[wickedchicken]

God, here we go again. Yet another example of companies stealing from Apple. This is clearly similar enough to the Macintosh (1984) that I'm surprised Apple didn't sue the hell out of AT&T. They certainly sued the hell out of Microsoft[1], so AT&T must have been lucky.

Around the same time, Myron Krueger had the gall to demonstrate pinch-to-zoom[2], nearly 23 years before Apple patented it. So many people piggy-backing off of Cupertino's innovation :/

[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apple_Computer,_Inc._v._Microso...

[2] http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dmmxVA5xhuo (skip to 4:32)

[simonh]

Development of the Lisa started in 1978 and it was released in 1983. The Blit was started in 1981 and released as the 5620 in 1984, the same year as the Mac.

So unfortunately the facts render your sarcasm rather hollow.

Anyway, the Blit doesn't infringe on Apple as it doesn't include any of the things Apple did genuinely develop independently - like pull-down menus, resizable and moveable windows, overlapping windows, directly manipulatable file and document names, desk accessories, control panels, internationalisation, multiple views of the file system and drag and drop file manipulation. So in comparison to Apple tech of the time it's so primitive it wouldn't be worth it anyway.

[jvm]

I'm fairly confident that many (most?) of the gui elements you listed were invented by Xerox and willfully copied by Apple. Certainly stacking resizable movable windows, pull-down menus, and manipulable desktop items.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Xerox_Star

[tabbyjabby]

Please read this article[0] and educate yourself. The amount of misinformation surrounding the Apple-Xerox relationship is dizzying.

edit: this article[1] is a bit briefer, and provides much of the same information.

[0] http://obamapacman.com/2010/03/myth-copyright-theft-apple-st...

[1] http://www.folklore.org/StoryView.py?project=Macintosh&s...

[georgemcbay]

The grandparent to your post says "Apple did genuinely develop independently". Not "Apple did legally license from Xerox in exchange for stock". So the point still stands.

The amount of misinformation surrounding how much of the modern computing experience Apple independently invented is also dizzying.

[shawndumas]

Xerox Star User Interface (1982) -- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cn4vC80Pv6Q

[simonh]

Which doesn't have any of the features I listed. e.g. look at those windows - they can't be moved, resized or overlap.

[tedunangst]

The difference is AT&T has several patents covering blit. Harder to sue someone for stealing your idea when they own the patent, not you. [revised wording]

[chmod775]

I'm surprised AT&T didn't sue the hell out of apple because BLIT is clearly older than the Macintosh. BLIT is actually from 1982 as is shown in the video at 3:50 and in the copyright notice some seconds later. The wikipedia article also claims it's 1882.

[maratd]

He was being sarcastic... unless you're being sarcastic too? Newsflash. Sarcasm on the Internet does not work unless you use <sarcasm> tags!

[molmalo]

Just an example of http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poes_law

[derleth]

> Sarcasm on the Internet does not work unless you use <sarcasm> tags!

It works fine:

If I'm sarcastic and you don't get it, it's because you're incompetent at reading.

If you're sarcastic and I don't get it, it's because you're incompetent at writing.

See? Perfect!

[tedunangst]

AT&T actually did go around suing various graphics vendors.

[EGreg]

When did Apple patent pinch-to-zoom?

This video is from 1988. Are you saying Apple patented it in 2011?

First of all in 2006, before the iPhone came out, I saw Jeff Han from NYU demoing much more than just pinch-to-zoom:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QKh1Rv0PlOQ

And secondly, I thought Apple bought the pinch-to-zoom patent! I don't know much about it, but I am curious about the date.

[wickedchicken]

> When did Apple patent pinch-to-zoom? This video is from 1988.

The video is from 1988, but it appears the work was around 1983. The pinch-to-zoom (on 'portable communication devices') patent[1] was filed in 2006, issued in 2010.

[1] http://goo.gl/gHgEB

[EGreg]

If that is the case, what about the Jeff Han video which came out in 2006? Jeff Han was obviously working on it for at least a year before he gave that talk. Shouldn't that be obvious prior art? He talks about pinch and much more!

[001sky]

You may want to read this. Posted early to HN. Has hitsory of Multi Touch development. As of 1998/1999.

http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4448186

[alayne]

The pinch to zoom patent is for single vs multitouch gestures on a touch screen. What Krueger is demonstrating is not a touch screen.

[marklindhout]

Does anybody else see why such patents are curbing innovation? I mean, the whole difference is a moot point.

[cma]

The patents didn't cover the touch screen sensors. The sensors and their drivers--not covered--just give you points corresponding to fingers and pressure. The same thing with this touch table.

You could take the exact same software written for the touch table and feed it the touch sensor (again, not patented) input. Under the ruling this would be found to infringe.

Think about that. Software written before the patent in question fed data from a different device--infringement. It would be like me filing a patent for elements of the standard desktop gui running on an LCD instead of a CRT, and suddenly getting a free pass against all prior-art.