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Federal Court Shuts Down Pay As You Go Wireless
self assembled struc writes "BCGI has been found guilty of infringing on pay-as-you-go wireless patents owned by Freedom Wireless. This means that cellular providers who use BCGI pay-as-you-go billing systems must immediately stop selling new service. For the next 90 days, as they wind down their service, they will have to pay Freedom Wireless 2.5 cents per airtime minute used PER CUSTOMER. This heralds a farewell to Cingular's Go Phone and Sprint-Nextel's Boost services, both powered by BCGI."
For wireless dial-up access, and I haven't noticed any
Lets hang our heads in shame.
Religion is a gateway psychosis. -- Dave Foley
Looks like they'll be paying as they go! Hahahahaha
I guess the name "Freedom Wireless" is an ironic choice.
I read the article. Is this for EVERYONE in the country? What will happen for all the users of these phones. What about tracfone, they've been at it for YEARS, does this affect them? I need clarification or some unfounded speculation, both would be nice.
--sig fault--
BULLSHIT!!!
You'll NEVER stop me from getting FREE WIFI off of my Pringles Can!!!
Take THAT FCC!!!
Until I read the article... I was about to get really really really pissed since I run my business off of prepaid...
He then turned and walked defiantly from the court room, only to sheepishly return and ask "Um....anyone have a cell phone?? I need to call my lawyer."
Freedom wireless is crap!
Why is pay as you go patentable?
no big sig
Head is hung in shame. As much as I hate Cingular, I'm forced to admits, we are slaves.
Friends don't help friends install M$ junk.
not all republicans are technoboobs, though many are, just like in the rest of the population.
no big sig
I hope we can rely on federal court to rid us of these patented monopolies.
I further wager that the judge concerned was appointed/nominated by a Republican.
I see that you subscribe to the popular fantasy that there's some practical difference between the wings of the Ruling Party.
For the record, both Democrats and Republicans tax and tax, spend and spend, get us into wars, commit felonies, and engage in cronyism. They are interchangable.
-jcr
The only title of honor that a tyrant can grant is "Enemy of the State."
here
Doesn't include the information I was looking for, but does give a bit more detail.
business model patents really are the great evil of the patent world. See it strangling industry after industry.
"God fights on the side with the best artillery." - Napoleon, Marshal of France - speaking truth to power
It's also a potential way to get oneself shot in the back of the head...
Just saying. I don't use those services myself, but people with nothing to lose (who might need that kind of service) are a group I personally try not to piss off.
Revenge is a dish I don't want any fucking part of. Particularly when someone's safety might be at stake.
"Oh my God. This is terrible. This is the end of my Presidency. I'm fucked."; ~ Donald J. Trump
RTFA, it was a jury trial. Whoever thought that business method patents were a good idea? "Yeah, we'd prefer if we just didn't have to compete in the marketplace -- please give us a government granted monopoly."
I used up all my sick days, so I'm calling in dead.
If I recall, Virgin buys their mobile minutes from Sprint as an MVNO, and BCGI is also another MVNO. So I doubt it'll affect Virgin, unless BCGI sells minutes to Sprint to resell to Virgin?
I'd say either way, BCGI customers are screwed. BCGI will have to cancel in 90 days, shutting off the customers, but those customers may have a hard time getting refunds if BCGI has to declare bankruptcy.
my geeklog
Is it pay as you go? In other words, do you buy cards for minutes of airtime, or do you get x number of minutes per month for a set subscription charge?
If it's the first, you're probably affected. If it's the second, then you're not.
Whoever stated that signature sizes should be limited to one hundred and twenty characters can just go ahead and kiss my
IS this a patent for pay-as-you-go wireless, or a particular implementation?
I think this particular patent covers the way they link a phone to an account and properly deduct the right amount of money from the account based on the number of minutes. So the patent isn't "pay as you go wireless", the patent is "a particular method to make this cellular phone system able to handle real-time billing".
The patent isn't on pre-paid phones, it's on one way of making pre-paid phones work. If you want to start your own pre-paid phone network, you shouldn't steal Freedom Wireless's way of doing it.
paintball
I am running an open access point and everyone around can use and make his VoIP calls over it for free. Why would I want to try charging anyone? In fact, I am already helping create wireless neighborhood mesh networks for make free distributed Internet a reality.
My bad, BCGI is not an MVNO company themselves, rather they sell minutes to *other* MVNO companies. My apologies for any confusion.
my geeklog
Seems RCN news is down, why they picked the small fry for the article link, I don't know, here's the washingtonpost.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/artiWASHINGTON (Reuters) - A patent dispute over prepaid cellular telephones threatens to disrupt service to millions of prepaid wireless customers at several U.S. carriers, including Cingular Wireless.
A federal judge in Boston granted an injunction on Monday against Boston Communications Group Inc., which sells customer management services for prepaid wireless telephones to a number of companies, including Cingular and Alltel Communications Inc.
The court had previously ruled that Boston Communications had infringed on two patents held by Freedom Wireless Inc., and has awarded Freedom Wireless $128 million in damages. Last week, the court added $19.7 million to the award for interest on lost royalties, and said it would explore further damages.
Under the injunction, wireless companies that use the BCGI prepaid wireless services must stop selling them. The companies have 90 days to continue serving current customers, during which they must pay royalties to Freedom Wireless.
BCGI said that the injunction could affect service to 3.1 million prepaid customers, including 400,000 at Cingular, representing 70 percent of its total revenue. It has asked the judge to stay the injunction while it files immediate appeals.
Cingular Wireless spokesman Mark Siegel said the injunction does not apply to the "vast majority" of Cingular's prepaid wireless customers, who use a different type of network technology. He said Cingular would also seek a stay of the injunction while it appealed the case.
"We intend to continue to provide service to all prepaid customers, including those on the BCG platform," Siegel said. He declined to say what steps Cingular might take if the injunction is not lifted.
A spokeswoman for BCGI could not immediately say who the other affected carriers were. The company has sold services in the past to a variety of carriers, including Alltel Corp. and Nextel, now a part of Sprint Nextel Corp.
Cingular Wireless and AT&T Wireless, which Cingular bought last year, were co-defendants in the suit against BCGI. Verizon Wireless was also a co-defendant but reached a settlement with Freedom Wireless before the trial began earlier this year.
Cingular is a joint venture of SBC Communications Inc. and BellSouth Corp.I remember reading about this case a few weeks ago in the Wall Street Journal. The article was entitled "Patent litigants pose growing threat to business."
The first paragraph brought to light one of Freedom Wireless' founder's criminal past (it involved stolen cars) as well as the fact that the founders had previously gone after GTE for similar issues (alleging stolen trade secret). GTE ended up getting paid $90,000 in legal fees, a statement that GTE had never stolen a trade secret, and a promise never to sue GTE again.
Fast forward a few years. Freedom Wireless currently does nothing but patent ligitation. These men are patent trolls.
The Wall Street Journal charges for their archives, but the full text of the same article is available here.
- Neil Wehneman
My legal education, in nifty podcast format
See, one of the problems of the political culture in this country is this: the people who are suspicious of corporate power are too trusting of government power to allocate resources for social change; the people who are suspicious of government power have a hard-on for the public sector (without realizing that wealth will always - always - muster power to protect itself) and, often, for the military. (The biggest weak-point in libertarian thinking is class-blindness - they think they are serving hard-working middle- and-upper-middle-class americans without understanding that this is exactly the class the created the Leviathan of state to begin with, and in whose interests it ultimately works.) This means that the political will to muster things like a reform of patent law will never occur unless it happens in a way that is in the interests of power.
Which may be happening here: the Cingulars and Nextels may start getting annoyed enough by the absurdities of patent law and the effect on their bottom line that they start to lobby for a change. Unfortunately, the change is not likely to make things any easier for the bulk of us.
You have to buy cards and top up the phone and stuff. I never use a phone so I thought this would be the best way to go instead of paying $40 a month for a phone that I will spend a total of 10 minutes on per month.
Does this mean I'm screwed as well?
Just because you can mod me down, doesn't mean you're right. Shoes for industry!
From the summary: "This heralds a farewell to Cingular's Go Phone and Sprint-Nextel's Boost services, both powered by BCGI."
In regards to Cingular, not exactly.
Cingular has two forms of prepaid service (GoPhone).
One is 'Pick-Your-Plan'. You have a reoccuring monthly charge on your credit or debit card which gives you a monthly allowence for service.
The other is 'Pay-As-You-Go'. You buy a prepaid card off the rack, and use that to make your calls on your cell. As you use it up, you replace the card. That's the part that will be affected by this ruling.
I'm not crazy,I'm actively irresponsible.
The patents is question are 5,722,067 filed in 1998 and 6,157,823 filed in 2000.
Although this is immediately disgusting, in the not-so-long-run this might end up being a good thing, this is putting a kink in Sprint/Verison and Cingular's (the big mean companies with nearly inexhaustible legal resources) business model, who will likely lash out against it. If all goes well for them, it will end up creating a substantial precedent against this kind of business-method patent, which would inadvertently improve the patent law situation in the U.S., if we're lucky it might even catalyze a wider reform.
thanks for the idea.
[new tab]
www.uspt.....
I think this could wake up the public to the need for patent reform in a way that other things would not.
Everyone uses wireless, pay as you go is a fairly obvious idea to pretty much anyone. A sudden skyrocketing price for cell phone calls will piss people off quite a bit.
LetterRip
I'm a Libertarian and have no great like for either the Democratic or Republican party.
Let this be an example to those of you that pooh-pooh our patent system. See, it works!
--- -- - -
Give me LIBERTY, or give me a check.
nah!
you're confusing republicans with politicians!
Democrat politicians are just as bad!
no big sig
And Democrats don't have greedy self serving hypocrits in their party? or do you honestly believe that Clinton wasn't a greedy, self-serving hypocrit?
For every republican you can find that's corrupt I can find a democrat...
which goes to show that blaming the party affiliation in a situation is as retarded as pulling the race card (Which the majority of the time is bullshit). There are retards on both sides of the fence and blaming based on party don't fix OR address the real problems - or keep the threads on topic.
If all you can say is 'it must be a republicans fault' your just showing your own ignorance. But... that's just my two cents
This article might help make some sense of why broadband in the US is so expensive as discussed in an earlier Slashdot article today.
Oh c'mon, you can come up with a better example than that. Rollerblades aren't unique at all, they were an extension of the standard roller skate.
Have you hugged your penguin today?
To "steal" a point made all the time on Slashdot: Freedom Wireless was not deprived of the use of this method. And yes, I just used "steal" the way you did, but such imprecision is only okay when no one is getting sued.
Also, do you actually know that BCGI learned about this method from Freedom Wireless, and if so that they wouldn't have come up with it on their own? If not then there goes the other half of "steal".
Unfortunately, the patent system doesn't even require that half.
Courts are bound to interpret the laws Congress gives them, and our popularly-elected Congress has seen fit to allow patents such as these.
Have you hugged your penguin today?
Supporters of the patent system claim that companies are only willing to make the investments in R&D necessary to technological progress if the discoveries that result are properly rewarded. To me, hundreds of millions of dollars seems like an excessive reward for finding such an "inventive step".
I would do some serious searching to find out exactly what was patented. So far, nothing I read about this case makes any sense about a patentable process. But I am naive at times.
Yes, your math is painful.
10 * $0.025 * 3,100,000 = $775,000
If this extends to PayPal as well as credit cards, then all you have to to do is think of a service that requires prepaid access then file a patent, and be an instant millionaire.
Vintage computer adverts: http://www.vintageadbrowser.com/computers-and-software-ads
Yes it is...I have no further excuse except that I am at work and ready to leave.
And still hefty...well, more husky than hefty...
Then return it, you're affected.
I have been spending a lot of time in Vietnam recently (6 months of the last year) and while I am there I always use my prepaid mobile phone. It is very sad to see that many companies over there can do it but there is a patent on such a simple idea here in the US.
Maybe there should be a concerted effort to completely break the system. Fight back by creating and collecting a portfolio of patents that can be used to cripple the system. Not just one "I'll be teh 1 laffing when my patent for breathing gets approved!", but a hundred, a thousand. With good luck and planning, the litigation proceeds can start fueling a feedback loop for expanding R&D/Legal services. Ultimate goal- break the patent system or own an empire. Win/Win. Who's with me?
Wrong. A typical cell phone plan in the US has you entering a long-term (1y or 2y) contract. The 'pick your plan' thing isn't long term, you just pay month by month.
If I were BCGI (and I'm certainly glad I'm not), I'd just cancel all service immediately. Screw paying extra money to Freedom Wireless or whomever. Setup a system to refund the money left on a phone, and just close doors. Leave a nice automated message saying basically, "We can't continue serving you because of a submarine patent lawsuit. If you'd like to make a complaint please call or write to..." and give the numbers for Freedom Wireless and the Patent Office/Supreme Court/Whoever in the government responsible for this bludner. The more public stink that can be made about this the better, as it increases the chance of some senator's daughter who just lost her pre-paid phone service because of this sort of BS.
-paul
Pistol caliber is like religion: everyone has their favourite, and theirs is the only right choice.
I wonder what impact this will have on parents who bought their kids firefly mobile phones. On a related note, I wonder how we can find out what exact brands and subbrands and such are actually affected.
There are 10 types of cliches in this world. Those that are new, and those that aren't.
Cingular Wireless spokesman Mark Siegel said the injunction does not apply to the "vast majority" of Cingular's prepaid wireless customers, who use a different type of network technology. He said Cingular would also seek a stay of the injunction while it appealed the case. It has nothing to do with the actual plan, it is related to the network protocols involved, I believe. Hopefully. Being a college student, I use the cards, being a stereotypical geek who doesn't get called THAT often.
"It is the stillest words which bring the storm. Thoughts that come with doves' footsteps guide the world."
PRODUCE the thing you patented, or lose the patent. Period. And if you are producing it, be treated (and regulated) as a monopoly in that area, since patents by definition grant monopolies. Patents only on real, tangible, physical items-no business methods, no software, no genetics.
There is NO excuse for the way the patent system is currently. Just because you're the first to do something doesn't mean it's non-obvious. Incremental changes or "improvements" should not be patentable-the inventor of cell phone technology should get a patent, the guy that figures out a better way to use it should not. Nor, generally, should the guy that figures out how to extend range by 10%.
Hopefully, larger companies continually getting hit by these things will lead them to recognize that pretty soon you're not going to be able to move, breathe, or fart without infringing on something patented. I certainly hope that leads them to reconsider the path they're going down, and use their influence to do something worthwhile for once.
To fight the war on terror, stop being afraid.
Don't you mean "I bet the jury was told not to consider the validity of the patent." Not that I RTFA, or even the whole summary. But the jury can consider whatever it wants. It can ignore laws it does not like. Jurors are just told to do things, and they assume the Judge has the authority to tell them to do those things and that not doing so is wrong.
Patents are pathetic, the other day I was eating some soup at lunch and the plastic spoon I used had a patent number on it.
...::----::...
I am in no way affiliated with this sig.
Most of the ridiculous verdicts in technical cases come from juries, who have no clue on the subject matter and only vote based on which lawyer gave a better dog and pony show.
They need to redefine "peers" in "a jury of his peers".
---------
There is inferior bacteria on the interior of your posterior.
Which may be happening here: the Cingulars and Nextels may start getting annoyed enough by the absurdities of patent law and the effect on their bottom line that they start to lobby for a change. Unfortunately, the change is not likely to make things any easier for the bulk of us.
Yeah, and when they do, it'll be couched in terms that sound like something we'd like, until we read the fine print or amendments. And everyone in America will think the problem is solved, and Joe Average, if he even understood the problem, will be happy, but it'll just be worse. Bit of a gloomy mood I suppose.
I further wager that the judge concerned was appointed/nominated by a Republican.
District Judge Edward Harrington.
I haven't been able to find who appointed him...
Bantam Dominique roosters crow a four-note song. Once you've heard it as "Happy BIRTHday" you can't NOT hear it that way
http://www.quinnemanuel.com/news/headline_detail.a spx?recid=9
I have some Cingular 'KIC' GSM prepayed phones (the kind you buy minutes for when they run out or every few months). The Cingular prepaid GSM phones seem to work the same as hundreds of millions of prepaid GSM phones in Europe and Asia (turkcell etc). Do these patents really apply to prepaid GSM service, or just to older TDMA or CDMS services? http://www.freedom-wireless.net/id4.html http://www.freedom-wireless.net/id5.html
I'm going to make a guess that the only GoPhone users affected by this are those on TDMA plans, as the GSM version's entirely compatable with regular GSM phones and doesn't do anything unusual with "virtual" phone numbers or anything else. Cingular rebranded a lot of its prepaid services GoPhone after it bought AT&T.
You are not alone. This is not normal. None of this is normal.
You have a company that I have never heared of that owns some kind of IP comes out of the wood works when some other lager company is making money at it. Not when they first start, but after they make money at. This way the compnay can not say well we do not have any money to pay you for something that you should have said some time ago. Aka when we started this some time ago. If you own the IP then you need to stop people before they get going not after they are fully up and running. and if they are fully up and running, then fine they can not sell any thing new, but the people all reaedy using it are not cut off from it.
Now our government is wrapped around the axle about the Miers nomination, the war in Iraq, energy and budget issues. Another hurricane is steaming toward Florida, the bird flu is spreading everywhere so nothing is going to change for quite a while. I don't think Congress is going to be able to agree on anything significant, and most definitely not patent reform. Even though it's desperately needed.
On another point the bird that's jumped over to humans kills half the people it infects. After it sweeps around the planet there may not be enough of us left to buy the services those companies are suing each other over.
See, there's always a bright side.
That's our life, the big wheel of shit. - The Fat Man, Blue Tango Salvage
I wonder if this patent is the reason my tracphone based net10 wireless is so weird, in order to redeem a card you "activate" it through them and minutes are sent back to your phone within a few minutes.
it also will sometimes deduct airtime when it can't connect to the network (which would be impossible if the metering system was network controlled)
Snowden and Manning are heroes.
Buy Freedom Wireless stock!
"The newly born animals are then whisked off for a quick run through a giant baking oven." --heard on Food Network
GoPhone, as it currently is, is a rebranding of several of AT&T, Cingular, BellSouth, etc's, old prepaid plans, plus Cingular and AT&T's GSM prepaid plans. I have a GoPhone PAYG SIM, and I can tell you the fact it works on regular GSM phones and the fact the phone knows the real number of the telephone when it does means it's highly unlikely that their current PAYG or PYP plans actually infringe upon the patents. The patents themselves generally cover a myriad of ways of implementing prepaid service, generally by either putting a bogus phone number in the cellphone, which forces incoming calls to be routed via a third party and makes it easy to identify prepaid callers, or by having the phone programmed to make 800 calls and route outgoing calls via that.
This probably explains Cingular's insistance that this will not affect the majority of their prepaid customers.
You are not alone. This is not normal. None of this is normal.
Exactly which providers are affected? I am a customer of T-Mobile's ToGo Prepaid service(I refuse to sign a contract, so plans don't work out for me), and I'm interested in knowing whether or not I'll be getting my $150's worth of minutes back if they go down in 90 days, because I doubt I'll use that much between now and then. Any insight?
"Crime fighters fight crime. Fire fighters fight fire. What do freedom fighters fight?" -George Carlin
if that patent covered the plastic it was made from which is 10% cheaper to manufacture than competing spoons of similar strength would that patent still be absurd? without knowing what the patent is you can't assume
Snowden and Manning are heroes.
You mean like the patent that was filed and approved for a method of swinging on a swing? see patent 6368227. It made the news, and quite a few blogs, but of course it didnt change anything.
tm
Support TBI Research: http://www.raisinhope.org
No, I'm sorry. Both "A Method of Killing Using a Piece of Shaped Metal Launched With Explosive Powder" and "A Method of Tying Ropes That Can Break a Person's Neck or Suffocate Them" have been patented. Come up with an original solution, or the patent owners will charge you for their deaths.
I haven't seen the patent first hand, but often something obvious now, wasn't at that time. If it were then why wasn't someone else doing it already.
I can list many examples of this. The mouse, keyboard, screens, printers, windowing environment, The Internet, an Operating system and even a CPU and the IC chips, were at the time major conceptual steps forward.
I can't tell you how hard it was to explain what the Internet or even a Network was to people in 1983, they just couldn't grasp it.
With patents if someone has been doing something then a patent gets filed by another person at later date, then the group getting sued must try to show that, if they can the patent holder will have to pay like multiple damages and costs.
So as a patent holder you never want to go to court with a weak patent.
But in practice, most people loose their nerve at the first letter from a patent holder, even if its a weak patent that wouldn't hold up.
As a result many people end up paying royalties or giving up without a fight, when they really would win and have that patent tossed out.
I have come to realize much of patent law is a poker game.
For a large company like Microsoft they look at the strength of a patent and the value of the company holding it and decide is it cheaper to pay or infringe. And same in reverse, even if a patent isn't worth the paper it's written on, if the company they sue can't afford to challenge it, then they win.
AT&T did this to many companies they felt were competition, file dozens of bogus suite against one company, from many little companies they control, and drive the small players out of business while leaving there name out of it.
I am always doing that which I can not do, in order that I may learn how to do it. - Pablo Picasso
is affected, which means the old ATT TDMA people "free2go" plan.
The GMS Pay as you go, and pick your plan are not affected.
i own a boost mobile phone. i shure hope it dosent die on me. im acully very happy with it and becides its only the billing system thats affected cant they dimply switch the billing sys.
Freedom wireless made enemies of Cingular and Sprint? Wow. Either they're trying to steal the business for themselves, or they're about to be in a world of hurt. Given that they named Cingular as a defendant in one of their cases, I'm guessing the latter.
There's no failure quite as dissatisfying as a complete and total solution to the wrong problem.
The article is very vague. Is there any indication of whether or not this is actually going to affect the big name cell phone companies?
Furry cows moo and decompress.
I don't know if it is the same Judge Edward Harrington, but from this article it appears that he was appointed by Ted Kennedy. http://cphack.robinlionheart.com/thompson#feloniou s_conduct
Not to go too far off-topic, but actually, Roller Blades are a particular brand name of roller skate, specifically, inline roller skates. It's a classic example of a brand name becoming synonymous with the general product, perhaps even more infamously than Kleenex, and to transition back to the /. world, Xerox.
We got to get Allan Ralksky to email the message to everyone...
Oh well, what the hell...
Cingular has a lot more than the two forms of Go Phone, those being PAYG and pick your plan. Both of those are GSM plans and neither is affected.
What is affected it TDMA to wit, AT&T Free2Go prepaid service. It is pretty much a don't care to Cingular because they have been out to get TDMA for quite some time now. Free2Go is virtually invisible if you are looking for it, yet it is a fine service.
This ruling helps Cingular in their quest to bury TDMA. Oddly, my phone with the very best coverage is that Free2Go.
Another reason they will not care is they do not make many dollars per month on prepaid customers like me. My $10 Free2go cards refresh it for 3 months and you can bet Cingular hates that!
This applies only to TDMA pay as you go phones.. if you have a gsm phone (on cingular at least) it won't effect you. -Trust me I looked it up when I saw this earlier today on engadget, since I just bought a gophone for my mom last night.
This heralds a farewell to Cingular's Go Phone and Sprint-Nextel's Boost services, both powered by BCGI.
Uh, no, this herlads and end to (affordable)Internet access on those. the 'go' phone is a prepaid/pay as you go cellualr phone. nothing about this patent stops cingular from continuing to offer cellular telephone access to go phone users, it only affects the cost of internet access on the phones.
https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/free-sw.html
Oh. Damn, and I thought you were going to say, "an angel gets his wings."
You are right:
For every republican you can find that's corrupt I can find a democrat...
but then again, it took the dems 40 years to screw things up, and the repubs have done it in 10.
The problem is not who is dishonest, but who is dishonest and efficient. Repubs and dems are both dishonest (or have dishonest members among them), but the repubs are head and sholders above dems at being organized, zelous, dogmatic, controlling, self-rightous, etc.
And in talking about Clinton, I will take the midget of the cabinet (Robert Reich) over each and every official on the W team.
this is the stupidest thing.i personally think that they should kill off the patent office. its killing innovation. jsut think if people acted liek this years ago we'd still probably have black and white tv's since someone woould have patent making tv's and no reason to innovate we'de still be seeing black and white. why cause if someone made another tv theyd get sued, or if someone made an addon theyd get sued. its crazy what people can patent nowadays in hopes of banking money off of smarter brighter people. sure they might have had the smarts to patent a half brained idea but its killing innovation.
We on planet Earth call it GSM.
I don't know if it is the same Judge Edward Harrington, but from this article it appears that he was appointed by Ted Kennedy.
Teddy couldn't have appointed him to a federal appellate judgeship (though he could have suggested it to his brother John F.).
Bantam Dominique roosters crow a four-note song. Once you've heard it as "Happy BIRTHday" you can't NOT hear it that way
So this is what it comes down to, hmm?
You all better stock up on canned food, because I'm going to file for a patent on pre-paid food.
A method of submitting a personal identification number and the type of food which will be authorized before allowing the injestion of said food. Personal identification number systems will vary by the financial institution used by the injester to prove and relinquish funds for said food injested by injester. The injestee shall have no say but their personal idenfication number shall also be sent to a computer to look up the current market value of said injestee.
All I have to say is, "POOP!"
the dems aren't any better, the advantage with them is they're running against all the corruption and evil, so they get away with less. It's kinda hard to run on a platform opposing corruption only to be corrupt. Plus since the media is owned by Republicans, the dems get scrutinized more. It's not that they're less evil, they're just given fewer opportunites. Plus, the current administration's tactic of being so openly corrupt that nobody can stand to believe they'd act that way in plain sight wouldn't fly with dems.
Hi! I make Firefox Plug-ins. Check 'em out @ https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/youtube-mp3-podcaster/
Buying food, gasoline, utilities, clothing, books, movies, etc. is pay as you go.
Food: University residence hall meal plans charge based on maximum allowed meals per week, not meals actually consumed. Overages cost extra. Utilities: At least in one country, only two bags of garbage are collected from each household per week. Overages cost extra in the form of tax stamps. Utilities: For a long time, Verizon's dial-up Internet access plan gave a subscriber 150 hours a month. Overages cost extra. Web hosting also tends to run on a predicted bandwidth and overage basis.
How can the Mafia sue the **AAs for stealing their business model if "there is no Mafia"?
You seem not to get it. The **AAs you speak of are the Mafia (music and film industry associations). Here's proof.
Tracfone has their own system for keeping track of minutes on the phone, and they have a patent on it, too. The handset itself keeps track of how many units of airtime it has available and they are added or subtracted from the phone when you enter special codes into the phone, or more recently, there are over-the-air ways to do this.
Local governments can kick people out of their houses for the sake of public works projects, and lately they've been doing it for commercial projects. The federal government can void patents in the name of national security. I'm not in love with either practice, but as long as those are the rules we have to live under why can't the principle of eminent domain be invoked to override a patent claim that denies a valuable service to a significant number of people. Especially if the technology has been in use for a while.
You have a company that I have never heared of that owns some kind of IP comes out of the wood works when some other lager company is making money at it. Not when they first start, but after they make money at.
If the alleged infringer can show that this is the case, then the damages may in fact be estopped by laches. Short, approximate: If you knowingly delay legal action in order to harm an alleged infringer, you can't collect damages for infringements that occurred prior to your filing suit.
I should sue every one of these big companies we've been talking about. RIM patenting a keyboard (what's so special about it that it deserves a patent), and Freedom Wireless patenting a system to have people pay money. I hold the patent on patenting general ideas and then suing to get more money. So I get to sue all of them. Then I can turn around and sue everybody for slander.
"10001110101 - periodic table with a centerpiece of mind" -Clutch
Better would have been "Every time someone litigates over a stupid patent, God kills a kitten." Please think of the kittens.
Innovation stifled by patents and fairly lame ones at that....
I become more and more convinced that we need to eliminate the intellectual property laws in order for mankind to prosper. They are merely another form of slavery. Not physical, but mental slavery.
im going to go out and patent pong... and all the old school games that didnt get patented and then make a fortune....
(yes i know i suck at spelling fell free to correct my grammar and/or spellin i dont care, im still not going to change
The US has for a long time been trying to export their patent laws overseas. In many african and asian countries it is a mandatory requirement for aid, trade, etc. By systematically patenting every obvious idea under the sun the US can continue it's "Perpetual Economic Expansion" by bringing patent serfdom to the rest of the world.
Once the US has a hold on the patent system and has established laws worldwide to protect the interests of US patent holders, it will be possible to sit back, let the developing countries do the work, and reap the profits. It's a brilliant strategy.
People living in developing countries (including me) must do everything in their power to lobby their governments to reject US patent laws. They could well be a noose around our neck and keep us in serfdom forever.
Hey, at least nothing is changing...
Would you feel the same if one night you had this dream in which you solved some fundamental problems that would allow ICs to be ten times faster (or something like that), and 3 or 4 years down the road some asshole at Intel say "eureka" and comes up with the same thing? Wouldn't it have been nice for you if you had written it all down and filed a patent on it? It's always a bitch when someone else comes up with something and decides to press the issue and clean up, but sometimes "fairness" is a matter of perspective.
"Who are in control, they are not in control of anything - they don't even control themselves!" - Glen Beck
>>> But... that's just my two cents
That's two AND A HALF cents, buddy, PER MINUTE.
It doesn't hurt to be nice.
dam... that would have been the perfect ending wouldn't it have? Thanks for the laugh lol
Who uses prepaid phones anyway? Unless something's changed drastically, they rape you on airtime. Sure you get to go without a contract, but they get you coming and going. Without vasoline. Surely people aren't going completely wireless using these prepaid phones? I use 1000-2000 minutes a month. How much would that be on a prepaid service? I've also been with my carrier for years now, and haven't had a contract since the first year--
Democrats tax and spend. Republicans just spend.
I see that you've forgotten why GWB senior lost to Clinton. Do you recall the phrase: "read my lips"?
Democrats commit felonies by lying about their extramarital relations
Ever heard of Dan Rostenkowski?
-jcr
The only title of honor that a tyrant can grant is "Enemy of the State."
In the early ninetys (or maybe earlier) there were other prepaid services that likely had a database that connected an ID of some sort to a remaining usage balance. Yeah it may have been a different ID from a phone number and the usage probably was not airtime.
When will America wake up and correct the absurd patent and judical systems?
Kids...teenagers, people with limited income.
It costs a buck eighty three.
Yet another reason for my mom to get rid of her super-old phone and service with them.
I don't get it.
Wanna trade? I got a patent for an elevated sitting surface supported by 4 pillars or "legs". Connected to this surface is a support plate for the back. (See sig for illustrations of this unique concept.)
The Chair Corp. comic(*00-12)
Ahem.
"Freedom Costs A Buck O' Five."
Lyrics
Support FSF: Stop thinking with your wallet, and think with your imagination. (cc/non-commercial)
I don't think you can patent the fuck. Too much prior art.
The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
Why can't people claim prior art from the Europeans. They had prior art from a lot earlier for prepay GSM. Sure this involved a lookup of credit from the subscriber identifier, but it would certainly invalidate a lot of the claims.
See my journal, I write things there
Clearly youre mother and mine need a new phone with a camera and the ability to play full motion video and run a moblog and play 3d games and display in VGA and all the other crap that phones do that 99% of the poeple that own a cellphone dont need.
unzip; strip; touch; finger; mount; fsck; more; yes; unmount; sleep
Plus tax. Taxes are never listed. I've always hated that in the US they can't list the amount of tax on the items.
AND that they look at me funny when the first thing I do when I go into a shop is ask what the local tax rate is.
May contain traces of nut.
Made from the freshest electrons.
Look closer, you'll notice a real difference.
D.C. is my home town. I've looked very close at the Ruling Party, and come to a different conclusion than you.
I know its cool to take the "everyone is corrupt, the same, and life is hopeless" stance here at slashdot and pretend libertarianism works, so enjoy your mod points.
Who said it's hopeless? All I said was that the Republicans and Democrats are interchangeable.
-jcr
The only title of honor that a tyrant can grant is "Enemy of the State."
Can hardly pay with cash, if you're running a tab. Better to not have this option. Why, people could say anything to one another and they couldn't be held accountable!
"Reality is that which, when you stop believing in it, it doesn't go away." - Philip K. Dick
Try this... Time Travel Patents
Please read my Canon EOS tech blog at http://www.everyothershot.com
Aerosmith:
Walk this way! (Patent restrictions apply)
Talk this way! (Providing you have written permission, acknowledged by a high court judge)
You feel sleepy. Close your eyes. The opinions stated above are yours. You cannot imagine why you ever felt otherwise.
I harp on this a lot, but doesn't it just seem like this is yet again another aspect of the push for a service economy? When we stop producing real goods, and start simply tweaking tech to provide new services, and ONLY doing that, doesn't it make sense that business will push to patent ideas and processes, instead of patenting technology?
I can hardly blame the businesses for wanting this and pushing for this, but it also smacks of a serious lack of leadership in the country, as well. What happens then is that business management is more important than science. Haven't heard that we have a lack of scientists lately, right?
Linux - because it doesn't leave that Steve Ballmer aftertaste.
Comments:
The first-free-minute idea is cool. Nextel used to have first outgoing minute free, mostly to appease worries about racking up huge bills when you're repeatedly calling a busy number. When combined with free incoming calls, and mobile-to-mobile it meant almost all calls were free.
The card idea is a good one. SIM cards are already "restricted" in some ways; why not store actual billing info on them? If they're easily removed, you could also use them in pay phones. On the other hand, you could just use a credit card, and never have to worry about sending a bill. If the card gets rejected, it terminates the call (probably about 15 seconds in to it ;-)
More ideas:
Use a different type of number: Look up some random "user ID" assigned to the phone. Bonus: If you borrow someone else's phone, or use a payphone, you can put in your user ID and have it bill your phone (yes, I know you can do this with a phone number, but the companies' marketing departments can spin this into a feature somehow ;-)
Obfuscate the number: MD5sum the number, reverse the number, etc... and look that up.
Use a different type of balance: Store the account balance instead of the number of minutes, and subtract minutes * rate from it instead of just minutes. Bonus: You can charge more for long-distance/roaming/international calls, text/multimedia messages, web browsing, etc...
Use a different time unit: Store the number of years, months, days, hours, seconds, milliseconds, metric hours, metric minutes, or metric seconds instead.
Just my $0.02, er, I mean 2 minutes...
ttuttle is a rankmaniac
At the heart of Freedom's 1996 patent is the idea of using a computer to match a cellphone number with a database showing how many paid-up minutes the cellphone owner has, then deciding whether to complete a call. using radius or tacacs+ to keep track of clients who try to connect via isdn or analogic modems, and see how much budget they have. this is part of the specifics! thrue it was not referred to cellphone (but il could easily been adopted) and usually is used to keep track of connection time, but budget limits are part of it!
I'm calling the Police.
You better watch out, there may be dogs about . .
"*shrug* yeah. I've long since realised the whole concept of freedom in the US is lip service to some ideal everyone would like, and everyone has convinced themselves they have, but has long since left on the wings of excess litigation, patents, government regulations and stupid laws."
I definately agree that special interests and corporations have too much power, but I also don't take light the fact that at any given time I can go anywhere I want, do anything I want within reason, without telling anyone where I'm going or what I'm doing. This is a good thing. But, I do believe that the more important aspect of my own freedom is the freedom not be fucked with by other people.
It doesn't always work, but it's a lot better then many places in the world.
- It's not the Macs I hate. It's Digg users. -
as 90% of the time I use one it's for work, and it means a headache (no one ever calls to tell me I'm doing a great job, they only call with problems), but for emergencies, last minute groceries and running late the wife and I both have a Tracfone. It's running about $20 USD/month for both of us.
This should be a wakeup call. The OSS MUST start patenting each and everything they can think of. The ONLY way we can keep OSS free and open is if we use the system to our advantage, like RedHat. Come up with ideas, patent them, or shop them to RedHat or even IBM and get them to patent them, giving you credit and having the patent open for all OSS. Basically, we have NO CHOICE.
If I don't act on it, I shouldn't be entitled to receive compensation for it. And receiving a patent for an idea is not acting on that idea in my opinion.
oh man did i get it wrong?
I stand corrected. Mark it on your calendar, it doesnt happen much.
I wrote an application in the spring of 1995 for a debit card system that did exactly that. It used a dbase database to track how many minutes you had remaining on your debit card before deciding to connect your call. It was written in VOS for Dialogic hardware while I was working at US Digital in Flint. The whole system went into production and cards were sold. The company is no longer doing business under that name but the principals are still around, and I expect there is enough evidence left over to present prior art.
The patent never should have been granted, what an obvious thing to implement.
I'm gonna patent the idea of patenting rediculious ideas w/no intention of producing a product and then waiting until somebody else impliments it and suing them. Then anytime somebody uses my method, they'll owe me royalites!
Life has many choices. Eternity has two. What's yours?
I have filed a patent for forum and email signatures. You all owe me 2.5 cents or you ned to cease and dissist.... :P
New and improved Guilt. Now its alcohol soluble!
5,722,067 was filed on December 23, 1994. 6,157,823 was filed on January 20, 1998 as a continuation of 5,722,067. This is hugely important because for purposes of prior art, both patents have a PRIORITY date of December 23, 1994.
This means that in order for prior art (e.g. a written publication or public use) to be effective in invalidating either patent, it would have to have been published (or otherwise be made publicly known) on or before December 23, 1993. That's 12 years ago folks, long before pay-as-you-go cellular service was even a germ of an idea for most people.
As ususal in these patent-related articles, posts abound with the knee-jerk "this is obvious", "I have seen this before", "patents suck" dribble. Nobody bothers to read the patent to see what it actually claims or when it was filed.
In these pay as you go services you usually have to buy the phone.. I wonder if you get anything back if you recently signed up or if you phone is useable for another service.
Now T-Mobile, Verizon, Cingular et al, will have to pay Freedom Wireless fees that they had not expected.
Why are we supposed to be upset by this?
Every month these same phone companies stick as many regulatory or usage fees as they think they can get away with onto our bills.
Now its their turn.
Many will suggest that we will only end up paying for it in the end. However, I would say that currently the phone companies charge what the market will bear. They bleed us for whatever they can. Their costs have little to do with what we pay.
--Barry
When I was a kid, I used a clothes pin to keep a bag of chips closed.
I was not upset to the the patented "Chip Clip" at the super market. They went through the effort of patenting and building a business. I didn't. They owe me nothing.
The problem with this isssue is the abuse of the patent system.
Patents are supposed to give the small guy a chance to start a business in the face of competing big business. If someone "patents" something without even trying to build a business or product its more like squatting. I really don't see much difference between this and cyber-squatting other than it is more insiduous.
----- If communism is a system where the government owns business, what do you call a system where business owns govern
Oh COME ON. If we knew in advance exactly how a judge would rule on everything, there'd be no need to appoint him/her, would there? We could just run the issue through the computer program called "How Judge XYZ Would Rule" and be done with it.
Now, if this judge had made a string of one asinine decision after another, that's another thing.
While it will be nice to sit around wanking ourselves and dreaming that this will cause the major cell phone companies to lash out at the patent office, I think the more likely outcome will be this:
"Due to increased cost of doing business, your minutes now cost 2.5 cents more per minute. Making a phone call or otherwise using our wireless services implies your agreement to this amendment of your usage agreement."
You say you got a real solution
Well, you know
We'd all love to see the plan
(The Beatles)
Don't just go with the first search hit, nor the liner notes of a compilation album. Sometimes you have to go digging for the complete lyrics.
Oh, say does that Star-Spangled Banner entwine / The myrtle of Venus with Bacchus's vine?
This is a total non-sequitur. Just because Bush Senior was the most prominent Republican at the time doesn't mean that his every act defined the Republican Party platform.
Finally, Bush Senior didn't lose the election because he raised taxes. He wasn't punished for raising taxes, but for raising taxes after saying this:
He shouldn't have made the promise, and raising taxes was probably the most sensible thing to do at the time he reneged on the promise. But when he made the promise, he was simply saying what the vast majority of his party wanted to hear. Hence, my assertion that Republicans are against taxation, even though they don't seem to have any talent for controlling spending.
The name rings a bell. But he was a Chicago politician. It's not like we could expect better from him.
You want the truthiness? You can't handle the truthiness!
GSM works fine out here in the country. CDMA's voice quality is awful, and has well documented issues about dropped calls when making peak-time phone calls inside buildings. CDMA is also a 1970s phone service with a 1990s digital spread spectrum thing bolted on, rather than a full, modern, digital mobile phone service with SIM cards, ISDN interoperability and functionality, and global position independence.
So go away, and tell your friends at Qualcomm to stop trolling here.
You are not alone. This is not normal. None of this is normal.
would be if this virus just targetted lawyers, with 100% lethality rate...
No, she needs it replaced because the minutes cost too much, run out too fast, and the faceplate doesn't stay on that well anymore. This feels like a troll Im reading, but it also has to be said that its obviously not 99% who don't need it. My mother has poor eyesight, so a picture ID for calls is great for her, and she has already used the camera to document evidence of a car accident just as it happened. Though I will concede that she doesn't need bluetooth, oh, except to have the pictures easily transferred to her phone. So what were you saying about almost nobody using featurs again?
I don't get it.
Who woulda thought to do something like that?
What's next, monthly billing based on credit card purchases?
Yeah, and a 12 year old to show her how to use it all.
As I witnessed just last night.
PS: Who are these deep-pocketed middle-class people who are tossing $300 phones at their pre-teens? What goes through their heads?
Terrorists can attack freedom, but only Congress can destroy it.
I never said group "A" were litterbugs; I said they were murderous, child-molesting mutants. How dare you accuse me of insulting them?
Get it now?
The patent covers something like being able to stop calls from a customer who has run out of minutes I believe. Anyway, it's a paent over a specific technical solution to a problem.
Would you consider a Television to be patentable? If I invent a television, should I not be able to patent it just because there's only one obvious way to make a television? (It took 50 years to move beyond cathod ray tubes.)
Patentable inventions are not just about obvious - yes, paying in advance for cell minutes is obvious. But just because the general concept is obvious doesn't mean that a workable instantiation of it is.
paintball