“Yesterday, Samsung used Stanley Kubrick’s 2001: A Space Odyssey — a forty year old science fiction movie about a future that is now ten years old — as an example of prior art in their ongoing IP lawsuits,” John Brownlee reports for Cult of Mac.
“The only problem? The devices shown in 2001 aren’t touchscreen tablets at all!” Brownlee reports. “Over at ObamaPacman.com, there’s a great debunking of Samsung’s prior art argument. You should read the whole thing, but here’s the jist: the devices in 2001 are televisions, not tablets.”
Read more in the full article here.
[Thanks to MacDailyNews Reader “Angel C.” for the heads up.]
I Watch all my TV on a computer.
Why would a tech news site, especially a Mac news site be called “Obama Pacman.” I’m dense. I don’t get it.
Don’t worry, Obama and Pacman don’t get it either !
@Thelonious Mac,
Hint: back when Obama was on the campaign trail he had a famous photo of him using a Mac with a Pacman on it
They should have used the P.A.D.D. from Star Trek.
They should innovate and convert the chest area of uniform into a touch screen and then clone it.
Kubrick? Pfff, please. G. Rod is the man.
Sorry , what I originally posted was
the chest area of (insert favorite Star Trek hottie here) uniform
That’s what I was thinking too. Wrong science fiction source Samsmug!
I don’t think those flat-panel displays were simulated with televisions. Instead, I believe Kubrick used a rear-projected film technique. The projectors would be under the table, aimed upward.
Yes they were 16mm film projectors – lots of them! You could make an argument about the idea about flatscreen LCD screens but not tablets.
So it’s Microsoft’s big ass table that’s in trouble?
Samdung is a bunch of moronic losers. LOL
Even if that scene showed “tablets,” it is irrelevant. It’s science FICTION. It’s NOT real. There are tablet-like devices in Star Trek TNG that are touch-controlled. Is that “prior art”?
By this reasoning, if some type of “hyper drive” or “teleportation” or “automative language translator” is ever invented, the inventors of the actual technology would not get the credit, because Star Trek’s producers once “imagined” the Warp Drive and Transporter and Universal Translator.
Note: Warp Drive allowed a TV show to visit a new planet every week. The Transporter allowed a low budget because they didn’t need special effects to show a spaceship landing on those planets every week. The Universal Translator conveniently explained why aliens on those planets spoke perfect English. Brilliant ideas “invented” to make a TV show produceable. 🙂
There are some good stories about some of those original Star Trek special effects. If I recall correctly, they sprinkled aluminum dust into a beam of light to produce the transporter sparkle effect. They would then mask the people at the beginning and end of the process and blend in the sparkle effect. Clever and effective for its time.
They also adapted off the shelf products as props. For instance, salt shakers and the like for medical instruments. Lots of ingenuity and a very progressive show.
Aluminum dust is explosive as Foxconn has learned.
What!!! You mean I won’t get credit for the time machine I am working on because of Quantum Leap?
Time Tunnel was out of business well before Quantum Leap, but Jules Verne will expect his royalty fees.
NO! THE CREDIT BELONGS TO ME!!!
Another MDN commenter and I pointed this out in yesterday’s story about this. Do the Obamapacman folks read MDN comments??
Should we care? I am guessing from the name that it merely contains more of the politically motivated rants that contaminate this forum on an all too frequent basis.
That was me.
I have the movie on Blu Ray. I need to look at it closer. This is exciting… a little.
Actually if the question is prior art then the video does show that.
The IPad is a lot of thing but its main purpose is to interact/view with a screen.
All of us here would agree that the show could have envisioned a non- square / rectangular object but they did not .
So as ” art ” not use samsung defined it right .
But Samsung should realize that that is just one of the reasons it is banned.
You think? They are clearly just a monitor allowing the ‘nauts to communicate with HAL using microphones to talk to him, and to communicate with the news anchor in that particular clip. IIRC, at no time to the ‘nauts actually interact with the screens, they’re passive devices. I’m sure if there were scenes with the ‘nauts actually using touch gestures on those screens then Samsung would be able to show them. As they haven’t, then such scenes don’t exist, and can’t show prior art, as there is no prior art in a passive tv monitor. The iPad is clearly not a passive device, but a fully interactive computer.
I am pretty sure prior art in this case refers only to the physical design of the object not the function. Therefore touch screen is not relevant. Apple are saying samsungs product looks like the iPad. Samsung are saying both products look like prior art. The prior art does not have to have had the same function. They are still clutching at straws though. There product is an obvious iPad clone.
I thought everyone knew that PADDs were first used in Star Trek back in 1966 anyway.
They were, but they used a stylus as an input device on the original TV show.
When I made a purchase at the Apple Store last weekend, I had to sign my name with a finger. It was unexpectedly difficult to do…it did not trigger the same muscle memory as a pen/pencil.
Was that your first purchase at an Apple Store? I have to get my fix all too often and find the finger signing way too easy.
I am absolutely desperate to get that technology at my store if only I could get my software vendor to implement it.
Whew!
That means my teleportation with transponder controls patent won’t be invalidated by photos of Mr. Checkov at that Star Trek lectern…
Just learned that Steve Jobs has resigned as CEO of Apple. Tim Cook will take over.
Well that just shoved Samsung’s argument up where the sun doesn’t shine.
Everybody can dream, but until a working product is being invented and manufactured, it just remains in the realm of fantasy. Haven’t we see many concept products being introduced but didn’t got anywhere? Samsung’s antic is a barrel of laughs.
What next the Chewbacca defence?