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Google Stands Behind HTC in Patent Dispute With Apple

Cavanboy18 said:
then that caveman who came up with the wheel should sue the pants off of every one.
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If the caveman has a patent, and if that patent has not expired (I suspect he lived more than 20 years ago, unfortunately) he should.

You are engaging in what everyone engages in - hindsight bias. Everything seems obvious and unpatentable in hindsight.
 
kdarling said:
Why, because Apple says they're "irreparably" harmed? Nokia used the same phrase in their suit against Apple, but it's more believable in their case.
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I've mentioned this before. "Irreparable harm" is a term of art that allows one to ask for remedies in equity (i.e.: injunctions). I see nothing in Apple's Complaint that hints at their underlying feelings on the matter. They have good lawyers, and their job is to influence the judge into thinking of them as the aggrieved party.
 
cmaier said:
Same principle applies to your other examples. Anything that compares shapes or compares sets of points isn't going to be prior art. Has to be vector paths and lifting you finger midway and continuing has to not unlock.
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I understand that. They were simply more examples of gesture based unlocking, to demonstrate that the idea of such unlocking is well known.

cmaier said:
What you should argue, instead, is obviousness.
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You were responding to someone else, but I was about to bring that up.

Unfortunately, you lose that one too - this is probably the textbook example of "success as a secondary indicia of non-obviousness.". Meaning, if it was so obvious how come no one did it until apple achieved massive success (sales, reviews, press coverage) by doing it?
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As someone with decades of touch experience, I would almost agree, but please hear me out:

All the previously implemented touchscreen unlockers had something in common that caused them to have a more complicated and hidden design: they were meant to also implement a secret graphical password.

In Apple's case, someone clearly went to the screen designer/engineer and asked for a touch unlocker without a graphical password... something super easy to do and containing a total visual aid for the user.

With such criteria, I contend that anyone versed in the art would've come up with a very similar looking simple slide unlocker.

Heck, it's so obvious, that even alien Predators starting back in 1987 did a horizontal left-to-right slide-to-unlock motion on their wrist computers before clicking other buttons to start the self-destruct sequence ;)
 
kdarling said:
With such criteria, I contend that anyone versed in the art would've come up with a very similar looking simple slide unlocker.

It's so damned obvious, that even alien Predators do a horizontal left-to-right slide-to-unlock motion on their wrist computers before clicking other buttons to start the self-destruct sequence ;)
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I yield to your superior knowledge, but "obviousness" in the colloquial sense is not the test. The test is defined in 35 USC 103, but the case law has rendered it so that to show obviousness you essentially have to show that you can combine one or more prior art references to reach the result.

In other words, if I had one reference that talks about using gestures (the type of gesture in the patent - not the type of gestures others have talked about) to unlock something, and another that says visual feedback is good, and you can show that a person having ordinary (not exceptional) skill in the art would find it obvious to combine those references to solve a problem, you can make a case for obviousness.

It is quite likely that one could find such references, and a little less likely that one can prove you would combine them (each side will have an expert witness supporting their story).

But Apple has the trump card - the secondary indications of non-obviousness.

These are:

- commercial success;
- long-felt but unsolved needs
- failure of others
- skepticism or disbelief before the invention
- copying, praise, unexpected results, and industry acceptance

The idea is that it's all well and good to say that theoretically someone would combine these references, but if it was so "obvious" to do so, how come no one did, and how come once the inventor did he achieved such success? If everyone knew they would achieve such success by doing it, why didn't they do it? It must be that combining those things either was not obvious to try, or that combining them resulted in a surprising unanticipated result.

Here, Apple clearly has the following going for them: commercial success, failure of others, copying, praise, industry acceptance. They can probably make a case for long-felt unsolved need and skeptism, too.

I almost always take the side of the defense in patent matters, and I can tell you I would love it if my clients always had a case as good as Apple's.

ps: did the Predators really do that? That would be very good art if it was to unlock a screen.
 
Google and HTC knew Apple had a ton of patents related to the iPhone, and yet still went ahead.


Big Mistake.
 
cmaier said:
But Apple has the trump card - the secondary indications of non-obviousness.

These are:

- commercial success;
- long-felt but unsolved needs
- failure of others
- skepticism or disbelief before the invention
- copying, praise, unexpected results, and industry acceptance

The idea is that it's all well and good to say that theoretically someone would combine these references, but if it was so "obvious" to do so, how come no one did, and how come once the inventor did he achieved such success? If everyone knew they would achieve such success by doing it, why didn't they do it? It must be that combining those things either was not obvious to try, or that combining them resulted in a surprising unanticipated result.

Here, Apple clearly has the following going for them: commercial success, failure of others, copying, praise, industry acceptance. They can probably make a case for long-felt unsolved need and skeptism, too.

I almost always take the side of the defense in patent matters, and I can tell you I would love it if my clients always had a case as good as Apple's.

ps: did the Predators really do that? That would be very good art if it was to unlock a screen.
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But wouldn't that "trump card" by apple be negatived by the fact before the iPhone there are multiple examples of things that function almost exactly the same as the unlocker. I remember on my Palm TX I had a locking software that function almost exactly the same iPhones. It was take take the leave and slide it to the right. It moved it and everything much like the iPhone and this was something I was using over 2 years before the iphone came out.

Yes the iPhone was popular but if HTC can show multiple example of things almost exactly the same before hand wouldn't it kill apple argument.
 
Rodimus Prime said:
But wouldn't that "trump card" by apple be negatived by the fact before the iPhone there are multiple examples of things that function almost exactly the same as the unlocker. I remember on my Palm TX I had a locking software that function almost exactly the same iPhones. It was take take the leave and slide it to the right. It moved it and everything much like the iPhone and this was something I was using over 2 years before the iphone came out.

Yes the iPhone was popular but if HTC can show multiple example of things almost exactly the same before hand wouldn't it kill apple argument.
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Could be. Can you describe the Palm TX thing more clearly (or provide a link) and I'll analyze it and let you know? Things that would be important:

1) if you start to slide and lift the stylus, do you have to start over?
2) did it exist before the patent's priority date? (the date of the iPhone doesn't matter)
3) did it simply require moving something from place to another, or did the path that was taken matter? (If you moved it from left to right while drawing a sine wave, for example, did that also unlock the phone?)
 
You haven't been on many juries, have you? Idiots, mostly. I'm soooo looking forward to my jury duty next week. /sarcasm

I'm not arguing anything, so nothing to lose.

What's your massive experience with this? Are you a patent attorney? If so, maybe if you stated it, and those arguing with you believed it, you'd get less crap answers back. :eek:

EDIT: Ah, just saw your sig line. I rarely read those. It suggests you are an attorney that deals with this stuff. That's cool. Much more weight to your posts on the topic in light of that. But also answers my question that you've likely not been on the jury end of a trial much. I'm done.

cmaier said:
I have lots of experience with this: trust me, a jury will understand. There will be visual aids, etc. Plus, the judge decides what the word gesture means - not the jury. The jury only gets to decide whether the gesture - as defined by the judge - exists in the prior art reference.

Sorry, but there is no way any of those references is anticipatory and no way you convince a jury of it.

What you should argue, instead, is obviousness. Unfortunately, you lose that one too - this is probably the textbook example of "success as a secondary indicia of non-obviousness.". Meaning, if it was so obvious how come no one did it until apple achieved massive success (sales, reviews, press coverage) by doing it?
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distortedloop said:
EDIT: Ah, just saw (his) sig line. I rarely read those. ....
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Besides that, people should also check poster profiles (click on their name in the post heading)... sometimes more information is in there.

For example, you might find you that you've been arguing 1960's business politics with a 14 year old. Or that you were debating cpu specs with someone who designs such things.

:)
 
kdarling said:
Besides that, people should also check poster profiles (click on their name in the post heading)... sometimes more information is in there.

For example, you might find you that you've been arguing 1960's business politics with a 14 year old. Or that you were debating cpu specs with someone who designs such things.

:)
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Yep.

So, to make it clear: Yes, I am currently a patent attorney. I write patents, and I litigate them (usually for the defense). Nothing I say should be taken as legal advice, of course - I'm just speculating like everyone else, but hopefully with a little more understanding of the rules of the game.

(I'm also a CPU designer, so don't debate CPU specs with me, either :)
 
cmaier said:
Could be. Can you describe the Palm TX thing more clearly (or provide a link) and I'll analyze it and let you know? Things that would be important:

1) if you start to slide and lift the stylus, do you have to start over?
2) did it exist before the patent's priority date? (the date of the iPhone doesn't matter)
3) did it simply require moving something from place to another, or did the path that was taken matter? (If you moved it from left to right while drawing a sine wave, for example, did that also unlock the phone?)
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I can not provide a link to it because my palm TX broke a long time ago and could not tell you the name of it but as for your question. It was a 3rd party software you had to download but it was there.

1. Yes I would have to start over.
2. Don't know but given the fact that I used in in 2004-2005 and even then I want to say it was few years old.
3. Path did not matter. It was much like the iPhone because on the iPhone I can put my finger on it and go up and down but the slider only move horizontally (providing I stay in the unlock area with my finger)

How it function was pretty much the same as the iPhones/iPod Touch. Different was mostly in the looks. It did not have all the fancy graphics and color smoothing on it but how it function was exactly the same.

Now I say apple can copy right how it looks but the functionality of the slider I think the patent should be invalidated as it can be shown to of been out for a long time.
 
cmaier said:
I have lots of experience with this: trust me, a jury will understand....
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LOL, you can't have so much experience, if you really believe this. Frankly, if you went to trial so often, you wouldn't have time to post so often here....

The bottom line is, Apple is doing what Apple has been doing for a while now. They use legal action, or the threat of legal action, to destroy their competition.

It works well for them with smaller fish, but I sure hope HTC, with Google's help, has the resources to withstand this.

Otherwise, innovation will grind to a halt.
 
cmaier said:
In other words, if I had one reference that talks about using gestures (the type of gesture in the patent - not the type of gestures others have talked about) to unlock something,

and another that says visual feedback is good, and you can show that a person having ordinary (not exceptional) skill in the art would find it obvious to combine those references to solve a problem, you can make a case for obviousness.
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How about this:

The NeoNode N1 and N2 smartphones have had swipe gestures since 2002. In fact, when the iPhone came out, several reviewers commented that it copied the NeoNode unlock method (although it added graphics).

"... announced the Neonode N1 back in 2002. It was very small. It had no keypad or keyboard at all. It did not use a stylus either. Instead, it used a swipe and tap system on a novel touch screen that used a grid of infrared beams to sense finger movement.

So those who marvel at how a swipe from left to right unlocks the iPhone, well, the Neonode N1 was unlocking that way more than five years ago. And if the iPhone's swipes and taps seem futuristic, they are not. Neonode has been using them since the first N1 came out."

Check this video at 4:00 (40% in) for the horizontal unlock swipe gesture on the NeoNodes.

So again, I would think that if an Apple designer was told to come up with an easy swipe-to-unlock (same as the NeoNode) but to also display instructions and show the swipe progress to the user, that almost anyone would've come up with a similar looking unlocker.

(Maybe even spring-loaded as well, although that part might not be in the patent.)

Regards. Oh and yes, Predators did the swipe although it was on a solid piece below the screen. Still, that brings up a question: in patent trials, don't you ask the inventor how they came up with the idea? As in, oh gee I was watching this movie and... ;) Thanks!
 
kdarling said:
Besides that, people should also check poster profiles (click on their name in the post heading)... sometimes more information is in there.

For example, you might find you that you've been arguing 1960's business politics with a 14 year old. Or that you were debating cpu specs with someone who designs such things.

:)
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The only problem with that is it assumes that their honest when they fill out their profile data, or that they've even bothered to do anything with it at all.

With regards to the immediate person at hand, he surely speaks to the subject more intelligently and consistently than most others have, and links to a website which if legit lends credibility to his posts, so I'll give him the benefit of the doubt.

Some others around here, given the drivel they spew constantly, I wouldn't give them any more credence even if their profile and a url signature suggested they were the most informed person in the world on the subject. (Not directed at you, of course! And also assuming some feel the same about me.)

;)
 
Google is the best free virus you can get for free... there is some big time privacy concerns when it comes to google. I think back to the day when all of googles voice call records were on an easy google search for everyone in the world to see, no thanks. And then google buzz, yeah right! :eek:
 
kdarling said:
How about this:

The NeoNode N1 and N2 smartphones have had swipe gestures since 2002. In fact, when the iPhone came out, several reviewers commented that it copied the NeoNode unlock method (although it added graphics).

"... announced the Neonode N1 back in 2002. It was very small. It had no keypad or keyboard at all. It did not use a stylus either. Instead, it used a swipe and tap system on a novel touch screen that used a grid of infrared beams to sense finger movement.

So those who marvel at how a swipe from left to right unlocks the iPhone, well, the Neonode N1 was unlocking that way more than five years ago. And if the iPhone's swipes and taps seem futuristic, they are not. Neonode has been using them since the first N1 came out."

Check this video at 4:00 (40% in) for the horizontal unlock swipe gesture on the NeoNodes.

So again, I would think that if an Apple designer was told to come up with an easy swipe-to-unlock (same as the NeoNode) but to also display instructions and show the swipe progress to the user, that almost anyone would've come up with a similar looking unlocker.

(Maybe even spring-loaded as well, although that part might not be in the patent.)

Regards. Oh and yes, Predators did the swipe although it was on a solid piece below the screen. Still, that brings up a question: in patent trials, don't you ask the inventor how they came up with the idea? As in, oh gee I was watching this movie and... ;) Thanks!
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Yep, you ask the inventor when and how they "conceived" of the invention, and what they did to "reduce it to practice." (An invention requires both parts, though filing the patent application counts as reduction to practice).
 
Verizon Slave said:
Google is the best free virus you can get for free... there is some big time privacy concerns when it comes to google. I think back to the day when all of googles voice call records were on an easy google search for everyone in the world to see, no thanks. And then google buzz, yeah right! :eek:
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Why do you keep repeating this? :rolleyes:
 
A Question About Patents

@cmaier


I'm not sure if this is right, but isn't there two kinds of patents? (Not literally, but figuratively) For example, I could get a patent for inventing the tire and then you could then get a patent for putting treads on the tire for better traction.

In this case, I'm assuming that you would need to get a license from me in order to produce your tires.

I ask this because Apple is holding onto a lot of patents but is not licensing them. At what point in time do companies have to open up their patents to licensing (like Nokia with their GSM patents)?

The only possible argument for Apple's suit holding back innovation is if it does not allow for people to improve upon Apple's patents and therefore holds back the evolution of a platform. Is this an actual concern?
 
I'm not sure if this is right, but isn't there two kinds of patents? (Not literally, but figuratively) For example, I could get a patent for inventing the tire and then you could then get a patent for putting treads on the tire for better traction.

In this case, I'm assuming that you would need to get a license from me in order to produce your tires.
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The "tread" patent is sometimes called an "improvement patent," but there is no legal difference between an improvement patent and any other patent. In fact, the first patent ever issued in the U.S. was an improvement patent (a better way to make potash).

As for the second point, yes. If I patent treads on tires, I cannot actually practice my own invention without getting a license to the underlying tire patent from you.

I ask this because Apple is holding onto a lot of patents but is not licensing them. At what point in time do companies have to open up their patents to licensing (like Nokia with their GSM patents)?
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You do not have to license your patents if you don't want to. Nokia has to because it joined the standards body and proposed it's own technology for the standard. Absent something like that, it's absolutely legal to refuse to license your patent to anyone.

The only possible argument for Apple's suit holding back innovation is if it does not allow for people to improve upon Apple's patents and therefore holds back the evolution of a platform. Is this an actual concern?
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People can improve on apple's patents, but that won't allow them to practice the improvement. However, if the improvement is good enough, apple might want access to it. In the tire tread situation, the inventor of the tire cannot use treads without my permission, either.
 
cmaier said:
Not a high horse. It's the law. For the patent to be invalid, someone had to have invented it before Apple. Otherwise Apple's patent is valid. And the very point of a patent is to grant the inventor a 20-year monopoly. That fosters competition by requiring other companies to come up with alternate, better solutions, and rewarding the inventor who put in the hard work to come up with the idea in the first place.

In a world without patent monopolies why would any company put in large sums of money to take risks on research that might not pan out? Why would Apple invest hundreds of millions of dollars in designing iPhone when everyone else could rip them off within months?

Someone earlier in the thread said patents are not a motivator for innovation and that "none of the greatest inventions of the last 100 years were patented." I responded by listing all of the inventions that had been patented in the last 100 years (TV, microprocessor, etc.) and invited him to tell me what great inventions in the last 100 years were not the result of a patent.

Still waiting for an answer.

And don't saunter in here calling me names. People who actually read my posts know I am anything but a fanboy - just, unlike you, I understand how innovation happens and how intellectual property works.

And, finally, here's a freebie for Google: to work around the patent just remove any visual indication in the form of a moveable object or predefined channel. Alternatively, use spin wheels (like a padlock) that respond not to the gesture, but to the final location of the touches. Or just put up a numeric keypad like everyone used to do, and make you enter a code. Or put up a grid and require the user to chord (simultaneously press) certain locations. Or swipe a predetermined number of times. Or a predetermined sequence of taps, like morse code (which has the benefit that someone can't examine your grease smears to figure out your code). Or dial a phone number with a faux rotary-dial phone dial. Or arrange a series of blocks into a predefined shape. Or write your signature with your finger. Or biometrics using the camera, microphone, or additional hardware. Or use the mic to listen for a particular hummed musical sequence. Or do exactly what iPhone does, but instead of depending on gesture, depend on the result (the slider ending up in its final position) - this probably means that lifting your finger can't reset the slider to the start, but you can make it so lifting your finger moves to any random location other than the start or end, if you'd like.

There - some ways to unlock a touchscreen without infringing the patent (which, unlike you, I took the trouble of analyzing). Happy now?

Quite some monopoly, huh? Won't be possible to have any touchscreen phone without swipe to unlock, right? Feel better?
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Im not going to even bother arguing with the mud slinging, I also have been on here a while.

All i am saying is this, and please read this before having a go at me:

If Apple wins this case, no-one will want design anything remotely close to an apple design. So yes, i believe would slow down design and competition.

Are we saying that Apple is whiter than white? That they've never taken an idea from someone else? Who would want to stand up to a $25 Billion company if Apple had "borrowed" one of your ideas - not many im guessing.

Apple is quickly becoming the new MS with its bullying tactics. It should be happy with competition. Hands up wants there to be only apple making clever gadgets - a world where we get old technology drip fed to us (3g iphone only on the second reincarnation), 2mp camera anyone?

Im opening up this argument to not just the touchscreen patent because if apple wins we will be going down the above road, and its not a nice one.
 
captain kaos said:
Im not going to even bother arguing with the mud slinging, I also have been on here a while.
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You called me a fanboy. I didn't call you any names. Only one slinging mud is you.

All i am saying is this, and please read this before having a go at me:

If Apple wins this case, no-one will want design anything remotely close to an apple design. So yes, i believe would slow down design and competition.
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Nonsense. All they have to do is not infringe! IBM has a zillion patents (and sues people all the time) and yet we have tons of computers. Tivo sues people and yet we have tons of competing DVRs. Boeing has a ton of patents on airplanes and we have lots of airplane makers. GM has a tons of patents on cars, and there's lots of competition.

Everyone just avoids infringing the patents. I pointed out around a dozen ways of implementing an unlock screen without infringing the patent. Each of their other patents also have tons of workarounds. Some cost more than Apple's solution, or are more inefficient. That's tough. Just like Apple shouldn't be infringing other people's patents, and if they are, they will have to pay and may be enjoined from selling their products. The rules apply to everyone equally, and yet despite a decade of nasty lawsuits, we seem to have lots of competition.
 
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