
US patent office rejects claims of Apple 'pinch to zoom' patent - Lightning
http://www.pcworld.com/article/2045461/us-patent-office-rejects-claims-of-apple-pinch-to-zoom-patent.html
======
btilly
Pinch to zoom absolutely should have been rejected.

Watch the 2002 movie _Minority Report_ for what I consider prior art on the
2007 patent filing at
[http://www.google.com/patents/US7844915](http://www.google.com/patents/US7844915).

~~~
Samuel_Michon
I don’t understand that reasoning. If that’s valid prior art, then patents for
functioning time machines won’t hold up either.

I think you’d have a point if it pertained to a design patent. If some movie
used a tablet that looked exactly like an iPad, 10 years before Apple produced
it, then surely Apple’s design patent for it would be worth zilch. However,
the pinch-to-zoom patent describes an implementation in minute detail.

IANAL though, perhaps someone with proper credentials will be so kind to
enlighten us.

~~~
Dylan16807
Patents are supposed to be on mechanisms, not effects. If you figure out a way
to travel through time, your patent only applies to that particular way. Pinch
to zoom is something with almost no behind-the-scenes mechanism to it, and
what mechanism might be valid for a patent existed in the movie.

~~~
btilly
I could post my own explanation of why I said what I said, but it would merely
be this one, more poorly worded. :-)

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aidos
Pinch to zoom has become such a standard in interface interaction that I
didn't question it until switching to google's map app on the iPhone. Their
double click and drag behaviour is superior in that you don't need two hands.

You know something is wrong with your UI when users sometimes resort to
putting their nose on the screen of their phone.

~~~
pud
Problem with Google Maps' iPhone implementation (double-tap, then slide) is
that it's unintuitive.

Source: I didn't know it existed before now. (It's awesome btw, thanks!)

~~~
ksk
I doubt pinch to zoom falls in that category then. The vast majority of
innovative (or unique) touch based interactions/gestures have to be learnt and
cannot be intuited. As you know, intuition just means your brain recognizes a
pattern.

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NelsonMinar
Interesting that it was rejected because of 7,724,242, by Danny Hillis and
Bran Ferren. Both of them are "Senior Inventors" of Intellectual Ventures, the
patent uber-troll company. I wonder if one of IV's shell companies is
prosecuting '242?

~~~
jauer
Given Danny Hillis's history (per Wikipedia) isn't it possible that there is
some legitimate R&D going on that is reasonable to protect?

I'm not really familiar with Intellectual Ventures but he has done some
fascinating things in the past, Thinking Machines being a prime example.

~~~
NelsonMinar
I'm a long time fan of Danny's work and am disappointed in his affiliation
with IV. I'd love to hear his side of the story. (I still have this fantasy
that IV is an elaborate prank to demonstrate how awful the US patent system
is, but at this point that'd be an awfully long con.)

Despite being a dangerous, destructive company, Intellectual Ventures has a
lot of smart people associated with it. Myhrvold himself is no slouch and many
of the folks who go to the infamous dinner parties with paralegals taking
notes are interesting people.

Here's IV's marketing on some of their "inventors":
[http://www.intellectualventures.com/index.php/inventor-
netwo...](http://www.intellectualventures.com/index.php/inventor-
network/inventor-spotlights)
[http://www.intellectualventures.com/index.php/inventor-
netwo...](http://www.intellectualventures.com/index.php/inventor-
network/senior-inventors)

~~~
levesque
They are either convinced that they are doing good, or in it for the money.

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Symmetry
But I presume the companies that have been paying royalties for half a decade
won't get their money back.

~~~
rhizome
I've long advocated for refund clauses in royalty settlement agreements, in
the eventuality that the patent is invalidated.

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bluthru
We all saw "pinch to zoom" publicly demonstrated in that multi-touch Ted talk
before the iPhone was unveiled.

I'm not sure why the "overscroll bounce" was rejected, as it was Apple's
unique invention and not obvious.

~~~
thezilch
"Overscroll" was rejected on multiple counts of obviousness and lacking in
novelty, due to prior art [0].

[0] [http://www.fosspatents.com/2012/10/patent-office-
tentatively...](http://www.fosspatents.com/2012/10/patent-office-tentatively-
invalidates.html)

~~~
bluthru
Sorry, but what specifically is the "prior art" being referenced?

~~~
thezilch
Specifically...

 _The direction of scrolling through the list of items may be reversed in
response to the scrolling intersecting a virtual boundary corresponding to a
terminus of the list. The scrolling reversal may correspond to a damped
motion. For example, during scrolling, a displayed portion of the list of
items may appear to bounce off of a boundary of the window in the touch-
sensitive display when a beginning or an end of the list of items is reached.
The apparent bounce may correspond to a simulation of a viscous or elastic
ball having momentum in a first direction striking an immovable and /or
inelastic object, such as a wall. The subsequent motion of the ball may be
damped, for example, by including a friction or dissipative term in the
simulation. A parameter corresponding to the friction term in the simulation
may be adjustable, allowing the ball to reach equilibrium in contact with the
wall, i.e., the virtual boundary, or displaced from the wall._

\-- "Ording" (2005) U.S. Patent No. 7,786,975
[http://patft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-
Parser?Sect1=PTO1&Sect2=H...](http://patft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-
Parser?Sect1=PTO1&Sect2=HITOFF&d=PALL&p=1&u=%2Fnetahtml%2FPTO%2Fsrchnum.htm&r=1&f=G&l=50&s1=7,786,975.PN.&OS=PN/7,786,975&RS=PN/7,786,975)

~~~
bluthru
I'm confused. Bas Ording is the designer at Apple who invented it. Scott
Forestall is also listed. I'd guess that all of the investors listed were
Apple employees.

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drewda
The HCI researcher Bill Buxton has a quite comprehensive run-down titled
"Multi-Touch Systems that I Have Known and Loved ":
[http://www.billbuxton.com/multitouchOverview.html](http://www.billbuxton.com/multitouchOverview.html)

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tehwalrus
my first reaction to this was "bah, software patents. I love living in the
EU."

But, this got me thinking - it a patent about something like a touch interface
(intrinsically linked to hardware, but where software is required) software or
not?

This also works for double clicks, key repeat delay, and stuff like joysticks.

Once you've invented the mouse, can you then patent every way of clicking and
shaking? similarly, following the touchscreen, can we then patent every
conceivable way to tap/swipe/pinch it?

I want to say "no, all these patents are obvious and dumb," but the "software
is mathematics" mantra really doesn't hold for these kind of fluffy, hands-on
concepts.

hmm.

~~~
mcintyre1994
Software patents are not entirely avoided in the EU, just to be clear. Quoting
a little from an essay I had to write, although “programs for computers” are
excluded by Article 52 of the European Patent Convention (1963), inventions
that include an inventive step and solve a technical problem by the
utilisation of a computer program have been upheld on appeal, for example in
the case of Microsoft Corporation (data transfer with expanded clipboard
features. T 0469/03 - 3.5.01, [http://www.epo.org/law-practice/case-law-
appeals/recent/t030...](http://www.epo.org/law-practice/case-law-
appeals/recent/t030469eu1.html))

They might tell us that computer programs can't be patented, but their courts
say otherwise - including states involved in the upcoming European Patent (for
those unaware, currently EU states choose which European Patent Office patents
to accept, the European Patent will synchronise all states except Spain and
Italy). Actually the situation in Europe is quite similar to America -
software isn't part of their patent legislation literature either; but such
patents have been upheld repeatedly.

~~~
tehwalrus
thank you for the clarification - I didn't know the detail of the situation!

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bougiefever
I want to patent The Wave. You know, when you see someone you know, and you
raise your arm with your palm facing out, moving your hand in a horizontal
motion. Yea, that wave. No one has patented it yet, so I'm going to claim it.

~~~
admsyn
This type of snark comes up whenever the patent system is discussed. However,
isn't the fact that this would (presumably) not be approved an argument in
their favour?

~~~
fpgeek
In a world where the USPTO approves such things as "Method of swinging on a
swing" [1], I wouldn't take any bets on what they won't approve.

[1]
[http://www.google.com/patents/US6368227](http://www.google.com/patents/US6368227)

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DigitalSea
Finally, The U.S. Patent and Trademark Office does their job correctly and
rejects a ridiculous patent. Hopefully only one of many ambiguous patents
denied in the coming months and years. Gestures should not be patentable
whatsoever and Apple are deluded for thinking so. I guess when you have
billions of cash at your disposal your imagination knows no bounds as to what
you think you are entitled to.

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shmerl
Apple are really patent sick.

~~~
mitchty
Compared to what? They're no more patent sick than other companies, they just
get reported on by the news more often.

Have a look at patents for car companies, you'd probably be shocked at how
common this stuff is. Patent attorneys don't exist for just the tech world,
they make money for a reason.

~~~
shmerl
Compared to how normal tech company should behave. Luckily there are companies
which are opposed to software patents. I'm sure there are other patent sick
companies, but Apple is just an infamous one. May be it's more reported than
others, but such reputation is deserved.

Patent attorneys don't participate in this on their own. It's from these
companies' approval. In normal companies attorneys ensure that company uses
patents only as defensive tools, in sick ones they use them for offense.

~~~
Steko
"Compared to how normal tech company should behave."

Shrug, Apple negotiates above board and pays Amazon tens of millions for one
click (possibly bullshit). Apple negotiates above board and pays billions for
walking all over Nokia's patents. Samsung walks all over Apple's design
(according to Google lawyers) and Apple's (possibly bullshit) patents and
Googlerola negotiates for a farcial 5%+ of revenue for one (possibly bullshit)
standards patent and yet it's Apple who is the huge villain for going after
them. Got it, Apple is supposed to write checks to other companies, never cash
any and Google and friends get a lifetime free pass for infringement because
they talk about being "open".

"We don't use patents offensively" tends to be propaganda from companies with
bad patent portfolios.

~~~
shmerl
_> Apple negotiates above board and pays Amazon tens of millions for one click
(possibly bullshit)_

So? Amazon is also patent sick. As well as Nokia and other patent aggressors.
Is that news? It's not an excuse for any of them.

"Good portfolio" does not include ridiculously idiotic patents like one click,
round corners or anything like that. It doesn't even include any software
patents at all.

