Open Source Music Fingerprinter Gets Patent Nastygram 487
Nushio writes "The code wasn't even released, and yet Roy van Rijn, a Music & Free Software enthusiast received a C&D from Landmark Digital Services, owners of Shazam, a music service that allows you to find a song, by listening to a part of it. And if that wasn't enough, they want him to take down his blog post (Google Cache) explaining how he did it because it 'may be viewed internationally. As a result, [it] may contribute to someone infringing our patents in any part of the world.'"
Update: 07/09 00:31 GMT by T :Story updated to reflect that Shazam is multiplatform, not Android-only, as implied by the original phrasing.
android hate (Score:4, Informative)
it was an iphone app long before it was an android app
Re:android hate (Score:5, Informative)
And there's a Windows Mobile, Nokia / Symbian, Blackberry app too. It's my fault for not Googling them up before hand..
Re:android hate (Score:5, Insightful)
Yes, I am. As a non-native english writer, who has difficulties dealing with grammar nazism, I find commas useful to explain stuff. =P
Re:android hate (Score:4, Funny)
Commas, will be misplaced.
Re:android hate (Score:5, Interesting)
>>>As a non-native english writer, who has difficulties dealing with grammar nazism, I find commas useful to explain stuff.
Let me help - "The code wasn't even released, and yet Roy van Rijn, a Music & Free Software enthusiast[,] received a C&D from Landmark Digital Services, owners of Shazam, a music service that allows you to find a song [] by listening to a part of it. And if that wasn't enough, they want him to take down his blog post explaining how he did it[,] because it 'may be viewed internationally. As a result, it may contribute to someone infringing our patents in any part of the world.'"
Fixed that for you. [] are deletions/additions. Basically I only found three errors. Grammarwise I'd recommend fewer interruptions. Simplify; simplify. As for the cease-and-desist I'd respond like so:
Dear Landmark:
Go watch Penn & Teller's "Bullshit". The title of that show is what I think of your shitty letter you litigious motherfuckers. I live in ____ where you do not hold a patent, so you can go shove a dildo up you anus. My post is protected my this country's right of free speech and free press.
Respectfully,
Not Your Slave Nor Your Serf
(middle finger)
Re:android hate (Score:5, Insightful)
Yeah and you're supposed to put a comma in front of conjunctive words like "and, or, but, because" especially if they join two sentences.
<snip>
I rocked my English SATs (99th percentile) so I'm fairly certain I'm right.
Shouldn't you have put a comma before "so" if you are going by that rule?
- I rocked my English SATs (99th percentile). I'm fairly certain I'm right.
- I rocked my English SATs (99th percentile), so I'm fairly certain I'm right.
Re:android hate (Score:4, Insightful)
That is such a beautiful example of Muphry's law [wikipedia.org].
Though your post could have benefitted from a gaffe or two.
Re:android hate (Score:5, Insightful)
it was an iphone app long before it was an android app
What does it matter that it was on the iPhone before Android? It's hardly surprising, considering the iPhone was released years before the Droid. I admit there hasn't been the usual heavy complement of Apple stories today, but that doesn't mean you have to start looking for ways to create them from unrelated articles. In any case, this has almost nothing to do with any platform, except that the author wrote the code in Java so as to run it on Android.
Back on-topic, the author has posted an update [google.com] which talks about the alleged patent infringment and includes the notices sent by the company. Classically, they hesitate to give actual patent numbers, but what it really comes down to is this: As the author says,
I've written some code (100% my own) and implemented my own methods for matching music. [...] I'm just a programmer who likes to work on technical, mathematical algorithms in his spare time. And if enough people ask for the source code, I'd be happy to give it to them. Who would have thought that creating something at home in a weekend could result in a possible patent infringement!?
But oh, no! Landmark claims
Landmark Digital Services owns the patents that cover the algorithm used as the basis for your recently posted "Creating Shazam In Java".
Well butter my biscuit and call me Daisy! Case closed! After all, they have a patent on "the algorithm". To be fair, the biggest instigator of this entire fiasco is probably his choice of using the commercial software's name in the article title. Going just by "Creating Shazam In Java", you might at first think he's attempting to completely re-create the software (for who knows what purpose). Of course, if you bother to read even the first few paragraphs it painfully clear that it's nothing of the sort. But because of this,
The code isn't published yet, but I was planning on releasing it under Apache License to the open source community soon. [...] Since I don't want to end up like Dmitry Sklyarov [wikipedia.org], with the possibility of a lawsuit, I'm not going to publish the code anymore...
If crap like this continues, independent software development in general (including a large chunk of FOSS) is doomed.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
independent software development in general (including a large chunk of FOSS) is doomed.
Only in countries silly enough to allow software patents. The rest of the world will laugh quietly to themselves as some countries bring themselves to a creative and technological standstill.
Re:android hate (Score:5, Insightful)
independent software development in general (including a large chunk of FOSS) is doomed.
Only in countries silly enough to allow software patents...
And the ones stupid enough to accept the crap ACTA will feed on their throat... actually, for those will be even worse: no allowing their software developers to patent but preventing them to use methods already patented in US.
Similarity application (Score:5, Informative)
More at http://www.music-similarity.com/ [music-similarity.com] I wonder if it uses the purported patented technology.
BTW, the assertion of a potential harm being caused by "...explaining how he did it because it 'may be viewed internationally. As a result, [it] may contribute to someone infringing our patents in any part of the world'" is certified bullshit.
All patents are public documents -- they must be public in order to inform the world just exactly what it is that the patent owner actually owns. It's detailed in the Claims section. "If you don't claim it, you don't own it."
Furthermore, a patent must "teach the invention," meaning that anyone "familiar with the art" shall be able to implement the invention with only the descriptions provided. If there actually is a patent for this technology, the cat is out of the bag.
Patent courts in the US are very favorably disposed to inventors -- assuming the technology is actually protected. It sounds like maybe not, and so the bluster and shrill threats.
Re:Similarity application (Score:4, Informative)
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
I had it as an app on my Sony Ericsson phone circa year 2000.
Well, really... (Score:2, Insightful)
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
> Why Mr. van Rijn use their proprietary name in his blog post?
Because it damn well pleases him to do so, and in the USA, at least, he is free to do so with impunity as long as he does not use it in a way that might mislead the public into believing that they are getting said product when they are not. A trademark is not a copyright.
Re:Well, really... (Score:4, Interesting)
> Why Mr. van Rijn use their proprietary name in his blog post?
Because it damn well pleases him to do so, and in the USA, at least, he is free to do so with impunity as long as he does not use it in a way that might mislead the public into believing that they are getting said product when they are not. A trademark is not a copyright.
[Emphasis mine.]
Look, I'm on van Rijn's side. However, I can appreciate that a blog post entitled Creating Shazam in Java could "mislead the public" even though it might not mislead the technically savvy. If I wrote a blog post entitled Creating Microsoft Office in Java you'd better believe I'd get a message from the folks in Redmond.
IMHO, if Landmark has any beef here at all, it's that their trademark is threatened, and feebly at that.
Re:Well, really... (Score:5, Informative)
Don't even have to RTFA, or even the summary.. Just the tagline says specifically that its a patent claim. Whether or not the claim would actually stand up in court is up to a judge should it get that far (never mind international concerns), but everything I've seen so far tells me that Shazam has all the right in the world to at least make the claim.
As far as I know, neither "easy after someone else has thought of it" nor "it didn't take me very long" are terribly good defenses in a patent case. The one you're looking for is "figured it out before someone else has thought of it", which this guy obviously didn't do given that he specifically set out to duplicate the abilities of an existing product. At this point his only defense is to show that his algorithm is sufficiently improved over (or at least different from) Shazam's that it would warrant being called 'innovative' (at least in the US.. I don't know about the EU's rules). Also, being his own code isn't a defense in a patent case (whereas it would be a defense in a copyright case if it could be proven).
Re:Well, really... (Score:5, Insightful)
The claim being that in software, once you do something, nobody else can do anything similar, even if it doesn't use any of their code or procedures. If the end result is the same, then whoever the most money to spend on legal fees is the winner. It's a fucked up way to run a railroad.
So, once someone made a word processor, nobody else should be able to make a word processor. And once somebody made a program that can play music files, nobody else should be able to write a program that can play music files.
"Innovative" has become such a cheap word. It really doesn't mean anything any more. When a word like "innovative" becomes a legal term of art, innovation ceases.
Re:Well, really... (Score:4, Interesting)
Funny you should mention railroads... [sourceforge.net]
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Unfortunately patents are given on a loose ground as long as what's written is complex enough for the patent reviewer to have a hard time to grasp it fully. And the patent reviewer won't admit that he can't understand what's written so he passes the patent.
Then it's up to a court to invalidate the patent.
Now hold on there (Score:3, Insightful)
Do you understand the basic concept of a patent? To earn the monopoly you have to publish your idea. The idea becomes part of the public domain. If someone else republishes your idea the the system works as intended. A patent is not a copyright. This sounds to me like the patent holder really doesn't want to honor the bargain he agreed to. The monopoly is on implementation. We can publish code examples to our hearts content as long as we don't run them.
Re:Well, really... (Score:5, Insightful)
Not just any scum, but unscrupulous corporate scum, which means that it's not even a person making the decision, but legally fictive golem that exists only to reward those that have bought shares, even at the expense of society as a whole. If it was a person, at least a case could be made for going up to him and calling him a piece of shit who should be ashamed of himself, to tell his neighbors that he's a piece of shit, and to remind his wife and kids that they're related to a piece of shit.
But what is a "Shazam"? It has no neighbors, no family, no community, no responsibility to do anything but eat and shit money in the pockets of its shareholders. It doesn't respond to shame, to peer pressure, to moral outrage. It doesn't even respond to the "marketplace" because they assert another legal fiction (patent) in order to pervert the marketplace, to ensure that it is immune to market forces.
And that is ultimately what this "Intellectual Property" baloney is all about: making sure that the marketplace can not work.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
You are quite right that you are not qualified. But on the subject tof US patents being enforced abroad you are also quite wrong.
Re:Well, really... (Score:4, Informative)
Re:Well, really... (Score:5, Insightful)
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
And there are no slow news days.
HOLY FUCK SELF-REFERENCE (Score:3, Funny)
This comment... While it itself has "-1 Troll" moderation status, it's self-referential and, it seems, a little bit ironically prophetic. Which, IMHO, deserves a +1 Funny or Insightful, depending on which kind of pedant you are.
But the moment it earns that +1, it loses that magical quality and is once again an overrated comment which ought to get a -1 Troll. Which in turn makes it a pretty cool comment.
This... This is Epimenides' Slashdot Comment.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
It only happens so often because the first time [wikipedia.org] no one cared.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
The Congress of 1994 actually was quite good, and they repealed a lot of idiotic laws from the books, plus cutting taxes. I credit them more than Clinton for the economic boom that came shortly afterward. They were also responsible for the Telecommunications Act that freed-up TV channels 52 to 83 for cellular and internet expansion.
Unfortunately that Congress evolved into the 2000 Congress which thought it was okay to forget their principles and pass draconian legislation like the Patriot Act. Power corr
Re:Well, really... (Score:5, Interesting)
BoingBoing has a good write up (http://www.boingboing.net/2010/07/08/patent-holders-legal.html). Most interesting was the fact that Landmark Digital Services took exception to the technical details of a patent being discussed. I think most people (myself included!) believe that reading a patent should tell you precisely how to replicate something, but there's a subtext to this story implying that is not the case here. I think a situation where a patent holder treats someone discussing a means to replicate patented technology as though they where handing out trade secrets is pretty interesting, certainly ./ worthy.
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
essentially the patent office is liable for contributory violation of patent law because by publishing the patent they are encouraging someone somewhere in the world to violate the patent.
Re:Well, really... (Score:5, Interesting)
> I think a situation where a patent holder treats someone discussing a means to replicate patented ./ worthy.
> technology as though they where handing out trade secrets is pretty interesting, certainly
In a sane world making such an admission in a legal filing would be grounds for voiding the patent since patent law requires dislosure of everything a person skilled in that field would need to know to implement the patented tech. The idea of patents is to trade full disclosure for a limited monopoly on commercial exploitation of the idea. However as soon as a patent is filed others may begin using your patented tech as a base to build their own innovations on. Of course they will need to license your original tech to sell theirs and you will have to license theirs if you want to incorporate it, etc. Of this are vast portfolios built of cross licensed codependent patents.
But we live in bizarro world. Sucks don't it.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
In a sane world making such an admission in a legal filing would be grounds for voiding the patent since patent law requires dislosure of everything a person skilled in that field would need to know to implement the patented tech.
We do live in a sane world (well at least in this regard).. if Shazaam admits it did not disclose the "best mode" for practicing its invention, or that it did not disclose enough information in its patents to "enable" the "person having ordinary skill in the art" to practice the in
Re:Well, really... (Score:5, Insightful)
Don't get me wrong, this really sucks for the guy and is completely unfair. But this sort of thing happens all the time. If this were a rare occurrence, then yeah, I'd be up in arms. It's sort of not newsworthy anymore.
The only reason that these things happen is that every time these things happen everybody looks around and says "Well, these things happen..." and THAT'S why they happen!
If you see something, say something...peace out.
Re:Well, really... (Score:5, Informative)
In the US at least a patent application is public record, and is intended to explain to the world how the object functions. This is not just to enforce the patent, but also to reward spreading the knowlege about how a patent works.
Asking someone to take down a blog post that describes the workings of a patented process is foolish. If the patent is written like it is supposed to be, anyone should be able to understand the patented process. You are no longer protected under trade secrets if you patent (which is why some choose not to). It is by definition at that point public knowledge.
Whether or not they have a patent case against him, they have no case against his blog.
Re:Well, really... (Score:5, Insightful)
What is far more scary is that using a sliding window to calculate DFTs and then hashing these values, and storing there offsets is somehow patented. To say that this is "obvious" to someone with any understanding of waves and Fourier transforms is an understatement.
Re:Well, really... (Score:5, Insightful)
"What is far more scary..."
Yes. As others said, unjustice must always be news, no matter how (sadly) common it becomes.
1) It's an obvious application of a Fourier transform so it shouldn't have been accepted for patent on first place.
2) Even if it wasn't obvious, this guy did not have access to the original code so chances are by big margin that this a different method to achive the same result so even after the patent is granted is very dificult to believe he could violate it.
3) Even if it wasn't obvious and it was the very same patented method, patents are, well, patent, so it's ludicrous to say "you shouldn't make public this" when the very patent system is built around the fact that the patented method is meant to be made public.
All in all this is a news about a disfunctional and criminally stupid patent system abused by a disfunctional and criminally stupid company.
Yes: this needs to be aired.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Well, really... (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:Why take down his blog? (Score:5, Informative)
they have to defend their patent or risk losing it.
That's trademarks.
Re:Why take down his blog? (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Well, really... (Score:4, Insightful)
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Yeah, that is unfair. I didn't realize all he did was post some code. That should certainly fall under free speech. I don't think their lawyers have anything to stand on here. If I were him I'd let them try to take him to court and then turn around and sue for harassment. I was wondering how he was getting matches for his song. He doesn't mention what database he is querying for a match.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Well patents are pretty damn public knowledge, so I don't see how an open-source project that does the same thing can be infringing on a patent.
Distributing source code isn't just discussing or summarizing the patent, it's implementing and distributing the invention.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
So is posting a recipe for chocolate chip cookies, but you don't see Betty Crocker suing every mother in the world who makes the same cookies for their kids.
Patent and disclosure... (Score:5, Interesting)
IA (definitely) NAL, but I thought the whole purpose of patents (other than protection) was to disclose the invention in full (not behind trade secrets) in exchange for knowledge of how the invention is done/made. Have the patent owners given any implementation details about their application?
Re:Patent and disclosure... (Score:5, Insightful)
Yep - I bet he's hit on a Trade Secret of theirs in his blog post and/or development work, and they're just trying to scare him away from posting the details. Trade Secrets are only secrets as long as nobody else knows about them - there's no protection on them other than that.
The patent holds NO ability to stop him from disclosing ANYTHING - anything covered by the patent is by definition publicly disclosed in the patent itself. If it's not there, it's not covered. Period. The "international viewing" holds no water either - there's nothing preventing someone from viewing the patent from another country.
He can go tell them to fuck off. He can probably sue for SLAPP or something like that too. I would!
In addition, my understanding is that this goes even further - there's nothing preventing him from developing his own implementation of their patent. The only issue arises when he distributes it beyond himself. IANAL, so this part I'm only 99.9% sure on. :)
MadCow.
Re:Patent and disclosure... (Score:5, Insightful)
At least in the US you have absolutely no recourse against someone who independently (not an employee, etc) develops one of your trade secrets. They can even patent it themselves and force you to pay a license fee!
That's the trade off between patents and trade secrets.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Not so if you never published it, preferring instead to keep it as a trade secret. In this case it's specifically not prior art and the patent can be upheld against you.
Trade secrets let you choose to not reveal your invention to the whole of humanity forever, but at the risk of losing control of your invention if someone else independently invents it later.
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Prior art requires people other than you to know about it, which excludes trade secrets.
If I invent a clever device for squeezing orange juice, but keep it as a secret, either as a 'trade secret', or even if I just have it in my house and use it there and no one ever sees how it works, it does not count as prior art, no matter how well i can prove I was using exactly the patented process it before the patent.
Now, if I was selling that device years ago, with no thought to patents, and someone comes along a
Re:Patent and disclosure... (Score:5, Insightful)
His implementation was different than their's, and if that's the case, they've got bigger issues, as one of their developers wrote a PDF on how Shazam Works. [columbia.edu].
And this guy certainly wasn't the first to write an article about How Shazam Works [wordpress.com] either.
They're afraid of the code.
Re:Patent and disclosure... (Score:4, Informative)
Exactly. If it were copyrighted, it'd be different, but if his work falls under a patent, there's nothing they can do as long as he doesn't offer his software for sale or in any products, or make it available as a binary. It's just like LAME, and various open-source decoders for patented codecs. The source code can be distributed freely, it's only when someone uses it that the patent holders have to be paid. The patent holders can only sue people who use the final product, and of course that's pretty difficult to figure out since anyone can download the source code and compile it.
The situation is more murky for anyone who distributes compiled binaries, though, which is why most US-based Linux distros don't include LAME or any MP3 decoders, but usually provide convenient ways for you to download these things and install them with one or two clicks.
Fuck 'em.
Re:Patent and disclosure... (Score:4, Informative)
In addition, my understanding is that this goes even further - there's nothing preventing him from developing his own implementation of their patent. The only issue arises when he distributes it beyond himself. IANAL, so this part I'm only 99.9% sure on. :)
I'm afraid you're wrong here. In the US, a patent gives the patentee the right to exclude others from making, using, selling, offering to sell, or importing the claimed invention. 35 USC 271 [cornell.edu]. Now, of course, the patentee must actually sue for patent infringement, and that's unlikely in the case of garage tinkerers (those that don't post everything online, that is), but there is no exception to patent infringement for 'developing your own implementation.' There is a research exemption related to preparing data that will be presented to the FDA [wikipedia.org], but that's not relevant here.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
While what you said is true, if this guy's blog post is only explaining how Shazaam works, without actually DOING what Shazaam does (e.g. offering source code), then he hasn't done any of the enumerated actions that a patentee can exclude others from doing. He does walk a fine line though... if he says: "Here's what Shazaam does, and here's my code to download that will do it for you" then he is coming very close to an "offer to sell" (giving it away for free is a little tenuous, but any monetary advantage
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
He does walk a fine line though... if he says: "Here's what Shazaam does, and here's my code to download that will do it for you" then he is coming very close to an "offer to sell" (giving it away for free is a little tenuous, but any monetary advantage he gets, even advertising revenue from page hits caused by people visiting & downloading the patented code.)
The fine line seems to me to be between the software as implemented and the patent claims description of it.
Suppose I do the following:
1) Create a custom parser that is designed to do nothing but read a particular patent document on the the USPTO's website.
2) Add a backend to the parser that generates machine code--possibly via an intermediate form like C++, Python or Java--that is nothing but a representation of the steps outlined in the patent.
3) Run said machine code.
At what point have I violated the pat
Re:Patent and disclosure... (Score:4, Informative)
As far as Trade Secret goes: Shazam's own Avery Wang published the ins and outs of the Shazam algorithm in Proceedings of the ACM back in 2006. The paper also mentions similar systems by Phillips and others that go back to 2001 and beyond. There's also a reference to a talk by Shazam's Avery Wang at an international conference in Baltimore in 2003. They've plastered their secret sauce for all the world to see for years, and now they fuck with this poor guy!
Ironically, the example in the ACM article was the Beatles song "Let it be". That's precisely what I would suggest Shazam does.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
This isn't Shazam. Odd sounding, but Shazam doesn't actually own the Shazam algorithm anymore, although it does retain the right to use it. Landmark LLC is a separate entity.
Re:Patent and disclosure... (Score:4, Interesting)
Of course, by threatening the guy Shazam & LDS have created their very own Streisand Effect; this is front page on
As for me, I won't be using their software, and I will be contacting them to register my disgust, though it probably will make no difference in their attitude.
Re:Patent and disclosure... (Score:4, Interesting)
If I patent a gizmo, and you make your own, it doesn't matter if you distributed it, you are liable for patent infringement.
But a software patent is nothing but a description of an algorithm. Full disclosure: the reason I know this is because I am a co-inventor on a software patent (I was evil once, but I got better.)
So apparently the First Rule of Software Patents is you do not talk about software patents, because by doing so you are actually in violation of the patent.
And don't kid yourself: code is how developers communicate with each other, and the distinction between pseudo-code and the real thing is utterly moot these days. Most of us write in sufficiently high level languages that our pseudo-code is indistinguishable from Python. So whenver a couple of developers talk about a patented algorithm they are almost certain to be violating the patent.
Re:Patent and disclosure... (Score:5, Informative)
Bizarrely, the USPTO doesn't require code for software patents; I assume other patent offices worldwide, in those countries which allow software patents, follow the same practice. You can't patent a mechanical device without schematics (I think) but for software, a vague description of the algorithm -- too vague to be of any use in implementation -- is enough. This is yet another example of why the idea of patenting things that aren't physical objects is fundamentally broken, but don't expect the situation to change any time soon.
Re:Patent and disclosure... (Score:5, Insightful)
What the? (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:What the? (Score:4, Interesting)
Even then, code is speech until you run it. Are we now to limit free speech by government order to protect their patents?
If the hardware store sells me a CNC mill and I make patented widgets with it will they sue the hardware store?
Re:What the? (Score:5, Insightful)
By that logic you could freely distribute an infringing program as long as you don't run it.
Yes, exactly. In the same way that a description or schematic of a patented invention does not infringe a patent, simple source code does not infringe a patent. How is this difficult to understand?
Re:What the? (Score:4, Insightful)
This case outlines one of the many major problems with software patents, one being that a split between implementation and description does not exist. The source code -- or even the object code -- to a program implementing a patented method is a description of that method.
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
This may be true in the US, but apparently not in the Netherlands: the patent lawyer he contacted told him Shazam would have a case if he published the code.
No, the attorney told him he's risking a lawsuit and that releasing open-source code using patented techniques is a "grey area". None of that indicates a lawsuit would have merit. You can sue anybody for anything. By posting, you risk me suing you because I don't like your use of the letter 'z'. That doesn't mean I'd win.
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
No he told him it might get him sued. You can sue anyone for anything, and he does not have the money to fight so he quit. I can totally understand that.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
By that logic you could freely distribute an infringing program as long as you don't run it.
No, you could freely distribute the source code of an infringing product so long as you don't compile it. The act of converting from "Speech" to a "device or process" happens in the compilation process, not in the execution of the process. (Software patents whilst legal, are still dumb to my thinking)
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Shazam... (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Shazam... (Score:5, Funny)
Because iPhones suck.
Re:Shazam... (Score:5, Informative)
Because I didn't Google it up properly. And Slashdot doesn't let me edit the story submission after I hit send. Its my fault.
Re:Shazam... (Score:5, Insightful)
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
What's that song? (Score:5, Funny)
Re:What's that song? (Score:5, Funny)
I call bullshit. (Score:5, Insightful)
Two: you cannot use a patent as a method to censor free speech.
Three: any US patent can be viewed internationally. A patent is by definition NOT a trade secret. Even if this guy's software DID use a patent-encumbered algorithm, his post cannot "contribute to someone infringing ... patents in any part of the world."
Four: a patent is not valid for the entire world.
Re:I call bullshit. (Score:4, Informative)
One: you cannot patent code. Period. There's plenty of cases where people have written (and released) code that some patent covered (ffmpeg anyone). The code itself is free speech.
They didn't patent code. They patented the method and system. And you can certainly patent those. In fact, the fact that it's not the code, but the method, that's patented is why he was infringing even though he did it in Java and they did it in C#. Patents are not copyright.
Two: you cannot use a patent as a method to censor free speech.
Nope, but you can use a patent to prevent someone from using your invention without your consent.
Three: any US patent can be viewed internationally. A patent is by definition NOT a trade secret. Even if this guy's software DID use a patent-encumbered algorithm, his post cannot "contribute to someone infringing ... patents in any part of the world."
Yes, because if someone takes his code and runs it, then they're infringing. Therefore, he's contributing to the infringement.
Four: a patent is not valid for the entire world.
Nope, but his post is viewable by the entire world. And someone could infringe in the US, where the patent is, by using his code.
Re:I call bullshit. (Score:5, Interesting)
The code is speech, compiling and running it is the infringement. Is patent protection now more valued than free speech?
I think someone fails to comprehend... (Score:3, Insightful)
,,,the fundamental nature of patents. Patents are published, by the PTO. This means that anyone, "international" or otherwise, can already view them. Furthermore, it is settled law that discussion of a patented invention, including detailed explanation of how to implement it, is not infringement.
Re:I think someone fails to comprehend... (Score:4, Informative)
but profiting from the idea is patent infringement
No it is not. At all. There is absolutely no manner in what you just said is true. If I, as an example of 'making money off a patent', pick a patent and charge people money to have me explain exactly how the patented process works, step by step, and sell them photocopies of the patent, it's entirely legal.
In fact, industry engineering books, books telling you how to, for example, design a printing press, will often do just that. They'll explain all the processes to do something, including patented ones, and then will tell you 'this is covered by patent #num until this date, so contact Blah Blah Inc to get a license if you want to do it that way.'.
Patents are public information. It is entirely legal to get paid to do anything with that information. Anything.
The only thing that is patent infringement is a) using the methods described in patents, or b) building a device that uses those methods and giving it to other people for them to use. (And using the device yourself is, duh, (a). Technically, you can build a device, keep it, and never use it, though.)
Anything else WRT to the patent is legal. Like I said, you can even make copies and sell them, as patent descriptions can't be copyrighted.
The question is whether or not this source code is a device, which makes it illegal to give away, or if it's more akin to a diagram of that device, which is entirely legal to give away. Sadly for Shazam, the courts have always sided with the 'diagram' analogy of source code.
Use pHash (Score:5, Interesting)
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Thanks - this is why I read Slashdot! :)
Is your library similar in concept to Complearn? (http://complearn.org/) From their homepage:
CompLearn is a suite of simple-to-use utilities that you can use to apply compression techniques to the process of discovering and learning patterns.
The compression-based approach used is powerful because it can mine patterns in completely different domains. It can classify musical styles of pieces of music and identify unknown composers.
They're actually being fairly reasonable (Score:4, Funny)
I mean, on the spectrum of software patent insanity, they're being relatively restrained and civil. They seem genuinely to be trying to head off competition for an invention that they are implementing and selling - which is the point of patents - rather than acting like patent trolls and trying to gouge money for something that they never implemented.
Of course, it sucks, software patents doubleplus bad, Fight The Man, counter sue them for a hundred beelyon Euros, Attica! Attica! Attica! and so on, but comparing a couple of polite "please don't make us do anything you'd regret" emails to Adobe's assraping of Dmitry Sklyarov [wikipedia.org] is rather hyperbolic. And yes, I have a "Free Dmitry Sklyarov" t-shirt, thanks for asking.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
This fellow is in the Netherlands, where non-commercial use of patents is entirely legal. Any threats of legal action are uncalled for, and suggesting he take down his blog post when Shazam has published an even more detailed white paper is simply beyond the pale.
The code was released in the original blog post (Score:4, Informative)
I RTFA, and he posts pretty much the entire source code of his implementation in the original blog post. That is what they were upset about: implementing the patent *and* distributing it. Had he merely discussed the methods Shazam used, it probably wouldn't have been a problem. However, I can go to his blog, cut-and-paste the code into a text editor, and have a working clone of Shazam. That is fairly cut-and-dry patent infringement, minus commercial gain and sidestepping the issue of software patents.
It's not like he was just talking about the process.
Re:The code was released in the original blog post (Score:4, Interesting)
Generally, the courts have held that source code is akin to a 'diagram', not the device itself.
It's perfectly legal to distribute diagrams of devices that implement patented methods. The patent holder can demand you make a note that it uses such a method, and is illegal to operate without a license, but can't actually stop you from distributing the diagrams.
Yes, it's weird a normal person can spend five minutes turning a diagram into a device.
OTOH, plenty of patents use already existing devices in novel ways, like 'entertain a cat with a laser pointer', which, now that I've described it, a good fraction of the people out there can implement with even less work then compiling. That's a silly, but real example, but there are real, serious patents on the use of medicines, for example, in novel ways, or adding tiny impurities to a well known process to make it better. Those are just as easy to implement.
Describing ways for people to make devices that implement patented methods, no matter how simple it is to turn it from 'diagram' to 'device', is legal. And source code has consistently been held to be 'diagram'.
Just deleted Shazam and installed SoundHound... (Score:3, Insightful)
There are several services doing this same general thing, might as well support the ones that aren't a-holes!
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Thanks for the tip, gonna be removing Shazam myself and trying out this new one.
Posible prior art (Score:5, Interesting)
The name of this proyect that seems to be prior art is Tararira (music retrival by sung query). It's from Uruguay, and does recognition of music just humming at a microphone. Proyect was created in 2004 and have code published.
http://iie.fing.edu.uy/investigacion/grupos/gmm/proyectos/tararira/ingles.php3
http://iie.fing.edu.uy/investigacion/grupos/gmm/proyectos/tararira/descargas/tarariraEN-src-0.1.tar.gz
http://iie.fing.edu.uy/investigacion/grupos/gmm/proyectos/tararira/descargas/tarariraEN.tar.gz
http://iie.fing.edu.uy/investigacion/grupos/gmm/proyectos/tararira/descargas/tararira.pdf
Tararira is a query by singing system. The problem of music retrieval by sung query (QBH, query by humming) consist of building a machine capable of simulating the cognitive process of identifying a musical piece from a few sung notes of its melody.
A melody is described by a sequence of notes, so it is natural to compare melodies by means of the similarity of their constituent notes. For this reason, the problem can be divided in two stages: the transcription of the voice signal into a sequence of notes and the search of this pattern in a MIDI melody database.
Tararira originates in July 2004 as the graduation project of Ernesto López, Martín Rocamora and Gonzalo Sosa at the IIE of the Facultad de Ingeniería, Universidad de la República.
obvious (Score:3, Interesting)
Just about all computer-based signal processing related to anything at all is performed in the frequency domain so passing the raw data through an FFT (or at least an FT) first is a no-brainer.
Calculating a hash is the blindingly obvious and standard approach to getting a semi-unique signature for mostly any data.
Both the FFT and the hashing would likely be the first thought of any competent software engineer tasked with solving this, in as much as using a screwdriver to undo a screw is obvious to a mechanic.
Don't even software patents have to require at least some concept of originality and non-obviousness?
Wimp out. (Score:3, Interesting)
No patent numbers? "Algorithm" in unreleased code? At least put up a token resistance and ask for details.
We need more responses like Blue Jean Cable's response to Monster [slashdot.org] when Monster Cable tried something similar.
Did anyone happen to look up *who* LDS is? (Score:5, Interesting)
It's a wholly owned subsidary of BMI... As in BMI/ASCAP?
It's the record companies again.
previous works (Score:3, Informative)
Send them this: (Score:3, Funny)
Dear Shazam,
My algorithm is not the same as yours. Specially, it differs in this key code section:
Sincerely, Timothy
'may be viewed internationally' -the whole article (Score:3, Informative)
A couple of days ago I encountered this article: How Shazam Works
This got me interested in how a program like Shazam works... And more importantly, how hard is it to program something similar in Java?
About Shazam
Shazam is an application which you can use to analyse/match music. When you install it on your phone, and hold the microphone to some music for about 20 to 30 seconds, it will tell you which song it is.
When I first used it it gave me a magical feeling. "How did it do that!?". And even today, after using it a lot, it still has a bit of magical feel to it.
Wouldn't it be great if we can program something of our own that gives that same feeling? That was my goal for the past weekend.
Listen up..!
First things first, get the music sample to analyse we first need to listen to the microphone in our Java application...! This is something I hadn't done yet in Java, so I had no idea how hard this was going to be.
But it turned out it was very easy:
1 final AudioFormat format = getFormat();
2 DataLine.Info info = new DataLine.Info(TargetDataLine.class, format);
3 final TargetDataLine line = (TargetDataLine) AudioSystem.getLine(info);
4 line.open(format);
5 line.start();
Now we can read the data from the TargetDataLine just like a normal InputStream:
01
02
03 OutputStream out = new ByteArrayOutputStream();
04 running = true;
05
06 try {
07 while (running) {
08 int count = line.read(buffer, 0, buffer.length);
09 if (count > 0) {
10 out.write(buffer, 0, count);
11 }
12 }
13 out.close();
14 } catch (IOException e) {
15 System.err.println("I/O problems: " + e);
16 System.exit(-1);
17 }
Using this method it is easy to open the microphone and record all the sounds! The AudioFormat I’m currently using is:
1 private AudioFormat getFormat() {
2 float sampleRate = 44100;
3 int sampleSizeInBits = 8;
4 int channels = 1;
5 boolean signed = true;
6 boolean bigEndian = true;
7 return new AudioFormat(sampleRate, sampleSizeInBits, channels, signed, bigEndian);
8 }
So, now we have the recorded data in a ByteArrayOutputStream, great! Step 1 complete.
Microphone data
The next challenge is analyzing the data, when I outputted the data I received in my byte array I got a long list of numbers, like this:
01 0
02 0
03 1
04 2
05 4
06 7
07 6
08 3
09 -1
10 -2
11 -4
12 -2
13 -5
14 -7
15 -8
16 (etc)
Erhm… yes? This is sound?
To see if the data could be visualized I took the output and placed it in Open Office to generate a line graph:
Ah yes! This kind of looks like 'sound'. It looks like what you see when using for example Windows Sound Recorder.
This data is actually known as time domain. But these numbers are currently basically useless to us... if you read the above article on how Shazam works you’ll read that they use a spectrum analysis instead of direct time doma
STOP CUSSING - ACT! (Score:3, Insightful)
I uninstalled the app immediately and left them with a one-star rating plus a link to explain the background. Also, I uninstalled them as malicious. Feel free to link http://tinyurl.com/3a93ed8 [tinyurl.com] in your one-star ratings.
Get SoundHound instead. It's better anyway. Now that I have SoundHound, I am actually glad that Shazam made me look for alternatives.
Again:
http://tinyurl.com/3a93ed8 [tinyurl.com]
http://www.soundhound.com/ [soundhound.com]
PS: It would be evil to install them just to uninstall them with one-star ratings. I could not condone that.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Last I looked Patents do not remove the right to "free speech" in any country.
Then you didn't look very hard. In the US, for example, the right to free speech is not absolute by any means. The government may prohibit defamatory speech such as libel and slander. It may regulate speech in a content-neutral manner (so-called time, place, and manner restrictions), such as ordinances regarding billboards. It may regulate obscene speech. The same Constitution that describes the right to free speech also give
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Sure, the source code itself isn't infringing. But where is that source code? It's in RAM and/or on your disk or flash drive. And there's probably a claim akin to "A storage device containing software to implement the method of claim X". So now your own drive or RAM has become an infringing device.
(I only wish I was joking).