I was thinking the same thing. The whole concept of their mission statement saying do no evil is like the devil saying thats his moto. Do you think he's going to tell the truth. Why would he?
Let us say it slow so the "smart man" can understand. There were many ways to implement multitouch before Apple and implementations that have come afterwards. Apple's implementation belongs to them, the others belong to their creators. They can try to use someone else's if they want them to or they can invest the money do it themselves. Google spends plenty on other R&D like search but they make more from IOS than Android so they want access to other companies tech for free so they can give it away and not hurt their bottom line.
The courts are supposed to protect people's property. It would be a pretty sorry state of affairs if the courts took Apple's property and forced them to give it away. Reminds me of the congress scene from Iron Man 2.
So, because there is a spotlight being shone on patent disputes now, versus the probably thousands of other cases on the books, it's suddenly MORE IMPORTANT to "do away with patent litigation"? No!
Patent disputes should be sorted out in courtrooms or in voluntary mediation. Where else would disputes be handled? On Twitter? Here?
Patent disputes are no different from any other kind of property dispute and I believe rash changes to the USPTO for political points or to satisfy some nebulous public dissatisfaction would be bad for patents and have repercussions far beyond the intent.
Which of my proposed changes would be "rash"?
Better evaluation up front to ensure that patents are only granted to inventions that are non-obvious to engineers in the field and not already in the public knowledge through prior art?
Requiring reasonably prompt action on patents once a potentially infringing product is released?
Limiting the scope of patents to what they say the patents are for, or requiring a high burden of proof that the patent is being violated for out-of-scope claims of infringement?
I HATE them tooooo! I hate thieves and liars with a fiery passion. My hate of them comes from the same place my distain for MS comes from. Schmidt sat on Apple's board during the development of the iPhone and after its release when he knew Google was planning to compete with them head on in several markets. Since he had insider info on what was coming they had a head start in the copy process. Microsoft did the same thing with Windows because Word and Excel was created originally for the Mac, they had access to the code and famously trick management at the time into a poorly written license that didn't confine their use to the programs they were working on for the Mac. I hate Samsung for the same reasons. If companies are allowed to steal from Apple without consequence, they will be once again on the brink of death and the innovation we have seen come from their success will end. So if those who steal from Apple are allow to run them out of business with their own creations, their customers loose.
I'm waiting for Google to argue that if enough civil liberties are taken away from the citizens, the citizens lose the right to have those civil liberties because depriving citizens of those rights has become "essential" to government. Same goddamn horseshit argument.
Sadly this seems to be the logic used by the current adminstration.
As to Google it is pretty clear that that the concept of do no evil has left the house long ago. It is extremely pathetic to hold up slide to unlock as something they can't design around. I mean really there has to be millions of ways to unlock a cell phone, slide to unlock is just one possible innovation here.
What I see here is Google saying that they are to damn lazy to think about design, new concepts or even a willingness to innovate. Not only is it pathetic but if successful would certainly screw over the concept of patents and their potential to spur innovation. It is like Google has missed the whole point of patents, you need to try harder, and come up with unique solutions consummers want. The reality is that those that respect the patent system are the ones in this country innovating.
As to patents and also copyrights Google has shown no respect at all for these rights that creators have. It is about time some of our federal money be spent determining why Google consistently violates rights holders ownership of their creations. Effectively Google is one of the most evil companies out there as they really don't give a damn about ownership of anything.
It is pretty clear that #3 below is pretty much how Google operates these days. Actually they have operated this way for years and have effectively ripped off many book authors and continues to do so. There attitude seems to be we are to big not to profit by ripping off others.
I wonder if Apple could actually use this against Google/Motorola in court. Did Google specifically mention Apple's patents as being essential? Isn't that admission that it's innovative and no one else has been able to create something like it?
Purely nitpicking (since this is the most ridiculous argument ever brought forward by Mountain View...), it does not. You could have a company patenting something obvious or essential (double-click, for example, or the App Store concept that Linux users knew decades before Apple iOS). Patents are supposed to protect innovation, just like Justice is supposed to protect the innocent. As any human-enabled system, it has its failures. It's statistically working unless the process is gamed by specialists.
Obviously, the question here is: are Apple/Google specialists (lawyers) gaming the patent system?
Google have just backed up Apple in proving that these patents are unique, oops!
No. They just proved the patents are an obstruction to their model, which was not a secret, and that they think/pretend those patents are a menace to the US economy, which is highly debatable, to be polite.
Sadly this seems to be the logic used by the current adminstration.
As to Google it is pretty clear that that the concept of do no evil has left the house long ago. It is extremely pathetic to hold up slide to unlock as something they can't design around. I mean really there has to be millions of ways to unlock a cell phone, slide to unlock is just one possible innovation here.
There is still the throw it at the wall to unlock method, seemingly quite suitable for most android phones. As far as I know, it's not patented yet. ;-)
"In the case of the smartphone patent wars, the first makes a cellphone a cellphone and the second makes it an iPhone," All Things D's John Paczkowski writes. "One is a core technology, the other is experiential product differentiation.""
This sums it up perfectly for me. It defines what most of Apple's lawsuits are about. It's about "experiential differentiation". In a market that has mostly been all about "standardizing and homogenization", with relatively minor cosmetic differentiators... until the iPhone came along and changed the game.
To me, Googles argument is a bit like the BandAid metaphor. People used 'bandages' for a long time… the one day someone invented a clever little combined package of gauze and adhesive, and named the resulting product the Band Aid…. it quickly became "ubiquitous" and almost the de facto standard of quickly patching small injuries...
Plenty of copycats hit the market soon after. But no-one could refer to theirs as a band aid. Nor could they use the same dimensions or even materials without paying a license or infringing.
To this day, "adhesive strips" and "adhesive bandages" sit alongside the (in its way) still unique Band Aid.
How is the iPhone, with the underlying iOS software and all of its experiential nuances any different?
The lines need to be made clear. For example, Apple invents a cool "it bounces at the end of the page" function (the 'over scroll' feature), that enhances the overall usability and experience. That's patented. By what POSSIBLE argument could anyone try to claim that invention should be free to all to use as an "essential standard"?
There are two key problems with the current patent system, both of which if fixed would do away with much patent litigation now.
The first is procedural. Patents don't get the review they need, and so patents that the engineers in the business would consider obvious and patents with prior art get approved. Once a patent is approved, the burden of proof becomes very high to invalidate it - which would only be justified if the evaluation process before approval was sufficiently rigorous.
The second is legal. You can hold on to a patent for decades, and then say "wait, this product that's been shipping all this time, it's infringing on my stuff." There should be a period of time, say a year after wide release, where failure to file becomes an implied license.
Edit: Oh, I'll add a third. Someone has a patent for a process for a very specific purpose (creating an automated response bot for a chat system) and then squints real hard and says "Hey, Siri infringes on this". The burden of proof for infringement on a patent described as related to a completely different process should be very high, the presumption should be that if the patent sets forth a way to handle a chat system, it only applies to chat systems.
Another problem is that patents can be to generic and can exist without an actual working implementation.
Ayn Rand's philosophy dovetails nicely into free market capitalism, quite different from Leninism and it perfectly illustrated the point being made.
Obviously you missed the point. I wasn't insinuating that Lenin and Rand shared similar philosophies. My point was that they represented annoyingly extreme viewpoints - on opposite ends of the political spectrum - that most educated people reject today as arrogant, cruel, selfish, and most of all, ineffective.
I want no part of any "free market capitalism" that embraces Rand's philosophies. Any philosophy taken to a ridiculous and callous extreme must be avoided. Love how Rand died of cancer while feeding off the government assistance she railed against. True sign of a selfish hypocrite.
Apple should accept this and have the courts make them essential standards and then collect megabucks.
Even if they only collect 1 dollar per patent that's 4 bucks per ever single android device out there. Kerching!!!!
That is far more acceptable than paying lawyers billions
ON THE OTHER HAND
Google have just backed up Apple in proving that these patents are unique, oops!
Because that's not Apple's business model and they shouldn't be forced to sell their technology if they don't want to. They make far more than $4 per iPhone, so why would they be happy about having to give away all their differentiating features for a few bucks?
The law allows for companies to have an exclusive right to practice their patented invention and Google's inability to innovate is not justification for removing that protection.
Another problem is that patents can be to generic and can exist without an actual working implementation.
J.
Properly issued patents can not be 'to' generic nor should they exist without a working implementation. Read up on the patent process. A patent must already be unique and novel and the best implementation must be presented to the patent office. If something slips through, it can be thrown out in court.
I don't believe in "patent trolls". I believe in IP as property, and thus the property may be used in any form it's owner wishes.
I have nothing to add to that. Your position speaks for itself. That's what I love about free market extremists - you embrace the most extreme manifestations of your flawed political outlook, no matter how terrible the outcome. The rest of us prefer to live in a more civilized world.
You're forgetting patent trolls. They are a clear sign of a failed patent system.
How is something that doesn't exist a sign of a failed patent system?
The problem is that all the people whining about 'patent trolls' don't understand the concept of intellectual property. A patent is property that you can buy, sell, license, use, not use, etc as you wish - just like any other property.
Think of a patent as a factory. If you own a factory, you have the right to leave it empty (unused) if you wish. You can use it yourself to product product. You can rent it out to someone else to produce product. You can wait until the rents increase to a higher level before renting it own. But no one else has the right to take over the factory simply because they don't like what the factory owner is doing with it.
Patent trolls don't exist? You do realize I'm referring to true patent trolls and not companies like Apple, right?
Have you ever heard of Intellectual Ventures? Explain to me how their practices and business model encourage innovation or help promote business. This company and others like them are like leeches on technology and the economy. The patent system is broken because it allows counter-productive behavior like patent trolling, which defeats the original purpose of allowing patents in the first place - to encourage innovation.
The patent system, just like copyrights, is an artificial construct that was created specifically to encourage creativity and innovation by providing the inventor, writer, or composer with a limited time of exclusivity over their creations so they can profit from them. Patent trolls turn this concept on its head - they bring nothing of value to the system.
We had various forms of touch input for years and they all sucked until the first iPhone came out. It's not just about the hardware but the software as well.
Originally Posted by jragosta
So? Why should that give others the right to steal Apple's ideas?
You totally missed my point. I'm saying that while touch input existed for a long time, it was Apple who perfected it and made it reliable and easy to use. As such, they deserve credit for doing so and if they were awarded a patent for it, it's perfectly valid. We're on the same side of this debate.
Comments
Quote:
Originally Posted by Suddenly Newton
Google: "if enough people copy your patents, we'll call it 'standards essential' thus making the copying retroactively legal."
Steve Jobs was right: "That 'don't be evil'? It's bullshit."
#next_pages_container { width: 5px; hight: 5px; position: absolute; top: -100px; left: -100px; z-index: 2147483647 !important; }I was thinking the same thing. The whole concept of their mission statement saying do no evil is like the devil saying thats his moto. Do you think he's going to tell the truth. Why would he?
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Quote:
Originally Posted by AbsoluteDesignz
so multitouch should belong to one company?
morons.
#next_pages_container { width: 5px; hight: 5px; position: absolute; top: -100px; left: -100px; z-index: 2147483647 !important; }Let us say it slow so the "smart man" can understand. There were many ways to implement multitouch before Apple and implementations that have come afterwards. Apple's implementation belongs to them, the others belong to their creators. They can try to use someone else's if they want them to or they can invest the money do it themselves. Google spends plenty on other R&D like search but they make more from IOS than Android so they want access to other companies tech for free so they can give it away and not hurt their bottom line.
Its moronic to think this is acceptable behavior.
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The courts are supposed to protect people's property. It would be a pretty sorry state of affairs if the courts took Apple's property and forced them to give it away. Reminds me of the congress scene from Iron Man 2.
Quote:
Originally Posted by SpamSandwich
So, because there is a spotlight being shone on patent disputes now, versus the probably thousands of other cases on the books, it's suddenly MORE IMPORTANT to "do away with patent litigation"? No!
Patent disputes should be sorted out in courtrooms or in voluntary mediation. Where else would disputes be handled? On Twitter? Here?
Patent disputes are no different from any other kind of property dispute and I believe rash changes to the USPTO for political points or to satisfy some nebulous public dissatisfaction would be bad for patents and have repercussions far beyond the intent.
Which of my proposed changes would be "rash"?
Better evaluation up front to ensure that patents are only granted to inventions that are non-obvious to engineers in the field and not already in the public knowledge through prior art?
Requiring reasonably prompt action on patents once a potentially infringing product is released?
Limiting the scope of patents to what they say the patents are for, or requiring a high burden of proof that the patent is being violated for out-of-scope claims of infringement?
Quote:
Originally Posted by fredaroony
Why would you "hate" a company? What has Google done to you personally that you would use such strong language?
#next_pages_container { width: 5px; hight: 5px; position: absolute; top: -100px; left: -100px; z-index: 2147483647 !important; }I HATE them tooooo! I hate thieves and liars with a fiery passion. My hate of them comes from the same place my distain for MS comes from. Schmidt sat on Apple's board during the development of the iPhone and after its release when he knew Google was planning to compete with them head on in several markets. Since he had insider info on what was coming they had a head start in the copy process. Microsoft did the same thing with Windows because Word and Excel was created originally for the Mac, they had access to the code and famously trick management at the time into a poorly written license that didn't confine their use to the programs they were working on for the Mac. I hate Samsung for the same reasons. If companies are allowed to steal from Apple without consequence, they will be once again on the brink of death and the innovation we have seen come from their success will end. So if those who steal from Apple are allow to run them out of business with their own creations, their customers loose.
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Even if they only collect 1 dollar per patent that's 4 bucks per ever single android device out there. Kerching!!!!
That is far more acceptable than paying lawyers billions
ON THE OTHER HAND
Google have just backed up Apple in proving that these patents are unique, oops!
Typical Google's philosophy : Hey Buddy, be cool, what you think is yours is mine !
that and I was 19 at the time lol
Sadly this seems to be the logic used by the current adminstration.
As to Google it is pretty clear that that the concept of do no evil has left the house long ago. It is extremely pathetic to hold up slide to unlock as something they can't design around. I mean really there has to be millions of ways to unlock a cell phone, slide to unlock is just one possible innovation here.
What I see here is Google saying that they are to damn lazy to think about design, new concepts or even a willingness to innovate. Not only is it pathetic but if successful would certainly screw over the concept of patents and their potential to spur innovation. It is like Google has missed the whole point of patents, you need to try harder, and come up with unique solutions consummers want. The reality is that those that respect the patent system are the ones in this country innovating.
As to patents and also copyrights Google has shown no respect at all for these rights that creators have. It is about time some of our federal money be spent determining why Google consistently violates rights holders ownership of their creations. Effectively Google is one of the most evil companies out there as they really don't give a damn about ownership of anything.
Quote:
Originally Posted by LighteningKid
I wonder if Apple could actually use this against Google/Motorola in court. Did Google specifically mention Apple's patents as being essential? Isn't that admission that it's innovative and no one else has been able to create something like it?
Purely nitpicking (since this is the most ridiculous argument ever brought forward by Mountain View...), it does not. You could have a company patenting something obvious or essential (double-click, for example, or the App Store concept that Linux users knew decades before Apple iOS). Patents are supposed to protect innovation, just like Justice is supposed to protect the innocent. As any human-enabled system, it has its failures. It's statistically working unless the process is gamed by specialists.
Obviously, the question here is: are Apple/Google specialists (lawyers) gaming the patent system?
Quote:
Originally Posted by irnchriz
Google have just backed up Apple in proving that these patents are unique, oops!
No. They just proved the patents are an obstruction to their model, which was not a secret, and that they think/pretend those patents are a menace to the US economy, which is highly debatable, to be polite.
"In the case of the smartphone patent wars, the first makes a cellphone a cellphone and the second makes it an iPhone," All Things D's John Paczkowski writes. "One is a core technology, the other is experiential product differentiation.""
This sums it up perfectly for me. It defines what most of Apple's lawsuits are about. It's about "experiential differentiation". In a market that has mostly been all about "standardizing and homogenization", with relatively minor cosmetic differentiators... until the iPhone came along and changed the game.
To me, Googles argument is a bit like the BandAid metaphor. People used 'bandages' for a long time… the one day someone invented a clever little combined package of gauze and adhesive, and named the resulting product the Band Aid…. it quickly became "ubiquitous" and almost the de facto standard of quickly patching small injuries...
Plenty of copycats hit the market soon after. But no-one could refer to theirs as a band aid. Nor could they use the same dimensions or even materials without paying a license or infringing.
To this day, "adhesive strips" and "adhesive bandages" sit alongside the (in its way) still unique Band Aid.
How is the iPhone, with the underlying iOS software and all of its experiential nuances any different?
The lines need to be made clear. For example, Apple invents a cool "it bounces at the end of the page" function (the 'over scroll' feature), that enhances the overall usability and experience. That's patented. By what POSSIBLE argument could anyone try to claim that invention should be free to all to use as an "essential standard"?
Another problem is that patents can be to generic and can exist without an actual working implementation.
J.
Quote:
Originally Posted by SpamSandwich
Ayn Rand's philosophy dovetails nicely into free market capitalism, quite different from Leninism and it perfectly illustrated the point being made.
#next_pages_container { width: 5px; hight: 5px; position: absolute; top: -100px; left: -100px; z-index: 2147483647 !important; }Obviously you missed the point. I wasn't insinuating that Lenin and Rand shared similar philosophies. My point was that they represented annoyingly extreme viewpoints - on opposite ends of the political spectrum - that most educated people reject today as arrogant, cruel, selfish, and most of all, ineffective.
I want no part of any "free market capitalism" that embraces Rand's philosophies. Any philosophy taken to a ridiculous and callous extreme must be avoided. Love how Rand died of cancer while feeding off the government assistance she railed against. True sign of a selfish hypocrite.
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Because that's not Apple's business model and they shouldn't be forced to sell their technology if they don't want to. They make far more than $4 per iPhone, so why would they be happy about having to give away all their differentiating features for a few bucks?
The law allows for companies to have an exclusive right to practice their patented invention and Google's inability to innovate is not justification for removing that protection.
Properly issued patents can not be 'to' generic nor should they exist without a working implementation. Read up on the patent process. A patent must already be unique and novel and the best implementation must be presented to the patent office. If something slips through, it can be thrown out in court.
Quote:
Originally Posted by SpamSandwich
I don't believe in "patent trolls". I believe in IP as property, and thus the property may be used in any form it's owner wishes.
#next_pages_container { width: 5px; hight: 5px; position: absolute; top: -100px; left: -100px; z-index: 2147483647 !important; }I have nothing to add to that. Your position speaks for itself. That's what I love about free market extremists - you embrace the most extreme manifestations of your flawed political outlook, no matter how terrible the outcome. The rest of us prefer to live in a more civilized world.
Quote:
Originally Posted by jragosta
Quote:
Originally Posted by freediverx
You're forgetting patent trolls. They are a clear sign of a failed patent system.
How is something that doesn't exist a sign of a failed patent system?
The problem is that all the people whining about 'patent trolls' don't understand the concept of intellectual property. A patent is property that you can buy, sell, license, use, not use, etc as you wish - just like any other property.
Think of a patent as a factory. If you own a factory, you have the right to leave it empty (unused) if you wish. You can use it yourself to product product. You can rent it out to someone else to produce product. You can wait until the rents increase to a higher level before renting it own. But no one else has the right to take over the factory simply because they don't like what the factory owner is doing with it.
Patent trolls don't exist? You do realize I'm referring to true patent trolls and not companies like Apple, right?
Have you ever heard of Intellectual Ventures? Explain to me how their practices and business model encourage innovation or help promote business. This company and others like them are like leeches on technology and the economy. The patent system is broken because it allows counter-productive behavior like patent trolling, which defeats the original purpose of allowing patents in the first place - to encourage innovation.
#next_pages_container { width: 5px; hight: 5px; position: absolute; top: -100px; left: -100px; z-index: 2147483647 !important; }The patent system, just like copyrights, is an artificial construct that was created specifically to encourage creativity and innovation by providing the inventor, writer, or composer with a limited time of exclusivity over their creations so they can profit from them. Patent trolls turn this concept on its head - they bring nothing of value to the system.
Quote:
Quote:
Originally Posted by freediverx
We had various forms of touch input for years and they all sucked until the first iPhone came out. It's not just about the hardware but the software as well.
Originally Posted by jragosta
So? Why should that give others the right to steal Apple's ideas?
You totally missed my point. I'm saying that while touch input existed for a long time, it was Apple who perfected it and made it reliable and easy to use. As such, they deserve credit for doing so and if they were awarded a patent for it, it's perfectly valid. We're on the same side of this debate.
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