Cheap Nike outletEarlier today, it was revealed that Microsoft was suing yet another company for infringing on their patents. The target this time? Barnes & Noble. Yes, Microsoft is suing a book chain. Why? Because they claim the Nook e-reader (which runs Google’s Android OS) copies status bars from Windows CE. Or something. If you’ll excuse my bluntness, it’s all a bunch of bullshit.

Devin has a good overview on CrunchGear of what the patents in question actually are. The whole thing is laughable. And everyone knows that except one party: Microsoft. The company has become completely drunk on their patents and subsequent lame lawsuits.
Nike Dunk sb shoesAnd as a result, they’re quickly losing the hearts and minds of just about everyone that doesn’t work in Redmond.

So what is behind all of this? Is Microsoft really trying to stop Barnes & Noble from selling the Nook? No. Instead, they’re trying to force them to license the use of the patents from them so Microsoft can get a piece of the action for each Nook sold. How do I know? Well first of all, it’s a tactic Microsoft has been using for a while now.

In October of last year, Microsoft sued Motorola over their Android-powered phones. What was odd was that they weren’t suing HTC for the same thing — because they reached a patent licensing agreement with HTC for that very reason. Microsoft’s maneuver was simply trying to get Motorola in line to do the same. And now they’re doing the same thing with Barnes & Noble.

At least today they’re not beating around the bush anymore.Kids Dunk Low Microsoft’s own General Counsel, Horacio Gutierrez, has put up a post on the issue with a title containing the words “Licensing is the solution.”

And to pre-empt posts like this one, Gutierrez notes, “Microsoft is not a company that pursues litigation lightly. In fact, this is only our seventh proactive patent infringement suit in our 36-year history. But we simply cannot ignore infringement of this scope and scale.”

Okay, let’s examine that “scope and scale” in Microsoft’s own words. In the post, Microsoft notes the following infringements by the Nook:

■Give people easy ways to navigate through information provided by their device apps via a separate control window with tabs;
■Enable display of a webpage’s content before the background image is received, allowing users to interact with the page faster;
■Allow apps to superimpose download status on top of the downloading content;
■Permit users to easily select text in a document and adjust that selection; and
■Provide users the ability to annotate text without changing the underlying document
“Easily select text”? “Navigate through information”? “Annotate text”? I mean, it reads like a joke, but it’s not. Next up, Microsoft is going to sue over the ability to type, look, and maybe even breathe. Nike outletI’m sure they patented those things at some point over the past 30 years. They have something ridiculous like 20,000 patents.

And again, the worst part is that the suits are hollow. Microsoft really does not care about Nook sales being stopped because they’re copying their “innovation” — they’re happy to have them keep selling, just as long as Barnes & Noble pays them for each one sold.

Other companies, like Apple, for instance, may be no more in the right over these bogus software patents. But at least they really believe that companies like Google (by way of HTC) have copied their intellectual property and want them to stop doing it. For Microsoft, this is a business model.

The truth is that this laughable model is just an extension of the one that made Microsoft, Microsoft: licensing.
Nike Dunk SB LowMicrosoft grew to where it is today because computer makers licensed Windows and Office. But as we dive into the mobile age, that model is not only broken, it has been destroyed. Google is licensing Android — but they’re doing it for free. It’s exactly why they were so easily able to kill off Windows Mobile.

Nike outlet"embarrassed" when her full-frontal nude photos appeared online in 2007 and 2009.

But now that it's happened again, she's downright mad.

Nike outlet store"Vanessa is deeply upset and angered that these old photos, which were taken years ago, continue to resurface," Hudgens' lawyer, Christopher Wong, said in a statement to the Daily News.

Nike Dunk SB High"It is particularly disturbing that whoever got hold of these private photos seems to be intent on illegally leaking them out over a long period of time," her attorney continued. Nike Dunk SB Low"We are actively working with law enforcement to determine who is responsible and hold them accountable for their actions."

Several previously unseen X-rated photos of Hudgens, 22, began circulating online Monday.

In one of the tamer pictures, Hudgens is reportedly kissing her friend, 18-year-old actress Alexa Nikolas.

Cheap Nike outletThe alleged leak coincides with the release of two films starring the former Disney star – "Beastly," which hit theaters on March 4, and "Sucker Punch," which opens March 25.

Hudgens also took legal action in 2009, with her lawyers investigating how the pictures made their way onto the Internet and demanding websites remove them.

The actress, who flaunts her fit body in a bikini on the cover of Shape's April issue, told Allure in 2009 – after the second leak – that the pictures were meant to be a "private thing."