Here's some more information about the Nigerian-character keyboard patent that LANCOR is suing OLPC about. It seems to be a "registered design", meaning that it protects the device's appearance rather than its function. So they're claiming that the OLPC keyboard LOOKS too much like their keyboard. But the OLPC keyboard places some characters, and in particular the function key that allows the user to type special characters, in a different place from LANCOR's keyboard. Even if the patent were for the device's function, rather than appearance, the two keyboards are designed to work differently. (The article goes into some techie details that I won't reproduce here.)

From what I've been able to track down online over the past two days, I can't see where this suit has a legal leg to stand on.

In other news, we had a nice group get-together at Karla and Al's for turkey dinner on Sunday. Joe M. and Joey D. went with Mark and me. Good food and cartoons -- can you beat that combination for a great day?

(OK, the Phantoms and the Eagles could have won, too, but we can't have EVERYthing. Like I said a few posts ago, sometimes there's a need for a lot more mojo than one person's pregame ritual can provide. ;o) )

When the leftovers were divided up, we got some turkey and fruit salad. The cats escorted me all the way to the kitchen, meowing the entire time, when I transported the bag with the food in it to the refrigerator. The Stripe Committee loves turkey, so we'll have to make sure they get a little snack when we eat the turkey.

OK, it's time to attempt to sleep. I'm so aggravated -- I had my sleeping patterns close to normal for a few days, and over the past couple days they've gotten all goofed up again. Grrrrrr! Back to square one in the "straightening out the sleep patterns" department.