News

Creative's 'Zen Patent' Heats Up the MP3 Player Patent Wars

Tuesday, August 30th, 2005 at 11:20 AM - by

Creative Technology Ltd. on Tuesday announced that on Aug. 9 it won what the company calls the "Zen Patent," which covers the user interface for its Zen and Nomad MP3 players. In a statement, Creative added that the patented interface is also "found in some competing players, such as the Apple iPod and iPod mini."

Creative CEO and chairman Sim Wong Hoo, who earlier this year declared "war" on Apple, said in the statement: "The first portable media player based upon the user interface covered in our Zen Patent was our NOMAD Jukebox MP3 player. We shipped the NOMAD Jukebox to U.S. retail customers in September of 2000. The Apple iPod was only announced in October 2001, 13 months after we had been shipping the NOMAD Jukebox based upon the user interface covered by our Zen Patent."

Mr. Sim went on to say: "Before this invention, there was no intuitive and efficient way to deal with the large number of tracks that could be stored on a high-capacity player."

The patent, which Creative applied for on Jan. 5, 2001, specifically covers "a method of selecting at least one track from a plurality of tracks stored in a computer-readable medium of a portable media player configured to present sequentially a first, second, and third display screen on the display of the media player, the plurality of tracks accessed according to a hierarchy, the hierarchy having a plurality of categories, subcategories, and items respectively in a first, second, and third level of the hierarchy."

On Aug. 9, AppleInsider broke the news that an inventor who now works at Microsoft filed a patent in May 2002 for "a hierarchically ordered user interface." That patent caused Apple's original and amended patents for the iPod user interface to be denied, leading to some speculative media reports claiming that Apple would have to pay royalties to Microsoft for each iPod it sold.

How today's events will affect Apple remains to be seen. Creative seems to be establishing prior art, which in patent law refers to the fact that an invention which is available for sale first wins out over an invention whose patent is filed first. Prior art led many who understand patent law to dismiss the Microsoft patent, but it's unknown if Creative could, for example, force Apple to pay royalties to them for each iPod and iPod mini sold.

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MarcelV said:

member since 30 Oct 2004 with 19 posts, unranked, send him a message or view his profile

Tue Aug 30, 2005 12:54 pm

This was the same guy who declared war on Apple in January. Didn't work out that well for him. So, this is their new direction? Time to grow up for him.

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A guest said: (hide)

Tue Aug 30, 2005 1:38 pm

I have had music ordered in hierarcical menus in my portable (laptop) ten years ago,

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Al Swearengen said:

member since 10 May 2005 with 339 posts, unranked, send him a message or view his profile

Tue Aug 30, 2005 1:55 pm

Guest wrote:
I have had music ordered in hierarcical menus in my portable (laptop) ten years ago,

Yeah, his patent sounds like data base.

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A guest said: (hide)

Tue Aug 30, 2005 2:29 pm

So I guess Sim Wong Hoo's "war on the iPod" now means trying to attack it via indirect means, seeing as how Creative's attempt to attack it via their own line of MP3 players has been a miserable failure.

And if anyone doesn't believe me, just take a look at Creative's latest quarter-report. That does a better job of proving their failure than I ever could.

Sim Wong Hoo's just grabbing at every last sliver of hope as he watches his company slide down the toilet.

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jimothy said:

member since 04 Jun 2004 with 589 posts, unranked, send him a message or view his profile

Tue Aug 30, 2005 4:43 pm

I really wish people would stop saying, "Apple's patent was rejected because of Microsoft got the patent first!" First of all, AppleInsider is a rumor site, so you do have to take what they say with a grain of salt (as well as other, supposedly more credible sites, such as CNet, which basically use AI as their source for this story).

As best as I can tell, the Microsoft patent was for something quite different (play lists), and that the timing is mere coincidence.

In fact, Creative's patent application seems like a more likely reason for Apple's to be rejected than does Microsoft's. Granted, that's also mere speculation, but I don't expect the media to go around reporting it as fact, as they have with AppleInsider's speculation (after they further embellish that report, no less).

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A guest said: (hide)

Tue Aug 30, 2005 5:24 pm

I looked at the patent and it's a classic case of a JUNK patent. It essentially claims hierarchical menus--like you have on every cell phone--but for the purpose of organizing music. So they're claiming the organization of music by artist, album and song in a portable player. Shame on Creative! What they've done is the opposite of creative.

Businesses pushed politicians who pushed the Patent Office into the official position that nothing is obvious if a businessman doesn't think it's obvious. Now the patent office is granting thousands of patents like this one to companies who are little more than pirates. The system is seriously broken.

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A guest said: (hide)

Tue Aug 30, 2005 8:35 pm

I hope Apple get's their butt sued off so bad that they crumble into the ground. The only reason they are doing well it turns out is selling a device which they stole from Creative. I have long been a creative fan and the whole Ipod generation has been nothing but upsetting. To see millions of people buying a product which infringes on the Creative insight that was the Zen MP3 player. If you own an Ipod you should feel ashamed. You are ripping off the true inventors of today's MP3 players, Creative. Throw it away now and redeem some class. Buy a few Creative devices to make up for the damages you have caused them.

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LaurieF said:

member since 15 Jun 2001 with 3510 posts, TMO Forum Mod, send him a message or view his profile

Tue Aug 30, 2005 9:27 pm

Arguing with Anonymous and his cronies is like shouting into a storm - I'll probably never be heard. Never mind.

You do talk a load of crap don't you? You are begging the question big time. Apple did not steal a device from Creative. It is arguable, but only just, that they stole the menuing system from Creative. But they didn't. I wrote my first hierarchical menu system in Cobol in , let's see now, 1980. Admittedly it wasn't for selecting music, but don't start saying that what Creative have done is a new idea.

Go and learn about patent law before complaining. A patent can be awarded for something that is both new and non-obvious. Creative's claim is neither.

Plonker.

PS: I do actually have some Creative hardware - a set of powered speakers which I plug an Airport Express into.

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A guest said: (hide)

Wed Aug 31, 2005 6:22 am

I'm from singapore and we all hate him over here. Apple iPod sales are far higher than his creative in even his own turf. He lost the war and is just so bitter about it. The razor thin margin of US$7 per zen is making his company sink further into the quicksand he has gotten himself into, and i hope he drowns. Rio already withdrawn from the mp3 market. i hope he does too!!!

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A guest said: (hide)

Wed Aug 31, 2005 6:24 am

You stink you know. The 1st mp3 player wasn't even invented by creative, please get your facts right b4 you start flaming or trolling.

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Vaughn said:

member since 15 Oct 2004 with 4 posts, unranked, send him a message or view his profile

Wed Aug 31, 2005 8:02 am

Uh... seems like someone's 'irony detector' fizzled out. HEL-LO!

I am (was) quite concerned with this, indeed as someone said, the USPTO system is 'broke'.

Now that I think about it, this 'shouldn't go nowhere' (stay away 'grammer poleece', I done writ it on purpose): Why?

I feel NeXT's file browser, nay, even Apple's MFS/HFS are 'prior art'- the patents bandied by MS and creative may address 'a plurality of music tracks' but, for all practical purposes, those tracks are a plurality of FILES.

Anyone care to do the mental exercise of drilling down to a file in System 1.0's 'Open...' dialog box?

This whole thing is akin to patenting the garden hose and faucet because you later used it to pipe KoolAid® instead of water.

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A guest said: (hide)

Wed Aug 31, 2005 7:52 pm

"Creative has admitted that thousands of their Zen Neon MP3 players that were shipped recently contain a mass-mailing Windows worm."

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