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Tandberg attempts to patent x264 open source algorithm
- stefanve 16y agoThat is freaking bizarre, curious about the follow up on this. I think someone is about to loos his job
- oiujhygtyhuji 16y agoNo need - lying on a patent application is perjury. And it's a federal court - remember not to drop the soap in the shower!
- prodigal_erik 16y agoThis waste of carbon isn't worthy of scrubbing Knuth's toilet, and I'm all for drumming him out of tech for life. But our neglect of security in prisons isn't funny.
- jrockway 16y agoBut software patents are bad so this one guy deserves all the blame! Not his bosses who pressured him to do it, not the system that set up a framework for claiming ownership of ideas... no, this is all his fault, and it's worse than murder! Death penalty!!! </sarcasm>
- palish 16y agoStab him with parenthesis! Smash his fingers in a Turing machine!
- mahmud 16y agoSamurai swords are not cutlery. Reserve parenthesis for seppuku!
- prodigal_erik 16y agoThank you, I hadn't noticed that Tandberg was not just some guy but a corporation laying the groundwork to engage in racketeering ("nice product you've got there...")
- pavlov 16y agoThis guy is named as the inventor on the patent application: http://no.linkedin.com/pub/lars-petter-endresen/0/6ab/390 http://no.linkedin.com/pub/lars-petter-endresen/0/6ab/390
- ig1 16y agoTandberg was acquired earlier this year by Cisco, if anyone has any Cisco contacts it might be worth bringing this to their attention as Cisco may not be aware of this as it happened prior to their acquisition. Cisco HR peeps have been quite active in the UK developer community recruiting for Tandberg recently, I'll forward this to one of them to see if can get some attention.
- kqueue 16y agoI'll see what I can do.
- shorbaji 16y agoI work for TANDBERG (now a part of Cisco) and I've dropped a note to Lars, the "inventor" in the patent. I certainly would like to hear the other side of the story and will share it if I get it.
- jcromartie 16y agoWhat "other side" is there, if it's a step-by-step description of x264?
- sbt 16y agoWell apparently one side is the mob
- moondowner 16y agoAnother prove that software patents should be abolished.
- jrockway 16y agoBy similar logic, copyright should be abolished because someone plagiarised their final English paper? People will always abuse any system, but that doesn't mean the system should be taken away from everyone else. I don't like software patents, but this is not a software patent issue. It's an "intellectual dishonesty" issue -- taking credit for someone else's work.
- wtallis 16y agoThe problem is that it was worth Tandberg's effort to put together and submit this fraudulent patent application. Enough applications like this get granted, and later go unchallenged or get upheld, that Tandberg had a reasonable expectation that they would get a patent to extort money out of somebody or scare competitors out of competing with them. Software patents need to be harder to get, easier to overturn, and there need to be steep incentives to not submit invalid applications.
- prodigal_erik 16y agoWe need USPTO to somehow bear consequences for the harm they're doing to the industry. Reviewed applications are counted towards the "production" of an examiner but approvals later overturned by a court are not counted against them. As long as they only have incentive to rubber-stamp basically anything or risk dismissal, that's what they'll do.
- sulla 16y agoUSPTO seems overwhelmed. I would rather see penalties for patent owners where their ability to create new patents is slowed or revoked if any of the patents they own are invalidated.
- sulla 16y agoGiven that there was the possibility of a 'three-strikes' provision for copyright abusers in ACTA, there should at least be a discussion about penalties for patent owners that makes it so the owner can no longer file any patents if a certain number of patents are invalidated.
- nickpinkston 16y agoI love it - but the patent-anything crew (IBM, Intel, etc.) would throw all their money at that. Maybe at least a percentage of total patents after the first 10 invalid ones, or something similar?
- antimatter15 16y ago"To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries." - Article 1, Section 8, Clause 8 of the United States Constitution
- astrange 16y agoThis is a pandering quote which everyone already knows and not really a useful comment at all.
- wtallis 16y agoI don't see how the quote was relevant given that there is already plenty of evidence that will defeat the patent application, but it seems like very few people actually know the constitutional basis for intellectual property laws. Even here on HN, I've seen posts from people who think patents are intended as a reward for inventors, rather than an incentive to invent. Under US law, inventors and writers do not automatically deserve exclusive rights - those rights are granted only as a means to encourage progress.
- jcromartie 16y agoThis is a frank response to a pandering quote which serves to let everybody know that you are a good comment watchdog and won't just ignore bullshit.
- tomjen3 16y agoGiven this, could one use that clause as a defense if sued by these "people"?
- lwhi 16y agoI dislike the patent system, and I also dislike dishonesty - but could it have been possible that the person accused might have stumbled across the same solution independently?
- sili 16y agoIf the person came up with the solution on his own, wouldn't he patent it in full including the missing piece that the author checked in only later? Without that piece, the solution does not work.
- DarkShikari 16y agoNo, it works -- that was just an extra optimization.
- JoachimSchipper 16y agoYes, but it strains credibility that he'd come up with it just after a similar commit was made to x264.
- dfranke 16y agoIt's unfortunate this wasn't noticed seven weeks ago. The application was published August 7. The public comment period runs for two months afterward.
- sili 16y agoI would imagine that this patent could be easily invalidated using prior art argument, the only down side is all the wasted effort and legal fees to fight the battle.
- JVerstry 16y ago"35 U.S.C. 102 Conditions for patentability; novelty and loss of right to patent. A person shall be entitled to a patent unless (a)the invention was known or used by others in this country, or patented or described in a printed publication in this or a foreign country, before the invention thereof by the applicant for patent, or ... (f) he did not himself invent the subject matter sought to be patented" Even if Tandberg were granted a patent because the USPTO missed the information provided in the post, it would not stand in court. Such information should be communicated to the USPTO to have them kill the application during examination. Case closed.
- gnubardt 16y agoWere it granted, the patent would still be a threat, even if it wouldn't hold in court. Organizations that can't afford the legal fees to retaliate against a patent suit are often forced to settle.
- meta 16y agoIf the implementation was indeed taken, it might be a dangerous mishap/black eye against their community reputation. It appears that Tandberg relies heavily on Opensource for at least one of their other products. Gstreamer and Tandberg video: http://gstconf.ubicast.tv/videos/case-study-tandberg-and-gstreamer/ http://gstconf.ubicast.tv/videos/case-study-tandberg-and-gst... It appears (given they were invited to a gstreamer conference) that they have been getting along with that project so maybe this was a one-of mistake? edit: make myself clearer
- deleted 16y ago[deleted]
- kjetil 16y agoNorwegian news site digi.no picked up this story and have a statement from Tandberg. Tandberg claims that their invention is different from what's in x264 and that they invented it before x264 the referred code. Google translated link: http://translate.google.com/translate?js=n&prev=_t&hl=en&ie=UTF-8&layout=2&eotf=1&sl=auto&tl=en&u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.digi.no%2F856986%2Fanklager-tandberg-for-video-patentjuks&act=url http://translate.google.com/translate?js=n&prev=_t&h...
- plist 16y agoThe norwegian link clearly states that they have documented their algorithm 7 months before it was released from x264. If this is true, there is definately nothing to see here...
- stuinzuri 16y agoThey _claim_ to have documented it internally. Garrett-Glaser has publicly documented his case. Any blind faith in the accuracy of Tandberg's response is not shared by me.