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Authored by: Anonymous on Friday, May 25 2012 @ 09:30 AM EDT |
It appears to me that, given a skilled team of lawyers, creating shills would be
as easy as giving them advance access to one's own briefs.
At least it
occured to me when reading the Oracle brief, "ok, you could see it like that".
It is just when reading the no-nonsense Google brief that you realize all the
holes that the Oracle argument has skillfully been spun around.
But give
someone just access to your presentation of the facts, and he'll get
biased more than reasonable.
Of course, having to realise the amount to
which one is susceptible to manipulation of that kind is somewhat depressing: it
means that practiced justice likely depends more on the balance of lawyer
quality than one would like to think.
In the address of the jury in "To Kill
a Mockingbird" by Harper Lee, Atticus Finch states:
But there is
one way in this country in which all men are created equal- there is one human
institution that makes a pauper the equal of a Rockefeller, the stupid man the
equal of an Einstein, and the ignorant man the equal of any college president.
That institution, gentlemen, is a court. It can be the Supreme Court of the
United States or the humblest J.P. court in the land, or this honourable court
which you serve. Our courts have their faults, as does any human institution,
but in this country our courts are the great levellers, and in our courts all
men are created equal.
It is sobering to realise by the effects on
oneself that this equality of men does bend under the hands of lawyers
who are experts in their job.[ Reply to This | Parent | # ]
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Authored by: Anonymous on Friday, May 25 2012 @ 12:23 PM EDT |
Jessica Barba was suspended from her New York school over a
fictional video character who commits suicide as a result of bullying.
A US
teenager suspended from school for creating a fictional character who committed
suicide to lift awareness of bullying should have been commended.
That is
the view of anti-bullying expert, Adjunct Professor Ken Rigby, from the
University of South Australia.
It would be good to get all the
details on this incident. Sadly I don't have time to track them down as it as I
am in the middle of planting season here on the farm. It sure sounds like a
case of overreaction from the school.
Article: Teen punished for idea to fight bullying [ Reply to This | Parent | # ]
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Authored by: Anonymous on Friday, May 25 2012 @ 01:51 PM EDT |
It's legal armageddon as NBC, CBS and Fox sue Dish Network over its
new DVR feature allowing users to automatically skip ads, and in response, Dish
sues them right back - and adds in ABC for good measure.
Graeme McMillan, Digital Trends
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Authored by: Anonymous on Friday, May 25 2012 @ 03:07 PM EDT |
linky
Personally, I think Amazon would be a better fit for the
technology Opera has developed.[ Reply to This | Parent | # ]
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Authored by: Anonymous on Friday, May 25 2012 @ 03:38 PM EDT |
Google has revealed that Microsoft has asked it to remove 500.000 links
Microsoft deems infringing.
link
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Authored by: Ed L. on Friday, May 25 2012 @ 05:00 PM EDT |
Charging developers for Visual Studio is, in effect, making
developers pay money for the privilege of making Windows worth buying. And yet,
without third-party software, Windows itself has next to no value; it doesn't
seem right to make programmers pay just to be able to make Microsoft's operating
system valuable...
There is no upside to this decision. It is
immensely
bad.
--- Real Programmers mangle their own memory. [ Reply to This | Parent | # ]
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Authored by: Anonymous on Friday, May 25 2012 @ 10:57 PM EDT |
The “blackout” of Web sites to protest the Stop Online Piracy Act
(SOPA) in January was an unprecedented show of Internet solidarity against bad
legislation.
But with new net-threatening measures like ACTA and CISPA
popping out of Congress on a practically monthly basis, one online entrepreneur
and a group of net activists want to enable regular SOPA-style mass protests at
the push of a button.
Alexis Ohanian, the 29-year old founder of social news
site Reddit, has partnered with the online advocacy group Fight for the Future
to create what they’re calling the “Internet Defense League.”
Andy Greenberg, Forbes[ Reply to This | Parent | # ]
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Authored by: Ed L. on Saturday, May 26 2012 @ 03:19 AM EDT |
So grant them their
patent
already.
--- Real Programmers mangle their own memory. [ Reply to This | Parent | # ]
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Authored by: Anonymous on Saturday, May 26 2012 @ 11:35 AM EDT |
When is a trademark not a trademark? According to a new lawsuit, the answer may
be when it becomes so well-known, it ceases to be a name and becomes a verb...
http://paidcontent.org/2012/05/25/man-sues-to-have-google-declared-a-generic-wor
d/[ Reply to This | Parent | # ]
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Authored by: Gringo_ on Saturday, May 26 2012 @ 12:52 PM EDT |
It is hard to understand how the NASDAQ could screw up
FaceBook's IPO so
badly...
The turmoil caused the four big market-makers
for
Facebook's stock, Knight Capital Group, Citigroup's
Automated Trading Desk,
Citadel Securities, and UBS AG to
lose around $115 million between
them.
The Reuter's article details the
confusion, but as yet there is no clear
explanation
forthcoming from NASDAQ. However, anecdotal reports yield
some
insights...
Orders that were supposed to be processed in
3
milliseconds were taking 5 milliseconds, said one person
familiar with exchange
operations. This proved to be a major
problem: In the extra two milliseconds
new orders flooded
in, thwarting the system's ability to establish an opening
price for the stock and leading to a backup in unprocessed
orders.
It is hard to understand how it could all boil
down to a
difference in processing times that either way are a
fraction of the
time it takes to blink your eyes.
What kind of hardware is NASDAQ using?
We know their
computers are insecure. Perhaps this is an indication they
use
Windows? Maybe an unreported intrusion was at the heart
of their problems? Back
in February the WSJ reported...
Hackers have repeatedly penetrated
the
computer network of the company that runs the Nasdaq Stock
Market during
the past year, and federal investigators are
trying to identify the
perpetrators and their purpose,
according to people familiar with the
matter.
For sure, we will hear more about this in the days
to
come, and undoubtedly there will be some law suites launched
by companies
short-changed by NASDAQ's screw up, unless
NASDAQ willingly accepts all
liability for losses. [ Reply to This | Parent | # ]
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Authored by: Anonymous on Saturday, May 26 2012 @ 01:47 PM EDT |
From
www.washingtonpost.com/business/technology/jury-google-did-not-infringe-oracle-p
atents-with-android:
Oracle: "Oracle presented overwhelming
evidence at trial that Google knew it would fragment and damage Java. We plan to
continue to defend and uphold Java’s core write once run anywhere principle and
ensure it is protected for the nine million Java developers and the community
that depend on Java compatibility."
Knowing that one would would
fragment and damage an unwanted competitor. This is what the software market has
been about all the time. Yes, even long before Microsoft entered. Yes, it has
been around for a very long time. Even before Apple blatantly copied Xerox gui;
no not in a copy-machine.
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Authored by: Anonymous on Saturday, May 26 2012 @ 05:40 PM EDT |
"A new report indicates that Facebook, fresh off its initial public offering,
is in talks to acquire Web browser maker Opera Software" link [ Reply to This | Parent | # ]
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Authored by: Anonymous on Saturday, May 26 2012 @ 08:10 PM EDT |
Aisha Mustafa, who has entered the active research area of
spacecraft propulsion by her newly invented device, told the governmental
EGYNews agency that she patented her invention last February in the Egyptian
Academy of Scientific Research and Technology (ASRT).
Mustafa’s propelling
device is based upon a scientific mix between quantum physics, space technology,
chemical reactions and electrical sciences.
Islam Mitsraym, OnIslam.net[ Reply to This | Parent | # ]
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Authored by: Anonymous on Sunday, May 27 2012 @ 04:15 AM EDT |
OK, here's "Legal Match" referral service on patenting software. This is the
conventional wisdom. No case law, no statutes cited. This is what we're up
against.
Can I Patent Software?
Although software functions
by using algorithms and mathematics, it may be patentable if it produces some
concrete and useful result. However, what cannot be patented is software whose
only purpose is to perform mathematical operations. Thus, software that
converts one set of numbers to another will not be patentable; but software that
converts one set of numbers to another to make rubber will be patentable.
[ Reply to This | Parent | # ]
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Authored by: artp on Sunday, May 27 2012 @ 12:06 PM EDT |
The New York Times has an article entitled
With
Personal
Data in Hand, Thieves File Early and Often that is an
absolute
hoot. The IRS is sending refund checks for
fraudulent returns based on identity
theft to addresses
that do not match the address of the person being
defrauded.
OK, got that firmly in mind? Now lets switch over to a
Techdirt
article on cybersecurity efforts in Congress:
Senator
Ron Wyden Slams
Cybersecurity Legislation Proposals For Eroding Trust &
Privacy.
Do you really want the people who can't even mail the check
to the right address making rules on how we secure our own
domains? Does the
government really know so little about its
citizens that it doesn't even know
where they live, let
alone how to verify that they are really the person who
should be getting that check. These checks add up to
billions, by the way. Yet
they want to keep track of every
little detail about us. Perhaps to send off to
their
corporate friends who can't be bothered to do due diligence
or research
who to sue for copyright infringement?
Did your brain explode when you tried
to reconcile those two
articles? It should have.
Don't forget to remind
your
CongressCritter about this mismatch when you talk to them.
If this were a
political post, which it is not. After those
two articles, the space-time
fabric should be out of
commission for at least a
millenium.
--- Userfriendly on WGA server outage:
When you're chained to an oar you don't think you should go down when the galley
sinks ? [ Reply to This | Parent | # ]
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Authored by: Anonymous on Sunday, May 27 2012 @ 02:25 PM EDT |
Memorial Day is a federal holiday observed annually in the United States on
the last Monday of May. Memorial Day is a day of remembering the men and women
who died while serving in the United States Armed Forces.
Formerly known as
Decoration Day, it originated after the American Civil War to commemorate the
fallen Union soldiers of the Civil War. (Southern ladies' organizations and
southern schoolchildren had decorated Confederate graves in Richmond and other
cities during the Civil War, but each region had its own date. Most dates were
in May.) By the 20th century Memorial Day had been extended to honor all
Americans who have died in all wars. - Wikipedia
The Real
War 1939-1945
As originally published in The Atlantic Monthly
August 1989
by
Paul Fussell
On its fiftieth anniversary, how should we think
of the Second World War? What is its contemporary meaning? One possible meaning,
reflected in every line of what follows, is obscured by that oddly minimizing
term "conventional war." With our fears focused on nuclear destruction, we tend
to be less mindful of just what conventional war between modern industrial
powers is like. This article describes such war, in a stark, unromantic
manner [ Reply to This | Parent | # ]
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