It is referred to as laches - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laches_(equity) - when a party waits well beyond the point when they knew they were being infringed, in order to allow the defendant to get in much deeper before asserting your claim. If this claim is valid (and it sounds like that is a big if) it would seem that the timing of their changes means it is highly likely they were thinking about infringement from that initial point. To allow Apple to create several generations of iPhones and then the iPad before asserting the claim sounds like a laches defense might be appropriate. (Though if I read it right, the laches defense comes after the infringement suit has been won, and in the process of arguing damages).

That said, I am not a lawyer, I don't play one on TV, and I didn't stay at a Holiday Inn Express last night. I just have spent way too many hours with patent attorneys in my career.

Why do you assume that a programmer password is needed to ensure some level of authentication? At least some of these devices are designed with a decent set of cryptographic protocols to prevent just the sort of random attacks that have been wildly speculated on this list. There is an arrogance in the security community that all companies are ignorant, out only for profit, and will blithely ignore the safety of the precise patients that they are in business to protect.

If a password was required on a programmer, the first thing that would happen in the programmers in an ER would be a post-it note on the unit with its password. Security Fail. There is a balance between fast access to these devices in an emergency, and the protections needed to ensure they are not tampered with when the patient is away from their physician. Security can be provided by ensuring that it is not possible to authenticate a programming session from a long distance, and that protections are in place to prevent hijacking of active sessions during programming. In an industry driven by safety risk assessment, there is considerable awareness of the potential threat, and mitigations in place to address it. The question was always "who would want to hack such a device" and that was answered last year. Academics in search of publicity (and the funding that follows).

By the way - the device in the original paper was an old device, removed from a patient because the battery had expired. It had been designed in the late 1990s. Significant changes have happened in the subsequent decade, but the authors chose to draw a line from that one data point and assume that designs were just the same today. That is just bad science...

Improvement? Are you implying that any manufacturer of an implantable device uses Windows. None do, that I am aware (and I am aware). You can't get 5-10 years of device life from a 15-35cc package using such an inefficient OS. They also don't use Bluetooth, or WiFi.

Ack - this issue was "patched" in the 80's. Please keep up with technology improvements. See the section entitled "Common Misconceptions About Pacemakers" at http://circ.ahajournals.org/cgi/content/full/105/18/2136 Circulation is one of the main Cardiology Journals Dr. Kenneth Ellenbogen has authored one of the basic textbooks on cardiac pacing. He is one of the authorities in this business.

And, as I recall, the announcers talked about "computer generated" during that sequence. They were talking about the guy who orchestrated the whole opening ceremony, and his use of computers for this sequence. Admittedly, they did not clearly state "this is not really happening". Would have to go back and re-listen to that on the DVR to get exactly what was said.