Another big problem with the Elsevier model is that often after fully reading an academic paper, you realize that it is not very useful. I estimate that for every 10 academic papers I read, only about one is a worthwhile "keeper". So the true cost to find a useful academic paper, using the Elsevier model, is actually hundreds of dollars.

What is really annoying is that the US patent and trademark office (USPTO) still requires many of its users to use browsers running Java (not Javascript) for many applications. These days, that means running either Firefox or IE (classic). Persons using iOS or Android are out of luck.

Can quantum entanglement methods be used to allow a web browser, while running an ad-blocker, to access Forbes? This might be real progress.

My first impression is that this does not look like a good day for Microsoft. Is this back to Windows RT? That worked so well last time.

The missing ingredient here is a sponsor. Having said that, this could be a pretty cheap mission as these things go. NASA would be nice, but the cost would be low enough for various private industry or research groups to be involved. Perhaps several could band together and split the costs.

Note that this probably refers to civilian encryption being accelerated by seven years. Most likely many sensitive US government databases, such as the personnel database, still have the password "admin", with no encryption at all.

Google has been highly influential in at least one area -- patents. The head of the USPTO and various high level patent judges are from Google. Google doesn't like software patents, and by some coincidence, software patents are being rejected right and left. So I think that they are getting their money's worth.

Seriously -- due to some bug, my "start" button disappeared from Windows 10 after a few months use. Looking online, I see this is a common problem, and none of the suggested fixes worked. The only alternative was to "nuke" my Windows installation or install Classic Shell. Now using Classic Shell...

There are a lot of short sellers who are obligated to deliver TESLA shares in the future at a fixed price. Unless the stock tanks, they will be in trouble. In this case I don't see that the article writer disclosed any short interest, but I also didn't see any disclaimer of any interest of any sort.

The basic concept sounds like a win-win for everyone. GSK gets to save money and act like the good guy, while the poorest countries get inexpensive drugs. Obviously the devil is in the details, but I am at a loss to think of a better solution. If you want new drugs, then at least the richer countries must pay their part of the development costs (a great way to totally kill new drug development is to deny patents everywhere). GSK's solution is similar to a progressive drug development tax.

Personally, I think that the main reason why the Feds backed off is that they realized that if the all writs act ever gets to the Supreme Court, it is going down. Ironically a different part of the same 1789 judiciary act was declared unconstitutional by the Supreme Court in Marbury v. Madison (1803). This was the classic case where the Supreme Court struck down an act of Congress for the first time. Apple is an organization with enough power and credibility to take this case to the Supreme Court. So it made sense to back off and preserve the "validity" of the all writs act for future use.

So it is more of an unauthorized practice of law sort of thing...

Ironically, it may be Kik's attorneys that acted improperly here. Trademark law allows similar names to be reused for different fields of use, so long as there is not a possibility of confusion/loss of market. Here I seriously doubt that anyone would confuse a Javascript module with a chat application. So quite possibly this was a bogus assertion in the first place, which ended up causing serious damage to a lot of folks.

Instead of an "FDA for Data and Algorithms", I would recommend a non-government testing agency instead. Many of these exist already (think UL, "consumer reports", or European "notified bodies"). This requires that the industry agree on certain testing standards, and post on their websites when the algorithms have been certified. This could bring a lot of benefits without the drawbacks of government control.

Good thinking Maricopa County! Cue the lawsuits regarding disrespecting grand jury confidentiality in 3, 2. 1...