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Comment Re:Apples' response to the reprimand (Score 1) 241

That's not what the order said.

From TFA:
"Within seven days of the date of this Order [18th July 2012] [Apple] shall at its own expense (a) post in a font size no smaller than Arial 11pt the notice specified in Schedule 1 to this order on the homepage of its UK website ... as specified in Schedule 1 to this Order, together with a hyperlink to the Judgment of HHJ Birss QC dated 9th July 2012, said notice and hyperlink to remain displayed on [Apple's] websites for a period of six months"

The "notice" was the apology, and was supposed to be posted on the homepage. In addition to that notice, they were supposed to include a link to the full judgment (kinda like a Source link in a blog post). The mandated link was to the judgment, not to the notice itself.

Comment Re:That's the way the cookie crumbles (Score 1) 455

I don't know if they can issue injunctions, but often people will represent themselves in small claims court. Especially since the opposing party would almost certainly not show up, you would have an essentially guaranteed successful case without even having to hardly argue your case. Perhaps this could get you legal action while minimizing the cost?

Comment Re:I just block (Score 5, Insightful) 716

Things of value require money, and money has to come from somewhere. Are you really saying you would prefer to pay for content directly, rather than to have an unobtrusive and moderately relevant ad that you can easily ignore?

Here on Slashdot, we have the alternative option to give our own contributions + good behavior, measured in the form of karma. That doesn't work on all sites, though, and even Slashdot would be unsustainable if no one viewed the ads; the only reason their model is sustainable is because positive-karma contributions presumably increase the value of the site, thus increasing its viewership, thus increasing the total number of ad-views enough to keep the site afloat. If everyone on the Internet adblocked, Slashdot would lose that revenue stream.

There's no such thing as a free lunch. If you don't want to be profiled by having your online behavior tracked, and you don't want to pay for the product (see outrage over NYT paywall), and you don't want to view ads... what of similar value would you prefer to give?

Comment Re:patent office = fail (Score 1) 362

The USPTO doesn't really try to determine whether or not your patent is actually valid before granting it. They just do a sanity check on it: is this idea theoretically, in a vacuum, patentable? They leave it up to the rest of the world to actually contest the patent, if for some reason (e.g., prior art, or "hey wait, I already have that patent!") the patent conflicts with something already in the real world.

In other words, if thinking is required, USPTO says "not our job."

Comment Re:A good start... (Score 1) 64

I'm not sure I want them to invent that. I can certainly see what would appear to be the utility of it, but most of the more insidious aspects of the dementiae come from degeneration in other areas (esp prefrontal, nigrostriatal, or broader (nonhippocampal) temporal areas). The loss of memory, while upsetting, really only serves as the harbinger (for some like Alzheimer's and frontotemporal dementia, anyway; for others like Parkinson's it comes after some of the other effects have already set in).

Once you consider that, you have to start wondering whether the ability to surgically (or even intravenously, once nanobots advance a bit further) inject memories into others might have more risks than benefits...

Comment Re:Listening to People outside the Norm (Score 3, Informative) 93

You are right in the sense he should not be "congratulated" for his illness. However, I would take caution before labeling the creativity and the illness as "true and true, but unrelated." By modern criteria, he very well may have had bipolar disorder with psychotic features (he did get diagnosed with schizophrenia, but back then so did everyone else who "acted crazy" -- delusions and psychosis fairly commonly accompany severe bipolar as we diagnose it nowadays). If so, then actually his periods of brilliance would have actually been his (already highly talented) brain building up and progressively overactivating to generate an immense sense of clarity and focus (the common description of the initial stages of mania) prior to devolving into the disorganization, delusions, and often bizarre behaviors of full mania (with or without psychosis, depending on the person).

In fact, this is exactly what makes bipolar so hard to treat -- it is basically like a drug, in that the "highs" can result in great success (and, even independent of the happiness about that success, it causes euphoria as well), but the destruction that occurs as a result of the behavior during those highs (as well as the severely depressed lows that often follow) generally end up tearing a person's world apart. Even so, the person often cannot see this and will completely refuse treatment, because (like a drug) they are basically addicted to their condition, and with the delusions of grandeur that often accompany the disorder further exaggerating (in their own mind) those periods of success... who wouldn't be?

That's why it might be worthwhile to take pause before laughing people like Charlie Sheen off the stage. 10 days after John Nash wrote this letter, once his brain had accelerated just a little bit further and beyond the boundaries of organized thought, Nash may very well have been just as "bi-winning," and merely had it manifest in a slightly different way.

Comment Re:Was it "mint" for health? (Score 1) 196

That last question is probably exactly why it closed. Remember that Health came out quite some time ago, back before Google's recent series of privacy fiascos. They probably thought they'd be able to get away with completely anonymizing the data (even more so than with search) then using it for ads. After all the Buzz, wifi-gathering, etc., though, legal probably gave that a big "hell no." With the original business model killed, maybe they were hoping they would get vendors that would pay to plug data into or pull data out of Health once it got some momentum (or maybe this was the original plan all along), or maybe hoped hospitals would want to use it in an enterprise, Google Apps kind of way... but nobody significant really took the bait. Either way, as others have pointed out, whatever the plan for ultimately monetizing this was, clearly it didn't work out. I agree, though, with the general sentiment: a universal PHR would've been a great step forward in health IT, and it is very sad to see one of the most promising prospects for that fade to blak. If you've worked in health IT at all, you know that this is a field that desperately needs a breath of fresh air.

Comment Nuisance, Not Crisis (Score 5, Informative) 213

I work at a trauma center, and we go to diversion all the time. It happens whenever the ER gets backed up to the point that the patients would be better served by going to a less-full ER than by coming to ours, even if that ER is a little further away. This happens at least twice weekly, although perhaps not as often as other, less busy ERs. Yes, the virus undoubtedly brought them to this clogged state much faster, but this isn't nearly the crisis the summary (or the article it is summarizing) makes it out to be.

Comment Re:"It's okay when we do it" (Score 2) 271

I don't think many of us would have supported this if it came out of nowhere. It didn't even come out of a response to Apple suing them. It came about because Samsung tried to trust the courts to issue the only ruling that made any sense at all... And instead they got their product banned from sale. What do you expect them to do, sit back and say, "man, this sucks"? They are only playing by the rules that a major first-world country defined, and even then only because they really have no other choice.

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