Re: Asimov Site

[Roy and/or Janet Miller <millers@inetnebr.com>]

This one is just too silly to comment on .

Roy

**** **** wrote:

> Matt Jenkins wrote in message <39a9d4ad@naylor.cs.rmit.edu.au>...
> >I would have thought that someone with an interest in information
> >technology would be a little more open minded.
> >
> >Throughout history, people have claimed future inventions to be silly,
> >impossible or whatever. Surely it has happened enough by now that you can
> >realise the foolishness of such claims..
> >
> >Cheers,
> >
> >Matt
>
> Matt,
>     The problem is, he'd have to concede that my IQ is more than the 10-12
> he claims it is now (rutabagas and other assorted garden vegetables commonly
> test at 14+). If he were in a friendly conversation with say, an attourney
> specializing in IP law, he'd be more than happy to speculate on future
> technology, maybe even mentioning nanotechnology. One possible scenario....
>
> Roy: "Hey, you know, I just read how IBM has managed to build these
> transistors that are only 1/100th the size of those in the pentium 3..."
>
> Lawyer: "Oh yeh, that and those single molecule memory units, and we might
> actually see those nanobots Star Trek has been having on the shows lately."
>
> Roy: "Yeh, the team at IBM spoke at great length about that, and how we
> might actually live to see the things built. Amazing world we live in."
>
> Lawyer: "Yeh, and I can tell you, the person who manages to get the
> royalties for those will make Bill G look like a pauper."
>
> Roy: "Sad though. Those awful comp.sys.apple2 pirates will finally be able
> to pirate actual //c's and 2e's."
>
> Lawyer: "Don't you worry about that at all. I've been talking to a group out
> at Ford, and they sure as hell don't want to lose the consumer's dependence
> on them. Word has it, they are already buying enough senator's to get the
> new Physicals Shapes and Forms IP law passed in Congress. Basically it will
> scrap patent, but can you say 'Job Security' ? I can. *grin*"
>
> Roy: "Wow. For once, my tax dollars are finally getting me something. Can't
> believe they're on the ball! I have just a bit more hope for the future.
> *smile*"
>
> Lawyer then puts on satanic headdress, and dances around a pentagram tiled
> into law office floor, to the beat of drums and flickering black candle
> light.
>
> Lawyer: "Ia! Ia! Hastur! Ugh! Ugh! Ia Hastur cf'ayak ' vulgtmm, vugtlagln
> vulgtmm! Ai! Shub-Niggurath!... Hastur--Hastur cf'tagn! Ia! Ia! Hastur! ..."
>
> Ok. So I got a little carried away with the dramatic fictionalization. Point
> is, he doesn't deny that this will happen out of hand, he is just either
> ignoring it until some corporate lawyer is clever and cunning enough to see
> to it that laws 'protect' this also, or he is doing the standard thing: That
> is waiting until technology outruns wisdom and/or law, and the come up with
> a halfassed solution after the fact. If your philosophy doesn't apply well
> to the future, why are you adhering to it now?