Hacker News Reader

Comment by DiabloD3 | Hacker News Reader

I'm not a patent lawyer, but can anyone explain to me how this wasn't already covered by either part of multi-zone systems in the 80s/90s, or part of literally every single room correction tech since the late 90s? Sonos didn't exist when this technology was invented.

Edit: Surprised I'm getting downvoted for this. All the patents listed are things multi-zone and room correcting systems already do. Look at technology built by Dirac or Audyssey for latency-correcting multiple clock domains; they already do it. Audyssey, Dirac, and Sonos all started around the same time, around 20 years ago, and all base their technology on the companies and engineers who came before them, and Audyssey and Dirac have solutions that are lightyears ahead of Sonos.

How does Sonos have valid patents here when its identical to what two better companies have done at the same time, or worse, what companies before them have already done? Something does not sound right here.

View on HN

The ITC cant invalidate patents so it was never part of the question

ITC can only look at imports and damages - aka lack of profit split - where they were due

And they found they were due, given the existence of the patent valid during the time in question

Feel free to correct me I’m wrong about the ITC

The ITC can definitely adjudicate invalidity.

Does anyone have a link saying either way here? Just want to be sure.

"Definitely" -- how do you know this? Citation please.

I actually don't know for certain and I was in Google Patent Litigation (as tech advisor). I never had a case before the ITC so I can't say 100%, but AFAIK only the PTO or a regular Federal court can declare a patent invalid.

But maybe they can say "well, this will probably be declared invalid, so we're going to stay the order." Like a German court can do. So please tell us one way or the other.

https://www.itcblog.com/488-did-you-know-determinations-of-p...

"Infringement, validity, and/or enforceability" constrained to section 337, per the above legal analysis.

IANAL

However the Federal Circuit has held that “ITC findings neither purport to be, nor can they be, regarded as binding interpretations of the U.S. patent laws in particular factual contexts.

OK, we're splitting hairs, but an ITC determination that your patent is invalid doesn't render it useless in other contexts.

You can, and everyone always does, litigate invalidity before ITC. (I am an IP litigator who has done it.) Note that the ITC cannot itself invalidate patents like district courts do, but they can--and often do--decline to issue an exclusion order because they believe the patent at issue is invalid.

See answer to the other poster.

For what it's worth, this isn't limited to invalidity. For example, ITC findings that a product infringes also are not binding on courts. The reason for all this is that the ITC is an administrative agency rather than an Article III tribunal.

I'm also not a patent lawyer, but for example the multi-room volume control patent specifically covers a mesh network of independent playback devices that can be dynamically rearranged into possibly overlapping zones, with the volume controls being on a separate device in the local network.

I would be surprised if that already existed in the 90s? I'd actually already be surprised if network-connected speakers were around back then, let alone all the mesh networking stuff.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com