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Is It Too Difficult To Expect The Press To Understand The Difference Between Patents And Copyright?
from the just-wondering... dept
Michael Scott pointed us to a story from the Mass High Tech Business News claiming that Adobe had been hit with a copyright infringement lawsuit by EveryScape. That caught my eye because it's pretty rare for there to be copyright infringement claims between software companies, since there needs to be actual copying of the code in question (in most cases), and that's pretty rare. And, reading the article, it didn't sound like anyone was actually alleging copying of code. The more I read, the more I suspected that the reporter just got the story totally wrong, and that this had to be a patent infringement case, rather than a copyright one.
And, indeed, that's what it appears to be. The company EveryScape, appears to have two patents (7,327,374 and 7,593,022) on the technology being discussed here. I get that not everyone recognizes the differences between copyrights, patents and trademarks, but honestly, if you're passing yourself off as a high tech publication, it seems like you should be able to get the basics down.
Furthermore, the author of the article makes it sound like Adobe directly copied EveryScape's software and then "began passing the technology off as its own." This implies that Adobe "took" someone else's technology, rather than creating their own. Nothing was taken here. It sounds like EveryScape makes a small feature that's an add-on in PhotoShop. If your business is based around selling a small feature on another company's product, that's just a bad business. You should expect, eventually, that other company will build its own if your feature is any good.
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If you are going to be a reporter, at least take an active interest in understanding what you are reporting about. If you do not understand, pick up the phone and call someone who does - before you publish something that is just wrong. Where was the editor on this one?
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To be fair...
Can't say I agree with the commentary about the primary company building its own plug-in. Given the IP mania in the software business, I would think the expectation is that if your tool works, then the bigger company will buy licenses or buy you out completely. Risking a lawsuit is just a waste of time and money, especially if the smaller company has a strong case.
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Having read the initial news report and several of the other news reports, it seems that many were duplicates published under different headings, and many were "derivatives" that carried forward the error. In other words, an error was spread by what seems to be news aggregation, and not individual reporting.
The strength of the internet, mass communication in real time, can at times also be one of its failings, mass communication in real time that virally spreads erroneous information.
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Home run
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It seems every article ever written about a patent issue has one side "blatantly copying" the others patent. Journalists almost always frame it that way regardless of the fact that it rarely is that simple. It's not very common for a company to copy someone else directly, especially if they know the patent exists. There is a lot of people stumbling onto the same idea independently in the corporate world.
As a bit of an aside, you also see a similar common theme in science reporting where there is one guy "fighting the system" and "bucking the common knowledge" to crusade his/her idea of how the world works.
This random "drama" that simplifies the entire thing seems to be the default way reporters work, much to their detriment. You read articles to find out what's happening and get a deeper understanding.
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EveryDog
I'm waiting for the counter suit, when EveryScape gets hit with EveryPatent in Adobes portfolio and has to fork over EveryThing. I wonder if the press will copy paste this article or act like it's a discovery :)
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Thank you, thank you, thank you!
EveryScape Boston suit
and you'll see dozens of incorrect reports that it's a copyright suit (most of them copied from other incorrect reports).
Copyright, Patent, and Trademark are the easy parts of intellectual property law -- and you're paying for it every time you open your wallet. So, it's in everyone's best interests to understand what they are and how they influence our lives; we're paying a premium for our willful ignorance, and the rights holders and lobbyists are raking it in.
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Considering how often I see errors in news reports about subjects I have knowledge of, I automatically assume that news reports about other subjects are wrong, too.
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Re: Thank you, thank you, thank you!
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