Phillips seeking damages?

[Nelson37]

I just got a very interesting letter from Phillips Corporation. Basically it says that numerous CD and DVD blank manufacturers have not paid royalties to Phillips for their patents, and further states that Phillips retains the right to pursue anyone who purchases and/or resells these "illegal" blanks. The amount was in pennies per disk, but that could add up.

There was some moderately scary legalese attached.

This could lead to slightly higher blank prices, or run out of business some of the low-budget manufacturers.

[Baldrick]

I think you mean Philips.

[miketree]

I fail to see how Philips could charge the end user for the use of un-licenced disks.

I would also imagine that it wouldn't be worth the time/expense of trying to recover same.

If they can't get the royalties from the manufacturer, they haven't got a snowball's chance in hell of geting it off the consumer or reseller.

[ItsMe]

Philips wouldn't have a leg to stand on, persuing end users that purchase blank disks. For one thing, they never informed consumers that royalties must be paid for blank disks. If they did, they missed me. Most likely the manufactures that bought licences from Philips had to sign something?

Anyway, the onus is on the manufacturers and not the consumers as far as I am concerned.

If they do try to persue consumers, we can gang together. I'd like to see a company try and sue millions of consumers.

[Mirror_Image]

[quote="ItsMe"]I'd like to see a company try and sue millions of consumers.quote]
They don't have to sue customers. All they have to do is sue the manufacturers, and if they win, the manufacturers raise their wholesale prices to cover the added costs, and that ripples all the way to the consumer. The consumer pays in the end, just like they do with any suit against a corporation, win or lose.

[ItsMe]

They don't have to sue customers. All they have to do is sue the manufacturers, and if they win, the manufacturers raise their wholesale prices to cover the added costs, and that ripples all the way to the consumer. The consumer pays in the end, just like they do with any suit against a corporation, win or lose.

Yes, your right. This applies to any suit, not just corporations. Take the increasing suites against the national health service over in blighty for instance. Its the tax payer that foots the bill.
We already pay a surcharge for CD-R's to the music industry (in the Netherlands at least), even if we don't use CDR's to copy CD's or downloaded music etc.

Still, I can understand Philips wanting to recover there investment costs, especially in the current economic climate.

I'm not very happy with the "sue you" attitude that an increasing number of companies and idividuals are taking these days though.

[BJ_M]

pay a surcharge in canada also -- supposed to give you more rights in copying of your own owned media ..

[FoxGarrison]

All I've got to say to Phillips is, "Good luck!"

I think it was AOL that tried to sue web site owners directly for using their propriety format .gif file and lost miserably. I don't see the JPEG or MPEG groups sue anybody for their file formats .jpg and .mpg. Then again a blank disk is not a file format...true...but it is used so much in the industry that a lawsuit such as this would be very beneficial for all of us VCD fans.

How? Well, let's say Phillips wins their nonesense claim, then that would boost CD prices. CD manufactures would have to justify the existence of a format that would then cost more per unit to produce then it would to retool and invest in the future of DVD and DVD-R. With the fast-approaching decline of CDs in the marketplace and the upcoming price cuts on DVD-Rs, it would be beneficial for manufactures now to take the plunge and release more DVD burners at cut-rate prices then it would later when they wouldn't be able to keep up with demand.

This would be good news for us VCD fans because we would be getting better products and better quality for our rips. But, then again, we wouldn't be cutting VCDs would we?

[FoxGarrison]

Oh, and another thing...since I'm living in Canada a special interest group representing the music industry in this great country of ours is asking for a special levy on all recording mediums consumers purchase. The tax is to go to Canadian artists. This would in effect raise the price of CDs to nearly triple their cost to which we purchase CDs now.

Would this mean that once I paid their tarriff I can make a dozen copies of their music and sell it on eBay free and clear? Afterall, they got their royalties since I did pay the tax on the dozen CDs...so the product in effect is paid for.

I wonder if Phillips got a load of this scam from my fun loving Canadian government.

[ItsMe]

The music & film industries are shooting themselves in the foot. Take the price of new DVD releases, they are often between 39-110 Euros's here in The Netherlands. Not to mention music CD prices. I'm not interested in funding MTV & TMF music video clips, but I am forced to, if I want to buy music CD's.

Although I do not download mp3's from the net and burn them to CDR's, I am forced to pay a levy to music artists whenever I buy blank CDR media (I am not refering to those special music CDR's). Why in Ford's name should I pay money music artists each time I make a VCD of my summer holidays? The music industry assumes that all consumers are criminals, thats why.

The music and film industries are just a bunch of fat cat thieves. No offence to cats intended.

[Nelson37]

I don't have a problem with PhiLips attempting to reclaim their development costs.

As far as attempting to charge consumers, legally they can do it but as a practical matter, its just not cost-effective. Resellers, however, are another story. Once Philips has informed them that they are purchasing illegal material, and given them a reasonable way to determine legitimacy, they certainly can, and probably will, pursue resellers who continue to sell unlicensed blanks.

I think government taxes on blanks are just plain stupid. It is not the government's job to create profits for anyone, only to ensure that the playing field is reasonably level. Also, the tax does not target the right group but makes everyone pay for the actions of a few, and also assumes that those few would be purchasing product rather than copying. But then, stupidity from government is to be expected.

[FoxGarrison]

I think government taxes on blanks are just plain stupid. It is not the government's job to create profits for anyone, only to ensure that the playing field is reasonably level.

I'm in total agreement. Here, here!

[a]

I think it was AOL that tried to sue web site owners directly for using their propriety format .gif file and lost miserably. I don't see the JPEG or MPEG groups sue anybody for their file formats .jpg and .mpg.

It was CompuServe, and they didn't lose (http://www.smartisans.com/burn_all_gifs.htm). JPEG and MPEG on the other hand are ISO standards created by committees, not patents owned by firms. You can apply the standard to create an algorithm or method which you could patent (like the LZW algorithm for GIF), but you can't usually patent a standard.

What does it mean? A manufacturer already is liable in paying multiple royalties to multiple companies owning the patent to the layering structure, chemical mixture or for example the trademarked label on the disc. If these requirements are not met, the patent owning firm has full right to sue. In a lot of western countries all consumers pay added price on CD-R's (which is a legal dilemma) in return of having a right to backup their owned audio material. CD-R is not the true problem, the true problem is that the audio industry is at the moment lobbying to get extra revenues on any memory capable of storing or playing audio data, whether it be a hard drive, memory unit or an MP3 player.

Regarding this question it is completely possible (and legal) for a patent owner to prevent functionality from disks of a business, which did not pay the royalties, or in worst case get their royalties through court order. I do not understand why they would bother an end user, however, unless he was involved in such business, known forespeeker for such conduct, or having his own publicly known pirate market going on :)

.a

[snorkel]

I just got a very interesting letter from Phillips Corporation. [...] This could lead to slightly higher blank prices, or ...

maybe this is their way of saying, hey, we're gonna black-list the blank media that haven't been paying royalties.. and we're gonna force other manufacturers to do it too. and by black-list I mean making them suddenly "incompatible" by means of firmware lookup..

so, they're just getting on the record right now.. so later when those dirt cheap blanks dont work on your fancy new burner you wont go bitching and complaining to the manufacturer.

just a thought.. hope I'm wrong.

-s.

[BJ_M]

I just got a very interesting letter from Phillips Corporation. [...] This could lead to slightly higher blank prices, or ...

maybe this is their way of saying, hey, we're gonna black-list the blank media that haven't been paying royalties.. and we're gonna force other manufacturers to do it too. and by black-list I mean making them suddenly "incompatible" by means of firmware lookup..

so, they're just getting on the record right now.. so later when those dirt cheap blanks dont work on your fancy new burner you wont go bitching and complaining to the manufacturer.

just a thought.. hope I'm wrong.

-s.

philips is not exactly a high profile cd-r burner maker ..