A wedge shape for a laptop is just an idea. How can this be patented? Ideas are not supposed to be patentable. "If nature has made any one thing less susceptible than all others of exclusive property, it is the action of the thinking power called an idea." - Thomas Jefferson

"If nature has made any one thing less susceptible than all others of exclusive property, it is the action of the thinking power called an idea." - Thomas Jefferson

cold fjord -

I believe that my facts about Iran are correct. I am not an expert on this, but I have read several articles about it from different sources. For example, the wikipedia article explains that MI6 and the CIA arranged for a coup of Iran's first democratically elected government, and that their primary reason for doing this was to ensure that cheap oil would continue to flow from Iran to England and the US. If that is true, and I were an Iranian, I would have a boiling outrage against the US. And if it is true, then the Iranian revolution - when they took over our embassy there - was indeed a legitimate revolution, against the US. I don't approve of the government that they have there now, but if the wikipedia article is true about Operation AJAX, then we can blame ourselves primarily for what Iran has become.

You are right about the Soviet Union. But I was talking about the US. We did terrible things to compete with the Soviet Union's terrible things. But that is an explanation: it is not an excuse. If two gangs are fighting, and one gang shoots an innocent child bystander in the crossfire, that gang is still responsible and guilty of killing the child: the fact that it was fighting with another gang is an explanation: it is not an excuse. To the child's family, the gang that shot their child is 100% guilty, and its anger toward that gang is justified. In our struggle against the Soviet Union, we were one of those gangs, and Iran was a bystander.

But my understanding is that the primary motivation for Operation AJAX was oil: not a struggle against the USSR. And oil has again and again been the reason for our meddling in the Middle East, and it might be our undoing. I wonder what the price of gasoline would be if we included all of the costs of defending our presence in the Middle East, as well as the geopolitical costs of our interference there, as well as the cost of the "war on terror" that is our response to the terrorism that has grown out of our meddling in the Middle East?

Yeah, we just overthrow governments and set up their elected officials to take the blame: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1953_Iranian_coup_d'%C3%A9tat

Insightful. I was wondering if you would point that out.

I do not know how the MPAA operates, but I would expect that a policy group would be an advisory group that provides analysis and options to the board or executive leadership, but that final policy choices would be made by the leadership and board, and that it would be up to the policy group to draft appropriate language to reflect those policy choices. But again, I don't have any insight at all into how the MPAA operates.

Ultimately, the people who set an organization's policies are (or should be) the board and executive leadership team.

That is disappointing. Thanks for these links. Remember though that people often have to represent the viewpoints of the organizations that they work for. I guess we'll have to wait and see how things evolve.

You got the name wrong.

I have known Paul Brigner since the 1990s and he is one of the most ethical, intelligent, and fair minded people I know. I expect he brought some of that to the MPAA - although I do not actually know what his impact there was. I do know that he is deserving of the benefit of the doubt, and I anticipate that he will be thoughtful, progressive, and fair-minded in his new position at ISOC. And I say this as someone who strongly supports Internet freedom and openness.

Given that solar energy is so plentiful, and that it will likely be widely available in the time frame that fusion power will be available, would it make more sense to apply the expertise of scientists into using fusion for spacecraft propulsion, which is an application that absolutely requires concentrated and compact energy? It could be a game-changer for travel within our solar system.

In addition, could the techniques used for fusion (both magnetic and inertial confinement) be applied to fission propulsion, for compressing fissile pellets to critical density? And would that be more within reach of current technology than the very high temperature and pressure needed for fusion? Why is no one researching that? It would literally open up the solar system for us.

Yes, true. But my concern is the continual creep of surveillance. If the government sniffs all communication, it can detect my transaction with Amazon, just as it can detect words in an email. We are losing our freedom in the name of the "war on terror" - and with almost no resistance. All of the soccer moms are more than happy to "feel secure" knowing the government is watching over them....

Indeed, traceability of all of one's transactions makes complete surveillance possible. The government would be able to know what books we are reading, as well as everything that we buy on the Internet or from anywhere.

Still, if the US can extradite Vladimir Zdorovenin and Gary McKinnon (let alone, Julian Assange) for their purported violation of US laws while outside the US, then the US should be able to extradite the execs of this company. Right?

Isn't this a violation of the DMCA?

Very insightful. I suspect that your reading list theory is the explanation.

Collins has obviously gamed the system in some way. I have looked through the "highlighted" passages, and they are not so memorable that they would be highlighted as often as claimed. I don't know how she did it (software maybe?), but her books have more highlights than longstanding works that have much more thought-provoking and memorable content. It is somehow a scam.

Then you should post something about that, in response to the question, "What do we do when the Internet Mob is Wrong?" - unless these private forums are too few and insignificant that they don't really matter.