. Well, maybe, but definitely Scotland
If patents and trademarks and copyright continue to expand as they are doing, pretty soon it'll be illegal to just about anything without a license. I just hope nobody manages to get a patent on sex...
Who/what is White Castle? Anyway, I was quoting the original article, so any poop raining down would be on the author, not me... :)
It has to be said: if McDonald's had patented, trademarked or copyrighted the 'plastic burger joint', they'd be suing Burger King and Wendy's, and never mind the competitive market...
It also has to be said, that if Rowling has registered "Harry Potter" as a trademark, then she has to fight anyone diluting that trademark. Just like anyone else defending their trademarks - defend it or lose it.
Oh, I agree with all you say. I was just trying to point out that if SCO's outrageous claims regarding derivative works were upheld, then maybe someone else had the same claim over them . That maybe, in fact, Honywell-Bull owns SCO, which would be really, really peachy...
We're all agreed that this is about FUD, and maybe stock pump-n-dump, right? So the threat of checking out IBM's customers is designed to stampede IBM into folding sooner. Of course, when IBM folds, it's gonna be in the sense of a giant redwood falling onto the lumberjack, because SCO is almost certainly violating a subset of IBM's 30,000 patents...
Unix, as an operating system, was clearly not the first ever operating system in the world. Multics, for example, predates Unix, and is even a direct ancestor, in that some of the Multics crowd went on to produce Unix. From www.multicians.org:
So, to a certain extent, doesn't that make Unix a derivative work of Multics, and therefore, using SCO's own logic, the Unix copyrights really belong to Honeywell (or whoever now owns Multics...)
C) IBM hands SCO a list of all the IBM patents that SCO is violating and tells them to fuck off or fight it out in court.
SCO may want to be bought out, but they picked the wrong potential buyer to harass...
Be fair - at least tell us how often it rains in Australia...
And that's the important thing that some people here are forgetting - they don't have to give a damn about emissions, provided they don't interfere with the next island. The next question is, just how lumpy is Niue, and are the lumps big enough to significantly attenuate the signals?
I think you missed one little detail in there - when IBM acquired Sequent, they also acquired the RCU patent which then begs the question: how does the RCU patent relate to the "derived work" status SCO is claiming?
That rustling noise you can hear is the sound of IBM's patent-enforcement platoon preparing for the first volley of lawsuits against SCO...
On the other hand, if you drop out some of the excess words, you're left with:
which I'm sure any reasonably competent attorney would interpret as implicit permission to retransmit, provided that it's done by the intended recipient, because obviously, if the sender doesn't want any retransmission at all the note would read:
IANAL, though, so maybe I'm wrong. It's exactly this kind of phrase-twisting that gets everyone in trouble...
Apparently, McDonald's believe they have the sole right to use the two letter prefix 'Mc', judging by the threat of legal action against Mary Blair and her McMunchies sandwich shop back in 1996. She sells cold meats and cold sandwiches and has a Scottish Thistle and St.Andrews flag on her sign.
The McDonald clan is fighting back, though. Lord McDonald, head of the McDonald clan, has appointed a clan member, one Ronald W McDonald, to be Sergeant-Major at Arms of the Guardians of Clan Donald: the linear descendant of the chief's bodyguard. The Guardians of Clan Donald aim to uphold and protect the dignity and honour of the ancient and honourable name of Clan Donald by all legal mean
Sure, but how far can you take it? How small a fragment of your trademarked name can you defend? *Craft, *raft, *aft, War*, W*craft ? Suppose Microsoft produced a game in the same genre as Warcraft, with a similar kind of theme, and called it Witchcraft. Would Blizzard be justified in sending them a cease-and-desist? Suppose MS's Warcraft-alike game wasn't based on solid ground, but instead was somehow always aloft, and they called it Aircraft? Only one letter difference - C-n-D? And of course, the sequel would be Aircraft II... Where would the madness end?
Imagine Blizzard C-n-D'ing the Navy for using *craft carriers - warlike theme, virtually god-like powers, attack and defence, etc - a clear violation of Blizzard's trademarked name..
First, of course, there needs to be a completely foolproof "watermarking" scheme that can definitively identify copyrighted material. That might work, eventually, for music and maybe for compiled software, but I think it would be chancy at best for anything distributed as source. The whole "make it implode" idea has to hinge on some reliable method of tracking copyrighted material.
Well, I don't think they've actually involved the judicial system, yet... They've threatened to, if IBM doesn't bend over and take it, but they haven't yet gone that far. I suspect they know that IBM will not only file for discovery on all the alleged infringing source, but they'll also show up in court with 47 filing cabinets of documents explaining in nauseating detail why SCO is wrong.
1) Settle this and fork over some cash, or we'll sue Linus Torvalds;
2) Settle this and fork over $1Bn;
and now: 3) Settle this and fork over $3Bn.
They've also made claims about IBM and AIX that may be unfounded (== libel), and using those claims, they've told IBM's customers that they may be operating illegally as well.
By now, SCO has lost all hope of being bought out, and shortly they'll be facing the collective corporate wrath of the Fortune 500 companies.
To be strictly accurate, this case is about whether IBM was responsible for SCO's alleged SMP code being ported to Linux.
If the Linux Kernel commits show that: 1) Linux got SMP before IBM was involved; and/or 2) that the developer(s) who submitted the SMP code had no connection with IBM, then SCO's immediate case against IBM falls apart.
I mean, it's possible that SCO's code could reach Linux some other way, not just via IBM, right? I'm not saying it did, just that it's possible. If it can be proved that Linux' SMP code is in no way related to IBM, then SCO has just dug their grave a little deeper - at the very least, IBM can counter-sue for libel, slander (probably), illegal restraint of trade and attempted extortion. Add to that 100's of IBM's patents SCO are probably violating, I'd say they're most definitely fucked
SCO won't let anyone see which parts to rewrite without signing the NDA which, in essence, is written in such a way that anyone signing it probably couldn't do kernel work ever again. The NDA also prohibits any comment other than, "yeah, that looks like it matches".
No, it means that the guys who normally write the long-winded press releases are busy preparing 42 filing cabinets worth of documents to submit to the court when SCO finally quits stalling and actually gets a court date.
Good luck there, SCO - using that logic, the US Govt is also supporting terrorists by printing and circulating dollar bills. What, you think terrorists won't use dollars? You're kidding, right? How else are they gonna buy stuff from Smith&Wesson and/or Colt? Oh yeah, the US Govt is also supporting terrorists by allowing arms manufacturers to continue to sell arms.
No, that's not really my opinion, I was just taking Sontag's reasoning to the logical ridiculous conclusion.
In related news, SCO's HQ disappeared last night. Witnesses claim to have heard a "whooshing noise", followed by a loud bang. A govt spokesman stunned the press by announcing that, in fact, UFOs do exist and were seen on radar as they abducted "a relatively unimportant building" from Lyndon, UT.
A weight sensor in the floor in front of the checkin desk ought to be cheaper to install. By the time passengers actually reach the airplane, cargo handlers could have loaded or unloaded enough cargo to keep the plane in safe limits. Even a fully loaded plane carries some cargo.
Having separate air for a quarantine area would also be challenging. I suppose quarantined passengers could be asked to wear a full NBC suit, on the assumption that clothing designed to keep bugs out could also do a reasonable job of keeping them in...