Ron's Info-Closet Annex

Sun, 07 Mar 2004

Patent cooperatives

I find "intellectual property" an obnoxious concept. Although I am fairly anosmic (or smell-blind, to coin a kenning), I find that the concept of IP stinks. Whereas trademarks can be almost benign, copyright is awful, and given the current practices of the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office, under which effectively all it takes to obtain a patent is money, patents stink the worst. Have you seen US patent #5,443,036, on teasing a cat with a laser pointer? The patent is self-satirising; it almost looks as though there's a Discordian at work here.

There are some interesting proposals to fix our broken patent system. One is OpenPatents.org, which is developing a kind of GNU General Public License based on patents rather than copyrights. Another is PATO, a similar but simpler system that would act like NATO in that it would be a "mutual defense" collective. The only requirement for joining such a collective is that you must agree to license your present and future patents to everyone else in the collective. In return, the rest of the collective license their patents to you. You now have access to a vastly larger patent pool with which to defend yourself against litigation, so if someone comes to you and says, "You're in violation of my patent on using a laser pointer to tease a cat. Pay up!", you can say, "Well, you're in violation of my licensed patents on laser pointers, teasing, and cats, so back off, Greyface!"

I spoke informally about this with an IP attorney I know (whom I rather like), and he told me that defensive patent pools are actually standard practice in many industries. John Walker of Autodesk developed the PATO idea independently circa 1993, so I don't know whether the world has caught up with him in the past ten years or so, or whether he was just out of touch with computer industry practice back then.

Entered 13:43 [/polyticks/ip] permalink

Sun, 22 Feb 2004

Doing my bit...

...to spread santorum far and wee.

Entered 23:26 [/polyticks] permalink

Thu, 23 Oct 2003

A Coping Strategy for Bad News

The news just keeps being bad, doesn't it? Does it cause you as much anxiety as it does me?

I came up with a list of things to remember about the media's presentation of the news that serves as a generalised coping strategy. I hope this short list helps you to cheer up.

Note: Some of these items apply mostly to news about the USA, where I live, such as ones that mention a bicameral legislature.

OK, let's take a semantic pause, everybody.

The legislation described may not be passed.
It may pass in the House but fail in the Senate, or the reverse.
If passed, it may be struck down in the courts, or tied up in the courts.
Public outcry may make enforcement impractical.
It may be enforced incompetently, or be impractical because of bureaucracy or lack of funds.
Any law can be repealed.
There may be no force of law behind an "initiative". It may be the result of a rogue agency or bureaucrat acting alone.
The reportage may be exaggerated or inaccurate.
It is in the interest of the Right to exaggerate to make us feel small and helpless.
It is in the interest of the Left to exaggerate to get us off our asses.
It is in the interest of the media to exaggerate to sell more ads.
When things are slow, the media may dig into its files and exaggerate old news.
It may take so long to enact bad legislation that it bleeds into the next administration, which might be more sympathetic to human rights.
It may not affect you until the next administration, which might be more sympathetic to human rights.
You may have misunderstood what you read, or jumped to conclusions.
It doesn't necessarily tie in with your favourite conspiracy theories.
Laugh, for crissake! Breathe.

Entered 04:58 [/polyticks/media] permalink

Wed, 22 Oct 2003

Sirius Cybernetics = Microsoft?

The major difference between the Sirius Cybernetics Corporation and Microsoft, as far as I can tell, is that Microsoft would never, ever use a slogan like "Share and Enjoy!"

Entered 20:45 [/polyticks/ip] permalink