There were some patents that were granted years ago:
1. Quantel claimed a patent over the 24-bit paint box applications.
2. Quantel also has(had?) a patent over implementing the XOR function in hardware for pixel processing/cursor applications.
3. There is also a patent on the concept of the setuser-ID bit on UNIX file systems.
4. Before the days of multimedia and sound cards, there was once a company who figured out how to play digitised sound on a standard IBM PC speaker (RealSound) by reprogramming the PC's timer chip.
A more accurate comparison would be if you had your CD collection in the garage, along with a CD player, an audio patch cable and a pile of blank CD's. You then invite everyone to bring their own CD burner and help themselves and make whatever copies they wanted.
The basic reason of Copyright Law is to prevent any created art of work to be duplicated without compensation being made to the owners.
When buying information, you are responsible for not allowing that information to be duplicated without permission. This applies to printed media (ie. technical manuals). Similarly with subscribing to satellite or cable TV, or even purchasing a TV. (You can't put a TV in a public place without getting a license).
If RIAA developed a system where users could buy a single music track for $1 (10 track CD = $10) , then the use of P2P networks would probably fade away. There are subscription services, but they require a monthly fee to be paid regardless of whether or not tracks are downloaded, so people ending up paying for music they have never bought.
So we're stuck with the crazy lawsuits. RIAA should just bill the music sharers for the equivalent loss of album sales.
And what exactly are Microsoft going to do when it is the application that you are currently developing keeps crashing... are they going to send round a couple of engineers to help fix the bugs?
I've worked for several companies, each of which different financial reward/punishment systems for finding bugs:
Bonus scheme:
Every bug found is awarded to the monthly team
bonus. Encourage people to report everything from spelling mistakes to extra newlines as bugs.
Every bug fixed is awarded to the monthly team bonus. Encouraged people to slap in changes without testing.
Punishment scheme:
Every bug found is deducted from the team bonus. Nobody tries testing as it will reduce the team bonus.
Every line changed is deducted from the team bonus. People try and stretch lines to be as long as possible in order to keep the number of lines changed as small as possible.
The BSG is the Broadband Stakeholder Group. Fortunately, they do provide a list of members.
But more than likely, it's NTL who are pushing for this, ever since the bad publicity they received over the broadband cap they tried to impose.
Wouldn't it be possible to apply lookup tables to the individual stages of the algorithm, rather than just the whole pipeline.
Or maybe you could crank the algorithm in reverse and use lookup tables that way?
In the UK, the police regularly use camcorders to record the activities of protest marchers, mainly to use as evidence if people become violent.
Of course, wearing a face mask or balaclava then becomes a crime.
Well, if you're sneaking off to job interview it might. The big issue is the fact that these tapes are being archived for 10 years. You told your boss you were visiting your parents down in Florida, while in fact you were sneaking off to Seattle. Who knows where this data is going to end up. Company offices can relocate, boxes and computers can be lost. If the data was wiped after everyone disembarked and the next lot of passengers boarded there wouldn't be anything to worry about. Given the fact that the airline already knows your name and address, your driving license, credit card number, your seat number where you are departing, and where you are going, I can't see what possible use having the mugshot of the side of your head looking out a window is going to be.
I can understand the logic of having a CCTV system to be used as evidence in case of disruptive passengers, but I don't see the necessity of keeping this information for 10 years.
Of course, you could just wear a big curly wig and a pair of sunglasses...
Perhaps I'm being suspicious, but doesn't this claim process give the state of California the option of finding out those computer users who bought computers (eg. Dell, Gateway, PDA's) out of state, but didn't pay their local state tax?
Claimants have to provide: proof of purchase, home address, and the software licenses purchased....
Ok, that leaves 39 other companies to file a lawsuit against and settle with...
Who's next...
1. Oracle
2. The tobacco industry (for fixing nicotine levels)
3. The fast food industry (for fixing saturated fat/sugar levels)
4. The electricity industry (for fixing electricity supply prices)
5. The inland farmers (for not fixing their irrigation water usage)...
Ok, that leaves another 35 to go...
You wouldn't need to build such a device. Instead, all you'd need to do is collect all the Jolt Cola cans that you drink in a month, cut out the RFID tags, and make them into something useful like body-jewellery for your girlfriend. Maybe you could even get some art and design students to turn them into a computer case or even clothing. Intel CPU's have been converted into ear-rings, so RFID tags shouldn't be too difficult.
The fun would really begin, when you find the RFID tag for a really large object (eg. 60-inch widescreen TV) stuck to the heel of your shoe and walk out of the store.
I work in a research lab in the UK. One time we considered patenting one of our techniques. We took legal advice and were warned that once we did file the patent, there was the chance that other major company or university would file any number of counter-patents. If we advanced the technology in any way, we would risk making a patent violation. Essentially one or more companies would file a handful of patents each based on slightly modified versions of the original patent.
Eg. If a patent was filed on a particular shape of brick for driveways (this has happened), competitors would file patents on the same brick for patios or pavements, and/or file patents for slightly modified shape of brick for driveways.
The only people who will gain from this (or any new legislation) are the lawyers.
In a short press statement, Blizzard also announced that they had sent a cease and desist order to all American airlines, requesting that they no longer refer to their vehicles as "Aircraft", but recommended that they use the term "fossil fuel powered heavier than air flying machine" instead.
If this tax were going to provide broadband access (cable modems) to rural communities, it would be worthwhile. But if it's going to subsidize the existing telephone monopolies, that seems to be waste of money.
Any tax on a telecommunications service should be used to bring that type of service to rural communities and poor neighbourhoods.
Reminds me of the time I was attending a tutorial class for a mathematics class. One of the questions required students to provide the proof that a mathematical expression was valid. Students came up with various solutions that took anywhere from 1 to 4 pages. Once the courseworks were handed in and marked, the professor produced the most elegant solution ever found, less than half a page in length.
How did you come by that solution, everyone asked, but he wouldn't tell. Then while the professor was out of the room, one of the assistant Ph.D. tutorial supervisors leaked the source:
I remember seeing a program on how Boeing and most aviation tested the flight deck systems using full component simulators on the ground. A whole office floor was dedicated to housing every single circuit board plus debugging equipment.
Surely, it would be possible for an engineer to wander around such an environment with a wireless cellphone/PDA/computer and determine what the effects were?
To prevent any potential hijacker from causing panic and terrorizing airplane passengers with big scary words or pictures, the following items are now banned from the passenger compartment: pencils, pens, finger paints, felt-tip pens and lipstick. Packets of tomato sauce, mustard, and mayo may be carried aboard with permission of the flight crew.
Passengers are reminded that the following words are also prohibited from being written at any time:
Gunpowder, Explosive, TNT, C4, Dynamite, Radio-active, Toxic and Hazardous
Passengers are also reminded that the following pictures are also banned from being drawn at any time:
Rifles, Air guns, Pistols, Hand-guns, Grenades, Rocket launchers and water pistols (including super-soakers), Skull and Cross-bones, and the Radioactive symbol.
Failure to obey these rules may lead to a fine being imposed and/or imprisonment. Thank you for your understanding and co-operation during this time.
Reminds me of when the head of department is determined to go on a search-and-delete operation for anything that might be potentially offensive.
The first students hear about this is when they log in and read the message of the day.
The first reaction: "Some ******'s gone and deleted my thesis on sexually explicit lyrics in rap music!".
Wouldn't a hidden server using power line communication be more secure?
Either way it still has to be plugged. This reduces the number of links down to one.
My guess is that we'll at least have the ability to have multiple HDTV quality video streams both ways. Video on demand could become reality - everything from DIY videos, home cooking to car repairs. Having a laptop connected to a wireless base station would be far easier to use than a widescreen TV with a video (I'm thinking of home rennovations when everything is under white sheets). It is no wonder Microsoft wants to control the video codecs for both Linux and Windows.
House building companies are already providing conduits for wires to be blown in, or are providing the cabling themselves. The only holdbacks are making fibre-optics more flexible - optic cables is still very brittle. Perhaps in the future, plastics could be used instead of glass - they might even be able to conduct both electricity and reflect light.
If Japan and Korea are providing trial services of 20 Kbits/second then that really shows where the rest of the world might be a couple of years.
Slashdot Mirror
There were some patents that were granted years ago:
1. Quantel claimed a patent over the 24-bit paint box applications.
2. Quantel also has(had?) a patent over implementing the XOR function in hardware for pixel processing/cursor applications.
3. There is also a patent on the concept of the setuser-ID bit on UNIX file systems.
4. Before the days of multimedia and sound cards, there was once a company who figured out how to play digitised sound on a standard IBM PC speaker (RealSound) by reprogramming the PC's timer chip.
A more accurate comparison would be if you had your CD collection in the garage, along with a CD player, an audio patch cable and a pile of blank CD's. You then invite everyone to bring their own CD burner and help themselves and make whatever copies they wanted. The basic reason of Copyright Law is to prevent any created art of work to be duplicated without compensation being made to the owners. When buying information, you are responsible for not allowing that information to be duplicated without permission. This applies to printed media (ie. technical manuals). Similarly with subscribing to satellite or cable TV, or even purchasing a TV. (You can't put a TV in a public place without getting a license). If RIAA developed a system where users could buy a single music track for $1 (10 track CD = $10) , then the use of P2P networks would probably fade away. There are subscription services, but they require a monthly fee to be paid regardless of whether or not tracks are downloaded, so people ending up paying for music they have never bought. So we're stuck with the crazy lawsuits. RIAA should just bill the music sharers for the equivalent loss of album sales.
And what exactly are Microsoft going to do when it is the application that you are currently developing keeps crashing... are they going to send round a couple of engineers to help fix the bugs?
I've worked for several companies, each of which different financial reward/punishment systems for finding bugs: Bonus scheme: Every bug found is awarded to the monthly team bonus. Encourage people to report everything from spelling mistakes to extra newlines as bugs. Every bug fixed is awarded to the monthly team bonus. Encouraged people to slap in changes without testing. Punishment scheme: Every bug found is deducted from the team bonus. Nobody tries testing as it will reduce the team bonus. Every line changed is deducted from the team bonus. People try and stretch lines to be as long as possible in order to keep the number of lines changed as small as possible.
The BSG is the Broadband Stakeholder Group. Fortunately, they do provide a list of members.
But more than likely, it's NTL who are pushing for this, ever since the bad publicity they received over the broadband cap they tried to impose.
Wouldn't it be possible to apply lookup tables to the individual stages of the algorithm, rather than just the whole pipeline.
Or maybe you could crank the algorithm in reverse and use lookup tables that way?
In the UK, the police regularly use camcorders to record the activities of protest marchers, mainly to use as evidence if people become violent. Of course, wearing a face mask or balaclava then becomes a crime.
Well, if you're sneaking off to job interview it might. The big issue is the fact that these tapes are being archived for 10 years. You told your boss you were visiting your parents down in Florida, while in fact you were sneaking off to Seattle. Who knows where this data is going to end up. Company offices can relocate, boxes and computers can be lost. If the data was wiped after everyone disembarked and the next lot of passengers boarded there wouldn't be anything to worry about. Given the fact that the airline already knows your name and address, your driving license, credit card number, your seat number where you are departing, and where you are going, I can't see what possible use having the mugshot of the side of your head looking out a window is going to be. I can understand the logic of having a CCTV system to be used as evidence in case of disruptive passengers, but I don't see the necessity of keeping this information for 10 years. Of course, you could just wear a big curly wig and a pair of sunglasses...
Perhaps I'm being suspicious, but doesn't this claim process give the state of California the option of finding out those computer users who bought computers (eg. Dell, Gateway, PDA's) out of state, but didn't pay their local state tax? Claimants have to provide: proof of purchase, home address, and the software licenses purchased ....
Ok, that leaves 39 other companies to file a lawsuit against and settle with... Who's next... 1. Oracle 2. The tobacco industry (for fixing nicotine levels) 3. The fast food industry (for fixing saturated fat/sugar levels) 4. The electricity industry (for fixing electricity supply prices) 5. The inland farmers (for not fixing their irrigation water usage) ...
Ok, that leaves another 35 to go...
Unless the crazy guy decides to throw the knive.
You wouldn't need to build such a device. Instead, all you'd need to do is collect all the Jolt Cola cans that you drink in a month, cut out the RFID tags, and make them into something useful like body-jewellery for your girlfriend. Maybe you could even get some art and design students to turn them into a computer case or even clothing. Intel CPU's have been converted into ear-rings, so RFID tags shouldn't be too difficult. The fun would really begin, when you find the RFID tag for a really large object (eg. 60-inch widescreen TV) stuck to the heel of your shoe and walk out of the store.
I work in a research lab in the UK. One time we considered patenting one of our techniques. We took legal advice and were warned that once we did file the patent, there was the chance that other major company or university would file any number of counter-patents. If we advanced the technology in any way, we would risk making a patent violation. Essentially one or more companies would file a handful of patents each based on slightly modified versions of the original patent. Eg. If a patent was filed on a particular shape of brick for driveways (this has happened), competitors would file patents on the same brick for patios or pavements, and/or file patents for slightly modified shape of brick for driveways. The only people who will gain from this (or any new legislation) are the lawyers.
In a short press statement, Blizzard also announced that they had sent a cease and desist order to all American airlines, requesting that they no longer refer to their vehicles as "Aircraft", but recommended that they use the term "fossil fuel powered heavier than air flying machine" instead.
If this tax were going to provide broadband access (cable modems) to rural communities, it would be worthwhile. But if it's going to subsidize the existing telephone monopolies, that seems to be waste of money.
Any tax on a telecommunications service should be used to bring that type of service to rural communities and poor neighbourhoods.
Reminds me of the time I was attending a tutorial class for a mathematics class. One of the questions required students to provide the proof that a mathematical expression was valid. Students came up with various solutions that took anywhere from 1 to 4 pages. Once the courseworks were handed in and marked, the professor produced the most elegant solution ever found, less than half a page in length.
How did you come by that solution, everyone asked, but he wouldn't tell. Then while the professor was out of the room, one of the assistant Ph.D. tutorial supervisors leaked the source:
One of students from a previous year produced it.
The only thing missing is a built-in treadmill, cross-country ski exerciser or bicycle. Then I could cancel my fitness centre membership.
I remember seeing a program on how Boeing and most aviation tested the flight deck systems using full component simulators on the ground. A whole office floor was dedicated to housing every single circuit board plus debugging equipment.
Surely, it would be possible for an engineer to wander around such an environment with a wireless cellphone/PDA/computer and determine what the effects were?
Wouldn't any communication system designed to use Internet protocols to handle financial transactions make use of secure http?
Airline security update
-----------------------
To prevent any potential hijacker from causing panic and terrorizing airplane passengers with big scary words or pictures, the following items are now banned from the passenger compartment: pencils, pens, finger paints, felt-tip pens and lipstick. Packets of tomato sauce, mustard, and mayo may be carried aboard with permission of the flight crew.
Passengers are reminded that the following words are also prohibited from being written at any time:
Gunpowder, Explosive, TNT, C4, Dynamite, Radio-active, Toxic and Hazardous
Passengers are also reminded that the following pictures are also banned from being drawn at any time:
Rifles, Air guns, Pistols, Hand-guns, Grenades, Rocket launchers and water pistols (including super-soakers), Skull and Cross-bones, and the Radioactive symbol.
Failure to obey these rules may lead to a fine being imposed and/or imprisonment. Thank you for your understanding and co-operation during this time.
Reminds me of when the head of department is determined to go on a search-and-delete operation for anything that might be potentially offensive. The first students hear about this is when they log in and read the message of the day. The first reaction: "Some ******'s gone and deleted my thesis on sexually explicit lyrics in rap music!".
Wouldn't a hidden server using power line communication be more secure? Either way it still has to be plugged. This reduces the number of links down to one.
My favourite quote from the Battlestar Galactica series: "...We tried reading the system manuals, then the ground came up and hit us..."
That is the craziest way to recreate a pac-man game.
Now I really want to see an animated version. How about getting a video game, connecting it to a video projection system aimed at the floor?
Even crazier, add a motion detection system that would generate input based on people moving across the floor.
My guess is that we'll at least have the ability to have multiple HDTV quality video streams both ways. Video on demand could become reality - everything from DIY videos, home cooking to car repairs. Having a laptop connected to a wireless base station would be far easier to use than a widescreen TV with a video (I'm thinking of home rennovations when everything is under white sheets). It is no wonder Microsoft wants to control the video codecs for both Linux and Windows.
House building companies are already providing conduits for wires to be blown in, or are providing the cabling themselves. The only holdbacks are making fibre-optics more flexible -
optic cables is still very brittle. Perhaps in the future, plastics could be used instead of glass - they might even be able to conduct both electricity and reflect light.
If Japan and Korea are providing trial services of 20 Kbits/second then that really shows where the rest of the world might be a couple of years.