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Apple Sues Burst.com in iTunes Patent Dispute

Posted by Zonk on from the you-with-the-patents-stick-em-up dept.

An anonymous reader writes "Burst.com, a patent holder of many patents covering streaming video and time-shifting of video, has been sued by Apple after license negotiations broke down. Apple is asking the court to invalidate Burst.com's patents. Burst.com is the same company that successfully sued Microsoft over patent infringements. Many comparisons will likely be made of NTP and Burst.com, but Burst.com actually has useful technology, has owned the patents for over a decade, and most importantly, actually had highly regarded products that made use of the patents."

10 of 146 comments (clear)

  1. NTP does too by feijai · · Score: 3, Informative

    NTP's patent holders made actual products based on the products, and held them for over a decade as well. Burst is different in what regard again?

  2. RTF Summary! by ImaLamer · · Score: 2, Informative

    And visit the website:

    http://burst.com/new/products/main.htm

    Burst.com doesn't just hold the patents, they are selling products which use them.

    --
    Get your Unix fortune now!
  3. A Brief History of QuickTime... by podperson · · Score: 4, Informative

    QuickTime was released in 1991. I think developers saw betas in late 1990 but I could be wrong. They'd demoed QuickTime as an early alpha at least one year earlier (e.g. they'd shown digital videos playing back in MacWrite documents).

    QuickTime 1.0 was followed in 1993 by 1.5 and 1.6 (which ran under Windows). By the time QuickTime 2.0 came out in 1994, you could embed quicktime videos inside a web page. QuickTime 3.0 allowed videos to start playing as soon as enough data had been downloaded, and you could stream ahead of the playback head (the way it works today). I believe QuickTime 3.0 also unified the file format (i.e. by eliminating "forked" QuickTime files where metadata was stored in the resource fork.)

    Given that Burst was founded in 1990, that its flagship product is at 2.0 (I think Apple's opensourced Darwin Streaming Server is probably a more mature product), I doubt they have a leg to stand on.

    It's ColorSync all over again.

    Also see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quicktime

    1. Re:A Brief History of QuickTime... by hw2084 · · Score: 5, Informative
      Given that Burst was founded in 1990, that its flagship product is at 2.0 (I think Apple's opensourced Darwin Streaming Server is probably a more mature product), I doubt they have a leg to stand on.

      Do a little bit of research first.

      The Burst patents don't cover all video streaming in general. Burst came up with and patented the streaming+caching technology that allows smooth playback of video over the internet. Before Burst, everyone would just have you download the whole file before playing, or do straight streaming which led to hiccups during playback.

      Before Burst was on the scene, video streaming was horrible because they couldn't figure out how to smooth out the slowdowns in traffic. After Burst demonstrated their technology (most famously for the U2 Popmart concert) *and* talked to Microsoft and Real about licensing their code, the next versions of their video players magically contained the same buffering technology. Apple was soon to follow, probably figuring "hey everyone else is doing it."

  4. How do you prefer your crow by way2trivial · · Score: 4, Informative

    boiled- baked- fried?

    http://www.burst.com/new/products/main.htm

    My god, a two click search, and by your own admission for holding patents with NO intent of producing. (If they had a product we would all be hating on Apple) your entire well reasoned and well written argument falls apart.

    --
    every day http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Random
  5. Burst beat Apple to Streaming/Buffering by hw2084 · · Score: 2, Informative
    You just made a fool of yourself to anyone with even a tiny amount of knowledge of QuickTime's streaming technology and when it was first created.

    Time for you to do a bit of 'research' yourself dimwit.

    From wikipedia entry on QT: "Apple released QuickTime 4.0 for Mac OS on June 8, 1999...It added the second version of the Sorenson video codec, and support for streaming."

    Burst demonstrated their streaming/buffering technology in 1997 (the U2 concert streamed via internet). Burst was clearly there first with their caching technology. You can see the timeline at the burst.com site: http://www.burst.com/new/about/timeline.htm

    1. Re:Burst beat Apple to Streaming/Buffering by podperson · · Score: 2, Informative

      Oh here's some research -- from a former QuickTime Evangelist's Blog:

      While I was Apple's QuickTime Evangelist, I was a magnet for all kinds of folks who claimed to have miraculous codecs and other holy-grail technologies. Burst.com claimed to have a revolutionary way of delivering streaming content. Lossless. Faster than realtime.

      Well, golly. You can deliver content losslessly and faster than real time via HTTP and FTP, too. Only Burst.com did this with a magical, proprietary protocol that required a magical, proprietary server that they would be happy to sell to you. The secret of the "secret sauce" that Burst.com CEO Richard Lang mentions in the feature is that there is no secret sauce.

      Mr. Lang believes that Microsoft was out to get him. However, the reality is that Burst.com was, at best, a fly to Microsoft's mountain.

      Now Burst.com is suing Microsoft, a move apparently prompted by Windows Media 9's "Instant On" feature. If you have a really fast conneciton and there are no bottlenecks along the way, it lets you see/hear media almost instantly. It works by putting a huge buffer at the client, and then filling that buffer as fast as possible so that buffering time is minimized.

      QuickTime's "Fast Start" provided much of this functionality with QuickTime 3's progressive streaming (1998), and QuickTime 6 added the final missing piece (random access) with its Instant-On feature earlier this year. RealNetworks uses a similar method to optimize the viewing experience in RealSystem 9.

    2. Re:Burst beat Apple to Streaming/Buffering by ajs · · Score: 3, Informative

      I would suspect a couple (especially the last) of the entries in this paper to be decent prior-art sources for much of what is listed in the patent's claims, but perhaps not all.

  6. Re:The patent system is ridiculous by QuietLagoon · · Score: 3, Informative
    I'm so tired of hearing about all these companies whose sole purpose is to hang onto patents and so-called intellectual property.

    Burst is not one of those companies that collects patents for the purpose of suing alleged infringers.

    Burst themselves had the foresight to develop their technology a number of years ago and patent their ideas. Check out their website and you will see that the "faster than realtime" technology that Burst developed is the only patents that they own.

  7. Re:Deflector by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Informative

    "He who lives by the sword dies by the sword" originating from a paraphrased "all who draw the sword will die by the sword" from Matthew 26:52 in the Bible. http://www.layhands.com/ModernPhrasesInTheBible.ht m