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USPTO invalidates Apple's "rubber-banding" patent asserted against Samsung

appleinsider.com

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Re: USPTO invalidates Apple's "rubber-banding" patent asserted against Samsung

#81

Post by makomk »

ircmaxell wrote: post #58
ankitaggarwal wrote: post #23

Sad. This is not a generic patent. It only seemed obvious now. Its not something that will stop innovation (as people scream about). A scrollbar implemented without rubber-band effect will do just fine. And why was this never implemented before anyways. There is all this hype that "Apple is Bad because they sued Samsung". But considering everything, they had no other choice legally. They had to make a case on some gr…

> But considering everything, they had no other choice legally. Patents are not Trademarks. Patents are valid and legal even if you don't enforce them (where trademarks become invalid if you don't enforce them). So no, they did have a choice. In fact, they had 3: 1. They could have not gotten the patent at all. This could open them up to legal liability if someone else got it and sued them. 2. They could have kept it…

There's actually an option 4: publish the invention but don't patent it, so that you have a strong claim of prior art if someone tries to sue you after patenting it themselves.

Re: USPTO invalidates Apple's "rubber-banding" patent asserted against Samsung

#82

Post by TimGebhardt »

randomdata wrote: post #62
TimGebhardt wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

@andrewcooke: There is an analogous situation to property taxes though -- Rezoning a property. If you can acquire land zoned for something cheaper like residential or agriculture and get the city to re-zone it to commercial it's almost always worth a lot more. Overnight the property is worth a lot more and the property taxes will jump, so you'll either need to get the money to develop it yourself or sell it off to a…

Patents were supposed to protect the little guy from losing his large up-front research and development costs to the big established guys. I always understood the purpose of patents was to provide incentive to bring trade secrets out into the documented open for the long-term benefit of society by having a great body of knowledge that anyone can use. So understanding of great inventions didn't disappear with the inve…

Hmm, my comments don't really reflect this, but I agree with you. I think the end result of a system like this would be that software patents would be next-to-nothing worthless and people just wouldn't bother, except perhaps in the cases of truly innovative works of software (I can't even think of any worth patenting right now...).

Would Apple really file their rubber-band scrolling patent at a value of $1bil, then pay some multiple of that per year when it's so easily avoided by their competitors? Probably not.

And if they do then more power to them. But it would put an upper bound of the amount of silly patents that a single large company could file and maintain (think IBM, MSFT, Apple, etc). Right now it costs a company hardly nothing to file all these and maintain them but they have a huge potential upside if your competitor steps on that patent landmine.

Re: USPTO invalidates Apple's "rubber-banding" patent asserted against Samsung

#83

Post by 001sky »

beedogs wrote: post #7
fpgeek wrote: post #3

This just helps illustrate the absurdity of the US patent system. Samsung and Apple have already been at this for over a year and a half (longer if you count their pre-lawsuit discussions). Now, after we've been through lawsuit filings, discovery, back-and-forth over injunctions and a trial and gotten a verdict... The patent office turns around and says: "On second thought, we shouldn't have issued that patent in the…

> The USPTO does not receive any funding from general taxation sources. Rather, the agency is fully funded by the fees paid by patent applicants and patent owners. This is probably a big part of why the USPTO sucks. If they had the resources to hire dozens and dozens of industry experts, and pay them aggressively competitive wages, they could probably fix most of the problems most of us have with the system as a whol…

This is rediculous if true. Clearly, patents are important public policy. They should be funded as such, and if need be, taxes from profits of patent-holding companies should be dedicated to the USPTO. Taxes from fees (1) dont scale; and (2) are orders of magnitude off the economic impact, so any distortion from bad decisions is also.

Re: USPTO invalidates Apple's "rubber-banding" patent asserted against Samsung

#85

Post by ircmaxell »

ankitaggarwal wrote: post #76
ircmaxell wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> But considering everything, they had no other choice legally. Patents are not Trademarks. Patents are valid and legal even if you don't enforce them (where trademarks become invalid if you don't enforce them). So no, they did have a choice. In fact, they had 3: 1. They could have not gotten the patent at all. This could open them up to legal liability if someone else got it and sued them. 2. They could have kept it…

Thanks for clearing things up. What I am trying to say is, they had no other choice to send the message across that stop ripping off apple products. The patent they sued samsung over can be considered silly but what choice they had? I bet if this verdict was not given, next galaxy series would've been like iPhone 5. It was not about money, it was more about market position because what samsung was basically doing was…

> The patent they sued samsung over can be considered silly but what choice they had? I bet if this verdict was not given, next galaxy series would've been like iPhone 5.

You mean the way that iOS 3, 4, 5 and 6 have stolen things from Android? Hell, the Book position sync thing that they introduced today copies from Android (and likely the Kindle).

Stop it with the FUD about this. The two phones are rectangular with rounded corners. Since when is that protected design? Look at the automobile market. Models are not distinguished by a generic look and feel, but by very very specific design details. None of which were copied between the devices.

Show me ONE major Apple feature that wasn't copied from someone else. The entire product is a culmination of ideas and innovation from others. Multi-touch? Done before. Large screen? Done. Icons? Done. Multi-Tasking? Don't even kid yourself. Notifications? Really?

What they did, and where their value is, is not in the concepts or innovation. It's in the level of polish that they apply. That's their competitive advantage.

And their legal battles are proof that they cannot compete on any other front other than polish. And since Android has been making leaps and bounds of improvements over the years, it's been threatening Apple's competitive advantage. And that's why Apple is suing.

It's the ultimate instance of the pot calling the kettle black.

Re: USPTO invalidates Apple's "rubber-banding" patent asserted against Samsung

#86

Post by esrauch »

eternalban wrote: post #70
AnthonyMouse wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm generally all for anything that involves government paying for college, but I don't think you're solving the problem in this case. The problem is that good engineers are expensive. Median base pay is what, about $90-100K? Which the patent office isn't willing to pay. What you're saying is, de facto, that they should pay examiners more -- enough to be competitive with that -- in the form of student loan repayment.…

I'm not talking about employment. It is the 21st century for God's sake, and we have the internet. )) For example, USPTO can setup a review system in cooperation with the top tier schools. Students can serve their country while they are earning their degree. The patent system can be made more reasonable if we address the problem of bogus patents issued by an overwhelmed USPTO. This would be a step in the right direct…

Except one of the claims that I've seen about the US patent examiners is that US patent examiners are likely to leave after only a few years, whereas the EU patent examiners are far more likely to be lifers. Bringing in a ton more people with no experience would only make that much worse.

Re: USPTO invalidates Apple's "rubber-banding" patent asserted against Samsung

#87

Post by snogglethorpe »

albedoa wrote: post #45
pi18n wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'd love to see some sort of punitive damages if a patent you sued over gets invalidated. At a minimum, Apple should need to compensate a portion of Samsung's legal fees.

Even if you stand against the current patent system, it's how it works right now, so that suggestion is a little bit of blaming the victim. Apple were told that they have a valid patent by the office which makes those determinations. How are they to blame for accepting grant of the patent?

Apple knows as well as we do how broken the patent system is—and they take advantage of that brokenness.

In no way are they a "victim."

Re: USPTO invalidates Apple's "rubber-banding" patent asserted against Samsung

#88

Post by ankitaggarwal »

ircmaxell wrote: post #85
ankitaggarwal wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thanks for clearing things up. What I am trying to say is, they had no other choice to send the message across that stop ripping off apple products. The patent they sued samsung over can be considered silly but what choice they had? I bet if this verdict was not given, next galaxy series would've been like iPhone 5. It was not about money, it was more about market position because what samsung was basically doing was…

> The patent they sued samsung over can be considered silly but what choice they had? I bet if this verdict was not given, next galaxy series would've been like iPhone 5. You mean the way that iOS 3, 4, 5 and 6 have stolen things from Android? Hell, the Book position sync thing that they introduced today copies from Android (and likely the Kindle). Stop it with the FUD about this. The two phones are rectangular with…

There is no end to this debate. We both can write tons of explaination about each platform, but it doesn't matter. Both companies are here to make profits and they resolve their legal disputes like this. There is no other way.

And about this very article, it is just not correct. Invalidating patents take years. Article like this surface the internet just before any big apple event.

Re: USPTO invalidates Apple's "rubber-banding" patent asserted against Samsung

#89

Post by Natsu »

sigzero wrote: post #71
dctoedt wrote: post #55

Some procedural observations: 1. The rejection was signed by a primary examiner (i.e., someone who has been at the USPTO for awhile and not a rookie) and was approved by a supervisory primary examiner who oversees reexamination proceedings. 2. The rejection is not final (see the unchecked box b near the top of the first page), therefore Apple can and will try to get the examiner to withdraw the rejection. 3. The reje…

So can Apple now sue the USPTO because they successfully defended it in court costing millions of dollars and now a YEAR later the USPTO invalidates it? I hope so.

I really doubt it.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sovereign_immunity

Also, appeals haven't even been heard. This is far from over. Apple hasn't won until appeals are exhausted.

Re: USPTO invalidates Apple's "rubber-banding" patent asserted against Samsung

#90

Post by esolyt »

BenoitEssiambre wrote: post #79
esolyt wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I actually prefer Android's current overscroll effect.

Yup. I always found the rubber banding to be kind of an odd way to indicate the end of a scrolling area. The problem is that instead of something indicating unambiguously the end of a view, the movement continues to happen momentarily as if there was more to come and only gradually stops. Users end up not knowing if they botched their finger gesture or if they are actually at a boundary. Even as an experienced user,…

This is exactly what I dislike about it. Ironically, it makes it more difficult to realize there is no more content.
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