EFF Patent Busting - Prior Art Needed for VOIP

JumperCable writes "The Electronic Frontier Foundation is seeking to bust an overly broad patent by a company called Acceris. Acceris claims patents on processes that implement voice-over-Internet protocol (VoIP) using analog phones as endpoints. These patents cover telephone calls over the Internet. Specifically, the claims describe a system that connects two parties where the receiving party does not need to have a computer or an Internet connection, but the call is routed in part through the Internet or any other 'public computer network'. The calls must also be 'full duplex', meaning that both parties can listen and talk at the same time, like in an ordinary phone call. To bust these overly broad claims, we need 'prior art' — any publication, article, patent or other public writing that describes the same or similar ideas being implemented before September 20, 1995."

Comments

Phone patches for radio?

[MichaelSmith]

Specifically, the claims describe a system that connects two parties where the receiving party does not need to have a computer or an Internet connection, but the call is routed in part through the Internet or any other 'public computer network'.

In CB radio, and possibly Amateur (Ham) radio you could have a phone patch device which would interface between the radio transciever and the phone system. With two such gadgets you could bridge a gap in the PSTN. Not really legal with amateur radio as you were not supposed to compete with commercial services.

I am sure that emergency services used phone patches on their VHF radios, though. Some documentation on that might be of some use.

TFA talks about it being full duplex. The impression I have is that this system would have used one frequency and a VOX to switch between transmit and recieve. It is possible there were true full duplex systems though.

Re:Phone patches for radio?

[NfoCipher]

>In CB radio, and possibly Amateur (Ham)
You've got that reversed.

>Not really legal with amateur radio as you were not supposed to compete with commercial services.
Autopatch has been and still is "legal".

Re:Phone patches for radio?

[Andy_R]

Not over the internet, or using intetnet protocol, so it's not VOIP.

(note to mods: I know I've posted this 3 times in reply to different people, but I maintain it's not redundant until people actually grok the concept and stop posting/modding up non VOIP references.)

Re:Phone patches for radio?

[bigattichouse]

KA9Q Packet radio was in existance before 1995. It would integrate with normal IP, and was used extensively in Brasil and several remote locations for TCP traffic. I wonder if anyone put a phone into the picture.

Re:Phone patches for radio?

[Anonymous Coward]

If you can convince the judge that "... ON THE INTERNETS!" is not novel when its been done before, then it's relevant.

Also, patent doesn't specify any particular protocol, only that it's full duplex and an "internet protocol". Also doesn't limit itself to THE INTERNET, they stated "public computer network" (like, say, public radiowaves, with computers running the show).

Re:Phone patches for radio?

[Maxwell]

Who ever said VOIP? The requirement is "over a public computer network". The internet was not the first public computer network. Did CompuServe ever allow voice calls? How about BBS's? Fido?

The patent is overly broad. So we are NOT stuck to "VOIP only" to break it...sheesh!!

JON

Re:Phone patches for radio?

[hankwang]

Not over the internet, or using intetnet protocol, so it's not VOIP

The actual patent says "internet OR computer network", although I give you that the claim indeed explicitly mentions "an internet protocol".

But note that the set of statements in a patent claim can be invalidated by a wider type of prior art. So a claim of using internet for some purpose is invalidated by prior art that does exactly the same thing on a computer network, since internet is just one type of computer network.

So if HAM radio can be considered a computer network, and someone connected HAM radio on both ends to regular phone lines, that would invalidate the patent. Unfortunately, unless it was packet radio (ethernet-like data transfer over radio), it wouldn't be a computer network.

Re:Phone patches for radio?

[belg4mit]

I know my best friend's father used Packet radio with his PC,
I was under the impression he somehow used it for free long distance.

Re:Phone patches for radio?

[theshowmecanuck]

Last I heard, a radio is not a computer network.

Re:Phone patches for radio?

[porpnorber]

Sorry, are you sure it is not you who are confused? From the FA: 'The transmission of the call is routed in part through a "public computer network" and in part through the PSTN. This implies that the transmission must cross at least one gateway between the "public computer network" and the PSTN. The Internet is one example of a "public computer network," but the patent does not define what else would qualify as a "public computer network."'

So unless there's language in the patent that TFA missed, discussing specifically, say, protocol conversion between nominally circuit switched and nominally packet switched data streams, or unless words like 'the Internet Protocol version 4' (as opposed to merely 'an internet protocol,' which would still clearly apply to the PSTN), I don't see how we can accept your objection.

The real problem with this whole discussion is that, to those 'skilled in the art,' it is blindingly clear that the PSTN has itself been a public network composed of computers for a very long time, that it is rife with gateways, and the crucial distinction between a 'public computer network' and a 'public network composed of computers' is notoriously a matter of security discipline, not of technology. But the real criterion in patent law is not whether something is obvious to one skilled in the art, it's whether one skilled in the art can explain why it is obvious to a lawyer. And, ahem, you can't explain anything obvious to a lawyer, because lawyers can't think in straight lines!

Re:Phone patches for radio?

[zappepcs]

However, it was not illegal for Trunked radio systemms. These are the kinds of radios that you see in police, fire, ambulance, and rescue vehicles. In 1986 I was working on such systems. The included a 300bps control channel, 4wire-2wire adapters (that were difficult to balance) and later full duplex audio.

While it maybe was an is illegal for Ham operators to connect to phone lines, they did so during wars to help sailors make phone calls back home.

Re:Phone patches for radio?

[innosent]

I wonder if ATM would count, as ATM networks could be considered "computer networks", and Packet-Switched voice over ATM is essentially like VoIP, just VoATM. This would probably mean that another (older) patent would protect it, one that might already have expired.

Re:Phone patches for radio?

[zippthorne]

Then you've never heard of APRS.

Re:Phone patches for radio?

[Cramer]

That's exactly what I was thinking... the PSTN has increasingly been a "computer network" since the mid-80's. In fact, the Lucent 5ESS I used to walk past several times a month has 2 sparc computers in it. And it dates back to 1980; however, I'm unaware of when those were installed. (They run "AT&T System V UNIX"... release 3 if memory serves. We had our own programs cron'd on it.) 'tho I think it's a stretch to call the PSTN a "computer network." (but not much of one. there is routing information crossing the network.)

Re:Phone patches for radio?

[rriven]

The MARS or Military Affiliate Radio System http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Military_Affiliate_Ra dio_System is what you are talking about.
I remember my dad "calling" home when he was in Korea for a year in the late 80's early 90's.

If i remember right the person goes to a MARS station and uses a radio and the signal get "routed" (relayed) to the states where it connects to a phone line.

from wikipedia "during the Korean War, Vietnam War and Gulf War, MARS was most known for its handling of "Marsgram" written messages and providing "phone patches" to allow overseas servicemen to contact their families at home."

"...was created in November 1925 by a few dedicated pioneers in the United States Army Signal Corps led by Captain Thomas C. Rives. His original intent was to enlist the talents of volunteer amateur radio operators as a ready source who could train soldiers in the then new technology of radio" Sounds like they used or still use Ham operators

Re:Phone patches for radio?

[Intron]

The PSTN started converting from analog/mechanical to ESS in the '60s. Since then every long distance call is carried partly in analog and partly over digital networks like T1 lines.

Vocaltek?

[rs79]

Didn't vocalteck do this?

Re:Vocaltek?

[Andy_R]

Yes, the linked article says the EFF are specifically looking for proof that VocalTec or Net2Phone were doing this before 20th September 1995.

Re:Vocaltek?

[Anonymous Coward]

vovaltech?

how is a computer network different from a 1990's modern phone network

Re:Vocaltek?

[JonathanR]

The company I worked for (Automotive parts manufacturing) between Sept '95 and Jan '97 had a system where interstate (non-local) calls could be routed through their leased data lines. There was a dialling prefix for each endpoint node. The data lines were ordinarily used for warehouse inventory/stock control operations (I think it was a VAX/VMS system, so I'm not sure what networking protocols were used for these data links). This was introduced halfway through my period of employment there, and given the conservative nature of the company, I'd be surprised if this was a bleeding edge installation at the time. Obviously it would have been developed well before this implementation.

Re:Vocaltek?

[Spamalope]

We did that at Leasing Associates from roughly 1993 until early 2006 using Datarace (brand) equipment - voice, compressed and full duplex. Certainly voice as a sideband over whatever leased line you've got was very common before 1995. All of the mux manufacturers had equipment to do it. The datarace equipment could route TCP/IP, but the equipment encapsulated each type of traffic and sent it to the other mux via a proprietary protocol to the other mux.

There were ISDN router boxes touted around that time as being able to route voice and data at the same time, using small packets, compression, and QOS to keep the voice from breaking up. The setups I remember were analog->voip->analog though, and were used to tie corporate phone systems.

It sound like this is a patent on existing packet switched voice tech, but specifying which devices the endpoints would be and what the transport protocol would be. Private PC->voip-PC was common, and private analog->voip->analog was common. There were regulatory barriers to doing PC->voip->analog AND tying into the PSTN (public phone system). Privately our 1993 system allow a branch office to press a one button extension on their phone, get a dial tone from the corp. office phone system, and make any call they wanted to. It just wasn't done with TCP/IP because other protocols are much more efficient.

Re:Vocaltek?

[Cramer]

If it's just a pbx robbing timeslots on a T1, then it doesn't count. That's simply a multiplexor. TW delivers voice to our office that way; voice takes timeslots away from data on the T1 when necessary.

Here's the oldest reference I got

[mangu]

The way it was described in the blurb, I guess the oldest implementation is mentioned here.

Re:Here's the oldest reference I got

[nikolag]

Tesla also deserves to be mentioned here.

Re:Here's the oldest reference I got

[Anonymous Coward]

Yeah, you have no clue about what constitutes prior art. A Bell reference is right up there with proclaiming that anything using bytes to execute a program is non-patentable over the first RAM storage.

Of course, this shows how little Slashbots actually understand the patent system they rag on all the time.

Re:Here's the oldest reference I got

[Anonymous Coward]

Bell isn't prior art. It doesn't anticipate all elements of the system. Thanks for playing.

Maybe they have the answer themselves

[vivaoporto]

Maybe EFF already has the answer, depending on how long AT&T is routing all phone calls through NSA network. They would even kill two birds with one shot, the subpoena to obligate AT&T to disclose the info could come from the patent suit. It's a win-win! What could possibly go wrong?

Re:Maybe they have the answer themselves

[Anonymous Coward]

ohphone http://www.openh323.org/

Re:Maybe they have the answer themselves

[Anonymous Coward]

Now, now, now, we all know that nobody did anything illegal until Bush was inaugurated. Everybody before that was perfect little angels. -Monica

Re:Maybe they have the answer themselves

[nil0lab]

Um, not to nitpick, but I think it's a Y-cable, not a through-cable.

VOIP Prior Art

[azrider]

Not sure if it was patented, but in the 70's when I worked for IBM, all office extensions worldwide went through the "tie-line". This was a linkup that used the massive IBM internal global network to make calls, i.e. I call Tokyo from LA and the call never touches the PSTN apparatus. Indeed, it never left the building on anything other than data lines. The phones at the desks were plain old analog WE2500 sets.

Re:VOIP Prior Art

[Melkman]

Hmm, it is even easier since drafts for the H.323 protocol (This was the first link I googled which gave a date...) Since H.323 is based on previous standards I'm sure drafts describing this functionality before that date can be found. H.323 was the first open VoIP protocol suite to gain wide use.

Re:VOIP Prior Art

[Anonymous Coward]

it doesn't have to be patented, just published or described somewhere.

Re:VOIP Prior Art

[Andy_R]

Unless IBM were using internet protocol (the IP in VOIP) a decade before the internet started, then that's probably not prior art.

Re:VOIP Prior Art

[Anne Thwacks]

OTOH if you can send voice as data, then sending arbitrary data over the internet is, to use the technical term, "Blindingly obvious" to anyone adequately skilled in the art.

Otherwise, I claim keeping text in a computer file.

Re:VOIP Prior Art

[Andy_R]

Prior art (which kills your 'text in a computer file' patent) is the easiest way of dealing with these patent trolls. While "it's blindingly obvious" is technically a valid reason to get patents struck down, it's tough to make such historical a value judgement stick in court, dealing with facts is what coursts are best at. Otherwise it either ends up in the old whoever has the most lawyers wins situation, or worse the transcript reads like this:

EFF: "Your Honour, this idea is obvious, you'd have to be a blithering idiot not to have thought of this"
Judge: "Well I didn't think of it!"
EFF: "That's because your are a blith.... erm..."
Defence: "We move that the case be struck down"
Judge: "Case dismissed with prejudice!"

Re:VOIP Prior Art

[MoogMan]

Valid prior art would be some form of H.323 to PSTN gateway (called a H.323 Gatekeeper), or maybe any sort of way to bridge PSTN with IP.

FWIW, Cisco's IOS v11.3 implemented this functionality, which puts it around 1999

The PDF to the H.323 standard is at http://www.itu.int/rec/dologin_pub.asp?lang=e&id=T -REC-H.323-200606-I!!PDF-E&type=items but I believe it was finalised in 1996, which puts it a bit too late. I think we'd need to be looking at SS7 Gateways to bust this patent.

Re:VOIP Prior Art

[Andy_R]

Sorry, if the IBM system never touches PSTN as you describe, then this fails part 4 of the EFF's list of features the prior art needs to have:

From the EFF site: CRITICAL FEATURES OF PRIOR ART NEEDED:

      1. The system must have the ability to connect an audio telephone call from a calling party to a receiving party.
      2. The telephone call must be "full duplex," meaning that both parties must be able to talk and listen at the same time. For example, regular telephone calls usually are full duplex, whereas walkie-talkie conversations in which a person cannot receive transmissions from others while he or she is transmitting generally are not.
      3. An ordinary telephone and telephone line are the only equipment the receiving party needs to have. The receiving party does not need to have a computer or an Internet connection to receive the call.
      4. The transmission of the call is routed in part through a "public computer network" and in part through the PSTN. This implies that the transmission must cross at least one gateway between the "public computer network" and the PSTN. The Internet is one example of a "public computer network," but the patent does not define what else would qualify as a "public computer network."

Additional Features:

      1. The caller must only have to dial the destination number and no additional phone numbers

Re:VOIP Prior Art

[Mordaximus]

It wasn't over 'data lines'. Tie lines connect one PBX directly to another. This can be done privately, but are usually done via a (or many) carriers. The trunks that carried voice were not data trunks. It's not prior art.

Re:VOIP Prior Art

[kilodelta]

WRT sending voice as data, the incumbent carriers have been doing it that way for the past thirty years.

Re:VOIP Prior Art

[Brickwall]

Er, who did you think provided those "tie lines"? AT&T, Centel, and all the other public phone companies. And once the calls reached the CO, they were routed over the PSTN just like every other call. If you think IBM created their own facilities, you're deluded.

Re:VOIP Prior Art

[the eric conspiracy]

I knew someone who was an employee of AT&T who was involved in the first VOIP call using a Sonus media gateway. Since Sonus was founded in 1997 I doubt that this occured prior to 1995.

Re:VOIP Prior Art

[PPH]

Back in 1980, I went to work for an outfit (Puget Sound Power and Light) that had a digital PBX. The way I understood its operation, each office had PBX equipment that were tied (through the system in the main HQ in Bellevue Washington) through either their own microwave system or leased lines.

I'm not sure if this qualifies under the 'public computer network' requirement, but upon further thought, I'm not certain that any such network exists. At least not in this country and not to any great extent. The vast majority of 'The Internet' in the USA is privately owned and consists of leased lines tying routers and data centers together. Whether the leasee uses that line to carry private phone calls (digital or analog), routes data packets over it on its own behalf or for the benefit of third paries, its all done as a matter of private contracts between the parties involved. So, at what point does a link between two private entities become 'public'?

What distinguishes what my old employer did almost 30 years ago from VoIP today? Certainly not the implementation over a "public" network, because there ain't no such thing.

Re:VOIP Prior Art

[neomunk]

Does fiction count? Like in Star Trek when ole' Picard says something like 'patch me through to Starfleet Command" or something? Or how about 2001:ASO when at the beginning the dude makes his phone call with the AT&T computer network. I bet a million examples (and probably explained in more detail then these) can be found throughout 20th century science fiction.

I mean, it's the idea itself that's patented right, so would fiction count?

Re:VOIP Prior Art

[Intron]

Network Voice Protocol was demonstrated in 1973 and standardized as RFC 741 in 1976. Stated goal:

"to develop and demonstrate the feasibility of secure, high-quality, low-bandwidth, real-time, full-duplex (two-way) digital voice communications over packet-switched computer communications networks"

Everything else in the patent (like using standard telephones at the ends) is pretty obvious.

Enough with the trivial shit

[Anonymous Coward]

There's going to be a lot of existing products that violate some asshole's patent without there being prior art because everybody thought that it would be a while before the obvious idea would become practical. The internet transports digital data in a best-effort manner that is good enough for (soft) realtime applications. Audio data can be digitized just like practically all other data. Using existing phones as microphone/speaker combination is a matter of adapting the voltages. Duplex is the same as two simplex connections. It is immediately apparent that internet telephony is possible. The hard part isn't thinking it up but implementing it and timing it right so that the cost/value ratio is favorable.

Prior art should NOT be the problem.

[mrchaotica]

This is ridiculous. All this patent covers is bridging between the Internet and POTS networks. It shouldn't need "prior art" to be struck down, it should be struck down merely because it's fucking obvious! I mean, it'd be one thing if it were a patent on one particular clever method of connecting the two networks, but the idea in general should not have been patentable in the first place.

Re:Prior art should NOT be the problem.

[pla]

All this patent covers is bridging between the Internet and POTS networks. It shouldn't need "prior art" to be struck down, it should be struck down merely because it's fucking obvious!

I don't think it does count as that obvious. If you remember the earliest days of free internet telephony, the biggest limitation (aside from the annoying lag) came from needing both parties to have a computer with an always-on connection (or risk missing calls).

Companies like Vonage exist to make a free service un-free solely because they act as a POTS bridge. Think about that. People will pay for something free (well, "free" presuming you would have intenet access anyway) because that one little "fucking obvious" step counts as such a massive leap forward in functionality.



The USPTO has made some phenomenally bad calls in the past, but I don't know if I can really disagree with this one.

Re:Prior art should NOT be the problem.

[Anonymous Coward]

I hate to break it to you but this is not how obviousness works. Even if it did, how obvious was this in 1995? Also, do not think this patent had an easy life. If it took 6 years to get this patent, it probably went through hell and a few revisions before it went out the door. Also, do not rely on the EFF documents were are overly broad and stupid. They actually read more like a bad patent then the "bad patent". Of course the EFF, is hoping to drive its membership and money collections by using their typical tactics.

I love what the EFF tries to do, but sometimes they come off as another crazy non-profit who just wants to stick it to the man. (See Greenpeace, PETA, and the ACLU for examples)

Re:Prior art should NOT be the problem.

[Anonymous Coward]

POTS bridge

That's a non-free service because using the POTS is not free. People don't pay for the little "fucking obvious" step, they pay to use the telephone companies' networks. But you can buy telephone adapters for VOIP and use them for pure internet telephony without monthly or per-minute charges. Communication between VoIP users of the same service, and increasingly often also between users of different VoIP services, is free precisely because the non-free POTS is not used for these calls. And yes, internet telephony with phones instead of headsets was fucking obvious back then, just not ready for prime-time with the expensive and slow network access. It really is a case of replacing one form of transport with another form of transport that is obviously capable of acting as a replacement. Digital phone networks are older than this patent. The only difference is that the internet is a public network without QoS guarantees (but good enough performance to make up for it).

Re:Prior art should NOT be the problem.

[Tarinth]

Patents can be busted by proving "obviousness" as well, and I imagine that EFF will try that in parallel. However, to have the best chance of success they'll want to attack every aspect of the patent which would include demonstrating that others had done so earlier.

Re:Prior art should NOT be the problem.

[Anonymous Coward]

Actually, you're missing the point. The original post mentions "processes that implement voice-over-Internet protocol (VoIP) using analog phones as endpoints." It doesn't say anything about starting points (which, when coming from a computer, obviously has to be turned on!, and if being received by an analog phone, it obviously has to be plugged into the POTS system. ). Net2phone (from the wayback machine archive) mentions computer to analog phone calls in Feb., 1997, which precedes the date requested.

As to obviousness, plugging something into one digital network, and getting it out to another digital network is obviously desirable. That's why artisoft lantastic, IBM token ring, netware, and tcp/ip were bridged together in some offices. How to do the implementation may not necessarily be obvious, but connecting the various networks is.

Re:Prior art should NOT be the problem.

[billcopc]

The "fucking obvious" problem is that you need a number to call to/from, and that number is not an IP address. The technical aspect of VoIP companies is trivial, just convert the sound to digital and ship it off to its destination... but the way things are today, you still need a POTS at the receiving end if they don't have VoIP. That's not technically difficult, it just requires money to rent the landlines from Ma Bell. VoIP "carriers" oversell landlines much like ISPs oversell bandwidth or modem banks, because not everyone uses everything all the time.

If all your friends and relatives, employers, partners, and local businesses were on VoIP, we wouldn't need the gateway because the PSTN would be obsolete. We're not there yet, and I don't think we'll ever be, not in my lifetime, because computers are unreliable. Even the standalone VoIP gateways are just embedded computers running outsourced software, they crap out every once in a while. The day they crap out on an emergency call is the day it will all come crashing down. The phone companies may be the axis of evil, but they usually provide quite dependable service, something the internet still hasn't mastered.

Re:Prior art should NOT be the problem.

[jambarama]

The problem isn't the *obvious* issue. I mean, it wasn't obvious to me in 1995, or most other people I'd wager. The problem is the scope of the patent. No one should be able to patent "processes that implement voice-over-Internet protocol (VoIP) using analog phones as endpoints." It is way to broad. Acceris should hold a patent on A SINGLE process to implement VoIP. You shouldn't be able to patent an end result, just the specific way you used to get there. Patents like this make clean room reverse engineering, work arounds, and competing methods all illegal without the patent holder's permission.

Re:Prior art should NOT be the problem.

[Anonymous Coward]

The limitation of early internet telephony was never technical, it was simply that no one had figured out the business model and managed to acquire the funding to set up the business. Once the funding was secured, they simply had to pay any competent network software developer to get the thing done, no genius required.

Re:Prior art should NOT be the problem.

[DeepHurtn!]

Hi,

I think there's a difference between *useful* and *obvious*. With regards to the obviousness clause, all that matters is that the claimed invention not be obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art at the time the invention was made. So if its functional or not, the idea is that if an average given person with ordinary skill in the art could have conceived the same thing, it's not a valid patent.

Of course, this is all pretty irrelevant, as the Federal Circuit pretty much gutted the obviousness clause during the 90s.

Re:Prior art should NOT be the problem.

[arth1]

The problem isn't the *obvious* issue. I mean, it wasn't obvious to me in 1995, or most other people I'd wager.

Back in '94, I was talking over speakfreely to an overseas friend on my Indy when my mother dropped by, and asked what I was doing. I told her, and she thought that would be horribly expensive since I was talking to someone on the other side of the planet. When I told her that it used the internet connection, so I only paid for the internet connection (mind you, a 128 kbps BRI was expensive enough back then), she asked whether I could hook up a regular phone to it. I had to explain that it was technically possible, but required the cooperation of phone companies on both sides of the internet line, so with the sluggishness big corporations operate with, it wouldn't happen any time soon.
Mind, she was an old lady who never even figured out how to use half the functions of her remote control or microwave oven, and yet to her it was THE obvious use.

Re:Prior art should NOT be the problem.

[noidentity]

"I don't think it does count as that obvious. If you remember the earliest days of free internet telephony, the biggest limitation (aside from the annoying lag) came from needing both parties to have a computer with an always-on connection (or risk missing calls)."

The reason it wasn't done from the start is that it was a lot cheaper for someone to write some software that allowed voice calls from PC to PC than start a company that maintained an internet-to-POTS bridge for people to go through when calling from PC to regular phone. I'm sure every author of such software had this in mind, but simply couldn't afford to set it up.

It's so fucking obvious that when I heard about internet phone calls, I always said to myself "When they have some kind of bridge to allow calling people on a regular phone, then it'll really be practical. But then you'd have a monthly fee."

Re:Prior art should NOT be the problem.

[Anonymous Coward]

If you remember the earliest days of free internet telephony, the biggest limitation (aside from the annoying lag) came from needing both parties to have a computer with an always-on connection (or risk missing calls).

Yet, the digital to POTS connection already existed (e.g. ISDN). The patent is about stitching together technologies that already existed. The non-obvious aspect was in creating those original technologies, not in stitching them together.

Re:Prior art should NOT be the problem.

[Anonymous Coward]

Hummm.... not that this was the first class at my university to do this back in 1993, but,
did the following as part of an undergraduate OS && network class.
1) Created server software to receive/store/forward voice/audio from network/modem computer.
2) Created client software which one could use on home computer, dial into university network, and connect
      to the "voice" server and have either live chats or put "voice" message in a box.
Could have live duplex 1 on 1 chats or group chats.

As memory serves me, graduate CS project in conjunction w/ EE project was to cut the modem/computer out of the loop, and allow people to just dial the server.

The above would seem to be covered by the patent, but did this several years before 1995.
Note: This goes over PTSN, routes between PTSN/computer network, modified program to do over several different types of protocols (including creating one's own protocol && using aformentioned program to verify it)

Re:Prior art should NOT be the problem.

[neomunk]

Bullshit.

You use Vonage over a 56k modem and get back to me on that one.

Re:Prior art should NOT be the problem.

[spyowl]

The problem isn't the *obvious* issue. I mean, it wasn't obvious to me in 1995, or most other people I'd wager.

I don't know how you feel about this issue, but I believe simply adding "over the Internet" to an existing method/technology/practice does not automatically make it non-obvious. In fact, these types of patent applications should be rejected outright.

The technology and practice of encoding the voice audio between analog devices has existed since very long time ago. Simply because this is now happening over the Internet does not make this method non-obvious. The G.711 standard that's widely in use today with VoIP services/applications and in general telephony has existed since 1972. If you want to look up history of pulse-code modulation and its application for audio transmission also while you are at it, please feel free.

Again, adding the Internet as a variable into an existing equation does not, or maybe should not make things patentable.

Artisoft LANtastic could do this

[scsirob]

How about this link: http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,1895,1161458,00.as p

It describes a voice adapter for Artisoft LANTastic in 1990. I used to operate a LANtastic network but didn't use the voice adapters. However, it seems to fit the 'prior art(isoft)' requirement ;-)

Re:Artisoft LANtastic could do this

[gravis777]

Interesting, but from the way this product is described, its LAN use only, which means that it does not connect to a public network, and it does not seem to connect at some point to the public phone network, which means it canot be used in this case

Re:Artisoft LANtastic could do this

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes, but it makes connecting *any network* to POTS obviouis. The internet is a set of LANs contencted together, more or less. Prior Art does not need to be pixel perfect match. I just needs to show that the patent is obvious for someone skilled in the Art.

Graham Article

[Rob_Warwick]

I'm not sure if this qualifies, since the article wasn't written until 2005, but Paul Graham mentions in one of this articles that a friend of his wrote some VoIP software in 1994. The article is available online.

In 1994 my friend Koling wanted to talk to his girlfriend in Taiwan, and to save long-distance bills he wrote some software that would convert sound to data packets that could be sent over the Internet. We weren't sure at the time whether this was a proper use of the Internet, which was still then a quasi-government entity. What he was doing is now called VoIP, and it is a huge and rapidly growing business.

Re:Graham Article

[mavenguy]

But did it involve using the PSTN at both ends? Just computer to computer via is acknowledged by the patent as prior art; the central point of novelty is the use of plain telephone sets at both ends communicating with each respective CO; that is regular duplex telephone traffic routed to a local service that converts both ends to/from a connection over IP to a similar remote service that converts back to an appropriate duplex analog telephone traffic to the remote party's analog telephone.

Re:Graham Article

[Rob_Warwick]

I've no idea, past what is quoted above, but I somehow doubt it. Thanks for clearing me up on exactly what they're looking for.

Re:Graham Article

[Omega996]

Inasmuch as the article only indirectly references his friend's involvement in the possible origins of VoIP, I took the astoundingly original step of sending an email to Paul Graham directly. Much easier to mention to him that his knowledge (or his friend's) might be of some use to the EFF than to badger a user who simply posted a link to the essay, and otherwise could have no knowledge of the subject at hand.

Another example of prior art

[synoniem]

Not sure about the actual year, 1990 or 1989 we were offered a new pbx that could divert calls over a permanent data line to all our offices (six at that time). Each call digitized to a 8Kb stream. This were technology from AT&T and Alcatel afaik and used normal analog phones.

Re:Another example of prior art

[hughk]

I work for a while at a sub of Alcatel in the late eighties in Europe. PBXs were definitely being connected over a LAN (at 10MB/s) and generally sharing traffic with IP and DDCMP. The end-users had either analog telephones or early generation ISDN phones. I know that Nortel were doing similar stuff as were Bosch and Siemens. By the mid nineties, most digital switches chatted using IP.

Re:Another example of prior art

[the eric conspiracy]

Out of band signaling methods like SS7 is not the same thing as PSTN-VOIP-PSTN.

Re:Another example of prior art

[russotto]

Yes, but if that counted then the PSTN itself would be prior art. It has been using 8Khz 7 bits per sample over a circuit-switched computer network for a very long time.

Of course, there's no reason that the PSTN itself should not be prior art, but I doubt it would qualify under the ridiculous standards for invalidating patents. To invalidate a patent you have to show that every aspect of the claim was anticipated exactly by the prior art. Unfortunately to be found in violation you need merely come close.

Re:Another example of prior art

[hughk]

No the patent said connection between exchanges via the internet *or* any other public network. And by the way, any non-voice band signalling is denoted as out-of-band. The important thing is that data networks have existed for a while and people have been digitising voice and slinging it over networks for a *long* time.

Break Stupid Laws

[essence]

Not sure if this would work, it would probably just end up in people getting sued bigtime, but what if there was a 'class action' of sorts, where a whole heap, and I mean heap, of people/companies used patented ideas, and basically told the patent office and the patent holders to get fucked. It would take co-ordination, but done on a mass scale, the point could be made, and the patent system reformed.

Re:Break Stupid Laws

[Anonymous Coward]

You first... we're all right behind you :)

Re:Break Stupid Laws

[ferd_farkle]

'Not sure if this would work, it would probably just end up in people getting sued bigtime'

Are you an unemployed lawyer, by any chance?

Re:Break Stupid Laws

[iminplaya]

The hippies already have prior art with the smoke-ins. Weed is still illegal.

Re:Break Stupid Laws

[iminplaya]

On the other hand, it did work for a certain Rosa Parks...

slavast talit

[Anonymous Coward]

Recommend at chad@chadfowler.com

ISDN

[HRogge]

See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ISDN It's digital communication over a computer network. Has been an ITU standard since 1980. Case closed, have a nice day.

Re:ISDN

[Icarus1919]

Yes, if wikipedia says it, it's so. Case closed, indeed.

Re:ISDN

[Andy_R]

ISDN does not use Internet Protocol, so it's not VOIP. Everyone seems to be missing the fact that this patent is of the type "[existing idea] but on the internet". Prior art to bust it needs to have routed the call over a public network such as internet, not just any digital and/or private line.

Re:ISDN

[synoniem]

What is the difference between a connection over a X25 network and "the internet"? Especially in the early days of internet X25 networks were used a lot.

Re:ISDN

[marcello_dl]

So if one alters and renames the tcp/ip stack optimizing it for VoIP traffic can avoid this patent and be granted one because the enhanced tcp/ip stack is not tcp/ip anymore just as tcp/ip is different from the isdn network stack. No change to the network infrastructure level, just one more kernel module for *nixes. Could be worse.

Or one could encapsulate ISDN over tcp/ip.

Patents are a way to make life miserable.

Re:ISDN

[hughk]

You made a very good point on X.25. The switch manufacturers used it for intercommunication but the important thing was that it was switches, i.e., you stuffed whatever in the packet, be it data or voice and then you put a destination address on the call and it could be routed through a network whether public or private. X.25 was just one low level protocol that was used to setup a point to point connection over a switched network.

Re:ISDN

[squiggleslash]

ISDN (at least, the bearer channels) do not run over X.25.

Mod parent anything but insightful, it's funny

[vivaoporto]

Come on, people don't recognize humor when they see it anymore? Next time I'll be telling that Microsoft has given up zune and will pay people to use it and I will be modded informative. Hmmm, wait!

I have an old Russian book, dated 1986

[WetCat]

Samoilenko S.I "Seti EVM" (Computer Networks), Moscow, Nauka, 1986

which describes Adaptive Communication (connecting voice phones using packet switching).
This book also referencing
Bellamy J.C. Digital Telephony. John Wiley and Sons, 1982

May be something can be found in that book too?

Electronic Cafe ISDN jams

[mattr]

Two refs here.

http://ecafe.com/nye96.html: Electronic Cafe Telebrations (see the rest of ecafe site). The Electronic Cafe was a pioneer in using ISDN modems with special synching to allow music jams with remotely based musicians, piping video and audio into cafe club spaces.

Also, Google: electronic cafe isdn history
This event happened in May, before the September date specified.
http://www.usc.edu/dept/dance/p9a_earlier_seasons. html

1994-95 Revisited
Zapped Taps(tm)/Alfred Desio Performed in 4 Cities Live
On Saturday, May 20, 1995, Zapped Taps(tm)/Alfred Desio , performed live at the Electronic Cafe in Santa Monica, at the Dairy Center for the Arts in conjunction with the Boulder Creek Festival in Boulder Colorado, at the World Trade Center in New York, and at the Electronic Cafe in Austin Texas. This was possible because of a ISDN wide band hook up. For Alfred Desio, based in Los Angeles, this began with a phone call from Dorinda Dercar, a tapper now residing in Boulder. She wanted the secret of how Desio creates electronic tap sounds, which she had first heard and seen in the film Tap, for which Alfred Desio was the consultant whose technology made it happen. After many calls and faxes, the two performed an interactive duet, she in Boulder and he in Santa Monica. Other artists on the program included Edwin Torres and Virtual Presence in New York, and music and comedy combining forces from the four cities.

LA C & D and Youth Activities
Even with these exciting technology events, a primary focus last season was still the special programs developed for the schools by both Louise Reichlin & Dancers and Zapped Taps/Alfred Desio. Reichlin's group added several weeks in Ventura and Orange County in addition to forty-one schools in the LA Unified, ranging from north in Sylmar to south in San Pedro in a season running from July 31, 1994 to June 7, 1995. Performances in schools are ones we will always strive to maintain. No advanced computer project can ever match the inspiration that springs from both sides of the footlights during our interactive programs that include repertory of four of our dances interspersed with audience participation so the students begin to understand that dance is something they can do and use in their own lives. That same season Alfred also spent two weeks in small towns in central California with a new school program using his Zapped Taps pulling together both dance and science in his approach.

For information about these pages please contact Louise Reichlin at louisehr@usc.edu or call (213)385-1171.

Return to Southern California Dance and Directory (home page)

Re:Electronic Cafe ISDN jams

[mattr]

Are you sure it wasn't full duplex?

Both musicians could hear both sides I thought.

Re:Electronic Cafe ISDN jams

[Cyphertube]

Public networks are the issue, not the Internet. So, it doesn't f*cking matter. Do you work for Verizon or something? You have posted all over the place with the same stupid argument. Yeah, it doesn't work if it is a PRIVATE network, but if it is a PUBLIC network, then so be it.

Hence, any system that used two phones and then sent the data across a public network, ostensbily in digital format, would work.

Not necessarily

[Rob the Bold]

Everyone seems to be missing the fact that this patent is of the type "[existing idea] but on the internet".

Their claim seems to be broader than just "Internet Protocol" -- which is part of what EFF objects to: the breadth of the claim.

From the summary and TFA:

Specifically, the claims describe a system that connects two parties where the receiving party does not need to have a computer or an Internet connection, but the call is routed in part through the Internet or any other 'public computer network'.

So, the Integrated Services Digital Network would fit that description.

Re:Not necessarily

[rs79]

"So, the Integrated Services Digital Network would fit that description."

Didja ever have ISDN service? It went like this:

1) Call the phone company and order an ISDN line.

That's not a public computer network. It's all going through the phone company.

Re:Not necessarily

[Rob the Bold]

Didja ever have ISDN service? It went like this:

1) Call the phone company and order an ISDN line.

That's not a public computer network. It's all going through the phone company.

Okay. What's the procedure for getting Internet service?

Re:Not necessarily

[smallfries]

No it wouldn't. The internet is a packet-switched network designed for computers. ISDN is a circuit-switched network designed to carry calls. They are very different.

Re:Not necessarily

[Rob the Bold]

The internet is a packet-switched network designed for computers. ISDN is a circuit-switched network designed to carry calls. They are very different.

ISDN is packet-switched, and is designed to carry multiple types of data, not just calls. All data is carried by asynchronous "cells", as they are called by the guys with bell-shaped-heads. Each cell has a header, with routing information, and a payload of data. Yes, I've seen the Wikipedia article that claims otherwise.

Re:Not necessarily

[smallfries]

Hmmm, I have to agree with the wiki article as I worked on ISDN and SS#7 switches and gateways for five years. Haven't poked around inside the depths of an ISDN stack I can tell you that it is definitely a circuit-switched network in the manner that the wiki describes. Are you perhaps thinking of something else?

Re:Not necessarily

[Brickwall]

ISDN is packet-switched, and is designed to carry multiple types of data, not just calls. All data is carried by asynchronous "cells", as they are called by the guys with bell-shaped-heads. Each cell has a header, with routing information, and a payload of data.

ISDN is synchronous; that's why they need framing bits. I think you are referring to ATM - asynchronous transfer method. I'll agree that almost all telco's use ATM for high speed transport.

Re:Not necessarily

[Anonymous Coward]

apparently the internet is "public" so i guess you should just call up your local government office. wait? what country am in again? its the heavy pink hand bearing down on us!

NVP

[Anonymous Coward]

I once read about something called NVP for Network Voice Protocol, which was to be something similar to Softphones, only it was to work via the ARPANET. There even is an RFC describing it, RFC741 from 1977. The first implementation appears to date back to 1973. But I cannot see anything in the RFC about briding to ordinary phone networks.

Somebody please ....

[jonfr]

Can somebody please delete the American patent system. Having no patent system is better the current horror system.

Neuromancer as Prior Art?

[Hey_bob]

I don't know if sci-fi writings would be prior art.. (it has also been a few years since I've read it)

Didn't Wintermute ring a number of phones, in a bank of pay phones, as Chase walked past it? Later it spoke with the characters over the phone several times, calls that originated from the 'internet' to a land-line.

Could the fictional realm of the 'matrix' in Neuromancer be considered akin to the internet? Wikipedia claims: "In Neuromancer Gibson first used the term 'the matrix' in reference to the visualized internet."

Since I quoted wikipedia, I suspect my credibility is gone. :-P

Re:Neuromancer as Prior Art?

[Anonymous Coward]

I thought of that, but careful reading of the passage shows no evidence that Wintermute's calls were routed over a public network. Indeed, the word 'network' never appears in Neuromancer.

Re:Neuromancer as Prior Art?

[bovinewasteproduct]

I don't know if sci-fi writings would be prior art.. (it has also been a few years since I've read it)

To a limited degree. The purpose of prior art is to show that the "CONCEPT" of an idea existed prior to the pantent. If I write about a process or product first, it is hard for someone else to claim the invention of it.

As an example, Heinlien's Waldo was the first mention of waterbeds (or the concept thereof), and so is prior art for any patent on them.

Also, prior art does NOT have contain EVERY concept of the patent claims, it just helps. If you can prove that it is an obvious step from the prior art to the patented idea/process, then you can get the patent rejected.

BWP

Autovon and DSN?

[Anonymous Coward]

Wasn't Autovon and later DSN (Defense Switched Network) doing this in full duplex long before 1995?

Heinlein

[TheSHAD0W]

In Robert A. Heinlein's book, "The Moon is a Harsh Mistress", a computer is given several digital voice circuits which are connected to the telephone system.

phone companies

[TheSHAD0W]

Haven't phone companies been running phone calls over digital networks for ages? That involves switches that are able to perform the conversion, and run the lines full-duplex. The fact that there are two conversions, analogdigitalanalog, shouldn't matter patent-wise; you're actually still performing both conversions, only one's been moved to a local device.

Simon Hackett's Etherphone?

[Russ Nelson]

I wonder if Simon Hackett's Etherphone qualifies? He was running voice calls over raw Ethernet packets back in 1992. He wrote up a white paper which was distributed at Interop that year.

Re:Simon Hackett's Etherphone?

[jesup]

Not unless it was connected to a PSTN bridge, which from your description it wasn't.

Verizon really pulled out all the stops

[kilodelta]

This one has a certain malodorous streak to it. Somehow I can see Verizon as one of the chief investors in North Central Equity which owns Acceris.

The attacks on VoIP are getting more and more vicious by the day and I'm glad the EFF is stepping into the fray.

Early VoIP work

[leonia]

http://www.cs.columbia.edu/~hgs/rtp/history.html lists early VoIP and voice-over-packet work, dating back into the 1970s. The closest is probably the ITU G.764 standard, which describes packet transmission to interconnect voice systems. These were typically used for trans-oceanic links, to save bandwidth.

voip

[Anonymous Coward]

I know that Dr. Renaldo Valenzuela did experiments at both Bell labs and the Rutgers WINLAB for voice over ethernet, then extended that work to TCP/IP, back around 1993-1995.

Also:
Larry Press, Net.Speech: desktop audio comes to the net, Communications of the ACM, v.38 n.10, p.25-31, Oct. 1995

H. Schulzrinne, Voice communication across the Internet: a network voice terminal, Technical Report TR-92-50, Department of Computer Science, University of Massachusetts at Amherst (July 1992).

A new patent by replacing "private" by "public" ?

[Anonymous Coward]

As far as I know my countries TelCo (KPN in the Netherlands) switched from pure audio to digital audio (for communication between their centers) many years ago, and I'm pretty sure that those devices routing the data-packets could be considered computers.

Allso, a definition as a "computer network" is very broad in itself. As the first poster remarked, even HAM-radio could be considered as such.

By the way : is it still allowed to file for a patent that has not got to show anything tangable for itself, and is fully based upon patents of others (even trying to encompass/absorbe it) ?

Infonet used to have it

[BanjoBob]

Infonet Services Corp (now BTInfonet) used to offer a product that did this some 10 years ago. The application resided on your PC but enabled calls to analog telephones pretty much anywhere. Infonet is a global network provider and their networks covered Asia, Europe, the Americas and who knows what all. This enabled them to use their private data networks for a variety of services that were immune from the Internet.

Telecom 95 in Genève

[dybdahl]

I attended the Telecom 95 exhibition in Genève, and I still remember how the news went around, that the finnish telephone backbone would be expanded using IP-capable equipment, to carry both internet traffic and telephone calls. This seemed very logical at that time, for those who knew about TCP/IP. I cannot believe that such huge investments in using the IP protocol for telephone traffic was made, unless the decision makers had seen internet telephony work. This means, that there is prior art somewhere.

I suggest that you look into the PR messages released at the Telecom 95 exhibition, and then do some research on those that cover telephony over TCP/IP.

The patent system is broken

[Cracked Pottery]

or there would be no need for the prior art to begin with. Patenting VoIP is patenting an idea, and a rather obvious one at that. There are some folks who moan about an ambulance chasing tort lawyer gaming the legal system on behalf of some loser just because a doctor removed the wrong kidney, but are oblivious to intellectual property lawyers playing a broken regime to share monopoly rents with huge corporations.

Gross Bogosity in Patents

[Anonymous Coward]

If they are able to uphold this patent, then nothing would stop someone (as an example) from patenting drinking glasses: a receptacle that accepts fluid, distributed from a container that otherwise holds bulk fluid.

Come on Patent people. It's time to put a stop to this absurdity; everyone trying to cash in on the most benign of things. Patents should ONLY be awarded to truly original and authentic designs and concepts.

How much more of this bullcrap do we have to deal with before they'll do something about it.

Re:Gross Bogosity in Patents

[Corwn of Amber]

It's designed that way. The USPTO delivers as many patents as possible because invention is slow in the Real World. That obviously does not work when you're building to and from abstracting ideas pretty much exclusively.
You should go read up rms' papers some time.

Re:Gross Bogosity in Patents

[Anonymous Coward]

"How much more of this bullcrap do we have to deal with before they'll do something about it."

I think you don't quite understand how democracy works, Citizen.

TeamSpeak/Ventrillo?

[Jarjarthejedi]

I'm not sure of this but wouldn't TeamSpeak and Ventrillo count as Prior Art? I know that I was using TeamSpeak 2.0 3 or 4 years ago so it's initial release date must have been a while before that, and both programs transmit voice data over the internet. Sure, they're not phone programs, but they are VoIP aren't they?

Mobile Subscriber Equipment

[Anonymous Coward]

I think this is what you are looking for:

Mobile Subscriber Equipment - its a military communications system. That uses digital links to provide data/voice. The signal is actually digitized in the phone (MSRT) however but travels over an IP network. For further reference: http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/library/pol icy/army/fm/11-43/index.html
If it's applicable, the dates of its creations certainly would place it in the realm of prior art.

The Mobile Subscriber Equipment (MSE) forms a network that covers an area occupied by unit subscribers. A typical grid is made up of four to six centralized Node centers which make up the hub or backbone of the network. Throughout the maneuver area, subscribers connect to local call switching centers by radio or wire. These switches, or extension nodes provide access to the network by connecting to the Node centers.

The MSE system provides communications in an area of up to 15,000 square miles. The system is digital, secure, highly flexible, and contains features that deal with link outages, traffic overload, and rapid movement of users. ...

Oct 79 Joint Operational Requirement approved. ...
Dec 85 Contract award (basic); Contract award (1st option). ...
Aug 90 MSE support of Operation Desert Shield began.

cell phones or fax?

[TheSlashaway]

"Specifically, the claims describe a system that connects two parties where the receiving party does not need to have a computer or an Internet connection, but the call is routed in part through the Internet or any other 'public computer network'. The calls must also be 'full duplex', meaning that both parties can listen and talk at the same time, like in an ordinary phone call." How about cell phones? Full duplex and routed over a cellular network? Or Internet to fax service?

Re:cell phones or fax?

[bovinewasteproduct]

"Specifically, the claims describe a system that connects two parties where the receiving party does not need to have a computer or an Internet connection, but the call is routed in part through the Internet or any other 'public computer network'. The calls must also be 'full duplex', meaning that both parties can listen and talk at the same time, like in an ordinary phone call." How about cell phones? Full duplex and routed over a cellular network? Or Internet to fax service?

A companies cell network would not be a "Public network" and as far as I know, ATM networks do not use Internet Protocols nativly. Were there any Internet to fax services prior to September 1995?

What I want to know, is how an application filed in 1995 and not modified (as far as I can tell), can mention prior art/patents from 1998? Where is the modification history?

BWP

Re:cell phones or fax?

[TheSlashaway]

Receiving party is a fax machine (not a computer and no Internet connection) Sending party is a UUCP to fax gateway. ???? And the kicker is that the evidence is on the EFF's own web site!!!! http://www.eff.org/Misc/Publications/E-journals/Go vAccess/govaccess.028

Etherphone

[dlleigh]

Xerox PARC in the 1980s. This may have been done at the raw ethernet level, but I wouldn't be surprised if they did work at the IP layer as well.

PSTN toll bypass for fax

[Anonymous Coward]

A Massachusetts company called Netcentric developed a suite of Internet to Fax products called FaxStorm in 1995 (you can tell they were an early company because they were able to grab such a good name). On one of them, you send a document to their servers via email; it would route the document to one of its worldwide POPs closest to the destination, which was a gateway to the local PSTN. The toll savings could be significant. So the use of the Internet for PSTN toll bypass preceded the patent filing.

They've since been bought out or gone defunct. I didn't work there so I don't have details.

The obvious prior art is...

[freebase]

The existing Public Switched Telephone network.

I've not read the patent, but if the claim is really as broad as indicated, it would seem to include the PSTN currently used for 'analog' calls.

The PSTN, by definition a Public Network, is made up of analog access lines connection analog 'terminals' - your phones - to what's known as a Class 5 switch. Class 5 switches are connected together at what's known as a Tandem, providing connectivity between all the users within an area. Access to the long distance network is via a connection to a Class 4 switch, usually at the tandem, but not always. Class 4 switches are interconnected (internetworked??) with other switches, and eventually a sufficient network is formed that allows you to call anyone with a phone.

The Switches (Class 5, Class 4, etc) used in this network are very much computers, and have been for quite some time http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/5ESS_switch.

The analog to digital conversion used to be done in the CO itself, and sometimes still is, but usually it's done at the Digital Loop Carrier (DLC) closest to the customer http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Digital_loop_carrier.

This network even has its own routing and control protocol, SS7 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SS7.

Plainly, the only thing really new about VoIP is that it abtracts the physical transport and allows the control plane traffic to be transmitted on the same path as the bearer plane traffic.

PGP Phone?

[Anonymous Coward]

What about zimmerman's pgp phone? I remember looking at it *about* that time period, but my memory is pretty fuzzy going back a decade. Archive.org turns up references to it as early as 9/96, and that's version 1.0beta (http://web.archive.org/web/19961224033201/http:// web.mit.edu/network/pgpfone/)

Mr. Zimmerman, if you read--can you confirm the date the product was first written? I'd be wagering version 0.1a if it existed was written or described somewhere earlier...

very early arpanet voip

[Anonymous Coward]

In the mid 1980's there was a company in Santa Barbara, Advanced Computer Communications, which was involved with the Arpanet and later Internet. Some of the founders were the original writers of TCPIP. I worked on a project that was delivered to the NSA to allow secure telepones to communicate anywhere in the world via packetized voice. The project was derived from earlier ATT work in a proto lab in the early 80's. I would say that VOIP has prior art going back nearly 30 years.
The founder of that company was a fellow named Roland Bryan who is still in a small business there.

Only solution

[jmorris42]

> Haven't phone companies been running phone calls over digital networks for ages?

Yes they have, and in a sane world that would in itself have ended the discussion at the USPTO. Since the first telco stuff was crude circuit switched equipment a better example would be ATM, which also easily predates the patent. But apparently the USPTO and the courts are still allowing a fresh patent for doing ordinary old things by simply adding "over the Internet" to them. We seriously need a law of one single paragraph:

"No patent may be issued or upheld if the only thing unique about it is that it extending an existing practice to the Internet. This is one of the designed purposes for the Internet; using something for it's designed purpose is NOT original or difficult for one skilled in the art so knock it off you idiots. This law is intended both as an order to the USPTO and binding guidance for the Judicary."

Long distance calling cards

[DigitAl56K]

How do those cheap international calling cards work? The ones where you can dial other countries at rates far lower than the phone company will give you? They have existed for years, and I don't know the implementation behind it, but I had always made the assumption that they were a VOIP link between nodes in the two countries with the service provider paying for bandwidth and local rates at each end only. I don't really know enough about it though...

mod parent down

[Anonymous Coward]

First, it wasn't IP-based, and second, the tie lines were simply trunks leased by IBM from the phone companies. This is analogous to renting a fixed space at a parking garage at a monthly rate instead of paying every time you go in. Nice try, but it has nothing to do with the patent claims.

Found one!

[DigitAl56K]

Please google "1994 gsm over ip"

http://goliath.ecnext.com/coms2/gi_0199-721578/ip- access-and-RigNet-deliver.html

M2 PRESSWIRE-24 February 2004-ip.access: ip.access and RigNet deliver GSM Abis over IP via satellite; ip.access and RigNet partner for implementation of GSM-over-IP-over-satellite solution; Successful trial paves way for delivery of GSM services to remote locations(C)1994-2004 M2 COMMUNICATIONS LTD

Also looks interesting:
http://kbs.cs.tu-berlin.de/~jutta/toast.html
http://kbs.cs.tu-berlin.de/~jutta/gsm/toast-igp.ht ml

Another paper

[Anonymous Coward]

High-quality coding of telephone speech and wideband audio Jayant, N.S.; Communications Magazine, IEEE Volume 28, Issue 1, Jan. 1990 Page(s):10 - 20

CDMA (IS-95) carried voice over IP

[claykarmel]

I believe IS-95, the first publicly used version of CDMA, which was in public use in 1995, carries voice packets over a TCP/IP network from the phone to the mobile switch. From there, the full duplex phone call terminates on any phone on the PSTN.

The question is whether the Sprint or Verizon IS-95 infrastructure constitutes a 'public network'. I would think so.

Wikipedia includes a lot of detail about IS-95, as do books on CDMA available on Amazon, so presumably Qualcomm does not mind publication of high level characterizations of it. I also sat through classes in CDMA at UCSD which described IS-95 in glowing detail. So I have good reason to believe none of this is confidential. EIA/TIA/IS-95 and IS-99 and IS-707 are published specifications available from Global Engineering.

I learned about this TCP/IP network in 1996 while developing 'data devices' to run on the IS-99 (data) overlay of IS-95. In order to present a TCP/IP socket to a handset application (which could terminate anywhere on the web), we had to run an additional TCP/IP stack. That is, our application formed a PPP connection to TCP, wrapped in IP, then PPP again, which was wrapped in the lower stack TCP and the lower stack IP. The lower stack terminated at the mobile switch (enhanced to handle IS-99), with L2TP or PPTP connection to an IP router. The upper stack terminated on a web server. It seemed like an insanely complex link, but it worked surprisingly well because of the highly tuned TCP/IP stack running on the Qualcomm chipset. (I think this connection was later branded as "QuickNetConnect".)

That is, the lower stack wasn't there for data. It was there, I believe, for Voice (Over IP) services in IS-95.

Re:CDMA (IS-95) carried voice over IP

[Anonymous Coward]

Doesn't layering TCP over TCP cause massive latency if there is any kind of packet loss?

Re:CDMA (IS-95) carried voice over IP

[bill_mcgonigle]

Doesn't layering TCP over TCP cause massive latency if there is any kind of packet loss?

No, that's a common misconception because some dope wrote a paper last decade calling it harmful. In the real world it "just works". I've built and sold products that do it.

Ah yes ...

[Anonymous Coward]

Nice to hear from the "I don't understand patents, but I hear they are evil" crowd. Grow up and learn to read more than just blogs.

Re:Ah yes ...

[jonfr]

When patent are all about how you preform a task on a website they are evil. Or when patent are all about how you send data between a to b they are evil. There are better ways to protect peoples ideas. But the patent system is not one of those good ideas. It is for a fact a century out of date.

The analog telephone network

[Anonymous Coward]

Hasn't been analog for long distance for about 30 years.

In the phone network the analog phone conversation is digitized and sent over a computer network. You can even get ATM digital point to point computer connections from the phone company for your data.

Isn't this Voice over ATM network prior art? I'd hardly think that changing the bottom couple of layers in the network stack and moving the digitization of the conversation closer to the phone counts as something that is so innovative that it could be patented.

Here's one.

[btarval]

With all due respect to the EFF, have they forgotten their roots? This stuff was discussed extensively on the old Cypherpunk list back in the early 90's. Heck, it was downright obvious, given that the FBI was mandating wiretapping equipment from the Telco's, and the Internet was in full use by any techically savvy person.

So just look at the Cypherpunk discussions for starters. You know, from the folks who started the EFF.

Here are link from a quick Google search for "cypherpunk voice internet":

March 15, 2004 A Race the FBI Can't Win: The Increasingly Asymmetric Costs of Wiretap Surveillance vs. Wiretap Avoidance. This one even mentions the term Voip.

Blue Boxes

[Empiric]

I'd suggest 1980's case law might yield some legal ammunition. Blue Boxing was routinely prosecuted as "computer fraud" (ahem), even when used only for residential phone to residential phone communications. Hence, it would seem, by legal precedent, the phone call was considered as going "over a computer network".

Telenet

[scrad]

Telenet did. Sprint provided it as a service for quite a while. I used to use it to connect to BBS's all over the US. You would call a modem on a number that was a local call, then issue a command to connect to another modem in another city, and then tell THAT modem to dial out for you. full duplex analog signal over a switched network. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Telenet

Re:Telenet

[squiggleslash]

I have no idea what you think you're describing, but it most certainly isn't ISDN over X.25!

ISDN is a digital interface to the phone system. You get two (or more, but basic service is 2) digital bi-directional 64kbps channels called "bearer" channels that are used for the phone calls, plus a 16kbps "D" channel (which may or may not have used X.25, I can't remember, but if it did it was for the very limited purpose of communicating with the telephone exchange.) The D channel was used, essentially, to set up and tear down phone calls.

It's an alternative to POTS (that's the normal analog phone system), and has the advantage that you get two lines, and have a certain amount of metadata going over the D channel that lets you program funky things in if you want. Because it's end-to-end digital, you don't need a modem when you're transferring data, so you can get faster data transmission than you would do if you were using POTS with modems. This is especially true if you use a feature called "bonding", where both Bearer channels could be combined into a single 128kbps line.

ISDN is/was relatively popular in Europe, where both POTS and ISDN are charged by time used. In America, where POTS is usually unmetered for local calls, ISDN was usually not, and as a result never really became popular.

ISDN has nothing to do with what you're describing. You're more likely to transmit X.25 over ISDN than anyone would be likely to do the opposite.

Re:Telenet

[scrad]

I was describing TELENET, the service, which is two pots lines connected via an x.25 packet switched network. It has nothing to do with ISDN. Which is why the SUBJECT was TELENET and not ISDN. I know what ISDN is. Do you know what Sprint's 'telenet' service was? Did you follow the link I provided?

Re:Telenet

[squiggleslash]

No, I didn't, because it wasn't relevent. You responded to:

ISDN (at least, the bearer channels) do not run over X.25.

with your comments about "TELENET". I assumed you thought "TELENET" had some vague relevence to my comment. If your intention was to start an entirely new thread about something completely unrelated, perhaps you could not reply to a comment of mine next time.

Are you retarded?

Re:Telenet

[scrad]

I will be sure to NOT reply to any comment of yours ever again. Otherwise, you will apparently resort to name calling.

well....I can help

[tacokill]

I graduated college in May 1995 and used Vocaltec myself back in the day. I particularly remember that proggie because as far as I know.....it was never cracked. ;)

So yea, I can vouch that Vocaltec/Net2Phone was around back in 1994-1995 and had software "out on the market". If I recall right, the company was Israeli.

All telephony?

[iabervon]

Since they don't define "public computer network", I can't see any reason not to consider the PSTN a "public computer network" (T1 and ISDN internet connections are actually blocks of routed phone numbers dedicated to last-mile internet routes, and these were well-established in '95). If that is true, every PSTN phone call is prior art.

Now, they obviously didn't mean to include POTS as a computer network, but if they're too vague to exclude it by some distinguishing feature, then it's impossible to determine what their patent should cover.

Re:All telephony?

[Tmack]

If I only had mod points... You state almost exactly what I was going to post myself. The "POTs" network vs the Internet network is like comparing Oranges against Oranges, where the oranges fell from the same tree but one went to the juicer and the other got sliced up for someone's breakfast. The Internet IS the POTs network. They use the same facilities, and are run by the same companies. The only difference is instead of running SS7 over the links they run IP,and the terminating equipment knows to route IP instead of SS7 (tho alot of devices are capable of both and more). What do you think T1/T3(DS3)/OC128, etc are? T1 is a link comprised of (up to) 24 DS0 lines, each DS0 carries 64kbs of data needed to transmit voice. In the telecom world, a single DS0 is a single telephone line, becaus physically that is how it is setup. Its analog only from the endpoint of an analog phone in your house to the remote terminal box down the street. From there it gets packetized and sent down one of the DS0's of a T1/HDSL/OCxxx line back to the nearest CO.

tm

Office voicemail?

[Bloke down the pub]

What about office voicemail? I also had a personal one I rented for a few months while travelling - this was before mobile phones were affordable. Unless there was a chap listening to the bleeps and changing tapes I assume that when I dialled in it was a computer playing the calls back to me.

These products came out around 1995...

[guruevi]

For some or another reason the lameness filter won't post a list of companies/products I had listed.

WebPhone, CUSeeMe, Net2Phone, ... all around 1995

Much dotcom boomers which I even remember using. CUSeeMe for example has been around forever, NeVoT is an example of something that ran on older stuff. I used to do it while messing around with modems. ICQ had it (I don't know when exactly).

NEVOT (NetworkVoice Terminal) is a media agent that provides packet-voice communicationsacross internetworks. It operates in either unicast, simulated multicast or IP multicast environments, using the vat or RTP protocols. NEVOT is part of the SPOKES conferencing systems that allows to create flexible multimedia applications from independent components. This document describes installation, operation and implementation of NEVOT. Copyright 1991-1995 by AT&T Bell Laboratories and GMD Fokus;

Start here: http://citeseer.ist.psu.edu/384701.html

Also, the H.324 protocol describes a way to get video & audio conferencing over POTS. The Datapoint MINX system was one of the early steps ('80s) and had all the fun-stuff we find in calling systems today. http://www.fundinguniverse.com/company-histories/D atapoint-Corporation-Company-History.html

There you go, have fun in court.

Hams have "phone patched" for years

[Anonymous Coward]

Although it does not require a computer, this IS a technique where local calls were routed via landline, to an amateur long-distance communication link, then remotely patched back into the remote local telephone network.

I know this was done in the fifties... I used to do it.

Look in any old ARRL Radio Amateur's handbook for the specifics.

There is but I can't remember the name... help!

[Anonymous Coward]

I know of a website that use to exist (still may?) that allowed PC to PC "calls" using a headset and mic. They also offered Website to POTS calls for free for some time, and later changed to a per minute but still cheap as crap method. I can't remember the website anymore, but I DO know the PC I used it on was a Pentium 233MMX with 28.8 dialup (or maybe at that point it was switched to a 56K). I believe it was back in 97, 98, or 99, before I graduated high school or shortly there after.

I can't believe I can't remember the name... which pisses me off. I can remember using it at my grand parents (where the computer was located) to call them just to check it out. And no, the call wasn't made by using the built in modem, it was sent out across the dialup internet connection, because I remember the call had quite a few periods of "slur" or whatever you want to call it.

If anyone remember the site or a similar site.. please help. Not being able to remember it is REALLY annoying me!

CUSeeMe and/or SpeakFreely?

[Anonymous Coward]

CUSeeMe was audio, video and text with emoticons over IP but I don't remember the first year.

SpeakFreely was written in 1991 and should have some good historical documentation.

Do I win?

Re:CUSeeMe and/or SpeakFreely?

[Anonymous Coward]

The parent comment has been "disappeared" from the article. I bookmarked it, but it doesn't appear on /.

OT - Sig Reply

[stoborrobots]

Common errors in english + FF 2.0 auto-spell

It's nice to see you're a fan of Brians's "Common Errors in English", but Paul specifically asks that you link to the main page, rather than the errors page...

Re:OT - Sig Reply

[vivaoporto]

All right, sig changed. Thanks for the tip :)

Prior Art pre-1995

[DynaSoar]

> we need 'prior art'

How about software available for download? Here's a usenet post from 1994 containing links to available software. This is just the first result I got searching the newsgroups via Google's advanced search function (search terms "phone internet duplex", filtered dates Jan 1 1981 to Dec 31 1994) [usenet post below ===== divider].

Google's patent search for the same terms and dates gave this result:

http://www.google.com/patents?vid=USPAT4866704

Abstract
An asynchronous, high-speed, fiber optic local area network originally developed for tactical environments with additional benefits for other environments such as spacecraft, and the like. The network supports ordinary data packet traffic simultaneously with synchronous T1 voice traffic over a common token ring channel; however, the techniques and apparatus of this invention can be applied to any deterministic class of packet data networks, including multitier backbones, that must transport stream data (e.g., video, SAR, sensors) as well as data. A voice interface module parses, buffers, and resynchronizes the voice data to the packet network employing elastic buffers on both the sending and receiving ends. Voice call setup and switching functions are performed external to the network with ordinary PABX equipment. Clock information is passed across network boundaries in a token passing ring by preceeding the token with an idle period of non-transmission which allows the token...

Patent number: 4866704
Filing date: Mar 16, 1988
Issue date: Sep 12, 1989

=====

Newsgroups: comp.sys.mac.apps
From: Sven Guckes
Date: Sat, 18 Jun 1994 06:37:56 GMT
Local: Sat, Jun 18 1994 12:37 am
Subject: Re: Voice messages across the internet???
Reply to author | Forward | Print | Individual message | Show original | Report this message | Find messages by this author
j...@iastate.edu (Jeff A Jensen) writes:

[Real-time talk over network]

>How come nobody's written a shareware program to let users of way-cooler
>macs to do the same thing? :) After all, most recent macs come with
>microphones, and they all have sound capabilities. So, where's the
>enterprising programmer(s) who will make this possible for thousands of
>dedicated mac/internet users?

2WayTalker 2.1
Talk2Me 1.3
TownMeeting 2.0
XCUSeeMe 0.60b1
Zing 1.3

See pointers below.

Sven

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Topic: Voice conversation on networks /mac/util/network/2waytalker2.1.sit.hqx /mac/util/network/talk2me1.3.cpt.hqx /mac/util/network/townmeeting2.0.cpt.hqx /mac/util/network/xcuseeme0.60b1.cpt /mac/util/network/zing1.3.cpt.hqx

Descriptions: /mac/util/network/2waytalker2.1.sit.hqx
92 3/6/94 BinHex4.0,StuffIt3.07

Was Komodo Tech around prior to 1995?

[fluffy99]

The Komodo Phone model 200 and model 300 were out in the mid 90s and did not require a PC. Both had analog ports for a regular phone. The KF200 used a modem dial-up and the KF300 used an ethernet connection for the VOIP side. Cisco bought out KomodoTech at some point and relabelled KF300 as the Cisco ATA816. The KF200 existed briefly as the ATA-182 but was dropped after the first few years.

Re:Was Komodo Tech around prior to 1995?

[fluffy99]

Oops, make that the Cisco ATA-186.

ISDN? All of ISDN? Anybody? Is this thing on?

[IBitOBear]

Lets see, the entire ISDN standard is awash with places where the POTS (Plain Old Telephone Service) is bridged to the packet switched "public network" of the ISDN networks run by the various providers.

ISDN phones directly call regular analog voice phones as well.

So there is no "Internet Protocol" but there are both required "public" networks.

Voice over Frame Relay and X.25 was old hat for the "Dimension" premises telephone switches sold and rented by AT&T back in 1986.

The principles were kown earlier

[Z00L00K]

for example the Ericsson AXE switches uses digital communication between the switches and that has been in place since before 1995. (Don't know the exact date, but the AXE was concieved late 70's or early 80's.)

What about John Walker's Speak Freely

[Anonymous Coward]

From http://www.speakfreely.org/ Speak Freely is a 100% software-based VoIP phone originally written in 1991 by John Walker, founder of Autodesk. After April of 1996, he discontinued development on the program. Since then, several other VoIP "phones" have cropped up all over the world. However, most of these programs cost money. Most of them have poor sound quality, and don't support some of Speak Freely's basic features such as encryption, the answering machine, or selectable compression.