Mod up for Obama reference.

The new formula is introduced before the expiration of the first patent. Patients who have been "weened" over to the new formula (via, for example, artificially limiting the supply of the old formula) will be less likely to go back to the old formula when it becomes generic.

So yes, the generic manufacturers will be able to use the old formula; they just end up with a smaller market of customers for it, at least initially.

> I'm sorry, that's just an insane ruling. REQUIRING a company to manufacture a specific product???

As opposed to granting them a limited monopoly? I haven't read the ruling, but I rather think that the company would have the choice to not manufacture the old version but instead have the patent revoked so competitors could manufacture it.

The practice of tweaking drugs like that is called evergreening.

(I'd only heard about that term being used for the pharmaceutical industry practice, but the linked Wikipedia article implies it is a general term for all patents.)

> because children in Africa are starving

Nice strawman, there.

However, reading (or willingness to actually address the point raised) fail.

Oh, and I like the use of "known criminals go free", as if it isn't actually written into the Constitution (due process) that yes, eventually (most) criminals need to be "go free" after they have served their sentences. Don't know what that logical fallacy is, though: appeal to fear? Appeal to moral panic?

> "much bigger deal" doesn't make much sense unless you are distributing limited resources

Last time I checked, all resources are limited, and growing more limited as the world population expands. If the police force is not suffering from having limited resources, it probably is a good idea to check whether it should be downsized, and the savings invested in other areas of government which are suffering from limited resources, for example, Social Security or education.

> Due Dilligence was never a part of the Creative Commons License.

Unfortunately, give how copyright works, it's impossible to do due diligence with respect to fair use, if you want to push it to the limit.

> But when you're paid to represent someone else

Obviously, then, whoever hired this guy failed utterly. Just kidding. I find it much more likely that whoever hired him, didn't hire him based on the "15 minutes" of public representation he'd end up making at the end of the mission.

And therefore, whoever decided, not that long ago, that he should be the one to be a public representative, failed. It was probably some PHB who doesn't know any of the technical staff well enough to know that this guy needed to be carefully managed in this particular regard.

> and not an attention-seeking douchenozzle

Do you know him personally? Because my guess is that he's probably one of those technically adept, socially inadept people we often meet in our line of work. Especially since I saw a headline that he broke down and cried when he apologized? You'd think that "an attention-seeking douchenozzle" would have just used the apology for... more exposure. Of course, it could have been an act, I guess.

> You're just really not on your A game today, are you?

Ad hominem and/or irrelevant.

> Or, perhaps, you really want to Oracle to lose, but can't think of any better reason than because "I don't like Oracle".

I actually have not stated, in this particular discussion, a preference for whether I think API's are or should be protected, nor have I stated any particular aversion to Oracle.

> I don't like Oracle either,

Oh, there you go again --- assuming things which don't follow from the previous discourse. I wonder if you'll do it again in your next reply?

> but that's a really crapy way to set national policy, policy that will affect many, many other situations.

Have to agree totally with you there.

Yes, I saw that you stated that, which made it stick out even more when you immediately turn around and assume what you've just questioned, without qualification.

Judging by your reaction, I don't even think you did it intentionally. A pity, really. In my eyes, the language of the last paragraph would be wonderfully disingenuous, if it had been an intentional attempt to attain its actual impact.

> If I want my valuable property to be protected from unlawful taking,

Wow, very nice. I don't manage to identify the exact logical fallacies you've invoked. However, it is obvious that you're implicitly assuming the claim in question: whether or not an API is "property", i.e., protected by copyright. In addition, you also appear to be making the bad analogy between copyright infringement and theft (of physical property), but you manage to be a bit ambiguous about it, so that the phrasing can set off a deep emotional reaction without being absolutely incorrect.

Masterful, indeed.

> So if "intellectual property" is a meaningless term

The poster you're arguing with did not claim it is a "meaningless term", he claimed that (practically) no legal argument can cite "intellectual property" as being its basis, since the diverse branches of IP law are... diverse. He didn't mean "intellectual property" in the sense of that clause, just like he wouldn't preclude discussing the fact that a defendant had taken a course in "IP law" as a justification that infringement by said defendant was flagrant or intentional.

He meant that no lawyer would (or rather, should) say "we are owed money because the other party infringed on our intellectual property" without specifying exactly what specific types of IP were infringed upon and how.

> Think designing an easy to use API is trrivial? ...

Yes, good point. Designing a good API can be difficult and creative. Unfortunately, this has nothing to do with whether it currently is protected by copyright (cf. creating a good recipe, or a fashion design), nor does it shed light on whether it would benefit society if were protected.

> So clearly the API was worth a lot to Google.

Which has nothing to do if it should be eligible for protection by copyright.

> It's simple to make an API. It's actually rather difficult to make a good one.

A good point, but totally off-topic with respect to whether it deserves protection under copyright. Lots of things which are difficult and creative are not protected, and there is no good evidence that protecting them would benefit society.