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Apple Admits iPod Is From 1970s UK
MattSparkes writes "Apple has all but admitted that a British man invented the iPod over three decades ago in the 1970s. Unfortunately, he let the patent run out. When another company tried to grab a portion of its iPod profits, though, Apple went running to him to defend them in court. In return, it looks like he's in for a share of the cash generated from the sale of 163 million iPods."
particularly since the device/patent preceeds every other solid state mp3 player, not just the iPod (which wasn't the "first" by any measure).
Do you even lift?
These aren't the 'roids you're looking for.
In the very old days, you had to build an object to get a patent. That requirement hasn't existed for a long time.
the iPod wasn't exactly the first mp3 player to be released anyway, just the first successful one
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mp3_player
TFA refers to a solid state chip being used not 'flash drive'. There were non volatile storage options available in the 70s and 80s that would have been up to the task (at least in a prototype). Eg. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bubble_memory
Sound was compressible and storable back then. Very high-end answering machines, note recorders, and PBX's used it. Think EEPROMS or even conventional RAM. Most everything was done in hardware, however -- sampling and digitizing, etc.
C|N>K
Depends on how you define "success". The Rio players were quite successful well before Apple came along. Apple's was the first (and only, so far) to become a cultural phenomenon, but there was plenty of money being made in the MP3 player market before they got there.
According to the article, the guy came up with a digital music player in 1979. Everyone on Slashdot should know that Apple's wasn't the first digital music player, nor even the first commercially successful one, not by a long shot. So no news here, except that Apple hired this guy to help defend themselves against a patent troll.
"Extension" here just means getting the normal 20 year term. He lost his after only nine years.
What I'm listening to now on Pandora...
There is no such thing as an international patent. Patents are per country, and in the UK, the patent term is up to 20 years from the filing date.
loading [******___]
http://www.kanekramer.com/html/development.htm
http://www.kanekramer.com/downloads/IXI-Report.pdf
A very interesting business plan had the RIAA not been so technophobic they could have had digital music in stores years before high speed internet and a recording format that probably
been harder to duplicate.
Then again I can only imagine...
"IXI music player new for 1992, 8mb of storage,
DOS, amiga and atari compatible...mac coming soon"
In fact, the summary isn't right. According to TFA - The dude just got hired as a consultant by Apple. Sounds to me like he's getting some credit.
It may be overdue, but it's not as bad as the article implies.
The GP is making a joke, referring to http://apple.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=01/10/23/1816257&tid=107.