Apple Hit With $625 Million Judgment in Patent Suit Over Cover Flow, Spotlight, Time Machine

[RightJustified]

Yes.. I'm actually laughing at the hypocrisy. Apparently it's only "wrong" when other companies patent ideas and innovations blindly - but when Apple applies for patents for ideas and innovations that they either haven't implemented for years or won't for years it's perfectly ok.... because they're Apple.

um... at this time, there are NO comments on here saying anything like that.

go ahead and read back through. i'll wait.

find someone saying "it's perfectly ok for apple to do it" in this discussion.

every comment says "the system is broken" ... not "the system is broken except for apple."

but thanks for assuming that everyone is a fanboy but you. you're too COOL for that, probably.

 

[iStudentUK]

Well in the UK you can't patent a computer program (it is excluded on the grounds that it is not an invention). Although, some people have managed to on technical grounds.

Is this the case in the US? Are these software issues just because some companies have found a way to get around the loop holes, or are patents granted for computer programs routinely in the US?

It would solve so many problems if software were only covered by copyright!

 

[cmaier]

The expression of idea is what you can patent or copyright. That is the basis of trademark/copyright/patent law.

No it's not. That's copyright. Trademarks protect names or other features that identify the source of a product. Patents protect processes (ways of making or doing things, for example), machines, things that are manufactured, and compositions of matter. (Design patents also protect the way things look, and plant patents protect...plants).

 

[Mike84]

This thread is going in circles.

 

[fxtech]

Ah, a patent holding company in Texas files suit in Texas with a resulting huge jury award. Shocking.

So the Texas-based company should have filed their patent in what state, exactly?

 

[Dooger]

Was bound to happen sooner or later. Jobs himself admitted that they steal great ideas. They'll just pass the $600m payment on to us.

 

[Mike84]

No it's not. That's copyright. Trademarks protect names or other features that identify the source of a product. Patents protect processes (ways of making or doing things, for example), machines, things that are manufactured, and compositions of matter. (Design patents also protect the way things look, and plant patents protect...plants).

You know what, I have no idea why I even put that on there. You are right and I know that but for some reason I tied all of the IP fields together. Yes, it is copyright that protects expressions of ideas, trademark protects marks that are used in commerce by corporations or businesses (not taking into consideration state trademark laws), and patents protect processes.

 

[Cougarcat]

What's sad is that this should happen over features that are the most trivial for Apple. I don't know anyone who uses cover flow (although it could be useful on the one place they haven't implemented it... on the touch devices.)

It's useless on the touch devices too (it's on there...rotate your device in the iPad app). It is, however, incredibly awesome in Safari history. It makes it incredibly easy to find a website when you've forgotten the title because you can easily spot it visually.

 

[cmaier]

Well in the UK you can't patent a computer program (it is excluded on the grounds that it is not an invention). Although, some people have managed to on technical grounds.

Is this the case in the US? Are these software issues just because some companies have found a way to get around the loop holes, or are patents granted for computer programs routinely in the US?

It would solve so many problems if software were only covered by copyright!

In the U.S. you cannot patent a computer program - it is copyrighted. However you can patent what the computer program DOES (not the abstract idea - just the use of the machine to accomplish the idea) or you can patent a machine which contains program code which, when executed, does what the computer program does.

 

[samcraig]

um... at this time, there are NO comments on here saying anything like that.

go ahead and read back through. i'll wait.

find someone saying "it's perfectly ok for apple to do it" in this discussion.

every comment says "the system is broken" ... not "the system is broken except for apple."

but thanks for assuming that everyone is a fanboy but you. you're too COOL for that, probably.

So quick to whip. I don't believe I said that it was going on in this thread. But maybe because you're a new poster (unless you've been lurking longer than 8/2010) you haven't read enough threads to know that it's a recurring theme

 

[ARK]

Apple already purchased the rights and intellectual property for Coverflow so how can they be sued for it?

http://www.steelskies.com/coverflow/

Apple acquires CoverFlow

In related news, iTunes 7 includes a feature called Cover Flow, which Apple purchased from a small software developer named Steel Skies.

"We are pleased to announce that all CoverFlow technology and intellectual property was recently sold to Apple," reads a message on the Steel Skies site. "It has been incorporated into the latest version of iTunes."

With iTunes 7 and Cover Flow, users can flip through their digital music and video collection just as they would CDs.

 

[Gasu E.]

I should have patented stupidity. I'd be the richest person on the planet by now

And you already would have met the criteria of demonstrating a working model of your invention.

<sorry, didn't mean it, but you set yourself up...>

 

[SimonTheSoundMa]

Can you give a reason for this line of thinking? Why should software be any different than music, movies, ect... ?

Copyright != Patent.

 

[MrSkoTA]

The real issue with these patents is how difficult it is to determine if what you are creating has already been created and patented.

It's not as easy as just typing "search on computer" and finding 3 companies that own the patent... Given the number of patents issued every year, it is a growing problem.

It is even more difficult if there is no current company using the technology in a product. (Which seems to be the case here.)

What the patent office needs to do is steal Spotlight from AAPL and implement it into the patent system.

 

[opeter]

I would make Apple pay a minimum of $10 Billion, since, they are using these functions more than 4 years in their OS. And they did make huge profit with it.

Software patents in the US are great things for these, who have them. You can become rich, if you have the knowgledge and resources.

 

[fxtech]

Does anyone else notice all of the "negatives" on a story where Apple is being sued for patent infringement, and yet when Apple sues HTC or anyone else for the same thing, it's overwhelmingly "positives"?

It's a crucial, yet flawed system that cuts both ways. People need to stop drinking that Kool-aid.

But they are ADDICTED to it - they can't help it!

 

[cmaier]

If I sell you the brooklyn bridge, you don't actually own it. The seller can only sell what the seller actually owns. The seller owned some IP (copyrights, for sure, and maybe some patents) but other patents exist.

Note that multiple patents can cover different aspects of something. And a patent gives you NO right to actually do anything - it only allows you to exclude OTHERS from doing it.

Apple already purchased the rights and intellectual property for Coverflow so how can they be sued for it?

http://www.steelskies.com/coverflow/

Apple acquires CoverFlow

In related news, iTunes 7 includes a feature called Cover Flow, which Apple purchased from a small software developer named Steel Skies.

"We are pleased to announce that all CoverFlow technology and intellectual property was recently sold to Apple," reads a message on the Steel Skies site. "It has been incorporated into the latest version of iTunes."

With iTunes 7 and Cover Flow, users can flip through their digital music and video collection just as they would CDs.

 

[dejo]

Apple already purchased the rights and intellectual property for Coverflow so how can they be sued for it?

Maybe because they didn't purchase it from the patent holder.

 

[transmaster]

I don't think someone who thinks there is such a thing as the "USPO" should be lecturing people on ignorance.

Oh I am so sorry I left the T for Trade mark out of the expedient, and I suppose you are the one who has the patient of Turnip generated fart sounds. Look up the 3rd district court of Marshall, Texas and see what the patient extortion artists are doing.

 

[newtonrj]

Ridiculous. People work just as hard on innovative software as they do on new devices and they deserve compensation for their ideas. I'm sorry that Apple stock *might* take a hit from this but that doesn't give Apple the right to steal.

Besides, its not like Apple hasn't sued the crap out of other companies for slight or even imagined infringements.

Creating an idea with a filed patent is different than;
- creating an idea,
- filing a patent,
- finding suitable assets,
- creating a product,
- marketing a product,
- selling a product,
- and reaping the benefit from limited competition utilizing your idea for a generation.

This working of an idea is the right of a patent holder. Not to create a patent and then assign it to a holding company who has no interest in developing patented technology.

 

[cmaier]

Oh I am so sorry I left the T for Trade mark out of the expedient, and I suppose you are the one who has the patient of Turnip generated fart sounds. Look up the 3rd district court of Marshall, Texas and see what the patient extortion artists are doing.

I don't need to look anything up. The E.D.Texas is, like every other district court, perfectly fair.

Two questions -

1) what is "out of the expedient?"
2) I am not a doctor, so why do you refer to my patients?

 

[benpatient]

I've actually been thinking about this for a while, and the reality is that eventually, there will be no copyright or patents. This is a passing moment in time.

The days when you could write and sing a song and expect to be paid by someone just because they heard it are over.

Software is basically the same.

Right now copyright, and to a smaller (but increasing) degree, patents, are in the same legal zone as "exceeding the speed limit."

The problem is that they are only passing through, whereas speed limits are pretty much at an end state, legally. Or at least they are in a holding pattern.

There is no way for copyrights to be enforced, long-term. It's all down to people doing the "right thing" and not "stealing" music/movies/pictures/software. That is just a less efficient version of a model where people make a product and stick it online for free, with a button to donate if you like it.

Right now, if you want to release a CD or a movie or a book or a video game the "old way," you get funding, you put the work together, you give it to a label/publisher/studio, they give it to a distributor, they give it to a retail outlet, and then a person buys it from the retail outlet. Only two of those links are really needed, (sometimes 3). A person to create the content (or a group of people), and people to enjoy/use the content. Sometimes you need funding up-front. A bank is a good choice. That's what banks do.

See noisetrade.com for an example of where we are headed. The future is NOW.

A popular torrent site put up a link to financially sponsor a filmmaker's $25,000 project, and had doubled their requested funds before the fundraising window was half-way over. This from supposedly "greedy" "thieves."

These same concepts apply to patents, although for the time being, the ridiculous branch of the Supreme Court seems to think that companies are people, and ideas can be owned.

We're going to look back on this era of "Intellectual Property" in 30-40 years and find it difficult to comprehend how people thoughts they could own the "rights" to genomes or chemical formulas or banjo pickings.

We are living out an experimental exercise in taking things to the absurd, logical (illogical) extreme. It will be fun to watch it continue to unravel.

 

[Gasu E.]

Can you imagine what a mess the world would be in if Companies like Apple were able to copyright every day items years ago.

A round wheel that you rotate left and right to guide you car.

A metal key that when rotated in a lock makes a bold move to unlock a door.

What a joke it would be.

Things that are Obvious and a basic requirement of an object should not be able to be copyrighted.

Alexander Winton patented the automobile steering wheel in 1900. Automobiles typically used a tiller mechanism to steer prior to this.

Linus Yale patented the cylinder pin-tumbler lock in 1861.

I guess these weren't so obvious at the time...

 

[D'Illusion]

All these patent cases should be thrown away if the originator cannot demonstrate the patent in use.

Otherwise I am off to patent time-travel, holographic 3D TV, space travel using an as yet undiscovered magical particle theory and any other futuristic impossibility that I can think of.

Why don't you patent an iMac without any screen problems.

 

[ctt1wbw]

So, you are saying that we should go against the constitution of the united sates that protects people who invent things, such as software and not allow them to protect it by having a patent for a limited time?

The patent thing is in the Constitution? Plus, I agree. You shouldn't be allowed to patent such broad scoping software ideas. Almost every patent that I've read about is so vague and broad in its content. Hell, you can patent anything in this country and never do a damned thing with it until someone else does it and then sue them. Truly pathetic system here.