TOUGH CROWD . . . Dan Crevier is one of the co-inventors on US Patent 6,895,426 , titled "Addresses as objects for email messages." He was pretty happy to announce that his patent issued yesterday, and posted it on his blog. Trouble is, he is currently one of the architects on Longhorn as part of the ConnectUX team for Microsoft.

Microsoft.

Publicly disclosing that you work for Microsoft is the equivalent of admitting that you are a child molester to the Slashdot crowd. Accordingly, his blog became swamped with snide comments and half-hearted "congratulations" on his otherwise notable accomplishment. Predictably, he had to shut down the thread.

There's just no pleasing some people . . .