I never understood why this patent was granted - back in 2006 the same gestures were demonstrated (and publicly) by Jeff Han with his FTIR multi-touch display.
It really doesn't appear that Apple should have been able to patent it, especially if their file date was in 2007 and it looks like the grant date was 2011 (seriously? wtf?).
Still, who knows why it was granted, and if I can find that prior art surely the other big companies who were sued because of it could too so I assume I'm missing something.
You wrote "Then your issue is not with Siri, but with technology as a whole. You have no business being on this site and should leave now." in response to '"My phone doesn't work" because Siri is offline'.
And then you write "My phone, which has Siri as a feature, is not working to it's full advertised functionality. Therefore, saying my phone isn't working is no less valid than the options I provided." after of course bitching about "Ever said "hmm, the cell tower must be down?" or "Power's out". You are the same person you're complaining about. The power isn't out, one of the many transformers is having one of hundreds of problems or a line is severed, etc. etc. "
As a troll you only get about a 3 out of 10, you made me laugh at you so that's good, but you really didn't manage consistency - you're all over the place like a frog on a hotplate. I'd suggest in future before answering you at least remain consistent within the same thread!
You cannot be right because you took both sides in the argument - revisionist history only works if there isn't a record of what you said originally.
As for..
"People who get all high and mighty because they know a little bit about computers are assholes." - I don't quite understand why you said it, it's not like I professed great knowledge about computers (not saying I don't). I spoke about power and the mechanics of cell towers - must have missed the computers. But I agree (in your case at least), you profess to know a little about computers and you're acting an ass.
One thing I am happy about though, you said "You're as dumb as he was." which is at least not saying I'm as dumb as you - cause that definitely would be a bad thing;)
Ever said "hmm, the cell tower must be down?" or "Power's out". You are the same person you're complaining about. The power isn't out, one of the many transformers is having one of hundreds of problems or a line is severed, etc. etc. The cell tower isn't "down", the antenna is obscured, or the amplifier has one of hundreds of failures possible, maybe the problem isn't at the tower at all.
I've just got to jump in here... In reference to the "Power's out"... Because obviously the power is out, the power supply to the house isn't functioning (probably why they said the power was out) - there's this fun thing called context (something you should be aware of the way you promote Siri - which frankly is Siri's killer feature over other voice systems) and when someone says the power's out, well the power's out. To jump in and say that because the power's on elsewhere (like upstream of their local transformer or in another country) then the power isn't out still doesn't change the obvious fact that "the power's out" for the person saying "the power's out".
Remember, when dealing with anything other than http (or other stateless protocols) CONTEXT is king - as in humans, humans use context so when someone says the "power's out" you probably don't need to check on the opposite side of the world.
And of course actually the cell tower could be "down", down being a generic term covering non-functional (through falling over, no power, lightning strike etc etc) - granted the failure could be on the device - but personally when I've said the network or tower is down it's usually because I've spoken to the friends around and found the ones on the same network have no signal (I'd blame the device in my pocket that I can most easily affect). The cell tower might be fine, but the network connection from the tower might be broken, but that has different failure symptoms on the device so....
Why have you leapt on someone saying that people will complain if Siri goes down - it's happened already as this quick (google) search found this http://www.pcworld.com/article/243175/siri_goes_down_for_a_day_apple_says_network_outages_are_possible.html From that article: " According to Venture Beat, contacting Apple customer service resulted in the typical, "Have you tried restarting your device?"" so people contacted Apple customer service because Siri was down... And they guy you tried to tear a new hole said...
"Now imagine those people with an iPhone 4S during a data outage or in the middle of New York City (or another smartphone sinkhole)? "My phone doesn't work" because Siri is offline or unreachable is a pretty lame excuse, but perfectly valid for people who are going to be trained to rely on it."
So he was right, and you were wrong.
Of course I'm not entirely sure what his point was - people will complain? That's not a surprise, there have been complaints about the accent it reads back to you in..
I'm also surprised that you didn't leap on it as validation of Siri - it's made enough of an impact that people complain when it's missing, if it were just a toy most likely people wouldn't bother calling customer support, no?
It's planned to be built at sea, so no continental drift to worry about.
Sea allows mobility (to an extent) to avoid the worst storms (and there are areas that get very few hurricanes) but just building big and strong enough would protect against things like hurricanes.
A quick search of oil rigs (and I'd assume these are smaller than the base station would be) shows that they get hit all the time (and damaged all the time) but the ones that leap out at me were those that had an oil tanker smacked into them. One major advantage of being at sea is that there is very little debris to be flinging at your base station and no continental shelf to raise up waves / tsunamis.
It's just an engineering problem there, nothing fundamentally unsolvable (except perhaps the ribbon, but it's looking good there too).
Yes, it is fiction, for it is not (yet) reality - the very definition of fiction.
It doesn't appear to be impossible, just very difficult.
Physics required for a geo-stable space platform? Huh? Do you mean something in geosynchronous orbit? Like say satellite TV? All those satellites are in geosynch orbit so you don't need active dishes to track them - geosynchronous orbit isn't difficult and is done every day.
The materials sciences for the ribbon material? Yes that isn't available yet, but it's on the way. There is no theoretical reason why we cannot build one, only practical reasons as we've not developed the materials yet.
One of the fun things you can do is look at what we have now, look at our scientific understanding of the universe from gravitation to atoms and then keep plugging away and testing and seeing what you get.
The theory describes materials such as carbon nano-tubes or graphene with sufficient tensile strength vs their weight to be able to build a space elevator. We cannot manufacture them in long enough sections yet but they are improving all the time - there's a lot of money in working out how to make this stuff.
Storms are engineering challenges, after all we manage to stick large unsupported free-standing structures up into storms and have them stay up, obviously this means we've got no idea how to do it at all and have just been lucky. Sheesh.
The people who are thinking about this aren't delusional (any more than the average population is - and probably less), these are just problems (even though you find them scary and don't understand) and they can be solved one way or another.
Well if you think it through the most effective renewable energy is space based solar, it's much more dense, permanently on and doesn't annoy anyone.
This starts being really possible with a space elevator, both for getting the machinery into space in the first place and getting the power back down (there's been talk of conductive cores to the elevators).
Is it really better for everyone if another $18billion is spent on social care? Isn't that just stopgap spending, spend a little more to temporarily make people feel better without actually changing anything? No new resources, no new energy sources etc? According to a quick look at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2008_United_States_federal_budget it seems that about $1.527 trillion was spent on welfare, how would $18 billion (1.1%) even be noticed in a budget of that size? Or add to it more than cheap and reliable access to space would? How about power costs dropping to fractions of what they are today? How about the reductions in pollution from shutting down fossil fuel power plants? How about dealing with nuclear waste once and for all? How about a reduction in wars and exploitation because the need for oil has just dropped massively?
The benefits of a space elevator out weigh pretty much anything you could possibly think of to do with $18 billion, spending it on anything else is short-sighted and really not going to change anything except probably make it worse.
3. Can you pull the ribbon into space in case something serious is taking place near the planet's surface, like a huge storm?
Yes. Easy to do at the counterweight at the far end. Would take some hours for the wave to move down and the Earth end raise up, but it is the obvious "Plan B" for a dire emergency on the ground.
What? Seriously you think you can just detach the ribbon from the base station and then attach it again? If the ribbon breaks at the base (the same scenario as detaching it) then the ribbon is lost to space.
The ribbon has to be under tension at the base, as in attempting to lift the base off the ground in order for anything to be able to climb it, otherwise you're attempting to climb an unsupported ribbon, which means the ribbon wants to escape but the base station doesn't let it. If there wasn't any tension in the base of the ribbon, you'd be climbing the inertia of the ribbon only, which means after all that effort, you can launch one item (and even then you need to climb quickly).
This isn't something you can just pull in and out or have hover about, the entire edifice is in dynamic tension and losing one of those balanced forces will bring the entire thing down (or up, or off or whatever).
6. How do you make the ribbon stay in one place above the ground anyway?
It's in orbit once per day, so to "first order" it stays put. Now, it will want to move about, at the 100 meter to 1 km level, because of tides and the like. If you anchor the terrestrial end, that thus means you are imposing waves on the cable. That seems to be OK, but more work is definitely needed here IMO.
It's anchored to a floating platform in the sea (not seen any viable discussions of land based elevators), the ribbon isn't like a rope dangling in the sky that you climb, it's not a rope ladder. The terrestrial end HAS to be anchored to a counter-weight that can also be supported by the earth in order to have tension you can exploit to climb the cable.
No need for ION engines (not sure why that's capitalised) to hold anything up - the forces on the cable beyond geosynch pull the entire cable tight, about the only use for the ion engines would be (and this is any type of reaction thruster) to help damp oscillations in the cable.
You are correct, the cable is much longer than it needs to be (more than twice I believe, geosynch is roughly 35k km up and the designs I've seen talk about a 100k km cable) mostly due to the requirement for lifting tension and the fact that the cable is incredibly light for it's length, in the order of grams per km.
An easier (for a given value of easy) would be to have a large mass (it's a measure of mass / distance past geosynch - no need for dark matter when a rock will do) a distance beyond the geosynch to counter-weight, either way it works - the forces on the cable past geosynch cause the cable to stick out straight, perpendicular to the surface of the planet and will always attempt to get that as straight as possible.
Don't worry about the cable snapping going too fast or too slow, as it happens as you have a weight travel down the cable the cable will travel ahead of the rotation of the planet, as something climbs the cable the cable will lean behind the rotation of the planet - effectively there's an east-west acceleration as the weight descends / ascends the cable. This has the effect of pulling the cable down fractionally but the excess tension also pulls the cable back up again, it won't be instant or 'snapping' as there's never any massive horizontal displacement / force - the speed of the climber dictates the rate of change of circumference/orbit and thus the horizontal force applied to the cable.
The tail won't really get ahead of behind of the 'station' (there won't actually be a station as far as I know) as the cable will attempt to remain straight from the point of horizontal deflection. There will be vibrations and other variations travelling up and down the cable but they should both damp in time and be damped dynamically.
One last thing to remember, most of the cable is outside of the atmosphere so there's no atmospheric drag (well, vanishingly small as it's not exactly a pure vacuum) on the tail to add to the problems.
It's a hard engineering challenge and we've not got the materials to do it yet but it'll change a lot when it (or something like it) does happen.
The whole point of a space elevator is that the centre of mass of the cable is at geosynch orbit (well slightly past it). There is no need to continuously thrust to hold the cable up because the rotational speed of the planet will fling away the cable.
The reason that the cable stays up is the gravity drops off by the square of the distance but distance travelled by the cable per hour at any height increases. The period of rotation is always 24 hours (give or take some lean) but the circumference described is greater as the height increases.
What this means is that at geosynchronous orbit the force downward due to gravity (at that distance from earth) exactly matches the centripetal forces from orbiting the planet (or more accurately attempting to fly off in a straight line but the gravity of the planet curving that line). Below geosynchronous orbit if you are orbiting the earth once a day you're doomed to crash into the planet without active energy input (the rate of curvature is higher than your speed thus you'll hit), above geosynchronous orbit if you're still orbiting the earth once a day you're doomed to escape the planets' gravity altogether and go flying off as you spiral out. This is why low orbit satellites orbit so quickly and high orbit satellites orbit so slowly, the relative strengths of gravity at the different orbits, plus the distance travelled to complete an orbit dictate the speeds.
The parts of the cable that are above geosynchronous orbit are attempting to escape earth, and the parts of the cable that are below geosynchronous orbit are trying to crash down to earth - the reason the cable stays up is that these are balanced. The entire weight of the cable (less the reduction due to centripetal forces) below geosynch (and adding the tension in the cable necessary to lift a weight) is indeed all passed through the portion of the cable in geosynch orbit (it's actually a huge section as 1 metre from geosynch either way isn't much difference). But the cable isn't a cable, at least not in current designs, it's a ribbon varying in width from thinnest at the ends to widest at geosynch as the loads vary - there are also thickness variations due to expected damage to the cable, ie at certain orbital levels micro-meteorite (and space junk more likely) impacts are very likely so the cable would be made wider to compensate.
Please note that this doesn't allow anything to be pulled up the cable, it is just supporting itself, what you need to do is stick a nice big weight on the end of the cable on earth, like say the base station weighing in at hundreds of tonnes (but not supported by the cable, supported by the earth's surface) and then extend the cable upwards until it has a tension high enough to do something useful. The tension in the base of the cable where it meets the base station will be at least the weight of anything you want to send up the cable (and have more because acceleration increases the force).
The real problem with understanding this is that humans live on such a small height variation and deal with speeds so slow that you cannot easily imagine what happens to gravity over those distances and how much energy is involved in those speeds - if you accept that orbital mechanics isn't the same as you running about on earth it becomes much easier to understand.
No revisions of any laws (other then potentially materials sciences as we don't yet have a material that has a strong enough tensile strength but low enough weight) are required for this to work, all you need to do is understand them.
The 'energy' you use to raise the payload is electrical converted to kinetic converted to gravitational potential. If there happened to be a mountain of a magical material that reached out into space then climbing that mountain would not violate any laws of thermodynamics.
Towers have problems, compressive strength vs weight, mechanical strength of the earths crust, and major issues with stability. Compression is a positive runaway scenario (the tower bends slightly and the weight causes the bend to accelerate), tension has a negative (or neutral I suppose) runaway scenario (the cable bends and the cable tries to straighten out).
I'm making the argument (as are Oracle in the courts) that it's the software patents that are the case, the copyright violations (the things that are behind the license) have been pretty much shot down - certainly all I'm hearing about is the patents and the big OMG Android copied Java appears to have been removed.
The license you (assuming you are the same person) linked to was a Sun/Oracle SDK End user agreement. There is no guarantee that this applies to Google engineers creating Android (or the company that Google bought that originally created Android).
You are making the stupid assumption that because you have found a license it is somehow magically applied to everyone. This particular license requires that the person to whom it applies have downloaded the SDK. I'm missing the point where you show that Google engineers in relation to Android have downloaded the SDK.
Unfortunately for you that isn't the only way to license the Java SDK, I know for a fact (having worked there on Java) that large companies, especially those that create their own VMs (completely legally under license, like Apple, HP, IBM etc) have different agreements. Your EULA that you linked has absolutely NOTHING to do with the licensing that they operate under - you are confusing individuals with large companies.
Harmony, the 'base libraries' that you are complaining about are owned by the Apache Foundation, they were pretty much written by IBM originally and IBM I believe has a completely different licensing agreement with Sun/Oracle as part of the fact they have multiple platforms and create their own VMs for them. Oracle hasn't sued or in any way protested the Harmony project other than the fact that due to the field of use restrictions Harmony is not TCK / JCK certified and as such can't be called Java - this by the way led to the rather public divorce of the Apache Foundation from the JCP.
If your assertion that the "license explicitly denies you the permission to create your own VM," applied to everyone then there is no way that IBM could create their own VM for AIX and zOS, there's no way that Apple could have created a VM to run on MacOS and there's no way that HP could have created a VM to run on HPUX. All these companies (and more) did this, and all of them entered into different agreements with Sun (and now Oracle).
You are not privy to the contents of these agreements, neither am I, but I can posit that they are different from the the EULA you quoted as according to you that license prevents them creating a VM.
Since you have no idea as to the legal agreements in force between Google and Sun/Oracle your assumption that the EULA for the SDK download applies is moronic - you might be correct, but you're more likely to be incorrect. Basing your entire argument on a document you have no evidence is even in force isn't the way to go about proving anything.
What I've tried to point out to you is that anyone could do the same thing - you never need to touch the license as you can access everything you need elsewhere.
Jikes(http://jikes.sourceforge.net/) - a java compiler (originally written by IBM again) means you'd not need the JDK to convert java code into bytecode. Kaffe(http://www.kaffe.org/) - a 'java' VM technically not Java but can execute java bytecode, open source cleanroom implemented legal... means you'd not need the JDK in order to execute your program. Harmony(http://harmony.apache.org/) - java class libraries , means you'd not need the JDK to use similar base libraries.
You can develop Android without ever getting near that license you're so wedded to, so I ask you how is that license in force? You're assuming that the license has to be in force whereas I've demonstrated multiple ways that it may not be.
As a quick aside, your mention of "pay 6 billion dollars" was cut down to 100 million dollars by the Judge, the 6 billion was Oracles made up number to try and get as much as they can - part of the negotiating and media position but not based
a) The GPL? I don't really understand why this is even a discussion. On one hand you're saying you should be able to do anything with anything you create, and on the other hand google shouldn't be allowed to. Since Android is effectively an application executing on Linux there's no reason for it to be GPL'd. There is no reason for it to be GPL'd other than that. One of the main reasons for Android to be under the Apache2 license is project Harmony http://harmony.apache.org/ that provide the class libraries. I don't know if they could have converted the class libs to the GPL and I really don't care, I'd prefer the Apache2 license to the GPL because as you say " I would certainly reserve that right on any software I write." - if I write apps I want to own the apps, or at least have something of a mechanism to stop people ripping me off.
b) Seriously? Did you read any of the things I'd posted? That license is between you (as the Android developer or android OS compiler - and even that isn't guaranteed) and Oracle. Remember, and this is important, Android does not run Java, it CANNOT run Java it runs Dalvik byte-code. The license you linked to was for the Java Development Kit, effectively a desktop JVM and compiler. Ergo executing Android does not violate this license, Writing apps for Android does not violate this license and I'm fairly sure that even compiling Android doesn't violate this licence although not 100% confident.
From that license file "D. Java Technology Restrictions. You may not create, modify, or change the behavior of, or authorize your licensees to create, modify, or change the behavior of, classes, interfaces, or subpackages that are in any way identified as "java", "javax", "sun" or similar convention as specified by Sun in any naming convention designation." Which is I presume what you're discussing here since there's no mention of embedded versions in the entire license agreement, this is an EULA for the download of the JDK, this may or may not be binding on Google (or indeed any large company) as it is specifically an End User License Agreement - quite a number of companies have their own licensing agreements with Sun and now Oracle over Java as it is different in the enterprise. But a major point here is that you can use the Java SDK to create programs that run elsewhere and therefore are not subject to this license, secondly there is more than one java compiler for example - http://jikes.sourceforge.net/ which kinda means that if you also have a VM you're able to avoid the license completely.
On a moral level the authors of Java (which by the way isn't Oracle) do have the moral right to tell you what you can and can't create with their software but (and this is important) they've already done that in the license for the language spec and bytecode spec. You're suggesting that they should have absolute control forever - this isn't a good thing and cannot happen. Companies would create new languages rather than be controlled by a competitor.
If you had written a new programming language and you wanted it to be popular you'd have to have few restrictions as if those restrictions are too onerous then the majority of people will never use it. Please note that writing a program is not the same as writing a programming language, one is a program and the other a specification and syntax. If you had put in restrictions then nobody would use it and nobody would care, what you can't (legally, let alone morally) do is say yeah do what you want and then tomorrow say nope, you can only create kiddie games on it. Unless your license had that unilateral ability (and remember consideration is necessary for a license to be binding) that you could change it at any time then you're stuck - most companies read the licenses and as such refuse to do business with something that has the huge risk of randomly changing at no notice.
Actually what Google did was relatively smart but not in this case creating an entirely new language.
It's quite a hack really but what happens is that you actually create your android app against stubs, completely in Java and using the desktop, free licensed version of the Java compiler, nothing here violates any copyright or patents.
Then you take your compiled Java code and re-compile it for Dalvik, so it's no longer Java and isn't running on a JVM.
Java the language isn't a computer program, quite explicitly Java is something in which you can write a computer program but it is not a program itself. Yes there are support tools such as the compiler and the JVM which allow you to execute a program written in Java but you must understand that Java is not a program. I think you're fundamentally misunderstanding how a programming language works.
Please note however that "Because Java is a "managed" language it's also a design document for a very specific piece of software, the JVM. And it's also the API "interface" (to use a term from C++) for a very extensive library." is pretty much completely incorrect.
The JVM doesn't have a design document, multiple companies produce multiple JVMs in different ways for different platforms and different instruction sets. Primarily Java consists of the language syntax and the bytecode syntax. The Java class libraries are not fixed, nor are they solely defined by Oracle, as should be pointed out by the Harmony class libraries.
Just to repeat it: Java is the language syntax and the bytecode specification!
"What google did is to take the specification, some "chapters" (like the language spec, compiler and base API) copied verbatim, and change a few chapters in the book (mostly packaging and extended the API) so that it would apply better to cell phones. Now this is all nice and great, but like for a real book, you can't do this without the permission of the original book owner." - I suppose it would look like that from the outside, but what you're really not understanding is that it's not what it is under the covers. Since everything was written in Java on the desktop for J2SE with additional libraries nothing has been violated - except for the Dalvik VM. So things like the language spec? Doesn't matter, the reason you can use the normal tools is that it's normal Java, under the normal license on the normal compiler and without hitting the Field of Use restrictions that required it in the first place. Compiler? It's not copied, you're using the one that Sun and now Oracle ship, all that happens afterwards is that the bytecode is converted to a different language to run on a different VM. Base API? I can only assume you mean the class libraries which have been clean-room implemented in Harmony and so Oracle's IP hasn't been touched.
"There are computer languages that do not allow you to base other languages off them (in fact most commercial are like this). The big exceptions is C/C++ (and another exception getting bigger is Javascript). But most languages do not in fact allow this, things like C#, F#, Object Pascal, PL/SQL,... do not allow you to make a new computer language based on them (in fact several Google languages explicitly forbid this, they even forbid trying to understand how they work)" - I'm pretty sure that I could write a Pascal alike language, create my own compiler and stay within the law (can't be sure I won't get sued but that's what the courts are for). I couldn't call it Pascal and I'm sure there would be minor differences but for all practical intents it would be a very similar language - and when you get down to it most languages are very similar, they have to be.
"(and remember : just because you haven't read the law or a contract doesn't mean it doesn't apply. A license = a contract)" - A license != A contract they are very different things in the eyes of the law, not reading law (which most definitely != a license) means you were negligent, not reading a contract means you were stupid if
You can't use J2SE on mobile devices (I'm pretty sure Google would have wanted to use J2SE) due to Field of Use restrictions and J2ME wasn't any good, so no choice if you wanted to use Java. Sun wouldn't open the Field of Use restrictions at all - possibly because they were making money from it but I don't know.
As far as I know Sun said it had to be J2ME on Android which wouldn't have worked, J2ME is incredibly restricted and frankly almost sufficiently different from J2SE to be a different language.
Sun could have sued - but Sun didn't want to be the bad guy. Oracle is happy to be the bad guy so there you go - which is weird, they happily piss off everyone they run across from open source developers to large companies.
Google have already opened their wallet, lawyers aren't free after all:) but barring getting rid of those patents (prior art, overly broad claims, or being found not to infringe etc) they'll probably have to pay. That said if the case goes against them I'm sure they'll appeal and if that fails or looks like it'll fail they'll settle - at least Oracle can't go for a scorched ground approach if the settlement is reasonable they've pretty much got to accept it (I think that's right).
Dalvik bytecodes are not sun bytecodes - they don't work, at all. And I suspect you're misunderstanding what verbatim means - because it certainly doesn't mean 'slightly different'.
Dalvik was written anew, not developed from a sun JVM. Although how clean-room this is as it was written is to be decided in the courts - and last I'd heard Oracle's contention that this was copied has been mostly shot down, hence the patent claims being the most talked about currently.
"Java is not public domain, and anything unique about java is protected just like the contents of a book." - Well except for the fact that writing a book does not mean you own the English language, you have some rights over expression of the language in that book and that format.
In programming the content of the book, the story is the program, the language the book is written in (say English) is the programming language ie Java. So a copyright for a particular program does NOT mean you own every program written in the same language.
You may be thinking of the class libraries because these provide 95% of the meat of Java, but of course Android uses the Harmony class libraries, something clean-room developed and currently owned by the Apache Foundation so it's not using the Sun class libraries.
Not a single programming language ever lays claim to the programs written within that language - if one ever did? then it would never be used. Why write a program in order to give it to someone else - seriously, TOS for all languages specifically state that the programs you create in that language are yours!
So to sum up, Google is only guilty of copyright infringement if (and only if) the Dalvik VM hasn't been clean-room developed correctly - it's not copyright infringement to convert from Java to another language (at any point of the compile process), nor is it copyright infringement to use the same development tools, the Dalvik bytecode is a different language to the Java bytecode.
What Android cannot (and if you'll notice - does not) do is claim that it runs Java, because field of use restrictions in the JCK and TCK prevent anything other than Java ME running on a mobile device and if a VM has not been JCK and TCK certified then it can't have the trademarked Java coffee cup or use the trademarked Java name and of course since Dalvik doesn't run Java bytecode.....
The largest part of this case is (as the previous posts mention - they are correct, you missed the point) the patents, as they are much more difficult to deal with. Copyright? Easy just develop it without ever seeing the original and you can't have copied.
Google didn't take something that didn't belong to them, yes they maimed it against the wishes of the original author (but if the author wanted to prevent this possibility all they had to do was not release it into the public), didn't use it's massive weight to outcompete the original author (seriously? If Sun had opened the Field of Use restrictions then clean-room re-implementing Java wouldn't have been necessary - Java ME was never fit for purpose).
As for the ends justifying the means? Well considering it appears about the only thing they may have done is violate some patents it's not exactly evil is it?
I could create a new language that looked the same as Java tomorrow (I'm a fast worker;) ) and not violate any of Oracles copyrights... Patents on the other hand..
[1] By definition, yes. Someone spent time and effort creating an idea, a technique, a widget, whatever. If they hadn't, there would have been nothing to patent. That idea/technique/widget was then used by Google who could build Android faster, cheaper, easier, more useful, because they didn't have to both identify the problem and then think of a solution to it themselves. So, yes, someone other than Google put in [some of] the effort to create [some of what became] Android.
Sorry but that's really not the case. You're making an assumption that just isn't true when it comes to software development - people never reuse idea/techniques/widgets from patents because there aren't any idea/techniques/widgets in patents, only claims.
Patenting idea/technique/widget X does not mean you've helped anyone. I have my name on several patents myself and have waded through many other patents (software and hardware), what you actually have are a series of claims and that's what you infringe - the sole sop to actually having the invention in the patent is the preferred embodiment, which is really no use. It's pretty much impossible to run through a patent database and find ways to solve your problems and it certainly would take longer than just writing it yourself from scratch. Just looking for prior art to verify that you have something patentable is a nightmare and then seeing what happened to a clear valuable idea when it became written up by the patent attorneys - if I couldn't have worked back to my idea from the end result I don't know how anyone else could have.
What usually happens is that someone patented X, and someone else who faced the same problem (or similar problem, or even something else entirely but the claims on X were broad) implemented X without ever knowing about the patent, and even if they had known about the patent it wouldn't have helped - they have been made so generic and legalised that there's really no benefit to the actual code.
In software people re-invent the wheel all the time, there's no library of patented functions you can pull from and pay a fee, you don't even look because if you looked it becomes willful infringement, you couldn't find something that matched and you wouldn't get any benefit from the legalese and broad generic claims.
The concept of a patent helping innovation by spreading knowledge around is false, the most you can say is that it may help innovation by protecting ideas. The reality is (I believe) that it hurts innovation by being about who has more money.
Doesn't matter if you use an Android based phone or if you're guilty of patent violation - damages will be minimal. No possibility of 100 million damages against an individual, more like $1 as there are over 100 million devices.
Can you really imagine Oracle suing someone for $1? Or even $3 for triple damages from willful infringement?
And if they do sue you, then they can't sue the manufacturer because they're attempting to get compensation twice for the same event (or at least I believe that's the case).
Patents aren't ever (for a given value of ever, I suppose it is remotely possible) enforced against individuals, you could probably win simply thru having more money but the PR would be hideous, you'd spend more trying to get your dollar than you'd ever get back and judges would end up detesting you.
When you get down to it, other than as attempting to change the behaviour of other people you're too small to be noticed. The same is for copyright infringement, the labels aren't really making much in the way of money (other than from the people who settle) and are pissing everyone off, including the judges they're relying on. Even when they win 100k judgements they've little hope of ever getting the money unless the person literally has that money lying around or is a high earner.
You know, for a while I thought this was someone else - the language was much better.
Which kinda indicates that you're faking a lot.. What do you get out of it? I'm kinda curious. So you're trolling, do you get a secret thrill out of getting a reply?
I don't understand your motivation - this took me like 5 minutes to reply and it's amusing so I'm not being detrimentally impacted, so if you're thrilled I'm replying and wasting my time I don't quite follow.
But back to the point, a quick bit of research shows that actually diet coke has 4 calories so I suppose in theory if you drink enough you might not starve - I have to admit I prefer coke zero over diet coke, and coke zero really does have zero calories. But my original point is correct, drinking only diet coke, or only water will kill you. Neither have enough to sustain life in the medium term.
If you meant drink only diet coke with meals and you'll be dead in a year, then again I have to say you're wrong - I know people who do 99% only drink diet coke (occasional alcohol) and they're still alive after many years - like 10 or so.
Ignoring your assumption that I'm american, yes I'm highly educated - but I do have to admit that none of my subjects / courses were in how long you can live on diet coke and I have to say that any education system that dedicates time to how long you can live drinking a particular carbonated beverage probably isn't worth very much.
And finally, what does this have to do with milk or GMO crops?
I suspect you'll troll another reply, but you'll only get another bite if you're interesting enough, sorry.
Diet coke has zero calories, therefore you won't make it very long before you starve to death, let alone all of the missing nutrients. Non-diet coke is loaded with calories so at least you will last longer..
And what has this got to do with milk? or GMO crops?
You might has well say only have water for a year - it also has zero calories, is missing a lot of vital nutrients and basically you'll starve, get scurvy and die.
Apple never denies apps or peripherals because they compete with Apple peripherals or apps. Never. The thing you are thinking of is when they don't approve apps that duplicate inherent iPhone/iPod touch functionality. That *can't* fit your idea that this is because it competes with their "own branded and thusly profitable peripherals" (or apps, I assume) (how do they lose a sale on something that is already part of the product?). This is easily explained by Apple's official reason: to keep the core experience intact.
iMovie, GarageBand, Texas Hold'em... These apps *all* have competition on the App Store. Docks, cables, headphones, smart covers, cases... These *all* have competitors in Made For iPod.
Your assertion is completely baseless.
What? I appreciate that you're coming from the Apple is amazing point of view, but seriously?
http://uneasysilence.com/archive/2008/09/13445/ - PodCasting app denied because Apple wants to keep the iTunes monopoly. Not because it duplicates anything on the phone, but because it duplicates functionality on the desktop.
http://androidencyclopedia.com/android-magazine-denied-on-apple-app-store/ - Android mag app denied on the AppStore - well because it's about Android. To me it's a pretty weak argument that you're so afraid of the competition that you attempt to prevent even learning about it? It's the equivalent of security through obscurity, why not compete on merit?
A quick google search shows millions of entries for this. I won't even bother getting into the publishing 30% debacle with in-app purchases which is a transparent attempt to lock down the iPhone to Apple iBooks offering.
Apple has a clear track record of doing this, saying anything else is just lying - definitely to others and potentially to yourself.
They don't control for control's sake. They don't even control for direct profit. They control to make the product more appealing to consumers. Control is *NOT* the purpose, control is the means. The purpose is a good working experience. Apple makes money by making products people want. They do this by making good products, not by controlling people. Every single Apple customer is a voluntary customer. They don't have a monopoly and they aren't a government. You don't hear people say, "I didn't want an [Apple Product], but I had to get one."
They do control for control's sake (although admittedly this is my opinion - since I can't mind read, and neither can you this is only opinion) and they do control for direct profit.
Yes a side effect of that control is somewhat of a decent working experience, but it were control for a good working experience then they would be more transparent with it - after all you want people to know what the control is, you don't want a confusing, variable and whimsical control experience unless you're after the control for the sake of control.
A well defined process with clear steps, feedback and acknowledgement would provide you with far more efficient (and I believe more effective) control for the purpose of providing a great working experience - but that isn't what the App Store has. And feel free to say it does, but it's really really easy to come up with counter arguments.
In other words, no, you can't cite a single example.
Not for the hardware side, no - but then again you can't provide evidence that they are all bunnies and light on hardware. For me the balance of probabilities indicate that they are as controlling on the hardware side as they are on the software side. There are millions of examples of that control (and don't get me wrong - sometimes that control is a good thing) on the software side. If you can show me that Apple is really a completely different company when it comes to MFI, great (although a weird split personality
How am I ignoring that? That's the very foundation of my point. It's Apple's system. If you want to play with them, you abide by their rules. It's in Apple's interest that their rules don't drive away third party manufacturers, while simultaneously making sure third party manufacturers don't piss in Apple's pool. That's why Made for iPod exists. It's not a profit center, it's mainly a way to make sure MFI products work well.
You're making an assumption that isn't actually true, or at least isn't completely true. It is in Apple's interests to keep some third party manufacturers, but as with the Apple AppStore itself it isn't in Apple's interest to keep all of them - it certainly isn't in their interest to keep anyone who competes too closely with their own branded and thusly profitable peripherals. You are correct, MFI isn't a profit center for them, however the iPod, iPhone and all iDevices that use the connector and play with the MFI certified peripherials are a profit center (and Apple peripherals are also profitable for them), therefore close control of MFI and connecting to 'their' devices is what they're after.
To an extent I'd agree with you, MFI does tend to make the peripherals work well with the devices (although like anything the older peripherals are useless), but control is the purpose, not just a good working experience.
Wow, that's pretty scary! I suppose you can cite an example of this happening, right? I mean, if not, and the dock connector has been around for the better part of a decade, you'd think maybe it's not something you need to worry about.
I half agree with you here, but not totally. As far as I know the situation is similar to that of the Apple AppStore, in that you're under an NDA and you can't really talk if you want to keep doing business with Apple. If you don't care about doing business, then you can risk breaking the NDA, but as there's a significant difference between hardware and software it's not likely that you'll be a straw-man that's not worth suing.
Based on Apple's tactics with the AppStore, it's more of a case of a track record than no evidence. I wouldn't be surprised to find out that Apple has done it, after-all where's the drawback for them? It's much easier to control small numbers of large players with a lot to lose than large groups of small players with nothing to lose.
Google hasn't "upped" shit. If you want to sell your product to many hundreds of millions of people, you pay a small pittance to Apple. Just because Google's system doesn't require a license is pretty much inconsequential to whether or not one will make products targeting the iPod dock connector. You don't create products in a vacuum. You need customers. Apple's customer base is far more lucrative than Google's.
In your opinion Google hasn't "upped" shit, in other people's opinions it might have - certainly it has interested me, a lot more than any hardware integration with an iDevice would do. The important point to realise with this is how many people might now tinker with Android and Arduino - people were tinkering with Arudino and Android already, and this makes it official (or at least easier for some). Now, I agree, it's unlikely that any one of these will suddenly mass-produce something, after all they're just small tinkerers. However it is very likely based on the number of people who will look into it (assuming there is a large number for a cheap, open and easy to use platform) that a lot of things that are good will come out of it. And this is where Apple may lose out, after all if you create a nifty hardware dongle, release the app into the Android Market and you're good to go - show me the speedy lifecycle of Apple hardware and apps?
Yes some of them will be rubbish, some of them won't work, a lot will be incredibly unique and useful for only a handful - but it'll be more than you'll ever get out of a iDevice unless Apple removes the barrier to entry. Show me the
In theory more than in practice. Routes change primarily when equipment goes down. It happens, but not that often.
I was under the impression that there was more changes in the route due to congestion, loading etc... I don't run a router so I have no first-hand information detailing this but I can see it both ways. I agree there's going to be a most likely path and barring loading and failures this would probably remain fairly static, I don't know how much the loading changes the route on a minute to minute basis, certainly I've seen routes change, but...?
of course you've now hacked a piece of maintain machinery, far more than the usual home machine so it's more of a risk that you'll be caught...
On balance it makes you less likely to be caught, because whoever is trying to catch you has to trace you back through this router in addition to any other measures you're taking (like other compromised routers, or using an internet cafe etc.) rather than only tracing you through the other measures.
Sorry that wasn't what I meant (and forgive the typo), I meant that it is far more likely that an internet router will be maintain / logged than a home machine. The chances of discovery of the hack would appear (to me at least) to be higher on a maintained piece of hardware rather than the unmaintained home system.
You don't actually have to be there, you only have to have a compromised machine there. Get some unsuspecting cable modem user to install a trojan, then spoof the user's neighbor's IP address to keep the compromised user from getting busted and thereby prompting them to remove the trojan.
You have a point, I'd not considered that you wouldn't need to be there, although I'm not convinced that the cable networks have such modems around that will happily pretend to be someone else's IP. They might do, but it seems really stupid, I had assumed that you would require physical access to the cable modem to manage it.
Maybe not, but if there is one fewer plausible explanation (like having open wifi) for why your IP address showed up in their logs, they're going to spend more time harassing you and your friends and family until they give up and go away.
All I'm saying is that leaving your wireless open makes your chance of getting raided go from "almost zero" to "almost zero" while providing you with a plausible explanation for any traffic that might be seen as coming from your IP address in the unlikely even that it actually does happen.
This is where we need to differ on opinion, I don't believe that IP spoofing really happens, but if it does happen then I think it's a much much smaller possibility than the likelihood of someone wardriving and getting your IP in a bad place that way.
Either way, if your IP shows up on a kiddie porn server and that server gets raided then you're going to have your equipment searched no matter what. If nothing shows up at all you'll get it back and be ok, if something shows up you're in trouble. I agree that IP spoofing is a lower order probability which means it will be less likely in a defence, however I think that the possibility that an open wifi will land you in trouble is orders of magnitude higher.
Finally, since you know approximately what you're talking about (and will be classed as a techie in court) you're probably not going to be able to get away with an open wifi defence - the usual 'I don't understand' defence may not look so good... Saying you believe in free wifi, and don't mind sharing is a possible, but then you also may have been doing that to provide plausible deniability to your nefarious activities - and so may not be as good a defence as you believe.
I think I made a mistake mentioning "Oh yeah, there is another way - they could be downloading it to your system (and then back out) using your system as a relay, but that relies on them compromising your system, something you can defend against and notice."
This isn't really IP spoofing, but in my defense I was in a rush:) It's not IP spoofing because it's going to the right IP... You're simply installing malware on the target system and bouncing it out again, and actually computer viruses have been used as defenses against computer charges.
The reason the incriminating bits are seen on your connection is that they're travelling over your connection. But that's something of a myth. You aren't going to have deep packet inspection most internet connections, and certainly not historical data - there's just too much of it.
Firstly if they do succeed in spoofing your IP address then your ISP in most cases won't log the inbound / outbound traffic as they won't see it - which means your ISP can't be the source of the legal queries. Which means it's from an external website, most likely when they get the logs of a criminal site they've managed to shut down (or honey-netted) which means they definitely don't have deep packet inspection for it.
"The point, made several times above, is that secure wireless, isn't very secure." - that wasn't my point (nor was I disagreeing with it), nor was it what I was responding to.
I was responding to a comment that said you should have an open wireless AP in order to provide additional doubt onto any conviction from IP spoofing. Being that I've not yet heard of widespread (or more than just a theoretical exercise) IP spoofing and I can see a lot of problems with it, it would seem that it's foolish to open a wireless AP in order to protect yourself from IP spoofing. Considering that there are events in the field that show that having an open wifi AP can land you in trouble.
The likely incidence of IP spoofing is much much less than the likely incidence of illegal behaviour on an open wifi AP. Which means you'll get a lot more hassle from the open wifi than from the IP spoofing.
I think what my point really boils down it is the oddity that people seem to think that a single IP address record on a suspect server is sufficient evidence to convict - the reason they take all your computing gear is because they have 'reasonable suspicion' that you committed the crime and are now looking for evidence in order to secure a conviction. If they don't find evidence (and they're honest etc) then you'll be fine. The event itself is low-order probability and then having it compounded with a bad enough defence and a clueless enough judge to be convicted isn't really worth worrying about.
There may be points about the court of public opinion, but as for actual conviction if you are innocent? Very very unlikely, and it's far more likely that you'll be convicted from an open wifi than from someone spoofing your IP.
You aren't guaranteed to get the same return path for the same set of packets - the dynamic nature of the net means that there are variations and the route tends to change over time. It's gotta be annoying for the people downing the kiddie porn to have their session interrupted because the packets took a different route now and then - also it ups the risk of being caught. The failures may be recorded on the source server and the traffic may get noticed.
Granted if you're lucky and get the router that the traffic always gets too it's fine, of course you've now hacked a piece of maintain machinery, far more than the usual home machine so it's more of a risk that you'll be caught...
As for cable segments? Depends on the topology, the technology and it ups the risk if you have a physical constraint to your location.
As far as I'm aware, when it comes to things like downloading kiddie porn or whatever they're trying to prosecute you for I don't think they can just throw you in prison because of a IP address log. They certainly can come and arrest you, and confiscate your computers and search for anything dodgy but you're likely to avoid jail as without additional evidence of wrong-doing it won't be enough to convict... Hence why they take all your devices in the first place.
If they believe you have been spoofed then they may take a closer look at the things around you, such as the people on the same cable loop, or as they know the source server and the routers it passes through they may be able to work out where it was intercepted.
I've no idea how savvy the cops are and if they'll keep searching once they can't pin it on you (or mebbe just keep trying to pin it on you) but it's difficult to reliably and without trace spoof your IP.
Maybe it's really common - but I've never heard of an instance of it.
Just so I understand - how exactly does someone spoof your IP address?
I mean if they're getting your IP address from the server logs on a kiddie porn server then the data was going to your machine. That's the way TCP/IP works - the IP address that the server has is the IP it's talking to.
If they spoof your IP, then the opening handshake will fail, because it's going to your router which is throwing it away as being rubbish. No session opened, no entries in the router's table, it's going to get blocked.
If someone wants to download kiddie porn (and I'm ignoring DDoS as 'breaking the law' as the 'sender' IPs are rarely real, or they're zombies plus the most they get is you disconnected) then they need to get the packets back, which means they need to have a route not just pushing it to you.
About the only way they can do that is to either get your IP when you don't have it (ie the ISP cycles around the IP addresses you have so someone else has yours), or they manage to hack all the routers coming from the kiddie porn site so that all packets route to somewhere else - not exactly your common garden script kiddie hack.
Oh yeah, there is another way - they could be downloading it to your system (and then back out) using your system as a relay, but that relies on them compromising your system, something you can defend against and notice.
It is much more likely that someone will use your open wifi point than they will pick your IP address and without you (or someone else) noticing manage to redirect it.
Slashdot Mirror
I never understood why this patent was granted - back in 2006 the same gestures were demonstrated (and publicly) by Jeff Han with his FTIR multi-touch display.
http://www.ted.com/talks/jeff_han_demos_his_breakthrough_touchscreen.html - take a look from about 2:29 onwards, pinch zoom, scoll etc.
It really doesn't appear that Apple should have been able to patent it, especially if their file date was in 2007 and it looks like the grant date was 2011 (seriously? wtf?).
Still, who knows why it was granted, and if I can find that prior art surely the other big companies who were sued because of it could too so I assume I'm missing something.
Seriously?
Wow.
Do you actually read what you're trolling?
You wrote "Then your issue is not with Siri, but with technology as a whole. You have no business being on this site and should leave now." in response to '"My phone doesn't work" because Siri is offline'.
And then you write "My phone, which has Siri as a feature, is not working to it's full advertised functionality. Therefore, saying my phone isn't working is no less valid than the options I provided." after of course bitching about "Ever said "hmm, the cell tower must be down?" or "Power's out". You are the same person you're complaining about. The power isn't out, one of the many transformers is having one of hundreds of problems or a line is severed, etc. etc. "
As a troll you only get about a 3 out of 10, you made me laugh at you so that's good, but you really didn't manage consistency - you're all over the place like a frog on a hotplate. I'd suggest in future before answering you at least remain consistent within the same thread!
You cannot be right because you took both sides in the argument - revisionist history only works if there isn't a record of what you said originally.
As for..
"People who get all high and mighty because they know a little bit about computers are assholes." - I don't quite understand why you said it, it's not like I professed great knowledge about computers (not saying I don't). I spoke about power and the mechanics of cell towers - must have missed the computers. But I agree (in your case at least), you profess to know a little about computers and you're acting an ass.
One thing I am happy about though, you said "You're as dumb as he was." which is at least not saying I'm as dumb as you - cause that definitely would be a bad thing ;)
Ever said "hmm, the cell tower must be down?" or "Power's out". You are the same person you're complaining about. The power isn't out, one of the many transformers is having one of hundreds of problems or a line is severed, etc. etc. The cell tower isn't "down", the antenna is obscured, or the amplifier has one of hundreds of failures possible, maybe the problem isn't at the tower at all.
I've just got to jump in here... In reference to the "Power's out"... Because obviously the power is out, the power supply to the house isn't functioning (probably why they said the power was out) - there's this fun thing called context (something you should be aware of the way you promote Siri - which frankly is Siri's killer feature over other voice systems) and when someone says the power's out, well the power's out. To jump in and say that because the power's on elsewhere (like upstream of their local transformer or in another country) then the power isn't out still doesn't change the obvious fact that "the power's out" for the person saying "the power's out".
Remember, when dealing with anything other than http (or other stateless protocols) CONTEXT is king - as in humans, humans use context so when someone says the "power's out" you probably don't need to check on the opposite side of the world.
And of course actually the cell tower could be "down", down being a generic term covering non-functional (through falling over, no power, lightning strike etc etc) - granted the failure could be on the device - but personally when I've said the network or tower is down it's usually because I've spoken to the friends around and found the ones on the same network have no signal (I'd blame the device in my pocket that I can most easily affect). The cell tower might be fine, but the network connection from the tower might be broken, but that has different failure symptoms on the device so....
Why have you leapt on someone saying that people will complain if Siri goes down - it's happened already as this quick (google) search found this http://www.pcworld.com/article/243175/siri_goes_down_for_a_day_apple_says_network_outages_are_possible.html
From that article:
" According to Venture Beat, contacting Apple customer service resulted in the typical, "Have you tried restarting your device?"" so people contacted Apple customer service because Siri was down... And they guy you tried to tear a new hole said...
"Now imagine those people with an iPhone 4S during a data outage or in the middle of New York City (or another smartphone sinkhole)? "My phone doesn't work" because Siri is offline or unreachable is a pretty lame excuse, but perfectly valid for people who are going to be trained to rely on it."
So he was right, and you were wrong.
Of course I'm not entirely sure what his point was - people will complain? That's not a surprise, there have been complaints about the accent it reads back to you in..
I'm also surprised that you didn't leap on it as validation of Siri - it's made enough of an impact that people complain when it's missing, if it were just a toy most likely people wouldn't bother calling customer support, no?
Agreed, in every particular - which I think is the first time that's ever happened to me on slashdot!
Kudos.
Z.
Yes.
It's planned to be built at sea, so no continental drift to worry about.
Sea allows mobility (to an extent) to avoid the worst storms (and there are areas that get very few hurricanes) but just building big and strong enough would protect against things like hurricanes.
A quick search of oil rigs (and I'd assume these are smaller than the base station would be) shows that they get hit all the time (and damaged all the time) but the ones that leap out at me were those that had an oil tanker smacked into them. One major advantage of being at sea is that there is very little debris to be flinging at your base station and no continental shelf to raise up waves / tsunamis.
It's just an engineering problem there, nothing fundamentally unsolvable (except perhaps the ribbon, but it's looking good there too).
Z.
Ahh a troll!
Yes, it is fiction, for it is not (yet) reality - the very definition of fiction.
It doesn't appear to be impossible, just very difficult.
Physics required for a geo-stable space platform? Huh? Do you mean something in geosynchronous orbit? Like say satellite TV? All those satellites are in geosynch orbit so you don't need active dishes to track them - geosynchronous orbit isn't difficult and is done every day.
The materials sciences for the ribbon material? Yes that isn't available yet, but it's on the way. There is no theoretical reason why we cannot build one, only practical reasons as we've not developed the materials yet.
One of the fun things you can do is look at what we have now, look at our scientific understanding of the universe from gravitation to atoms and then keep plugging away and testing and seeing what you get.
The theory describes materials such as carbon nano-tubes or graphene with sufficient tensile strength vs their weight to be able to build a space elevator. We cannot manufacture them in long enough sections yet but they are improving all the time - there's a lot of money in working out how to make this stuff.
Storms are engineering challenges, after all we manage to stick large unsupported free-standing structures up into storms and have them stay up, obviously this means we've got no idea how to do it at all and have just been lucky. Sheesh.
The people who are thinking about this aren't delusional (any more than the average population is - and probably less), these are just problems (even though you find them scary and don't understand) and they can be solved one way or another.
Z.
Well if you think it through the most effective renewable energy is space based solar, it's much more dense, permanently on and doesn't annoy anyone.
This starts being really possible with a space elevator, both for getting the machinery into space in the first place and getting the power back down (there's been talk of conductive cores to the elevators).
Is it really better for everyone if another $18billion is spent on social care? Isn't that just stopgap spending, spend a little more to temporarily make people feel better without actually changing anything? No new resources, no new energy sources etc? According to a quick look at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2008_United_States_federal_budget it seems that about $1.527 trillion was spent on welfare, how would $18 billion (1.1%) even be noticed in a budget of that size? Or add to it more than cheap and reliable access to space would? How about power costs dropping to fractions of what they are today? How about the reductions in pollution from shutting down fossil fuel power plants? How about dealing with nuclear waste once and for all? How about a reduction in wars and exploitation because the need for oil has just dropped massively?
The benefits of a space elevator out weigh pretty much anything you could possibly think of to do with $18 billion, spending it on anything else is short-sighted and really not going to change anything except probably make it worse.
Z.
3. Can you pull the ribbon into space in case something serious is taking place near the planet's surface, like a huge storm?
Yes. Easy to do at the counterweight at the far end. Would take some hours for the wave to move down and the Earth end raise up, but it is the obvious "Plan B" for a dire emergency on the ground.
What? Seriously you think you can just detach the ribbon from the base station and then attach it again? If the ribbon breaks at the base (the same scenario as detaching it) then the ribbon is lost to space.
The ribbon has to be under tension at the base, as in attempting to lift the base off the ground in order for anything to be able to climb it, otherwise you're attempting to climb an unsupported ribbon, which means the ribbon wants to escape but the base station doesn't let it. If there wasn't any tension in the base of the ribbon, you'd be climbing the inertia of the ribbon only, which means after all that effort, you can launch one item (and even then you need to climb quickly).
This isn't something you can just pull in and out or have hover about, the entire edifice is in dynamic tension and losing one of those balanced forces will bring the entire thing down (or up, or off or whatever).
6. How do you make the ribbon stay in one place above the ground anyway?
It's in orbit once per day, so to "first order" it stays put. Now, it will want to move about, at the 100 meter to 1 km level, because of tides and the like. If you anchor the terrestrial end, that thus means you are imposing waves on the cable. That seems to be OK, but more work is definitely needed here IMO.
It's anchored to a floating platform in the sea (not seen any viable discussions of land based elevators), the ribbon isn't like a rope dangling in the sky that you climb, it's not a rope ladder. The terrestrial end HAS to be anchored to a counter-weight that can also be supported by the earth in order to have tension you can exploit to climb the cable.
Z.
No need for ION engines (not sure why that's capitalised) to hold anything up - the forces on the cable beyond geosynch pull the entire cable tight, about the only use for the ion engines would be (and this is any type of reaction thruster) to help damp oscillations in the cable.
You are correct, the cable is much longer than it needs to be (more than twice I believe, geosynch is roughly 35k km up and the designs I've seen talk about a 100k km cable) mostly due to the requirement for lifting tension and the fact that the cable is incredibly light for it's length, in the order of grams per km.
An easier (for a given value of easy) would be to have a large mass (it's a measure of mass / distance past geosynch - no need for dark matter when a rock will do) a distance beyond the geosynch to counter-weight, either way it works - the forces on the cable past geosynch cause the cable to stick out straight, perpendicular to the surface of the planet and will always attempt to get that as straight as possible.
Don't worry about the cable snapping going too fast or too slow, as it happens as you have a weight travel down the cable the cable will travel ahead of the rotation of the planet, as something climbs the cable the cable will lean behind the rotation of the planet - effectively there's an east-west acceleration as the weight descends / ascends the cable. This has the effect of pulling the cable down fractionally but the excess tension also pulls the cable back up again, it won't be instant or 'snapping' as there's never any massive horizontal displacement / force - the speed of the climber dictates the rate of change of circumference/orbit and thus the horizontal force applied to the cable.
The tail won't really get ahead of behind of the 'station' (there won't actually be a station as far as I know) as the cable will attempt to remain straight from the point of horizontal deflection. There will be vibrations and other variations travelling up and down the cable but they should both damp in time and be damped dynamically.
One last thing to remember, most of the cable is outside of the atmosphere so there's no atmospheric drag (well, vanishingly small as it's not exactly a pure vacuum) on the tail to add to the problems.
It's a hard engineering challenge and we've not got the materials to do it yet but it'll change a lot when it (or something like it) does happen.
Z.
Sigh.
The whole point of a space elevator is that the centre of mass of the cable is at geosynch orbit (well slightly past it). There is no need to continuously thrust to hold the cable up because the rotational speed of the planet will fling away the cable.
The reason that the cable stays up is the gravity drops off by the square of the distance but distance travelled by the cable per hour at any height increases. The period of rotation is always 24 hours (give or take some lean) but the circumference described is greater as the height increases.
What this means is that at geosynchronous orbit the force downward due to gravity (at that distance from earth) exactly matches the centripetal forces from orbiting the planet (or more accurately attempting to fly off in a straight line but the gravity of the planet curving that line).
Below geosynchronous orbit if you are orbiting the earth once a day you're doomed to crash into the planet without active energy input (the rate of curvature is higher than your speed thus you'll hit), above geosynchronous orbit if you're still orbiting the earth once a day you're doomed to escape the planets' gravity altogether and go flying off as you spiral out. This is why low orbit satellites orbit so quickly and high orbit satellites orbit so slowly, the relative strengths of gravity at the different orbits, plus the distance travelled to complete an orbit dictate the speeds.
The parts of the cable that are above geosynchronous orbit are attempting to escape earth, and the parts of the cable that are below geosynchronous orbit are trying to crash down to earth - the reason the cable stays up is that these are balanced. The entire weight of the cable (less the reduction due to centripetal forces) below geosynch (and adding the tension in the cable necessary to lift a weight) is indeed all passed through the portion of the cable in geosynch orbit (it's actually a huge section as 1 metre from geosynch either way isn't much difference). But the cable isn't a cable, at least not in current designs, it's a ribbon varying in width from thinnest at the ends to widest at geosynch as the loads vary - there are also thickness variations due to expected damage to the cable, ie at certain orbital levels micro-meteorite (and space junk more likely) impacts are very likely so the cable would be made wider to compensate.
Please note that this doesn't allow anything to be pulled up the cable, it is just supporting itself, what you need to do is stick a nice big weight on the end of the cable on earth, like say the base station weighing in at hundreds of tonnes (but not supported by the cable, supported by the earth's surface) and then extend the cable upwards until it has a tension high enough to do something useful. The tension in the base of the cable where it meets the base station will be at least the weight of anything you want to send up the cable (and have more because acceleration increases the force).
The real problem with understanding this is that humans live on such a small height variation and deal with speeds so slow that you cannot easily imagine what happens to gravity over those distances and how much energy is involved in those speeds - if you accept that orbital mechanics isn't the same as you running about on earth it becomes much easier to understand.
No revisions of any laws (other then potentially materials sciences as we don't yet have a material that has a strong enough tensile strength but low enough weight) are required for this to work, all you need to do is understand them.
The 'energy' you use to raise the payload is electrical converted to kinetic converted to gravitational potential. If there happened to be a mountain of a magical material that reached out into space then climbing that mountain would not violate any laws of thermodynamics.
Towers have problems, compressive strength vs weight, mechanical strength of the earths crust, and major issues with stability. Compression is a positive runaway scenario (the tower bends slightly and the weight causes the bend to accelerate), tension has a negative (or neutral I suppose) runaway scenario (the cable bends and the cable tries to straighten out).
Z.
Sigh.
I'm making the argument (as are Oracle in the courts) that it's the software patents that are the case, the copyright violations (the things that are behind the license) have been pretty much shot down - certainly all I'm hearing about is the patents and the big OMG Android copied Java appears to have been removed.
The license you (assuming you are the same person) linked to was a Sun/Oracle SDK End user agreement. There is no guarantee that this applies to Google engineers creating Android (or the company that Google bought that originally created Android).
You are making the stupid assumption that because you have found a license it is somehow magically applied to everyone. This particular license requires that the person to whom it applies have downloaded the SDK. I'm missing the point where you show that Google engineers in relation to Android have downloaded the SDK.
Unfortunately for you that isn't the only way to license the Java SDK, I know for a fact (having worked there on Java) that large companies, especially those that create their own VMs (completely legally under license, like Apple, HP, IBM etc) have different agreements. Your EULA that you linked has absolutely NOTHING to do with the licensing that they operate under - you are confusing individuals with large companies.
Harmony, the 'base libraries' that you are complaining about are owned by the Apache Foundation, they were pretty much written by IBM originally and IBM I believe has a completely different licensing agreement with Sun/Oracle as part of the fact they have multiple platforms and create their own VMs for them. Oracle hasn't sued or in any way protested the Harmony project other than the fact that due to the field of use restrictions Harmony is not TCK / JCK certified and as such can't be called Java - this by the way led to the rather public divorce of the Apache Foundation from the JCP.
If your assertion that the "license explicitly denies you the permission to create your own VM," applied to everyone then there is no way that IBM could create their own VM for AIX and zOS, there's no way that Apple could have created a VM to run on MacOS and there's no way that HP could have created a VM to run on HPUX. All these companies (and more) did this, and all of them entered into different agreements with Sun (and now Oracle).
You are not privy to the contents of these agreements, neither am I, but I can posit that they are different from the the EULA you quoted as according to you that license prevents them creating a VM.
Since you have no idea as to the legal agreements in force between Google and Sun/Oracle your assumption that the EULA for the SDK download applies is moronic - you might be correct, but you're more likely to be incorrect. Basing your entire argument on a document you have no evidence is even in force isn't the way to go about proving anything.
What I've tried to point out to you is that anyone could do the same thing - you never need to touch the license as you can access everything you need elsewhere.
Jikes(http://jikes.sourceforge.net/) - a java compiler (originally written by IBM again) means you'd not need the JDK to convert java code into bytecode.
Kaffe(http://www.kaffe.org/) - a 'java' VM technically not Java but can execute java bytecode, open source cleanroom implemented legal... means you'd not need the JDK in order to execute your program.
Harmony(http://harmony.apache.org/) - java class libraries , means you'd not need the JDK to use similar base libraries.
You can develop Android without ever getting near that license you're so wedded to, so I ask you how is that license in force? You're assuming that the license has to be in force whereas I've demonstrated multiple ways that it may not be.
As a quick aside, your mention of "pay 6 billion dollars" was cut down to 100 million dollars by the Judge, the 6 billion was Oracles made up number to try and get as much as they can - part of the negotiating and media position but not based
Ok, google's choices as you see them.
a) The GPL? I don't really understand why this is even a discussion. On one hand you're saying you should be able to do anything with anything you create, and on the other hand google shouldn't be allowed to. Since Android is effectively an application executing on Linux there's no reason for it to be GPL'd. There is no reason for it to be GPL'd other than that. One of the main reasons for Android to be under the Apache2 license is project Harmony http://harmony.apache.org/ that provide the class libraries. I don't know if they could have converted the class libs to the GPL and I really don't care, I'd prefer the Apache2 license to the GPL because as you say " I would certainly reserve that right on any software I write." - if I write apps I want to own the apps, or at least have something of a mechanism to stop people ripping me off.
b) Seriously? Did you read any of the things I'd posted? That license is between you (as the Android developer or android OS compiler - and even that isn't guaranteed) and Oracle. Remember, and this is important, Android does not run Java, it CANNOT run Java it runs Dalvik byte-code. The license you linked to was for the Java Development Kit, effectively a desktop JVM and compiler. Ergo executing Android does not violate this license, Writing apps for Android does not violate this license and I'm fairly sure that even compiling Android doesn't violate this licence although not 100% confident.
From that license file
"D. Java Technology Restrictions. You may not create, modify, or change the behavior of, or authorize your licensees to create, modify, or change the behavior of, classes, interfaces, or subpackages that are in any way identified as "java", "javax", "sun" or similar convention as specified by Sun in any naming convention designation."
Which is I presume what you're discussing here since there's no mention of embedded versions in the entire license agreement, this is an EULA for the download of the JDK, this may or may not be binding on Google (or indeed any large company) as it is specifically an End User License Agreement - quite a number of companies have their own licensing agreements with Sun and now Oracle over Java as it is different in the enterprise.
But a major point here is that you can use the Java SDK to create programs that run elsewhere and therefore are not subject to this license, secondly there is more than one java compiler for example - http://jikes.sourceforge.net/ which kinda means that if you also have a VM you're able to avoid the license completely.
On a moral level the authors of Java (which by the way isn't Oracle) do have the moral right to tell you what you can and can't create with their software but (and this is important) they've already done that in the license for the language spec and bytecode spec. You're suggesting that they should have absolute control forever - this isn't a good thing and cannot happen. Companies would create new languages rather than be controlled by a competitor.
If you had written a new programming language and you wanted it to be popular you'd have to have few restrictions as if those restrictions are too onerous then the majority of people will never use it. Please note that writing a program is not the same as writing a programming language, one is a program and the other a specification and syntax. If you had put in restrictions then nobody would use it and nobody would care, what you can't (legally, let alone morally) do is say yeah do what you want and then tomorrow say nope, you can only create kiddie games on it. Unless your license had that unilateral ability (and remember consideration is necessary for a license to be binding) that you could change it at any time then you're stuck - most companies read the licenses and as such refuse to do business with something that has the huge risk of randomly changing at no notice.
Finally your forced lice
Actually what Google did was relatively smart but not in this case creating an entirely new language.
It's quite a hack really but what happens is that you actually create your android app against stubs, completely in Java and using the desktop, free licensed version of the Java compiler, nothing here violates any copyright or patents.
Then you take your compiled Java code and re-compile it for Dalvik, so it's no longer Java and isn't running on a JVM.
Java the language isn't a computer program, quite explicitly Java is something in which you can write a computer program but it is not a program itself. Yes there are support tools such as the compiler and the JVM which allow you to execute a program written in Java but you must understand that Java is not a program. I think you're fundamentally misunderstanding how a programming language works.
Please note however that "Because Java is a "managed" language it's also a design document for a very specific piece of software, the JVM. And it's also the API "interface" (to use a term from C++) for a very extensive library." is pretty much completely incorrect.
The JVM doesn't have a design document, multiple companies produce multiple JVMs in different ways for different platforms and different instruction sets. Primarily Java consists of the language syntax and the bytecode syntax.
The Java class libraries are not fixed, nor are they solely defined by Oracle, as should be pointed out by the Harmony class libraries.
Just to repeat it: Java is the language syntax and the bytecode specification!
"What google did is to take the specification, some "chapters" (like the language spec, compiler and base API) copied verbatim, and change a few chapters in the book (mostly packaging and extended the API) so that it would apply better to cell phones. Now this is all nice and great, but like for a real book, you can't do this without the permission of the original book owner." - I suppose it would look like that from the outside, but what you're really not understanding is that it's not what it is under the covers. Since everything was written in Java on the desktop for J2SE with additional libraries nothing has been violated - except for the Dalvik VM. So things like the language spec? Doesn't matter, the reason you can use the normal tools is that it's normal Java, under the normal license on the normal compiler and without hitting the Field of Use restrictions that required it in the first place. Compiler? It's not copied, you're using the one that Sun and now Oracle ship, all that happens afterwards is that the bytecode is converted to a different language to run on a different VM. Base API? I can only assume you mean the class libraries which have been clean-room implemented in Harmony and so Oracle's IP hasn't been touched.
"There are computer languages that do not allow you to base other languages off them (in fact most commercial are like this). The big exceptions is C/C++ (and another exception getting bigger is Javascript). But most languages do not in fact allow this, things like C#, F#, Object Pascal, PL/SQL, ... do not allow you to make a new computer language based on them (in fact several Google languages explicitly forbid this, they even forbid trying to understand how they work)" - I'm pretty sure that I could write a Pascal alike language, create my own compiler and stay within the law (can't be sure I won't get sued but that's what the courts are for). I couldn't call it Pascal and I'm sure there would be minor differences but for all practical intents it would be a very similar language - and when you get down to it most languages are very similar, they have to be.
"(and remember : just because you haven't read the law or a contract doesn't mean it doesn't apply. A license = a contract)" - A license != A contract they are very different things in the eyes of the law, not reading law (which most definitely != a license) means you were negligent, not reading a contract means you were stupid if
You can't use J2SE on mobile devices (I'm pretty sure Google would have wanted to use J2SE) due to Field of Use restrictions and J2ME wasn't any good, so no choice if you wanted to use Java. Sun wouldn't open the Field of Use restrictions at all - possibly because they were making money from it but I don't know.
As far as I know Sun said it had to be J2ME on Android which wouldn't have worked, J2ME is incredibly restricted and frankly almost sufficiently different from J2SE to be a different language.
Sun could have sued - but Sun didn't want to be the bad guy. Oracle is happy to be the bad guy so there you go - which is weird, they happily piss off everyone they run across from open source developers to large companies.
Google have already opened their wallet, lawyers aren't free after all :) but barring getting rid of those patents (prior art, overly broad claims, or being found not to infringe etc) they'll probably have to pay. That said if the case goes against them I'm sure they'll appeal and if that fails or looks like it'll fail they'll settle - at least Oracle can't go for a scorched ground approach if the settlement is reasonable they've pretty much got to accept it (I think that's right).
Z.
Er?
Dalvik bytecodes are not sun bytecodes - they don't work, at all. And I suspect you're misunderstanding what verbatim means - because it certainly doesn't mean 'slightly different'.
Dalvik was written anew, not developed from a sun JVM. Although how clean-room this is as it was written is to be decided in the courts - and last I'd heard Oracle's contention that this was copied has been mostly shot down, hence the patent claims being the most talked about currently.
"Java is not public domain, and anything unique about java is protected just like the contents of a book." - Well except for the fact that writing a book does not mean you own the English language, you have some rights over expression of the language in that book and that format.
In programming the content of the book, the story is the program, the language the book is written in (say English) is the programming language ie Java. So a copyright for a particular program does NOT mean you own every program written in the same language.
You may be thinking of the class libraries because these provide 95% of the meat of Java, but of course Android uses the Harmony class libraries, something clean-room developed and currently owned by the Apache Foundation so it's not using the Sun class libraries.
Not a single programming language ever lays claim to the programs written within that language - if one ever did? then it would never be used. Why write a program in order to give it to someone else - seriously, TOS for all languages specifically state that the programs you create in that language are yours!
So to sum up, Google is only guilty of copyright infringement if (and only if) the Dalvik VM hasn't been clean-room developed correctly - it's not copyright infringement to convert from Java to another language (at any point of the compile process), nor is it copyright infringement to use the same development tools, the Dalvik bytecode is a different language to the Java bytecode.
What Android cannot (and if you'll notice - does not) do is claim that it runs Java, because field of use restrictions in the JCK and TCK prevent anything other than Java ME running on a mobile device and if a VM has not been JCK and TCK certified then it can't have the trademarked Java coffee cup or use the trademarked Java name and of course since Dalvik doesn't run Java bytecode.....
The largest part of this case is (as the previous posts mention - they are correct, you missed the point) the patents, as they are much more difficult to deal with. Copyright? Easy just develop it without ever seeing the original and you can't have copied.
Google didn't take something that didn't belong to them, yes they maimed it against the wishes of the original author (but if the author wanted to prevent this possibility all they had to do was not release it into the public), didn't use it's massive weight to outcompete the original author (seriously? If Sun had opened the Field of Use restrictions then clean-room re-implementing Java wouldn't have been necessary - Java ME was never fit for purpose).
As for the ends justifying the means? Well considering it appears about the only thing they may have done is violate some patents it's not exactly evil is it?
I could create a new language that looked the same as Java tomorrow (I'm a fast worker ;) ) and not violate any of Oracles copyrights... Patents on the other hand..
Z.
[1] By definition, yes. Someone spent time and effort creating an idea, a technique, a widget, whatever. If they hadn't, there would have been nothing to patent. That idea/technique/widget was then used by Google who could build Android faster, cheaper, easier, more useful, because they didn't have to both identify the problem and then think of a solution to it themselves. So, yes, someone other than Google put in [some of] the effort to create [some of what became] Android.
Sorry but that's really not the case. You're making an assumption that just isn't true when it comes to software development - people never reuse idea/techniques/widgets from patents because there aren't any idea/techniques/widgets in patents, only claims.
Patenting idea/technique/widget X does not mean you've helped anyone. I have my name on several patents myself and have waded through many other patents (software and hardware), what you actually have are a series of claims and that's what you infringe - the sole sop to actually having the invention in the patent is the preferred embodiment, which is really no use. It's pretty much impossible to run through a patent database and find ways to solve your problems and it certainly would take longer than just writing it yourself from scratch. Just looking for prior art to verify that you have something patentable is a nightmare and then seeing what happened to a clear valuable idea when it became written up by the patent attorneys - if I couldn't have worked back to my idea from the end result I don't know how anyone else could have.
What usually happens is that someone patented X, and someone else who faced the same problem (or similar problem, or even something else entirely but the claims on X were broad) implemented X without ever knowing about the patent, and even if they had known about the patent it wouldn't have helped - they have been made so generic and legalised that there's really no benefit to the actual code.
In software people re-invent the wheel all the time, there's no library of patented functions you can pull from and pay a fee, you don't even look because if you looked it becomes willful infringement, you couldn't find something that matched and you wouldn't get any benefit from the legalese and broad generic claims.
The concept of a patent helping innovation by spreading knowledge around is false, the most you can say is that it may help innovation by protecting ideas. The reality is (I believe) that it hurts innovation by being about who has more money.
Z.
Doesn't matter if you use an Android based phone or if you're guilty of patent violation - damages will be minimal. No possibility of 100 million damages against an individual, more like $1 as there are over 100 million devices.
Can you really imagine Oracle suing someone for $1? Or even $3 for triple damages from willful infringement?
And if they do sue you, then they can't sue the manufacturer because they're attempting to get compensation twice for the same event (or at least I believe that's the case).
Patents aren't ever (for a given value of ever, I suppose it is remotely possible) enforced against individuals, you could probably win simply thru having more money but the PR would be hideous, you'd spend more trying to get your dollar than you'd ever get back and judges would end up detesting you.
When you get down to it, other than as attempting to change the behaviour of other people you're too small to be noticed. The same is for copyright infringement, the labels aren't really making much in the way of money (other than from the people who settle) and are pissing everyone off, including the judges they're relying on. Even when they win 100k judgements they've little hope of ever getting the money unless the person literally has that money lying around or is a high earner.
Z.
You know, for a while I thought this was someone else - the language was much better.
Which kinda indicates that you're faking a lot.. What do you get out of it? I'm kinda curious. So you're trolling, do you get a secret thrill out of getting a reply?
I don't understand your motivation - this took me like 5 minutes to reply and it's amusing so I'm not being detrimentally impacted, so if you're thrilled I'm replying and wasting my time I don't quite follow.
But back to the point, a quick bit of research shows that actually diet coke has 4 calories so I suppose in theory if you drink enough you might not starve - I have to admit I prefer coke zero over diet coke, and coke zero really does have zero calories. But my original point is correct, drinking only diet coke, or only water will kill you. Neither have enough to sustain life in the medium term.
If you meant drink only diet coke with meals and you'll be dead in a year, then again I have to say you're wrong - I know people who do 99% only drink diet coke (occasional alcohol) and they're still alive after many years - like 10 or so.
Ignoring your assumption that I'm american, yes I'm highly educated - but I do have to admit that none of my subjects / courses were in how long you can live on diet coke and I have to say that any education system that dedicates time to how long you can live drinking a particular carbonated beverage probably isn't worth very much.
And finally, what does this have to do with milk or GMO crops?
I suspect you'll troll another reply, but you'll only get another bite if you're interesting enough, sorry.
Enjoy.
Z.
Seriously? I appreciate you're trolling but...
Diet coke has zero calories, therefore you won't make it very long before you starve to death, let alone all of the missing nutrients. Non-diet coke is loaded with calories so at least you will last longer..
And what has this got to do with milk? or GMO crops?
You might has well say only have water for a year - it also has zero calories, is missing a lot of vital nutrients and basically you'll starve, get scurvy and die.
Really stupid statement.
Z.
Apple never denies apps or peripherals because they compete with Apple peripherals or apps. Never. The thing you are thinking of is when they don't approve apps that duplicate inherent iPhone/iPod touch functionality. That *can't* fit your idea that this is because it competes with their "own branded and thusly profitable peripherals" (or apps, I assume) (how do they lose a sale on something that is already part of the product?). This is easily explained by Apple's official reason: to keep the core experience intact.
iMovie, GarageBand, Texas Hold'em... These apps *all* have competition on the App Store. Docks, cables, headphones, smart covers, cases... These *all* have competitors in Made For iPod.
Your assertion is completely baseless.
What? I appreciate that you're coming from the Apple is amazing point of view, but seriously?
http://uneasysilence.com/archive/2008/09/13445/ - PodCasting app denied because Apple wants to keep the iTunes monopoly. Not because it duplicates anything on the phone, but because it duplicates functionality on the desktop.
http://androidencyclopedia.com/android-magazine-denied-on-apple-app-store/ - Android mag app denied on the AppStore - well because it's about Android. To me it's a pretty weak argument that you're so afraid of the competition that you attempt to prevent even learning about it? It's the equivalent of security through obscurity, why not compete on merit?
A quick google search shows millions of entries for this. I won't even bother getting into the publishing 30% debacle with in-app purchases which is a transparent attempt to lock down the iPhone to Apple iBooks offering.
Apple has a clear track record of doing this, saying anything else is just lying - definitely to others and potentially to yourself.
They don't control for control's sake. They don't even control for direct profit. They control to make the product more appealing to consumers. Control is *NOT* the purpose, control is the means. The purpose is a good working experience. Apple makes money by making products people want. They do this by making good products, not by controlling people. Every single Apple customer is a voluntary customer. They don't have a monopoly and they aren't a government. You don't hear people say, "I didn't want an [Apple Product], but I had to get one."
They do control for control's sake (although admittedly this is my opinion - since I can't mind read, and neither can you this is only opinion) and they do control for direct profit.
Yes a side effect of that control is somewhat of a decent working experience, but it were control for a good working experience then they would be more transparent with it - after all you want people to know what the control is, you don't want a confusing, variable and whimsical control experience unless you're after the control for the sake of control.
A well defined process with clear steps, feedback and acknowledgement would provide you with far more efficient (and I believe more effective) control for the purpose of providing a great working experience - but that isn't what the App Store has. And feel free to say it does, but it's really really easy to come up with counter arguments.
In other words, no, you can't cite a single example.
Not for the hardware side, no - but then again you can't provide evidence that they are all bunnies and light on hardware. For me the balance of probabilities indicate that they are as controlling on the hardware side as they are on the software side. There are millions of examples of that control (and don't get me wrong - sometimes that control is a good thing) on the software side. If you can show me that Apple is really a completely different company when it comes to MFI, great (although a weird split personality
How am I ignoring that? That's the very foundation of my point. It's Apple's system. If you want to play with them, you abide by their rules. It's in Apple's interest that their rules don't drive away third party manufacturers, while simultaneously making sure third party manufacturers don't piss in Apple's pool. That's why Made for iPod exists. It's not a profit center, it's mainly a way to make sure MFI products work well.
You're making an assumption that isn't actually true, or at least isn't completely true. It is in Apple's interests to keep some third party manufacturers, but as with the Apple AppStore itself it isn't in Apple's interest to keep all of them - it certainly isn't in their interest to keep anyone who competes too closely with their own branded and thusly profitable peripherals. You are correct, MFI isn't a profit center for them, however the iPod, iPhone and all iDevices that use the connector and play with the MFI certified peripherials are a profit center (and Apple peripherals are also profitable for them), therefore close control of MFI and connecting to 'their' devices is what they're after.
To an extent I'd agree with you, MFI does tend to make the peripherals work well with the devices (although like anything the older peripherals are useless), but control is the purpose, not just a good working experience.
Wow, that's pretty scary! I suppose you can cite an example of this happening, right? I mean, if not, and the dock connector has been around for the better part of a decade, you'd think maybe it's not something you need to worry about.
I half agree with you here, but not totally. As far as I know the situation is similar to that of the Apple AppStore, in that you're under an NDA and you can't really talk if you want to keep doing business with Apple. If you don't care about doing business, then you can risk breaking the NDA, but as there's a significant difference between hardware and software it's not likely that you'll be a straw-man that's not worth suing.
Based on Apple's tactics with the AppStore, it's more of a case of a track record than no evidence. I wouldn't be surprised to find out that Apple has done it, after-all where's the drawback for them? It's much easier to control small numbers of large players with a lot to lose than large groups of small players with nothing to lose.
Google hasn't "upped" shit. If you want to sell your product to many hundreds of millions of people, you pay a small pittance to Apple. Just because Google's system doesn't require a license is pretty much inconsequential to whether or not one will make products targeting the iPod dock connector. You don't create products in a vacuum. You need customers. Apple's customer base is far more lucrative than Google's.
In your opinion Google hasn't "upped" shit, in other people's opinions it might have - certainly it has interested me, a lot more than any hardware integration with an iDevice would do. The important point to realise with this is how many people might now tinker with Android and Arduino - people were tinkering with Arudino and Android already, and this makes it official (or at least easier for some). Now, I agree, it's unlikely that any one of these will suddenly mass-produce something, after all they're just small tinkerers. However it is very likely based on the number of people who will look into it (assuming there is a large number for a cheap, open and easy to use platform) that a lot of things that are good will come out of it. And this is where Apple may lose out, after all if you create a nifty hardware dongle, release the app into the Android Market and you're good to go - show me the speedy lifecycle of Apple hardware and apps?
Yes some of them will be rubbish, some of them won't work, a lot will be incredibly unique and useful for only a handful - but it'll be more than you'll ever get out of a iDevice unless Apple removes the barrier to entry. Show me the
In theory more than in practice. Routes change primarily when equipment goes down. It happens, but not that often.
I was under the impression that there was more changes in the route due to congestion, loading etc... I don't run a router so I have no first-hand information detailing this but I can see it both ways. I agree there's going to be a most likely path and barring loading and failures this would probably remain fairly static, I don't know how much the loading changes the route on a minute to minute basis, certainly I've seen routes change, but...?
of course you've now hacked a piece of maintain machinery, far more than the usual home machine so it's more of a risk that you'll be caught...
On balance it makes you less likely to be caught, because whoever is trying to catch you has to trace you back through this router in addition to any other measures you're taking (like other compromised routers, or using an internet cafe etc.) rather than only tracing you through the other measures.
Sorry that wasn't what I meant (and forgive the typo), I meant that it is far more likely that an internet router will be maintain / logged than a home machine. The chances of discovery of the hack would appear (to me at least) to be higher on a maintained piece of hardware rather than the unmaintained home system.
You don't actually have to be there, you only have to have a compromised machine there. Get some unsuspecting cable modem user to install a trojan, then spoof the user's neighbor's IP address to keep the compromised user from getting busted and thereby prompting them to remove the trojan.
You have a point, I'd not considered that you wouldn't need to be there, although I'm not convinced that the cable networks have such modems around that will happily pretend to be someone else's IP. They might do, but it seems really stupid, I had assumed that you would require physical access to the cable modem to manage it.
Maybe not, but if there is one fewer plausible explanation (like having open wifi) for why your IP address showed up in their logs, they're going to spend more time harassing you and your friends and family until they give up and go away.
All I'm saying is that leaving your wireless open makes your chance of getting raided go from "almost zero" to "almost zero" while providing you with a plausible explanation for any traffic that might be seen as coming from your IP address in the unlikely even that it actually does happen.
This is where we need to differ on opinion, I don't believe that IP spoofing really happens, but if it does happen then I think it's a much much smaller possibility than the likelihood of someone wardriving and getting your IP in a bad place that way.
Either way, if your IP shows up on a kiddie porn server and that server gets raided then you're going to have your equipment searched no matter what. If nothing shows up at all you'll get it back and be ok, if something shows up you're in trouble. I agree that IP spoofing is a lower order probability which means it will be less likely in a defence, however I think that the possibility that an open wifi will land you in trouble is orders of magnitude higher.
Finally, since you know approximately what you're talking about (and will be classed as a techie in court) you're probably not going to be able to get away with an open wifi defence - the usual 'I don't understand' defence may not look so good... Saying you believe in free wifi, and don't mind sharing is a possible, but then you also may have been doing that to provide plausible deniability to your nefarious activities - and so may not be as good a defence as you believe.
Z.
I think I made a mistake mentioning "Oh yeah, there is another way - they could be downloading it to your system (and then back out) using your system as a relay, but that relies on them compromising your system, something you can defend against and notice."
This isn't really IP spoofing, but in my defense I was in a rush :) It's not IP spoofing because it's going to the right IP... You're simply installing malware on the target system and bouncing it out again, and actually computer viruses have been used as defenses against computer charges.
The reason the incriminating bits are seen on your connection is that they're travelling over your connection. But that's something of a myth. You aren't going to have deep packet inspection most internet connections, and certainly not historical data - there's just too much of it.
Firstly if they do succeed in spoofing your IP address then your ISP in most cases won't log the inbound / outbound traffic as they won't see it - which means your ISP can't be the source of the legal queries. Which means it's from an external website, most likely when they get the logs of a criminal site they've managed to shut down (or honey-netted) which means they definitely don't have deep packet inspection for it.
"The point, made several times above, is that secure wireless, isn't very secure." - that wasn't my point (nor was I disagreeing with it), nor was it what I was responding to.
I was responding to a comment that said you should have an open wireless AP in order to provide additional doubt onto any conviction from IP spoofing. Being that I've not yet heard of widespread (or more than just a theoretical exercise) IP spoofing and I can see a lot of problems with it, it would seem that it's foolish to open a wireless AP in order to protect yourself from IP spoofing. Considering that there are events in the field that show that having an open wifi AP can land you in trouble.
The likely incidence of IP spoofing is much much less than the likely incidence of illegal behaviour on an open wifi AP. Which means you'll get a lot more hassle from the open wifi than from the IP spoofing.
I think what my point really boils down it is the oddity that people seem to think that a single IP address record on a suspect server is sufficient evidence to convict - the reason they take all your computing gear is because they have 'reasonable suspicion' that you committed the crime and are now looking for evidence in order to secure a conviction. If they don't find evidence (and they're honest etc) then you'll be fine. The event itself is low-order probability and then having it compounded with a bad enough defence and a clueless enough judge to be convicted isn't really worth worrying about.
There may be points about the court of public opinion, but as for actual conviction if you are innocent? Very very unlikely, and it's far more likely that you'll be convicted from an open wifi than from someone spoofing your IP.
Z.
Yes and no...
You aren't guaranteed to get the same return path for the same set of packets - the dynamic nature of the net means that there are variations and the route tends to change over time. It's gotta be annoying for the people downing the kiddie porn to have their session interrupted because the packets took a different route now and then - also it ups the risk of being caught. The failures may be recorded on the source server and the traffic may get noticed.
Granted if you're lucky and get the router that the traffic always gets too it's fine, of course you've now hacked a piece of maintain machinery, far more than the usual home machine so it's more of a risk that you'll be caught...
As for cable segments? Depends on the topology, the technology and it ups the risk if you have a physical constraint to your location.
As far as I'm aware, when it comes to things like downloading kiddie porn or whatever they're trying to prosecute you for I don't think they can just throw you in prison because of a IP address log. They certainly can come and arrest you, and confiscate your computers and search for anything dodgy but you're likely to avoid jail as without additional evidence of wrong-doing it won't be enough to convict... Hence why they take all your devices in the first place.
If they believe you have been spoofed then they may take a closer look at the things around you, such as the people on the same cable loop, or as they know the source server and the routers it passes through they may be able to work out where it was intercepted.
I've no idea how savvy the cops are and if they'll keep searching once they can't pin it on you (or mebbe just keep trying to pin it on you) but it's difficult to reliably and without trace spoof your IP.
Maybe it's really common - but I've never heard of an instance of it.
Z.
Just so I understand - how exactly does someone spoof your IP address?
I mean if they're getting your IP address from the server logs on a kiddie porn server then the data was going to your machine. That's the way TCP/IP works - the IP address that the server has is the IP it's talking to.
If they spoof your IP, then the opening handshake will fail, because it's going to your router which is throwing it away as being rubbish. No session opened, no entries in the router's table, it's going to get blocked.
If someone wants to download kiddie porn (and I'm ignoring DDoS as 'breaking the law' as the 'sender' IPs are rarely real, or they're zombies plus the most they get is you disconnected) then they need to get the packets back, which means they need to have a route not just pushing it to you.
About the only way they can do that is to either get your IP when you don't have it (ie the ISP cycles around the IP addresses you have so someone else has yours), or they manage to hack all the routers coming from the kiddie porn site so that all packets route to somewhere else - not exactly your common garden script kiddie hack.
Oh yeah, there is another way - they could be downloading it to your system (and then back out) using your system as a relay, but that relies on them compromising your system, something you can defend against and notice.
It is much more likely that someone will use your open wifi point than they will pick your IP address and without you (or someone else) noticing manage to redirect it.
Z.