Apple wants halt to $600m patent case
Apple is challenging a $625.5m court judgment awarded to Mirror Worlds for patent infringement. The computer giant wants an emergency stay on the verdict found against it last Friday. The court found Apple guilty of patent infringement and awarded damages of $208.5m for each offence. It said there were outstanding issues around …
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Rubs eyes
Apple infringing someone elses patents? Really?
Oh well, looks like it's just a one off
Apple == Automatically guilty?
In any other article about someone losing a patent case everyone would be up in arms about the stupidity of software patents and how everyone that sues is a troll and the courts are dumb.
But when it's Apple they are automatically guilty? In this case software patents are entirely justified and the courts displayed insight and common sense?
Figures.
(Not an fan of the fruit, my next phone will be a droid, but I do think the double standards are entertaining).
Re: Apple == Automatically guilty?
"(Not an fan of the fruit, my next phone will be a droid, but I do think the double standards are entertaining)."
Whose double standards are those? No, I don't think software patents have any validity whatsoever, but since Apple have decided to sign up and threaten people using them, the old observation about people who "live by the sword" comes to mind.
Double Standards?
Who's double standards? aPples or TheRegisters? Lets face it, aPple have a lot of double standards, especially when both Steve Jobs freely admits they steal good ideas "We have always been shameless about stealing great ideas" Steve Jobs 1994, and their lawyer, Jeffrey Randall told the Jury in aPples defence in this case that the patents they've been found guilty of infringing didn't cost much so weren't worth bothering with!!! Now I'm no lawyer, but surely that is, in much the same way that Jobs stated, admitting their guilt? Crazy no
Boot on the other foot?
Mirror Worlds are simply "Protecting their intellectual property".
Anyone remember this little gem?
"We can sit by and watch competitors steal our patented inventions, or we can do something about it. We've decided to do something about it. We think competition is healthy, but competitors should create their own original technology, not steal ours."
Karma...
Like MS, Apple finds that Karma's a bitch. Mr. Jobs should know this.
When?
are these guys going to understand that the legal system exists so that Apple can sue everyone else damn it, it's not there so people can sue Apple.
Perhaps they'll grow up and join the opposition to stupid patents, but personally I doubt it.
Triple Dipping
Well, if Apple infringe three different patents, what's wrong with asking for compensation on all
three?
Not that I agree with trolling, but seems odd to say the least that Apple are making this argument.
symmetry in the patent world
Moving on from software patents being rubbish anyway, it's interesting how the aggressive litigants seem to use the same language.,
as plantiff: you are wounded shocked dismayed nay violated, and just defending your homestead
as defendant: you haven't seen the papers, expect the claims to be without merit, will be contesting vigorously
if successful: you are vindicated for doing what's right, proud of the justice system,
if unsuccessful: you will read the judgement closely and expect to be appealing or if you are out on a limb: the judge got it wrong, the jury is stupid
Do they all use the same PR company?
Copying
No, they're different PR companies, but they rip off each other's work.
Ahahahhaaa
This is what you sign up for. You don't get to just be the hunter, jerks.
Patent web
Can we have a map of who's currently suing who? There are so many software patent "infringements" going around right now.
Simple
All the majors are suing all the other majors. The total sum of money (payments made + payments made) is zero. The only people getting rich are the lawyers (the perfect definition of a parasite).
If there were less (no?) software patents, the energy and resources wasted funding these legal fiascos could be put into making better products/cutting costs etc.
@Ian Yates: Can we have a map of who's currently suing who?
Saw this linked to from Slashdot earlier:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2010/oct/04/microsoft-motorola-android-patent-lawsuit
Fluff
I would expect more details as to just what is claimed to be patentable from a publication claiming to "Bite the hand that feeds IT."
@ David Kelly 2
What is claimed to be patentable? These days it would appear to be anything to work around anti-competition laws and stab a knife in the backs of your competitors while jumping up and down yelling "Mine! Mine! Mine!" like the seagulls in Nemo...
I always thought that the gulls were "saying"
"Mate! Mate! Mate!" but then what do I know, I'm a Kiwi :P
Taking a bite
These cases "should" affect Apple a lot more in terms of credibility than the actual wallet. Unless, thinking back to an article here last week reflecting how the percieved value of Apple makes them the second largest company in the world? I wonder what taking a bite from the "Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil" would do to that
The number of patent infringements as of late seems to outnumber actual companies! Can't we just make the whole world happy and permit people to club lawyers like they were seals
'Ello, 'Ello: Wot do we have here?
It always warms my heart when I hear some indignant, self-righteous immodest character gets a dose of what he accuses others of doing.
(Job worshippers please click the red box below, right, now)
Apple's Mac was built on IP theft because Xerox PARC was too slow in filing patents. They have pinched other's ideas over the years. Then Apple files a patent application for having sub-assemblies in an integrated circuit - obviously stolen from analogue.digital converters of old - a process also referred to as 'system-in-a-package'.
2010 is really a bitch of a year for Jobs ... bet he's looking forward to 2011 and an iPhone 5 that works.
@JaitcH
Apple stole nothing from Xerox. Xerox wanted to invest in Apple and received $1 million in shares. I have no idea if Xerox retained or sold their shares, but as the product Apple came up with was the Mac, I'm guessing that Xerox made fabulous sums.
Xerox had created some of the most revolutionary ideas for computing but promptly sat on them all for several years. Jobs & Co sought, and got, permission to take a look round and used the ideas they picked up as per their agreement with Xerox.
Easy solution
Repeal software patents. That should act as a thermonuclear detonation wiping out all patent trolls and useless lawsuits. Also, FIX the damn patent system!!!
A taste of their own medicine
Sucks to be on the receiving end of the patent stick, eh Steve?
"Yale Professor David Gerlernter."
That's GELERNTER.
Also developed the "Linda" programming language, basically agents coordinating over tuplespaces. Tuplespaces must have been patented, too, then I reckon.
So he has patents and been so wronged that 600 million dollar are coming his way?
It's amazing that people still work. If everyone was filing patents and sueing each other, we could actually push the economy into miracle land.
He is, same story, different thread...
Do Apple 'deserve' this? Perhaps, it's hard to argue otherwise, but why make stuff up to prove your point?
""Apple's Mac was built on IP theft because Xerox PARC was too slow in filing patents.""
Xerox didn't know what they had. They were far to concerned with their copier business to give a shit what was done at PARC. Apple pretty much wondered around PARC with the board of Xerox's blessing! I'll direct you to http://goo.gl/1E7d and let someone that was actually involved with the Macintosh project explain to you why you are wrong and how ignorant you actually are.
Just to clue you in...
... JaitcH is just a misinformed Apple hater that likes to make stuff up for clicks. He rarely responds back.
RE: He is, same story, different thread...
Thanks for that link !
"I'm sure some things I remember as having originated at Apple were independently developed elsewhere. But the Mac brought them to the world."
Now that's naively optimistic, ironic, even poignant, in the light of the software patent glue we find ourselves mired in now. Instead of just innovating, the Platform Vendors are now all building their own versions of walled gardens, spending a considerable amount of their energy heavily fortifying them with patent cannons and other trade secret weapons. We can probably thank Microsoft for setting the overall "trust no one" tone for the behavior, but software patents aren't exactly helping.
Am I missing something?
@Paul 25, am I missing something? Yours is the SECOND COMMENT on the article, nobody's had a chance to get up in arms or not yet.
That said... on the one hand, software patents are bogus in general. On the other, Apple is more deserving than usual of a smackdown -- I mean, as JaitcH says they copied almost every element of the (classic) MacOS from Xerox PARC, *then* had the gall to file "look and feel" lawsuits against almost every other GUI maker in the 80's even though Apple copied it! More recently, they may give the impression of being happy-go-lucky, but they keep their lawyers busy with cease-and-desists and such, not just to prevent leaks of future products but also to make things difficult for people who try to discuss flaws on existing products.
And on the three suckiest things in OSX.
They could pull all three and no one would really notice. It'd be like the good ol' stable days of OS9 when these types of "glamor" weren't as necessary as Apple thinks they are.
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