Recent Comments:
Apple quietly bumps 30-inch Cinema Display specs {Engadget}
Mar 29th 2006 5:19PM It's likely that Apple and Dell are using the same supplier of LCDs, and that the manufacturer retested the parts, and rated them higher. Apple, when they discovered that Dell was listing the higher numbers, went back and revised theirs.
It's more than likely specsmanship, not any change in the actual displays.
Day 10 of Engadget Mobile's 30 days of cellphone giveaways {Engadget Mobile}
Feb 23rd 2006 8:34AM Another entry
Day 8 of Engadget Mobile's 30 days of cellphone giveaways {Engadget Mobile}
Feb 20th 2006 8:06PM The limerick, peculiar to English
Is a verse form that's hard to extinguish
Once Congress in session
Decreed its suppression
But people got around it by writing the last line without rhyme or meter.
NTP, don't cry, dry your eyes {Engadget}
Jan 29th 2006 5:14PM It's always instructional to turn things around. What if RIM had gone after NTP? Would their supposedly worthless patents be overturned? Would they be called a patent troll?
IBM has a billion dollar per year patent portfolio. Their tactics are forthright: either pay to license, or they'll find *some* patent to hang you on. While it's true that many of IBM's patents are quite innovative, there are many that don't meet that standard.
As a small developer, the spectre of software patents may not keep me awake at night -- but it ought to.
The basis for patents is contained in Article 1, Section 8 of the US Constitution, giving the legislature the authority "To promote the progress of science and useful arts, by securing for limited times to authors and inventors the exclusive right to their respective writings and discoveries."
The question I have is whether, in fact, patents such as those in question actually do anything to promote the progress of science and useful arts, or whether they do just the opposite.
