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Spring Design Sues Barnes & Noble Over Nook IP
bth writes to let us know that Barnes & Noble has been sued by a company called Spring Design, which alleges that the recently announced Nook e-book reader infringes its intellectual property. This isn't a patent troll kind of situation; rather, the claim is misappropriation of trade secrets. Spring Design claims that they have been developing a dual-screen, Android-based e-book reader since 2006, filing patents all the while; and that they showed pretty much everything to Barnes & Noble in the expectation of working together with them to bring their reader to market.
Alex, with its unique Duet Navigator, provides the capability for interaction and navigation techniques of the two screens and furthermore utilizes the capabilities of Android to enhance the reader's experience by supporting interactive access to the Internet for references and links. As the first in the market to offer an e-book with full Internet browsing while reading and with easy navigational control via its touch screen, Alex is well-positioned to offer the most dynamic and powerful reading device in the market.
This thing looks awesome. Good for Spring Design in protecting it's IP. One of my biggest complaints with the Kindle is Amazon's insistence that it be locked down and only do what Amazon wants it to do. The Alex uses Android and sounds like it's a sweet device that might be hackable and could be turned into a really really useful tool.
Here's hoping that Spring Design really are the good guys in this.
What did they steal? Ideas? Give me a break. Does "An android based E-book reader" constitute a patent worthy idea? Actually, of course it does, and that's why I for one do not see the benefit in supporting such startups in cases like these.
This company is a patent troll. What did they invent? A button that makes text scroll smoothly? A pop up or context sensitive interface? Oh! They invented a two screen device where you control things by moving a stylus on the bottom screen! Perhaps supplemented by additional buttons! How Original!! Yes, indeed, all companies implementing any such mechanism on any e-book whatsoever should have to pay these brilliant engineers for their hard worn innovation. /end scarcasm.
The only people who support this company are those who believe that being the first to develop something, or being the first to spew out any old brain fart, entitles you to exclusive ownership and control over all future implementations and revenues involving that thing. It the proverbial American Dream; Winning the lottery through one crazy scheme. Everybody has one in the back of their head, and so the system stands with popular support. I for one utterly reject this model as a basis for technological development and progression.
Patents need to die. Completely. If you can't stand on your own two feet like startups in every other industry, then you shouldn't be in business. Holding the world back until you get your protection money is a despicable practice, no matter how big or how small you are.
May the Maths Be with you!
The word patent means open or visible. Honours in England are granted by "letters patent" which are sealed in an open, i.e. readable, form. The meaning carries through into law; something can be a trade secret or patented but not both.
So how their patents, which they shared with a) B&N and b) every literate person in the world, can be a secret is a mystery to me.
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
... has been working with major book stores, newspapers and publishers over the last 2 years, sharing the vision and the capabilities of the dual screen device.
So I contact Spring Design rep and asked a simple question (this was about 1 hr before my T-Mobile G1 went bye bye for the evening). I asked "Did you have any contact with BN about your device prior to the release of the Nook?"
/. is should I post the PDF briefing on wikileak.org? There is nothing that says I cannot and it should be available via open records request to the court it was filed in (Northern District of California, San Jose Division). Only thing is it is marked copy and has a series of numbers on it that could linked to the version e-mailed to me. I do not want to hurt Spring Design's case, but I do want to get inform out there.
Woman explained she was not speaking on behalf of company, but when I pressed she said that the simple answer was "yes", but the best way to understand was to read to court filing. I was then able to get her to e-mail the court filing to me. Social engineering at it's finest.
It blew my mind it documents how Spring Design was contacted by Phil Baker (A strategy and development consultant for BN) back in February of this year after the Kindle 2 was released. Not hard to prove call or e-mail, it then includes NDA that was signed by BN prior to meeting with Spring Design, and that pretty much seals the deal, as it has non-compete and nondisclosure sections BN walked right over. Then outlines various meetings, conf calls, e-mails, power points, etc. that continued while Spring Design was led to believe BN would be partnering to use their device.
The really brazen part is it went as high as the CFO of BN and that as late aa 10/1/09 BN was meeting with Spring Design's CEO supposedly over partnering deal, but they still needed to know this and that about how ALEX device worked.
Better still is on a press call given my Willaim J Lynch at BN, Mr. Lynch who was given various Spring Design's concepts and information, actually refers to product screen benefits exactly as outlined by Spring Design to him. He says on the transcript of call that BN is releasing the first dual screen e-reader, yet e-mail sent by him and included as exhibit shows he was privy to Spring's Design product.
Then there is the helpful advice BN gave Spring Design where BN staff recommended Spring Design not talk to Amazon, because (as BN says) Amazon is the kind of company that is likely to steal Spring Design's proprietary information rather then form a partnership as BN was planning.
So my question to
Respect the Constitution
make them sign a contract saying they won't make the same device for some amount of time
Usually such contracts are very difficult to draft as well as get the other party to sign them.
Consider this. I'm an iPhone developer. I've talked to clients where they basically say: "I have a great idea for an application and I'd like to tell you but you'll have to sign so that everything I tell you cannot ever be executed by you alone".
That's rather difficult. They might mention a lot of ideas that I already had, thus limiting myself.
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