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Embattled ACTA Negotiations Next Week In Geneva; US Sees Signing This Year

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| Criticism from NGOs
|
| Canadian law expert David Fewer, staff counsel at the University of Ottawa’s
| Canadian Internet Policy and Public Interest Clinic, told the Ottawa Citizen
| that the discussion paper was very close to a potential Christmas wish-list
| by Hollywood companies.
|
| Knowledge Ecology International (KEI), in an earlier statement filed to USTR,
| warned against a lack in differentiation and clearness of core terms, like
| counterfeiting, infringement or piracy. “Is Microsoft a “pirate” for
| insisting on the right to continue to infringe the z4 patents in order to use
| an infringing DRM technology to protect Microsoft software itself from
| infringement by unauthorised uses?” KEI asked in its statement.
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http://www.ip-watch.org/weblog/index.php?p=1071

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PaaS and the patent trolls

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| If the advent of PaaS stirs up a plague of patent trolls to resurrect
| long-dead patents and bring suits against providers or users it could become
| a nightmare for the nascent industry. The providers who suffer most will be
| those based in countries that enforce business methods patents most
| rigorously: the United States, Australia, Japan and Singapore, according to
| Wikipedia’s article on the topic. In contrast, “patent protection for
| business method patents in Israel, China, India, Mexico, and most of Europe
| is difficult.”
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http://blogs.zdnet.com/SAAS/?p=528

Infringement claims detailed

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| Microsoft Corp. violated an Alcatel-Lucent patent to produce its Xbox
| video-game player, a lawyer for Alcatel-Lucent told jurors who are
| considering a demand for $419 million in...

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EU hopes for Community patent under French Presidency

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| "If there is enough political will, I am confident of having a solution soon,
| maybe even under the French Presidency," Vijzak stated.
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http://www.euractiv.com/en/innovation/eu-hopes-community-patent-french-presidency/article...

Recent:

The Struggles of France's Three Strikes Law

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| As 2008 began, the international music industry was proudly predicting the
| dawning of a new age of co-operation between rightsholders, Internet
| companies and governments. The dynamic...

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Can Microsoft Do the ISO Limbo?

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| Even if Microsoft can hold the line and push OOXML through that final hoop,
| however, that doesn't necessarily mean success. A member of the European
| Parliament recently called for...

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Is Microsoft Repeating Vista Mistakes with Windows 7?

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| Microsoft seems to be sending the wrong message with its demo of Windows 7's
| touchscreen at the D: All Things Digital conference. Observers fear Microsoft
| may be making the same mistakes that hurt Windows Vista. Instead of focusing
| on Vista, Microsoft demonstrated a Windows 7 touchscreen that may not be
| available for years.
`----

http://www.newsfactor.com/story.xhtml?story_id=13300AE25VTZ

Again, this confirms that the codebase of Windows is a mess. They didn't even
make it modular like they Promised(C).

Days ago:

Windows 7 Shows Microsoft Hasn't Learned Vista Lessons

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Bill Gates doesn't play monopoly? Laugh? I nearly died

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| Bill Gates and Steve Ballmer, Microsoft's High Command, received the same
| treatment, with one softball question after another. 'Was Vista a mistake?'
| Not at all, replied Gates....

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Microsoft has lost its grip on the ecosystem

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| This dominance is the product of Microsoft's influence over its partners, but
| Redmond is starting to lose its grip. At least three key manufacturers — of
| chips, PCs and handsets — in the ecosystem have wriggled free. Microsoft,
| used to leading others, is increasingly finding itself being led places it
| doesn't want to go.
|
| The first sign came out of the 'Vista Capable' lawsuit, when previously
| confidential uncovered emails showed what Intel seems to have done to
| Microsoft just prior to the launch of Windows Vista. Intel wanted to stick
| its 915 chipset into new PCs and Microsoft wanted to do the same with Vista —
| the problem was, the 915's embedded graphics capabilities could not handle
| Vista's flashy Aero interface.
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http://resources.zdnet.co.uk/articles/comment/0,1000002985,39426609,00.htm

Recent:

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Microsoft France bans wine marketing

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| Key words used to search for online wine sales sites, and promotional links
| to them, have been banned from Microsoft’s French MSN website.
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http://www.sbpost.ie/post/pages/p/story.aspx-qqqt=MEDIA+AND+MARKETING-qqqs=mediaandmarketing...

Recent:

Searching for document formats

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| I’m not sure there’s a concrete conclusion here though it is clear to me that
| Microsoft Live Search has the least useful and relevant set of links about
| ODF in the top ten beyond the Wikipedia entry. I find that odd. Perhaps they
| just have a really quirky relevance algorithm.  
`----

http://www.sutor.com/newsite/blog-open/?p=2143

Is Microsoft tinkering with Live Search results?

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Microsoft pledges support for Yar’Adua’s seven-point agenda

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| Under the agreement, he said, Microsoft was expected to build capacity in the
| teaching community and train teachers in the area of developing digital
| literacy curriculum.
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http://www.tribune.com.ng/01062008/news/news13.html

COMPUTING: Adult education has Microsoft Office classes

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| Digital Cameras parts 1 and 2 and additional courses in Microsoft Word,
| PowerPoint, and Excel are available in July.
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http://www.acorn-online.com/news/publish/ridgefield/34416.shtml

Related:

Governments Must Reject Gates' $3 Bid to Addict Next Billion PC Users

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Freedom and privacy in the cloud: a call for action

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| The freedom to keep your data for yourself and the freedom to run free
| software. You should be able to reclaim and enjoy these freedoms also when
| using web applications.
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http://www.clipperz.com/users/marco/blog/2008/05/30/freedom_and_privacy_cloud_ca...

Performance booster for Web-based devs:

Ruby on Rails Performance Options Grow

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| Ruby on Rails (RoR) is a popular open source development framework because it
| enables rapid application development.
|
| The new performance management and profiling tools are important additions to
| the RoR development community as RoR moves from being a hobbyist development
| language to a bona fide enterprise development framework.
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