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Thank you for the writeup. Possibly interesting links: https://www.autodeskresearch.com/people/gord-kurtenbach#patents https://www.autodeskresearch.com/people

• DonHopkins 8y ago
  Yes, those are the patents that Alias marketing people and product advertisement brochures were referring to as the "marking menu patents". Here is the brochure they are still distributing to this day: http://images.autodesk.com/adsk/files/aliasdesign10_detail_bro_us.pdf http://images.autodesk.com/adsk/files/aliasdesign10_detail_b... Here is an illustration from that brochure: https://cdn-images-1.medium.com/max/450/1*3C79dFnlhN__OJ3XmEjN9A.png https://cdn-images-1.medium.com/max/450/1*3C79dFnlhN__OJ3XmE... It says "Marking Menus. Quickly select commands without looking away from the design. Patented marking menus let you use context-sensitive gestures to select commands." What Bill Buxton told me back then (and still tells me now) directly contradicts the claim in that brochure, and the claims that Alias marketing people were making. Alias marketing claimed point blank that "of course marking menus are patented!" That brochure (and many others) claim point blank that "Patented marking menus let you use context-sensitive gestures to select commands." Bill Buxton claimed back then (and still claims now) point blank that "marking menus are not patented", and that I would be an idiot to believe Alias marketing. So there is an obvious glaring contradiction here. At the time he made that claim to me, he understood very well because I explained quite clearly that I was asking about any patent relating to marking menus in general, because I did not believe it was possible for marking menus to be patented, and Alias marketing was lying and invoking his lie to support their false claims. I thought there was some patent related to marking menus that they were talking about, and exaggerating its claims to spread FUD. And there was. And they were. But he refused to admit the existence of any "marking menu patents" at that time by any definition of the term, even though we all now know they those patents exist, and Alias marketing brochures specifically refer to "patented marking menus". My problem is that Alias marketing was spreading FUD about the patents, and when I asked them about it, they specifically mentioned Bill Buxton's name as the person who patented them, yet when I called Buxton within minutes of hearing that ridiculous claim to ask him about it, he denied there was any such thing as a marking menu patent by any definition, and he got quite abusive and demeaning, calling me an idiot for believing them, and claiming to be insulted that I'd think he'd patent marking menus, like his marketing people told me he did. And he flat out refused to ask his marketing people to stop lying in his name on his behalf. My problem is not Bill Buxton's or Alias marketing's obvious insincerity and lack of credibility (that's their own problem). It's their intention and result of their lies that I'm concerned about: their FUD was meant to and succeeded in preventing Kinetix (and others) from adopting marking menus or pie menus for 3D Studio Max. And there is evidence that it also discouraged open source applications like Blender from using marking or pie menus, when they had nothing to be afraid of. https://blenderartists.org/t/when-will-marking-menu-patent-expire/618541 https://blenderartists.org/t/when-will-marking-menu-patent-e... Gordon Kurtenbach, who now works at Autodesk, which now ironically owns both Alias and 3D Studio Max, confirmed those facts to me: >Don, I read and understand your sequence of events. Thanks. It sounds like it was super frustrating, to put it mildly. Also, I know, having read dozens of patents, that patents are the most obtuse and maddening things to read. And yes, the patent lawyers will make the claims as broad as the patent office will allow. So you were right to be concerned. Clearly, marketing is marketing, and love to say in-precise things like “patented marking menus”. >At the time Bill or I could have said to you “off the record, its ok, just don’t use the radial/linear combo”. I think this was what Bill was trying to say when he said “there’s no patent on marking menus”. That was factually true. However, given that Max was the main rival, we didn’t want to do them any favors. So those were the circumstances that lead to those events. >After Autodesk acquired Alias, I talked to the manager who was interested in getting pie menus in Max. Yes, he said he that the Alias patents discouraged them from implementing pie menus but they didn’t understand the patents in any detail. Had you at the time said “as long we don’t use the overflows we are not infringing” that would have been fine. I remember at the time thinking “they never read the patent claims”. But as I said before, the 3D Studio Max developers at Kinetix heard about the Alias marking menu patent from Alias marketing, and made the decision to ignore their users and not support them, long before I heard of it from them on the trade show floor, or read the patent. So of course I couldn't say that at the time.