HTC 'dismayed' by Apple's bizarre patent allegations HTC has snapped back at Apple's second patent-infringement complaint over the Taiwanese manufacturer's Android-based smartphones and tablets. "HTC is dismayed that Apple has resorted to competition in the courts rather than the market place," HTC general counsel Grace Lei said in a canned statement. The statement notes that …
"24. A portable computer as in claim 23, further including a sound output device in combination with a radio transceiver whereby cellular or radio telephony networks may be used. "
No - I have no comment - I'm going to get my coat and head for the pub.
There's plenty else to get indignant about without misinterpreting the case. The claim you have quoted has little bearing on the scope of the patent. You need to look at the independent claims. The process is like a logical "AND". To infringe, a system would need to implement at least all the features in one of the independent claims and the thread of dependent claims up to and including the dependent claim you have quoted.
Reading the independent claims, the scope of this patent actually sounds, at first, quite narrow. the first independent claims 1-3 would only cover a device like DEC's Itsy - which was demoed only shortly after this application was made.
http://www.hpl.hp.com/downloads/crl/itsy/index.html
Scrolling / navigating content by changing the orientation of the device isn't actually that useful (though it might feasibly affect some games and the odd weird app).
However then we get to the most important claim in the context of iOS/Android; claim 4, which basically describes changing displayed screen orientation in response to changes in the physical orientation of the device. Which of course all iOS and Android devices do. So unfortunately, if this patent is held to be valid, it very much looks as though Android ( and by using Android HTC) will be said to infringe claim 4.
Be aware this patent has a basis in hardware (e.g. Relates to use of accelerometers to detect physical device orientation). As such it's not a pure software patent. Sorry to be the bearer of bad news, but hardware patents are generally much stronger and more likely to be found to stand up.
Sounds like something ships' instruments have been doing for centuries. the gimbal is hardly a new device.
If there's something truly inventive in the way an electronic device simulates a gimbal, then fair dos - that invention could well be patentable. But a patent on *being* a gimbal?
Vic.
It's amazing how often patents in when market are invalid because there has been a solution available for years in another market.
If the interface is a physical display, it probably won't count. Nor if it is purely an indicator of orientation rather than the UI itself rotating.
The problem is patent authorities are reluctant to invalidate patents on the grounds of obviousness. It is generally taken as a weak argument. This is because many good inventions appear obvious after the event. A good example is the Black and Decker workmate, which essentially combined a work-top with a clamp. The guy who came up with the invention spent quite some time and effort trialling it.
"The problem is patent authorities are reluctant to invalidate patents on the grounds of obviousness. It is generally taken as a weak argument. This is because many good inventions appear obvious after the event. A good example is the Black and Decker workmate, which essentially combined a work-top with a clamp. The guy who came up with the invention spent quite some time and effort trialling it."
The workmate example is often cited, but workbenches and clamps have been around for thousands of years. If no example of a workmate could be found - give the man his patent.
The problem with the sort of patent at issue is that new technologies are entering the market all the time and a whole legal industry to devoted to filing patents that imagines uses for these. In reality, 99.99% of the worthwhile ideas are truly obvious - multiple development teams would independently think of the same idea. These patents then become anti-competitive corporate weapons, rather than protecting true innovators.
In my opinion the burden of proof should be on the defense. The fact that someone thought of a feature before handheld displays were common should be a strong point against it. Someone unware of the patent, independently having the same idea should also score against it. For instance, I would bet that the Apple team who introduced the feature tried to patent it and ran up against the BT patent - which they then brought.
Add Symbian and WinMo to the same list. They both change the orientation.
This however puts selective litigation against a specific Android manufacturer on "interesting" grounds with regards to competition law. Apple has big enough market share to pass the "significant market power" competition test. So it has to behave in a manner which will not put it on the receiving end of antitrust authorities.
So if it is to litigate at all on this one it has to litigate against _EVERYONE_ indiscriminately or offer it for licensing similarly on non-discriminatory terms. So the fact that the patent is probably good and applies to _ALL_ current mobile devices is actually against Apple in the long term.
My guess is that it will end up having to license this one.
Getting licensing fees from Android device manufacturers. They will end up bennefitting more than Google who currently make nothing from Android itself and only charge licensing fees for key apps like the AppStore and maps. Both of which are replaceable.
Google are currently getting badly mauled by analysts in their earning calls over their complete lack of diversified revenues (basically, as near as damnit all their revenues are down to advertising, even Android revenues, which are fir the most part simply ad revenue classified as due to Android. On the same reasoning they could have a category in their annual report "revenues due to iPhone").
I seriously predict Google will soon back-peddle (further than they already are by delaying Honycombe release) on their commitment to keep Android Open Source. Of course it will be difficult for them to do, and the developer community will have a right to be annoyed, but the raw economic facts are clear. Google are a hugely significant number two in the tablet OS space. A market that is exploding with growth. Apple are making billions from it. Meanwhile Google are making near as dammit big fat zero. The market analysts, bless their moral cotton socks, are starting to see Google's stance as stupidly and beligerently Hippy. The development community doesn't agree and sees a longer term strategy, with OS an assurance of longer term relevancy. But unfortunately the market tends to win out. Brinn hasn't performed well in the Google earning calls. He is on the spot. I predict continuing to go in to them with nothing to say on diversified revenues will no longer be an option after the next one. If there is not significant diversification or at least indication diversification is happening, Google's share price will be hit hard after the next call.
Let's face it. There won't be a change. Google don't suddenly have new revenue earning sources. If there is a small increase in licensing revenues, it will simply highlight the current approach doesn't properly (as the moneymen will see it) exploit the potential. The realization MS and Apple stand to make more than Google in direct licensing fees will really bring the point home.
Google+ will provide a welcome diversionary message and will give him something positive to say, but it won't save his arse from the heat that will be applied over revenue diversification. Ergo, Android's "freedom" will be increasingly curtailed so it can be converted into licensing revenue in the hear and now.
@ So that will be Apple and Microsoft
One day I had a great business idea. I decided to make pies and sell them for zero pounds. Soon my enterprise became very successful. Queues were forming around the corner
for my amazing pies and was busy every day. But I can't figure out what's wrong, I have so many customers but my bank says I am not keeping up payments.
"However then we get to the most important claim in the context of iOS/Android; claim 4, which basically describes changing displayed screen orientation in response to changes in the physical orientation of the device. Which of course all iOS and Android devices do. So unfortunately, if this patent is held to be valid, it very much looks as though Android ( and by using Android HTC) will be said to infringe claim 4."
This 'invention' is too obvious! I remember viewing photographs on my first digital camera (long before smartphones) and wishing it had this feature. Once people start viewing pictures and documents on handheld displays the need for a rotate function is obvious. Making that function automatic is obvious. Patents should not be granted/upheld for such low hanging fruit.
I have not axe to grind. If digital camera's have been doing this from long before '99 then cite the example, the patent is invalid, case closed and well done.
Now, having worked as an expert witness on patent cases, I know what it's like when you start actually looking for the prior art. It usually turns out what you were sure was the case, actually wasn't.
So I challenge you to find an example of a camera that has this function. If you can find one, post back here, or if you prefer and are more mercenary minded, contact HTC and ask for payement, they would be most interested to know. You may well be right, there are plenty of invalid patents out there. But equally not all of them are.
Sorry to have to be the one to tell you this, but there were honking great big CRT displays in the 1980s that rotated between landscape and portrait mode and adjusted aspect ratio on the fly based "on the physical orientation of the device". I had one, and used it on a Mac and on an Amiga.
as changing the displayed screen orientation in response to the physical display orientation being changed existed in the late 80s (I should know as I wasted enough of my lie on faulty ones)
It's a bit like patenting power led because it's on a a newly released device, it's been done before despite the context
It's sad to see that instead of competing in the consumer market apple has decided to take the low road by trying to sue it's competitors out of the market, are they really that worried about their future market share and foot hold in the consumer electronics sector. They are playing a dangerous game by basically pissing off their competitors, and I’m not talking about just one but all of them including some that they have working relationships with i.e. Samsung I mean they're acting like a redneck with a shotgun yelling "get off my property" firing wildly into the air. Maybe they should start spending less money on lawyers and more on innovation, but that’s just my opinion dang
Gotta wonder if, with Jobs not at the helm so much any more due to ill-health, the remaining management team are in some kind of blind-panic death spiral. Lately they just seem to have the delusional attitude that they invented everything, and are therefore due a slice of every pie out there.
I mean a phone is supposed to be able to make phone calls....
And as for a tablet, there creation is pretty but I don't see any real advantage over a proper computer really - only fashion.
But the guy was suggesting that they should compete, what they appear to have done is turn up at the race track with a machine gun.
Yes the US patent system is a mess. What bugs me is that Merkin companies are trying to make their hopelessly screwed patent system apply outside the US.
I'd like to see a few more foreign companies take the Samsung route and go after US companies in the US using the US patent and legal system. Once a handful have succeeded the the US patent system will be fixed as a priority. If the system starts damaging US interests then the system will be fixed.
this is one of the reasons why i would NEVER touch another apple product ever again. control control control is all they are after - if they cant have it they will sue until other companies fold.
i hope htc (by far a superiour products imho) take them to the cleaners for wasting thier time,
if apple put as much effort into thier products as they do thier court cases they would have kept android way behind insted of snapping at thier feet (and over taking)
This phone device was invented in 1997, nothing like this back then. Hardware was built and tested in a garage near Milton Keynes.
"hardware patents are generally much stronger and more likely to be found to stand up"
I agree.
It was not designed to make lawyers loads of money and stop the sale of HTC devices to customers.
I will be doing a talk on it's history tomorrow at Oxford University to get the facts straight.
This post has been deleted by its author
Thank you for correcting my spelling, I started work too early. :-)
What has William Gates go to do with it however? (Apart from the fact he personally was offered this patent in 1998 for almost nothing and turned it down)
This article in The Register on the patent has a few mistakes, so I will be telling the true version tomorrow.
"What has William Gates go to do with it however?"
The man himself has nothing to do with it. However, a building named after the man can be found in Cambridge. Of course, if you don't live there, you might not be aware of that.
I'll just get my coat before I become any further embroiled in this sub-thread.
This post has been deleted by its author
...I'm amazed that Terry13 was able to find out which bus to take to get to Cambridge in the first place. Lyndsay Williams is the name on the patent in question - which suggests that they are the ideal person to give some historical background on the controversial patent. The fact that the talk happens to be in Oxford is just a statement of geographical fact.
Assume that the Microsoft licensing is indeed for FAT32.
You can't deny that MS invented it. You can't deny that there are alternatives to it so it's hardly a monopolistic proposition. At that point, your choice is "use something else or pay up".
HTC have decided it's cheaper to pay up, obviously.
This post has been deleted by its author
Even if there is no prior art before this patent was awarded, there have been plenty of examples of it being "infringed" between that time and now.
The fact that this patent has never been defended against these historical "infringers" should render it invalid. If you don't reasonably defend your patent, you lose it.
Every radio mouse must be covered by this - a means of detecting movement, converting that to an electrical signal, storing (briefly I admit) and using radio to send it to a unit which will respond by changing pages....
Frankly prior art for this must abound by the lorry load.
Time the patent offices started earning the money they take and lobbing a few more of these patents in the bin before litigation starts.
This post has been deleted by its author
Is there an 'acid test' for distinguishing between invention and design, or is this a judgement made (or not!) by the patent office?
The majority of IT patents that are reported do not seem to involve what I would consider to be an invention, but merely a design. Clearly this is often US tech companies trying to kill competition - no surprises there - but it does leave the question remaining, for patent non-experts like myself, as to where design ends and invention begins?
The Register 
Biting the hand that feeds IT
Copyright. All rights reserved © 1998–2025
