Apple's Pinch+Zoom Patent Invalidated By Preliminary USPTO Ruling 149
skade88 writes "Apple has lost its patent on Pinch+Zoom. This is the patent that won Apple their billion dollar verdict against Samsung. GrokLaw has an article, too." The ruling is only preliminary, though, not final.
prior art (Score:5, Informative)
This 2005 patent [google.com] from Danny Hillis [wikipedia.org] seems to be one of the main things the reexamination is noting as prior art.
Re:Refund? (Score:5, Informative)
Samsung hasn't paid any money yet, the final details of the case aren't 100% settled yet. This isn't the only patent involved in the case Apple has lost since the judgment, either. Most likely, damages will be reduced. By how much is yet undetermined (my guess would be "considerably", but then I would also have guessed Apple wouldn't have won in the first place).
Yay, more sensationalist headlines. (Score:5, Informative)
The difference between "preliminarily rejected" and "actually invalidated" is analogous to the difference between "being arrested" and "being convicted". Apple has to defend the patent and lose before anything changes.
Comment removed (Score:5, Informative)
Re:The Single Patent? I Thought It Was Six? (Score:5, Informative)
The USPTO has said the "bounce" patent ('381) should never have been granted, and the judge involved has said the tap-to-zoom ('163) looks like it might be invalid. That together with this would mean Samsung only violated the 3 design patents (the, uh, "rounded corners and color" and "rounded edges on icons" design patents, I'll leave the validity of a patent on those up to the reader).
Re:Where was this art during the trial? And PJ's b (Score:5, Informative)
A good chunk of Samsung's prior art evidence wrt phones (the violations they were fined $1b for - they were cleared of copying the iPad) was disallowed because they missed a filing deadline. Kinda defeated the whole purpose of having the trial IMHO, but Judge Koh decided her schedule was more important.
Groklaw is referring to an erroneous instruction given by the jury foreman to the other jurors. He (wrongly) told them that software claiming to be prior art to features on the iPhone were only relevant if the code would run on the iPhone. Since all of the code submitted as prior art runs on other systems and thus doesn't run on the iPhone, he told the jury they could dismiss all the prior art claims out of hand without even having to look at it. So the jury never looked at the software prior art which was submitted at trial. Groklaw is just saying they should have.
Re:Refund? (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Refund? (Score:2, Informative)
Just because a person criticizes Obama doesn't make them part of the GOP. Although it is shockingly rare, liberals do criticize Obama for being a neo-con right wing bastard. I'm a liberal through and through which is why I criticized GWB for being an evil fuckwad, and is exactly why I criticize Obama for being an evil fuckwad -- the "Adam Lanza in Chief" if you will -- what else would you call a person who spends every Tuesday deciding which random innocent people should die by drone attack. Indeed, exactly 3 years prior to the Newton crime, Obama killed 14 women and 21 children using cluster bombs. But yeah -- to you "progressives" of the "New GOP" (aka Democrats) -- those people don't matter. Their kinda brown and not Christian so you couldn't give a crap about their human rights. You Democrats make me fucking want to puke.