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I have just sent the questions to DNAP.
http://ragingbull.lycos.com/mboard/boards.cgi?board=DNAP&read=300933
Agreed, but lets make sure they have the opportunity to respond. Remember that this effort was instigated on the other board and some of the questions have come from that forum from posters that do not participate here. We must not exclude them.
mingwan0,
Sorry for the delayed response to both this and your private post.
I am quite comfortable with w2p's excellent suggestions. However, I think as this is a collaborative effort from many sources we should make sure the individual contributors who provided the specific questions are able to approve.
I also have no issues with any numbering system that might be agreed upon. I am more concerned with content than format.
I will not be available for the rest of this holiday weekend as I am leaving momentarily. Good luck with the process, I will be looking forward to seeing the progress made over the weekend.
regards,
frog
Cosmic,
Alternately, if the intention is to get as many of the questions as possible answered in the newsletter before the meeting, then perhaps it would be a good idea to send the entire list of questions as soon as possible. Thereby allowing the company to include information in the newsletter that they may not have previously considered.
regards,
frog
bag8ger,
I think that I will leave any decisions regarding deletions from the list to mingwan when he returns. I am sure that the membership would prefer that I not exercise any editorial control over the list apart from the tentative addition of questions as they are offered.
regards,
frog
Grateful,
Forgive me for answering your post to mingwan0, but he has asked me to maintain the list while he retires for the evening. I have amended your question to the Management section as follows;
"Can you provide an update on the status of the search for a Director of Marketing that was mentioned in the TWST article?"
I will try to keep up the list as questions are proposed and hand it back to mingwan0 for his editorial expertise when he returns.
regards,
frog
mingwan0,
You are correct, the IP that is specific to the patent applications is assigned to the company. The core of the company however, is not the patents, they merely protect it. The core is the 'platform'.
As you have seen, a couple of the questions on the draft list pertain to the platform. What form does it take? Is it tengible...CDROMS, documentation, datasets?
The platform could be licensed out to others without impacting the assignation of the patents. In fact it is possible that if the form of the platform includes an eclectic array of resources that is combined into a functioning entity through the manipulation of a single knowledgeable individual, that it 'could' just walk away.
Let's not dwell on this subject, it is not my intention. I was trying to explain the basis for the question that's all. I also doubt that they will fail. I look forward to your comments.
mingwan0,
I agree completely, I think that it is appropriate to withdraw the questions regarding non-competes. Although I personally, am still not comfortable with my understanding of the details, it is inapproriate to include them in their present form.
Just for your own reference I based the questions on my own misgivings. I have this nagging discomfort regarding the security of the shareholder value, I know it is paranoid, but I can't seem to let it go. There seems to be no tangible connection between the shareholders and the IP that is only real value that the company owns.
It has occured to me that if some subset of the principles were to create a private company of their own perhaps one that was not in 'direct' competition to DNAP. They could 'license' the technology at some discount of it's market value. They could include in the agreement (standard boilerplate) that would protect their license in the event of DNAP's failure. If this was to occur and DNAP was to fail, either through bad luck or the resignation of the principles or some other unforseen catastrophe, the shareholders would be left with nothing except a UHT machine that has a dubious lineage and an abandoned lease, while the players would get to move on with the technology, unencumbered by a bunch of unhappy investors. I was trying to understand the specific restrictions of the non-compete agreements to see how much 'play' existed in them.
As you can see, it is not a valid topic for the meeting and it has no real basis in fact. As I said, I'm just feeling a little paranoid at this juncture.
Please delete the questions.
mingwan0,
I think you misunderstood my post. I was reacting to the phrase "pretty plain stuff". I would not characterize the meeting as such. I suggested that if all the company had to offer at such a meeting was trivial pap then there would be the opportunity for a confrontation between frustrated investors and the management.
I also predicted that such a confrontation would not occur due to the expected 'significant announcements' that we both suspect will occur.
In regard to your reference to the questions list. Nitya asked you and I to contribute to a mutually agreed upon list of questions and we both agreed. I contributed a first draft list of questions to the RB board. It was my assumption that you would edit the list and offer your own additions or deletions as we went. If you had some other understanding or if you are still waiting for input from me then I have let you down and I apologise. Please let me know what you need from me and I will endeavor to respond as soon as possible.
best regards,
frog
There is no way that the shareholders meeting will be "pretty plain stuff".
While it is quite possible the company has nothing noteworthy to pass along to the shareholders(good or bad). The number of shareholders with probing questions and the required responses will easily surpass "pretty plain stuff".
It is also possible that the company will decline to answer some of the questions for various reasons, but I think the sense of growing frustration with the company and its tight lipped approach to investor relations will force some level of confrontation. The company will be forced to either answer the questions or aggressively stonewall the shareholders. In either case it will not be "pretty plain stuff".
However, given the companies penchant for keeping things close to the vest, it is doubtful that they would organise a shareholders meeting if they didn't expect to gain some value from it. Either good or bad there will be some significant announcement made at the meeting or during the run up to it.
regards,
frog
Furthermore, if you are unable to accept the possibility that there is any connection between DNA and geographical origin, then I might suggest that you are invested in the wrong company.
regards,
frog
Terry,
Please review the text of the message and pay particular attention, this time, to the term 'origin'.
regards,
frog
Ethnicity is NOT specifically a social construct. It is a concept that describes both social and genetic origins.
"of or relating to large groups of people classed according to common racial, national, tribal, religious, linguistic, or cultural origin or background."
Clearly the genetic (ancestral) components of classification inherent in racial and national origins CAN be distinguished by genetic testing.
While genetics will never be able to accurately distinguish many specific ethnicities, especially those that occur within racial and national groups, it can quite clearly distinguish between those that are specifically geographical in origin.
OT: Dnaowner,
Although I would dearly love to, I'm afraid I cannot.
worktoplay,
Wasn't there a company tour associated with the new share authorization vote last March?
In hindsight, I'd say that the results of that meeting and the apparent bait and switch tactics in regards to the promised warrants program could be characterized as ominous.
With history as our guide, It looks like it could go either way.
regards,
frog
worktoplay,
"The fact that they're calling a shareholders meeting is of interest to me."
Don't worry, it's of interest to EVERYONE.
Given the track record of investor relations and the absolute dearth of info from the company, it is a very interesting development.
You are correct and I stand corrected. DNAP does NOT engage in the normal practice of electing officers and voting on proposals put forward by management at annual shareholder meetings. So the suggestion that they might actually behave like a normal company could, in fact, be cause for some exhilaration.
Given the present state of investor morale and the downward trend in both the pps and the level of recrimination from long term investors, it is something of a surprise that they would schedule such an event unless they have something fairly significant to announce. Let us hope that such an announcement will be positive in nature. The alternative would be quite ominous.
regards,
frog
Don't the stockholders usually vote on management proposals, board of directors, and other such company business at these stockholder meetings?
Or are you reading between the lines again?
ming, I'm not asking you to remove anything, even the squashed frog picture. And yes, I was refering to those previous posts, as well as the ongoing stuff from others and not to mention your very witty parody.
I'm just enjoying the irony of you now having to monitor and restrict such posts when before you were able to make them. Luckily you weren't subject to the restrictions back then based on your affiliations.
I bear no ill will believe me. Just allow me to take some mild enjoyment in the turn of events.
best wishes,
frog
ming, lol
That Violation of Privacy thing is a little tricky huh?
Strikes a little close to home doesn't it? How far back are you allowed to go to remove that stuff?
regards,
frog
FYI,
Some time ago the internet access to the relevant documents of court proceedings in Florida was eliminated by state law, however the listing information is still available on line. Since the ban went into effect there have been two additions to the filings in the on-going Kondragunta case. An inspection motion some weeks ago and a written response filed on the fifth of May.
http://www.clerk.co.sarasota.fl.us/srqapp/civdetail.asp?tb_searchby=Company&tb_searchfor=2003+CA...
Does anyone know of a method for accessing this public information short of flying to Florida and going to the courthouse?
mingwan0, That is very good news!
I have enjoyed our discuusions in the past, and I look forward to continuing them in the future. I feel confident that you will carry out the battles within the confines of the board and not employ the executive privilege now at your disposal to influence the outcome.
I perceive you as a man of integrity and honor and look forward to your influence here.
regards,
frog
expectinganimediateimprovement
Mike,
So, are you saying that a 'validation' of 2.0 in terms of verifying the ability of the product to differentiate beween African/nonAfrican ancestry would not be applicable to 2.5?
Also, if there are so many 'opportunities' available in this country to verify the accuracy of the product, how was it possible to release 2.0 in it's clearly unfinished state? Were they only focused on the African/nonAfrican aspects?
Can we expect the accuracy issues to be behind us now? Pesumably they learned some significant lessons in terms of accuracy and verification processes during the last go round. Is it reasonable to expect that the product design issues have been resolved as well as the design processes that led to them?
How is it possible to enhance 2.5 in terms of IndoEuropean/NativeAmerican/East Asian without maintaining the accuracy of the African/nonAfrican distinctions? Are the algorithms so entwined that an enhancement in one area must be balanced with a degradation in another?
mingwan0, A lot has been made of the apparent validations by the various groups. Is there any detailed information available regarding them?
We know that the San Diego stuff, for instance, was done some time ago on the previous version of the product. The latest version is apparently much more accurate and less prone to significant mistakes. (plus or minus one great grandparent. lol)
Given that there are significant accuracy issues with the first version, how viable can the validations have been?
Were the products measured to be accurate to a specific degree, or were they deemed merely usable in some instances?
I guess what I'm trying to say is that given the significant innacuracies of the first version, innacuracies that needed to be addressed by a new version, what is the credibility of the reported validations? Do they have any intrinsic scientific value or are they merely PR fodder that can be used ad infinitum?
regards,
frog
An observation.
---
"Mike, I agree with some of what you say but not the part about "recent" admixture. It was never pitched as recent."
---
I think by 'recent' Mike is referring to DNAP's original suggestion that certain anomalies discovered in the Ancestry product could be explained by 'recent' contributions made by the 'hidden grandmother', and not by the ancient stuff that was eventually determined to be the explanation.
regards,
frog
worktoplay,
The establishment of family membership is a huge part of the existing genealogy paradigm. The basic tools of genealogy employed today are birth, death, and marriage records. Quite often the effort of searching through such records will turn up previously unknown branches of families as well as family groups that seem to be related but may not have an 'official' paper trail/connection.
Such a tool would add a significant resource to these efforts. If it could be priced reasonably I would not be surprised to see it surpass the Ancestry product in terms of popularity, as it fits more readily into the existing paradigm.
It will be interesting to watch.
regards,
frog
OT: terry hallinan,
If I valued your opinion in even the slightest degree, I might be offended by your slander. Such name calling is supposed to be frowned upon in this forum.
Fortunately, experience with your previous posts has provided ample oportunity to assess the value of your input.
regards,
frog
terry hallinan, You seem to be hell bent on turning every discussion into a racial argument. I'm sorry, I'm not interested. DNAP has the ability to distinguish between a very few regional origins. If you wish to make racial hay out of that, I guess that is your priviledge.
regards,
frog
terry, Try to stay within the context of the discussion. The premise at hand is that a DNAWitness profile will allow the investigators to narrow the field of suspects based on the apparent 'description' developed from the profile.
DNAWitness has the ability to differentiate between a few huge demographical types. It can not distinguish between a Spaniard or a Frenchman, A Korean and a Japanese. If in fact it could differentiate a Saami from a belgian circus clown perhaps your input would be relevant, but until that time I'm afraid it isn't.
mingwan0, I'm sorry but I see no value there whatsoever.
The 'vetting' process as it is usually implemented is merely the confirmation of information provided by the potential employee. The DNAWitness product has the refined ability to confirm or deny any claims made by such a potential employee to within the constraints of a continental (or sub-continental) extent.
If we assume that our subject, we'll call him Osama for convenience, is not a complete idiot. It is likely that Osama will pretend to be from somewhere within the territorial resolution of DNAWitness.
I will concede that should Osama present himself for vetting with a Swedish passport, then we will have a high probability of nabbing him. Otherwise it is a concept with more PR value than functional capability.
worktoplay, Easy fella...take deep breaths. lol
My original question has indeed been answered. There are clearly scenarios in which DNAWitness has value. We can possibly apply the technology to limit the number of possible suspects for a crime based on their GEOGRAPHICAL (right this time, lol) origin.
When this capability was applied to domestic crime it had value when there was some diversity in the suspect list, allowing for the elimination of a significant number of suspects and allowing the authorities to concentrate on those remaining. Obviously there are limitations on the value of such a technology when the suspect list is not diverse. For instance in the Ramsey case in Colorado, if the profile comes back suggesating a caucasion of European ancestry, then there is little value gained as the majority of the potential suspects fit that profile.
When we apply the technology to the war on terror, what do we gain?
What you and GE have come up with are scenarios in which the technology may be applied in such a way as to provide some value, but how would we quantify that value?
Narrowing down a world full of terrorist suspects to merely a continent full might have some mathematical advantage but narrowing down to just a few dozen million from a few billion doesn't seem like enough does it?
Now in the event that you have just a few hundred terrorist suspects to chose from then I suppose separating the Chechens from the Saudis could give you a leg up, but if you already have such a focused group it is doubtful that you don't already have a good idea what each is up to, that is what the FBI is supposed to do already..
My point is not that DNAWitness has no value in such investigations it's just the same limited benefit that it has in domestic applications. To suggest as the PR did, that there is a significant breakthrough that will greatly assist the war on terror is just a little over the top.
regards,
frog
There you go...a reasonable concept, I knew you could do it.
worktoplay, Don't be so simplistic. We were not discussing the war on terrorism in general we were addressing specific scenarios where a DNAWitness like product might have some value.
None of the ideas put forward so far seem to have any merit. Just because the nonsense proposed up to now isn't viable does not mean there is no useful application.
If there is no place for a reasonable debate about the merits of such ideas then what are these boards for?
Sorry that's HEY Arch...
Het Arch,
How's the rebuild coming?
worktoplay,
1. Try to keep the stories straight. According to your own numbering scheme we are talking about suicide bombers who spread themselves all over the walls.
2. If the authorities already knew the identity of the people in question then their origin is irrelevant. It doesn't matter who knows their ancestry the police or themselves. Ancestry is a clue towards identity, not the other way around.
worktoplay,
1. After a terrorist has 'gone geological' (lol), his organization invariably calls up the local TV station and presents the bombers last video containing his picture his family and his last prayers and blessings. I don't think that figuring out what continent he was from compares with that as a part of the identification process.
2. If the CIA or Interpol has followed a group of suspected terrorists to a location, then they already know who they are. They don't just go looking for strangers with 'terrorist' tattooed on their forehead.
mingwan0, It would certainly help, although as I understand the technology that isn't going to be possible for a good long while yet. The amplification step alone takes a significant time period.
Do you have any new information that infers a faster turnaround?
I would think that such a breakthrough in the speed of the amplification process would be a greater benefit to the entire science as opposed to just increasing the turnaround on a Witness analysis. That alone would be worth more than anything in the pipeline so far. What have you heard?
DougS, LOL. Well that's one way to do it. Kudos
ifida,
Don't change the subject. Tell us how we are going to use DNAWitness to capture terrorists at the border.
ifida,
"Do you really think that the government would allow someone to provide a sample....instead of just swabbing their mouth on the spot and testing it? Weak....very weak."
Do you really think that we are going to build internment camps at all of the airports and entry points in this country in order to 'swab' every entrant and carry out a long term test?
Do you really think that Osama is going to sneak into this country with a Swedish passport?
How is a swab test for a geographical region going to catch a middle eastern terrorist? Do you think they are so stupid as to not claim a regional origin?
Weak ifida, ...very weak.