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Nintendo Sued over Wiimote Trigger
kaizokunami writes "A company named Interlink Electronics, Inc., creator of interface devices has filed a suit in US District court against Nintendo of America, claiming the Nintendo the trigger on the bottom of the Wii controller infringes on their patent. The article includes images submitted with the patent application." From the article: "The complaint alleges that the trigger on the bottom of the Wii controller infringes on Interlink Patent No. 6,850,221 (Trigger Operated Electronic Device), which the company secured on February 1, 2005. Nintendo president Satoru Iwata first presented the Wii controller to the public not too long after that date, during the 2005 Tokyo Game Show."
I am tired of posting replies, so I will simply make one big huge post so hopefully everyone will read it.
1. N64 is not prior art. Nor is anything else not seen until after Sep. 5, 1995. This patent was filed in 1997 as a continuation of another application filed on the date I provided. If you want prior art, please pre-date 1995. (Note: N64 was first shown in Nov. 1995.)
2. The use of this device as a "mouse" is irrelevant. The patent claims are broad enough they can be construed to cover a gaming console. I have to given them some credit for that claim wording, it made me shake my head.
3. No matter how many people "came up" with the idea, it does not matter. The patent definition of obviousness is not the human definition. It might seem obvious to place a button in such a location, but did anyone file a patent or design such an item before them? If not, then was it really that obvious for someone to do it?
4. They really are not trolls. They have been making these products and making amicable licensing agreements with other companies. I still think this patent might be bogus, but I would not know without doing a full patent search.
So to recap, prior art must be before 1995, read the claims and ignore most everything else, and they are not really trolls, but this patent is probably pretty weak, especially if you consider it took almost 10 yrs to issue and there are a good number of reference arts provided.
"Some days you just can't get rid of a bomb."