Like I said, if Joe Mauer doesn't strike out, he pretty much gets on base.
Also, I just remembered that Twins baseball is a lot more fun when they don't suck.
They don't suck right now and the future is bright? Its been, what, five years since both those things were true? I can live with a couple years of futility every now and again if this bright future thing holds up.
The geography of hate-tweets. A fascinating visualization of the use of "hate speech" (here, negative uses of key terms) on twitter, as a proportion of all tweets, by county. Project description.
I would be interested in seeing those maps compared to maps of benign terms with similar overall frequency. I realize that they emphatically claim their data are normalized for population, and while I think they have done so in a very strict sense, I think there is still a small-sample size effect that potentially impacts the visual truthiness of their graphic.
Take a random small county from the West, like, say, Crook County, WY. There are roughly 7,155 people in Crook County, WY. Using their Quad Cities example of 41 tweets for 31 tweeters, suppose that 150K tweets measured corresponds to about 115K hate tweeters. The US is at about 140M Twitter accounts. Given a US population of 311M, an estimate of 3,220 Twitter accounts in Crook County, WY is probably an overestimate, given a supposition that there are more Twitter accounts per capita in urban than rural areas.
From 3,220 Twitter accounts in Crook County, using the 1.5% opt-in rate, there would be about 48 Twitter accounts in Crook County, WY that opted in to geotagging. Using the same 1.5% opt-in rate, there should be 2.1M Twitter accounts nationally opted in to geotagging. With 115K hate tweeters measured, that gives a rate of about 5.5% hate tweeters (disturbingly high, admittedly.) Assuming a uniform distribution of hate, you would expect a grand total of 2 hate tweeters measured in Crook County, WY. And that's for the overall rate--the specific terms obviously appear with a lower rate than the full set of terms, so the expected number of specific hate tweeters is going to be even lower than 2 in Crook County, WY.
With such low expected measurements in many of the small counties, it's not too surprising that most of the low population areas didn't register in the study.
Looks like a bump around Cripple Creek, CO.
Hey, I saw this live!
That happened just 2-3 pitches after I woke up from my (extremely rare) nap. I'd be kicking myself if I'd missed it.
I am duly impressed.
I am duly impressed.
That's what he said.
This also happened last night.
i think over on HBT some idiot was claiming that this was all a planned act for attention. well, that's certainly commitment to the bit...
(Kenny Mayne voice) He ran into some fencing someone put up in the outfield.
Without getting too forbidden zoney, crap like this is why Eric Holder seems to consistently be such a disaster as AG. (That link is the response the DOJ sent to the ACLU when asked to clarify its policies on when the government can read our text messages without a warrant.)
That, and apparently being okay with the President's unilateral killing of American citizens.
Guys, I'm neither agreeing nor disagreeing with the content, but I'd suggest that we use the special forbidden zone area of the wgom if we're going to talk about stuff like this.
Wait, there is a special FZ area that's regularly used? I thought that was a one-time deal.
well, it's a reeeeealy long one-time deal
perhaps a reminder on where it lies?
beats me. I don't tend to hang out in those parts
There is a category for it. Hypothetically, comments there will not show up in the sidebar. There were some issues with that last time that I think are solved.
Could the legal experts among the Citizenry kindly answer a few questions related to the Monsanto v. Bowman ruling? I'm not trying to enter the Forbidden Zone, but simply seeking a better grasp on the implications of the case.
- What's to stop the court from applying this to other cases of replicated IP being traded at below-market values and without remuneration to the IP owner?
- Does the ruling suggest how far down the "stream of commerce" can IP owners claim ownership?
- What does that mean for digital IP, which is even more easily and rapidly replicated than seed?
- Lastly, does this ruling effectively places the burden of separating non-Monsanto seed from Monsanto seed on the grain exchanges and farming co-operatives? Seems like selling non-Monsanto seed that may contain even trace amounts of Monsanto seed opens all parties up to a lawsuit by Monsanto, either through breach of contract or IP theft.
I understand Bowman was effectively goading Monsanto to sue him. That's probably stupid without some major legal juice and a tight case to argue. Still, it seems like this is one more way for Big Ag, Monsanto or otherwise, to blight traditional farming practices via the legal system and economies of scale. Fair assessment?
Don't grain elevators typically already have the burden of separating seed? Sure they do. It's up to the farmer to properly identify the grain as they bring it in, but I think that's always been the case. I'm imagining it's been this way with hybrid corn, for instance, for decades.
"separating seed"?
I don't think so with these patented seed. There is an exception in the patent [edit: err, user's agreement] for purchase of "commodity seed" from elevators. (pretty good summary before-the-fact here).
I haven't read the case yet, but the whole thing seems weird. Farmers effectively contract with Monsanto for use of the patented seed. Why isn't this case just about contract law, rather than about patent law? And if it is about contract law, Monsanto has no case.
this guy bought patented seed, grew a crop, sold some to a grain elevator, then bought some back as "commodity seed" and replanted. I am struggling to understand how this case makes sense.
I guess if he sold some to the elevator without identifying it correctly in the first place?
Yeah, this really seems to me to be a case where Monsanto wished they'd had a better licensing contact than they did, and so sued to create one via the courts.
Caveats: I am a layman, I don't really know anything about IP, one man's opinion.
From the description of the story I heard, it sounded like he sprayed Roundup on the crops he didn't purchase from Monsanto, though I'm not 100% sure on that. If true, that strikes me as an action where Monsanto could at least somewhat legitimately say, look, he's benefiting from our R&D without compensating us for the seed. I wonder what the ruling would have been if he had not used Roundup--it seems more difficult to claim that he's benefiting from Monsanto's R&D if he's not using Roundup.
no, the issue is the Roundup Ready (Roundup resistant) seed, not the use of Roundup.
Right, he bought seeds from a grain elevator (which is not the normal source for farmers to purchase seeds) under the assumption that he'd be getting a good proportion of Roundup Ready seeds without having to purchase them from Monsanto. The NYTimes has a nice summation of it here.
I am saying that I personally think that the two things are not so easily separated from one another. What advantage does the Roundup Ready seed have in the absence of Roundup?
Okay, I’m probably getting in way over my head here (and I’m not even a fan of Monsanto), but it’s true enough that in the absence of Roundup, there is no advantage to using Roundup Ready seeds. Yet if Monsanto were to allow any farmer to obtain Roundup Ready seeds through a source other than directly from the company (regardless of whether the farmer uses Roundup on them), I assume they would not be able to enforce the agreement they have with farmers that farmers can’t use the seeds Monsanto developed without paying a fee directly to Monsanto.
True enough, that if you're buying seeds from Farmer Joe that Monsanto can't charge you a fee for that/enforce their agreement with you (since there is no agreement). But Monsanto had a licensing agreement and that licensing agreement didn't forbid this kind of thing. That's on them for not having a good enough contract in the first place.
It should also be noted that the patent on the original Roundup Ready seed is about to expire (they are rolling out Roundup Ready Mark II next year).
So Farmer Joe could have just held onto those seeds for a little while?
I'm guessing they'll stop selling the original and only sell #2, right? Or only sell the roundup that works with #2, such that there's compatibility problems with other seeds? Such that others can't engineer competitors? We're talking monopolistic/anti-trust/anti-competition kind of stuff here, right?
Lastly, does this ruling effectively places the burden of separating non-Monsanto seed from Monsanto seed on the grain exchanges and farming co-operatives?
Since the vast majority of grain is not used for seed, there's rarely separation by type and I don't think this changes that. The harvest going to elevators or co-ops is meant for feed or manufacturing at that point, and they aren't re-selling it as seed.
Sometimes varieties do get separated, as Rhu mentioned (oil vs. high-starch), or by GMO (not usually an issue in this country, but overseas it's still a big deal), but Monsanto, Pioneer and the rest of the seed companies have plots to produce their seed and it isn't mixed with farmer-harvested crops.
It seems pretty easy for seeds to become intermixed, even outside the seed exchange infrastructure, and result in patented seed winding up in commodity seed. I guess that's more of what I was referring to regarding liability for seed separation.
which is part of why there is an explicit exception for "commodity seed" purchases from grain elevators. While those companies sell seed, feed, and chemicals, their main raison d'etre is buying grain and re-selling to ADM, Cargill, ConAgra, etc.
OK, I think I see what you're getting at-
To me, the advantage of the patent (in this case, the ability to use Roundup on a crop that it would normally kill) is that the farmer can use an efficient herbicide on weeds in both corn and soybean fields with less worry about over-spraying or pesticide resistance.
If a farmer buys and plants some mixed commodity/patent seed, he won't benefit from the patent since he won't be able to spray it with Roundup without killing any of the non-patent variety. So, if he's not getting any advantage from having the patent seed, so I don't see how he would have to worry about liability in that case. This is definitely not what Bowman did though, right?
nevermind, I missed the above comments- seems to be exactly what he did, pretty much
just to clarify, there is a difference between herbicide and pesticide; you meant "herbicide resistance"
I did mean herbicide resistance, but I'd also argue I used it correctly-
Herbicides, also commonly known as weedkillers, are pesticides used to kill unwanted plants.
This was a case I was waiting for a while, but I haven't had a chance to read it yet. That said I think this case is unusually fact based for now, and I'm not sure how that affects it as a metaphor for other businesses.
I keep thinking of this scene, over and over, whenever I think about the implications of this case:
httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oijEsqT2QKQ
I wish I'd had time to comment today - I've been thinking the same thing about genetically modified organisms since reading this. It takes a case like the one by Monsanto to really crystalize how big GM crops have gotten; how large a role they play in modern agribusiness.
its 99 degrees at the St James airport
and my job this afternoon is to go work up 3 softball fields
I think Im going to melt
The #1 high school basketball prospect in the country is named Andrew Wiggins? Please tell me his nickname is Ender.
speaking of, everyone lay down your bets: which movie will butcher the book worse, ender's game or world war z?
I've not read Ender's Game, but I'd say World War Z wouldn't easily lend itself to the traditional Summer Blockbuster format. I'll go with Z.
I've already heard lots of "Z" complaints.
with so much of the "action" in Ender's Game going on inside Ender's head, I'm voting for the former. That plus I'd never heard of World War Z.
World War Z wins "most butchered" in a landslide. At least Ender's Game still follows the original plot (as far as I can tell, anyways).
Way better than the one complaining about Mauer's contract (also on the contributor network today. Ugh.).
ah, yes, my blood is certainly "boiling".
What'd SBG say the other day? Mauer's performing at a $42 million-level? Yup, I'm all up in arms over that contract.
I'll stick to Socal's articles from now on, thank you very much.
I hate both of you for making me read that piece of trash (about Mauer's contract, not socal's piece).
I didn't make it past the first two tortured sentences.
From the author's bio:
His work has also been published on Bleacher Report.
Explains so, so much.
And "published" doesn't seem like the right descriptor. "Posted", or "splattered", maybe.
Splattered is so perfect. Yes, indeed.
I'm not ashamed to admit that I giggled a little bit after coming up with that one.
Is there a game log tonite? /*embarrassed as don't know how to self-initiate */
Twins/Tiggers games rule!
+10 to whomever posted the 'I See A Darkness' clip by Bonnie Billy. I downloaded it this morning, and really enjoy it.
AMR posted the clip, but I'll take partial credit for starting the converstation. Call it +9 for AMR, +1 for me?
The Cash version was in 1st gear - uggh. Bonnie Prince was a nice clip. And some dance moves!
If Cash is 1st gear, the Bonnie Prince original is idling.
httpv://youtu.be/LAriDxTeed8
I saw that - complete lamo-ville-Arkansas. They have another clip that is much more presto.
It might have had something to do with the meager lunch of carrot sticks, sugar snap peas, cherry tomatoes and a pickle that I had today. Or maybe the notion of fried chicken.
Manny is still being Manny.
Since April 15, Hicks is batting .226/.347/.452. League average is .255/.321/.412.
Breakout!!!
httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ANEx_6mbC2M
Like I said, if Joe Mauer doesn't strike out, he pretty much gets on base.
Also, I just remembered that Twins baseball is a lot more fun when they don't suck.
They don't suck right now and the future is bright? Its been, what, five years since both those things were true? I can live with a couple years of futility every now and again if this bright future thing holds up.
The geography of hate-tweets. A fascinating visualization of the use of "hate speech" (here, negative uses of key terms) on twitter, as a proportion of all tweets, by county. Project description.
I would be interested in seeing those maps compared to maps of benign terms with similar overall frequency. I realize that they emphatically claim their data are normalized for population, and while I think they have done so in a very strict sense, I think there is still a small-sample size effect that potentially impacts the visual truthiness of their graphic.
Take a random small county from the West, like, say, Crook County, WY. There are roughly 7,155 people in Crook County, WY. Using their Quad Cities example of 41 tweets for 31 tweeters, suppose that 150K tweets measured corresponds to about 115K hate tweeters. The US is at about 140M Twitter accounts. Given a US population of 311M, an estimate of 3,220 Twitter accounts in Crook County, WY is probably an overestimate, given a supposition that there are more Twitter accounts per capita in urban than rural areas.
From 3,220 Twitter accounts in Crook County, using the 1.5% opt-in rate, there would be about 48 Twitter accounts in Crook County, WY that opted in to geotagging. Using the same 1.5% opt-in rate, there should be 2.1M Twitter accounts nationally opted in to geotagging. With 115K hate tweeters measured, that gives a rate of about 5.5% hate tweeters (disturbingly high, admittedly.) Assuming a uniform distribution of hate, you would expect a grand total of 2 hate tweeters measured in Crook County, WY. And that's for the overall rate--the specific terms obviously appear with a lower rate than the full set of terms, so the expected number of specific hate tweeters is going to be even lower than 2 in Crook County, WY.
With such low expected measurements in many of the small counties, it's not too surprising that most of the low population areas didn't register in the study.
Looks like a bump around Cripple Creek, CO.
Hey, I saw this live!
That happened just 2-3 pitches after I woke up from my (extremely rare) nap. I'd be kicking myself if I'd missed it.
I am duly impressed.
I am duly impressed.
That's what he said.
This also happened last night.
i think over on HBT some idiot was claiming that this was all a planned act for attention. well, that's certainly commitment to the bit...
(Kenny Mayne voice) He ran into some fencing someone put up in the outfield.
Wow, well played Padre. Well played, indeed.
Eventually he'll learn how to stick the landing.
Tough break for the Sewage students.
Don't know if anyone saw this when I posted it late last night, but I thought it was pretty sweet.
Ha ha ha. Awesome
Without getting too forbidden zoney, crap like this is why Eric Holder seems to consistently be such a disaster as AG. (That link is the response the DOJ sent to the ACLU when asked to clarify its policies on when the government can read our text messages without a warrant.)
That, and apparently being okay with the President's unilateral killing of American citizens.
Guys, I'm neither agreeing nor disagreeing with the content, but I'd suggest that we use the special forbidden zone area of the wgom if we're going to talk about stuff like this.
Wait, there is a special FZ area that's regularly used? I thought that was a one-time deal.
well, it's a reeeeealy long one-time deal
perhaps a reminder on where it lies?
beats me. I don't tend to hang out in those parts
There is a category for it. Hypothetically, comments there will not show up in the sidebar. There were some issues with that last time that I think are solved.
Could the legal experts among the Citizenry kindly answer a few questions related to the Monsanto v. Bowman ruling? I'm not trying to enter the Forbidden Zone, but simply seeking a better grasp on the implications of the case.
- What's to stop the court from applying this to other cases of replicated IP being traded at below-market values and without remuneration to the IP owner?
- Does the ruling suggest how far down the "stream of commerce" can IP owners claim ownership?
- What does that mean for digital IP, which is even more easily and rapidly replicated than seed?
- Lastly, does this ruling effectively places the burden of separating non-Monsanto seed from Monsanto seed on the grain exchanges and farming co-operatives? Seems like selling non-Monsanto seed that may contain even trace amounts of Monsanto seed opens all parties up to a lawsuit by Monsanto, either through breach of contract or IP theft.
I understand Bowman was effectively goading Monsanto to sue him. That's probably stupid without some major legal juice and a tight case to argue. Still, it seems like this is one more way for Big Ag, Monsanto or otherwise, to blight traditional farming practices via the legal system and economies of scale. Fair assessment?
Don't grain elevators typically already have the burden of separating seed? Sure they do. It's up to the farmer to properly identify the grain as they bring it in, but I think that's always been the case. I'm imagining it's been this way with hybrid corn, for instance, for decades.
"separating seed"?
I don't think so with these patented seed. There is an exception in the patent [edit: err, user's agreement] for purchase of "commodity seed" from elevators. (pretty good summary before-the-fact here).
I haven't read the case yet, but the whole thing seems weird. Farmers effectively contract with Monsanto for use of the patented seed. Why isn't this case just about contract law, rather than about patent law? And if it is about contract law, Monsanto has no case.
this guy bought patented seed, grew a crop, sold some to a grain elevator, then bought some back as "commodity seed" and replanted. I am struggling to understand how this case makes sense.
I guess if he sold some to the elevator without identifying it correctly in the first place?
Reading Techdirt's analysis of the ruling, I'm having the same problem, Doc.
Yeah, this really seems to me to be a case where Monsanto wished they'd had a better licensing contact than they did, and so sued to create one via the courts.
Caveats: I am a layman, I don't really know anything about IP, one man's opinion.
From the description of the story I heard, it sounded like he sprayed Roundup on the crops he didn't purchase from Monsanto, though I'm not 100% sure on that. If true, that strikes me as an action where Monsanto could at least somewhat legitimately say, look, he's benefiting from our R&D without compensating us for the seed. I wonder what the ruling would have been if he had not used Roundup--it seems more difficult to claim that he's benefiting from Monsanto's R&D if he's not using Roundup.
no, the issue is the Roundup Ready (Roundup resistant) seed, not the use of Roundup.
Right, he bought seeds from a grain elevator (which is not the normal source for farmers to purchase seeds) under the assumption that he'd be getting a good proportion of Roundup Ready seeds without having to purchase them from Monsanto. The NYTimes has a nice summation of it here.
I am saying that I personally think that the two things are not so easily separated from one another. What advantage does the Roundup Ready seed have in the absence of Roundup?
Okay, I’m probably getting in way over my head here (and I’m not even a fan of Monsanto), but it’s true enough that in the absence of Roundup, there is no advantage to using Roundup Ready seeds. Yet if Monsanto were to allow any farmer to obtain Roundup Ready seeds through a source other than directly from the company (regardless of whether the farmer uses Roundup on them), I assume they would not be able to enforce the agreement they have with farmers that farmers can’t use the seeds Monsanto developed without paying a fee directly to Monsanto.
True enough, that if you're buying seeds from Farmer Joe that Monsanto can't charge you a fee for that/enforce their agreement with you (since there is no agreement). But Monsanto had a licensing agreement and that licensing agreement didn't forbid this kind of thing. That's on them for not having a good enough contract in the first place.
It should also be noted that the patent on the original Roundup Ready seed is about to expire (they are rolling out Roundup Ready Mark II next year).
So Farmer Joe could have just held onto those seeds for a little while?
I'm guessing they'll stop selling the original and only sell #2, right? Or only sell the roundup that works with #2, such that there's compatibility problems with other seeds? Such that others can't engineer competitors? We're talking monopolistic/anti-trust/anti-competition kind of stuff here, right?
Since the vast majority of grain is not used for seed, there's rarely separation by type and I don't think this changes that. The harvest going to elevators or co-ops is meant for feed or manufacturing at that point, and they aren't re-selling it as seed.
Sometimes varieties do get separated, as Rhu mentioned (oil vs. high-starch), or by GMO (not usually an issue in this country, but overseas it's still a big deal), but Monsanto, Pioneer and the rest of the seed companies have plots to produce their seed and it isn't mixed with farmer-harvested crops.
It seems pretty easy for seeds to become intermixed, even outside the seed exchange infrastructure, and result in patented seed winding up in commodity seed. I guess that's more of what I was referring to regarding liability for seed separation.
which is part of why there is an explicit exception for "commodity seed" purchases from grain elevators. While those companies sell seed, feed, and chemicals, their main raison d'etre is buying grain and re-selling to ADM, Cargill, ConAgra, etc.
OK, I think I see what you're getting at-
To me, the advantage of the patent (in this case, the ability to use Roundup on a crop that it would normally kill) is that the farmer can use an efficient herbicide on weeds in both corn and soybean fields with less worry about over-spraying or pesticide resistance.
If a farmer buys and plants some mixed commodity/patent seed, he won't benefit from the patent since he won't be able to spray it with Roundup without killing any of the non-patent variety. So, if he's not getting any advantage from having the patent seed, so I don't see how he would have to worry about liability in that case.
This is definitely not what Bowman did though, right?nevermind, I missed the above comments- seems to be exactly what he did, pretty much
just to clarify, there is a difference between herbicide and pesticide; you meant "herbicide resistance"
I did mean herbicide resistance, but I'd also argue I used it correctly-
From the repository:
This was a case I was waiting for a while, but I haven't had a chance to read it yet. That said I think this case is unusually fact based for now, and I'm not sure how that affects it as a metaphor for other businesses.
I keep thinking of this scene, over and over, whenever I think about the implications of this case:
httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oijEsqT2QKQ
I wish I'd had time to comment today - I've been thinking the same thing about genetically modified organisms since reading this. It takes a case like the one by Monsanto to really crystalize how big GM crops have gotten; how large a role they play in modern agribusiness.
its 99 degrees at the St James airport
and my job this afternoon is to go work up 3 softball fields
I think Im going to melt
The #1 high school basketball prospect in the country is named Andrew Wiggins? Please tell me his nickname is Ender.
speaking of, everyone lay down your bets: which movie will butcher the book worse, ender's game or world war z?
I've not read Ender's Game, but I'd say World War Z wouldn't easily lend itself to the traditional Summer Blockbuster format. I'll go with Z.
I've already heard lots of "Z" complaints.
with so much of the "action" in Ender's Game going on inside Ender's head, I'm voting for the former. That plus I'd never heard of World War Z.
World War Z wins "most butchered" in a landslide. At least Ender's Game still follows the original plot (as far as I can tell, anyways).
If it's not, it will be!
Twins Hope Spectacular Game by Hicks Is Just the Beginning
Way better than the one complaining about Mauer's contract (also on the contributor network today. Ugh.).
ah, yes, my blood is certainly "boiling".
What'd SBG say the other day? Mauer's performing at a $42 million-level? Yup, I'm all up in arms over that contract.
I'll stick to Socal's articles from now on, thank you very much.
I hate both of you for making me read that piece of trash (about Mauer's contract, not socal's piece).
I didn't make it past the first two tortured sentences.
From the author's bio:
His work has also been published on Bleacher Report.
Explains so, so much.
And "published" doesn't seem like the right descriptor. "Posted", or "splattered", maybe.
Splattered is so perfect. Yes, indeed.
I'm not ashamed to admit that I giggled a little bit after coming up with that one.
Is there a game log tonite? /*embarrassed as don't know how to self-initiate */
Twins/Tiggers games rule!
+10 to whomever posted the 'I See A Darkness' clip by Bonnie Billy. I downloaded it this morning, and really enjoy it.
AMR posted the clip, but I'll take partial credit for starting the converstation. Call it +9 for AMR, +1 for me?
The Cash version was in 1st gear - uggh. Bonnie Prince was a nice clip. And some dance moves!
If Cash is 1st gear, the Bonnie Prince original is idling.
httpv://youtu.be/LAriDxTeed8
I saw that - complete lamo-ville-Arkansas. They have another clip that is much more presto.
I suddenly got very hungry.
It might have had something to do with the meager lunch of carrot sticks, sugar snap peas, cherry tomatoes and a pickle that I had today. Or maybe the notion of fried chicken.
Chikin fried Chikin. Mmm.