Because whether you Apple drones like or not and OS interface is still published software. Published works is already protected by copyright. Software is protected by copyright. Filing patents on software features is ludicrous. Why should software be allowed a patent and not books, music, or any other published work? Why should software publishers be protected by both copyrights and patents and not book, or movie publishers. Shouldn't movie publishers be able patent the concepts of a movie? such as wars in space, or a love story. So that anyone who writes a book, movie about wars in space should have to pay a patent-license fee no matter what the story is about just because its wars in space? Its the same as saying you wrote code that does something similar to mine even though your code tis totally different from mine so you owe me a patent. Its asinine to defend such behavior.
You like to accuse Slashdotters as hating Apple but what many people hate is not Apple its Apple attempt to own other people's code through abuse of the legal system and there are quite a few coders on slashdot. Code is already protected by copyright. The notion that I cannot sit down in front of my computer and write completely different code from anything Apple wrote that does a similar function is ludicrous. Apple suing over things like Swipe to unlock, clicking on a thumbnail that brings up the full picture, stacking icons in a grid, and similar obvious software-patents is anti-competive and its an attempt to take ownership of other peoples completely different code. And Microsoft is no better. These people want to be gatekeepers of all useful code. What next? Patenting complete applications? All these things are as ridiculous as patenting the file-menu. This "All your code are belong to us" mentality has to stop and Apple is just giving themselves a bad name in the geek community. You probably would have better luck getting a bus to fly than to expect that the majority of geeks and coders to cheer-lead for this type of practice. Going by your logic it seems that Lodsys as valid case then no? Its all software patents and an attempt to use them to usurp other people's code is purely unethical to say the least.
It will hurt Apple's screen quality as it is undisputed throughout the tech industry that Samsung makes the best screens for the price hands down. no one else comes close. Hitachi does have nice screens but they are significantly more expensive than Samsung.
Samsung is only targeting Apple because Apple targeted them first. Looking at the litigation history of both companies one can easily deduce that Apple will continue trying to use software-patents to own other people's code and Samsung probably won't go after Motorolla, HTC, LG or the others.
Using software-patents to shutdown opensource is worse than using alleged submarine patents. The notion that you can't write code without Apple claiming they own your totally different code through patents these days is hair-raising at the least. Swipe to unlock? That is code, Stacking pictures then opening full screen when one clicks a picture - that is code. Pinch zooming - that is code and lots of prior art exists. Not novel. A Dutch judge already rejected the swipe to unlock as prior art.
That same anecdotal evidence can be used for all those millions of Windows products that people gobble up. And lets see if sales are the main marker on how good a product is then Windows must be many times better than OS-X
I think what the OP is talking about is the fact that Apple claims to own the tablet form factor. Anyone that makes a tablet that is rectangle with rounded corners are liable to get sued. Apple did not create that form-factor. This form-factor has existed in concept for at least 17years. They did not create multi-touch. That was university research. They did not create capacitive touch screen displays. They did not invent slide to unlock, A Dutch court cited prior art. They did not invent thin form factors either. But they are trying to take the sole credit for all those technologies that they did not invent. All apple did was combine this tech to make products and are trying to stop competitors from doing the same thing. Not much different from me taking a bunch of components and building a computer then trying to sue world+dog over doing the same thing I did. That is anticompetitive. The bottom line is if one go on a litigation campaign against world+dog and then whine when the blowback hits the fan at high speed then that would make one a massive hypocrite. Apple is showing its true colors IMO.
Well we know Apple is trying to own all code. Both Apple and Microsoft is on a campaign with software-patents to own other people's code. If your write a feature/app with completely different code that does a similar function. (swipe to unlock) (display thumbnails that u click on and opens a pic) (annotate a document without modifying it) (scroll bounce) etc you are likely to be sued. This is the real problem. The fact that in these times you cannot sit down in front of your computer and write your own completely different code without worrying about Apple and Microsoft's software-patents is sickening to say the least. They patent obvious things then demand a stop ship or exorbitant license fees on a product that contains your code. Its a campaign to shut-out opensource from the marketplace by driving up the cost of development and increasing the barrier of entry. Anyone with a brain can see right through this charade.
Uhhh I dunno. Isn't Apple and Lodsys the ones suing everyone else too? I mean seriously. This Apple can do no wrong attitude is really sickening. I don't see Samsung suing HTC, Motorola, etc.
Didn't the recent changes in patent law make it easier to submit prior art on a filed patent? Anyone know the procedure to submit this product as prior art?
Hey Lowell McAdam,
You are saying that in order to expand you and AT&T needs to buy other companies to get more spectrum. So when they purchase T-Mobile and you purchase Sprint(for more spectrum) of course. What happens to the marketplace when only two players are left?. What happens to customers ability to chose? What happens to the choices of phones? Remember when iPhone was the only decent smartphone AT&T offered? What happens to unlimited wireless? Since AT&T decided to drop unlimited and you decided to follow suit leaving Sprint as the only true unlimited carrier. I don't buy your spectrum argument. I think you are licking your chops at the ability to drive up prices due to lack of consumer choice and nickel and dime us to death with overage charges. We do not want a duopoly on communications in America.
Microsoft is on a mission to destroy open source and this is their strategy. They approach companies producing devices with open source operating systems and use dubious software patents to force them to pay or face a massive litigation expense. I suggest people do a search on "Microsoft Barnes and Noble" to see how B&N is fighting back against this egregious campaign by Microsoft to own other people's code. I wish B&N well.
Doesn't matter. Microsoft is on a mission to own your code. If your write software and distribute it as part of an operating system then you probably will be in their radar and they will sue you.
"Among the statements by Barnes & Noble are details of meetings between the companies "
At the meeting, Microsoft alleged that the Nook infringed six patents purportedly owned by Microsoft. Microsoft had prepared claim charts purportedly detailing the alleged infringement but insisted that it would only share the detailed claim charts if Barnes & Noble agreed to sign a non-disclosure agreement (“NDA”) that would cover the claim charts as well as all other aspects of the parties’ discussions. Noting that the patents were public and that the infringement allegations pertained to Barnes & Noble’s public product, Barnes & Noble refused to sign an NDA.
Insisting that an NDA was necessary, Microsoft discussed the alleged infringement on a high level basis only. Microsoft nevertheless maintained that it possessed patents sufficient to dominate and entirely preclude the use of the Android Operating System by the Nook. Microsoft demanded an exorbitant royalty (on a per device basis) for a license to its patent portfolio for the Nook device and at the end of the meeting Microsoft stated that it would demand an even higher per device royalty for any device that acted “more like a computer” as opposed to an eReader.
After sending the proposed license agreement, Microsoft confirmed the shockingly high licensing fees Microsoft was demanding, reiterating its exorbitant per device royalty for Nook, and for the first time demanding a royalty for Nook Color which was more than double the per device royalty Microsoft was demanding for Nook. On information and belief, the license fees demanded by Microsoft are higher than what Microsoft charges for a license to its entire operating system designed for mobile devices, Windows Phone 7.
This pretty much sums up what they are doing. They are approaching companies producing devices with Linux and threating them under NDA to sign a per-device license fee or Microsoft will sue them out of business. Thereby shutting them down.
A scenario:
Microsoft walks into a business
Microsoft: what a nice open source business you have here but this is a dangerous neighborhood, you need some protection.
Store owner: Protection? from who?
Microsoft: well from us really. If you don't pay us to use open source and Linux in particular we will sue you out of the marketplace
Microsoft: Oh and sign this NDA. You cannot talk about this to anyone... get it?
Its really sleazy egregious mobster-like behavior on the part of Microsoft. Unless the Linux developers and greater community start lobbying the government, open source and Linux as we know it is screwed.
Actually maybe not so much. Then you will have to deal with even a faster rate of population growth. STDs in modern times seem to help to slow population growth in a crude way. Also people use more condoms and thereby reduce the rate of pregnancies. So you have a few factors at play.
Well those treatments probably would have been here if it wasn't for the endless regulation of the Federal Gubmint. Not to worry. The republicans want to get rid of entities such as the FDA, EPA, etc. So when they get back in power look for all these entities to be severely crippled. And people can get their treatments without having to worry about pesky things like safety.
Yes but how did the government stop others from competing with Microsoft on the same grounds of copyright thereby allowing Microsoft to gain monopoly status? DId copyright stop others from competing with Microsoft? Did the copyright laws only apply to Microsoft at the time? Just don't understand how the government through copyright laws created the Microsoft monopoly. thanks.
I did not say I have a problem with the Microsoft monopoly. You claimed that all monopolies are created by government. I just wanted you to elaborate on the government's involvement in creating the Microsoft monopoly. I am having a hard time finding any information to that effect. As far as the Google monopoly goes I think i figured that one out. Government created the Internet (apranet) and now Google has a monopoly on searching the Internet. So government created the Google monopoly. Just want to know how did they create the Microsoft monopoly. Since all monopolies are created by government intervention.
As far as copyright law goes. Everyone that writes software has the same equal protection. How did copyright law give microsoft the advantage over their competitors that benefit equally from said law?
Slashdot Mirror
Because whether you Apple drones like or not and OS interface is still published software. Published works is already protected by copyright. Software is protected by copyright. Filing patents on software features is ludicrous. Why should software be allowed a patent and not books, music, or any other published work? Why should software publishers be protected by both copyrights and patents and not book, or movie publishers. Shouldn't movie publishers be able patent the concepts of a movie? such as wars in space, or a love story. So that anyone who writes a book, movie about wars in space should have to pay a patent-license fee no matter what the story is about just because its wars in space? Its the same as saying you wrote code that does something similar to mine even though your code tis totally different from mine so you owe me a patent. Its asinine to defend such behavior.
So what exactly is Samsung, Motorola Xoom, and HTC in aggregate copying from Apple? They are suing world+dog. Not just Samsung.
You like to accuse Slashdotters as hating Apple but what many people hate is not Apple its Apple attempt to own other people's code through abuse of the legal system and there are quite a few coders on slashdot. Code is already protected by copyright. The notion that I cannot sit down in front of my computer and write completely different code from anything Apple wrote that does a similar function is ludicrous. Apple suing over things like Swipe to unlock, clicking on a thumbnail that brings up the full picture, stacking icons in a grid, and similar obvious software-patents is anti-competive and its an attempt to take ownership of other peoples completely different code. And Microsoft is no better. These people want to be gatekeepers of all useful code. What next? Patenting complete applications? All these things are as ridiculous as patenting the file-menu. This "All your code are belong to us" mentality has to stop and Apple is just giving themselves a bad name in the geek community. You probably would have better luck getting a bus to fly than to expect that the majority of geeks and coders to cheer-lead for this type of practice. Going by your logic it seems that Lodsys as valid case then no? Its all software patents and an attempt to use them to usurp other people's code is purely unethical to say the least.
It will hurt Apple's screen quality as it is undisputed throughout the tech industry that Samsung makes the best screens for the price hands down. no one else comes close. Hitachi does have nice screens but they are significantly more expensive than Samsung.
Well this was much further ahead in 1994 than the registered drawing that Apple patented.
yeah and this and this among others.
Samsung is only targeting Apple because Apple targeted them first. Looking at the litigation history of both companies one can easily deduce that Apple will continue trying to use software-patents to own other people's code and Samsung probably won't go after Motorolla, HTC, LG or the others.
Using software-patents to shutdown opensource is worse than using alleged submarine patents. The notion that you can't write code without Apple claiming they own your totally different code through patents these days is hair-raising at the least. Swipe to unlock? That is code, Stacking pictures then opening full screen when one clicks a picture - that is code. Pinch zooming - that is code and lots of prior art exists. Not novel. A Dutch judge already rejected the swipe to unlock as prior art.
That same anecdotal evidence can be used for all those millions of Windows products that people gobble up. And lets see if sales are the main marker on how good a product is then Windows must be many times better than OS-X
I think what the OP is talking about is the fact that Apple claims to own the tablet form factor. Anyone that makes a tablet that is rectangle with rounded corners are liable to get sued. Apple did not create that form-factor. This form-factor has existed in concept for at least 17years. They did not create multi-touch. That was university research. They did not create capacitive touch screen displays. They did not invent slide to unlock, A Dutch court cited prior art. They did not invent thin form factors either. But they are trying to take the sole credit for all those technologies that they did not invent. All apple did was combine this tech to make products and are trying to stop competitors from doing the same thing. Not much different from me taking a bunch of components and building a computer then trying to sue world+dog over doing the same thing I did. That is anticompetitive. The bottom line is if one go on a litigation campaign against world+dog and then whine when the blowback hits the fan at high speed then that would make one a massive hypocrite. Apple is showing its true colors IMO.
Well we know Apple is trying to own all code. Both Apple and Microsoft is on a campaign with software-patents to own other people's code. If your write a feature/app with completely different code that does a similar function. (swipe to unlock) (display thumbnails that u click on and opens a pic) (annotate a document without modifying it) (scroll bounce) etc you are likely to be sued. This is the real problem. The fact that in these times you cannot sit down in front of your computer and write your own completely different code without worrying about Apple and Microsoft's software-patents is sickening to say the least. They patent obvious things then demand a stop ship or exorbitant license fees on a product that contains your code. Its a campaign to shut-out opensource from the marketplace by driving up the cost of development and increasing the barrier of entry. Anyone with a brain can see right through this charade.
Uhhh I dunno. Isn't Apple and Lodsys the ones suing everyone else too? I mean seriously. This Apple can do no wrong attitude is really sickening. I don't see Samsung suing HTC, Motorola, etc.
Didn't the recent changes in patent law make it easier to submit prior art on a filed patent? Anyone know the procedure to submit this product as prior art?
LOL ain't that the truth.
Hey Lowell McAdam, You are saying that in order to expand you and AT&T needs to buy other companies to get more spectrum. So when they purchase T-Mobile and you purchase Sprint(for more spectrum) of course. What happens to the marketplace when only two players are left?. What happens to customers ability to chose? What happens to the choices of phones? Remember when iPhone was the only decent smartphone AT&T offered? What happens to unlimited wireless? Since AT&T decided to drop unlimited and you decided to follow suit leaving Sprint as the only true unlimited carrier. I don't buy your spectrum argument. I think you are licking your chops at the ability to drive up prices due to lack of consumer choice and nickel and dime us to death with overage charges. We do not want a duopoly on communications in America.
Because if you RTFA you see that Microsoft is mandating that all manufacturers do this. They mandated this. They know exactly what they are doing
Bonch? is that you?
Microsoft is on a mission to destroy open source and this is their strategy. They approach companies producing devices with open source operating systems and use dubious software patents to force them to pay or face a massive litigation expense. I suggest people do a search on "Microsoft Barnes and Noble" to see how B&N is fighting back against this egregious campaign by Microsoft to own other people's code. I wish B&N well.
Doesn't matter. Microsoft is on a mission to own your code. If your write software and distribute it as part of an operating system then you probably will be in their radar and they will sue you.
This may answer your question. From geekwire.
"Among the statements by Barnes & Noble are details of meetings between the companies "
At the meeting, Microsoft alleged that the Nook infringed six patents purportedly owned by Microsoft. Microsoft had prepared claim charts purportedly detailing the alleged infringement but insisted that it would only share the detailed claim charts if Barnes & Noble agreed to sign a non-disclosure agreement (“NDA”) that would cover the claim charts as well as all other aspects of the parties’ discussions. Noting that the patents were public and that the infringement allegations pertained to Barnes & Noble’s public product, Barnes & Noble refused to sign an NDA.
Insisting that an NDA was necessary, Microsoft discussed the alleged infringement on a high level basis only. Microsoft nevertheless maintained that it possessed patents sufficient to dominate and entirely preclude the use of the Android Operating System by the Nook. Microsoft demanded an exorbitant royalty (on a per device basis) for a license to its patent portfolio for the Nook device and at the end of the meeting Microsoft stated that it would demand an even higher per device royalty for any device that acted “more like a computer” as opposed to an eReader.
After sending the proposed license agreement, Microsoft confirmed the shockingly high licensing fees Microsoft was demanding, reiterating its exorbitant per device royalty for Nook, and for the first time demanding a royalty for Nook Color which was more than double the per device royalty Microsoft was demanding for Nook. On information and belief, the license fees demanded by Microsoft are higher than what Microsoft charges for a license to its entire operating system designed for mobile devices, Windows Phone 7.
This pretty much sums up what they are doing. They are approaching companies producing devices with Linux and threating them under NDA to sign a per-device license fee or Microsoft will sue them out of business. Thereby shutting them down.
A scenario:
Microsoft walks into a business
Microsoft: what a nice open source business you have here but this is a dangerous neighborhood, you need some protection.
Store owner: Protection? from who?
Microsoft: well from us really. If you don't pay us to use open source and Linux in particular we will sue you out of the marketplace
Microsoft: Oh and sign this NDA. You cannot talk about this to anyone... get it?
Its really sleazy egregious mobster-like behavior on the part of Microsoft. Unless the Linux developers and greater community start lobbying the government, open source and Linux as we know it is screwed.
Actually maybe not so much. Then you will have to deal with even a faster rate of population growth. STDs in modern times seem to help to slow population growth in a crude way. Also people use more condoms and thereby reduce the rate of pregnancies. So you have a few factors at play.
Well those treatments probably would have been here if it wasn't for the endless regulation of the Federal Gubmint. Not to worry. The republicans want to get rid of entities such as the FDA, EPA, etc. So when they get back in power look for all these entities to be severely crippled. And people can get their treatments without having to worry about pesky things like safety.
Yes but how did the government stop others from competing with Microsoft on the same grounds of copyright thereby allowing Microsoft to gain monopoly status? DId copyright stop others from competing with Microsoft? Did the copyright laws only apply to Microsoft at the time? Just don't understand how the government through copyright laws created the Microsoft monopoly. thanks.
I did not say I have a problem with the Microsoft monopoly. You claimed that all monopolies are created by government. I just wanted you to elaborate on the government's involvement in creating the Microsoft monopoly. I am having a hard time finding any information to that effect. As far as the Google monopoly goes I think i figured that one out. Government created the Internet (apranet) and now Google has a monopoly on searching the Internet. So government created the Google monopoly. Just want to know how did they create the Microsoft monopoly. Since all monopolies are created by government intervention.
As far as copyright law goes. Everyone that writes software has the same equal protection. How did copyright law give microsoft the advantage over their competitors that benefit equally from said law?
thanks.
Thanks for this info. Can you explain to me how the government created the Microsoft monopoly? Thanks.