

Patent infringement claim re: “Creating Shazam in Java” blogpost (2010) - danso
http://www.royvanrijn.com/blog/2010/07/patent-infringement/

======
Smerity
It terrifies me that even disclosing that you are attempting to understand a
patent implies you intend to infringe upon it. It's as close to a thoughtcrime
as possible without peeking into our heads. Worst of all, this is only
happening thanks to our modern age of information sharing[1], which helps
encourage innovation.

Even if this topic covered was complex enough such that a patent was
warranted, this is still disturbing as this accusation of patent infringement
aims to directly halt the understanding of any of the innovations at play.
Patents are an exclusive right granted in exchange for detailed public
disclosure of the invention - to promote understanding and innovation is their
purpose!

This wasn't angled towards mass production, just simply understanding and
spreading knowledge - a fundamentally important concept in our knowledged
based field.

[1]: Quote: "Also, as I'm sure you are aware, your blogpost may be viewed
internationally. As a result, you may contribute to someone infringing our
patents in any part of the world."

~~~
kabdib
This is the double bind. You can't go looking because you're penalized.

Yet the PTO and patent community refers to patents as "teachings". I
continually heard that. "This patent 456 teaches that yadda yadda bing-bap-
boom" and your very soul (well, professional career) is pillar-of-salt
material if you even go look.

And yet, none of the _really hard_ stuff seems to be patented. Or I could just
be bitter. Or both :-)

"Let's see if someone's got prior art on (super whiz-bang technology)." Click,
page, click . . .

"Wait, no--"

"Oh crap, I just read someone's hash table patent. Pass me another mind-wipe
pill, would you?"

"Sigh. I'll have them hire another lawyer downstairs."

Which is what it's really about these days. Ka-ching, baby.

------
Htsthbjig
Even those that promote patenting algorithms should agree that patents purpose
is opening the details of a machine or process in exchange for a monopoly.

That was the purpose of original patent's plans, that everybody could
replicate your machine or process with the information provided.

When you want a monopoly and also ban publishing the details of the algorithm
or working examples, something wrong is happening.

It has gone too far, with people recommending other people NOT to read
patents, because it will be bad for them on court.

~~~
kabdib
The reason that companies tell employees not to read patents is that knowingly
infringing a patent is triple damages (as opposed to just accidentally
reimplementing something).

I've read a bunch of software patents, with attorneys helping me out with
language and advice, but this was under the guise of "How can we do a product
like X, but not infringe on the related patents?" The patents in question were
very broad, nearly without exception either ridiculously obvious or adoption
of techniques that I found in textbooks and papers from conferences. It was
almost like the company producing product X had bribed the PTO, it was that
bad.

I believe that nearly every piece of software exceeding a few hundred lines of
code infringes on someone's bullshit software or business methods patent. And
of course, you can't go reading all the patents, so every software project is
pre-screwed. Shipping software these days is a matter of ignoring the issue,
crossing your fingers and hoping that a patent troll doesn't come knocking.

~~~
Twirrim
The PTO largely doesn't seem to care or do any research beyond the bare
basics. As far as I can tell they're not really incentivised to do so either.

They collect a whole heap of fees for getting and maintaining a patent
([http://www.uspto.gov/learning-and-resources/fees-and-
payment...](http://www.uspto.gov/learning-and-resources/fees-and-
payment/uspto-fee-schedule)), and even claim a fee for revisiting a patent,
but so far as I've been able to find, it doesn't cost them anything to
actually invalidate one. It ought to cost them all the money they've taken so
far, and then some on top, to provide them with more of an incentive to make
sure the patent is correct.

------
rayiner
Trolling hobbyists is indefensible, but it's simplistic to say that this is an
obvious patent on "matching music using a hashing function." The patent in
question is: 6,990,453. It describes doing a frequency domain analysis of the
audio signal to obtain a set of landmarks, and using characterizations of
those landmarks to obtain the fingerprints, and using the fingerprints to
match songs:
[http://www.google.com/patents/US6990453](http://www.google.com/patents/US6990453).
That's why Shazam can recognize recorded and transcoded music. Simple hashing
would not do that.

In fact, the article in question is actually based on a different article,
which is based on a paper published by one of the Shazam authors:
[http://www.ee.columbia.edu/~dpwe/papers/Wang03-shazam.pdf](http://www.ee.columbia.edu/~dpwe/papers/Wang03-shazam.pdf).

IMO, the outrage here is the tone-deaf PR of the CTO.

~~~
themartorana
While technically awesome, it's still math. It cuts so closely to being able
to patent proofs or mathematical expressions (it's kind of hard to argue
that's not exactly what it is) and I hope one day the judicial system
understands software well enough to invalidate software patents.

It's technically amazing. Shaman still amazes me with its speed and accuracy.
But in the end, it's simple (advanced) numerical analysis.

I'd much rather their implementation be held close to the vest as a trade
secret, where stealing source code is illegal, but if I produce similar
functionality on my own via my own work and time investment, I don't need to
fear that someone has government sponsored exclusivity on that pattern of
mathematical analysis.

~~~
throwawaykf05
_> ... it's still math..._

This is a very prevalent misconception around here, so I will address it
again. Saying "software is mathematics" is about as correct as saying
"machines are physics". (Note that you cannot patent laws of physics either.)

------
placebo
I'm always surprised by the confusion of well meaning, intelligent, creative
but obviously naive hobbyists trying to understand the justice or logic when
they are threatened by lawyers backed by organisations with lots of money.

Here's a wakeup call: Justice has nothing to do with any of this, and the only
logic behind it is the golden rule, i.e that those who have the gold make the
rules. This is nothing new. Satisfying greed of the powerful by invoking
terror on the less powerful is a very common occurrence throughout human
history. The only things that change in different times and places are the
implementations of this rule.

Sorry to be so cynical about this, and I'd be delighted if you prove me wrong.
It's ironic how patents today exist to mostly serve the exact opposite of
their original intent.

------
jrockway
I don't think you can patent the description of the algorithm. Doesn't the
patent itself contain the description of the algorithm?

This just sounds like pure bullying from third-rate "lawyers".

------
hhjj
Interesting letter showing lawyers think matching music thanks to an hashing
function is not obvious (else why would they try to bully someone to remove
that information from www).

~~~
teddyh
Lawyers actually “think” nothing. Or rather, what they write and what they
argue is what they are paid to write and argue. It has no actual connection to
what they actually think - they might not even have actually personally
considered the issue, and may never do so. However, what they write is in many
ways _meant_ to be taken seriously and reacted to, just like troll posts.
Therefore, take care not to be trolled by lawyers.

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masterzoozoo
A quick search on github.com
([https://github.com/search?utf8=%E2%9C%93&q=shazam](https://github.com/search?utf8=%E2%9C%93&q=shazam))
lists a lot of implementation related to it. Bad that they are running behind
a single guy. May be their implementation is exactly same as what is posted on
the blog.

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voltagex_
Why hasn't AcoustID been targeted? [0]

[0]: [https://acoustid.org/](https://acoustid.org/)

------
phaed
Streisand effect in 3, 2, 1...

