Apple sued over multitouch
macrumors.com
macrumors.com
Neither MacRumors nor the original Bloomberg article list patent numbers, but this does not appear to involve any of the specific patents involved in the Apple-HTC thing. It appears to relate more generally to the touch sensing hardware Apple uses across their product line. That is not part of the HTC thing because HTC (like everyone else) uses Synaptics.
As mentioned in the Bloomberg article, Elan won a suit against Synaptics over the same patent in 2008. It makes sense that they would pursue Apple next, as Apple's Fingerworks-derived touch technology is (to my knowledge) the only thing out there other than Synaptics with any market presence.
But I think that the more these lawsuits show up, the clearer becomes that patents are really against innovation, so in the end it could be a good thing for those hoping in a patent laws reform.
In the end, only a few prototypes were made. A friend of mine has one: http://chester.blog.br/mac512.html
It's easy to imagine Apple pulling the same strings again.
Then they will try to cut these laces. And these laces are patent laws.
Apple's own heavy handedness with multitouch related lawsuits and dealings may have triggered this.
Either way, I'd like to see a lot more multitouch out there.
Last time I checked, Apple had bought Fingerworks which had a patent portfolio that I'm told was "fairly large" and had been developing since before the 2000's. I'm pretty sure that what's going to happen is that Apple's going to pull out a trump patent and get Elan's patent invalidated due to prior art (which was itself approved by the patent office).
Why do we even engage in the polite fiction that patents are meaningful anymore? They're just government-sponsored lawsuit cards now. Do they do ANYONE any good in our modern legal system?
To give an example, I'm listed as a co-inventor on a pending patent application (though I will never get any royalties from it). The patent is for a type of device that costs more than a hundred thousand dollars to build. The owner of the patent will be a small business that deals with such small volumes that they will mostly have to license the patent to other companies in order to fulfill demand, but they hope to build and sell several of these devices themselves. When the project to develop this device started, most of the experts in the field told us that it was impossible. Now that we've published the basics of how our design works, it would be fairly easy for the large players in the industry to replicate our results without having to buy anything from us. If our patent application isn't granted, then the only way for the company to recoup their costs would be to treat the results of my research as a trade secret. (It's too late for that, though, and I've never signed an NDA.) Going the trade secret route would be a loss for the market, as I've already mentioned that the inventors can't meet the demand on their own. Getting a patent is a good compromise that allows my employer to recoup his costs, but also ensures that our invention can be put to good use.
1. Get screwed. The big players profit from our discoveries, using their name recognition and economies of scale to ensure that we get essentially no business from our invention. We don't recoup our investment. Anticipation of this scenario stifles innovation among start-ups and small businesses.
2. Treat our discoveries as trade secrets, and attempt to have a monopoly. We end up being able to sell enough to recoup our R&D costs. However, we're not able to meet demand, so most of the market goes on buying the current technology (more expensive and less efficient) until one of the bigger players can reverse-engineer our stuff or re-invent it. Clearly, this is sub-optimal for the market as a whole.
3. Treat it as a trade secret, but using only contract law, license it enough to meet demand. We are able to recoup our R&D costs, but without patent filings as evidence, we run a high risk of this deteriorating to case 1 with insurmountable legal costs.
All three options lack the guarantee that our findings will eventually become public domain.
What other free-market solutions do you see that would be better?
And it doesn't seem like there is an easy way to predict what patents should and should not apply to.
I'm glad Apple have so much spare cash that they can afford not to have their arms twisted on this, and can afford to fight it, or negotiate it, or pay any fines or settlements.
labs.moto.com has done some good testing of smartphone screens and found the iPhone to be far more accurate than the competition. My own experience with some non-phone multitouch devices has also shown Apple to be the only one to get it truly right. Even Wacom's Bamboo tablets can barely manage to recognize two-finger gestures, whereas a MacBook Pro can handle jitouch, and recognize those complex gestures well enough for me to consider jitouch indispensable.
It's hard to believe that the differences could be due only to software or even relatively obvious improvements in Apple's hardware, so somebody deserves some patents, and it's probably Apple (unless they stole somebody else's technology). The ensuing litigation storm then is more a result of how lucrative the multitouch market is than it is a symptom of messy patent laws.
Ultimately, I think it was probably Apple that did (or bought) the research necessary to make a multitouch sensor that is better than a gimmick, and for that they deserve a period of exclusivity to recoup their costs and give them some profits to invest into the next big thing. On the other hand, 20 years is a long time for those of us with lesser budgets to wait for such a cool technology. What we should be hoping for, then, is that somebody more inclined to license their technology can or has independently developed a multitouch sensor that is as good as or better than what Apple's been shipping, and that they can prove this in court if necessary. Reducing the term of these patents might be helpful, but I don't think that there's justification to eliminate hardware patents like these.
The only area that patent exclusivity should be granted are in those technologies, processes, and methods that would not have been developed (and divulged) otherwise. If superior Multi-Touch would have happened anyways, then there is no reason to grant Apple a patent on the process.
Remember - the entire purpose of patents is "To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts..." - if the progress is going to happen anyways, there is no need to issue a patent.
The fact that good multitouch was developed by Apple (really, FingerWorks, which Apple bought in 2005) instead of Synaptics or Cirque (who make pretty much everybody else's touchpads) suggests that there was significant innovation, rather than multitouch just being the logical next step.
Such as the iPhone cloning distinctive features that have been developed / patented by Nokia and others. Double standards?
Every technology that's newly introduced into the mainstream is distinctive at first. I don't see LEMS or NMT phones around anymore.
Yeah, multitouch on a glass screen, that's the killer feature that will make mobile phones popular.
Anyways, what's wrong with clones? It's time to market that matters. If somebody clones an ipad, or whatever, then the markets will decide who the winner is.
Unfortunately with the bajillions of already existing patents, it is very difficult and costly to innovate in an incremental manner (incremental improvement tends to be efficient improvement) without infringing on something.
It's important to remember that with the iPhone Apple was very much an upstart, with no experience in the cellular industry. They had a very tough time getting into the market because most carriers wouldn't agree to give Apple enough control to ensure that the carriers didn't ruin the user experience. They've now fundamentally changed the dynamics of the cellular industry, and all the device makers have more leverage. If Nokia and the other established phone manufacturers had been free to clone the iPhone as closely as they wanted, then the iPhone would have been mostly marginalized before Apple could even give it 3G capabilities. Apple would not have a particularly successful product on their hands, and the App Store revolution wouldn't have happened.
I suspect the founders of the company would disagree with you on the "unfortunate" part.
How is that innovative?
Technology once sold as an expensive niche keyboard is now in the hands of tens of millions of people worldwide. Darn.
If somebody clones an ipad, or whatever, then the markets will decide who the winner is.
How is that innovative? When products do not differentiate, they compete on price, which drives prices down to levels incapable of sustaining any significant innovation.
And if the other 99% of the world want to use said thing in more inovatives way, apple forbids. And they can forbid even if original reasearch got to close results. Darn
The iphone is just a better market model.
Interesting, but the iphone should have nothing to do with this. This is simply over the multi-touch technology and whether or not other people can independently come up with similar solutions.
Why not have the best of both worlds and open up another market? There's also an opportunity cost, because smaller companies cannot use this technology and innovate. Smaller companies tend to innovate more than bigger ones (yes even Apple). So yes, darn.
> How is that innovative? When products do not differentiate, they compete on price, which drives prices down to levels incapable of sustaining any significant innovation.
Oh, but products do differentiate and technology does improve. For example, software, unencumbered by patents, has been sustaining (and increasing) significant innovation for quite a while. Also, software does not only compete on price.
Also, it's innovative because companies have to push the envelope and cannot rest on their laurels to just use their position to rake in the cash (like Microsoft and IBM did).
It comes down to simple economics. Protectionism hinders innovation.
Ask Fingerworks. They could have licensed their technology to other companies if they had wanted to and found other companies willing to agree to their terms. Evidently they found being acquired by Apple to be their best option. And Apple, in possession of the same information, declined to continue participating in that market. I don't see what's wrong with either company acting in its own interests on this. The market was apparently not a viable one, and both parties have profited enormously in spite of not being a part of it.
There's also an opportunity cost, because smaller companies cannot use this technology and innovate.
You're talking about opposed concepts here. Using somebody else's technology is not innovating, it's copying. It also has nothing to do with "smaller companies": Fingerworks was a very small company and somehow, in spite of your claims, they were able to innovate. And they acquired the original patents. Where we the cries of protectionism hindering innovation then? Why was it ok when they were in the way of others using that technology?
As I said before: had Fingerworks not been able to secure a patent on its inventions, Apple (or any other company) could have simply copied their technology instead of acquiring them or licensing it. Competitors would clone and drive prices down, established companies with greater manufacturing, marketing, and distribution capabilities would have crushed them in short order. And Fingerworks wouldn't have had any leverage against them except their potential value as employees. Is this not a worse scenario for small and innovative companies than the one where they have significant bargaining power?
Oh, but products do differentiate and technology does improve.
You've ignored the context. You specifically said clones, and I specifically used the word when to indicate that I was talking about some circumstances and not all circumstances. When products do not differentiate (i.e. when they clone each other), innovation stagnates. Why differentiate when you can just do what your competitors do, but cheaper? Why innovate when you can just tack on some blue LEDs and silver trim to differentiate?
When products do differentiate, innovation flourishes. (At no point was I saying anything like "all products do not differentiate" or "all products only compete on price", as these are obviously untrue.)
Note that I say nothing about the size of the company (it doesn't matter) or the value of the differentiation (different doesn't mean good).
software, unencumbered by patents
There are articles on HN about software patents on a daily basis, and their existence comes up in plenty of stories not directly about them, such as the arguments over HTML5 video codec support, wherein even the "patent free" Theora video format was developed originally by a small company (On2) seeking to profit by licensing its patented technology. You can argue that such innovation might have happened without patents, but you can't argue that they did.
Software is also covered by copyright, which you seem to have ignored entirely, even though it serves effectively the same function of preventing creations from being ripped off. Again, though: I was not talking about software at all, much less software in general. I was talking about hypothetical iPad clones, just as you were.
it's innovative because companies have to push the envelope and cannot rest on their laurels
Why would they if any invention they create is immediately available to their competitors? Doesn't that reward the strategy of simply waiting for others to invent and cloning them? Doesn't that make it harder for small companies to break into old markets new inventions, when the established players can simply rip those ideas off? Doesn't it eliminate one of the main reasons that a big company would ever acquire a smaller company? Doesn't that in turn drastically reduce the value of invention?
That's good for them. Unfortunately nobody else can enter that market, even if they independently come up with the technology, because there are patents on the multi-touch technology.
> Using somebody else's technology is not innovating, it's copying.
So using a software library or hardware component as a tool to create innovative technology is not innovating? Technology is a tool that is built upon previously developed technology. Being restricted in this way is a hinderance, not a boon.
An example of the potential benefits is in open source software. Open source software has dramatically increased the innovation in the software field.
> It also has nothing to do with "smaller companies": Fingerworks was a very small company and somehow, in spite of your claims, they were able to innovate.
True they were able to innovate. Kudos. I disagree that they needed patents to innovate, as you have previously stated. It's not like their keyboards came with a clone technology button. Cloning takes effort and time and expertise. It is not the characteristic of a market leader, like Apple.
Think about it this way, why does any technology (specifically software) company get acquired by a larger company? Is it the technology or the expertise of the staff that is most important? Usually it's the staff, otherwise, why would it be so important for the staff to stay onboard with the acquiring company?
> And Fingerworks wouldn't have had any leverage against them except their potential value as employees.
Not true. If they wern't bought out by Apple, they would have been a licensor of the technology. They probably would have had a healthy business supplying Apple with iphone/ipad multi-touch technology and making keyboards.
However, that deal was significant for Apple because they get significant leverage because they had a shot at a monopoly over the multi-touch technology. Fortunately, this did not happen, but unfortunately there is a bunch of patent litigation waste.
> It also has nothing to do with "smaller companies"
It has everything to do with smaller companies. Who can afford the large patent warchests? Larger companies. I suppose patent trolls can count as a smaller company, though.
> When products do not differentiate (i.e. when they clone each other), innovation stagnates.
The same can be said about a monopoly. There is no differentiation because there is only one party.
However, that is all moot because electronics and software is hardly in danger of being stagnant. These areas are innovating ever more rapidly (and NOT because of patents).
> Why differentiate when you can just do what your competitors do, but cheaper?
Steve Jobs has a good answer for you, and it is not patents.
> Why innovate when you can just tack on some blue LEDs and silver trim to differentiate?
Because that is not differentiation. People see right through that.
> Software is also covered by copyright, which you seem to have ignored entirely, even though it serves effectively the same function of preventing creations from being ripped off.
First of all a Patent != a Copyright. Patents are far more broad. They prevent people from independently coming up with an innovative technology, especially if a previous patent is overly broad.
Copyrights do not. Copyrights prohibit outright copying, which I am against.
I wanted to keep the scope of this discussion on patents because the patent system is obviously very flawed. I also question the utility of patents in the first place. I do agree with copyrights, though.
> Why would they if any invention they create is immediately available to their competitors? Doesn't that reward the strategy of simply waiting for others to invent and cloning them?
No because nobody invented the magic cloning button yet.
> when the established players can simply rip those ideas off?
What's wrong with using other people's ideas? Isn't that why humanity is so advanced?
> Doesn't it eliminate one of the main reasons that a big company would ever acquire a smaller company?
No, because like I said before, bigger companies acquire for talent and licensing. There are a number of reasons why bigger companies are less innovative. Lack of ownership among employees is one of them.
> Doesn't that in turn drastically reduce the value of invention?
No, it increases it.
Patents were put in place to discourage trade secrets. In the technology world, trade secrets are not quite as advantageous as they once were.
Somebody else could have developed the FW technology, at a certain cost and time spent. It still makes the FW technology valuable.
> Indeed, FingerWorks probably would never have been founded if it could not have differentiated itself with patented technology.
So by that argument, why do any software companies exist? Last time I checked, I'm getting paid to write software. You're just trying to spread FUD. Nice try.
I didn't say anything about software companies, but if you insist: just replace "patented technology" with "copyrighted software" and you'll explain most software companies. I can't claim to know every business model, however.
Last time I checked, I'm getting paid to write software.
Good for you. What prevents your competitors from taking your work and selling it for cheaper? How would you feel if I proposed to take that away?
You're just trying to spread FUD. Nice try.
Sure, and you're just being an asshole. Please leave.
I wouldn't disagree that there need to be major revisions in our practice (patents shouldn't take years to be granted, obvious patents need to be curtailed, etc. etc.).
Care to enumerate? I have read "Against Intellectual Monopoly" and I'd really like to get a decent view on the opposite side of the argument.
"Rewarding Innovation Efficiently: The Case for Exclusive Rights" http://innovationforum.gmu.edu/2008/papers/reward.pdf
"Removing the Property from Intellectual Property and (Intended?) Pernicious Impacts on Innovation and Competition" http://papers.isnie.org/paper/150.html
"What's Wrong With Royalty Rates in High Technology Industries?" http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=1104315
"A Stitch in Time: The Rise and Fall of the Sewing Machine Patent Thicket" http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=1354849
"Rethinking the Development of Patents: An Intellectual History, 1550-1800" http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=863925