Given that the statute permits reverse engineering and study of Computer Software and overrides any Licensing terms related to the software - will we be allowed to publish "the research" without reference to the copyright holder ?
In particular what if the research covers benchmarks... ? May this law actually allow independent benchmarks at last ?
1. They've allowed temporary copies (Section 8) - so "transients" created say while listening to the music aren't infringing:-)
2. They've allowed "timeshifting" for domestic premises. Interestingly this opens a whole can of worms for them given the phrasing. A copy can be made for the purposes of timeshifting as long as it does not become an infringeing copy - i.e. one that is sold or let for hire. This would seem to allow at least the creation of "backup" copies for personal use.
3. Section 15 - Observing Studying and Testing of Computer Programs. They've allowed this - as long as you own a copy - and even better this Copyright Act overrules any restrictive license imposed by the copyright holder. (2) Where an act is permitted under this section, it is irrelevant whether or not there exists any term or condition in an agreement which purports to prohibit or restrict the act (such terms being, by virtue of section 296A, void).".
Of course the really stupid part of this is that any infringement is a criminal offense (why?) and you can potentially end up spending longer in jail than a burglar or rapist.
These guys www.ovonyx.com have had something better (but similar tech) for the last 3 years. Intel have bought into the tech and are helping develop it into commercial devices.
Non-volatile, fast (SRAM speed), and multi-read/write
This was only announced to divert attention away from the Government's rather dodgy position in the Hutton enquiry... dead scientists, dodgy war memos... the list goes on.
Just before the Iraq II war we had an announcement about taxing the sale of houses - a similar ploy to try and divert attention away from a rather corrupt Labour party's inner connivings.
Let's face it - how on earth is a device in a car going to be able to tell if you're in a bus-lane or not - with current tech ?
Sigh
Its usual in cases like this for the weakest member of the herd to be singled out - as long as its worth suing.
With a high-profile case like this NTP now have leverage against larger companies, who rather than litigate will end up settling for a fee ($53mill + lawyers fees is a lot of licenses).
In practise of course this is just another example of the US Patent system gone barmy.
As one of the next posters has said 'logical steps' should not be patentable.
In fact this is one of the tenets of acquiring patents "The patent should not be obvious to those familiar with the domain".
Of course using an alternate transport for emails should not be patentable (otherwise there'd be patents for Copper, Fibre, Horse and Cart etc). I suspect that the actual patent would be a little more specific than that.
e.g. Patent 6,452,588 (RIM patent on Handheld Email Device) isn't really a patent on a Handheld Email Device - its a patent on a portable device whose keyboard has been optimised for thumb usage.
(I'm surprised Psion never challenged that one)
Patent Nos. 5,625,670; 5,631,946; 5,819,172; 6,067,451 and 6,317,592
All of these are basically the same patent, with subtle enhancements (so subtle is difficult to see what the differences are!)
5,625,670 - looks to be the original transport 'patent' and should be overturnable.
5,625,670
63127592 - a quick look at this suggests that the originality of the patent is that the message will contain a tag indicating origination or destination on a wireless device.
With many forms of IP, you actually lose your rights to enforce the IP if you do not act against infringers within a reasonable period.
In this case Linux has been around since 1991 (?) and no action has been taken, ergo it might seem that the IP holder has lost the right to enforce IP as it has failed to act in a reasonable time.
Slashdot Mirror
In particular what if the research covers benchmarks ... ? May this law actually allow independent benchmarks at last ?
Stupid isn't it!
infringements of the acts are "Criminal" and not "Civil" breaches.
As long as you didn't listen to the originals whilst you were recording them they classify as "timeshifted copies" on your PC.
Amendments to Section 19 absolves you my Son
1. They've allowed temporary copies (Section 8) - so "transients" created say while listening to the music aren't infringing :-)
2. They've allowed "timeshifting" for domestic premises. Interestingly this opens a whole can of worms for them given the phrasing. A copy can be made for the purposes of timeshifting as long as it does not become an infringeing copy - i.e. one that is sold or let for hire. This would seem to allow at least the creation of "backup" copies for personal use.
3. Section 15 - Observing Studying and Testing of Computer Programs. They've allowed this - as long as you own a copy - and even better this Copyright Act overrules any restrictive license imposed by the copyright holder. (2) Where an act is permitted under this section, it is irrelevant whether or not there exists any term or condition in an agreement which purports to prohibit or restrict the act (such terms being, by virtue of section 296A, void).".
Of course the really stupid part of this is that any infringement is a criminal offense (why?) and you can potentially end up spending longer in jail than a burglar or rapist.
These guys www.ovonyx.com have had something better (but similar tech) for the last 3 years. Intel have bought into the tech and are helping develop it into commercial devices. Non-volatile, fast (SRAM speed), and multi-read/write
This was only announced to divert attention away from the Government's rather dodgy position in the Hutton enquiry ... dead scientists, dodgy war memos ... the list goes on.
Just before the Iraq II war we had an announcement about taxing the sale of houses - a similar ploy to try and divert attention away from a rather corrupt Labour party's inner connivings.
Let's face it - how on earth is a device in a car going to be able to tell if you're in a bus-lane or not - with current tech ?
Sigh
Its usual in cases like this for the weakest member of the herd to be singled out - as long as its worth suing.
With a high-profile case like this NTP now have leverage against larger companies, who rather than litigate will end up settling for a fee ($53mill + lawyers fees is a lot of licenses).
In practise of course this is just another example of the US Patent system gone barmy.
As one of the next posters has said 'logical steps' should not be patentable.
In fact this is one of the tenets of acquiring patents "The patent should not be obvious to those familiar with the domain".
Of course using an alternate transport for emails should not be patentable (otherwise there'd be patents for Copper, Fibre, Horse and Cart etc). I suspect that the actual patent would be a little more specific than that.
e.g. Patent 6,452,588 (RIM patent on Handheld Email Device) isn't really a patent on a Handheld Email Device - its a patent on a portable device whose keyboard has been optimised for thumb usage. (I'm surprised Psion never challenged that one)
Patent Nos. 5,625,670; 5,631,946; 5,819,172; 6,067,451 and 6,317,592
All of these are basically the same patent, with subtle enhancements (so subtle is difficult to see what the differences are!)
5,625,670 - looks to be the original transport 'patent' and should be overturnable. 5,625,670
63127592 - a quick look at this suggests that the originality of the patent is that the message will contain a tag indicating origination or destination on a wireless device.
With many forms of IP, you actually lose your rights to enforce the IP if you do not act against infringers within a reasonable period.
In this case Linux has been around since 1991 (?) and no action has been taken, ergo it might seem that the IP holder has lost the right to enforce IP as it has failed to act in a reasonable time.
IPLawyers got any comment ?