[ Update: I am disappointed to see that you are supposed to download Microsoft Silverlight to participate. I will not do that, as I stopped using Microsoft products years ago. I do see that you can at least listen eventually if you have YouTunes, via subscribing free to YouTunesU via Universities, Santa Clara. You can also use Mono if, unlike me, you are willing. If this isn't a clear and obvious demonstration of why proprietary anything is a royal pain, I don't know what else to say. I view Mono as having patent issues, ironically enough, as does Microsoft. Ironically Santa Clara has just provided a clear illustration of precisely what is wrong with software patents. Most people these days use their smartphones or tablets for this sort of thing, and that means Microsoft is the very last on the list of marketshare. Extrapolate, please. It's no longer the case that if you pick only Microsoft, you've reached most people. The world has changed. Not to mention but it's precisely users of Free operating systems who are the most interested in this topic. Microsoft thinks the patent system is just fine. So, now I see why Richard Stallman refused to allow his talk to be live streamed this way. That ought to have let Santa Clara know that this is a valid and real issue to a large number of people, including me. My readers are expressing deep disappointment. I feel it too.]

[ Update 2: A Groklaw member, gibus, reports: "You can watch the conference with Free software (mplayer, vlc...) on mms://ammsmedia.scu.edu/mobile2 "]

I confess I begged for this, because I know a lot of you are seriously interested in this topic but can't make it there. So thank you Santa Clara Law. Here's where you go tomorrow, and it runs all day from 8:50 am to 5:30 pm Pacific time, minus one talk at 9 AM.

You can also ask questions, and they'll try to get to them as time allows by emailing or tweeting. I'll show you the announcement in full, with all the details. Michael Risch and Colleen Chien will be speaking, as will James Bessen, and Eben Moglen and Dan Ravicher and Google's Kent Walker and the Honorable Paul Grewal, Northern District of California, the magistrate judge on the Apple v. Samsung litigations there, and Stanford's Mark Lemley and Keith Bergelt of Open Invention Network and Julie Samuels of EFF and Pamela Samuelson of UC Berkley School of Law and many more. It's going to be something.

I know we will have a couple of attendees from Groklaw there in person, and I know you wish you could be there too. So do I. But I'm very grateful that they are streaming this and that they will make the talks available in a few weeks as well, in case you can't devote the whole day to it all at once. I can't think of any legal topic I care about as much as this one right along through here, and it's been a long slog just to get the topic stage front and center. And here it is.

Here's the announcement:

"Can't Make Tomorrow's Conference on Software Patents? Watch Online!"

November 15, 2012 at 10:11 AM

We're excited for our big conference tomorrow, Solutions to the Software Patent Problem.

We're pleased to announce that we will be streaming the event for those of you who can't join us in person. Go to http://ammsweb.scu.edu/webcasts/mobile2/Solutions_Software_Patent_Problem/index.htm Streaming viewers can participate in the conversation by emailing their questions to HTLI.SCU@gmail.com or tweeting questions to @SCUHTLI (we'll also take questions using the #htli hashtag). We can't promise we'll get to all of the submitted questions, but we'll treat them equally to questions from the in-person audience. In addition, streaming viewers can participate in our online polls.

The stream will run the entire day of the conference (8:50 am to 5:30 pm Pacific time). However, in accordance with his wishes, we will not be streaming Richard Stallman's presentation (roughly 9 am to 9:20 am Pacific). We plan to video-record the day's proceedings and post the recordings in a few weeks.