Comment Sterling's Schismatrix (Score 1) 133
See the latter part of Schismatrix for interesting and, uh, creative applications of fleshly living quarters....
See the latter part of Schismatrix for interesting and, uh, creative applications of fleshly living quarters....
It has been suggested in various writings that the newly issued Microsoft patent on an XML-based document would somehow resolve Microsoft's woes against i4i. This is most unlikely. A patent grants only rights to exclude others from practicing a claimed invention, and creates no right at all to practice the claimed invention. It is quite possible to obtain a patent governing a novel and unobvious variation of an existing patented technology. While the second patent would grant its owner the right to exclude people (including the first patent owner) from practicing the variation, it would grant no right to practice the variation if the variation also infringed the first patent.
Of course, it may be the case that the first company may want to practice the variation as well, in which case a cross-licensing deal might be worked out. But the issuing of a new patent on related technology does not, itself, help Microsoft out of its box unless the new technology does not infringe the i4i patent.
In the late 1960s, I was taught high-school physics from the PSSC (Physical Science Study Committee) Physics textbook. The curriculum and textbook were put together by an NSF-convened panel. All the curriculum materials (textbook, supplementary readings, teacher's guides, experimental equipment) were made freely available. I still have two copies of the textbook produced by different publishers and with different covers but identical inside.
Although it was demonstrably superior to other physics curricula, the PSSC program was ultimately a failure because publishers, who couldn't make much money selling the PSSC textbook due to competition, eventually dropped the book and pushed hard to get their proprietary, therefore more heavily marked-up, textbooks adopted by school boards.
The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeal has spoken again in the Saga of Cohen, Kremen and the sex.com domain name. In this new opinion, the Ninth Circuit socks it to NSI, stating that they are amenable to suit for conversion of the domain name "sex.com" as a result of their acceptance of an on-its-face incredible forged letter transferring the domain name to now-fugitive Cohen. This one may make a big difference, and lead to
Saliva causes cancer, but only if swallowed in small amounts over a long period of time. -- George Carlin