
Google Says Some Apple Inventions Are So Great They Ought to Be Shared - cooldeal
http://allthingsd.com/20120720/google-claims-popularity-has-made-some-apple-patents-de-facto-essentials/
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raganesh
"I actually agree with Google. On that note, I think their search algorithms
have become essential for the industry. As much as I've tried switching to
Bing or Yahoo, I keep coming back to Google's engine.

Those algorithms should be de facto standards and licensed under FRAND"

Came across the above comment at
[http://forums.appleinsider.com/t/151423/google-argues-
popula...](http://forums.appleinsider.com/t/151423/google-argues-popular-
apple-patents-are-de-facto-standards-essential#post_2151008)

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michaelpinto
Maybe software patents should only be good for a few years? I think that a
current patent is good for twenty, but maybe it's only fair if a patent can
last for five years? That might really encourage innovation...

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eropple
Frankly, and I realize this might be a radical notion (said with tongue firmly
in cheek), but I think none years is about right.

Yes, none years sounds good. Shall we go with that? ;)

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gue5t
I think that this might also be the sweet spot for copyright!

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nilsbunger
GPL depends on copyright, so you'd be eliminating enforceability of that too.

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JoshTriplett
So be it; if we got rid of copyright and lost copyleft in the process, I'd
consider that a net win. The Free Software Foundation has said on several
occasions that they feel the same way.

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rachelbythebay
I'm sure they wouldn't mind the G diaspora going out and documenting all of
the Secret Sauce at great length, then. After all, the things which prop up
all of that web searching, web indexing, and all of that "original stuff"
inside is pretty great. So, come on, share them.

"Indeed, many of the same interoperability benefits that the FTC and others
have touted in the SSO context also occur when one firm publishes information
about an otherwise proprietary standard and other firms then independently
decide (whether by choice or of necessity) to make complementary investments
to support that standard in their products. "

I mean, that is, before those people get hired by Facebook or whatever and
then make a newer version of the same thing and open source it. What happens
when the secret sauce isn't secret any more, and the people who made it have
moved on?

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beedogs
_What happens when the secret sauce isn't secret any more, and the people who
made it have moved on?_

Sun Microsystems happens: a decade of stagnation followed by a quick and
brutal collapse.

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rachelbythebay
Fair enough. I like using SGI as an example, especially given that G moved
into their campus right there. There are still a few reminders of that which
came before, like the plaque in the park, and until a few years ago, a list of
conference room names: superscalar, pipeline, etc.

I understand that SGI had a whole wing of building 40 set up for customer
demos. G turned it into a bunch of interview rooms named after programming
languages. Well, that is, until 2011.

Apparently it's been turned into a huge customer demo room again if my
mol^H^H^Hsources are to believed. There's a lot of eye rolling any time I ask
about it.

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beedogs
Wow, good call actually. SGI were doing amazing things in the early-to-mid 90s
and then... linux workstations? I never understood that one.

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antidoh
They were in the workstation business, and couldn't raise their head up out of
that rut.

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nilsbunger
If google tried to invalidate this based on prior art, or use it to argue for
reforming patents, I'd 100% agree.

But if apple has a patent on it because they were the first to invent it, then
it became ubiquitous because others copied apple.

To say multitouch gestures like (inch/zoom, and slide-to-unlock are
"essential" shows a lack of imagination in what a phone could be. Apple didn't
make a fundamental discovery, they just made a cool product feature.

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DeepDuh
IMO there is a fundamental difference between pinch-to-zoom and slide-to-
unlock. The pinch gesture

-) has quite a bit of prior art, most notably minority report

-) is similarly self-evident on a multi touch surface as drag-and-drop using a mouse or modifier keys on a keyboard

Meanwhile slide-to-unlock is a simulation of a real world object on a multi
touch surface. I'd also argue that it's an idea Apple has clearly introduced
with the iPhone with not much prior art.

Conclusion: Those gestures should be analyzed separately when one has to
decide whether a design is infringing or not.

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fpgeek
Neonode N1m

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jinushaun
I'm with Google on this one. Imagine if someone patented the checkbox/toggle
button. Now imagine all the crazy ux/UI companies would have to invent to get
around the patent. It's pure lunacy. I've seen this first hand, where the
product development team is more focused on not violating software patents
than designing the best possible user experience. It's "not invented here"
syndrome to the n-th degree. If consumers already know how to interact with
something a particular way, why are we trying to make them bend another
backwards to do it another more awkward way.

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antidoh
"Imagine if someone patented the checkbox/toggle button."

Do you think it's not? My assumption is that that specific thing is patented,
and is either expired or the owners don't enforce it or don't know they own
it, or, that there is a broader patent whose owner may eventually decide to
enforce in the context of a checkbox or similar thing.

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malandrew
Patents and standards are at odds with each other. We needs only to look at
the war that has held back a common video format for the web for proof. The
mpeg vs ogg kerfuffle is irrefutable proof that consumers are hurt when a
patent is the basis of a standard. In domains where a standard is necessary,
no patents should be granted. The economic incentive to innovate is still
there because the common parts all people to be part of a larger ecosystem of
devices, which is essentially a market to profit from.

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gringomorcego
Does anyone really think about how our grandchildren will look at these patent
issues today?

'Tell us again about the dark times when people were scared to share
algorithms and concepts!'

