Agreed the article is bullshit. However getting the issue 100% backwards the author actually raises an important point. Active placebos do make for a different comparator than inert placebos --- arguably a much better one. Given that north of 90% of patients and doctors have been found to correctly guess allocation in blinded trials of tricyclic antidepressants and other antipsychotics, it might actually help to add something to the placebo which does generate side effects to make it harder for people to pick which group they are in.
It always made me laugh reading about 'double blinded' trials of cannabis extract for MS... In this and many other cases the blind is a complete fiction.
Outlawing active placebos would actually be very foolish. Up to 90% of patients and 100% of physicians have been found to have broken blinds in trials of tricyclics, almost certainly because of the side effects. The original article is extremely weak in failing to address this... in fact, drug companies really should be adding ingredients with side effects to their placebos, but won't because it increases the complexity and reduces the statistical power of the trials they run.
Agreed, so change advertising requirements. Instead of "compared to a placebo" (which is highly misleading in this case), make the drug companies disclose side effects differently. "In clinical trials, this drug had the following incidents of side effects... An active placebo intended to cause anticipated side effects had the following incidents...."
This preserves all of what you can currently get, but it frames the issue so that the average individual does not assume that an on-par comparison means all side effects are placebo effect.
There are other examples, but this is a function of our executive's decision to bend over to US demands and rewrite UK law, rather than corruption of the legal system itself.
How many times. Jobs paid for the IP from Xerox. Check your facts. There probably are things Apple have stolen over they years, but this wasn't one of them.
Xerox did give Apple access to PARC, but see how that allows Apple to freely use any of their IP without compensation.
According to Xerox:
''The ruling does not mean Apple hasn't taken substantial portions of the Star and claimed them as their own,'' a statement issued by Xerox said. ''The court merely held, we believe erroneously, that Xerox does not have standing to present facts in support of our contention.''
Emphasis can be a powerful thing. If you see an array of amazing things (as I'm sure Jobs & Co did at PARC), and then you select a key item to emphasize and popularize, then you have, in fact, contributed value. One could say that this was Steve Jobs' first act of 'technology curation' - an act which has (successfully) been commoditized and monetized via the App Store.
