Not at all. If TFA is right, this has nothing to do with 'little details'. The big details are that Cisco had no product called 'iPhone' for years, and recently just stuck a sticker on a picture of an existing product, rebranding it 'iPhone', when renewing the trademark, when no such branding existed in the real world.
I believe that you and TFA are right, Cisco has not used the trademark in marketing their VOIP web/phone system. I'm looking at the box from one (ca. 2002) right now, and it is branded "Cisco IP Phone". Nowhere in the box, on the product or in the manual was it referred to as an "iPhone", "IPhone", "I Phone" or "I-Phone".
For that matter, I've seen the instruments placed on TV shows (e.g. "West Wing") and never seen any "iPhone" branding you would expect for a product placement on TV. Looks like they registered it and blew it off.
Of all the problems in the US, and around the world, they decide that this is something they should work on. Ignore all the letters from the people they represent, and take care of special interests.
When you put a big check in the letter to your senator, then they'll listen to you. That's how you tell the letters to act on from the letters to trash.
Everyone knows that Google does this, right? I put in seach "1 gallon in cubic inches" and this is the result. You can do this for just about any units, there really is no reason to post things like "what's that in real units?" when you can so easily convert between anything.
Just for example, I asked:
"speed of light in furlongs per fortnight"
and I got the handy answer:
the speed of light = 1.8026175 × 10^12 furlongs per fortnight
So why doesn't the US change? Because the advantage of using a metric system over not having a metric system is very great compared the relative advantage of using one particular metric system (like SI) over another (and the costs of switching).
As a scientist, I can attest to the massive superiority of the metric system for scientific measurements et cetera, after all, that's partly what it was DESIGNED for. (1cm^3 of pure water doesn't weight 1g at sea level for no reason, for example...).
IANAL, but I think the Patents icon is misleading here.
My theory, which is mine, that I have, which you may ask, is this: "There is no Trademarks section or topic on Slashdot". Since a topic and section must be specified, the closest match, "Patents", was chosen.
People have been Killed, robbed, beatened, and otherwise harmed by people's greed to acquire these products. Yet, none of these are items that are within the definition of "basic needs". Nobody "needs" these.
The "poor" Americans are some of the richest people in the world, just look at the obesity levels. Truly "poor" people are literally dying of starvation, worry about their next meal, wonder where they will sleep tonight.
That does seem to suggest that "Income Inequality" does matter. That it's not just a matter of how poor you are in absolute terms, but how poor you are compared to your fellow citizens.
The US has, I believe, nearly 2 000 000 people in prison. This is a big enougfh cost item that it needs proper study.
A little over a decade ago, I was asked to do a little research. I worked at a company that put phones in jails for prisoners to call their moms, wives and girlfriends (collect). Boss wanted to find proof that this was a growth industry. I was the only engineer there, so math-related problem came to me. A little digging at the library showed that the population of at federal, state, county and local detention facilities was roughly doubling every 10 years.
Good news for the company: customer base was growing faster than US population at large. Bad news for everyone else: if trend continued everyone would be in jail sometime around 2070. I assumed (to myself) that this trend couldn't coninue for that long . ..
I hadn't checked the numbers lately, but in the mid 90s the population was about 1 million. So if your 2 million figure is right, we're still on track.
Does some CEO grabbing obscene bonuses (deserved or not) fuel social unrest? Historically, the answer is yes, but only if the bulk of the population is suffering.
So it's probably a good idea to talk about it now. TFA shows the US "Gini" index increasing substatially from 1970 to 2005 (in small part due to change in computation).
Brasil has huge problems with social inequality far beyond what is happening in the US.
So our Gini is increasing, and countries (or at least one country) with higher Gini have serious problems with crime to the point that it affects their overall economy. It would be a good idea to try to understand the causal relationship JIC it turns out to be "high Gini => high crime => lower GDP".
The FCC already sold off the cell spectrum, which is now being sold back to us at riduculous prices. $.05 for a text message?
This sounds pathetic, but who is your "low cost" text message carrier? ATT/Cingular/Whatever-they-call-themselves-tomorro w is bumping up rates to 15 cents per. In my back of the envelope calculations, text rates are about 100x voice rates per unit of network bandwidth.
Think of the millions of clocks worldwide with automated systems b/c there authors didn't think that daylight savings time would change...
No embedded system I worked on in the years Win2K was being developed had a non-configurable DST setting. DST was changed in '86 and in several previous decades. There is no good reason to assume that a legislative mandate is eternal, unlike universal math constants . ..
sorta reminds me of something I saw in a "How not to program" book "don't set pi as a constant, you might have to update it".
WTF? Make it user-configurable so fundamentalists can set pi=3?
The gov't changed the rules governing daylight savings time;
This happened previously in 1987 when DST in the US changed as a result of 1986 legislation. It's not like they could claim they didn't know DST could be changed when that exact thing had happened just over a decade earlier. They could have made DST user-configurable, plenty of embedded systems desinged at that time did.
The place seemed full of dead man's switches but it reality was probably just a finicky cobbled together collection of systems that required intervention when cron jobs/scheduled tasks could have done it (and later did).
This leads to this observation: Any sufficiently finicky cobbled together collection of systems that requires intervention is indistinguishable from a Dead Man's Switch.
Except I'm pretty certain they didn't develop the concept of using a circuit like that to convert an analog signal into a digital PWM signal. If they invented that, then I wouldn't dispute the patent-worthiness. However, merely applying someone else's analog-to-PWM circuit to joysticks doesn't seem to me to meet the non-obviousness criterion.
I don't think the Analog position/PWM conversion is the real meat of the infringement claim -- you're correct, that's been in use long before 1998. The cleverness here (if it is indeed theirs) is modulating that on a digital channel designed to read button presses. Not earth-shattering, but kinda clever. It appears that the design is intended to be a retrofit for consoles desinged only for button-press input.
I agree that PWM is not new. I agree that it remains to be proven that these guys invented the scheme described here. I agree that analog joysticks are not new and the A/D converters are not new. Again, the only part of the patent claim that I would call novel is the PWM-button thing.
Given the Wii and the PS3 are standard wireless, how does that lawsuit work again? With base-model 360s?
With previous generations of consoles, perhaps? According to TFA, the patent was applied for in 1998, awarded in 2001. The Wii and PS3 aren't the only consoles created since then.
As near as I can tell from the text of the patent, this patent troll has patented the use of an Analog to Digital Convertor for converting the analog output of a joystick into a digital signal. I'm not 100% certain but it sounds like either an integrator type circuit or a PWM type circuit.
I believe that's exactly what it does. That's not novel. What could be novel is that they seem to be putting the PWM signal on a button input to the console, giving a game with the ability to read the PWM as a joystick postion an analog joystick. This is some extrapolation on my part, but that's what I think they're claiming infringement on.
I did read TFP, and it looks to be a retrofit type device to allow use of analog joystick on a digital joystick port by modulating the joystick position on a digital (button press?) signal. I think it's only for consoles that don't have analog ports already. Newer systems that implement all functions on a USB connection would not apply here.
The patent was applied for in 1998, I believe the first atari consoles had joysticks in the late 70s
This device seems to be for connecting an analog joystick to a digital input by converting the analog postion into a PWM digital signal. It's an analog joystick with the A/D and encoder built-in. Perhaps an incremental improvement, at best. I suppose it eliminates the need to have the A/D hardware on the console itself, so the connection can be all digital (and have fewer pins). You could even retrofit a console designed for digital controls only to use an analog joystick (assuming you write games to read the PWM signal). If they really are the first to come up with this particular scheme, then maybe they have a claim.
Before you think how these warning labels - such as "Do not use iron on clothes you are wearing", a couple of years ago, a Slashdotter admitted to have burned himself while ironing the shirt he was wearing.
"I'm so tough, my girlfriend irons my shirts . . . while I'm wearing them."
I'd love to claim that line, but it comes from some Austrailian comedian about 20 years ago, I think.
End result: one guy out a lot of time, and up $52. Big deal. If I want to waste time, I'll at least waste time in front of my PS3, cocktail in hand.
Sounds like he's up 52 bucks compared to you at the end of a few hours. Now who's the dumbass with the stupid hobby?
And it's not just the $52. He's gained knowlege, published it for the benefit of others, and for all we know could have been enjoying a cocktail himself in the process. It's his time, he can spend it as he pleases whether you or I approve or not.
Slashdot Mirror
Beer if proof that God loves us and wants us to be happy.
-Franklin
I believe that you and TFA are right, Cisco has not used the trademark in marketing their VOIP web/phone system. I'm looking at the box from one (ca. 2002) right now, and it is branded "Cisco IP Phone". Nowhere in the box, on the product or in the manual was it referred to as an "iPhone", "IPhone", "I Phone" or "I-Phone".
For that matter, I've seen the instruments placed on TV shows (e.g. "West Wing") and never seen any "iPhone" branding you would expect for a product placement on TV. Looks like they registered it and blew it off.
OK, I'll bite. Where do you live?
When you put a big check in the letter to your senator, then they'll listen to you. That's how you tell the letters to act on from the letters to trash.
1 US gallon = 231.000001 cubic inches
Everyone knows that Google does this, right? I put in seach "1 gallon in cubic inches" and this is the result. You can do this for just about any units, there really is no reason to post things like "what's that in real units?" when you can so easily convert between anything.
Just for example, I asked:
"speed of light in furlongs per fortnight"
and I got the handy answer:
the speed of light = 1.8026175 × 10^12 furlongs per fortnight
So why doesn't the US change? Because the advantage of using a metric system over not having a metric system is very great compared the relative advantage of using one particular metric system (like SI) over another (and the costs of switching).
But "A pint's a pound the world around".
My theory, which is mine, that I have, which you may ask, is this: "There is no Trademarks section or topic on Slashdot". Since a topic and section must be specified, the closest match, "Patents", was chosen.
That does seem to suggest that "Income Inequality" does matter. That it's not just a matter of how poor you are in absolute terms, but how poor you are compared to your fellow citizens.
A little over a decade ago, I was asked to do a little research. I worked at a company that put phones in jails for prisoners to call their moms, wives and girlfriends (collect). Boss wanted to find proof that this was a growth industry. I was the only engineer there, so math-related problem came to me. A little digging at the library showed that the population of at federal, state, county and local detention facilities was roughly doubling every 10 years.
Good news for the company: customer base was growing faster than US population at large. Bad news for everyone else: if trend continued everyone would be in jail sometime around 2070. I assumed (to myself) that this trend couldn't coninue for that long . . .
I hadn't checked the numbers lately, but in the mid 90s the population was about 1 million. So if your 2 million figure is right, we're still on track.
So it's probably a good idea to talk about it now. TFA shows the US "Gini" index increasing substatially from 1970 to 2005 (in small part due to change in computation).
So our Gini is increasing, and countries (or at least one country) with higher Gini have serious problems with crime to the point that it affects their overall economy. It would be a good idea to try to understand the causal relationship JIC it turns out to be "high Gini => high crime => lower GDP".
This sounds pathetic, but who is your "low cost" text message carrier? ATT/Cingular/Whatever-they-call-themselves-tomorro w is bumping up rates to 15 cents per. In my back of the envelope calculations, text rates are about 100x voice rates per unit of network bandwidth.
No embedded system I worked on in the years Win2K was being developed had a non-configurable DST setting. DST was changed in '86 and in several previous decades. There is no good reason to assume that a legislative mandate is eternal, unlike universal math constants . . .
WTF? Make it user-configurable so fundamentalists can set pi=3?
A: Do not take away my daylight.
B: Definitely do not tell me to get up earlier. I guarantee that I am way crankier in the morning than you.
This happened previously in 1987 when DST in the US changed as a result of 1986 legislation. It's not like they could claim they didn't know DST could be changed when that exact thing had happened just over a decade earlier. They could have made DST user-configurable, plenty of embedded systems desinged at that time did.
They use British spelling, like "colour", "humour", and "motour". Apologies to Dave Barry.
This leads to this observation: Any sufficiently finicky cobbled together collection of systems that requires intervention is indistinguishable from a Dead Man's Switch.
I don't think the Analog position/PWM conversion is the real meat of the infringement claim -- you're correct, that's been in use long before 1998. The cleverness here (if it is indeed theirs) is modulating that on a digital channel designed to read button presses. Not earth-shattering, but kinda clever. It appears that the design is intended to be a retrofit for consoles desinged only for button-press input.
I agree that PWM is not new. I agree that it remains to be proven that these guys invented the scheme described here. I agree that analog joysticks are not new and the A/D converters are not new. Again, the only part of the patent claim that I would call novel is the PWM-button thing.
With previous generations of consoles, perhaps? According to TFA, the patent was applied for in 1998, awarded in 2001. The Wii and PS3 aren't the only consoles created since then.
I believe that's exactly what it does. That's not novel. What could be novel is that they seem to be putting the PWM signal on a button input to the console, giving a game with the ability to read the PWM as a joystick postion an analog joystick. This is some extrapolation on my part, but that's what I think they're claiming infringement on.
I did read TFP, and it looks to be a retrofit type device to allow use of analog joystick on a digital joystick port by modulating the joystick position on a digital (button press?) signal. I think it's only for consoles that don't have analog ports already. Newer systems that implement all functions on a USB connection would not apply here.
This device seems to be for connecting an analog joystick to a digital input by converting the analog postion into a PWM digital signal. It's an analog joystick with the A/D and encoder built-in. Perhaps an incremental improvement, at best. I suppose it eliminates the need to have the A/D hardware on the console itself, so the connection can be all digital (and have fewer pins). You could even retrofit a console designed for digital controls only to use an analog joystick (assuming you write games to read the PWM signal). If they really are the first to come up with this particular scheme, then maybe they have a claim.
. . . welcome our new 3d dildo and sleeve printing overlords.
Centripedal acceleration: a = -w^2 * r
(I can't find my lower case omega key)
You state a = 120g = 9.81*120 = 1177m/s^2
1177 = w^2 * r
I measured my washer, r = 28cm = .28m
4200 = w^2
w = 64.8 radians per second
1 revolution = 2*pi radians
Angular velocity = 10 revolutions per second = 600 revs per minute
"I'm so tough, my girlfriend irons my shirts . . . while I'm wearing them."
I'd love to claim that line, but it comes from some Austrailian comedian about 20 years ago, I think.
Sounds like he's up 52 bucks compared to you at the end of a few hours. Now who's the dumbass with the stupid hobby?
And it's not just the $52. He's gained knowlege, published it for the benefit of others, and for all we know could have been enjoying a cocktail himself in the process. It's his time, he can spend it as he pleases whether you or I approve or not.