Klausner Adds Another Visual Voicemail Patent Lawsuit

from the whoops,-missed-one dept

Tue, Apr 27th 2010 3:06pm — Carlo Longino

Small patent holding firm Klausner Technologies has sued HTC for infringing the patents on visual voicemail it says it holds, adding the phone maker to a long list of companies that have been attacked with the overly broad patent. Just as in the previous cases, it's not clear how this system actually helps anybody that's doing any actual innovation; the company with the patent, but which has never apparently done anything to actually bring it to market, gets to assess an innovation tax on companies doing the actual legwork. Meanwhile, the idea underlying the patent -- displaying voicemail info on a screen -- really isn't much more than a foreseeable progression of technology. So carry on, patent system, holding back innovation and misaligning incentives.

Thank you for reading this Techdirt post. With so many things competing for everyone’s attention these days, we really appreciate you giving us your time. We work hard every day to put quality content out there for our community.

Techdirt is one of the few remaining truly independent media outlets. We do not have a giant corporation behind us, and we rely heavily on our community to support us, in an age when advertisers are increasingly uninterested in sponsoring small, independent sites — especially a site like ours that is unwilling to pull punches in its reporting and analysis.

While other websites have resorted to paywalls, registration requirements, and increasingly annoying/intrusive advertising, we have always kept Techdirt open and available to anyone. But in order to continue doing so, we need your support. We offer a variety of ways for our readers to support us, from direct donations to special subscriptions and cool merchandise — and every little bit helps. Thank you.

–The Techdirt Team

Filed Under: patents, visual voicemail
Companies: htc, klausner

18 Comments

If you liked this post, you may also be interested in...

Reader Comments

Subscribe: RSS

View by: Time | Thread

Anonymous Coward, 27 Apr 2010 @ 3:17pm

carlo, you make the mistake common to so many including the masnick: you look back from todays prospective and quality something as obvious now. but it may not have been obvious then. that is always the issue. can you say without a doubt that it was obvious when the patent was submitted? not just the concept,but the steps involved to do it?
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
- Anonymous Coward, 27 Apr 2010 @ 3:24pm
  
  Re:
  Yeah, I would never have thought of putting information on a visual medium! It's not like people have been doing that for the past 500 years.
  [ link to this | view in chronology ]
- Anonymous Coward, 27 Apr 2010 @ 3:27pm
  
  Re:
  "but it may not have been obvious then."
  
  It was obvious then. Maybe not to retards like yourself, but to the rest of society it was.
  [ link to this | view in chronology ]
- abc gum, 27 Apr 2010 @ 6:20pm
  
  Re:
  "look back from todays prospective and quality something as obvious now. but it may not have been obvious then."
  
  Possibly, you meant to say something like
  "look back from todays perspective and (quantify?) something as obvious ..." ?. You forgot the part about someone practiced in the field.
  [ link to this | view in chronology ]
- Big Al, 27 Apr 2010 @ 7:26pm
  
  Re:
  So, isn't this the equivalent of my old answering machine displaying a light when someone had left a message? Or my new one showing the number of messages and the calling numbers?
  
  Good lord, these guys can make a fortuine suing everyone without even creating a competing product.
  [ link to this | view in chronology ]
- Michael, 28 Apr 2010 @ 4:16am
  
  Re:
  Yes, it is easy to look back and say something is obvious. It is especially easy when you look at how many companies are doing this now. Are you really arguing that every company that is doing this saw the patent and copied it?
  
  This is another good case for an independent invention argument for obviousness.
  [ link to this | view in chronology ]
Anonymous Coward, 27 Apr 2010 @ 3:28pm

Don't patents protect the process, not the end product?

A patent of a toaster would patent the specific mechanical interactions that go on inside the product that lowers bread into a small oven, then pops it up with a timer. The patent would not be able to protect the overall idea of "a small kitchen appliance that automatically toasts bread to the desired amount."

Another example is that of transistors. The original transistor design is not what we use today, even though it was patented. People found better ways to do the same thing and that's what we use today.

So how can companies patent overall ideas like visual voice mail? Wouldn't they have to patent the actual method of translating the voice mail on phone company servers into a visual UI?

I guess this would go back to the whole nonsense of patenting software.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
- Anonymous Coward, 27 Apr 2010 @ 4:14pm
  
  Re:
  you could have gotten a patent on 'a small kitchen device using electrical resistance heating and sensor systems to toast bread to a desired amount', back when it wasnt obvious. its obvious now so something of a joke. heck there is a patent on windshield wipers now isnt that just the most obvious thing now?
  [ link to this | view in chronology ]
  - Anonymous Coward, 27 Apr 2010 @ 5:09pm
    
    Re: Re:
    Yes, because innovation never occurs without patents and hence all ideas should be patented.
    [ link to this | view in chronology ]
  - Anonymous Coward, 27 Apr 2010 @ 5:23pm
    
    Re: Re:
    You mean the windshield wiper technology that was stolen from the inventor, who had to spend years fighting in the courts to get proper credit and ownership of? Who actually built a working model of his invention beforehand? There was even a Hollywoodized movie about this.
    
    Way to counter your own point: Just because you patent an idea doesn't mean you're the rightful holder of that IP.
    [ link to this | view in chronology ]
    - Anonymous Coward, 27 Apr 2010 @ 8:24pm
      
      Re: Re: Re:
      yes, stolen because (stupidly) he didnt get a patent on it. see? that is one of the reasons why patents are important.
      [ link to this | view in chronology ]
      - Anonymous Coward, 27 Apr 2010 @ 11:58pm
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re:
        Hmm?
        
        Your saying patents are so important because the patent system is broken? Because no one looks for prior art or tries to verify the credibility of an application?
        
        That's some hilarious circular logic you've got going there. "We need patents to protect ourselves from patent trolls! Without the patent system, someone else could claim the patents!"
        [ link to this | view in chronology ]
        
        Anonymous Coward, 28 Apr 2010 @ 5:31am
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
        no i am saying because he didnt move to get a patent and declare his prior art, someone else got the patent. once they have the patent he has to then prove actual prior art in a court of law to get it back. harder work. if he had patent his device he wouldnt have the issue. sorry you are trying to twist my words and bait me mike, but you fail.
        [ link to this | view in chronology ]
        
        Anonymous Coward, 29 Apr 2010 @ 8:48am
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
        So it's okay that the patent office doesn't check that the applicant actually invented the thing in question?
        
        Great system there.
        [ link to this | view in chronology ]
Andrew D. Todd, 27 Apr 2010 @ 3:34pm

Here You Are! In Concrete Detail.
http://www.techdirt.com/article.php?sid=20080826/2135392104#c52

You see?
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Trish, 27 Apr 2010 @ 7:17pm

reply to commentor #1
"not just the concept,but the steps involved to do it?"
There was a post recently on this blog that this comment reminds e of; it was something like 'if you have an idea to program some function but don't know how to do it, outsource the problem to a bunch of IT guys and they'll come up with the code'. Software patents are bs because the code used belongs to everyone, and the 'inventor' is really just using that code to perform a function on a computer, he's not inventing anything. The concept of photo voicemail is pretty obvious, think Star Trek back in the 60's where images were displayed on a screen and people talked to each other through those screens, wouldn't take a genius to think of voicemail using video even back then. The steps involved to do that could be 'invented' by any decent programmer.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
- Anonymous Coward, 27 Apr 2010 @ 7:50pm
  
  Re: reply to commentor #1
  if my company is paying someone $40 an hour to code, you better believe that we own the code. if not, why would anyone bother to pay to code anything, knowing the competition could just take the code and duplicate all your efforts for nothing?
  [ link to this | view in chronology ]
  - abc gum, 27 Apr 2010 @ 8:14pm
    
    Re: Re: reply to commentor #1
    You do not understand the software business.
    [ link to this | view in chronology ]