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Kodak Sues Sony Over Digital Camera Patents 364

Posted by timothy from the itchy-lawyers dept.
KenC writes "Kodak has filed a lawsuit against Sony alleging that 10 of its patents have been used without permission. Included among the patents as reported via Reuters is electronic camera utilizing image compression and digital storage . Kodak claim the patents involved were issued between 1987 and 2003. More from Bloomberg." As reader Nekura2025 asks "Um, doesn't that apply to all digital cameras?"
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Kodak Sues Sony Over Digital Camera Patents More

Kodak Sues Sony Over Digital Camera Patents

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  • Not another one (Score:5, Insightful)

    by mod_critical ( 699118 ) * on Tuesday March 09, 2004 @08:34PM (#8516483)

    I was unable to find any more sources for this information, as something like Kodak sueing for a patent on "electronic camera utilizing image compression and digital storage" seems like one of those typical press exaggerations.

    However, if this really is a patent held by Kodak this is just another example of the failure of the patent system to issue appopriate tecchnology patents. This is just like the "One Click Order" patent that Amazon was trying to enforce a while ago.

    I don't understand how a patent could be issued for "electronic camera utilizing image compression and digital storage" when it is simply the assembly of dozens of really patent worth technologies: CCD image sensor, electronicaly programmable non-volitile memory, compression algorithims, and the like

    I sincerely hope that this is either a press exaggeration, otherwise it is clear that technology patent problems are still persisting.

    • Re:Not another one (Score:5, Insightful)

      by torokun ( 148213 ) on Tuesday March 09, 2004 @08:45PM (#8516582) Homepage
      Don't always jump to conclusions based on the title or summary description of a patent.

      This is probably better read as "a certain type of electronic camera utilizing a certain type of image compression together with a certain type of digital storage"...

      There is absolutely nothing here that could lead you to criticize the entire patent system... aggh...

      • Re:Not another one (Score:2, Informative)

        by Anonymous Coward

        I acknowledged that this might be deceptivly stated. But if it is indeed as it sounds, it would not be the first time.

        See this article [lessig.org].

        See this article [bbc.co.uk].

        See this article [iftf.org].

        See this article [bellgully.co.nz].

        There are countless other articles on similar incidents and concerns as well. I wasn't blindly criticizing the entire system. Knob.

      • There is absolutely nothing here that could lead you to criticize the entire patent system...

        Especially if you're in the litigation business. That's the only business that benefits from the copyright/patent system. Yes, the system promotes innovation, as in innovative lawsuits. There are a lot of people that benefit from this system, but that doesn't make it good. The businesses that would die without it would be replaced by other, probably more beneficial businesses. Then we could get on with innovating

        • Patents themselves are not bad (Score:5, Insightful)

          by HermesHuang ( 606596 ) on Tuesday March 09, 2004 @10:35PM (#8517473)
          Without the possibility of a patent to let a company make some money off of a new invention for a bit, very few companies would be willing to spend money on research and development. Yes, patents can be misused. But without patents you'd have a "free-rider" problem where everyone wants everyone else to put up the time, money, and resources to develop new things, so that they could then simply copy it. In such an environment, almost nobody will be willing to innovate.

          The businesses that will die will be the ones who put money into R&D. That includes those who fund university research. I sincerely doubt in the environment you seem to want we would be able to innovate or create anything. However, since our forefathers got along fine with whale oil and candles, I guess we don't actually need too many of the innovations since then.

          • Re:Patents themselves are not bad (Score:5, Insightful)

            by slipstick ( 579587 ) on Tuesday March 09, 2004 @10:55PM (#8517643)
            Well this is totally unsubstantiated.

            I could equally say that without "protection" companies would be forced to innovate faster in order to stay ahead. It's as equally plausible because it's as equally untestable.

            Hey, this is fun. I can make up a future that doesn't exist as well. Consider that without protection. Innovation may actually occur not only faster but in a more logical and less disruptive manner. Each change may be small compared to previous ideas but they would occur at an ever faster pace. As well small companies would be able to make up ground faster and add their own innovations that a "bigger" less agile company either refuses to try to market or doesn't see a return large enough for their coffers.

            By the way, somebody had to "innovate" the candle too at some point. I'm pretty sure they didn't have patent protection.

            Companies, large or small, will always innovate because that's what they have to do to stay competitive. If all it took were a few patents to keep a company on top innovation would actually grind to a halt.

            Lastly, in my brave new world, companies would not only innovate with technology but maybe they would actually spend time innovating in customer service because that's what would really count.

            Gee that was fun. Thanks for playing.

            • Re:Patents themselves are not bad (Score:5, Insightful)

              by HermesHuang ( 606596 ) on Wednesday March 10, 2004 @02:52AM (#8518856)
              *sigh* here we go again.

              Perhaps I was a bit general. I will be specific in that I will say what I personally deal with:

              I do R&D in microelectronics. Most of the projects I work in involve an investment of hundreds of thousands of dollars, if not millions of dollars, of equipment and manpower. When the final product comes out our profits are figured not only on production costs, but those development costs. If we did not have a patent for our devices, a week after we come out with a new product, another company would be able to sell the same product at a lower cost because they did not have to spend the money to do the development work. Hence anything they make over production costs will already be profit.

              Thus at least in my own specific experience (and yes, in my self interest, since I'd be out of a job) cutting edge technology would not be able to exist as it is today. There is no way we can just make small changes, because every little change we make means we have to retool at least some of the fab line. So when we turn out a new product, it has to be a significant step above what we previously had, to justify the expense of the changeover.

              I respect your idealism, but as someone who is in the middle of it, I don't see it as a matter of being agile or innovative enough. From my standpoint, developmental costs are simply too great to be ignored, and so the first person to make something would always lose out.

              This is not to say that all research and development is necessarily expensive. But If you want to look at it abstractly, The person who makes a product first has to set their price according to production costs and development costs. The second person to make that same product can set their price based solely on production costs (and perhaps the cost of buying 10 or so items from the person who first made it to take apart). Thus the second person will be able to out-compete the first person. If the development costs are fairly neglegible (like with a candle) then the market is still competitive between the two sellers. But if development costs are high like in microelectronics, even selling at a loss the person who developed the device would still be selling for a higher price then the person who copies them.

              This is not to say patents cannot be abused. One example I can think of is patenting gene sequences and the like. The purpose of a patent is to give whoever develops something a grace period within which to recoup the costs of doing the development.

              I am not playing. This is my livihood we're talking about here. If we were not able to patent our products, I would not be able to go to my boss and say "I have a new idea, but we'll need to order this $300,000 PECVD to fabricated it in our lab to work out all the details." I suppose I could try to make a new device within the constraints of what we already have the capability of making. But in the competitive world that I live in, if we already have the capability to make it, chances are someone else has already done it.

              • nonsense (Score:3, Insightful)

                by ajagci ( 737734 )
                I do R&D in microelectronics. Most of the projects I work in involve an investment of hundreds of thousands of dollars, if not millions of dollars, of equipment and manpower.

                I think you are a bit naive, here. Hundreds of thousands of dollars barely pays for the costs of a patent, let alone any kind of significant R&D project.

                When the final product comes out our profits are figured not only on production costs, but those development costs. If we did not have a patent for our devices, a week afte

          • Re:Patents themselves are not bad (Score:5, Insightful)

            by JuggleGeek ( 665620 ) on Wednesday March 10, 2004 @03:11AM (#8518915)
            In such an environment, almost nobody will be willing to innovate.

            As things are going, the patent system makes it darn near impossible to innovate.

            I think email programs have been stuck for a long time. I can think of a number of things I'd like them to do that they don't do currently. So lets say I write my own, with plans to sell it. I'd want it to have some protections to help get rid of spam, to help avoid the common viruses, etc, in addition to some things that would simply make email more useful. I'd also probably want it to be able to do essentially the same thing with usenet messages - usenet isn't that different from email, so go for the gusto, right?

            How long before I get hit with a ton of "You used our patent here" stuff? Not long after it went public, I suspect.

            Companies have filed suits claiming they own patents to HTML links, for god sakes. And to websites that use a menu system which stays the same as you go from page to page. And all kinds of other things. More than one company using Challlenge/Response as a solution to spam (nothing more than a hand-shake, IMO) have claimed that they own the patent to that.

            If patents had been available for software back then, Visicalc would probably still be the best spreadsheet program around, as nobody else would be allowed to design a spreadsheet. Lord knows what we would be limited to when it comes to word processors and databases.

            I can understand a reasonable amount of protection for non-obvious ideas that take a lot of time and effort to make work, but the way the patent system is going is *not* going to increase the number of people/companies who develop technology, it's going to limit the number who can do it.

            Only companies with lots of money and good lawyers are going to even have a shot. How does that help anyone except a select few?

    • On click patent... (Score:5, Funny)

      by digitalamish ( 449285 ) on Tuesday March 09, 2004 @08:57PM (#8516682)
      This is just like the "One Click Order" patent that Amazon was trying to enforce a while ago.

      Actually Kodak patented "You push the button we'll do the rest" a hundred years ago. I think Amazon has some 'splaining to do....

      • Actually Kodak patented "You push the button we'll do the rest" a hundred years ago. I think Amazon has some 'splaining to do....

        What about Smith and Wesson?

    • Re:Not another one (Score:5, Insightful)

      by itbwtcl ( 755688 ) on Tuesday March 09, 2004 @09:05PM (#8516747)
      One thing you have to keep in mind is, all patented devices seem obvious when you have the
      benefit of hindsight. The first automobiles were nothing more than an "assembly of dozens of really
      patent worth[y] technologies..." If you have the foresight, the skill, and the facilities to glom
      them together and make something new then go for it.

      The proper use of a patent system is the best way to encourage innovation. Unfortunately recent
      sloppy (and possibly corrupt) patent processing is giving the system a poor reputation. We need to
      be encouraging our govenments to fund, train, and staff the patent offices properly.

      We also need to be encouraging our representatives to enforce a clear and sane patent policy.
      Patents on natural processes, language, and software constructs are purely destructive. Such
      patents are the real threat.

      I don't know if Eastman Kodak's patents are legit, but if they are not it will be because someone
      else thought of the specific device/implementation first. If they legitimately had a "eureka" moment
      then they deserve to hold and enforce the patent.

      • Re:Not another one (Score:5, Insightful)

        by jovlinger ( 55075 ) on Wednesday March 10, 2004 @12:51AM (#8518378) Homepage
        no!

        there are so many patents out there that have patented the "desire" not the "implementation".

        * I'd like to make shopping on the web easy enough to require only one click!

        * I'd like to compress my images on a camera!

        * I'd like to have richly marked up pages stored on a server and allow remote clients to access and display them.

        These are NOT patent worthy, any more than

        * I'd like a non-fire-based, perpetual source of light.

        However, the invention of

        * carbon filament in a noble gas through which electricity is passed to cause incandesence

        IS a patentable invention, because it is a novel IMPLEMENTATION, not a novel desire. ... or rather, above I should have said "... SHOULD not be patent worthy." I'm sure the system has progressed far beyond its original intentions.

        While I'm on the subject, I'd like to question whether any patents today actually function to foster innovation. It seems that the strategic patent is a very potent weapon AGAINST innovation (on the part of your competitors) by locking others out of a business endeavor you have no intention to persue--yet--but want to keep others from. See the drug industry for rampant examples: They patent the drug, and just when that's about to expire, they patent the messenger whatsit, and when that expires, they patent the resulting whosit... some of which are produced naturally by your body. Hell, they've even started patenting DNA, which they don't even know what it DOES!

        At some point, you have to stop swallowing the propaganda and question these things.

    • Re:Not another one (Score:4, Funny)

      by harlows_monkeys ( 106428 ) on Tuesday March 09, 2004 @09:15PM (#8516828) Homepage
      This is just like the "One Click Order" patent that Amazon was trying to enforce a while ago

      I'm amazed at your psychic powers that allow you to discern the contents of a patent entirely from the title. Were you born with this ability, or was it acquired?

    • Re:Not another one (Score:3, Informative)

      by Anonymous Coward
      The patent [uspto.gov] is 5,016,107, and issued May of 1991.

      The patent doesn't cover compressing images on a digital camera. It covers one (rather broad, it was filed in 1989) compression algorithm (sounded like JPEG) when used in the entire system.

      I can't say definitively, but it sounds as though if the image is compressed before being saved to the media, the patent wouldn't be violated.

      Don't read too much into titles of patents. They need to be descriptive, not specific. For instance, patent 6,703,724 (filed

    • Re:Not another one (Score:5, Insightful)

      by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 09, 2004 @09:31PM (#8516928)
      The difference between this and "one-click shopping" or retroactively patenting browser plugins is that Kodak really did pioneer most of this stuff back in the 1980s and early 90s, and there was a lot of serious R&D and technology advances involved.

      Think back to 1995 ... pretty much every digital camera was made by Kodak.

      Sure, you could get a digital SLR from Nikon or Canon, but it was branded as a Kodak and had a Kodak digital back the size of a coffee grinder mounted onto what was basically a stock 6006 or EOS1.

      And those pro MF and LF backs? And that first 320x200 consumer digicam that cost $1,500?

      All Kodaks.

      Too bad for Kodak they haven't made a competitive digital camera in like 5 years.

  • Pulling a Darl... (Score:2, Insightful)

    by hendridm ( 302246 )
    Looks like SCO's business model is catching on. If you can't innovate, litigate! Maybe we could make the Kodak icon the EPCOT Center [slashdot.org] too? It will be a symbol for all companies whose business model revolves around suing those who were successful where they were not.

    • Re:Pulling a Darl... (Score:5, Insightful)

      by smittyoneeach ( 243267 ) on Tuesday March 09, 2004 @08:41PM (#8516554) Homepage Journal
      True enough, assuming a spurious lawsuit.
      However, if you had tremendous amounts of R&D money invested, and someone else was turning your effort into market share and killing you, you might fail to detect humor in the situation.

      • Re:Pulling a Darl... (Score:5, Insightful)

        by GlassHeart ( 579618 ) on Tuesday March 09, 2004 @09:28PM (#8516903) Journal
        if you had tremendous amounts of R&D money invested, and someone else was turning your effort into market share and killing you, you might fail to detect humor in the situation.

        That situation is never funny, but not all bad situations should lead to litigation. You may have spent millions in R&D, but were you working on something non-obvious?

      • Re:Pulling a Darl... (Score:3, Insightful)

        by sonpal ( 527593 )
        if you had tremendous amounts of R&D money invested, and someone else was turning your effort into market share and killing you,

        If this were the case, then the blame would fall squarely on your shoulders for poor execution. Kodak had products based on outdated technology, and did the research for new technologoy but did not bring it to market fast enough (perhaps to milk the film products for all they are worth). If Sony managed to bring newer technology to the market faster, Kodak deserves to lose

      • Sony had digital storage in 1981. (Score:5, Informative)

        by dbirchall ( 191839 ) on Tuesday March 09, 2004 @09:48PM (#8517044) Journal
        See the description and photo of the original MAVICA (MAgnetic VIdeo CAmera) on digicamhistory.com [digicamhistory.com].

        I'm not sure when image compression entered the picture, but unless Kodak came up with it before 1981 and it took them until 1987 or longer to get the patent, it would appear that this constitutes prior art - by Sony themselves.

    • Re:Pulling a Darl... (Score:4, Insightful)

      by Stalke ( 20083 ) on Tuesday March 09, 2004 @08:42PM (#8516564)
      I was about to say the same thing along the lines of "Doesn't it sound a bit familar that when a company discovers that its business model is based upon an obsolete technology that is leading them them to bankrupcy, they decide to sue the biggest of the companies that are using the new technology."

      Although unlike sco I think that Kodak is probably looking for a buyout. Good idea really. Kodak's brand is still the largest consumer brand. I can easily see us all buying sony camera's in the future that include "Kodak Colormatch technology" or whatever new tech they want to associates with Kodak's old film brand image (no pun intended).

      • Not even comparable (Score:5, Insightful)

        by Ohreally_factor ( 593551 ) on Tuesday March 09, 2004 @09:16PM (#8516832) Journal
        First of all, SCO probably was hoping IBM would buy them out.

        Secondly, Kodak has been at the forefront of digital imaging technology research from the outset. Kodak has been making the transition from film to digital over the past 15 years. Since film is still used in many industries and in many parts of the world, they are correct not to completely abandon the film business. That doesn't mean they haven't been developing and using cutting edge technology.

        Thirdly, SCO didn't invent IP lawsuits. SCO's innovation is in substituting a media circus for solid evidence and good lawyering. There are many IP lawsuits you never hear about because the parties DON'T call press conferences.

        • Re:Not even comparable (Score:4, Insightful)

          by Speare ( 84249 ) on Tuesday March 09, 2004 @10:08PM (#8517220) Homepage Journal
          Kodak has long dabbled in digital photography, but I would call their efforts to date as being seldom "at the forefront." They glued some chips to a Nikon 8008 body for a few photojournalist concept bodies, then they basically stopped everything but a few mediocre digicam instamatics for ten years. Now they're catching the consumer bug again, but sorry, it's too late. They won't invent the Digital Brownie. Canon wipes the floor with Kodak's marketshare, and Nikon and Sony are both dancing on their grave. Kodak woke up from their film-chemical-induced stupor way too late to save themselves.

    • Re:Pulling a Darl... (Score:2, Insightful)

      by peu ( 163472 )
      I'm sorry to tell you this but I'm not sure that the comparision between Kodak and SCO is a good one.
      Kodak really innovates in many fields, you like it or not.

      Next you would say, close the (C) office and void all the patents...

      Try not to generalize

  • Who could have thought of that? (Score:5, Funny)

    by Nea Ciupala ( 581705 ) * on Tuesday March 09, 2004 @08:34PM (#8516488)
    Using image compression in a digital camera... I think that idea must be worth... (apply pinky to lip) ONE MILLION DOLLARS!

  • Doh! (Score:5, Interesting)

    by John Miles ( 108215 ) * on Tuesday March 09, 2004 @08:35PM (#8516494) Homepage Journal
    These patent claims bring a (somewhat) amusing anecdote to mind. Around 1990, I was working at Dell Computer as a wet-behind-the-ears engineer, when the company announced a "patent bounty" of $1,000 per filed application. "Cool!", thought I, as I hastened to write up patent disclosures on every personal project I'd worked on for the past couple of years. (Hey, it seemed like a lot of money at the time.)

    One of the disclosures I submitted was for an ungainly contraption [qsl.net] that predated most manufacturers' earliest portable digital cameras. "PicturePerfect" was inspired by the Canon Xapshot, but, unlike the Xapshot, it had the ability to store images independently of a host computer and transmit them as data rather than raw video. It worked a lot more like a modern digital camera than anything on the market at that time.

    The patent committee at Dell was unimpressed. They didn't file the patent(s) I submitted, didn't pay me $1,000... and possibly missed a chance to own a big chunk of the whole digital-photography industry.

  • You pick the nice fat targets first... (Score:5, Insightful)

    by StandardCell ( 589682 ) on Tuesday March 09, 2004 @08:36PM (#8516501)
    As reader Nekura2025 asks "Um, doesn't that apply to all digital cameras?" Sure it does...but you need to pick the target with the most money first.

  • This is simple... (Score:2, Insightful)

    by oldosadmin ( 759103 )
    Patents only exist if it would not be OBVIOUS.

    Lets go through this. I'm a digital camera maker. Technology is that space is limited, and at the beginning, so is picture resolution.

    The obvious combination of the facts is this: We would COMPRESS the images and store them on a medium.

    Technology patents are stupid. People should stop being so damn greedy.

    • Re:This is simple... (Score:2, Informative)

      by thogard ( 43403 )
      You can patent something that would be obvious if the reason behind it isn't. So did they compress the images so they didn't use so much memory or did they compress them because they wanted to export them as jpeg to be standard or some other reason? A 3rd reason could make the patent valid even if the other two are obvious.
    • Technology is always obvious in retrospect.

  • Last refuge of a scoundrel (Score:5, Informative)

    by amarodeeps ( 541829 ) <dave&dubitable,com> on Tuesday March 09, 2004 @08:39PM (#8516529) Homepage

    In Rochester, where my parents live, everyone they know who works for Kodak prefaces their statements in meetings with "If I'm still here..."

    That company is going downhill so fast, it's no real surprise they're turning to other sources for revenue. But it is depressing that such a former juggernaut couldn't keep their innovation once their old technology started becoming obsolete...sad they couldn't leverage their older skills and technology. Uh...by sad, I mean, not sad at all, sorry, take another number.

    Or maybe leveraging their older technology is what they're trying to do with these patent suits, I guess...

    • Re:Last refuge of a scoundrel (Score:5, Funny)

      by cinderful ( 586168 ) on Tuesday March 09, 2004 @08:46PM (#8516585) Homepage
      Locals say you can develop film in the ole Geneseo River in Rocheser because Kodak and Xerox dumped so many chemicals into it.

    • That company is going downhill so fast, it's no real surprise they're turning to other sources for revenue.

      Hum. No, it is not: Kodak profits $122 million a year. It's not much (at least for such a well known company) but it's definitely not a sign of a company going downhill. In fact, both profits and icome grow each year.

      How to I know that? Got it from http://finance.yahoo.com/q/is?s=EK [yahoo.com].

    • George Eastman used the patent system [about.com] from day one (1888) to acquire market dominance. This is no "new" source of revenue. Kodak's IP/patent dept. is huge.
      However, this shows that the patent system doesn't guarantee shit for you in the long run unless you keep innovating.
    • Kodak has also failed to grasp the resurgence of film-based motion picture production either. Do you realize that Super8 film sales are up for the past 2 years? Kodak finally realized this, and are releasing Super8 forms of their higher-end film, the Vision-series. But, there are no new cameras, so this groundswell of Super8 support will be lost to Kodak when some genius company goes "hey, look at the sales growth of Super8 film, let's make a new camera!" and takes away Kodak's market. Already you can g
    • Kodak recognizes itself as a leaking ship, but is trying very hard to fix things by cutting out its non-core businesses (for instance, it just got rid of its government business) and at the same time diversify into core-related businesses. They seem to be focusing more on the output of images now than the capture of images. They just bought the other half of the digital color press NexPress [nexpress.com] in its entirety (it was already a Kodak joint venture).

  • Kodak is behind (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Traa ( 158207 ) * on Tuesday March 09, 2004 @08:40PM (#8516534) Homepage Journal
    This wouldn't have anything to do with the fact that Kodak is way behind [guardian.co.uk] in the digital camera market now would it?

    If you can't join em, sue em?

  • Prior art: Ansel Adams (Score:2, Informative)

    by Anonymous Coward
    Ansel Adams, who died in 1983, knew that digital cameras would be the future of photography long before Kodak filed any of these patents.

    Source: A documentary on Ansel Adams from 1983 or so, which I saw in the late 1980s in high school photography class.

    I can't find anything online about this; too many weblogs about whether Ansel would have actually used digital cameras get in the way of a meaningful search.

    • Re:Prior art: Ansel Adams (Score:3, Interesting)

      by Xeger ( 20906 )
      An obvious idea cannot be patented. 'Obvious' means that a person of average skill in the art could have independently formulated the idea without knowledge of the "invention" on which the patent is being filed. "The art," in this case, means the art of camera design.

      It doesn't strike me as a great leap that an experienced photographer or optics guy living in the year 1991 with even a reasonable degree of computer knowledge would have been able to foresee the digital camera. Sure, he might not have known a
    • Ansel Adams, who died in 1983, knew that digital cameras would be the future of photography long before Kodak filed any of these patents.

      Kodak isn't claiming a patent on digital cameras.

  • Can I patent the idea of when a button is pressed, something happens? Then I can sue oodles of companies for infringement. If I make it vague enough, a foot-pedal could count as a button press in which case I can go after the automotive industry as well as the makers of old fashioned sewing machines! Heck, unless you can take pictures with a camera telepathically, this can even be used against Kodak. Mwahahahahaha!!!

    World domination awaits!

  • What a turnabout. While many here have condemned any possible patents that might be involved in this, it's worth noting that Kodak lost its instant camera business some years ago as a result of infringing Polaroid's patents. Interestingly, neither company is close to its peak anymore.

  • Kodak probably has those patents too (Score:5, Interesting)

    by ObviousGuy ( 578567 ) <ObviousGuy@hotmail.com> on Tuesday March 09, 2004 @08:43PM (#8516571) Homepage Journal
    Kodak, for the past several years, has been pouring money and effort into churning out digital camera IP because they have been having their ass handed to them in the film market. Their film cameras have gone nowhere fast, mostly squashed by Polaroid. Even their digital cameras are being crushed by camera giants Canon and Nikon.

    Kodak may still have the lead in medium format and larger digital photography, but this market is much smaller than the DSLR and consumer digicam markets. But with dwindling numbers of customers for their primary product, mostly lured away by the better quality product of FujiFilm, Kodak has pledged to focus on their digital lineup from here on out.

    So they've got these patents in hand, and it is indicative of actual patent violation on Sony's part that Sony is the only defendant here. Sony is hardly the largest digicam maker. If Kodak really wanted to go after a company that was making these digital photography and storage devices, they would go after Canon. However, they are not, going after Sony instead. This leads me to believe that Sony is either in violation of Kodak's patents or Sony has some IP that Kodak wants to cross license. Perhaps the 4 color CCD?

  • Yes, this applies to all digital cameras (Score:5, Informative)

    by Thagg ( 9904 ) <thadbeier@gmail.com> on Tuesday March 09, 2004 @08:43PM (#8516572) Journal
    While this applies to all digital cameras, almost all digital camera manufacturers pay royalties to Kodak for a license to a number of digital imaging patents. Kodak's labs in Rochester were way out in front of everybody on this, back in the late 80's and early 90's. Unlike Xerox PARC, though, with Xerox's mouse/window based PC's, Kodak filed patents on their innovations, and make a good sum of money licensing them.

  • At least... (Score:5, Interesting)

    by 222 ( 551054 ) * <stormseeker@@@gmail...com> on Tuesday March 09, 2004 @08:45PM (#8516583) Homepage
    At least they attempted to negotiate with Sony for 3 years before filing suit, and from what i read it sounds like they actually have a couple of solid patents that might hold up.
    Just thought id throw that out there before someone started complaining about how rampant patent lawsuits can be ;)

  • Fair Use (Score:3, Interesting)

    by acd294 ( 685183 ) on Tuesday March 09, 2004 @08:46PM (#8516592) Homepage
    It is really too bad in my opinion that there is no fair use clause in the patent law like there is for copyrights. The 4th fair use clause in the copyright law is "the effect of the use upon the potential market for or value of the copyrighted work" Cite Here [copyright.gov]

    What this means for those who dont know, is that in general, if the company being sued for copyright infringement were to stop being able to use the copyrighted work, then the suing company would have a monopoly on the market. There was case using this clause where Sega was suing a company for including copyrighted code in their third party releases for segas console so that even though they werent licensed by sega, they could still be played on the console. Cite Here [cornell.edu]

    In my opinion there should be something similar in patent to protect against these silly patent lawsuits.
    • IANAL, but my reading of this is that clause 4 had nothing to do with the Sega case. This was a reverse engineering case in which copies of Sega microcode was made during the reverse engineering process. This was ruled legal under copyright law of 1995, but probably illegal under the DCMA. Clause 4 has nothing to do with this case.

      In my opinion there should be something similar in patent to protect against these silly patent lawsuits.

      If such a clause were to exist patents would be worthless. Everybody w
    • Patents exist to grant monopolies on very specific devices. Your example of the Sega vs. Accolade case is especially not applicable here because the ruling was overturned in Accolade's specifically because Sega did not hold a patent on the console in question; Kodak does hold patents on this technology. Accolade's use of Sega's code was arguably fair use because it did not devalue the Genesis itself, in fact it increased its value, although it could be said that since they collected licensing fees from peop

  • That's it, I've had it! (Score:4, Funny)

    by GoMMiX ( 748510 ) on Tuesday March 09, 2004 @08:55PM (#8516667)
    I've got to get into this new broad-patent thing! It seems to be all the craze.

    Anyone know if someone has patented "a substance used to create stuff?"

    Or how about; 'a method or process of converting oxygen to carbon-dioxide?'
  • NASA has been using digital image storage, compression and transmission since at least the 70's.

    Then again, patents can be really specific so maybe this would not count as prior art and Kodak may have even developed these systems for NASA.

    The article is short on specifics, but I wonder why Sony in particular is targeted and not Nikon, Fuji, Canon or any of the other dozen digital camera manufacturers.
  • > As reader Nekura2025 asks "Um, doesn't that apply
    > to all digital cameras?"

    Yes. So what? They can enforce it or not as they choose.

  • Kodak pretty bitter over Digital (Score:4, Interesting)

    by doomy ( 7461 ) on Tuesday March 09, 2004 @08:58PM (#8516696) Homepage Journal
    I was watching discovery channel the other day, and there was the Kodak guy very bitter about not having taken a lead on the Digital market. He kept on saying that the film market is still the thing to do and then moving onto movie film formats pointed out that every single acadamy nomintated movie was done on Kodak film.
  • You sue one, win, and then hit up all the others for royalties. If you lose, your costs are not as high as suing everybody.

  • I bet the dispute isn't about the patent per se (Score:5, Informative)

    by ptomblin ( 1378 ) <ptomblin@xcski.com> on Tuesday March 09, 2004 @08:59PM (#8516702) Homepage Journal
    Kodak has a lot of patents that relate to digital photography, some of which date back to the 1960s regarding technology they developed for film cameras or film processing. But all the big camera and digital camera manufacturers cross license each other's patent portfolios, usually on an entire portfolio to entire portfolio basis, with no money being exchanged - it's all very convenient for them, but I bet it's hell if a new company wanted to get into the business.

    What is probably happening here is that Kodak wants access to some Sony patents, and needs to leverage the patents they have to get access to it. This is probably just a legal ploy to get Sony back to the bargaining table.

    Disclaimer:
    Even though I'm currently on contract at Kodak, I don't have any inside information on this case and I'm not involved in digital still cameras. I just know what they told us in the "why you need to apply for patents on your work" lecture.

  • Maybe Sony is the only holdout (Score:5, Insightful)

    by WreckDiver ( 685191 ) on Tuesday March 09, 2004 @09:01PM (#8516713)
    Before raking Kodak over the coals, has anybody bothered to check and see if maybe all the other digital camera manufdacturers are already licensing Kodak's patents?

  • Like Polaroid ? (Score:5, Interesting)

    by MajorDick ( 735308 ) on Tuesday March 09, 2004 @09:01PM (#8516719)
    Anyone here remeber when Polaroid sued Kodak for patent infringment on their instant cameras ? Polaroid made sure to wait nice and long unil Kodak instant cameras were everwhere,then ZAP, Actually If I remeber right it wasnt on the camera but rather on the film, Kodak had to buy back all those cameras at like 25 a pop. I wonder if this was Kodaks tactic in suing Sony ?

  • Only the CLAIMS of patents matter (Score:3, Informative)

    by RyanAXP ( 60761 ) on Tuesday March 09, 2004 @09:02PM (#8516725) Homepage
    Well, more correctly, the claims of the patent are what matter, in light of the disclosure, prosecution history and other tools of claim construal.

    It seems that every time a patent-related story is posted here, a million Chicken Littles come out of the woodwork to proclaim that we'll all be sued out of house and home, based on the TITLE of the patent. Please understand that the titles of patents are very general in nature, and in no way does the title of a patent define its scope (unless a really good litigator can convince the judge otherwise!).

    Thus, a patent styled "Circular Object For Rolling Motion" almost certainly does not entitle its owner to sue someone who makes wheels--rather, you must look to the *claims* of the patent and construe them in light of the specification and what was said during the procuring of the patent, etc., to determine exactly what (if anything) would actually read on (and ostensibly infringe) the claims of the patent.

    The more "crowded" a technology area is with prior art, the narrower the claims of a patent must be. So while almost anything is patentable, in a mature art such as automobile mechanicals, you would have to throw so many limitations into your claims during prosecution that often, someone would actually have to try pretty hard to manufacture a product that infringes your patent.

    In this case, I was unable to find the numbers of the patents being asserted by Kodak, so I cannot construe the claims. Until we see the actual patents and claims, any rumination on this subject is silly.

    Cliff Notes: regardless the name of a patent, it's the CLAIMS that matter.
  • That's when they got rid of C. Al Dewan.

    Who's he? One of the unsung geniuses of the photographic era, he designed many of their scientific film processes -- including the film that was used on Skylab.

    He also made some custom extreme-ultraviolet 70mm film for our sounding rocket flight in the early 1990s. The film was called "649 experimental", and it was fabulous. Very sensitive to extreme-ultraviolet, but practically dead in visible light -- I think its effective ASA rating was about 0.05. Yes, that's 2,000 times less sensitive than normal film. And the resolution was fabulous -- about 2,000 line pairs per millimeter -- that's like 0.25 micron pixels. For our application (a telescope platform that was like a prototype of the solar coronal imager on SOHO [nasa.gov]), it was the bee's knees. Much higher resolution than any electronic detector, and sensitive and reproducible as all get-out.

    Thing was -- Kodak told Al not to make us the film. So he (I'm paraphrasing here) gave them the finger, made our film, and retired.

    I figured that was the beginning of the end for them -- it was a symptom that they were beginning to restrict and ultimately ditch the very people who were continuing to make them great. A company that big has a lot of momentum -- but, sure enough, they're spiraling down. Not enough innovation.

  • I don't know what the solution to this one is but as it stands the current system of compensating inventors, innovators and artists is straining and about ready to burst. There needs to be widescale reform.

    Looking at individual people and companies suing each other is like trying to tell the history of a world war by looking at a single hand to hand fight battle.

    I think we need to scrap the system and start again but realistically I couldn't even tell you with what. This is the best I can come up with off

  • The sky isn't falling (Score:3, Informative)

    by mark-t ( 151149 ) <marktNO@SPAMnerdflat.com> on Tuesday March 09, 2004 @09:10PM (#8516786) Journal
    This is a *GOOD* use of patents... Kodak had patents on the hardware, not the algorithms.

    This is what a patent is supposed to do... to stop people from stealing your invention and making money off of it.

    If Kodak is the only company that can manufacture digital cameras right now, so be it... it certainly sucks to be the other manufacturers if that's the case, but if they own the patent, then that's pretty much the bottom line right there. Eventually the patent will expire and the idea will become public domain.

  • Here's the patent (Score:5, Informative)

    by mabinogi ( 74033 ) on Tuesday March 09, 2004 @09:14PM (#8516815) Homepage
    Number 5016107 [uspto.gov]
  • ...wouldn't it have long since expired by now?

    The whole point of patents was to give a leg up to the people who invent something before for a few years before making the methods available for all to implement.

    So how long to patents in the US live for now?

  • Sony's New Product Line (Score:4, Funny)

    by Snoopy77 ( 229731 ) on Tuesday March 09, 2004 @09:18PM (#8516843) Homepage
    Not wanting to pay up for the use of patented technology Sony has released a new line of digitcal cameras. These cameras do not use any image compression techniques, limiting the user to only one photo. 'But that's perfect', says one Sony engineer, 'cause we don't store any images either. They just come up on the view finder for 10 seconds and then disappear.'
  • There are so many responses here comparing Kodak with SCO. But here's a novel idea--wait until you actually read the patents before making a judgment as to their obviousness. Since the patent numbers weren't even listed in the articles, I think everyone here is jumping the gun.
  • Patenting the "purpose" of an invention is an unsustainable practice. Protecting the way of doing it, not merely what is accomplished by doing it that way, used to be enforced by requiring a model - the model was patented, with flexibility to protect against "trivial change" bootlegging. Not the "purpose" of the model. Since the PTO dropped the requirement for a model apparatus, they have been protecting the title of the patent document, or the purpose of the invention, or the market demand it fills. Very q

  • digital photography wasn't obvious in the 80s! (Score:5, Insightful)

    by ObiWonKanblomi ( 320618 ) on Tuesday March 09, 2004 @09:36PM (#8516966) Journal
    I see a lot of people saying how digital photography was supposedly "totally obvious" in the 1980s. Totally wrong.

    I was watching this Japanese documentary (thank goodness it was subtitled!) about canon's development of the digital camera. Some things to keep in mind of the time:

    - the processing power to display the image on a computer was so great, it wasn't perceivable to make such an affordable device. Did anyone have 32 bit graphics on their PC in 1983?

    - even if the device could be made it would weigh a lot!

    According to these canon engineers that developed the digital photo camera, digital photogaphy wasn't perceived as a reality in the early 80s. In fact, the only real r&d (way more r than d) was being put into digital video cams, and that was considered bleeding edge, since a lot of the effort was being put into having a more portable tape-recording video camera.

    When Canon finally made a successful prototype, they took it out to a park in Tokyo, where they took a picture of a young lady with a dog. The device was the size of large pizza box! This box weight a lot and took up a lot of power. Sure, it was a prototype, but this was the result of almost 6 years of development.

    What we may see as obvious from our 21st century standpoint definitely wasn't so in the early 80s.

  • Prior art: NASA (Score:3, Interesting)

    by carlalex ( 213077 ) on Tuesday March 09, 2004 @09:45PM (#8517019)
    Digital storage and compression of electronicly taken pictures? Voyager? Viking? Etc... they weren't sending back cans of film from Mars or the outer solar system or developing the pictures in little onboard photo labs in the 70s. And compression was quite important given that your average deep space comm link isn't exactly high bandwidth.

    Guess that Aerospace degree came in handy after all.

    • Re:Prior art: NASA (Score:4, Interesting)

      by eclectro ( 227083 ) on Tuesday March 09, 2004 @11:51PM (#8518034)
      Actually those missions did not use CCD devices [nasa.gov], but a technology called a vidicon (vacuum tube) that was used in television cameras.

      Needles to say Nasa has always been on the forefront of imaging technology, and the ones used in space imaging are quite different than the ones you find in your every day digital camera.

      When you send a billion dollar probe somewhere, you can't afford not to have the very best in imaging technology.

      Some amateur astromers have adapted the CCD technology found in digital cameras for their telescopes, but they pale in comparison to ones specifically made for this purpose. Decent ones are still quite expensive, and you can check the latest astronomy magazines for mor information on them.

  • SCO sues Kodak for stealing their business model... Sigh. The only thing that stifles innovation is friviolous lawsuits over "intellectual property" and moronic patents.

  • Another dying star, ... (Score:4, Funny)

    by Dr. Mu ( 603661 ) on Wednesday March 10, 2004 @01:51AM (#8518642)
    ... its fuel of innovation and market share spent, and its core collapsing under its own weight, explodes as a SUPERNOVA. Expelling enormous gas clouds of lawsuits and IP claims with the brilliance of a trillion suns, Supernova EK2004 is dazzling observers the world over. Dr. Roland Smythe of the National Observatory commented, "This star was much larger than SCSO2003, which went supernova last year. But both are following the same progression and will soon be naught but a memory. Nonetheless, the data we've obtained from these two events will be studied for years to come." Indeed.

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