Apple Wins Reversal of $625.5 Million Mirror Worlds Patent Infringement Verdict

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-04-04/apple-wins-reversal-of-mirror-worlds-patent-verdict.html

by ssclafani • 15 years ago

34 10 15 years ago

TheSwede75• 15 years ago

The old truths of the OJ trial still rings true. Justice is not black or white, the only color that matters is green!

kj123452• 15 years ago

To me these patents seem less transparently silly than many of those often at issue in high-profile cases, and yet they end up providing an even harsher argument against software patents. With the silly patents a couple tweaks to the system might get them thrown out, but I don't think any patent system that accepts software patents could find a basis for rejecting these. From that starker viewpoint its as crazy an idea as ever that the person who typed these abstract descriptions and made these shoddy diagrams deserves more ownership than Apple, who actually made the concepts real.

timr• 15 years ago

"From that starker viewpoint its as crazy an idea as ever that the person who typed these abstract descriptions and made these shoddy diagrams deserves more ownership than Apple, who actually made the concepts real."

To be fair, Gelernter wrote several books about these ideas, founded a software company based on them, and tried to market several different desktop software packages using the ideas in the mid/late 90s. He's also a professor of computer science at Yale, and invented a bunch of concepts (in the same books) that were inspirations for JavaSpaces and Jini. He's not a wackadoo in some garage in Texas.

My point is, it's terrifically unfair to characterize Gelernter as a patent troll. He's been a prolific contributor to computer science, and (speaking as someone who was a fan of the books that first popularized the ideas in question), a lot of Apple's UI designs today really are fantastically similar to what Gelernter was dreaming up 20+ years ago. The Time Machine UI, in particular, was so much like the lifestreams concept that I originally thought that Apple had hired him to do the design.

There are situations where ideas seem obvious in retrospect, but completely out of left-field at the time of their conception. These ideas weren't even in the ballpark when Gelernter first started publishing them.

CamperBob• 15 years ago

Unless you can demonstrate that the people who implemented the Apple products actually read a single line written by Gelernter, the grandparent's point stands.

Ideas aren't, or at least shouldn't be, worth jack squat. Apple did all the actual work here.

kj123452• 15 years ago

Thanks I didn't know all that about Gelernter and his work.

rosenjon• 15 years ago

For reference, here is a picture from one of the MW patents: http://www.patentlyapple.com/.a/6a0120a5580826970c013487fbb5...

You can see how there is some Cover Flow similarity there. However, why should this be patentable at all? Otherwise, shouldn't I just sit down and sketch as many UI configurations as I can think of, patent them all, and then sue the hell out of anyone who then implements them? Just seems silly.

hboon• 15 years ago

Yes, you can, but you'll have to spend some money, say 10k in US each, more for international markets, as well as a battle-chest of cash for lawsuits. Depending on how far you take the ideas, you'll either be known as a patent troll or inventor.

Derbasti2• 15 years ago

Is there any other country in this beautiful world that encourages lunacy like this?

I mean, patenting a specific engine design is fine by me. But that would be equivalent to patenting the source code structure of Spotlight, which no one can see anyway. How did we get to the point where we now have patents not for implementations but for interfaces? I wonder how much money is wasted every year on disputes like this. How much time is wasted on it. How many lives are getting wasted on it!

Software does not have visible physical implementations like engines do. Software consists of ideas, written down so computers can execute them. Software really only exists in the mind, it has no physical reality. If you patent software, you patent cell patterns in some brain. If you sue someone for that, you are claiming ownership of some programmers brain tissue!

It will be a fine day when we programmers can legally own our own brains again. It will be a day worthy of great celebration! Until then, american minds must keep their head down lest someone wants to rip their brains out, which is a sad thing indeed.

arron61• 15 years ago

Well I hope you called out apple when they sued HTC on patents like, sliding an image to unlock a phone...

Derbasti2• 15 years ago

It's not that anyone in particular partaking in this system is evil. They all have to do it. It's the system itself that is evil.

I don't care who sues who. Software patents in general are an awful mess that should be abolished.

Apple Wins Reversal of $625.5 Million Mirror Worlds Patent Infringement Verdict

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