What it means in the long term is that any American software company is at the whim of US software patent squatters *regardless* of where they sell, whilst software companies based in the EU can pretty much ignore them as long as they don't sell in the US. That in turn means that the US is going to fall behind in the technology market as its corporations start moving overseas (and its citizens start having to deal with substandard/outofdate software), and that in turn means job losses, a huge drop in GDP, and probably a recession.
That of course, is assuming that the US Administration doesn't step in and revoke software patents - which is not something I can see the current administration doing. No offence to those that voted for them - but they strike me as bieng somewhat short sighted (and generally dis-interested) when it comes to things like this.
Long story short, It's time to start looking at the overseas property market.:)
Most people don't care about the ethics behind the services they use or the products they buy - remember, those of us on Slashdot tend to represent a minority.
What the vast majority of people care about is simply wether something works, and how easy it is to use. In that sense, MSN would have to deliver better than google across the board to start biting into googles existing market - and that's unlikely to happen while all their services are based around the MSN website. People like google because it starts simple, and it just works - no fuss.
Google could well be a competitor in that they are making software and services available that are platform independant. As they continue to do that, there are fewer 'lock-in's that microsoft can exploit to maintain it's position, and as a result it will begin losing market share.
So, In a sense, Google is a competitor in that they might seriously hurt microsofts bottom line.
The best way of dealing with this kind of thing would be to have a layer of foil underneath a layer of soundproofing - such as a vaccum between two airtight panes with tweeters or noisemakers at the contact points. Sound cannot reach the foil if there is no physical contact between the inside of the room and the foil wrap.
An alternative would be to blow pressurised steam through wall cavities - water reflects microwaves pretty damned well, and the movement would drown out the conversation.
Neither's exactly cheap, but they should both work.
Because a lot of people use high end gaming cards as 'cheap' cards for CAD or video editing workstations. Even a $600 Geforce is cheaper than a $3000 wildcat:)
A government is supposed to protect the freedom of the people...
Wrong. The purpose of a government is not to protect our 'rights' - We elect leaders, not puppets. All this rhetoric about personal freedoms looks nice on paper, but at the end of the day a government that is afraid to do anything that the people might not like is nothing more than a talking shop.
Incidentally, everything you've said about religion makes me assume that you're posting from the U.S. - there is no power in this country, be it Parliment, the Royal family, or Her Majesty's Courts, that tries to enforce or coerce any religious view. Hell, we've got too many people from too many backgrounds for anything like that to work in the first place.
He didn't say that Katrina was caused by global warming - the reference to New Orleans was because NO has been flooded - which is the same fate that many cities are predicted to share as a result of GW.
Disc capacities always use Decimal - so it's a 1000 byte unit.
The normal convention is that we only use the binary units when dealing with RAM - even though it's incorrect to do so, using the prefixes original definition.
Because Tera = 10^12.
'Tera', 'Mega' et all are all generic prefixes that are NOT limited to use in the computing field. They're right to advertise as 0.5TB because 500,000,000,000 is one half of a Terabyte.
The duplicity of the terms has caused confusion for a while, and as a result there is a movement to try and end the confusion - basically, getting us IT guys to start using Kibi, Mebi, Gibi, Tebi, etc. instead. Consult W/Pedia for more.
Think about it - more and more people are starting to get in the 'digital lifestyle', downloading movie trailers and the likes, whilst at the same time games are becoming larger and more complex.
Combine that with more people starting to run digital camcorders - hence, wanting to use their PC for video editing, and the arrival of HDTV, and it shouldn't be that hard to see that there is a growing demand for high capacity drives.
If anything, the demand is likely to become higher amongst the 'everyday user' because they are also the least likely run basic maintenance operations [I.e, Whacking the stuff you don't need anymore onto a DVD so it's not clogging up your bloody HDD].
The European Union screwed up: forcing Microsoft to publish protocols to only proprietary vendors is just about the worst outcome possible. Furthermore, source code for portions of the system is nearly useless.
Just so you know, the case is in progress - there has not yet been a ruling to reverse. The EC [European Commission - an administrative body, and not the EU] had an agreement with microsoft that is now going to court to test it's validity.
If multiple people 'invent' something from the ground up in a relatively short timeframe, then it can be argued that that invention must have been fairly obvious, in which case no-one should be granted a patent on it. Again, this is an area in which the system is currently broken, and needs fixing.
That is especially true if the two 'inventions' work based on the same operating principles - if they work on differing principles, they are in effect two different inventions, and can be patented independently of each other.
At least, that's the theory. Like I said, the implementation is broken, but not the idea behind it
As an aside, your last assertion is wrong - in the US patents system, if you can prove you invented it first, you can get the patent overturned and/or transferred. Europe (where I be) operates on a first to file system, but the US operates on a first to invent system.
The great problem I have with patents is that if you invent something, but it happens to have been patentented by someone, you can't use your invention without having to pay royalties to the patent holder. That goes against my sense of fairness, which I hold as a very important value.
That's more to do with borked implementation than the idea itself. In theory, if you invent something the patent should be yours. Other people bieng able to patent inventions that aren't theirs is a symptom of a broken system, not a broken ideal.
If multiple people 'invent' something from the ground up in a relatively short timeframe, then it can be argued that that invention must have been fairly obvious, in which case no-one should be granted a patent on it. Again, this is an area in which the system is currently broken, and needs fixing.
That goes against my sense of fairness
As it should, but just make sure your placing your ire in the right place.:)
Heh, sorry, just came from a php board and forgot about the br tags.:/
Lets be trying that again...:D
Yup. The development costs that go into things such as new pharmacuticals take a long time to get back. If not for patents, the big drugs companies simply wouldn't bother doing research - because they'd be spending all that money only to get ripped off by a competitor.
Patents are not a bad thing in themselves. The problem is that, particularly in the software world, they tend to get granted for obvious re-applications of existing technology.
The intent behind patents is to protect innovators and give them time to recoup their costs. But the implementation is broken in that the people who pass these patents often lack the technical knowledge to be able to tell wether something is 'obvious' or not. On top of that, Lawyers often re-word the submissions to obsfucate what is actually bieng submitted to the point of making even simple ideas appear much more complicated than they actually are.
Basically, the system just needs an almighty overhaul. I doubt that many people would (reasonably) argue that patents themselves are bad - even software patents have legitimate uses. It's just the implementation thats at fault.
Yup.
The development costs that go into things such as new pharmacuticals take a long time to get back. If not for patents, the big drugs companies simply wouldn't bother doing research - because they'd be spending all that money only to get ripped off by a competitor.
Patents are not a bad thing in themselves. The problem is that, particularly in the software world, they tend to get granted for obvious re-applications of existing technology.
The intent behind patents is to protect innovators and give them time to recoup their costs. But the implementation is broken in that the people who pass these patents often lack the technical knowledge to be able to tell wether something is 'obvious' or not. On top of that, Lawyers often re-word the submissions to obsfucate what is actually bieng submitted to the point of making even simple ideas appear much more complicated than they actually are.
Basically, the system just needs an almighty overhaul. I doubt that many people would (reasonably) argue that patents themselves are bad - even software patents have legitimate uses. It's just the implementation thats at fault.
If something is released to the public domain, then there is NO EULA, and no restrictions placed on use or distrubution whatsoever.
Public domain essentially means that the owner has released all rights in relation to the infomation - be it a book, a piece of software, a film, music, whatever.
In that sense, yes, the public domain is dyng. It's becoming increasingly rare for someone to distribute something without placing a restriction or two on its use - everyone wants their piece of the cake, so to speak.
That's a fan-made project, and one of many. It's not bieng made by EA, and it's unlikely that any fan-made projects will ever hit the spot the way Wc3 or Strike Commander did.
Hell, a full on Wing commander/Strike commander game or a new System Shock would kick ass, but it's not going to happen. EA's only interested in direct-to-console games and the odd franchise like BF - and even that was rushed and released with bugs that should NEVER have got through QA.
Because it makes sense to make that point - If they've got a new proprietary implementation (which is what it sounds like) then chances are that they'll try to file for a patent for it in the near future - assuming they haven't done so already.
Although copyright is the problem that the great-grand-parent was pointing out, It's not likely to be the only problem that other developers would face trying to implement a compatible algorithm. Something to bear in mind, no?
but Software patents aren't valid in the EU, and copyright law is in a different state.
It's likely that you'll see it in other (open) apps soon enough - they'll just be based in Europe instead of the U.S.
Slashdot Mirror
Doesn't really mean anything just yet.
:)
What it means in the long term is that any American software company is at the whim of US software patent squatters *regardless* of where they sell, whilst software companies based in the EU can pretty much ignore them as long as they don't sell in the US. That in turn means that the US is going to fall behind in the technology market as its corporations start moving overseas (and its citizens start having to deal with substandard/outofdate software), and that in turn means job losses, a huge drop in GDP, and probably a recession.
That of course, is assuming that the US Administration doesn't step in and revoke software patents - which is not something I can see the current administration doing. No offence to those that voted for them - but they strike me as bieng somewhat short sighted (and generally dis-interested) when it comes to things like this.
Long story short, It's time to start looking at the overseas property market.
nt! Why did you click me! :D
Most people don't care about the ethics behind the services they use or the products they buy - remember, those of us on Slashdot tend to represent a minority.
What the vast majority of people care about is simply wether something works, and how easy it is to use. In that sense, MSN would have to deliver better than google across the board to start biting into googles existing market - and that's unlikely to happen while all their services are based around the MSN website. People like google because it starts simple, and it just works - no fuss.
Google could well be a competitor in that they are making software and services available that are platform independant. As they continue to do that, there are fewer 'lock-in's that microsoft can exploit to maintain it's position, and as a result it will begin losing market share. So, In a sense, Google is a competitor in that they might seriously hurt microsofts bottom line.
A little late reading this. Sorry.
The best way of dealing with this kind of thing would be to have a layer of foil underneath a layer of soundproofing - such as a vaccum between two airtight panes with tweeters or noisemakers at the contact points. Sound cannot reach the foil if there is no physical contact between the inside of the room and the foil wrap.
An alternative would be to blow pressurised steam through wall cavities - water reflects microwaves pretty damned well, and the movement would drown out the conversation.
Neither's exactly cheap, but they should both work.
Because a lot of people use high end gaming cards as 'cheap' cards for CAD or video editing workstations. Even a $600 Geforce is cheaper than a $3000 wildcat :)
Bah. I have troubles if mines set to anything below 100. :|
(VMPro 454, btw)
Wrong. The purpose of a government is not to protect our 'rights' - We elect leaders, not puppets. All this rhetoric about personal freedoms looks nice on paper, but at the end of the day a government that is afraid to do anything that the people might not like is nothing more than a talking shop.
Incidentally, everything you've said about religion makes me assume that you're posting from the U.S. - there is no power in this country, be it Parliment, the Royal family, or Her Majesty's Courts, that tries to enforce or coerce any religious view. Hell, we've got too many people from too many backgrounds for anything like that to work in the first place.
He didn't say that Katrina was caused by global warming - the reference to New Orleans was because NO has been flooded - which is the same fate that many cities are predicted to share as a result of GW.
;)
Try not to read what's not there.
Sorry, I'm in one of those moods ;)
Disc capacities always use Decimal - so it's a 1000 byte unit.
The normal convention is that we only use the binary units when dealing with RAM - even though it's incorrect to do so, using the prefixes original definition.
Because Tera = 10^12.
'Tera', 'Mega' et all are all generic prefixes that are NOT limited to use in the computing field. They're right to advertise as 0.5TB because 500,000,000,000 is one half of a Terabyte.
The duplicity of the terms has caused confusion for a while, and as a result there is a movement to try and end the confusion - basically, getting us IT guys to start using Kibi, Mebi, Gibi, Tebi, etc. instead. Consult W/Pedia for more.
Think about it - more and more people are starting to get in the 'digital lifestyle', downloading movie trailers and the likes, whilst at the same time games are becoming larger and more complex.
Combine that with more people starting to run digital camcorders - hence, wanting to use their PC for video editing, and the arrival of HDTV, and it shouldn't be that hard to see that there is a growing demand for high capacity drives.
If anything, the demand is likely to become higher amongst the 'everyday user' because they are also the least likely run basic maintenance operations [I.e, Whacking the stuff you don't need anymore onto a DVD so it's not clogging up your bloody HDD].
I'll agree with the second paragraph, however.
That was the assertion I was responding to. I guess i should have quoted it directly instead of saying 'your last assertion'...
That is especially true if the two 'inventions' work based on the same operating principles - if they work on differing principles, they are in effect two different inventions, and can be patented independently of each other.
At least, that's the theory. Like I said, the implementation is broken, but not the idea behind it
As an aside, your last assertion is wrong - in the US patents system, if you can prove you invented it first, you can get the patent overturned and/or transferred. Europe (where I be) operates on a first to file system, but the US operates on a first to invent system.
And by doing so, conviently circumnavigate the patent. Muahahah.
That's more to do with borked implementation than the idea itself. In theory, if you invent something the patent should be yours. Other people bieng able to patent inventions that aren't theirs is a symptom of a broken system, not a broken ideal.
If multiple people 'invent' something from the ground up in a relatively short timeframe, then it can be argued that that invention must have been fairly obvious, in which case no-one should be granted a patent on it. Again, this is an area in which the system is currently broken, and needs fixing.
As it should, but just make sure your placing your ire in the right place.
Yup. The development costs that go into things such as new pharmacuticals take a long time to get back. If not for patents, the big drugs companies simply wouldn't bother doing research - because they'd be spending all that money only to get ripped off by a competitor. Patents are not a bad thing in themselves. The problem is that, particularly in the software world, they tend to get granted for obvious re-applications of existing technology. The intent behind patents is to protect innovators and give them time to recoup their costs. But the implementation is broken in that the people who pass these patents often lack the technical knowledge to be able to tell wether something is 'obvious' or not. On top of that, Lawyers often re-word the submissions to obsfucate what is actually bieng submitted to the point of making even simple ideas appear much more complicated than they actually are. Basically, the system just needs an almighty overhaul. I doubt that many people would (reasonably) argue that patents themselves are bad - even software patents have legitimate uses. It's just the implementation thats at fault.
If something is released to the public domain, then there is NO EULA, and no restrictions placed on use or distrubution whatsoever.
Public domain essentially means that the owner has released all rights in relation to the infomation - be it a book, a piece of software, a film, music, whatever.
In that sense, yes, the public domain is dyng. It's becoming increasingly rare for someone to distribute something without placing a restriction or two on its use - everyone wants their piece of the cake, so to speak.
That's a fan-made project, and one of many. It's not bieng made by EA, and it's unlikely that any fan-made projects will ever hit the spot the way Wc3 or Strike Commander did. Hell, a full on Wing commander/Strike commander game or a new System Shock would kick ass, but it's not going to happen. EA's only interested in direct-to-console games and the odd franchise like BF - and even that was rushed and released with bugs that should NEVER have got through QA.
Because it makes sense to make that point - If they've got a new proprietary implementation (which is what it sounds like) then chances are that they'll try to file for a patent for it in the near future - assuming they haven't done so already.
Although copyright is the problem that the great-grand-parent was pointing out, It's not likely to be the only problem that other developers would face trying to implement a compatible algorithm. Something to bear in mind, no?
We're is a contraction of 'we are', and is perfectly correct. There's nothing worse than trying to be a grammar Nazi and getting it wrong :)
but Software patents aren't valid in the EU, and copyright law is in a different state.
It's likely that you'll see it in other (open) apps soon enough - they'll just be based in Europe instead of the U.S.