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SONICblue Granted Broad Patent on DVR Technology
hayb writes: "In another miscue from the U.S. Patent office, Sonicblue has received a patent for everything under the PVR sun. Now comes the question if they will go after others, or at least Tivo. To quote the first line of the patent: 'USPTO patent number 6,324,338 also covers methodology that creates, names, prioritizes and manages recorded programs on the hard drive for DVRs.'"
and earn a Slashdotting - that'll teach 'em.
How is this different than ye olde filesystem directory? Does that qualify as prior art?
Fuck prior art, recording video onto a hard drive is hardly "non-obvious".
-- Sigs are for losers
I love the fact that patent wars might erupt between the PVR folks while at the same time theyre battling copyright wars with everyone else....Damn, I love capitalism ;)
.sig wanted: Must be concise, funny, and display my cleverness.
I understand that the USPTO office has no idea what is involved in any sort of tru innovation, but I really begin to wonder if things, such as organization of recorded programs, should ever be patentable. I understand patenting the technology behind the way that PVR stuff works, but to patent the idea of a pvr seems very silly to me. Couldn't the same thing have been done with an archive of VHS tapes and a computer. How is the technology behind this really new other than the fact that it is done with a different medium (tapes vs hard drive).
So it has an advanced search feature and a somewhat interactive selection stage. Don't most software packages have the same features? There is nothing novel about these features; only the physical setting has changed (from the PC to the PVR). I think the U.S.P.T.O. has been infiltrated or something...
"What is the sound of one belly slapping?"
What happens with add-on boards for the PC like the WinTV-PVR which can essentially turn your PC into a DVR?
I wonder if ATI's All-In-Wonder and others will get swept up in this? Just a thought since there are several graphics card co's creating TV tuner and recording capabilities in to their cards and providing software for doing TiVo and Replay like functions (record and organize).
Just wondering how far SonicBlue will push the patents? I imagine we'll see TiVo and others reach some sort of license deal and eventually pass the cost on to us in the end, as it usually happens.
-s
Here's a better question. Does it matter if they do?
We've seen dozens of dumb patents come through lately, many of which could apparently be thrown out on the basis of prior art. The question is, have they? I certainly can't think of any off the top of my head. How many months/years does it take to prove prior art and get some of these nuts-o patents rescinded? And during that time, can the patent holder still collect on it? Does the holder have to return money made from the patent in the event that prior art is found, or are people who licensed the patent screwed out of that cash?
End of lesson. You may press the button.
There are two things to note:
There is prior art for this stuff. Besides TiVo, people have tried to do this kind of technology before in the past; Java was spawned off of an 'embedded systems language' called Oak; which IIRC was built for things like PVRs, etc... but in the early 90s the public just wasn't ready for that kind of tech. Regardless, at the least TiVo was around before ReplayTV. Prior art is a powerful thing. Besides, SonicBlue has M$ To contend with as well, M$ having that UltimateTV thing (Which I strangely haven't seen/ heard ads for lately; i remember them blitzing the media early this summer.)
Additionally, as referenced in This Slashdot Article from earlier this year, TiVo was also recently granted a slew of patents on PVR Tech. I'm not sure which company got what tech patented however...
Me wonders - given SONICBlue's flamboyant flaunting and flouting of The Media interests - and now this patent - could SONICBlue be a media industry trojan horse? Conspiracies, conspiracies everywhere.
pr0n - keeping monitor glass spotless since 1981.
I'd be very surprised if a lawsuite comes out of this except as a tactic to leverage a little better price on patent royalties. Sonicblue will give Tivo a call that goes a little something like this:
Sonicblue: Hi, Tivo, we were thinking you might want to license this patent from us for $X.
Tivo: But that's not a valid patent, we've been doing that for years.
Sonicblue: Well, you can fight us if you'd like. I'm sure your lawyers will only charge you 10-100 times $X.
Tivo: hmmmm... okay, where do we send the money. We can always pass the cost on to the customer anyhow
This sig has been temporarily disconnected or is no longer in service
The first lines of patents tend to be broad, but not because the patents are broad, but rather because the first lines are introducing the field that the patent is in.
The first few claims are often the same way, giving definitions and context for claims built on them. Claims aren't supposed to be that way, but often they are anyhow. I was once told that a claim had to be a single sentence and could not contain the word "or". Makes things tricky.
In another miscue from the U.S. Patent office
Why is this a miscue? ReplayTV was the first to develop PVR technology and patent it. I can remember first hearing about the ReplayTV several years ago, and then several months later I heard of a competitor called TiVo.
If this patent is a miscue, where is your prior art evidence to back that up?
"And like that
It looks like this thing is practically patenting copying video to a hard drive... so couldn't not only Tivo, but also RealPlayer, Windows Media Player, tons of independant video players, etc. be used as examples of prior art if SonicBlue were to go after anyone with this?
Seems like a pretty weak and unenforcable patent when prior art is EVERYWHERE.
The USPTO has issued patents to various organizations for dubious reasons, apparently. But they've done this for a long time. Such as allowing software patents and things like human genetic structures... This isn't what bothers me alone.
The major thing is that nobody appears to be shocked over this. This is what is really scary. Why? Because if these patents become increasingly ambiguous, who is to say that it can't get worse, without public scrutony? And worse, are patent laws going to be changed so that a filing party can "contribute" to the USPTO or any other organization to receive a "limited disclosure" filing? I know that is highly hypothetical and probably won't happen, but stranger things have happened.
Wealth is the product of man's capacity to think. -Ayn Rand
I recall a previous /. article about a little IP-licencing-wannabe company called Pause Technology that held a 1992 patent on the whole DVR idea. Where do they fit in all this?
My spoon is too big!
I, for one, think this is a good thing. After a brief visit to Microsoft's "Re-education" Center I've learned that competition bad, patents good.
Interesting how Sonicblue were "good guys" to your average Slashdot goer for fighting the evil entertainment industry...
Then they went and won a patent. Now they're EVIL! How *DARE* they attempt to make money!
end communication
"Say Goodbye to 20 years of Network Oppression! "
(crowd cheers)
"And Say Hello to 20 years of SONICBlue Oppression!"
(crowd continues to cheer)
Jack Valenti and the MPAA are to technology as the Boston strangler is to the woman home alone
Both companies claim they have patents....
:
From SonicBlue (aka ReplayTV):
USPTO patent number 6,324,338 also covers methodology that creates, names, prioritizes and manages recorded programs on the hard drive for DVRs.
"This patent and other forthcoming ReplayTV patents will establish SONICblue as the leading provider of Digital Video Recording technology," said Ken Potashner, chairman and CEO, SONICblue. "Over the next five to seven years, we expect the DVR to become as prevalent in the home as the VCR is today."
From Tivo
TiVo, headquartered in Sunnyvale, Calif. is the creator of personal television. TiVo's easy-to-use service and patented consumer electronics technology will allow consumers to take control of their television viewing experience by teaching TiVo their likes and dislikes.
So, it's going to come down to a lawsuit. Whichever company can show they had the first working, worthwhile thoughts will eventually be able to force the other to pay royalties. Does this mean either will go out of business? Probably not, it just means one is going to be $10/box more, and that $10 might going to the competitor instead of the CEO.
Video for Online Dating Profiles
This patent is not just about recording video onto hard disks. Most of the claims are dependent on a clause that says "a processor selecting future shows from a channel guide database for recording based on said user specified criteria, wherein the selection of shows is based on one of either pattern matching or fuzzy logic analysis of the user specified criteria and the channel guide database, and wherein the processor further selects for removal a previously recorded show having a lower priority than the selected future shows if insufficient capacity exists for recording the future shows;" This allows you the box to learn that you like SciFi and automatically record all the SciFi shows. Not hard, once you hear the idea, but I remember thinking that was a good idea when the product first came onto the market.
Other claims talk about automatically recording portions of a program that repeats. That way you always have the latest CNN sports news. I don't think anybody's product does this yet. (But it does seem kind of $illy to have two dependent claims that mention CNN.)
This patent is not just a software patent. Yes, some of it can be implemented using software, but not all of it. I don't know all the prior art, but this isn't completely obvious, and it's certainly not as fundamental to the industry as the press release implies.
I think this kind of statement sort of implies that they may use it as a stick to beat down their competitors, including Tivo. Unfair, since ReplayTV actually disappeared from the market for a time, suddenly popping up as SonicBlue.
But what really bothers me is the destructive effect that this may have. Tivo has worked very hard to not only provide a unique and valuable product to their customers, they've also been very careful to "play nice" with the networks. They have, for instance, refused to put a 30-second-skip button on the remote. They've also, discouraged copying of programs from the harddrive (how effective that is, I don't know). And so on.
Meanwhile ReplayTV/SonicBlue have done the skip button, and with the latest incantations of their boxen, claim to be able send shows between units (a scheme that will undoubtably be cracked, if it hasn't already) which, of course, can't make the networks happy at all.
Terrific. So now are choices are a company that the networks like, but that is doomed by patent infringments (maybe), or a "bad-boy" that the networks will eventually crush because of their disregard for the networks' well-being... Ugh....
And somewhere, in the shadows, is Microsoft (UltimateTV) waiting to step in with their "Content owner-friendly" box....
Anyone want to buy a TV-set? Cheap?
Where the value of X-Mailer: is the true measure of a man...
It looks like this thing is practically patenting copying video to a hard drive... so couldn't not only Tivo, but also RealPlayer, Windows Media Player, tons of independant video players, etc. be used as examples of prior art if SonicBlue were to go after anyone with this?
I haven't analyzed the patent enough to see if it is really trying to patent "copying video to a hard drive," but I did not get that on my first impression.
However, TiVo came AFTER ReplayTV, and RealPlayer streams video, it doesn't save it. Windows Media Player plays/streams video, it's not in charge of saving video. And the last two don't even deal with TV programs.
I think the title of their PR sums up the patent: "Patent Covers Methodology for Recording and Storing TV Shows."
"And like that
The link is unclear, but it appears to only affect DVRs, not PCs . . . I couldn't find it easily on uspto.gov either.
The patent. This reads as if it's only the interface they're patenting IMHO.
Best line:
13. The method as recited by claim 10 wherein the default channel is CNN Headline News.
obvious doesn't enter into it.
they can be challenged.
there was this guy he patented the "pencil"(as we now no it).
then there was this guy, he patents the eraser.
then there was a third guy, take a pencil, puts an eraser on it, get a patent.
But just adding 2 thing together is not patentable in less they do something unique, so the third guy's, patent was challenged and he had it revoked.it did nothing new.
Now, we just need to prove that adding all these abilites together really doesn't do anything different then each of there individule parts would do if noit bound together.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
PVR are old like hell...
.COM's, you pay to get it and you can get screwed if you don't get all the little bits left and right (like domain.com, mydomain.com dom-ain.com), and even if you do, someone will workaround it (.net .whatever) and you'll have to finish this up in court (only lawyers win)same go if you're legit and if you're stepping on somebody else that can claims anything out of his little left and right bit, you get sued again...
does that mean that if I sell my program I made on my amiga 8 years ago to record TV content with my DPS personnal video recorder, to my hard drive at a precise hour, I'll be breaking this patent?
Yet another stupid patent that shows that Patents are becomming stupid
While I do understand that technological patents are a pain to filter and there's no black and white yes/no approach to them, and that if you're not precise enough, people go around you, if you're overkill and patent every screws in your system, of course you're blocking anything else using the same screws so it's ridiculous, but c'mon... some people are actually PAIED to work this out and THINK about how to manage these issues, it's not our job, but then again, it seems like they aren't doing theirs and it's the rest of us that are penalized.
--- Metamoderating abusive downgraders since my 300th post.
> So should your inability to spell...
As well as your ability to read. It was "Outlowed", not "Autolowed". Autolowed is what programs do. Outlowed means "made lower than", or, alternatively, "mooed more than".
Virg
Well, prior art means exactly didley-swat!
:-)
For example, Julius Caesar used to have a combover two millenia ago. But look what i found in Delphion.
Scary, huh. If you're gonna try that you've got bigger problems than both hairloss and patent infridgement.
I hate to reply to my own post, but this is NOT flamebait! I was attempting to point out that patents are a key underpinning of the economic system that makes a technological world possible.
/. love to hate patents without having thought of this vital aspect of the problem, but in the context of the article posted, that's pretty dang relevant!
I realize that many here at
For more info on how big companies can abuse patents, and how they keep them from steam-rolling the little guys, see my letter to the editor in LWN a while back: http://lwn.net/2000/0420/backpage.phtml#backpage
"The future's good and the present is nothing to sneeze at." - Roblimo's last
Lawsuits are expensive. Why would Tivo spend millions of dollars and years in court tangling with SonicBlue when they can just pay them a few bucks per unit in royalties and pass that on to the customers?
Now conceivably Sonicblue could try to monopolize the market by refusing to license to Tivo but it's not like they want a huge court battle either. It's in their financial best interest to license it to Tivo. Lawsuits might come up as a negotiating strategy but I think it's very unlikely this will ever end up in court.
Remember, when you go to court the only people that win are lawyers.
This sig has been temporarily disconnected or is no longer in service
You are speaking of two different things. Patents are designed to protect the inventor (as your quote from Ms. Bowles implies), but you go on to criticize the /. community for pointing out that patents shouldn't be awarded when the "innovation" is obvious or follows prior art.
Patents are actually the tools used by Microsoft and others to stomp on everyone they feel like. They--unlike the inventor--have an army of lawyers who know the weaknesses of the Examination process at the P.T.O.
Your assertion about the cause of innovation is 100% erroneous. I don't recall hearing of Leonardo DaVinci's numerous patents, nor the numerous patents awarded to the ancient Egyptians for "a process of stacking 20,000+ lb blocks of stone in the sand to form a giant pyramid", or the ancient Mayans for "a device which indicates the vernal equinox by allowing the sun's rays to illuminate a wall". Innovation is the direct result of human will, which our patent system appears to be smothering by allowing Megacorps to hoard patents for everything under the sun.
"What is the sound of one belly slapping?"
My company developed a multimedia system that recorded (crude greyscale) video to a hard drive, in real time, with random access to files. We also wrote a groundbreaking proposal for a digital information storage media standard (UDiS Media). Said proposal sent to various major electronics companies and written up in at least one British computer magazine. In the UDiS Media proposal, we described a machine (based on the aforementioned multimedia system that would record TV programming based on content of interest. When? In 1988. We intend to develop our machine and it will be good to know that our 'prior art' (which was demonstrated in the UK in 1988, and in the USA in 1991) will at the very least mean SonicBlue / ReplayTV will not be able to sue us when it comes to some of the basic claims. A final point of interest, I just today found out that my US patent attorney represents SonicBlue. What a tangled web we have weaved.
O'WONDERWe're working on it.
Honestly, I think it's a good thing that they got this patent. They've made so many bad choices in the last 5 years, that maybe this is what they need to get themselves out of debt. They no longer have a hold in the video card market (read, s3, Diamond). Their share in the portable mp3 player market isn't that impressive anymore since It's been flooded with alternatives that work as well, if not better than theirs. I've used both a TiVo and a ReplayTV, and they're both awesome products. Personally, I'd choose a ReplayTV over a TiVo though. Anyhow, just my $.02
Are there any good open source PVR projects?
pr0n - keeping monitor glass spotless since 1981.
Here's the patent in question from the USPTO's website. Note that it was filed August 7, 1998 - long before TiVo went into operation. I also notice that I don't think it reference's the 1992 patent on pausing a live TV feed (as other posters were asking about) - I could be wrong on that though.
-"Zow"
I agree that patents have an extremely important roll in protecting some forms of innovation. Drugs companies, for instance, pour massive amounts of money into researching drugs. If they didn't have patent protection to prevent other companies from chemically cloning their work and issuing a generic drug, they wouldn't do the research.
Patents serve another important purpose as well--they encourage companies to _publish_ their techinical innovations, rather than keeping them as trade secrets. This allows people to build on the ideas in the patents, even if they may have to pay royalties. Also, patents to have limited duration--eventually the work reverts to the public domain. The secret of making half-silvered mirrors was jealously guarded in Europe for years, retarding the development of optics.
However, not all fields need patent protection. Buisiness Innovations, for instance, are one of the stupidest things patentable under todays system. A company derives benefits from using a buisiness innovation first, regardless of how many other people copy it.
I am also of the opinion that software does not need to be patented. Copyright protection protects the specific implemenation from being stolen. The patentability of mathematical algoritms protects many other research intensive software projects. Most other software patents seem to be "using computers and software to do X." Maybe software patents could be fixed by a more strict application of the principle "nothing is patentable that is obvious to a practitioner of the art," but unless you can come up with some good examples of software innovation that wouldn't have occured without patent protection, I'll still favor eliminating them.
Pay a little attention: there will always be some isolated innovation by lone inventors.
The point is that if you want to harness that innovation to create a technological society (which requires a technological *economy*, sorry communists!), then patents aren't just nice, they're absolutely vital.
I don't deny that patent abuse occurs - but the system works *very* well in rooting out bad patents in places where it actually matters. (Nobody cares if Joe Doaks is silly enough to pay for 15 diesel-powered toenail clipper patents, so those bad patents will stand unchallenged, the ones that matter are contested, as they should be. The system works, and works well.)
"The future's good and the present is nothing to sneeze at." - Roblimo's last
It's the claims which count, not what the marketing folks say.
Claim 1 requires a channel guide database, user criteria, that the processor use pattern matching or fuzzy logic, and an interesting kicker -- the processor also "further selects for removal a previously recorded show having a lower priority than the selected future shows if insufficient capacity exists for recording the future shows..."
Most of the independent claims (1, 19,30,36,42,48,49,50) have this limitation, namely the leabillity to automatically remove old recorded shows.
If you don't have this limitation, it seems to me you've avoided those claims.
On the other hand, I don't know what Claim 26 means!
namaste-
Just because one company has a patent doesn't necessarily mean it will put another out of business. (I know what I'm talking about, I was a US patent paralegal for the #1 computer company for several years.)
If either company holds any value to Intellectual Property, they should have a flock of patents coming down the pipeline for any given product. (Don't go looking for them because you won't find them until they're issued.) Patents usually take 2 years to issue and they are typically issued with fairly specific claim language (unless it's something stellar like a time-machine).
Also, many companies have in-house attorneys who handle IP problems like this all day long. It's nothing new. Often times both companies will end up cross-licensing their patents with each other to keep new competitors at bay.
In the computer industry, this kind of thing happens all the time. There is so much cross-licensing going on between the major computer manufacturers you'd think it was a cartel. I'm not even kidding.
Trust me, this is nothing to get worked up about. The only reason that the Amazon one-click patent was so problematic is that their competitors didn't have any patents at all, and business methods (at the time) were thought to be unpatentable. Did it put their competitors out of business? No. It just made things really uncomfortable.
Even in most worst cases, a negligible royalty fee is usually negotiated for - and even then, the damages (royalties) only START since the time the "infringing" company is put on notice from the owner of the patent.
*yawn*
"They said I probly shouldn't fly with just one eye," "I am Bender. Please insert girder."
My impression of SonicBlue is a good one. Not only do they make a good product, but they have stood up to law suits and other such drivel that is dangerous to fair use and personal rights (30 second/ant commercial button, etc...). They're revenue is going to come from users who decide that they need Sonic Blue's service and have a good impression of SB. If they start suing my video card's manufacturer and prevent me from using other such resources, not only is prior art going to be established and the patent is going to get thrown out, but they are going to lose my business as well as, I hope, yours.
Nothing says you have to apply for a patent. But if you invent something that is novel, useful, and non-obvious to one reasonably schooled in the art, and you want to have a chance at taking it to market unmolested, then you'll file a patent on it.
/. just blast away against patents because Stallman doesn't like them, without ever bothering to learn how they work. Stallman's wrong about a lot of things, patents are #2 on the list. (Emacs instead of vi is #1... Now *that's* flamebait!)
The cost argument doesn't wash: Patents can be had for a few hundred dollars in filing fees. People usually use patent attorneys becuse its easier and quicker, but it's NOT required. In fact, in the US, the USPTO is REQUIRED to assist you in your filing as an individual inventor without counsel. PLEASE read up before you flame: I'd suggest Nolo's excellent book, Patent it Yourself Sadly, most people here on
"The future's good and the present is nothing to sneeze at." - Roblimo's last
Also, patents to have limited duration--eventually the work reverts to the public domain. The secret of making half-silvered mirrors was jealously guarded in Europe for years, retarding the development of optics.
This is an excellent point I didn't make in the interest of brevity.
I think the real only problem with patents, especially software and computer patents, is that the pace of development has so far outstripped the term of the patents.
Personally, I'd like to see some sort of self-regulating system that would adjust the length of all patents issued in any particular field between 5 and 20 years, inversely proportional to the number of patents granted in that field over the past twelve months. Five years seems long enough for even the fast moving stuff (remember it needs to be long enough to recover R&D costs and make some money), 20 should be enough for the slow-moving stuff. Such a system also fights abuse, since big companies that file lots of patents just because they can (IBM, anyone?) would find that such a practice is self-defeating, and devalues their important patents. Also, it tends to favor original inventors that bring true innovation, while devaluing the fruits of the system for those that seek to profit by simply filing lots of patents late to "get a piece of the action". If those patents are shorter, the incentive to abuse the system is considerably less. It's key that such a self-regulator be pegged to patents *granted* rather than patents *filed* - that way, the term changes only kick in if there's innovation sufficient to be patentable in the first place. (If terms were tied to filings, malicious groups could "poison the waterhole" for everyone...)
"The future's good and the present is nothing to sneeze at." - Roblimo's last
6,666,666
Inventor: Satan, et. al.
Friday, 13th September 2002
Secure repository of souls in unpleasant conditions.
Abstract
This patent covers a method of storage of a plurality of souls, selected by an inverse meritocratic criteria, in a plurality of areas containing, but not limited to, fire, brimstone and bubbling pools of sulphur.
As for the rest of it, you can get an IR port that acts like a serial port for your PC. Setting up your PC for IR (or bluetooth) remote control should be pretty straight forward.
I'm trying to teach myself to set people on fire with my mind... Is it hot in here?
If the only thing that these guys can claim to have invented is the concept that, if the disk is full, the least-priority previously recorded program is deleted, how can they claim that such an invention is such a blindingly brilliant contribution to the world as to merit patent protection?
Yes, but it's an old idea, storing video on HDs, I had had the idea back in 1987 while a student, I'm pretty sure I discussed it with atleast 20 students at the time, my vision included what would in todays parlance be called a peer2peer moderation system as the cable link would have been two way, we didnt have buzzwords back in the day, if TiVo or any other manufacturer wants me and my old hacker student freinds to stand up in court and blow this peice of trash out of the water we'll expect all expenses paid, okay?
Any sufficiently advanced man is indistinguishable from God
Anonymous Coward is right. We should take a few moments to READ the patent before commenting on it. My initial reaction was an off-the-cuff remark - another reason not to post unless you have something to SAY. Anyway, on to the point:
IANAL, but I readthe 338 Patent and a couple of the others. This patent references pre-existing technologies and - my reading - basically says that they're patenting their feature set and particular implementation. Nothing new here. Yeah, they may be over-reaching, but that despends on your point of view and what they do.
It's something that, yes, a company can whip out and club another one over the head with. Yeah, it can be used to squeeze royalties out of someone for an infringement. Any patent does that, for a while anyway.
All patents are designed to squeeze the maximum claim for the maximum legal "protection" and financial gain. You stand on the shoulders of prior art, but ultimately what decides whether you violated patent rights or not is a judge or collection thereof, the size of your bribe, and/or your legal budget. There are whole business that do nothing but hold patents and sue the crap out of any industry player that does what that paper says (e.g. link to a document) and make them pay a fee that will be large enough to satisfy the blood sucking leeches, but cheaper that going to court over it. They may allege something STUPID, like they invented the wheel or the hyperlink, but it's often cheaper to pay than litigate and risk huge leech fees and huge damages. This is patent law, friends. Blah.
Anyway, my personal opinion is that patents are freaking stupid. They don't protect what they should protected. Instead, they're used like clubs to beat other companies with. Another tool in the legal arsenal.
I'd rather see a return to trial by combat. Each company chooses a champion who fight it out to the death (or tap-out) or whatever. If only Bill Gates, Steve Jobs, and Xerox Parc squared off in an arena with axes or something. Panem et Circenses.
And secondly, broad patents which can be thrown out easily in court are still very usefull for large corporations with lots of cash and/or lawyers. They can scare any smaller startups out which don't have the cash to fight. It's the USPTO's obgligation to reject stupid patents to prevent abuse by the megacorps.
I was once told that a claim had to be a single sentence
Easy. "We claim a method for allowing $cool_feature comprising " followed by a list of noun phrases describing the steps.
and could not contain the word "or"
The patent under present discussion contains an "or" in the first claim: "wherein the selection of shows is based on one of either pattern matching or fuzzy logic analysis of the user specified criteria"
However: this particular wording opens up a potential loophole: The word "either" may turn an OR into an XOR by excluding the "both" possibility.
Will I retire or break 10K?
2 people were developing the telephone, bell patented it mere hours before the other guy.
That's not the whole story. Mr. Bell submitted his final patent a couple hours before Mr. Gray submitted his first draft.
However, as the population of the United States increases, assuming the proportion of inventors in the population remains constant, the number of inventors will increase, and the probability of two inventors inventing the same invention independently increases approximately as the square of the number of inventors. Your attorney may be able to use independent invention as evidence of obviousness to disprove the validity of a patent.
Will I retire or break 10K?
>10312934826: "Demolishing buildings with airliners"
>MR BIN LADEN I WANT MY ROYALTIES!!!!
I dont think afghanistan allows patents on business methods.. like most countries...
//rdj
No one can understand the truth until he drinks of coffee's frothy goodness.
--Sheikh Abd-Al-Kadir, 1587
The Chicago Manual of Style says I can do it either way in the context I used (punctuation not part of the quote). So that's just a matter of preference.
Virg
TiVo has already been granted several patents. I don't know exactly what they entail, but it is entirely possible that Replay's patents detail a different type of PVR than TiVo uses. The systems have a similar application, but are vastly different in their implementation. My understanding of patents is that the way you do something can be just as patentable as the application itself, so the two may not even be related.
"The guide is definitive, reality is frequently inaccurate."
Because, technically, the outline is supposed to cover what is covered by the Patent grant. The body is supposed to merely be the defense of the WHY the Patent grant should be given.
I am not merely a "consumer" or a "taxpayer". I am a Citizen of the State of Texas
The patent examiner is supposed to be a professional in the field in question. They're supposed to be able to assess the claims on their merit, etc. If it's an obvious patent it's not supposed to get past the examiner stage.
There really isn't anything novel here other than TiVo and others made it possible to do things that only much more expensive professional systems are capable of.
There really shouldn't have been a grant on this "Patent".
I am not merely a "consumer" or a "taxpayer". I am a Citizen of the State of Texas
Dublin, when I hear you rambling I would guess that your dad is a patent lawyer. I will try some correction:
No, my dad's not a patent lawyer, but he does hold a number of patents, all of which are truly new and innovative.
Some other examples where patents had negative effects:
- WAP: it blocked further innovations that would have been more appreciated by the market.
- digital and internet TV: only a very select group of companies is active of this market. Most companies prefer to leave this legal minefield to others.
WAP died because it was an incredibly stupid idea, and darn near useless, not because the phone.com folks were too heavyhanded with the patents, even though they were.
As for digital/Internet TV, I'll give you only one point there: The Gemstar patent on displaying on-screen program guide information in a grid has caused some minor problems in the industry, but really only for those that refuse to license it. (For those who are wondering, this is why the DirectTV guide works pretty well, and the Scientific Atlanta digital set-top guide is so clunky - the latter are designed around the Gemstar patent.) I personally think this one is not non-obvious, but Gemstar has proven otherwise - to the point that TV Guide decided not long ago to buy Gemstar for that patent...
"The future's good and the present is nothing to sneeze at." - Roblimo's last