Apple is, by all accounts, a Goliath of a company. The world’s largest technology firm by revenue, Apple’s success can be attributed to a variety of factors, including software. On that front, one man—who has never worked for Apple—thought he deserved some of the credit.
His name was David Gelernter. He filed a patent infringement lawsuit against Apple for $625 million dollars.
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| Professor Gelernter |
Gelernter, a Professor of Computer Science at Yale, is known for his conservative politics, work in parallel computing, and his writing. We will review his case against Apple and determine whether it was justified.
Professor Gelernter alleged that Apple’s implementations of Spotlight and Time Machine violated his IP. The lawsuit dealt with Gelernter’s concept of a stream (lifestream). In his manifesto, Gelernter describes a stream as a channel for a specific object; a view of its associated documents, sorted by time.
Spotlight, MacOS’ system-wide search indexer, can be thought of as a stream. Reviewing Gelernter’s patient and his manifesto, we see Spotlight brought search in MacOS closer to Gelernter’s vision:
· The location and nature of file storage is transparent to the user
· Information is organized on the fly
· Updating is automatic
Gelernter sought an environment without the “file-cabinet” abstraction of computer file systems; Spotlight partially allows this.
“The file-cabinet metaphor traps us in a 'passive' instead of 'active' view of information.” –Gelernter
Yet, direct lookup is a simple concept. Perhaps time machine will provide a more illuminating example.
On paper, Time Machine’s alleged infringement is subtle. The key is in the service’s presentation, not functionality.
A comparison between patient 6,768,999 and the Time Machine interface
Time Machine’s UI appears similar to Gelernter’s patients. While Gelernter says a stream allows for “time travel,” he was referring to a chronological document ordering, not state backup, as Apple developed. Still, the reminiscence is undeniable.
From a legal perspective, it’s easy to see why Gelernter had an initial victory on his hands. Apple’s UI implementations reflect what he described. On the other hand, the case feels silly. If we take Gelernter’s manifesto at face value—and a stream is indeed an inevitable development—holding a trademark feels wrong. And this idea of a visual document stream is quite simple; can you really ‘own’ it? And indeed, Gelernter’s victory was eventually overturned. Fortunately, the Unabomber survivor took the loss in stride, telling his lawyer:
“Joe, I’ve been through worse”
Hi Bryce, I thought this was a really good post! Looking at your old versus new post, I really like the updated images you used. I think being able to see Apple's product next to Gelernter's patent really gives you a good idea about why he thought he had a case. I also thought this was an interesting way to tie in a reading for a blog post - by going through the author. Overall great post and strong revision.
ReplyDeleteHi Bryce! Your post is certainly very interesting and unique! In comparison to your earlier post, the layout of this post is more appealing and easier to follow. Your revised post also has a better introduction, which is more to the point and the addition of statistics provides better context for the reader. Furthermore, adding a little background on Gelernter's profile helps the reader better understand the context behind your overall post. I also like the use of bullet points as it helps your arguments come across in a more efficient manner. Overall, your post is a great improvement from your first one!
ReplyDeleteHello Bryce, great post. I am impressed with how well you formatted your post. You added relevant photos with captions and even included the use of stylized quotes. All of the improvements you made on your original post made a big difference. Still, I think you could improve your post by incorporating more of Gelernter’s manifesto.
ReplyDeleteHey Bryce, I thought this was an interesting topic, especially given the prominence of companies like Apple today. At the same time, I felt that some parts needed some more explanation, such as when you mentioned "Time Machine’s UI appears similar to Gelernter’s patients", what exactly about the UI is similar to the patents?
ReplyDelete