more patent issues... :-)

[Banister Trevor]

Hope you all haven't seen this before. I got a laugh.

Trevor

>REDMOND, WA--In what CEO Bill Gates called "an unfortunate but
>necessary step to protect our intellectual property from theft and
>exploitation by competitors," the Microsoft Corporation patented
>the numbers one and zero Monday.
>
>With the patent, Microsoft's rivals are prohibited from manufacturing
>or selling products containing zeroes and ones--the mathematical
>building blocks of all computer languages and programs--unless a
>royalty fee of 10 cents per digit used is paid to the software giant.
>
>"Microsoft has been using the binary system of ones and zeroes
>ever since its inception in 1975," Gates told reporters. "For years,
>in the interest of the overall health of the computer industry, we
>permitted the free and unfettered use of our proprietary numeric
>systems. However, changing marketplace conditions and the
>increasingly predatory practices of certain competitors now leave
>us with no choice but to seek compensation for the use of our
>numerals."
>
>A number of major Silicon Valley players, including Apple
>Computer, Netscape and Sun Microsystems, said they will
>challenge the Microsoft patent as monopolistic and anti-
>competitive, claiming that the 10-cent-per-digit licensing fee would
>bankrupt them instantly.
>
>"While, technically, Java is a complex system of algorithms used to
>create a platform-independent programming environment, it is, at
>its core, just a string of trillions of ones and zeroes," said Sun
>Microsystems CEO Scott McNealy, whose company created the
>Java programming environment used in many Internet applications.
>"The licensing fees we'd have to pay Microsoft every day would be
>approximately 327,000 times the total net worth of this company."
>
>"If this patent holds up in federal court, Apple will have no choice
but
>
>to convert to analog," said Apple interim CEO Steve Jobs, "and I
>have serious doubts whether this company would be able to remain
>competitive selling pedal-operated computers running software off
>vinyl LPs."
>
>As a result of the Microsoft patent, many other companies have
>begun radically revising their product lines: Database manufacturer
>Oracle has embarked on a crash program to develop "an abacus
>for the next millennium." Novell, whose communications and
>networking systems are also subject to Microsoft licensing fees, is
>working with top animal trainers on a chimpanzee-based message-
>transmission system. Hewlett-Packard is developing a
>revolutionary new steam-powered printer.
>
>Despite the swarm of protest, Gates is standing his ground,
>maintaining that ones and zeroes are the undisputed property of
>Microsoft.
>
>"We will vigorously enforce our patents of these numbers, as they
>are legally ours," Gates said. "Among Microsoft's vast historical
>archives are Sanskrit cuneiform tablets from 1800 B.C. clearly
>showing ones and a symbol known as 'sunya,' or nothing. We also
>own: papyrus scrolls written by Pythagoras himself in which he
>explains the idea of singular notation, or 'one'; early tracts by
>Mohammed ibn Musa al Kwarizimi explaining the concept of al-sifr,
>or 'the cipher'; original mathematical manuscripts by Heisenberg,
>Einstein and Planck; and a signed first-edition copy of Jean-Paul
>Sartre's Being And Nothingness. Should the need arise, Microsoft
>will have no difficulty proving to the Justice Department or anyone
>else that we own the rights to these numbers."
>
>Added Gates: "My salary also has lots of zeroes. I'm the richest
>man in the world."
>
>According to experts, the full ramifications of Microsoft's patenting
>of one and zero have yet to be realized.
>
>"Because all integers and natural numbers derive from one and
>zero, Microsoft may, by extension, lay claim to ownership of all
>mathematics and logic systems, including Euclidean geometry,
>pulleys and levers, gravity, and the basic Newtonian principles of
>motion, as well as the concepts of existence and nonexistence,"
>Yale University theoretical mathematics professor J. Edmund
>Lattimore said. "In other words, pretty much everything."
>
>Lattimore said that the only mathematical constructs of which
>Microsoft may not be able to claim ownership are infinity and
>transcendental numbers like pi. Microsoft lawyers are expected to
>file liens on infinity and pi this week.
>
>Microsoft has not yet announced whether it will charge a user fee to
>individuals who wish to engage in such mathematically rooted
>motions as walking, stretching and smiling.
>
>In an address beamed live to billions of people around the globe
>Monday, Gates expressed confidence that his company's latest
>move will, ultimately, benefit all humankind.
>
>"Think of this as a partnership," Gates said. "Like the ones and
>zeroes of the binary code itself, we must all work together to make
>the promise of the computer revolution a reality. As the world's
>richest, most powerful software company, Microsoft is number one.
>And you, the millions of consumers who use our products, are the
>zeroes."
>