Injunction Against EchoStar Blocked 109
bestinshow writes "ExtremeTech has the news that a judge has blocked the injunction against Echostar Communications selling its PVRs." From the article: "The ruling was the latest in an ongoing battle between TiVo, one of earliest companies to design personal video recorders, now called digital video recorders or DVRS. 'As a result of the stay EchoStar can continue to sell, and provide to consumers, all of its digital video recorder models,' EchoStar added. 'We continue to believe the Texas decision was wrong, and should be reversed on appeal. We also continue to work on modifications to our new DVRs, and to our DVRs in the field, intended to avoid future alleged infringement.'"
Stayed Tuned For More Judge-on-Judge Action! (Score:5, Insightful)
Consumers win, consumers lose... all of this is irrelevant, the truth is that we have a sh*tty patent system that's vague enough to have two judges give 2 different verdicts on the same case.
In all cases I believe that it is wrong to make EchoStar stop its service immediately, and to remotely disable the current consumers. Consumers that have already paid shouldn't be the ones to bear the consequences. But then again, the consumers' interest is the least of the worries of those concerned...
Re:This is good. (Score:4, Insightful)
Tivo enjoyed great profits from their launch, but what they want now is a lock on the market for what was essentially a small up-front investment.
Tivo's current systems are generally superior to most of the competition. Their problem is that they are EXPENSIVE. The cable companies realized that DVRs sell service, so like cell phones they give them away in exchange for monthly contracts. Tivo is selling $400 cell phones in a market where most people expect them to be free (even if a bit more junky). This is why Tivo is losing market share fast.
While I'd love to see Tivo win, the fact is that their original product wasn't that innovative. Others were working on the same sorts of things, but Tivo executed better. That should earn them some bucks, but not royalties for 17 years. Plus, Tivo's up-front expenses were not that high - probably not more than a few 10's of millions of dollars - they were almost certainly fully recovered with a healthy profit.
Patents should exist where they are needed to allow companies to make healthy profits on risky ideas. However, that is all they are needed for - if a company is able to make a healthy profit without a patent, then one is not necessary. Patent lifetimes should probably be tweaked by industry as well - in industries where we expect a high level of expense to ensure quality (such as pharmaceuticals) we should probably grant longer patents (or lower the safety standards to reduce up-front costs). In an industry like toothbrush designs they should probably be shorter. Software patents should probably only last a year or two - as softare is not capital-intensive and a two year head start is plenty to make a profit.
In general patents should exist for the benefit of society - to encourage companies to come up with innovative products. That benefits everyone. However, if a company is willing to do R&D with the promise of a 200% payback we shouldn't be offering them 20,000%.
No confilct there. (Score:3, Insightful)
Monopolies rarely in the long run, or hect short run, produce products that are inferior or of lesser value.
Or put it in the other way, without the patent, other companies or inventors.. can produce prducts that are better. That's the nature of competition.
Re:This is good. (Score:3, Insightful)
Unfortunately, protection from competition breeds expenses, encourages waste and creates inefficient uncompetetive organizations.
"in industries where we expect a high level of expense to ensure quality (such as pharmaceuticals)"
Pharmaceuticals are a perfect example; they waste 80% of their income outside research. They spend more than twice as much on marketing and administration as they do on R&D. The protection breeds the expense which makes the protection necessary for the protected business model.
"However, if a company is willing to do R&D with the promise of a 200% payback"
Then offer them a 200% payback. Outright. Instead of a patent creating a monopoly, let it be worth a 200% ROI for the patent holder if it gets used in products to a certain amount within the next five (or ten, or thirty) years. Paid by the patent office, financed through ordinary state financing rather than a hidden economic tax in the incarnation of monopoly pricing. You get rid of the customer/inventor conflict relationship, small inventors get paid even if some big company rips them off, etc.
Economic incentives for R&D can take many forms. State protected monopolies has to be about the most inefficient and economically damaging model conceivable.
Re:This is good. (Score:3, Insightful)
Patents are needed to give people the incentive to innovate to begin with. Let's say that you come up with some novel, highly efficient form of the internal combustion engine. You put millions into research, mortgaged your house, everything. Without a patent, or equivalent legal means of protetion, some auto manufacturer could by 1 engine, tear it down, and due to the economies of scale begin producing it more cheaply than you almost immediately. So you've just pissed away years of effort and millions of dollars. That would be OK with you?
The biggest problem with the patents is the process. The USPTO is run like a sweatshop. You have a quota on how many patents to work on, not enough time to do adequate research into proir art, and people who are not specalized sufficiently in the fields that they are reviewing patent applications in.
Simply because there are a lot of people working on an idea does not invalidate the claim of the first one to bring it to market either. Another fundemental problem with the patent process is that patents are granted for concepts, not things. If you don't have a working example or implementation of what you are trying to patent, then no patent should be granted.
The real problem here rather than a flat out patent case seems to be that EchoStar simply acted in bad faith with TiVo by using a TiVo to jumpstart the development of their own product under the guise of licensing negotiations. I know that a lot of EchoStar customers could suffer due to the unethical behavior of their provider, but IMO all that means is that EchoStar customers should start lining up for a class action lawsuit to recover subscription fees immediately.
Re:what's the point? (Score:1, Insightful)
And everyone worried about losing their DVR service listen: If EchoStar loses they will most certainly choose to liscence from Tivo instead of fucking their customers. However much money they have to pay Tivo is nothing compared to losing customers because they had to drop a popular serivce.
Now I know lots of people are complaining that Tivo's patent is too general. I'm a loyal Tivo customer but I'm beginning to think so myself. That doesn't change the fact that the patent should have been challenged instead of this crap with EchoStar. Everyone has to play by the rules and in this case EchoStar didn't.
Re:question for those who understood this stuff.. (Score:3, Insightful)
The quick turn around on this will probably help keep the legal fight and what it means to consumers under wraps. But I hope it servs as a wake up call to people what sort of conditions they're agreeing to when they get a DVR from their provider.
Be wary of any electronic device that depends on authorization or information from someone else in order to function. Because you never know when they may have to/choose to pull the plug.
The only DVR you can really depend on is one you own outright and can make configuration changes to for the programming data source yourself (like a Myth box).
WTH? (Score:3, Insightful)
allow for the recording of one program while watching another program (aka, anything one can normally do with a VCR) on a DVR.
Look at a VCR. It holds one video cassette.
Look at a DVR. It holds one hard drive (usually).
Try recording to a VCR while watching another program on the same tape (or on a different tape). It's physically impossible. Recording to and watching from the same physical media is what makes the Tivo/VCR analogy fall apart.
(aka, anything one can normally do with a VCR)
Why not just argue that we've been able to do this all along with multiple television sets?