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Steve Jobs Video Kills Apple Patent In Germany
An anonymous reader writes "Today the Federal Patent Court of Germany shot down an Apple photo gallery bounce-back patent over which Cupertino was/is suing Samsung and Motorola. A panel of five judges found the patent invalid because the relevant patent application was filed only in June 2007 but Steve Jobs already demoed the feature in January 2007 (video). While this wouldn't matter in the U.S., it's a reason for a patent to be invalidated in Europe. For different reasons someone thought the iPhone presentation was a mistake. It now turns out that when Steve Jobs said "Boy have we patented it!" his company forgot that public disclosure, even by an inventor, must not take place before a European patent application is filed. But Apple can still sue companies over the Android photo gallery: in addition to this patent it owns a utility model, a special German intellectual property right that has a shorter term (10 years) and a six-month grace period, which is just enough to make sure that history-making Steve Jobs video won't count as prior art."
Europe wonders why it has zero innovation and everyone floods to the valley. Enjoy those H1Bs!
I guess
Story title should be:
We don't think that Apple is the most innovative innovater in the innovative history of innovating innovaters (which is in itself an innovation).
and the summary should be:
Boy, have we made sure to make this story fanboy/troll bait!
But Apple can still sue companies over the Android photo gallery:
Please do! Maybe then, they'll replace the aforementioned crash-and-bug-laden POS with something, I dunno, functional.
An enigma, wrapped in a riddle, shrouded in bacon and cheese
public disclosure, even by an inventor, must not take place before a European patent application is filed
This should be reversed: no patent can be granted before the inventor has demonstrated that it really works.
Not being able to tell people what you have before you tell the government? i guess that is so they can keep the creme of the crop on ideas.
---- Booth was a patriot ----
I've got news for you: https://duckduckgo.com/?q=patents+stiffle+innovation
Except for the pharmaceutical industry perhaps, patents do more harm than good. (oh, lawyers apparently benefit also from patents...)
German apples kill Steve Jobs.
Or something like that.
why link to an admitted shill's website?
The word incompetence doesn't begin to describe the situation.
/. If consider the role that they have to fill, I suspect that the USPO would tell you their job is more of the former, since they don't have the time, money or lawyers to do much more than rubber stamp things. Consider that you can file a patent for just about ANYTHING and for only a couple thousand bucks in filling fees, the USPO has to vet it and get it processed in a relatively short period of time. That's a lot of knowledge and expertise working on a very modest budget.
Is it incompetence, or a system which is measured as successful by how many patents it processes and accepts?
I don't get the impression the USPTO has any incentive to do their job thoroughly and competently -- but that this is what they've been told to do by the government.
Just keep cranking out patents and let the courts decide seems to be how they operate.
I agree with you that it would seem to be a logical step for the USPO to take, but it begs the (rhetorical) question : Is the USPO in charge of getting patents filed (basically filling out the forms and stuffing it in a filling cabinet for someone else to seriously evaluate), or are they in charge of vetting patents and acting as authority about what is or isn't actually legally a viable patent?
Clearly, the geek and nerd community feels it is the latter role that they should be full filling, as evinced by the volume of criticism you see on sites like
I think that the USPO does very well with the funds that they are allocated and under the directive that they have been given. Unless you are some sort of stellar organization genius that can step up and work miracles, you shouldn't be calling them incompetent, but rather calling their mission directives into question. Do you really think that the guy in the USPO who gave a green light to stuff like 'one click checkout', couldn't see the obvious idiocy to the patent? He/she looks at patents every day, all day. I'm going to go out on a limb and say that they can probably spot a dumb patent a mile away, but their organizational directives don't allow them veto power over a patent application, 'because its dumb.', as that would create all sorts of legal issues.
It is easy to stand back an slag a process based on its failures, but its much harder to get in there and actually fix things. If you have better ideas, call your government and tell them.
HA! I just wasted some of your bandwidth with a frivolous sig!
The "bounce" is just the natural step response of an underdamped second order system. You cannot patent, or at least you should not be able to patent fundamental mathematical principles. The only people who think this is in any way novel or patent-worthy are those who've never taken a higher level math or physics course. But ignorance of the natural laws of math and physics is not an excuse.
If I come up with an invention, and pay the state money, I can claim ownership of it.
If I come up with an invention, and not pay the state, or (in the EU) not pay the state before I publicize it, the state takes ownership of it (steals it).
Does that make sense to anyone? If so, I sure would like to hear it.
iRony.
They just haven't patented it yet, so they can't use the term as such but they can iMply it.
Which is also a technology that Apple is currently in the process of patenting.
Mit der Dummheit kämpfen Götter selbst vergebens
Because also a shill can be factually correct?
Of course, that statement was specifically and uniquely directed at the multi-touch technology and the iphone screen, which has nothing to do with this patent issue. But meh... What would be a good headline without a bit of missinformation.
Even from the grave he's his own worst enemy...
Friend: "The NIC is misconfigured..." Me: "No prob, I'll just telnet in and fix it." *Silence*
There was far too much prior art on the concept that had already been disclosed so the patent would not have stood. I believe it isn't even valid in the US any longer.
You can lead a man with reason but you can't make him think.
Are Fandroids having a change of heart about patents, now that one of them isn't quite as widely applicable?
This brings up a VERY interesting question. How does Peter Molyneux patent anything? He makes stuff up on the fly during the live press releases for Fable games then goes back and tells his developers to add it to the game.
But probably not, and that's the problem.
Like The Daily Mail, Florian Mueller has so little credibility at this point that it's impossible to trust anything he says with any degree of confidence.
Much better to go elsewhere, to somewhere with a track record of genuinely being able to report factually with some consistency.
Hola que tal, excelente nota mil respetos para Steve Jobs el siempre será el padre de la tecnología http://www.oscarherrera.info/blog/branding-personal-muestras-o-escondes-tu-talento/
Oscar Herrera | Tu Mentor de Negocios Online