There are three salient questions: First, is Apple a troll seeking rents or a functioning entity that invests in research and seeks to make money from products? Second, are the patents valid given the current patent system and laws (prior art, obviousness, &c) or not. And third, is the current system broken?
I think there's room to debate the second and third points. But with respect to the first point, Apple is using the patent system exactly as it was intended. Apple has been researching personal computing since it was founded, and invests heavily in figuring out exactly what works to make viable products. If Apple isn't entitled to patent protection for it's discoveries, I'd argue nobody is.
Which is a fine argument to make, but we should leave Apple out of it and say that even when a company uses the system as it was intended to be used, the system is broken. If Apple's victory over HTC is scary, the real conclusion is that all patents are scary, even those that protect companies doing actual research and who sell actual products.
Meanwhile, I think that Google are the actual villains. Do they spend billions dismantling the patent system? No. Do they spend billions protecting their partners from lawsuits? No. What they do is aid and abet other companies to violate patents, and then they shrug their shoulders and sell a few more text ads for Viagra or ambulance chasing lawyers.
I think the current system is inconsistent, totally broken and unfit for purpose for various reasons that have been discussed at length. But even accepting the law as it stands, it is very clear that the obviousness test is not applied correctly.
I have read some software patents (not this one) and all of them were completely obvious to me. They do not have to be obvious to a judge, they have to be obvious to "one of ordinary skill in the art". That's exactly what I am.
All of the above is not Apple's fault and I don't blame them for patenting what is essentially the context menu. But it is Apple's choice to use patents in a defensive way or to act aggressively against their competitors.
Yes they are a for profit company and it is their right to act in that way. But it is a very short sighted decision that hurts the profitability and innovative power of this entire industry. It is also short sighted because being seen as a nasty, destructive force that deems it appropriate and necessary to act in ways that are seen as unfair and anticompetitive by almost everybody can be the downfall of the mightiest companies as Microsoft and IBM can attest to.
> Apple has been researching personal computing since it was founded, and invests heavily in figuring out exactly what works to make viable products.
Apple actually does comparatively little spending on R&D when contrasted with the likes of Microsoft or even Google. [1] When it comes to design, it's well known that Apple is of the mentality that good design is something recognizable and, that being the case, they don't invest in human-computer interaction research. [2]
As the government has found out, R&D dollars spent is not the best way to rate the output. To put in programmer terms, we have all seen projects that spent a lot of money on developers and shown no more than a 5 person team would have had. The companies process (and desire) in patent making is an important item also.
Apple is in comparatively less markets then Microsoft and Google so it would make sense that they could spend comparatively less then Microsoft & Google in R&D.
I don't see how [2] says anything about whether Apple invests in HCI research. Whether they do market research or customer research is a completely different matter.
You lost me at the last paragraph (otherwise a really nice argument). Launching into a tirade against Viagra ads doesn't do much for your case IMO. I suppose making a multi-billion dollar bid for relevant smartphone-related patents isn't doing enough for your partners? Google never really tried to "make" these phones. You could argue that Samsung, HTC, et al. "fell for it" without realizing all the legal ramifications riddling the platform now that they're fully invested in it. However, while I'm sure Google didn't buy Android based on altruistic impulse, you make them out as a villain straight out of a James Bond movie, "we'll create a 'open' mobile OS based on Linux to sell more Viagra ads. mwahhaha".
Provided these patent claims are valid and honored, from this point on the only end game I can see is the big platform companies racing to acquire more and more obscure patents to play a game of chicken, until they reach a point of mutually assured destruction of "you can't make phones, I can't make phones so there".
But with respect to the first point, Apple is using the patent system exactly as it was intended. Apple has been researching personal computing since it was founded, and invests heavily in figuring out exactly what works to make viable products.
How do you feel about the MS attacks against Android? I find it odd that so many have come out in support of Apple, but against MS. MS has taken a much softer position (licensing fees vs injunctions) and frankly the Apple patents are no stronger than MS's in these cases. In fact, I think that one of Apple's patents have prior art in Windows Mobile.
Personally, I've come around to believing that we should end SW patents (if you can actually separate them from patents at all), but as long as they're on the books a public company that isn't utilizing them to the best of their ability is violating their fudiciary duty.
Apple is using the patent system exactly as it was intended. Apple has been researching personal computing since it was founded, and invests heavily in figuring out exactly what works to make viable products.
The patents are broad enough to affect any smart phone and many other mobile devices. Context-specific actions based on local data[1] and real-time data processing[2].
The first question isn't whether or not Apple is a troll (they are clearly not), the question is: are they using patents in an anti-competitive manner. Do they have valid IP claims whose cleverness deserves protection from copycats or is this just kneecapping the competition?
Both patents cover technology that is obvious (today, they were filed 10 years ago). Neither has anything to do with what makes the iPhone special. And they are targeted at Apple's biggest competitor. So the most obvious conclusion is that this is a strategic move by Apple using IP that has no real merit.
To reiterate: This isn't using the patent system as it was intended. Apple isn't protecting the Apple-ness of their products from copycats. They are using their strong patent portfolio against competitors with weak patent portfolios.
If you don't like the patent system, I have a sympathetic ear. I have issues with it as well. I've yet to see any proposals for an alternative, though, and an alternative would require amending the constitution.
If you're going to abuse the system to push competitors out of the market, you can do this with every competitor. Apple has not sued RIM, Palm, Microsoft, or any of the feature phones that -- from an abusive, overly broad perspective-- infringe on Apple patents.
Apple has only sued the people who took the iPhone design and replicated it. Apple is going after the cloners, not the competitors.
Before the iPhone was announced, android was an OS for a blackberry type device. It was better than RIM's OS, I believe, but it was the RIM formfactor and UI style. After the iPhone was announced, suddenly android became a touch-screen phone OS, copying the iPhone.
It is important to remember that a touch screen UI was never done before in this way. There were no touch screen phones prior to the iPhone announcement. It isn't like the iPhoen was just another phone... the iPhone was a new kind of phone. It created a new category. Just as the iPad created a new category (despite there being table PCs in the past, going way back, there was no tablet device market prior to the iPad.)
Apple invented the touchscreen UI, and much of the technologies for the modern smartphone. Apple started working on the iPhone and iOS system for the iPad project sometime around 2002-2003. Google started working on the touch version of android in 2007- after the iPhone was announced. If google had decided to compete, and launched a massive R&D effort, and invented a bunch of stuff, then they'd have patents of their own to defend with. They didn't, they just copied the iPhone.
There is no question android is designed to be an iPhone like OS running on touch screens with multi-touch. Apple invented this category of product, Apple has patented it with legitimate, innovative, non-obvious inventions.
Calling this "abuse" communicates to me that you think when it comes to software, people should be able to copy whatever they want.
I think that's bad. I think google should have innovated, and if they aren't willing to do so, then I don't think the should be able to just outsource their R&D to Apple and get the results for free.
The purpose of patents is to open the kimono and let everyone know what you've done. Apple did this, which gave google a heads up for starting their own innovations. This is good for innovation because it means companies don't have to start from scratch. It isn't a license to just copy the patent and not innovate.
Calling this "abuse" communicates to me that you think when it comes to software, people should be able to copy whatever they want.
If by "copy" you mean "create products with similar functionality without copying code", then essentially yes. Otherwise we'd end up with one spreadsheet, one browser, one touchscreen phone, and we'd still be on Friendster.
The first iPhone was announced on January 9, 2007. The LG was announced on December 12, 2006. Your timeline seems to be a bit off.
> I made a good, rational argument, but since I'm not in agreement with the hive mind, it is currently sitting at -1.
So two people downvoted you. Let me explain how voting works on HN: A comment which the initial readers dislike will be downvoted, because they tend to express their opinions through downvoting rather than argument. Then, over the next few hours, the rest of the people on HN will show up, read your comment, and vote on it based on whether they think it presents a "good, rational argument". This happens all the time - comments drop down to -1 or -2, the submitter freaks out about hiveminds, and then when the rest of the people on HN get around it reading it it gets upvoted. Calm down.
Also, due to UI issues, it's aggravatingly easy for iPhone users to accidentally vote on a comment. I've become incredibly paranoid when reading HN on my phone these days just because I've accidentally driven so many commenters ballistic with random downvotes. Getting mad over one or two votes just doesn't make sense, even less than getting mad over HN votes in general makes sense.
(Incidentally, and ironically given the subject matter, this problem doesn't seem to exist on Android. I wonder if Apple has a patent on forum rage.)
I don't understand how Apple proponents can claim on one hand that iOS is vastly superior to Android but on the other that similarities between the two systems pose an existential threat to Apple's ability to innovate. Either execution counts or it doesn't. If Android is outselling the iPhone at similar price points it's obviously doing more than just copying. What's worse, the patents with which Apple is actually litigating are trivial.
The defenses I hear of the patent system remind me a lot of defenses I hear for American drug policy. At this point the evidence is overwhelming that current U.S. patent law does more to stifle than to foster innovation and this is going to hurt American global competitiveness in the long run.
Look towards iOS 5, you could easily say Apple outsourced their notification system R&D to Google. And that is the problem with software patents. Everyone borrows bits from here and there, sometimes there is just one obvious way of doing things, sometimes there is parallel inspiration. As long as peope aren't actually stealing code or intentionally trying to deceive customers, it is a pretty large grey area.
They are using the patent system exactly as it has been setup. You can argue about the system, but they are definitely not acting as patent trolls here. If the patent was too trivial, then expect HTC to argue for patent invalidation - exactly as the system was setup.
So is your argument that patents are ok, and a functional entity suing a patent violator is ok, but this specific patent is not ok? Or that patents are ok, but using them to push competitors violating the patents out of the market is not ok? Or that patents altogether are not ok?
So if Apple are against software patents (IIRC this is their official stance) then that leaves us having to believe what they say and not what they do.
BTW, why is it Google's responsibility to "spend billions dismantling the patent system"?
Apple is definitely not opposed to patents. I remember slides from the original iPhone announcement touting how much they patented their multitouch system (which apparently wasn't that well considering how I don't see those patents in any of their suits).
At the same time Steve Jobs is openly and repeatedly quoting Picasso's "Good artists copy. Great artists steal." (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CW0DUg63lqU for one example) which directly contradicts the "let's monopolize ideas" trend.
They say often whatever is convenient and aligned with profit motif at most times and the truth some times.
Apple (i.e. Jobs) publicly talks about how many ideas they have monopoly on to scare competition, reassure analysts and because it the current legal system it is a great advantage. That's the profit motive speaking.
At times, when talking about necessity of stealing other people's ideas, Jobs speaks the truth because we all know that everything we build is an improvement on something else. Once we patent everything, there will be nothing to build on. No ability for new people to disloge incumbents by improving on what they did in the past and therefore no incentive for incumbents to improve. Why spend effort improving things if you can collect just as much money by selling the stuff you did 5 years ago?
Comments
There are three salient questions: First, is Apple a troll seeking rents or a functioning entity that invests in research and seeks to make money from products? Second, are the patents valid given the current patent system and laws (prior art, obviousness, &c) or not. And third, is the current system broken?
I think there's room to debate the second and third points. But with respect to the first point, Apple is using the patent system exactly as it was intended. Apple has been researching personal computing since it was founded, and invests heavily in figuring out exactly what works to make viable products. If Apple isn't entitled to patent protection for it's discoveries, I'd argue nobody is.
Which is a fine argument to make, but we should leave Apple out of it and say that even when a company uses the system as it was intended to be used, the system is broken. If Apple's victory over HTC is scary, the real conclusion is that all patents are scary, even those that protect companies doing actual research and who sell actual products.
Meanwhile, I think that Google are the actual villains. Do they spend billions dismantling the patent system? No. Do they spend billions protecting their partners from lawsuits? No. What they do is aid and abet other companies to violate patents, and then they shrug their shoulders and sell a few more text ads for Viagra or ambulance chasing lawyers.
I think the current system is inconsistent, totally broken and unfit for purpose for various reasons that have been discussed at length. But even accepting the law as it stands, it is very clear that the obviousness test is not applied correctly.
I have read some software patents (not this one) and all of them were completely obvious to me. They do not have to be obvious to a judge, they have to be obvious to "one of ordinary skill in the art". That's exactly what I am.
All of the above is not Apple's fault and I don't blame them for patenting what is essentially the context menu. But it is Apple's choice to use patents in a defensive way or to act aggressively against their competitors.
Yes they are a for profit company and it is their right to act in that way. But it is a very short sighted decision that hurts the profitability and innovative power of this entire industry. It is also short sighted because being seen as a nasty, destructive force that deems it appropriate and necessary to act in ways that are seen as unfair and anticompetitive by almost everybody can be the downfall of the mightiest companies as Microsoft and IBM can attest to.
> Apple has been researching personal computing since it was founded, and invests heavily in figuring out exactly what works to make viable products.
Apple actually does comparatively little spending on R&D when contrasted with the likes of Microsoft or even Google. [1] When it comes to design, it's well known that Apple is of the mentality that good design is something recognizable and, that being the case, they don't invest in human-computer interaction research. [2]
[1] http://b2bspecialist.posterous.com/chart-randd-spending-comp...
[2] http://cacm.acm.org/blogs/blog-cacm/97958-why-is-great-desig...
As the government has found out, R&D dollars spent is not the best way to rate the output. To put in programmer terms, we have all seen projects that spent a lot of money on developers and shown no more than a 5 person team would have had. The companies process (and desire) in patent making is an important item also.
Apple is in comparatively less markets then Microsoft and Google so it would make sense that they could spend comparatively less then Microsoft & Google in R&D.
Actually, they spend substantially more on R&D than appears under that heading in their financials.
Much of their R&D is outsourced to component suppliers, paid for by advance funding of new factories and other production facilities.
But their spending is incredibly effective in terms of developing products people want.
I don't see how [2] says anything about whether Apple invests in HCI research. Whether they do market research or customer research is a completely different matter.
You lost me at the last paragraph (otherwise a really nice argument). Launching into a tirade against Viagra ads doesn't do much for your case IMO. I suppose making a multi-billion dollar bid for relevant smartphone-related patents isn't doing enough for your partners? Google never really tried to "make" these phones. You could argue that Samsung, HTC, et al. "fell for it" without realizing all the legal ramifications riddling the platform now that they're fully invested in it. However, while I'm sure Google didn't buy Android based on altruistic impulse, you make them out as a villain straight out of a James Bond movie, "we'll create a 'open' mobile OS based on Linux to sell more Viagra ads. mwahhaha".
Provided these patent claims are valid and honored, from this point on the only end game I can see is the big platform companies racing to acquire more and more obscure patents to play a game of chicken, until they reach a point of mutually assured destruction of "you can't make phones, I can't make phones so there".
But with respect to the first point, Apple is using the patent system exactly as it was intended. Apple has been researching personal computing since it was founded, and invests heavily in figuring out exactly what works to make viable products.
How do you feel about the MS attacks against Android? I find it odd that so many have come out in support of Apple, but against MS. MS has taken a much softer position (licensing fees vs injunctions) and frankly the Apple patents are no stronger than MS's in these cases. In fact, I think that one of Apple's patents have prior art in Windows Mobile.
Personally, I've come around to believing that we should end SW patents (if you can actually separate them from patents at all), but as long as they're on the books a public company that isn't utilizing them to the best of their ability is violating their fudiciary duty.
Software patents and public companies' fiduciary duty to maximize shareholder wealth: two legally-enthroned perverse incentives.
Apple is using the patent system exactly as it was intended. Apple has been researching personal computing since it was founded, and invests heavily in figuring out exactly what works to make viable products.
The patents are broad enough to affect any smart phone and many other mobile devices. Context-specific actions based on local data[1] and real-time data processing[2].
The first question isn't whether or not Apple is a troll (they are clearly not), the question is: are they using patents in an anti-competitive manner. Do they have valid IP claims whose cleverness deserves protection from copycats or is this just kneecapping the competition?
Both patents cover technology that is obvious (today, they were filed 10 years ago). Neither has anything to do with what makes the iPhone special. And they are targeted at Apple's biggest competitor. So the most obvious conclusion is that this is a strategic move by Apple using IP that has no real merit.
To reiterate: This isn't using the patent system as it was intended. Apple isn't protecting the Apple-ness of their products from copycats. They are using their strong patent portfolio against competitors with weak patent portfolios.
1: http://patft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?Sect1=PTO1&Sec...
2: http://patft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?Sect1=PTO1&Sec...
They are abusing the patent system to push competitors out of the market. They used a trivial patent to do this, these things are not valid in Europe.
These things are not a problem for the real innovation guys the USA likes so much. http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2729720
If you don't like the patent system, I have a sympathetic ear. I have issues with it as well. I've yet to see any proposals for an alternative, though, and an alternative would require amending the constitution.
If you're going to abuse the system to push competitors out of the market, you can do this with every competitor. Apple has not sued RIM, Palm, Microsoft, or any of the feature phones that -- from an abusive, overly broad perspective-- infringe on Apple patents.
Apple has only sued the people who took the iPhone design and replicated it. Apple is going after the cloners, not the competitors.
Before the iPhone was announced, android was an OS for a blackberry type device. It was better than RIM's OS, I believe, but it was the RIM formfactor and UI style. After the iPhone was announced, suddenly android became a touch-screen phone OS, copying the iPhone.
It is important to remember that a touch screen UI was never done before in this way. There were no touch screen phones prior to the iPhone announcement. It isn't like the iPhoen was just another phone... the iPhone was a new kind of phone. It created a new category. Just as the iPad created a new category (despite there being table PCs in the past, going way back, there was no tablet device market prior to the iPad.)
Apple invented the touchscreen UI, and much of the technologies for the modern smartphone. Apple started working on the iPhone and iOS system for the iPad project sometime around 2002-2003. Google started working on the touch version of android in 2007- after the iPhone was announced. If google had decided to compete, and launched a massive R&D effort, and invented a bunch of stuff, then they'd have patents of their own to defend with. They didn't, they just copied the iPhone.
There is no question android is designed to be an iPhone like OS running on touch screens with multi-touch. Apple invented this category of product, Apple has patented it with legitimate, innovative, non-obvious inventions.
Calling this "abuse" communicates to me that you think when it comes to software, people should be able to copy whatever they want.
I think that's bad. I think google should have innovated, and if they aren't willing to do so, then I don't think the should be able to just outsource their R&D to Apple and get the results for free.
The purpose of patents is to open the kimono and let everyone know what you've done. Apple did this, which gave google a heads up for starting their own innovations. This is good for innovation because it means companies don't have to start from scratch. It isn't a license to just copy the patent and not innovate.
There were no touch screen phones prior to the iPhone announcement.
Nope: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LG_Prada_%28KE850%29, among several others. Apple took an existing idea and executed it well. By your standards, they should be sued out of existence.
Calling this "abuse" communicates to me that you think when it comes to software, people should be able to copy whatever they want.
If by "copy" you mean "create products with similar functionality without copying code", then essentially yes. Otherwise we'd end up with one spreadsheet, one browser, one touchscreen phone, and we'd still be on Friendster.
[deleted]
> which was announced after the iPhone
The first iPhone was announced on January 9, 2007. The LG was announced on December 12, 2006. Your timeline seems to be a bit off.
> I made a good, rational argument, but since I'm not in agreement with the hive mind, it is currently sitting at -1.
So two people downvoted you. Let me explain how voting works on HN: A comment which the initial readers dislike will be downvoted, because they tend to express their opinions through downvoting rather than argument. Then, over the next few hours, the rest of the people on HN will show up, read your comment, and vote on it based on whether they think it presents a "good, rational argument". This happens all the time - comments drop down to -1 or -2, the submitter freaks out about hiveminds, and then when the rest of the people on HN get around it reading it it gets upvoted. Calm down.
Also, due to UI issues, it's aggravatingly easy for iPhone users to accidentally vote on a comment. I've become incredibly paranoid when reading HN on my phone these days just because I've accidentally driven so many commenters ballistic with random downvotes. Getting mad over one or two votes just doesn't make sense, even less than getting mad over HN votes in general makes sense.
(Incidentally, and ironically given the subject matter, this problem doesn't seem to exist on Android. I wonder if Apple has a patent on forum rage.)
I don't understand how Apple proponents can claim on one hand that iOS is vastly superior to Android but on the other that similarities between the two systems pose an existential threat to Apple's ability to innovate. Either execution counts or it doesn't. If Android is outselling the iPhone at similar price points it's obviously doing more than just copying. What's worse, the patents with which Apple is actually litigating are trivial.
The defenses I hear of the patent system remind me a lot of defenses I hear for American drug policy. At this point the evidence is overwhelming that current U.S. patent law does more to stifle than to foster innovation and this is going to hurt American global competitiveness in the long run.
Look towards iOS 5, you could easily say Apple outsourced their notification system R&D to Google. And that is the problem with software patents. Everyone borrows bits from here and there, sometimes there is just one obvious way of doing things, sometimes there is parallel inspiration. As long as peope aren't actually stealing code or intentionally trying to deceive customers, it is a pretty large grey area.
They are using the patent system exactly as it has been setup. You can argue about the system, but they are definitely not acting as patent trolls here. If the patent was too trivial, then expect HTC to argue for patent invalidation - exactly as the system was setup.
So is your argument that patents are ok, and a functional entity suing a patent violator is ok, but this specific patent is not ok? Or that patents are ok, but using them to push competitors violating the patents out of the market is not ok? Or that patents altogether are not ok?
I just mean software patents, this is the reason why i mentioned Europe.
So if Apple are against software patents (IIRC this is their official stance) then that leaves us having to believe what they say and not what they do.
BTW, why is it Google's responsibility to "spend billions dismantling the patent system"?
Apple is definitely not opposed to patents. I remember slides from the original iPhone announcement touting how much they patented their multitouch system (which apparently wasn't that well considering how I don't see those patents in any of their suits).
At the same time Steve Jobs is openly and repeatedly quoting Picasso's "Good artists copy. Great artists steal." (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CW0DUg63lqU for one example) which directly contradicts the "let's monopolize ideas" trend.
They say often whatever is convenient and aligned with profit motif at most times and the truth some times.
Apple (i.e. Jobs) publicly talks about how many ideas they have monopoly on to scare competition, reassure analysts and because it the current legal system it is a great advantage. That's the profit motive speaking.
At times, when talking about necessity of stealing other people's ideas, Jobs speaks the truth because we all know that everything we build is an improvement on something else. Once we patent everything, there will be nothing to build on. No ability for new people to disloge incumbents by improving on what they did in the past and therefore no incentive for incumbents to improve. Why spend effort improving things if you can collect just as much money by selling the stuff you did 5 years ago?