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The Devil's Advocate - Apple's GUI Patent Strategy is Transparent [TMO Scoop]

by , 7:00 PM EDT, May 13th, 2004

In my morbid fascination to see how many times other “reporters” will see-and-net one of my stories as if it was their own, I bring you, righteous reader, another important Apple patent application for your reading pleasure. Apple filed a patent application for "Graduated visual and manipulative translucency for windows" on November 5, 2003, which was published by the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) as US Patent Application No. 20040090467 on May 13, 2004.

[Author's Addendum: This patent application is a continuation of now issued US Patent No. 6,670,970, which was filed on December 20, 1999 and published on December 30, 2003.]

This patent application is targeted towards the use of transparency in a Graphical User Interface (GUI); the abstract describes the invention as:

...overlaid, Information-bearing windows whose contents remain unchanged for a predetermined period of time become translucent. The translucency can be graduated so that, over time, if the window's contents remain unchanged, the window becomes more translucent. In addition to visual translucency, windows according to the present invention also have a manipulative translucent quality. Upon reaching a certain level of visual translucency, user input in the region of the window is interpreted as an operation on the underlying objects rather than the contents of the overlaying window.

The listed inventors are Thomas Bonura and Kim Silverman. Dr. Kim Silverman is apparently "Apple's Principle Research Scientist" researching "Speech Synthesis, Speech Recognition, Voice Verification, Latent Semantic Analysis, and their integration into the User Interface."

In fact, some of the figures in the patent show the use of transparency in the context of speech recognition, which may be a sign of things to come from Apple.


Illustration accompanying Apple's new patent application

From the patent application:

For example, if a speech recognition program indicates that an information-bearing, floating window is to be created on the graphical user interface to provide the user with feedback regarding the status of the speech recognition program, the application can pass values for these parameters to an appropriate functional layer of the computer operating system ...

This is a pretty important patent application, if it is granted. Claims 26 and 33 seem to broadly cover translucency with regard to windows:

26. A computer-readable medium for providing a graphical user interface for a computer, the computer-readable medium comprising: means for rendering a window on a display; and means for varying a level of translucency associated with said window in response to a predetermined event.

Securing protection for such window-transparency technology may mean the only semi-transparent Microsoft Word tool palettes you will see will be on the Mac, if anywhere at all. As it develops demand for style and eye-candy in the consumer-technology sectors, those that wish to coast off of its developments will find it more difficult without licensing Apple's technology. Who knows, if Apple were this aggressive in protecting its designs with patents earlier, we all might have been spared the iMac'ified George Forman Grill.

Considering the Mac-like leanings and heavy use of transparency in future versions of Microsoft's Longhorn [via the good folks at MacDailyNews and screen shots via the sharp eyes at Cult of Mac], this patent application, should it issue, would be an major stumbling block to Microsoft and an important barrier to mimicry for Apple.

Although Apple lost the battle to Microsoft in the GUI-look-and-feel lawsuit of the late 80s by relying on copyrights, as well as various contract issues, it seems to be righting its errors by stockpiling user interface patents for an impending war. Should it come, would-be UI imitators might find themselves in deep Waterloo.

Observer Comments

Show: Subjects Only | Full Comments
View Name:Guest
Subject: Prior Art
View Name:Guest
Subject: ya' know...
Close Name:DocRoss Posts: 33 Joined: 06 May 2004
Subject: RE: ya' know

It's an interesting question. My guess is that the method for using this UI would be available as an API in XCode that you and other developers could plug in as part of your application. You could implement it in your Mac OSX apps, but not in your x86 apps.

Not suggesting I have any inside (or other) knowledge, it just seems like that would be a likely direction for this invention.

View Name:Guest
Subject: Wow...
View Name:Guest
Subject: Prior Art
View Name:Guest
Subject: You're KIDDING, right?!
Close Name:jfbiii Posts: 108 Joined: 06 May 2004
Subject: The patent office is obviously out of control.

The whole system for granting patents has become absurd. What's next, a patent for a method of using a muscle to manipulate a diaphgram in such a way as to expand a cavity into which air may be drawn?

There are many things which are reasonably patentable. I don't think we're examining one of them.

View Name:Guest
Subject: Ramifications of MS/Apple deal?
Close Name:jkheit Posts: 20 Joined: 27 Feb 2003
Subject: Continuations

Quote
Guest wrote:
There could be something more interesting at work here. This particular patent application is a "continuation" of Patent 6,670,970 filed in December 1999, which falls under the terms of the 1997 patent exchange Apple and MS (which is publicly available on the US DOJ web site as an antitrust exhibit). Essentially, Microsoft and Apple have free access to each other's patents filed up until August 2002. So maybe someone who understands patent law can explain: what is a patent continuation, and would Microsoft be denied use of it if it is granted? Is that why Apple is filing such an obviously dated (based on the Rhapsody-styled diagrams) patent in 2003?


Thanks for the note Guest, I've added an addendum noting the continuation. Now on to your question. A few of caveats: 1) This is WILD SPECULATION on my part. 2) This is in no way legal advice. I'm not your lawyer. If you need legal advise you should find a lawyer and ask your questions to see how the law applies to your circumstances (as even slight differences in facts can cause completely different outcomes). 3) Enough butt covering...

Often when patents are filed, some of the patent claims are allowed, while other patent claims are not allowed. The claims define your invention and what you’re entitled to. What is often done is the person seeking a patent says "ok, I'll take what I can get for now Mr. Examiner at the USPTO. Please issue a patent on the claims you allowed." Then for the claims that were not allowed and that require more arguments back and forth between the patent office and lawyers; in such situations a divisional/continuation may be filed. So the allowed claims issue as a patent, those that were not allowed are divided out and form the basis of a new application. And as the subsequent patent applications based on those rejected claims are rejected over time, they may be continued allowing the lawyers to make more arguments to get the patent allowed.

Now why does it work like that? Well there are tons of reasons, most of which are more innocuous than what you'll see in the law lecture I link to below. The major reason is when you write a patent application some of the claims are really broad, and some are more narrow. The USPTO patent Examiner will allow the narrow claims, and it will simply be more of a fight to convince the Examiner that the applicant deserves the broader claim. There are a tons of other reasons, and if you check out the video you'll get a decent overview.

So it may be a simple matter of that; they are just continuing on with some claims that were originally rejected. Now where things get interesting is as you allude to, the agreement with Microsoft to cross-license each other's patents was part of that $150Mill investment. It may include patents for up until the agreement terminates; I would guess. Often such agreements if drafted well will include all continuations, divisionals etc., for X number of years after the termination of the agreement, but sometimes not. So if the agreement is up, then there is value in pursuing such continuations that Microsoft would not have the benefit because the term ran out.

One of the readers brought up a nice "conspiracy" theory in that Apple will hold all of these UI patents over Microsoft’s head. Basically that Microsoft would have to continue to make Office or Apple would sue Microsoft if Microsoft tried to use such UI elements. Who knows. Maybe.

Anyway, if you want to know more about the fundamentals of patent continuations (first, are you feeling well? you can find a nice lecture here:

http://realserver.law.duke.edu/ramgen/spring04/lemley.rm
http://www.law.duke.edu/cspd/articles/lemley.doc

View Name:Guest
Subject: Arrogant Mac Guy-Speech is the future.
View Name:Guest
Subject: Apple's GUI Patent Strategy
View Name:Guest
Subject:
View Name:Guest
Subject: Prior Art
Close Name:Retro -   TMO Forum Mod Posts: 762 Joined: 14 Jun 2001
Subject: MS Longhorn link is wrong (I think)

I think this is the correct link...

http://www.extremetech.com/slideshow/0,1555,p=1&s=&a=126556&po=3&i=1,00.asp

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