A cut of the *gross* may not even work. If I'm reading the various blogs correctly, what the movie studios do is set up a new company for the production of each movie, lend that new company a ton of cash for the creation of the movie. The studio then has to get paid back before any net or gross calculations are performed because it's a loan repayment, not a cost of production. Since it's a loan, they also get to charge interest. Thus, with a big enough initial "loan" and corresponding interest rate, it's possible to rig things so that no movie ever turns a profit - regardless of the quality or box office draw./props for the creative way of avoiding payouts//still think it's equivalent to stealing
Dear Sir,
I represent the American Safety Razor Company and am writing to inform you that you are being sued for the infringement of our product "Burma Shave". You should be receiving a packet of information shortly on where to send the $2,098,720,923US in compensation that our legal team has determined to be the current damages.
Thank you,
Lowell Dewey
Dewey, Cheatum & Howe
Attorneys at Law
1 Ripoff Lane
Scumville, DC 12345
I have an e250 and while it only has a 2Gig capacity, that's more than enough for a full day of work - even a bit of overtime. If I get tired of my ripped CD's, I can always tune in FM radio.
The best part? Now that my coworkers are used to seeing it on me, I can use the handy record feature to blackmail^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H keep track of important notes... yeah, yeah... that's it....I'm using it for note-taking.
Biggest disappointment: No Win2K support. Yes, that's an old OS, but it's where I rip all my CD's. Fortunately, it's only a minor slowdown to load music from a different machine.
I've had the unit for a month now and am really happy with it. I would recommend these to anyone looking for an MP3 player.
He's not trespassing until he comes inside (or crosses your fence boundary - in most places this requires that your gate be present, closed and locked) without your consent.
and then from the article
"He was just very smart-mouthed. He put his foot in the door, and my husband said, 'Excuse me, I did not invite you in, please leave,' and he wouldn't," Janet Gannon said. "We did not invite him in, we asked him to leave, and he wouldn't."
So does a foot in the door preventing it's closure constitute trespass in your book? It does in mine. I doubt it, but I wonder if this guy was smart enough to make a copy first. If he did, wouldn't we all love to see it up on Google Video....?
The other item *NOT* discussed in depth is the thermal consequences of going underground. The ground has a limited capacity for pulling heat away from lines as they heat up from the power running through them. An above ground installation with as little as 3.3ft/sec (1m/sec) airflow at a 90 degree angle can provide significant cooling allowing the power company to run even more power through the lines. In the hot summer months typical in the US, this can mean the difference between brown/black outs and being able to run the AC's.
There was one point where the article mentioned that underground wasn't even an option for lines over 345kV. What about a 500kV or 750kV? With the way power demand is increasing, lines of that size will become more and more common. I used to work for a small firm in the Northeast, US that tries to help power companies deal with thermal constraints and monitoring power lines. The owner holds patents on some of the technology they use and has been on many of the IEEE panels/committees that relate to power transmission. You can probably find out more about thermal issues and power lines here
Or maybe it's because Forgent Networks filed a lawsuit against MS and Apple and about 40 other companies over the JPEG compression algorithms. If this standard gets adopted and popular, MS can drop JPEG entirely and pay penalties, but no licensing fees while earning licensing fees in return.
I only did one Google search, but easily came up with this old article from last October. I haven't really followed the case, but it's one reason why MS may have done this.
Funny, but I thought this had some bearing on the matter:
The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.
There is also some additional information on the FindLaw site for those that are curious.
reasonable basis to conclude that there is a significant risk
Since when is business EVER reasonable about anything?
I wish I could say I was joking, but think about it for a second. Vague language like this leaves it up to each individual company to determine whether or not they want to report. And given the media thrashing from any expected report, you can safely guess (never assume) that my/your definition of reasonable and the corporate definition of reasonable will be separated by a small gap roughly the size of the Pacific Ocean.
You are correct about the "control" toothbrushes kept in another room. Once those tested positive, I believe they went one step further and tested one straight from a package on the assumption that the "control" toothbrushed had been contaminated. Other than a show summary, a quick look on the Discovery web site turned up no results.
For reference, it was "Episode: 12: Break Step Bridge, Toothbrush Surprise, Rowing Water Skier"
The idea of "you have to demonstrate your patent somehow" (e.g. for a patent on something like an encryption algorithim, you have to demonstrate working code for it) would also help.
Yes. There is very little reason that I can think of for this not to be a requirement. I don't think that it solves much, though -- my concern is not people filing impossible patents or patents that are very difficult for those people to implement, but simply taking areas of ideas and holding monopolies over them without then returning advances in technology that would not have otherwise been made.
Of course, there will be people that say things like "what about all the tech that goes into a cell phone" (or similar). There are protocols and communications and blah blah blah. They have a valid point, but only to a degree. Each piece could still be implemented in a limited scale. If not, how the heck do you test your idea? How do you even begin to prove it can work if you can't implement it in some way?
I guess there is always the "trust me, I'm a doctor" approach, but I don't think that will get you very far.
{Big Co} decides that they were ripped off and decides to get "compensation"
{Big Co} sues {Patent Troll Co}
{Big Co} wins, even on appeal
Lawyers everywhere drop dead from heart attacks because now they have to make sure they have legitimate grounds for suing someone......
They are just trying to catch up with PriceCostco. They've been doing this for at least two years now. You buy a product with a rebate, go to the Costco web site, fill in your receipt number and mail to address and get your rebate in 7-10 days.
Actually, it would smash their entire "doing it for the artist" excuse to bits. And the artists are the real owners of the rights. It would really hurt if all their artists did this to them.
However, in the prevalent "me" culture that has developed here in the USA (can't speak for countries I'm not living in), a lot of sheep^H^H^H^H^H people expect to be able to do whatever they want because their needs trump any other potential need or mechanical function.
That's exactly why I make a point of laughing out loud at them when it is obvious that their tactics failed miserably. It'll probably get me shot someday, but it's still fun.
Slashdot Mirror
A cut of the *gross* may not even work. If I'm reading the various blogs correctly, what the movie studios do is set up a new company for the production of each movie, lend that new company a ton of cash for the creation of the movie. The studio then has to get paid back before any net or gross calculations are performed because it's a loan repayment, not a cost of production. Since it's a loan, they also get to charge interest. Thus, with a big enough initial "loan" and corresponding interest rate, it's possible to rig things so that no movie ever turns a profit - regardless of the quality or box office draw. /props for the creative way of avoiding payouts //still think it's equivalent to stealing
I represent the American Safety Razor Company and am writing to inform you that you are being sued for the infringement of our product "Burma Shave". You should be receiving a packet of information shortly on where to send the $2,098,720,923US in compensation that our legal team has determined to be the current damages.
Thank you,
Lowell Dewey
Dewey, Cheatum & Howe
Attorneys at Law
1 Ripoff Lane
Scumville, DC 12345
Gee.... maybe they should get smart and just have it broadcast "I'm XYZ-123 and I'm attached to vehicle A with VIN 1ZX7846927AB2342346"
Unfortunately, sales of tape would go through the roof as people tape over holes to turn their $1 bills into $100s...
I have an e250 and while it only has a 2Gig capacity, that's more than enough for a full day of work - even a bit of overtime. If I get tired of my ripped CD's, I can always tune in FM radio.
The best part? Now that my coworkers are used to seeing it on me, I can use the handy record feature to blackmail^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H keep track of important notes... yeah, yeah... that's it....I'm using it for note-taking.
Biggest disappointment: No Win2K support. Yes, that's an old OS, but it's where I rip all my CD's. Fortunately, it's only a minor slowdown to load music from a different machine.
I've had the unit for a month now and am really happy with it. I would recommend these to anyone looking for an MP3 player.
and then from the article
So does a foot in the door preventing it's closure constitute trespass in your book? It does in mine. I doubt it, but I wonder if this guy was smart enough to make a copy first. If he did, wouldn't we all love to see it up on Google Video....?
There was one point where the article mentioned that underground wasn't even an option for lines over 345kV. What about a 500kV or 750kV? With the way power demand is increasing, lines of that size will become more and more common. I used to work for a small firm in the Northeast, US that tries to help power companies deal with thermal constraints and monitoring power lines. The owner holds patents on some of the technology they use and has been on many of the IEEE panels/committees that relate to power transmission. You can probably find out more about thermal issues and power lines here
I can live with that.
I only did one Google search, but easily came up with this old article from last October. I haven't really followed the case, but it's one reason why MS may have done this.
The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.
There is also some additional information on the FindLaw site for those that are curious.
I guess the real answer to all of this is BOHICA: Bend Over, Here It Comes Again.
reasonable basis to conclude that there is a significant risk
Since when is business EVER reasonable about anything?
I wish I could say I was joking, but think about it for a second. Vague language like this leaves it up to each individual company to determine whether or not they want to report. And given the media thrashing from any expected report, you can safely guess (never assume) that my/your definition of reasonable and the corporate definition of reasonable will be separated by a small gap roughly the size of the Pacific Ocean.
1, 1, 2, 3, 5... err... Fibonacci?
For reference, it was "Episode: 12: Break Step Bridge, Toothbrush Surprise, Rowing Water Skier"
Including the one straight from the sealed package....
Yes. There is very little reason that I can think of for this not to be a requirement. I don't think that it solves much, though -- my concern is not people filing impossible patents or patents that are very difficult for those people to implement, but simply taking areas of ideas and holding monopolies over them without then returning advances in technology that would not have otherwise been made.
Of course, there will be people that say things like "what about all the tech that goes into a cell phone" (or similar). There are protocols and communications and blah blah blah. They have a valid point, but only to a degree. Each piece could still be implemented in a limited scale. If not, how the heck do you test your idea? How do you even begin to prove it can work if you can't implement it in some way?
I guess there is always the "trust me, I'm a doctor" approach, but I don't think that will get you very far.
{Big Co} decides that they were ripped off and decides to get "compensation"
{Big Co} sues {Patent Troll Co}
{Big Co} wins, even on appeal
Lawyers everywhere drop dead from heart attacks because now they have to make sure they have legitimate grounds for suing someone......
ahhhh... the bliss would almost be too much.
They are just trying to catch up with PriceCostco. They've been doing this for at least two years now. You buy a product with a rebate, go to the Costco web site, fill in your receipt number and mail to address and get your rebate in 7-10 days.
Painless, easy and fast.
Actually, it would smash their entire "doing it for the artist" excuse to bits. And the artists are the real owners of the rights. It would really hurt if all their artists did this to them.
STALLMAN COMMUTNIST
Not sure what a commuTnist is, but I'm sure it's really special.
Of course it's obvious to you and I.
However, in the prevalent "me" culture that has developed here in the USA (can't speak for countries I'm not living in), a lot of sheep^H^H^H^H^H people expect to be able to do whatever they want because their needs trump any other potential need or mechanical function.
That's exactly why I make a point of laughing out loud at them when it is obvious that their tactics failed miserably. It'll probably get me shot someday, but it's still fun.