Finally a voice of reason. These lawsuits are nothing more than a chest thumping pissing contest. Regardless of what you or I might think Apple needs Moto and Moto needs Apple. They'll negotiate a happy little cross licensing deal and be done with it.
Apple doesn't "need" Moto - that relationship went away a long time ago, when Motorola refused to ramp up development of the 68000 series chipsets for the Mac. And Moto doesn't own any significant IP in the GSM licensing be used in the current GSM phonesets, unlike Nokia who is trying to extort extra special fees from whoever they can. Especially Apple.
But yes - the court system is simply part of corporate negotiation for licensing and sharing of IP. Some like to play, some don't. It indicates the maturing of the mobility space, as these things get challenged and sorted out among the players. You can bet that all the lawyers (actually the legal assistants) are working overtime in all the corporate legal departments pulling out currently owned IP and patents and comparing them to all the other registered patents to see who's got the most leverage.
2. If you have have ever applied for a patent, raise your hand.
3. Heck, if you have ever had a copyright, raise your hand.
I am willing to bet the sum total of 1-3 is 0 or close to 0.
SO let's throw down gr -
I have several bonafide full copyrights under my possession, and a large body of common copyright material beyond that. I have a large group of associates that between them have over ten thousand patents in ownership and one, a metallurgist friend, who alone holds over a thousand active patents by himself. On top of that I have worked on litigation involving intellectual property for a number of landmark lawsuits in the US.
My point? I'm not out here demanding that the average commenter put-up or shut-up on this topic. Everyone here - even you, is entitled to offer an opinion. However, the consistent tone of your commentary has afforded me the opportunity to add you to my ignore list - you're intolerant and worthy to be ignored.
No, it is like saying you shouldn't practice brain surgery without having gone to medical school.
Last I heard, no one has a patent on brain surgery. And, getting an advanced degree was neither a necessary nor sufficient condition for getting a patent.
Patents are getting ridiculous these days. Apple (and others) somehow think you can patent 'intuition' or 'structure'. And then sue some other maker that uses input methods, etc., which are similarly 'intuitive', or digital organization methods that are 'structured'. It's like McDonald's suing Burger King because Burger King puts a meat patty and cheese between 2 halves of a bun.
Well, when there was a secret sauce and third piece of bread in between it was protected for 20 or 30 years. Its call a Big Mac and had Burger King done it they would have been sued. Thats why it took so long for them to copy this sandwich. They were waiting for the time limit to expire.
All very tiresome. The endless lawsuits are completely out of control. Everyone is suing everyone over the same stuff. If it wasn't so pathetic it would be funny.
Pathetic, yes. But there still are a lot of suits targeting Apple.
Patents are only as strong as the attorneys defending them. Hope that Jobs has the quality in his legal team that he demands everywhere else.
You can criticize all you want, you know what they say about opinions.
No, it is like saying you shouldn't practice brain surgery without having gone to medical school.
Most of the posts here are based largely on the belief that anyone suing Apple is a priori wrong, and not on basic understanding of the patent system.
Nope....
Rather it's saying that the whole everyone suing everyone in a bunch of tantrums is plain wrong.
Before any of the current cases get heard there is going to be more, i'd wager within a year every company involved in the mobile space is going to be in multiple law suits with each other.
Apple has been very peaceful on the -launching- of lawsuits, not silent, just quiet. The patents in NeXT IP are a direct result of Bill Gates being a prick back when and Jobs making sure that never happens again. NeXT innovated massively and that's all in Apple now. It's never come up before because the OS space has been static for 15 years, now with the launch of the new realm of mobile as an actual platform it will be on like we've never seen it.
My hope is that the courts, suing and patent system get reformed as a result more than any of these giants get taken down.
Patents are getting ridiculous these days. (...) It's like McDonald's suing Burger King because Burger King puts a meat patty and cheese between 2 halves of a bun.
Or like Smucker's getting patents for the peanut butter and jelly sandwich.
Motorola developed the first prototype commercial use portable cellular telephone handset (the DynaTAC) in '74. But it was Bell labs that put together the first workable commercial cellular system in the US in 1984 - without which the DynaTAC couldn't work. However it was NTT in Japan in '79 that produced the global first full system of 1st gen cellular voice networking, followed closely by the NMT system in Scandinavia in '81. The DynaTAC would not become available to the commercial market until 1984. The Simon Personal Communicator, by IBM and BellSouth, was the first mobile phone to add PDA features, including pager, calculator, address book, fax machine, and e-mail device in a 20oz package costing $900 - released in '93. The lightweight Motorola StarTAC was released in 1996, and was the fore-bearer of the modern flip-phone style.
So to get your dates correct: Apple was incorporated in mid '76 and its first IPO was in '80. In fact no, Moto wasn't in it such a long time before Apple was doing business, and it can be successfully argued that Apple was "something" while Moto was trying to produce the StarTAC. Being "in the biznizz" and actually being commercially successful are two different benchmarks by the way. So the StarTAC - being Moto's first commercially available consumer cell phone was trotted out in 1996, the next year Steve Jobs returned to pull Apple out of it's death spiral and the rest, is history. You should read up on these technologies sometime. The rapidity with which these things developed is very exciting when you know what you are talking about.
And based on this time table Next was in business patenting their work as well since 86'
Actually, the sum total of 1-3 is 1 or close to 1 for almost everyone.
As soon as you write something unique, you have a copyright on that work.
It's almost impossible to enforce until you REGISTER the copyright, but any work that you create is copyrighted from the moment of creation.
Sorry, I was not clear. I meant that if we added up the number of people here who responded to 1-3, the answer would be 0 or close to 0, because few if any people here probably have any patents or copyrights.
It is the same story every time the patent issue gets raised here - the system is broken, you can patent an idea, etc. and yet few if any people know much if anything about how the system works.
Yes, one can have an opinion, but to declare that something is "broken" requires a minimum knowledge of how that thing is in the normal state. To the best of my knowledge there are only a couple of patent lawyers who post here. So most of the declarations are by people who think Apple is getting the short end of the stick (which they may be, but without reading the patent and the complaint, and knowing what it means one does not know), and yet if it were MS being sued for the same thing, they would be cheering yea.
Rather it's saying that the whole everyone suing everyone in a bunch of tantrums is plain wrong.
Except, if your patents are being violated, then suing is your recourse. Go back to the Kodak thread over the summer. Kodak sued Apple for violating a series of patents, after trying to negotiate with Apple (according to the story). And yet, people were declaring that this was wrong, Kodak was a patent troll (mind you, Kodak is nearly 150 years old), Kodak should not sue because they were not "innovative".
Quote:
Originally Posted by cy_starkman
Before any of the current cases get heard there is going to be more, i'd wager within a year every company involved in the mobile space is going to be in multiple law suits with each other.
And why is this necessarily a bad thing, particularly if patents are being violated.
Quote:
Originally Posted by cy_starkman
My hope is that the courts, suing and patent system get reformed as a result more than any of these giants get taken down.
But exactly how would you reform it, so that the inventor, particularly the small inventor does not get screwed.
I have several bonafide full copyrights under my possession, and a large body of common copyright material beyond that. I have a large group of associates that between them have over ten thousand patents in ownership and one, a metallurgist friend, who alone holds over a thousand active patents by himself. On top of that I have worked on litigation involving intellectual property for a number of landmark lawsuits in the US.
My point? I'm not out here demanding that the average commenter put-up or shut-up on this topic. Everyone here - even you, is entitled to offer an opinion. However, the consistent tone of your commentary has afforded me the opportunity to add you to my ignore list - you're intolerant and worthy to be ignored.
I am not sure that you will see this. My point is though, if you want to declare that patent system is broken, complain about the system, how it works, and what is wrong with it, you need to know something about the topic. Simply basing your assertions on the fact that your favorite company is getting sued is trivial.
You say you worked on litigation re:IP. Would anyone have asked you to work on the case, or provide an opinion if you were the Manager of a Burger King. The answer is no - because you have no expertise under those conditions.
Apple has been playing by the rules and revolutionized the industry (again).
The interesting thing here is Motorola are not trying to block the iPhone. They are trying to get the patents declared invalid so later on Apple cannot use them against Motorola. Even if Apple loses it shouldn't impact the iPhone.
Apple gets to revolutionize the industry. Android handsets are improved to counter Apple. Apple improves the iPhone to stay ahead. The consumer wins.
Actually, the sum total of 1-3 is 1 or close to 1 for almost everyone.
As soon as you write something unique, you have a copyright on that work.
It's almost impossible to enforce until you REGISTER the copyright, but any work that you create is copyrighted from the moment of creation.
Actually it is pretty easy as long as you have some other way to verify your claim. Registration is just a well recognized but far from foolproof way of doing so.
Comments
Finally a voice of reason. These lawsuits are nothing more than a chest thumping pissing contest. Regardless of what you or I might think Apple needs Moto and Moto needs Apple. They'll negotiate a happy little cross licensing deal and be done with it.
Apple doesn't "need" Moto - that relationship went away a long time ago, when Motorola refused to ramp up development of the 68000 series chipsets for the Mac. And Moto doesn't own any significant IP in the GSM licensing be used in the current GSM phonesets, unlike Nokia who is trying to extort extra special fees from whoever they can. Especially Apple.
But yes - the court system is simply part of corporate negotiation for licensing and sharing of IP. Some like to play, some don't. It indicates the maturing of the mobility space, as these things get challenged and sorted out among the players. You can bet that all the lawyers (actually the legal assistants) are working overtime in all the corporate legal departments pulling out currently owned IP and patents and comparing them to all the other registered patents to see who's got the most leverage.
See which one fills up faster.
These patents go back to the late 1980s, Moto. Suck on it.
Ok, everyone who has posted here:
1. If you have a patent, raise your hand.
2. If you have have ever applied for a patent, raise your hand.
3. Heck, if you have ever had a copyright, raise your hand.
I am willing to bet the sum total of 1-3 is 0 or close to 0.
SO let's throw down gr -
I have several bonafide full copyrights under my possession, and a large body of common copyright material beyond that. I have a large group of associates that between them have over ten thousand patents in ownership and one, a metallurgist friend, who alone holds over a thousand active patents by himself. On top of that I have worked on litigation involving intellectual property for a number of landmark lawsuits in the US.
My point? I'm not out here demanding that the average commenter put-up or shut-up on this topic. Everyone here - even you, is entitled to offer an opinion. However, the consistent tone of your commentary has afforded me the opportunity to add you to my ignore list - you're intolerant and worthy to be ignored.
That's like suggesting that I shouldn't criticize an omelette because I can't lay an egg.
Get real.
You can criticize all you want, you know what they say about opinions.
No, it is like saying you shouldn't practice brain surgery without having gone to medical school.
Most of the posts here are based largely on the belief that anyone suing Apple is a priori wrong, and not on basic understanding of the patent system.
I'm sure you thought they were the shiznit when you had them.
Yes, shiznit.
Perhaps you need to reflect on how this once-great company ended up in the pile of shiznit that it did. (Hint: Product lineup).
No, it is like saying you shouldn't practice brain surgery without having gone to medical school.
Last I heard, no one has a patent on brain surgery. And, getting an advanced degree was neither a necessary nor sufficient condition for getting a patent.
Moreover, I'll bet your own score is zero.
So, move along.......
Patents are getting ridiculous these days. Apple (and others) somehow think you can patent 'intuition' or 'structure'. And then sue some other maker that uses input methods, etc., which are similarly 'intuitive', or digital organization methods that are 'structured'. It's like McDonald's suing Burger King because Burger King puts a meat patty and cheese between 2 halves of a bun.
Well, when there was a secret sauce and third piece of bread in between it was protected for 20 or 30 years. Its call a Big Mac and had Burger King done it they would have been sued. Thats why it took so long for them to copy this sandwich. They were waiting for the time limit to expire.
All very tiresome. The endless lawsuits are completely out of control. Everyone is suing everyone over the same stuff. If it wasn't so pathetic it would be funny.
Pathetic, yes. But there still are a lot of suits targeting Apple.
Patents are only as strong as the attorneys defending them. Hope that Jobs has the quality in his legal team that he demands everywhere else.
You can criticize all you want, you know what they say about opinions.
No, it is like saying you shouldn't practice brain surgery without having gone to medical school.
Most of the posts here are based largely on the belief that anyone suing Apple is a priori wrong, and not on basic understanding of the patent system.
Nope....
Rather it's saying that the whole everyone suing everyone in a bunch of tantrums is plain wrong.
Before any of the current cases get heard there is going to be more, i'd wager within a year every company involved in the mobile space is going to be in multiple law suits with each other.
Apple has been very peaceful on the -launching- of lawsuits, not silent, just quiet. The patents in NeXT IP are a direct result of Bill Gates being a prick back when and Jobs making sure that never happens again. NeXT innovated massively and that's all in Apple now. It's never come up before because the OS space has been static for 15 years, now with the launch of the new realm of mobile as an actual platform it will be on like we've never seen it.
My hope is that the courts, suing and patent system get reformed as a result more than any of these giants get taken down.
Patents are getting ridiculous these days. (...) It's like McDonald's suing Burger King because Burger King puts a meat patty and cheese between 2 halves of a bun.
Or like Smucker's getting patents for the peanut butter and jelly sandwich.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sealed_crustless_sandwich
Motorola developed the first prototype commercial use portable cellular telephone handset (the DynaTAC) in '74. But it was Bell labs that put together the first workable commercial cellular system in the US in 1984 - without which the DynaTAC couldn't work. However it was NTT in Japan in '79 that produced the global first full system of 1st gen cellular voice networking, followed closely by the NMT system in Scandinavia in '81. The DynaTAC would not become available to the commercial market until 1984. The Simon Personal Communicator, by IBM and BellSouth, was the first mobile phone to add PDA features, including pager, calculator, address book, fax machine, and e-mail device in a 20oz package costing $900 - released in '93. The lightweight Motorola StarTAC was released in 1996, and was the fore-bearer of the modern flip-phone style.
So to get your dates correct: Apple was incorporated in mid '76 and its first IPO was in '80. In fact no, Moto wasn't in it such a long time before Apple was doing business, and it can be successfully argued that Apple was "something" while Moto was trying to produce the StarTAC. Being "in the biznizz" and actually being commercially successful are two different benchmarks by the way. So the StarTAC - being Moto's first commercially available consumer cell phone was trotted out in 1996, the next year Steve Jobs returned to pull Apple out of it's death spiral and the rest, is history. You should read up on these technologies sometime. The rapidity with which these things developed is very exciting when you know what you are talking about.
And based on this time table Next was in business patenting their work as well since 86'
unlike Nokia who is trying to extort extra special fees from whoever they can. Especially Apple.
Please provide proof of this claim
Ok, everyone who has posted here:
1. If you have a patent, raise your hand.
2. If you have have ever applied for a patent, raise your hand.
3. Heck, if you have ever had a copyright, raise your hand.
I am willing to bet the sum total of 1-3 is 0 or close to 0.
Actually, the sum total of 1-3 is 1 or close to 1 for almost everyone.
As soon as you write something unique, you have a copyright on that work.
It's almost impossible to enforce until you REGISTER the copyright, but any work that you create is copyrighted from the moment of creation.
Actually, the sum total of 1-3 is 1 or close to 1 for almost everyone.
As soon as you write something unique, you have a copyright on that work.
It's almost impossible to enforce until you REGISTER the copyright, but any work that you create is copyrighted from the moment of creation.
Sorry, I was not clear. I meant that if we added up the number of people here who responded to 1-3, the answer would be 0 or close to 0, because few if any people here probably have any patents or copyrights.
It is the same story every time the patent issue gets raised here - the system is broken, you can patent an idea, etc. and yet few if any people know much if anything about how the system works.
Yes, one can have an opinion, but to declare that something is "broken" requires a minimum knowledge of how that thing is in the normal state. To the best of my knowledge there are only a couple of patent lawyers who post here. So most of the declarations are by people who think Apple is getting the short end of the stick (which they may be, but without reading the patent and the complaint, and knowing what it means one does not know), and yet if it were MS being sued for the same thing, they would be cheering yea.
Nope....
Rather it's saying that the whole everyone suing everyone in a bunch of tantrums is plain wrong.
Except, if your patents are being violated, then suing is your recourse. Go back to the Kodak thread over the summer. Kodak sued Apple for violating a series of patents, after trying to negotiate with Apple (according to the story). And yet, people were declaring that this was wrong, Kodak was a patent troll (mind you, Kodak is nearly 150 years old), Kodak should not sue because they were not "innovative".
Before any of the current cases get heard there is going to be more, i'd wager within a year every company involved in the mobile space is going to be in multiple law suits with each other.
And why is this necessarily a bad thing, particularly if patents are being violated.
My hope is that the courts, suing and patent system get reformed as a result more than any of these giants get taken down.
But exactly how would you reform it, so that the inventor, particularly the small inventor does not get screwed.
SO let's throw down gr -
I have several bonafide full copyrights under my possession, and a large body of common copyright material beyond that. I have a large group of associates that between them have over ten thousand patents in ownership and one, a metallurgist friend, who alone holds over a thousand active patents by himself. On top of that I have worked on litigation involving intellectual property for a number of landmark lawsuits in the US.
My point? I'm not out here demanding that the average commenter put-up or shut-up on this topic. Everyone here - even you, is entitled to offer an opinion. However, the consistent tone of your commentary has afforded me the opportunity to add you to my ignore list - you're intolerant and worthy to be ignored.
I am not sure that you will see this. My point is though, if you want to declare that patent system is broken, complain about the system, how it works, and what is wrong with it, you need to know something about the topic. Simply basing your assertions on the fact that your favorite company is getting sued is trivial.
You say you worked on litigation re:IP. Would anyone have asked you to work on the case, or provide an opinion if you were the Manager of a Burger King. The answer is no - because you have no expertise under those conditions.
Apple has been playing by the rules and revolutionized the industry (again).
The interesting thing here is Motorola are not trying to block the iPhone. They are trying to get the patents declared invalid so later on Apple cannot use them against Motorola. Even if Apple loses it shouldn't impact the iPhone.
Apple gets to revolutionize the industry. Android handsets are improved to counter Apple. Apple improves the iPhone to stay ahead. The consumer wins.
Ok, everyone who has posted here:
1. If you have a patent, raise your hand.
2. If you have have ever applied for a patent, raise your hand.
3. Heck, if you have ever had a copyright, raise your hand.
I am willing to bet the sum total of 1-3 is 0 or close to 0.
Oh nm I did not post before .
Actually, the sum total of 1-3 is 1 or close to 1 for almost everyone.
As soon as you write something unique, you have a copyright on that work.
It's almost impossible to enforce until you REGISTER the copyright, but any work that you create is copyrighted from the moment of creation.
Actually it is pretty easy as long as you have some other way to verify your claim. Registration is just a well recognized but far from foolproof way of doing so.