Patents: I haven’t been blogging much, as I’ve got the damn flu. I thought I was clear after a minor bout, then it came back around again for another run… urgh. Now I’m all hot, confused, achy, and (due to it affecting my ears and therefore sense of balance) clumsy. Damn you, influenza virus! :(

But there’s some good news — NoSoftwarePatents.com has opened, with a nice, clean, clear website full of excellent content. Not only does it cover the usual list of basics, with good examples like FFII’s web-shop example, it goes into more detail about parallels; here’s a great one:

Patents on software are just as wrong as expanding the patent system to literature. With patents on story elements, no movie could be published without having to firstly check whether there is any general idea in the storyline that someone patented during the last 20 years. Here’s an example: At first sight, Dirty Dancing and Titanic are two very distinct movies. However, if there were patents on story elements, then the makers of Dirty Dancing could have sued the studio of Titanic. Both movies have a scene in which a poor boy takes a rich girl from a party of her social peers to a dancing party of his group, and she enjoys it. Dirty Dancing came out only nine years before Titanic, so any patent would still have been in force. No one knows whether James Cameron had that Dirty Dancing scene in mind as he wrote the Titanic script. Maybe Cameron never saw Dirty Dancing but the patent (if it existed) could be used against him anyway.

That’s exactly the right parallel to make! Software patents cover the tens to hundreds of little algorithms you need to put together to make a software product, and comparing an algorithm in a software product to a scene concept in a movie, illustrates that nicely.

Each page has a little quote from heavy-hitters like Bill Gates, Oracle, Deutsche Bank, PriceWaterhouseCoopers, etc., coming out against swpats. There’s also a section dealing with the disinformation that the other side has been putting out.

Next time you need to send a URL over to educate someone about this issue, this is the one to reach for.

Some news on the EU Software Patents Directive — IDA eGovernment News reports that ‘the formal approval of the draft Directive on the patentability of computer-implemented inventions by the EU Competitiveness Council has been postponed due to translation delays’, and notes that ‘on 6/10/2004, the Parliament’s Internal Market Committee selected former French Prime Minister Michel Rocard to draw up its response.’ It goes on:

Unsurprisingly, the appointment of Mr Rocard — an outspoken adversary of software patents — was welcomed by opponents of the proposed directive and criticised by its supporters. That Michel Rocard is taking over the dossier reflects the fact that the wider economic, infrastructural and social implications for Europe are now seen more clearly. Also, in the Council a learning process has begun, and it will be supported by the Parliament’s move, Mr Holger Blasum of the Foundation for a Free Information Infrastructure told journalists. On the oher hand, Francisco Mingorance of the Business Software Alliance pointed out that Mr Rocard hasn’t shown any sympathy to the directive in the past. We can only hope he will be sufficiently open to the view of persons and groups which have a different opinion, he said.

Well, that sounds like good news to me ;)

Tags: damn, dancing, dirty, example, party, patent, patents, scene, software, story, titanic

Patents: lyranthe.org notes that the EU elections are coming up this Thursday, 11th June. Accordingly, here’s a single-issue roundup of the candidates, from what I’ve heard:

• The Labour Party, sadly, haven’t yet come up with a concrete policy on the issue — but the Dublin candidate, Ivana Bacik, has (verbally) stated her opposition.
• The Greens, however, are actively campaigning against them, their candidates clearly understand and have communicated with voters on the issue in the past, and the cross-Europe party policy is clearly stated.
• Eoin Dubsky is an independent candidate, standing on a primarily anti-war platform. He’s stated his opposition to software patenting clearly and publically. He’s also a total techie — with RSS feeds and a Redbrick account! ;)
• FG’s position is totally unclear, as usual… ;)
• And in the other corner: FF and the PDs are whole-heartedly supporting software patenting; in fact, they’re the ones running the EU Council which just pushed through software patenting law despite the democratic mandate from the European Parliament. boo.

(PS: these are my opinions, not those of my employer. ;)

(updated: I’d left out Eoin Dubsky! my bad, now fixed.)

Tags: candidate, issue, june, lyranthe, opposition, org, party, patents, policy, software, thursday

Ireland: Now that the IP Enforcement directive has passed, Irish readers might be interested to find out how their MEPs voted on it.

First off, the good ones:

• PATRICIA MCKENNA - GREEN PARTY MEP (DUBLIN) since 1994
• NUALA AHERN - GREEN PARTY MEP (LEINSTER) since 1994

Both of the Green MEPs voted along party lines on a key amendment, amendment 54, which would have limited enforcement to commercial-scale counterfeiting rather than individual infringement.

But on the other side, we have these, who voted for applicability of the directive to all ‘IPR’, according to FFII. The hall of shame:

• JOE McCARTIN - FINE GAEL MEP (CONNACHT/ULSTER) since 1979
• JOHN CUSHNAHAN - FINE GAEL MEP (MUNSTER) since 1989
• DANA ROSEMARY SCALLON - INDEPENDENT MEP (CONNACHT/ULSTER) since 1999
• NIALL ANDREWS - FIANNA FAIL MEP (DUBLIN) since 1984
• GERARD COLLINS - FIANNA FAIL MEP (MUNSTER) since 1994
• JIM FITZSIMONS - FIANNA FAIL MEP (LEINSTER) since 1984
• LIAM HYLAND - FIANNA FAIL MEP (LEINSTER) since 1994

Unsurprising to see the conservative FFers (and Dana!) in there — but what do FG think they’re doing?

Considering that FFII read this as permitting ’surprise raids on teenagers in the middle of the night by private security firms on the flimsiest of evidence’, as passed, this is a ‘hall of shame’ issue.

The moral: vote Green!

Tags: amendment, directive, enforcement, fail, ffii, green, hall, ireland, mep, meps, party

Funny: Getting Even With Nicorettes (NYTimes): a very funny article about giving up smoking by taking up a full-time nicotine gum habit.

‘I’ll be at a party,’ he said, ‘and someone will say, `Oh, is that Nicorette?’ and I’ll say, `Yes, do you want some?’ They’ll say, `Oh, I don’t smoke,’ and I’ll say, `Try it anyway.’ There’s this excitement and curiosity, and then on about the fourth chew, this look comes over their face that says, `Oh God, why are you giving me lead?’

‘It’s like prank gum. It’s like going to kiss your grandmother and finding her tongue in your mouth.’

Tags: article, funny, gum, habit, nicorette, nicorettes, nicotine, nytimes, party, smoking, someone

Politics: Lest we get carried away with the beauty, grooviness and coolness-in-general of New Zealand — where 1 in 160 of the population was involved in the making of the LoTR trilogy — up pops this story. It seems racism and xenophobia is finally arriving on the shores of Aotearoa.

Under the headline ‘Whose country is it anyway?’ Peters’s leaflet rails against Asian immigrants, falsely claiming that hundreds of thousands are coming to New Zealand and blaming them for, among other things, traffic problems in Auckland. These immigrants are, according to Peters, simultaneously poor enough to be leeches on the welfare system, and rich enough to drive up the cost of housing.

It would be easy to dismiss all this as a piece of desperate populism. But, unlike the Australian One Nation party, New Zealand First is not a collapsing political joke: it is the third-biggest party in Wellington’s parliament, and until 1999 Mr Peters was the country’s deputy prime minister. Barring an electoral miracle, the opposition National party will have to take them on as coalition partners if it is ever to win another election.

‘Traffic problems in Auckland’? WTF? (found via Danny Yee)

Computing: Amazing. via GirlHacker, it turns out that a teapot has long been used as a demonstration of complex computer graphics techiques — with it’s curved surfaces, hidden surfaces and the like (don’t ask me, I’m no graphics guru). If you were around for the early 3-D graphics days, you’ve almost definitely seen the teapot.

Well, it turns out there was a real teapot. Here’s the history.

A related image is that of ‘Lenna’, a standard test image used when testing image compression schemes, which features a woman giving the viewer a rather saucy come-hither look. It turns out she was a Swedish model, who posed for Playboy in 1972, and that picture was scanned by an (unauthorized) researcher at USC. Piracy!

Playboy later threatened to prosecute over the unauthorized use, but by now has recognised the unique history this now has, and has relented. Cool.

Tags: beauty, country, image, lest, making, party, playboy, politics, population, teapot, traffic

Lest we get carried away with the beauty, grooviness and coolness-in-general of New Zealand — where 1 in 160 of the population was involved in the making of the LoTR trilogy — up pops this story. It seems racism and xenophobia is finally arriving on the shores of Aotearoa.

Under the headline ‘Whose country is it anyway?’ Peters’s leaflet rails against Asian immigrants, falsely claiming that hundreds of thousands are coming to New Zealand and blaming them for, among other things, traffic problems in Auckland. These immigrants are, according to Peters, simultaneously poor enough to be leeches on the welfare system, and rich enough to drive up the cost of housing.

It would be easy to dismiss all this as a piece of desperate populism. But, unlike the Australian One Nation party, New Zealand First is not a collapsing political joke: it is the third-biggest party in Wellington’s parliament, and until 1999 Mr Peters was the country’s deputy prime minister. Barring an electoral miracle, the opposition National party will have to take them on as coalition partners if it is ever to win another election.

‘Traffic problems in Auckland’? WTF? (found via Danny Yee)

Computing: Amazing. via GirlHacker, it turns out that a teapot has long been used as a demonstration of complex computer graphics techiques — with it’s curved surfaces, hidden surfaces and the like (don’t ask me, I’m no graphics guru). If you were around for the early 3-D graphics days, you’ve almost definitely seen the teapot.

Well, it turns out there was a real teapot. Here’s the history.

A related image is that of ‘Lenna’, a standard test image used when testing image compression schemes, which features a woman giving the viewer a rather saucy come-hither look. It turns out she was a Swedish model, who posed for Playboy in 1972, and that picture was scanned by an (unauthorized) researcher at USC. Piracy!

Playboy later threatened to prosecute over the unauthorized use, but by now has recognised the unique history this now has, and has relented. Cool.

Tags: beauty, country, image, lest, making, party, playboy, population, teapot, traffic

Humour: BBC: Serbia wedding guests ‘down plane’.

Guests at a wedding in central Serbia have apparently shot down a small aircraft by mistake.

They were celebrating in the traditional way - firing off shot after shot into the air above the wedding party. Unfortunately, there was a two-seater aircraft flying overhead. One eye-witness told reporters the plane was shot in the left wing.

oops!

Spam: Spammers try fooling filters with digital signatures (ZDNet). oh look, they quote myself and Theo ;)

Tags: air, aircraft, bbc, firing, humour, mistake, party, plane, shot, way, wedding

The concept of a ‘pay-to-mail’ scheme — charge people to send you mail — is patented, it seems. Good, I never liked it anyway ;)

A method and apparatus for determining whether a party sending an email communication is on a list of parties authorized by the intended receiving party. If the sending party is not on the list of authorized parties, an electronic billing agreement is emailed to the sending party indicating a fee that will be charged to the sending party in return for the message being provided to the intended receiving party. Preferably, the present invention is implemented with Internet communications and utilizes a security protocol to enable the electronic transaction to be transacted in a secure manner.

Date: Tue, 01 Jul 2003 15:00:09 -0400
From: “Bob Wyman” (spam-protected)
To: (spam-protected)
cc: “‘Yakov Shafranovich”‘ (spam-protected)
Subject: RE: US Spam patents: Partial list

A new, spam-related, US Patent was issued today. It is a continuation in part of US Patent 6,192,114 which is on the first list of patents I posted to this group.

See: http://patft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?patentnumber=6587550

US Patent 6,587,550 METHOD AND APPARATUS FOR ENABLING A FEE TO BE CHARGED TO A PARTY INITIATING AN ELECTRONIC MAIL COMMUNICATION WHEN THE PARTY IS NOT ON AN AUTHORIZATION LIST ASSOCIATED WITH THE PARTY TO WHOM THE COMMUNICATION IS DIRECTED

Abstract A method and apparatus for determining whether a party sending an email communication is on a list of parties authorized by the intended receiving party. If the sending party is not on the list of authorized parties, an electronic billing agreement is emailed to the sending party indicating a fee that will be charged to the sending party in return for the message being provided to the intended receiving party. Preferably, the present invention is implemented with Internet communications and utilizes a security protocol to enable the electronic transaction to be transacted in a secure manner.

————————————————————————

Inventors: Council; Michael O. (186 Hurt Dr., Cordele, GA 31015);
Santos; Daniel J. (3525 Roswell Rd., #721, Atlanta, GA 30305) Appl. No.: 783340 Filed: February 14, 2001

Asrg mailing list (spam-protected) https://www1.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/asrg

Tags: agreement, apparatus, billing, communication, email, fee, list, method, party, patent

Dear Raed — a blog from an Iraqi bloke called Salam Pax. It’s amazing to read this; a true, educated, passionate, reasonable voice from inside Iraq.

The trenches and sandbag mountains I wrote about last week are now all over Baghdad. They are not being put there by the army; they are part of the Party’s preparations for an insurgence. Each day a different area of Baghdad goes thru the motions. Party members spread in the streets of that area, build the trenches, sit in them polishing their Kalashnikovs and drink tea. The annoyance-factor of these training days depend on the zeal of the party members in that area. Until now the worst was the (14th of Ramadan) street, they stopped cars searched them and asked for ID and military cards, good thing I wasn’t going thru that street, I still have not stamped my military papers to show that I have done my reserves training.

Totally off on a tangent, but that street-name reminds me of a line from McCarthy’s Bar (extract here):

In Germany once, in the military garrison town of Erlangen, I had a few drinks with three American GIs who were planning to visit England because it would be neat to see where John Lennon and Elvis grew up’. They also wanted to know if they could use dollars, and would the street signs be in English? I tried to tell them about Elvis coming from Tennessee, but it seemed to make them want to kill me. The Twenty-eighth Rule states: Never Get Drunk with Soldiers (particularly in countries where the streets are named after dates).

Tags: area, blog, bloke, party, pax, raed, salam, street, thru, training

“I spiked Ted Heath’s dinner”. “At a meeting in 1970, ad man Jeremy Scott sprinkled speed on the Tory leader’s canapes. His firm went on to win the party’s account, and Heath won the election.” … “I was really just trying to cheer everyone up,” he adds sheepishly. “The quantities I used were minute.”

Tags: account, dinner, election, firm, leader, man, meeting, party, speed, tory

A gold urn made for a Nazi party leader has been discovered in a Bavarian lake, prompting a scramble by treasure hunters determined to get their hands on the Third Reich’s long-lost riches. However, getting at any gold that might be down there, may not be so easy:

Toplitz is a byword for everything dangerous in Alpine lakes. After 30ft there is no light, and below 100ft, the water is almost freezing. At 348ft, the bottom comes into view. There is no life at the bottom of the lake because there is not enough oxygen to sustain it.

348ft, fact fans, is 116 metres. Yikes, that’s some serious diving…

Tags: bavarian, bottom, gold, lake, leader, party, scramble, third, treasure, urn