Court order prohibits sale of PS2 in United States

[shmokes]

Wow....Sony has been ordered by an federal district court to halt game machine sales in the U.S. and to pay Immersion Corp. $90 for patent infringement, because of technology used in the dual-shock controllers.  They are planning to appeal the case, and will continue selling hardware in the meantime, while paying a compulsary license fee to Immersion Corp., but this decision is already merely upholding the decision of a lower court.  The cease and desist order applies to sales of PS1, PS2 and more than 40 games.

Interesting.

http://edition.cnn.com/2005/BUSINESS/03/27/japan.sonysuit.reut/

[cholin]

and to pay Immersion Corp. $90 for patent

should be changed to $90,000,000!  Cool!

[shmokes]

LOL.....yes.  $90 million.

[HaRuMaN]

That's just messed up! 

[TalkingOctopus]

This is HUGE.  I bet some lawyers at Sony got fired because of this one.  They should have settled like Microsoft and Nintendo did...

[evlbeaver]

I think Sony will ultimately win.  There is plenty of prior art for force feedback.  I believe even the original ps1 dual shock predates their patent.

[Stingray]

I believe even the original ps1 dual shock predates their patent.

Not according to the news story I heard on the radio yesterday.

-S

[nighthawk2099]

If I understand the case correctly, it's not the force feed back they are talking about, it's the pressure sensativity part of the dual shock (the harder you push on the button, the harder the punch or faster the car goes).  It would be sad if Sony doesn't pull something off and Micro$oft takes fulll control of the console market.  Then again, this could be the one shot MS has to slam dunk Sony.

Kick'em while they're down.....

[shmokes]

I wouldn't worry too much.  Worst case scenario is Sony has to stop selling PS1 and PS2.  Consider that this ruling is from an appeal of a decision that is at least two, maybe three years old.  They are now appealing this decision.  How long will that take, do you suppose?  The injunction only applies to PS1 and PS2.  PS3 is right around the corner.  The worst this could do to Sony is prohibit them from selling PS2s for a few months prior to the release of the PS3.  It would suck for them, but certainly would not be a deathblow by any stretch of the imagination.

Starting with PS3 I'd guess they will simply start paying Immersion the royalties that everyone else pays them or they will remove the offending technology from their controllers.

But if this appeal takes 2-3 years to be heard by the overworked appeals courts, just like the last one did, this will have virtually no affect on Sony's ability to sell any of their consoles in the United States even if the decision is upheld (as I expect it will be).  Main thing for Sony is $90 down the drain, but they can weather that without batting an eye.

[Stingray]

Obviously I'm missing something because I don't understand why Sony has to stop selling the consoles, why not just the controller?

-S

[NeeBick]

The orginal patent was filed in 1995 (predating ps1) and updated a couple of times (that is why if you look quickly at the patent it says 2001 but look closer and you see that there was several extensions).  Immersion has been doing force feedback for a long time (licensing to such companies as logitech).  They have full right in this case, I just know the sony fan boys are going to crying that this is unfair but believe it or not some patents are legit.

The systems are prohibit from sale since they contain code and api's related to the technology.

[shmokes]

Obviously I'm missing something because I don't understand why Sony has to stop selling the consoles, why not just the controller?

-S

I'd guess that it's be breaking the law knowingly and doing it anyway.  Lexar, for example, is seeking a ruling that would force Toshiba to stop selling ALL products in the United States, after they willfully stole trade secrets.  It's probably somewhat punitive.

[evlbeaver]

The orginal patent was filed in 1995 (predating ps1) and updated a couple of times (that is why if you look quickly at the patent it says 2001 but look closer and you see that there was several extensions).

[Lilwolf]

Sega got hit on one of these.  There is one guy who owns the patent for basically all consoles.  Game machine that plays on a TV. 

And EVERY console since has paid this guy like a million or so... Sega decided not to and lost like 900million.  They still continued selling consoles, but had a HUGE cut in their development.  REALLY hurt them.

Sony will continue no matter what.  They will just have to pay out the nose.  They should have paid their dues like the others.  Notice that MS and Nintendo paid up... and if there was a way around the patent I think the others would have taken notice...

MS and Nintendo seem to be more lawsuit happy then Sony is.

[RayB]

I don't think their patent is so broad as to also include "force feedback" as in HardDrivin. Their patent is "vibration" feedback. Or more specifically, Software controlled vibration.

All a dual shock has in it is the same technology as your wife's virbator! (A motor with an off-set weight on the axel), but Immersion patented the software contolling of such a device to achieve different "effects" of vibration. Otherwise Immersion would not have received this patent, since everyone knows "vibration devices" have been around for over a century.

As far as I know, Nintendo also had to pay them. They settled about a year or two ago.

~Ray B.

[CPickler]

The PS3 Most likely has the same technology.  So even if they tried to ignore it and stop selling PS1 and PS2, it wouldn't work.  They would just expand the lawsuit or file to have "technologies in development" prohibited as well.  There are a lot of legal loopholes.  Sony is definately not going to be able to escape this one unscathed.