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Patent Lawsuits Galore
eldavojohn writes "Guess who owns the patent on the touch-screen keyboard. Not Apple — SP Technologies has filed a suit based on just that. Ars brings out the intriguing detail that the founder of the patent troll company is serving prison time for health-care fraud." Read on for four more patent developments in the day's news.
Today the news broke that Aloft is suing Microsoft and Adobe for deliberately violating the patent entitled 'Network Browser Window with Adjacent Identifier Selector.' Qualcomm had a bad day as the US Trade Representative advised the President not to intervene in the patent beef it is losing against Broadcom. Today we found out Sharp is suing Samsung for an LCD infringement. Ending an eventful day on a note of sanity, a judge today threw out the jury verdict on Alcatel-Lucent vs. Microsoft and Microsoft no longer has to pony up $1.5 billion.
Today the news broke that Aloft is suing Microsoft and Adobe for deliberately violating the patent entitled 'Network Browser Window with Adjacent Identifier Selector.' Qualcomm had a bad day as the US Trade Representative advised the President not to intervene in the patent beef it is losing against Broadcom. Today we found out Sharp is suing Samsung for an LCD infringement. Ending an eventful day on a note of sanity, a judge today threw out the jury verdict on Alcatel-Lucent vs. Microsoft and Microsoft no longer has to pony up $1.5 billion.
I think it's all a sham.
Why are they suing now, when Palm had devices with touchscreen keyboards only 11 years now. However they kinda hit the right company at least: the Apple Newton was before Palm and had a on screen keyboard on its touchscreen too. Too bad for the patent troll the Newton lived (and died) even before the patent was filed in 2000.
Apple should be rejoicing, since they claim that the patent system is running perfectly.
Guess who owns "a" patent on the touch screen keyboard. Actually, on a supposed improvement to the touch screen keyboard. This is the lovely thing about patents in general and software patents in particular; you can claim so many patents for the same thing.
/me waits for the patent lawyers to reply to this post, telling me how utterly wrong I am, and how without software patents no-one would write software.
The humble network plug is covered by about 45 patents iirc. At least that's a finite number.
But the average humble user interface is covered by hundreds, thousands of patents, each for minor improvements (if at all) on other peoples' work.
Software patents are designed for one thing only: to allow lawyers to parasite off engineers.
Come on, make my day, patent punks!
My blog
they got an injuction against apple. Everyone would have to download an update that would remove the keyboard. No more "I'm posting this from my iphone posts."
Not really a loss. Maybe they could bring back the thumb keyboards.
If you keep bailing out the patent system by having judges rescue the companies with the power you are gonna get stupid hypocrites like Apple's recent statement that the system is fine and no one will change it.
The case will go in a similar vein:
Apple: "And here is exhibit one!!
Judge: "Case Closed, Next!!"
Of course, it may have neem "MS >> Alcatel". Hopefully, though, the judge went "Hang on, that's rediculous. The patents aren't core, MS paid millions for a license for a hundred others, why is two worth 1.5 Bn?" etc.
What the hell's the point of a Jury verdict if the Judge can just throw it out ?
Wanna fight ? Bend over, stick your head up your ass, and fight for air.
For those who haven't bothered reading the SP tech. patent on touchscreen keyboards - it's basically an "improvement" on existing touchscreen keyboards. The "improvement" is that the keyboard is not resizable, movable, minimizable, etc. It appears on the screen in one location and cannot be removed or hidden (until it is no longer needed, at which point it could disappear). The patent includes sample Visual Basic code - also absolutely horrible!! Read on for brief entertainment. 1. choose patent at random 2. remove some functionality 3. patent "improvement" 4. sue 5. Profit?? Shit.. that didn't work.
Al
Great, now you can patent a picture of technology!
What is this, a joke? FTA:
The patents in question are for Aloft's "Network Browser Graphical User Interface for Managing Web Content," US patent number 7,117,443, and "Network Browser Window with Adjacent Identifier Selector," US patent number 7,194,691 (...). They were filed for in late 2003 and were granted in October of 2006 and March of 2007, respectively. They describe user interfaces in a network browsing window that display the content at a specific URL as well as the URL itself somewhere on or around the window.Sounds like a plain old web browser to me. This was filed in 2003 and granted in 2006/2007? I guess nobody had ever heard of web browsers by then. This is just too stupid.
slightly off topic, I apologize.
..but does anybody know what happened to the "morse code" mobile texting input people were discussing a few years ago? after all it is well proven that morse code is a lot faster then texting.
..and on topic I know there are some patents in this area..
t ent-for-morse-code-generating-cellphone/
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AhsSgcsTMd4
http://www.engadget.com/2005/03/12/nokia-files-pa
Seeing all this crap going on in "the land of the Free", I really urge all of us that are not under its jurisdiction to make damn sure there is no IP rights harmonization, converting our more sensible laws into something benefitting the American lawyer population.
Seriously, keep a sharp eye on proposed laws in your own country, that are being pushed by the U.S... In Europe we've managed to beat them once with the software patents legislation, but they keep pushing. They in this case is US goverment/Microsoft; awfully enough there is no difference, Our ms. Kroes has stated her annoyance a being approached by US ambassadors to go easy on M$. She's got some big brass ones though, and I don't see her being pushed around at all.
Bart
Microsoft: "Your honor. IE6. We rest our case."
My sci-fi novel, Ghost Thief, is now available from Amazon.com.
Hmm, I seem to recall: The Macintosh had a "keycaps" desk accessory, circa 1984 Good ol PLATO had a touchscreen keybaord, circa 1973. Some judges might consider this Prior Art.
IANAL, so correct me if I'm wrong. The justice system is designed to fail safe: it intentionally (and rightly) prefers the guilty going free to the innocent being punished. The ability of a judge to override a jury is confined to changing "guilty" or "liable" verdicts into "not guilty" or "not liable" verdicts, and so provides an additional safeguard against wrongful conviction.
and how is a patent quqlified as a patent ?? what's next ? some high flying bozo getting a patent for "aerobic pulmonary breathing" ??? good'old ADAM (from adam & eve story) should own this patent and the *judge* will order every human (mammal? maybe?) to pay 1c/breath for this ???
RTFP - Read The Friendly Patent. The claim is for a keyboard that comes back in the same place every time. The claimed problem is that people move their keyboard around and then can't figure out how to use it. So, their innovation is that the keyboard is always in the same place. You can't move the iPhone keyboard because it takes up the entire screen. There's no place to move it to.
I wish I could say that I don't understand how this patent was ever granted in the first place, but we all know how it happens.
What irritates me about patents like this is that they fail not just tests of obviousness and novelty, but tests of history. Years ago, I used a program that had a statically placed pop-up keyboard. The keyboard always came up in a location that blocked data behind it. Didn't the patent examiner realize that the ability to move the keyboard around WAS AN INNOVATION IN THE FIRST PLACE?! Removing an added feature hardly qualifies as something worthy of a patent.
I'm not a fan of the iPhone, but I really hope this patent gets squashed with prejudice.
Brian
I seem to remember the evil executives computer in tron having a touch screen keyboard...
"The input area has no task bar and may not be minimized, maximized, or deleted. Therefore, the input area becomes an integral component and provides the user with a constant and reliable method of inputting information into the computer program."
You can easily get rid of the iPhone keyboard. It slides down when you click on the google maps and stuff and don't need text input capability. It's by no means constantly on display...
So, what are they infringing?
What they have patented here is a display whereby the keyboard is an absolutely permanent feature and soaks up space on the screen forever and ever and cannot be taken off. No device like this has ever existed because it'd be a shitty thing to do considering the cost of screen real estate to both users (usability standpoint) and manufacturers (more pixels and screen area = more $ to make).
sue each other into oblivion and get it over with?
Touch screen keyboards have been around forever. The one I worked on ran as a TSR under MSDOS and when triggered would take up part of the screen and would simulate a real keyboard. This was back around 1992-1993, well before this patent was filed. I know of other keyboards as well, such as one I saw on Geoworks on a Casio Zoomer and I'm sure others were also available.
My notes on the claims for the patent (quoted from the patent):
1. A method of entering data on a touch screen display, the method comprising: invoking a computer program in which user input is sought; invoking an input area, including a plurality of data input fields; invoking a graphical keyboard area incapable of user termination independent of termination of the input area, the graphical keyboard area having a plurality of keys on the display; selecting keys on the keyboard to provide the desired input; and automatically terminating the graphical keyboard area after the desired input is received in the input area.
The keyboard I worked on was capable of being toggled on or off by the user and was not application specific, but this is something rather minor and obvious.
2. The method of entering data on a touch screen display of claim 1 wherein the input area is created by an executable code.
Done. The keyboard I worked on would draw the keyboard in the lower half of the screen and shrink the text above it to fit (since it ran in text mode).
3. The method of entering data on a touch screen display of claim 2 wherein the executable code is compiled visual basic code.
Can't say it was in Visual Basic... the keyboard TSR I worked on was written in Turbo C with some assembly. The computer language used should not affect the patent.
4. The method of entering data on a touch screen display of claim 1 wherein the computer program invokes the input area.
This was not computer program invoked, but this is fairly obvious. I think there were other applications at that time where the application could invoke a keyboard for input fields. I don't recall if it was at a fixed location or not, though it might have been. I think GRiD's pen SDK had this capability. Usually it supported handwriting recognition that was input field specific (i.e. if an input field expected only numbers it would only recognize numbers, or if letters only, it would only accept letters. This was to improve the accuracy of the handwriting recognition.)
5. The method of entering data on a touch screen display of claim 4 wherein the computer program accesses a dynamic link library file in order to invoke the input area.
A TSR under MSDOS is sort of a dynamic link library, since it hooks itself into the OS and BIOS and is called by the application. Dynamic link libraries are pretty obvious for functionality such as this.
6. The method of entering data on a touch screen display of claim 5 wherein the dynamic link library file is a C++ program.
The keyboard I worked on was not language specific and it shouldn't matter what language it's written in. The keyboard was written in C and assembly, but would work with applications written in any language (including C++).
7. The method of entering data on a touch screen display of claim 1 wherein the computer program is executing on a personal computer.
The pen computer was basically a personal computer and the keyboard program would also run on a regular PC with a mouse or similar input device. The computers ranged from 8088 to 80486 machines at the time.
8. The method of entering data on a touch screen display of claim 1 wherein the computer program is executing on a pen-based computer.
That's what the keyboard I worked on usually ran on.
9. The method of entering
This post is encrypted twice with ROT-13. Documenting or attempting to crack this encryption is illegal.
You could tie damages to use.
How can someone claim 'irreparable damages' if they went out an 'bought' a patent and started trolling with it, after it sat fallow for a thirteen years? If you have or control a patent the amount of damages you could claim could be limited to a simple multiple of your income from use of the patent within a certain interval from its grant. If you didn't earn anything from it, it wasn't worth anything was it? How about a mechanism to revoke patents that don't show use by the inventors within a certain interval? The Constitution says in Article I, Section 8:
"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."
If it didn't get used it doesn't promote science or useful arts. Income from patents could be reported to the IRS and might be taxable or partially exempted might even be taxable on a separate schedule, after all its a grant of a monopoly, isn't it? You could shorten the grant period of a patent, and make it eligible for a single renewal based on an income test. The 1790 Patent Act set an interval "Not exceeding 14 years". The 1836 Patent Act allowed a 7 year renewal after a finding that a patent met the promote/progress criteria. I can understand how much effort it would require to renew. You'd get three tiers of patent holders: Those that realize income upon or before grant, those who also realize enough income to pay for the renewal process, and those that never realize income. Could you simply use extremely high renewal fees as a test?
Patent trolling is an attempt to monetize ideas, which are not recognized as 'intellectual property' under U.S. law. All other protections required a tangible expression or realizable invention. Ideas are not property. Even in trade secrets it's keeping a secret that has the value (indemnity), not the idea.
2. People patent things not to make them, but to charge others for using them. (Patent Trolls).
[snip] The real problem here is not that they do not move into production (as you say, not having capital is a darn good reason not to), but they never really invented anything in the first place. This is different from "obviousness".
The reason behind patent disclosures was to provide a detailed enough technical description that the invention can actually be made relying on the disclosure. The inventor thereby adds measurably to the sum of knowledge and, when the patent expires, others benefit from it. In the past, there was a much greater emphasis on this, to the extent that people actually sent scale models to the patent office of their inventions.
Today, especially in the IT-related fields, the patent description is so vague as to be completely useless to the public at large, the entire purpose of the system. The patents are vague because the inventor never actually made anything, never had the capability to make anything, and probably never had the intention. They just describe something that someone else might want to eventually do, slap it on a piece of paper and add a filing fee. They could never mass produce their "invention" even if they wanted to, because they never figured out if it actually works or how to make it work. Someone else comes along and actually puts research and energy into *solving a problem* that is almost similar to the earlier patent, and the patent trolls come out of the woodwork.
If I file a patent claiming a "method for faster than light travel involving creation of a stable wormhole with focussed graviton beams". I should darn well have to demonstrate that it works and that it works from *my submitted description* before the patent is granted. As I recall, there actually is an FTL patent in the system, however.
It's even older than Palm. The concept was clearly displayed on Star Trek: The Next Generation.
When the patent office approves patents like this, something is seriously wrong. What, exactly, does the $500 filing fee cover, if it doesn't include at least half an hour of looking for prior art? Just paper shuffling and bureaucracy?