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US ITC May Reverse Judge's Ruling In Kodak vs. Apple
An anonymous reader writes "Going after Apple and RIM, Kodak says, 'every digital camera and phone with a camera' infringes on its patents. A judge sided against Kodak in January, but now the US International Trade Commission has agreed to review the judge's decision. With the ITC's ability to block imports, Apple and RIM may have no choice but to fork over dough to Kodak in the event of an unfavorable decision. If the ITC can toss out court decisions like this, one wonders how much hope there is for patent reform. The patent in question is Patent Number 6292218: 'Electronic camera for initiating capture of still images while previewing motion images.'"
...the Judge's decision. I thought only an Appeals Court can do that, not an AGENCY of the Administration.
I am not merely a "consumer" or a "taxpayer". I am a Citizen of the State of Texas
...the Judge's decision. I thought only an Appeals Court can do that, not an AGENCY of the Administration.
In today's America jurisdictions and authority seem to be dynamically defined ... once again IT methodology has creeped beyond its scope.
...the Judge's decision. I thought only an Appeals Court can do that, not an AGENCY of the Administration.
FTA: "ITC Judge Paul Luckern on Jan. 24 agreed with the companies on both issues." The first judge was a judge on the ITC. Essentially we have a judge reviewing his own court's decision. It's not like the ITC is trying to reverse a federal Court of Appeals or something along those lines.
Read the original article on bloomberg.com. It says
Apple and RIM denied infringing the patent and argued it was invalid. ITC Judge Paul Luckern on Jan. 24 agreed with the companies on both issues.
So it seems that the "ruling" was just an earlier finding of the same agency (and the Slashdot summary was misleading). Maybe Apple and RIM need to sue in regular court, then your question would apply.
C - the footgun of programming languages
Regular courts are too slow; by the time the final decision comes down it's moot or nearly so. So everything is effectively decided in the preliminary stages, whether via an ITC order to stop imports, or a TRO, or whatever. Once you've blocked the other guy's product, you just drag out the regular court proceedings until they cry uncle.
Because there is a mile of difference between an administrative law judge and an Article III Federal judge. One is an employee of the agency involved, essentially an "Article I" judge that is a member of the Executive branch. The other is a member of the Judicial branch. One is used within an agency to determine the agency's position on an issue. The other has the power to review agency decisions and to overturn them. The linked article is describing an internal appeal process within the agency prior to the agency developing a 'final' agency position.
We "throw out" the Constitution YEARS ago.... that is how.
As usual. The ITC doesn't decide whether there is patent infringement, they decide whether there is enough evidence of patent infringement so that a company should be stopped from importing things into the USA to stop them from infringing on patents. So they should only stop the most obvious cases. The patent dispute goes to court anyway, and if the ITC had stopped Apple from importing iPhones into the USA, and then it turned out that actually Apple hadn't infringed on any patents, then that would be some major problem.
And of course Kodak can ask the ITC to reconsider its decision. So they will look at the exact same evidence again. Now I don't know what the rules are for a decision of the ITC, but in a court judgement the ruling would only be changed if the first judge had made blatant errors. I'd think that is unlikely to happen.
Doing "Thing A" in the background while showing "Thing B" to the observer?
I think politicians have Prior Art on that one!
Wait.. what? What about prior art? How is this even a patent? I was using an electronic system to capture still images while previewing a motion image back in the early 90's. In fact, I made a still image "movie" of just such a thing of part of "Harlem Knights." It was a black and white, low resolution digitizer, but it still is the same principal.
I forget what the brand/name of the device was, but I was using it for a myriad of things back in 1990 or 1991 at the latest. That right there should invalidate the patent, since the patent was filed in 1997.
I can not lay my hand on any part of the Union Constitution which gives the Executive branch power to act like the Judicial branch. Perhaps I don't understand the "ITC"'s location within the government, but it appears to me to be an unconstitutional organization.
As for the patent:
People at my Computer Users Group were taking digital photos with Commodore Amigas as early as 1985. I still have several of them stored away. That would be considered "prior art" right? So the patent should be invalidated.
My AC stalker: " I personally agree with your posts most of the time, but that won't keep me from modding you troll"
Before digital cameras, that was known as a "viewfinder": capture a still image while previewing the world through a tiny little window. Die in a fire, Kodak. You used to be great, but you've completely SCO'ed your reputation.
Dewey, what part of this looks like authorities should be involved?
I'm just waiting for my patent on blinking and metabolizing oxygen to go through. Muh ha ha ha.
No, because the patent isn't for taking digital photos.
Quidnam Latine loqui modo coepi?
"Electronic camera for initiating capture of still images while previewing motion images.'"
Sounds exactly the same as what my Amiga-owning colleagues were doing in 1985, 86, 87, et cetera.
My AC stalker: " I personally agree with your posts most of the time, but that won't keep me from modding you troll"
Try actually reading the patent to find out what is actually patented. The title doesn't tell the whole story. Ever.
Quidnam Latine loqui modo coepi?
All I can say about this is wow!
http://www.DrewryNewsNetwork.com
Too bad we have to wait until 2017 for their patent to expire... I'm surprised this patent didn't infringe on the VCR's PAUSE button.
In this case we see the double standard portrayed extremely clearly.
There are other cases. Just consider the case of Mr. Håkan Lans, in this one his patents basically got stolen from him. He got ripped off. And still no justice to him - not surprisingly.
Another one? Check out Nokia vs. Qualcomm. Once the other side kills the counterparty's chief lawyer, you know stakes are high.
US expects other countries to fully follow the US IP regime (ACTA is pushed in, DMCA warnings sent around the world). But then, when the US companies would stand to lose against a non-US company in a patent dispute, suddenly there are legal magic tricks and other dirty tricks, and the non-US company loses.
What I can't fathom is why the world plays along with this nonsense.
I skimmed the patent 6292218 that was filed in 1997 and it might not be applicable to current cameras. It describes a camera with "a removable memory card", which many devices like iphone and ipad don't have. It also describes two separate processors, one for previews and one for the captured picture, and also a multiplexer that the display uses to select which image to display. I suspect current cameras don't have true separate "processors", rather just a flag in firmware to decide what to do. However, in 1997 this kind of processing probably needed to be done separately. The patent was issued in 2001, so I'm not sure why Kodak waited 10 years on this.
I can not lay my hand on any part of the Union Constitution which gives the Executive branch power to act like the Judicial branch. Perhaps I don't understand the "ITC"'s location within the government, but it appears to me to be an unconstitutional organization.
The ITC is an Article I court or "legislative court," so-called because they are created by an act of Congress. The Supreme Court has repeatedly upheld the constitutionality of Article I courts, at least when certain constraints are in place (e.g. their rulings must be reviewable by a regular Article III court). "[I]t long has been settled that Article 3 does not express the full authority of Congress to create courts, and that other articles invest Congress with powers in the exertion of which it may create inferior courts and clothe them with functions deemed essential or helpful in carrying those powers into execution." Ex parte Bakelite Corp., 279 U.S. 438 (1929). "Article III does not confer on litigants an absolute right to the plenary consideration of every nature of claim by an Article III court." Commodity Futures Trading Com'n v. Schor, 478 U.S. 833 (1986). Assigning limited adjudicatory functions to Article I courts is "consistent with Art. III, so long as the essential attributes of the judicial power are retained in the Art. III court, and so long as Congress' adjustment of the traditional manner of adjudication can be sufficiently linked to its legislative power to define substantive rights." Northern Pipeline Constr. Co. v. Marathon Pipe Line Co., 458 US 50 (1982).
There are tons of Article I courts, including the ITC, Bankruptcy Courts, Tax Courts, courts-martial, the Patent Office's Board of Patent Appeals and Interferences and Trademark Trial and Appeal Board. Decisions of the ITC are reviewable by the Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit and from there the US Supreme Court.
I am not supporting the basis of the authority-
I'm just pointing out the relevant section/basis for argument.
There are sections of our constitution which equivocate international treaties and the constitution
the absoluteness of such equality is debated, usually towards whatever point of view the debater wants to take.
BUT, a treaty signed into international law, where the US part of fulfilling the terms of the treaty is handed to the executive branch- which then creates an agency to upkeep the mandate.
could in fact cause the thus designated agency (in this case ITC) to have powers & duties equal to those otherwise held by the judicial.
every day http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Random
Patent filing date has nothing to do with it, we have 'first to invent' rules
(so happy or not- that is the current law- gotta live with it for now)
so if Kodak can prove they did it before someone else-- they win for first to invent
BTW, I readily found a website
http://www.retrothing.com/2008/05/kodaks-first-di.html
indicating kodak first met the conditions of the patent in 1975
"The device was semi-portable, and a massive VCR-sized microcomputer was used to display the images on a TV screen using a primitive frame store, but I doubt that the Kodak executives saw digital technology as a credible threat to their existing product line"
every day http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Random
What part of the ITC system is unconstitutional?
I can't see Kodak and SCO in the same light. wallowing and desperate for cash mebbe, but not SCO.
Kodak isn't trying to sue the community at large. Big difference to me.
(and no, I don't own any Kodak product or Kodak stock)
So it seems that the "ruling" was just an earlier finding of the same agency (and the Slashdot summary was wrong)
FTFT (Fixed that for them)
I remember something else; it was at a mall in the late 70s if I remember correctly, or maybe very early eighties, where someone used a *video camera* hooked up to a control monitor where you saw the image in real time and a device that printed the image on a line printer when he pressed the button.
The first claim requires the camera to have a capture button.
"(d) a capture button for initiating capture of a still image while previewing the motion images presented on the color display;"
Apple may want to argue that a touch screen is technically not a button. It would explain Apple's position for apps in the app store that apps are not allowed to remap a physical button as a capture button.
Bert
Thinking about this case made me realize why patents are a bad idea. And the problem with patents have to do with the scarcity of invention ... or lack of thereof.
Patents give inventors monopoly over their invention, even if other people come up with the same idea independently.
One of the main assumptions justifying this is that invention is scarce. Coming up with an invention requires either a rare original idea which is hard to come by, some special insight that only few brilliant people would have, or a tremendous amount of effort that only few would be willing to spend on developing such an invention.
If inventions are indeed rare, then the benefit of encouraging innovation by giving such monopolistic power to the inventor, and making it safe for the inventor to publish the invention and license it to others is greater than the damage caused by such monopoly. If invention is easy to come by, on the other hand, such monopolistic power stifles innovation rather than foster it.
If you look at most patents, even the better ones, where there is no issue of prior art, most of them are solutions that are easy to come by. They may not be immediately obvious, but if you take any reasonably experienced engineer and give him a few months to work on this problem, they would come up with a solution, and probably a similar solution. With thousands of qualified engineers in each area and hundreds of companies that benefit from such inventions, it no longer makes sense to protect them with patents.
Patentable inventions are supposed to be "non-obvious", but this doesn't solve the problem. Even if the USPTO made a better job of filtering out obvious inventions (more than the lousy job they're doing right now), we'll still have all these patents where the solution is not immediately obvious but are the kind of invention that any qualified engineer could come by. And because this is true for most inventions, and because there is no clear criteria for distinguishing between the true "high quality" and the lower quality patents, I think we are better off by eliminating patents in most areas altogether.
You must be knew here. If it isn't literally in the US Constitution and mean what the poster wants it to mean it's clearly unconstitutional.
The executive branch has people that may be called "judges" or "magistrates" or "arbitrators" -- they use them all the time to decide if people are entitled to certain Social Security benefits, Section 8 housing, certain tax regimes, etc. but they are not "judges" in the sense of the federal Constitution, because they are not presiding over an "Article 3 Tribunal."
Don't blame me, I voted for Baltar.
I invent something today,
file in ten years
the patent is granted as of the day I file it + the life of the patent, not the invention date.
the basis for granting the patent is first to create
the life of the patent is based on filing/issue date
every day http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Random
It only applies to single CCD color sensors using a color mosiac. I would presume all 3 CCD cameras are not covered.
(a) an image sensor having a two-dimensional array of photosites covered by a mosaic pattern of color filters including at least three different colors for capturing images of a scene, each captured image having a first number of color pixel values provided in a first color pattern;
The truth shall set you free!
Your digital hardware is proprietary garbage and broken as shit, the rest of your products are a buggy-whip industry, and on top of that you're a patent troll.
Fuck off and die. kthx.
Damn, the computer mis-moderated, so I'm going to have to cancel the mod with a post. That's a brilliant overview!
It's a small world and it smells funny; I'd buy another if it wasn't for the money; Take back what I paid (SoM)
I had an 8mm video camera in 1996 that could also take still photos with a resolution of about 400k pixels, but the resolution of the viewfinder was about 100k pixels. This seems to be prior art? (The patent seems to be about previewing at a low res, but capturing at a high res.)
Don't know how the patent law is in the USA, but to make sense, a patent law must include some kind of lower limit (in German "Schöpfungshöhe"), to distinguish between real inventions and non-patentable trivialities. Does patent law in the USA really lack that, are their employees so incompetent that they may have missed how trivial this is, or have they been bribed for granting the patent anyway?
With a sensor like the CCDs in digital cameras, which deliver a constant stream of data, it is most obvious that you will display that stream (the "motion pictures"), even when the device's main use is to take still images.
No invention to see here, Kodak, move on.
You might argue about the problems patents bring us but this at least isn't a "systems and methods" patent which I hate so much. It's a pretty solid one... if they were really granted it they got a solid case in my opinion. I hope they won't win because this could really stifle innovation (I'd hate to see a smartphone without a camera, music player, and so on because patents are stopping it or making it too expensive). But in a legal way I think Kodak is unfortunately right.
This is actually a significant change, assuming live demosaicing of images hadn't been done before.
-- Let us endeavor so to live that when we pass even the undertaker shall be sorry. -- M. Twain
I have a patent for a "container which typically holds liquids". Now I can sue anyone that has something remotely resembling a drinking glass... " wait u have an ice chest? ... That ice chest is holding water?... Nope I'm suing...
Yes, I did bother, and found out that indeed, the title is a summary of what is achieved but the actual content of the patent is a specific approach to achieving it.
Quidnam Latine loqui modo coepi?
You need to read the enumerated and numbered claims. A patent isn't defined by it's summary. It's defined in the claims.
I can not lay my hand on any part of the Union Constitution which gives the Executive branch power to act like the Judicial branch.
The ITC can't act like a judicial court. All the ITC can do is block the import of specific products. An ITC ruling can't award damages or send anyone to prison (not that the ITC would have anything to do with criminal cases anyway). A judge in a federal court will take into account an ITC decision for the same parties for the same patents, so the side that wins in the ITC is more likely to win in federal court, but it's certainly not a requirement.
Most inventions seem trivial after they have been invented and fully developed.
You know that electric light thing? Just a bulb with a filament in it. Trivial. What about radio? Exactly like the sunlight that has been shining down on Earth for billions of years. Sure the frequency is different and there is an applied signal, but that sort of change is obvious to anyone practiced in the art. All of the patents that include a radio must have been bought with graft of some sort.
By this same reasoning, you can't patent anything, ever. If that is your point, then fine - I get it it. The truth is this invention might seem obvious to you now, but it was not back then. Kodak developed several inventions critical to the digital camera we all enjoy today, including this.
Not sure exactly how to read a patent, but one of the claims refers to a "removable memory card".
That looks fine for Apple then.
Jason.
The ITC is made up of six people who delegate patent infringement actions to an administrative law judge. The ALJ runs the proceeding like a court and then makes an "initial determination" to the commission about whether they should exclude products from entry into the country. The commission deciding to review this finding isn't necessarily a sign they will reverse or even change the outcome. It's just an indication that it's an important case that they want to review before the decision of the ALJ (who is just a guy hired by the commission) becomes final. Even if the ITC decides to exclude products, the President (yes, Obama) has an opportunity to reverse the decision because the ITC is an administrative AGENCY (not a court) under the jurisdiction of the executive branch of the government. I wish these basic facts would sink in to anyone out there reporting on ITC news. If the President doesn't take action reversing the ITC determination, only then does it finally go to a real court: the Federal Circuit and then the Supreme Court if they'll hear it. There's a lot more to go folks.
Claim 1 is the important part. Notice that is doesn't mention memory card.
Luckern is an administrative law judge. They are the sort of judges who review and administer federal regulations to take the load off of the federal judiciary, like tax and bankruptcy and immigration courts (and kill the taxpayer with redundancy). Ad law judges are known as "Article I judges," as opposed to Article III judges in the judiciary. Kind of a misnomer, since Article I of the Constitution never actually mentions judges.
Anyway, my understanding is that the IT Commission itself - not judges, but political appointees - will review this decision. And even if the ITC overrules the decision, they cannot award damages, just prevent offending imports (I guess that would apply to Apple products, since they are assembled in China). And most importantly, any decision by any Article I court is reviewable by real judges, i.e., Article III judges (US District courts, the DC circuit, SCOTUS). So I'm thinking a sitting judge, even Article I, is going to know the law better than some politicos (i.e., even if they overturned him, he'd likely be upheld on appeal).
Plus there are lawsuits involved - both Kodak and Apple are suing each other - so this will be going on for a while, and the ITC won't have the final word.
BTW, IAAL and this ITC stuff was new to me. Learn something every day.
Slashdot "libertarians": Small government for me, big government for those I disagree with. -1, I disagree with you
Kodak hasn't patented the idea of a video preview for a still camera. They patented the idea of taking limited information for the sensor (i.e. skipping pixels) in a specific way to provide a faster, low-quality video preview instead of previewing the data off the entire sensor. Additionally, they talk about taking the data off the sensor in a specific way so that the pixels still maintain the Bayer-filter. When Kodak sold off their OLED technology, I thought they were screwed. With this patent, they may actually have a case...
Apple should fork over a pile of dosh. Not so sure about RIM, but Apple was founded on stealing ideas from other people like PARC. Heck, even the name was taken from the Beatles - for which Apple has had to pay for twice now. And they sue for names not even remotely their own - anyone remember iPood?
But don't think that I'm picking on Apple alone. Disney's history is hardly Snow White either. And now Disney is the biggest hypocrite in the Don't Steal From Me crowd after Apple.
"It's the height of ridiculousness to say for those 9 lines you get hundreds of millions."
Not all CCD sensors can do video. Full-frame devices, which have been used in consumer cameras and are still used in high-end high-res large format cameras, need a shutter and typically do not provide video output. Keep in mind the patent is from 10 years ago. If X*r*x can patent a switch on a copier that lets you put the same size paper in two paper trays, then this patent is quite non-obvious in comparison. Given my experience getting patents at Kodak, their patent bribery system is not very effective! Disclaimer: I am a former Kodak employee and know both the people who wrote this patent. One of them was my first supervisor. They are technically solid.
Sorry, but gray text on gray background is making my eyes bleed.
This should be the first clue.
It only applies to single CCD color sensors using a color mosiac. I would presume all 3 CCD cameras are not covered.
...and this is a perfect example of all that's wrong with the patent system. Patents are supposed to be "non-obvious". Doing it in color instead of black-and-white is about engineering, not imagination.
No sig today...
The patent looks like a schematic of an SGI Indy
with Indy Cam to me.
I recall previewing images in the digital domain
and clicking to capture it. Scripts would
post process... as one might want. One example
was a security tool hacked by someone tired of
having the cleaners swipe candy. A sequence of
stills was inspected for deltas and if things move
more than a bit a movie or a sequence of stills
was saved and in once case transported to a machine
in another building with a locked door.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SGI_Indy
" It was the first computer to include a digital video camera, and...."
Modern cameras and phones are just smaller.
Truth is stranger than fiction, but it is because Fiction is obliged to stick to possibilities; Truth isn't. Mark Twain.
Doing two things at the same time doesn't (or shouldn't) make a patent. It's plainly obvious that it's desirable for electronic devices--computers, which nearly every electronic device technically is nowadays--to do things simultaneously in a useful way.
I believe that patents are now simply evil and should be abolished. "I thought of it first!" is what it boils down to, and it is just as much whining now as it was in kindergarten. Let inventors negotiate for confidentiality, let companies keep trade secrets, and let other companies be rewarded for their hard work at reverse engineering. Then look who gets rewarded: those who actually do work, not those who sit around doing nothing but telling others that they can't use their imaginary property.
Sheesh, the very idea of imaginary property is so absurd, it's only because people don't think for themselves that they accept the idea of it. Without the free exchange of ideas, we'd still be living in caves going "Ug!" It's shameful.
"Those who consume the bulk of goods are those who make them. We must never forget this secret of our prosperity."