[mythtv-users] DISH Receivers and external HDDs

[Michael T. Dean]

On 04/13/2008 07:41 PM, Brian Wood wrote:
> That wouldn't surprise me. What does surprise me is that the DISH  
> attorneys were not able to blow that patent out of the water. We were  
> using digital hard-drive-based systems to time shift in the early  
> 1990s, and we couldn't have been the only ones doing it.
>
> I guess "Prior Art" doesn't mean anything anymore.
>
> Does this mean Myth is (potentially) infringing TiVo's patent?  
> Actually I guess it would be the Myth users who might be doing so.

I haven't read the patent, myself, as I do /not/ read patents at all if 
there's any way I can avoid doing so.  While I don't condone breaking 
patents, as a software developer, I don't go out looking for information 
on patents that I could be unknowingly infringing.  After all, someone 
has to help the patent holder prove that he's aggressively defending the 
patent.

If anyone wants to read the patent, it's the TiVo "Multimedia time 
warping system," patent #6233389 ( 
http://www.freepatentsonline.com/6233389.html , according to Google--the 
link under the search result).  Fortunately for me, they chose a stupid 
name that's meaningless, so from the title alone, I don't believe I (or 
anything in Myth) is infringing, as time doesn't warp when I use 
Myth--except, of course, when doing so in the proximity of the event 
horizon of a black hole.  Therefore, I've managed to ensure I only use 
my Myth box when sufficiently far from a black hole.

BTW, I would prefer--in keeping with my decision to not read the 
patent--that people do not discuss the details of the patent here.  
Perhaps there's some other more appropriate place--some kind of legal 
newlist/forum/...  Perhaps Groklaw?

Mike