Nokia Claims Apple Does "Legal Alchemy" To Mask IP Theft

CWmike writes "Nokia asked a federal judge last week to toss out Apple's antitrust claims, saying the iPhone maker indulged in 'legal alchemy' when it tried to divert attention from its infringement of Nokia's intellectual property. The filing was the latest salvo in a battle that began in October 2009 when handset maker Nokia sued Apple, saying the iPhone infringed on 10 of its patents, and that Apple was trying 'to get a free ride on the back of Nokia's innovation.' Apple countered in December with a lawsuit of its own that not only claimed Nokia infringed 13 of its patents, but that Nokia also violated antitrust law by legally attacking Apple after it declined to pay what it called 'exorbitant royalties' and refused to give Nokia access to iPhone patents. 'These non-patent counterclaims are designed to divert attention away from free-riding off of Nokia's intellectual property, a practice Apple evidently believes should only be of paramount concern when it is the alleged victim,' Nokia charged in the motion. Apple is on a legal roll, having also recently sued the maker of Google's Nexus One, HTC, for patent infringement."

Comments

I hope Bilski invalidates them all

[linuxrocks123]

Hopefully the Bilski decision will come out and invalidate software patents. Then these companies can get back to competing on innovation.

Re:I hope Bilski invalidates them all

[Anonymous Coward]

Hopefully the Bilski decision will come out and invalidate software patents. Then these companies can get back to competing on innovation.

Note that the patents Nokia are using against Apple are not Software patents, but real technology patents. The fact that Apple has nothing but software patents to respond with is a signal about how fragile Apple in fact is, with no real "valuable" intellectual property.

Re:I hope Bilski invalidates them all

[Locke2005]

Wait a minute... they do have a patent on the "Steve Jobs reality distortion field", don't they?

Re:I hope Bilski invalidates them all

[eldavojohn]

Hopefully the Bilski decision will come out and invalidate software patents. Then these companies can get back to competing on innovation.

Um, from what I've read of the patents, Nokia's patents seem to be (at least partially) for hardware while Apple's patents (in both suits) are about the software (frameworks and the like) on the phones. Nokia's patents seem to focus on the devices that implement standards. While it will reduce the number of patents covered for royalties, I don't think a negative Bilski decision will immediately cause all charges to be dropped ... rather they would just figure out a different angle of attack.

Personally, I think software patents are complete and utter bullshit but you have to respect the hardware patents ... that's heavy R&D to get the hardware on phones where it is today. You should get your reward for figuring that crap out. I think it's too long of a patent term but you gotta start somewhere.

This whole patent portfolio charade reeks of a prison scene where when you enter a market you either make someone your bitch or become somebody's bitch. You're telling me that these two companies couldn't have respected each other enough to have worked this crap out before they turned it into a public mud slinging spectacle? Grow up.

Re:I hope Bilski invalidates them all

[Anonymous Coward]

Oh.. so, Nokia patents are, well, not really required. Apple patents, er, you are not really sure? Then WTF are you saying? Looks like just another fucking apple fanboi to me.

Re:I hope Bilski invalidates them all

[E IS mC(Square)]

that would apply ONLY to apple, not nokia who holds real patents and deservedly asking apple to pay up.

Re:I hope Bilski invalidates them all

[klingens]

That's a trade secret. For a patent, you have to show how it actually works. No one managed to dissect His Holiness Steve yet.

Re:I hope Bilski invalidates them all

[Anonymusing]

The fact that Apple has nothing but software patents to respond with is a signal about how fragile Apple in fact is, with no real "valuable" intellectual property.

Apple holds plenty of hardware patents, like the multi-touch feature of the iPhone.

Re:I hope Bilski invalidates them all

[fuzzyfuzzyfungus]

Is his entire transplant team under NDA, then?

Re:I hope Bilski invalidates them all

[ircmaxell]

Nokia has already paid off its research costs many times over from the sale of cellphones

Sure, for those specific innovations. But R&D is an expensive, time consuming process that leads to many dead ends and few profitable results (if done in the Bell Atlantic method). So they do need to capitalize on the relatively few innovations that are profitable to pave the way for the vast number that are directly profitable (Consider that Bell invented basically DLP way back in the 1970's. Sure, it's a good innovation, but it never paid them profits, because it didn't become economically feasible for decades later).

I think personally software patents are stupid, because the barrier to entry into such a field are so small that it's very hard to realistically say "I'm the first one to ever come up with this idea" and prove it (After all, it could have been part of some student's senior research project in the 70's, but was never "published")... With technologies with a large barrier to entry (especially large barriers to research), patents offer some protection to companies that they can recoup their research costs. Consider the example of someone building computer algorithms for file system interaction. How many man-hours does it take to do that? Sure, there could be a fair number, but probably not man-decades... How many non-human resources are involved? Sure, you do have a few computers/servers/etc, but my guess is MAYBE $10k... Now, consider research into radio protocols for cellphone data. How many man-hours are involved there? Potentially many decades (if you have more 2 or 3 working for any significant amount of time). How many non-human resources? LOTS. FCC licenses, transmitting equipment, diagnostic equipment, potentially hundreds of thousands of dollars (if not millions of dollars). All dedicated (for that particular time at least) to the research. That's why patents exist... To give companies an incentive to do non-trivial innovation... The fact of the mater is (IMHO) for a large number of the software patents that I've seen, the innovation is trivial at best (If not already common knowledge)...

Just my $0.02...

Re:I hope Bilski invalidates them all

[jim_v2000]

"Nokia has already paid off its research costs many times over from the sale of cellphones, so it doesn't make sense to pay anything to Nokia."

Except that whether or not they've made their money back is entirely irrelevant to anything. It's Nokia's patented technology, and if someone wants to use it, they have to pay up.

Re:I hope Bilski invalidates them all

[Kitkoan]

Hopefully the Bilski decision will come out and invalidate software patents. Then these companies can get back to competing on innovation.

Note that the patents Nokia are using against Apple are not Software patents, but real technology patents. The fact that Apple has nothing but software patents to respond with is a signal about how fragile Apple in fact is, with no real "valuable" intellectual property.

Another problem here is it says that when Apple counter sued for the 13 patents, they also admitted they are violating Nokia's patents because they didn't want to pay the royalty rates and cross-patent usage. Just because Apple didn't want to pay the rates and patent usages doesn't give them the legal right to use and profit from Nokia's work for free.

Re:I hope Bilski invalidates them all

[linhares]

PAY ME YOU %%&$%@#@ BASTARDS!!!

You're gonna have to pry my linked-list patent from my cold dead hands!

Re:I hope Bilski invalidates them all

[jo_ham]

And Apple want to pay up - they just don;t want to pay more than other cellphone companies to use the GSM patents. Nokia is obliged (not by Apple) to licence those patents equally to anyone who wants them, not to strongarm anyone it chooses if it fancies some of the IP the company holds. Apple here is claiming that Nokia is unfairly leveraging its GSM patents (the standards) to get more in return than it should really be asking for (by the terms of its obligation to licence them).

Apple isn't trying to *not* pay - it just wants to pay what other cellphone makers pay.

Re:I hope Bilski invalidates them all

[jo_ham]

They want to pay the *fair* rate - which Nokia is obliged to give them. They are claiming that Nokia is attempting to charge them more (in terms of cash and cross licenced patents) than they are allowed to charge.

They want to pay what other people pay. Nokia is not allowed to charge more to whoever it chooses.

Re:I hope Bilski invalidates them all

[jo_ham]

No, they are asking (according to Apple) more than they are allowed to - Apple wants to pay what everyone else pays for the GSM patents. Nokia is obliged to charge them that rate. Apple claims Nokia is strongarming them unfairly to get access to other patents that Apple holds.

Re:I hope Bilski invalidates them all

[Nathanbp]

How is the hardware R&D any more valid than software R&D? I have a hard time figuring out this distinction. So far as I can tell, if you're against software patents, you're either against all patents, or you're a hypocrite.

In typical Slashdot form, I present a car analogy.
Software patents are like patenting the idea of an engine (I put gas in and it makes the wheels turn). Once you've patented your software, no one else can make engines without your permission.
Hardware patents are like patenting a specific kind of engine (I put gas in and it does this and that and the wheels turn). Other people can still make engines without paying you royalties as long as their engines don't work exactly the same way as your engine.

Re:I hope Bilski invalidates them all

[linhares]

I hope Bilsky will not invalidate this beautiful Patent Troll Patent; so these Patent Trolls will have to pay up to a Patent Troll for their Patent Trolling. Imagine this, a monopoly of Patent Trolling!

Re:I hope Bilski invalidates them all

[tlhIngan]

Another problem here is it says that when Apple counter sued for the 13 patents, they also admitted they are violating Nokia's patents because they didn't want to pay the royalty rates and cross-patent usage. Just because Apple didn't want to pay the rates and patent usages doesn't give them the legal right to use and profit from Nokia's work for free.

Actually, Apple didn't want to agree to Nokia's non-licensing of the patents. Apple is willing to pay, but Nokia doesn't want RAND license fees like everyone else wants to pay. Instead, Nokia wants Apple to pay more than everyone else. Apple wants to pay, Nokia doesn't want to accept the terms that Apple is paying under.

Apple knows of the patents - they have to pay as part of standard agreements, which is why they're all licensed under RAND (reasonable and non-discriminatory) principles. So they're willing to pay Nokia the same fees that every other cellphone maker pays them. Nokia, though, sees potential in what Apple is doing, and demands that they pay more simply because Apple has something Nokia wants, and Apple has no choice but to pay Nokia anyways.

In a car analogy, Nokia is selling engines for cars. Everyone who wants to build a car has to buy a Nokia engine, and they all pay $5,000 for it. Since Nokia is the only company that can sell engines, they agreed to sell anyone who makes cars an engine for $5,000 (RAND). Apple comes along, builds the iCar, and wants to buy the Nokia engine. Nokia sees that the iCar has a nifty dashboard widget, and wants that for their cars. So Nokia charges Apple not just $5,000, but $5,000 plus the dashboard widget.

In this case, no one has clean hands nor is completely innocent.

Re:I hope Bilski invalidates them all

[zappepcs]

And we can expect to see iPhone work-alikes in 3.. 2.. 1..

Seriously, I find this rather funny. We might soon be able to call it the tarnished halo effect?

Re:I hope Bilski invalidates them all

[Idiomatick]

Software patents are less meaningful usually. You've heard 'you can't patent an idea'?

That is often what software patents boil down to. Something interesting like a type of encryption/compression maybe should be patentable. This also relates to obviousness, many software patents are obvious... but patents are annoying to get. This results in big corporations which have people to deal with patents just patenting everything. Which slows progress.

Next is cost. If you think that patent laws are important to encourage innovation not to make random people rich then this is an issue. A patent for something created in a lab may cost many millions to get working. Think about the money sunk into creating better computer parts each year. In software however most of the patented things were created in a minutes to days.

And there is compatibility. In the carbon based world not too many things need to work together, maybe wipers with cars and lights in sockets. In the computer world there is an incredibly complicated interconnected ecosystem of crap. Winamp talks to messenger, web server, windows, certain games and so on.... and that is just one piece. The problem is that many patented technologies causes needless fragmentation which slows progress. Think of all the crap oss people have had to build not because they wanted a better system but because of legal barriers.

They are also unnecessary because software is so opaque. It is unlikely anyone is going to copy your software's patentable bits since it isn't available to them. So each time someone creates say ogg over mp3 they are actually creating it from scratch anyways, showing that what was patented was an idea. In all othercases of software ripping-off copyright will be more than sufficient, there is no need for two overlapping laws.

In the end all you need to ask is this: "Do software patents help or hinder a healthy programming environment?" Most people think not.

Re:I hope Bilski invalidates them all

[diamondsw]

Actually, it does. As part of a standard, Nokia is bound to license these patents on fair and non-discriminatory terms. If it turns out they were charging exorbitant fees to Apple as opposed to other manufacturers, it would be illegal and they would face sanctions (from who and in what form, I'm unsure).

Re:I hope Bilski invalidates them all

[prockcore]

Except that Apple doesn't hold any multitouch patents. They *license* them from Synaptics

Re:I hope Bilski invalidates them all

[c 0xFF]

I've wondered the same thing, if only because digital circuits can be created in much the same way as software (VHDL, verilog, etc).

If you can take software and implement it in hardware, and then patent it ... is that OK? What about patentable hardware that is reimplemented in software?

Re:I hope Bilski invalidates them all

[Kitkoan]

They want to pay the *fair* rate - which Nokia is obliged to give them. They are claiming that Nokia is attempting to charge them more (in terms of cash and cross licenced patents) than they are allowed to charge.

They want to pay what other people pay. Nokia is not allowed to charge more to whoever it chooses.

What about the cross-patents they are licensing with other company's? The royal rates may work on a more sliding scale based on the usability of the patents included in the trade and since the iPhone is only 3 years old, its possible the patents they had to offer didn't add up financial as the could have meriting (in Nokia's eye) to a high royalty rate.

Re:I hope Bilski invalidates them all

[Lehk228]

the complicating factor is that nokia has patents on GSM and 3G, are the "higher rates" the combination of both?

considering recent history with the two companies, i would default to trusting nokia unless they were shown to be dishonest.

Re:I hope Bilski invalidates them all

[gilesjuk]

Do you think Apple has actually invented much of the hardware in the iPhone? of course not, it's off the shelf parts. So why is Apple the target? it sounds like to me this is a software patent argument. The people supplying the chips to Apple are the people infringing.

Nokia may have a case if and when Apple produce their own cell silicon, the radio part of the phone.

Re:I hope Bilski invalidates them all

[aztektum]

Why not?

Re:I hope Bilski invalidates them all

[jo_ham]

By RAND terms - in exchange for the GSM patents being included in the standard for cellular communication, Nokia agreed to licence them under RAND terms. Otherwise, they would not have been included in the standard: it's a way to ensure that there is still profit in allowing others to use your work, and enable a standard (which is handy for a large radio communication network)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reasonable_and_Non_Discriminatory_Licensing

Read the wiki page - it even uses the GSM patents themselves as an example. Bonus.

It has nothing to do with licensing copies of Windows, which are not covered by RAND conditions.

Re:I hope Bilski invalidates them all

[Kitkoan]

In a car analogy, Nokia is selling engines for cars. Everyone who wants to build a car has to buy a Nokia engine, and they all pay $5,000 for it. Since Nokia is the only company that can sell engines, they agreed to sell anyone who makes cars an engine for $5,000 (RAND). Apple comes along, builds the iCar, and wants to buy the Nokia engine. Nokia sees that the iCar has a nifty dashboard widget, and wants that for their cars. So Nokia charges Apple not just $5,000, but $5,000 plus the dashboard widget.

In this case, no one has clean hands nor is completely innocent.

Yes, but it's not just royalty rates involved in this case. Its patents and royalty rates. With your car analogy: Nokia is selling engines for cars, everyone who wants to build a car has to buy a Nokia engine up $5000 and offer up say $10000 worth of patents. Along comes Apple, a new comer to the field and wants to make the iCar with it's nifty dashboard widget. They only want to pay the $5000 everyone else pays but when it comes to the patent end, they only have $5000 worth of patents they can use, leaving a $5000 difference between what they want to pay and what everyone else is paying. (iPhone is only 3 years old so it's possible on that level). Now you have everyone paying a total of $5000 cash + $10000 patents value to make a total value of $15000. Apple offers only $5000 cash (like everyone else) + $5000 in patents = $10000, $5000 less then anyone else. That leaves Apple getting the unfair deal in their favor. Looking only at the cash value, yes that is horribly unfair of Nokia to want that extra $5000 from Apple, but it's only higher cash because the patent options lacked compared to what they normally charge.

Re:I hope Bilski invalidates them all

[jo_ham]

I don't know who to trust here. Apple may be litigious, but it's not stupid - if it was a simple case, they would have settled it by now. Their GSM hardware isn't even unique - they use off the shelf chips, which other phone makers have been using for a long time with no issues (unless they paid up over the odds under the threat of Nokia's legal stick and didn't tell anyone).

It shouldn't be this hard to pay up for the use of GSM and other wireless patents that are covered by RAND, and it's unlikely to be something Apple has overlooked.

I think it is probably more likely that Nokia wants something equivalent in cash value from Apple, and there is a disagreement over just how much Apple's patents are actually worth, but I am only guessing.

It's almost certainly *not* that Apple just flat out refuse to pay for the use of the patents - they're using 3rd party hardware that other people use, who do pay Nokia. It's something else.

Re:I hope Bilski invalidates them all

[jo_ham]

This is what I suspect it is about. Nokia wants particular patents, and is claiming that they are worth the price of the GSM patents, Apple presumably is disagreeing and claiming they are worth more.

I'm just guessing, but it's going to be something like this.

I doubt that most of the deals to use the GSM patents from other phone manufacturers are pure cash payments to Nokia - it's always going to be about trading patents.

Re:I hope Bilski invalidates them all

[Ironhandx]

Incorrect. Apple CLAIMS that Nokia has demanded unfair rates.

Since the only thing I've seen amounts to 1-2% royalties(and thats from the apple camp) and Nokias patents covers the vast majority of the tech thats actually used to make the the iPhone a, you know, phone, I don't think its too outrageous, do you?

From what I can gather the truth to the story is that Nokia, going about business as usual, decided to up their royalty rates by .5%(approximately). Certainly this decision could have been hurried because Apple was about to enter negotiations, but thats also business as usual for any company. Once it was in place with Apple they likely were going to institute it in their other agreements elsewhere once those agreements expired. Where the big problem seems to come in is the actual dollar figure of $6-$12 per every iPhone.

To make a long story short, for the most part, it seems to me that Apple is getting nailed by their own Apple tax and they're not fans of the feeling.

Re:I hope Bilski invalidates them all

[greenbird]

They want to pay the *fair* rate - which Nokia is obliged to give them.

Huh, this is an aspect of patent law I've never heard of. I was under the impression that the owner of the patent could simple tell everyone to fark off and not license it to anyone. Can you show me this "fair rate" clause? Who gets to determine what a "fair rate" is? In other words, I call BS.

Re:I hope Bilski invalidates them all

[Anonymusing]

What about the patents they bought with Fingerworks?

Re:I hope Bilski invalidates them all

[Mongoose Disciple]

I assumed they were killed after the procedure, kind of like killing the Pharoah's slaves after they finish building his pyramid so they can't compromise its secret chambers.

Re:I hope Bilski invalidates them all

[michaelhood]

Do you think Apple has actually invented much of the hardware in the iPhone? of course not, it's off the shelf parts. So why is Apple the target? it sounds like to me this is a software patent argument. The people supplying the chips to Apple are the people infringing.

Nokia may have a case if and when Apple produce their own cell silicon, the radio part of the phone.

Patent law doesn't work that way, nor should it. Many of these companies who produce the low-level components (ICs, chipsets, etc.) in embedded electronics are based in Asian countries with little real-world IP enforcement.

If you import it and sell it, you're responsible.

Re:I hope Bilski invalidates them all

[masmullin]

His DNA is NDA

Re:I hope Bilski invalidates them all

[jim_v2000]

The problem is really what constitutes "discriminatory" in RAND terms for GSM (I couldn't find that defined anywhere). Does it mean that you must charge everyone the same amount, or that you must seek something of the same value. For some companies that could be cash, for others it could be patents. If this goes to court, that'll be the first issue to address.

Re:I hope Bilski invalidates them all

[jim_v2000]

And leave them with a net profit of nothing? The purpose of patent law is not just to help with R&D, but to also allow the inventors to reap the rewards of their inventions.

Re:I hope Bilski invalidates them all

[Mongoose Disciple]

Are you sure that's accurate?

My understanding was that basically all the major companies in the mobile space essentially "traded" use of patents to each other via agreements, and that it was generally considered that none of them would be able to make a profit in that space if they didn't do so.

In other words, what they're asking from Apple is essentially the same deal they have with everyone else.

Re:I hope Bilski invalidates them all

[Shimbo]

So far as I can tell, if you're against software patents, you're either against all patents, or you're a hypocrite.

You need a better dictionary. Being hypocritical isn't believing something inconsistent, which pretty much everyone does. It's believing one thing and acting differently, like acting anti-gay when you're gay yourself.

Re:I hope Bilski invalidates them all

[Mongoose Disciple]

Apple may be litigious, but it's not stupid - if it was a simple case, they would have settled it by now.

I'm not convinced that's true -- sometimes the smart move is to play for time even though you'll ultimately lose.

In other words (assuming for the moment that Apple is in the wrong and knows they will lose, which isn't necessarily true, but for the sake of discussion I'll pretend it is), Apple might think they can make more money by growing their marketshare by infringing on Nokia's patents now, than they will lose by losing the case in a few years or however long their lawyers can drag it out in court.

The reality of the legal system is that sometimes even your victories are pyrrhic.

Re:I hope Bilski invalidates them all

[jedidiah]

No. The purpose of patent law is to help with R&D ONLY.

The only relevant question is what helps improve the state of the art.

Anything else is irrelevant nonsense that people try to apply "big lie" tactics to.

Re:I hope Bilski invalidates them all

[jedidiah]

> How is the hardware R&D any more valid than software R&D?

They are far less likely to be total bullshit.

Perhaps this has to do with the fact that there is already a long patent history in hardware and no more potential for "squatting" on "unclaimed property".

Re:I hope Bilski invalidates them all

[EastCoastSurfer]

The problem is that on one side you have Apple screaming RAND and the other side with Nokia screaming the same thing. From what I've read when other companies have licensed GSM they usually give a little cash and some cross licensing. Knowing Apple they probably want nothing to do with cross licensing and instead just want to pay cash.

Of course I don't think there are many official court documents out there yet so we really don't know what Apple offered and what Nokia wanted. All we have is clips of both side posturing.

Re:I hope Bilski invalidates them all

[jo_ham]

RAND license terms.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reasonable_and_Non_Discriminatory_Licensing

Re:I hope Bilski invalidates them all

[allo]

a real patent cannot be violated, because if its not a trivial patent, you cannot implement it, without licensing it and having the patented information.

Re:I hope Bilski invalidates them all

[bzipitidoo]

R&D is an expensive, time consuming process that leads to many dead ends

Corporations seek to avoid expense. They don't engage in research if there is any other choice. They leach. Universities and government labs are the main hosts, and that's ok, that's one of the purposes of those organizations. But the leeches shouldn't be given exclusive rights to the work of others.

That's why patents exist... To give companies an incentive to do non-trivial innovation...

Yes, in an ideal world. In reality, the system works poorly, and even against the goal. Instead of more innovation, we get less competition, less diversity, and less innovation as companies use the system to hurt and eliminate one another, and reduce consumers' choices. Then there's patent trolls and the likes of SCO, the suicide bombers of the War on Innovation. One possible outcome of this fight is that Apple and Nokia both lose, and only the trial lawyers win. We need disarmament to stop this sort of destructive competition. Get rid of the patents. It's like trying to win a sports contest by assassinating the competition before the contest, and winning by forfeit when the competition doesn't show up. Turn this war back into a sport.

Re:I hope Bilski invalidates them all

[jo_ham]

Well, Apple has every right to demand the same rate as everyone else - if Nokia wants to change the licencing fee, it is unable to. Even if it only goes up 0.5%, that is still a large amount when you are selling millions of phones.

The RAND terms specify what Nokia can do. If Apple thinks it has a case, it will fight it out.

The whole point of the RAND terms are to ensure that everyone is paying equally - Nokia can't charge Apple more just because it wants to.

Re:I hope Bilski invalidates them all

[jo_ham]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reasonable_and_Non_Discriminatory_Licensing

This is what I mean. The GSM patents are a special case. As an exchange for being part of the standard, Nokia agreed to put them under RAND terms.

Re:I hope Bilski invalidates them all

[jo_ham]

That, I believe is exactly what this case is about. Nokia's terms will have been set out at the time the GSM standards were all finalised. It probably isn't just a cash value though, and will almost certainly involve patent trading - the value of the other company's patents likely being the crux of the argument.

Re:I hope Bilski invalidates them all

[jo_ham]

Well, if that's the case, Apple would have paid up already. They aren't going to fight a case they don't see merit in, especially if Nokia are asking for legit terms. It has to be more complex than that.

Re:I hope Bilski invalidates them all

[jo_ham]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reasonable_and_Non_Discriminatory_Licensing

Go read. GSM patents are a special case.

Also stop posting AC. Makes you look silly.

Re:I hope Bilski invalidates them all

[jo_ham]

That depends on your definition of stupid.

Have you ever tried to grab a window and move it on Windows? You click the side and it just resizes it! Madness!

Different strokes for different folks.

(perhaps there should be a toggle in system prefs that changes the behaviour, or holding option while dragging swapped to resize mode).

Trust was the wrong word - "believe" might have been better. Either way, I'm not certain who is "right" in this lawsuit.

Re:I hope Bilski invalidates them all

[firewood]

Nokia has already paid off its research costs many times over from the sale of cellphones, so it doesn't make sense to pay anything to Nokia.

If only 1% of the patents in a companies portfolio pay off, the a company would need to take in over 100X profit from each valuable patent, on average, just break even on patentable research. But no smart gambler/executive would make the bet on investing in any R&D for just break-even odds. It's only a smart bet if you are looking to take in a payoff is well over the inverse odds. "many times over", for small N, might not even be in the ballpark of enough for that.

Re:I hope Bilski invalidates them all

[Anonymous Coward]

No. The purpose of patent law is to help with R&D ONLY.

And you have statutory and case law to back this up, right?

Re:I hope Bilski invalidates them all

[Lunix Nutcase]

I don't know who to trust here. Apple may be litigious, but it's not stupid - if it was a simple case, they would have settled it by now.

Yeah Apple never files stupid cases.

Re:I hope Bilski invalidates them all

[masmullin]

Have you ever tried to grab a window and move it on Windows? You click the side and it just resizes it! Madness!

Just FYI.

I just tried to do what you describe on my Macbook Pro... it does nothing, doesn't resize, doesn't move the window (test application was Finder).

Im a mac user, but some of the sh!t that apple does is retarded. ObjectiveC/Cocoa ?? WTF just build a C++ library if you need an object oriented Carbon! And not maintaining Carbon to 64bit... WTF Steve!

Some of their stuff is smart though... using Unix underneath is great (even if it breaks their "think different" paradigm). Xcode has lots of great tools included in it.

Apple isn't a smarter company than other players, they are just different (and trendy). I tolerate Apple's stupid decisions because I think their smart decisions (unix, decent hardware) acceptably recover them.

Re:I hope Bilski invalidates them all

[jo_ham]

Ah, you picked the dog in the litter (and I'll agree, they are fallible like any company). The Finder itself is pretty woeful and really needs some love.

A window is supposed to be grabbable from any grey portion that is visible, so for a Finder and a Safari window that is the top and bottom. Some windows have side borders though, some don't - that really should be consistent.

Re:I hope Bilski invalidates them all

[Vayra]

Except that VHDL and it's ilk is not something you can use on a big system if you want it to work well. Everything will simply be far too inefficient to be able to compete with those who do it by hand. Sure it may work for simple circuits but for anything approaching a complicated system it's useless to use synthesized circuits.

Designing circuits is still primarily a craft, not something automated.

Re:I hope Bilski invalidates them all

[hclewk]

Universities and government labs are the main hosts, and that's ok

Bull. Sure those institution work great for general scientific research, but when it comes to applying the science, private companies that profit from the result are the way to go.

Now, what happens when I spend 10 years and thousands of dollars tinkering in my basement to build a next-gen Thingy, and then, since patents don't exist, two weeks after I release my product to the market, company X with billions of dollars at it's disposal come out with an identical copy and a far superior marketing strategy? Well, I don't recoup my costs (not even close) and company X makes all the money. Would company X have developed this technology? No. Will I ever do it again? No. Will a university develop this? No, they have no interest.

Yes, the patent system is broken. Is the solution to completely abolish it? Hell no.

Re:I hope Bilski invalidates them all

[Lars T.]

Do you think Apple has actually invented much of the hardware in the iPhone? of course not, it's off the shelf parts. So why is Apple the target? it sounds like to me this is a software patent argument. The people supplying the chips to Apple are the people infringing.

Nokia may have a case if and when Apple produce their own cell silicon, the radio part of the phone.

Patent law doesn't work that way, nor should it. Many of these companies who produce the low-level components (ICs, chipsets, etc.) in embedded electronics are based in Asian countries with little real-world IP enforcement.

If you import it and sell it, you're responsible.

Yeah, exactly - and we can't have Nokia suing itself, that would be silly. I mean they also get some chips from Infineon. And why the hell is Infineon suddenly based in Asia?

So much for that theory.

Re:I hope Bilski invalidates them all

[Fjandr]

Then Apple should build their own engine or buy someone else's. If you have actual technology for sale that is covered by a valid patent, you should be able to choose to whom you sell and for what price. You should be able to negotiate deals with anyone who wants to buy it, including negotiating for access to other things you might want. A patent provides legally protected leverage in an industry for a limited (theoretically) time, and just like freedom to associate or not with whom you choose, you should be able to sell or not based on whatever arbitrary criteria you want to set. There are all sorts of instances when companies set different rates based on who is buying and what sort of negotiating power each party has.

That this is an item protected under patent should make absolutely no difference.

Hell, that should be one of the benefits of patents: being able to control, in any manner you desire, the sale of your idea for a limited time.

Re:I hope Bilski invalidates them all

[Anonymous Coward]

The whole point of the RAND terms are to ensure that everyone is paying equally - Nokia can't charge Apple more just because it wants to.

No they're not, and yes they can.

There is nothing in RAND terms that specifies what Nokia can or can't do. GSM has been entangled in this mess since the beginning. The only point of RAND is to ensure the patent holders don't wield so much control as to pose a barrier to entry.

This is generally why companies cross-license their patents as part of the negotiation.

Apple has basically admitted to willful infringement, so they're already starting the case from a weakened position.

Re:I hope Bilski invalidates them all

[mjwx]

And Apple want to pay up - they just don;t want to pay more than other cellphone companies to use the GSM patents.

This is a myth.

Nokia is obliged (not by Apple) to licence those patents equally to anyone who wants them,

Only specific patents. Those patents were offered at the same cost as everyone else. However Apple feels entitled to Nokia's entire patent catalouge which is not covered by agreements like RAND and have openly admitted to using these patents without paying fees.

Other manufacturers pay less because they have their own patent portfolio's which are of equal value, these are traded to Nokia for use of their patent portfolio in lieu of cash, Apple has no such patent portfolio so they have to pay cash like manufacturers that do not maintain heavy patent portfolio's like HTC.

Whoops, I said HTC. Apple is now using it's dubious software patents to sue HTC. This is being done entirely as a response to Nokia suing Apple over patents not covered by RAND in an attempt to artificially increase the value of it's own patent portfolio, which is far weaker then Nokia's.

Apple isn't trying to *not* pay - it just wants to pay what other cellphone makers pay.

And that is exactly what Nokia is suing for. Nokia spend years and millions developing this technology, Apple has no technology of equal value so why should Apple get a free ride.

Re:I hope Bilski invalidates them all

[Lars T.]

The fact that Apple has nothing but software patents to respond with is a signal about how fragile Apple in fact is, with no real "valuable" intellectual property.

Interesting point: So what are those Apple patents

Among the patents Apple accuses Nokia of infringing:

• No. 5,634,074 : Serial I/O device identifies itself to a computer through a serial interface during power on reset then it is being configured by the computer
• No. 6,343,263 B1 : Real-time signal processing system for serially transmitted data
• No. 5,915,131 : Method and apparatus for handling I/O requests utilizing separate programming interfaces to access separate I/O services
• No. 5,555,369: Method of creating packages for a pointer-based computer system
• No. 6,239,795 B1: Pattern and color abstraction in a graphical user interface
• No. 5,315,703: Object-oriented notification framework system
• No. 6,189,034 B1: Method and apparatus for dynamic launching of a teleconferencing application upon receipt of a call
• No. 7,469,381, B2: List scrolling and document translation, scaling, and rotation on a touch-screen display
• No. RE 39, 486 E: Extensible, replaceable network component system
• No. 5,455,854: Object-oriented telephony system
• No. 7,383,453 B2: Conserving power by reducing voltage supplied to an instruction-processing portion of a processor
• No. 5,848,105: GMSK signal processors for improved communications capacity and quality
• No. 5, 379,431: Boot framework architecture for dynamic staged initial program load

So the first listed is already quite obviously a hardware patent (filed in 1993, so don't post prior-art younger than that), and that isn't the only one.

Re:I hope Bilski invalidates them all

[cbhacking]

You're missing the bit where the other companies (the ones that Nokia charges the RAND rate to) have contributed back to the general body of patents that cover 3G cellular connections. They helped reduce the time, and therefore cost, of R&D, which helped Nokia bring new products to market sooner.

Apple, which does basically jack shit research of any type, let alone in phone technology, decides they want to use 3G tech, but expects to pay only as much as the companies who (through their own work) helped bring that tech to market. IANAL, but as far as I know they have no legal reason to expect this; Nokia can charge them whatever it feels like.

If Apple didn't like Nokia's behavior and thought they had a case in court, they could have sued Nokia for the "right" to pay the same price as another company, regardless of any differences in the value those companies have to Nokia. They might even have won that case. However, to start selling product that is using the patented technology, knowing full well it is patented, and lacking a license to use those patents... well, you don't need to have a degree in law to recognize that as illegal. *Maybe* Nokia will be forced to let Apple license their tech at the same price as LG, but Apple will still owe Nokia an awful lot of money for all those illegally sold iPhones.

Re:I hope Bilski invalidates them all

[cbhacking]

Question A: Where is it required that Nokia allow Apple (who provided no help toward developing 3G, unlike other phone manufacturers) to license the relevant patents at the same price as another company that directly helped develop the technology? Citation needed.

Question B: Hypothetically, suppose you're right and Nokia was obligated to offer Apple the same pricing. In that case, which of the following options is legal for Apple to take:
(A) File a lawsuit against Nokia
(B) Sell their product using unlicensed technology anyhow?

Re:I hope Bilski invalidates them all

[Kagetsuki]

Determining what rate is fair is entirely up to the patent holder. If I want to let a small company use my patented technology for a small fee such that they can produce new things then so be it, that will help spread my technology and will allow said smaller company to actually produce their product. However, when a giant company comes along and wants to use my technology I know they can pay, so I'm going to charge them more. That is actually pretty fair if you ask me.

Re:I hope Bilski invalidates them all

[Lars T.]

a real patent cannot be violated, because if its not a trivial patent, you cannot implement it, without licensing it and having the patented information.

The "patented information" is publicly available - which is actually where the word patent comes from: lettre patente, "open letter". IOW trivially and patently wrong.

Re:I hope Bilski invalidates them all

[bzipitidoo]

Abolish, and replace.

We could have a better system for compensating inventors. Monopoly is why the current system is so bad. More than that, the whole notion of owning an idea is toxic. It habituates our thinking. We have become accustomed to treating ideas and information as if they are material goods, of routinely overlooking the extremely important and cost saving ways they aren't. When we say "your idea", we mean that you discovered or invented it, and when we say "your car", we mean that you own it. This vital difference has become blurred. It is how people can use the term "stealing" in place of copyright infringement and be taken seriously. That you invented something should not give you absolute authority over what everyone else does that might be related. And because it is an idea, not a material object, the effect is as if you were given the power to dictate not just whether and how someone uses your car, but any car, or even any wheeled transport. Just having to find you and the thousands of others and ask everyone's permission is a huge burden, so huge that no one does it. It's impractical. No one goes patent fishing, they keep on and hope no troll pops up. Our courts have to waste time debating things that should be obvious. That is why I'd rather see the system entirely replaced, and not merely reformed. And also why I think it eventually will be. I think the most likely future is that these laws fall into disuse, as everyone shifts to better ways as they become apparent. Patents will become the kiss of death, the reason to shun an idea. I'd like to see that happen in my lifetime, but I don't think it will.

Your example is not representative. Patents are more danger than salvation. One patent, on any of the dozens of innovations that go into those 10 years of work can shut you down. Extremely difficult to get anywhere toiling away in obscurity. Big organizations have resources and expertise to work the system, hermits don't. The court system grossly favors the rich, not intentionally, but because they can afford better lawyers and other help.

What if some other inventor working on the same idea beats you to the patent office by hours, as happened to Elisha Gray? Under the current system, you are even more screwed than if there were no patents. You can't even continue to try to bring your invention to market because you'd be infringing the other guy's patent! He was granted the monopoly, and you aren't even allowed to compete, let alone enjoy freedom from competition. The other doesn't have to license to you, doesn't have to allow you anything.

Why did we even set things up this way? Of all the ways to resolve an issue, making it moot is the best, and sending it to the courts for an ugly, expensive, bitter, long, agonizing "winner take all" fight is among the worst. Even a gunfight has one advantage over the courts: it's quick. The patent system may as well be an unsupervised school yard fought over by gangs. You'd think after the umpteenth police raid, people would realize this can't be allowed to go on, and resolve to make changes.

Re:I hope Bilski invalidates them all

[totally bogus dude]

So a company is going to invest millions of dollars into R&D and risk losing it all if it doesn't product anything worthwhile so that, in the best case, it can... get back to the same level of wealth that it started with? And you think that's going to promote progress in science and the useful arts?

Research is a high-risk investment: most research doesn't lead to anything commercially viable. In order to make a high-risk investment appealing, you need to have a high-reward component. That's exactly what the patent system does and provides for: a high reward if your research yields something useful, which means it's worthwhile to run research projects even if most of them don't pay off.

Nobody is going to invest money into something where they risk losing it, and the very best they can hope for, is to be no better off for having invested it.

Yes, one of the costs of this is that some progress will become stalled when it gets mired in patents. But if you start nullifying any patents that are holding up further development, you greatly decrease the potential reward for research, thus making it less appealing.

Re:I hope Bilski invalidates them all

[Lars T.]

Um, from what I've read of the patents, Nokia's patents seem to be (at least partially) for hardware while Apple's patents (in both suits) are about the software (frameworks and the like) on the phones.

Well, then you read the wrong sources - the list of patents claimed by Apple is publicly available and contains several hardware patents. The list from Nokia is a little harder to find, but "US Patent 6359904 - Data transfer in a mobile telephone network" sounds a lot like a software patent to me:

The scope of the present invention is a method for data transfer in a digital mobile communications system, in which method it is handled data in certain layers according to certain protocols, in a certain layer out of said layers it is transferred user data in radio blocks (RB) over a physical radio channel between a mobile station and a fixed mobile communications network, for the transfer of said certain layer it is formed in the radio block (RB) a payload of a certain size comprising check bits (CHB) connected with the performing of the transfer and transfer bits (TB) available for the transfer of user data, each radio block (RB) is channel coded using a certain coding method and the size of said payload is dependent on the coding method. In the transfer bits (TB) of the radio block to be coded using at least a certain coding method it is transferred user data in a first part of the transfer bits and in a second part of the transfer bits it is transferred fill bits in such a way that it is chosen for the transfer of user data a number of transfer bits divisible by eight.

"A method" is the tip-off. US Patent 6694135 - Measurement report transmission in a telecommunications system is also "a method". I'm not going to bother to check the others.

Re:I hope Bilski invalidates them all

[cycoj]

Note that RAND can mean quite a lot of things and usually it is not exactly specified what RAND exactly means. IIRC there's been quite a few patent cases over what RAND is or not is. Also so far we don't have any proof that Apple really tried to license the GSM patents and Nokia indeed did want to charge "outrageous" fees, this is simply what Apple says and I'm inclined to take everything what either company says with a large grain of salt.
My personal suspicion is (and I don't really have anything to back this up), Nokia tried to licence the patents for a percentage of the revenue or the cost of the iphone, they possibly even do that for all phone makers. However because of Apple's comparetively high prices they would actually by significantly more than almost all other licencees. Now, is "1% of your phone price" reasonable and fair? I'd say you can argue both ways. What is actually also quite interesting, IIRC in Apples own documents they admit that they only approached Nokia for licences of the patents sometime after the iphone came out (I think it was actually a significant time after), that would mean they at least admit to having used Nokia patents for quite a while without a licence no matter what. I don't know what the usual policy for this sort of thing is though.

Re:I hope Bilski invalidates them all

[countach]

Last I checked, there is no distinction between "real" and software patents. Apple's patents are as real as anybody's.

Re:I hope Bilski invalidates them all

[Wovel]

Unless your patent is covered by http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reasonable_and_Non_Discriminatory_Licensing (for the 11th time in this thread :).

Re:I hope Bilski invalidates them all

[Splab]

Why?

Apple has brought nothing to the table, Nokia is only required to license out its patents, by no means are they required to let Apple eat mostly for free - I've seen a lot of people pointing to RAND without any of them actually bothering to read up on it, RAND just requires the licensing out to others at a reasonable price, RAND does not specify that everyone should get same discounts.

Re:I hope Bilski invalidates them all

[mwvdlee]

The patent system isn't broken.

There are rules in place that should prevent non-trivial patents from being awarded.

I have no issue with a software patent that describes some truely revolutionary concept.

The problem is that, for some reason, these rules aren't actually applied and most software patents are trivial and highly derivative.

Re:I hope Bilski invalidates them all

[yacc143]

Actually anyone wanting to implement GSM nad/or UMTS has to pay patent licenses, that is nothing secret about that. Actually there are even patent pools setup so it's easier. (Actually these pools have even EU and DoJ approval, see http://www.3glicensing.com/articles/03%20-%203G%20(p12-14)%20f.pdf )

If Apple is so naive that they can get away without paying for the basic technology, they'll get what they deserve. The legal system takes time, but if they are unlucky the damages will wipe out the whole company in some years.

Additionally, if Apple even paid up on the basic patents, Nokia has been in this business for a long time. All major elements of the iPhone (touch screen => Nokia tablets, installable software => Java JARs and Symbian phones, and so on) have been done earlier by Nokia. If Apple is unlucky, all of these will be patented by Nokia. If they are lucky only some. Don't think that this time even the nationalism of the US legal system will save their hide. (And Apple has been toeing the line with it's locked walled garden iPhone/iPods for a long time in at least some EU countries, so that's additional fun for Apple that can be resurrected anytime, and it clearly targets Apple's business model, which is bad. Devices and technologies are way easier to replace.)

Re:I hope Bilski invalidates them all

[kevinbr]

"......For example, Apple’s 2004 R&D-to-Sales ratio of 5.9% trails the computer industry average of 7.6%, and its $489 million spend is a fraction of its larger competitors. But by rigorously focusing its development resources on a short list of projects with the greatest potential, the company created an innovation machine that eventually produced the iMac, iBook, iPod, and iTunes....."

Define R and D?

Define jack shit?

Re:I hope Bilski invalidates them all

[jo_ham]

They don't want to "get away with not paying" - they *want to pay* and know they have to - they just want to pay what is fair, as described by the terms under which the GSM patents are covered.

Re:I hope Bilski invalidates them all

[jo_ham]

Go look up RAND licence terms, then come back.

I'll wait.

Re:I hope Bilski invalidates them all

[david_thornley]

In the US, the constitutional purpose of patents is to promote progress in the useful arts. In order to do that, patents have to not only allow somebody to recoup R&D costs, but also to make a profit beyond that. After all, if it's not profitable to invent, not as many people and companies will invent, and that doesn't promote progress. How much of a profit opportunity, and how selective the terms, are debatable, but the principle is sound Constitutional law here in the US.

Re:I hope Bilski invalidates them all

[Gilmoure]

At first, thought you were talking about cylon clones like in BSG.

Re:I hope Bilski invalidates them all

[INeededALogin]

From the wiki article, second sentence:

The normal case is that when joining the standardization body, companies agree that if they receive any patents on technologies which become essential to the standard then they agree to allow other groups attempting to implement the standard to use those patents and they agree that the charges for those patents shall be reasonable.

Apple did not join the 3G Patents Ltd group to get the patent under the RAND license. The only choice is to go directly to Nokia and negotiate a different deal.

Re:I hope Bilski invalidates them all

[Mongoose Disciple]

Well, if that's the case, Apple would have paid up already.

This isn't necessarily true -- it could be the smart move for Apple to do something it knows is likely to eventually lose in court and prolong how long they're able to do so, if they think they can make more money meanwhile than they will lose by paying legal fees meanwhile.

Re:I hope Bilski invalidates them all

[The End Of Days]

If you were right, I'd agree with you, but you are mischaracterizing a complex issue with a vast oversimplification.

H.264, for instance, is not the idea of a codec. It is a very specific and very complex implementation of a particular codec. Your analogy is broken despite the fact that Slashdot loves it.

Re:I hope Bilski invalidates them all

[The End Of Days]

Good, a semantic argument that isn't even about the point. Thanks! for nothing...

Re:I hope Bilski invalidates them all

[The End Of Days]

In the end all you need to ask is this: "Do software patents help or hinder a healthy programming environment?" Most people think not.

If that's all I need to ask, you need to cite your answers better. I'm not sure where you get "most" from, but I suspect you aren't even close. I might grant you "most open-source developers think not." I might even grant you "most developers think not."

Re:I hope Bilski invalidates them all

[The End Of Days]

Naturally modded down as Troll. It's good to know that asking a serious question that may expose flaws in Slashdot-approved reasoning should be silenced. How dare I question your gods?

Re:I hope Bilski invalidates them all

[hclewk]

The problem is that, for some reason, these rules aren't actually applied...

In other words, it's broken.

Re:I hope Bilski invalidates them all

[mwvdlee]

If you don't know how to drive a car, it doesn't mean the car is broken, it means you need to learn how to drive.

Patent offices should get people, procedures and technology capable of handling software patents according to the rules that already exists.

Re:I hope Bilski invalidates them all

[hclewk]

So, in other words,

"My accounting program isn't broken just because users can enter letters in the number-only fields. I explicitly say in the instructions that in number-only fields, only numbers should be used. Companies who buy this program should get people capable of reading instructions and following them."

Re:I hope Bilski invalidates them all

[cheesybagel]

I kinda doubt Nokia only has patents on GSM. Apple is also plainly spewing bullshit about object oriented graphics interface in a cellphone, since Symbian is written in C++ and has a GUI. Symbian is older than iPhone. Also, meet IBM Simon, presented over a decade before the iPhone.

Re:I hope Bilski invalidates them all

[jo_ham]

I'm not taking sides here - I'm just pointing out that the details of this case get conveniently omitted when it is discussed.

I'm not sure who is "right" here (and am generally not a proponent of software patents).

Any time it's brought up, it's painted in the summary like Apple is being run by Darl McBride with a rusty pipe with a hook on the end and Nokia is the innocent baby seal. I don;t think it's that cut and dried.

Re:I hope Bilski invalidates them all

[aristotle-dude]

Would you care to explain how you might implement a GSM (or wifi, for that matter) radio transmitter and receiver, in only software?

Apple used a set of Infineon chips (Infineon Digital Baseband Processor and Infineon UMTS Transceiver) for GSM and a Broadcom chip for WiFi. The Infineon chips were bonafide licensed products and along with the Broadcom WiFi chipset. Apple also paid a license for WiFi in the same way as they had done for all of their airport base stations and airport cards in their computers. They were fully licensed. Nokia has no legal claim for WiFi against Apple since they had already paid license fees to the legal license holders.

Apple is willing to pay a reasonable license fee to Nokia but that fee would be a flat fee per unit rather than a percentage of the sale price of a handset because the majority of the price of the iPhone comes from IP owned by Apple rather than Nokia. The chips themselves are already licensed.

Re:I hope Bilski invalidates them all

[farble1670]

They want to pay what other people pay. Nokia is not allowed to charge more to whoever it chooses.

there's a limit on what someone is allowed to charge?

Re:I hope Bilski invalidates them all

[farble1670]

I think personally software patents are stupid

nokia's patents are technology patents ... apple is counter sueing with their software patents.

Re:I hope Bilski invalidates them all

[farble1670]

the problem is that they aren't trading dollars for dollars. they are trading patents for patents and dollars. companies are licensing each others' patents, and they have to put a dollar figure on each of them. apple doesn't think it's getting a fair exchange for their patents.

it's like if apple had p1, and nokia holds p2. they both want to license each others' patents. so they trade. but nokia decides that p1 and p2 are not of equal value and demands that in addition to the license to use p1 from apple, they require $1000 from them.

the issue isn't that nokia is charging them more than anyone else, it's that they don't agree with apple on the value of apple's p1 patent.

Re:I hope Bilski invalidates them all

[jo_ham]

If their patent is under RAND terms, yes. The GSM patents owned by Nokia are just such ones - in exchange for them being part of the standard.

Re:I hope Bilski invalidates them all

[professionalfurryele]

Just a general comment but this idea of patents as property is exactly the problem with the darn things. It should be mandatory to license a patent in an open way. If you need to license a patents then you go to the company and they have to provide you with a price which is public knowledge. The licence also should be sold at a price that the market can stand.

Sick to death of the obviousness of it all

[MrDoh!]

It's a bunch of phones.
You press buttons, make calls with them to other people. Thank goodness that's not a patentable idea or we'd all be shafted.

The tweaks on how to make these calls really seem.... unimportant apart to the lawyers.

Re:Sick to death of the obviousness of it all

[__aaclcg7560]

You mean phones still make phone calls? OMG! I thought that feature was dropped years ago in the era of pictures, videos and text messages.

Re:Sick to death of the obviousness of it all

[Pojut]

I wouldn't have noticed much...I think the most minutes I've used up in a billing cycle in the last two years was 35 :/

Re:Sick to death of the obviousness of it all

[postbigbang]

The patents for tip-and-ring landlines expired long ago. There was a fight, even then.

According TFA, this also about GSM, UTMS, and WiFI-- and Nokia has intellectual property claims in all three; and those are what the litigation against Apple is all about.

Let's see: cells and wireless. No, not about phones. Bridging GSM lines for data... no, not about phones. WiFi switch-off.... no, not about phones again.

Not about software either. Hmmmm.

This doesn't speak to Bilski, this doesn't have anything to do with that. This, notwithstanding to the madness of patents in general.

Re:Sick to death of the obviousness of it all

[Skuld-Chan]

Its hilarious because you know - making phone calls was patented - look up 174465. Sure its old, but there you go.

On cell phones I'm sure Motorola patented the hell out of the original Dynatac as well.

Re:Sick to death of the obviousness of it all

[Lars T.]

Let's see: cells and wireless. No, not about phones. Bridging GSM lines for data... no, not about phones. WiFi switch-off.... no, not about phones again.

Not about software either. Hmmmm.

Ohh? US 6,694,135 - Measurement report transmission in a telecommunications system
Abstract
A method of obtaining data messages at a radio communication network from a mobile station operating therein during downlink transfer, the method comprising the network providing a header portion of the downlink transfer with one or more unique polling codes for requesting the mobile station to transmit one or more respective data messages indicative of one or more corresponding conditions at the mobile station.

That doesn't sound like software to you? It sure doesn't sound like hardware.

Re:Sick to death of the obviousness of it all

[Wovel]

The Patent expired. "

United States Patent No. 174,465 was issued to Alexander Graham Bell in 1876, and became recognized as the most valuable patent in history."

http://inventors.about.com/od/tstartinventions/ss/TelephonePatent.htm

What makes you think they're software patents?

[Colin Smith]

Nokia has a huge R&D organisation. Everything from software down to silicon.
 

I'm with Nokia

[improfane]

After being screwed by Microsoft in the past, it's pretty obvious why Apple is so aggressive nowadays. It's taking taking some pages from Microsoft.

I am with Nokia because they're quite nice with Qt and they are definitely rightly responsible for a lot of technology that no doubt Apple just implemented without permission. I think the fact that about 40 firms* paying royalties is evidence enough.

I will not buy an iPhone and never will be part of that monopoly. iPods, iPhones are engineered to fail and you paying ~£30 for the privilege to do very little.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/8321058.stm

Re:I'm with Nokia

[Yvan256]

How could somebody called Olli-Pekka Kallasvuo be in the wrong?

I'll get working on your question once I'm able to pronounce the name correctly.

Re:I'm with Nokia

[Idiomatick]

Since we are blaming whole countries for the acts of a few people .... Sweden seems nice too, but then ikea is the biggest 'charity' tax dodge on earth.

Re:I'm with Nokia

[spyfrog]

But Ikea is actually a company owned by a foundation based in Holland and owned by a guy living in Switzerland.

Re:I'm with Nokia

[Idiomatick]

Clearly a pan-European plot!

Re:I'm with Nokia

[mdwh2]

I agree. And stories like this are worth remembering every time you hear people claiming that Apple "invented" so many new things and that everyone else just copied.

As an aside, I find it curious that this is in the "Apple" category, and not "Mobile", or indeed why not have a "Nokia" category. Nokia have 40% of the mobile market, Apple have, well, not very much at all, but it says it all about Slashdot's coverage these days that they're only interested in what affects Apple.

Re:I'm with Nokia

[fermion]

I don't see how this applies. Apple forked KHTML into Webkit, which is now one of the standards, along with Gecko and Trident. Webkit works so well that Google uses this, to compete with Apple. I don't see Apple suing Google over the use.

Open source is the new business model. It helps alleviate these patent disputes and build support. When Nokia bought QT, the bought significant good will and a large user base. Unfortunately this was not enough to counteract years of bad decisions. What bad decisions? Nokia advertised cool stuff, but they treated the gadgets as something that was a privilege to own. They also never challenged the carrier lock in the US. Apple succeeded by designing something the custoer wanted, not something that the carriers wanted.

I pretty much ignore these patent things. Either the company, like Apple, will have defensive patents in place or they will pay for the use of the patents. If Nokia asked for such a large sum of money as to put the iPhone out of the market, they are a fool. Apple is one company that pays for patents, even the useless one-click. It seems that, like MS, Nokia is no longer willing to compete, just whine about losing market share.

Re:I'm with Nokia

[whisper_jeff]

...iPods, iPhones are engineered to fail...

News to me. I own an old 406 gig iPod which is about eight years old and still works like a dream. I own an first gen iPod Touch which works perfectly. And I own an iPhone 3GS which works flawlessly. Now, I know that's anecdotal evidence but I think the millions and millions and millions and millions of people who own iPods (and often multiple iPods) would disagree with your claim that they are engineered to fail.

Feel free to prove me wrong but I doubt you'll succeed.

Re:I'm with Nokia

[Wovel]

My original iPhone with its original battery far outlasted any of the Nokia phones I have ever owned, you are just delusional. Nokia has all of those licensees because their technology was made part of the standard, part of becoming part of the standard was agreeing to RAND licensing terms.

Nokia is very clearly wrong, Apple has been trying to pay them for years. All of this has been linked countless times in this thread already by me and others, look around.

Re:I'm with Nokia

[improfane]

So rather than provide me with sources or evidence, you call me delusional and tell ME to look for sources?

The good old Nokia phones that are just are mobile phones last longer than any iPhone can - how can you compare something that has barely been around to something that has been around forever? The battery life of a Nokia phone trumps the iPod.

Re:I'm with Nokia

[kevinbr]

What company releases a product and then quits? Releasing new products does not automatically define that they are engineering obsolescence. My original 5 gig ipod still works. My original iMac ( 1998) still works. I have a 520c Portable that still worked the day I threw it out ( 1995?) last month.

I never sell any apple product they all continue to work .

Re:I'm with Nokia

[broeman]

Somewhat :) When the owner of Ikea got tired of Swedish taxes (1960/70s I think), he moved the company to Denmark. Denmark later on also went on the same boat with outrageous taxation, and he moved again. I guess Switzerland is probably the best place to be in Europe, if you are evading taxes (if you're rich enough, you can negotiate your own tax-rate with the local government). Placing the company in the EU, it is in a good position to the internal market.

Silly, but predictable

[Bullfish]

As long as there is profit in suing for such things, a lot of companies will keep doing it. After a few decades of stealing from each other, software and hardware companies are waking up, looking around and realizing there is money to be made from suing each other for practices they have all engaged in... damn near all the patent infringement lawsuits I have read about seem on the surface, to be frivolous... it really is time for patent reform

Corporate Wars

[i_ate_god]

They are much less exciting than REAL wars. When will Apple and Nokia build up militias and shoot each other to death while I watch it on my major news source in night vision?

Re:Corporate Wars

[Anonymous Coward]

Nokia already has a military product line.
They produce communications and encryption devices for army use. For example sanla.

Re:Corporate Wars

[geminidomino]

They are much less exciting than REAL wars. When will Apple and Nokia build up militias and shoot each other to death while I watch it on my major news source in night vision?

They just need a few more politicians. Patience, chummer.

Re:Corporate Wars

[R3d M3rcury]

Yes, but Apple has iPhone-using snipers.

Re:Corporate Wars

[mjwx]

They are much less exciting than REAL wars. When will Apple and Nokia build up militias and shoot each other to death while I watch it on my major news source in night vision?

But the shiny plastic white iArmour of the Fanboy Guard was far too easy to spot in the dark and the black turtlenecks stood out in the snow making them perfect targets for Nokia. Not to mention that they could only get iAmmo from one iStore and their iRifles could only shoot one bullet at a time. The war was over before it began with the Finns doing to Apple what they did to the Soviets back in the 30's.

RAND

[danaris]

Now, someone else may have more recent information that contradicts this, but...

My understanding was that Apple tried to license these patents from Nokia. They are part of the GSM specification, which no GSM phone can function without. Because they are part of the standard, they must be licensed under Reasonable And Non-Discriminatory terms.

But Nokia wanted more from Apple for these patents than they did from anyone else.

What, exactly? I don't know. Either the articles I've read didn't say, or I've since forgotten. I think it was cross-licensing with some of the specific patents on the iPhone, but as I say, I'm not sure.

Either way, if Nokia isn't licensing the original patents under RAND terms to Apple, then they should be burned to hell and back for this. They knew the price when they put patents of theirs into the GSM spec, and now they have to live with it.

Dan Aris

Re:RAND

[kylant]

Have you ever considered that both sides of the story might be true?

Apple has a rather unusual model to sell its phone: From what we've heard Apple demands not only a one-time sales price from the operators (as most other mobile manufacturers do) but also a part of the monthly fee paid by iphone-customers. If Nokia licenses its patents for a percentage of the sales price (a common practice) they could also have asked for a percentage of the monthly fee (and justly so, if you ask me, as Apple just spreads out the sales price over a longer period of time). Apple on the other side might object to being the only GSM-manufacturer that has to pay a monthly fee.

Re:RAND

[jo_ham]

That will be difficult - Apple buys its GSM chips off the shelf.

Re:RAND

[Dtyst]

How I heard the story: When Apple announced the iphone, Nokia started negotiations with Apple and asked them to pay the same patent fee as everyone else in cell phone business. Apple did not want to pay. One year after the release of IPhone Apple still didn't agree to pay. As Nokia noticed some of Apples UI multi-touch patents were quite good, Nokia said ok, give us right to use your patents instead. Apple said no. Nokia sued Apple as they have been using Nokia patented technologies for years and haven't paid Nokia a dime. Now Apple is trying to twist story that Nokia is just after their patents. That is a lie. Nokia offered Apple same as everyone else from the start.

Re:RAND

[Low Ranked Craig]

Apple demands not only a one-time sales price from the operators (as most other mobile manufacturers do) but also a part of the monthly fee paid by iphone-customers.

while no one out side of Apple and the carriers know for sure, it has been assumed based on information from the minimal disclosures that Apple has made that Apple had this model when they launched the first iPhone, but then changed to a standard subsidy model with the launch of the 3G iPhone.

One point of confusion for analysts is that Apple uses subscription accounting for iPhone sales. So assuming they get about $360 for AT&T for each phone sold, they recognize that revenue over 24 months, or $15 a month. It's in here somewhere.

Re:RAND

[UnknowingFool]

My understanding is that the cross-licensing agreements protects both companies from a patent war. In this case, however, Apple didn't have a lot of cellphone technology to cross-license. So Nokia wanted their non-cellphone tech. Apple said no. It would be interesting what Nokia charged some cellphone makers that don't bring a lot of innovation. For example some of the Asian manufacturers that don't really invent new technology but figure out ways to make it cheaper. What did Nokia charge them?

Re:RAND

[chowdahhead]

Nokia offered to license the patents to Apple on a per-patent fee or one fee for the whole portfolio; the amounts of those fees have not been disclosed. Apple rejected this offer. I can't find any information about cross-licensing in the Delaware complaint. Without more information, we can't be certain if Nokia is being unreasonable or not, but Apple can't just refuse to license Nokia's IP because they don't like the terms.

Re:RAND

[X.25]

Now, someone else may have more recent information that contradicts this, but...

My understanding was that Apple tried to license these patents from Nokia. They are part of the GSM specification, which no GSM phone can function without. Because they are part of the standard, they must be licensed under Reasonable And Non-Discriminatory terms.

But Nokia wanted more from Apple for these patents than they did from anyone else.

What, exactly? I don't know. Either the articles I've read didn't say, or I've since forgotten. I think it was cross-licensing with some of the specific patents on the iPhone, but as I say, I'm not sure.

Either way, if Nokia isn't licensing the original patents under RAND terms to Apple, then they should be burned to hell and back for this. They knew the price when they put patents of theirs into the GSM spec, and now they have to live with it.

So, let me see if I got this right:

You don't know WHAT Nokia wanted from Apple, but you KNOW that Nokia didn't license the original patents under RAND terms?

I am sorry - could you try to explain this to me again? You know that Nokia wouldn't give Apple the patents under RAND terms, but you don't know what Nokia was asking for?

I am at the point where I am annoyed more by Apple appologists than by biggest Microsoft fans.

And that is really really hard to achieve...

Re:RAND

[KnownIssues]

Let's say all that is true (because I have no reason to believe you are wrong). If Nokia refused to make a reasonable deal with Apple – one that would violate anti-trust laws – shouldn't Apple have sued Nokia at that point, rather than build a device they knew required licensing to use that they didn't have? Is this "it's easier to ask forgiveness than it is to get permission"?

If Apple had built something and just failed to identify patents because they didn't research some obscure patents, I could understand. But it's obvious from the background that Apple did know and simply chose to violate the patents with the presumption they would fight that battle later – and win. I can almost see accounts/lawyers weighing that if they put the iPhone on the market and it tanks, then Nokia won't bother to sue. If the iPhone succeeds, then it will pay for its own court costs.

Re:RAND

[Idbar]

Wow, what you say makes a lot of sense. Another cellphone from AT&T will cost a hell lot of money. Apple is selling their handsets for a lot less than other manufacturers, perhaps because they are NOT paying their respective royalties?

Re:RAND

[Weezul]

I'm afraid all this mess is way more complicated than merely Nokia's obligation to offer the patents to GSM Association Members under RAND terms.

We're not sure that Apple ever had the rights to RAND terms administered by the GSM Association. Nokia's RAND obligations are a contract with the GSM Association, not Apple. We don't know why Apple has avoided joining the association. Apple might be fucked if the association favors existing members like Motorola and HTC. We've also gleaned that Nokia's initial offer was quite close to the pure RAND terms, but the price went up when Apple played hard ball.

We are sure that Apple has knowingly violated the GSM patents without obtaining licenses. We should therefore expect that Nokia will win significant punitive damages based upon Apple's ongoing violations, as RAND would have no bearing upon past infringement. We're obviously unsure however how much gets covered by the hardware maker's license, also whether Apple's went though manufacturer that had the licenses (Chinese manufacturer, hello?).

I'm personally curious what role the GSM Association plays in enforcing the RAND obligations imposed upon members. Is association membership a contract between all the members pairwise, like a treaty, or a contract between each member and the association?

Re:RAND

[david_thornley]

IANAL, and I don't know the facts of the case.

However, it seems to me that, with RAND licensing, there's a presumption that any company will be able to use the patent(s) involved, the only question being the price. Since the patent holders are being successful businesses, delaying payment isn't going to cause irreparable harm. Nokia isn't going to suffer from lack of a revenue stream, and Apple has plenty of money to pay any court-ordered amount with. Therefore, there's no problem with using the patent first and negotiating exact payment later.

The issue is simply how much Apple should pay. Apple is arguing that, under existing agreements, Nokia is asking more than is allowed, and Nokia is arguing that it's allowed to ask what it's asking. I don't know the details of these agreements; if they are at all vague, this could be an honest disagreement. Vague agreements always have the potential to wind up in court, which is one of the things lawyers hate about them. (If the RAND agreements were clear-cut, it's very unlikely there would be a lawsuit going on.)

Nor is there going to be anything earth-shattering about the result. What will happen is that Apple will pay Nokia some money, and the court will have to decide how much.

In other words, I don't see much "there" there. It's a legal suit over what is presumably a disputable set of agreements. Neither side is necessarily being a jerk. It's a matter of price that will not affect any set of shareholders or customers much. It's business as usual.

What is also business as usual is a bunch of Slashdotters holding firm opinions about the issues without knowing them and getting far more emotional about it than the principals.

Re:RAND

[mdielmann]

From what we've heard Apple demands not only a one-time sales price from the operators (as most other mobile manufacturers do) but also a part of the monthly fee paid by iphone-customers...Apple on the other side might object to being the only GSM-manufacturer that has to pay a monthly fee.

Yes, it would really suck if the only hardware provider to charge monthly fees to the hardware they provide had to pay royalties on said monthly fees. They are clearly being persecuted for their uniqueness.

Re:RAND

[farble1670]

if it was a simple as asking for a larger check from apple, nokia wouldn't have a leg to stand on and we wouldn't be hearing about this. the issue is the valuation of apple's patents and x-licensing. apple thinks the patents they license to nokia are worth more, and therefore, they should pay less to nokia for nokia's patents.

nokia owns p1. apple needs to license p1. apple offers their p2+p3 for p1. nokia asks for p2+p3+$1000 for p1. how much exactly are p2+p3 worth? that's the issue. one thing for sure, they aren't worth whatever apple says their are worth. it's in apple's best interest to overvalue their own patents. nokia's patent on the other hand has a set price and is licensed for that same set price from many, many other companies already.

documenting it on http://en.swpat.org

[H4x0r Jim Duggan]

Here's what I've gathered so far about these:

• Nokia v. Apple (2010, USA)
• Apple v. HTC (2010, USA)
• Nokia
• Apple Inc.
• Patent non-aggression pacts (including the Sun-Microsoft 2004 deal)

swpat.org is a publicly editable wiki, help welcome.

Re:documenting it on http://en.swpat.org

[corerunner]

Thanks Jim Duggan! The wiki looks like it's coming alone nicely.

1984 ad

[Anonymous Coward]

Remember when Apple resembled the androgynous athlete more than the creepy old Big Brother dude on the TV? I do...

Multi-touch prior art from 1985, more from 1991

[H4x0r Jim Duggan]

Multi-touch has been invented many times. It was even publicly documented in 1985:Multi-touch prior art.

Re:Multi-touch prior art from 1985, more from 1991

[rolfwind]

Apple hasn't and can't patent an idea, which multitouch is. They have a specific implementation implemented, via buying up Fingerworks years ago which was started by two University of Delaware professors.

I have no clue if the implementation touches on prior art, but it's like saying engines have been designed many times before, hence an engine can't be patented. The idea of an engine can't be, but it could be a fundamentally new design that executes things different and perhaps better.

Re:Multi-touch prior art from 1985, more from 1991

[greenbird]

Apple hasn't and can't patent an idea. They have a specific implementation implemented

All software patents are patenting an idea. If it was an implementation what would be patented is the source code which is already covered by copyright. Show me one software patent that isn't patenting an idea but an actual implementation. If the patent was on the implementation rather than the idea I should be able to implement it in another language and not be liable under the patent.

Re:Multi-touch prior art from 1985, more from 1991

[Curate]

I have no clue if the implementation touches on prior art

I believe it does touch on prior art, in multiple places.

Re:Multi-touch prior art from 1985, more from 1991

[Pinky's Brain]

So is pinching an idea or an implementation?

Re:Multi-touch prior art from 1985, more from 1991

[Marcika]

So is pinching an idea or an implementation?

IANAL (especially not a US patent lawyer), but my common sense says: Pinching is a concept (the "look and feel" of the UI) and should not be patentable. The pinch recognition algorithm is a software patent and should be thrown out of court in a sane jurisdiction (which the USPTO isn't, even after Bilski). The multi-touch hardware implementation that enables pinching is a patentable implementation - but I'm quite sure that Apple doesn't have dibs on that, since most touch screen and multi-touch technology is 20 years old...

Re:Multi-touch prior art from 1985, more from 1991

[greenbird]

That's like saying that if Company A patented NewGizmo but made it out of oak wood, that Company B could come along and make it exactly the same except made of maple wood to get around the patent.

No it isn't. You see by writing in another programing language the inputs and outputs are the same but how the program gets those results are different. That's what an implementation is. It's a specific method for starting at A and getting to B. Your analogy would be closer to if I created and ran the program on a PC instead of a Mac. Then the implementation would be the same.

Re:Multi-touch prior art from 1985, more from 1991

[Lunix Nutcase]

Such as?

Re:Multi-touch prior art from 1985, more from 1991

[Me! Me! 42]

Nobody talks about where, exactly . . .
. . . because it touches on the naughty bits!
Its not about patent infringement, its actually a patent molestation suit!

Re:Multi-touch prior art from 1985, more from 1991

[TehDuffman]

Such as?

Whoosh

Re:Multi-touch prior art from 1985, more from 1991

[Cyberax]

"make it exactly the same except made of maple wood to get around the patent"

That's almost exactly how hardware patents work. If your patent states "a method to make oak-wood gizmo", then a maple-wood gizmo won't violate it.

There are ways to work around this, for example patenting "a method to create a gizmo using knobs frobbing". But they can be worked around by using "frob knobbing" even if it's a trivial replacement.

Re:Multi-touch prior art from 1985, more from 1991

[cheesybagel]

It's the XXIst century. All you need for the patent to be valid is to add "over the Internet" or "in a cellphone" and you are set.

Isn't licence pricing usually kept quiet?

[Colin Smith]

But Nokia wanted more from Apple for these patents than they did from anyone else.

Really? So, exactly how much did Nokia want from Apple?

And exactly how much did the other licensees pay?

 

Link to the full motion to dismiss

[Anonymous Coward]

Digital Daily's posted Nokia's Motion to Dismiss in its entirety: http://digitaldaily.allthingsd.com/20100315/nokia-appl-follo/

Alchemy?

[RyuuzakiTetsuya]

Legal Alchemy? iPad Magic?

Is this Cupertino we're talking about or Hogwarts?

Re:Alchemy?

[Low Ranked Craig]

Maybe Nokia should get a three-headed dog to guard their patents...

Re:Alchemy?

[$RANDOMLUSER]

Certainly not. This is Steve Jobs we're talking about. They meant to say "transubstantiation".

Re:Alchemy?

[onefriedrice]

Legal Alchemy? iPad Magic?

Is this Cupertino we're talking about or Hogwarts?

Seriously. I think Apple's marketing team must all be out on vacation because the image on Apple's homepage had the worst tagline I've ever seen:

"A magical and revolutionary product at an unbelievable price."

That's unbelievably bad. I thought Apple was a lot classier than that garbage.

Re:Alchemy?

[RyuuzakiTetsuya]

it's physical size relative to the iPhone and iPod touch make the price unbelievable to the iPod Touch purchasing consumer.

it's called "Marketing."

When combined with slick user centric and less engineer and devleoper centric tools, can create fuckin' magic.

Re:Alchemy?

[broeman]

"unbelievable price" = even more expensive that you would ever have dreamed of!

Not Alchemy

[Dishevel]

Magic. Cause Apple dose not employ alchemists. They have Wizards.

Re:Not Alchemy

[ascari]

And not "Legal" either. Nokia's position is that what Apple is doing is "Illegal". So the post should have been "Illegal Magic".

Re:Not Alchemy

[Lehk228]

no, the Magic is made by HTC, not Apple

Re:RAND - *IF* you developed it...

[GuyFawkes]

RAND terms only applied IF you developed and contributed to the standard.

RAND terms SPECIFICALLY EXCLUDED everyone who came along afterwards and wanted to use / licence GSM.

Apple DID NOT help develop GSM.

Apple REFUSED to accept non-RAND GSM licencing terms.

These are the facts. These are ALL the facts.

Re:Exactly - it was cross-licences

[robmv]

I do not believe what Apple says. if Apple requested Nokia licensing for the GSM standard related patents, and they refused to provide them in RAND terms, Apple should have gone to the standard body and tell them Nokia wass not doing what they must do.

Apple has no right to implement them just because Nokia refused RAND terms

Re:RAND - *IF* you developed it...

[Dtyst]

Yes, that is true. Apple is not part of RAND, so RAND term do not apply to them.

[citation needed]

[danaris]

That goes counter to how I've always understood the whole point if RAND to be. If you're correct, then no company that ever wanted to use a GSM chip, but was unable to have participated in the creation of the standard due to, oh, I don't know, not having existed at the time or some other equally lame reason would be effectively excluded from being able to make use of this standard in any practical way.

I suspect you're thinking of more normal cross-licensing agreements. Because that's what you've described. If not...extraordinary claims require extraordinary proof.
Dan Aris

Re:[citation needed]

[mvdwege]

For at least W-CDMA related patents, grandparent is right. The only way you get RAND terms is by applying to become a member of the consortium and put up your own patents for the common pool.

Mart

Re:Exactly - it was cross-licences

[Dtyst]

Especially when Apple is not part of RAND and therefore Nokia has no obligation to give Apple their patents for RAND prices.

Obligatory Jefferson quote :

[unity100]

jefferson as in thomas jefferson

It has been pretended by some that inventors have a natural and exclusive right to their inventions, and not merely for their own lives, but inheritable to their heirs. But while it is a moot question whether the origin of any kind of property is derived from nature at all, it would be singular to admit a natural and even an hereditary right to inventors. It is agreed by those who have seriously considered the subject, that no individual has, of natural right, a separate property in an acre of land, for instance. By an universal law, indeed, whatever, whether fixed or movable, belongs to all men equally and in common, is the property for the moment of him who occupies it, but when he relinquishes the occupation, the property goes with it. Stable ownership is the gift of social law, and is given late in the progress of society. It would be curious then, if an idea, the fugitive fermentation of an individual brain, could, of natural right, be claimed in exclusive and stable property. If nature has made any one thing less susceptible than all others of exclusive property, it is the action of the thinking power called an idea, which an individual may exclusively possess as long as he keeps it to himself; but the moment it is divulged, it forces itself into the possession of every one, and the receiver cannot dispossess himself of it. Its peculiar character, too, is that no one possesses the less, because every other possesses the whole of it. He who receives an idea from me, receives instruction himself without lessening mine; as he who lights his taper at mine, receives light without darkening me. That ideas should freely spread from one to another over the globe, for the moral and mutual instruction of man, and improvement of his condition, seems to have been peculiarly and benevolently designed by nature, when she made them, like fire, expansible over all space, without lessening their density in any point, and like the air in which we breathe, move, and have our physical being, incapable of confinement or exclusive appropriation. Inventions then cannot, in nature, be a subject of property. Society may give an exclusive right to the profits arising from them, as an encouragement to men to pursue ideas which may produce utility, but this may or may not be done, according to the will and convenience of the society, without claim or complaint from anybody. Accordingly, it is a fact, as far as I am informed, that England was, until we copied her, the only country on earth which ever, by a general law, gave a legal right to the exclusive use of an idea. In some other countries it is sometimes done, in a great case, and by a special and personal act, but, generally speaking, other nations have thought that these monopolies produce more embarrassment than advantage to society; and it may be observed that the nations which refuse monopolies of invention, are as fruitful as England in new and useful devices.

he basically says patents are bullshit.

Re:Obligatory Jefferson quote :

[unity100]

From the time he wrote that passage until well after WWII the great majority of inventions in the world took place in countries that had a patent system similar to ours.

your understanding of scientific history is beyond flawed.

in between jefferson's time and ww2, information had free flow. scientists, pioneers of scientific age has been sharing their scientific discoveries without holding them hostage. ideas and methods flowed around freely. it was the golden age of discovery.

it was during this time a lot of inventors patented various machinery and inventions based on these FREE FLOWING scientific information and ideas.

the fact that those people patented, does NOT mean that the scientific revolution happened because there were patent systems.

you also lack enough information about scientific history in that a goodly majority of scientific breakthroughs and inventions were made in mainland europe, which did not have a patent system like in u.k., or u.s.

so basically those entrepreneurs in u.s. and u.k. rode free on the free science's ideas and breakthroughs, laying claim to their applications for their own benefit.

the ability to patent an idea may be extremely encouraging to inventors, but it is extremely damaging to science. without science, there can be no ideas.

Re:Obligatory Jefferson quote :

[martin-boundary]

From the time he wrote that passage until well after WWII the great majority of inventions in the world took place in countries that had a patent system similar to ours.

Nonsense. To make such a claim requires comparing patented inventions against unpatented inventions. However, there is no list of all (or even a majority of) unpatented inventions, let alone unpatented inventions that ended up having commercial influence.

Which leaves you with a highly circular type of reasoning: original inventions are generally recognized when they are patented, therefore patenting caused the appearance of inventions.

Ridiculous.

Re:Obligatory Jefferson quote :

[unity100]

yea, because he had to. being forced to something due to circumstances or society's pressure does not mean that you condone it.

Re:Obligatory Jefferson quote :

[joggle]

It depends on how anal you want to be. If you take a high-level approach as Jefferson did then it is a reasonable statement (when he said "and it may be observed that the nations which refuse monopolies of invention, are as fruitful as England in new and useful devices.").

If you compare nations that have weak patent protection (say China or Russia) vs ones that do (most everyone else that is a major world player) the difference in the level of invention is quite large.

Who invented jets? The British. Who invented the airplane? The Americans. Who invented almost every initial contraption related to making electricity available to the public? Americans. Trains (and tons of types of steam engines)? British, French and Americans. Most of the major agriculture inventions in the early 20th and 19th century were also invented in America and England (tractors, the cotton gin, etc).

I could go on.

Then look at major Russian inventions. Did Kalashnikov profit from his invention? Nope. Have Russians made any other guns that have caught traction worldwide? No.

Obviously to 'prove' that having patent protection leads towards more development would be difficult. But to argue that it is ineffective is burying your head in the sand.

Also, the question isn't really the number of useless or little-known inventions, but ones that had an impact. Part of the reason patents exist isn't to stop the spread ideas, but make it easier to spread. First, the information in the patent is public and easily accessible to other inventors. Once the patent expires (presuming it's even granted in the first place) any information in the patent is free to use. In addition, it is meant to encourage the adoption of the invention by making it easier for the inventor to get the capital needed to produce it on a large scale (which I guarantee does help in the real world--try talking to a venture capitalist sometime if you have doubts).

Re:Obligatory Jefferson quote :

[mr_matticus]

he basically says patents are bullshit.

No, he doesn't. He says the idea of "natural property" is bullshit, because it is, and people who consider patents a natural right when real property is a social construct are overstating their case.

"But while it is a moot question whether the origin of any kind of property is derived from nature at all, it would be singular to admit a natural and even an hereditary right to inventors. It is agreed by those who have seriously considered the subject, that no individual has, of natural right, a separate property in an acre of land, for instance."

In fact, he specifically says that if such a system is society's will, then it is entirely proper. "Society may give an exclusive right to the profits arising from them, as an encouragement to men to pursue ideas which may produce utility, but this may or may not be done, according to the will and convenience of the society, without claim or complaint from anybody" (emphasis added)

This same Jefferson, of course, also said:

an inventor ought to be allowed a right to the benefit of his invention for some certain time

He went on to found the Patent Office as Secretary of State and is one of the key figures in the development of patent requirements and practice, specifically because of his particular reservations. Jefferson became a strong proponent of the US patent system.

Re:Obligatory Jefferson quote :

[unity100]

industrial revolution started in england, france in the middle of 18th century (1750s), if you totally ignore the previous movements and its precursors in those countries and netherlands, germany. (then HRE, prussia).

Economic feasibility

[Arancaytar]

The lawyers are happy, and everyone is paying lots of money. At this rate, at some future point it will hopefully become unaffordable to litigate over software patents, and all companies who do so will go the way of SCO.

Wrong

[Too Much Noise]

You keep posting these 'facts' about cross-licensing. You're basically wrong. RTF Filing. From Statement of facts, p 4-5

In late 2007, Apple and Nokia began negotiating a potential license agreement for Nokia's patents essential to the ETSI standards (id. 86). Apple admits that, at the start of the negotiations, and again in September 2009, Nokia offered license terms to Nokia's essential patents that did not require Apple to grant any license back to Apple's non-essential patents (id. 86, 91).3 Apple acknowledges its rejection of Nokia's "standard" license terms (id. 85, 91, 92). Apple's unhappiness about these offers seems only to be that Nokia was asking for what Apple considered too much money for Nokia's essential patents (see id. 91).

Apple also admits that "Nokia defined both a portfolio rate and an average per patent royalty rate" that did not require any
license-back of non-essential patents (id. Answer to 44). Once again, Apple's only problem with these offers is the amount of money involved (id. 91).

Again, according to Nokia's filing, there was an offer to cross-license, but it was Apple that first made it.

Apple further admits that it was willing to grant Nokia a cross-license to certain Apple patents that are not claimed to be essential to any of the standards listed above (id. 87). Apple avers that, in Spring 2008, Nokia made another license offer, proposing Apple expand its prior offer to give Nokia the right to pick a limited number of Apple non-essential patents that would be licensed (id. 89). Apple states that it rejected the proposal (id.).

But hey, don't let facts get in the way of righteous anger.

Re:Wrong

[UnknowingFool]

Your "facts" are Nokia's version of the facts just like it is Apple's version that Nokia wanted unreasonable patents. So is one lying? Well not neccessarily. The disagreement can come from how Nokia and Apple define "non-essential patents". Nokia may think that some of Apple's patents are essential while Apple may contend that they are non-essential. The only neutral 3rd party is the court and it has not made any decisions yet.

Re:RAND - *IF* you developed it...

[diamondsw]

RAND terms only applied IF you developed and contributed to the standard.

Um, wrong much?

From everyone's favorite source:
"companies agree that if they receive any patents on technologies which become essential to the standard then they agree to allow other groups attempting to implement the standard to use those patents and they agree that the charges for those patents shall be reasonable"

There is absolutely nothing involved in being part of the standards body to receive RAND terms. If you're part of the standards body you have to extend RAND terms.

Same Story, Different Name

[Surasanji]

Apple, Microsoft and every other company in the business seems to do this pretty often. Did Apple sue Microsoft on the Window's GUI way back when- something they both stole from Xerox?

Re:Exactly - it was cross-licences

[jo_ham]

This is what the court case is all about. Apple's GSM hardware is all third party, and used by other cellphone makers. The procedures for paying the licences are well understood. It seems (according to Apple) that it was only further into the process that Nokia decided to change the game up.

Apple went to the standards body when Palm started spoofing Apple's USB Vendor ID - that went well for them, right?

Apple must pay the RAND terms for the use of GSM patents. Nokia must allow them to pay in those terms. It cannot ask for more. Where it may get fuzzy is just what "fair" is - if Nokia is attempting to put a cash value on some of Apple's IP and claiming that as payment equal to the RAND terms, and Apple is claiming that it is worth more than that.

Either way, this is not simple - Apple is not foolish enough to launch a phone filled with stardards-based (3rd party driven) GSM and other cellphone radio hardware without paying to use the patents involved.

Re:Exactly - it was cross-licences

[jo_ham]

If Apple wants to use GSM hardware, Nokia is obliged to licence it to them under RAND terms. RAND is not an organisation (in this sense, although there is a non-profit called "the RAND corporation", but it has nothing whatsoever to do with this) it means Reasonable And Non-Discriminatory licensing; which applies to the GSM patents Nokia holds. They are required to licence them fairly and equally to anyone who wants to use them, in exchange for the patents being part of the standard for cellular communication.

Apple doesn't need to be part of anything to be able to licence the patents. You could set up your own mobile phone company in your basement and Nokia would be obliged to licence the patents to you too - at the same rate that everyone pays to use them.

Re:Exactly - it was cross-licences

[robmv]

so you advocate "make justice with your own hands"?

Apple violate patent laws (if this history of no licensing by Nokia is true) just to prove Nokia is evil and must RAND license the patents?

If Apple version is true, why not sue Nokia because they do not license with RAND terms as they "must do" because they added their patent to the standard before using the patents?

Re:Wow, troll mod for mere information...

[joggle]

You certainly aren't trolling but are you correct? I don't know whether Nokia is required to offer Apple reasonable license rates for GSM technology. I thought the whole point of patents is to allow inventors to have a time-limited monopoly to their idea. But as far as I know the only restriction to their invention is the time they are given exclusive rights to it--ie, there is no requirement that they sell rights to their invention to whoever wants to use it.

I'm certainly not a patent attorney so I don't know if you are correct or not.

Eh, yes it is

[SmallFurryCreature]

Else Apple HAS to sell me in Holland music for 1 dollar and NOT 1 euro. Or are there different rules for companies then for consumers?

And Nokia doesn't sell the licenses, it uses cross-licensing which every other player in the industry does all well to ensure against patent cases like this. But Apple has no patents. So, Apple is not asking to pay what everyone else pays because nobody else pays with just cash.

Jobs reality distortion field seems to be fully in effect on you.

Re:Eh, yes it is

[jo_ham]

No, the GSM patents are a special case. No reality distortion field in effect, just a little googling about how the GSM patents are covered.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reasonable_and_Non_Discriminatory_Licensing

This page explains it. In exchange for the patents being part of the GSM standard, Nokia agreed to put them under RAND terms. It doesn't apply to all patents, or to companies, just these ones.

The disagreement is most likely because Apple thinks (rightly or wrongly, hence the lawsuit) that the terms Nokia are asking for are unfair, based on their RAND terms. I don;t know who is actually in the right here, and the lawsuit will ultimately determine it, but it's a lot more complex than "Apple don;t want to pay up".

Re:Eh, yes it is

[fbjon]

Part of the situation is also that fair prices under RAND aren't available to any asker, just within the consortium, i.e. to it's members. The whole thing really seems to me like some sort of business deal wrapped in infringement lawsuit paper anyway, but IANAbusiness expert.

Re:Eh, yes it is

[Lars T.]

And Nokia doesn't sell the licenses, it uses cross-licensing which every other player in the industry does all well to ensure against patent cases like this. But Apple has no patents. So, Apple is not asking to pay what everyone else pays because nobody else pays with just cash.

"because nobody else pays with just cash" - care to prove that?

You're funny....

[einhverfr]

The early phone industry faced very long and complex wars over patent thickets for quite some time. Who had the patent on what parts of the Telephone? Who had patents on various bits of electromechanical switch technology? Cell phones too are very, very patent-laden.

Re:Exactly - it was cross-licences

[chowdahhead]

Can you give a citation please. I've skimmed the Delaware docket and and I can't find anything that mentions cross-licensing. It does state that Nokia was seeking both license fees and interest for past violations. I wondering where it's documented that the fees were excessive or Nokia demanded non-monetary compensation.

RDF patents

[Chas]

Nope.
Chuck Manson got to it first.
Though some ancillary patents are held by the estate of Jim Jones.
There were even a couple filed afterwards by some guy named Khoresh in Waco Texas.

Re:Exactly - it was cross-licences

[jo_ham]

Well, I have no doubt they have tried to do just that. They're not going to let something as basic as licensing GSM patents slip during the iPhone development cycle. I think this is just the later, public revelations about a long drawn out fight.

They probably didn't set out to violate the patent laws, and are using off-the-shelf GSM chips that other manufacturers use, so likely assumed, based on advice/enquiries about the length of time it would take to get the patents paid for.

Re:Wow, troll mod for mere information...

[jo_ham]

For the GSM patents, yes - they are a special case. In exchange for being accepted as part of the standard, Nokia agreed to put them under RAND conditions.

It's a good way to recoup costs of R&D, since the patent becomes a standard, and companies pay equally and fairly for the use of it, fostering compatibility between different systems.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reasonable_and_Non_Discriminatory_Licensing

Re:Steve Jobs says:

[masmullin]

What? Jobs is a cleric? He's gonna grab his holy symbol and mace!

Re:RAND - *IF* you developed it...

[masmullin]

Wikipedia is always 100% correct and always 100% legal... mmmhummm. Thats why my university profs want me to quote ONLY from it.

Buy chips and Pay licencing?

[acomj]

If Apple is buying off the shelf chips for its GSM transmitter, those come with a hidden "Tax" to actually use the chips? Why aren't the chip makers paying the royalty to Nokia if it really has patents on what those chips do?

Re:Buy chips and Pay licencing?

[juissi]

The chip makers pay their royalties to _make_ the chips, but the users of the chips pay the royalties to _use_ them.

Re:Wow, troll mod for mere information...

[joggle]

OK, that makes sense. Then the question is whether the royalties Nokia demanded were reasonable. I can't see any way of determining this from where I sit, it all seems to be information closely held by both Apple and Nokia.

exactly!

[Weezul]

If they invalidated software patents, Apple's whole bullshit portfolio would evaporate, meaning fewer bullshit patent cases. Nokia's parents would remain valid of course because they're actual technological patents resulting from serious research.

In fact, best possible outcome technologically speaking would be Apple's software patents being invalidated, while Apple owing Nokia some small but non-trivial fee for every iPhone shipped, and then Nokia reinvesting that money in further technological advances and MeeGo.

Re:exactly!

[Wovel]

You should go through this thread where several people have shown the actual lists of patents involved. There are at least 2 Nokia software patents and 3 or 4 Apple hardware patents. In short, you have no idea what you are talking about. I seriously doubt you have any idea at all what claims are at the core of this case, you just dislike Apple.

Nokia will settle due to a few solid Apple patents

[hardcache]

Nokia's claim against Apple involves patents Nokia has that are based on industry standards. Where does Nokia's innovation start and where does industry standard end? Can you patent an industry standard? Can you charge license fees that rely on an industry standard? What of the companies involved in the standard - do they now have to pay to use what they developed? Apple's claim against Nokia does not involve's standards but rather patents it owns on mobile device hardware, software, interface... Apple is in a good position on a few of its claims against Nokia. Industry experts believe Nokia and Apple will Settle based on the strength of Apple's claims against Nokia.

Re:Apple is not a member of GSM group

[jo_ham]

The "group" is anyone who wants to use the GSM patents.

A Venn diagram of "everyone" and "wants to use the GSM patents" would have Apple in the bit where the two circles intersect.

Proposal

[bickerdyke]

I herewith propose the use of the expression "legal alchemy" to describe the creative usage of ones own patents, but with more effort put into legal than technical creativity.

Not to be confused with the Patent Troll, which refers to maliciuos use of aquired patents with no creativity at all.

Re:RAND - *IF* you developed it...

[shutdown -p now]

You linked to the general definition of RAND. There's nothing in the definition that precludes some form of "limited RAND", where the terms are only applied to a members of a specific group, and not outside of it.

In any case, every time this Nokia vs Apple topic is raised on Slashdot, I see this very same exchange about RAND. However, neither the side that claims GSM is RAND-licensed to everyone, nor the side which claims some kind of "limited RAND", have offered any definite sources. I've tried to find it on GSM Association website on my own, but wasn't successful.

Until then, both yours and GP's claims are just speculation, and the actual licensing terms for GSM specs, and how they apply to this situation, are unclear.

So the downfall begins

[cenobyte40k]

so the downfall really begins. When as a company you realize that the only way you are going to survive is to sue those that compete with you out of business, you are on the way out. If like the Music Business, Hollywood and now Apple, you have a huge amounts of money and a large eager fan base you might pull it out for awhile, but unless you 'think different' you are on the way out. I think MS might be on the same ride, the major difference between MS and the others is the number of profitable areas it has (Consumer electronics, Office software, operating systems, business systems, consumer application market, gaming, etc, etc). unlike the others that are very highly focused. Apple only makes consumer electronics an some software to support it, Hollywood and the Music industry only make the one product each (expect the parent companies to make it though as they are mostly more like MS) This might allow MS to survive the death of one or more core market areas in the long run (Like Sony could survive the loss of BMG).

Re:Exactly - it was cross-licences

[R3d M3rcury]

You could set up your own mobile phone company in your basement and Nokia would be obliged to licence the patents to you too - at the same rate that everyone pays to use them.

I tried that, but Mom still wants me to get a "real job."

Bummer.

Re:Wow, troll mod for mere information...

[DJRumpy]

Whether or not Nokia can charge more to Apple than it does to other vendors for the same licensing costs is important as it would establish anti-competitive practices. I also don't understand Nokia's stance on this request to dismiss. Do they think that just because Apple has countersued, that their original case will just be ignored? Everyone will get their day in court, regardless of who countersues.

Re:Apple is not a member of GSM group

[Lars T.]

But Apple is not a member of that group and therefore not entitled to those rates.

Which group would that be? The GP doesn't mention any "group". Do you mean the GSM Association? What makes you think Apple is not a member?

Re:Wow, troll mod for mere information...

[mjwx]

Where's the trolling in my post?

Your post may not be trolling but it is definitely incorrect.

RAND only covers specific patents, Apple is trying to use RAND to get access to Nokia's entire patent portfolio including those covered by RAND. RAND exists to prevent one patent holder from prohibiting entry into the market by refusing to license patents relating to the GSM standards, this does not cover all of Nokia's patents.

Apple is only being asked to pay what other manufactures are paying, it is just that Apple has not got a large enough or valuable enough patent portfolio to make cross licensing an attractive or even fair deal for Nokia. Apple is not the only manufacturer that has been asked to pay cash to use Nokia's patents, they are just the only one who thinks they don't have to.

I guess there's someone with a serious axe to grind against Apple with mod points. Shame.

However your reply is a troll, you were incorrect and that does not constitute an anti-Apple conspiracy.

Re:RAND - *IF* you developed it...

[Zxern]

Nice editing to bad you missed a key part.

" The normal case is that when joining the standardization body , companies agree that if they receive any patents on technologies which become essential to the standard then they agree to allow other groups attempting to implement the standard to use those patents and they agree that the charges for those patents shall be reasonable. RAND licenses allow a competitive market to develop between multiple companies making products which implement a standard."

You must be a part of the standardization body to get the full benefits.

Re:Wow, troll mod for mere information...

[mwvdlee]

It should be trivial by simply comparing the licensing fee requested from Apple to that paid by other licensees.

Re:RAND - *IF* you developed it...

[danaris]

Good God, did you even read what you pasted?

The normal case is that when joining the standardization body , companies agree that if they receive any patents on technologies which become essential to the standard then they agree to allow other groups attempting to implement the standard to use those patents and they agree that the charges for those patents shall be reasonable. RAND licenses allow a competitive market to develop between multiple companies making products which implement a standard.

That paragraph says what diamondsw and I were saying. Not what GuyFawkes was trying to say.

Dan Aris

Re:Wow, troll mod for mere information...

[joggle]

It should be trivial, but not for us since that isn't exactly public information.

Re:Apple is not a member of GSM group

[INeededALogin]

Which group would that be? The GP doesn't mention any "group". Do you mean the GSM Association? What makes you think Apple is not a member?

Because they are not on this list


The RAND wiki article that everyone points to... in the first few sentences says that the company gets non-discriminator and reasonable rates for joining the standards body and cross-licensing patents. Apple is not on that page so it is not part of the body.

Re:RAND - *IF* you developed it...

[Reemi]

The FAQ on 3GPP.org is very clear on the terms:

  What is the 3GPP IPR Policy?

The 3GPP Organizational Partners have agreed that their IPR policies should be respected and that their respective members should be encouraged to declare "their willingness to grant licenses on fair reasonable terms and conditions and on non discriminatory basis" (Article 3.1 of the Third Generation Partnership Project). For more information Look Here >>>

The above-mentioned principles are further reflected in Article 55 of the 3GPP Technical Working Procedures which request that each Individual Members should declare "at the earliest opportunity, any IPR which they believe to be essential, or potentially essential, to any work ongoing within 3GPP".

What is the 3GPP policy on licensing?

Some aspects of 3GPP systems are covered by essential Intellectual Property Rights (IPR) - that is, patented technologies without which equipment cannot be implemented. The IPR vests in - i.e. the patents are held by - individual companies, and not by 3GPP itself or any of its Organizational Partners (OPs). All Individual Members of 3GPP abide by the IPR policies of the OP to which they belong; all such policies are broadly similar (see FAQ 3.1), and require IPR holders to make licences available to all third parties, whether or not they are 3GPP Individual Members, under fair, reasonable and non-discriminatory (FRAND) terms.

Re:Apple is not a member of GSM group

[Lars T.]

Which group would that be? The GP doesn't mention any "group". Do you mean the GSM Association? What makes you think Apple is not a member? Because they are not on this list

Good point - but wait, where is Nokia? Where is is Motorola, HTC and the others building Android phones? Gee, I have the feeling you found the fucking wrong list - but thanks for trying.

Re:RAND - *IF* you developed it...

[shutdown -p now]

A good find, thank you. That said, if I understand it correctly, 3GPP only covers GSM 3G patents, not the older GSM patents; the latter is what GSM Association is all about.

Re:YHow do you know that?

[jo_ham]

Well, the rules are pretty simple - GSM is patented, and you need to pay a licence fee. It's not like they suddenly realised - however, the question of the bill is what is at issue.

It's like you going to a restaurant with 4 friends and then being billed for 10 meals.

Re:RAND - *IF* you developed it...

[Reemi]

3GPP includes as well the original GSM (2G, phase 1) specification and my interpretation therefore is that patents related to GSM phase 1 fall under RAND as well.

GSM standardization activities started in 1982 (GSM == Groupe Spécial Mobile). In 1989 the responsibilities were transferred to ETSI and in 1990 Phase 1 was completed. That means, the original GSM technologies should be patent free (20 year).

3GPP initially copied the ETSI specifications and started working with that as a basis.

The GSM Association you refer to is according my knowledge not working on any technical standardization. They seem to be more operator focused.

Re:RAND - *IF* you developed it...

[Weezul]

Thanks that's very clarifying. But how are the contracts actually implemented?

It appears the patents are not simply offered under a fixed license, like say a GPLed program. Each case requires separate negotiation. So what happens if a patent holder blocks that process?

I'd naively imagine that, as the patents are not distributed under a fixed license, the licensee must ultimately appeal to 3GPP itself if they feel the terms are unfair, no?

If A and B enter into a contract, and A reneges, then B has a very strong case against A. If C is hurt by A reneging, they won't have nearly so strong a case.

We've then got all the sticky issues like : Apple declining the initial offer that places essential IPR under FRAND terms. Apple's ongoing infringement. And all how both companies will throw in tangentially relevant patents. etc.

Re:RAND - *IF* you developed it...

[Weezul]

Yes, but the issue seems far more complex :

(1) Nokia says their first offer placed GSM essential patents under FRAND terms, proposing additional cross licensing only for non-essential patents.

(2) Who enforces Apple's access to FRAND terms? I'd imagine the FRAND obligations are spelled out in contracts between Nokia and 3GPP.

(3) Apple has now been violating these patents for several years now. It's doubtful that FRAND terms apply to past infringement.

Re:RAND - *IF* you developed it...

[Reemi]

The implementation of this all is left to the owners of the IPR. 3GPP only wants to ensure that nobody can block others from implementing the specification. Guess it is up to the local courts to decide what is fair.

Without having insight, I assume that in this case the discussion is more about the value estimation of the IPR portfolios. My guess is that Nokia does not consider the Apple portfolio as very valuable for them as the only need a part of the Apple IPRs.

And as an other poster pointed out, the discussion could be as wel regarding a per-unit fee based on sales price. As Apple is into deals with operators (keeping initial price low) they might not like Nokia going for the secondary payments.

Again, all is guessing. We will need to wait.

Re:RAND - *IF* you developed it...

[Zxern]

Sigh. The wiki states: the normal case
As in usually but not always.

Just because most RAND agreements are written in such a way does not mean that the GSM RAND was written that way.

Till we actually see the terms no one really knows.

Re:RAND - *IF* you developed it...

[danaris]

Sure, but if you wanted to show that the GSM patents were not meant to be available under RAND terms to non-members, why the hell did you quote that passage? All it says is, "Usually when you patent something and get it added to a standard, you have to license it under RAND terms."

That would be like being asked for evidence that the grass outside your window was red, and saying, "Well, usually, grass is green."

Dan Aris