Obama Take Executive Actions to Curb Patent Trolls
Yesterday, President Obama announced several executive actions and legislative proposals aimed at curbing patent trolling. Congress is already considering a host of bills dealing with the abusive use of patents. For more on this story, check out this Reuters article.
Akhil Amar and Barry Scheck on Maryland v. King
In a 5-4 decision, featuring a scathing Scalia dissent, the Supreme Court in Maryland v. King held that the 4th Amendment does not prohibit law enforcement from obtaining and testing DNA samples from arrestees. Last evening, All in with Chris Hayes discussed Mayland v. King with Barry Scheck, co-founder of The Innocence Project, and Akhil Amar, Yale Law School professor.
Fareed Zakaria started his Sunday program by “giv[ing] his take on new data about the U.S. economy.”
“Kahn Academy: The Future of Education?”
Several months ago, 60 Minutes ran a story about the Kahn Acamedy, a non-profit educational website. I was so inspired by the story that I wrote a letter to the editor of the Scranton Times-Tribune (below).
I have two questions for NEPA parents. First, do you remember everything (or anything ) from high school algebra or biology? Second, do you have children asking you to help them with polynomials or the phases of mitosis?
It is not uncommon for parents, even parents who were once exceptional math and science students, to no longer have the foggiest notion of how cell division works or what a polynomial even is. However, there is an answer – the Khan Academy.
Recently, “60 Minutes” ran a segment on the Khan Academy and its revolutionary vision for education. The Khan Academy is a website run by Salman Khan, an American educator with multiple degrees from MIT and an MBA from Harvard.
While I suggest that all students, teachers and parents go online and watch the “60 Minutes” story for themselves, the gist of it is that Khan’s website has thousands of short (15-20 minute) and engaging math and science lessons (as well as SAT prep).
The most amazing part is that it is all free. No longer does getting a tutor depend on whether you can afford it. So, the next time you or your child or your student is struggling with math or science, Internet search for “Khan Academy.” It will blow your mind or, at least, greatly expand it.
Several weeks ago, I posted a link to Marc Maron’s WTF podcast where he urges his listeners to support the Saving High-tech Innovators from Egregious Legal Disputes (SHIELD) Act, a pending bipartisan bill that would force patent trolls to pay defendants’ attorney’s fees in unsuccessful litigation.
This week, NPR’s Planet Money team discusses patent law and the patenting of podcasts. Here is a description of the story:
Back in the nineties, Jim Logan started a company called Personal Audio. The concept was simple — people could pick out magazine articles they liked on the internet, and his company would send them a cassette tape of those articles being read out loud. The cassette tapes didn’t catch on like Jim hoped, but he had bigger dreams for the idea behind them.
He dreamed that one day you wouldn’t need a cassette player, you would just be able to hear smart people talking about whatever subject you wanted, and that audio would be magically downloaded to a device of your choice. He says he dreamed of podcasting as we know it today.
Now Jim Logan did not create the technology to podcast. He himself is not a modern-day podcaster. But he did get a patent on that big dream of downloading personalized audio, and he claims to have the patent on podcasting.
On today’s show, he says all the people out there podcasting today, owe him money.