Facebook's Former Privacy Chief Criticizes Instant Personalization

Facebook has put out a new feature which is justifably incurring the wrath of the world, including ours. See

Facebook's Former Privacy Chief Criticizes 'Instant Personalization'

Who Invented GPS? Is a Patent Ruckus Brewing Over the Claimed Invention of GPS Navigation Technology and the Attendant Patent 3,789,409 ?

Who invented GPS?

The question is an important one because it has a disputed answer and as such throws light on the question of what kinds of things should be patentable
-- or, stated more generally --
should private persons be able to patent "claimed" parts of inventions which, as a whole, were demonstrably designed by many people and financed by billion-dollar outlays by the United States government?

This question applies to a lot of the government-funded research at universities which in the past has led to private persons obtaining patent monopolies by which they subsequently rip off the taxpaying citizenry and establish vast technological empires - originally paid for by Uncle Sam, as the nation itself flounders for cash while private interests swim in patent monopoly money.

This flawed patent system must -- in our opinion -- be changed to reflect the reality that purely "individual" inventions are rare in the modern technical world and that much recent human progress is a large team effort, based on vast amounts of prior art,  from which private individuals should not unduly profit. Stated otherwise, many of the patents now in private hands but actually reflecting "government work" should probably be in the hands of the US government -- a situation which would greatly reduce the tax burdens of U.S. citizens.

In any case, according to the April 7, 2010 posting True Story of GPS Yet to Be Told at GPS World, a ruckus appeared to be brewing over the origins of GPS technology and the May 1, 2010 posting at GPS World by Stephen T. Powers and Brad Parkinson titled The Origins of GPS: And the Pioneers Who Launched the System (Part I) confirmed that assessment, writing:

"We call this a tribute to the almost-forgotten people whose intellectual labor and skill initially developed GPS. As we unveil this story, we will point out the original — and critical — system study, the 1966 Woodford/Nakamura Report, that became the essential blueprint for GPS. Many people are unaware of this study since, in its original form, it was classified U.S. Department of Defense (DoD) Secret. It was not declassified until August 1979, more than a year after the first launch of a GPS operational satellite in February 1978...

As early as 1962, Dr. Ivan Getting, president of the Aerospace Corporation, saw the need for a new satellite-based navigation system. He envisioned a more accurate positioning system that would be available in three dimensions, 24 hours a day, seven days a week. He had direct access to the highest levels of the Pentagon and was a tireless advocate for his vision....

By 1962, engineers at Aerospace, under Air Force sponsorship, were heavily immersed in studying the system aspects of a new navigational satellite system. From 1964 to 1966, Aerospace carried out an extensive, formal system study whose principal authors were James Woodford and Hideyoshi Nakamura, both highly regarded space-systems engineers.

Their work was summarized as a DoD secret briefing in August 1966. As a result of the classification, it was unavailable to anyone outside the project until 13 years later, in 1979, when it was finally declassified (figure 4)....

In October 1970, more than four years after the completion of this study, Roger Easton of NRL applied for a patent on the two-satellite, ρ-ρ technique (option N) that required an atomic clock for the user and was only two-dimensional. The patent (U.S. 3,789,409) was granted in 1974, a year after the three-dimensional design of the GPS system had already been defined in the Lonely Halls Pentagon meeting to be described later....

In 1964, the U.S. Navy initiated a second satellite program, named Timation, under the direction of Roger L. Easton, Sr., a long-time member of the NRL staff. The NRL’s Timation project was aimed at exploring techniques for passive ranging to satellites, as well as time transfer between various timing centers around the world. This project ran parallel to, and was in competition with, the Air Force Program. It subsequently developed a number of experimental satellites, the first of which was called Timation 1. This small satellite, weighing 85 pounds and producing 6 watts of power, was launched on May 27, 1967....

Recently an article appeared that implied that the GPS design was essentially the same as Timation. (“In what ways did GPS improve on Timation?” Easton: “I can’t think of any ways in which GPS improved on Timation. Essentially, they are the same system.” Interview in High Frontier magazine.)

Aware that this incorrect statement denigrated the people who had first analyzed, advocated, and demonstrated the fundamental concept, as well as built the system, Parkinson resolved to correct the record, and highlight the names of those who deserve credit. This is a major purpose of this article. This article has been reviewed and approved for veracity by virtually all the key figures (still alive) who actually designed, built, and tested GPS."

On October 8, 1970 Roger L. Easton filed a patent application for a Navigation System Using Satellites and Passive Ranging Techniques, for which a patent was issued on January 29, 1974 by the USPTO as U.S. Patent Number 3,789,409. The patent abstract provided:

"A navigation system wherein the navigator's location is obtained by determining the navigator's distance (or range) from one or more satellites of known location. Each satellite transmits multifrequency signals that are derived from a stable oscillator which is phase synchronized with the navigator's equipment that produces similar multifrequency signals. Phase comparison between the signals received from the satellites and the locally produced signals indicates both the distance between the navigator and the satellites and the navigator's location. In determining his location, the presence of the navigator is not revealed since no interrogatory transmission by him is required."

So who really "invented" GPS? One man? Hardly.

We recommend a reading of The Origins of GPS at GPS World.

Gross Domestic Product (GDP) in Selected World Countries per capita in U.S. Dollars at Current Prices 2009 - Source: IMF Chart Generator as adapted by LawPundit | Denmark Leads the Normal World in Income Equality

We put together the following chart for internal use recently and pass it on as a potentially useful piece of information in assessing the world economic and political situation.

It is singularly remarkable that the country with the highest GDP for a "normal economy", i.e. not one based on oil or banking, is Denmark -- and that is also the country with the greatest equality of income in its population according to the Gini coefficient. Maybe the rest of the world has the wrong formula.

It also appears to us that the conflict in the world today is economic and not religious, based on these figures, which show a clear division of the world between the "haves" and the "have nots".

A Selected List of The GDP in US Dollars of
EU Euro-Zone and non-Euro-Zone Countries 2009
(+ EFTA and some non-European countries added for comparison)
Gross Domestic Product (GDP) per capita U.S. $$ at current prices
Source: IMF Chart Generator, as selected and reordered by LawPundit
(some columns have been deleted, some labels have been shortened
and the numbers have been rounded -- go to the IMF Chart Generator
or to this page at Wikipedia if you want original or more inclusive data)

Shaded cells indicate IMF staff estimates
Country (State)	Subject Descriptor (GDP per capita 2009, current prices)	2009 U.S. $$
Luxembourg - EU (world's #1 - via banking), Liechtenstein, not ranked by the IMF, surely has a higher GDP	GDP per capita	104,512
Norway - EFTA, EEA (oil)	GDP per capita	79,085
Qatar (oil)	GDP per capita	68,872
Switzerland - EFTA (via banking)	GDP per capita	67,560
Denmark - EU (world's best income distribution)	GDP per capita	56,115
Ireland - EU	GDP per capita	51,356
Netherlands - EU	GDP per capita	48,223
United Arab Emirates (oil)	GDP per capita	46,857
United States	GDP per capita	46,381
Austria - EU	GDP per capita	45,989
Australia	GDP per capita	45,587
Finland - EU	GDP per capita	44,492
Sweden - EU	GDP per capita	43,986
Belgium - EU	GDP per capita	43,533
France - EU	GDP per capita	42,747
Germany - EU	GDP per capita	40,875
Japan	GDP per capita	39,731
Canada	GDP per capita	39,669
Iceland - EFTA, EEA	GDP per capita	37,977
Singapore	GDP per capita	37,293
Italy - EU	GDP per capita	35,435
United Kingdom - EU	GDP per capita	35,334
Spain - EU	GDP per capita	31,946
Hong Kong SAR	GDP per capita	29,826
Greece - EU	GDP per capita	29,635
Cyprus - EU	GDP per capita	29,620
Slovenia - EU	GDP per capita	24,417
New Zealand	GDP per capita	27,259
Israel	GDP per capita	26,797
Brunei Darussalam	GDP per capita	26,325
The Bahamas	GDP per capita	21,529
Portugal - EU	GDP per capita	21,408
Malta - EU	GDP per capita	19,111
Czech Republic - EU	GDP per capita	18,557
South Korea	GDP per capita	17,074
Taiwan	GDP per capita	16,392
Slovak Republic - EU	GDP per capita	16,282
Saudi Arabia	GDP per capita	14,486
Estonia - EU	GDP per capita	14,267
Croatia	GDP per capita	14,243
Hungary - EU	GDP per capita	12,927
Latvia - EU	GDP per capita	11,607
Poland - EU	GDP per capita	11,288
Lithuania - EU	GDP per capita	11,172
Turkey	GDP per capita	8,723
Russia	GDP per capita	8,694
Brazil	GDP per capita	8,220
Mexico	GDP per capita	8,135
Romania - EU	GDP per capita	7,542
Malaysia	GDP per capita	6,897
Bulgaria - EU	GDP per capita	6,223
South Africa	GDP per capita	5,824
Serbia	GDP per capita	5,809
Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia	GDP per capita	4,482
Iran	GDP per capita	4,460
Bosnia and Herzegovina	GDP per capita	4,279
Thailand	GDP per capita	3,940
Albania	GDP per capita	3,825
China	GDP per capita	3,678
Syria	GDP per capita	2,579
Egypt	GDP per capita	2,450
Indonesia	GDP per capita	2,329
Iraq	GDP per capita	2,108
Philippines	GDP per capita	1,746
Vietnam	GDP per capita	1,060
India	GDP per capita	1,031
Pakistan	GDP per capita	1,017
Bangladesh	GDP per capita	574
Afghanistan	GDP per capita	486