How did Motorola manage to push back while others caved?
And why didn't Google/Motorola fight the very existence of the patents?
They did. For example http://www.pcworld.com/article/2070280/german-court-invalida...
Microsoft won't stop forcing companies to pay for its bogus Android patents
71–80 of 133 posts
Re: Microsoft won't stop forcing companies to pay for its bogus Android patents
#72Darn, with all this talk we hear of a "new Microsoft", it would be nice if they stopped doing this.
It needs a culture change, and that won't happen. If Microsoft actually wanted to be a part of the free software community, they would start liberating all of their software, one piece at a time. Most of the things I've seen look like business decisions (top-down) not engineering decisions (bottom-up). I still feel that liberating .NET was done to force Mono out of business. Or to attempt to gain a monopoly with C# developers.
Don't get me wrong, more free software is always a good thing. But I still remember the Microsoft of old and no, I don't accept that they've changed their ways. It's just the next step in their line of business decisions.
Re: Microsoft won't stop forcing companies to pay for its bogus Android patents
#73Earlier quoted context omitted.
The point is, that you cannot use other filesystem, perhaps more suitable to underlying storage technology, like F2FS, because it does not work with Windows. FAT is actually terrible filesystem. It's only advantage is "works with Windows". For SD-cards, it is actually mandatory to use FAT (exFAT for SDXC). It's part of the spec. MTP/PTP is a non-functioning mess.
MTP/PTP works fine for what it is. Also MSFT didn't force anyone to adopt FAT32 and exFAT for SDHC and SDXC it's not even part of the SD association https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SD_Association If there was a better FS out there that met all the requirements for SD cards don't you think it would've been adopted? Because the last thing I think all of those guys wanted is to pay MSFT royalty fees, however the alternati…
> If there was a better FS out there that met all the requirements for SD cards don't you think it would've been adopted?
No, it would not. It is dependent on Microsoft's willingness to ship IFS with Windows. And why would they do that, to lose their leverage?
No, common user is not going install third-party IFS module. He might not even able to do so (work computers, etc).
Re: Microsoft won't stop forcing companies to pay for its bogus Android patents
#74Slightly OT:
"I'm writing this on Linux Mint" must be the equivalent, in the personal computing world, of having a long beard and wearing hipster clothing.
So many are using it but they all think they are oh-so-not-mainstream.
Oh, and just like those skinny jeans, they are probably going to hate it sooner or later.
EDIT: I was referring to Linux Mint, not Linux in general. I would never call a Slackware user a hipster ;-)
Re: Microsoft won't stop forcing companies to pay for its bogus Android patents
#75Earlier quoted context omitted.
> rip off the best ideas The obviousness bar should be raised much higher so that if a lone undergraduate could arrive at a solution it is not a patentable solution. If we are going to entertain software patents then they should be used to cover major investments, like it works in pharmaceutical industry. Most patents are not of this kind, and most things in iPhone are just straightforward progression of prior art.
Which undergraduate though, I was an undergraduate once, so was Dijkstra, I suspect his idea of obvious would have been divergent from mine.
And average one, obviously. This isn't an objective measure, but there are similar concepts in jurisprudence.[1] Patent system was created in a different time, but at least to me in the present it only makes sense to use it to protect ideas that necessitated hundreds of man-years of investment by competent teams and not to be used for land grabs for trivial ideas that anyone can arrive at just by virtue of being a pioneer one's field.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_man_on_the_Clapham_omnibus
Re: Microsoft won't stop forcing companies to pay for its bogus Android patents
#76Earlier quoted context omitted.
"Google owns countless patents and Apple just might be the biggest patent troll in history and none of them seem to receive even remotely the same amount of scrutiny." Why would you face scrutiny for holding patents?
Patents are like nuclear weapons - they stay dangerous for a very long time, most who have them claim their primary function is to scare others who have them away from attacking them with theirs, but their actual function is to scare and extort anyone who doesn't have them into doing what the patent-holding assholes want. Of course we want to hold anyone who has them under careful scrutiny.
> Patents are like nuclear weapons - they stay dangerous for a very long time
That is not actually true about nuclear weapons; they require regular maintenance. And they are like any other military technology, they get outdated and their designs have to be constantly refreshed.
If a country doesn't maintain their nuclear arsenal, there's a very good chance that they might not work when they need it to. This happened to much of Russia's inventory. This, of course, gets factored into geopolitical strategy.
Re: Microsoft won't stop forcing companies to pay for its bogus Android patents
#77Earlier quoted context omitted.
The point is, that you cannot use other filesystem, perhaps more suitable to underlying storage technology, like F2FS, because it does not work with Windows. FAT is actually terrible filesystem. It's only advantage is "works with Windows". For SD-cards, it is actually mandatory to use FAT (exFAT for SDXC). It's part of the spec. MTP/PTP is a non-functioning mess.
MTP/PTP works fine for what it is. Also MSFT didn't force anyone to adopt FAT32 and exFAT for SDHC and SDXC it's not even part of the SD association https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SD_Association If there was a better FS out there that met all the requirements for SD cards don't you think it would've been adopted? Because the last thing I think all of those guys wanted is to pay MSFT royalty fees, however the alternati…
Because the last thing I think all of those guys wanted is to pay MSFT royalty fees, however the alternative could've been even more expensive.
Those guys are SD card producers; they don't implement the FAT filesystem themselves, and therefore AFAIK don't have to pay the tax.
Re: Microsoft won't stop forcing companies to pay for its bogus Android patents
#78As long as litigation is of a positive net present value (i.e. expected return is positive) then they have a duty to their shareholders to undertake it. It's just the way of the world, its not like the CEO is taking into account this when thinking of 'the way microsoft should be' its just the state of tech innovation at the moment.
Re: Microsoft won't stop forcing companies to pay for its bogus Android patents
#79As long as litigation is of a positive net present value (i.e. expected return is positive) then they have a duty to their shareholders to undertake it. It's just the way of the world, its not like the CEO is taking into account this when thinking of 'the way microsoft should be' its just the state of tech innovation at the moment.
That's not actually a thing. Corporate law gives officers great discretion in how to run the business.
Re: Microsoft won't stop forcing companies to pay for its bogus Android patents
#80Earlier quoted context omitted.
>But the point is, it is a very trivial way of interacting with a touchscreen. It is, in fact, one of the few ways one can interact with a touchscreen. I don't get how people can argue stuff like this should even be covered by patents. What's the rationale ? Did Apple spend billions in R&D to develop this feature it now needs a mechanism to recoup it's investment ? I suppose they wouldn't "invent" swipe to unlock if…
Yeah that's supposed to be covered by the requirement that an invention be "novel" to qualify for a patent.
Who carea if it's novel or not ? Patents are a government granted monopoly defended on the premise that there would be a strong disincentive to invest in R&D if someone could just copy your deaign and a strong incentive for you to not share your invention.
In my mind there is no universe in which Apple dosen't implement swipe to unlock just because it's not patentable - it's just abusing a flawed system (can't blame them for it - they didn't make the rules)