You specifically stated an editorial. I have never seen any newspaper that had an editorial that did not have a disclaimer that stated since it was an editorial it did not reflect the views of the company as a whole. Thus, the editorial is a private citizen expressing their views, not representing the company.

As I said, an editorial is the same as a blog post edorsement. These are not the same as a campaign advertisement. However, could it be construed as a campaign advertisement? Perhaps, and if so, then they should be penalized for breaking the law.

The entire point here, is the effect that was bad from Citizens United was not who can make advertisements, but the fact that companies can donate unrestricted amounts of money to political campaigns and do not have to disclose it. Which results in the fact that corporations can effectively buy elections.

This, this, holy fucking crap this!

I keep seeing people arguing about cloning products and whatnot, and I keep saying this exact thing. While people call those who don't like patents "entitled", I say it's them who feel they are entitled to own ideas, simply because they were given the problem first...

I agree with you on that. Guess what, that's why there was a court case. The judge decided that the particular tone and content of the movie they made was nothing different than an elongated version of a 30 second television advertisement. If the decision was limited to the interpretation of the law and stated that the judge was wrong based on the content and tone of the movie that would have been fine. The problem I have is the expansion to remove any limitations on corporate spending with politics.

In the same way that a blog endorsement is different from a campaign advertisement. A private citizen making a statement (regardless of the platform) is not the same as an advertisement paid for from the general treasury of a corporation.

You have to look at the context and end results.

The reason why they were prohibited to show the movie they created, was that it was determined by the courts that it was not a "bona fide commercial activity" it was instead "an elongated version of a negative 30-second television spot." Which "served no purpose other than to discredit Clinton's candidacy for Presidency."

This is of course different from reporting, ostensibly, news from the NYT and CNN. Notice that the law does not say that they cannot publish anything they want about a candidate. It says that a corporation cannot use their general treasury to fund "electioneering communications." There's a very big difference from reporting a story and running a campaign advertisement.

There's a difference between promoting a political opinion and directly financing a campaign. If the people who have grouped together want to give money to a campaign, then they can do so of their own money and their own will. The corporation itself, the manifestation of the group, should not be able to.

You're arguing a complete straw man. I never said they weren't within their rights. I never said that what they are doing is illegal, nor even hinted at it.

I'm also not talking about things that are "OMFG why didn't I think of that." I'm talking about things that when that particular problem was put to me I went "So, why don't you just do this?" after thinking about it for roughly 5 or 10 minutes. Or problems that result in my reaction of "you mean they don't just do X? Why the hell not?" And then found out that those solutions are patented by MS, which is why they don't do it.

When there's prior art along with thousands of competent software engineers who all look at something like showing you the text in the browser while still loading the background images to make it seem faster (rather than just waiting until everything is downloaded) and go "well, duh!?" at the solution, then the patent should never have been granted.

I never said that they can't do what they are doing, or that it is illegal in anyway, I just said that I don't like it, and it's wrong for them to do it, for these patents to have been granted, etc. If you're going to argue with me, at least argue the point I am arguing, rather than a straw man.

No one said they broke any laws. And it's not just MS hate, I hate on pretty much every company that uses their patents offensively.

The patent isn't trivial because I call it that, the patent is trivial because an ordinary software engineer would find the solution to be obvious. These patents, along with many others, should never have been granted. It's more of an example why software patents are just a horrible idea. The implementation is not patented, the idea is, which is contrary to the purpose of patents.

In addition, just because they have a patent does not mean they must assert the patent just to make a buck (use it offensively). Microsoft makes more money from Android phones than from their own Windows phones, by asserting trivial patents that should not have been granted. Regardless the legality, it's what many would call being a troll.

Since we're just discussing microsoft here, let's take a look at the patents that Microsoft is using:

• Placing a loading status icon in the content area of a browser
• Browser recognizes background images and loads the text first so it loads faster
• Putting controls into the OS for all applications to use rather than tabbed controls on an application by application basis
• Using a handle to change the size of text for a selection region
• Storing and displaying non-modifiable annotations to text

• • Please tell me how those aren't common sense things that are trivial to be patented. You can't because any engineer worth his salt will see the problem that needs to be solved and find the obvious solution, which is each of these. Not to mention the prior art.

This is copyright, not patents. Prior Art means nothing.

How is reading a book different from playing a video game? Both are a hobby that one can partake in that provides enjoyment. Both take a lot of work to produce. But one is referred to as an "adolescent mentality" and the other is not, that makes no sense.

Did you know the average gamer is 21 - 35 years old? You going to say that everyone in the entire industry has an adolescent mentality? Give me a break...