Sony loses lawsuit against Immersion??

[Berserk]

http://www.computerandvideogames.com/news/news_story.php?id=113874

Okay I don't get this at all. An obscure company like Immersion has won a lawsuit against Sony because Sony uses Force Feedback ( THEIR technology they say) in their controllers and several games. The court of California has demanded that Sony must pay 82 millions dollars!!! And even more they must pay 1.37% each year of Playstation income 40 games which uses force feedback , that is 27 millions dollar per year!

Oh come on!! That's just taking advantage of Sony's strong position. Force feedback already existed longer than the Dual shock controller, N64 had this in their Rumble Packs and on the pc it existed even
longer. And now Xbox and Gamecube also have rumble in their controllers right? Microsoft closed a deal with Immersion but what abaout Nintendo or cellular phones!? I think the rules about patents really stink in the US. Now Sony has to pay that much money for a simple motor with a littele weight on it?
That judge is just stupid and knows nothing about games. And instead of letting Sony pay for a percentage of the Playstation revenue maybe they should let them pay for the Dual Shock conroller revenue. It's just not fair Immersion may have a patent on force feedback but has nothing to do with Playstation as a whole.

 

[ERP]

Patents are a nasty thing, if you violate one knowingly then you get taken to the cleaners.

It's also upto the patent holder to choose who they persue, if you are confident about your claim you go for the big guys first, it's where the money is.

I'm sure many other "deals" and suits will follow this result.

 

[MfA]

Patents work this way by design, everywhere. Not just the US. You dont have to violate them knowingly, that just increases damages.

 

[YeuEmMaiMai]

this may or may not stand....I'll wait for the appeals process to finish before I make any judgements.

 

[darkblu]

what this news says is that the console customers have just received a bill for > $90M getting nada in return. three cheers for the american patent office and big law companies.

 

[London Geezer]

what this news says is that the console customers have just received a bill for > $90M getting nada in return. three cheers for the american patent office and big law companies.

Hey they have to make a living somehow!!

 

[Cryect]

That's jst taking advantage of Sony's strong position. Force feedback already existed longer than the Dual shock controller, N64 had this in their Rumble Packs and on the pc it existed even
longer. And now Xbox and Gamecube also have rumble in their controllers right? Microsoft closed a deal with Immersion but what abaout Nintendo or cellular phones!? I think the rules about patents really stink in the US. Now Sony has to pay that much money for a simple motor with a littele weight on it?

Nintendo's Force Feedback works in a slightly different way than apparently violates the patent. Didn't Sony had to change their method because they were using the method Nintendo was using who had a patent on their method? Nintendo does have couple patents you can find that apply to force feedback(6,200,253 & 6,676,520).

Its not a patent on the idea of force feedback but a specific method of generating the force feedback (which MS uses as well and happens to pay a licensing fee for). On the PC its normally a completely different type of forcefeedback based on wires pulling the joystick around.

And I wouldn't call immersion exactly obscure since they have been around for a while with a whole lot of forcefeedback and haptic feedback systems that have been licensed for a long time. Not sure why Sony should get away without paying licenses while other groups using their methods do pay the licenses.

Edit: Also if you check their patents you will notice they have been filing patents on force feedback since 1994 so its not like they are brand new in the field or anything.

 

[London Geezer]

Well, it's the Law, if Sony was supposed to pay a licence, then they should have. If they copied the patented technology, they should pay.
"If"...

 

[see colon]

Oh come on!! That's jst taking advantage of Sony's strong position. Force feedback already existed longer than the Dual shock controller, N64 had this in their Rumble Packs and on the pc it existed even longer.

sony isn't the victim here, please don't try to make them out as such. the dual shock controller was just a response to nintendo's rumble pack, and the original design (sometimes refered to as "single shock") so closely resembled nintendo's meathod they were forced to change it. most 3rd party controller makers have been licensing from immersion for some time now (mad catz, intec, logitech, pretty much ever magor console 3rd party controller manufacturer), sony just tried to use their "strong market position" to get out of paying royalties for something they should have in the first place.

 

[Shifty Geezer]

If Sony stole the technology deliberately they deserve to get stung. If they didn't know the technology was patented, it's kinda unfair. Having to keep tabs on the Patent's is a massive undertaking, like the one for 3D rendering that's popped up now and threatens to dominate the entire CG scene.

Either way though, I think the size of the payout is insane. According to that CVG article Sony have to pay out some $27 million per annum. Their gaming division made IIRC $90 million last year. That's like a quarter of their income, for two bits of wobbly metal! That's ridiculous! Would Immersion REALLY be making $27 million extra a year if Sony hadn't used their idea?

Many of these patents are also mega-stupid, because a patent has to be non-obvious. Once one idea has come out (force feedback) variations on that idea ARE obvious, so how anyone ever gets the patent is beyond me. I guess the patent office wouldn't take anywhere near as much money if they didn't accept fees for every idea under the sun, so they'll accept "Patent for Eccentric Weight shaped like a Cube" after accepting same for a "semi-circular weight", because that means more money (tens of thousands a year for international patents. The Patent Offices must be RAKING it in!!!

 

[darkblu]

Well, it's the Law, if Sony was supposed to pay a licence, then they should have. If they copied the patented technology, they should pay.
"If"...

..if the technology was actually new at the time it got patented;
if the us patent officers were actually doing a job;
if the patent violation was actually worth 90M + royalties;
if.. if..

but as already rightfully mentioned, if the law says we're gonna pay then we're gonna pay. hey, that's what it's all about, right?

 

[Cryect]

Would Immersion REALLY be making $27 million extra a year if Sony hadn't used their idea?

Thats not the point of the punishment... The point of the punishment is to pay for both retrospective fees and actually a higher fee than normal for continuation of using the license since the license wasn't properly negotiated and it's normally the patent's owner choice do they want to license the technology or not (say instead for some reason Immersion dislikes Sony so wouldn't license the technology to them by Sony going ahead and doing it anyway they never got to have the chance to say no, now if Sony does this knowingly the fees would be a lot higher of course).

Also its questionable whether sony really didn't know about the patents. A small company I would bet wouldn't but a company Sony's size should be spending the time to find out but often will not so they can go ahead and use technology's and hope they aren't patented and if they had researched them they could be hit for higher penalties. Anyways proving that a company knows about a patent is a lot harder.

if the patent violation was actually worth 90M + royalties;

Fines don't represent what something is worth but are a punishment... Kinda like if you steal a $2,000 computer and get caught and sued in civil court then are fined you will find out your fine isn't just $2,000 but likely a number potentially even a magnitude higher to act as future discouragement.

Whether it works or not of course can be questioned but fines aren't just to say well you didn't pay for something and stole it instead but now that we caught you, you only have to pay what you would have paid in the first place. In that case, it definately encourages stealing since you would pay the same amount either way if you get caught every single time so why not steal everytime and make out ahead on the times you don't get caught.

Of course stealing physical objects is different from using intangible ideas but the laws are based on similar ideas.

 

[see colon]

If Sony stole the technology deliberately they deserve to get stung. If they didn't know the technology was patented, it's kinda unfair.

i'm sure immersion let them know as soon as they found out. microsoft settled out of court, and sony had the same option, but choose to fight it out in court.

if the patent violation was actually worth 90M + royalties;

well, every sony dual shock and dual shock 2 controller violates the patent. there are 80M ps2's worldwide (each shipping with one ds2), add in dual shock sales for ps1 (newer units shipped with the ds, and controller sales) and extra controller sales for ds2's, there are quite a few units sony has produced that use immersion's technology. not to mention the "you guys are jerks for making us go through a court battle when it's obvious that you are using tech we patented" charge, i think that # is fine.

 

[Xenus]

Something is offly damn fishy.

2nd April 1998: SCEE announces the latest breakthrough in hand held Controllers for PlayStation - the Analog Controller (DUAL SHOCK).

United States Patent 6,424,333
Tremblay , et al. July 23, 2002

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Tactile feedback man-machine interface device


Abstract
A man-machine interface which provides tactile feedback to various sensing body parts is disclosed. The device employs one or more vibrotactile units, where each unit comprises a mass and a mass-moving actuator. As the mass is accelerated by the mass-moving actuator, the entire vibrotactile unit vibrates. Thus, the vibrotactile unit transmits a vibratory stimulus to the sensing body part to which it is affixed. The vibrotactile unit may be used in conjunction with a spatial placement sensing device which measures the spatial placement of a measured body part. A computing device uses the spatial placement of the measured body part to determine the desired vibratory stimulus to be provided by the vibrotactile unit. In this manner, the computing device may control the level of vibratory feedback perceived by the corresponding sensing body part in response to the motion of the measured body part. The sensing body part and the measured body part may be separate or the same body part.


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Inventors: Tremblay; Mark R. (Mountain View, CA); Yim; Mark H. (Palo Alto, CA)
Assignee: Immersion Corporation (San Jose, CA)
Appl. No.: 838052
Filed: April 18, 2001

United States Patent 6,275,213
Tremblay , et al. August 14, 2001

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Tactile feedback man-machine interface device


Abstract
A man-machine interface which provides tactile feedback to various sensing body parts is disclosed. The device employs one or more vibrotactile units, where each unit comprises a mass and a mass-moving actuator. As the mass is accelerated by the mass-moving actuator, the entire vibrotactile unit vibrates. Thus, the vibrotactile unit transmits a vibratory stimulus to the sensing body part to which it is affixed. The vibrotactile unit may be used in conjunction with a spatial placement sensing device which measures the spatial placement of a measured body part. A computing device uses the spatial placement of the measured body part to determine the desired vibratory stimulus to be provided by the vibrotactile unit. In this manner, the computing device may control the level of vibratory feedback perceived by the corresponding sensing body part in response to the motion of the measured body part. The sensing body part and the measured body part may be separate or the same body part.


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Inventors: Tremblay; Mark R. (Mountain View, CA); Yim; Mark H. (Palo Alto, CA)
Assignee: Virtual Technologies, Inc. (Palo Alto, CA)
Appl. No.: 561782
Filed: May 1, 2000

You can't file patents if the tech is already used by another company.

 

[AzBat]

Immersion isn't obscure. They have been around since 1993. Plus they have over 170 patents. Check their patent portfolio page...

http://www.immersion.com/corporate/patents/patent_portfolio.php

BTW, the day before Microsoft and Immersion announced their settlement of the lawsuit Microsoft re-filed a correction to their "Force feedback mechanism for gamepad device" patent. The new publication # is 20050009606 filed on Jul 27, 2004. It was just publish January 13.

I suspect Immersion had problems with the previous patent and required a correction as part of the deal. One thing though, if you do a search on Microsoft's patents they have a few regarding haptic technology.

Tommy McClain

 

[Npl]

looking at the portfolio it seems like they put up small sheets labeled Haptic, Force, Feedback, Keyboard, Device, Interface and a few others, had an ape shuflle them and added a few lines of "explaination". All Bases covered ?

 

[Shifty Geezer]

Something is offly damn fishy.

2nd April 1998: SCEE announces the latest breakthrough in hand held Controllers for PlayStation - the Analog Controller (DUAL SHOCK).

United States Patent 6,424,333
Tremblay , et al. July 23, 2002

Surely this explains Sony's court action? If they KNEW they stoll Immersion's tech and ergo KNEW they'd get stung, they'd have settled out of court. The only reason to fight is

1) You don't think the patent valid so contest it
2) You use big-buck tactics to muscle out the competition

Could this be a case of Sony believing they had the rights to the technology as the Patent Office granted THEM the patent, whereas if the technology already existed they wouldn't have got it. Maybe the Clearks at the Patent Office don't waste their time with searches but just take the fees and leave it to the courts to decide what's actually a legit patent or not?

I'm confused :?

 

[Xenus]

No those are the Immersion patents but as you can see they were filled after Sony had used the tech in the dual shock. Last time I checked you cannot patent tech that is already on the market from another company.

 

[Berserk]

Ok I stand corrected Immersion isn't obscure, but I never heard of them. I say this is the fault of the Patent Office who must do some research before they patented the Dual Shock controller.

 

[Guden Oden]

This is bullshit.

How many ways is it possible to patent a motor with an off-center weight attached to the drive axle? Just because there's two motors with different-sized weights on them doesn't make it a none-obvious 'invention' that is worthy of being awarded a patent.

Besides, it's not even force feedback at all, it's just vibration.

Like I said; bullshit. Immersion's patent should be overturned and their asses should be kicked for trying to extort money for such an obviously bullshit reason.