Yahoo Crosses The Line • Hacker News Board

Re: Yahoo Crosses The Line

#141

Post by monochromatic » Tue, Mar 13, 2012, 4:11 PM UTC

moldbug wrote: post #134

monochromatic wrote: post #122

This guy doesn't even mention the claims of the patents in suit, so why should I trust his opinion about their merits? If you don't know how to read a patent, you're absolutely not qualified to make pronouncements like this: > None of them represent unique and new ideas at the time of the filing. I supect they all can be thrown out over prior art if Facebook takes the time and effort to do that. Also, even the articl…

Can we bring Hitler into the conversation? No one needs to be "educated" in the intricate and fascinating political and economic power dynamics of the Third Reich to have a valid opinion about Hitler. All they need to know is that Hitler killed the Jews and was evil. Similarly, no one posting here needs to know anything about the technical details of patentology, a subject in which I suspect you're quite expert, to k…

If ridiculous comparisons make you feel better about holding strong opinions on subjects you're ignorant about, then by all means.

> The best lack all conviction, while the worst

> Are full of passionate intensity.

Re: Yahoo Crosses The Line

#142

Post by eroach » Tue, Mar 13, 2012, 4:16 PM UTC

SCO tried this crap to the tune of 45 million. What a stupid use of time and effort.

Re: Yahoo Crosses The Line

#143

Post by mirkules » Tue, Mar 13, 2012, 4:18 PM UTC

AznHisoka wrote: post #71

bambax wrote: post #13

> I used to care about that company for some reason That's the strangest part. I never found Yahoo useful for anything (except Douglas Crockford, but he could have been employed anywhere).

I actually like Yahoo News for some reason. Some of the stories they feature in the front page makes me want to click through and read it when I'm bored.

I'll second news.yahoo.com. It's better than Google's layout, and you can dive right into subregions of the world to get more specific world news.

Also, nba.yahoo.com has a better layout than nba.com itself for following stats and even following the games live (a really well-done java applet).

Finally, I've been playing around with switching search engines from Google to something else, and I found for most tech stuff, Yahoo! actually has more relevant search results than Bing or DDG.

Re: Yahoo Crosses The Line

#144

Post by pg » Tue, Mar 13, 2012, 4:23 PM UTC

CPlatypus wrote: post #65

nikcub wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

for starters, in the comment section of the original post and besides, the onus of citation should be on you with your crazy broad assumption that Fred has placed 'immense pressure' on startups to generate patents.

I just looked at all of Fred's comments on that thread, and saw no such thing. Please don't lie just because you find the truth about startups and patents inconvenient.

Please don't lie just because you find the truth about startups and patents inconvenient.

Will you please stop? The fact that you're having to hop all over this thread defending yourself should make you reconsider what you said, not start calling third parties liars for contradicting you.

Re: Yahoo Crosses The Line

#145

Post by kd5bjo » Tue, Mar 13, 2012, 4:24 PM UTC

viggity wrote: post #6

I really don't like saying this, but here it goes: Don't hate the player, hate the game. We need real, substantive patent reform in this country.

It seems that a lot of people think that we need substantive patent reform, but what I haven't heard is any real proposal except for scrapping the entire system (or possibly just for software). I've put together the basics of a proposal here:

http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3698637

I'm sure that it has a lot of problems, but we need to start having the discussion of how to fix the system, instead of just whether or not it needs fixing.

Re: Yahoo Crosses The Line

#146

Post by pedalpete » Tue, Mar 13, 2012, 4:47 PM UTC

I tried to find an example where Google sued a company for infringing on PageRank, but it doesn't appear that has ever happened.

If everyone really just uses patents for the threat of a possible lawsuit, is it still worth having them, even if you hope to never use one?

Re: Yahoo Crosses The Line

#147

Post by rokhayakebe » Tue, Mar 13, 2012, 4:48 PM UTC

monochromatic wrote: post #122

This guy doesn't even mention the claims of the patents in suit, so why should I trust his opinion about their merits? If you don't know how to read a patent, you're absolutely not qualified to make pronouncements like this: > None of them represent unique and new ideas at the time of the filing. I supect they all can be thrown out over prior art if Facebook takes the time and effort to do that. Also, even the articl…

The guy is a VC with over a decade of experience investing in technology companies and selling a portfolio company to Yahoo for billions of dollars. He may know a thing or two about software patents.

Re: Yahoo Crosses The Line

#148

Post by sopooneo » Tue, Mar 13, 2012, 4:50 PM UTC

pedalpete wrote: post #146

I tried to find an example where Google sued a company for infringing on PageRank, but it doesn't appear that has ever happened. If everyone really just uses patents for the threat of a possible lawsuit, is it still worth having them, even if you hope to never use one?

Many others have already pointed it out, but how closely it parallels nuclear weapons philosophy is startling.

Re: Yahoo Crosses The Line

#149

Post by olaf » Tue, Mar 13, 2012, 4:57 PM UTC

viggity wrote: post #6

I really don't like saying this, but here it goes: Don't hate the player, hate the game. We need real, substantive patent reform in this country.

It's not very effective to hate. I would prefer "fight/act effectively against the people who make/are responsible for the rules of the (dirty) game."

Re: Yahoo Crosses The Line

#150

Post by jcfrei » Tue, Mar 13, 2012, 4:57 PM UTC

AznHisoka wrote: post #71

bambax wrote: post #13

> I used to care about that company for some reason That's the strangest part. I never found Yahoo useful for anything (except Douglas Crockford, but he could have been employed anywhere).

I actually like Yahoo News for some reason. Some of the stories they feature in the front page makes me want to click through and read it when I'm bored.

it's funny you mention this. yahoo actually got several maching learning algorithms in place, constantly adjusting headlines and summaries to get a higher CTR on the articles. i've visited the site occasionally and noticed and immediate desire to click on some of the links. Source: http://www.theregister.co.uk/2011/09/23/yahoo_core_personali...