

Apple sues HTC over 4 patents in new lawsuit - kljensen
http://news.priorsmart.com/apple-v-high-tech-computer-lR8/

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ZeroGravitas
Every time software patents come up we have the same conversation here.
Someone will look at the title, e.g. in this case "Unlocking a device by
performing gestures on an unlock image" and say _what!?_ , how can that be
patentable.

Then someone will come along and say, that bit of text is totally meaningless,
it's the actual claims that count.

But fundamentally, how could anything under that heading no matter how
tenuously connected or complex actually be worth a patent.

edit: link to patent <http://www.google.com/patents?id=dUnKAAAAEBAJ>

Can someone give valid argument as to why that isn't total BS, cause I'm not
seeing anything but standard phone unlock, now with a touchscreen.

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kiba
Well, it's nothing new, really.

Patent shenanigans has been happening since before James Watt got into patent
wars with various steam engine inventors.

You see, all those who think patent problems are a recent phenomena of our
time are clearly mistaken. It's a disaster that stretches centuries.

Nobody wants to think about abolishing it of course. It's _unthinkable_ and so
obviously _wrong_. We should reform it. We should fix it! We should do
anything but abolish it!

But you know what? If those crazy libertarians believe in those clearly
_outrageous_ ideas, maybe they do have some merits. It would seem to be so
opposite to the idea of property right and ownership, but yet those crazy
ideologue believe IP to be incompatible with property rights.

I mean, we even got Eric Raymond being _afraid_ of IP abolitionists being
_right_.

But clearly, I will be dismissed as someone with no entrepreneurial experience
or just some kid who only want free musics. A nut-case who only considers
short-term interest.

I guess I'll have to crush you all in the business arena and show you how
wrong you clearly are.

~~~
jacksoncarter
Perhaps we should abolish all property rights? What exactly are property
rights anyway? The government can use eminent domain to take them. The white
people can take them from the aboriginals.

Property rights really only apply if you are powerful enough to ignore them or
defend them yourself. Those home owners in Connecticut weren't powerful enough
to stop the corporations from using their property to build an apartment. The
same is true of patents. You can get the patent and own it legitimately, but
if a more powerful corporation has better lawyers, they'll take it. It's like
laws don't really exist. Laws are written to those in power as we go along. As
the power shifts, the laws shift toward the powerful.

I read this morning that states are reducing pensions for people who have paid
into them for years. Isn't that pension, essentially their property as well?
That's been taken away.

Do property rights _really_ exist?

I was also thinking about it from another perspective. Say you create a park
and want to charge people to enter it. You only want to let 5 people enter the
park, but 10 people who didn't pay to enter, enter anyway. They don't take
anything from other people. The park is still there just as the movie is still
there if it is pirated. Nothing is lost except revenue for tickets to enter.

~~~
kiba
Thinks of correct property rights as being a sort of rule of laws. Now the
rule of laws might be a legal fiction, but it does have utilitarian benefits.

People can predict and know what's going to happen to them if they transgress
and plan their life around that. Moreover, it give them incentive to invest
and increase our overall wealth in the long term.

However, some people likes to make the rules of law a quasi ethical principle.
That what some people called, "justice".

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rbanffy
Apple must prevent Android from becoming widespread as soon as they can. Once
more phone makers adopt Android and start sharing enhancements, Apple will be
unable to out-innovate and will be relegated to a niche.

Apple can, possibly, spend more money in R&D than HTC, but it can't outcompete
the whole industry.

HTC's move could be to convince telcos Apple's move hurts the whole industry
(for AT&T, an HTC is no different from an iPhone and they really don't care
which one you use as long as you are a profitable client). You can try to
picture Apple trying to sell unlocked iPhones with no subsidies and trying to
compete with every HTC and Motorola and Dell and Samsung subsidized by every
telco.

~~~
foobarbazetc
"Apple will be unable to out-innovate"

Erm, what? Android may be able to out-sell by volume, maybe, but will it ever
out-innovate Apple? Probably not.

~~~
rbanffy
Apple is one company. On the Android camp we can count Google, Motorola, HTC,
Samsung, LG, Acer, all enjoying the shared results of the investment in Java
technology, Eclipse IDEs, and the Linux kernel (on which Nokia also depends).

No. Apple can devote the whole company to the iOS platform and it will still
be less than the companies I mentioned will combine in developing both Android
and the technologies on which it depends.

Apple can out-innovate Microsoft. It cannot out-innovate the whole world.

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eli
I should be proactive on this and patent unlocking a device using voice print
or facial recognition

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locopati
Counting down to when Palm (now HP) steps in and says, actually you both owe
us licensing fees.

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protomyth
I would imagine HP / Palm will just do a cross-licensing and be done with it.
HTC has a much more problematic position then HP/Palm, Nokia, Apple,
Microsoft, and RIM. The suits between the big players are more extended
negotiations.

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eli
You would think HTC would have someone on staff just read through all of
Apple's patents to try to avoid them.

The patent only covers the "slide to unlock" kind of deal and there's no
reason HTC _had_ to set it up that way,

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abstractbill
Reading patents is a very bad idea. If you can be shown to have most likely
known about the patent you have infringed, the penalties are substantially
higher than if you didn't know.

~~~
loup-vaillant
Three times higher, if I recall correctly. For US patents only. I don't know
about other countries.

