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Comment Re:Oh you know Britain (Score 2) 544

Actually, it's along the lines of "you can take photos in public places, except for some places which we won't tell you about, and if we think you're up to no good" - guidance here. But the courts and MPs have been eroding this power over the last couple of years such that the savvy journo should be able to argue rings around any jobsworth copper trying to lean on them for taking photos.

Comment Re:World Class Hypocrisy (Score 1) 381

So when Motorola/Samsung/Nokia/... each spend $Millions researching stuff to stick in the aforementioned patents, under the understanding that they can all cross-license at a reasonable cost (i.e. share the pool, probably at an overall expense of near $0), it is unreasonable to then charge more to a new entrant who has contributed nothing to the standards (and who has more cash than the US govmt)?

Comment Re:Battle of the Apes (Score 1) 578

There ain't no such thing as Motorola anymore, as Motorola Inc split into Motorola Solutions (Networks) and Motorola Mobility (Handsets + set top boxes) - affectionately known as Motorola Solutions (making a small profit) and Motorola Problems (not quite making profit). As part of the deal, all of the IPR owned by Motorola Inc was transferred to Motorola Mobility to give it a revenue stream (and, I suppose, to make it more attractive on the auction block) and Motorola Solutions got a license to use what it wanted at the time of the split. Since then, Solutions has split into two, with the (3GPP and 3GPP2) mobile networks technology bit getting bought by Nokia Siemens Networks, leaving the TETRA/Govmt and iDEN businesses in the Motorola Solutions stable.

"Motorola" as a brand is now thoroughly axed to death. I can't imagine that the brand will last long on consumer devices when under the Google umbrella, and the enterprise devices are either dying a slow/quick death (3GPP, 3GPP2 being replaced with NSN kit & iDEN cos it's a dying proprietary tech) or being outsourced to another well known brand (TETRA is relying on Ericsson for it's LTE enhancements, IIRC).

Comment Re:Open Source but Patent Encumbered (Score 1) 176

They may be the oldest, but their market share for handsets has slipped down to the low single digits (this mirrors the picture in their network infrastructure business, which is now owned by NSN after being spun off as a separate business last year, but all the IPR stayed with the handset division). Yes, they do have a patent "war chest", but the investment in it has shrunk considerably over the last decade at least, so I wouldn't be surprised if it's actually a "war jewellery box". There might be a few gems in there, but most of the killer patents will have expired or are soon to expire so their negotiating position might be somewhat weak.

Comment Re:They were played (Score 1) 176

So that means that the early GSM patents are just now in public domain

FTFY. The GSM specs have been evolving over the last 20 years, and continue to do so as it enters the last maybe ten or so years of usefulness (and even that's a figure in doubt as the GSM network coverage is so ubiquitous - handset churn rate helps this along, though). GPRS and EDGE and enhancements to the specs, and even UMTS (incl HSPA) and LTE reuse & improve on some aspects of GSM. Patents are still being sought on GSM tech, and the spec still has changes being made by manufacturers and operators - especially when they have a patent on the change proposal

You might possibly be able to make a handset that technically does GSM without infringing on a patent, but it would be rather feature-light (if functioning at all, with modern network infrastructure).

Comment Re:Recruiting? (Score 4, Informative) 132

errr - that's not a tardis (hope this isn't a "swoosh" moment, it's a regular old-style public phone box (booth). You don't see them about much, although a while back an enterprising sculptor put a dozen together like this and flogged it to my local council for several tens of thousands of quid.

The tardis is supposed to be a police telephone box, which has a different design and colour like this. These boxes also contained equipment other than a phone - such as a first aid kit and an incident book.

On a last pedantic note, there were red police boxes in Glasgow, Scotland, for a time.

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