LinuxParanoid's Journal: User-moderated story queue, late-November 2003

If you have an interesting story submission that has been neglected in the second half of November 2003, then reply to this post.

I had a vaguely interesting one...

[Frisky070802]

... but I wasn't at all surprised it wasn't accepted, given the ratio of submissions. Orthogonal's journal entry about a rejected posting, on the other hand, really surprised me.

Re:I had a vaguely interesting one...

[Frisky070802]

Apologies, this was the first time I came across a reference to this request, and I misinterpreted it. Please don't moderate it as a troll :).

My submission, which I didn't save, was a pointer to an interesting article [ieee.org] on companies that say they'll file an inventor's idea with the patent office. "Caveat inventor" :)

mandatory 'invention promotion co.' disclosures

[LinuxParanoid]

Thanks, that was an interesting article, particularly the description of the American Inventors Protection Act which I hadn't heard about.

--LP

Ask Slashdot: How to run for governmental office

[hound3000]

These days it seems like half the stories on slashdot are no longer about technology and gadgets, but how tech-savvy Congress and state governments aren't. How many slashdot readers have considered running for office to try to proactively change things? How many readers have held public office of any type from city council or higher? How many have done anything more than write a letter to your Congressman politely asking them to 'knock-it-off' on this bill or that?

If anybody has ideas on how to start and m