I'm not convinced any companies, even patent trolls, are truly acting irresponsibly. It's impossible to know if a patent is/isn't valid without going to court. And it's impossible to know if a patent is/isn't being infringed without going to court.

This leads to disagreements between patent holders and potential licensors about just how much should be paid in any licensing agreement, or whether any licensing fees should even be paid at all. To make matters worse, the courts are making stupid decisions all the time.

In my mind, this is a clear situation where we need to blame whoever wrote patent law in the first place for failing to predict the mess they created. And blame more recent government(s) for failing to do anything about it.

But how to solve it? That's the trillion dollar question.

Nope. It's a choice. Apple is choosing to strangle the competition while they have the strong hand. Microsoft chooses to set up a protection racket with companies that infringe on their vaguely-defined Linux patents. In contrast, IBM and Google (generally?) don't pursue patent suits unless they're attacked first. (At least, that's the impression that's been put forth by tech journalism.)

There is a market for sub 300 dollar notebooks.... they are called notebook computers.....I bought a 15 inch Toshiba notebook for my wife... LCD screen, 250 gig HD, 4 gigs of memory, Decent graphics and an AMD cpu for $279. Why would I bother with a POS netbook when I can get a fully functioning PC with a sane resolution?

You make a good point -- I think that Canon is a lot better than some other manufacturers in this respect, but I just checked and their newest DSLRs are using a different battery which doesn't look like it'll work with my current camera. I think that having standardized battery types would be great -- it would be nice if batteries were as interchangeable as, say SD or CF cards. I see no reason why that isn't possible. That said, getting a hold of a CF card in 10 years may be tricky as well; guess we'll have to wait and see.

And i find it hard to believe that when they were filming their latest commercial they didn't notice what it actually sounds like when they're singing "walking in a 4g wonderland."

I would add to that the requirement that any law can only be presented to the committee after the President has signed it, and they have 2 weeks to approve or disapprove. At the end of two weeks, the law defaults to "disapproved".

Good luck getting monstrous laws passed under that regime!

If the RIAA wants their property protected without paying for it directly, then I suggest they start paying property taxes like everybody else who relies on the military or police to protect their property.

The best systems are ones that intrinsically converge to fairness -- e.g. the best way for two people who want cake to cut cake? One person cuts, the other chooses; the system enforces fairness. The best way for intellectual property to be protected? The content owners can pick whatever value they think their content is worth, then pay 4% property tax per year like everybody else. If a million people infringe on their property, each person is only liable for one-millionth of this taxable amount. The competing forces (A. company wants lower taxes so wants to claim their property is worthless, and B. company wants maximum awarded damages and so wants to claim their property is worth trillions) will force the company to self-assess a fair price. If their property is REALLY worth trillions, the company won't hesitate to pay 4% ($40 billion) per year in taxes. If the company isn't willing to pay more than $2 million per year in taxes to protect their property, then it's only worth $50 million, and so if they sue 50,000 people, each person is only liable for a maximum of $1,000. If the company isn't willing to pay more than $0 per year in taxes to protect their property, then their property is worthless and there's no penalty to infringe.

I quit sending job-applications after age 45!

!

know why?

- I even didnt get an answer any more when saying how old I am

When I faked my age to 35 and still sent my list of features, they eagerly invited me for interviews

to withdraw with an: sorry we already filled the job

not saying: with someone cheaper!

For anyone else who missed the end of the Celebrity Apprentice because of the speech, Hope got fired.