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Netflix Suing Blockbuster for Patent Infringement
grouchomarxist writes "Netflix is suing Blockbuster for Patent Infringement. From the article: 'Netflix holds two U.S. patents for its business methodology, which calls for subscribers to pay a monthly fee to select and rent DVDs from the company's Web site and to maintain a list of titles telling Netflix in which order to ship the films, according to the patents, which were included as exhibits in the lawsuit.
The first patent, granted in 2003, covers the method by which Netflix customers select and receive a certain number of movies at a time, and return them for more titles.
The second patent, issued on Tuesday, "covers a method for subscription-based online rental that allows subscribers to keep the DVDs they rent for as long as they wish without incurring any late fees, to obtain new DVDs without incurring additional charges and to prioritize and reprioritize their own personal dynamic queue -- of DVDs to be rented," the lawsuit said.'"
I am really worried. Any minute now, someone will patent going to work by bus. (Including SCSI and VME)
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My pics.
next 7-11 will sue circle K because they both run the same business.
So a common-sense business method is patentable? The U.S. patent system really is broken, I'd encourage all to read Jaffe & Lerner's Innovation and Its Discontents to see just how broken it is. Personally, I think there's no hope of repair, and innovation would progress better were the entire system thrown out. But patents are seen as such a triumph of early American government, with founding fathers like Jefferson in favor of them. Plus, our legislature is currently enslaved to monetary interests. So, we're stuck in quite a pickle where nothing can really be done.
Aside from whether or not business methods should be patentable... since they were granted the patent, it's pretty obvious that they had come up with a novel process which was straight-up copied. On the legal merits, they should certainly win.
500GB of disk, 5TB of transfer, $5.95/mo
OK so what if I go out and patent queueing at a shop checkout to pay for goods, or paying for magazines to be delivered to your home on a monthly basis, or, or........
This shit has to stop, I mean netflix are just being totally petty about the whole damn thing. I mean, what *other* way is there to organise online DVD rental? Are they going to enforce patents on their *whole* business model.
This has to stop. Gah!
When the posters fear their moderators, there is tyranny; when the moderators fears the posters, there is liberty.
One hand washes the other, but your post is more like both hands waving apprehensively in the air because you weren't sure which one to wave but now you realize that waving both looks stupid but you've already committed to your decision and don't want to look like you did it on accident.
English is easier said than done.
The first patent, granted in 2003, covers the method by which Netflix customers select and receive a certain number of movies at a time, and return them for more titles.
...um, long before 2003?
Isn't this exactly how libraries have worked since
Blockbuster should charge $.01 per year late fees. No longer the same as the patent.
First of all, Blockbuster sucks, they 'settled' their class action lawsuit for overcharging for late fees by offering about 3-4 free rentals as payment. That is unfair. They made millions from these late fees and then when they were found to be scamming, they just offered some free rentals, big deal...we never saw that late-fee money again.
Netflix needs to stop staggering movies for frequent-renters. Just because someone can take full advantage of their 'all-you-can-rent' policy, doesn't mean they should be penalized for it. Netflix already gains from those who don't return their movies regularly, so why should they care if some rent and watch a new movie every day? Just charge more per month or get rid of the policy.
He who knows best knows how little he knows. - Thomas Jefferson
... should probably take the time to read the patents in controversy assigned to Netflix first.
They are:
US Patent No. 6,966,484 to Calonje, et al.; and
US Patent No. 7,024,381 to Hastings, et al.
As you do so, look at the claim language, not the specification, to find out what the invention actually covers. Discuss.
Yes, "common-sense" business models are patentable. Why? Because "common-sense" is not as common as you would think.
As for the "patents are bad for innovation" argument : if you come up with a way to manufacture widgets that no one else has before, and that innovation has cost you a certain amount in development costs, should you not have the right to protect that investment? If your competition can just steal your methods, then you would have no incentive to innovate.
I am not saying that there isn't a line here, or that the the line hasn't been jumped over by the US. patent office, but by and large patents do in fact encourge business investment into research that would otherwise not happen.
If at first you don't succeed, redefine 'success'
Last time I checked, patenting was only for "new and innovative" methodologies and products. What I read in the article is neither. It is common sense to give people the products they want in the order they want them, and to give repeat customers a flat-rate on rentals. I suppose Netflix should look elsewhere for their innovations. They could try pantenting their screw over your customers business methodology...
"Bad times have a scientific value. These are occasions a good learner would not miss." ~ Ralph Waldo Emerson
A method in which I look in the fridge on a regular basis and realize it is empty. I then get in the car and drive to the beer store to replenish my supply of beer.
You all owe me.
Do you think Netflix is going to also patent their wonderful method of throttling their better customers? I just signed up for Blockbuster after watching my netflix shipping come to a slow grinding halt. I am actually LUCKY if I get my three movies at a time in a single week now. So I wanted to check out Blockbuster to see how they fared. Now they are getting sued by Netflix. Boy is that irony? Of course this will never go through - if it does, imagine the precident it will set. KMart will go after Walmart (for their methodology of having consumers in lines to pay for goods). Converse will go after Adidas (for their methodology of creating goods to go on someone's feet). I just hope like hell Blockbuster isn't also sued for slowing down the shipping of movies. I do believe Netflix has the corner on that market!
nature loves variety::society hates it get your variety at http://www.monkeypantz.net
I hereby announce that I hold a patent on suing others for infringing on dubious patents. If you hold a patent of dubious nature, and you sue someone else over it, you owe me royalties.
And if you sue me over my patent, you still owe me royalties.
$nice = $webHosting + $domainNames + $sslCerts
Nope, I got that patent already. And if you want to make a bowel movement, I got that one too. So pay up.
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Blockbuster, if you're listening, you need to lay hard into the US Patent Office and sue them for incompetently issuing bogus patents that will cost you huge penalties in legal fees and possible settlement costs.
The advantage of vigorously pursuing full-scale litigation against the patent office is that most of the research for your legal team will be done free of charge. There is a huge community who are already aware of the problem with the USPTO and can point to at least hundreds of similar bogus patents that have or may in the future cause significant financial loss to other companies.
One problem is that often someone will patent an idea without further developing it. They will sit on it until another company does all the footwork to make the idea feasible and then sue them. Unless the other company takes the risk the patent won't benefit anyone.
Chika Chik-ah... do-e ow ow.
I use these guys: http://www.intelliflix.com/. It's cheap. Anyways, they too are copying Netflix, must be that they're not big enough to get sued for it yet. Estupido.
nothing
There's a difference between patenting inventions (i.e. what the system was designed for) and patenting commercial actions and methods of organization, which is what business model patents are. Business model patents do NOT promote the Sciences and Arts. They merely ensure a monopoly without encouraging innovation.
If it's for-profit but free, you're not the customer -- you're the product (e.g., the Slashdot Beta's "audience").
Yes but common sense refers to the time the patent application is filed. I agree that lots of ideas are obvious after someone has had them. That is why you file the patent, and then tell the world about it. But if your idea was obvious before you suggested it, that's common sense and isn't (and shouldn't be) protected. If all obvious ideas could be patented, it becomes a race to file patents, and innovation naver gets a look in. Which appears to be how the US patent office functions.
My good friend who has been working at netflix for approximately 5 years says that most of the employees think the lawsuit issue with blockbuster is a waste of time
Blockbuster has been getting their asses kicked in regards to marketshare vs. netflix for about the last year or so
When blockbuster initially tried to compete with Nflix, the Nflix folks were a bit scared, including my buddy who was worried about the future of the company he helped develop - however, after Nflix's somewhat recent resurgence & increased user subscription, which in turn boosted the stock prices from all time lows, blockbuster has become a non-issue to Nflix (well at least to my buddy and most of the staff)
--
We don't need incentive to innovate, innovation is in the inner essence of the human race. Problems need to be solved, and someone will solve them first. There are many benefits of being an inventor or pioneer. And innovation is good for business as well, as it gives you a lead over the competition (no need to tie people down). There are ways you can prevent others from just stealing your work, such as copyrights, and trade secrets. That does not apply to business methods (you can still take credit for creating it, which can be good marketing). Here what matters is that you need to execute well and provide the better value for your customers.
It seems that as soon as you add the words internet or software people just lose any sence they had. If you asked someone if you could patent having cash registers at the front of the store instead of having someone follow you around charging you as you take things off the shelf they would tell you there is no way you could patent that. But now if you have some software in a virtual store that computes your bill once you've finished selecting which items you want that's patentable. This country really needs to come to terms with the technology it has invented and realize how few differences there are between this new tech and the business methodology from the brick and mortar establishments it is based on.
Business method patents would be more palatable if the term of protection weren't so long, especially when the web is involved. Seventeen-year legal monopolies just don't fit a twelve-year-old medium.
org.slashdot.post.SignatureNotFoundException: ewg
I believe not at all. Rights are granted for the benefit of the whole of society, not single individuals: otherwise you might as well reintroduce slavery, as it was very beneficial to a few guys. Having a monopoly on something that can be reproduced indefinitely such as business or programming methods, and knowledge in general, means unfairly harming everybody else. You are not damaged by someone else who's using your methods (this does not block you from using them), unless you mean by competition, and last time I checked there is quite a load of legislation that actually protects competition, as it is demonstrated to improve product quality for society.
You cannot steal a method or an idea. You can only copy it. The original author still has it.
On the contrary, if you know that the competition is going to figure out your methods and implement them after a while, you know also that you must keep innovating and leveraging your position as first in the market (it takes time to make a Webshop from just an idea: and if you are slow and competition is faster than you to commercialise, it's all your fault). In other words, you have to do actual work, not rest on your laurels because some law forbid everybody else from using your methods.
From the whole society's point of view (that is, our point of view), if Netflix wins we are going to see worse service from Blockbuster and less competition. If Blockbuster wins, competition will be closer between the companies and they will have to find a way to get more customers.
The more I think of the patent system the more I think that the whole concept is flawed. As generally with IP, Beethoven and Mozart died in poverty, Britney Spears is filthy rich.
Victims of 9/11: <3000. Traffic in the US: >30,000/y
to all but lawyers (confession: I am a recovering lawyer). Under the current approach, Coca-Cola's greatest error was not New Coke, it was not patenting the "containing of a carbonated fluid in a variable sized vessel..." Take that Pepsi, et al. Henry Ford should clearly have nailed down the whole "four wheeled, motorized vehicle" thing and avoided all these annoying "also rans."
Personally, I think a company should live or die on thier ability to innovate and, more importantly, provide value and support to their client base...not their ability to litigate. YMMV.
Well, at the time, NetFlix was new and innovative with their business model. Therefore, the patents were reasonable at the time. Just because something seems obvious now doesn't mean that it has always been obvious.
IMHO, a time limit is needed for business model patents. I won't argue here how long they should be valid, just that they should have a reasonable expiration date. That way, the innovative company can cash in on their research and development for the time limit of their patent while still allowing competition in the market.
Naturally, companies (and I assume politicians as well) won't like the idea of time limited business model patents but I think that is what would be best for the consumer.
As for the "patents are bad for innovation" argument : if you come up with a way to manufacture widgets that no one else has before, and that innovation has cost you a certain amount in development costs, should you not have the right to protect that investment?
If a company comes up with a new way to manufacture widgets -- a new widget-making machine, for instance -- and you're talking about a competitor stealing the construction plans for the machine, then I think this is a different situation, and far less objectionable.
But when we're talking about business process innovation -- finding new ways to store inventory, or manage relationships with vendors and customers, or hire and retain employees, or deliver goods and services -- then I think the argument is less clear. Presumably you do these things simply to derive a competitive advantage, and the additional profits you expect to earn are incentive enough.
It used to be that the PTO wouldn't grant patents for business methods, because they saw them as abstract ideas -- this all changed with the State Street case.
In-town, one could stroll to the lending library (or send one's maid or footman) to return a book and pick up the next one on the list. It was a social occasion as well as a literary one. Subscription price varied depending on how many books you wanted to have in your posession at a time.
Out of town patrons paid a subscription fee (higher to cover the cost of shipping) that depended on how many books they wanted to posess at a time (a few, up to dozens of them if you were going to India), handed over or mailed in their list and waited for the postman to deliver the books. When they were finished with the book/s, they sent it/them back and got the next batch on the list that was in stock.
Come to think of it, almost any restaurant or fast food store offers "all you can drink until you leave for a single fee". Many sports teams offer a season pass, which is "all the local games you can attend this season for a single fee".
How does applying this concept to DVD rentals make it unique?
Edward Burr
Having a smoking section in a restaurant is like having a peeing section in a swimming pool.
I make a case for a Blockbuster bankruptcy here. The Netflix thing just makes it worse. http://www.worldoftech.blogspot.com/
So what you're saying is ways to improve business, the assembly line pioneered by Henry Ford for automobiles should be patentable?
While it was an amazing idea, and helped bring automobiles into the grasp of the average man, doesn't mean it should be exclusive to that company. A company discovers a new model that works, what should prohibit another company from taking up that model instead of going under? Bookstore than failing can't sell their books online because Amazon patented the 'innovation' of selling books online? Sorry, I thought capitalism was supposed to spur innovation not suffocate it.
-Brandon
You do have the right to protect that investment in any case. Nobody is proposing prohibiting the protection of investments. What you're talking about is stripping other people of the right to use an idea.
If your competition can just steal your methods,
Eh? Is anyone proposing that stealing methods, which would necessarily entail forcibly erasing your knowledge of those methods from your mind, should be explicitly legal or something?
Why do you patent authoritarians have such trouble describing things honestly? Is it because your arguments are so incredibly weak that they wouldn't survive if people understood what they really are?
then you would have no incentive to innovate.
Yeah, because no innovation ever happened at any point in history before patent systems were established.
I am not saying that there isn't a line here, or that the the line hasn't been jumped over by the US. patent office, but by and large patents do in fact encourge business investment into research that would otherwise not happen.
Your evidence of this? And remember, we are talking about removing people's freedom. You need really strong and convincing evidence of a huge, unambiguously beneficial end effect to propose such a thing. And certainly everything I've seen suggests precisely the opposite, it just ends up with a load of power being wielded by the already powerful few, and makes innovation far more difficult for the majority of less powerful people and companies, whilst creating artificial monopolies which remove much of the incentive to innovate from the monopoly-holder.
Did they also include a patent for slowing shipping down because you rent too many movies from them?
After all, Unlimited isn't really unlimited with netflix.
I'm leaving netflix To go to blockbuster - I guess people like me defecting is what really prompted the lawsuit. Instead of living up to the "Unlimited Rentals" they are going to sue everyone else out of existance.
_ _ _ Go for the eyes Boo! GO FOR THE EYES!
And if you want to make a bowel movement, I got that one too. So pay up.
I owe you quite a back log.
Death and danger are my various breads and various butters.
I believe not at all. Rights are granted for the benefit of the whole of society, not single individuals: otherwise you might as well reintroduce slavery, as it was very beneficial to a few guys. Having a monopoly on something that can be reproduced indefinitely such as business or programming methods, and knowledge in general, means unfairly harming everybody else. You are not damaged by someone else who's using your methods (this does not block you from using them), unless you mean by competition, and last time I checked there is quite a load of legislation that actually protects competition, as it is demonstrated to improve product quality for society.
Its easy to suggest solutions to problems you don't understand. Patents are for the general public because they are vested to the public after a term of years. Otherwise, the idea might have never been released. This is the tradeoff, you disclose your novel idea to the public, and you get a limited monopoly on the idea. Its not unreasonable at all, especially if you spend hundreds of millions of dollars developing the idea.
Just imagine how cheap Coca-Cola would be if they patented the formula in 1920.
You cannot steal a method or an idea. You can only copy it. The original author still has it.
What about modify it? Improve it? Remove steps that are unimportant? Use it on a different subject matter? Apply it in different way?
From the whole society's point of view (that is, our point of view), if Netflix wins we are going to see worse service from Blockbuster and less competition.
But society appreciates ingenuity and creativity. There is going to be a design-around for the patent, you just have to use your wits to figure it out. And when its figured out, how much competition will there be?
This is typical slashdot flamebait. A lot of accusations and no intelligent discourse. I think business method patents are absurd too, but the whole anti-patent attitude lacks any true discussion on the merits of the patent system. Maybe from your software-developing perspective patents are absurd, but have you ever thought outside of the box and realized that its a good for other industries?
Are you insane? All rights are granted to individuals only, never to "society". In your example, for instance, the South benefited greatly as a society from institutionalized slavery - not just "a few guys". I'm not here to say slavery is right (in fact it is very wrong), but that granting rights to "society" means granting rights to the majority. In that case, whatever the majority (or "society") finds desirable is correct. If society decrees that slavery is beneficial, under your model of rights, then slavery is allowed.
Under the individual rights model, as the US is founded on, each individual citizen is granted all the rights of every other citizen. You have the right to be free from being enslaved, I have the right to be free from being enslaved, Bob has ... get the picture?
You are not damaged by someone else who's using your methods (this does not block you from using them), unless you mean by competition, and last time I checked there is quite a load of legislation that actually protects competition, as it is demonstrated to improve product quality for society.
Pretend for a moment that you've been slaving (hehe) away in your basement to create a new method for conducting business that is vastly superior to the well-established companies already in the market. You create a new company to compete with these multi-billion dollar per year corporations, and with your business method you have the potential to blow them away. However, without a patent on your new method, all the established companies copy you immediately.
Not only did you not benefit from your hard work, you basically did all your competitors a favor by giving it away for free. You worked for nothing. What's the point in doing it again next time you have a good idea? You tell your story to a few friends, who tell it to a few more friends, and all of a sudden no one wants to innovate.
Allowing a patent on your business method gives your startup company a fighting chance to establish itself in the marketplace. The limited term of patents (currently 20 years) means that eventually, yes, all your competitors will be able to use the same business method that made you so fantastically successful. Know what that means? Time to innovate again.
Also, for the other companies that cannot use your business method, they must innovate new and even more improved business methods to compete with *you* now - they can't just use your idea and stop there.
I wish you damn socialists would just stop complaining that other people have better opportunities and luck than you because they came up with something people want and you didn't. Show me something you've invented or created and shared with the whole world gratis - what's that? You can't? Oh.
The Ezine Directory
I wonder if throttling is part of that business method that is patented.
/me wipes the sarcasm off his lips...
That would actually make it 'novel' and potentially patentable... I mean, who actually would think of a system of Unlimited rentals that was in fact Limited depending on whether or not the customer actually tried to use the service as if it were unlimited.
Who here can show prior art where the word Unlimited actually means Limited.
That actually sounds pretty novel to me.
Don't stand for this. I am a Netflix customer and here is my email to them.
Netflix,
I cannot express with enough emphasis my disappointment with your decision to sue Blockbuster because they had the audacity to compete with you. I have been a Netflix member for several years and while I find your service superior to Blockbusters (which I canceled after 2 weeks) I do have something it appears you do not believe to be common among your subscribers. That thing is a conscience.
If you continue to pursue this shameful attempt to intimidate future startups from trying to compete I guarantee you that I will cancel my account. We Internet users, which constitute a large part of your subscriber base, actually follow these events with keen interest and typically find this practice of yours reprehensible. Patenting a business model, while successful on your part, is seen by many as an abuse of the system.
I ask you, on behalf of many of your subscribers, to end this, UN-American attempt to eliminate competition through dodgy manipulations of our legal and patent system.
In an average living room there are 1,242 objects Vin Diesel could use to kill you, including the room itself.
During a class in which we were discussing the Constitution, U.S. Law, and landmark Supreme Court cases, one student voiced some confusion about why the lawyers in some particular case -- one that was patently absurd to common sense and plain reading of the Constitution and laws in question -- would even take the case, since it didn't at all seem to pursue Justice.
The professor, who was also a litigation attorney, interrupted the student before he finished speaking and said, "Don't think for a moment that it is about Justice. That's naive. Legislation may be about Justice, but litigation -- for the lawyer -- is an industry by which they earn their money to buy a house and car, and to buy things they like. Lawyers working for Justice work for non-profits."
He went on to compare lawyers to cobblers -- they make shoes that sell, not that are perfect for the foot. The better the cobbler is, they more they will be able to achieve Just ends as an aside while they're performing their craft of forging a fine lawsuit for their customers -- if they care about that at all.
There are very few people in any field who perform their functions primarily out of idealism. It is as likely that you'll find a lawyer who is seeking first and foremost to forward Justice as that you'll find an IT guy who is ideologically attached to his specific employer's technological well being. More likely, it's a way for him to earn money utilizing some (fairly) specialized skill to pursue his real interests (gaming, golf, whatever).
As a final note, it does seem to me that there are certain fields that are more likely to generate idealogically motivated workers. Most of them become most apparent (as my professor said) in the pro bono arena (because it becomes obvious that the person isn't working for money). I should also point out that a fair number of lawyers may become lawyers for ideological reasons, but may also be willing to take cases that are lucrative even if not towards their certain ideological end.
It seems so obvious that patents like this only serve as legal ammunition to attack competitors. To most of us, the concept of patenting "Doing X over the internet" is ridiculous, but why is it so ? Does anyone have an example of a patent that has actually benefitted the world at large ?
From what I've seen, patents serve to "protect" the intellectual property, but really how can you own an idea ? You can invent something and be the first to market, but to use the legal system to keep everyone else out of the game is just plain retarded. If someone's business model is so fragile that they must protect their ideas with patents, then in my book they deserve to suffer everything we throw at them. If they can't stand up to the competition on level ground then they should die and let the stronger entity take their place.
-Billco, Fnarg.com
Y'know, I really get tired of this right-wing bashing of Al Gore. Of course he didn't invent pants, but he was instrumental in getting funding for the original ARPANTS which is what our modern high-speed pants derived from. So, while he of course doesn't know the technical underpinnings of interfacing, serging, hemming, and button-holing needed to make pants, he can, in some sense, take credit for our modern pants.
"To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries" - Article I, Section 8, US Constitution.
..." variety, the type you can 'innovate' in a single evening while having a beer with your buddies.
The reason for granting time-limited exclusivity (patents, copyrights) is not that innovators have a right to protect an investment, as the GP says. The reason is that without time-limited exclusivity, there would be a lot less incentive for innovators to innovate in the first place. This is especially true for innovations that require a substantial investment of time and money.
To the extent that certain innovations do not require this investment, they are less deserving of exclusivity. Society as a whole gains when a drug company finds it worth its while to spend a billion dollars to develop a new drug that they can patent and sell above cost for a limited time (until generics enter). But society loses (from lack of competition as you point out) from patenting innovations of the "wouldn't it be cool if
Imposing Libertarian views on everyone online since 1992.
They have a patent for not charging latefees. WTF? That's the most insane thing I've ever heard. I'm going to patent cars that don't use internal combustion engines or batteries and then sue everyone when they try to make a fuel cell car, or any car that uses another technology that hasn't been invented.
Brilliant.
Although, since I'm not charging late fees right now I suppose I'm violating netflix patent.
autopr0n is like, down and stuff.
This looks like a recipe to me...
Now, with a more desireable mouth melt! mmmmm :-)
Yeah, 1987 is old, but I wanted a cookie example unrelated to "non-obvious inventions" about persisting web-browser session state.
United States Patent: 4,664,921
Seiden, May 12, 1987
"Dual-textured cookie products containing narrow melting range shortenings"
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION "Traditionally, fresh homebaked cookes have exhibited a slightly crisp outer surface texture and a chewy, more ductile interior, while commercially prepared cookies have exhibited only a single texture, in most cases relatively hard and crisp. A recent development in the cookie industry is a storage-stable, crumb continuous dual texture cookie which closely approximates homemade yet does not deteriorate when stored in a warehouse or on a store shelf for reasonable periods of time.
Abstract "This invention comprises crumb-continuous cookie products having distributed therein discrete regions of storage-stable crisp texture and discrete regions of storage-stable chewy texture in which the crisp regions contain a shortening having an SCl at 21.degree. C. of from about 14.0 to about 20.0 and an SCl at 33.degree. C. of from about 0.0 to about 8.0 and the chewy regions contain a shortening having an SCl at 21.degree. C. of from about 12.0 to about 18.0 and an SCl at 33.degree. C. of below about 2.0. The shortening system having these melting characteristics provides a more tender crumb texture, more desirable mouthmelt and dissipation and better flavor display in the cookie."
Recipe Excerpt "The use of beta prime stable shortening for cookies, while not essential to the production of an acceptable cookie, is greatly preferred. If a shortening which is unstable in the beta prime form, for example, partially hydrogenated Canola oil, is used, the initially small beta prime crystals will gradually transform into large and higher melting agglomerates of beta crystals. The high melting large and grainy beta crystals detrimentally affect the taste and mouthmelt of the cookie. To produce cookies with good mouthmelt and dissipation and flavor display that will retain these characteristics under adverse storage conditions, it is greatly preferred that the solid glycerides present remain predominantly in the beta-prime form."