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WordLogic Patented the Predictive Interface
Packetl055 writes "Have any of you heard anything about this company, WordLogic, with a soon to be granted/issued patent with 117 claims for predictability software? They recently received a patent approval/allowance letter from the US Patent and Trademark Office. Their patent application was submitted in March 2000. If I read this correctly, any software that gives you any prediction after you type something is infringing on their patent — e.g. vehicle navigation systems, cellular telephones, PDA's, Google with their 'Did You Mean' when using Google for a search, the new Apple I-Phone, Blackberry, Sony Playstation-3, etc., etc. If true, this is going to be huge: lawsuits after lawsuits." Their stock trend over the last few days suggests that somebody was paying attention to the the USPTO news from August 9. WordLogic makes products (assistive input software) and doesn't seem to be merely a patent troll.
I just checked and my damned junk mail filter put that email in the trash!
Is it just my observation, or are there way too many stupid people in the world?
that they wouldn't get anywhere with a lawsuit.
It's just too easy to create infringing code. I don't much like FDR's administration (there's a decent argument that he actually prolonged the Great Depression by his attempt to ram a centralized economy down the country's throat), but one of the good things he did do was to radically cut back the number and scope of patents on the theory that handing out monopolies was a bad idea.
Dog is my co-pilot.
Would she infringe upon their patent? 8)
Karma Whoring for Fun and Profit.
Prior art from 1996, anyone. Thank you, Bill! ;-)
I live ze unknown. I love ze unknown. I am ze unknown.
I spent half an hour once trying to find a way to disable that in NeoOffice, and never succeeded. I hate that feature so much. It distracts me, and I'm a fast enough typist not to benefit much from it.
My blog: http://www.seebs.net/log/ --- My iPhone/iPad app: http://www.seebs.net/seebsfrac/
The I-Phone? Does it work with MACS?
The word is "no." I am therefore going anyway.
I hope they enjoyed the intellisense autocomplete feature in Visual Studio when they developed the software that their patent is based on.
Patents this broad on software just shouldn't ever be granted, period. Effectively this patents inference, which is ridiculous. I'm also fairly certain that tech existed prior to 2000 which was capable of predictive i/o. Browser histories, etc.
I like basketball!!1!
"WordLogic makes products (assistive input software) and doesn't seem to be merely a patent troll."
Just because they make products doesn't mean that they aren't a patent troll.
This is my opinion. To make sure you don't steal it, it's covered by the DMCA.
I predicted that they'd do that!
Unbreakable toys can be used to break other toys.
"We are very excited about the obvious opportunities that will be open to WordLogic in the near future."
I'll bet you are....
Don't assume that there's prior art just because the Slashdot summary seems to be similar to things you used in the past. The only measure of valid prior art (other than actually going to court) is when a patent lawyer looks over both the letter of the claims and the claim of prior art. Often, in that light, the prior art turns out to have no relevance.
Patent submitters typically know about the most obvious examples of prior art, so most patents are worded to carefully carve out a niche in which the patent almost, but not quite, describes existing technologies.
Eeco flight navigation system, some time in the '80s or '90s. Contact me at mailto:sol@linker.com for expenses-only expert or factual testimony if anyone sues you on this nonsense. I've been sued on this sort of nonsense before (and won), and I'll do whatever I can to abate it. Maybe /. can set up an area where patent-fighting experts can help out /.ers on this stuff.
In what way would this differ from a spellchecker, said technology being available since at least the 1970s?
Dewey, what part of this looks like authorities should be involved?
You are concluding what a patent covers without even seeing the claims, based upon a corporate press release.
Par for the course....
yawn
Why is it that prior art must be exactly what the patent is claiming, but infringing work just needs to be similar to what is claimed?
Editors, for these stories, please include a link to the patent, not just the news release and a general description.
http://bgcommonsense.blogspot.com
Pretty sure I've seen predictive input for a LONG time... some examples..
Cell phone input (T9 & iTap circa 1995)
PDA writing interfaces (Newton?)
Shell command line completion. (bash, ksh)
Visual Studio 6...
Emacs
Windows 3.1 tablet edition
Automatic spell checking correction ( MS word 95, possibly before)
I'm sure there's tons more here... but wiring a dictionary up to an input is obvious prior art, no matter how you spin it.
I said no... but I missed and it came out yes.
Of course it's not merely a pig. It's Dancer Pig!
Dancer Pig! Dancer Pig!
Does whatever a Dancer Pig does!
Can it dance
In ballet?
No it can't,
'Cause it's a pig.
Look out!
Here comes the Dancer Pig!
I used to be a sysop at Imperial College Computer Centre in London, and the mainframes I worked with, a Cyber 176, and a CDC7600 had this on the console back in 1978. It was also available on the 6600, which was a 60s era machine.
Call me old fashioned, but I like a dump to be as memorable as it is devastating - Bender
J. Carlberger published a paper titled Design and Implementation of a Probabilistic Word Prediciton Program in 1997. That should pretty much take care of the prior art argument.
Fine. Then the submitter should almost, but not quite, deserve a patent.
Because most patent infringement cases are decided by juries. Prior art claims need to be ruled on by a judge, but 12 people, too stupid to get out of jury duty, get to decide if the infringing work actually infringes on the claims.
:D
Don't you just love our court system here in the U.S.?
My blog
I've been getting these coupons since the early 90s.
Yeah, those sure are annoying. Good thing prediction has been patented. Maybe spammers will have to stop predicting that I want "my sexual life more different and easier!", or I'll "impress my girl with a WonderCum!"
A cat can't teach a dog to bark.
I'm pretty sure their European patent (granted in 2004) is used as a basis by the description. That patent # is 1171813 (I got my info off this site
From the description it appears to be the same, at least, and it does pretty much describe a form of autocomplete (when a list of choices is displayed not a single choice). I don't know if it requires some form of activity to show the choices, but this sounds a like pressing cont-D after set filec in the csh (tcsh, zsh and bash use tab completion, but filec is much older) as applied to just about any device (like the described pointer pointing at a character).
I met with them earlier this year. I don't think they're patent trolls. They develop and sell products; though nothing came with it, they were interested in technical cooperation. For the businessman I spoke to, the patents were evidence of their technical innovation and a point of pride. Most of us on Slashdot see patents differently, but his perspective is how they have been seen in other industries and in the past. Of course, this was just one guy (though senior) and may not reflect the company as a whole - or their lawyers. I don't mean to defend the patents (I would be happy to see software patents abolished), but the company I saw was a technical firm, not a legal one.
The product they showed me lets you create a dictionary of common phrases (which can be very long), then retrieve and input them easily using their predictive input algorithm to drill down through multiple possibilities. The software sits on top of Windows, essentially between the keywoard and whatever app you're using. It reminded me somewhat of Stephen Hawking's system (which I vaguely recall having seen on TV once) or Chinese word processor software which allows you to type in a syllable, then pops up a list of matching characters and lets you pick one by typing a number (though the fellow I spoke with wasn't familiar with this). Example uses described to me included lawyers, who might want to pull up whole paragraphs of boilerplate text, and students (I don't recall the use case for this).
It's interesting that we don't really have any idea what their patent actually says yet we all know it's incredibly obvious! Why wasn't it patented earlier? Maybe they do something differently? Maybe it's not that fact that they can do it, but rather how they accomplish it that is patented.
You can patent dropping rocks on the ground if your method is new, better, or improved upon the earlier design. a catapult would be a terrific way of "dropping" rocks on the ground.
I won't even get into how the rest of your analogy doesn't apply in the slightest. Plus, it doesn't involve cars.
First patent is using dictionaries in predicting incoming text
1) SYSTEM AND DEVICE FOR PREDICTION OF SUBJECT ( JP1029972 )
PURPOSE:To analyze the content of a text based on prediction, by analyzing an inputted text by using the grammatical rule of a targeted language, predicting the subject of the text from a word possible to regulate the subject, and predicting the subject predicted from the largest number of words as the subject of the inputted text. CONSTITUTION:The titled device is provided with a subject dictionary 1 in which the candidate of the subject predicted from each word is registered in every word unit, and a subject indicating word segmentation part 2 which analyzes the inputted text grammatically and extracts the word to become the main constituent of the input text. At a subject selection part 3, the subject dictionary 1 is referred, and when no subject candidate to be predicted exists in every word unit extracted at the subject indicating word segmentation part 2, no operation is performed, and when it exists, it is taken out, and the number of taking out is held at every taken out subject candidate, and when the taking out and the counting of the number of appearance are completed, the subject candidate having the largest number of appearance out of taken out subject candidates is outputted as the subject of the inputted text. In such a way, the subject of a supplied text can be predicted. The second patent uses previous text inputs in helping to predict the incoming text
2) METHOD AND DEVICE FOR PREDICTING SUBJECT> ( JP2280272 )
PURPOSE:To analyze the content of a text based on prediction by holding the set of micro features having the number of times of appearance exceeding a critical value as the present status, and assuming a subject expressed in the partial set of the micro features most neighboring to the above set as the present subject. CONSTITUTION:A recent appearance word meaning storage means 2 stores meaning by the expression of the micro feature of a constant number of words appearing recently, and a critical value filter 3 delivers only the micro feature in which the number of times of appearance of the micro feature existing in the recent appearance word meaning storage means 2 exceeds the critical value to a present status storage means 4. A most neighoring subject selection means 6 compares the set of the micro features held by the present status storage means 4 with the expression of the micro feature corresponding to individual subject in a subject dictionary 5, and outputs the subject having the least common part as the present subject. In such a manner, the content of the text can be analyzed based on the prediction.
I predict WordLogic's patent application is not viable.
The Wright Brothers patented the method of inducing roll by differentially changing the angle of attack of each wing. It was the key invention that made the controllable airplane, and the many requests Curtiss made to the Wrights for details (promising only to use them non-commercially) shows Curtiss deception in that area. I'd call the Wright's patent a great example of when the patent system worked. The Wrights innovated, Curtiss stole, and the Wrights successfully sued them for it in exchange for reasonable licensing fees (they didn't shut down Curtiss aircraft or refuse to license, despite actively building their own aircraft.)
E pluribus unum
Does anyone here ever read these patents before posting how stupid they supposedly are? Reading the patent clearly shows that they are not applying for a patent on predicting text alone, but rather on an input method used by most PDA's and visual keyboards. In addition to displaying possible words, it HIGHLIGHTS the keys on the visual keyboard or displays the input strokes required to generate the next character that it thinks you want to select. Visual Studio never lit up characters on my keyboard, it never even displayed a visual keyboard on my screen. I'm all for patent reform and striking down obvious techniques, but in this case, while IANAL, on its face value it looks pretty legitmate to me.
(Not entirely sure that its all that much more useful than the standard predictive text stuff that I've already seen or used, but that is not the point.)
but 12 people, too stupid to get out of jury duty,
I always hate it when people use that expression. Another way of interpreting that statement is, hundreds of people too selfish, greedy or stupid to perform their civic DUTY, often prevents the system from working properly. But then these hundreds will go off complain how broken the system is. Its kind of like throwing lit matches around ones home while pointing out how every day items around the house tends to be flamable. So who is really the stupid one?
IMO, there are three serious problems with the current legal system. One, most any moron can be a judge. Judges are not even required to be knowledgable or communicate with a subject matter expert for issues on which they rule. Two, too many laws are writen by lawyers which only benefit lawyers; serving only to generate more billable hours. Three, people try hard to break the legal system by avoiding their civic duty, thereby insuring the "dumb ones", by in large, are on juries. So we have idiot judges ruling on topics well outside of their expertise, often for laws which make no sense, running a trial for jurries too stupid to get out of their duty because the people that should be there lied their way out of it.