Post 28: Funny Patent 2

Method of Swinging on a Swing

So apparently a guy managed to patent how you "pull alternatively on one chain and then the other", so you probably owe Steven Olson a lot of money.

This is a patent about literally the METHOD of how to swing on the swing. 

How absolutely ridiculous haha. 

Post 27: Funny Patent 1

The Flatulence Deodorizer

in 2000, this is a pad that is worn by people to ABSORB gas by people from farting. here's a drawing:

This is a really weird version of a diaper, although I feel like really self concious people would buy it? Here are some testimonies of people:

"Your product has really helped me in the cramped space of my cockpit. I would sometimes notice the other guys using their mask to get some fresh oxygen ... When I feel the urge I usually quickly install it thru the back of my pants. Then I do not have to worry. It also does a nice job muffling the noise."

"On September 14th mom will be 78 years old, and that's why I'd like to take her to Hawaii ... I've traveled there twice, but she never has because of her flatulence problems."

Read more: http://www.cracked.com/article_15693_the-10-most-ridiculous-inventions-ever-patented.html#ixzz2SIK9h2oi

Post 26: Google Battles Generification -- and Wins

For your reading pleasure read more here: http://www.minyanville.com/sectors/technology/articles/Tech-News253A-With-Pressure-From-Google/3/26/2013/id/48928

The tl;dr: Google Pressures Sweden to Amend Definition of New Word

A google term was removed from the Sweden's Language Councils list of new words added to popular lexicons. This is the first time a word was actually removed from the 2012 list, and it's this: ogooglebar.

It means something a person can't find by using a search engine. Heard of it before? Cuz I sure haven't!

The issue is since this isn't related to Google's name itself but actually to search engines in general. Google wanted the word to be ammended to refer to purely Google searches to maintain the integrity of the brand. But the word means, you can't find something from them, so why would they want a word that shows that they don't have the information on it.

Regardless, Sweden still removed it, and there are some court debates about this. In your opinion, do you think this should be removed or not? This isn't exactly a mobile case, but I still think that it's interesting!

Post 25: Apple files patents for "curved" and "non-rectangular" batteries for mobile devices

Read more here! http://www.phonearena.com/news/Apple-files-patents-for-curved-and-non-rectangular-batteries-for-mobile-devices_id42623?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+phonearena%2FySoL+(Phone+Arena+-+Latest+News)

There's more talk recently about iOS updates. The plan is that there are some new flatter visual designs, that I'm all for since flat design is super sick.

Apple's filed for 2 patents for portable device batteries. One is a "curved battery cell" and the other is for a "non-rectangular battery". here's a visual so you can think about what things might look like in the future.



These patents were filed in October of 2011, and Apple's reasoning is "the curve is formed to facilitate efficient use of space inside a portable electronic device".

Interestingly there are battery cells that are kind of already like this, so I smell some future lawsuits to come.

This would allow for apple to have dramatic new designs, and it sorta already fits into Apple's overall look which is kind of round and not sharp. Apple commonly uses tapered edges on devices, so that they seem lighter and thinner. Being able to have a new rounded battery could help them fit a bigger battery into a tapered design.

Let me know if you think you could think of some cool designs for this!

Post 24: Japanese mobile boss claims he's already patented the tech inside Google Glass Mobile

Read here: http://www.engadget.com/2013/04/10/softbank-ceo-vs-google-glass/

Here's a funny one! One of Japan's richest men, claims he's patented Google Glass already.

Lets get things straight, he's got an army of lawyers to call, and his name is Masayoshi Son, a billionaire and CEO of SoftBank. In 2010, there was in fact a patent that is similar but not identical to Google's. In Google's, one's own words are translated with Google specs. In his, he says that they're translation glasses with captions.

You can view the Glass's promo video here: Project Glass promo video.

So how is this guy so rich? He sold a translation device patent to Sharp for $1 mill.

So what are your thoughts on this? Real or fraud?

Post 23: ZTE agrees to Android, Chrome patent licensing from Microsoft

Read about this here: http://www.infoworld.com/d/mobile-technology/zte-agrees-android-chrome-patent-licensing-microsoft-217176

the tl;dr: Microsoft has inked an agreement with China's ZTE for its Android and Chrome patent licensing program.

It seems that as far as we know, "Financial details of deal were not disclosed. But the agreement gives ZTE access to Microsoft patents covering phones, tablets, computers, and other devices running Google's Android and Chrome operating systems."

There are many other companies that also signed with Microsoft's licensing program, which is meant to help these gadget vendors and avoid further lawsuits with Microsoft. 

Something like 80% of Android smartphones sold in the US and worldwide are under agreements with Microsoft. 

Interestingly enough, China's Huawei, the world's 3rd largest smartphone vendor, and Google/Motorola haven't signed with Microsoft. 

I think that this could result in some interesting cliques in the future. Google and Huawei are both huge firms, so they could probably stand their own against Microsoft. Perhaps there are other reasons for them not signing on but we'll have to see about that!

Post 22: Apple's Patent for "No Look" Multitouch Interface

Read here but you must scroll down to see this article http://www.minyanville.com/sectors/technology/articles/Tech-News253A-With-Pressure-From-Google/3/26/2013/id/48928

Recently Apple was granted ANOTHER new patent! US Patent No. 8,407,623 for "Playback control using a touch interface." 

This patent was actually originally filed in 2009, so that shows you how long it takes to make a a filed patent come to reality right? Basically it's a system that registers touch input, when nothings being displayed on the screen. Users then don't have to even LOOK at the device to contorl it, and this could potentially save a ton of battery life as well!

The patent also has commands for playback functions, and as the article articulate:

"The patent lists commands for playback functions, like a single tap for play/pause, a double tap for moving to the next item, a triple tap for moving to the previous item, a clockwise circle for turning the volume up, and a counterclockwise circle for turning it down."

I think this is a SUPER cool innovation that would be so useful in many aspects. Unfortunately, it's a little disappointing that there's already a patent for it, because I would love to see this on some other devices!!

What other applications do you think this could open doors for? Let me know below!

Post 21: Rackspace fights patent troll in the name of every mobile developer everywhere

Read about it here! http://gigaom.com/2013/04/12/rackspace-fights-patent-troll-in-the-name-of-every-mobile-developer/

tl;dr: Rackspace is taking one for the team by trying to invalidate a patent that an alleged patent troll claims covers the ability for mobile displays to rotate as the device turns.

Rackspace is a cloud computing provider and right now they're taking a challenge to fight against patent trolls. I think that's a decently noble cause, since patent trolls seem to be the most difficult to deal with, and most frustrating. 

Currently, they're trying to challenge the validity of a patent: Rotatable Technologies, which is suring anyone in mobile apps that use rotating screen displays. And yes, that is pretty much how many and most screens operate in smartphones. 

You can read about the detailed the legal challenge in a blog post here and  its petition to the United States Patent and Trademark Office. Rackspace got trolled by getting sued by this Rotatable company along with some other big names, and then were offered to settle the claim for less than 75k. Rackspace wasn't having any of that and used " a legal theory called patent exhaustion, patent holders who sue and lose or settle with and grant a license to upstream defendants (e.g., OS or device manufacturers in this case) can’t then go after downstream users such as Rackspace or Whole Foods. " 

Rackspace has stood up to many other trolls before, so kudos to them for their brave stances. If you'd like to know about their other defenses, read the article because there are many instances. 

For fun here's an image:

One of many pieces of evidence in the Rackspace petition.

Rackspace commented that they want to start a movement against patent trolls, and I'm all for that. 

Post 20: Study: One-quarter of U.S. patents issued this year will be in mobile

Read away here! http://www.infoworld.com/d/mobile-technology/study-one-quarter-of-us-patents-issued-year-will-be-in-mobile-215366

Some interesting tidbits right here: a quarter of all patents in the U.S. this year are mobile related. We've seen countless times in this class just how many patents get filed, so for 1/4 of them to be about mobile items, that's kind of ridiculous. It really shows how big mobile businesses are getting, and the hardware behind it too. I think it's safe to say that there are some huge things on the horizon for mobile phones, and the fact that there are so many patents being released really backs it up.

In other news, the mobile related patents issued grew by 591% from 2002 to 2012. U.S. is ahead in mobile patents beating out Europe. Some facts they claim:

" Last year, the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office granted nearly three times as many mobile patents as the European Patent Office. The U.S. has taken the lead partly because of the growing importance of mobile software development, which takes place predominantly in the U.S."

Not only that, Samsung Electronics has the most MOBILE related patents across the U.S. and Europe. (IBM is still the largest overall patent holder). Samsung had the most patents granted in 2012 and they were for innovations in devices and network infrastructure/tech. 

So now we know that Samsung can be considered a dominant patent holder,  way above Apple and Google, how do you think future patent litigation will favor?

Post 19: Nokia wins one against HTC in German patent case

The short tl;dr: A court finds HTC to be violating a patent held by Nokia, but whether the ruling will change the German marketplace in any way remains to be seen.

and can be read more in detail here: http://news.cnet.com/8301-1035_3-57575065-94/nokia-wins-one-against-htc-in-german-patent-case

Nokia has just won a patent infringment, but in Germany.

The official ruling is: HTC is infringing a Nokia patent related to saving battery life by identifying packets of data that can be reconstructed through the use of an encoded message.

The issue is that there is some debate as to whether or not this is a large victory for Nokia or not. It seems that Nokia actually won't be importing three devices in Germany anyways. Unfortunately the  three devices were the only ones that were affected by this ruling. German business is not going to be affected in any way by this, a claim made by Nokia themselves.

However, HTC will plan to appeal the courts decision, and there have been some people who are saying that they believe HTC's statement about the three devices is not completely true.

How do you think this will affect either companies? HTC and Nokia have many more claims to be ruled on, do you think this has any affect on future rulings?

Post 18: Apple seeks patent for wraparound iPhone display

A classmate spoke of this in class this week, and I came across this article: http://www.thinkdigit.com/Mobiles-PDAs/Apple-seeks-patent-for-wraparound-iPhone-display_14054.html

It's pretty much exactly what it sounds like, a screen that wraps around the phone, allowing for more visibility. Here's a diagram that might help you understand:



What's interesting is that this might not be limited to just phones, but other types of displays as well. The front of the phone will likely be all display. In fact, this allows for tons of new possibilities in terms of development.

Interestingly, the concept of a complete display on phones has already been done on Android and Nexus phones. Physical buttons on the front of the phone aren't on those Android phones anymore, unlike the typical iPhone button on the bottom center. In fact Android has many interesting ways they adapt to a full display front like getting menu's and locking screen widgets are merely from swiping at the edges of the screen.

Still, this wraparound screen is a cool idea. However I'm not sure how effective it will be. If the phone's edge is slim as many phones are today, what's the point of having a screen on it? I can see a few potential uses, but I guess there's the beauty of innovation, we'll have to see to find out.

Interested? Think it's bad? Let me know belowwwwwww.

Post 17: Google agrees to not abuse mobile patents, search ads, or search results

Here's the article if you'd like to read more in depth: http://www.infoworld.com/d/the-industry-standard/google-agrees-not-abuse-mobile-patents-search-ads-or-search-results-210056

It seems that Google is under investigation by the FTC. They're taking the high road and agreed to do some changes to halt the current FTC findings. Interesting...something to hide perhaps?

Here's the basics:
changes in business practices concerning smartphones, tablets, and gaming consoles.

changing business practices for online search advertising.

allowing competitor access on FRAND(fair, reasonable, and nondiscriminatory) terms on smartphones, laptops, tablets, and gaming consols.

agreed not to seek injunctions against products is believed may infringe on it's patents.

give online advertisers more flexibility on platforms.

but whoa. Did you see that?

agreed not to seek injunctions against products is believed may infringe on it's patents.

that's a pretty bold statement, and there's more: 

"Google has agreed to a consent order that prohibits it from seeking injunctions against a willing licensee, either in federal court or at the U.S. International Trade Commission, to block the use of any standard-essential patents that the company has previously committed to license on FRAND terms."

Google has a pretty tall order to fulfill with some of these changes. Do you think they're completely serious about these? Possible loopholes? Let me know in the comments below!

Post 16: Apple ensnared in Chinese patent fight over Siri

Hello again,

take a look if you'd like to read more in depth about this article: http://gigaom.com/2013/03/27/apple-ensnared-in-chinese-patent-fight-over-siri/.

Yes, once again, we'll be talking about Apple vs Someone-else.

Although this time, it's a Chinese company called Xiaoi that is suing them. Over Siri.

The foreigner: Xiaoi
Their product: automated chat robot for Customer Service/hotlines
The argument: "Siri infringes on OUR patents."
When they got their patent: 2006

When Siri appeared in Apple phones: 2011

As most of us know, Siri was a technology that Apple acquired, and Xiaoi's problem is the robot interaction part of Siri, not the speech recognition capabilities.

Not that much information is out yet, but I think it's funny how these things come to pop up many years after the fact.

In your opinion, is Xiaoi way out of line? Did Apple really infringe on their patent? Let me know below!

Post 15: Google donates patents to protect cloud software from lawsuits

Hello all, here'd my article for reference: http://gigaom.com/2013/03/28/google-donates-patents-to-protect-cloud-software-from-lawsuits/

Somewhat big news! Google is creating what is called a "patent pledge", to attempt to stop patent wars on the cloud and big data developers like those in the mobile industry. This pledge includes 10 patents that are related to their MapReduce technology, which is what their search system is based off.

What this pledge does:
Allows developers to freely use/sell tech using these patents without fearing for lawsuits. The catch is that only projects that are open source, that is that anyone can access them, are allowed to take advantage of this pledge.

Google's aim:
Allow open-software so people can build off of each others work. To me, this seems like an open invitation to collaboration and new tech developments.

Interesting idea:
MapReduce covered a form of parallel processing which is powerful and allows multiples things to be done at the same time, that is, "in parallel." A lot of people were afraid that their patent on the Hadoop tool was going to be too much, but this patent is actually included in the 10, so many of these fears are now assuaged.

What do you think of this move by Google? Good or Bad? Is this even possible or is it too naive? Let me know in the comments below!

Post 14: Apple's Thermonuclear Patent War Is A Farce

For your viewing pleasure: http://readwrite.com/2012/12/08/apples-thermonuclear-patent-war-is-a-farce

Extra Extra!  Apple's "Steve Jobs patent" is now invalid, as declared by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office. If you don't know what this patent is, it's a multi-touch screen patent.

For for anti-apple people, ya'll must be celebrating for now haha.

Apparently, this patent was a sham from the start. But here is now a list of some of Apple's losses, in case you haven't heard of them:
England court ordered Apple to have ads that explained Samsung didn't copy them. ads

But they didn't do it right, so the courts made them do it again. again

Even the big Cali case they won might be overturned since the jury made so many mistakes during the trial.

Actually I'd want to keep going but the article is pretty biased. (against Apple) The author claims that
"Apple is using lawyers and courtrooms to do two things:

First, Apple is using lawsuits as a form of marketing, a way to generate headlines and smear rivals as copycats, while depicting Apple -- pure, noble Apple -- as the font of knowledge from which all innovation flows.

Second, Apple figures it can outspend its rivals and beat them into submission with bogus claims, tie them up with expensive litigation and distract them.

This is not what courts are for. Nor is it what patents are for. This is despicable behavior."

Ouch. 

One (maybe) factual piece of info stands:

Android occupies 75% of the market share now. That's gotta be some troubling news for Apple. 

What do you guys think of Apple? Good guy, bad guy? Let me know below!

On a side note, I may never get a job at Apple after all these posts lol. 

Post 13: Google patent shows laser keyboard for Glass

Here's the article if you'd like more information: http://www.nbcnews.com/technology/futureoftech/google-patent-shows-laser-keyboard-glass-1B8024451

Here's a diagram that explains a bit more:


New patent claim by Google:
Laser projector keyboard
This supposedly can project onto any nearby surface, even a user's hand.

This projection is most likely to be some kind of menu for user's to interact with and choose options.

But hmmmm...doesn't these seem familiar? If not, here's a hint, Microsoft's kinect! Yes over a year ago, Microsoft showed something very similar to this. What's special about Google's claim then?

Google claims that by putting this on a pair of glasses, it's entirely different, and the project actually keeps tract of the user's head and body movements to make everything smooth.

What do you think about the claim by Google? Yay or nay? Let me know below!

Post 12: 2012: A year of patents, mobile fights, and one big IPO

It's already March in 2013, so before it's too late why not have a recap of some of the biggest tech news from 2012? Here's the article I'm reading if you'd like more info on these things!
http://news.cnet.com/8301-10797_3-57559873-235/2012-a-year-of-patents-mobile-fights-and-one-big-ipo/

2012 marks the year where more patent litigations were brought up than ever before. Even bigger than Facebook's IPO or Microsoft's release of Windows 8, patent wars were the biggest news scene to date last year.

The article suggest that patent wars grew tremendously due to the fact that people finally understand what patents are and how to cheap the system. From trolls to battles over rounded corners, some patent wars were downright ridiculous. But they still won.

Some of the big 3 in tech, Apple, Google, Microsoft, and now even Facebook were gathering and acquiring smaller companies and competitors like mad.

So we've come to standstill in regards to changing technology. "Imitation is how the the tech industry works." I wholeheartedly agree with this, imitation and then iteration is what makes tech better and better, and allows for more discoveries and improvements. So with all the new patent issues coming up, the standstill of some technology seems imminent. Yet let's not make all the big companies into the bad guys. They get their fair share of attacks from other smaller companies as well.

Let's take a look into one of better known patent wars. Samsung vs Apple. Regardless of which side your own, we all know Apple has great presence in the market for mobile phones. But if you've been looking at the trends, you might notice that Samsung is ahead in leadership for phone sales. They actually control 29% of the cellphone market and 28% of the smartphone market. Apple had only 20% and 10% respectively. Knowing this, it seems like Apple's war in the courtroom is more like trying to take back their stake, rather than filing for patents willy nilly because they feel like it.

Does this change anyone's mind about who's side their on? Let me know!

Post 11: Nikola Tesla vs Thomas Edison

When we're in grade school we learn about American history and how Edison was the one who invested the light bulb with his key + kite combo. We rarely hear the name of Tesla, even though in actuality he was responsible for the majority of electricity's innovations.

We have many laws and regulations regarding patents now, but back then perhaps this was not as closely followed. To enlighten you on a few things Tesla's done, this comic by The Oatmeal does a pretty great job.
http://theoatmeal.com/comics/tesla

If you're too lazy to click that link, (it's pretty long), let me summarize it for you:
Tesla invented AC current, which uses thin wires and high voltage to transfer electricity over long distances.
Tesla also created the backbone for Radio to develop, a nobel prize that was won by Marconi for using Tesla's work.
Tesla pitched the idea of Sonar to the US Navy in WWI, but the idea was ignored and not taken into effect until Watson-Watt was credited with it's discovery 18 years later.
Tesla also discovered X-rays, the first Hydroelectric pump at Niagara Falls, cryogenic engineering, patented the transistor, record radio waves from outer space, discovered the resonance frequency of the earth, build an earthquake machine, remote controls, electric moters, and wireless communication.

In short, he's a boss.

To me it's a pretty sad that his inventions were not accepted at the time he discovered them, but only many years later when someone picked up from where he had left off. It seems like Tesla was simply just too ahead of his time.

PS. Here's a funny YouTube video of a epic rap battle between Tesla and Edison:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gJ1Mz7kGVf0

Post 10: Obama says patent trolls “hijack” and “extort;” So do something, Mr. President

Some good news: http://gigaom.com/2013/02/16/obama-says-patent-trolls-hijack-and-extort-so-do-something-mr-president/

Even the President has noticed and responded about the existence of Patent Trolls. His words:
“The folks that you’re talking about are a classic example; they don’t actually produce anything themselves. They’re just trying to essentially leverage and hijack somebody else’s idea and see if they can extort some money out of them.”

This is great news because there might be some very soon to come changes in the patent world, especially if Obama decides to get involved. A few things he could do:

1. Some industries have actually blocked some previous patent reform efforts, so he'll need to stop monopolies. For tech though, there is often not as much of this issue, because first-mover advantages result in quite a large advantage for them, and because tech moves super fast. 

2. To address trolls, he may need to change the pattent fee structure, so that hoarders have less incentive to hold onto patents. Obama could potentially be involved with this directly and he can also try to reduce jury verdict to below the billion dollar  mark. 

3. He could increase the attention on huge patent trolls, and maybe have a start-up tax. Politically that's already tough, but there shouldn't be a reason that private companies can avoid taxes like these. 

What do you think Obama should do?

Post 9: Tech firms launch new website to fix patent mess

Do you think the Patent Law system in the US is broken? These people certainly think so, and now they're created a new site to help fix and regulate things : http://gigaom.com/2012/11/14/tech-firms-launch-new-website-to-fix-patent-mess/

Patent Progress is supposed to bring people's attention to the patent problem and to give solutions from people in legal and policy positions. Contributers on the advice side are people in leading intellectual property, lawyers, and scholars. The site is composed of a group that has bases in Google, Microsoft, Yahoo, and Facebook.

The site has a dictionary of terms for people to look up, like patent trolls, and they explain many of the topics that a majority of people probably don't understand. I believe that this site will provide a great place for people to educate themselves on the patent issues we're facing today.

What do you think of this idea? Do you think it will work?

Post 8: IBM: We’re number one (in patents)

Hello!

This is less about a patent more but I thought it would be interesting to note which companies have the most patents. http://gigaom.com/2013/01/10/ibm-were-number-one-in-patents/

Surprised? It's IBM! (I was.)

Interestingly enough, Google and Apple were both noted to have gained massive amounts of patents, but they still didn't break the top 10 companies. Place your bets, ladies and gentlemen:

I was very surprised to see that a lot of the top patent carriers are International companies. 

The article notes a very interesting idea: 

"Patent ownership represents more than just bragging rights. Increasingly tech companies rush to amass patents to protect themselves from infringement lawsuits and to wage legal war on competitors. Complicating matters are the “patent trolls” – companies that buy patents to assemble a legal arsenal to go after alleged infringers but don’t actually create technology. "

In any case, if you want to perhaps figure out where to look in future posts for patent issues, you may want to follow these companies!

Post 7: Apple smart watch efforts confirmed by US patent

Helloooo

So I read this article on apple's new smart watch: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-21547947.

The article goes into the design and patent issues. This is supposed to be a flexible touch-screen (cool right?) and there's apparently a huge "need" for this item. If you can't imagine what it's supposed to look like, read this:
"The mooted device is likened to a "slap wrap" - a thin strip of metal covered in fabric which snapped around the user's wrist to form a bracelet."

They've just filed for a patent on this, but there might be issues coming up because a lot of tech watch companies are also working in this field. It's a weird mesh because the watch companies obviously have been working with these products for a long time and are developing similar things. Apple on the other hand is a giant tech firm who could supply the software and hardware side of it. 

Nothing's happened yet, but if you like watches, maybe you should consider following this story to see where it leads. 

Post 6: Update on Samsung vs Apple

This post will be about the emailed out article: http://news.msn.com/science-technology/stalemate-between-apple-samsung-in-smartphone-wars

If you guys have been following this, it's been pretty intense for a while. Right now though, it seems like things have fallen into a stalemate between these two companies. To quote:

"Indeed, a series of recent court rulings suggests that the smartphone patent wars are now grinding toward a stalemate, with Apple unable to show that its sales have been seriously damaged when rivals, notably Samsung, imitated its products."

So what happens now?

It seems like both of these companies have greatly benefited from this war in some aspects. Cook apparently never really wanted to sue Samsung because of manufacturing diplomacy stuff, and Samsung got some pretty good market research data from selling phones that greatly resembled the iPhone.

The article is leaning towards the idea that these two super companies might actually band together in terms of furthering technology. They even go so far as to say that there might be a possibility these huge firms might go after some of the smaller ones like Blackberry.

In some aspects this legal war seems to be almost like a battle of who'd better. So perhaps they're squaring up and this war might result in some awesome technology as the battle to be the best. That would be a cool outcome though it might go in the opposite direction in terms of stifling innovation and iteration.

Did anyone else who read this article agree or disagree with it?

Post 5: Google accuses BT of patent trolls

Hey ya'll,

Here's an interesting yet short article that was uploaded yesterday: http://www.techradar.com/news/internet/google-accuses-bt-of-arming-patent-trolls-in-new-lawsuit-1131280.

This stems from a acusation in 2011 where BT said that Google infrindged on 6 mobile patents in all different departments like Andriod, Maps, and Gmail. Now Google's basically claiming that BT used Google's patents for phone calls and networking.

They're trying to turn the tables on them for this, and they say that they have an army of patent trolls.

It's in the courts now, but it's really impressive that BT is heading up against Google, a huge giant in the industry. It will be an interesting story to follow along in the coming months.

Post 4: Legal Issues

Hey ya'll,

So I remember reading back a while ago on HackerNews an article about a very particular legal case involving property. The story goes like this:

There's a guy, let's call him Mike (because I cannot remember or find the article anymore). Mike's spent a few years developing a mobile app, which he's pushed out to the app stores online. He's given it a name, lets call it FriendFinder, because it's relevant to what his app does.

Fast forward a bit and a start-up has pushed out a very similar product that does the same thing, and calls it FindFriends. This startup is backed up by a pretty impressive venture capitalist firm and within no time, Mike gets a email from their lawyers demanding he either he takes his app off the market or he sells over all his rights, data, and code to these guys, or else he's getting sued for it anyways.

Uhm...what?

When I read this I was super surprised but also a bit sad for this Mike fellow, because what can he really do to protect himself from this large company over this intellectual property? Considering the name and the product is so similar, is there definitive proof that someone has more ownership of it?

In the end, I never followed this story to see where it went, but let me know how ya'll feel about this situation.

Post 3: Monday Class Post

Hey ya'll,

So today we covered patents, copyrights, trade secrets, and other things related to these. To be honest I'm still a little confused on the difference between all three, because it seems like there's a gray area when it comes to distinguishing them.

Let's take Google as an example. The Google logo is a trademark, and to make things really simple, let's look at their search engine. This search engine is pretty much a ton of code and algorithms that involves many processes and hardware even to complete, servers, warehouses, etc.

We can define Google's search engine as a trade secret in a sense, no? I've studied before how they approach the search function and at it's very basic point, it's a implementation of PageRank, an algorithm. It's definitely not open sourced, and people can have little search bars on their pages to allow users to search within that site itself for things. PageRank is what started Google off so I definitely don't think they'd want to release it. However, PageRank is actually considered a patent, because, well, it's patented by Google.

So which is it? A patent or a trade secret? I guess the easiest way to explain it is that PageRank itself is a patented product, but the trade secret lies in all the secret criteria they use it in to figure out how to best rank pages in a Google Search.

Agree or not? Let me know in the comments belooowwww!

Post 2: Why 190G?

Hello again,

To be very straightforward, I'm taking this class to fulfill part of the CET requirement! I'm actually not too sure how useful this certificate will prove to be, although the course material I've learned in the classes I've taken is actually pretty useful. Although I do not know how many more of these classes I can handle after this.

Luckily, I only need one more unit to attain the CET. I'm taking this class for 2 units so now I guess that makes me an overachiever.

Jokes aside, I'm hoping I will find this class useful because I'm working on a mobile app myself right now with a GSI. So theoretically, I should be able to patent my work if it's somewhat ingenious and/or new, right?

Whelp, we shall see but I'm looking forward to this semester!

Talley-ho,
Lanssie

Post 1: About me!

Hellllllloooo

My name is Lanssie and I'm currently a Junior studying Computer Science. I've never really blogged before so apologies if my writing seems a bit awkward. I suppose it will get better as time passes along so if you decided to read mine, sorry about that.

I was born in Beijing, China, but I moved here when I was 3.5 yrs. old so that's barely any time to get accustomed to my homeland but I'm doing okay so far. My hobbies include design and drawing, badminton, Wushu ( Chinese Martial Arts), and reading! I like watercolor painting the best, and my current favorite artist is one from the Impressionist time period, Claude Monet. I like to stay active, hence the sports, and in terms of reading I like almost anything as long as it isn't too cheesy or ridiculously trivial. (Like if the main plot was about some tiny problem that isn't really all that important =___=)

I suppose that's all I have to say for now. If you've got any questions you could ask and if they're not too personal I'll respond.

Cheers,
Lanssie