well, whatever jwz may alhave wrote about his experience several months ago, things are certainly different now. APalm exec gave his explicit blessing to the PreCentral homebrew srore. You may want to read a few of their posts on the subject to get a different point of view.
While I'm sure jwz is being truthful, it's possible that either intentionally or otherwise he's shaded the facts to make his case more sympathetic.
the nice thing about developing for the Pre is that Palm has pretty explicitly stated that they are fine with developers making their applications avaialable through other channels, the prime example being the PreCentral Homebrew store. In some ways, it's the best of both worlds as Palm is able to make sure the apps available on their branded outlet are tested to work well, yet developers and users wtill have other legitimate options to get apps onto their phone.
BTW, sending this from my Palm Pre. I've got dozens of apps loaded from both the Palm App Catalog and the Precentral homebrew store.and I have to say, some of the homebrew apps are rough around the edges and could use a little work before hitting the mass market. It's nice to see that Palm has enabled their developers to easily support beta testing with end users.
Flickr has a problem, and that's the way they handle DMCA notifications in general. Its standard procedure to pull down the photo upon receiving a DMCA notice. In this case it's a shame_ since I would bet the original complaint was probably filed by someone with no copyright claim. Further, the image is clearly fair use since it is transformative, critique and non-commercial.
But Flickr doesn't take any of that into account. They just mechanically remove any image that gets a DMCA notice, with no ability to restore the original image or comments.
Flickr has a problem due to the way they handle DMCA notice and the lack of a restore capability. It's got about zero to do with the subject of the photo, alrhough it is fun to see the conspiracy theorists suggest otherwise.
Without defending the patent process in general, I think it's important to realize that at every step of the process, Echostar has sought to delay the proceedings and extend the trial. Every court ruling has been in TiVo's favor, yet 5 years on Echostar still continues as if TiVo never filed a lawsuit. Now, if this was the first re-examination and was filed promptly when the lawsuit was begun, they would have a stronger case. But filing for a patent reexamination 5 years after being sued looks like yet another delaying tactic. Wash, rinse, repeat.
News organizations have a long history of paying license media, from photographs to videos, for documentation of newsworthy events. That's completely different than paying someone to provide a quote or to supply privileged information. The videographer owned the copyright to the video, and was of course free to sell it to anyone he wished.
I think that's an important difference here, and I'd like to see a reputable reference that claimed it was unethical for journalists to pay for photos or videos. I mean, Getty Images has a very nice business licensing stock photography to news organizations. Is it OK to buy from Getty but not from an individual?
Near as I can tell, the only place it's being questioned is by the person that submitted the story on Digg. I realy don't see any evidence of actual journalists claiming this violated some ethical rules.
The licensing money that NPG gets is the problem! That they receive hundreds of thousands of dollars each year to “license” public domain images is absurd. No doubt many of the works in the museum were donated so they could be enjoyed by the public. But by locking up the paintings, and by demanding exorbitant fees to republish the public domain images, they are depriving Britain’s citizens of some of the most important art work in her history.
How many textbooks don’t include these images because of licensing costs and legal hassles? How many schoolchildren have been deprived of seeing this historical work because the gatekeepers want to create an unnatural monopoly on a public treasure? It’s a shame that these alleged guardians of Britain’s past culture are so blinded to the opportunities that exist in a world when each copy is free that they fail to realize that they could perform their mission much better by opening up, by embracing the digital world instead of fighting it as a buggy whip maker battled the automobile industry.
The NPG was given a gift of these photos, the condition of that gift being a mandate to share these important images with Britain’s citizens. They have failed in that mission, and even as others work to remedy this, still the NPG fights the future and tries to claim as their own works that were created hundreds of years ago. They have no right to license these photos; they have a duty to protect them, and share them with the world. If they can’t meet those duties, then they should turn the paintings over to someone who can.
Of course, TiVo is no patent troll. They have a product, they've been in the market for 10 years-- which they helped pioneer-- and they continue to innovate. I'm unaware of any other lawsuits TiVo has been a party to. One reason for their survival was their ability to stay out of the courtroom.
And then there's the matter of their business, which relied (in part) on licensing their software to DirecTV, Humax, Comcast and other TV providers and hardware companies. Now, for better or worse, the courts have rules that TiVo's "time-warp" and other trick play features are deserving of patent protection and DISH has violated them. Honestly, I think the whole concept of software patents is a little inane, but that's the system we got.
Now given all that, When DISH first lost this case FIVE years ago, they had the opportunity to settle. Anytime in the next 3-4 years they probably could have licensed TiVo's technology for under $200 million and TiVo shareholders would have rejoiced. But they didn't. DISH played chicken with the court, violated court orders repeatedly, and have now been found in contempt. So in addition to the $100 million they already paid, and the other $100 million they are due through April 2008, they will soon (likely) be on the hook for several hundred million more, and will be forced to license TiVo's technology or shut off their DVRs.
So yeah, on the surface it's a patent case. But dig deeper, and you'll find that Echostar/DISH have been the ones prolonging the court battle and consequently increasing their financial exposure substantially. DISH isn't appealing on any moral grounds, and even if they were, they would have been wise to settle years ago at a much lower cost. Thumbing their noses at the legal system may cost them billions of dollars.
A very insightful (in more ways than one) and informative (for presenting compelling information) about the movie (short stories told via video & audio) about the theater (place to be entertained) and the content (stuff you listen to, watch or look at) industry and how they have work together (even when they don't).
The difference in the case is that since RIM was sued, the Supreme Court made a significant ruling on another patent case. This was absolutely expected to happen in the future, because that's how SCOTUS wrote the decision.
I'm not sure if this ever was an issue, but it certainly is no longer an issue. I went to the alleged offending site and checked both boxes. I got the error message shown below. Did the blog writer actually check this before writing his entry or did Lenovo just recently fix this error? Better yet, did Techdirt.com check to if there really was a problem.
------------------------- There was a problem with your submission. The following errors occurred:
* You have checked both or neither privacy related checkbox. Please choose one or the other.
The Washington Times/ UPI has been flacking this story under various guises for days. And the best they could do is find when Senator Feinstein responds to a question. You've gone ahead and outdone the Washington Times, managing to ascribe beliefs to Feinstein that she did not express. This is piss poor. The relevant bit, excerpted below, is far different from how you characterized it, "Senator Really Does Want A Return Of The Fairness Doctrine."
---------------
Asked if she would revive the fairness doctrine, which used to require broadcasters to present competing sides of controversial issues, Feinstein said she was "looking at it."
-------------
This is poor journalism Techdirt, I expect much more out of your typically well-written, well-researched website. I'll be much more skeptical of your headlines from now on.
It's good that emissions were down last year, but one reason was because of the warm winter. Of course, if summer was hotter than normal that should have meant a rise in CO2 output. Looking at the data, there is some variability from year to year, so it's not clear if this is part of a larger trend.
I find most telling two quotes in the article. First, "Drug companies spend more on research on lifestyle drugs than on life saving drugs," and "The patent system would continue to play a part for applications for which no one offers a prize." The result of which would be, private companies would still spend just as much on lifestyle drugs. In fact, for-profit driven companies would now be more motivated to develop lifestyle drugs since they could still get monopoly prices. For all of their waste & marketing, drug companies still spend probably $100 billion on drug research. Unless there are prizes commensurate with these amounts, research spending by private companies will inevitably drop. The new drugs may be cheaper, but don't kid yourself thinking there will be as many.
As usual, an article about a Microsoft product degenerates into generic complaints of the Redmond company. Which is fine, but if the commentators would first reads the article, they would see what the issue is.
Sites are identified in 4 ways: Red (known phishing site), Yellow (suspected phishing site), White (normal) and Green (verified legitimate business). The only issue the new certificates have to do with is green vs. white. A small business site will not be flagged as a suspected phishing just because they don't have the extended certificate. There's a fair bit of uncertainty now, because some suspect that your typical consumer will only do business with "green" sites. That may be true, but those people are probably the ones who now only shop at Amazon, Target & Dell now anyways.
It's an oversimplification to characterize it as MS identifying sites as safe/unsafe. There are 4 levels, and if you were to present it as a dichotomy, it would make much more sense to group the "White" sites with the "Green" rather than the "Yellow" and "Red." Not getting an extended certificate won't be enough to make it "Yellow" or "Red," and characterizing it as a false positive if a legit site is "White" doesn't make a lot of sense. I recommend that folks read the linked articles, as Mike's summary and the stories' headlines do not give a good sense of the full story.
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Re: Re: (as jakerome)
Mike, check out the link to read Precentral's post on the matter. There are some more details that put jwz's issue into context.
http://www.precentral.net/submitting-palms-app-catalog-how-difficult-it
Re: Re: (as jakerome)
well, whatever jwz may alhave wrote about his experience several months ago, things are certainly different now. APalm exec gave his explicit blessing to the PreCentral homebrew srore. You may want to read a few of their posts on the subject to get a different point of view.
While I'm sure jwz is being truthful, it's possible that either intentionally or otherwise he's shaded the facts to make his case more sympathetic.
(as jakerome)
the nice thing about developing for the Pre is that Palm has pretty explicitly stated that they are fine with developers making their applications avaialable through other channels, the prime example being the PreCentral Homebrew store. In some ways, it's the best of both worlds as Palm is able to make sure the apps available on their branded outlet are tested to work well, yet developers and users wtill have other legitimate options to get apps onto their phone.
BTW, sending this from my Palm Pre. I've got dozens of apps loaded from both the Palm App Catalog and the Precentral homebrew store.and I have to say, some of the homebrew apps are rough around the edges and could use a little work before hitting the mass market. It's nice to see that Palm has enabled their developers to easily support beta testing with end users.
Re: Re: (as jakerome)
Looks like the poster is just trying to get your goat.
(as jakerome)
Flickr has a problem, and that's the way they handle DMCA notifications in general. Its standard procedure to pull down the photo upon receiving a DMCA notice. In this case it's a shame_ since I would bet the original complaint was probably filed by someone with no copyright claim. Further, the image is clearly fair use since it is transformative, critique and non-commercial.
But Flickr doesn't take any of that into account. They just mechanically remove any image that gets a DMCA notice, with no ability to restore the original image or comments.
Flickr has a problem due to the way they handle DMCA notice and the lack of a restore capability. It's got about zero to do with the subject of the photo, alrhough it is fun to see the conspiracy theorists suggest otherwise.
(as jakerome)
The system sort of sucks, no doubt, but this is at least the 2nd time that Echostar has asked for a reexamination. The last time, http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/news/2007/11/patent-office-upholds-key-tivo-patent-at-issue-in-ec hostar-lawsuit.ars the patent was upheld.
Without defending the patent process in general, I think it's important to realize that at every step of the process, Echostar has sought to delay the proceedings and extend the trial. Every court ruling has been in TiVo's favor, yet 5 years on Echostar still continues as if TiVo never filed a lawsuit. Now, if this was the first re-examination and was filed promptly when the lawsuit was begun, they would have a stronger case. But filing for a patent reexamination 5 years after being sued looks like yet another delaying tactic. Wash, rinse, repeat.
A video is neither a "tip" nor a "quote" (as jakerome)
News organizations have a long history of paying license media, from photographs to videos, for documentation of newsworthy events. That's completely different than paying someone to provide a quote or to supply privileged information. The videographer owned the copyright to the video, and was of course free to sell it to anyone he wished.
I think that's an important difference here, and I'd like to see a reputable reference that claimed it was unethical for journalists to pay for photos or videos. I mean, Getty Images has a very nice business licensing stock photography to news organizations. Is it OK to buy from Getty but not from an individual?
What people are questioning it? (as jakerome)
Near as I can tell, the only place it's being questioned is by the person that submitted the story on Digg. I realy don't see any evidence of actual journalists claiming this violated some ethical rules.
Non story.
(as jakerome)
The licensing money that NPG gets is the problem! That they receive hundreds of thousands of dollars each year to “license” public domain images is absurd. No doubt many of the works in the museum were donated so they could be enjoyed by the public. But by locking up the paintings, and by demanding exorbitant fees to republish the public domain images, they are depriving Britain’s citizens of some of the most important art work in her history.
How many textbooks don’t include these images because of licensing costs and legal hassles? How many schoolchildren have been deprived of seeing this historical work because the gatekeepers want to create an unnatural monopoly on a public treasure? It’s a shame that these alleged guardians of Britain’s past culture are so blinded to the opportunities that exist in a world when each copy is free that they fail to realize that they could perform their mission much better by opening up, by embracing the digital world instead of fighting it as a buggy whip maker battled the automobile industry.
The NPG was given a gift of these photos, the condition of that gift being a mandate to share these important images with Britain’s citizens. They have failed in that mission, and even as others work to remedy this, still the NPG fights the future and tries to claim as their own works that were created hundreds of years ago. They have no right to license these photos; they have a duty to protect them, and share them with the world. If they can’t meet those duties, then they should turn the paintings over to someone who can.
Re: Re: competition (as Jake)
Of course, TiVo is no patent troll. They have a product, they've been in the market for 10 years-- which they helped pioneer-- and they continue to innovate. I'm unaware of any other lawsuits TiVo has been a party to. One reason for their survival was their ability to stay out of the courtroom.
And then there's the matter of their business, which relied (in part) on licensing their software to DirecTV, Humax, Comcast and other TV providers and hardware companies. Now, for better or worse, the courts have rules that TiVo's "time-warp" and other trick play features are deserving of patent protection and DISH has violated them. Honestly, I think the whole concept of software patents is a little inane, but that's the system we got.
Now given all that, When DISH first lost this case FIVE years ago, they had the opportunity to settle. Anytime in the next 3-4 years they probably could have licensed TiVo's technology for under $200 million and TiVo shareholders would have rejoiced. But they didn't. DISH played chicken with the court, violated court orders repeatedly, and have now been found in contempt. So in addition to the $100 million they already paid, and the other $100 million they are due through April 2008, they will soon (likely) be on the hook for several hundred million more, and will be forced to license TiVo's technology or shut off their DVRs.
So yeah, on the surface it's a patent case. But dig deeper, and you'll find that Echostar/DISH have been the ones prolonging the court battle and consequently increasing their financial exposure substantially. DISH isn't appealing on any moral grounds, and even if they were, they would have been wise to settle years ago at a much lower cost. Thumbing their noses at the legal system may cost them billions of dollars.
(as Jake)
A very insightful (in more ways than one) and informative (for presenting compelling information) about the movie (short stories told via video & audio) about the theater (place to be entertained) and the content (stuff you listen to, watch or look at) industry and how they have work together (even when they don't).
(as Jake)
How does it hurt them? Their cash is just as green as ever. As long as they keep paying off our congressman, they'll get the laws they like.
(as Jake)
The difference in the case is that since RIM was sued, the Supreme Court made a significant ruling on another patent case. This was absolutely expected to happen in the future, because that's how SCOTUS wrote the decision.
(as Jake)
I'm not sure if this ever was an issue, but it certainly is no longer an issue. I went to the alleged offending site and checked both boxes. I got the error message shown below. Did the blog writer actually check this before writing his entry or did Lenovo just recently fix this error? Better yet, did Techdirt.com check to if there really was a problem.
-------------------------
There was a problem with your submission. The following errors occurred:
* You have checked both or neither privacy related checkbox. Please choose one or the other.
(as Jake)
Where exactly do the radicals park and why should i care?
Total Bullshit Techdirt (as Jake)
The Washington Times/ UPI has been flacking this story under various guises for days. And the best they could do is find when Senator Feinstein responds to a question. You've gone ahead and outdone the Washington Times, managing to ascribe beliefs to Feinstein that she did not express. This is piss poor. The relevant bit, excerpted below, is far different from how you characterized it, "Senator Really Does Want A Return Of The Fairness Doctrine."
---------------
Asked if she would revive the fairness doctrine, which used to require broadcasters to present competing sides of controversial issues, Feinstein said she was "looking at it."
-------------
This is poor journalism Techdirt, I expect much more out of your typically well-written, well-researched website. I'll be much more skeptical of your headlines from now on.
Warmer winter=less CO2 emissions (as Jake)
It's good that emissions were down last year, but one reason was because of the warm winter. Of course, if summer was hotter than normal that should have meant a rise in CO2 output. Looking at the data, there is some variability from year to year, so it's not clear if this is part of a larger trend.
(as Jake)
I find most telling two quotes in the article. First, "Drug companies spend more on research on lifestyle drugs than on life saving drugs," and "The patent system would continue to play a part for applications for which no one offers a prize." The result of which would be, private companies would still spend just as much on lifestyle drugs. In fact, for-profit driven companies would now be more motivated to develop lifestyle drugs since they could still get monopoly prices. For all of their waste & marketing, drug companies still spend probably $100 billion on drug research. Unless there are prizes commensurate with these amounts, research spending by private companies will inevitably drop. The new drugs may be cheaper, but don't kid yourself thinking there will be as many.
Missing the point (as Jake)
As usual, an article about a Microsoft product degenerates into generic complaints of the Redmond company. Which is fine, but if the commentators would first reads the article, they would see what the issue is.
Sites are identified in 4 ways: Red (known phishing site), Yellow (suspected phishing site), White (normal) and Green (verified legitimate business). The only issue the new certificates have to do with is green vs. white. A small business site will not be flagged as a suspected phishing just because they don't have the extended certificate. There's a fair bit of uncertainty now, because some suspect that your typical consumer will only do business with "green" sites. That may be true, but those people are probably the ones who now only shop at Amazon, Target & Dell now anyways.
It's an oversimplification to characterize it as MS identifying sites as safe/unsafe. There are 4 levels, and if you were to present it as a dichotomy, it would make much more sense to group the "White" sites with the "Green" rather than the "Yellow" and "Red." Not getting an extended certificate won't be enough to make it "Yellow" or "Red," and characterizing it as a false positive if a legit site is "White" doesn't make a lot of sense. I recommend that folks read the linked articles, as Mike's summary and the stories' headlines do not give a good sense of the full story.