Apple "rubber-banding," "pinch-to-zoom" patents challenged by Samsung witnesses
Samsung on Monday mounted its defense in the ongoing Apple v. Samsung patent trial, with the pair of "fact witnesses" giving testimony regarding alleged prior art to Apple's "rubber-banding" and "pinch-to-zoom" patents.
Samsung is attempting to establish prior art to invalidate Apple's '915 "pinch-to-zoom" and '381 "rubber-banding" patents, which the Cupertino-based company claims is being infringed upon by a number of devices made by the South Korean electronics giant.
Monday's testimony included a pair of fact witnesses who were involved in technology similar to Apple's patents, but completed their research before the iPhone maker patented its inventions, reports CNet.
LaunchTile
Taking the stand first was University of Maryland professor and LaunchTile co-creator Ben Bederson, who gave an in-court demo of the UI zooming technology. LaunchTile, a project backed by Microsoft Research, was invented as an alternative smartphone input method which allowed for one-handed operation.
According to Bederson, the technology was released in 2004 to help "people access a lot of information" on mobile devices like the then-popular Palm PDA series of products. LaunchTile and its partner AppLens also aimed to solve issues related to navigation on devices without touchscreens.
As Bederson's demonstration showed, LaunchTile allows a user to navigate 36 on-screen applications with one thumb by zooming in on thumbnail images of mobile apps. The interface zooms in from a 36-app "world view" screen to a so-called "zone view," at which point a user can select from the four tiled on-screen thumbnails to enter "application view." Bederson calls this a "pure zoom" method for selecting a specific application. Simple swipe gestures are also supported by the technology.
With LaunchTile, Samsung sought to invalidate Apple's '381 patent for overscroll bounce, a unique UI feature that alerts a user when the limits of an image or scrollable page are reached. Apple lawyers were quick to point out the differences between Bederson's technology and the '381 patent, including LaunchTile's "snap back" feature not being present when the edges of application tiles are reached.
DiamondTouch
Samsung's second witness was Adam Bogue, creator of Mistubishi Electric Research Laboratories' DiamondTouch display table. The projector-based table is akin to Microsoft's original Surface in that it supports multi-touch gesture inputs to manipulate displayed imagery. Bogue notes the technology was created with collaboration in mind, allowing users to gather around a digital table to discuss ideas.
DiamondTouch's primary gesture was called FractalZoom which used a single touch for scrolling and two fingers for pinch and zoom. Interestingly, Bogue claims he demoed the multitouch tech to Apple hardware engineers in 2003, though the meeting was fruitless. Samsung did, however, submit a number of e-mails Bogue kept concerning the Apple demo as evidence.
Source: bogue12's YouTube channel
While DiamondTouch was presented as a challenge to Apple '915 "pinch-to-zoom" patent, a follow-up technology called TableCloth was also submitted to invalidate the '381 patent. TableCloth, built for Adobe Flash, featured a bounce-back animation for images dragged offscreen. Bogue claims the technology was available for viewing on the company's multitouch-enabled PCs stationed in MERL's lobby.
Apple v. Samsung will return to court on Tuesday with more Samsung witness testimony, while both parties are expected to wrap up arguments next week.
Samsung is attempting to establish prior art to invalidate Apple's '915 "pinch-to-zoom" and '381 "rubber-banding" patents, which the Cupertino-based company claims is being infringed upon by a number of devices made by the South Korean electronics giant.
Monday's testimony included a pair of fact witnesses who were involved in technology similar to Apple's patents, but completed their research before the iPhone maker patented its inventions, reports CNet.
LaunchTile
Taking the stand first was University of Maryland professor and LaunchTile co-creator Ben Bederson, who gave an in-court demo of the UI zooming technology. LaunchTile, a project backed by Microsoft Research, was invented as an alternative smartphone input method which allowed for one-handed operation.
According to Bederson, the technology was released in 2004 to help "people access a lot of information" on mobile devices like the then-popular Palm PDA series of products. LaunchTile and its partner AppLens also aimed to solve issues related to navigation on devices without touchscreens.
As Bederson's demonstration showed, LaunchTile allows a user to navigate 36 on-screen applications with one thumb by zooming in on thumbnail images of mobile apps. The interface zooms in from a 36-app "world view" screen to a so-called "zone view," at which point a user can select from the four tiled on-screen thumbnails to enter "application view." Bederson calls this a "pure zoom" method for selecting a specific application. Simple swipe gestures are also supported by the technology.
With LaunchTile, Samsung sought to invalidate Apple's '381 patent for overscroll bounce, a unique UI feature that alerts a user when the limits of an image or scrollable page are reached. Apple lawyers were quick to point out the differences between Bederson's technology and the '381 patent, including LaunchTile's "snap back" feature not being present when the edges of application tiles are reached.
DiamondTouch
Samsung's second witness was Adam Bogue, creator of Mistubishi Electric Research Laboratories' DiamondTouch display table. The projector-based table is akin to Microsoft's original Surface in that it supports multi-touch gesture inputs to manipulate displayed imagery. Bogue notes the technology was created with collaboration in mind, allowing users to gather around a digital table to discuss ideas.
DiamondTouch's primary gesture was called FractalZoom which used a single touch for scrolling and two fingers for pinch and zoom. Interestingly, Bogue claims he demoed the multitouch tech to Apple hardware engineers in 2003, though the meeting was fruitless. Samsung did, however, submit a number of e-mails Bogue kept concerning the Apple demo as evidence.
Source: bogue12's YouTube channel
While DiamondTouch was presented as a challenge to Apple '915 "pinch-to-zoom" patent, a follow-up technology called TableCloth was also submitted to invalidate the '381 patent. TableCloth, built for Adobe Flash, featured a bounce-back animation for images dragged offscreen. Bogue claims the technology was available for viewing on the company's multitouch-enabled PCs stationed in MERL's lobby.
Apple v. Samsung will return to court on Tuesday with more Samsung witness testimony, while both parties are expected to wrap up arguments next week.
Comments
"Good artists copy great artists steal" -- SJ
Maybe you're looking at it wrong?
Anyway: Looks like this may well be a case of... Prior Art = Invalid Patent.
Computer says no.
That's a Pablo Picasso quote btw.
Okay, well first off the Pinch to zoom is clearly nothing like Samsungs LaunchTile.
Second off, Samsung's "DiamondTouch" is the exact opposite of pinch to zoom, in Samsung's system, you use it to change window size, in Apple's you use it to actually make objects appear larger onscreen, without affecting the size of the window.
Both of Samsung's bullshit patents don't cover Apple's tech.
I cannot see the similarities after watching the video links...
Prior Art is extremely hard to prove when invalidating patents; the patent office does a very good job of researching and discovery before issuing a patent.
This will get demolished by Apple.
Is Samsung claiming that these guys were their inspiration? Seriously? Even fandroids -- except DaHarder, of course -- have to be chuckling.
First of all, that LaunchTile is the most lame, stupid and poorly devised method for navigating anything that I have ever seen! That's a clusterbleep of epic proportions. I think that professor needs to spend more time teaching and less time smoking pot. Further, I see no correlation with any patent that Apple is asserting.
Secondly, in the DiamondTouch video was a perfect example of wasted R+D money. Oh look, I can circle a word, and then you can circle the word too! Ooohhh!!! We can circle the word together! STARS!!! Seriously, is this some kind of kinky computer nerd foreplay? An exhibit in the Crayola factory tour? WTF is it? Oh, and 1991 called and they want their Christmas-themed sweater back. Again, how is this pinch to zoom? The only thing that was vaguely, almost, not-at-all pinch-to-zoom was resizing a window with two fingers as if you had two mouse pointers. Pinch uses a thumb and forefinger. Ask the girl in the sweater to tell you about how that's done properly after all that touch lovin.
Thirdly, Samsung... stick out your right hand.. extend your forefinger and thumb. Now place that on your forehead. That's what you are... you may need to find a mirror, and an English translator.
The first video seems totally unrelated to anything on any iPhone. The second seems like they COULD have used that for what Apple did with pinch to zoom, but that didn't ever occur in the video.
Originally Posted by 845032
"Good artists copy great artists steal" -- SJ
Good arguments don't misuse this quote. Bad arguments do.
All this shows is that there are a lot of different gestures for performing actions on a touchscreen.
Unfortunately for Samsung, Apple uses different gestures so I don't see how they will be able to invalidate them.
Yet the Apple haters will go: "See - a touchscreen with gestures - this proves Apple copied".
One: http://www.southparkstudios.com/clips/103454/the-chewbacca-defense
And two:
[VIDEO]
Quote:
Originally Posted by DaHarder
Maybe you're looking at it wrong?
Anyway: Looks like this may well be a case of... Prior Art = Invalid Patent.
You've been awfully quiet lately, ReTarder.
Was that the result of the exposure of your need-for-negative-attention recently, or just the fact that everything you pretend to stand for has been copping an ass-kicking in court recently?
Enlightened minds would love to know...
Really, would that be like a fire throwing light onto a wall invalidating any projector patents or film based camera's invalidating any digital camera patents?
You can't patent an idea, only an implementation of an idea, although the ideas are similar in these examples, the implementations are different enough foe Apple to ba awarded patents on there specific method.
No name calling. His comment is certainly stupid enough that you don't need to resort to that to make a valid counter-argument.
Quote:
Originally Posted by SolipsismX
No name calling. His comment is certainly stupid enough that you don't need to resort to that to make a valid counter-argument.
I'm sorry.
I call it as I see it. (>_<)