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Apple Yanks Toddler's Speech-Enabling App
theodp writes "TIME reports that four-year-old Maya Nieder's speech-enabling 'Speak for Yourself' app was yanked from the App Store by Apple due to an unresolved patent dispute at the behest of Prentke Romich Company (PRC) and Semantic Compaction Systems (SCS), makers of designated communication devices (not iPad apps). 'The issue of whether or not Apple should have pulled Speak for Yourself from the App Store before the case was decided is trickier. Obviously, Apple would rather be safe than sorry and remove a potentially problematic app instead of risking legal action. The problem, however, is that this isn’t some counterfeit version of Angry Birds.' 'My daughter cannot speak without this app,' writes Maya's mom, Dana. 'She cannot ask us questions. She cannot tell us that she's tired, or that she wants yogurt for lunch. She cannot tell her daddy that she loves him.' If you're so inclined, Dana suggests you drop a note to appstorenotices@apple.com."
But its still on her device - so she still can do all those things. If she syncs her phone/ipad with itunes, she even has her own back up of the app and can reinstall it just fine.
An app being yanked from the AppStore doesn't mean it gets removed from your device.
Don't you wish you could just decide for yourself what you could were allowed to install on your device?
Don't use iOS devices for anything important. This kind of risk is the exactly one of the reasons the App Store and iOS' close ties to that store, is such a dumb idea to become dependent upon.
It's not your computer. Get that into your head.
And if people would stop buying them because of that, then developers would target some other, much more friendly, computer. Then you wouldn't be screwed right now.
As copyright owner of this comment, I authorize everyone to defeat any technological measure which limits access to it.
If the Buddhists are right, some patent lawyers and company executives are looking forward to an reincarnation as a pile of petrified sh*t at the bottom of the ocean.ï
There is no way they can make up that amount of bad karma.
This partial quote is extremely misleading. Apple simply removing something from the App Store does not delete it from devices it is already installed on. They can still use the application. That is part of a hypothetical "What if Apple remote wiped it from our device" which has not happened.
Bogtha Bogtha Bogtha
Wait did the toddler write the app? No right? So the mention of the toddler is just a cynical attempt to influence the readers?
I have absolutely no compassion for these people who chose to support a proprietary software ecosystem that they KNOW is run by fascists who care only about money.
I have even less compassion for them if the developer is an Apple fanboy who cannot see past the stars in his eyes, and is blind to the fact that Apple has been bad to developers in general.
Apple has boned developers time and again by not respecting their rights. Anyone who would develop an app they personally need and then distribute it to their own devices via the App Store is a fool when they can use Android and have zero of these problems. Android already has all the significant functionality that the new IOS is getting.
Apple also bones users regularly, when they make an error they tell the customer that it's their fault. B&W G3s have a well-known data corruption error and Apple's answer was "buy an IDE card", not "we will replace this hardware in accordance with the law because it is defective". When Apple folded the TIL into the knowledge base they expunged this article though earlier and later articles made it. Apple will steal from you (in this case, someone is really deprived of something, and the hardware was sold under false pretenses because it does not comply with specifications it claims to meet) and then cover it up.
When you lie down with the dogs, you wake up with disease.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
This is still in court right? Innocent until proven guilty? What would apple do with Miranda??? /Rant
Build a Man a Fire, and He'll Be Warm for a Day. Set a Man on Fire, and He'll Be Warm for the Rest of His Life.
Why can't the kid communicate these things? If it is big enough to understand how to use an app, it is big enough to figure out how to communicate such things as "I am tired", or "I want yogurt"... not to mention that if you have a toddler and cannot recognize the signs of him/her being tired, clearly you are not paying enough attention to your child. (I speak as a someone who has a toddler and a newborn in the house) Perhaps you should stop letting technology raise your kids?
He's the greatest mind of our time, very famous around the world, has millions of pounds in the bank, the best medical care money can buy, etc.
Yet he refuses to upgrade the archaic system that allows him to spak.
This is exactly why. You just don't trust something that important to a fly-by-night company that sells their wares through the Apple Store, of all places.
...perhaps Dana should post up millions and millions into a trust account so if/when Apple is sued by the patent troll, they don't have to pay.
Perhaps Dana should contact the patent trolls and appeal to them directly....
"the problem, however, is that this isn’t some counterfeit version of Angry Birds."
This cracks me up. Angry Birds was a pretty solid ripoff of "Crush The Castle." At least CtC authors acknowledged their inspiration from "Castle Clout." Pulling anything imitating Angry Birds is pure BS.
WWJD -- What Would Jimi Do?
(Smash amp, burn guitar, take home the groupies)
This sounds like a story about why patents are horribly broken... not really a story about Apple.... ?
Seriously, if the kid is mute she should have been taught sign language from day one, then she wouldn't be in the position of being unable to communicate at the age of three.
So the app was written by a toddler, right? No, it was two speech pathologists, Heidi LoStracco and Renee Collender. So it was funded by the four-year-old? No again. So it's the only way she speaks, at least? Nope, just the one she likes the best.
This headline, most of the summary, and the majority of TFA are an appeal to emotion to cloud what's ultimately a bog-standard legal issue. The app's future sale and distribution has been blocked, just like Galaxy tablets, XBoxes, iPads, and many other products that are banned from sale until patent issues are worked out. The point of the story (I guess) is to point out that patent litigation affects innocent bystanders, but this is nothing new, and I personally find the intense spin disgusting. Somehow, the fact that a four-year-old uses this app supposedly makes it okay to copy someone else's research and development? What about the researcher at Prentke Romich whose income depends on the company's speech hardware, who has a toddler at home to feed? What about the toddler whose lawyer parents are working on this case?
Won't somebody please stop thinking of the children?
You do not have a moral or legal right to do absolutely anything you want.
So she cannot speak without it, yet it begs to ask: "How did you speak before your iphone?" iphones haven't been around forever... what would you have done if it never existed... what did you do?
Troll doesn't mean "something I don't believe in"
It means "something the poster doesn't believe"
I believe every statement I made in this post. Anything that can be factual IS.
In any case, here's someone volunteering to recreate this trivial app on Android so that the fact that Apple is abusive to users and developers alike does not have to keep this kind of app from existing.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
Sounds like lots of room in that market to undercut the opposition.
Like anyone can even know that
You do know that when a toddler tells her daddy she loves him, she's just sucking up, right?
Anyway, this is a problem with doing anything through an intermediary -- any time a dispute arises, the intermediary reacts to protect itself, not you. Same thing could happen if the app were somehow sold in a box at Best Buy. Of course, Apple gives you no choice but to sell the app that way. And IMO they're a bunch of wimps for not at least waiting for a preliminary injunction; if they got sued, getting a ruling that an app store is not liable for any unknowing or disputed patent violations would be valuable to them.
If they won't put the app up, jailbreak the iPad and make a open source alternative.
I was trying to put this information in such eloquent forms but Sarten-x has done it
Google pulls your app? You can still download/install from a different source. (Snes9x comes to mind)
Apple pulls your app? You're shit out of luck.
The monks that had the patents for hand-printing manuscripts sued his ass off for the entire idea of printing letters, and thus the printing press never became popular.
Don't you just hate when someone figures out a way to do something 10x or 100x cheaper?
I want to explain her how the wonderful software patent system works...
I realise this is slightly OT, but it annoys me a little to have Buddhism replaced by cartoon-Buddhism. Buddhism is not Christianity. It's medieval Catholicism in which the patent lawyers and company executives would spend eternity in a nasty place. For traditional Buddhists, any and all engaging with the illusion that is the world of the five senses is karma.
Modern relativism has largely obsoleted religious sanctions - and I'm not about to regurgitate Durkheim - but the fact is that there are an awful lot of people who in the past would have had the fear of Hell to create a check on their antisocial behaviour. Now, they just don't care. Hence increasing inequality and doctrines like Libertarianism (which basically comes down in the end to, he with the most money to pay lawyers always wins).
From scarped cliff or quarried stone she cries "A thousand types are gone, I care for nothing, no not one."
If you are going to do this sort of thing, maybe you should do it on a device you can control. Lots of android stuff out there that you can sideload on with no problems.
Friendly computers are immune to a patent dispute causing previously-installed software to stop working, yes. Poster tried to tug at heart strings by implying this happened (RTFAing tells me this is not actually the case; they won't have a problem unless they need to replace hardware, migrate, etc).
Furthermore, friendly computers are immune to patent disputes allowing someone other than publisher to interfere with the market, prior to a court order. Apple should not have any say in whether or not this product is on the market. Even a stolid authoritarian would agree this is a matter for the courts, not Apple (or the marketplace, since we're using an authoritarian PoV). But the platform's unreasonable reliance on Apple-only repository makes it an Apple problem.
That is a design flaw. A known and very high-profile (and staggering) design flaw since day 1, which is one of the reasons I never bought any of these products.
And really, if you think about it, a truly friendly computer cannot even have its software interfered with by an injunction, even if we think that's a bad idea. Unless government forces have knowledge of a specific computer, that computer ought to be answering to its owner rather than another party.
We have seen this principle at work in the past, where people used patented codecs, cryptographic software, and DMCA-prohibited software despite its illegality. This is the essence of a friendly computer: serving its owner over all other considerations. That's true even if you think it's a bad idea -- that there's such thing as "too friendly," and that society has a legitimate interest in having the capacity to forcefully deny users the ability to use their computers in certain ways.
As copyright owner of this comment, I authorize everyone to defeat any technological measure which limits access to it.
Instead of blaming apple for respecting property rights, why not request a limited license from the alleged patent holders for permission for this app in this instance?
Except that a jailbreak wouldn't help address the concerns expressed in the article.
they already have the app, so loading it isn't the problem at this point. The problem is how to ensure that it doesn't get broken with future iOS upgrades. and jailbreaks are FREQUENTLY broken by iOS updates with no guarantee that another jailbreak method will come along.
A better long term solution would be to move to a platform where the official market place does not have a monopoly on software distribution, and to move to an open source solution. That way regardless of any one parties wishes, you are still safe.
Why should we be flooding Apple's inbox with requests to put the App back in the AppStore?
By doing so, they expose themselves to legal liability and potential lawsuits.
It seems that if you are angry about this and wanted to see this app back in iTMS, you'd write the software creators and patent claimant urging them to settle their differences fairly and amicably in the interests of the consumer. iTMS will promptly put the app back online when instructed to do so and can be assured they will not be sued for doing so.
Take a look at these products. Any freaking icon that gets pressed and emits a predetermined sound for communication conflicts with their patent. What crap. US PTO and Congress needs to review Patent Law and preclude this kind of overreach.
http://store.prentrom.com/
The pseudo-patent system that allows this aburd behaviour to happen. Im kind of glad China, India and others don't give a rats ass about ACTA or patents.
So why should this girl? She should learn to sign or something. Or better yet, she should just learn to talk, I don't see anything wrong with her.
The headline is quite misleading. Apple is just one of the parties involved. The real culprits are intellectual properties laws and the companies that abuse them.
so, money is speech but speech isn't. it would be amusing if it wasn't so depressing.
More than likely Apple didn't pull the app. the developer pulled the app when the patent holder sent a notice.
I know this from experience with two of my apps.
One of my apps was an electronic implementnation of a physical board game, which is arguably a valid complaint, so I agreed to pull it to avoid legal hassles.
The second one was a complaint because my app's name was too similar to theirs, which has a registered trademark. This is still under discussion with the patent holder.
Apple didn't pulled either of my apps. They simply noted the complaint and provided a way for both parties to communicate and allow them to settle the issue themselves without Apple getting involved.
People here seem to think Apple acts unilaterally without providing a reasonable way for people to settle the issue. You're thinking of Google, who HAS removed apps from other people's devices. Apple has never done this.
Am I mistaken in believing this story has been posted here before??? If not, then there was one quite similar to this where a child with a speaking disability was "robbed" of their speaking tool.
The British people buy it and pay for it. They just don't mind that the person they are buying it for is the them from an alternate reality (you might have been the one needing life long care, so why not pay for it just because it didn't turn out that way? Don't bother republicans, you will never understand this, is something called being human).
MMO Quests are like orgasms:
You may solo them, I prefer them in a group.
lol
o Two companies have legal dispute over some speech thing.
o Apple is asked to pull app until legal dispute is settled.
o Apple: (shrug) OK. (pulls app) (App remains on iPads that downloaded it)
o Media: "ZOMFG!!1! APPLE DESTROYS THE ***LIFE*** OF CHILD WITH HANDICAP AND DRIVES MOTHER TO MISERY AND MADE FLUTTERSHY CRY!!!11!2657682365879!!"
o Slashdot AppleHateSquad: "LOVE ITSELF HAS BEEN OBLITERATED FROM THE ENTIRETY OF THE PAN DIMENSIONAL MULTIVERSE!!!!!"
I can't figure out why people stay with iOS when you are forced to go through iTunes or the App Store. With Android I have my pick of multiple App stores, and/or I can just install the app directly from my phone and bypass App stores all together.
This is a perfect case for reworking the patent system. Clearly it isn't working for the betterment of humanity, this isn't a problem with apple but with the concept of "intellectual property". Companies should be rewarded for their ability to consistently make good products and not for their ability to patent overly broad ideas and win lawsuits. Why didn't the plaintiff write an easy to use app distributed version of their software before the other company? They had no incentive to do the research, they already own the patent and can charge whatever they want for their curmudgeonly versions so why pay someone to make it cheaper and easier to use? If patent owners aren't diligent in maintaining their "property value" then they shouldn't be able to complain when someone plants a garden on their weed ridden lawn.
From your link: "To continue, you must enter the Apple ID and password you used to register as an Apple Developer."
At least CtC authors acknowledged their inspiration from "Castle Clout."
And Castle Clout ultimately goes back to Scorched Earth. Genre launches don't happen as often as some copyright maximalists would have you think.
A counterfeit version of Angry Birds would be a game that falsely purported to be Angry Birds, not just a game with similar mechanics.
The Tetris Company would disagree with you. Having the same mechanics is the very thing that makes it counterfeit in the worldview of Tetris author Alexey Pajitnov and his business partner Henk Rogers.
Then advocate a method that allows them to only communicate with select people rather than to break the law by communicating with a larger group.
Oh sounds like Disney will buy out that software then. I know my 2yr old loves running arounf the living room chanting, Lighting McQueen! Lighting McQueen! Ka-Chow! Lighting McQueen!
When Apple pulls an app from the app store, it's *ONLY* removed from their store and *NOT* your device. The only time the latter ever happens is if the app is known to be malicious, and that's only in extremely rare circumstances (and when that happens it usually makes the news).
Case in point: I have a number of apps Apple's pulled from the App Store (iDOS, MAME to name a few) that iTunes will happily back up and sync to any device I throw at it.
So, maybe do some research before spewing your "Insightful" garbage.
I'm with most of the people here. Over sensationalized, and targeted at the wrong company. Why pester Apple about it when they are doing what they probably should and limit their legal liability. Why not complain to PRC and SCS to have them issue a statement that they will indemnify and hold harmless Apple with respect to this app. Then Apple wouldn't have a reason to pull the app, and the companies can still go after the alleged patent infringers. And the user can then get their updates (should the original developer choose to do any).
What about the researcher at Prentke Romich whose income depends on the company's speech hardware, who has a toddler at home to feed?
Then the maker of this speech hardware should have offered to license the relevant patents to the application developer at a reasonable royalty.
This article might pull at my heartstrings more if there weren't several low-tech solutions available to, yes, even an illiterate 4 year old. Chief among them being sign language, something that would be simple enough for a child of her age to learn and has a built-in infrastructure by being the language of the Deaf, which by rights afforded by ADA and other laws would always have types of access. Why not teach her sign language? Not only would she learn to communicate in a full language of her own, instead of being constrained by somebody's picturized version of English, but she could communicate without the aid of an iPad or any such tech device. What happens when the battery runs out or if there's a disaster and she's out of range of her iPad? How would she communicate?
/. readers think of, but for once it might be more appropriate here than the solution already in use.
I know low-tech is the not the first thing that
Build the same kind of app for Android tablet, then port it to all other tablet OSes including iOS. If Apple still refused to take this new standard app in their store then sue them to FORCE them to accept it. Put a stake in the ground that a free app like this geared towards enabling handicapped people can NOT be refused by an app store.
The software supposedly infringes on over 100 patents. It sounds like Prentke Romich Company (PRC) and Semantic Compaction Systems -- the makers of the original software -- put a lot of time and development into the original expensive product. Along comes a small company ( Heidi LoStracco and Renee Collender) that duplicates much of their work and design in a lighter device (iPad) and sells it at a price that vastly undercuts them. The original sellers have to charge more because they are actually making a licensed medical device, working through channels to get approved by insurance and hospitals, and dealing with all the legal nightmares involved with that while the smaller company just uploads an app to the AppStore. The medical device for children has to survive drop tests and other ruggedization tests that an iPad doesn't (so it's bulkier) and because it's not manufactured in bulk in China (so it costs a lot more).
If it wasn't for the "Think of the Children" aspect, most of the time Slashdot comes down pretty heavy against app cloners.
Now, if we had mandatory FRAND licensing for software or for medical devices, perhaps they could offer their software on the iPad if they paid the licensing costs for those patents. However, the "fair price" for the cost of developing "approved" medical technology in the US is pretty huge and might drive the app cost up to $5000-10000. It sounds like the patent system is working to protect the original property rights owners from someone copying their technology and skirting around all the work they did in complying with the system.
You forgot one,
Apple Fanbois: OMG OMG! Someone wrote something bad about my holly Apple! I must assassinate that messenger in any way possible for the Holy Jobs!
There are any number of things that got jeopardize her voice, patent issues, the company going out of business, the company upgrading in a way that breaks her ability to use it, the company decided to charge a lot more money, Apple decided they don't want this type of app anymore. Only if it were free software on a free software device would her right to use this app have any sense of security. As of now, if she loses or breaks her iPad, she is SOL on this one.
buy an android phone, cheap, off prepaid providers like cricket. don't bother hooking up a phone number to it. build your speech app in android, upload directly to phone. there, now the kid is talking and not texting while driving. or should i patent this process?
insensitive clod overlords obligatory xkcd car analogy russian reversals whoosh pedant fanbois ftfy in 3...2...1..PROFIT
she could get it from other sources, as well as updates.
Welcome to the Apple fenced garden.Screwed devs and customers.
People who would buy an iPad primarily for those app, and spend 300 bucks on the app, would certainly by an android device. They don't care about the device, they care about helping their child.
Anyways, there are so many stupid issues here:
299.99 for an app that does this:
http://www.speakforyourself.org/About_The_App.html
really?
Using an app that is platform dependent? for this?
ug.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
Android has had these for a while. They don't pull apps like Apple. Seems like it's not a big problem.
Hi. I work with the FAA, two of my most recent projects were EFB related, in fact.
If a pilot is looking at his iOS based "FAA certified" EFB in IMC, he shouldn't be a pilot. They're not certified for use in flight, and have to be stowed (and turned off) before takeoff.
Nice straw man, though.
Maxim: People cannot follow directions.
Increases in truth directly with the length of time spent explaining them
who is 4 years old, has been trying to talk. The iphone was released in June 29, 2007 which is 5 years ago minus a few weeks.
It's terrible that this girl may not have this app forever but that is not the point. If patents were infringed upon that is a completely separate issue. It is not as if Apple execs woke up one night and decided to go out and do evil for giggles.
We should be angry with PRC or if Speak for Yourself actually gave the finger to PRC and wrote the app aware of every infringing line of code then people should be pissed at them.
...There goes my good karma.
OMG facts!
Move away from the walled garden. The grass is greener and there's more variety of plants.
-]Phreak Out[-
she is in no way breaking any law.
The programmers MAY be in violation of patent law, but that has yet to be proven in a court of law.
I didn't really read the patents in question, but an app that help's someone who can't speak... speak... must do one main thing that most other apps do not: speak.
Text to Speech has been around since the early 90s, and is implemented freely in Windows, Mac, Linux and other operating systems. There must be an overwhelming amount of proof of prior art. I can only imagine that this patent is something like, "A method for storing text for use in text to speech in a way that enabled someone to easily communicate with others." which is just crazy.
I e-mailed Maya to suggest this.
Her daughter doesn't have good enough finger coordination for sign language.
They did try.
she is in no way breaking any law.
A patent confers the exclusive right to make, use, or sell an invention. "Make, use, or sell" includes use.
It's remarkable really. The fact that Apple's app store is involved is the only factor that makes this "of interest".
Just because a user puts an IOS device into a "critical" functional use does not make it any more Apple's problem than a normal use.
Let's say I used an iPad to replace the dashbord disply in an old truck I'm restoring. Apple finds out the app I'm using is infringing and they remove it. That's MY problem, not Apples. They cannot be held responsible for how I choose to use their device.
This story just uses the tears of children to lubricate it's insertion into the news media.
You chose to give money to a corrupt company that dictates what you can and cannot run on the device you purchased. Had you gone with a more sensible solution, such as an Android product, you would not be having these problems. You chose the product most likely to give you trouble, and now it's giving you trouble. I have no sympathy for you.
I agree - but the concern you raised on backward compatibility on the iOS APIs is something that software developer would have to deal with either way. Whether the application is allowed to be distributed in the app store or not. So really to me the Jailbreak option should really mitigate the concern. As long as there is a published API set, jailbreak the phone and have someone make the enhancements.
Companies that make assistive devices like this know:
* Their customer is actually the government agency that pays them
* The customer will pay an incredible premium for a single-purpose device instead of software on a general-purpose device
That last one is important. In some states, agencies are precluded from giving their clients laptops with, say, scanners for the blind or textspeech software for the deaf, because the client might use the device to do things other than handle their disability.
To a Lisp hacker, XML is S-expressions in drag.
In spite of propaganda to the contrarary, in reality the legal system has never actually worked that way.
When you are arrested, and in certain states even a traffic violation counts, you subjected to due process. This includes being handcuffed, taken to jail, deloused, one or more body cavity searches, and there isn't shit your lawyer can do about it until its time for you to go in front of a judge for bail and have your arraignment scheduled.
Then you will probably have to pay your lawyer a significant amount of $$$ along the way, and face the possibility of losing your job as well.
So you may still be found innocent, but due process is going to be painful and expensive.
Their FAQ section specifically addresses questions related to this issue: http://www.prentrom.com/news/media-information-on-pending-litigation
Is it true that the infringement suit will remove all AAC apps from the market?
No. There are many vocabulary apps in the market, some of which have been available for several years. The lawsuit only addresses one specific app, which infringes on the intellectual property developed by SCS.
Why is SCS suing? How are the app developers infringing?
The Unity system that powers our language solutions is the result of the long commitment and hard work of Bruce Baker and his company, Semantic Compaction Systems, which licenses the system to PRC. Our patent attorneys determined that there are multiple instances of infringement on the Unity patents. Bruce has spent more than 25 years and millions of dollars to create and refine this software, resulting in life-changing technology that has given a voice to thousands of individuals with profound disabilities. To take someone’s life work and market it as your own is simply wrong.
Did PRC attempt to work with SFY to resolve this situation?
When PRC first learned of the app in November 2011, we reached out to the company’s founders, and offered various business solutions. When all of our offers were refused and they continued to market the app, we filed the first and only lawsuit PRC has ever filed in our 45-year history.
If this isn’t all about money, why do your devices cost thousands of dollars?
Our devices are durable medical equipment, built in accordance with FDA regulations. We also hold accreditation from the Accreditation Commission for Health Care and are an ISO-9001 registered company.
Our products are medical devices and have specialized features important to our clients, such as heavy duty cases, enhanced voice output and multiple access options including eye-gaze and head pointing. The devices provide multiple vocabulary options, allow for customization and provide support tools such as the Vocabulary Builder, Icon Prediction and the Language Activity Monitor. All of the companies that create dedicated AAC devices manufacture only a few thousand of these devices each year and obviously don’t enjoy the same economies of scale as products intended for the consumer market.
[etc]
Apps to renotices!?
The current state of the patent system is very good at preventing independents from competing against established corporations. That is exactly what it is supposed to do: protect the wealth of the already-rich. The popular misconceptions about using patents to stimulate innovation and protect the little guy are just lies used to get buy-in.
You do benefit from this somewhat...if you own any blue-chip stocks. But you would benefit a lot more if pattents weren't there to act as a brick-wall to real innovation.
I'm reading a lot of comments about keeping iOS where it is, dedicating the device to the task, second hand hardware should the iPad fail, etc.
I understand the article is overblown, but seriously none of these comments seem to have taken into consideration that these parents likely don't have the technical skills /. has, are possibly unable to dedicate the device to the task, etc.
There's a disturbing lack of empathy.
Get a Windows 7 phone
If you go with a company that controls what you can do, this is what you get. No thank you, I'll wait for a KDE/Linux tablet.
Welcome to Naraka:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Naraka_%28Buddhism%29
How many centuries before you admit it's hell? Btw the word hell isn't Christian but from the Norse Hel (one l) found in Åsatru:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hel_%28location%29
You might think you're a Buddhist but are you? :)
The problem is you can't guarantee the continued ability to jailbreak the device after the device is upgraded. Jailbreak is usually broken by the upgrades.
so the published APIs only help half of the problem, they are no good to you if you can't load them on the device because you can't find a way to jailbreak the newest iOS version.
The only long term solution is to move to a device where that isn't an issue.
What does this girls ability or inability to speak have to do with the patent infringement? If the app was infringing on the patent, and the app is no longer allowed to be sold, of course people won't be able to purchase it.
n/t
... the boogeyman story ..... when Google has used it HUNDRED OF TIMES, while Apple hasn't use the alleged feature not even once.
It is annoying me how so many people want charity for this family in one form or another from apple, from the patent holders, ect.. This product would not even be around in the first place if it wasn't for greedy money-grubbing people. Do you think apple would have made the IPhone if they wouldn't have made buckets upon buckets of money?
Can I pick a side without the false dichotomy?
There is one very simple solution which is they move the company to the PRC where they can legally thumb their nose at the companies trying to stop them from marketing their software. There is are added bonuses in that patent trolls who lose their case end up in a Chinese prison and 9 times out of 10 a company based in China will win their case against a company not based in China.
Brasil, Venezuala, South Africa, Cambodia and a number of other countries have similar laws or stances regarding protecting indigenous IP. If they are being trolled by a couple of companies providing outdated software/technology then move to someplace that won't let these companies have their way in court.
Why not make your own simple way, design a web page / pages. you can make it look much the same and link pictures to sound recordings, there are so many things you can get a web page to do and it is easy to design to your spec, even if you or people you know can not design web pages and need to pay some one to design it for you it is still loads cheaper than the apple app, and not limited to just apple devices, it will work on any web enabled device. And with luck you or some one maybe some one reading this will do this and post it on the web as a free download, it can even be made as an installable app (exe) with some thing like “WEBEXE” I would be happy to help but do not know what spec you need, but I will be looking it to the app and the functions needed and will try to post some thing. I have a son with autism and know what it is like to struggle to communicate.
What does this girls ability or inability to speak have to do with the patent infringement? If the app was infringing on the patent, and the app is no longer allowed to be sold, of course people won't be able to purchase it.
Stealing from the Rich and Giving to the Poor .] To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries (Article One of the United States Constitution).
"All stealing is comparative. If you come to absolutes, pray who does not steal?" (Ralph Waldo Emerson). Let's be honest, once an innocent man becomes introduced to the idea of free music, software, movies, and other expensive items, he'll get attached forever. Kleptomaniacs are created every day as more and more join the "warez scene," a global reference to the collection of warez groups. "Warez" was coined to indicate more than one piece of pirated software and refers primarily to copyrighted material traded in violation of copyright law (Warez). Despite internet piracy exploding recently as a world wide industry, it is being frowned upon as well as illegal in most countries; although, it will never be completely hindered due to the mass number of violators.
The law varies throughout the world, however, there are four elements of criminal copyright infringement that are universal: the existence of a valid copyright, the copyright was infringed, the infringement was willful, and the infringement was either for commercial gain or substantial gain (Warez). The law behind internet piracy in the U.S. falls under the Copyright Act of 1976 which gives the author the exclusive right to reproduce, display, distribute, and sell his original work. It is part of the Federal law and is authorized by the United States Constitution. The power to enact copyright law is granted in Article I, Section 8, Clause 8, also known as the Copyright Clause, which states: The Congress shall have Power [. .
The growth of computer network communications, especially the global internet, has made illegal copying of expensive easy and nearly untraceable (Piracy). One of the biggest examples of this was "Napster." "Napster" was a nickname given by friends to Shawn...
Considering the media attention that this patent case is receiving, I would expect this issue to be resolved in Maya's favor; her parents are doing the smart thing by launching a PR campaign. Hopefully, this is a legal battle that will be resolved by the politics of public opinion.