.....In comparison, what do people think of Apple's iTunes patents, including the 3-state burn button that irises open when you prepare to burn a CD?
i'm no lawyer, but it's quite clear how it works, why it works, how it is unique, and if some other Tunes-like application just copies it, well, thats just wrong
that's the benefit of good user-interface concept and visual design.
show a layperson jury the iris thing, they'll be all like ooh and aahh and hey i think my son can do that...!
show a layperson jury that piece of shit contois drawing and they'll be like, wtf ??
it'll be hard to come up against the iPod-familiar public, unless the lawyer spins it as Apple is a big heartless corporation that built an empire by 'ripping off' a poor, honest man's visionary work
theres other music software out there that allows people and such to download to music players and what not.. a big one would be limewire... and thats not legal... hmm....
As others have said, prior art is probably going to make this difficult to prove. The browse feature works a hell of a lot like column view, whch has been in NeXT operating systems since the late 80's. I would think you would have to convince people that the browse button along with the column view and the categories used, as one construct, is that particular patent. Implementation is everything.
I dunno, I think they have a shot, but it's always tough to prove anything specific like this. It is strange that it took this long to get around to the lawsuit. When was this actualy filed?
James goes to NAMM in 1996 while going to college. Six years later, James is hired by Apple for software development. Three years later, James gets a letter from a man named Contois: "F**K U JAMES!!!1 F**K U & UR APPLL!¡! SSHUV iPUNES ^ UR AS*!¡!11 I'M SUEING HAHAHLOLOL!!!!!!11"
Heh. The thing is, SoundJam looked absolutely nothing like iTunes. Apple was all about the metal interface though when they bough SoundJam. So they asked James to rewrite the UI. Does it resemble the other software? Well kinda. But there are lots of programs that are similar. I'd hardly call iTunes a copy though. In fact, I think iTunes more closely resembles the UI for Claris Emailer than this other piece of swill. Ahhhh...Emailer...my long lost friend.
The burden of proof will be on Contois to prove that his patent has been infringed upon. The evidence is pretty clear that it has been. (Read next paragraph before flaming.)
Mind you, I do believe the US patent system is complete nonsense. I am seeing stuff patented that has been in use for years. In this case, a media playing interface has been around for as long as a computer has been able to play media. I can think of GEOS on the Commodore 64 playing AIFF sound clips, to name one. I would think that Apple's primary goal would be to shoot holes in the patent itself.
An injunction would be a showstopper for Apple. I am not sure if it will be granted but it could be decimating.
The problem with reading a published patent is that distinguishing the "innovation" from the generic wordsmithing around it can be next to impossible. Without further investigation, the language may just be a scarecrow.
A bunch of lawyers are going to exchange letters/phone calls/faxes as well as seek clarifications from the USPTO concerning with all the submitted paperwork before anyone knows anything. Unfortunately, the general public probably won't be privy to this information.
I find it ironic how the Contois interface elements are supposedly being infringed upon. Apple's own "look and feel" suit comes to mind except no patent was involved back then as far as I remember though (design or utility).
An injunction would be a showstopper for Apple. I am not sure if it will be granted but it could be decimating.
Logically, this is much like the Tiger Direct case. Not a chance they get a preliminary injunction. If iTunes shipping for the last 4 years hasn't already damaged them irreparably, having it continue to ship during the trial certainly isn't going to.
To win a preliminary injunction they would have to show a likelihood they'd win--not at all clear to me in this case--and that immediate redress is needed to prevent further harm. Since they have no competing product, and no other patent licensees, I don't see the harm argument flying at all.
i like the way how in their picture of itunes, contis have made the source column reallyh wide to try to make it look more like their image, in fact the contis thing doesnt even have a source column, and so they layout of this area is quite different.
My god, look at that picture on the right - IT LOOKS JUST LIKE ITUNES!!
I know!
The strage thing is if this had been the other way round we would be slagging off the other company. MusicMatch has a similar layout to iTunes, so does WMP but the reason is there's a design system for showing music. How many othere ways are there to do it?
Ummm... ITunes' columns are a NESTED HIERARCHY like the NeXT column view in OS X.
Source > Genre > Artist > Album > Song.
I don't see how category-composer-artist-song is the same thing. Somtimes that makes a hierarchy, but not always.
Still, I like how they resized the iTunes art area to make it LOOK more similar
They have indeed, the default iTunes setup does not have the source pane stretched like that or the browser viewable. I rarely use the browser anyway, the common method seems to be searching by keyword, which bares little resemblence at all to Contois, no more than any other ID3 tag sorting application like foobar2000.
Comments
Anyways, why should this be successful ? Things just overlap a bit
and theres another point... being agressive gets back on you - are they really sure they have it all set straight enough? :-D
"
Music eBusiness expert David Contoiswill share the success story of how
he transformed his family's Essex Junction piano and organ business into
eMusicGear.com,one of America's top e-commerce retailers of Yamaha Music
Products and other popular brands. "
Oh, he seems to be a big guy now
I wouldnt worry especially when Apple came up with the collumn view concept in 1980!
Originally posted by Xool
.....In comparison, what do people think of Apple's iTunes patents, including the 3-state burn button that irises open when you prepare to burn a CD?
i'm no lawyer, but it's quite clear how it works, why it works, how it is unique, and if some other Tunes-like application just copies it, well, thats just wrong
that's the benefit of good user-interface concept and visual design.
show a layperson jury the iris thing, they'll be all like ooh and aahh and hey i think my son can do that...!
show a layperson jury that piece of shit contois drawing and they'll be like, wtf ??
it'll be hard to come up against the iPod-familiar public, unless the lawyer spins it as Apple is a big heartless corporation that built an empire by 'ripping off' a poor, honest man's visionary work
Originally posted by bergz
Still can't view appleinsider images in Camino. Is it me or do you not support Camino? Not the first time this has been mentioned.
Safari , of course, works dandy.
--B
Images work fine with my Camino. I'm using the nightly updates though, which might be the difference.
I dunno, I think they have a shot, but it's always tough to prove anything specific like this. It is strange that it took this long to get around to the lawsuit. When was this actualy filed?
Originally posted by 00100011
James goes to NAMM in 1996 while going to college. Six years later, James is hired by Apple for software development. Three years later, James gets a letter from a man named Contois: "F**K U JAMES!!!1 F**K U & UR APPLL!¡! SSHUV iPUNES ^ UR AS*!¡!11 I'M SUEING HAHAHLOLOL!!!!!!11"
Heh. The thing is, SoundJam looked absolutely nothing like iTunes. Apple was all about the metal interface though when they bough SoundJam. So they asked James to rewrite the UI. Does it resemble the other software? Well kinda. But there are lots of programs that are similar. I'd hardly call iTunes a copy though. In fact, I think iTunes more closely resembles the UI for Claris Emailer than this other piece of swill. Ahhhh...Emailer...my long lost friend.
The burden of proof will be on Contois to prove that his patent has been infringed upon. The evidence is pretty clear that it has been. (Read next paragraph before flaming.)
Mind you, I do believe the US patent system is complete nonsense. I am seeing stuff patented that has been in use for years. In this case, a media playing interface has been around for as long as a computer has been able to play media. I can think of GEOS on the Commodore 64 playing AIFF sound clips, to name one. I would think that Apple's primary goal would be to shoot holes in the patent itself.
An injunction would be a showstopper for Apple. I am not sure if it will be granted but it could be decimating.
simply rephrased... Who?
Get a job!
A bunch of lawyers are going to exchange letters/phone calls/faxes as well as seek clarifications from the USPTO concerning with all the submitted paperwork before anyone knows anything. Unfortunately, the general public probably won't be privy to this information.
I find it ironic how the Contois interface elements are supposedly being infringed upon. Apple's own "look and feel" suit comes to mind except no patent was involved back then as far as I remember though (design or utility).
Originally posted by almostwise
Images work fine with my Camino. I'm using the nightly updates though, which might be the difference.
My CaminoKnight didn't last a week. very frustrating.
--b
Originally posted by JamesG
Let's look at this logically, shall we?
SNIP
An injunction would be a showstopper for Apple. I am not sure if it will be granted but it could be decimating.
Logically, this is much like the Tiger Direct case. Not a chance they get a preliminary injunction. If iTunes shipping for the last 4 years hasn't already damaged them irreparably, having it continue to ship during the trial certainly isn't going to.
To win a preliminary injunction they would have to show a likelihood they'd win--not at all clear to me in this case--and that immediate redress is needed to prevent further harm. Since they have no competing product, and no other patent licensees, I don't see the harm argument flying at all.
stu
Originally posted by Nine-Seventy
My god, look at that picture on the right - IT LOOKS JUST LIKE ITUNES!!
I know!
The strage thing is if this had been the other way round we would be slagging off the other company. MusicMatch has a similar layout to iTunes, so does WMP but the reason is there's a design system for showing music. How many othere ways are there to do it?
Originally posted by nagromme
Ummm... ITunes' columns are a NESTED HIERARCHY like the NeXT column view in OS X.
Source > Genre > Artist > Album > Song.
I don't see how category-composer-artist-song is the same thing. Somtimes that makes a hierarchy, but not always.
Still, I like how they resized the iTunes art area to make it LOOK more similar
They have indeed, the default iTunes setup does not have the source pane stretched like that or the browser viewable. I rarely use the browser anyway, the common method seems to be searching by keyword, which bares little resemblence at all to Contois, no more than any other ID3 tag sorting application like foobar2000.