Bell Labs won a Nobel prize for the transistor for work that they did before anybody knew whether it was anything more than a cute electronics trick. I don't see anything of that level coming out of Microsoft Research.
The beauty of the old Bell Labs was that to a certain extent, basic research was OK and appreciated. I couldn't imagine any corporate lab today producing anything close to the quality and quantity of fantastic work that came out of Bell Labs. Google certainly has the resources to do it, but the big question is would the shareholders appreciate the long-term value of such an asset?
"Kissenger is a robot with highly-sensitive and motor-actuated lips, which you can use to transmit a kiss to another Kissenger."
Did anyone else get the image of making out with a robot with the appearance of Henry Kissinger? Or am I the crazy one here...
You're not crazy, you're just showing your age. Most of the people developing social media technology these days have no idea what Henry Kissinger looks or sounds like, and they totally don't get the Monty Python tune...
You have better legs than Hitler and bigger tits than Cher
I'm sorry, but pendantic flair is an example of an oxymoron, not irony.
Does this mean we (and whoever created our HR software) have to sue IBM? Or can we just ask for a cut when they start collecting license fees on this patent?
No. It's a valid US patent.
It means that IBM can sue whoever created your HR software and get an injunction to stop its sale in the US. Whoever makes your HR software would then need to fight IBM and a team of wicked sharp lawyers in court, and convince a bunch of dumb-fucks in East Texas, who have nothing better to do for three months than sit in a jury for $12 / day, that the patent isn't valid do to prior art or obviousness.
Welcome to the giant cluster fuck that is the US patent system.
OMG! It's just like Firefox!
And it makes our women AWESOME.
Not sure about awesome, but definitely scary. Case in point, Michele Bachmann.
My big concern is that the world is full of dumbasses. A dumbass cop will try to force some stubborn dumbass to move. The stubborn dumbass will sit there with the beam in his eye until the damage is permanent while the dumbass cop will keeps on pointing the beam. I believe that the technical term for this phenomenon is dumbass positive feedback.
Unless the laser is a tightly focused dot(in which case it won't be much use against a crowd) its intensity will vary rapidly with distance. In order to not be a complete toy at operationally useful ranges, it will very likely be downright dangerous at closer ones. Luckily, cops are technical experts and models of restraint, so that won't prove to be a problem.
The parent is technically wrong. The parent doesn't understand Gaussian beams. If a laser is tightly focused, the far-field divergence is large. The larger the focus, the less the divergence. A visible beam collimated to 5 cm diameter or so will stay collimated for over a kilometer.
That's the roadmap summary. Here's the detailed roadmap:
1. Adopt a plan.
2. Make the plan more ambitious at the insistence of the President and Congress.
3. Receive 30% of the required funding from congress, 25% of which is non mission-critical pork.
4. Overrun lowball funding by a factor of 3.
5. Congress cuts off funding before real accomplishments can be met.
6. Repeat
Work expands to fill the time available. -- Cyril Northcote Parkinson, "The Economist", 1955