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Apple and Google Included in Suit Over Embedded Interactive Media in Browsers
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Speaking as a person who has 1 software patent and is in the process of getting another one, I STILL hope they go down. The patent is ludicrous; the EMBED tag? You can patent the EMBED tag? What's next? The BLINK tag?
It just gives credence to the argument that all software patents are nonsense, since you can't tell the difference between one this stupid, and a REAL one.
I'm not sure software should be patentable, many people that work with me (and also have patents by the way) will tell you they do not think so. I'm not so sure there isn't good reasons to want to encourage good ideas to be patented even if they are "abstract".
But when stuff like this goes on, it's pretty hard to argue the case for it. I mean, since we obviously couldn't prevent the patent office from doing something this stupid with the current set up, it becomes difficult to say where (if anywhere) you could draw the line or ammend things such that it is still viable to patent software, while preventing this kind of patent from allowing a do-nothing, no-value company from stealing from everyone else.
It just gives credence to the argument that all software patents are nonsense, since you can't tell the difference between one this stupid, and a REAL one.
I'm not sure software should be patentable, many people that work with me (and also have patents by the way) will tell you they do not think so. I'm not so sure there isn't good reasons to want to encourage good ideas to be patented even if they are "abstract".
But when stuff like this goes on, it's pretty hard to argue the case for it. I mean, since we obviously couldn't prevent the patent office from doing something this stupid with the current set up, it becomes difficult to say where (if anywhere) you could draw the line or ammend things such that it is still viable to patent software, while preventing this kind of patent from allowing a do-nothing, no-value company from stealing from everyone else.
I agree on the last statement, but something REALLY bothers me about this thread. One is that the VERY SAME PEOPLE who are going on and on and on about how evil this company is to sue Apple over some bogus patent are the same ones who defend Apple themselves to death when someone supposedly infringes on one of THEIR bogus patents. It's such FREAKING HYPOCRISY and it makes me sick. Either you are against bogus BS patents or you are not against them. Make up your minds people. Apple only owns a zillion bogus "idea" patents that they then use to sue the living heck out of anyone who dares make something with something even remotely similar to their "idea". Well big friggin' whoopty-do. You want an example? Look into their current threats against anyone who might possibly want to use multiple finger touch technology in one of their products. It doesn't matter HOW it's implemented. The current system defends anyone who does something similar regardless of how they arrived to do it. It's total BS and it applies to Apple as much as any other company out there. But the so-called "fan boys" defend Apple while hypocritically attacking anyone else that does the same things Apple does. If some of you just admitted you hate everyone that isn't Apple or Steve Jobs for no particular reason what-so-ever and will use any BS logic to attack anyone but Apple/Steve because you WORSHIP the guy/company *THEN* I would at least have some modicum of respect for you at least being honest, no matter how ridiculous I think it is to worship Apple/Steve. But no, it's always some psuedo-logical argument that sounds good until you realize that you turn 180 any time it's Apple doing the infringement case (e.g. Psystar immediately comes to mind). Then all the sudden those evil jerks just stole Apple's intellectual PROPERTY. Then suddenly it's OK to own "ideas"! What a load of horse manure. At least I'm consistent in my hatred for BS intellectual property concepts where you can own "ideas".
i believe in Patents and Copyrights, but I think there should be a revamp of how they are given out.
There should be distinguishable differences between Patents for widgets that exist versus Patents and Copyrights for ideas for widgets that only exist on paper. Having an idea is great, but make something of it. if you can't OR WON'T then step aside and let someone else have a shot at it.
Idea Widgets should only get Conditional Patents. a person or entity should demonstrate within a predetermined period of time that they are attempting to implement their ideas into an actual widget, OR that they have ACTIVELY pursued licensing their idea for use by other persons or entities. if you fail at either, then the Conditional Patent expires AND the idea is officially deemed Public Domain. at that point, anyone or anything is free to through all the money they want at developing the idea into something productive and no one is prevented from doing the same (competitive development).
IF an actual widget is created from the idea, then the person or entity would be issued an official Patent or Copyright (as we see today) that protects their intellectual property rights.
doing this would help prevent companies from creating patents, hoping they get lost in the cracks at the US Patent Office only to have a company(ies) blindly infringe on said patent. then they simply turn around and sue. Patents and Copyrights should protect INNOVATION and PROGRESS, not only be a way to pad the wallets of the uninitiated.
There should be distinguishable differences between Patents for widgets that exist versus Patents and Copyrights for ideas for widgets that only exist on paper. Having an idea is great, but make something of it. if you can't OR WON'T then step aside and let someone else have a shot at it.
Idea Widgets should only get Conditional Patents. a person or entity should demonstrate within a predetermined period of time that they are attempting to implement their ideas into an actual widget, OR that they have ACTIVELY pursued licensing their idea for use by other persons or entities. if you fail at either, then the Conditional Patent expires AND the idea is officially deemed Public Domain. at that point, anyone or anything is free to through all the money they want at developing the idea into something productive and no one is prevented from doing the same (competitive development).
IF an actual widget is created from the idea, then the person or entity would be issued an official Patent or Copyright (as we see today) that protects their intellectual property rights.
doing this would help prevent companies from creating patents, hoping they get lost in the cracks at the US Patent Office only to have a company(ies) blindly infringe on said patent. then they simply turn around and sue. Patents and Copyrights should protect INNOVATION and PROGRESS, not only be a way to pad the wallets of the uninitiated.
why i understand what it is you are trying to say here, in my opinion i think you've missed a vital detail.
if and when apple has sued anyone, it can certainly be said that they have something to show for their patents. in other words, they aren't simply suing over ideas on paper that NEVER get turned into reality (at some point).
the case being discussed here is of a company that creates nothing, produces nothing. if you read the article it even quotes the company as describing themselves as nothing more than "idea creators". while i accept that it is certainly within their rights to do this, i happen to also think it problematic.
i wrote a bunch in the post above. i'll not repeat all i wrote there in this post. if you were to read it, youd understand better where i think the problem lies and possibly a way to "fairly" fix it.
basically though, i think Patents and Copyrights as we know them today should ONLY protect real world widgets not ideas. there should be a separate category for Ideas that get Conditional Patents. if all a person or entity does is squat on the Conditional Patent and not try to turn it into a real world widget, then they risk losing the patent rights, and the idea becomes Public Domain an un-patentable by anyone.
Edit:
by the way, i wasn't a fan of this same company going after Microsoft a few years back either. so speaking for myself at least, this isn't an issue of being an Apple Fanboy as you were generalizing
Edit 2:
sorry for coming back again, but i forgot to respond to the Psystar argument you made. first that wasn't strictly a Patent/Copyright case. that case primarily dealt with a violation of an End User License Agreement. i'm not here to argue the merits for or against EULA, but they are not Patents and therefore not a good comparison of what this company is trying to do to Apple, and the other companies, nor what they've already done to MS.
I think I'll file a patent for the process of 'patent trolling' and sue anyone that tries to use it.
you're too late: http://yro.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=07/10/20/1031236&from=rss
Quote:
Originally Posted by blackpond
I think I'll file a patent for the process of 'patent trolling' and sue anyone that tries to use it.
you're too late: http://yro.slashdot.org/article.pl?s...31236&from=rss
This is even closer:
Halliburton Tries To Patent Form Of Patent Trolling
Originally Posted by blackpond
I think I'll file a patent for the process of 'patent trolling' and sue anyone that tries to use it.
you're too late: http://yro.slashdot.org/article.pl?s...31236&from=rss
This is even closer:
Halliburton Tries To Patent Form Of Patent Trolling
digging a little more, look at what i found!
http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20081030/1117172691.shtml
i can't imagine that this ruling doesn't have a direct correlation to the Eolis suit.
http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20081030/1117172691.shtml
i can't imagine that this ruling doesn't have a direct correlation to the Eolis suit.
I think Eolas Technologies has Internet by the balls
Patent filed 1994. What was in 1994? Nothing, even Netscape was still in beta.
Granted a Patent in 1998 and immediately sued M$ for infringement in 1999. They didn't just sit on it like your typical troll.
They explain their lost in later production and research as being squeezed out of the market by M$ monopoly (don't know about that, but holding patent allows you to bar sales from others, doesn't matter if they make it into production or not).
And they have publicly announced their intention to sue M$ in 1997-1999, its not like Apple, Google, etc. didn't know about the ongoing litigation.
Take a moment to look at this without 20-20 hindsight (Anonymous User: BS patent, that so easy even cavemen can do it), and i think they really got they whole Internet embed Java whatever by the balls.
Just my two cents.
Anyone finding something similar before 1994?
Patent filed 1994. What was in 1994? Nothing, even Netscape was still in beta.
Granted a Patent in 1998 and immediately sued M$ for infringement in 1999. They didn't just sit on it like your typical troll.
They explain their lost in later production and research as being squeezed out of the market by M$ monopoly (don't know about that, but holding patent allows you to bar sales from others, doesn't matter if they make it into production or not).
And they have publicly announced their intention to sue M$ in 1997-1999, its not like Apple, Google, etc. didn't know about the ongoing litigation.
Take a moment to look at this without 20-20 hindsight (Anonymous User: BS patent, that so easy even cavemen can do it), and i think they really got they whole Internet embed Java whatever by the balls.
Just my two cents.
Anyone finding something similar before 1994?
Isn't that actually what patents are for? You think of it first, it's legally yours. The patent is not for if you do anything with it or not. But did they think of it first though. Did calling for external applications to run embedded media in hypermedia documents exist before it was filed in 1994?
I recall this was possible with Quicktime in Hypercard documents before that date if memory serves.
Edit: I also recall that the well-known pointing hand icon we see on clickable links also originated from Hypercard. And pretty much everything else too. The html internet is basically Hypercard networked from servers. So is the key word in their patent actually 'networked'? So they simply copied an existing and working concept to apply it to the new emerging internet technology before anyone else could. Like patenting the existing four wheels on horse buggies for use on automobiles.
Quick Wiki lookup, I believe I am correct:
Thousands of them before the end of the 1980s. Elios invented nothing, just took something that already existed which hundreds of companies were already producing and applied it as a patent to the emerging internet before anyone else thought to do so. That makes them 100% patent trolls.
Thousands of them before the end of the 1980s. Elios invented nothing, just took something that already existed which hundreds of companies were already producing and applied it as a patent to the emerging internet before anyone else thought to do so. That makes them 100% patent trolls.
Exactly, surely by that fact alone this should be declared "obvious" and the patent invalidated on those grounds alone.
You are confusing patents and copyrights.
If I have a patent, I can restrict what _you_ can do. You can come up with an idea all on your own, develop it, get rid of all the problems, market it, and I own you because I wrote down a vague description of the idea before you did, and patented it.
If I have a copyright, you can do anything you like, except stealing my work.
That's the difference.
Microsoft most likely settled on the understanding that the money was used to sue all these other plaintiffs into oblivion.
The length of time this had been going on for Eolas were unlike to win before running out of money.
My god, Eolas website is awful. You think they'd be able to make better use of all these things they invented. In fact their site seems to be all about reinforcing the "fact" that the invent things. Their site is almost contentless.
Ths U.S. District Court in the Eastern District of Texas yet again.
It's just ridiculous. They ALL go to east Texas hoping, or ASSUMING, that they get the favor from the morons (who I suspect make nice profits directly or indirectly from all those stupid lawsuits).
I wish someone shut down that district court already.
It's just ridiculous. They ALL go to east Texas hoping, or ASSUMING, that they get the favor from the morons (who I suspect make nice profits directly or indirectly from all those stupid lawsuits).
I wish someone shut down that district court already.
Who cares, I'm sure Google being the self proclaimed lord and master of Cloud Computing would buy the patent if they had too.
Eolas needs to brush up on their english. And and And and And That thing over thar.
I really hate it when people registers some arbitrary patents just to let big companies pay out royalties or settlement. It just hinders the development of new technology. A really naïve thought but like that Volvo dude who invented the seatbelt didn't patent it because he wanted every car to have them installed.
A really naïve thought but like that Volvo dude who invented the seatbelt didn't patent it because he wanted every car to have them installed.
Not according to Wiki: