Apple's iPod Interface Patent in Jeopardy 333
Gadget Guy writes "Apple has been denied on their quest to patent the iPod software interface. According to AppleInsider - 'Standing in Apple's way appears to be a prior filing by inventor John Platt, who submitted a patent application for a similar software design for a portable device in May of 2002 - just five months before Robbin submitted his claims on behalf of Apple.'" The Register also helps to shed a little additional light on the subject.
Good (Score:5, Insightful)
Full-disclosure: I own an iPod, a PowerMac G5, and a 17" PowerBook. I love OS X. I occasionally drink the special Kool-Aid while sitting in range of the reality distortion field.
Intellectual Property (Score:4, Insightful)
Two people with their own intellectual prowess create the same idea. Yet, the person that manages to get to the patent office first gets the patent. Which means that, in this case, ownership has nothing to do with the original creation of intellectual property.
Prior Art (surely in the Top 10 /. subject lines?) (Score:3, Insightful)
Patents good now? (Score:1, Insightful)
2 points (Score:5, Insightful)
1. John Platt is officially "Manager of the Knowledge Tools Group at Microsoft Research." Which would be very bad for Apple, except that...
2. This isn't a final rejection, and certainly isn't as serious as the AppleInsider article makes it sound. Read the article on the Register for more info (I know this is
The mouse that clicked (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Obviousness (Score:4, Insightful)
Inovative? (Score:5, Insightful)
"describes rotating an input device to navigate in a linear fashion through a user interface."
Didn't I do this when using the 'Paddle' on my Atari 2600 two decades ago? Doesn't seem so inventive.
Re:Intellectual Property (Score:3, Insightful)
my comparison (Score:2, Insightful)
I seem to keep comparing this to a thing like Walls patenting the IDEA of ice cream, and Hagen das then going and making lovely ice cream, much better than Wall's. In my view, hagen das have the better product, they should not be penalised. It is consumers which decide who gets rich, not bloody patents - which seems to be the craze now.
An odd view, but somone must agree with me!
They are trying to patent a tuner knob? (Score:5, Insightful)
"describes rotating an input device to navigate in a linear fashion through a user interface" I think the car radio on my Dads 1950 Ford did that. I rotate the knob and it moves the channel indicator in a linear fashion across the "user interface" showing which radio frequency I'm tuning to.
Oh wait, if you put "e", "i", before it or "computer/Network/Internet" after it - something invented 50+ years ago it is suddenly NEW! Welcome to the new iMillenium!
Re:Nothing will happen (Score:3, Insightful)
tempest in a teapot (Score:4, Insightful)
What's actually happening seems to be a fairly normal, even boring, patent registration process for a couple of ideas that look vaguely similar if you want to write a click-whoring article about them. It hardly counts as putting the iPod interface in 'jeopardy'.
Re:Good (Score:4, Insightful)
Care to explain that?
By the way, there have been far dumber/worse patent snafus reported here. If they didn't expose said stupidity, what makes you think this rather benign instance will?
Re:Prior Art (surely in the Top 10 /. subject line (Score:4, Insightful)
Comment removed (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Intellectual Property (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Intellectual Property (Score:5, Insightful)
Should not all fevered speculation over this issue cease due to the salient fact of the parent post, of which many of us were quite aware? The iPod itself, which has remained essentially consistent in interface from day one, serves as prior art. It is not as if anyone can contest the iPod's date of market origin. So where's the beef?
Re:Nothing will happen (Score:5, Insightful)
The Patent Office apparently has it both ways. I think most people here would be happy with them if they just did the job they were tasked with and showed due diligence.
So, it's obvious that the Patent Office is looking at applications and not just stamping them through w/o checking a simple search first..
Just because some patents appear subject to due scrutiny doesn't imply all of them are (or that they are subject to all the appropriate scrutiny).
So we get pissed off when they don't search and we get pissed off when they do?
I think most people here are primarily getting pissed off when they don't uphold their own guidlines (which they do not appear to follow consistently).
If they can't perform the public service that is the reason for their existence, they should be reformed or done away with. They should not be allowed to simply rubber stamp patents when they are supposed to be investigating them properly and for that matter they should not be granting patents for things that are 'patently' trivial or otherwise in conflict with the established regulations.
Other than those who actually object to these patents on principle, I don't think most
Re:Good (Score:3, Insightful)
Well, because your software interface is already protected by copright and you have no inalienable right to any further monopoly on the idea. In any event you don't need the patent to make money from your knobs so there's no need for it and you already have protection to exploit your idea, so that should be sufficent.
That is unless your requirements for sufficency extend to unfairly surpressing competition. Even so, it's far from "OK", IMHO.
Further, unless your hardware interface is staggeringly novel, then there is massive prior art on that too. Come back when you get the bugs out of a telepathic interface or something. And when you do, it'll be the telepathy chip that deserves the patent. The software that draws the pretty pictures on the screen will still not be "OK" for patenting.
By the way, there have been far dumber/worse patent snafus reported here. If they didn't expose said stupidity, what makes you think this rather benign instance will?
Have standards dropped so far at the USPTO that "medium-stupid or better" is all the qualifications an idea needs to be patentable? Just because we have the crimes of Jack the Ripper on record, that doesn't mean we should cease from complaining about cases of homicide; neither do past stupidities excuse this.
Re:Good (Score:4, Insightful)
I've had this great idea for a way to stifle... (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Nothing will happen (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Nothing will happen (Score:3, Insightful)
So the ipod is a collection of old ideas put together into a new one... why is this news? Just about every invention in history has done that. Doesn't make the ipod any less successful.
Oh wait, this is slashdot... Apple didn't get granted a patent. The sky is falling.
Re:Good (Score:3, Insightful)
That's the trick with using the unobvious clause - every function for which someone tries to invent something to perform is inherently obvious: a device to fly, a device to control engine output (governor), a device to make light, a device to sew instead of doing it by hand, a device to agument human senses, etc. It's the device that is the novelty, not the resulting thing. I even will allow for certain medicines, but not the effect they produce (for instance: patent on chemical XYZ, not patent on 'cure for influenza').
I would wager, phiolosophically, that no human has ever invented anything that was not some kind of extension of what exists in the natural world - the universe itself is prior art in my estimation.
Re:Good (Score:3, Insightful)
If you come up with a new algorithm that sorts video files by programmatically analyzing the video and using a calculated height of the people in the video as your sort variable... you know what? That's pretty cool and pretty complicated. I agree, you ought to be able to get a patent.
But I don't think you ought to be allowed to patent a graphical button which commands the computer to sort in either an ascending or descending fashion.
Similarly speaking, this boneheaded Apple patent. Using a paddle wheel to move up or down a linear list? How exactly does placing these software function any different on a mobile device than on an Atari 2600 game? Seriously, how is it different?
You ought not to be able to patent the bubble sort just because you use it on your video file names, instead of person names. Same principle here.
Re:Good (Score:3, Insightful)
I don't know that he ever says he is ok with that. I'm certainly not. I see no reason why any lump of plastic and wires that plays music should be patentable, regardless of whether it's functionality is implemented in hardware or software.
I am not really agains the idea of software patents in theory, but I am very much against them in practice because I can't remember ever hearing of a single software patent that I really think would be non-obvious to an experienced software developer. Of course this also applies to most non-software patents issued these days as well.
And don't even get me started on people trying to patent business practices...
Re:Good (Score:3, Insightful)
Well, you can take the pragmatic viewpoint that patents tend to stifle innovation in software, and anti-competitive and demonstrably unnecessary for purposes of turning a profit. On the other hand I've yet to see a decent argument as to why software should be patentable.
So given that swopats have bad effects, and given that we are talking about what should be done - does it not make sense to outlaw them? I think I'd like a better argument than "it works for tractors" before I endorse the notion.