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TiVo Patent Victory Over Dish Network Upheld
Thomas Hawk writes "An appeals court today shot down Dish Network's last chance to avoid a multi-million lawsuit verdict won by TiVo over their time shifting DVR technology. In addition to having to pay TiVo a minimum of $92 million, Dish Network will also now have to honor a court injunction to turn off DVR software to most of their customers. I hope Dish Network customers like commercials with their daily dose of Dr. Phil."
Americans are a complacent lot. They'll tolerate taxes and fee increases, regulation, government snooping, abridgement of century-old (and God given) rights, etc. with maybe one in ten thousand even bothering to pick up a telephone or a pen and contact their congressman or senator.
But if you fuck with their television, you'll see angry roving mobs take to the streets that make "21 days later" look like a tea party. I suspect this will not end well.
I was trying to think of something really witty to say, something that would totally make the parent rethink their post and question their whole thought structure on Americans... but all I could come up with was this Family Guy quote:
...how sad is that?
"Who touched the thermostat?"
FYI this has no effect on anyone with a newer model Dish DVR, i.e. they aren't going to take it away from you. New software was pushed out 6 months ago to replace the infringing software. If you have a real old one, now is a good time to upgrade.
Tivo's:
http://investor.tivo.com/releasedetail.cfm?ReleaseID=304285
Dish's:
http://dish.client.shareholder.com/releasedetail.cfm?ReleaseID=304293
The latter includes these tidbits:
The decision, however, will have no effect on our current or future customers because EchoStar's engineers have developed and deployed 'next-generation' DVR software to our customers' DVRs. This improved software is fully operational, has been automatically downloaded to current customers, and does not infringe the Tivo patent at issue in the Federal Circuit's ruling.
"All DISH Network customers can continue to use their DVRs without any interruption or changes to the award-winning DVR features and services provided by DISH Network.
"We intend to appeal the Federal Circuit's ruling to the United States Supreme Court."
No, Dish can (and if you RTFAed, they will) appeal to the Supremes.
But, true, Dish has a tough hill to climb. The Supremes only accept a small percentage of all appeals. Dish's goose is mostly cooked.
Knowing Tivo they begged and pleaded for months to get Dish to pay for a license. Either Tivo asked for too much or Dish was uncooperative.
“Common sense is not so common.” — Voltaire
You can look up the press releases from Dish that say that they have updated their software. They are appealing because they don't want to have to shell out the bucks for past transgressions.
DirecTV used to, but that's irrelevant as this is about Dish Network.
Pet peeve - you infringe somebody's patent - not violate it.
Yeah but violating it sounds funnier.
If their legal department is anything like their HR department, talking to them was pretty much useless. I'd be surprised if Tivo had any recourse other than to sue them. Although I hate software patents and think that many DVR-related ones are completely retarded (TV Guide has one for the guide grid format, for example) I can't suppress a certain amount of glee that this misfortune has fallen upon Echostar. So I'm just going to point at them and go "Ha-ha!"
I'm trying to teach myself to set people on fire with my mind... Is it hot in here?
Yeah, but knowing Dish Network...they probably weren't interested in paying someone for technology that they developed.
The entire patent is bogus. Tivo combined time-shifting with a digital storage device and an on-screen guide. Hmmm. Time-shifting is not patented by tivo. Digital storage of video is not patented by tivo. Dish Network and DirecTV actually hold prior art on the on-screen guide. This seemed like a fairly obvious usage of common technologies.
Remember. Dish Network is the same company that turned all Viacom channels off for a few weeks because they didn't want to give in to pushy business practices by Viacom. I am not saying this is good or bad, but I am saying that Charlie Ergen(Dish CEO) has big testicles.
So, I doubt it was that Tivo asked for too much money. I think the fact that TIVO asked for money at all would have put them off.
Perhaps it's that Tivo "just works"? If I wasn't gainfully employeed and had tens of hours a week to burn, I'd get a MythTV box. If I wanted to be frustrated all the time when watching TV, I'd get a Comcast DVR system. Tivo's benefit isn't software, or the guide data, it's usability. Those of us with disposable income don't mind paying $15/month to have all of our shows waiting for us and not having a problem when we try to watch them.
Even thought I own a DishNetwork receiver, I think that TiVo was right to get their patent and Dish Network shouldn't have fought as hard as they did. TiVo isn't a bunch of patent trolls; they built and marketed hardware which other people copied.
Nothing for 6-digit uids?
TiVo has patents on the "jump to tick" on the timeline and the 8 second jump back among other things.
No. Those features DID NOT exist until Tivo came out with them, and you won't see them on any other other PVR - due to the patent.
TiVo's UI and remote and functionality is the absolute best thought out.
I'm going to have to give it up soon, thanks to DirecTV and TiVo divorcing, and TiVo deciding to diss legacy (Lifetime) customers with the removal of discount rates for additional units.
I really hate that situation.
I'll be signing with AT&T UVerse as soon as they get my house address listed as green in the database. I wish they used CableCARDs so I could keep my HD TiVo. *sigh*
Ever dream you could fly? Get up from the Flight Sim. I Fly
DISH WILL NOT have "to turn off DVR to most of its customers". Anyone using the 622 or 722 (what they ship now as their DVR offerings) is NOT affected. Software was upgraded months ago specifically to get around the patent. If you have a far older DVR, then all this means, is you'll get a free upgrade to the new model, rather than paying for it. A pain in the ass though the patent is, a travesty this is not.
Mmm, pimping your own misleading blog FTW! It's not like many people in the comments of his own blog entry he submitted didn't point out this RATHER MAJOR DISCREPANCY... but oh noes! Removing scaremongering does not help pageviews, does it?
Actually, infringement is one method of violation, so you do both. Infringement is more specific and usually the case with a patent claim, but violation is not incorrect.
Anyone know how this is going to play out insofar as Bell ExpressVu receivers in Canada?
They (Bell) use the identical "Echostar" PVR boxes as our neighbours to the south. Sounds to me like Bell is going to have a huff of angry customers too here shortly.
I have a crappy, buggy Directv HR20 HD DVR. I received a message a couple days ago. It seems if I were to record a PPV movie (I don't, I don't like their PPV prices) I now have only one day to watch it before they are going to remotely erase it from my DVR.
Unbelievable.
Now there's DRM for ya!
.
Not to mention that Dish like other large companies who have lost patent cases in the past, will simply "license" whatever tech they infringed upon. The lawyers get paid (again) and Tivo gets a well-deserved cash-flow fix.
Whoever thinks Dish will simply turn off DVR service with the flick of a switch, is sorely lost when it comes to even simple business tactics, let alone creative thinking.
+++OK ATH
Spoken like a person who never had it.
The innovation is not only that it can jump back 8 seconds, but that there is a single button right your finger to do it. What's obvious is rewind. A one-button "Wait! What was that just now?" rewind is and was novel.
The jump back is so essential, I've caught myself reaching for it on the car radio.
I held off buying an iPod until the Apple genius showed how I could backup podcasts sorta the same way (it needs to be ONE button).
I want jump back in life. I tried to replay things I see out the window!
What slashdotters should keep in mind was that the founding TiVo developers were Linux hackers - one of us. I suspect those pioneers have been gone from TiVo for years - lost during the early hard times, but we should appreciate that they built what we wanted. That legacy is reflected that TiVo never really came down hard on TiVo hacking. They even knew the hackability was a sales feature. I was surveyed as such years ago.
Again, what's sad is TiVo's inability to come up with a business model with the film industry and TV services fighting them at every step. It never helped that you couldn't explain the product in a sentence.
Ever dream you could fly? Get up from the Flight Sim. I Fly