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This is not a patent, this is an application publication. You can tell because it says "pub no" in the upper right corner instead of "patent no". For reference:

Link to publication from TFA
Link to a real patent (believe it or not)

TFA author can't tell the difference, which is incredibly obvious once you know what you're looking for. And a lot of applications never become a patent.

Now that the application has published, anyone who knows of any prior art might be able to let the patent office know about it if this application isn't examined before the new law kicks in September 16 this year. See the America Invents Act, section 8 (starts bottom of page 32).

My comments were limited to the design patents and their claims and have nothing to do with the underlying software because there are no claims in the patents in that regard. If you had read the design patents, you would know how limited in scope it is, "CLAIM The ornamental design for a graphical user interface for a display screen or portion thereof, as shown and described." Note that there is no indication in the patent that the interface is a touchscreen. Read the patent and you figure out if any effort was required in software development to file for the patent.

You know, the submitter thoughtfully included a link to the patent, so you would not have had to (wrongly) to guess what Apple is patenting.

(Although, actually, here is a better copy of the patent, as a single PDF file including diagrams. That patent office site sometimes makes it hard to get images on some browsers/OSes).

Back to basics. A capacitor is an insulator between two conductors. The key concept here is that their insulator has an insanely high breakdown voltage, which is why they can supposedly make an ultracapacitor that operates around 500V instead of the usual 5V or so.

The patent says "The alumina-coated calcined CMBT powder and the poly(ethylene terephthalate) plastic have exceptional high-voltage breakdown and when used as a composite with the plastic as the matrix the average voltage breakdown was 5.57 * 10^6 V/cm or higher. The voltage breakdown of the poly(ethylene terephthalate) plastic is 580 V/micrometer at 23 degrees C. and the voltage breakdown of the alumina-coated CMBT powders is 610 V/micrometer at 85 degrees C."

Note how many different units they use. Conventionally, dielectric strength is quoted as KV/mm. So we have

• Their new composite: 5.57 * 10^6 V/cm = 5.57 * 10 ^ 3 KV/cm = 5.57 * 10 ^ 2 KV/mm = 557 KV/mm
• PET: 580 V/micrometer = 580 KV/mm
• Alumina-coated CMBT powders: 610 V/micrometer = 610 KV/mm

First, why did they make a composite that's worse than either of its components? This would be obvious if they used the same units for all their breakdown voltages in the patent.

Second, those are unreasonably good numbers. The usual breakdown voltage for PET as used in Mylar capacitors is only 17 KV/mm. Why is their PET 35 times as good as everybody else's?

(Check this, please. Look at the actual patent image. The searchable text version at the USPTO doesn't show math symbols very well.)

Apple seems to enjoy patenting stuff that others have already come up with. Some time back, the filed a patent on voice menus, despite the fact that the rockbox project had already released such a feature(and, since rockbox development is in the open, the feature could be said to have been public even prerelease) and the Kenwood music keg had been selling with a similar feature for some time.

Slashdot also mentioned, a while back Apple's attempt to patent the same OLED keyboard that Art Lebedev has been showing pictures of since forever.

Apple does occasionally innovate, and they are quite good at executing "polished version of something somebody else did already; but not really well enough for the mass market"; but they have a downright nasty habit of patenting stuff that other people have already developed.

First off, they don't quite link to the patent so on a non-slashdottable version is here or you can go straight to the full massive PDF if you want (single file if you have problems viewing above in Linux).

Looks pretty much like a poster child example of why the patent system is broken. Either that or the USPTO needs to start looking at revoking patents in hind sight or after professional review by many leading members of the field. So much for patent reform!

This is going to be interesting. Section 337 actions are brought in rem, so success in this action could result in an exclusion order against any product incorporating or including the infringing device. That's lots of stuff! Section 337 actions are also fast, furious, and expensive!

You can get a copy of the patent from http://www.pat2pdf.org/

Here's the original 7 patents... #6,430,275, #6,137,869, #6,104,711, #6,282,574, #6,128,304, #6,298,062, and #6,359,880.

It sounds like #6,430,275 (tiff, pdf, text/png) is the one that's the VOIP/POTS bit.

Well written. I like alternatives. :) Usually makes for good conversation.

However, your proposal has a lot of problems.

1) Who gets to write a summary of the patent? Doesn't the summary stand a good chance of suggesting the answer? "Can you envision a way to make use of the friction energy generated by automobile brakes?" "Uhhhh... sure... I guess you could, uh, charge an electric battery..." (patent)

2) In some cases, recognizing that there even is a problem is the brunt of the invention. "Let's say you have a telegraph. And let's say you have two people who want to communicate in both directions using that telegraph. How might you do that?" (patent)

3) Is this really a good way of determining novelty and non-obviousness? Maybe you just have twelve really stupid or unimaginative reviewers. ;) And what happens if the invention is in such a niche field that you can't find a full 12 experts to review it? What if you can't even find one?

4) Even if you can find twelve reviewers, and even if they do a good job - can you imagine the expense involved? And the delays?

A two or three year duration is the absolute maximum reasonable time for a software patent. Twenty years is laughable. Outside of obscure specialty software like banking systems, twenty years from now, no piece of software that is currently in use will still be in use in any identifiable way.

Yeah! Like that MP3 algorithm - no one uses that any more. (many patents)

Or RSA public-key cryptography - nobody uses that old thing. (patent)

But this assertion has an even bigger problem than being factually incorrect: it's impossible to apply it. There is no bright-line test for "software" vs. "hardware" vs. "biotech," etc. In fact, many inventions cross these boundaries - that's what's cool about technology. What patent term would you afford to a patent for a hardware circuit that implements a bioinformatics algorithm?

- David Stein

According to the transaction history of the patent (Sorry for the long url – http://portal.uspto.gov/external/portal/!ut/p/_s.7 _0_A/7_0_CH/.cmd/ad/.ar/sa.getBib/.ps/N/.c/6_0_69/ .ce/7_0_3AB/.p/5_0_341/.d/5?selectedTab=fileHistor ytab&isSubmitted=isSubmitted&dosnum=10260471#7_0_3 AB), the patent was rejected only once. The main cause was (not surprisingly) that "a method of traversing a list... is an abstract idea or the mere manipulation of an abstract idea." However, some other claims were rejected as prior art according to US Patent 5,950,191 (See http://www.pat2pdf.org/pat2pdf/foo.pl?number=59501 91).
Saying that, the mentioned patent may not be so obvious as seems at first sight. The idea is not a simple linked-list or doubly-linked-list, but somewhat more sophisticated linked-list with auxiliary pointers.

Slashdot has always been the KOA Kampground of overweight pear-shaped losers who profess to be highly intelligent yet somehow fail to even take five minutes to go have a look at what it is they are railing against. GO HAVE A LOOK AT THE PATENT. LOOK AT THE PRIOR ART REFERENCES CITED BY THE EXAMINER DURING PROSECUTION. LOOK AT THE *CLAIMS* TO SEE WHAT IS ACTUALLY BEING PATENTED, LOSERS.

Go here: http://www.pat2pdf.org/ (it's free, just like you guys like stuff) and enter the patent number "6,999,083" and you will receive a steamy fresh PDF of the patent. And, oh my, what's this?

References Cited:
Tom Ham, "Half-Life: Spectator Tech", June 2001, http://www.gamespy.com/articles/june01/hlmod3b/.*

Remember kids, you may educate yourselves for FREE on internet and it won't require you to leave your Mom's basement.

The PDF shows the the figures:

Method and apparatus for tooth bone conduction microphone.
http://pat2pdf.org/patents/pat20050196008.pdf

Thanks to pat2pdf.org.

This would be a better link

http://www.pat2pdf.org/patents/pat6928433.pdf

We have all been getting wrapped up in hysteria. The USPTO's examiner rejected Apple's application, supposedly as not patentable over a Microsoft patent application, or so it appears.

I used to be a patent examiner (1999-2000; left in large part due to the fact that I didn't feel the job could be done properly with the resources and time available). I've read, as many of you have, the respective applications, notably the claims. Keep in mind that only claims can be infringed upon. Patents are granted solely on an applications claims, not on any other stuff described in the application. While the full disclosure in application M can be used to reject application A's claims, A only infringes on M if it is claimed by M.

The claims of the M$ application (PDF) are not infringed upon, IMHO, by the Apple application (PDF). M$ claims a way of generating a playlist, whereas Apple claims a method of interfacing wherein a user directly picks items to be played. Even though M$ claims -- in a dependent claim that their system might be included in a media player, that still does not mean Apple is infringing on the M$ patent, should the M$ patent stand. It only means that Apple cannot patent its device over that which M$ disclosed in its application.

Further, IMHO, independent claim 1 of the Apple application specifically cites selecting items "through a rotational action with respect to said user device" -- something which I cannot find in the M$ application. Therefore, there is no reasonable case for infringement. The only question is whether that 'rotational' step alone makes Apple's app patentable over the M$ app (again, still assuming we don't even bother to knock out the M$ app), or whether Apple will need to narrow its claims a bit first.

I am not worried about the iPod infringing on the M$ app/patent in question. However, iTunes' creation of Smart Playlists appear to be a much closer match to what M$ discloses. That is where Apple should be worried, unless they can show a different, non-infringing algorithm for auto-creating their Smart Playlists.

We have all been getting wrapped up in hysteria. The USPTO's examiner rejected Apple's application, supposedly as not patentable over a Microsoft patent application, or so it appears.

I used to be a patent examiner (1999-2000; left in large part due to the fact that I didn't feel the job could be done properly with the resources and time available). I've read, as many of you have, the respective applications, notably the claims. Keep in mind that only claims can be infringed upon. Patents are granted solely on an applications claims, not on any other stuff described in the application. While the full disclosure in application M can be used to reject application A's claims, A only infringes on M if it is claimed by M.

The claims of the M$ application (PDF) are not infringed upon, IMHO, by the Apple application (PDF). M$ claims a way of generating a playlist, whereas Apple claims a method of interfacing wherein a user directly picks items to be played. Even though M$ claims -- in a dependent claim that their system might be included in a media player, that still does not mean Apple is infringing on the M$ patent, should the M$ patent stand. It only means that Apple cannot patent its device over that which M$ disclosed in its application.

Further, IMHO, independent claim 1 of the Apple application specifically cites selecting items "through a rotational action with respect to said user device" -- something which I cannot find in the M$ application. Therefore, there is no reasonable case for infringement. The only question is whether that 'rotational' step alone makes Apple's app patentable over the M$ app (again, still assuming we don't even bother to knock out the M$ app), or whether Apple will need to narrow its claims a bit first.

I am not worried about the iPod infringing on the M$ app/patent in question. However, iTunes' creation of Smart Playlists appear to be a much closer match to what M$ discloses. That is where Apple should be worried, unless they can show a different, non-infringing algorithm for auto-creating their Smart Playlists.