Company Claims To Have Patented The Concept Of An MP3 Player; Sues Everyone
from the aren't-patents-great? dept
A "company" which just so happens to be located in every patent troll's favorite city for patent lawsuits, Marshall, Texas (and which "shares" an office with its lawyer), is now claiming a patent on the very concept of an MP3 player and is suing Apple, SanDisk and Samsung for not paying up. The details behind the patent are a little sketchy. The company is named Texas MP3 Technologies, but the only place where that company's name appears in a Google search is on a patent application (not a granted patent) that was published the day before the lawsuits were filed (suggesting the company didn't waste much time in heading to court). However, the application itself is a continuation of two previous patents, one of which was issued last summer. However, that patent was issued to SigmaTel, in Austin. The earlier patent was issued in 2003, to a company called MPMan, though they all list the same inventors.Even if you go back to the earliest date, it seems fairly ridiculous that there's a patent on the overall concept of the MP3 player -- and the fact that this patent seems to involve a series of continuation filings, a trick used by folks like Jerome Lemelson to extend the scope of old patents to cover new technologies, doesn't help this seem any more legitimate. The latest application has added a bunch of claims to the original patent, though, it's still in application stage and those claims may very well be thrown out. Overall, while we hate to use the term "patent troll," all of the initial evidence suggests this is a classic case of patent trolling. Some random inventor, who hasn't brought the product in question to market, is claiming (and continually adjusting) a very broad patent on a basic concept, and then suing all the companies who are actually successfully bringing such a product to market. This is creating incentives for innovation?
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Ha ha
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MPman?
mpmaneurope.com
Makes sense, they claim to be "inventors of the mp3player", and it does seem to be a patent troll.
Yet another example of the brokeness of the patent system.
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mpman.com points to reigncom
I know which company I believe ;-)
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Re: mpman.com points to reigncom
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Please...
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Re:
The iPod doesn't even play MP3's with out some hacking,
I don't know who has been lying to you, buddy, but this is just plain wrong. Mine has happily played nothing but MP3's ripped from my collection since the day I bought it, and not a single ITMS purchase ever.
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Re:
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Wrong
Absolute rubbish. Stick to what you know, please.
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Re:
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Re: umm, the iPod dosen't play MP3s without hackin
iPod plays all MP3 formats and incarnations (CBR, VBR- any freq, any bitrate up to 320- complete Fraunhofer IIS license and codecs in iPod+iTunes) except MP3PRO. (esoteric)
Fraunhofer owns the patent to MP3 codec, as they invented the code itself. But they don't make consumer devices. (players)
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Re: file type
Yes it does. I do it all the time.
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Re: The iPod plays MP3's with no problem
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Patent the idea of suing for patent infringement
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Patent infringement
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Al Gore & Hillary
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Re: Al Gore & Hillary
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Flap flap flap go the gums.
Ipods play mp3's out of the box.
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two cents worth
I also have a patent pending on the concept of sueing someone for conceptonal thought.
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a solution
Let every appliation become approved. Let every lawsuit succeed, then let us live in system we created. It couldn't be done... things would have to change.
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Silly
Also, people please read all the comments. There are now 4 comments on the board saying Ipods play MP3's. We all know this, so if you are not going to have an original thought then keep it to yourself.
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iPOD ... Learn about it.
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Re: iPOD ... Learn about it.
If you'd like to test this, plug up your ipod, set your file browser to Show Hidden Files and Folders, go to the now visible Ipod control folder on your ipod, then into any of the F## folders and check out all your mp3's. In mp3 format.
Which happens to be the easiest way to transfer your music from an ipod to another computer, because although itunes renames all your music filenames to some gibberish (to me) number, it keeps the tags intact. (and will even sort them for you, if you tell it to!)
Now, what is this about me learning about an Ipod? :-P
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Re: iPOD ... Learn about it.
And that conversion is done before the music is even listed in your playlist.
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Re: Re: iPOD ... Learn about it.
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Re: iPOD ... Learn about it.
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History MP3
http://inventors.about.com/od/mstartinventions/a/MPThree.htm
Quote from page
MP3 Players
In the early 1990s, Frauenhofer developed the first, however, unsuccessful MP3 player. In 1997, developer Tomislav Uzelac of Advanced Multimedia Products invented the AMP MP3 Playback Engine, the first successful MP3 player. Two university students, Justin Frankel and Dmitry Boldyrev ported AMP to Windows and created Winamp. In 1998, Winamp became a free MP3 music player boosting the success of MP3. No licensing fees are required to use an MP3 player.
end quote.
This sure sounds like prior art to me, don't see how anyone could get one issued to them
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ITunes?
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Of course, whether they actually use those powers intelligently is another issue. And the patent system *IS* horribly broken ;) But this case isn't a shining example of why.... it's just people trying to cheat the system, which is a universal and entirely expected theme even were the system to be nearly perfect.
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Except that the patent system has already let this particular mess go to trial and result in a $1.5 Billion judgement.
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Ipod
Aren't we talking about some moron in Texas who claims to own the patent on MP3's? To the best of my own research Fraunhofer Gesellschaft owns the patent on the process that creates an MP3. I love these American process trolls.
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Re: Ipod
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http://base.google.com/base/a/1222981/D17213308585651471655
it would appear that Toler Schaffer is (or was) Sigmatel's patent attorney.
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seriously?
notice how it would convert .wma to .m4a's, too, if that's how it worked...but obviously it doesn't work that way because it just plain skips the .wma files in your library (or it might ask you to convert them to .m4a? i guess i'll have to check that)
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Re: Al Gore & Blah
Thats hilarious... Its been a one-sided civil war for 15 years before we took over. People like you are why I am sometimes ashamed to have served overseas. The lack of respect, the lack of comprehension, and the lack of patriotism.
You wouldn't have a country if it wasnt for taking chances. Even if you are not a citizen of the United States, your country still took chances to get to what it is today. War is a part of life. Only people who have never seen another country are niave enough to believe in world peace. That is a concept... a dream.
I have wasted enough time responding to your pathicisms. Vote for your democrats who will have us pull out and thousands of lives will be lost... and my best friends life will have been lost for no reason. I refuse to repeat Korea and Vietnam... we pull out, thousands more die. I want my bud's life to be remember as helping free a people from their leader, and free them from hundreds of years of being ruled.
USA TV shows you only negatives... but the first time you walk down the street and see the faces of those who are thankful for you freeing them and their family... you don't care how the war started. You just want to make sure you damn well finish it.
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Re: Re: Al Gore & Blah
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Re: Re: Al Gore & Blah
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You guys are nuts
It was purchased by Sigmatel last year and they sold it to this Texas law firm. Sigmatel didn't get any cash from it, what they got was a royalty exemption for any manufacturer who uses Sigmatel chips. Sandisk is switching to their chips now and will be able to sell royalty-free in the future. If Apple switches to Sigmatel they will have a fully paid license, too.
Disclaimer: I own a small amount of Sigmatel stock. Depending on how this trial proceeds, I may buy more...
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device, not software
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l0zErS
This is insane. Roughly put, Patent rule states "It shouldnt be obvious".
DUH!
More over I dont see iPod being marketed as "MP3 Player" But as a jukebox.
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Prior art :)
Prior art that was researched by Microsoft prior to suing Apple was Xerox Smalltalk & Amiga Corp. (purchased and brought to market by Commodore Business Machines)
Of course Smalltalk and Amiga OS didn't matter since it was Microsoft who invented the GUI after Xerox developed the concept in the 70's and Apple & Commodore had machines in the marketplace :P
Same old story ... different product
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Seriously. Mobile mp3 player is not an invention, it is something that became feasible with time and technology.
The walkman was an invention. Then came the cd player mp3 player etc.... It's just evolution of an idea.
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It would be sweet if
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