More on Patents, Apple, Evil and Hypocrisy

Thanks to laurion for pointing me at John Gruber's excellent article about patents, and the Apple / HTC case in particular. It's a little long, but well worth the read: it is a very measured examination of the concept of software patents, which essentially comes to the conclusion that, while software patents are legitimate in principle, the majority of them are for the wrong thing -- patents on relatively vague ideas, not really on novel and innovative implementations as they should be.

He then goes over to the Apple vs. HTC smartphone case, and makes some of the same points I did last week, but also points out that this whole thing doesn't smell like a legal dispute, but like a personal one: that Steve Jobs appears to be personally aggrieved that Apple's design concepts are being taken up by other companies. Frankly, I think he's probably right: this patent suit violates the industry norm of patent detente, so one suspects there has to be a reason for that. I'd guess that Jobs is taking a lot of (justifiable) pride in Apple's design skill, and is lashing out at the companies that have built off of it.

Which on the one hand is understandable; but on the other, is the *rankest* hypocrisy I've seen in some time. Those of us who have been around a while remember what turned Apple from a hobbyist's company into a powerhouse -- the introduction of the Macintosh, most of whose ideas were directly ripped off from Xerox. Yes, Apple put it all together well, and did a great job of marketing it, but let's be clear: most of what was regarded as innovative in the Mac was stuff that Xerox PARC had been cooking up over the previous decade, and sharing pretty freely. (This is why many of us snorted when Apple got huffy about the introduction of Windows: most of what they were complaining about, they hadn't invented in the first place.)

All of which just strengthens my feeling that this move crosses my personal "evil" line, at least for the software industry. Apple appears to have forgotten their own roots as a company that took the great design ideas of others and built on them: now that they *are* the great design laboratory, they are trying to prevent just the kind of sharing that created them, and which helps the industry to thrive.

(Really, I want to see a parody ad, with The Apple Guy as a cranky old man, lashing out at the new kid in his yard...)

More on Patents, Apple, Evil and Hypocrisy

Thanks to laurion for pointing me at John Gruber's excellent article about patents, and the Apple / HTC case in particular. It's a little long, but well worth the read: it is a very measured examination of the concept of software patents, which essentially comes to the conclusion that, while software patents are legitimate in principle, the majority of them are for the wrong thing -- patents on relatively vague ideas, not really on novel and innovative implementations as they should be.

He then goes over to the Apple vs. HTC smartphone case, and makes some of the same points I did last week, but also points out that this whole thing doesn't smell like a legal dispute, but like a personal one: that Steve Jobs appears to be personally aggrieved that Apple's design concepts are being taken up by other companies. Frankly, I think he's probably right: this patent suit violates the industry norm of patent detente, so one suspects there has to be a reason for that. I'd guess that Jobs is taking a lot of (justifiable) pride in Apple's design skill, and is lashing out at the companies that have built off of it.

Which on the one hand is understandable; but on the other, is the *rankest* hypocrisy I've seen in some time. Those of us who have been around a while remember what turned Apple from a hobbyist's company into a powerhouse -- the introduction of the Macintosh, most of whose ideas were directly ripped off from Xerox. Yes, Apple put it all together well, and did a great job of marketing it, but let's be clear: most of what was regarded as innovative in the Mac was stuff that Xerox PARC had been cooking up over the previous decade, and sharing pretty freely. (This is why many of us snorted when Apple got huffy about the introduction of Windows: most of what they were complaining about, they hadn't invented in the first place.)

All of which just strengthens my feeling that this move crosses my personal "evil" line, at least for the software industry. Apple appears to have forgotten their own roots as a company that took the great design ideas of others and built on them: now that they *are* the great design laboratory, they are trying to prevent just the kind of sharing that created them, and which helps the industry to thrive.

(Really, I want to see a parody ad, with The Apple Guy as a cranky old man, lashing out at the new kid in his yard...)

I don't like hard-sell, but an impassioned plea will sometimes work

A few days ago, fairdice pointed out this plea from Ars Technica. It makes a point that really *ought* to be obvious, but which a lot of folks are in denial about: ad blocking is very destructive to websites. The Cult of Free has managed to convince most people that they are entitled to read whatever they want, without having to pay for it; the result is that any attempt to require people to pay drives most sites' readership down precipitously. (I note that even the Economist, which costs a fair fortune in paper, is mostly online-readable for free.) The side-effect of that is that sites are utterly dependent on advertising for their revenues, and ad blockers starve that, potentially killing sites.

Of course, the article manages to overlook the one very good, very technical reason for ad-blocking: many of those ads are doing a lot more than simply trying to get you to buy a product immediately. A large fraction of them are essentially low-grade spyware, using various techniques to assemble a profile of who you are and what you are interested in, by tracking you across many websites. That profile is the main reason why advertising online is worth money, and why page views matter every bit as much as clicks -- the spyware takes effect when you view the page.

But that said, the original point is a valid one: these sites need to make money somehow. And the shareware principle is very deeply embedded in my soul: if I'm making use of their services, I *should* be contributing to the site somehow. Yes, there are all the rationalizations of the Cult of Free; personally, I find most of them rather selfish and short-sighted. The morality entirely aside, if someone's providing a service I find valuable, it's in my best interest to help keep it running.

Fortunately, Ars (like many sites, and it's a trend I encourage) provides another approach: subscriptions. That is, you don't *have* to pay, but you can choose to instead. No ads, no information leakage through them (although Ars' own privacy policy *does* suck to a surprising degree), and a very quantified contribution to helping run the site. IMO it's rather pricey at $50/year, but if I'm being honest this is probably the single website I use most, so it's worth that much to me...

I don't like hard-sell, but an impassioned plea will sometimes work

A few days ago, fairdice pointed out this plea from Ars Technica. It makes a point that really *ought* to be obvious, but which a lot of folks are in denial about: ad blocking is very destructive to websites. The Cult of Free has managed to convince most people that they are entitled to read whatever they want, without having to pay for it; the result is that any attempt to require people to pay drives most sites' readership down precipitously. (I note that even the Economist, which costs a fair fortune in paper, is mostly online-readable for free.) The side-effect of that is that sites are utterly dependent on advertising for their revenues, and ad blockers starve that, potentially killing sites.

Of course, the article manages to overlook the one very good, very technical reason for ad-blocking: many of those ads are doing a lot more than simply trying to get you to buy a product immediately. A large fraction of them are essentially low-grade spyware, using various techniques to assemble a profile of who you are and what you are interested in, by tracking you across many websites. That profile is the main reason why advertising online is worth money, and why page views matter every bit as much as clicks -- the spyware takes effect when you view the page.

But that said, the original point is a valid one: these sites need to make money somehow. And the shareware principle is very deeply embedded in my soul: if I'm making use of their services, I *should* be contributing to the site somehow. Yes, there are all the rationalizations of the Cult of Free; personally, I find most of them rather selfish and short-sighted. The morality entirely aside, if someone's providing a service I find valuable, it's in my best interest to help keep it running.

Fortunately, Ars (like many sites, and it's a trend I encourage) provides another approach: subscriptions. That is, you don't *have* to pay, but you can choose to instead. No ads, no information leakage through them (although Ars' own privacy policy *does* suck to a surprising degree), and a very quantified contribution to helping run the site. IMO it's rather pricey at $50/year, but if I'm being honest this is probably the single website I use most, so it's worth that much to me...

Once again, the administration demonstrates an unusual bit of clue

Press release from Friday: Edward Tufte named to Recovery Independent Advisory Panel. This is the panel that is supposed to provide accountability and transparency for the stimulus project -- to help everyone understand where the money is going and how it is actually being used. To that end, appointing the single person most associated with making data clear and understandable is -- well, rather refreshing. It would seem to indicate that someone up there actually *wants* transparency, instead of simply wanting to *claim* it...

Once again, the administration demonstrates an unusual bit of clue

Press release from Friday: Edward Tufte named to Recovery Independent Advisory Panel. This is the panel that is supposed to provide accountability and transparency for the stimulus project -- to help everyone understand where the money is going and how it is actually being used. To that end, appointing the single person most associated with making data clear and understandable is -- well, rather refreshing. It would seem to indicate that someone up there actually *wants* transparency, instead of simply wanting to *claim* it...

A Day of Arts

Quick diary entry with a few personal highlights from Saturday:

I have to say, part of the fun of the day was watching my household in action. hfcougar was working on herding the numerous cats. (With both their Majesties and Highnesses visiting, there are a *lot* of cats.) Gundormr taught an informal class on trichonopoly, which IIRC wound up entirely attended by Laurels. (He did a good job of white-fencing it, too, drawing in onlookers with a quick introductory lesson.) And ladysprite put a fine trio of entries into the championship, including a *frighteningly* funny dance choreography. (I direct you to her account of it, which is well worth reading. The documentation is a delight in and of itself.)

Besides that, the main focus of my day was heralding. I've done a fair amount of it, of course, but it's been occurring to me that my experience is oddly specialized: I've almost entirely done *solo* courts. I've been Jehan's Emergency Backup Herald for several years now (called upon when none of the Real Heralds were available), and I've mainly run Royal Courts in odd circumstances where I was the only good candidate. (For example, since we only had a couple dozen Easterners at the SCA 30th Year Celebration, I wound up as Royal Herald there.) So I realized that I had better participate in a couple of courts as a team member, before I step up to trying to lead such a team, so that I know what it feels like.

In practice, it went well, although it was a bit silly and complicated. I wound up wearing two tabards into Court. I heralded Baron Jehan in, and ran Carolingian Court. Then I snuck off to the side, whipped off the Carolingian tabard in favor of the royal one underneath, and took my turn doing an award in Royal Court. (rufinia's Silver Crescent -- I took a look at the court docket, and pretty much called dibs on that one.) It was quite a bit of fun all around, and I was happy to find that there weren't any major surprises -- but I do need to put better insoles into my SCA shoes...

A Day of Arts

Quick diary entry with a few personal highlights from Saturday:

I have to say, part of the fun of the day was watching my household in action. hfcougar was working on herding the numerous cats. (With both their Majesties and Highnesses visiting, there are a *lot* of cats.) Gundormr taught an informal class on trichonopoly, which IIRC wound up entirely attended by Laurels. (He did a good job of white-fencing it, too, drawing in onlookers with a quick introductory lesson.) And ladysprite put a fine trio of entries into the championship, including a *frighteningly* funny dance choreography. (I direct you to her account of it, which is well worth reading. The documentation is a delight in and of itself.)

Besides that, the main focus of my day was heralding. I've done a fair amount of it, of course, but it's been occurring to me that my experience is oddly specialized: I've almost entirely done *solo* courts. I've been Jehan's Emergency Backup Herald for several years now (called upon when none of the Real Heralds were available), and I've mainly run Royal Courts in odd circumstances where I was the only good candidate. (For example, since we only had a couple dozen Easterners at the SCA 30th Year Celebration, I wound up as Royal Herald there.) So I realized that I had better participate in a couple of courts as a team member, before I step up to trying to lead such a team, so that I know what it feels like.

In practice, it went well, although it was a bit silly and complicated. I wound up wearing two tabards into Court. I heralded Baron Jehan in, and ran Carolingian Court. Then I snuck off to the side, whipped off the Carolingian tabard in favor of the royal one underneath, and took my turn doing an award in Royal Court. (rufinia's Silver Crescent -- I took a look at the court docket, and pretty much called dibs on that one.) It was quite a bit of fun all around, and I was happy to find that there weren't any major surprises -- but I do need to put better insoles into my SCA shoes...