The Morning Roar: Patent Trolls vs. Adam Carolla (and all Podcasts), State Awarded Custody of Sick Boston Child, and Facebook Acquires Virtual Reality Company
Welcome to your Wednesday edition of The Morning Roar! Patent Troll Targeting PodcastsIt seems the absurd lengths professional patent trolls will go through to try to leverage the state's patent laws against anything that moves, up to and including human genes, have known no boundaries known to science. This story escaped me until now, but an apparent patent-trolling company has filed a claim against Adam Carolla and several other successful podcast creators over the very concept of a podcast. But Carolla isn't sitting back and taking it, and has been leading the fight against these tenacious trolls.From The Economist:
Personal Audio has a patent issued to it in 2012 that, according to one of its founders, James Logan, covers the production of serialised or episodic content that can be downloaded from a specific URL that client software can retrieve and store—effectively the definition of a podcast. (The precise claim in the patent is much more precise and lengthier.) Personal Audio has also filed suit against NBC and CBS, as well as Discovery Channel's HowStuffWorks.com and TogiEntertainmnet's TogiNet streaming station.Mr Carolla has launched a campaign to raise the $1.5m his attorneys estimate the suit could cost at a minimum to defend, and is currently on a speaking tour of other podcasts to raise awareness (and funds). A benefit event is upcoming. He has raised $175,000 in a matter of weeks, and estimates $100,000 has been spent on lawyers so far. No trial date has yet been set.
It's great to see Carolla leading the charge against this sort of nonsense, as this is a cause worth fighting for. Patents are state-granted monopolies which grant a single individual or company the exclusive right to create a product in a certain way. Patent trolls like Personal Audio - who didn't file the patent until 2009, well after podcasts had become an established medium - use the injustice of these laws to try to strong-arm money out of people peacefully providing products and services to others.Donate to Carolla's legal defense fund here. This is a case I'll be following closely from here on out - because I sure don't want to pay these trolls to keep turning out the Lions of Liberty Podcast every week! Speaking of which, I discussed patents and other types of intellectual property in the very first episode of the show.State Award Custody of Sick Boston ChildKristin Tate at BenSwann.com has an update on the sad story of 15 year old Justina Pelletier, who had been in the custody of Boston Children's Hospital against her parents will for over a year. And now, a judge has ruled that Justin will be under the permanent custody of the Massachusetts Department of Children and Families.The first question on my mind: why does Massachusetts have a "Department of Children and Families?" Kristin Tate describes the frightening events that have led to Pelletier's virtual imprisonment at the hands of the state of Massachusetts.
Years ago doctors diagnosed Justina with mitochondrial disease, which causes loss of muscle control. Despite this diagnosis, Justina was able to live a happy and relatively normal life with her family in Connecticut.During a visit to Boston Children’s Hospital during February 2013, doctors claimed that the teen has somatoform disorder, not mitochondrial disease. Somatoform disorder is a mental disorder — not a physical one, like mitochondrial disease.The hospital ordered that Justina be taken off all of her mitochondrial and pain medication. Lou and Linda did not think this was the best plan of action and wanted to bring their daughter home. Officials would not allow that. The parents were subsequently escorted out of the hospital by security personnel. Only four days later, they found out they had lost custody of their daughter due to “both parents’ resistance towards recommended treatment plans” and “overmedicalizing” the girl.
Government should not be in the business of determining the proper course of medication for any patients, let alone children in their teenage years. These decisions should be left up to parents, doctors, and the patients themselves. If the parents felt it best to keep their daughter from feeling the pain she had been feeling before her pain medications, and wanted to pursue other options, that should be their prerogative.Sadly, much of society has come to accept the state as the arbiter of what is "best" for us, including children. From all reports, Justina is in far worse shape than when she first arrived from the hospital, and is paralyzed from the waist down.Ironically, as one branch of the state enables Justina's captivity, she is withheld from another branch, the state's public schools. She has not received any schooling whatsoever since being held at the hospital.Full Story at BenSwann.com.Facebook Acquires Virtual Reality Company Oculus VRFresh off their widely-questioned acquisition of WhatsApp for $19 Billion last month, that old rascal Zuckerberg is at it again. This time he's being a bit stingy, paying a mere $2 billion for virtual reality company Occulus VR. Occulus VR makes a virtual reality headset called the Occulus Rift. Originally designed with video games in mind, Mark Zuckerberg already has big ideas about the possible uses of the technology:
But this is just the start. After games, we're going to make Oculus a platform for many other experiences. Imagine enjoying a courtside seat at a game, studying in a classroom of students and teachers all over the world or consulting with a doctor face-to-face -- just by putting on goggles in your home. This is really a new communication platform. By feeling truly present, you can share unbounded spaces and experiences with the people in your life. Imagine sharing not just moments with your friends online, but entire experiences and adventures.
The future is always a second away, and anything we've imagined seems to become reality once man grasps how to make it so. See: Trains, submarines, airplanes, spaceships, and now, the wondrous possibilities of technologies beyond our wildest dreams like Occulus Ryft.Many will shout that this technology will inevitably be used for some sort of evil purpose. And while it's reasonable enough to conclude that totalitarian governments will always attempt to use new technologies for evil, I see this as akin to being concerned about the invention of the combustion engine because governments will eventually use it for tanks to crush protestors. Sure, they'll think of evil ways to use technology, but technology has always bettered humanity, and I have confidence that as technology accelerates key market features of any technology will include features which prevent against government intrusion.Business Insider has a great video on Occulus Rift - check it!Imagine feeling like you're on a rollercoaster from the comfort of your living room? How cool is that?!What do you think about virtual reality technology? Chime in by interacting with us on our social media.The Lions of Liberty are on Twitter, Facebook & Google+Receive access to ALL of our EXCLUSIVE bonus audio content – including “Conspiracy Corner”, “Degenerate Gamblers” and the “League of Liberty Podcast” by joining the Lions of Liberty Pride and supporting us on Patreon!Read The Morning Roar every weekday Monday-Friday!