Techdirt. Stories filed under "dinosaurs"

Techdirt. Stories filed under "dinosaurs" Easily digestible tech news... http://www.techdirt.com/ en-us Techdirt. Stories filed under "dinosaurs"http://www.techdirt.com/images/td-88x31.gifhttp://www.techdirt.com/ Tue, 4 Dec 2012 17:00:00 PST DailyDirt: Cool Coins, Unpopular Coins... Michael Ho http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20101020/11492211502/dailydirt-cool-coins-unpopular-coins.shtml http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20101020/11492211502/dailydirt-cool-coins-unpopular-coins.shtml

New Zealand is minting a series of coins with Hobbit characters on them -- with the most expensive Hobbit coin made of about 28 grams of gold. The coins will be legal tender, but they'll probably be hoarded by Hobbit fans and coins collectors for being preciousss. [url]

The Royal Canadian Mint has a glow-in-the-dark quarter with a dinosaur on it. Canada killed its penny, but collectible glowing coins apparently have a bright future up north.... [url]

A 1909 Lincoln penny is on Mars, as part of the Mars Hand Lens Imager (MAHLI) instrument on the Curiosity rover. This penny will serve as a calibration target, and it's probably the most valuable penny in the universe. [url]

The US GAO recommends replacing dollar bills with dollar coins -- even though dollar coins are a hugely unpopular with people who actually spend American money. The US Treasury had to stop minting a lot of dollar coins last year because it had such a ridiculous surplus of dollar coins that weren't making it into general circulation. If only people would use dollar coins, the government could save a bit of money when it makes money. [url]

Paleontologists are playing with 3D printers and making some huge dinosaur parts for life-sized dinobots. Dinosaur robots could help us better understand how real dinosaurs moved and how they might have interacted. [url]

Stratasys 3D printers have been used to print out lightweight prosthetic devices, custom-fitted for the wearer. Someday we might all have 3D printed exoskeletons to make us stronger... and everyone will say, "I want that." [url]

A 3D photo booth can print out tiny figurines that look almost like custom GI Joe action figures -- or very detailed wedding cake statuettes. The printed dolls go for about $265 for a 4-inch figurine and $530 for an 8-inch size. [url]

If you'd like to read more awesome and interesting stuff, check out this unrelated (but not entirely random!) Techdirt post.

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]]> urls-we-dig-up http://www.techdirt.com/comment_rss.php?sid=20101020/11551411504 Fri, 9 Sep 2011 08:29:20 PDT Did Jim Henson Infringe on a Recently Approved Patent? Zachary Knight http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20110906/06122315822/did-jim-henson-infringe-recently-approved-patent.shtml http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20110906/06122315822/did-jim-henson-infringe-recently-approved-patent.shtml US patent system could be fixed. One of the proposals on the list was allowing for input from those who are skilled in the art behind a patent application. Under this system, a person or company working within the industry surrounding a patent application could review it and submit their reasoning behind whether the proposal is obvious and not patentable or original and patentable. This public input would help patent examiners decide on the final patent-ability of an application.

As an example of why such a public input segment would be beneficial, we have a recent patent, found by io9.com, for "A costume suit modeled after a large size animal"(PDF) This patent, which was submitted by Japanese company ON-ART, which specializes in airbrush painting of large balloons, was approved on August 16, 2011. This patent has a total of twelve claims all having to do with the mechanics of the suit, which allows for the operator to create the realistic movements of the animal he portrays.

Here is a video of the suit in action.

So how does this support the need of public input into the patent system? For this, I submit the 1986 Jim Henson movie, Labyrinth. This movie stars a character by the name of Ludo, a large, hairy monster who is gentle at heart and friends with rocks of all sizes. Ludo was created by the Jim Henson team and allows for a person to sit inside the suit, and to move his head, neck and mouth as well as his arms and legs.

Below is a portion of the Labyrinth production video featuring the creation of Ludo.

Had public input been allowed, Disney, which owns Jim Henson Productions, would have been able to submit their prior art and this patent would have been either resubmitted with a more narrow focus or rejected outright. Unfortunately, the final patent-ability of this costume will not be determined until a costly legal battle takes place.

I may be a lay person when it comes to costumes modeled after large animals, but I find nothing unique or original about the patented dinosaur costume when compared to the 25 year-old prior art of Ludo. The only explanation I can think of is the that patent examiner really was not familiar with costumes and relied too heavily on the patent applicant to do the search for prior art. To wit, the applicant informed the US Patent Office, "a full-scale costume of a large size animal that is able to make a realistic movement has not been disclosed."

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]]> or-is-it-prior-art http://www.techdirt.com/comment_rss.php?sid=20110906/06122315822 Tue, 29 Mar 2011 17:00:00 PDT DailyDirt: Playing With Technological Fire... Michael Ho http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20110301/10030313315/dailydirt-playing-with-technological-fire.shtml http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20110301/10030313315/dailydirt-playing-with-technological-fire.shtml

Pumping water into the ground in order to extract more natural gas may be causing some man-made earthquakes in Arkansas. A seismologist says that an earthquake with a magnitude greater than 5.5 is extremely unlikely, but also states that the fault system in the area is largely unmapped. [url]

Wired interviews Jack Horner on his experiments towards hatching dinosaur-like creatures from chickens. Since Horner is working on a really tight budget, he's not actually creating any fancy DNA hybrids -- just knocking out genes until he finds (he hopes) a set of genes that resembles a pre-historic, dinosaur-looking chicken-lizard. [url]

Here's an interesting TED talk that questions the wisdom of bioengineering animals. GATTACA, FTW. [url]

To discover more interesting tech-related content, check out what's currently floating around the StumbleUpon universe. [url]

By the way, StumbleUpon can recommend some good Techdirt articles, too.

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