What a convenient and utterly baseless assumption. Can you provide any evidence at all that armed pilots or air marshals are responsible for the lack of another 9/11-style attack? We also armored cockpit doors, increased airport security, and focused more resources on intelligence gathering. Can you conclusively prove that those measures had nothing to do with the relative calm? Can you even demonstrate that we haven't just been lucky for the past decade? No, you can't, so stop being ridiculous.
Realize there's a big difference between licensing and patent and selling it. If the government is licensing patents, they're not granting a monopoly to anyone - they're quite free to license the patent to as many different companies as they want.
Frankly, while using the crappy patent system may not be the best way to go about it, it's perfectly reasonable for the government to recoup licensing revenue to compensate taxpayers for government funded research. Otherwise, government funded research would turn into a pure corporate subsidy. We have too many of those already...
Not to question the independence of the Italian judicial system, but this decision has Berlusconi written all over it. He and his backers clearly feel threatened by any mass media that they don't own or control, and seem willing to use almost any means to discredit or clamp down on independent media...
Re: NRA proposal (as Mark Peskin)
What a convenient and utterly baseless assumption. Can you provide any evidence at all that armed pilots or air marshals are responsible for the lack of another 9/11-style attack? We also armored cockpit doors, increased airport security, and focused more resources on intelligence gathering. Can you conclusively prove that those measures had nothing to do with the relative calm? Can you even demonstrate that we haven't just been lucky for the past decade? No, you can't, so stop being ridiculous.
Re: Re: (as Mark Peskin)
Realize there's a big difference between licensing and patent and selling it. If the government is licensing patents, they're not granting a monopoly to anyone - they're quite free to license the patent to as many different companies as they want.
Frankly, while using the crappy patent system may not be the best way to go about it, it's perfectly reasonable for the government to recoup licensing revenue to compensate taxpayers for government funded research. Otherwise, government funded research would turn into a pure corporate subsidy. We have too many of those already...
Re: (as Mark Peskin)
What agenda is that? The truth? Certainly you're not implying that TechDirt has a financial interest in making distorted claims (like the MPAA)?
Politics... (as Mark Peskin)
Not to question the independence of the Italian judicial system, but this decision has Berlusconi written all over it. He and his backers clearly feel threatened by any mass media that they don't own or control, and seem willing to use almost any means to discredit or clamp down on independent media...
(untitled comment) (as Mark Peskin)
Can we start a campaign to ensure the top suggestion for "cheese" is "eating surrender monkey" ?