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Nigerian Company Sues OLPC

Posted by kdawson on from the split-shift-key dept.

d0ida writes on the continuing troubles at the OLPC Association. Adding to the recent difficulties — the BBC has picked up the litany — a US-based, Nigerian-owned company has now filed a patent-infringement lawsuit against OLPC. Lagos Analysis Corp. claims that OLPC "made unauthorized use of LANCOR's multilingual keyboard technology invention in XO laptops." The suit was filed in Lagos.

22 of 277 comments (clear)

  1. I guess the OLPC folks .... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Insightful

    ... could just ignore Nigerian law and be just fine. After all, it's not like many Nigerians obey anyone else's laws (much less their own).

  2. This is good news by JonTurner · · Score: 2, Insightful

    Maybe Nigeria can become known as a country of greedy patent trolls instead of just a country of internet scammers. As if there's any practical difference.

    OLPC team -- don't get discouraged. As they say, if you're receiving flak, you must be over the target.

    1. Re:This is good news by NoMaster · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Maybe Nigeria can become known as a country of greedy patent trolls ...
      Who says they're patent trolls?

      They might actually have a point. It's not like they've sat on this for years - the public release of OLPC laptops is so recent that it's entirely conceivable that it's taken this long to examine them, document any violations, and file suit. And who knows what behind-the-scene negotiations, which may have delayed filing, have taken place between them and OLPC?

      Is it just that the OLPC, being "free" and "open" and using Linux and all, are considered by /. groupthink to automatically be in the right? Or are people suggesting that all patent owners are patent trolls? (A position with which I would largely agree, BTW.)

      Sorry, not picking on you specifically - you're just the first in thread to mention the words "patent troll".

      --
      What part of "a well regulated militia" do you not understand?
    2. Re:This is good news by Lachlan+Hunt · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Or are people suggesting that all patent owners are patent trolls? (A position with which I would largely agree, BTW.)

      Not all patent owners are patent trolls. Only those that use their patents to sue people and get in the way of progress and innovation.

      --
      By reading this signature, you hereby agree with the content of the above comment.
    3. Re:This is good news by m2943 · · Score: 4, Insightful

      They might actually have a point

      They might in principle, but in practice, they don't. The OLPC keyboard differs from theirs, and there are decades of prior art in using multiple shift keys to reach multiple languages on one keyboard. Their keyboard is basically the "US International Keyboard" for Windows with the keys rearranged.

    4. Re:This is good news by QuantumG · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Yeah, that's the retarded world view where "innovation" means "work around a patent". In the real world, "innovation" means "build on the work of others" and patents are what you use to stop people doing that.

      --
      How we know is more important than what we know.
    5. Re:This is good news by garbletext · · Score: 5, Insightful

      It's a nonprofit organization. This company is literally robbing children, quite likely children from their own country. Maybe they're not patent trolls, but they're clearly assholes.

  3. Better yet, just don't send them by KingSkippus · · Score: 5, Insightful

    As pointed out in a later post, the OLPC project in Nigeria is basically charity.

    If they continue having problems like this, simply don't send any to them. Let LANCOR explain to the Nigerian government and people how their greed and abuse of patent law is screwing up the education of Nigeria's children and putting them at a serious disadvantage to the country's neighbors.

    1. Re:Better yet, just don't send them by duggi · · Score: 2, Insightful
      I don't understand the point in giving a laptop to a child yet.

      screwing up the education of Nigeria's children and putting them at a serious disadvantage to the country's neighbors. Seriously, Can anybody explain why laptops are so essential for education? Forget laptops, we were not supposed to use even calculators for those lengthy calculations in chemistry in out Undergrad entrance exam. Why then, are laptops so crucial for a child future? Figure this out: I am trying to solve a 1st order differential equation, I would like a pencil and a paper to work this out. NOT a laptop. I cannot how a 10 year old is going to learn maths or chemistry (for that matter, his local language) in a laptop.
      --
      http://monkeynesianeconomics.blogspot.com/
    2. Re:Better yet, just don't send them by dbIII · · Score: 3, Insightful

      It's like having access to a huge library and the telephone numbers of hundreds of willing teachers.

    3. Re:Better yet, just don't send them by wizardforce · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Let LANCOR explain to the Nigerian government and people how their greed and abuse of patent law is screwing up the education of Nigeria's children and putting them at a serious disadvantage to the country's neighbors.
      that assumes the Nigerian government cares in the first place, they are after all a major part of the problem in regard to education in Nigeria.
      --
      Sigs are too short to say anything truly profound so read the above post instead.
    4. Re:Better yet, just don't send them by foobsr · · Score: 3, Insightful

      the cost of software is not important, even though he admitted that the average annual salary in the West African country is only $160

      /cynical True, because no one can afford the hardware in the first place,

      CC.

      --
      TaijiQuan (Huang, 5 loosenings)
    5. Re:Better yet, just don't send them by gilesjuk · · Score: 3, Insightful

      But this is what is wrong with patents, the chances of two people having the same idea aren't that slim.

      Patents were invented to protect break through designs which took a lot of time and money from being copied. Two people having the same idea isn't copying.

      The Television was developed by three different people, if Baird had patented it we may have been using mechanical TV for decades.

    6. Re:Better yet, just don't send them by rtb61 · · Score: 3, Insightful
      Ignorance is not bliss. Consider this one simple fact, try carrying around the required number of text books, reference books and general education books, then try carrying one dvd that could not only contain all the information in those books but provide accompanying multi media. Off course if you want to save carrying around a few hundred kilograms of dead wood you will need a kilogram or so of silicon and plastic to read that disc.

      Even as you unthinkingly type your post, you would willingly deny people who can not afford to do the same the opportunity of sharing knowledge, beliefs and understanding from around the world. By the way, the laptop can also be used in the first and second world. It is not a third world computer, it is a computer targeted as an educational tool for children from around the world and the more sold the cheaper it becomes.

      --
      Chaos - everything, everywhere, everywhen
    7. Re:Better yet, just don't send them by martin-boundary · · Score: 2, Insightful

      It's like having access to a huge library and the telephone numbers of hundreds of willing teachers.
      Yeah, a library full of books written in ancient Greek and Egyptian hieroglyphs, and mostly Roman teachers :)

      Unfortunately, most third world kids don't speak the main language of the net, and won't have much use for what's currently on it. Actually, that's probably a good thing...

    8. Re:Better yet, just don't send them by somersault · · Score: 2, Insightful

      You mean out there stabbing everyone that isn't wounded, and then stealing their boots :P Any bandages Microsoft have are going to be infected anyway

      --
      which is totally what she said
    9. Re:Better yet, just don't send them by nicklott · · Score: 1, Insightful
      WTF? did I miss something? What do microsoft have to do with this? And how did this get to +5?

      While suing a charity is not a very nice thing to do and generally isn't good PR, this doesn't actually seem to be a patent troll. LANCOR do actually make real things and OLPC did buy some of those things and some features from those things appeared in OLPC's things. Seems to me to be exactly the kind of case that patent law was invented for.

      Whether the claim has merit or not is up to the court but it clearly isn't spurious. And implying Microsoft have something to do with it is just plain slander.

    10. Re:Better yet, just don't send them by Captain+Sarcastic · · Score: 2, Insightful

      Unfortunately, most third world kids don't speak the main language of the net, and won't have much use for what's currently on it. Actually, that's probably a good thing...


      The whole point of being a student is to not have much use for the status quo, and to have a desire to expand upon it.

      Henry Ford (I think) said that if you'd asked American consumers in the 1900's what they'd wanted, they'd have answered, "A faster horse." For whatever faults they had, he and his contemporaries were dissatisfied with the status quo then.

      Perhaps with the OLPC product, we can have a new generation of people from a previously un-heard-from part of the world, asking questions like, "Do we really need this? What if we try...?" The Nigerian government would be well-advised to consider this.
      --
      Strike while the irony is hot! -- The Freethinker
  4. Could be legit by SuperRenaissanceMan · · Score: 5, Insightful

    From TFA: "LANCOR's technology named Shift2 keyboard technology has been used to create a new class of region specific based keyboards called KONYIN Multilingual Keyboards, which are currently on sale globally." I don't think you can be sure to call this one a patent troll. They are actually producing a product, not just holding a patent for the sole purpose of the suit.

    --
    Any comment mentioning moderation is automatically Offtopic.
  5. I guess the old proverb is still true... by Spy+der+Mann · · Score: 4, Insightful

    No good deed goes unpunished.

  6. Re:what this is by UbuntuDupe · · Score: 4, Insightful

    It's about using two extra shift keys for the non-ASCII characters. On his keyboard, he calls them "Shift2" and "Ng". This is a nice way to do languages that use the latin alphabet with a few abnormal extra characters.

    It's not like ...

    It's not like ...

    It's not like...

    It's not like ...

    But it *is* like CTRL and ALT, except that they're just for generating characters rather than calling arbitrary functions.

    (Btw, anyone who refers to a new interface for accessing more characters from the same keys as "technology" is an idiot.)

    --
    Apology to Ubuntu forum.
  7. Re:Please tell me you put your foot in your mouth. by Belial6 · · Score: 2, Insightful

    That is not what the parent said, but even if that is what was meant, it would be an incredibly stupid thing to say. Assuming that any professional should go unquestioned is a poor idea. It is particularly bad of an idea to not question teachers. Teaching is not rocket science, and the output of our public schools pretty much speaks for itself. Really, a lot of these public school kids can't read until they are 6 or 7, even after spending a year or two in preschool.

    I have actually had a couple of these "profession teachers" try to tell me that you shouldn't even show kids actual letters until they are 3. Instead they are pushing this crap that has become popular amongst "educators" called Zoophonics. They seem to think pqbd are easier for a kid to learn than PQBD. And apparently punching, kicking, and animal fighting are good ideas for education.

    It comes down to the fact that our public schools are in shambles, and no matter how bad the other parts are, teachers have to take take a very large part of the responsibility for that. So, question them.