Samsung copied Apple with their Android devices

[Cerveza mas fina]

You know the arrow indicator from Crazy Taxi?

Having an arrow point you to your destination is patented by Sega.

[Cerveza mas fina]

Why didnt they patent it on foot? Typical Sega oversight. They should have patented QTE too, and blue skies.

[Brehvolution]

brb, going to patent square ice cube trays with rounded bottoms.

[Beezy]

Borys

[Beezy]

Yes. Black is black, white is white, and there's nothing in between.

[chronovore]

Why didnt they patent it on foot? Typical Sega oversight. They should have patented QTE too, and blue skies.

They could have or should have patented QTEs (then, maybe no-one would use them!), but there is "prior art" for blue skies.

Also, Midway appears to own the ghost car patent. With them out of business, I wonder what happens to patents then. Someone may have picked that up at their fire sale?

[Tasty]

If Google and Motorola win in court against Apple then Apple should pay up. I'm not defending Apple. Just innovation and patents. They are there for particular reason.

They are "there" because software wasn't a thing when they were invented. They're completely destructive to innovation. The fact that two people on opposite ends of the earth could come up with the same solution to a problem but one of them could get sued by the other because they didn't get a patent first is quite frankly sickening to me as a software developer.

That situation happens in software all the time and the use of patents is just corporate bullying at that point.

What makes the situation more broken is that US law was changed somewhat recently so that it doesn't matter who actually invented something first, all that matters is who was first to file the patent. So even if you could prove you invented something thirty years before someone else, you're SOL if you didn't get a patent on it.

I don't understand how anyone even minutely educated could disagree that software patents are a disgrace in their current form. It's like arguing the moon doesn't affect the tides.

Software patents suck. YOU CAN'T EXPLAIN THAT

[chronovore]

Yeah, software patents are now primarily a new form of currency with which corporations can negotiate (or consume each other). Patents have only ever been as valuable as one's ability to defend them in court, and you can see with the Samsung/Apple battle how much these things can cost to pursue.

In terms of a legal device to foster and encourage innovation, while protecting the inventor from outright theft of their ideas... yeah, it is not really filling that role in the larger software development landscape. However, it is worth noting how much influence the iOS UI has had on tablet design.

http://osxdaily.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/08/tablets-before-and-after-ipad.jpg

[Tasty]

There will always be trend chasers but those chasing a trend shouldn't be punished because they usually put their own spin on things and give consumers greater choice, and force the trend setter to compete more evenly.

Take the standard desktop GUI. If Xerox had been smart about things and exploited the system as much as Apple is abusing it, then there would be no Mac OS, no Windows. No mouse except for Xerox mice. It would be a veritable dark age of computing, where Xerox would be as big as Microsoft was in its heyday times 1000 and no one being able to remotely compete with them.

[Brehvolution]

War has changed, Borys.

[Beezy]

War has changed, Borys.

[chronovore]

[Tasty]

[Pringo]

For anyone more knowledgeable about software patents I'm kind of curious how you would propose fixing the system. Everyone seems to be saying it's awful yet I haven't really seen any really solid explanations of what to do with it. Should software patents be thrown out completely? How do you get companies to invest heavily in R&D in that case if everything they release can be cloned by competitors? Do you keep software patents but restrict them to something like FRAND licensing so the patents are available to everyone? Do you more heavily restrict what exactly can be patented?

[Tasty]

I've got a pretty extreme view on the whole patent system bullshit.  Which is to say, I don't think there should be any such thing.  They say it promotes creativity, but it looks to me more like it stifles it.  I trust that even without the patent system, companies would still innovate, if only to get the leg up on competition even for a short while.

Exactly.

[recursivelyenumerable]

Ok dudes, yall smarter than me so explain:

why is there not a movement to "disable" software patents because they are "evil" nowadays?

There is, it's just that only programmer nerds and startup business nerds care about it

[TakingBackSunday]

For anyone more knowledgeable about software patents I'm kind of curious how you would propose fixing the system. Everyone seems to be saying it's awful yet I haven't really seen any really solid explanations of what to do with it. Should software patents be thrown out completely? How do you get companies to invest heavily in R&D in that case if everything they release can be cloned by competitors? Do you keep software patents but restrict them to something like FRAND licensing so the patents are available to everyone? Do you more heavily restrict what exactly can be patented?

The clause in the Constitution that covers IP law and copyright and patents is worded very clearly and concisely: the entire system is supposed to be a balance of the rights of the creators and the rights of the citizens in order to spur growth in innovation and creation.  Patent law is a bit more of a grey area because that also introduces trade secrets, business practices, etc., but basically, current patent law severely limits the scope of aforementioned innovation and creation due to the awful litigious nature its taken.  IP and copyright law are nearly as bad.

[TakingBackSunday]

As for what to do, fuck if I know because I'm not smart enough for patent law.  I'd say trivial shit like "TOUCH ZOOM" is too broad; too general to patent.  There should be a written law that go into great detail what warrants a patent and what doesn't.  Copyright suffers the same shit.  "IS IT NOT distinguished mentally-challenged AND YOU THOUGHT ABOUT IT?  SHIT, LIFE+70 YEARS FOR YOU"

[MCD]

Time to stop using a shitty OS, Samsung.

Yup.

[Tasty]

Time to stop using a shitty OS, Samsung.

Yup.