Patent Troll With Good Record in Past Sues Netflix, SoundCloud, Vimeo, Others Over Offline Downloads (arstechnica.com)

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Patent Troll With Good Record in Past Sues Netflix, SoundCloud, Vimeo, Others Over Offline Downloads (arstechnica.com)

Posted by msmash on Monday February 6, 2017 @05:20AM from the patent-trolling dept.

Netflix added the ability to download movies and TV episodes for offline viewing in November last year. Music streaming service SoundCloud, and video hosting service Vimeo have had this feature for quite some time, too. But they are all being sued now by a patent troll. From an ArsTechnica report: The plaintiff is a company few have heard of: Blackbird Technologies, a company with no products or assets other than patents. Blackbird's business is to buy up patent rights and file lawsuits over them, a business known colloquially as "patent trolling." Last week, Blackbird (who tells potential clients about being "able to litigate at reduced costs and achieve results") filed lawsuits against Netflix, SoundCloud, Vimeo, Starz, Mubi, and Studio 3 Partners, which owns the Epix TV channel. [...] The patent-holding company, which filed the lawsuits in Delaware federal court, has good reason to hope for success. The '362 patent already has a track record of squeezing settlement cash out of big companies.

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Re:Ah yes, the store file locally patent! by hattig · 2017-02-06 05:30 · Score: 2

When was this patented?
Ancient browsers have web page caching in the mid 90s, for example.
And lets not mention dial-up services in the 80s.
Re:Ah yes, the store file locally patent! by Anonymous Coward · 2017-02-06 05:31 · Score: 1

After streaming video was invented and perfected, the next logical step was the ability to watch video that was stored locally in some type of format, say optical or magnetic storage, rather than receiving the bits from the aether. This really should be patentable because it's simple common sense that one leads logically to the other.
Square by fluffernutter · 2017-02-06 05:34 · Score: 1

And their websites have square corners. Surely someone has patented that.

--
Laws are rules for the court, but merely a bottom bar to hit for life. Think beyond laws in your actions always.
IMO by AndyKron · 2017-02-06 05:44 · Score: 3, Funny

Blackbird Technologies = Rancid bird shit IMO
This is why companies patent stupid things by alvinrod · 2017-02-06 05:45 · Score: 5, Insightful

This is why you see big companies constantly patenting little things that are seemingly obvious or otherwise inane. If you have a patent of your own, it becomes much easier to refute the claim of some other company that you're infringing on their patent. Then they would have to spend time trying to invalidate your patent, which might make it easier to invalidate their own. It probably doesn't even make it to court though as the legal team would just send them a nice "fuck off" letter in reply and the legal hyenas for the patent troll will just look for somewhere else to do their bottom feeding.
1. Re:This is why companies patent stupid things by Oswald+McWeany · 2017-02-06 05:51 · Score: 1, Informative
  
  Yes, I think the existing patent laws are woefully out of date. They need a major overhaul and revising. Big changes need to be made , big changes that won't make some rich powerful people happy, but that are necessary.
  
  --
  "That's the way to do it" - Punch
2. Re:This is why companies patent stupid things by Antique+Geekmeister · 2017-02-06 16:09 · Score: 1
  
  > This is why you see big companies constantly patenting little things that are seemingly obvious or otherwise inane.
  It's not the only reason. Having a broad suite of patents, even if they are unenforceable or easily blocked in court, can drain the resource of other plaintiffs who do _not_ have such a patent suite, whether or not their patents are legitimate.
Automated CD-R Duplication patent? by Whatanut · 2017-02-06 05:45 · Score: 5, Interesting

Seems odd skimming the patent to apply this to offline video caching. It seems fairly specific to a method of automating the process of ordering, duplicating and shipping CD media. There is some ambiguous text in there about "digital media". But it also has claims such as:
4. The method of claim 1, wherein said first module is configured to send at least one signal to at least one printing device to create mailing address labels for each of said requests.
Which, I'm sure netflix is not doing. Seems like an attempt to broadly use a patent that's not really related to the actual process being used.
Shocking...

--

yvan eht nioj
1. Re:Automated CD-R Duplication patent? by Luthair · 2017-02-06 05:58 · Score: 3, Informative
  
  The patent sounds like it would cover how the internet generally works for transferring files from servers.
2. Re:Automated CD-R Duplication patent? by SlaveToTheGrind · 2017-02-06 07:05 · Score: 2
  
  A dependent claim like claim 4 is by definition narrower than its parent claim -- a dependent claim must add at least one additional limitation. And someone can infringe one claim of a patent even if it doesn't infringe others. So whether Netflix does what claim 4 says is immaterial to whether it does what claim 1 says.
  It may well be that some of the broader claims are more generic than the specific process described in the patent -- it's not unusual for a patent to have higher-level claims. (That said, if they're too high-level and/or the patentholder tries to stretch the claims to cover something too different than the original idea, they run the risk of being held invalid. It wouldn't surprise me if that's the outcome here.)
3. Re:Automated CD-R Duplication patent? by Tablizer · 2017-02-06 07:05 · Score: 1
  
  // algorithm to generate a Web Patent h = openFile("ordinary_task.txt"); while (w = readNextWord(h)) { if (random(0.0, 1.0) > 0.96) { w = w + " using the Internet "; } print(w); }
  
  --
  Table-ized A.I.
4. Re:Automated CD-R Duplication patent? by drinkypoo · 2017-02-06 07:22 · Score: 2
  
  The patent sounds like it would cover how the internet generally works for transferring files from servers.
  You have to meet all the major claims of the patent to be infringing, though, right? There can be lists of lesser things or optional things, but if it doesn't say that it's optional then it has to be involved to be infringement? Or at least, that's my IANAL understanding.
  
  --
  "You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
5. Re:Automated CD-R Duplication patent? by Theaetetus · 2017-02-06 07:32 · Score: 2
  
  Seems odd skimming the patent to apply this to offline video caching. It seems fairly specific to a method of automating the process of ordering, duplicating and shipping CD media. There is some ambiguous text in there about "digital media". But it also has claims such as:
  4. The method of claim 1, wherein said first module is configured to send at least one signal to at least one printing device to create mailing address labels for each of said requests.
  Which, I'm sure netflix is not doing. Seems like an attempt to broadly use a patent that's not really related to the actual process being used.
  Shocking...
  That's a dependent claim (you can tell because it refers to another claim). It's like an include statement, so the invention recited in claim 4 is everything that's in claim 1, plus the added limitation about the first module. Even if Netflix isn't doing that added step, they could be doing everything that's in claim 1 and infringe the patent.
6. Re:Automated CD-R Duplication patent? by nadass · 2017-02-06 07:50 · Score: 1
  
  The patent was issued 10 years ago (February 2007) and they allege infringement based on theOffline Downloads feature.
  
  Hello Blackbird? This is Netflix. We will happily invalidate your '362patent by virtue of presenting prior art in the realm of offline distribution of digital media via our original DVD-by-mail business which lead to Blockbuster going bankrupt. Also theconcept ofdownloading media for offline consumption already existed before the patent was either issued (e.g. Apple iTunes) or was even conceived (e.g. TiVO in the early 2000's, Napster in the 1990's, BBS/Usenet in the 1980's). FURTHERMORE there are methods published in open standards (e.g. HTML5) which basically make these claims overly broad as tocause everybody to infringe. K THX BYE.
7. Re:Automated CD-R Duplication patent? by SlaveToTheGrind · 2017-02-06 09:52 · Score: 1
  
  You have to meet all the major claims of the patent to be infringing, though, right?
  You have to meet all the elements of at least one claim. Taking one of the broadest claims (claim 1) as an example, you would have to perform all the recited steps, and the computer would have to have all the recited modules/connection:
  A computer-implemented method of digital data duplication comprising:
  taking requests at one or more user interfaces;
  transmitting said requests through a network to a computer;
  assigning each of said requests to one of a plurality of output devices; and
  executing the duplication process,
  wherein said computer comprises:
  at least one first module configured to create a task log based on incoming requests;
  at least one second module configured to store all data necessary for executing said duplication process;
  at least one third module configured to create a subset of said data stored in said second module, further configured to download said subset to one of said output devices, and further configured to command said output device to transfer said subset onto blank media; and
  a connection through which said second module communicates with said first module and said third module
8. Re:Automated CD-R Duplication patent? by Qzukk · 2017-02-06 14:38 · Score: 1
  
  Also keep in mind that "said computer" is the computer RECEIVING the request for data, not the one requesting the data. IE something on Netflix's end has to receive requests from one or more user interfaces and transmitted to a computer (which creates a task log of incoming requests, stores all data necessary for executing duplication, and take the required data from the storage and transmit it to an output device, which is then commanded to output the data to blank media) that sends the request to an output device and executes the duplication process.
  I suspect that the troll is trying to claim that when I download a movie from Netflix, *my* computer is a "said output device" and/or the internet is "blank media". With either of these translations, I don't see a thing in here that any webserver+IE 5.0 didn't do on windows 98 (except for the bits about printing labels, though I bet you could with Avery's website back then). If there was any sort of DRM or even simply a customization step worked in here then you might be able to claim it is unique to how Netflix writes requests to my "output device".
  That said, I certainly don't want to spend a million dollars to convince a court of that, and even in the off chance that the judge finds this claim so bullshit that they award attorney's fees, this "Blackbird" company is probably nothing but a paper corporation with one patent, the PO box, and a google voice number, and spends 100% of the income on lawyer fees.
  
  --
  If I have been able to see further than others, it is because I bought a pair of binoculars.
9. Re:Automated CD-R Duplication patent? by SlaveToTheGrind · 2017-02-06 15:55 · Score: 1
  
  That said, I certainly don't want to spend a million dollars to convince a court of that, and even in the off chance that the judge finds this claim so bullshit that they award attorney's fees, this "Blackbird" company is probably nothing but a paper corporation with one patent, the PO box, and a google voice number, and spends 100% of the income on lawyer fees.
  That's not necessarily as bulletproof of a position as it sounds anymore. Last month Judge Gilstrap in the Eastern District of Texas held the person behind the shell company behind the shell company that filed a frivolous case personally responsible for almost $500k the other side's attorney's fees, and even sanctioned the local attorney running the case $25k.
From The Article by Anonymous Coward · 2017-02-06 05:46 · Score: 1

The '362 patent was designed with optical disc content in mind. Filed in 2000, Lee envisioned a system in which a computer server "downloads necessary data onto the CD-R writing machine," then sends the CD-R into a bin for shipment. However, the patent claims that Lee's attorney wrote, and the US Patent Office ultimately granted, use the vague terminology of describing various "modules" that together comprise a "computer-implemented method of data duplication."
I think Netflix should ask for a jury trial on this one.
Is Watch Offline anything even remotely like burning and shipping a custom CD-R to someone?
1. Re:From The Article by geekmux · 2017-02-06 06:02 · Score: 1
  
  The '362 patent was designed with optical disc content in mind. Filed in 2000, Lee envisioned a system in which a computer server "downloads necessary data onto the CD-R writing machine," then sends the CD-R into a bin for shipment. However, the patent claims that Lee's attorney wrote, and the US Patent Office ultimately granted, use the vague terminology of describing various "modules" that together comprise a "computer-implemented method of data duplication."
  I think Netflix should ask for a jury trial on this one. Is Watch Offline anything even remotely like burning and shipping a custom CD-R to someone?
  Ironically, you ask this question of the very company who also offers a DVD service that is essentially exactly the definition of watching a movie "offline"...
2. Re:From The Article by suutar · 2017-02-06 06:34 · Score: 1
  
  yes, but they don't burn the discs, they just ship existing discs. (I kind of wish they could burn the discs, because the older and less-used parts of their catalog are becoming unusable.)
3. Re:From The Article by Anonymous Coward · 2017-02-06 07:27 · Score: 1
  
  Except that the discs that Netflix sends out with that service are not burned DVDs.
  What, you mean that those scratches weren't personalized just for me????
Re:We don't care by Oswald+McWeany · 2017-02-06 05:48 · Score: 5, Insightful

Nor should we.
We should always care about Patent Trolling. Patent Trolling is a parasitic problem within our economy. Patent Trolling suppresses innovation, both economic and intellectual. Patent Trolling Negatively impacts people's standard of living, if in a non-direct manner.
If you don't care about this specific instance of patent trolling, you should care about it as an anti-industry that no doubt has and does impact you, even if you're not aware of it.

--
"That's the way to do it" - Punch
Re:Ah yes, the store file locally patent! by Anonymous Coward · 2017-02-06 05:49 · Score: 4, Informative

This really should NOT be patentable
FTFY

it's simple common sense that one leads logically to the other.
Sorry, that does not apply at the patent office. I'm wonder if they even have computers in their workplace, because everything with 'on the computer' seems to be getting rubber stamp auto-approved. Or maybe they've outsourced the workforce - and patents are now being approved by AI instead.
Who are Blackbird's clients? by Anonymous Coward · 2017-02-06 05:50 · Score: 1

I want to vote against them, with my wallet.
Re:Ah yes, the store file locally patent! by Mr+D+from+63 · 2017-02-06 05:55 · Score: 2

Back around 2000, a company called Wavexpress patented a secure video download and encryption technology. They had a service for a while where you could pay for some videos, store them locally and watch as you pleased (TVTonic). It was more an effort to execute pay per view over what was slow internet service at the time. It was poorly executed and owned by Wave Systems, which was run by and incompetent CEO (Steven Sprague) who some feel was a crook that bled the stock value dry. He made so many unfulfilled promises its unreal he lasted for so many years.

I would not be surprised if those patents were involved.
Re:We don't care by Anonymous Coward · 2017-02-06 05:59 · Score: 5, Insightful

Patents are written in extremely vague terms. It's done on purpose by the original patent writer so that the can capitalize on everything and every innovation that may do the same thing - see Xerox's original patents. They tied up photo copying for decades.
It's just karma.
If you don't like this then have patent laws reformed so that they have to be specific to the invention.
And eliminate software patents.
Re:We don't care by Anonymous Coward · 2017-02-06 06:04 · Score: 4, Funny

I get it--a patent troll troll.
Hopefully they countersue. by Chas · 2017-02-06 06:09 · Score: 1

Then keep the fuckers in court until their pocketbooks start bleeding real blood.

--

Chas - The one, the only.
THANK GOD!!!
Usenet by BinBoy · 2017-02-06 06:13 · Score: 2

> Filed in 2000
Web browsers did it before then and Usenet newsreaders did it before browsers.
Re:Past != Future by geekmux · 2017-02-06 06:17 · Score: 1

Just because something has been wrong in the past does not mean it is wrong now.
Just because something has been right in the past does not mean it is right now.
Unfortunately, our legal system does not always run on common sense logic, and prior cases feeding legal precedent tend to be a rather effective way to repeat history, even when the result is repeating a wrong. This is essentially why this patent remains an effective weapon for a patent troll.

Past performance is not indicative of present condition or future results.
While generally true, this is not the stock market floor, and lawyers don't base their paycheck on 50/50 odds.
Re:We don't care by Ichijo · 2017-02-06 06:35 · Score: 1

If I patent something and I am not allowed to sell my patent, or the buyer is not allowed to enforce it, doesn't that reduce the value of my invention and thereby suppress innovation?

--
Any sufficiently unpopular but cohesive argument is indistinguishable from trolling.
WTH is a Pattent Troll with a Good Record? by Anonymous Coward · 2017-02-06 06:35 · Score: 5, Interesting

gtfo of here with that
1. Re:WTH is a Pattent Troll with a Good Record? by Anonymous Coward · 2017-02-06 07:32 · Score: 2, Informative
  
  I'm guessing it means they are good at winning cases/getting good settlements.
2. Re:WTH is a Pattent Troll with a Good Record? by meerling · 2017-02-06 14:36 · Score: 1
  
  That's easy, it's called fiction. There's never been such a thing as a "good patent troll", there are just various levels of greed steeped in evil.
this patent requires "write to BLANK media" by raymorris · 2017-02-06 06:45 · Score: 1

It seems to me that online services have nothing to worry about here.
The patent has two independent claims. Claim 1 includes "command output device to transfer [data] onto blank media". (The patent envisions burning and mailing custom disks).
Claim 8 includes "command a printer to print a mailing label".
http://patft.uspto.gov/netacgi...
1. Re:this patent requires "write to BLANK media" by tepples · 2017-02-06 07:12 · Score: 1
  
  The cache folder of your video rental app is "blank media".
2. Re:this patent requires "write to BLANK media" by DontBeAMoran · 2017-02-06 07:21 · Score: 2
  
  But a folder is not "blank media", it's "an empty area of an already-formatted and currently-in-use media".
  
  --
  #DeleteFacebook
Re:Trumps Tweeps by Austerity+Empowers · 2017-02-06 06:57 · Score: 1

I print all of Trumps tweets
Should I be worried about these "trolls"
You have much, much bigger things to be worried about.
Re:Ah yes, the store file locally patent! by Jason+Levine · 2017-02-06 07:02 · Score: 1

It was filed on November 21, 2000, though it looks like it was approved February 6, 2007.

--
My sci-fi novel, Ghost Thief, is now available from Amazon.com.
"Patent Troll With Good Record in Past..." by mmell · 2017-02-06 07:08 · Score: 1

Gotta admit, that one's got me scratching my head.
Bridge pano by orgelspieler · 2017-02-06 07:12 · Score: 1

Hopefully the photographer of that pano of the Zakim Bridge can sue them for copyright infringement. (assuming they didn't pay him royalties)
Let me bust this one... by portwojc · 2017-02-06 07:18 · Score: 1

"further configured to download said subset to one of said output devices, and further configured to command said output device to transfer said subset onto blank media" - Phones / Tablets /Devices aren't really media but then again it seems like they count it as such for this patent (nice stretch there). However are they blank to start? Nope.
They gave the inventor one stretch by calling a device that stores something media but what about the word blank? Kind of hard to get around the term blank. Meaning nothing on it.
I'm probably misguided but if I'm right then problem solved.
1. Re:Let me bust this one... by pr0fessor · 2017-02-06 07:42 · Score: 1
  
  I'm sure netflix will describe the entire process differently since I didn't notice a bunch of drm mentioned in that description.
2. Re:Let me bust this one... by Gilgaron · 2017-02-06 08:09 · Score: 1
  
  Wouldn't surprise me to see it go that way... if there's an encrypted container of some kind that the movie goes into then it may not be blank at all.
Re:We don't care- don't blame flies for a fly prob by charliemerritt03 · 2017-02-06 07:20 · Score: 2

What is the core problem? Lawyers are always hungry, like flies - you don't blame flies for a fly problem do you? What is the big warm pile of smelly?
More people to sue! by viperidaenz · 2017-02-06 07:21 · Score: 2

Since they made the wording so broad, it sounds like a download manager.
They should sue Headlight Software for making GetRight, in 1997....
1. Re:More people to sue! by SlaveToTheGrind · 2017-02-06 07:56 · Score: 1
  
  I for one appreciated the subtle humor. Most people probably won't dig enough to understand that the patent's priority date is late 2000....
Re:Ah yes, the store file locally patent! by drinkypoo · 2017-02-06 07:24 · Score: 1

Or maybe they've outsourced the workforce - and patents are now being approved by AI instead.
Now we know where the MCP went after being blown up. END OF LINE.

--
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
Executive order No. 13775 by volodymyrbiryuk · 2017-02-06 07:45 · Score: 1

Grab them by the patent!

--
sudo rm -r -f --no-preserve-root /
Doctrine of equivalents by tepples · 2017-02-06 07:47 · Score: 1

A lawyer for the plaintiff would argue that "blank media" and "an empty area of an already-formatted and currently-in-use media" are substantially similar for the purposes of the doctrine of equivalents.
1. Re:Doctrine of equivalents by Qzukk · 2017-02-06 14:04 · Score: 1
  
  The doctrine of equivalents is a giant flaming pile of bullshit. If the guy wanted to file a patent for saving to a computer and not blank media, he should have done so.
  What really should be done is that if someone invokes the doctrine of equivalents, whatever they claim is equivalent is now grounds for a prior art analysis, and if prior art can be found for downloading an encrypted copy of a video to an "empty area of an already-formatted and currently-in-use media", then the patent is invalid completely, since they made the claim that their patent is equivalent to doing that.
  
  --
  If I have been able to see further than others, it is because I bought a pair of binoculars.
Re:Innovation by hackwrench · 2017-02-06 07:57 · Score: 1

Money is not the sole reason for doing anything. The pursuit of things that result in less socialization I find to be a problem. The myth that the lone wolf-person is the sole provider of culture and invention impairs development more than anything else.
Re:We don't care by AutodidactLabrat · 2017-02-06 08:05 · Score: 1

You forgot to set the "Sarcasm" flag
Re:We don't care by gnick · 2017-02-06 08:48 · Score: 2

So when did you last acknowledge your black overlord?
Orange is the new black.

--
He's getting rather old, but he's a good mouse.
Re:Ah yes, the store file locally patent! by Darinbob · 2017-02-06 11:07 · Score: 1

You must be new to this universe.
Re:Ah yes, the store file locally patent! by SlaveToTheGrind · 2017-02-06 13:51 · Score: 1

He'll sign an executive order reaffirming 35 U.S.C. Section 103, you mean?
Your "simple rule" has been in force since 1952.
Re:We don't care by AutodidactLabrat · 2017-02-07 06:51 · Score: 1

Soooo, you're the 1-D-10-T, Open-between-the-headsets working under the prejudices inculcated in the majority by age 18?
Einstein's definition of common sense
in this world, we need UNcommon sense
Re: We don't care by avivasatenstein · 2017-02-07 10:14 · Score: 1

I would not worry. The innovation is being done offshore in countries that do not recognize parents. They do recognize copyrights. I expect to see Netflix and othersove to those locals.