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SCOTUS: Patent Rights Over a Printer Cartridge Are Exhausted When It Is Sold

law.cornell.edu

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Re: SCOTUS: Patent Rights Over a Printer Cartridge Are Exhausted When It Is Sold

#61

Post by schoen »

balls187 wrote: post #47
awjr wrote: post #14

In short, the sale of a product does not allow you to control what is done with the product afterwards through patent law. I'm assuming this is almost similar to attempts to use copyright law to stop the sale of products on the grey market. http://www.bipc.com/court-rebuffs-attempt-to-use-copyright-l... I do wonder though, if they changed the underlying software on the cartridges they would get into trouble. I do not…

Interesting that even with importation fees, it was cheaper for Costco to import watches.

That's especially likely to happen when manufacturers are deliberately trying to charge very different prices in different markets (like you see in a lot of parallel importation cases).

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Market_segmentation#Geographic...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Price_discrimination#Internati...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parallel_import

Re: SCOTUS: Patent Rights Over a Printer Cartridge Are Exhausted When It Is Sold

#62

Post by joshuak »

touchofevil wrote: post #48

If you want to learn about a really interesting aspect of the "first sale doctrine" and how it applies to software, you should have a look at "Vernor vs Autodesk" in the USA and compare it to "Oracle vs UsedSoft" in the EU. Basically, in the USA the courts determined that if a company sells you software, but in their terms & conditions claim that they are merely granting you a license, then you can't resell the softw…

That sounds a little better than the ridiculous Autodesk decision, however it sounds trivial to circumvent by simply putting a 'term of license' clause in the EULA.

I'd go so far as to say I don't think EULAs should be considered a valid legal instrument.

Re: SCOTUS: Patent Rights Over a Printer Cartridge Are Exhausted When It Is Sold

#63

Post by tuwtuwtuw »

euyyn wrote: post #31
baltimore wrote: post #17

Does this mean that printer prices are about to go up since HP/Brother/Lexmark will no longer be able to make as much money on the ink?

The writing's on the wall for the whole business anyway.

Lexmark did attempt to move to new markets some years ago due to this. They sold off their consumer/inkjet business and have been buying a bunch of software companies. This attempt to "softpivot" failed miserably. Lexmark was sold to a Chinese business some time ago. Now the software business is being split up and sold.

Re: SCOTUS: Patent Rights Over a Printer Cartridge Are Exhausted When It Is Sold

#64

Post by tooltalk »

elipsey wrote: post #57
euyyn wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> smartphone makers from being able to blacklist devices that are resold What is that blacklist?

Verizon denied my activation of used phones a couple of times due to a blacklisted IMEI, so apparently they (at least used to) keep an internal blacklist also.

I thought the blacklist was for only stolen or lost devices reported by the first owner.

Re: SCOTUS: Patent Rights Over a Printer Cartridge Are Exhausted When It Is Sold

#65

Post by gameshot911 »

Can someone clarify one part:

>The other option is to buy a cartridge at a discount through Lexmark’s “Return Program.” In exchange for the lower price, customers who buy through the Return Program must sign a contract agreeing to use the cartridge only once and to refrain from transferring the cartridge to anyone but Lexmark.

>As a result, even if the restrictions in Lexmark’s contracts with its customers were clear and enforceable under contract law, they do not entitle Lexmark to retain patent rights in an item that it has elected to sell.

There are two issues at play here, right? One is Lexmark's patent rights, and the other is the contract between Lexmark and the consumer. The Supreme Court held that Lexmark can't use patent rights to prevent refilling the cartridges, but what of the contract? Is that enforceable?

Re: SCOTUS: Patent Rights Over a Printer Cartridge Are Exhausted When It Is Sold

#66

Post by schoen »

geofft wrote: post #52

I'm a little surprised that Ginsburg dissented here, and also dissented from Kirtsaeng v. John Wiley : naively, she's "liberal", and (at least in my bubble) being "liberal" is associated with wanting less strong IP protection. But I see also that she wrote the majority opinion in Eldred v. Ashcroft , saying that the 28-year extension to copyright terms was constitutional. What's the right way to understand her legal…

Justice Ginsburg is definitely known as an IP maximalist.

Some people have wondered if she's been influenced by her daughter's views on IP, since Jane Ginsburg (a colleague of Eben Moglen's at Columbia!) is one of the most influential copyright law professors and has taken a maximalist view in many copyright controversies.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jane_Ginsburg

> (at least in my bubble) being "liberal" is associated with wanting less strong IP protection

And that's also much less true in regions with major media industries, like New York and Los Angeles.

Re: SCOTUS: Patent Rights Over a Printer Cartridge Are Exhausted When It Is Sold

#67

Post by awinter-py »

touchofevil wrote: post #48

If you want to learn about a really interesting aspect of the "first sale doctrine" and how it applies to software, you should have a look at "Vernor vs Autodesk" in the USA and compare it to "Oracle vs UsedSoft" in the EU. Basically, in the USA the courts determined that if a company sells you software, but in their terms & conditions claim that they are merely granting you a license, then you can't resell the softw…

Are european secondhand copies resellable in the US?

Re: SCOTUS: Patent Rights Over a Printer Cartridge Are Exhausted When It Is Sold

#68

Post by joshuak »

Shivetya wrote: post #59
joshuak wrote: post #54

Good, but the tip of the issue is licensing. Autodesk[1] has set precedence that all an organization must do to limit the resale of anything is institute a EULA. Simply by asserting that an offer is for a license not the thing being licensed the seller can bypass common law, Lord Coke, and the first sale doctrine. P.S. This also means that expensive professional software like Autodesk's, or anything with such an EULA…

well I am curious how it will play out in the long run because unlike printer cartridges you have no physical object with software since almost all is done via digital distribution. I do know our commercial software at work on about every platform is by license only. we don't own any of it. didn't microsoft do this with Office, give you a "low" monthly rate instead of selling out right? Perhaps the plan is, buy it fo…

I do not believe that mechanism of delivery is a relevant feature of any of these laws. The copyright of a book is not contingent on its delivery via a binding of paper.

One could argue a subscription is different than a purchase (of anything license or otherwise), but if you subscribe to a magazine you can legally resell any issues you receive. I see no reason you shouldn't be able to re-sell your Office 360 subscription.

The law as decided in the Autodesk case seems to indicate that you can restrict the sale even of physical items if you assert that the items contains 'licensed' software, and state the terms of the license do not allow resale. The owner of the product could sell the physical item, but only if they could remove the 'licensed' software.

Re: SCOTUS: Patent Rights Over a Printer Cartridge Are Exhausted When It Is Sold

#69

Post by twoodfin »

elipsey wrote: post #57
euyyn wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> smartphone makers from being able to blacklist devices that are resold What is that blacklist?

Verizon denied my activation of used phones a couple of times due to a blacklisted IMEI, so apparently they (at least used to) keep an internal blacklist also.

Verizon owns their network, so I'd imagine they have pretty broad discretion (FCC-willing) on restricting the specific devices they'd allow on it. Blacklisting IMEI's seems like a pretty reasonable theft deterrent.

Re: SCOTUS: Patent Rights Over a Printer Cartridge Are Exhausted When It Is Sold

#70

Post by ghaff »

SeanDav wrote: post #50

I can't believe that the printer market has not been disrupted by someone offering a decent printer without ridiculous ongoing printer cartridge costs. I just bought a £99 printer that will cost more than £99 in printer cartridge costs after just a few months of casual use and I did not spot any alternatives.

The alternative for most people is to buy a cheap laser printer. You don't need color for most things and the operational costs are far lower.

To answer your question, though, the profits for fairly low margin printing hardware business need to come from somewhere. Sure, you can cut the margins on ink. Now you're paying $500 for the printer whether you use it heavily or just now and then.

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