As you said, there would be much more motivation if it wasn't just taxpayer money, so why couldn't they use a system whereby they have several firms fund and set up different solutions and then the best solution gets a predetermined amount of money from the government?
A lot of defense contracts are awarded by biddable contract, and I've heard (though not from a reliable source) that new marines are told during boot camp to always remember that their rifles were made by the lowest bidder.
It definitely has the potential to save money, but it also raises questions about just what the companies are doing to achieve that savings.
I did read TFA, but I didn't understand how the scrolling UI works. The photos weren't much help. If the Zune does have a wheel, though, that will be a very interesting development - that's really the feature that makes or breaks the iPod, and I was under the impression that Apple patented it. If Apple didn't, why haven't any of their competitors picked up on it yet?
From what I picked up from the article, it doesn't in fact have a wheel. What it has is a wheel looking thing with buttons. So, basically, the click wheel, but without the scrolling portion, just several buttons imbedded into a piece of the circular piece of the cover that's colored differently.
Actually, it is a defense. As I said, someone can claim their product containing the word pod is based named upon podcast, and as you've said, it's in the public domain. So if I create new piece of hardware called the podPlayer and they pursue me, my defense will be "it's a player which plays files which have a podCast format. The name podPlayer even indicates it's podPlayer -- a player of pod formats.
Unless & until you can show me how using the word pod in a name will stand up because Apple can claim it came from iPod and not from the pod in podCast, you won't have a case.[1] If you believe otherwise, I'd like to see logic beyond ukase or fiat.
I don't think you understand how trademark law works.
"Podcast" isn't being claimed as a trademark by Apple. Anybody can use the word, as a normal word in normal conversation, with no problems.
However, when you go to sell something under a brand name, infringement happens if there is a significant chance of consumer confusion between your product and an existing product, or if your brand is likely to dilute the distinctive qualities of a famous trademark. Where you got the name makes no difference. If you wanted to sell the podPlayer, the courts would most likely rule that you're using a name that dilutes the iPod mark and prevent you from doing so. You can't say, "But I got the name from something else", they don't care. It's not like copyright where there's a legal prohibition of derivative works, the mark being a derivative or not isn't a factor.
Specifically, 15 USC 1114 prohibits, in part, "use in commerce any reproduction, counterfeit, copy, or colorable imitation of a registered mark in connection with the sale, offering for sale, distribution, or advertising of any goods or services on or in connection with which such use is likely to cause confusion, or to cause mistake, or to deceive" where 15 USC 1127 says "The term 'colorable imitation' includes any mark which so resembles a registered mark as to be likely to cause confusion or mistake or to deceive."
Also, 15 USC 1125 says, in part, "The owner of a famous mark shall be entitled, subject to the principles of equity and upon such terms as the court deems reasonable, to an injunction against another person's commercial use in commerce of a mark or trade name, if such use begins after the mark has become famous and causes dilution of the distinctive quality of the mark, and to obtain such other relief as is provided in this subsection."
You can see that there's no requirement that the infringing mark be a derivative of the original, all that matters is that the two are similar.
If they're going after the use of a word or use of pod, what are they going to do about podcast?
Nothing. Podcast is just a word in the common language.
They're either going to have to remove that word from everyone's vocabulary (that genie has already left the bottle), or everyone will say they are using the fragment pod from podcast, not iPod.
That actually wouldn't be a defense. If they were to sue, what they have to show is that the use of the word "pod" is likely to cause confusion in the eyes of consumers about who makes the product. Now, I think they'd have a hell of a time convincing a jury that the name of the vending machine-related Profit Pod has any chance of confusing consumers, but that doesn't necessarily mean they can't try to scare them out of using it anyway.
He discovered or helped discover 10 transuranium elements, won the Nobel Prize, chaired the Atomic Energy Commission (helping get the Limited Test Ban Treaty and Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty signed), and even transmuted lead into gold. A great combination of top-notch chemistry and good citizenship.
Ever notice that whenever a big company denies something, everyone quickly wonders what they're up to? If I were running a big company, I'd deny things just to watch people analyze them.
"We have no plans to merge with Panasonic at this time."
"The idea that there are plans to develop a new laptop line at this time is patently false."
"We firmly deny that we are planning to expand into the pharmaceutical business."
"We do not currently receive, and have never received, the majority of our new technology from aliens."
Well, you could read the article, but he chose Java because of the combination of the virtual machine and sandboxing, which allowed users to receive programs over the network without the program needing to know basically anything about what it's about to run on, and without as much security risk. It was really a choice of the Java support software rather than anything to do with the language itself.
But now, that term (at least in the US) has lost its uniqueness with just "copy" or "photocopy" and I guess the reason is that the technology is not new anymore, and Xerox does not hold anywhere near a monopoly on the market anymore.
Actually, Xerox ran an advertising campaign that urged people to "photocopy", not "xerox", and also sent a lot of letters to the media to make sure they didn't use xerox as a verb. The use of "photocopy" instead of "xerox" is something Xerox spent a lot of money to achieve.
(I assume) Google already trademarked their name, so popularizing the term will not make it impossible for them to trademark it, cause they already hold the trademark.
One of the requirements of holding a trademark is that you must both use it and defend it from intrusion by others. If you don't do those things, the government can rule that you don't really care about it, and remove its protection. It's not like a patent where you can hold it without using it for anything.
At the very least, their brand name is being used in the context, and anyone new to the internet who hears the term over and over, will come accross google.com and think that it is the real McCoy, just like I believe Kleenex tissues to be the real McCoy of tissues, anything else being a cheap, generic knockoff.
How do you feel about Zipper brand metal fasteners? DryIce brand frozen carbon dioxide? Yo-Yo brand...whatever you'd call a yo-yo aside from "yo-yo"? There's a real threat to their losing the trademark.
where the most 'integration' you get is lausy copy&paste support of filenames from GUI to CLI, however not the other way around.
In some cases it's better than that. In Mac OS X, for instance, if you drag a file from the Finder to a Terminal window, it inserts the filename of that file on the command line, and if you select an absolute filename in the Terminal and drag it to an application in the Dock, it tries to open that file in that application. If you select some text in the Terminal and drag it to TextEdit, it will create a new untitled file with that text in it. If you select some text in the Terminal and drag it to a Finder window, it creates a text clipping there with that text in it.
It's not great (for instance, dragging just the a filename from an ls to an application won't work, because it doesn't know what directory it's in), but it's better than just copy and paste.
There wouldn't really be griefers, they'll just be people who are secretly working to thwart others. A bunch of other players will have to team up and kill him.
The problem there is that players have a very clear alternative to teaming up and killing him: they can stop playing. And, based on the evidence so far, many players will do just that. It's a suggestion that might take hold somewhere, but for World of Warcraft, the most mainstream of all games, there's no chance they'll go with something like that.
While you are closer to the truth, you are also mistaken. Citizens are not only the customers of government employees, they are also the bosses.
I heavily disagree. If the citizens are the bosses of civil servants, that implies they should have the power to affect managerial changes to the system, things like scheduling, staffing, and purchasing. That idea is just ridiculous, the system could never work in that manner.
Citizens really operate as customers, or perhaps as stock holders. They should be able direct the goals of the government, but not the details. They should have the power to say, "The DMV needs to serve people more quickly" and the DMV should respond to that appropriately. They should not have the power to say, "Move Marty and Carol from evening shift to afternoon shift and hire two new employees to cover their evening shift slots." That's what someone with expertise is for.
Am I the only one who strongly believes that if they remove all content protection from Blu-Ray and HD-DVD, the drive and software manufacturers will stand to make more money, even after factoring in rampant piracy, than with the current mess they have?
I'm sure a lot of people believe that. But would you be willing to lay several billion dollars on the line because of it?
Sony knows what it's getting with content protection. For better or for worse, they've done content protection. That's what they're comfortable with. Risking their current empire on what some people believe will work is unsettling for them.
If that kind of change is going to come, I think it will need to come from someone new, without a lot to lose. Something like an independent film distributor making $10-$15 million movies and distributing them digitally. Throw a couple hits in there so they have some money to play with, and they could really change the nature of the system. I can't see Sony or other big media companies doing that, though.
Why must they put DRM on it? CSS has already been proven not to be effective, so what are the Media Companies afraid of?
At least part of it is probably that the DMCA prohibits circumventing an access control measure. If you just put raw data on there, you can't invoke those portions of the DMCA.
I haven't been able to figure out how to get somebody else to be a judge on www.diplom.org (so that me and six other friends can play a game over email). Any pointers?
Just in terms of terminology, judges are computers that run software to determine the results of moves and so forth. You're probably looking for a GM, which is a neutral person who does the administrative work of setting up and running a game on a judge. If you've got six friends together who want to play, feel free to e-mail me at flooey at gmail dot com and I can set a game up for you guys and help you get going.
It's not our job to convince you of anything. It's our job to protect you from you and other assholes who would seek to do you and the rest of us harm. It's by rule of majority - that means we keep everybody safe, and disregard the snippy rantings of part-time quarterbacks. In interests such as these, the safety of all outweighs the convenience of the one. Just as you think we're too dumb to protect you, we think you're too dumb to protect yourself.
As a fellow civil servant, let me say that this paragraph is an excellent example of a widespread opinion within the government that I think is completely ridiculous: that the average American is somehow below the average civil servant. I can't stand it, whether it's the lady at the DMV who can't understand why people are annoyed at having to stand in line for hours or the serviceman who thinks that because you're not carrying a gun you're not serving the United States.
The business of the United States isn't government. It's agriculture and manufacturing and research and information. By and large, the people who actually make the United States great aren't the people working for the government. That's why we're called civil servants; we're here to help those people so they can spend their time doing what's actually important without having to worry about things like being robbed or having their radio interfered with or getting fleeced by a cheating business.
When we get in the way of that, they're perfectly right to call us on it. Sure, the intrusion may be necessary, and they may not have any idea what's actually going on, but to claim that we don't have to convince them of anything because this is our job is missing the whole point of our job in the first place. They're not our bosses, but they are our customers.
Whoever wrote that particular bit of code. That's one of the amazing things about the way the GPL is written, it takes what would normally be a complete mess and makes it workable. And not only that, but by having each coder retain copyright to what they wrote, you also create a huge body of people who have standing to sue were someone to violate the GPL.
Slashdot Mirror
As you said, there would be much more motivation if it wasn't just taxpayer money, so why couldn't they use a system whereby they have several firms fund and set up different solutions and then the best solution gets a predetermined amount of money from the government?
A lot of defense contracts are awarded by biddable contract, and I've heard (though not from a reliable source) that new marines are told during boot camp to always remember that their rifles were made by the lowest bidder.
It definitely has the potential to save money, but it also raises questions about just what the companies are doing to achieve that savings.
Better than loosing together, as most people seem to be doing today.
I think you just need to losen up.
Not only did I write "a piece of the circular piece of the cover", I wrote it after he said he figured it out. I lose at Slashdot.
I did read TFA, but I didn't understand how the scrolling UI works. The photos weren't much help. If the Zune does have a wheel, though, that will be a very interesting development - that's really the feature that makes or breaks the iPod, and I was under the impression that Apple patented it. If Apple didn't, why haven't any of their competitors picked up on it yet?
From what I picked up from the article, it doesn't in fact have a wheel. What it has is a wheel looking thing with buttons. So, basically, the click wheel, but without the scrolling portion, just several buttons imbedded into a piece of the circular piece of the cover that's colored differently.
Actually, it is a defense. As I said, someone can claim their product containing the word pod is based named upon podcast, and as you've said, it's in the public domain. So if I create new piece of hardware called the podPlayer and they pursue me, my defense will be "it's a player which plays files which have a podCast format. The name podPlayer even indicates it's podPlayer -- a player of pod formats.
Unless & until you can show me how using the word pod in a name will stand up because Apple can claim it came from iPod and not from the pod in podCast, you won't have a case.[1] If you believe otherwise, I'd like to see logic beyond ukase or fiat.
I don't think you understand how trademark law works.
"Podcast" isn't being claimed as a trademark by Apple. Anybody can use the word, as a normal word in normal conversation, with no problems.
However, when you go to sell something under a brand name, infringement happens if there is a significant chance of consumer confusion between your product and an existing product, or if your brand is likely to dilute the distinctive qualities of a famous trademark. Where you got the name makes no difference. If you wanted to sell the podPlayer, the courts would most likely rule that you're using a name that dilutes the iPod mark and prevent you from doing so. You can't say, "But I got the name from something else", they don't care. It's not like copyright where there's a legal prohibition of derivative works, the mark being a derivative or not isn't a factor.
Specifically, 15 USC 1114 prohibits, in part, "use in commerce any reproduction, counterfeit, copy, or colorable imitation of a registered mark in connection with the sale, offering for sale, distribution, or advertising of any goods or services on or in connection with which such use is likely to cause confusion, or to cause mistake, or to deceive" where 15 USC 1127 says "The term 'colorable imitation' includes any mark which so resembles a registered mark as to be likely to cause confusion or mistake or to deceive."
Also, 15 USC 1125 says, in part, "The owner of a famous mark shall be entitled, subject to the principles of equity and upon such terms as the court deems reasonable, to an injunction against another person's commercial use in commerce of a mark or trade name, if such use begins after the mark has become famous and causes dilution of the distinctive quality of the mark, and to obtain such other relief as is provided in this subsection."
You can see that there's no requirement that the infringing mark be a derivative of the original, all that matters is that the two are similar.
Line 6 pods are well-known in their market.
iPods are well known by nearly everyone, even those who don't own one.
I think what he's pointing out is that "nearly everyone" is actually the iPod market.
If they're going after the use of a word or use of pod, what are they going to do about podcast?
Nothing. Podcast is just a word in the common language.
They're either going to have to remove that word from everyone's vocabulary (that genie has already left the bottle), or everyone will say they are using the fragment pod from podcast, not iPod.
That actually wouldn't be a defense. If they were to sue, what they have to show is that the use of the word "pod" is likely to cause confusion in the eyes of consumers about who makes the product. Now, I think they'd have a hell of a time convincing a jury that the name of the vending machine-related Profit Pod has any chance of confusing consumers, but that doesn't necessarily mean they can't try to scare them out of using it anyway.
He discovered or helped discover 10 transuranium elements, won the Nobel Prize, chaired the Atomic Energy Commission (helping get the Limited Test Ban Treaty and Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty signed), and even transmuted lead into gold. A great combination of top-notch chemistry and good citizenship.
At least, that's the case when it comes to my phone, which is not red, decorated with a cross, and with flip-out tools like a knife and a corkscrew.
Too bad, that would be the best cell phone ever.
Ever notice that whenever a big company denies something, everyone quickly wonders what they're up to? If I were running a big company, I'd deny things just to watch people analyze them.
"We have no plans to merge with Panasonic at this time."
"The idea that there are plans to develop a new laptop line at this time is patently false."
"We firmly deny that we are planning to expand into the pharmaceutical business."
"We do not currently receive, and have never received, the majority of our new technology from aliens."
Java??? WTF? Where is C or FORTRAN or COBOL?
Well, you could read the article, but he chose Java because of the combination of the virtual machine and sandboxing, which allowed users to receive programs over the network without the program needing to know basically anything about what it's about to run on, and without as much security risk. It was really a choice of the Java support software rather than anything to do with the language itself.
But now, that term (at least in the US) has lost its uniqueness with just "copy" or "photocopy" and I guess the reason is that the technology is not new anymore, and Xerox does not hold anywhere near a monopoly on the market anymore.
Actually, Xerox ran an advertising campaign that urged people to "photocopy", not "xerox", and also sent a lot of letters to the media to make sure they didn't use xerox as a verb. The use of "photocopy" instead of "xerox" is something Xerox spent a lot of money to achieve.
(I assume) Google already trademarked their name, so popularizing the term will not make it impossible for them to trademark it, cause they already hold the trademark.
One of the requirements of holding a trademark is that you must both use it and defend it from intrusion by others. If you don't do those things, the government can rule that you don't really care about it, and remove its protection. It's not like a patent where you can hold it without using it for anything.
At the very least, their brand name is being used in the context, and anyone new to the internet who hears the term over and over, will come accross google.com and think that it is the real McCoy, just like I believe Kleenex tissues to be the real McCoy of tissues, anything else being a cheap, generic knockoff.
How do you feel about Zipper brand metal fasteners? DryIce brand frozen carbon dioxide? Yo-Yo brand...whatever you'd call a yo-yo aside from "yo-yo"? There's a real threat to their losing the trademark.
where the most 'integration' you get is lausy copy&paste support of filenames from GUI to CLI, however not the other way around.
In some cases it's better than that. In Mac OS X, for instance, if you drag a file from the Finder to a Terminal window, it inserts the filename of that file on the command line, and if you select an absolute filename in the Terminal and drag it to an application in the Dock, it tries to open that file in that application. If you select some text in the Terminal and drag it to TextEdit, it will create a new untitled file with that text in it. If you select some text in the Terminal and drag it to a Finder window, it creates a text clipping there with that text in it.
It's not great (for instance, dragging just the a filename from an ls to an application won't work, because it doesn't know what directory it's in), but it's better than just copy and paste.
All they are doing in WoW is teaming up and killing monsters, so why are they playing?
All the people who play the vast majority of single player games are doing is killing monsters by themselves, they don't even have other people.
Presumably, people just enjoy killing monsters.
There wouldn't really be griefers, they'll just be people who are secretly working to thwart others. A bunch of other players will have to team up and kill him.
The problem there is that players have a very clear alternative to teaming up and killing him: they can stop playing. And, based on the evidence so far, many players will do just that. It's a suggestion that might take hold somewhere, but for World of Warcraft, the most mainstream of all games, there's no chance they'll go with something like that.
Why would I upload video to a site like youtube?
I feel that I can say with confidence that you are not YouTube's target audience.
While you are closer to the truth, you are also mistaken. Citizens are not only the customers of government employees, they are also the bosses.
I heavily disagree. If the citizens are the bosses of civil servants, that implies they should have the power to affect managerial changes to the system, things like scheduling, staffing, and purchasing. That idea is just ridiculous, the system could never work in that manner.
Citizens really operate as customers, or perhaps as stock holders. They should be able direct the goals of the government, but not the details. They should have the power to say, "The DMV needs to serve people more quickly" and the DMV should respond to that appropriately. They should not have the power to say, "Move Marty and Carol from evening shift to afternoon shift and hire two new employees to cover their evening shift slots." That's what someone with expertise is for.
Am I the only one who strongly believes that if they remove all content protection from Blu-Ray and HD-DVD, the drive and software manufacturers will stand to make more money, even after factoring in rampant piracy, than with the current mess they have?
I'm sure a lot of people believe that. But would you be willing to lay several billion dollars on the line because of it?
Sony knows what it's getting with content protection. For better or for worse, they've done content protection. That's what they're comfortable with. Risking their current empire on what some people believe will work is unsettling for them.
If that kind of change is going to come, I think it will need to come from someone new, without a lot to lose. Something like an independent film distributor making $10-$15 million movies and distributing them digitally. Throw a couple hits in there so they have some money to play with, and they could really change the nature of the system. I can't see Sony or other big media companies doing that, though.
Why must they put DRM on it? CSS has already been proven not to be effective, so what are the Media Companies afraid of?
At least part of it is probably that the DMCA prohibits circumventing an access control measure. If you just put raw data on there, you can't invoke those portions of the DMCA.
I haven't been able to figure out how to get somebody else to be a judge on www.diplom.org (so that me and six other friends can play a game over email). Any pointers?
Just in terms of terminology, judges are computers that run software to determine the results of moves and so forth. You're probably looking for a GM, which is a neutral person who does the administrative work of setting up and running a game on a judge. If you've got six friends together who want to play, feel free to e-mail me at flooey at gmail dot com and I can set a game up for you guys and help you get going.
It's not our job to convince you of anything. It's our job to protect you from you and other assholes who would seek to do you and the rest of us harm. It's by rule of majority - that means we keep everybody safe, and disregard the snippy rantings of part-time quarterbacks. In interests such as these, the safety of all outweighs the convenience of the one. Just as you think we're too dumb to protect you, we think you're too dumb to protect yourself.
As a fellow civil servant, let me say that this paragraph is an excellent example of a widespread opinion within the government that I think is completely ridiculous: that the average American is somehow below the average civil servant. I can't stand it, whether it's the lady at the DMV who can't understand why people are annoyed at having to stand in line for hours or the serviceman who thinks that because you're not carrying a gun you're not serving the United States.
The business of the United States isn't government. It's agriculture and manufacturing and research and information. By and large, the people who actually make the United States great aren't the people working for the government. That's why we're called civil servants; we're here to help those people so they can spend their time doing what's actually important without having to worry about things like being robbed or having their radio interfered with or getting fleeced by a cheating business.
When we get in the way of that, they're perfectly right to call us on it. Sure, the intrusion may be necessary, and they may not have any idea what's actually going on, but to claim that we don't have to convince them of anything because this is our job is missing the whole point of our job in the first place. They're not our bosses, but they are our customers.
The game of Diplomacy, except 80 years in the future. http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00005EBA0
You can play it over e-mail as well. www.diplom.org is a good place to start.
But who owns the copyright to each bit of code?
Whoever wrote that particular bit of code. That's one of the amazing things about the way the GPL is written, it takes what would normally be a complete mess and makes it workable. And not only that, but by having each coder retain copyright to what they wrote, you also create a huge body of people who have standing to sue were someone to violate the GPL.
...after factoring in the personal cost of having to live in Alabama or Idaho?