Here's a paywall bypassing link to the article http://tinyurl.com/WSJ-Digione
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Company That Sued Apple for iPhone 6 Patent Infringement 'Barely Exists'
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Look up "neonode swipe to unlock". It existed before the iPhone. Apple shouldn't have gotten that patent just like this Chinese company shouldn't have gotten any patent for it's design. Karma, gotta love it.
Apple's claim 1 on slide-to-unlock is as follows:
1. A method of unlocking a hand-held electronic device, the device including a touch-sensitive display, the method comprising:
detecting a contact with the touch-sensitive display at a first predefined location corresponding to an unlock image;
continuously moving the unlock image on the touch-sensitive display in accordance with movement of the contact while continuous contact with the touch screen is maintained, wherein the unlock image is a graphical, interactive user-interface object with which a user interacts in order to unlock the device; and
unlocking the hand-held electronic device if the moving the unlock image on the touch-sensitive display results in movement of the unlock image from the first predefined location to a predefined unlock region on the touch-sensitive display.
detecting a contact with the touch-sensitive display at a first predefined location corresponding to an unlock image;
continuously moving the unlock image on the touch-sensitive display in accordance with movement of the contact while continuous contact with the touch screen is maintained, wherein the unlock image is a graphical, interactive user-interface object with which a user interacts in order to unlock the device; and
unlocking the hand-held electronic device if the moving the unlock image on the touch-sensitive display results in movement of the unlock image from the first predefined location to a predefined unlock region on the touch-sensitive display.
Note the requirement for an "unlock image" that moves with the user's finger. Note that the Neonode device has no such image. It's a small difference, but it is different. Is it different enough? It passed initial review and was issued, but the courts are the final arbiter.
Invention is a series of unbelievably small steps. Nothing gets invented from whole cloth. Most patent battles are over these kinds of details that totally get lost in the general press. What is the "same" to a layperson is not the "same" under patent law.
Very often the legal distinction is whether something is obvious to "one skilled in the art" which is obviously a subjective measure that suffers from the fact that everything is obvious once you've seen it. In practice, the argument generally boils down to "if it was obvious, why didn't anyone else do it?"-- that is, it is novel if it is first.
Apple was first with the unlock image. The action is quite similar to what Neonode implemented, but if the the unlock image if of benefit and was obvious to one skilled in the art, and the Neonode folks are clearly skilled in the art, then why didn't they take this obvious step? The answer, Apple would argue, is that it must not have been obvious.
Debating patent infringement without having read the patents or done a deep dive search into prior art is futile, particularly under a patent system that's been weaponized.
Similarly, authors didn't invent the alphabet but it'd be a stretch to claim that the books they wrote aren't original.
Murder suspense thriller novels are largely similar, should you then discredit every author who wrote a suspense novel because they're not the first to do so?
Should you then also allow every author to plagiarize a bestselling suspense thriller novel and slap their own name on it and sells it as their own?
What I'm saying is that there are small details and differences in patents, patents are not a general idea of something, it entails detailed methods of implementing said patent. Hence Apple is entirely justified to litigate if their competitor's implementation is too similar or even an exact copy of Apple's
The Neonode example illustrates a brilliant point that a small difference makes the difference between patents hence the onus should be placed on competitors to use a slightly different implementation to not infringe on Apple's patents
The argument of how Apple shouldn't have sued feels disingenious as it seems to be implying that companies are fully entitled to rip others off and profit off the work of others and the owner of those patents should not litigate against said theft.
Is that truly what you call innovation?
There are
Law is law and Apple must obey.
On the other hand the chinese are as slippery and underhand as Apple any day of the week and it is a case of dirt on dirt making nobody any whiter.
There are no degrees of existance in law. Only in Apple's mind or when someone/thing puts a wobble in their day.
Shenzhen Baili, the Chinese company that claimed the iPhone 6 violated the patent of its 100c smartphone, is reported to "barely exist" following its victory in the Beijing Intellectual Property Office against Apple.
In response to Shenzhen Baili's patent lawsuit, The Wall Street Journal investigated the company, along with its parent Digione, and found that the latter company had collapsed, "brought down by buggy products, mismanagement and fierce competition, according to former employees and investors." Digione has apparently been absent from China's mobile phone market for nearly a year.
iPhone 6 (left) and Shenzhen Baili's 100c (right)
All the same, Shenzhen Baili is claiming to continue to battle Apple through its pending appeal process, and the company "is still operational in its necessary functions," according to Digione lawyer Andy Yang. The company originally filed the patent infringement claim in December 2014, shortly after the launch of the iPhone 6, but the case only recently reached the court system in Beijing.
Despite its assertion to continue going after Apple in court, the financial records of Baili and its parent company reveal that both are insolvent, with debts that greatly exceed their total assets. Former employees of the company even said that the suit against Apple was "always more a marketing ploy than a serious court case."
Despite the setback, Apple has confirmed that both the iPhone 6 and 6 Plus have stayed on sale in China thanks to an administrative order appeal from a regional patent tribunal in Beijing last month.
Article Link: Company That Sued Apple for iPhone 6 Patent Infringement 'Barely Exists'
Law is law and Apple must obey.
On the other hand the chinese are as slippery and underhand as Apple any day of the week and it is a case of dirt on dirt making nobody any whiter.
Apple also destroyed a lot of small companies along the way by stealing their product ideas. "Sherlock", anyone?
More to the subject: In today's patent system, it doesn't matter AT ALL whether the company that owns the patent "barely exists" nor does it matter if that company even has a product that uses the patent in question. Patents are NOT about such things -- they're just some abstract description on paper about some idea, and not about the implementation of that idea. And whoever puts that on paper first, wins. After that, it's only a question of whether you have sufficient funds, decent lawyers and a judge who rules in your favor. And that already implies that the patent system does not protect an inventor who came up with an awesome idea in his garage at home - due to its highly costly nature, it only protects corporations. The patent system is screwed and should be abolished yesterday. And while we're at it: The copyright system is not far from that point either. It also does not protect the artists, writers and developers, it only protects the industrial chain around the real creators. (As a historical reference: The copyright system was invented to protect the PRINTERS of the books, not the AUTHORS of these books.) In its current form, the copyright system should go, too.
The Chinese government controls the courts and approved of this ruling. Naive progressives like Cook and Co. think they can deal with the Chinese like they would other Americans or Europeans, nope. China will permanently be squeezing Apple. The $1 billion "investment" in Didi Chuxing was just one (and probably not the first) of many shakedowns to come.
Yeah. I cannot agree more.
Current copyright system is just those huge publishers/corporations used to strike others. CD price is still sky high, and streaming price is also incredibly high ($10 is too expensive, we need $5 or even lower).
For apps, I would rather pay directly to developer when possible, not to Apple, not to Microsoft, not to Google.
Anyway. Copyright system and patent system is screwed. However no one has a better idea to fix those problems. Maybe the only cure is to drastically drag down capital value so that they are far less "valuable". I don't know.
That's an audience which also gasps over new watchband colors
. So sure, when they saw something that looked cool, in a field they had no experience with, of course they were impressed!Here's what the Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit said about that audience in their Feb 2016 ruling which not only invalidated the slide-to-unlock patent, but also gave Samsung back $120 million of the original jury award:
As evidence of industry praise, Apple presented expert testimony that the attendees at an Apple event manifested approval when Steve Jobs first presented and unlocked the iPhone.... Evidence of approval by Apple fans—who may or may not have been skilled in the art—during the presentation of the iPhone is not legally sufficient. - Appeals Court Dumps Apples Slide To Unlock Patent
One thing I never see mentioned: NeoNode later noticed that new users didn't know about the slide to unlock, so they added little arrows along the path as a guide. That was 2005, I think.
Good question, and the answer is: No, not according to courts all over the world.
- At least ten judges throughout the world invalidated Apple's slide-to-unlock patent over obviousness. One example:
After that finding, and similar rejections in the UK and Germany, Apple dropped the slide-to-unlock patent from their Samsung lawsuits in other countries such as Australia. They only kept it going in friendlier California. Which worked for a while, until:
- A US CAFC panel of judges also invalidated it. See top of this post.
... or a copy of a sliding virtual on/off switch, implementations of which date from the 1980s. The CAFC cited this prior art from a 1992 paper (that also mentioned making the thumb image larger, as Apple did):
Sounds really familiar. "...movement of the unlock image from the first predefined location to a predefined unlock region on the touch-sensitive display..." - much later Apple patent
Yes, the courts have decided, as you said.
Btw, that particular '721 patent did not pass its initial USPTO reviews. Every claim was rejected three times before the examiner ran out of time and issued the patent anyway. (This happens more than it should, as a result of USPTO changes that made issuing patents easier and better for a career, than rejecting them. Examiners also figure a patent can always be challenged later if need be. Which is what happened here.)
Read this patent analysis by M-CAM, which goes into details on the rejections that Apple kept trying to overcome, and how they eventually wore down the examiner.
Not only was it a blatant attempt at priority date double-dipping (by trying to use a previous patent's date so Apple could sue others using the new one), but it left out important prior art, and is seen as a system poster child of the way that large corporations often repeatedly submit rejected patents until the examiner is worn down and out of allotted time. It's not just Apple that does this.
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The main reason Baili is doing this has more to do with international trade for several other big companies in China the likes of Huawei and ZTE who encountered a lot a "hurdles" in the trade of U.S. market.
Shenzhen Baili, the Chinese company that claimed the iPhone 6 violated the patent of its 100c smartphone, is reported to "barely exist" following its victory in the Beijing Intellectual Property Office against Apple.
Why do you need a "company to exist" in order to protect your invention from infringement. Why an individual inventor cannot protect his invention?
It's probably not mentioned because it's not really relevant. It is still different from the Apple patent. Samsung's defense rests on combining two different prior art exhibits and claiming that it was obvious to combine them-- one involves using the sliding gesture, the other, from another company, involves using a tracking image as feedback to the user.
That, in a nutshell, was my point. Googling "Neonode" doesn't teach you anything about the case. Every time a patent case comes up, people who have no idea how the system works turn it into a gang war between rival fan clubs.
The crux of the arguments are much more nuanced than that. It's also much more nuanced than the snark in the article you linked to. There's a caged view of the actual ruling at the bottom of that article, but it's much easier to just look at the full PDF issued from the court-- it is remarkably easy to read for a court opinion and does give a lot of insight into why IP law is so complex (I suspect kdarling has read it, link for non-kdarling folk):
http://www.cafc.uscourts.gov/sites/default/files/opinions-orders/15-1171.Opinion.2-24-2016.1.PDF
(Touch to unlock is referred to as '721, and the ruling for that starts on page 15-- it's more interesting to read than many would imagine)
It also explains why, even though Apple produced documents explicitly showing "Samsung engineers recommended modifying Samsung software to 'clarify the unlocking standard by sliding' to make it the 'Same as [the] iPh- one.'", that wasn't sufficient as an argument against Samsung.
Every country has its own IP laws, so judgements in one country don't necessarily translate to another, and different judgements don't necessarily indicate willful corruption or nationalism.
Falling back to defend yourself in only one country, which also happens to be the worlds biggest market, is not an indication that your case is weak, it's a financially sound decision.
It can also be seen in the judgement that this was not as cut and dried as many are trying to say it was (this wasn't a direct infringement on someone else's patent which would be straight forward, but an argument over whether a collection of prior art, taken as a whole, made Apple's patent obvious) and their argument was based on precedent in US law that may not translate to other courts.
It doesn't matter that Apple had to refine their patent a few times to get it through-- that's part of the process. If Apple was giving cash bribes to the examiner, that would matter, but "wearing them down" is kind of a weird way of describing a prescribed process that has a time limit. I agree the process isn't optimal, but you can't blame Apple for following the process. It is standard procedure to claim the world and then compromise down to a much narrower claim. At the end the examiner felt that, on balance, the claims stood and issued the patent.
They wouldn't do that for a tungsten filament in an evacuated bulb.
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In the end, my point isn't to try to litigate whether Apple's patent is valid or not, but to point out that this is much more nuanced than many people think it is and most of the arguments that are being raised are irrelevant or incomplete. If you get your information from blogs then you have little understanding of what the fight over "slide to unlock" is really about-- because it's not about sliding to unlock.
You clearly get that but, then, the post you quoted wasn't responding to you...
Only a company with deep pockets should deal with China. China is completely dishonest and fraudulent from it's business people through to it's government. Apple is big enough. The world should isolate and ignore China commercially, we would all be better off. treat them like they don't exist.
It is different, but I brought it up because it speaks to the idea of giving the user at least a visual indication of action and direction.
Yep, the 2004 NeoNode manual, and the 1992 Plaisant UI paper, from which I took an image of slide switches.
Interestingly, Apple included references to both in their patent application disclosures, which the judges took note of.
"On appeal, Apple does not dispute that Plaisant, when combined with Neonode, discloses all of the claimed features of the ’721 patent." - CAFC Ruling
I see what you're saying; that one needs to read the actual ruling to know why it's important.
Still, it was half of the prior art that won Samsung's defense both here and overseas. And many people here are apparently still unaware of it at all. So I think it does teach part of what is needed to know.
True. Which is why I attempt to educate using many different types of examples, one of which might be understandable to a particular reader, since everyone learns differently.
I agree, I think anyone who wants to seriously comment on these things should at least read the ruling as you did.
The trouble with Apple is that it often has a weak case, and their lawyers know it. That's why they did their best to make sure that prior art was kept out of the California trial and away from the jury. The same prior art made all the difference in other countries.
Someone with a very strong case would not so afraid of a jury seeing all the evidence.
I think the appellate judges' arguments closely parallel those of judges in other countries who had access to the same prior art. (E.g. the Netherlands judge noted both the NeoNode and the same example of historical UI slider switches.)
Exactly, and that's been true about almost every part of these patent trials. One of my favorites is the nuances that surround the so-called "universal search" patent, with pre-trial claim construction hearings going so far as to bring in dictionaries from the time of the patent application, to try to interpret what the original inventors actually meant. Even the placement of a comma can totally change the entire trial outcome. And yet some people still try to claim that Apple's patents were clearly valid and infringed. Nothing could be further from the truth.
Regards.
International patent and trademark law is often (not always) essentially political. There is no way Jony Ive actually copied this phone when designing the iPhone 6 - it simply doesn't make any sense. Apple doesn't have people looking at cheap Chinese domestic market phones for design ideas, plus the iPhone 6 was several years in development, so Jony's crew was working on it long before this ever turned up (I'd be amazed if they were even aware of it). Apple probably DOES have a group assigned to keep an eye on Samsung and a few other major manufacturers (and you can bet those guys have a group whose job is to keep an eye on Apple). They probably even have industrial spies whose job it is to outright steal each other's prototypes.
While this case is obvious to a neutral court (in Apple's favor),Chinese courts can be anything but neutral, especially when they're angry about sanctions against Chinese companies (as they are right now about US actions against Huawei and ZTE, right as those companies wanted a bigger share of the US market). Chinese companies might play more blatantly unfairly than many others, due to their "capitalism without democracy" political system, but don't think US companies are beyond doing the same thing... I'm sure Apple is NOT unhappy about Justice Department probes into Huawei and ZTE! Every country uses their legal system to protect their own companies at one level or another.
While this case is obvious to a neutral court (in Apple's favor),Chinese courts can be anything but neutral, especially when they're angry about sanctions against Chinese companies (as they are right now about US actions against Huawei and ZTE, right as those companies wanted a bigger share of the US market). Chinese companies might play more blatantly unfairly than many others, due to their "capitalism without democracy" political system, but don't think US companies are beyond doing the same thing... I'm sure Apple is NOT unhappy about Justice Department probes into Huawei and ZTE! Every country uses their legal system to protect their own companies at one level or another.
Actually, the specific design pieces (in red below) that the Beijing administrator looked at between the Apple and Chinese phones, especially for the side view, are more similar...
View attachment 637386
...than the same curves between the Apple and Samsung phones in the California trial:
View attachment 637385
So anyone who still actually believes the Samsung phone looked "exactly like" the Apple one, has little choice but to agree with Beijing that the Apple phone infringes the Chinese one. (In both cases, the decisions ignored all the camera / port / button / logo placements and other details that were different and that easily alerted a consumer.)
Maybe. Or it could be just a local official's favor done in an attempt to get some cash from Apple, since it was only done at the Beijing level, not national.
Wait. First you said it was obvious, then you claim it's not. In any case, you're massively incorrect
First off, Apple didn't invent the concept of swipe to prevent accidental unlocks. A horizontal swipe gesture had already been done in 2002 on a Windows CE phone exactly for that reason. What Apple patented, was using an image slid in a predefined range of motion.
However, that's the same visual action that a virtual on-off button takes, and that's why (along with the 2002 phone), other countries' courts quickly invalidated the Apple patent. Too much prior art.
But you originally argued Apple had no right to claim form as patent right for the iPhone and iPad, but now you're arguing this Chinese company does have a right to it? Seriously, your hatred of Apple has affected your memory. You pick any side against Apple, argue for it, hoping nobody remembers your points against Apple. Well some people don't forget. Such Hypocrisy. If you argue a point, at least be consistent over the whole course. You've been exposed once more. Why does an Apple hater like you come to an Apple forum in the first place? Your attempts at FUD have been exposed. Time to let your issue go, the record is utterly broken.
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Who has ever claimed that Apple invented slide to unlock? They patented it. So according to you, any company that doesn't invent something has no right to patented it? So you're absolutely against every troll patent shelf company that drags Apple into court. I'll have to frame that comment of yours for future reference when you troll these boards cheering for patent trolls. I'll remind you. You're welcome.
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Would you care to provide any links where Apple ever, somewhere claimed it invented swipe to unlock, inertial scrolling, multi-touch, pinch zoom or most everything you keep harping about?
You see, inventing is one thing, patenting is another. So you've argued in the past in favour of patent trolls (and now this company mentioned in the storyline) holding patents for things they never invented, but you come here arguing that Apple is evil because they hold patents for things they didn't invent? I would call that gross hypocrisy. So now we know why you're here, perhaps you could show some courtesy and be a tad consistent with your sophism in future.
Seriously? No.
I think everyone else got the point, which was that both decisions were based on a few similarities, while ignoring all the blatant differences. That's why I said:
Also try reading the original thread on this topic, "Apple Ordered to Halt iPhone 6 Sales in Beijing Over Patent Infringement Ruling", where I originally pointed out how silly both decisions were:
I also agreed with others that it sounded like either government pressure against Apple, or a simple money grab like with the iPad trademark case. Do try to keep up before posting, please.
Obviously you missed all the people who posted their mistaken belief that no one had ever thought of using such a gesture to prevent accidental unlocks. I'm not going to use their names, but they posted incorrect claims such as "(Competitors) used it anyway, because they couldn't think of anything just as effective. They hadn't thought of it before, even in its most simplistic form."
Well, of course not. Moreover, patent grants are not set in stone. They can be challenged and invalidated, as happened with claims in Apple's slide-to-unlock and other trial patents.
Are you claiming that a company should be able to patent something it did not invent? Nonsense. Or are you confusing patent invention with ownership?
And finally, no, I don't hate Apple. What I'm not fond of, are internet myths, and anyone who uses personal attacks in place of reading comprehension and civil discussion. If you think you have some actual facts to contribute to help your arguments, please do so. Don't try to use ad hominems as a substitute.
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I believe Kdarling has answered you very well, and yes you patent something because you came up with the idea of it first. Do you understand what a patent is?
http://www.dictionary.com/browse/patent
[doublepost=1466800840][/doublepost]Can you sue for having your head so far up your ass that you actually fail to see that your 100c phone actually infringes on Apples original iPhone 3G... If so Apple should counter sue.
Shenzhen Baili, the Chinese company that claimed the iPhone 6 violated the patent of its 100c smartphone, is reported to "barely exist" following its victory in the Beijing Intellectual Property Office against Apple.
In response to Shenzhen Baili's patent lawsuit, The Wall Street Journal investigated the company, along with its parent Digione, and found that the latter company had collapsed, "brought down by buggy products, mismanagement and fierce competition, according to former employees and investors." Digione has apparently been absent from China's mobile phone market for nearly a year.
iPhone 6 (left) and Shenzhen Baili's 100c (right)
All the same, Shenzhen Baili is claiming to continue to battle Apple through its pending appeal process, and the company "is still operational in its necessary functions," according to Digione lawyer Andy Yang. The company originally filed the patent infringement claim in December 2014, shortly after the launch of the iPhone 6, but the case only recently reached the court system in Beijing.
Despite its assertion to continue going after Apple in court, the financial records of Baili and its parent company reveal that both are insolvent, with debts that greatly exceed their total assets. Former employees of the company even said that the suit against Apple was "always more a marketing ploy than a serious court case."
Despite the setback, Apple has confirmed that both the iPhone 6 and 6 Plus have stayed on sale in China thanks to an administrative order appeal from a regional patent tribunal in Beijing last month.
Article Link: Company That Sued Apple for iPhone 6 Patent Infringement 'Barely Exists'