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Comment by FirmwareBurner | Hacker News Reader

Who cares what the size of the "little guys" is? The size is not the point. The point is Apple stole(again) from someone, now they have to pay.

Breaking the law isn't when the offended party is only children, grandmas and puppies instead of other corporations.

Next time they should try the legal way of doing business, like paying to license IP like everyone else. Stealing is bad m'kay.

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15 of the 17 patents that they claim Apple violated have been invalidated. Apple is still appealing the other 2 so they could be legit or go away as well. If those remaining 2 hold up then Apple should pay, if not then Masimo is abusing the patent system.

>if not then Masimo is abusing the patent system.

I bet my money every single company out there is abusing the patent system. Apple famously patented "slide to unlock" and B&O's own scroll wheel invention for their iPod.

Everyone can agree the patent system is broken in many ways and leads to the sorry state of today where if everyone is abusing it and you don't then you loose out so you have to abuse it too, to stay in the race. It's a tragedy of the commons.

I'm not accusing you personally of hypocrisy, but I do find it amusing the patents are almost never ok on HN except when they're being violated by Apple.

It's difficult to be objective when you gave thousands of dollars to that corporation in product purchases or stonks or have an inexplicable emotional attachment to their products. You now have skin in the game. Hence the Apple defense mob on HN.

The o2 sensor on the apple watch is a net win for the wider society. And never forget: patents exist to benefit society as a whole. Not particular companies.

By this logic, all medicine should be free. Of course, that would result in pharma companies deciding not to spend billions of dollars researching ways to create new drugs. I'm not saying the existing system is optimal, but it's overly facile to say that O2 sensors are a social good, therefore any company ought to be able to implement patented methods related to O2 sensors.

I would argue by that logic medicine should be accessible, not free. Apple Watches aren't free either, the point is access to the tech.

>Apple Watches aren't free either, the point is access to the tech.

It's not the people's fault they loose access to the tech if Apple hasn't paid the ones who invented it. Apple also has access to the tech, they need to pay for it, and not sell people tech they don't have rights over.

I understand that you're passionate about this issue, but please don't just reply to all of my posts with essentially the same reply, especially as an interjection.

> It's not the people's fault they loose access to the tech if Apple hasn't paid the ones who invented it

The ITC decision will not require Apple to remove the functionality from anyone's devices.

I believe it is accessible — Massimo is willing to license it to Apple. The issue is that Massimo thinks the reasonable licensing fee is higher than what Apple wants to pay.

Personally I feel that the patent is far too broad, but I appreciate and respect your answer.

I am not opining on the breadth of the patent, and I have no idea who is being unreasonable, Apple or Massimo.

>The o2 sensor on the apple watch is a net win for the wider society.

Doctors' work is also a net benefit to society, yet we still pay them handsomely because nobody works for free, nor do companies develop IP for free.

If Apple cared about the net benefit to society or at least its customers who buy their products, they should have just paid to license the apropriate IP. It's not like they're short on cash.

I don’t know the details, but one of the few benefits of having companies as rich as Apple is that they can conceivably push back on stupidly broad patents. That they have lost this case doesn’t mean the parent is in any way sensible. Most parents are obvious and the patent examiners seem to have very little expertise or time to do their job properly. This creates a mess, and the courts sometimes enforce patents even when they seem stupid to everyone in the business.

I’m not saying that happened here - but it might have. Most patents are dumb.

I care more about patent abuse, not about which giant corporation wins. The only people who actually lose here are consumers.

> Who cares what the size of the "little guys" is? The size is not the point.

See the comment they were replying to for why they said that. The size is exactly the point if they're being characterised by size.

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