Honeywell Vs Nest: When the Establishment Sues Silicon Valley 228
An anonymous reader writes with this quote from an article at TechCrunch:
"Honeywell filed a multi-patent infringement lawsuit against Nest Labs and Best Buy yesterday. The suit alleges that Nest Labs is infringing on seven Honeywell patents. Honeywell is not seeking licensing fees. The consumer electronic conglomerate wants Nest Labs to cease using the technology and is actually looking to collect damages caused by the infringement. Damages? Bull****. This is about killing the competition."
Really? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Really? (Score:4, Funny)
I total agree's you.
Re:Really? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Really? (Score:4, Funny)
Yes you can, you simply change the law. Patents are not inherent to the organization of the universe, and a compulsory license requirement would be in no way unconstitutional.
$1 billion dollars, per usage.
Compulsory license requirement met.
Re:Really? (Score:4, Informative)
Typically compulsory licensing requirements include that the price must be fair. No reasonably human being (and likely no court) would feel that $1 billion dollars per thermostat is a fair licensing price when Honeywell is selling their thermostats for $50-$100 each. Presumably they'd have to sell their thermostats at $1b+ to claim that the patents were worth $1b per unit and seems likely that Honeywell would find themselves out of business pretty quickly if they demanded $1b+ per thermostat.
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Re:Really? (Score:5, Informative)
You're obviously a legal genius compared to me, because I'm not even aware that such things exist. I'm sure you'll enlighten us all with numerous examples.
The GP was referring to RAND requirements. (Reasonable and Non Discriminatory, or something like that). Very common for industry standards organizations that accept patented technologies as part of the standard. If they do, they usual require RAND requirements from the patent holder.
Re:Really? (Score:5, Informative)
You're obviously a legal genius compared to me, because I'm not even aware that such things exist. I'm sure you'll enlighten us all with numerous examples.
Your sarcasm is as obvious as your lack of knowledge.
Here is a USA example [justice.gov] Search for the term "reasonabl" (last character purposely left off so you can hit the variations of the word).
Here is a WIPO Study. [google.com] Check out page 9. It seems to apply to the EU.
Next time, do your own homework. =D
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For example, if your patent is used in an industry standard, the standards boards require that licensing be available to everyone at a reasonable price. Courts have generally upheld the requirement if patent infringement cases go to trial where a company was simply trying to implement the standard. So yes, it's not a legal requirement that I'm aware of, but it's not unprecedented either.
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You're obviously a legal genius compared to me, because I'm not even aware that such things exist. I'm sure you'll enlighten us all with numerous examples.
But "fair" is a rather subjective term (when it comes to rents landlords and tenants often have subtly different ideas) so whose definition do we use?
Not if they continue to sell their own for $50.
It would be trivial (although I am not a lawyer so trivial may not mean a lot here) to demonstrate that Honeywell is comfortable "licensing to themselves" for a certain (relatively low) amount, given that these are consumer goods. Certainly it would be well less than the MSRP for any given unit that happens to use said "novel innovation", and it would bring the numbers back down to reality. Similar schemes are used for regulated industries (like DSL service) wherein the vendor cannot charge a reseller mor
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We've had them in europe for years.
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You're obviously a legal genius compared to me, because I'm not even aware that such things exist.
Go hang out with a cover band. You'll find out how compulsory licensing works.
Incidentally, that's why allofMP3 was explicitly legal in all countries and was never shut down until threatened with non-legal violence (companies from the US bribed authorities to shut it down "whatever it takes" mob style preferred, and the people running the site got the message).
Not if they continue to sell their own for $50
The issue is that compulsory licensing being "fair" would mean that they could not demand more than the price of the unit as licensing (which isn't
Re:Really? (Score:5, Insightful)
The entire point of patents was to promote invention and empower human economy. Honeywell killed off its remote thermostat product line long ago and has no intention of producing any more... they just want to make sure nobody else can enter that business either. That is expressly AGAINST the entire point of patents and their current use as a bludgeon to hold the world at large hostage has rendered them not only nonproductive but profoundly harmful to human enterprise.
The use of patents to cut up human IP into little fiefdoms, and turn corporations into despotic warlords, holders of IP to control and dominate society has become detrimental to human advancement, social well being and and the future of new businesses. We need to change IP laws to protect inventors, but prevent corporations from using IP as a means to destroy fair competition, promote monopolies and as such place the public in the stranglehold of sole proprietorship. It is a natural process as we move towards an information society to have IP become the currency of trade. It is therefore detrimental to society to put artificial boundaries on the free market of ideas and IP. We need to change the way that IP is managed, such that inventors are rewarded... specific people who hold patents on created works and are fairly remunerated for their inventions by both their companies and society at large. As such we also need to limit or eliminate the right of corporations to own patents, because they are compelled to use them as tools to dominate the market.
All of this is the mischief that descends from corporations having human rights without human limitations. It is also high time to define corporations properly as human enterprises, giving them the appropriate rights and freedoms to operate and thrive and remove the privileges that have proven so detrimental to society, human existence and life on the planet in general. We are at a historic nexus and our future demands that we stop and look at what contributes to our future and what threatens it. We carry tremendous baggage from the past, some of it wisdom, some if it atrocity. We need to consciously choose a future and invent who and what we are going to be. To do less, is take our hands off the wheel and simply hope that things will turn out. Good luck with things just turning out.
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The language of a compulsory licensing law would require demonstrating that every licensee is charged a fair and equitable price, which cannot be any higher than the price of their own products minus the material and production costs. And that difference would be distributed among the many patents used in a single product in the proportion the company specifies (for all).
I take it you would vote against such a law and allow big corporations to continue to stifle innovation and drag this country down?
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I dunno.
Here are fact. What Honeywell's doing is legal. Their patents are valid.
Notice: I said nothing about "should". This is about facts: "the thing which was done" according the its Latin origin [wikipedia.org].
The facts can change as actors in these events act. For instance, a court could decide that the patents are crap, as I believe they should. Or that the patents should be compulsorily licensed to Nest. Or all patents should be abolished.
But we're not talking about "should" or "there oughta be a law", or "that ain'
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And if we are discussing "what should be", you can bring in related facts to support the argument, such as "this patent should have been prevented by this specific prior art" or "there's specific legal precedent for enforcing licensing in this similar case."
Except, in many such cases, the facts end up where the infringer gets the patent nullified, so speaking to those specific set of common facts isn't as off topic as you assert.
For "voice activated control" I offer up 10,000 years of amimal husbandry as prior art. But apparently, a mere 10,000 years of one of the most popular industries/passtimes is irrelevant. For leaching power from another system for operations, I submit 2000+ years of windmills and water wheels. For "buffering" of actions, I would sub
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Parts of copyright law already have this - mechanical licensing, for example. It's relatively straight forward and accessible. Oddly, syncronization rights are not compulsory, nor are master rights. They're not always easy, but it's a hell of a lot better than if they didn't exist.
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And in what ragged and damaged interpretation of the Constitution would that be? Which power granted to the government does it fall under? You do realize the Constitution is a listing of the rights of the government and not the rights granted by it, don't you?
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Umm, no.
The Constitution is a listing of the POWERS of the federal government. Rights are something only people have.
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Didn't this happen once? I heard of a libertarian legend that the US gov. once forcibly pooled all the patents required to create airplanes.
Re:Really? (Score:5, Insightful)
And we probably should have some provision for mandatory licensing, if we're going to grant patents like this one:
A thermostat having a thermostat housing and a rotatable selector disposed on the thermostat housing. The rotatable selector adapted to have a range of rotatable positions, where a desired parameter value is identified by the position of the rotatable selector along the range of rotatable positions. The rotatable selector rotates about a rotation axis. A non-rotating member or element, which may at least partially overlap the rotatable selector, may be fixed relative to the thermostat housing via one or more support member(s). The one or more support member(s) may be laterally displaced relative to the rotation axis of the rotatable selector. The non-rotatable member or element may include, for example, a display, a button, an indicator light, a noise making device, a logo, a temperature indicator, and/or any other suitable device or component, as desired.
[US Patent 7159789].
So what is the invention here? A rotating selector that "rotates about a rotation axis?" What else would it rotate about? A rotating selector that can be used to set a desired parameter by rotatable position? How else would a rotating selector be used? A thermostat where the the temperature setting input is "disposed on" the housing?
What they're describing here isn't a mechanism, it's a *design*.
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So what is the invention here?
Maybe if you want to know what the invention is you should look at the part of the patent where they tell you what the invention is, rather then reading the abstract?
Re:Really? (Score:4, Interesting)
I have read the patent. It's not long. The only claims that have any possible relevance to the Nest device are pretty much described verbatim in the abstract. Other than that, the claims are commonplace stuff like using gears or belts to drive a potentiometer shaft which encodes the dial's position. That's older than the hills. The patent is padded out somewhat with all the different things you could stick on the stationary part (indicator lights, buzzers, bi-metal thermometers, company logos), but none of that is essential. There's a moving part and a stationary part, and the stationary part may or may not have stuff on it.
What is described in the patent is a user interface in which a digital thermostat mimics the operation of an analog thermostat. In the device as described, the position of a rotating dial on the outside of the chassis set some value. Judging from the pictures the Nest UI doesn't work that way. It is more like a jog-dial in which the direction of motion controls moves the value up and down; the absolute rotation is irrelevant.
The only way to stretch this patent to cover the Nest device would be to grant Honeywell exclusive rights to any UI in which a rotation part encloses a stationary one, regardless of the mechanism or mode of operation. In other words, Honeywell is claiming a patent on a visual design.
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"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;"
Allowing someone to patent an invention and then prevent anyone else from using it, while at the same time not using it themselves, does nothing to "promote the progress" of science and useful arts.
As for freedom of speech, your freedom of speech does not include the right to force others not to say somethi
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Let me fix that for you:
Oh I like this game.
"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;"
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Here, let me try:
"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."
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Allowing someone to patent an invention and then prevent anyone else from using it, while at the same time not using it themselves, does nothing to "promote the progress" of science and useful arts.
Not necessarily. Without patents, it is conceivable (some might say likely) that a given invention would never get published, but rather be kept as trade secrets in case they are useful later. Given a truly non-obvious invention, there is a benefit to society to see it published and its means of building/operating carefully documented. With the patent system, the idea is that everything is public and in return the company has some protection against competitors using the invention against them even if th
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Let me fix that for you:
"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;"
Allowing someone to patent an invention and then prevent anyone else from using it, while at the same time not using it themselves, does nothing to "promote the progress" of science and useful arts.
As for freedom of speech, your freedom of speech does not include the right to force others not to say something.
First you'd have to define progress.
I'd love to have a patent on lead-free solder, gasoline with corn in it, and wind farms just so I could prevent them from being used. They're worse than the alternatives and stopping them from being used is indeed progress.
Maybe someone wants to patent a new gun design and prevent people from using it. Maybe because it's not safe, maybe because it's too good at killing people, whatever. You don't get to decide what progress is, and neither does the patent office. The
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So then.
On First Amendment grounds....
Copyright is illegal.
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Maybe. Copyright does not prevent you from making your own art. Then you have the right to express it, yourself. Copyright law does have some flaw, and is routinely abused by big corporations (which abuse a LOT of laws, routinely). But its fundamental basis is still valid, to protect a specific art. Freedom of speech protects AN expression of an idea. Copyright doesn't apply to the idea.
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So then.
On First Amendment grounds....
Copyright is illegal.
Yes it is. The jailing portion, anyway.
The paying $$BIG MONEY$$ penalties portion is valid, though.
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Of course, there's the qualifier you breezed right over: "To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts...." Although (AFAIK) the Supreme Court has never entertained a challenge based upon the premise that a given law *impedes* progress, it's not inconceivable. The catch is, the Supreme Court can't be forced to hear a case, and it's unlikely to do so unless we someday end up with a retired patent lawyer on the bench.
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Preventing others from doing so is not the basis of patent laws. The basis is to promote innovation for the national good. At one time the law scheme we had did an adequate job of that. But that was before we had all these too big to fail corporations that act as economic bullies. Time to change the law. But the basis, for improving our nation, remains the proper basis for how the laws should change.
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The SCOTUS has ruled over and over that congress has a lot of leeway in their interpretation of the copyright clause. I'm sure there would be no problem if they decided the exclusive right for patents would only last, say 1 year, and then they could require either a compulsory license or the option of abandoning the patent protection entirely. I mean they've basically said that "limited time" could be "forever minus one day", or that they could continue to retroactively expand copyright term over and over
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Also you left out the first paragraph of Aricle 8,
The Congress shall have Power To [usconstitution.net]
IE it is part of the powers granted to the Congress, it was not a requirement of congress to do anything. hence the term given is the "Enumerated_powers" [wikipedia.org]
Similar is true of the 1st amendment, it tells us that the US government, and by the 10th amendment the states, are not allowed to infringe on the right of speech, or pass laws that do. They are not required to protect the free speech of citizens, except from that of governme
Re:Really? (Score:5, Insightful)
Isn't it the dream of every company to kill the competition? And isn't the point of patents controlling your innovations, including limiting your competition from using them? It seems to me they're taking a fairly normal and ethic (as far as businesses are ethical these days) route to the whole thing. It's bad business for everyone if companies believe they can get away with infringing patents and then just pay for licensing if they get caught.
Re:Really? (Score:5, Funny)
Isn't it the dream of every company to kill the competition?
I think you mean "blow the competition away."
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The problem i
But the patents can be BS (Score:5, Informative)
TFS doesn't say (probably to drive more views to the linked page) but this is all about thermostats.
Some of the patents include "thermostat is round and can be rotated" [google.com], "thermostat asks the user questions" [google.com], and stuff like that. Considering how skeptical many people are about Apple's "design patents" on "rounded rectangles with touch screens", I would be skeptical of some of these as well.
Now some of the other patents, like leeching power off of the main system, may hold up under more scrutiny (though this technique has been in wide use throughout the industry; I recall two-wire sensors that derive their power parasitically from the data line, and if the patent covers similar technology then it should be revoked).
Also, FYI, you can compel some patents to be licensed. FRAND patents, for instance; Samsung got into hot water when they tried to use FRAND patents as a weapon against Apple.
IMO, you shouldn't be able to use patents to shut down competitors. Especially competitors that outsmarted you by building a better product than you could.
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How could have they possibly applied for this patent in 2004, when they've produced round thermostats with rotating setpoint adjustments since just about forever?
Re:But the patents can be BS (Score:5, Insightful)
>.> Reading comprehension fail?
Honeywell's thermostat is parasitically powered, not their sensors. I'm saying the general technique - drawing power from other devices over e.g. data lines - is obvious to anyone skilled in the art of circuitry.
Here's a Maxim DS18S20 1-wire parasite-powered digital thermometer chip. http://www.maxim-ic.com/datasheet/index.mvp/id/2815 [maxim-ic.com]
Arduino parasitic power. http://www.arduino.cc/playground/Learning/OneWire [arduino.cc]
Hell. RFID chips derives power parasitically from the transmitter.
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that would be chipmakers, like philips, who make i2c and other serial controlled devices.
honeywell is an integrator. they never designed these concepts.
its laughable if it wasn't such a shame.
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Isn't Honeywell a defense contractor as well? They're pretty well entrenched in the nuclear arms manufacturing industry. Or was the honeywell that makes thermostats spun off at some point and they are completely independent now?
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No you can't, and that's about one third of all that's wrong with the patent system of all the countries I know of.
Patents exist to REWARD them for sharing their patents, through licensing, and then land their inventions in the public domain.
That they don't even TRY to license them shows their contempt for the very reason they're allowed to have a patent in the first place.
It might be an idea to have an arbitrage type of system, where the patents expire unless the patent-holder signs up new licensees, until
Not true (Score:2)
These compulsory licenses were put in place to prevent extremely anti-competitive behavior. Just like Motorola's latest suit against Apple, demanding 2.25% of all iPad sales. Motorola can't just demand a billion dollars per patent infringement case and clean out Apple by s
US Government? National Security? (Score:3)
What if a company patents something that is "vital to the security of the country," like a "Terrorist-Find-O-Matic?" Can't the government say, "tough shit, we need that?"
I was about to start working on my "Crotch-Groping-O-Matic" device, but if the TSA folks are going to just steal it from me, I won't bother.
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Patent hold get to license the technology or not, based upon their own preferences. You can't FORCE a company to share it's patents.
As it happens, not only can you, a great many of the patent law systems of the world do to some degree or another(it seems to be even more common with copyrights; but also happens with patents). All Paris Convention for the Protection of Industrial Property signatories(1883-Present) possesses the right to create compulsory licenses under certain circumstances.
In the specifically US context, it's worth noting that patents and copyrights are listed as something Congress may create(but is not in any way ob
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Why does this incoherent drivel get modded up to +5 insightful? Has the modding system been infiltrated again?
the thing is (Score:2)
Re:the thing is (Score:5, Insightful)
They are indeed extremely lame-looking patents, even by the usual standards of patent lameness. Several of them are an attempt to patent early-20th-century button/knob technology, and several others are an attempt to patent standard 1930s-50s control theory. Oh, except with the phrase "used in a thermostat" or "in an HVAC system" added, which makes it totally novel.
One of the patents is for this earthshattering invention: a system that can change from an initial temperature to a second temperature, while indicating on a display an ETA for reaching the target temperature.
Another one is for this: a display with a circular housing over it, where rotating the housing, by means of a potentiometer to which it is attached, changes an HVAC system parameter.
And yet another one is this: a display that asks a user questions in natural language, displays a menu of possible responses (such as "yes" and "no") among which the user may select, and then adjusts an HVAC system's configuration as a result of the user's response.
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have they sued car manufacturers, or do they have different patents that have "in a car" plastered on them.
Toyota Prius vs. Honda Insight design copy (Score:2)
I haven't heard that Toyota has brought suit against Honda yet.
Makes you wonder why we have these types of suits in the technology arena.
http://kristianwidjaja.com/blog/2009/03/the-2010-honda-insight-a-toyota-prius-copycat/ [kristianwidjaja.com]
Re:the thing is (Score:5, Funny)
Personally, I liked the one about 'diverting' power from the home's electrical system to power the thermostat. You mean like every electrical appliance in existence?
Re:the thing is (Score:4, Insightful)
Actually, that one's not quite as ridiculous as it sounds, assuming the technology isn't much different from home thermostats. AFAIK, home thermostats in an old home with only a furnace might have as few as two wires: one that's approximately 24Vac, and one that gets connected to it whenever the furnace should turn on. A newer home with an air conditioner might have two or more additional contacts for the a/c compressor & blower, and possibly 24vac of its own. I believe that most use battery power for the digital logic, but use the 24vac to energize the relay coils. I believe most home digital thermostats were historically battery-powered because the logic doesn't draw much power, and because it prevented the programming from getting lost whenever the power were shut off at the breaker.
Fast forward to 2012. For literally a few cents, you can buy an 8-bit microcontroller with real eeprom and flash, and a linear power supply to convert 24vac into 5vdc is far from being rocket science. Instead of relying upon continuous power to keep the settings alive, you can just write them to flash, and read them back when power gets restored. I believe this is more or less the nature of their patent.
Assuming I'm mostly right, this is a pretty lame patent. Unfortunately, it probably does meet the technical standards for being granted. I can only assume that Honeywell grabbed it because the market for home thermostats has traditionally been so small, few other companies have even bothered with it (I mean, let's be honest... how often do most people REALLY replace their thermostats?), so nobody else even thought about filing a patent for it first.
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It's an extremely lame patent. Stealing a bit of power from a control circuit isn't new at all. Many panel lights are powered that way for example.
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It took (a small amount of) work to take the garbage out yesterday too, where's my 20 year monopoly?
Honeywell was NOT the first to steal power from a control circuit, so if a patent is deserved at all (for a merely clever idea) then it shouldn't be theirs and it should be long expired by now.
Re:the thing is (Score:4, Funny)
Personally, I liked the one about 'diverting' power from the home's electrical system to power the thermostat. You mean like every electrical appliance in existence?
As long as they aren't up to diverting power from "Life Support" things can't be too critical yet.
Re:the thing is (Score:4, Insightful)
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It was patent-worthy when "on a mainframe" was appended(though much of that has expired by now, so it isn't a matter of significant practical concern)
It was again patent-worthy when done on a PC.
You'd better fucking believe that doing it "on the internet" made it patent-worthy all over again and then some.
On a 'smartphone'. Oh you know it, and twice as shin
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Get a Nest (Score:5, Interesting)
I have a Nest and it is awesome. Don't buy it because it will save you money (it may reduce your montly cost a little, but it'll take a while to make up for the cost of the device), rather buy it because it is a fun toy. It's very well implemented, looks nice, the software is great, and you can do cool stuff like connect to it from your pod.
Fuck Honeywell. If their patents have been violated, then where are their Nest-like products? I smell another patent troll.
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The fact is Honeywell has been making computer controlled systems like this for decades. Just because some little knockoff came along years later and packaged up a cheap version for consumers does not mean they have the right to infr
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I don't know. It seems like a number of the Patents fall into the category of "Blindly obvious" and "overly broad". I mean really? They have a patent on using sentences on a screen on a thermostat?
It looks like Nest's real crime is making a inexpensive competitor to Honeywell's expensive proprietary technology. To someone who knows very little about the situation, it looks like Honeywell has been bilking it's higher end customers and using patents to generate monopoly rents. How come Honeywell doesn't
Re:Get a Nest (Score:5, Insightful)
You just compared a learning thermostat to a programmable thermostat. That leads me to this question:
Nest $249
Oranges $1.29/pound
So who is more expensive?
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You just compared a learning thermostat to a programmable thermostat. That leads me to this question:
Nest $249
Oranges $1.29/pound
So who is more expensive?
Apples! Everyone knows Macs are more expensive.
Next time ask me a hard one.
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Wow dude. You got an unfair troll mod for that.
re: industrial sector (Score:2)
I'd say it's ALSO a fact that the only products Honeywell has been offering consumers are basic, dumb thermostats or overpriced digital models with very basic functionality and a high price-tag that you're presumably supposed to pay to get that respected Honeywell name badge on the front.
If there are issues over some specifics, such as the particular control mechanism used, violating Honeywell patents? Then fine ... let them demand licensing fees for those items and move on. The fact Honeywell hasn't done
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Honeywell is one of the best-known brand names in the controls industry, mostly due to their past dominance. In the last couple of decades they have not been what you could call leading or innovating. (IMHO, anyway)
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I have a round thermostat on my wall. It's been there since the 1970's or earlier as far as I can tell. Clearly longer than any patents last. It uses a coiled bi-metallic strip and a mercury switch to operate. I am not an Electrical Engineer (I have some experience with it as a hobby and from where it overlapped with the Computer Science courses I took at University and even a small amount of professional experience doing such work) and don't really qualify as someone "skilled in the art". Nevertheless, if
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Thanks, Honeywell! (Score:5, Funny)
I had no idea these Nest Thermostats existed, but they look awesome. Now that I know about them I can go out and buy one and enjoy an increased quality of life. Thanks, Honeywell, for bringing them to my attention!
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I know right? my cheapass honeywell is absolute junk that if you bump into it too hard it will fall off of its base and dangle by its wires. and forget setting it it couldn't tell the temperature any better than it could tell the difference tween its ass and a hole in the ground. It had gotten down to like 40 in here last night even though that innovative digital POS thought it was 62, its set to kick on at 60 during the night.
Common technology in large HVAC systems (Score:5, Interesting)
Large buildings already have control systems that do this, and Honeywell manufactures many of them.
The "Nest" device may well be mostly hype. (What is "far-field motion detection", anyway?) There's only so much you can do with input from one location and nothing but on/off control over heating and cooling.
Compare the EcoBee [ecobee.com], which does the same job, and probably better. EcoBee can handle remote sensors for outdoor air temperature. It measures humidity, which "Next" doesn't claim to do. It can be set up to control fans and dampers. (One of the biggest wins in HVAC management is figuring out how much air to take from outside and how much to recirculate.)
Nest is a status symbol, not a HVAC management system. It looks cool. It creates the illusion that it's doing something "green". It probably helps a little.
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Large buildings already have control systems that do this, and Honeywell manufactures many of them.
The "Nest" device may well be mostly hype. (What is "far-field motion detection", anyway?) There's only so much you can do with input from one location and nothing but on/off control over heating and cooling.
Compare the EcoBee [ecobee.com], which does the same job, and probably better. EcoBee can handle remote sensors for outdoor air temperature. It measures humidity, which "Next" doesn't claim to do. It can be set up to control fans and dampers. (One of the biggest wins in HVAC management is figuring out how much air to take from outside and how much to recirculate.)
Nest is a status symbol, not a HVAC management system. It looks cool. It creates the illusion that it's doing something "green". It probably helps a little.
Look at the EcoBee, and without reading any instructions or manual, attempt to change the temperature lower or higher. Do those "menu" type buttons do that job? Or is it a touch screen? Those are not immediately obvious, and most of the population would say the same thing.
Nest is an attempt at making the interface in such a way that the usage is obvious to most of the population without looking it up in a manual. Right now, that costs extra, but maybe not for long.
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Nest is a status symbol,
Because being able to say you are able to afford a $250 thermostast gives you greater status bragging rights than getting a $700 phone or a $100k car!
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Nest is a status symbol, not a HVAC management system. It looks cool. It creates the illusion that it's doing something "green". It probably helps a little.
It was produced by an ex-Apple employee's startup, after all...
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A bit of a contradiction (Score:2, Insightful)
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"This is about killing the competition." (Score:4, Informative)
No shit. What the hell do you think patents are for? They may or may not be socially desireable, but don't lose sight of the fact that they are government-granted monopolies. Preventing competition is what they are all about (Licensees are not competitors. They are customers.)
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Probably not too much of an issue (Score:3)
Let's see:
Patent number: 5482209
Filing date: Jun 1, 1994
Issue date: Jan 9, 1996
So patents filed before June 2005 the patent term is the longer of 20 years from the filing date or 17 years from the issue date. Check.
Expiration is Jan 9, 2014, based on 20 years from the filing date.
Let the Lawsuit drag on for two years until the patent expires, so as long as they don't get an injunction they will just pay some damages and presumably be on their way.
I'd like to innovate the whole system (Score:2)
When I upgraded my HVAC to 2 stage heat/cool, they could not setup the 2 stage heat to be activated from the thermostat controller, so it had to be set to switch to hi mode after 15 minutes of continuous demand. Why? Because there were only 5 wires. Why couldn't they design a thermostat/HVAC that only needed 2 wires? Instead, it still uses an ancient protocol that needs more wires for more features.
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It's been done. Look at the Carrier Inifinty/Bryant Evolution systems. 4 wire communicating system. There are other communicating systems from Trane and various other manufactures as well, but they all use different protocols, which is a problem. Perhaps someday they'll standardize but for now you'll need a matched system from one company.
Saw it coming - MagicStat (Score:5, Informative)
I kinda saw this coming, but didn't grasp the implications, e.g. patent issue.
When I saw Nest, I chuckled at their claims that this was such a revolution. Why, the thermostat will learn your usage patterns by itself!
Scroll back like 30 years or so ago when I lived in Dertroit. A friend of a friend, I think in Ann Arbor, invented this thermostat call MagicStat. It learned your usage patterns all by itself. That's why was was unimpressed by Nest's claims. Yawn. Long, 30-year yawn.
Honeywell bought the MagicStat patents. I presume they've maintained those and taken out new ones throughout the years.
Here's the Trademark record - 1982 (Score:5, Interesting)
Here's the trademark listing for Magic-Stat which was issued to QuadSix Corporation of Ann Arbor, Michigan filed in February, 1982, and subsequently assigned to Honeywell Corporation. One
http://tess2.uspto.gov/bin/showfield?f=doc&state=4008:kk95v8.3.2 [uspto.gov]
(I realize the trademark has nothing to do with patents. Just using the trademark to help fix the date and origination of the "learning thermostat" idea.)
So, it looks like Nest took 30 year old technology and created a buzz by giving it a bit of Apple shine.
I actually had one of the original Magic-Stats, before it was sold under the Honeywell label. I was reasonably happy with it. The unique feature is that it would learn the inertia of your system, so that it would achieve the desired temperature at the time that you wanted. That, and the unique simplified user interface. e.g. you just set it to the desired temperature when it doesn't seem right, and it learns your pattern from that.
It just amazes me how much buzz these guys got over something that was invented 30 years prior.
Originally invented in 1953 ( wiki) (Score:3)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Honeywell_T87 [wikipedia.org]
60 years on one design, i think the patent on the circular design has expired.
They are probably suing on software patents. ( which shouldnt be allowed in the first place).
More details (Score:3)
Privacy policy and EULA (Score:4, Informative)
The thing has a privacy policy and an end-user license agreement. Remember, this thing is a slave to a server at the manufacturer, and they can download new firmware. So they have total remote control over your furnace. They disclaim all liability. There is no warranty. (Honeywell normally offers a 5-year warranty). They can discontinue the service at any time.
You can't even resell the thing. The software license doesn't transfer. So if you sell your house, the thermostat has to be replaced.
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Concur! Geez the lame bottom-of-the-market-sucking thermostat they included in my freaking expensive-as-Hell house is so cheap looking, under-brained, and just plain unconsidered as to be insulting. Honeywell did a lousy job innovating, and thus allowed a market opening in a market they OWNed for decades. I figure they deserve what they get.
Go Nest!
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http://yourhome.honeywell.com/home/products/thermostats/ [honeywell.com]
Are there really 53 different products there? I might have miscounted.
I think people on Slashdot especially are smart enough to be insulted. What's the difference between a 7-day thermostat, a 5-2 day thermostat, and a 5-1-1 thermostat? I'm pretty sure if you popped the cheap injection-molded plastic cover off, you'd find the same 8-bit microprocessor and eeprom in each of them. Why should they all be priced differently? And could you or I, sitt
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To anyone that has purchased a cheap consumer thermostat, the need or market for improvement is absolutely obvious and the IP thicket is pretty much the only conceivable problem.
The Nest is definitely not "cheap". In fact, it costs more than Honeywell's Prestige thermostat, which does all of the same things that the Nest does (which is what Honeywell has patents on). Your problem is in buying a "cheap" thermostat. The products are there, just not at your price point, and the Nest definitely doesn't fit into your price point.
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If we're going to take THAT broad a view of damages, then Honeywell owes me money for 'damages'. They have, after all, abused the patent system and now the taxpayer funded courts.
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This looks like a case where a company successfully innovated in the marketplace, and then took out patents to help secure their position.
The position adopted by the author of TFA was not subtle and, in my view, does not help the discussion.
Yes, that's the impression I got too. Although Honeywell's behavior suggests they want Nest out of the market entirely. For starters, they didn't serve papers to Nest -- Nest found out via the press release from Honeywell. Also, Honeywell wants Nest to simply cease & desist. I wish these kinds of lawsuits never happen -- a legitimate claim being used to obliterate a true innovator. If I was Honeywell, I would have used Coase's theorem [wikipedia.org] to negotiate with Nest, pointing out that Honeywell was in the r
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But that would involve cooperation and allow for a competitor. They have a lovely cash cow, and they're doing what they can to make sure nobody gets a slice.
It would be one thing if Honeywell was actually planning on improving their thermostats, but they aren't. And they don't want anyone else to improve them either. It's not quite the same as patent trolling (in the NTP sense), but more like AT&T with modems.