No, the comparison is to what other companies are paying for similar FRAND patents. You can't compare to non-FRAND patents, because FRAND patents are a special type of patent--in order to get its patent approved as part of a standard, a company promises in advance to license it at to anybody a "fair, reasonable, and non-discriminatory" rate. Being accepted as part of a standard is valuable, because often their are many ways to do something, and the patent's value thus comes largely from being required for standards compliance (i.e. "work-arounds" are not permitted). Effectively, by agreeing to license a patent at a low rate, a company gains access to a captive market. Ordinary patents are not subject to this restriction, but that also means that competitors are free to avoid paying by using a work-around.
These are in line with typical licensing fees for other FRAND patents. Remember, in order to get its patent approved as standard essential (an thus gain monopoly access to a captive market) a company commits to license that patent at a "fair, reasonable, and non-discriminatory rate."
Apple's reaction is exactly what I'd expect. It's a very clear illustration of the difference between Microsoft's and Apple's design philosophy. Microsoft tends to emphasize a large feature set, whereas Apple favors a smaller feature set heavily optimized for usability. I expect that Surface will do OK, although it probably won't be a runaway success like the iPhone and the iPad. After all, it's a matter of taste--there are some people who like Microsoft's design approach (they often have a collection of multitools), and there will be some uses for which none of Apple's products is perfectly suited, while the versatility of Microsoft's is just what is needed.
Most of us already take a cognitive enhancer to help us with school or work, so that ship sailed a long time ago. The most commonly used cognitive enhancer is caffeine, which seems to be pretty benign, although it is at least mildly addictive. Some people also take nicotine, which is severely addictive and (at least as commonly administered) quite harmful.
Then of course there are people who are diagnosed with ADHD. Although there is almost certainly some biological, and probably genetic, basis for ADHD, there is currently no objective diagnostic test that will distinguish people with ADHD from those without--diagnosis is by an essentially arbitrary set of behavioral criteria. Where the line is drawn between "normal" variation and disease is pretty arbitrary. Sometimes, the line is drawn based on the efficacy of a treatment, and at one time it was thought that ADHD drugs like methylphenidate (Ritalin) and amphetamine (Adderall) only benefitted people with ADHD, but this turns out to be untrue, so this also does not qualify as a diagnostic criterion.
So far, the ADHD medications seem to be fairly benign, although they too can be habit forming (except perhaps for atomoxetine [Strattera] which is probably less effective as a cognitive enhancer). I say so far, because it has been just a bit over a couple of decades since we began chronically treating children with these ADHD drugs on a large scale, so if they were going to come down with, say, early Parkinson's Disease in middle age, we probably would have seen at least a hint of it by now, but it's still a bit early to be certain.
Gitmo is still open because the Bush administration successfully painted us into the corner through the use of torture. The violations of human rights at Gitmo under Bush turned out to be so extreme that it rapidly became clear that if the inmates were given a fair trial with US standards of evidence judge, so much of the "evidence" against them would have to be thrown out that large numbers of very dangerous terrorists would have to be released.
Groklaw suggests, rather shockingly, that Apple's lawyers might have been a little selective in how they presented some of this evidence to the court, by picking little parts of it that offered a different shade of nuance."
The primary thing this tells us is that Groklaw is so biased on this matter that they aren't thinking straight. Let's apply just a bit of common sense:
These are Samsung documents. Apple obviously does not have the power to hide the contents of Samsung's own documents. As is commonly the case, some court documents were redacted for the public to protect the proprietary interests of the companies involved (Samsung, in this case). That does not mean that the jury did not get to see them. It appears that Samsung now thinks it is in its interest to make the documents public.
Groklaw is trying to get us to believe that the jury's decision that Samsung intentionally copied Apple was based entirely on an out-of-context quite from this document. There's something a bit fishy there. If Apple quoted something from Samsung's documents out of context, wouldn't Samsung's lawyers have been at pains to quote the correct context? You'd think so, wouldn't you? Unless, of course, this document was not actually as pivotal as Groklaw (and presumably Samsung) now would like us to believe. Could it be that the jury did not base its judgment solely--or even primarily--on this document? Could it be that the jury saw much more compelling evidence that Samsung's copying was intentional?
It also presumes that advanced civilizations would waste their time and resources building such a contraption, when, given the technology necessary to do so, it would be far easier to find another planet.
Would it? The technology required to build any kind of Dyson sphere and the technology required to move a large population to another star are both so far beyond our own capability that there is little basis to judge which is easiest.
Roundup kills plants, and is full of phosphates. Your kidneys would be in a very very bad state.
Uh, our bodies are full of phosphates. So are all the foods that we eat. Ever hear of ATP, the fundamental energy currency of a cell? That's adenosine triphosphate. Most of our enzymes have phosphate groups stuck to them, often several. Needless to say, our kidneys handle it very well--which is why it is possible to drink a soft drink--most of which are buffered with quite a bit of phosphate--without suffering kidney damage. The amount of phosphate resulting from herbicide residue would be trivial in comparison.
2. Natural fungicides are available, and most grain is tested for this sort of thing. Nobody uses antibiotics on plants crops, and the only regular bacterial infections from "organic" food come from e.coli infections due to the use of uncomposted manures, any responsible farmer uses dried and if possible composted manure.
Antibiotics are not widely used on plant crops because the major things that kill crops are things like insects, fungi, and competition from other plants, so we use insecticides, fungicides, and herbicides. That does not make them sterile. Bacteria are everywhere, including in the soil, and there are many other pathogenic species that can be in manure besides coli. And crops are generally picked or otherwise handled by humans, and humans also carry diseases. Natural fungicides do exist, but they are not infallible--fungi and plants have been engaged in biological warfare since before our species existed, and for every weapon there is a counter weapon--which is why plants, organic or otherwise, are often harmed by fungal infection. And note that any fungicide, natural or otherwise, is fundamentally a poison. It may not poison us because our cells are different from fungi in some (but not all) ways, but there is no guarantee of safety.
Good, I can stop requesting on a hand search when I fly out of Boston. It's not that I consider the exposure particularly hazardous--I don't; I've voluntarily exposed myself to far more radiation over the years--I just saw no point in additional exposure to ionizing radiation when I can avoid it, and I don't really mind the hand search.
There are many other interpretations. The one where it exists in a combination of the possible states is the Copenhagen interpretation. Another popular one is the many words interpretation. Instead of the cat being in a combination of the possible states, there are multiple universes with each universe containing a different possible history (dies at T=1, dies at T=2, still alive, etc.) and there is a different version of the observer in each universe coming to a conclusion based on which universe he's in.
Many worlds does not get you away from quantum superposition, because the different histories still have to be able to interfere to be consistent with the equations. My understanding of the many worlds interpretation is that when we open the box, our state becomes correlated with the state of the cat, so that the system goes from outside scientist observing a closed box containing a superposition of live cat and dead cat, to a superposition of sad scientist observing a dead cat and relieved scientist observing a live cat. In a sense, the superposition appears to go away because we become part of it. So this is a method of obtaining information about the nature of the superposition inside the box without ourselves becoming correlated with the individual states.
Yes, these exaggerated complaints arise every time Apple releases a new phone, and in the end, they never seem to have amounted to much. Remember iPhone4 "antennagate"? It received huge media coverage, but in the end it had minimal impact on the user experience, because overall the iPhone4 got good reception, and despite all the jokes about "holding it wrong," pretty much any cell phone will get better reception if you don't cover the antenna with your hand. Loosening up your grip a bit when in a marginal signal area turns out to be a pretty minor adjustment that most people make without even thinking about it.
So are the maps flap and the camera flap any different? Perhaps Apple's new Maps application isn't quite as reliable as the old Google version (although more recent tests that objectively compare the two versions find that they are not dramatically different in reliability for simple navigation). But Google navigation is still available through Google's mobile web site and there are numerous 3rd party alternatives, so while it is always news that an Apple product is not absolutely perfect, the impact on most users is very nearly zero--and Apple will probably improve it over time, now that they are getting feedback from millions of users.
So now we find that the iPhone 5 camera produces lens artifacts in circumstances where there is a bright light shining on the lens--a situation that is problematic for many cameras for multiple reasons. There have already been numerous reports that the overall performance of the camera is quite good, particularly in low light situations. So is the iPhone 5 really more vulnerable to such lens flare than other cell phone cameras (clearly other cameras do the same sort of thing in at least some circumstances)? Perhaps; we'll have to await objective tests to know for sure. But let's suppose that it is. Certainly the iPhone 5 can successfully take pictures in some circumstances when many phones--and even dedicated cameras--will fail, due to its good low-light performance and HDR capability. So is it really such a horrible problem if users have to be a little more careful in framing their picture when there is a bright light source in the scene?
A camera on a cell phone is inherently a compromise. It needs a very small lens, and it can't be recessed much.
And to get a good picture you have to hold it right--the most common way of holding it wrong being to put your thumb in front of the lens.
Lens flares can arise with any camera, to the point that computer-generated video often includes simulated lens flares, because it makes the image seem more "realistic" to people who are accustomed to camera video.
The iPhone 5 camera has received a number of accolades for its improved performance, particularly in low light situations, and a lens that is less vulnerable to damage. Now we are hearing that it has a tendency to lens flares when there is a bright light source shining directly on the lens. Most of the photos I've seen that illustrate this artifact are ones that would be problematic with most point-and-shoot cameras, simply because the automatic exposure tends to be dominated by the bright light source, leaving the intended subject too dark. However, some modern cameras, including the ones in recent iPhones, have HDR capability, encouraging people to take shots that they would not even have attempted with cameras of just a few years ago. It's a bit early to tell whether the iPhone 5 is really more prone to lens flare artifacts than earlier models, but the same general advice applies to all cameras, and especially cell phone cameras:
For optimum results, take some care in how you hold the camera and how you frame your shot, particularly when there are bright light sources in the scene.
Considering that a license is a contract to use somebody else's IP, that seem a pretty fine distinction, but IANAL, so perhaps it makes some kind of legal sense. Perhaps the agreement included provision for arbitrary termination by Samsung. In that case, the question arises whether Qualcomm disclosed this to Apple. If not, it seems like Apple might have a cause against Qualcomm if they happen to lose to Samsung.
Samsung had an agreement with Qualcomm that Qualcomm's license to Samsung's patents covered Qualcomm's customers. So Apple used Qualcomm's chips under the understanding that they were fully licensed. But apparently desperate because of Apple's many claims related to Samsung's copying, Samsung attempted to cancel Qualcomm's license as it pertains to Apple. This is of doubtful legality, as licensing of standards-essential patents is supposed to be nondiscriminatory. But it gives Samsung some basis for countersuit, which probably helps them with investors, at least for the moment.
Certainly speaking as an academic scientist, sorting my emails over several years to respond to such a demand would be an enormous amount of labor at substantial cost, for which we have neither the funding nor the manpower. It would be unethical to simply turn it all over, as there are items in it that are covered by confidentiality--discussion of student progress, for example, or information covered by NDA. So somebody would have to go through all of the email, read each one and judge whether it is subject to the demand.
This is likely to be the case for nearly any academic researcher, so such demands would be a good way to slow down a scientist's work--or, if the university ends up paying the expense, leading university administrators to discourage faculty from engaging in any kind of research that might subject the university to the financial liability of responding to such demands.
It is hard to imagine that the benefits from allowing this sort of imposition on university researchers would justify the cost in dollars and lost productivity. And there are additional costs--consider for example, the way stolen emails of climate researchers were taken out of context and distorted to fuel accusations of impropriety--which after multiple (and costly) investigations turned out to be false.
another in an increasingly long list of features that apple fans have been willing to live without for many years
Yes, the lack of a Apple voice routing app was an unfortunate consequence of relying on Google. Google never provided voice routing, and the terms of use for Google's data specifically prohibited using it for that purpose.
But comments like yours make me think that people who have never owned an iPhone have simply no notion of the richness and diversity of 3rd party apps available for iOS. Like virtually everybody who has a need for it, I've had voice turn-by-turn navigation on my iPhone for years. There are a wealth of such apps for iOS, at a range of prices down to free. The only thing we haven't had until now is an Apple-branded one. Which explains why the glitches with the new Apple Maps app haven't dissuaded much of anybody from upgrading to the new version of iOS.
I hit "update" right away, but I wasn't particularly concerned. I'd had my iPhone long enough to know that there is a wealth of mapping and navigation apps available for it, and that Google Maps is readily accessed via Safari.
Clearly a walled garden system like Apple will have quicker adoption of new software.
The real problem is that the cell-phone providers each have their own "walled garden" due to differences in hardware and customized apps, which means that any Android upgrade has to be tweaked for the specific hardware and provider. But whereas Apple has chosen the strategy of producing a limited number of hardware models and maintaining compatibility of iOS with older hardware models as long as possible, cell phone manufacturers and providers have chosen to emphasize manufacturing lots of new models. As a result, it's a lot of work and expense for them to keep older models up-to-date, and it doesn't really make them any money, because they make their money by encouraging their customers to upgrade to the latest hardware, and their marketing strategy is to sell to feature-oriented customers rather than value-oriented customers, so continuing to provide upgrades for years simply doesn't pay.
In fact, there are numerous map programs available for iPhone, including some free ones, so users are indeed free to choose whatever map program they want to use. Personally, I like Navigon, which isn't free, but which is quite reliable (although I've never used any GPS mapping app or device that didn't occasionally make routing errors, sometimes ludicrous ones).
The Google-based version of Apple Maps had some nice features, but it hadn't really advanced with the times, and no longer met user expectations for a mapping app. It seems likely that Google was not highly motivated to produce an up-to-date mapping app for iOS, because its improved version was a selling point for devices using their own Android OS. So Apple had little choice but to produce their own mapping app, and deal the problems that will inevitably arise when there are suddenly millions of users, because no amount of testing is going to catch every glitch worldwide.
In the meantime, most of the functionality of the Google version of Apple Maps is still available at www.maps.google.com.
I like Google transit routing, although there is certainly room for improvement. Sometimes it will recommend a route that will leave you stranded for an extended period of time if its estimate of travel time turns out to be a bit optimistic. I'd like to have a transit routing app that would give me a choice of the fastest route or the most robust one (i.e. with a little more time for connections or with a later connection without a big delay). I'm hoping that Apple's decision to link to 3rd party apps for this feature will result in more competition and better transit routing.
In the meantime, Google's transit routing can still be accessed on the iPhone at www.maps.google.com
It sounds like what you are saying is that you didn't bother to check out what the advantages and disadvantages of the new iOS version before updating (even though there were articles about it all over the net even before the upgrade came out), and you are too lazy to download 3rd party apps, and you blame Apple.
Apple's apps are nice, but if you don't take advantage of apps other than Apple's, you are actually missing out on much of the functionality of your iPad.
If you really miss Google Maps all that much, here's an easy way to get it back, which doesn't even require downloading a 3rd party app.
1. Start Safari 2. Enter www.maps.google.com in the address field 3. Tap the middle icon at the bottom of the screen (the box and arrow) 4. Tap "Add to home screen"
Slashdot Mirror
No, the comparison is to what other companies are paying for similar FRAND patents. You can't compare to non-FRAND patents, because FRAND patents are a special type of patent--in order to get its patent approved as part of a standard, a company promises in advance to license it at to anybody a "fair, reasonable, and non-discriminatory" rate. Being accepted as part of a standard is valuable, because often their are many ways to do something, and the patent's value thus comes largely from being required for standards compliance (i.e. "work-arounds" are not permitted). Effectively, by agreeing to license a patent at a low rate, a company gains access to a captive market. Ordinary patents are not subject to this restriction, but that also means that competitors are free to avoid paying by using a work-around.
These are in line with typical licensing fees for other FRAND patents. Remember, in order to get its patent approved as standard essential (an thus gain monopoly access to a captive market) a company commits to license that patent at a "fair, reasonable, and non-discriminatory rate."
Good way for Google to cut its own throat. Google's searches are a big part of its income, far more important than android.
Apple's reaction is exactly what I'd expect. It's a very clear illustration of the difference between Microsoft's and Apple's design philosophy. Microsoft tends to emphasize a large feature set, whereas Apple favors a smaller feature set heavily optimized for usability. I expect that Surface will do OK, although it probably won't be a runaway success like the iPhone and the iPad. After all, it's a matter of taste--there are some people who like Microsoft's design approach (they often have a collection of multitools), and there will be some uses for which none of Apple's products is perfectly suited, while the versatility of Microsoft's is just what is needed.
I don't know about 7" tablets, but Apple's new 7.9" tablet seems to be selling well, as Apple has already had to lengthen the quoted delivery time.
Most of us already take a cognitive enhancer to help us with school or work, so that ship sailed a long time ago. The most commonly used cognitive enhancer is caffeine, which seems to be pretty benign, although it is at least mildly addictive. Some people also take nicotine, which is severely addictive and (at least as commonly administered) quite harmful.
Then of course there are people who are diagnosed with ADHD. Although there is almost certainly some biological, and probably genetic, basis for ADHD, there is currently no objective diagnostic test that will distinguish people with ADHD from those without--diagnosis is by an essentially arbitrary set of behavioral criteria. Where the line is drawn between "normal" variation and disease is pretty arbitrary. Sometimes, the line is drawn based on the efficacy of a treatment, and at one time it was thought that ADHD drugs like methylphenidate (Ritalin) and amphetamine (Adderall) only benefitted people with ADHD, but this turns out to be untrue, so this also does not qualify as a diagnostic criterion.
So far, the ADHD medications seem to be fairly benign, although they too can be habit forming (except perhaps for atomoxetine [Strattera] which is probably less effective as a cognitive enhancer). I say so far, because it has been just a bit over a couple of decades since we began chronically treating children with these ADHD drugs on a large scale, so if they were going to come down with, say, early Parkinson's Disease in middle age, we probably would have seen at least a hint of it by now, but it's still a bit early to be certain.
Actually, according to the data presented in the lecture, the drugs improve short term memory as well
Gitmo is still open because the Bush administration successfully painted us into the corner through the use of torture. The violations of human rights at Gitmo under Bush turned out to be so extreme that it rapidly became clear that if the inmates were given a fair trial with US standards of evidence judge, so much of the "evidence" against them would have to be thrown out that large numbers of very dangerous terrorists would have to be released.
The primary thing this tells us is that Groklaw is so biased on this matter that they aren't thinking straight. Let's apply just a bit of common sense:
These are Samsung documents. Apple obviously does not have the power to hide the contents of Samsung's own documents. As is commonly the case, some court documents were redacted for the public to protect the proprietary interests of the companies involved (Samsung, in this case). That does not mean that the jury did not get to see them. It appears that Samsung now thinks it is in its interest to make the documents public.
Groklaw is trying to get us to believe that the jury's decision that Samsung intentionally copied Apple was based entirely on an out-of-context quite from this document. There's something a bit fishy there. If Apple quoted something from Samsung's documents out of context, wouldn't Samsung's lawyers have been at pains to quote the correct context? You'd think so, wouldn't you? Unless, of course, this document was not actually as pivotal as Groklaw (and presumably Samsung) now would like us to believe. Could it be that the jury did not base its judgment solely--or even primarily--on this document? Could it be that the jury saw much more compelling evidence that Samsung's copying was intentional?
Say for instance a detailed Samsung report comparing Samsung's product to Apple's feature by feature and recommending that Samsung emulate Apple's design choices?
Or perhaps emails showing that Google warned Samsung that its products were infringing upon Apple's designs?
This is kind of sad. Groklaw did some nice reporting on the SCO lawsuit. But when it comes to Apple and Samsung, they seem to have gone off the rails.
Would it? The technology required to build any kind of Dyson sphere and the technology required to move a large population to another star are both so far beyond our own capability that there is little basis to judge which is easiest.
Uh, our bodies are full of phosphates. So are all the foods that we eat. Ever hear of ATP, the fundamental energy currency of a cell? That's adenosine triphosphate. Most of our enzymes have phosphate groups stuck to them, often several. Needless to say, our kidneys handle it very well--which is why it is possible to drink a soft drink--most of which are buffered with quite a bit of phosphate--without suffering kidney damage. The amount of phosphate resulting from herbicide residue would be trivial in comparison.
Antibiotics are not widely used on plant crops because the major things that kill crops are things like insects, fungi, and competition from other plants, so we use insecticides, fungicides, and herbicides. That does not make them sterile. Bacteria are everywhere, including in the soil, and there are many other pathogenic species that can be in manure besides coli. And crops are generally picked or otherwise handled by humans, and humans also carry diseases. Natural fungicides do exist, but they are not infallible--fungi and plants have been engaged in biological warfare since before our species existed, and for every weapon there is a counter weapon--which is why plants, organic or otherwise, are often harmed by fungal infection. And note that any fungicide, natural or otherwise, is fundamentally a poison. It may not poison us because our cells are different from fungi in some (but not all) ways, but there is no guarantee of safety.
The cat does know. The superposition is of a live cat (that knows it is alive) with a dead cat (that presumably doesn't know anything).
Good, I can stop requesting on a hand search when I fly out of Boston. It's not that I consider the exposure particularly hazardous--I don't; I've voluntarily exposed myself to far more radiation over the years--I just saw no point in additional exposure to ionizing radiation when I can avoid it, and I don't really mind the hand search.
Many worlds does not get you away from quantum superposition, because the different histories still have to be able to interfere to be consistent with the equations. My understanding of the many worlds interpretation is that when we open the box, our state becomes correlated with the state of the cat, so that the system goes from outside scientist observing a closed box containing a superposition of live cat and dead cat, to a superposition of sad scientist observing a dead cat and relieved scientist observing a live cat. In a sense, the superposition appears to go away because we become part of it. So this is a method of obtaining information about the nature of the superposition inside the box without ourselves becoming correlated with the individual states.
Yes, these exaggerated complaints arise every time Apple releases a new phone, and in the end, they never seem to have amounted to much. Remember iPhone4 "antennagate"? It received huge media coverage, but in the end it had minimal impact on the user experience, because overall the iPhone4 got good reception, and despite all the jokes about "holding it wrong," pretty much any cell phone will get better reception if you don't cover the antenna with your hand. Loosening up your grip a bit when in a marginal signal area turns out to be a pretty minor adjustment that most people make without even thinking about it.
So are the maps flap and the camera flap any different? Perhaps Apple's new Maps application isn't quite as reliable as the old Google version (although more recent tests that objectively compare the two versions find that they are not dramatically different in reliability for simple navigation). But Google navigation is still available through Google's mobile web site and there are numerous 3rd party alternatives, so while it is always news that an Apple product is not absolutely perfect, the impact on most users is very nearly zero--and Apple will probably improve it over time, now that they are getting feedback from millions of users.
So now we find that the iPhone 5 camera produces lens artifacts in circumstances where there is a bright light shining on the lens--a situation that is problematic for many cameras for multiple reasons. There have already been numerous reports that the overall performance of the camera is quite good, particularly in low light situations. So is the iPhone 5 really more vulnerable to such lens flare than other cell phone cameras (clearly other cameras do the same sort of thing in at least some circumstances)? Perhaps; we'll have to await objective tests to know for sure. But let's suppose that it is. Certainly the iPhone 5 can successfully take pictures in some circumstances when many phones--and even dedicated cameras--will fail, due to its good low-light performance and HDR capability. So is it really such a horrible problem if users have to be a little more careful in framing their picture when there is a bright light source in the scene?
A camera on a cell phone is inherently a compromise. It needs a very small lens, and it can't be recessed much.
And to get a good picture you have to hold it right--the most common way of holding it wrong being to put your thumb in front of the lens.
Lens flares can arise with any camera, to the point that computer-generated video often includes simulated lens flares, because it makes the image seem more "realistic" to people who are accustomed to camera video.
The iPhone 5 camera has received a number of accolades for its improved performance, particularly in low light situations, and a lens that is less vulnerable to damage. Now we are hearing that it has a tendency to lens flares when there is a bright light source shining directly on the lens. Most of the photos I've seen that illustrate this artifact are ones that would be problematic with most point-and-shoot cameras, simply because the automatic exposure tends to be dominated by the bright light source, leaving the intended subject too dark. However, some modern cameras, including the ones in recent iPhones, have HDR capability, encouraging people to take shots that they would not even have attempted with cameras of just a few years ago. It's a bit early to tell whether the iPhone 5 is really more prone to lens flare artifacts than earlier models, but the same general advice applies to all cameras, and especially cell phone cameras:
For optimum results, take some care in how you hold the camera and how you frame your shot, particularly when there are bright light sources in the scene.
Considering that a license is a contract to use somebody else's IP, that seem a pretty fine distinction, but IANAL, so perhaps it makes some kind of legal sense. Perhaps the agreement included provision for arbitrary termination by Samsung. In that case, the question arises whether Qualcomm disclosed this to Apple. If not, it seems like Apple might have a cause against Qualcomm if they happen to lose to Samsung.
Samsung had an agreement with Qualcomm that Qualcomm's license to Samsung's patents covered Qualcomm's customers. So Apple used Qualcomm's chips under the understanding that they were fully licensed. But apparently desperate because of Apple's many claims related to Samsung's copying, Samsung attempted to cancel Qualcomm's license as it pertains to Apple. This is of doubtful legality, as licensing of standards-essential patents is supposed to be nondiscriminatory. But it gives Samsung some basis for countersuit, which probably helps them with investors, at least for the moment.
Certainly speaking as an academic scientist, sorting my emails over several years to respond to such a demand would be an enormous amount of labor at substantial cost, for which we have neither the funding nor the manpower. It would be unethical to simply turn it all over, as there are items in it that are covered by confidentiality--discussion of student progress, for example, or information covered by NDA. So somebody would have to go through all of the email, read each one and judge whether it is subject to the demand.
This is likely to be the case for nearly any academic researcher, so such demands would be a good way to slow down a scientist's work--or, if the university ends up paying the expense, leading university administrators to discourage faculty from engaging in any kind of research that might subject the university to the financial liability of responding to such demands.
It is hard to imagine that the benefits from allowing this sort of imposition on university researchers would justify the cost in dollars and lost productivity. And there are additional costs--consider for example, the way stolen emails of climate researchers were taken out of context and distorted to fuel accusations of impropriety--which after multiple (and costly) investigations turned out to be false.
Yes, the lack of a Apple voice routing app was an unfortunate consequence of relying on Google. Google never provided voice routing, and the terms of use for Google's data specifically prohibited using it for that purpose.
But comments like yours make me think that people who have never owned an iPhone have simply no notion of the richness and diversity of 3rd party apps available for iOS. Like virtually everybody who has a need for it, I've had voice turn-by-turn navigation on my iPhone for years. There are a wealth of such apps for iOS, at a range of prices down to free. The only thing we haven't had until now is an Apple-branded one. Which explains why the glitches with the new Apple Maps app haven't dissuaded much of anybody from upgrading to the new version of iOS.
I hit "update" right away, but I wasn't particularly concerned. I'd had my iPhone long enough to know that there is a wealth of mapping and navigation apps available for it, and that Google Maps is readily accessed via Safari.
The real problem is that the cell-phone providers each have their own "walled garden" due to differences in hardware and customized apps, which means that any Android upgrade has to be tweaked for the specific hardware and provider. But whereas Apple has chosen the strategy of producing a limited number of hardware models and maintaining compatibility of iOS with older hardware models as long as possible, cell phone manufacturers and providers have chosen to emphasize manufacturing lots of new models. As a result, it's a lot of work and expense for them to keep older models up-to-date, and it doesn't really make them any money, because they make their money by encouraging their customers to upgrade to the latest hardware, and their marketing strategy is to sell to feature-oriented customers rather than value-oriented customers, so continuing to provide upgrades for years simply doesn't pay.
In fact, there are numerous map programs available for iPhone, including some free ones, so users are indeed free to choose whatever map program they want to use. Personally, I like Navigon, which isn't free, but which is quite reliable (although I've never used any GPS mapping app or device that didn't occasionally make routing errors, sometimes ludicrous ones).
The Google-based version of Apple Maps had some nice features, but it hadn't really advanced with the times, and no longer met user expectations for a mapping app. It seems likely that Google was not highly motivated to produce an up-to-date mapping app for iOS, because its improved version was a selling point for devices using their own Android OS. So Apple had little choice but to produce their own mapping app, and deal the problems that will inevitably arise when there are suddenly millions of users, because no amount of testing is going to catch every glitch worldwide.
In the meantime, most of the functionality of the Google version of Apple Maps is still available at www.maps.google.com.
I like Google transit routing, although there is certainly room for improvement. Sometimes it will recommend a route that will leave you stranded for an extended period of time if its estimate of travel time turns out to be a bit optimistic. I'd like to have a transit routing app that would give me a choice of the fastest route or the most robust one (i.e. with a little more time for connections or with a later connection without a big delay). I'm hoping that Apple's decision to link to 3rd party apps for this feature will result in more competition and better transit routing.
In the meantime, Google's transit routing can still be accessed on the iPhone at www.maps.google.com
It sounds like what you are saying is that you didn't bother to check out what the advantages and disadvantages of the new iOS version before updating (even though there were articles about it all over the net even before the upgrade came out), and you are too lazy to download 3rd party apps, and you blame Apple.
Apple's apps are nice, but if you don't take advantage of apps other than Apple's, you are actually missing out on much of the functionality of your iPad.
If you really miss Google Maps all that much, here's an easy way to get it back, which doesn't even require downloading a 3rd party app.
1. Start Safari
2. Enter www.maps.google.com in the address field
3. Tap the middle icon at the bottom of the screen (the box and arrow)
4. Tap "Add to home screen"