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Company With Checkered Past Tries To Claim Patent On Cell Phone Buttons
from the back-to-the-drawing-board dept
You might remember a company called Hop-On, which claimed several years ago that it had developed the first "disposable" cell phone. While the company was able to attract a lot of media attention, the phones it was showing off turned out to be nothing more than repackaged Nokia phones. A few years later, Hop-On claimed to really come out with the disposable phones, but they made no impact on the market whatsoever. In the meantime, the company's CEO got indicted for fraud related to a previous company, and was eventually convicted. Last month, he managed to avoid jail time for that crime, and went back to the helm at Hop-On, just in time for the company to announce it's been awarded a patent covering "a MP3 Phone with speakers on the side, in addition to front and side buttons to activate its camera/video features." The CEO adds that he's looking forward to raking in the cash from operators, retailers and handset vendors, since millions of phones meeting this description have been sold in the US. However, the company was awarded a design patent, not a utility patent, so his assertion of being in the money may be just a little bit premature since design patents cover only the ornamental characteristics of the object. Furthermore, design patents aren't especially broad, since they cover one single design of an object. They also must be original -- so the very fact that millions of supposedly infringing handsets were sold before the patent was awarded (since design patent applications aren't published until the patent is awarded) might undermine the company's claim just a little bit.
Reader Comments
(Flattened / Threaded)
I'm happy to say I did it...took a little time to work through it but now I get it thank you for your help ...
VOB to iPod
http://www.vob-converter.com
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You do not know
You do not know why this company (and many others) that tried to introduce disposable cell phones were shut down or crippled by lawsuits and criminal charges.
My advice is - do some research on the subject.
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Re: You do not know
huh?
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Re: You do not know
OK, I just went and did some research on it.
In the past 5 years everyone who has announced a disposable phone product has been a scam.
Hence, they were crippled with lawsuits and criminal charges.
Anything I missed?
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Re: Re: You do not know
Yes.
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ROFL!!
Money may not grow on trees, but idiots sure seem to.
But realistically - that's a good idea. They should charge anyone who makes false claims about copyrights with fraud.
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what we know...
Fuck you, towel head...(strong email to follow).
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Re: what we know...
wow - can you say "Off Topic"? I knew ya could! go flame somewhere else..
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Why?
Why would anyone want a disposable cell phone?
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Re: Why?
So they couldn't be traced, would be one reason...
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New Patent for me
I will be setting a patent up for talking on cell phones. This should rake in plenty of cash because I know everyone talks on their cell phones and didn't get the ok from me to do so. When will I see my payment? You know this patent thing is getting so out of hand before long no one will make money on anything. The world will just be a free for all.
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