‘What if Blowing One’s Nose into Soft Disposable Paper Were Owned by Kleenex?’
via Douglas Rushkoff – Blog – Apple v Samsung: What if they had Patented the Alphabet?.
Imagine we were just developing spoken language for the first time. And someone came up with a new word to describe an action, thought, or feeling – like “magnify” or “dreadful.” But in this strange world, the person who came up with the word demanded anyone else who used it to pay him a dollar every time the word was uttered. That would make it pretty difficult for us to negotiate our way to a society that communicated through speech.
That’s the way the patent wars on smartphone and tablet advances are beginning to feel to me.
As a human being, I do not particularly care about Apple’s recent victory in the US version of its patent lawsuit against Samsung for copying its iPhone and iPad’s form and features. Now that Apple is demanding that Samsung pull eight of its products off the shelf, my only personal interest is whether the Samsung products, once banned, will become collectors’ items. Will I one day want to show my grandchild the phone that dared to mimic the iPhone?
But while the details of legalities and impact to share prices and even consumer choice don’t keep me or any of my friends up at night, there is nonetheless something creepy about Apple’s suit. It’s not so much that Apple – the biggest company in the world – has turned into a competitive monster; it’s the territory that Apple’s fighting over. It feels as if the technology innovation wars are no longer over one piece of technology or another, but over us humans.
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More on technology from PJ Lifestyle:
What’c the big deal? Why, come yearc ago, the Accociated Precc actually copyrighted the moct important conconant in the Latin alphabet!
Yec, the effekts on our cociety were profound. But fortunately, due to applicable precedentc, though it hac cince been legally mandatory to write:
S©
…at every occurrence of that letter, by virtue of the long duration of s© in the publik domain, ucerc of the letter are indemnified againct any attemptc by AP to impoce royaltiec on itc uce.
Ctill, many were koncerned about poccible uncpecified rickc of violating the AP’c kopyright on s©. To thece the grammarianc rekommended the cubctitution of the letter “c,” one of whoce two pronunciationc is identikal to it.
Of kource, for perfekt klarity we alco had to renounce the uce of “c” for itc alternate “k” cound, but really, how bad did that turn out to be?
Cir, you made me laugh. Thanks
“What if blowing one’s nose into soft disposable paper were owned by Kleenex?”
I’d say: “Thank God they didn’t patent the other soft paper thing!” and then I’d rush right out and patent it… What’s your point again?
Don’t know much about computers or have a tablet, but I do know that back in the day, the Wright Bros. tried to patent the airplane. Believe it or not the Smithsonian Institution helped break the patent. It was done through subterfuge, someone “flew” an airplane that was pre-Wright-Flyer. The “earlier” plane actually was older, but wouldn’t fly without modifications that the Wright Bros. invented. So it flew (with these modifications) and that was proof that legally the Wright Bros. didn’t invent the airplane, and weren’t eligible to collect license fees from everyone else who built them.
Imagine if they’d won…
The Wrights did patent the airplane. Glenn Curtiss took the Langley Aerodrome and modified the hell out of it to succeed in making a few brief hops. The Smithsonian was complicit in this, as they admit. It wasn’t a bright spot in Smithsonian history.
As for their patent, WWI changed everything.
The suit finally ended with the advent of World War I when the aircraft manufacturers established the Manufacturers’ Aircraft Association to coordinate wartime aircraft manufacturing in the United States and formed a patent pool with the approval of the U.S. government. All patent litigation ceased automatically. Royalties were reduced to one percent and free exchange of inventions and ideas took place among all the airframe builders.
This arrangement was to have lasted only for the duration of the war, but in 1918, at the war’s end, the litigation was never renewed. By this time, Orville had sold his interest in the Wright Company to a group of New York financiers and had retired from the business.
Several inventors flew before the Wrights but none of them was able to do much more than straight-line flight. The Wrights perfected and patented the three-axis system of controlling flight, which mainly added banking to turning and changing altitude. They banked by warping to wings, and successfully defended against all other methods, including various flaps and wingtip devices. Once they had worked out the technique many willing souls were eager to climb aboard and play pirate.
All Smithsonian attempts at flight were a fiasco from start to finish, whether with Langley or Glenn Curtiss.
I know this is off topic but here goes. The Wrights actually invented aeronautical engineering.
1. Being cyclists, they instinctively knew the importance of control in all axes. They incorporated Wilbur’s wing warping concept into their 1900 glider model with good results, proving that control was possible.
2. When their 1901 glider performed poorly, they almost gave up. They’d used the best airfoil data available (the Lilenthal tables) and came to the conclusion that the accepted world authority on the matter was wrong. They built a wind tunnel and tested a series of airfoils until they found the best one for their needs. Their 1902 glider was very successful. They each made hundreds of flights that year.
3. When they were ready to build their 1903 Flyer, they encountered two big problems. First, they couldn’t find an engine with enough power and with a low enough weight to meet their needs, so they made their own. Then, they needed to make propellors. Since propellors had been used on ships for decades, they thought it would be easy. However, they found ship propellor design was rather hit or miss. They made some fundamental breakthroughs in propellor design (realizing it was a spinning wing section instead of mere paddles). When the Wright Experience tested an actual Wright propellor in a NASA wind tunnel, they found it was 80% efficient at converting power to thrust. The best wooden propellors available 100 years later are only a few percent more efficient.
4. When they returned from their Kitty Hawk fights, they set up operations in Dayton. Over the next couple years, they grew in ability from brief hops to flights over 30 minutes long. That’s where they really learned to fly.
Yeah, I’m a geek and huge fan of the Wright Brothers. It was said that no one man could’ve invented the airplane. Instead, it took two extraordinary men named Orville and Wilbur. Neither had more than a high school education but both were very intelligent and well read. They’re personal heros of mine.
Hey, Apple is just doing what it does best – make money any and every way it can. Their products are generally good, but overpriced and overvalued.
Ask Bruce Willis. He has a story for you…
“Ask Bruce Willis. Heh has a story for you.”
And that’s all it is…a story:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/blog/2012/sep/03/no-apple-bruce-willis
If THIS version is true, it should be headliens all over. The Times (just the Times, no prefix) is turning into its yellow-journalism cousin, the New York Times?
Sounds good to me! They can call it the “Boogers for Bucks” program.
The use of the words “boogers” and “bucks” in the same sentence is the intellectual property of me so watch it, you little parasites.
Let me see now…your First Amendment rights are being short-changed, and you are somehow being “oppressed” by NOT having cheap(er) access to the stolen intellectual/technical property of someone else?
Try shouting.
Maybe a stick in the dirt to make symbols.
Cave painting?
If that doesnt work as “fast” and as “fun” as you’d prefer, then man-up and BUY the damned gadget thingie you so desperately want , from its rightful owner.
A company that invests time and resources to invent some new level of communication technology deserves to have thier patentable methods and hardware protected…
Even when they are Big, Evil Corporations that have “earned enough money” already.
Hey, maybe I should turn a buck by ripping off YOU’RE ideas and inventions?
Hmmm?
C’mon, I need the money, and their IS a market for it.
How dare you deny me my “rights” ?!?
actaully apple pattented movements. hey they tried, problem is the patent office gave it to them.
patent hands on the wheel at ten and two?
a tennis stroke?
how one types with which fingers when and how fast?
how about how you mow the lawn?
It is sheer absurdity. hard to argue a particular right is being violated however it is a very anti-capitalist mindset. the lawyers at the patent office are boobs with no sense of technical specifications and what should and should not be patentable. now off to see the latest iphone 5 gossip!
“Will I one day want to show my grandchild the phone that dared to mimic the iPhone?”
That’s a great sentence.
And Scott probably could have. Heaven knows they must be having a hard enough time keeping the trademark.
Dear Apple,
Your corporate headquarters certainly does look nice! But your landscaping features “short trimmed green graminoid plants”, sometimes referred to as a “lawn”, which as you know, you copied from landscaping you observed elsewhere.
Please send us 500 gazillion dollars for use of our “lawn” design, or immediately desist from placing plants in front of your building in this manner.