Thunderbird Club

[Larry V]

I'm going to buy Apple stock. Thanks for the tip!

Probably not a bad time to get in... it's on sale at the moment.

DISCLAIMER: Please remember that past performance may not be indicative of future results. Different types of investments involve varying degrees of risk, and there can be no assurance that the future performance of any specific investment, investment strategy, or product made reference to directly or indirectly in this TalkBass post, will be profitable, equal any corresponding indicated historical performance level(s), or be suitable for your portfolio.

 

[Dr_Feelgoood212]

A concept I was just reading about:

If I buy an apple (fruit), I own it and can use the seeds to grow apple trees and create more apples.

If I buy an Apple phone, I can’t reverse engineer it to figure out how it works and build more phones. Or even modify them without being sued.
So do I really own the phone?

Depends on the seeds. There are companies out there that have patents or whatever on strains of wheat or soy. If you’re a farmer and they find even one strain in your crops you can get sued.
There’s a documentary on the FDA that better explains it.

 

[Gaolee]

Depends on the seeds. There are companies out there that have patents or whatever on strains of wheat or soy. If you’re a farmer and they find even one strain in your crops you can get sued.
There’s a documentary on the FDA that better explains it.

We have a rose in the back yard that I understand is patented. How you patent a rose is beyond me, since "innovations" in roses are mutations that humans had some part in through selective breeding, but that were also dependent upon whatever causes genetic mutations. This particular rose doesn't have the perfume that roses sometimes crank out, but it has buds that start out black and then become velvety red/black blossoms. If I were to grow cuttings or graft cuttings onto rootstock and sell them, it would be a violation of the patent. Then there's the craziness of pharmaceutical companies patenting chemicals secreted by plants, animals, and microbes. If you live in the Amazon and use folk remedies, you may be violating a patent. None of it makes sense.

 

[PillO]

A concept I was just reading about:

If I buy an apple (fruit), I own it and can use the seeds to grow apple trees and create more apples.

If I buy an Apple phone, I can’t reverse engineer it to figure out how it works and build more phones. Or even modify them without being sued.
So do I really own the phone?

Well, not exactly.

The apple may not be used as described, depending upon the specific apple. As an example, Honeycrisp apples have been patented by the University of Minnesota and the name trademarked. Although the patent has expired in the US, the trademark remain in force. Further the tree is sterile. To produce apples, the blossoms must be pollinated by other apple trees. The fruit will be Honeycrisp apples, but the seeds will produce a hybrid. So, you can't grow Honeycrisp apple trees without dealing with UMn.

With your Apple phone, you will have difficulty disassembling it as it is put together with a proprietary screw and you will be unable to buy a screw driver to open it. But, ignoring that, you have a "right to repair" in the US (at last I saw the court decisions). So you could reverse engineer it. You could even build more as long as you are not selling them (assuming that the parts are commercially available or that you are able to fabricate them yourself). The part you will have difficulty with is the software that runs the phone, as you do not own that; you acquire a license to use it on the hardware when you buy the phone.

I like the analogy, but unfortunately it doesn't work on either side. Products are far more complicated than they used to be.

 

[PillO]

You're leasing it until the "I gotta have it" upgrade comes out.

I am not sure that they can force an upgrade on you. I am also not sure that they can't.

 

[PillO]

you'd be surprised how easy it is to circumvent patents...

A single patent yes. A well organized intellectual property strategy, no.

 

[PillO]

Don't get me started on cell phones! They are the most expensive disposable junk I can imagine. For what they cost, they should last decades, not three to five years. And no, I don't need any upgrades as long as it continues to function.

They contain more computing power than was used to take man to the moon. 640k ought to be enough for anyone. There is a market worldwide for perhaps 6 computers. Maybe the Amish are onto something...

 

[PillO]

Daggumit! How did you get that picture of me?

At least they don't have your passport picture like they do of me.

 

[PillO]

We have a rose in the back yard that I understand is patented. How you patent a rose is beyond me, since "innovations" in roses are mutations that humans had some part in through selective breeding, but that were also dependent upon whatever causes genetic mutations. This particular rose doesn't have the perfume that roses sometimes crank out, but it has buds that start out black and then become velvety red/black blossoms. If I were to grow cuttings or graft cuttings onto rootstock and sell them, it would be a violation of the patent. Then there's the craziness of pharmaceutical companies patenting chemicals secreted by plants, animals, and microbes. If you live in the Amazon and use folk remedies, you may be violating a patent. None of it makes sense.

You can't get composition of matter patents on natural products. To get a patent, you must demonstrate that what you have invented is new, useful, and is non-obvious to one skilled in the art. A chemical from a plant is not patentable; the extraction is obvious to one skilled in the art. If a plant is used as a remedy, it is not new to use it as a remedy. However, if you make changes to a chemical found in nature that are not obvious to one skilled in the art, is useful, and is a previously undescribed chemical, then it is patentable.

Now, the patent offices have patent examiners of variable skill levels and poor patents can be approved and good patents can be rejected. But, this is why there is recourse to the courts for patent decisions.

 

[PillO]

Probably not a bad time to get in... it's on sale at the moment.

DISCLAIMER: Please remember that past performance may not be indicative of future results. Different types of investments involve varying degrees of risk, and there can be no assurance that the future performance of any specific investment, investment strategy, or product made reference to directly or indirectly in this TalkBass post, will be profitable, equal any corresponding indicated historical performance level(s), or be suitable for your portfolio.

View attachment 3348493

You missed the disclaimer about being licensed to make recommendations (unless you have a series 7/series 79/series 86&87 license!).

 

[Larry V]

You missed the disclaimer about being licensed to make recommendations (unless you have a series 7/series 79/series 86&87 license!).

I circumvented the licensing matter with the use of the word, "Probably".

 

[PillO]

I circumvented the licensing matter with the use of the word, "Probably".

Tell it to the SEC buddy...

 

[dukeorock]

Heck of a day yesterday. Done recording at the studio we were working at but not done with basic tracking, so I suggested we record horn overdubs at the artists house. Grabbed my laptop, a few mics and stands, cables, etc. I’d been wanting to purchase a portable recording interface with 4 inputs, but hadn’t yet decided on one, so I took my old Steinberg MR816x out of the home rack. Got to the session an hour early, set up and could not get the interface to work with the laptop (I’d never tried before). Ran out and got new cables and nothing worked...meanwhile 3 horn players had arrived. In my panic, I ran to a local music store to grab a Focusrite Clarett 4pre for about $600. Great reviews and seemed ‘worth it’ so we could get to work. Local shop didn’t have a thunderbolt version, so they made me a deal on the 8 channel version. Now I’m out over $800 and the horn players are still sitting around. When I got back to the studio, I couldn’t get the drivers to recognize the hardware interface on the laptop! Even had a Mac genius tech dude helping me. Nothing worked! Ultimately ran home, grabbed my IMac (which I shoulda done in the first place!), hooked it up to the new Focusrite interface and it still didn’t work, so I connected the 10 year old Steinberg and everything was fine and we finished up horns. Stressful day! Got home late last night and searched online to see what was up with the new interface. Read some reports that suggested you have to attempt multiple downloads of the driver/console software to get it to ‘click’ with the hardware. Sure enough, after a couple attempts it worked fine on the laptop. Still can’t find all the ‘bundled software’ that supposedly comes with it. All this left a bad tasted in my mouth, so I’m considering just returning the darn thing today. Was kinda stoked to have a portable rig though :/

 

[BklynKen]

Heck of a day yesterday. Done recording at the studio we were working at but not done with basic tracking, so I suggested we record horn overdubs at the artists house. Grabbed my laptop, a few mics and stands, cables, etc. I’d been wanting to purchase a portable recording interface with 4 inputs, but hadn’t yet decided on one, so I took my old Steinberg MR816x out of the home rack. Got to the session an hour early, set up and could not get the interface to work with the laptop (I’d never tried before). Ran out and got new cables and nothing worked...meanwhile 3 horn players had arrived. In my panic, I ran to a local music store to grab a Focusrite Clarett 4pre for about $600. Great reviews and seemed ‘worth it’ so we could get to work. Local shop didn’t have a thunderbolt version, so they made me a deal on the 8 channel version. Now I’m out over $800 and the horn players are still sitting around. When I got back to the studio, I couldn’t get the drivers to recognize the hardware interface on the laptop! Even had a Mac genius tech dude helping me. Nothing worked! Ultimately ran home, grabbed my IMac (which I shoulda done in the first place!), hooked it up to the new Focusrite interface and it still didn’t work, so I connected the 10 year old Steinberg and everything was fine and we finished up horns. Stressful day! Got home late last night and searched online to see what was up with the new interface. Read some reports that suggested you have to attempt multiple downloads of the driver/console software to get it to ‘click’ with the hardware. Sure enough, after a couple attempts it worked fine on the laptop. Still can’t find all the ‘bundled software’ that supposedly comes with it. All this left a bad tasted in my mouth, so I’m considering just returning the darn thing today. Was kinda stoked to have a portable rig though :/

Wow, that sucks.

 

[JJR58]

Heck of a day yesterday. Done recording at the studio we were working at but not done with basic tracking, so I suggested we record horn overdubs at the artists house. Grabbed my laptop, a few mics and stands, cables, etc. I’d been wanting to purchase a portable recording interface with 4 inputs, but hadn’t yet decided on one, so I took my old Steinberg MR816x out of the home rack. Got to the session an hour early, set up and could not get the interface to work with the laptop (I’d never tried before). Ran out and got new cables and nothing worked...meanwhile 3 horn players had arrived. In my panic, I ran to a local music store to grab a Focusrite Clarett 4pre for about $600. Great reviews and seemed ‘worth it’ so we could get to work. Local shop didn’t have a thunderbolt version, so they made me a deal on the 8 channel version. Now I’m out over $800 and the horn players are still sitting around. When I got back to the studio, I couldn’t get the drivers to recognize the hardware interface on the laptop! Even had a Mac genius tech dude helping me. Nothing worked! Ultimately ran home, grabbed my IMac (which I shoulda done in the first place!), hooked it up to the new Focusrite interface and it still didn’t work, so I connected the 10 year old Steinberg and everything was fine and we finished up horns. Stressful day! Got home late last night and searched online to see what was up with the new interface. Read some reports that suggested you have to attempt multiple downloads of the driver/console software to get it to ‘click’ with the hardware. Sure enough, after a couple attempts it worked fine on the laptop. Still can’t find all the ‘bundled software’ that supposedly comes with it. All this left a bad tasted in my mouth, so I’m considering just returning the darn thing today. Was kinda stoked to have a portable rig though :/

I wanna like that, only cause of all the effort you put in. Sorry to hear you had all that trouble while working so hard on this session.

 

[dukeorock]

I wanna like that, only cause of all the effort you put in. Sorry to hear you had all that trouble while working so hard on this session.

Thanks
It worked out in the end, but man...that was stressful! The sax player had to fly out today, so I’m happy we got all his parts done. The trumpet and trombone player are local, so if we need more from them, it’ll be easy enough to get em back in. Gonna go cut some lead vocals today on the husband part of the duo. I think Sunday I’m gonna cut some vocals and violin on the wife. Not a ton left to do after that. One song will have some faux orchestral stuff. Adding cello and a 5 string viola to the main violin parts to thicken things up. Can do pretty much the rest of the record with one mic. My trusty old AEA R84 ribbon. Incredible microphone, especially for its price point. Its been my main mic for upright bass for like 12-13 years now, but really it works great on pretty much everything. The entire Prayer Flags record was done using only the AEA and an EV RE20. I only own maybe 5-6 mics these days. My two other main mics are an EV RE27 and an old AKG D12 (not to be confused with the newer AKG D112). The D12 was Ken Scott’s kick mic of choice, if memory serves. Works great on trombone too. I’ve read that Bowie used kick mics a lot for lead vocals to bring out all that great low end he had in his voice.
Been jonesing for a couple new mics lately...another AEA R84 for stereo stuff and some sort of U67 variant would be nice.

 

[GonePlaid]

We have a rose in the back yard that I understand is patented. How you patent a rose is beyond me, since "innovations" in roses are mutations that humans had some part in through selective breeding, but that were also dependent upon whatever causes genetic mutations. This particular rose doesn't have the perfume that roses sometimes crank out, but it has buds that start out black and then become velvety red/black blossoms. If I were to grow cuttings or graft cuttings onto rootstock and sell them, it would be a violation of the patent. Then there's the craziness of pharmaceutical companies patenting chemicals secreted by plants, animals, and microbes. If you live in the Amazon and use folk remedies, you may be violating a patent. None of it makes sense.

No, it makes dollars.

 

[GonePlaid]

Heck of a day yesterday. Done recording at the studio we were working at but not done with basic tracking, so I suggested we record horn overdubs at the artists house. Grabbed my laptop, a few mics and stands, cables, etc. I’d been wanting to purchase a portable recording interface with 4 inputs, but hadn’t yet decided on one, so I took my old Steinberg MR816x out of the home rack. Got to the session an hour early, set up and could not get the interface to work with the laptop (I’d never tried before). Ran out and got new cables and nothing worked...meanwhile 3 horn players had arrived. In my panic, I ran to a local music store to grab a Focusrite Clarett 4pre for about $600. Great reviews and seemed ‘worth it’ so we could get to work. Local shop didn’t have a thunderbolt version, so they made me a deal on the 8 channel version. Now I’m out over $800 and the horn players are still sitting around. When I got back to the studio, I couldn’t get the drivers to recognize the hardware interface on the laptop! Even had a Mac genius tech dude helping me. Nothing worked! Ultimately ran home, grabbed my IMac (which I shoulda done in the first place!), hooked it up to the new Focusrite interface and it still didn’t work, so I connected the 10 year old Steinberg and everything was fine and we finished up horns. Stressful day! Got home late last night and searched online to see what was up with the new interface. Read some reports that suggested you have to attempt multiple downloads of the driver/console software to get it to ‘click’ with the hardware. Sure enough, after a couple attempts it worked fine on the laptop. Still can’t find all the ‘bundled software’ that supposedly comes with it. All this left a bad tasted in my mouth, so I’m considering just returning the darn thing today. Was kinda stoked to have a portable rig though :/

My dad was an engineer. One of his 'favorite' sayings was "Nothing ever works". After which, he'd figure it out.

 

[Chucky Stiletti]

Well, not exactly.

The apple may not be used as described, depending upon the specific apple. As an example, Honeycrisp apples have been patented by the University of Minnesota and the name trademarked. Although the patent has expired in the US, the trademark remain in force. Further the tree is sterile. To produce apples, the blossoms must be pollinated by other apple trees. The fruit will be Honeycrisp apples, but the seeds will produce a hybrid. So, you can't grow Honeycrisp apple trees without dealing with UMn.

With your Apple phone, you will have difficulty disassembling it as it is put together with a proprietary screw and you will be unable to buy a screw driver to open it. But, ignoring that, you have a "right to repair" in the US (at last I saw the court decisions). So you could reverse engineer it. You could even build more as long as you are not selling them (assuming that the parts are commercially available or that you are able to fabricate them yourself). The part you will have difficulty with is the software that runs the phone, as you do not own that; you acquire a license to use it on the hardware when you buy the phone.

I like the analogy, but unfortunately it doesn't work on either side. Products are far more complicated than they used to be.

perhaps but there's a myriad of Apple clones in Asia. the Asians continue to buy them. I have seen the chinese reverse engineer integrated circuits which is more challenging than software or a phone itself. intellectual property laws don't really protect much of anything over there..

 

[Chucky Stiletti]

My dad was an engineer. One of his 'favorite' sayings was "Nothing ever works". After which, he'd figure it out.

hence the old.."experience is what you get, when you don't get what you want"...