Aqua-Soft ForumsDon't think this has been posted yet, anyway..
Anyone heard about Creative suing Apple for patent infringement, hmm LOL ::slant:
Link: http://www.eetimes.com/news/latest/showArt...cleID=187203272
Creative Sues Apple
I hate creative so much. The first mp3 player I ever bought was a creative and I live in singapore. The thing broke down at least 5 times and I had to go to and from the stupid factory in the middle of no where clocking up about 100$ worth of taxi fares to ask to have things repaired. When I asked for a new one, they said ok and gave me my old one back with something else wrong. I hate creative.
And I dont care who has the patent, this is total (insert unallowed swearword here).
If anything is a rip off its the creative zen. I hope they loose miserably
And cool as on the mac book front , that things a beauty.
Well, yeah... this news made me laugh today too 
Every company that seems to have an MP3 player seems to want the iPod to become a failure, I really don't think it's going to happen anytime soon.
It's just a way to try to stop so many iPods so people will thier product instead, though I really doubt it's thier going to win Apple.
Few things:
1, iPod video looks ugly with the enlarged screen.
2, iPod photo was out before the Creative Zen, Apple just made the iPod bigger to allow a bigger screen.
3, You can clearly see that the graphics done on the Zen were done to duplicate the look of the iPod. The only thing that is not 1:1 is the text doesn't turn white when you select it.
4, iPod could use a GUI redo.
The Creative Zen (or whatever the product's name is) looks really crappy. Seriously, that design looks exactly like the iPod's but in a crappier form and the design has been on the iPod since it was black and white. Creative is a huge rip-off and they want to sue Apple for it. 
The Zen is nothing like the iPod. I bet you Creative wants to prevent iPods from being sold in the US so they can make a whole line of iPod wannabes or something....
-Ertai
they don't want to prevent ipod sales..i mean, sure that would be great overall- but it's highly unlikely that there will be a cease and desist order on the production of ipods. they just want a huge settlement.
Maybe Apple will have to change the GUI and we'll see Front Row on iPods. 
Go back to black and white screens!
Going to black and white screens is insane!, Nevah! I love my black 60 GB iPod's screen with color * carrases the iPod, "I love ya bahbeh" :'("
If any of you cared to read the actual patent...
Creative filed for it on Jan. 5, 2001... that's 9 months before the iPod was introduced.
For those who don't know, the first iPod was introduced to the public on Oct. 23, 2001
It took our wonderful government agency 5 years to process it!
Inventors: Goodman; Ron (Santa Cruz, CA); Egan; Howard N. (Capitola, CA)Assignee: Creative Technology LTD (Singapore, SG)
Appl. No.: 755723
Filed: January 5, 2001
Apple is going to have to do some explaining in court.
this has nothing to do with graphics... this has to do with the method of scrolling through the system.
does it really physically hurt you people to say anything bad about apple? geez... they stole (or allegedly) a rightful patent. they're not the do all, end all of good business model...
I'm not sure if wookietv, has read the "Famous" iPod/Creative Interface patent story !!!
I'd suggest you do a little research on the same topic. Then you'll know if you should say that Apple (allegedly or not) stole "Rightful" patent.
Indeed, but it's not like Apple hasn't been in the wrong before. I think I agree with teh wookie. 
-NC
But couldn't it also be that it is unintentional? I didn't get a chance to read the patent document (too many users), but the UI of the iPod was basically a port of the Columns browser type that Apple used in OSX (heck, Apple could have stole this, too). Not to mention that the type of navigation is pretty common among MP3 players.
If they stole it, damn, it would likely hurt Apple very much. That type of navigation was key to it's product.
Everyone knows it was bound to happen sooner or later, but sucks to the company based in the country I live in. Its easy, theres always a way around it. I dont care who owns the patent, (lawyers will) but Apple has done SO MUCH better with the interface, to the point that when creative finally released something, it looked like the iconic ipod.
The interface on ipods has been like this for ages. The question you must ask is why is creative doing it now? Maybe the fact that sales in their mp3 players has decreased by 50% ? maybe cos they lost hundreds of thousands of dollars recently? I dont care. I dont even own an ipod, cos im like dirt poor, but the thing is legendary.
I believe the slide interface used on OSX with Finder etc is apple origional. If so, thats a bloody strong argument.
And in other news, apparently Microsoft and MTV are teaming up to make another online store. Apparently its a threat to iTunes. I think thats funny considering the music from this new store aparently wont be able to play on ipods, and currently ipods dominate by like 90%. Makes you laugh. People are good with threats.
Apologies for the ramble, but everyone loves rambling! (creative and or mircosoft could have me sued! ahhh!) I better watch my tounge
The interface on ipods has been like this for ages. The question you must ask is why is creative doing it now?
Why now you ask??? Because it took our finely tuned government agency nearly 5 years to grant the patent. A patenet that was applied for well BEFORE the introduction of the iPod.
Granted, Apple did a nice job on the implementation, but the idea and the concept clearly belongs to Creative.
Creative merely waited until they had the legal ammunition to go after Apple.
With Creative clearly being the rightful patent owner, Apple is going to have to either pay for the rights and share a portion of any profits made (past, present and future) or design a new interface for the iPod.
Something tells me Apple will just pay.
what player by creative predates the ipod and has a scrolling screen and memory that requires such a menu structure?
Something tells me Apple will just pay.
Yeah, and the back of every single iPod would carry "Designed by Creative in Singapore, Assembled in China, Apple logo© engravement made by Apple in California" on it's back )))
P.S. Oh, I wish, they stole sound decoders from Creative, not interface 
what player by creative predates the ipod and has a scrolling screen and memory that requires such a menu structure?
The NOMAD Jukebox and the NOMAD II MG... introduced in January 2000.
Source: http://www.creative.com/corporate/milestones/
January 2000Creative announces two new additions to its Personal Digital Entertainment (PDE) solutions - the NOMAD® Jukebox and NOMAD® II MG. Both products include USB support, are programmable and support multi compressed audio formats including MP3 and WMA. With a 6GB storage capacity, Nomad Jukebox can store over 100 hours of digital audio.
The point of contention here is not the player itself, but rather the method in which the data is organized and accessed.
Creative did it first.
i know, i know.
hmm i didn't have apple pegged as a company that steals ideas, thought it was more microsoft's style..
I wouldn't say they stole it... more likely they came to similar if not the same conclusions as the Creative developers.
Same thing applies in a lot of cases. Unfortunately a lot of people would rather create drama and say so and so company stole it, rather than acknowledging the fact that it's entirely possible for two people to come up with the exact same idea.
Regardless, this is purely a case of who came up with it first and therefore owns the rights to it.
All evidence at this point in time clearly indicates that the engineers at Creative beat Apple to the punch.
Some how i dont think creative will get that far, but we shall see. I mean look what they did to apple corp over the logo...
Some how i dont think creative will get that far, but we shall see. I mean look what they did to apple corp over the logo...
Big difference between the two cases.
Apple Corp was a trademark usage issue. And it was a pretty weak case in the first place.
This one on the other hand is a patent issue. Patents are hard as hell to overturn once they are granted. Look at what almost happened to RIM with respect to Blackberry service.
RIM chose to pay off the patent owner for usage rights.
And those patents were pretty weak.
Creative has some pretty solid ground right now considering the timing of the patent request and the introduction of the devices in question.
Apple can afford really good lawyers, so it will more than likely boil down to who can out spend who, in a court battle.