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When patents attack Android

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Re: When patents attack Android

#201

Post by kelnos »

Steko wrote: post #178
kelnos wrote: post #136

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Innovators are pro-IP, followers are contra-IP. Strongly disagree. This kind of statement really needs some supporting evidence.

Ok so I'll cite some supporting evidence: http://infochachkie.com/fast-followers-i/ "Whenever creating an imitation of a successful leader, great care must be taken to avoid outright intellectual property infringement; the closer the duplication, the greater the care which must be exercised. MGA Entertainment (MGA), which produced the Bratz dolls, learned this the hard way. Late in 2008, U.S. Courts forced MGA to cea…

Making a blanket statement about all innovators and all followers is an extraordinary claim, which requires extraordinary evidence. A reference to a single court case between a pair of companies hardly passes that bar.

Regardless, reading your linked article, it seems to have a pretty positive (or at least neutral) view of being a so-called "follower". It's interesting to point out the NKOTB-follower groups like Backstreet Boys and 'NSync. Regardless of whether or not you like their music, it's hard to deny that they were hugely successful and helped push the "boyband" genre of music into greater popularity. Not saying this is good or bad from an aesthetic point of view, but it sounds good from a business perspective.

Re: When patents attack Android

#202

Post by nitrogen »

econgeeker wrote: post #144
nitrogen wrote: post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Software developers, and Open Source developers in particular, have been adamantly against software patents for a very long time. It seems equally as likely that independent developers are taking advantage of Google's predicament to further their own goal of abolishing software patents. Edit: I will add that I personally have done exactly this in conversation. But, in the worst case, Google is exploiting a sentiment…

"Software developers, and Open Source developers in particular, have been adamantly against software patents for a very long time." This is exactly as true as the claim that all scientists support AGW theory. Reality-- most scientists don't support that theory. But proponents of the theory say that they all do, all over the place. And since there is nobody who actually speaks for all scientists, there's nobody to pro…

"Software developers, and Open Source developers in particular, have been adamantly against software patents for a very long time."

This is exactly as true as the claim that all scientists support AGW theory.

Reality-- most scientists don't support that theory.

But proponents of the theory say that they all do, all over the place. And since there is nobody who actually speaks for all scientists, there's nobody to prove them wrong.

So they repeat it over and over and over and over again, even though it isn't true.

Logically, your statement is easily disproven. I have been developing software for two decades, including open source, and I support software patents.

Now you can never make that statement again. Well, you can't if you're honest.

At the risk of sounding like I'm retroactively changing my argument, I didn't say "all software developers." My intended meaning of "software developers" and "Open Source developers" was many, not all, which I believe is a common and valid grammatical interpretation of a pluralized noun without a specified quantity.

Sites like Groklaw and organizations like the FSF (though FSF is a bit more extreme on most things than I am) show that there is a sizable group of people against software patents, and whether you yourself are for, against, or neutral, your position does not disprove the harm done to OSS/FS, small companies, and general innovation by software patents.

Finally, though this is off topic, do you have evidence that most scientists don't support the theory of anthropogenic global warming? From the perspective of a non-climate-scientist, non-politician such as myself, it seems like most climatologists do consider anthropogenic greenhouse gases a problem. It also seems that claiming that most scientists disbelieve in AGW is a hallmark of conservative arguments (as in preserving the legal status quo, not as in right wing), as is claiming that patents help the small inventor.

Re: When patents attack Android

#203

Post by danilocampos »

patrickaljord wrote: post #192
danilocampos wrote: post #191

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They're already suing manufacturers with patents they acquired two weeks ago?

They acquired Novel and others long before Nortel.

You're doing an admirable tap-dance to preserve your Google partisanship here. Apple may have acquired patents before this but I'm having a hard time finding support for your assertion that they're trolling with those alone. Or even applying them at all as part of their patent litigation, as raganwald has pointed out elsewhere.

Consider these patents cited in Apple's HTC complaint:

http://techcrunch.com/2010/03/02/the-complaint-apples-patent...

Steve Jobs and Scott Forestall are mentioned as inventors in some, and plenty more are attributed to one Bas Ording, who is a UI designer at Apple.

Even if fully half of Apple's patents in this complaint were acquired from an outside source, I have a hard time begrudging them their application of patent law in the protection of a business that makes a real product that required significant investment to create.

Re: When patents attack Android

#204

Post by coffeeaddicted »

econgeeker wrote: post #116
hn_decay wrote: post #100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Perhaps this is an unfair caricature, but it has been my observation that the vast majority of "pro-software patent" supporters are misguided fans of either Microsoft or Apple. They seldom have anything to do with software development, and their perspective is seldom enlightened or nuanced. Strawman, unfair, bigotry, whatever -- I would love to be proven wrong. I have yet to hear a pro-software patent argument that i…

I have yet to hear an anti-patent argument that wasn't just repetition of the "patents are wrong" ideology. I'm actually neutral on patents in the sense of "what would be best in an ideal world". But the bottom line is this- my work is not free unless I choose to donate it. Thus in exchange for giving you my work, I'm going to require a license. If you steal it, you've stolen it, just as if you stole a car. But wait-…

You mix up patents and copyright. You are right with copyright - I copy your code, I know I do that and that's why I'm ok with copyright protection. With patents people don't steal it - they don't even know you own it in most cases. Because software development would grind to a full-stop if you had to check every time you code something for all possible patent violations. Even lawyers have a hard time figuring out which code breaks which patents - software developers simply have no chance doing that on their own anymore. Patents are the wrong protection scheme for software for the same reason they are wrong for example for protecting book authors (imagine "Happy Ends" or similar ideas would be patented...).

Re: When patents attack Android

#205

Post by nitrogen »

Steko wrote: post #178
kelnos wrote: post #136

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Innovators are pro-IP, followers are contra-IP. Strongly disagree. This kind of statement really needs some supporting evidence.

Ok so I'll cite some supporting evidence: http://infochachkie.com/fast-followers-i/ "Whenever creating an imitation of a successful leader, great care must be taken to avoid outright intellectual property infringement; the closer the duplication, the greater the care which must be exercised. MGA Entertainment (MGA), which produced the Bratz dolls, learned this the hard way. Late in 2008, U.S. Courts forced MGA to cea…

As I understand it[0], Mattel's claim of ownership of the Bratz IP derives from the fact that their creator developed them while subject to an IP assignment and non-compete contract.

The Bratz case seems entirely unrelated to the matter at hand, though in the closest comparison I can see, Mattel is a parasite trying to use IP laws to reap the benefits of creative work done by MGM and the designer of the Bratz dolls. The pro-IP Mattel is not the leader in this case.

[0] Edit: and, according to your article: "A jury deemed that the creator of Bratz, Carter Bryant, devised the idea while he was an employee at Mattel."

Re: When patents attack Android

#206

Post by hn_decay »

hackinthebochs wrote: post #200
drats wrote: post #149

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Minority report was released in 2002. What about interfaces in Lawnmower Man (1992) or Johnny Mnemonic (1995)? Or endless other sci-fi? Sit a UI designer and an engineer down for a couple of sessions to talk about a touch screen (x,y coordinates coming into software from human hands) anytime in the last fifty years and they will come up with the concept of gestures in at most a few hours. What about Douglas Engelbart…

The point he's making is that showing a rendered clip of some UI is not prior art, as far as patents go. You have to actually be able to demonstrate how it works. If someone develops warp drive or the transporter, does star trek count as "prior art"? That would be ludicrous. (trying to figure out what comment you're replying to is exactly why whitespace-as-blocks is a brain-dead idea in python/coffeescript)

>The point he's making is that showing a rendered clip of some UI is not prior art, as far as patents go

While the discussion was targeted more at the actual value of software patents (i.e. what specifically Apple 'invented' with their multitouch patents), in actual practice yes such a movie is prior art if the novelty of the patent is the application of multifinger gestures. The idea that you need to show a working implementation is nonsense, and has never been a requirement of the patent system.

Regarding warp drive, the novelty of multitouch is the mere concept of using multifinger gestures on an interface. The novelty of a warp drive is the mechanism of achieving warp drive, not the concept of it.

To put it another way, if you patent a method (or system) of making a car fly, maybe that's an invention. Patenting the concept of flying cars, however, is not.

Re: When patents attack Android

#207

Post by [deleted] »

Steko wrote: post #189
hn_decay wrote: post #164

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Apple didn't patent anything first, they bought the inventor and paid him." http://patft1.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?Sect1=PTO1&Se...

I'm not sure what point you're trying to make other then to distract from the fact that your prior art argument has been torn to shreds repeatedly.

[deleted]

Re: When patents attack Android

#208

Post by aristidb »

econgeeker wrote: post #144
nitrogen wrote: post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Software developers, and Open Source developers in particular, have been adamantly against software patents for a very long time. It seems equally as likely that independent developers are taking advantage of Google's predicament to further their own goal of abolishing software patents. Edit: I will add that I personally have done exactly this in conversation. But, in the worst case, Google is exploiting a sentiment…

"Software developers, and Open Source developers in particular, have been adamantly against software patents for a very long time." This is exactly as true as the claim that all scientists support AGW theory. Reality-- most scientists don't support that theory. But proponents of the theory say that they all do, all over the place. And since there is nobody who actually speaks for all scientists, there's nobody to pro…

Most of the software developers I talk to don't like software patents. Certainly not all, and I don't have precise numbers, but it's almost certainly the majority.

Re: When patents attack Android

#209

Post by gord »

Note to Google - fix smartphones and insure against future patent abuse by advancing an even better alternative - a fully formed HTML5+Javascript mobile OS offering.

Mobile and Web are the same thing, its just we have a legacy crud that needs to be factored away.

Ideally my phone runs linux with a GPU accelerated HTML5 UI, and has a javascript programming model with open API to get to hardware features. We are nearly there.

I believe Objective-C and Java languages are ultimately unsuited to phone app development. [ because phone app development _is_ web app development ]

This would be a bold, unifying, visionary strategy. You already have this in place, it just needs to be amplified - doing so could be the perfect strategy to win the patent game by making the patent game largely irrelevant.

Re: When patents attack Android

#210

Post by panacea »

hn_decay wrote: post #194
Steko wrote: post #189

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not sure what point you're trying to make other then to distract from the fact that your prior art argument has been torn to shreds repeatedly.

Are you always such a boring fanboy? THAT is the Apple multitouch patent that the industry holds as fearsome. No one gives a shit about the Fingertouch patents.

hn_decay... Regardless of the validity of your comments, you just played the "fanboy"/'Godwin' card. That's a virtual mutually assured destruction move. You won and lost and the debate is now a fallout zone.
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