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Sun and Kodak Settle Out of Court
prostoalex writes "The patent dispute between Eastman Kodak and Sun Microsystems in regards to three patents that EK claimed Sun was violating with Java, came to an end. Thursday afternoon Associated Press announced the companies settled out of court with terms of the deal unclear yet. Before Eastman Kodak was looking for $1.06 billion in damages."
According to news.com.com, it looks like Kodak is getting $92M out of Sun. Who's next?
-- "A chicken is an egg's way of making another egg."
Should things happen the same way with Microsoft and the hundreds of other "patent-infringers", is now a good time to buy Kodak stock?
There's got to be a red-eye joke in there somewhere...
How about the settlement consisted of 20 million copies of Photoshop Elements?
"Accept that some days you are the pigeon, and some days you are the statue." - David Brent, Wernham Hogg
How can 3 patents be worth 1.06$ billion dollars? I thought Kodak was in the crapper these days anyway. Would this have been their only means to making any sort of a profit?
Steal This Sig
How could Sun settle? IANAL but it seemed like they would easily win an appeal (in a courthouse anywhere but Rochester).
And how could the editors post this story without more details about the settlement? What a tease. Now I have to know.
Am I part of the core demographic for Swedish Fish?
...crap like this would help companies realize how messed up the patent situation in the US is right now. Unfortunately, it will probably only increase their zeal for patents and patent-related lawsuits, so that while they might lose a confrontation like this from time to time, they'll also be able to win some.
Settlements have no precedential value, so, the question(s) raised by Kodak's original patent prosecution claim remain... .NET operates in much the same way as Java.
:\
I'm sure other languages do as well...
geek. lawyer.
Groklaw has the story also:0 0410071
http://www.groklaw.net/article.php?story=2
Invent, patent, don't produce, then sue. Sounds better than 100 hr work weeks bringing a project together...
Does anyone remember the Polaroid vs. Kodak debacle?
Maybe that experience is what gave Kodak the idea. The sheer number of software programs constantly being developed also makes patent searches an overwhelming task. And how do you research prior art in proprietary software licensed under terms that forbid reverse engineering?
Software is developed so rapidly a 20-year blockade is impractical; it never wears out, so the traditional argument that patents are needed to stimulate stagnant industries doesn't apply. Patents hold back rapid development, and they are designed to protect mature industries, once the rapid phase is completed, but with software, there is no end to the rapid development, no maturity plateau that can be beneficially protected.
As Microsoft has learned, software doesn't wear out. You can run Windows 95 in 2004, if you so choose, and the only motivation to upgrade is if the customer wants innovation, new bells and whistles. So patents aren't needed to encourage invention. Software companies have to invent, because their product never wears out.
Isn't ironic when you link to an out of court settlement and you have it on a place called iwon.com? I know it doesn't really matter that its a AP piece but come on, you guys have a sick sence of humor.
My UID is prime is yours?
Who else is on the hit list? Microsoft and Sun are out, since MS already apparently has a license for the patents, and Sun just paid them off...
Is Apple next? They have their own Java implementation, don't they? IBM and Ximian/Novell, perhaps, too? IBM's VM could be infringing, and so could Mono's VM... and that's just sticking in Java-ish territory. Who knows what else they can hit with such a broad patent.
using namespace slashdot;
troll::post();
I think that Honeywell lawsuit might have put Kodak in a bad spot in trying to fight Sun at the same time
Down With Slashdot BETA!!! I've been around the corner and seen the oliphant; you can only abuse me from your perspecti
This entire case was setup by ms
Eh? do you know something I don't?
I know we all hate Microsoft, but blaming them for this is just hurting your credibility.
Or do you blame Microsoft when it rains in the weekend too?
Or can such decisions be appealed? I'm guessing that even if an appeal was possible, it's not going to happen now that Sun settled.
-Vendal Thornheart
According to the Groklaw discussion, the jury trial came from a town where Kodak is one of the two main employers. One can only suspect that this may have swayed the jury.
This is definitely a case for PubPat to tackle. There has got to be significant prior art on these patents.
To anyone thinking of looking, prior art must fulfil the following requirements (IANAL):
Paul.
You are lost in a twisty maze of little standards, all different.
Time to ask the Public Patent Foundation to see if this patent can be overturned because of prior art and obviousness. Sounds like these patents are really good targets for both problems.
- David A. Wheeler (see my Secure Programming HOWTO)
So that open source software could be threatened next. Tin foil hat.
When all you have is a hammer, every problem starts to look like a thumb.
Microsoft has a license from Kodak for .net. Sun has a license from Kodak for Sun's engine. Sun has Star Office cleared of Microsoft's embrace, at least for now. Wait until the "standards" get published and the Open Office standard can not, of course, be accepted, because it is potentially encumbered.
.net? Not me.
The irony of it all is that this is exactly what Microsoft has been doing from the beginning. Let someone develop it cheap, then if the original developers don't give it to Bill cheap, Bill takes it.
Hello
Plus Sun has agreed to buy Polaroids remaining inventory of Land Cameras and 6 gajillion disposable flash bulbs.
As part of the settlement, Kodak asked they also agree not to go after the film developing business. It seems Kodak wants to keep Sun out of the Darkroom.
Okay, not really. Just a bad joke.
Three patents can very well be worth a billion, but appearantly these weren't, otherwise Kodak wouldn't have settled. If your local arsonist asks for ten grand in return for his "fire protection insurance", it's up to you to decide whether that protection is worth the money, or whether to call the police. This is just the same thing, except it's not illegal to blackmail corporations on the basis of frivolous patent claims, and the police won't return your call.
Even if Kodak had gained nothing on this stunt, their mere wielding of the software patent weapon in public constitutes a threat to the economic safety of almost anyone. It would be like the arsonist getting away with it just because he was unable to "sell" any insurances, and later failed to demonstrate the need for one. Is blackmailing ok just because the victim doesn't get to pay exactly the amount asked for initially?
As someone pointed out in an earlier thread (either here or on Groklaw), anybody supporting Kodak by buying their shares or their products is an accomplice to whatever Kodak does. It's up to each individual to decide whether that involvement can be justified.
I would think that prior art for this patent would be relatively easy to find, so I'm wondering what the hell Sun is up to.
.NET, Novell with Mono.
This will probably lend credence to the patent claim, so not only does Sun get Kodak off their backs, they probably also get a few lawsuits nicely directed at some of their competitors.. MS with
'Heres 92 mil, by the way - you may wanna check out THESE particular companies as well.'
I think you need a new power supply--I had something very similar happen once. Get a name brand and expect to pay $50 or so. Preferably one in a simple cardboard box from a nearby shop so you can return it if it doesn't fix the problem.
This happened to me before though it's been a while. I swapped out the power supply and that fixed it. Do you have a spare p/s you can try? Even if it doesn't fit you could use it to determine if that is the problem.
http://www.busyweather.com/
Can you give us more info? Did you read the motherboard manual for any error beeps?
:)
Make sure all the internal cables are secure. Try kicking the case, installing linux...oh wait, power problem, right
But seriously, are all the fans working? Is there anything out of the ordinary other than no boot-up? Try replacing the power supply if nothing else helps, helped me once.
I'd show ya, but goats.cx is no longer online.
So this is the end of making a GPL version of Java?
Wasn't that a Streisand song some years back?
Related links ... ...
-
- Best deals: The Almighty Buck
-
I click on it and it says "Your search for The Almighty Buck was unsuccessful."
Comment removed based on user account deletion
switch out the power supply with a known good one, double check ALL of the cards, mem, cables, etc. More than likely it's the power supply, I've had almost EXACT prob about 6 mo's ago.
Down With Slashdot BETA!!! I've been around the corner and seen the oliphant; you can only abuse me from your perspecti
It is absolutely sad to see that a company that develops, implements, and pushes forward a field such as computing, and thefore society, can be sued by a company that created a vaguely similar idea that it abandoned because of their lack of vision.
Cheers... wait, no, no cheers today...
Adolfo
PS. I am guilty of abusing the use of run on sentences.
First off I haven't read the patents so I don't really know, but from everything I've read about this case, apparently these patents cover the idea of "one program asking another program to do something"... Um, So any program that includes a library, and makes calls against that library, as well as any program that makes system/OS/Windowing environment calls illegal... So, that pretty much covers everything.
I've never written a program that didn't at least include some basic system libraries, or language libraries. Every program must by necessity "ask for help" from other programs, whether that be the OS or a library. If this is really what this patent covers, they have successfully patented programming.
One of Sun's key arguments in its 'Solaris and JDS are superior to Linux because...' campaign is that Sun's products are indemnified against IP problems, and we can expect to see a Microsoft patent used against Linux in the near future - in a FUD atttack to drive people towards Solaris as 'The only safe choice in x86 *NIX'.
Microsoft wants all UNIX users corralled up behind a single company so they can then simply drive that company into the ground, instead of having to play 'whack-a-mole' with Linux distributors.
Sun are taking advantage of this by profiting when they can, but they must realise this is a business strategy that is assuming 'eventual defeat' - Sun are clearly not able to cut a path as an independent technology company, and feel that becoming the 'New Apple to Microsoft' - e.g. expect a Microsoft Virtual PC port with a bundled XP/Longhorn Licence to Solaris x86 soon - is the best way to ensure survival in the short to medium term.
Clearly, they have no long-term strategy, unless it is to simply cede their server market to Windows NT and fade quietly into oblivion like SCO.
If the USA doesn't move beyond Windows on the desktop, there are a lot of other countries who will - Software patents as implemented by the US government, are overwhelmingly stupid, and even if every US Linux distributor faces massive taxes, you will have to deal with the fact that Linux is as prevalent, and as easily developed in Europe or India, or Japan, as it is in the US.
Linux is not going out like this, and this whole 'intellectual property lawsuit' business is just making me, as a programmer, computer user and an educated, open minded person, really angry.
If companies like Redhat are making money out of selling something they also give away for free, this is largely a result of the groundswell of dissatisfaction with the crap we have had to pay so much money for up till now -
Make a good product using ethical business practices and provide clear benefits to a supporting community of users, with contracts based on mutual trust, not meaningless stockmarket numbers and the threat of litigation, and people will be interested in buying it, using it and developing it.
When did 'The network is the computer' get replaced by 'The Microsoft(R) Network (c) Microsoft Corporation 2004 is the computer (pat. pending)'?
I gots ta ding a ding dang my dang a long ling long
1) Purchase bogus patents
2) Sue for $1.06 billion
3) ??? Settle for $93 million
4) PROFIT
It's the wave of the future
no-text
Wow, I can't believe this has happened. Since when is Kodak doing remotely software related?
I don't even considered them the experts in their supposed field (taking pictures), Fuji film pwns their asses big time (for me).
Still less software!
I think patent applicants MUST submit a valid implementation of their "novel ideas" to provide a limit of the scope of just how "ingenious" they are.
Come on, the industry is really making a big fuss out of their own ingeniuity (stupidity more like!)
Let's all move to China and India and let these fuck turds sue each other out of business while we just happily develop and develop!
Hell, even Iraq is better!
Online backup with Mozy, sounds like Ozzie, but more!
MS already has licenses from Kodak, Sun has acquired non-transferable rights, so IBM is next I guess? Is Kodak stupid enough to do that?
Now what is worse is that a whole bunch of FOSS supporting firms can be pulled to court with this nonsense.
So is Java lost for the US until 2007? (the pattents were filed in 1987 I believe)
You can't handle the truth.
BEST REGARDS-
Eastman Kodak Corporation
it supported one program calling another (chaining) and the use of overlays, which is similar. From the Borland Museum"
In the Museum: Turbo Pascal version 3.02
Ship date: 17-September-1986
Turbo Pascal 3 was the first Turbo Pascal version to support the Intel 8087 math co-processor (16-bit PC version). It also included support for Binary Coded Decimal (BCD) math to eliminate round off errors in business applications. Turbo Pascal 3 also allowed you to build larger programs (> 64k bytes) using overlays.
Judge not, lest ye be judged.
I dunno, $75 billion profit buys a hell of a lot of weather control R&D...
Let's do the math. The claim is for $1bn. They settle for $92m. My guess is that both sides decided that Kodak has less than 10% chance of winning.
Just some wild speculation but...
Perhaps Sun just wants to end the suit right away so that they are more attractive to potential buyers?
Perl, Kaffe (GPL JVM "implementation"), PHP, Mono, Ruby, and even GNOME (bound to ORB), just became unwarranted risks.
This can not be passed off as patent paranoia, or as a patent cold war. IBM, HP, Microsoft, and now Sun, all have licensed this patent for use, and therefore have no significant vested interest in fighting additional litigation by Kodak on another's behalf, nor, for this same reason, will Kodak be disuaded from pursuing litigation against smaller parties on any grounds of "mutually assured patent destruction."
Any project which is not backed by a player at least as powerful as Kodak, is a risk not worth taking.
If your product is based on Perl, either you must be prepared to pony up whatever Kodak demands (and they can choose to not license to you at all), or your business plan just fell through the floor until 2007.
This is fear, and it is well warranted.
I feel a great disturbance in the force. The sound of the last outposts of intellectual freedom, suddenly crushed.
so now if I write a program that infringes on these patents using java as the programming language... am I safe because sun has already paid my licensing fees?
...amazing grace how sweet the....
If that's true then Sun has paid the price for us...making the ultimate sacrifice.
102 posts and no "kodak moment" jokes??
Jeez...it must be really late at night in badjoke land.
I agree with the other two previoius replies. However I was intriqued by your mention of switching the power input switch to 220v. Why did you do that? I assume you are on 120v power.
Unfortunately, I learned a little bit about this the hard way. I once was bolting together a new stack of parts late one night. It came up a couple of times but seemed a little 'slow' to start. Then it quit and wouldn't run again.
Since it was late, I ran through the voltages at the ATX connector. They all were fine. However the one pin that seemed odd was the one that was not power per se but actually just a signal out of the P/S. I forget the pin and the exact signal name but it was effectively a "power good" signal. The power supply has to assert this prior to the motherboard attempting reset. You wouldn't want to start running if the power was not reliable.
I tried another PS, it worked and I resolved to take the PS back.
I couldn't do that for a couple of days but when I got there, my vendor did up all the paper work. He started to take the unit back to the stock room and at the last moment he asked, "Hey, did you know you were on 220v?"
Of course that explained most everything. You see a modern switching power supply can take quire a range of input power. All it has to do is adjust the pulses that is is switching internally. Since this is already controlled by a feedback circuit, this is easy to do -- it is already done as a matter of course. I am writing this on a notebook which has a 'brick' power supply. It says that it will work with 100-240v. All that is necesary is a different cord, no switch to mess with.
I have been at this long enough to have worked around the alternative 'linear' power supplies. They could be very sensitive to changes and spikes in input power. Kids today don't know how good they have it.
It is not uncommon for switching power supply units smaller than a full ATX p/s to allow voltage to range wide enough that a 120/240v switch is not necessary at all. However, in a more complex power supply, you want some assurance that the input voltage is within tolerable levels. That is one of the functions of the switch. It changes what the p/s passes as acceptable. This monitor function for ATX p/s's is done pretty much on one chip along with monitoring of all of the various DC voltages. Only when all of these are within tolerance is the signal lead asserted back to the mobo.
So, when you switch to the higher voltage, the mobo should never start. That is consistant with your report of hard drives spinning, fans running, etc. but no POST. That is what I had as well.
Every indication is that you are looking at a bad ps. Probably bad in 3.3V output which is not used by fans or hard drives. By dinking with the input switch, you are making a change in the problem area but not really rectifying (pun intended) the specific real problem.
In my situation, I alluded to the fact that the configuration error explained most everything observed. I also said that the mobo should not work if the power good signal is not asserted. However, I was left to wonder about the first two times when my mobo did come up......
They aren't the only tech players with patent portfolios. If they keep sueing deep pockets, they will find a fight. They should remember that they are late adapters to digital photography, and much of the technology they use is patented by other companies.
Yup, that's right. Sun didn't service their own hardware out in the field at all. Then they hired a bunch of the employees from Kodak. What I don't know, is whether Kodak still services Sun equipment and if their service agreement could have influenced their settlement. Inquiring minds want to know ...
Any company currently attempting to make money out of IP/patent issues seems to be admitting that it doesn't have a sustainable business model, and that it isn't confident it can adapt.
Look at SCO, look at Kodak.
Even Microsoft is desperately attempting to make money from FAT, what does this say about Microsoft?
These companies are doing no more than stifling innovation and making life difficult for everybody, just because they can't easily maintain their enormous salaries.
Things can't go on like this, it's getting ridiculous.
Linux/Open Source/Anti Microsoft News
There seems to be a lot of posts that go something like, "this looks like a good patent for XXXXXX to try to fight." While the work these groups do is noble and all, they can't be expected to challenge more than a handful of patents a year. It's not easy work. Not to mention the lawyers hired by Kodak, Sun, MS, etc... are among the best in the world.
0 184224
s /tech.h tml
m pep.htm
What we need is more of the people right here to step up and do it themselves. How?
Read this:
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/157
Or apply here:
http://www.piercelaw.edu/
Or here:
http://www.law.berkeley.edu/cenpro/program
Then take this:
http://www.uspto.gov/web/offices/pac/mpep/
The only way to fix the problems is to have the smartest people doing work the way "should" be done. Go work for the USPTO, and refuse to grant patents that aren't novel. Or work for a firm that challenges existing patents. Do something.
If you need incentive, while you're complaining about Programmers and Engineers not being hired, IP is the single fastest growing area of the law, and highest paid. If you pass the Patent Bar, you WILL get a job...a good job.
An object-oriented dialect of scheme that runs on a stack based, bytecode virtual machine. Almost certainly an ancestor of Java (Sun's original name for the Java project was "oak" so that might tell you something). Has always been open source and academic articles were published describing the structure of the language (back in 1988).
Check it out here: http://www-bcl.cs.may.ie/~bap/oaklisp/
Patenting all OO languages is a complete crock.
Search for "oaklisp" on google, it uses a very similar engine to Java (almost identical at the VM level). Published 1988.
For the RMI (remote methods) angle on things, there is an rfc describing portmap and nfs that makes rock solid prior art for remote procedure calls (not strictly object oriented but behaviourly equivalent). Published before 1990.
I had this happen with a duff CMOS battery, might be worth a try
-j
Linux was a serious threat to Sun. Migration from Solaris to GNU/Linux is straightforward for many companies, and can be done gradually - by running free software on top of Solaris.
The Kodak patent, on the face of it, applies not only to Java, but also to CORBA. Free implementations of CORBA will become impossible. That will lock Linux out of enterprise computing.
In short: we have a serious problem.
The amiga device driver worked as a semi-independent program which took messages from other programs that wanted to access the device, queued the messages, responded to them, etc. In effect an invocation of a function in one program by message passing to another program. All documented in fine detail in various Amiga programming manuals which were published approx 1985 (maybe earlier, I sold mine).
Amiga GUI code was object oriented and not too different to the device drivers in operation, plenty of message passing and queueing. This may be a bit borderline but should be good backup for the smalltalk prior art that also worked in a similar way. The Amiga design was obviously heavily influenced by smalltalk.
Not 100% correct, but often true. There are companies that are basically research labs, and have been making good money at that, but they're going to have large and diversified patent portfolios and actively promote and publicise the technologies involved from the start. They aren't likely to suddenly show up years after a product's been in use and go "Oh, yeh, that stuff you've been using for years... we just realised we own it...".
There's a secondary systemic problem that exacerbates the problems of software patents: if a public company's core business goes down the tubes they're pretty much legally required to maximise the return on any remaining asset they have. It's like the way some internet companies "turned evil" after the dot-bomb and started going into spam support services or selling their mailing lists: their mailing lists may have been the only asset they had remaining.
You have left an unnecessary "invent" step in there.
According to this site: For the 1st half of 2004 http://www.bizreport.com/news/7776/ Sony has 21.5% market share(of Digital Cameras) Kodak has 18.3% Canon has 14.7% Olympus has 11.8% Fuji has 8.7% HP has 7% Nikon has 5.7%
Considering Polaroid's extensive patent portfolio on instant photography and other subjects, Kodak's behavior was a bit like walking into a biker bar and loudly proclaiming that "Only pussies and cowards ride Harleys". They knew they were entering a legal minefield.
Mea navis aericumbens anguillis abundat
As it will encourage companies with bullshit patents to come after legitimate innovators in the software industry. If Sun had stood up for itself, which it apparently doesn't have the cash to do, it would have shown that EK has a crappy patent to begin with.
GJC
Gregory Casamento
## Chief Maintainer for GNUstep
both the (if / then / else) and (do / while)
programming routines were found to have been
patented.
All your code belongs to us.
Does this kill the chance of an open source java implementation from Sun?
They settled, but I would guess that the settlement terms did not include "hey Sun, you can write open source versions of our IP"...
Use Kodak's Contact Form to let them what you think. I did:
As a software developer, I was dismayed to hear about Kodak's decision to sue Sun based upon some bogus software patients. Most software developers think these kinds of patents are causing great harm to the American software developer. Any new feature (even obvious ideas) added to a piece of code could potentially be infringing on someone's intentionally vague software patient. I just read the 3 patents which Kodak has accused Sun of violating. Honestly, I have no idea just what you are claiming to have invented. Of course, that's probably the point.
In addition, Kodak seeks over $1 billion in damages from Sun. This is obscene. Through Java, Sun has revitalized the software industry. You are causing great harm to a company that has done wonderful things for both developers and consumers alike.
In response, I have decided to avoid Kodak products forever more. No more Kodak 35mm film, photo paper or film processing for me. By the way, my next camera will probably be a Canon digital camera. In short, you've sold your last Kodak product to me ever.
I know that my personal boycott of your products will have no measurable effect on Kodak's bottom line, however you have just annoyed over one million Java developers. We take this stuff seriously. I suggest Kodak visit SlashDot, a news site read 3 million times every day to get a feeling for the damage you have inflicted upon yourselves.
Before Kodak reinvents itself as a Intellectual Property (IP) holding company whose business model is to simply sue everyone in sight, I suggest that you investigate another company that has gone down that road before you. SCO, formerly a well respected Unix vendor, has basically given up Unix development and now focuses on very shaking IP lawsuits against vendors (IBM, RedHat) and users of the Linux operating system. With their software patent action, SCO (stock symbol: scox) has lost the goodwill of software developers worldwide. Their stock price has dropped from about $150/share five years ago and now trading at $3.70/share. In short, SCO is on the verge of collapse.
Be smart, don't be a SCO. Develop great products, not bogus IP lawsuits and you may yet avoid SCO's fate.
Polaroid really blew it there.
With a big name like Kodak marketing their technology, Polaroid would've made massive amounts of money by licensing the patents for royalty fees.
Instead, Polaroid just sued Kodak and prevented them from selling any instant cameras, relegating Polaroid to a small-time niche-market player.
retrorocket.o not found, launch anyway?
I believe they are a MAJOR contributor to the community within the Rochester area in terms of charities and such. (The other major employer/contributor being the Wegmans supermarket chain).
Both companies are loved by the locals because of the benefit they have to the community.
retrorocket.o not found, launch anyway?
...are engaged in litigation?
Who cares.
Kodak lost the imaging business because they failed to latch onto digital early enough, believing film would prevail.
Sun lost the server business because they failed to latch onto Free / Open Source Software early enough, believing SunOS would prevail.
It's like two dying hippos head-butting each other. Fun to watch, but mostly irrelevant.