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Submission + - Amazon's winding course through the patent jungle (patexia.com)

Submitted by
ericjones12398
ericjones12398 writes: "On one hand, Amazon is not exactly short on patents themselves. The "non-exhaustive list" on the company's site is a tidy little bundle of e-commerce IP, with a few questionable software patents — including a 1-click buying method, a Lodsys-baiting in-app purchasing method and a social networking patent, all of which have achieved a somewhat notorious reputation. Indeed, the last fiscal year was as significant for Amazon's litigation as for the company's behind-closed-doors acquisitions."

Submission + - Implants may improve therapy for neurological disorders (patexia.com)

Submitted by
ericjones12398
ericjones12398 writes: "Breakthrough new research out of Massachusetts General Hospital shows that the use of magnetic field stimulation from microscopic devices implanted into the brain may be able to boost brain activity and alleviate symptoms of several devastating neurodegenerative conditions. Researchers leveraged the use of magnetic stimulation, which has been used for years to diagnose and treat neurological disorders. However, transcranial magnetic stimulation often generates fields by hand-held coils outside the skull, which ends up activating undesired parts of the brain, and makes delivery specificity to certain parts of the brain difficult."
Patents

Submission + - Intellectual property rights: the quiet killer of Rio+20 (patexia.com)

Submitted by
ericjones12398
ericjones12398 writes: "Richard Phillips, president of the Intellectual Property Owners Association, sent a powerful message to Washington the day before the Rio+20 UN Conference on Sustainable Development regarding the U.S. intellectual property community’s stance on sharing IPR with developing nations. Philips argued any language included in the Rio+20 final declaration compromising the existing IP regime would discourage investment and destroy trade secrets. “Any references to technology transfer should be clearly qualified and conditioned to include only voluntary transfer of IPR on mutually agreed terms.” The IPO has no interest in helping developing countries transition to a more sustainable economy if it means sacrificing valuable IPR. And the IPO’s chilly message set the tone for what many pundits and participants considered a disappointing Rio+20 conference yielding few substantive results."
Image

Book Review: Permanent Emergency 89

Posted by samzenpus from the read-all-about-it dept.
OverTheGeicoE writes "Former TSA Administrator Kip Hawley has been in the news in recent months, talking about how the Transportation Security Administration is broken and how it can be fixed. Some of his TSA criticisms in the popular press seem to make sense. This seemed strange to me. Just last March he was defending TSA in a debate with Bruce Schneier in The Economist. Then, the very next month, he's criticizing his former agency as if he was on the other side of that debate to begin with. Why? I felt like I was missing something, so I decided to read his book to find out more about his position. The title of the book is Permanent Emergency: Inside the TSA and the Fight for the Future of American Security, and it is co-written by Nathan Means." Keep reading for the rest of OverTheGeicoE's review.
Advertising

Submission + - Targeted TV ads: silver bullet or privacy nightmare? (patexia.com)

Submitted by
ericjones12398
ericjones12398 writes: "The effectiveness of television, as an advertising medium and as a return on investment (ROI), has been constantly questioned since the arrival of the "digital marketing age." Not surprisingly, those who are loudest with this concern are mainly high-tech technology companies that are either strong proponents of online advertising — like Google — and/or device hardware manufacturers — like Apple. These organizations hope to "improve the user experience" by introducing proprietary technologies — usually their own — that can integrate within the existing television environment."
Patents

Submission + - Patent Wars Worth the Price tag? (patexia.com)

Submitted by
ericjones12398
ericjones12398 writes: "It’s beginning to feel like a TV series, a weekly patent war drama. Apple and Samsung have consistently been going back and forth with claims of IP infringement, to the point where who is accusing who of what is exhausting to follow. The question I would like to ask and try to answer is what the opportunity costs are of pursuing litigation versus just toughing it out? Would it be more economic for both companies to live and let live, or is there value to be captured in legal finger pointing? My best guess would be that this isn’t about stopping sales this quarter or next, nor is it about defending the small-scale tech features that merely mildly differentiate. It’s instead about momentum and branding. Winning these cases is PR that says, we are the leaders in smartphone technology, we are the innovators."
Patents

Submission + - Nokia seeks more leverage in the forever mobile patent war (patexia.com)

Submitted by
ericjones12398
ericjones12398 writes: "Struggling cell phone manufacturer Nokia launched a recent attack in both German and U.S. courts, filing lawsuits against HTC, RIM, and ViewSonic, alleging a laundry list of infringements on 45 patents pertaining to mobile software and hardware. Nokia also filed a meaty complaint against HTC at the International Trade Commission in Washington requesting select mobile devices be banned from sale in the U.S. According to Louise Pentland, Nokia’s chief legal officer, “Nokia had to file these actions to end the unauthorized use of our proprietary innovations and technologies, which have not been widely licensed.”
Chief among the ITC complaint was patent 5,570,369, a power saver designed for the GSM system and based on TDMA technology. Although, on the surface, ‘369 appears to have been tossed in the recycle bin with other 2G relics, the 1996 patent helps serve as a warning shot to competitors recycling Nokia’s technology. At the same time it reveals a possible ulterior motive to stop Google’s momentum. HTC seems to be straight in the crosshairs of Nokia’s legal assault, with three relevant – and curious — phones singled out in the ITC complaint. HTC’s Sensation 4G, Amaze 4G and Inspire 4G are all driven by Android. While similar phones based on the Windows Phone platform were missing from Nokia’s accusations."
Medicine

Submission + - The race to $1,000 human genome sequencing (patexia.com)

Submitted by
ericjones12398
ericjones12398 writes: "Just one decade ago, sequencing an entire human genome cost upwards of $10 million and took about three years to complete. Now, several companies are racing to provide technology that can sequence a complete human genome in one day for less than $1,000.
A genome sequence for $1,000 was a pipe dream, just a few years ago,” said Dr. Richard Gibbs, director of the Human Genome Sequencing Center at Baylor College of Medicine, in a statement provided by Life Technologies Corp., one of the companies developing gene sequencing technology. “A $1,000 genome in less than one day was not even on the radar, but will transform the clinical applications of sequencing."
Security

Moxie Marlinspike Proposes New TACK Extension To TLS For Key Pinning 55

Posted by samzenpus from the protect-ya-neck dept.
Trailrunner7 writes "Two independent researchers are proposing an extension for TLS to provide greater trust in certificate authorities, which have become a weak link in the entire public key infrastructure after some big breaches involving fraudulent SSL certificates. TACK, short for Trust Assertions for Certificate Keys, is a dynamically activated public key framework that enables a TLS server to assert the authenticity of its public key. According to an IETF draft submitted by researchers Moxie Marlinspike and Trevor Perrin, a TACK key is used to sign the public key from the TLS server's certificate. Clients can 'pin' a hostname to the TACK key, based on a user's visitation habits, without requiring sites modify their existing certificate chains or limiting a site's ability to deploy or change certificate chains at any time. If the user later encounters a fraudulent certificate on a "pinned" site, the browser will reject the session and send a warning to the user. 'Since TACK pins are based on TACK keys (instead of CA keys), trust in CAs is not required. Additionally, the TACK key may be used to revoke previous TACK signatures (or even itself) in order to handle the compromise of TLS or TACK private keys,' according to the draft."
News

Submission + - FDA cracking down on x-ray exposure for kids (patexia.com) 1

Submitted by
ericjones12398
ericjones12398 writes: "The Food and Drug Administration is proposing that manufacturers of X-ray machines and CT scanners do more to protect children from radiation exposure. If companies don't take steps to limit X-ray doses, the agency may require a label on their new equipment recommending it not be used on children.

X-rays and CT scans can provide doctors with lots of useful information. But the radiation that creates the helpful images also increases a person's risk for cancer. There's been an explosion in the use of imaging tests. And rising radiation doses, particularly from CT scans, have drawn concern.

The cancer risk increases with the dose of X-rays received during a person's lifetime, so kids' exposure is particularly important. It's also the case that children are more sensitive to X-ray damage.

The FDA is also telling parents to speak up. If a doctor orders a test or procedure that uses X-rays, parents shouldn't be afraid to ask if it's really necessary. Also, it doesn't hurt to ask if there's an acceptable alternative, such as ultrasound or MRI, that doesn't rely on X-rays.

Even so, the agency doesn't want people to forgo needed X-rays. "The risk from a medically necessary imaging exam is quite small when compared to the benefit of accurate diagnosis or intervention," Dr. Jeffrey Shuren, head of FDA's Center for Devices and Radiological Health, said in a statement. "There is no reason for patients who need these exams to avoid them."

The agency scheduled a public meeting in July to talk about the proposal.
The Medical Imaging & Techonology Alliance, a trade group, said it looks forward to commenting on the FDA's proposal and working with the agency."
Google

Submission + - Is Google the new Microsoft? (patexia.com)

Submitted by
ericjones12398
ericjones12398 writes: "Google’s come up with its solution for Dropbox: If you can’t buy ‘em, copy ‘em. The search engine and online advertising giant replaced its popular Google Docs service with Google Drive, a cloud computing storage service designed to directly compete with start up Dropbox. This raises the question, has Google become the new Microsoft?
Us ancient folk who remember the 1990s and the Microsoft anti-trust trial can certainly notice some parallels. A big, dare we say monolithic, company doesn’t bother innovating on its own. It just waits for other companies to innovate, makes some changes for legally significant distinctions and enters into competition with the innovator. Sound familiar?
Still, Google is not unchallenged in its supremacy. Bing has gained a bit of traction as a search engine, showing that Microsoft isn’t dead or stagnant by any means. Yahoo! is always trying to regain its place in the search engine world. And not everything Google does comes across as the Second Coming in the market. Google Plus+ currently has fewer subscribers than MySpace, if that tells you anything. So it’s by no means a done deal that Google Drive is going to push Dropbox and other upstarts out of existence."
Science

Submission + - Does higher health care spending lead to better patient outcomes? (patexia.com)

Submitted by ericjones12398
ericjones12398 writes: If you haven’t seen the words “health care” in news headlines lately, you must be living under a rock. Health care reform, health care spending, Medicare spending, Obamacare; the list goes on and on. What I find most controversial among the latest research and news is an obviously flawed payment scale that undervalues primary care and overvalues specialty care. There is evidence suggesting that publicly funded health care spending (i.e., Medicare) has not based on primary health care needs. Rather, Medicare spending relies on a resource-based relative value scale (RBRVS) which promotes higher spending without evidence of better patient outcomes.

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