What Apple and HTC’s Landmark Pact Means for the Patent Wars

By Sam Gustin – Put simply, these patent wars have spun out of control. This could have detrimental effects to U.S. competitiveness. No less a legal authority than federal judge Richard A. Posner — who recently dismissed a major patent lawsuit between Apple and Motorola — recently wrote that “there appear to be serious problems with our patent system.”

Last year, for the first time, Apple and Google spent more on patent litigation and intellectual property than on research and development. That’s not healthy for either of these companies or the U.S. economy. more> http://tinyurl.com/aqmffh4

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• Patent Perestroika! What Apple and HTC’s Landmark Pact Means for the Patent Wars (business.time.com)
• Apple vs. Motorola: Judge decries “excessive” copyright and software patent protections, by @binarybits (nextlevelofnews.com)
• Apple-HTC ten-year license deal shows Android patent peace is achievable (fosspatents.com)
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Apple vs. Google is the Most Important Battle in Tech

By Sam Gustin – In the 1990s, Microsoft Internet Explorer battled Netscape Navigator in the great Web browser wars. In the 2000s, Google and Yahoo locked horns over Internet search — and we know how that turned out. Today, the latest high-stakes tech conflict is between Apple’s iPhone and Google’s Android mobile operating system for supremacy in the smart phone market.

Each of these clashes defined an era of Internet history. Apple vs. Android is no different. Everyone agrees that the struggle for Internet advantage is shifting to the mobile realm, and iPhone and Android have surged to the front of the pack with diametrically opposed business models. Neither of these players will be vanquished anytime soon — these battles take years to play out — but the company that gains the upper-hand will be best-positioned to take advantage of the massive structural shift from desktop PCs to smart phones and tablets. more> http://tinyurl.com/9lvcckc

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What Is Embedded Vision & What Can I Do With It?

By Ann R. Thryft – “What the heck is embedded vision?” you may be asking when you see the title of our next Continuing Education Center course, Fundamentals of Embedded Computer Vision: Creating Machines That See.

Until recently, because of its cost, embedded computer vision was found mostly in low-volume applications like machine vision. There, it usually consists of visible light and maybe also infrared cameras, plus various types of inspection systems, attached to robots or not, on the manufacturing floor, the assembly line, or the warehouse.

But then one of those magic moments happened. CMOS image sensors got cheaper, smaller, and much more powerful, and cameras started appearing everywhere — for example, in tablet PCs, the iPhone, and driver safety systems. Those high-volume apps drove prices down even further. more> http://tinyurl.com/blqde5v

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Who’s Devouring AT&T’s Data Capacity?

Top of cellular telephone tower
(Photo credit: Wikipedia)

By Kevin Fitchard – What does a mobile network hosting 41.2 million smartphones look like? A network where growth in data traffic far exceeds data revenue growth.

AT&T’s chickens have come home to roost. Customers are finally starting to consume the big buckets of data AT&T is selling them, taking their fair share of network capacity while not paying more for the privilege. Consequently AT&T is seeing a massive increase in data traffic without a corresponding jump in data revenue.

AT&T has begun throttling back speeds on those customers once they exceed 3 GB on HSPA+ and 5 GB on LTE. more> http://is.gd/h4th6w

Don’t Throttle Me: Other Ways To Manage Wireless Traffic

By Jeffrey Glueck – Choking users’ download speeds to a trickle, around the clock, for two weeks or more a month, regardless of whether the local network is congested at that moment, is an example of a “solution” developed with rudimentary network management tools and gives the appearance of not having customer experience in mind. In essence, this kind of policy punishes users merely using a service they pay for.

Throttling a customer 24×7 might free up bandwidth for other users, but only by rendering a heavy user’s phone unworkable. Consider an alternative, where heavy users can watch videos while the effective capacity of the tower is instantly expanded based on demand loads. more> http://tinyurl.com/6u4qrsy