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Unofficial Michel Thomas courses project | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Language Programs, Books & Tapes |  | |
| leosmith Senior Member United States Joined 6551 days ago 2365 posts - 3804 votes  Speaks: English* Studies: Tagalog | Message 49 of 97 23 September 2011 at 7:20am | IP Logged | |||||||||||
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Why not just create the courses and let MT publish them? They wouldn't be free, but at least they'd be available. On
the other hand, if you create a free program that violates some patent, what could they sue you for? There won't be any profits, after all. 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||||||||
| jazzboy.bebop Senior Member Norway norwegianthroughnove Joined 5419 days ago 439 posts - 800 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Norwegian | Message 50 of 97 23 September 2011 at 4:13pm | IP Logged | |||||||||||
Highly unlikely Hodder would publish anything by people not already affiliated with them. From what I've seen, all the MT Method courses were made by people who had already produced courses for Hodder in the past. There is also the problem of taking the risk of publishing a course by an unknown person. They probably wouldn't want to go to the expense of having an expert in the language evaluate the course either and they'd likely be stringent on things like sound quality too. They've already decided not to publish anything else, I doubt a fan-made course handed to them on a plate will make them change their minds unfortunately. Edit: My info appears to be incorrect, it seems they will actually publish later courses after all. Edited by jazzboy.bebop on 24 September 2011 at 1:59pm 3 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||||||||
| Chris Heptaglot Senior Member Japan Joined 7122 days ago 287 posts - 452 votes Speaks: English*, Russian, Indonesian, French, Malay, Japanese, Spanish Studies: Dutch, Korean, Mongolian | Message 51 of 97 23 September 2011 at 5:28pm | IP Logged | |||||||||||
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Spot on jazzboy.bebop!
1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||||||||
| Spanky Senior Member Canada Joined 5957 days ago 1021 posts - 1714 votes Studies: French | Message 52 of 97 23 September 2011 at 7:01pm | IP Logged | |||||||||||
I agree the likelihood of a lawsuit is extremely remote. Just for fun, though, the measure of damages in a patent violation claim need not be related to profit made by the violator, but as easily can be the loss of profits experienced by the patent holder. If you Leosmith as an aerospace or aeronautical engineer (I still believe you are a spy notwithstanding your denial, as discussed in another thread) developed a super-swell idea for a product or process that you can sell and make a $gazillion in profits, but someone comes along, violates your patent and gives your prized patent-protected product or process away for free, your claim against her or him is for damages of $1 gazillion dollars, representing your loss regardless of the absence any gain on the part of the patent violator. I have a vested interest in patent protection, as I have a patent application pending (I am trying to scoop another forum member's spinning wheel project, the one that reportedly only killed 6 of 10 mice). 2 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||||||||
| montmorency Diglot Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 4829 days ago 2371 posts - 3676 votes Speaks: English*, German Studies: Danish, Welsh | Message 53 of 97 23 September 2011 at 7:35pm | IP Logged | |||||||||||
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I've been looking through all this again, I would really like to see it succeed.
I think that it is clear that any use of the MT name itself is almost certainly out of the question. Far too risky. Patent infringement: Well, aside from the fact that the patent may not be enforceable in the UK (although, while Neil may be in the UK, some of his potential volunteers might be in the USA...), I believe in industry legal ways of getting round patents are used all the time. Basically I think you would just have to add some feature that you could claim is uniquely your own, i.e. not part of the original patent (but I'm not a patent expert, so obviously it needs checking). Morally dubious perhaps, but as this is non-profit-making, I don't think that is much of a problem. So you need to call it something else, say a catchy title that tries to sum up what it's all about. Someone suggested the HTLAL course, which could do as a working title until someone comes up with something better. Then you need to find one or more unique or original features to add, and actually, this has a lot to do with the individual tutor. For example, one of the things that MT was always saying on his recordings was "I take full responsibility for your learning", which is pretty mind-blowing when you think about it. It was probably a psychological trick, but I think very effective. Well, I don't think you'd want to risk saying that on these courses, but if you could come up with some similar psychological aids to confidence building, and any other new features that people can think of. I think the two students idea should be retained, as should the use of the pause button in exactly the way it was used by the original MT recorded courses. But with of course the addition of any original ideas that people can come up with, which may well be during the recording of the course itself, i.e. it shouldn't be cast in concrete from the beginning, but should be allowed to grow and evolve. As someone else said, you have to give the "creatives" - the course developers - freedome - the freedom to be creative. I have a preference for experimentation, testing and prototyping before doing something for real, especially something as time-consuming as this. This includes, but may not be limited to: 1. The process - the organisation of how the volunteers interwork (and Librivox seems a good model, as someone mentioned) 2. The teaching method(s) - Is it working? - Do we need to try something new? So, as again someone said, try one first and see how it goes. Of course, it means the overall process will take longer, but it's probably worth taking the time to get it right. Once the process(es) and the method(s) are proved, then hopefully it should build up a momentum of its own. Well, talking of patents, etc, someone who knows about these things needs to give some thought as to the status of the copyright of the finished courses. And, in the fullness of time, I would be happy to volunteer to be a guinea-pig student on one of the Scandinavian courses. (I'll be the stupid one ... I have form :-) ). Edited by montmorency on 23 September 2011 at 11:31pm 2 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||||||||
| Chris Heptaglot Senior Member Japan Joined 7122 days ago 287 posts - 452 votes Speaks: English*, Russian, Indonesian, French, Malay, Japanese, Spanish Studies: Dutch, Korean, Mongolian | Message 54 of 97 24 September 2011 at 3:09am | IP Logged | |||||||||||
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And you want all this to be done for free?
Good luck with that! 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||||||||
| leosmith Senior Member United States Joined 6551 days ago 2365 posts - 3804 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Tagalog | Message 55 of 97 24 September 2011 at 11:20am | IP Logged | |||||||||||
please cite
That's true. So just for giggles, set it up under an LLC. The LLC has no money, and goes broke if sued, but no real harm is done. Is that possible?
Look who's talking. We all know that Spanky is just a thinly veiled cover for the underworld king-pin Buckwheat. Alfalfa confessed all in the national enquirer, or have you already forgotten?
If you get to 10, I'd like to buy the patent myself. 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||||||||
| jazzboy.bebop Senior Member Norway norwegianthroughnove Joined 5419 days ago 439 posts - 800 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Norwegian | Message 56 of 97 24 September 2011 at 1:57pm | IP Logged | |||||||||||
It was a comment made on the official MT Method facebook page less than a year ago that they would not publish any more courses for any further languages after being asked about the progress of the Hindi course, however, having looked through their post history again, in August they now say that the Hindi course is delayed until summer of next year. And I saw that someone made the suggestion recently for a Hebrew course which the people who run the facebook page say will be passed on so it looks like they will be doing more languages in future after all. 1 person has voted this message useful |
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