Copyright protection reminds me of a driving lesson I got from a NY
cabdriver.  He said, "Right of way isn't really something you got or you
don't got, cause if you see that guy isn't gonna give it to you, you don't
got it."  That wasn't the letter of the law, but it saved me a lot of paint
driving in New York.  If copyright holders actually sued, they'd have the
copyright protection.  Finding a lawyer or lawyers who might want to actually
push these actions is the apparent way to go.  If a clone maker class action
comes about, you might get a contingency fee arrangement worked out, it you've
got the case and the fortitude to push it.  Otherwise, some guy just hangs up
on you.
                    -moneysmith, BIX


 No matter how hard I try to find some justification for the idea, touch
screens still look idiotic. I've threatened severe bodily injury to people
who put fingerprints on my $500 monitor. If someone tapped a Cross pen on
a $2500 monitor, I'm afraid I'd just murder them on the spot.

 Besides the effort of holding your arm out and pawing at the monitor, who
wants to live with fingerprints and scratches on the screen? And like
Dvorak mentioned one time, what if a big housefly or something landed on
the screen and started walking around???
                                         -dave2, BIX


I always liked the story in there about the consultant called in to
bail out the group foundering on some very complex project.  On the
airplane home, it occurred to him that by building it around an
interpreter, the whole thing became very simple and in short order
he had the whole thing completed.  Understandably, the original project
group was quite dispirited that one guy could so quickly and easily
solve a problem that had been vexing there whole team for so long.
But their hopes were raised when their team leader stood up to
ask a question toward the conclusion of the consultant's presentation.

   "And how fast does your system run?"

(It's been 15 years since I read this, so let me just fill in approximately
here.)

   "It processes 15 transactions per second."

   "Ah, well.  _Our_ system did 35 transactions per second," responded
the team leader, looking around the room at his team, now all feeling
somewhat better.

   "Yes.  But mine works."             -hamilton, BIX


  > My entry: PRESS ANY KEY TO CONTINUE:
  I remember the first time I saw WordPerfect.  I figured it was.  I wanted
OUT - the book said to press the END key.  I pressed the END key (the only key
on my keyboard labelled END).  Nothing happened.
  I asked the expert - he said "Oh, they mean F7".  Oh, OK.  That's logical.
                                        - Ward Chistenson, BIX


     Ah--I see you've fallen for that "California falling into the Pacific"
story as well.  That's a story we circulate to prevent an influx of paniced
people from the east.
     The truth is, when the Big One comes, everything from the San Andreas
fault to the Missouri fault will sink into the sea.  There will be a whole new
ocean between the eastern U.S. and the Pacific Coast.
     It is safe for me to tell you peope this, of course, since nobody will
ever believe it.  Most people don't even notice that Dr. Richter's people built
their main lab in the area that's supposed to fall into the Pacific.
- Bruce Wheelock, BIX


 I was in college, 1973, 18 months after the university of Kansas student union
was burned by a student protester.
 The battery holder had rotted out in my bike headlight, so I slipped 4 C cells
in a peice of conduit, hooked some wire some wires on, and taped it to the top
bar of my bike.
 Eventually, the batteries failed, I was flush at the time and bought a new
headlight.  I threw the old light and the conduit into the trash can behind the
dorm and went off to class.  The trash men came, noticed a piece of pipe in the
trash with wires and electrical tape, panicked and called the cops, who
panicked and called the Army bomb squad, who called the FBI. They all came to
the dorm, interviewed everyone, took the pipe out to their field and blew it
up.  When I got back from class, 6 cops where waiting for me, to ask "what was
in the pipe"  I told them, they called the Army, who confirmed my story.  The
cops (FBI, KBI, Army, city and campus) told me "don't do it again" and left.
-- Rick the MAAAAAD bomber.         -rboatright, BIX


... I was once told by Robert Heinlein that an author should leave some
errors in a manscript to give the editors something to do to justify their
jobs. I remarked on this to an editor who was actually a friend of mine at
one time -- it is possible to make friends temporarily with an editor -- and
he replied, "So I've noticed, Harry.  But why do you have to leave so
MANY errors?"                          - gharry, BIX


A few months back I invented the "Turbo Coke".  That is a pair of
no-doze taken with the normal glass of Coke.     - jdlugosz, BIX


TITLE: Phony Tape Drives
Some insane elf or computer at Colorado has now sent me a total
of FOUR phony mag tape drives.  They are just the cases, with half
a tape sticking out.  Seeing them is supposed to put customers into
a buying frenzy.
                             - roedy, BIX


Reminds me of a classmate in a high school Earth Science class.  One of the
questions on a quiz was "Water is found in what three states?"  He nudged
his neighbor and whispered "Is there water in Utah?"
                                        -kaminski, BIX


>self-unpacking containers

My boss's daughter received a package packed with popcorn.  UPS (?) left it
on the porch and something opened it and ate the popcorn.  The contents
apparently came through just fine.         -rbabcock, BIX


-- The universal desire to pop bubbled paper cannot be denied.

Bubble popping, even among the very senior staff, was such a 
problem at Univac on Friday night they passed a memo about
condemning the practice of wanton destruction of packing materials.
                                -roedy, BIX


>putting the milk away in the cupboard ...

At least you realized it. Last week someone in my house reached up into the
cupboard for one of those little corning ware things we keep leftovers in.
Unfortunately, it _already_had_ leftovers in it.
                                          - jmaxfield, BIX


 Parents can do cruel things to children. There's a young teller at my
bank named "Charmin."

 Robin, Sandy, Lynn, Hillary, Mickey, Cody, and others are becoming
genderless names. What's worse is when parents stick diminutives on
birth certificates. I knew one guy named "Bobby" who got downright
hostile about it. And of course there was Dartanyun back in school.
Or my sister Lorraine, whose birth certificate says "Lorane" because
the hospital people were nearly illiterate.               -dave2, BIX