More Evidence of the Bad Patent System

Because The Patent System Sucks, The Only Thing To Do Is File For More Bad Patents

Not to speak for Dodge, but I don't believe he's defending these patents, but just pointing out that if you're in Microsoft's shoes, it's the most reasonable thing to do, given the ridiculous mess that our patent system has become. The whole idea that you should need to file for patents on all sorts of stuff just to avoid later being accused of infringing on an obvious idea should be evidence enough that our patent system is in drastic need of a remake.

Yes it is.

Related: Patent lunacy defense - Patent Review Innovation - Are Software Patents Evil?

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Curious Cat Management Improvement blog address

This is a reminder that the new address for Curious Cat Management Improvement blog is:

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Wordpress Hosts Please

I am looking for suggestions for a decent wordpress host. My current host, TextDrive has been down for 4 hours (that I know of) so far today. This is the 3rd time in less than 2 months they have had such problems (well I think they are problems anyway). the first two times after I contacted them (if I don't notice and contact them I never hear anything) I am told it is rare, we are making changes, there are special causes for this time... We care...

I want a host that publishes uptime figures on the server I will be hosted on (how anyone could claim to manage a web hosting business without such stats is beyond me but...). And I would like that the figure to be above 99.75%. And by 99.75% I mean that is when it is actually available (not that well it is available 99.9% of the time except when we have problems, we don't count x, y and z unavailable time as unavailable, we count is as down only if our Sys Admin has received notice and has accepted the ticket until then we don't start the time...).

I would also prefer a host that responds to problems. I can understand not responding to down web sites within minutes for cheap hosting options. But repeatedly having servers fail for hours in the same day and not even responding to tickets for hours when that is happening is not what I am looking for.

99.75% = 8738.1 hours out of 8760 hours in a 365 day year. That is down 22 hours. The rest of the time anyone visiting the site will see the proper web page.

The End of Pax Americana

The End of Pax Americana by Robert J. Samuelson:

In World War II, an estimated 60 million people died. Only four subsequent conflicts have had more than a million deaths (the Congo civil war, 3 million; Vietnam, 1.9 million; Korea, 1.3 million; China's civil war, 1.2 million), reports the Center for International Development and Conflict Management at the University of Maryland. Under the U.S. military umbrella, democracy flourished in Western Europe and Japan. It later spread to South Korea, Eastern Europe and elsewhere. In 1977, there were 89 autocratic regimes in the world and only 35 democracies, the center estimates. In 2005, there were 88 democracies and 29 autocracies.

Prosperity has been unprecedented. Historian Angus Maddison tells us that from 1950 to 1998 the world economy expanded by a factor of six. Global trade increased 20 times. These growth rates were well beyond historic experience. Living standards exploded. Since 1950, average incomes have multiplied about 16 times in South Korea, 11 times in Japan and six times in Spain, reports Maddison. From higher bases, the increases were nearly five times in Germany, four in France and three in the United States.

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