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The information on Groklaw is not intended to constitute legal advice. While Mark is a lawyer and he has asked other lawyers and law students to contribute articles, all of these articles are offered to help educate, not to provide specific legal advice. They are not your lawyers.

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EU settles eBook pricing war. | 136 comments | Create New Account
Comments belong to whoever posts them. Please notify us of inappropriate comments.
To Big to Fail, FAILS
Authored by: Anonymous on Friday, December 14 2012 @ 02:18 AM EST
When you decide not to prosecute bankers for billion-dollar crimes connected to drug-dealing and terrorism (some of HSBC's Saudi and Bangladeshi clients had terrorist ties, according to a Senate investigation), it doesn't protect the banking system, it does exactly the opposite. It terrifies investors and depositors everywhere, leaving them with the clear impression that even the most "reputable" banks may in fact be captured institutions whose senior executives are in the employ of (this can't be repeated often enough) murderers and terrorists.

Even more shocking, the Justice Department's response to learning about all of this was to do exactly the same thing that the HSBC executives did in the first place to get themselves in trouble – they took money to look the other way.

Matt Taibbi, Rolling Stone

[ Reply to This | Parent | # ]

Arduino announces ready-to-play Esplora
Authored by: tiger99 on Friday, December 14 2012 @ 06:58 AM EST
Link

Well, the Arduino, Raspberry Pi, and various other recent things, seem to have triggered a flood of cheap programmable devices of various types. I think that is great.

This thing obviously can become a game controller, so it will be a nice peripheral for the Pi, as well as any laptop or desktop.

I think that we are seeing the beginning of a new era where the little guy, with very linited finances, can actually get to develop useful things on cheap but decent hardware. This has never before been so in the field of computing, as even the likes of a Sinclair Spectrum cost many times more than any of these simple boards that are available, and when inflation is factored in, the cost is not even in the same order of magnitude. Nor are the performance capabilities, but in the opposite direction.

As we now have a world where anyone with some spare time can learn to program reasonably well (and most people will succeed, if they have the interest and motivation and make the effort to learn), there is all the more reason to get rid of software patents, completely and utterly, otherwise they will always get in the way of what people can do. Just imaging some kid who gets an Esplora and a Pi, and makes something clever and useful. First thing he will do is share copies of the software with his friends. Next, someone nasty like Apple, M$ or Oracle notices a patent violation......

That must not be allowed to happen. Freedom to program matters.

[ Reply to This | Parent | # ]

How to unGPL GPLed software.
Authored by: Anonymous on Friday, December 14 2012 @ 07:19 AM EST
I was looking at Linux databases trying to find a non client-server database a
bit "stronger" then sqlite ( comparing to Paradox on Windows ). One of
the DB's I came across is MaxDB
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MaxDB.

In the article is says taht for a while MaxDB was GPLed but more recent versions
are closed source. So I'm confused. How can you close source a GPLed product?

Mouse The Lucky Dog

[ Reply to This | Parent | # ]

NASA combats the conspiracy theorists:
Authored by: JamesK on Friday, December 14 2012 @ 08:11 AM EST
How Curiosity took a self-portrait on Mars

---
The following program contains immature subject matter.
Viewer discretion is advised.

[ Reply to This | Parent | # ]

Dave Hester sues Storage Wars, claim show is faked
Authored by: Anonymous on Friday, December 14 2012 @ 08:12 AM EST

I like trying to find the most off-topic stuff that I can, but which is really related. Here's a court case involving Reality TV Show Storage Wars. One of the stars is suing the show, and claims it is faked.

TMZ has a copy of the redacted complaint linked to from the story. Enjoy.

TMZ Online

Wayne
http://madhatter.ca

[ Reply to This | Parent | # ]

Code-breaking ‘hero’ Alan Turing deserves to be pardoned, scientists plead
Authored by: JamesK on Friday, December 14 2012 @ 08:21 AM EST
Stephen Hawking and other eminent scientists called Friday for the British government to pardon computer pioneer Alan Turing, who helped win World War II but was later prosecuted for homosexuality.

---
The following program contains immature subject matter.
Viewer discretion is advised.

[ Reply to This | Parent | # ]

EU settles eBook pricing war.
Authored by: Anonymous on Friday, December 14 2012 @ 09:37 AM EST
It would seem that the idea of penalties maxing at 10% of global turnover has
concentrated minds somewhat. See:-

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/newsbysector/mediatechnologyandtelecoms/97425
63/Amazon-wins-EU-e-book-pricing-war-with-Apple.html

Other outlets have the news too.

[ Reply to This | Parent | # ]

Fast DNA origami opens way for nanoscale machines
Authored by: Anonymous on Friday, December 14 2012 @ 09:38 AM EST
Molecules can now be folded into shapes in minutes, not days.
The technique involves using short DNA strands to hold a longer, folded strand in place at certain points, like sticky tape. Until now, assembling the shape has involved heating the DNA and allowing it to cool slowly for up to a week.

But that time has now been slashed to minutes. Hendrik Dietz, a biophysicist at the Technical University of Munich in Germany, and his colleagues stained the DNA with fluorescent dye and watched what happened as it cooled and folded. By stopping the reaction at different stages, they could check how far the folding and sticking had gone.

They discovered something striking: “It turns out that almost for the entire temperature range, nothing happens," says Dietz. But when a crucial temperature is reached, the whole structure forms suddenly.

Katharine Sanderson , Nature

---

Does this have any impact on Folding@Home ?

http://folding.stanford.edu/English/HomePage

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Folding@home

[ Reply to This | Parent | # ]

totally off topic: 0.99999999999....
Authored by: Anonymous on Friday, December 14 2012 @ 10:20 AM EST
Hi all math-minds,

On a totally not related site I found a discussion about
1 == 0.99999999....
because there was nothing in between those numbers.
not even 0.(0)1 what is claimed to be nonexistent because
there is no end to all the intermediate 0's to attach the 1.
Isn't that the same as saying pi is non-existent because
it has no end to attach the (never ending) rest of it ?
(While clearly it exists exactly as TT.)

[ Reply to This | Parent | # ]

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