... that vapourware only works if the customer thinks it will come around in the next year and a half or so. Five years down the road is too far away to convince customers not to buy an AMD or Cyrix chip, as well as too far away to convince investors to buy shares of Intel.
They should have consulted with Micro$oft Marketing, like Bill keeps telling them...
Why all this jibberish about Motorola, when everyone knows that the guys in the black helicopters are monitoring all of us anyways. After all, belly buttons are really just the scars from implanted tracking/monitoring devices anyway.
As a recent graduate of NC State, I've seen it walk the same path as UVa, perhaps moreso. I think state universities face additional pressures from taxpayers and legislatures to generate products and technologies that have an immediate impact on the state economy.
Perhaps if the federal government raised taxes on megacorps and invested that money into the NSF and other governemnt research financiers, universities could maintain / increase research funding without feeling the pressures of immediate returns to industry. Simply change the flow of money from (corps to universities) to (corps to fed to universities). This extra link would sever the universities' direct ties to a particular company or industry, and allow it the freedom to develop technologies that aren't skewed by immediate profits.
Isn't raising the standard of living a loftier goal than raising profits?
Take a whole bunch of legally distributed MP3's of average length, and rename them after Metallica songs. Perhaps spell a word or two wrong. Then, when you get 'caught' by one of the 5000 monkeys in California, countersue -- after all, it wasn't a Metallica song anyway.
Step 5: go ahead and try it. The state of patent law is as follows: the undermanned and undereducated patent office simply can't determine which ideas in technology are fresh and unique -- so when in doubt, they grant the patent.
However, if a patent is not legit (ie neither fresh nor unique), the courts will not hold up the patent... and the patent sluts know that.
IMNAL, and I am concerned about 'the government' making big incorrect decisions, but I have more faith in the judicial system than the legislative system...
So, at the very least, keep steps 1 and 6, but do not worry about the patent sluts, for they will be humbled.
This is a fine example of open-sourcers overreacting in a psudo-millitaristic manner. There is no need to burn anything.
Unisyss invested resources in developing LZW, the algorithm used by GIFs. Their owners (investors) have every right to cash in on GIFs. If there is a better alternative for the price, the market will adjust, and folks will use other compression formats. This market really does work -- with or without virtual pyros.
Relax, and choose the options that work best for you. Everything will work itself out; the fastest and biggest bank of information (um... that would be the Internet) doesn't need help from geeks in serch of a cause.
Perhaps instead of investing time and energy on Unisys and GIFs, we could be writing drivers for the open source community...
- Tom Vitolo Just a guy who likes computers (and has a degree in Economics)
Slashdot Mirror
... that vapourware only works if the customer thinks it will come around in the next year and a half or so. Five years down the road is too far away to convince customers not to buy an AMD or Cyrix chip, as well as too far away to convince investors to buy shares of Intel.
They should have consulted with Micro$oft Marketing, like Bill keeps telling them...
Why all this jibberish about Motorola, when everyone knows that the guys in the black helicopters are monitoring all of us anyways. After all, belly buttons are really just the scars from implanted tracking/monitoring devices anyway.
pssst... hey Carnivore: CHINA! SADDAM! NUCLEAR SECRETS! LEWINSKY!
As a recent graduate of NC State, I've seen it walk the same path as UVa, perhaps moreso. I think state universities face additional pressures from taxpayers and legislatures to generate products and technologies that have an immediate impact on the state economy.
Perhaps if the federal government raised taxes on megacorps and invested that money into the NSF and other governemnt research financiers, universities could maintain / increase research funding without feeling the pressures of immediate returns to industry. Simply change the flow of money from (corps to universities) to (corps to fed to universities). This extra link would sever the universities' direct ties to a particular company or industry, and allow it the freedom to develop technologies that aren't skewed by immediate profits.
Isn't raising the standard of living a loftier goal than raising profits?
Here's a fun idea:
Take a whole bunch of legally distributed MP3's of average length, and rename them after Metallica songs. Perhaps spell a word or two wrong. Then, when you get 'caught' by one of the 5000 monkeys in California, countersue -- after all, it wasn't a Metallica song anyway.
Man, that would be fun!
(standard IMNAL disclaimer)
- Tommy V
karma prude
On steps 1 through 4... precisely right.
Step 5: go ahead and try it. The state of patent law is as follows: the undermanned and undereducated patent office simply can't determine which ideas in technology are fresh and unique -- so when in doubt, they grant the patent.
However, if a patent is not legit (ie neither fresh nor unique), the courts will not hold up the patent... and the patent sluts know that.
IMNAL, and I am concerned about 'the government' making big incorrect decisions, but I have more faith in the judicial system than the legislative system...
So, at the very least, keep steps 1 and 6, but do not worry about the patent sluts, for they will be humbled.
- Tommy V
This is a fine example of open-sourcers overreacting in a psudo-millitaristic manner. There is no need to burn anything.
Unisyss invested resources in developing LZW, the algorithm used by GIFs. Their owners (investors) have every right to cash in on GIFs. If there is a better alternative for the price, the market will adjust, and folks will use other compression formats. This market really does work -- with or without virtual pyros.
Relax, and choose the options that work best for you. Everything will work itself out; the fastest and biggest bank of information (um... that would be the Internet) doesn't need help from geeks in serch of a cause.
Perhaps instead of investing time and energy on Unisys and GIFs, we could be writing drivers for the open source community...
- Tom Vitolo
Just a guy who likes computers (and has a degree in Economics)