Google Reader was my constant homepage until they killed it. It did exactly what I wanted it to do. I’m with Andy in mourning it’s passing. Google+ also killed off my favorite blog, John Walkenbach’s J-Walk Blog, (which had one of the most amazing online communities going) by luring John to Google+. Most of the wonderful community he’d built just drifted away; it was too hard to follow Google+ as a platform at the time.
First, I agree with everything said in this article about how rediculous both this lawsuit and the ongoing behavior of Anish Kapoor vis-a-vis the Bean is.
But while it is true that Chicagoans mock the the Bean, we also love the Bean. And one of the Bean’s greatest features cannot really be adequately photographed, which is being inside the Bean and experiencing the amazing reflective interior topology that Kapoor has created. It’s well worth a visit to the Bean. I wouldn’t urge anyone to come to Chicago just to see the Bean, but if you’re here anyway it is something you shouldn’t miss.
If I ever commission a piece of public art—pretty bloody unlikely, mind you—I will either require FULL rights be included, or the art to be contractually placed under an irrevocable CC0 Creative Commons license.
In Scotland, your name cannot be taken from you in trade if it is trademarked otherwise. If your name is McDonald and you want to open a sandwich shop and call it McDonald’s in Scotland, the huge multinational trademark bully could not do a damned thing about it.
...if you are a senior political appointee. If you are a member of the U.S. Armed Forces, being stupid and dishonest resulting in mishandling of classified material is ALWAYS a crime. I saw a junior officer's career end over the destruction of several hundred secret documents without documentation. Everyone agreed that they had almost certainly gone into a burn bag and were destroyed, but without the record of the destruction the Classified Material Custodian was still responsible to produce those documents and he could not. No malice, genuine error, but as often happens in the service, the officer was allowed to resign his commission in lieu of a court martial. As a junior officer and squadron Classified Material Custodian, I actually received a non-punitive Letter of Reprimand for a missing confidential document that later turned up in the Executive Officer's helmet bag. (No, they didn't apologize or rescind my letter.)
Real helicopter pilot here. With only a single blade, there has to be a counter-torque mechanism to prevent the body of the device from rotating in an opposite direction equally to the blade rpm. That's why helicopters have tails rotors. I don't see any counter-torque mechanism so I do not understand how they are negating the torque from the rotor blade into the body.
I think I ask this question every time New York cabs come up. What economic model makes it reasonable for folks to pay in the range of $800,000 to a million dollars for an NYC cab medallion? How long do you have to run a cab under the medallion to recoup that? It looks to me like it would have to be several hundred years.
Because of USC 17 Circular 92 Section 105, works prepared by employees of the U.S. Government are in the public domain. When I was the Admin Officer & Information Systems Officer for a large Navy training squadron back in the 80s, the Naval Air Rework Facility in San Diego opened a software shop. They were handing out disks with maintenance management and flight scheduling software at an event on the base as a "free trial", with the caveat that we'd have to pay them if we kept using it. I told them we'd use it if it was any good, but we wouldn't pay them. They told me we had too, that they couldn't produce the software if units didn't pay. I asked if they were all civil service folks writing the code and they said yes, and I pointed out to them that by Federal law, every line of code they wrote was in the public domain. They were a bit taken aback by this as I guess it hadn't occurred to them that this was the case, and finally they came back with "Well, if you don't pay you won't get any support!" To which I replied, "Well if your software and documentation are any good, we won't need any!"
Currently most HTTPS Federal web sites use self-signed certificates, which causes browsers to label them as unsafe. I see no issues with the U.S. Government registering as a Certificate Authority (CA), but until they either do that or purchase certificates from registered CAs, this move will actually weaken consumer security by encouraging them to overrule what otherwise is a very sensible warning and limitation.
...but in the Public Domain. "A work prepared by an officer or employee" of the federal government "as part of that person's official duties," under section 105 of the Copyright Act, is not entitled to domestic copyright protection under U.S. law, placing it in the public domain. So all code written by Federal employees as part of their job is in the public domain, even better than Open Source.
I see a market for an encryption system that will have an alternate self-destruct password, i.e. you agree to enter your password and enter the destruction password. Is this out there already?
Interesting
I was wondering where AvaxHome had gotten off to...now I know.
Google Reader was my constant homepage until they killed it. It did exactly what I wanted it to do. I’m with Andy in mourning it’s passing.
Google+ also killed off my favorite blog, John Walkenbach’s J-Walk Blog, (which had one of the most amazing online communities going) by luring John to Google+. Most of the wonderful community he’d built just drifted away; it was too hard to follow Google+ as a platform at the time.
Things about the Bean worth noting
First, I agree with everything said in this article about how rediculous both this lawsuit and the ongoing behavior of Anish Kapoor vis-a-vis the Bean is.
But while it is true that Chicagoans mock the the Bean, we also love the Bean. And one of the Bean’s greatest features cannot really be adequately photographed, which is being inside the Bean and experiencing the amazing reflective interior topology that Kapoor has created. It’s well worth a visit to the Bean. I wouldn’t urge anyone to come to Chicago just to see the Bean, but if you’re here anyway it is something you shouldn’t miss.
If I ever commission a piece of public art—pretty bloody unlikely, mind you—I will either require FULL rights be included, or the art to be contractually placed under an irrevocable CC0 Creative Commons license.
Has Apple bought one?
There’s the real question...has Apple bought one of these things?
Re: Too bad they’re not named Macy
I should have said, too bad their surname is not Macy...
Too bad they’re not named Macy
In Scotland, your name cannot be taken from you in trade if it is trademarked otherwise. If your name is McDonald and you want to open a sandwich shop and call it McDonald’s in Scotland, the huge multinational trademark bully could not do a damned thing about it.
Nuns?
If the issue IS religious garb on the beach, are they going to make nuns strip at gunpoint? Hmmmm...
Being stupid and dishonest is no crime...
...if you are a senior political appointee. If you are a member of the U.S. Armed Forces, being stupid and dishonest resulting in mishandling of classified material is ALWAYS a crime. I saw a junior officer's career end over the destruction of several hundred secret documents without documentation. Everyone agreed that they had almost certainly gone into a burn bag and were destroyed, but without the record of the destruction the Classified Material Custodian was still responsible to produce those documents and he could not. No malice, genuine error, but as often happens in the service, the officer was allowed to resign his commission in lieu of a court martial. As a junior officer and squadron Classified Material Custodian, I actually received a non-punitive Letter of Reprimand for a missing confidential document that later turned up in the Executive Officer's helmet bag. (No, they didn't apologize or rescind my letter.)
No, actually by this logic it would be "cops in Chicago can shoot people because people in Chicago shoot people all the time."
Counter torque?
Real helicopter pilot here. With only a single blade, there has to be a counter-torque mechanism to prevent the body of the device from rotating in an opposite direction equally to the blade rpm. That's why helicopters have tails rotors. I don't see any counter-torque mechanism so I do not understand how they are negating the torque from the rotor blade into the body.
Re: Must be something more...
...aha! A large group of BLACK women. Guess that looks pretty suspicious to the Terminally Stupid Agency.
Economic model for cab medallions
I think I ask this question every time New York cabs come up. What economic model makes it reasonable for folks to pay in the range of $800,000 to a million dollars for an NYC cab medallion? How long do you have to run a cab under the medallion to recoup that? It looks to me like it would have to be several hundred years.
Software by Federal employees is in the public domain
Because of USC 17 Circular 92 Section 105, works prepared by employees of the U.S. Government are in the public domain. When I was the Admin Officer & Information Systems Officer for a large Navy training squadron back in the 80s, the Naval Air Rework Facility in San Diego opened a software shop. They were handing out disks with maintenance management and flight scheduling software at an event on the base as a "free trial", with the caveat that we'd have to pay them if we kept using it. I told them we'd use it if it was any good, but we wouldn't pay them. They told me we had too, that they couldn't produce the software if units didn't pay. I asked if they were all civil service folks writing the code and they said yes, and I pointed out to them that by Federal law, every line of code they wrote was in the public domain. They were a bit taken aback by this as I guess it hadn't occurred to them that this was the case, and finally they came back with "Well, if you don't pay you won't get any support!" To which I replied, "Well if your software and documentation are any good, we won't need any!"
But will they continue to self-sign?
Currently most HTTPS Federal web sites use self-signed certificates, which causes browsers to label them as unsafe. I see no issues with the U.S. Government registering as a Certificate Authority (CA), but until they either do that or purchase certificates from registered CAs, this move will actually weaken consumer security by encouraging them to overrule what otherwise is a very sensible warning and limitation.
Re: The first baby boy born on Mars...
Ok, I'm old and the name part of my memory no longer functions at peak capacity. Correction: Valentine Michael.
The first baby boy born on Mars...
...would need to be named Michael Valentine [lastname].
If you don't know why, shame on you; look it up.
Not just Open Source...
...but in the Public Domain. "A work prepared by an officer or employee" of the federal government "as part of that person's official duties," under section 105 of the Copyright Act, is not entitled to domestic copyright protection under U.S. law, placing it in the public domain. So all code written by Federal employees as part of their job is in the public domain, even better than Open Source.
Curiouser and curiouser...
The idea that someone could be guilty of inducing infringement of an invalid patent would seem to be close to the ultimate in Alice-in-Wonderland law.
I see a market opportunity!
I see a market for an encryption system that will have an alternate self-destruct password, i.e. you agree to enter your password and enter the destruction password. Is this out there already?
OH NO...
...my anonymous online persona is a sanitation engineer! But wait...no AOL account . What a relief. Who still has an AOL account, anyway?