or, company B sues Government D because its seizure of the assets of Company A in a manner which has turned out not to be according to law has resulted in Company A being unable to fulfil its obligations to Company B, causing company B financial loss.

Note, I wasn't saying allowing discrimination for arbitrary reasons was a good idea. I was attempting to make eyegone face up to the reality of what he was proposing. I think all discrimination for arbitrary reasons is bad (especially if you're supposed to be a professional physician, or similar) and don't like this watered-down 'protected classes' list idea which effectively authorises arbitrary dicrimination against everyone else.

I disagree. Why should there be a "barring discrimination on prohibited grounds, of course" get-out? Either a doctor should be free to refuse to treat anyone, and be an asshat about it if [s]he wants, or they shouldn't.

did you actually read the article you linked all the way through? No-one is saying 'it would break the internet for the patent to be valid, therefore it isn't'. They're saying 'it would break the internet for the plantiffs to win this case, so they shouldn't'. [in the past tense, obviously, since the case has now been concluded]

Further, the very last section of that article:

supports the view that a legal ruling which would have ridiculous consequences ought not to be made simply because the consequences would be ridiculous.

It's like a sick joke - for it to be a broadly known and utilised fact that courts are clearly inconsistent as to how they handle cases from place to place, and nothing being done about it.

I mean, can't they implement some sort of moderation (and meta-moderation) system for judges and start tossing out the ones who fail?

unfortunately, there doesn't seem to be any further jurisidictional test than asking the requesting country "do you claim jurisdiction?"

c) i) "I know, we've had a spy in the Manhatten Project for years"

it's a nice idea, but I can't help thinking it's not going to produce a significant enough saving to be worth the trouble, or the risk.

the buyer, because they're deemed to have accepted the goods, and have failed to make payment. The buyer then makes a claim against paypal which may or may not be successful ("you didn't have to use our dispute resolution service or follow our instructions, not our fault that you smashed your violin").

I build my own machines, so it's entirely about the money.
Even buying the 'OEM' version, you still end up paying a huge amount for Windows. Windows 7 Professional will set you back £110 - that's an upgrade from an i5 to an i7 AND 6GB of RAM.

However, I won't be putting XP on any new machine I build, so I suppose my next upgrade (with begruding purchase of a new version of Windows) will just have to wait until this one really can't cope.