As Creative launched yet another “iPod killer” (this time an “iPod nano killer”) that trumpets the usual list of obviously unimportant extras such as support for subscription services, built-in FM radio, and built-in voice recorder, Wired’s Eliot Van Buskirk and Sean Michaels asked Creative’s Spokesman Phil O’Shaughnessy about the ongoing legal battles with Apple:
O’Shaughnessy said that the company anticipated Apple’s retaliation, but that Creative’s patented method for categorizing music on a portable screen was not obvious, as some critics have complained (when people tell him that the idea of browsing by Artist, Genre, etc. is intuitive, he says “Thank you!”).
News that Apple tried to license the navigation method from Creative before the iPod was released backs up this claim, as does the fact that the HanGo/Remote Solutions Portable Jukebox PJB-100 — the only hard drive-based MP3 player in the world before Creative’s first HD-based player — could only sort by folder and filename.
Only time will tell whether Creative will succeed in blocking iPods from being imported (O’Shaugnessy estimates that the ITC will take a few months to decide, but that the North District of California will take longer to reach a decision on whether the iPod infringes Creative’s patented menu design).
Full article here.
Does Creative really think they have a chance of some measure of success (settlement) with their litigation or is their spokesman just spinning as spokesmen are wont to do? If Creative really had a case, why didn’t they sue Apple immediately upon debut of the original iPod, instead of finally resorting to litigation only after years of failing to compete with Apple’s iPod?
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