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But Sonos claims Google actually did steal the technology. And the court agrees. From the article: Back in 2013, while Google was considering how it could make

But Sonos claims Google actually did steal the technology. And the court agrees. From the article: Back in 2013, while Google was considering how it could make its music streaming service work on Sonos' speakers, the latter company gave the search giant an inside look at its technology. At the time, it didn't seem like a big deal. Google wasn't making speakers, and it wasn't in the smart home business at all. It would be another year before it bought Nest as a way to get into the hardware business. Sonos says that as a result of that inside look, Google "blatantly and knowingly" copied its technology and included it in its own products.

leoedin 5y ago
The feature is about adjusting the volume of a group of speakers together. That doesn't sound like the kind of thing that you'd need to copy Sonos' source code to implement. Maybe that inside look lead Google to decide to enter the market, but I really doubt the person who wrote the speaker-group volume functionality had ever seen anything from Sonos. If they had they'd be facing copyright infringement lawsuits too. Ultimately software patents don't really care how something is implemented, just that it has the functionality defined in the patent. So for this ruling it doesn't really matter if Google copied Sonos or not.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- jrockway 5y ago
  I think Google and Sonos had some partnership agreement in place, which makes this more complicated.
- floatingatoll 5y ago
  Disagreeing with the concepts of software patents doesn’t mitigate Google’s theft of them. Google knew they were stealing patented works when they did so. I don’t own any Sonos or Google products, and I’m still annoyed with Google for knowingly stealing when they could afford to pay.
strictnein 5y ago
There's an amazingly high number of people not reading this article, even by HN standards.
what_ever 5y ago
> But Sonos claims Google actually did steal the technology. And the court agrees. Could you please point to me where you see the ITC (International Trade Commission) that you call as "court" agreeing to the specific paragraph that you posted? I am not arguing with you, just want to know this better myself. Disc: Googler.

leoedin 5y ago

The feature is about adjusting the volume of a group of speakers together. That doesn't sound like the kind of thing that you'd need to copy Sonos' source code to implement. Maybe that inside look lead Google to decide to enter the market, but I really doubt the person who wrote the speaker-group volume functionality had ever seen anything from Sonos. If they had they'd be facing copyright infringement lawsuits too. Ultimately software patents don't really care how something is implemented, just that it has the functionality defined in the patent. So for this ruling it doesn't really matter if Google copied Sonos or not.

deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
jrockway 5y ago
I think Google and Sonos had some partnership agreement in place, which makes this more complicated.
floatingatoll 5y ago
Disagreeing with the concepts of software patents doesn’t mitigate Google’s theft of them. Google knew they were stealing patented works when they did so. I don’t own any Sonos or Google products, and I’m still annoyed with Google for knowingly stealing when they could afford to pay.

strictnein 5y ago

There's an amazingly high number of people not reading this article, even by HN standards.

what_ever 5y ago

> But Sonos claims Google actually did steal the technology. And the court agrees. Could you please point to me where you see the ITC (International Trade Commission) that you call as "court" agreeing to the specific paragraph that you posted? I am not arguing with you, just want to know this better myself. Disc: Googler.