Spotify Sued For Patent Infringement

An anonymous reader writes "Celebrated online music player Spotify just entered the US market a few weeks ago, and already it's being sued for patent infringement. Welcome to America! The patent in question is a very very broad patent on distribution of music in a digital form, which basically describes how anyone would ever distribute digital music. The company suing, PacketVideo, has no competing product. It just wants money from the company that actually innovated."

Comments

Look at the bright side:

[MyFirstNameIsPaul]

In 3 years it will be public domain to broadly distribute music in a digital form.

Re:Look at the bright side:

[StripedCow]

Yes, but probably there will be various other patents to practically prevent that.

Spotify

[m2vq]

Spotify is actually an awesome service. For a few years it has almost completely stopped music piracy in scandinavia and in other european countries. Now instead of sending each other mp3 files as file transfer people are just pasting spotify links in IM conversations here. It's something music companies should be proud of, and help it grow even more.

Re:Spotify

[Anonymous Coward]

If you buy a track on Spotify it will be downloaded as a DRM free MP3.

Re:Spotify

[dakameleon]

I suppose artists should be celebrating getting 0.00029c per play than nothing at all, right?

Re:Spotify

[m2vq]

If you are an artist that no one listens to, what did you expect to get, seriously? If you produce good music that people like to listen to you also get good revenue. (and please don't drag "but music is shit now and it was better before" or "mainstream music is for idiots, indies rock" in to this, they are doing worse everywhere)

Re:Spotify

[Spad]

Well given that they would normally get 0c per play of a CD or iTunes track then I'd imagine so.

Assuming a ~$1 track price on something like iTunes (and this 9p to the artist as per your linked article), the break-even point is about 300 plays, but the assumption (pretty fairly IMO) is that far more people will hear your stuff on Spotify than would buy it on iTunes, so in reality it's probably a pretty decent deal.

Re:Spotify

[PARENA]

I use the native Linux version and volume control works just fine for me. I'm on openSUSE. Unpack the deb file (ar vx spotify-...deb). Then cd to / and tar xzvf /location/of/unpackageddeb/data.tar.gz and voila! Works like a charm.

Re:Spotify

[CowboyBob500]

If an artist is trying to create something to make money then they are doing it for the wrong reason - and it most likely shows (see Rebecca Black). If as an artist you end up making money, then that's great but it should never be a driving factor in the creation process. Which is why every single artist I know (including myself) would still put their music up on Spotify even if they paid nothing at all. It's all about spreading the word, finding an audience, and most importantly people appreciating what you are doing. One person saying they enjoy your art is worth more than any money these companies pay - whether that's 0.00029c or 99c (or whatever) per play.

(This is all IMO obviously)

Re:Spotify

[psiden]

The big record companies share very little with the artist, but as for buying a CD or paying to download a song from iTunes (just as you can, do from Spotify if you like to!) the artists share isn't any better. So comparably it's still a reasonable price for EACH TIME a song is played by A SINGLE LISTENER, especially if you compare with what you get as an artist when your songs are played on the radio. And streaming is radio, only the listeners decide the playlist themselves. The more people play a song, the more the record companies gets, simple as that. How much (or little) that actually propagate to the artists is nothing but a disgrace, but its not Spotify's fault. The interesting amount is how much Spotify PAYS, not how much the artists actually gets. And in Scandinavia that amount has grown exponentially since the start.

Re:Spotify

[Orphis]

You have to enable the "High quality streaming" option in the preferences panel to have a better quality.

Re:Spotify

[Anonymous Coward]

Where is this dungeon where these people are being "forced" to do anything? I keep hearing about it, but all I see is people who choose to do something that everyone knows rarely makes money for the vast majority of people who do it. It's the same thing for people who aspire to be pro athletes. Yes, there are a handful who make ridiculous sums, but the vast majority don't make a living wage, either because they don't get picked up by a team at all, or because they simply aren't good enough, etc.

People try to say exactly the same thing about open source and software development. If people are giving away all this work without the ability to "control" it (as if that's even possible in the real world), how will programmers make any money? And yet, here are all these people (myself included) who continue to be paid very healthy amounts of money to do just that.

My suggestion to stop living in the world of theory, and look at how things actually work in the real world.

Re:Spotify

[fortyonejb]

If you discount art solely because you don't like the intentions behind the creator then you have no business being an artist.

On the bright side

[scottbomb]

The more these patent trolls do their thing, the closer we get to legislation that puts an end (or at least seriously hampers) such behavior. Unfortunately, such legislation tends to have unintended consequences but seriously, this is getting out of control and something needs to be done. I can see this as another case where the "loser pays" idea may have an impact.

Re:On the bright side

[scottbomb]

Sorry, MyFirstNameIsPaul. It seems I may have inadvertently infringed on your subject title. Please, don't sue me.

Re:On the bright side

[Anonymous Coward]

I heard that the Congress will take care of that legislation you're talking about right after they agree on raising the debt limit...

Re:On the bright side

[gilesjuk]

It seems to be easier to develop a cool idea, patent it, never develop it then sit and wait for someone else to do a similar idea so you can sue them.

This goes against the original idea of patents which was to give small companies a fighting chance at developing a new product.

Re:On the bright side

[JaredOfEuropa]

That is exactly what companies like Intellectual Ventures (started by some former Microsoft bigwigs) do. They sit around all day in think tanks coming up with "cool ideas", not with the intention of actually putting in the effort to turn these ideas into products, but simply patenting them by the tens of thousands. They wait until someone comes along with the same idea who does develop a product, then they cash in. Intellectual vultures indeed.

By the way, I have no indication whatsoever that legislators in the US or Europe are of the opinion that the current patent system is hurting innovation. Is anything happening on that front?

Nice Intro to Software Patent Issue

[uncadonna]

If you're having trouble explaining the software patent issue to someone you think might be interested, refer them to Julian Sanchez' recent article which sums it up very nicely.

Re:Nice Intro to Software Patent Issue

[bmo]

A better introduction is This American Life episode 441.

http://www.thisamericanlife.org/radio-archives/episode/441/when-patents-attack

The best show on radio, ever.

--
BMO

Re:Nice Intro to Software Patent Issue

[NeutronCowboy]

I'm glad someone else heard that show. I'm thinking that if the problem of patent trolling has reached the rather staid waves of public radio, there's a chance that it might gain some serious traction in the broader population.

Re:Nice Intro to Software Patent Issue

[bmo]

Whenever this is brought up, people like you hop up and down and behave as if removing patents from software would leave software completely unprotected. Software got along fine for decades without patents. It even got along fine without copyright protection until the 80s.

Now it's the only thing on the planet that is protected by patent and copyright. This is unique and contradictory.

You patent mechanisms. You copyright art and literary works.

Pick one, and one only, please.

Copyright seems to protect software much more than patents. Indeed, current practice is that software is written and published without patents in mind at all. Software designers are told to deliberately not look for existing patents because if one does, it is "proof you knew or should have known" of a patent and any damages from a lawsuit are tripled because it's now "willful infringement" instead of incidental.

It's a bet. It's a bet that litigation will hit "the other guy" before you, and it's a bet that a patent, if it's brought up in a lawsuit, is trivial and obvious and it's also a bet that if it's not trivial and obvious, that a patent swap can be made. It's the little guy that gets stomped on in the last bit because the little guy has one or two patents and not the amount needed for MAD when a big company comes knocking.

This means that patents do nothing but harm the little guy when it comes to software. If you are a little guy, your best bet with a patent is to sell it for chump change (a few tens of thousands of dollars) to Intellectual Ventures, because you sure as hell aren't going to be able to do anything with it yourself if the IVs of the world get their way. You got 5 million to fight a lawsuit? No? Tough shit, then.

--
BMO

Actually, this is for DRM protected music...

[cliffjumper222]

Reading Claim 1, of which all the others are dependent, this is for the distribution of music using a user-specific DRM system. Also, the claim is incredibly long which != broad BTW. Remember, do one thing differently and you're golden. Reading the claim and with such specific nuggets like the music having to include a "core" that includes "at least one object identification code, object structure information, a consumer code and an encryption table", and at least one "layer" around the core containing "the actual music information" etc and I wonder if anyone would actually do it that way anyway. That was probably the way PacketVideo did it, who have actually be around for years doing video meida streaming going back to the 56K modem days (and probably before). And they are innovators, not a troll.

It's a self-perpetuating problem

[mykos]

Patents, in theory, are designed with the ultimate goal of rewarding creativity. But now creative people can't walk two steps without tripping over a patent. So now they have to work for a giant company who has a mountain of patents in its vault just so they have protection from being sued out of existence by companies like the ones they work for.

Oh yeah, and anything creative the individual come up with is now property of the corporation, adding to the cycle.

"Celebrated" my ass

[oldhack]

US Patent laws are crap.

But who "celebrated" this thing? PR bullshit.

Re:"Celebrated" my ass

[cronius]

I've used (the paid version of) Spotify for a couple of years now and I absolutely love it. I can listen to an uninterrupted ocean of music all day long (both at work and at home), keep offline copies of playlists on my cellphone for running etc. and recently I've started to discover a lot of new music by simply browsing recommendations, different labels and so on inside Spotify. I'd say it's pretty rare to see a Party in Norway these days where the music doesn't come from Spotify. (They also have a native Linux client, which is a plus.)

The only complaints I have is:
1) Some music is not available. Sometimes single tracks, albums or even entire artists (e.g. metallica).
2) Some music switches between being available and not. It's annoying to see a part of a playlist I've made suddenly grayed out because "the artist or label has chosen not to make these songs available in your region". And suddenly they're available again for whatever reason.

But overall I'm very happy. Oh and it's also easy to share music. Example: For those who have Spotify, check out these playlists I've published (if the browser doesn't automatically open Spotify, just copy the spotify-url into the search bar of Spotify):
http://open.spotify.com/user/cronius/playlist/7yitDSr8e6uLORAkdA3mxm (Chilli)
http://open.spotify.com/user/cronius/playlist/3flYNN5Oe7dhW3Vths0D7J (Electronica)

Fuck all patents and patent holders

[fadir]

Seriously, I'm sick and tired of this.

I'm absolutely convinced that we suffer way greater from all the damage those patent trolls cause and the general barrier that the pure existence of patents pose than the potential issues of a total removal of patents would cause. I have yet to see any conclusive argumentation why we actually need (in the meaning of: the society as a whole) patents. There might be slight issues with innovation in certain areas during the transition but I'm sure that this wouldn't outweigh the benefits of not having to employ hordes of lawyers or being afraid to get sued to hell and back all the time.

Re:Fuck all patents and patent holders

[fadir]

We are working hard to change that! Barely a month passes without some idiot endorsing the idea to introduce software patents or the like.

I used to work for DWS/PacketVideo

[pyalot]

As anybody can see from my CV ( http://codeflow.org/ ) I used to work for DWS. This was a little serverside company sister to Secure Digitial Container, the company the patent comes from that was later bought (together with DWS) by PacketVideo.

I liked working for DWS, they where a small and quirky company with good people. DWS/SDC never sued anybody for this patent, it was mainly a bargaining chip to impress clients. Mind the patent is about DRM, specifically, it's about polymorphic DRM (that is the variant that delivers its own encryption/decryption/obfuscation code together with the content).

Sidenote: DWS/SDC where far flung leftovers of Napster.

But then the inevitable happened, the companies got bought by PacketVideo. The founder/investor and the then CEO (a superb business drummer, though no techie) left the company and American management took over.

During my work there, I was increasingly troubled by the DRM side of business. Eventually I left (and I'd have probably been fired if I didn't), mostly for reasons where management differed with my idea of efficiency and quality. I traveled around the world and I started freelancing, and I can't say it was a bad decision, has been a good life since.

I'm not surprised that PacketVideo eventually started suing people for the patents they hold. It's a small and troubled company that's been struggling for years to "get it right", and as they probably increasingly run out of funds to keep the fiction alive, it gets ever more tempting to cash in some quick buck simply by virtue of sitting on patents you've acquired.

Active Discouragement

[DaAdder]

Basically what this amounts to is actively discouraging anyone in the technology sector, anywhere in the world, to do business in the USA. You're clearly showing that what works and is successful in the rest of the world is an unwanted development in your country. As someone is pointing out, this has reduced, almost eliminated the need for music piracy in a lot of European countries, which apparently isn't something you're interested in either.

On top of that, you're considering not paying the interest on the money you borrowed from the rest of the world. This would of course end people betting on your country as a safe investment. Money flowing into your economy from the rest of the world appears to be something to avoid as well. Reducing the number of people in your country that can actually pay their mortgage or stay employed at all seems to be no cause for concern either.

The only thing I can really see you doing that would cause your status as an ally and first rate investment opportunity to go into decline any faster, would perhaps be to start senseless wars that ran on for decades mainly to keep the price of oil up.

Oh wait...

New Anthem

[CyberDragon777]

I propose this as the new US national anthem:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MeXQBHLIPcw

Seems appropriate.