
To defend Android, Google must attack software patents - brkcmd
http://www.h-online.com/open/features/To-defend-Android-Google-must-attack-software-patents-1276948.html
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wccrawford
"That is, Google could easily have gone higher with its bid: why didn't it?"

... Rich people get rich by spending wisely. Just because Google -has- money
doesn't mean it should spend it on the first thing that comes along.

If they didn't buy something, it's because they thought the price was too high
for the value it brought to them. It's pretty simple economics.

~~~
dexen
This.

Also, the value of patent pool may be vastly different to the consortium than
to Google. Basically, the value reflects how the buyer evaluates competitor's
competetitive strength.

In this case, it may be the consortium considers Google a very strong
competitor, while Google considers the consortium a somewhat less troubling
competition.

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tdfx
I'd like to see them take that $4bn they would've spent on Nortel patents and
use it for a patent reform campaign. I'm sure that kind of money could buy a
lot of votes in DC.

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andybak
The fact that your last sentence is uncontroversial is really depressing.
Everyone accepts that 'lobbying' is a polite word for 'bribery' and should be
unacceptable in a modern democracy. We should all be on the damn streets about
this.

~~~
GrooveStomp
I completely agree with you. My sister in law was talking about working for a
high-profile lobbying group because "That's how real political change
happens." I pretty much felt sick to my stomach right then and there.

Unfortunately, most of us (myself included) realize that's just the way things
are now. I'm not defending this position - just commenting on it.

~~~
nodata
That's just the way things are and nobody cares, or at least: no-one visible
cares.

The only people who appear to be speaking out on issues like this are
Anonymous. What does that say?

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va_coder
I'm starting to realize that the success of Android is, in part, a triumph of
open source and that's got people scared. And now their attacking it with
everything they've got.

~~~
roc
It has nothing to do with the Open Source part and everything to do with the
"triumph" part. Android devices are selling very well. Its competitors
couldn't care less how it's built or by whom. Their response is the same
regardless: they use every tool in the shed to not only make themselves
better, but to act as a drag on their competitors.

~~~
martythemaniak
Open has a lot to do with it - Android is a great OS by itself but because
it's free, it has hurt RIM, MS and Apple's profits quite a bit. Hence why
they've banded up and decided to throw everything they have at it.

~~~
Steko
I think you meant Nokia not Apple. Apple's profits have been world beating and
they sold pretty much every iPad and iPhone 4 they could make for the last
year.

Which is not to say Android isn't a threat to Apple, clearly it's the largest
threat, but just that it hasn't seriously affected Apple's profits.

~~~
william42
Well, the question is if Apple would be making even more if they didn't have
to compete with Android.

~~~
Steko
Since they have been mostly supply constrained I would say not a whole lot
more. It's a valid question though, they might be able to extract a larger
subsidy from carriers.

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petegrif
The writer, who has indeed attacked software patents on previous occasions,
omits a key step in his argument.

para 3 "Of course, that doesn't necessarily mean that Android infringes on
anyone's patents.:" This is absolutely correct. But it doesn't mean that it
doesn't either. And without examining the facts (a matter requiring a
significant effort of time and effort and no small familiarity with patent
law) it is impossible to know a priori whether the patents have been infringed
upon.

"It simply indicates that the companies in question have done the sums and
decided that it is probably cheaper in the long run to pay licensing fees now
rather than risk losing a long and expensive patent infringement suit and end
up paying much more later. " True. But without evidence and argument we still
don't know if they settled because they (a) although they sincerely believed
they were not infringing they didn't want to risk the legal process, or (b)
they did believe they were infringing and whilst they would much rather not
pay it was pointless to resist. All we can be confident of therefore is that
(a) in either case their assessment of the risk has certainly been expertly
evaluated by the best IP attorneys money can buy, and (b) those attorneys
advised them to settle so they are unlikely to have been crystal clear it was
blindingly obvious there was no infringement.

"In other words, these deals are mostly about the skewed incentives of the US
patent system" This is a false conclusion. This statement is not a reasonable
consequence of anything that proceeded it. It is rather a statement of the
writer's opinion of the patent system. He has twisted the argument, with no
supporting evidence, to support his cause.

The fact is that from the material he presents (practically nothing) we cannot
draw any meaningful conclusions about the state of the patent system. He
and/or we may have prior opinions about the subject but this paragraph is just
another opinion masquerading as an argument.

~~~
Joeri
Of course you can draw meaningful conclusions. Given that all popular
smartphone OS market players are in cross-licensing deals or lawsuits related
to patents, and that a single licensing deal can cost $10 or more per handset,
you can conclude that it's too expensive for small players to enter that
market (since they will have no patent portfolio to negotiate with). This
means that the smartphone OS market is effectively closed. That's harmful, no
matter how you twist the argument.

~~~
Steko
"This means that the smartphone OS market is effectively closed."

So how did Apple enter it? Or Google? When 75% of the market is an exception
to your rule it's time to give the rule a second look.

"too expensive for small players"

This is dreamland. Patents aside, making a competitive mobile phone is a huge
capital intensive endeavor. Patents don't scare people off half as much as the
world of contract manufacturing does. There's no 17 year old _wunderkind_ in
Topeka being stopped from billionaire status here.

~~~
Joeri
Apple and Google are excellent examples of how the market is closed. They can
lose billions of dollars and still turn a profit. They can enter any market
they want, even completely closed ones.

If it's dreamland, why are there small desktop linux competitors? You confuse
engineering effort with business effort. You can't launch a smartphone OS
business, but you can launch a desktop OS business. The only reasons that this
is the case are patents.

~~~
Steko
"why are there small desktop linux competitors?"

How are they different from the Android forks showing up around the world?

How do they make money? How much would they make if Google gave away the same
services for free?

If milk (read: Smartphone OS) was free it's seems pretty clear that you and I
would not want to enter the milk selling business.

Caveat: unless we were able to deliver a superior quality milk that people
would pay for and had some assurance (read: patents) that our innovation(s)
would not be immediately copied and given away by the free milkers (read:
Google/KIRF pirates).

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monochromatic
Sure, they could throw $4B into a lobbying campaign against software patents.
But there's no great reason to think it would be successful, and it probably
wouldn't have any effect on previous patents. On the other hand, that would
make a hell of a warchest for defending themselves in infringement suits...

~~~
flocial
But how would they convince stockholders? Spending $4 billion on a bid for
patents where the ouctome is known versus a campaign that might work but goes
against the system are very different things.

~~~
monochromatic
I agree. That's why I'm saying using the money to defend against infringement
suits as they arise makes more sense, instead of using it to try to change the
system as a whole.

~~~
flocial
I replied to the wrong comment. Totally agree with you.

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petegrif
The really big unaddressed question in this post is whether Google actually
does have to defend Android. After all, $10 per handset is nothing like as
much as the cost of developing, maintaining and supporting your own smartphone
OS. We're not talking feature phone here, this is a sizeable piece of
sophisticated software that is in competition (primarily) with iOS. (Bear in
mind that Apple can amortize its enormous development expense over a very
large number of handsets!) I suppose you could argue that it gives MS some
kind of an advantage with their OS but that rather ignores the investment MS
had to make developing their OS.

I am certainly prepared to be persuaded that somehow fighting the patents in
question is a life or death matter for Android but so far I haven't seen a
convincing evidence that it's true.

~~~
aphexairlines
$10 to MS, $10 to Apple, $10 to Nokia, $10 to RIM, $10 to Qualcomm, $10 to
Oracle, $10 to nvidia, $10 to IBM, etc...

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petegrif
?? I'm sorry. I don't understand your point. Could you explain it for me.

~~~
aphexairlines
I mean that paying off $10 to Microsoft doesn't scale because very soon you'll
be paying several others with similarly slightly-relevant patents and who are
all already either in court, threatening to take their cases to court, or have
a history of not being shy about doing that.

~~~
petegrif
For major players I think it is likely to scale precisely because of the
pervasiveness of patents in the area. Those companies with substantial patent
portfolios (many of them as you pointed out) gain nothing by suing each other
and so most of the time they don't. The case that would indeed be a concern
would be if there were a company with no patent portfolio that the others
could all pile onto and freeze out. This is possible but it does raise the
question of how Apple was able to enter a market with such heavy existing IP
holdings. A point worth remembering is that patents don't have to stop you
innovating but rather oblige you to redirect your innovation. So if you want
to build another 'me too' product there may well be IP issues to navigate but
if you do want to truly innovate it is unlikely to be a major concern of the
kind you describe with everyone else holding patents in the area.

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nextparadigms
If Google wants to abolish patents, they'll need a lot of companies to support
them. But surely some of these companies will want to help:

[http://www.geek.com/wp-
content/uploads/2010/10/mobilelawsuit...](http://www.geek.com/wp-
content/uploads/2010/10/mobilelawsuits.jpg)

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jdq
_"To defend Android, Google must attack software patents"_

But then Google jeopardizes its own search patents.

~~~
erikpukinskis
More than any other software company, I think that Google's patents are purely
defensive. I don't think Google wants to sue anyone.

I think that's largely true for Microsoft and Apple as well. Although Apple
does get a little snippy when people copy too closely. And Oracle seems to
relish a good lawsuit.

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ZeSmith
I wonder if it would be possible to claim that patents used in this way
actually violate antitrust laws.

~~~
petegrif
No it wouldn't. Patents are deeply enshrined in US law and a patent holder is
perfectly within their rights to pursue those infringing on their rights. In
fact that is the only right they have!!

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dlikhten
I propose we write an android/iphone game for that. As the android bot attacks
patents. With the last boss being balmer who will throw "developers" at the
little android's shield of awesomeness.

It'll be mortal combat meets zelda. Who's in?

~~~
praptak
I'd rather make it into a LARP. One with pitchforks and torches.

