Apple Sues Creative

boarder8925 writes "Apple is counter-suing Creative, claiming it has infringed 'four patents in its handheld digital players.' The suit was filed the same day that Creative filed suit against Apple. 'Creative proactively held discussions with Apple in our efforts to explore amicable solutions,' a spokesman for Creative said. 'At no time during these discussions or at any other time did Apple mention to us the patents it raised in its lawsuit.'"

Comments

Summary: Creative says "Waaaaaaaah"

[Whiney Mac Fanboy]

Quoting the summary:

'Creative proactively held discussions with Apple in our efforts to explore amicable solutions,' a spokesman for Creative said. 'At no time during these discussions or at any other time did Apple mention to us the patents it raised in its lawsuit.'

Waaah! Waaah! Waaaah!

What were creative thinking? That they'd get some sympathy? Play with patent fire & you're going to get burnt.

And frankly, I think Apple & Creative should be more worried about this patent then each other.

Mildly interesting to see what's happened to Apple and Creative's stock since the two announcements (looks like Apple's lost ~4% & Creative ~2.5%).

*Sighs* such a pity to see two companies that employ so many talented people wasting their time like this.

Re:Summary: Creative says "Waaaaaaaah"

[idonthack]

The Microsoft patent article you linked to:

Creating a surprise twist in the portable music wars, the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office has denied Apple's application to patent its method of using hierarchical menus to navigate through the iPod's contents.

The basis for the denial: A similar method outlined in a Microsoft researcher's patent application, filed after the iPod was introduced but before Apple sought its own patent.

Prior art for the lose?

Re:Summary: Creative says "Waaaaaaaah"

[Prog_Burner]

I'm of the opposite opinion, the Creative Zen Micro I have has a broken headphone jack, due to bad design (Letting the headphone jack move enough to seperate from the board.) I later found out that in order to get warranty service I will have to pay labour and provide proof of purchase. This was a gift from my ex, so small chance I'll be able to get the reciept and smaller chance that the labour charged will be worth it in the long run (I want to be able to put the damn thing in my pocket, it's supposed to be portable!) Due to those two things (bad design, crappy service) I will be putting that "labour" cost towards an Ipod and I hope that Creative stops making shoddy MP3 players.

Re:Summary: Creative says "Waaaaaaaah"

[why-is-it]

"It's incredibly embarrassing," said industry analyst Rob Enderle.

Enderle? The well-known microsoft and sco shill?

Embarassing indeed...

Re:Summary: Creative says "Waaaaaaaah"

[Thrudheim]

It seems to me that Apple, in contrast to the opinion of some, has priced the iPod very competitively. Creative is losing a ton of money by trying to maintain slightly cheaper prices for its competing lines. In some cases, actually, the iPod is priced just the same or slightly less. It is a losing battle for Creative because they do not have the economy of scale that Apple has with the iPod, so they lose money at these prices while Apple does well. In this case, Apple has a Dell-like supply chain.

This article, from over a year ago, says it all: "Creative Responds to iPod Price Drop." Apple took the offensive by cutting prices, and it has continued this strategy. As an analyst in the article says, "Apple has left little room for other music vendors to compete on price." Creative followed that strategy nevertheless, and the results are very clear: Creative cannot sustain a price battle with Apple and stay in business. Their third-quarter sales fell to $225.7 million compared to $333.8 million for the same quarter the previous year. Their net loss for the quarter was $74.7 million. For the past three quarters, it was $105.4 million.

Simply put, Creative is in serious financial trouble. The recent legal action against Apple smacks of a desperate strategy to use their trump card -- their GUI patent -- to shore up their finances. Their problem is that this patent is being challenged and there is a very good possibility that it will not stand. A hierachical system for organizing a music library is just too obvious to be the intellectual property of any one company. Apple has the legal team to drag out the process as long as possible. Their countersuit is just the first step in this process.

Re:This is why patents suck

[Anonymous Coward]

From Article 8 of the US constitution:

[The Congress shall have Power ] 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;

And an ipod is both a science AND a useful art!!!1!!1!!!!

Re:Brain ..... Hurting....

[ajakk]

In the United States (and definately not Europe), there are several ways that the public use of a product can be prior art to a patent. First, if the prior art conceived of before you conceived of your invention, then you cannot get a patent on it (who came up with the idea first). Second, if the invention was publicly used more than one year prior to the date of your patent application, then you are barred from getting a patent (regardless of who invented it first). Thus, in the case of Microsoft, they could argue that they conceived of the invention before Apple did, and that they iPod was not in public use (or on sale) more than one year before they filed their patent application.

The law that describes what qualifies as prior art is 35 U.S.C. 102.

Re:Creative is cheaper? Huh?

[drhamad]

I don't know exactly what player you're referencing, but for example, the Creative Zen Vision:M 30GB and the Apple iPod 30GB are both $299 (ignoring Apple edu & corporate discounts, even). And that's not even getting into the software side of the equation.

Re:Creative is cheaper? Huh?

[defaria]

I purchased a Creative Zen Touch 40 Gig for ~$200 whereas the iPod 30 Gig was $300. 10 more gig - $100 cheaper.

From a talk by the USPTO comissioner

[SuperKendall]

I was just at a talk given by the USPTO comissioner - a lot of the talk was given to how they are addressing the problem you describe.

Basically a big problem was that for quite a few years, the USPTO funds were being partially diverted to other programs (like social security). So they were not really able to do a lot during that time to address a growing backlog of patent applications.

Now they are fully funded and hiring around 1000 patent examiners a year, with a new program to help train them that's a little like a patent university. This will not shrink the backlog this year, but it will stop the rate of growth the backlog is seeing to some extent and eventually allow them to catch up.

Another big problem is that right now you can re-file a patent as many times as you like, with no changes at all... currently (and these figures are from the talk) 30% of the backlog is refiled patents with no new claims! So they are going to try and institute a system whereby you get one refile after the first one, but after that if you want to refile again you have to show a panel that the patent has been changed enough to be worthy of refiling.

There were a number of independant inventors in the audience and one asked what the USPTO could do to help defend little guys from bigger companies stomping them with lawyers as you experienced. The answer was that he realised the problem but that the USPTO was not a legislative arm of the government and the only way they could help was to make sure a patent was as strong as it could be so it would hold up in court. He did say they would like to see programs to help smaller inventors so someday perhaps we might see a government program for that (though personally I am not sure about another goverment program for anything, but perhaps this is a case where it is wrranted for the health of our patent system and IP space).

Re:Pffft...that's why I bought an iRiver.

[plazman30]

The price of both the iPod line and the creatve line are almost identical. The big reason to choose Apple is longevityof the company, available third party add-ons, and the UI. Apple wins on all three.