Another one! Has the American technology industry gone nuts. Seems that the US tech companies are too busy fighting each other. Reminds me of the Roman Empire - rotting from the inside out. The only ones winning are the bloody lawyers. Sad.

What a bunch of whiners! Sit down and shut up!

I'm so sick of these patent suits, don't they know they look like a bunch of idiots to consumers?

Well it seems like Creative are getting desperate, that seems like a long shot.

I don't really blame them though, Creative Zen players are much better quality than ipods, but ipods just have that "wow" popularity factor that everyone wants them.

Anymore, Apple is spending more time in court than Microsoft ever did. All of iPod's profits are going to the lawyers.

STOP with the patent infringement suits! For God's sake!

"Asked to elaborate on why the company had filed the suit, Creative representatives refused to comment."

Yeah, because they SUCK and have no case.

Good job Creative, sue for patent infringement because your business model sux, your products suk even more, your software sux and your company produces the most worthless crap.

DIE and DIE slowly, Creative.

Actually, your comments make no sense. Ipods have lousy build quality, even worse sound quality, the only things they have going for them, is a decent UI, and very slick marketting.

Creative players have always been well built, and sounded very good in comparison to the cr@ppy ipods.

Actually, YOUR comments make no sense.

Why do you think the iPod has such huge market share? You think marketing alone gets you 80% of the market? No. The things are built like a tank, if you think different you've never used one. I'm not talking about some 14year old moron scratching the screen, i'm talking about dropping it, running over it with a car, stepping on it, etc, it keeps working cuz it's built like a tank. So that's that.

Creative players are flimsy pieces of plastic! They do have better sound quality, I'll give you that, but I must say... NEWSFLASH, iPod is a CONSUMER product not an AUDIOPHILE product. Lets look at the numbers....

80% of portable music player owners have iPods...
5% of portable music player owners have creative whatevers

Now, out of those 85% percent of music player owners, what % do you think are audiophile who will even notice the difference? Probably even less than 5%!

Let me tell you something else, I'm no audiophile, I just want music while I walk to the store or go outside for a smoke. Do you think I want a device that is rock solid, cool looking, well supported by the manufacturer and has awesome interface or some piece of green plastic that is a pain in the a** to use, is about twice as thick, costs nearly the same, is made by a company that posted 100+million dollars in losses and has slightly better sound quality?

No thanks. iPod's are popular for a reason, the problem here is all the mac zealots and the anti-mac zealots are warring over trivial details like sound quality just becuase it's made by apple.

Apple has been doing well in the past few years and creative has been going straight down the toilet. How about we give apple a chance for once.

Your comment doesn't make sense either. Apple fans always say that Mac OS is better than Windows. Yet Microsoft has 95% of the market. Your saying that a superior product will always dominate the market! So I guess Windows is a superior OS since it has 95% of the world market.

Hmm... Well lets see here... Up until 2001 windows WAS the superior product (still s***e, but definitely better than mac os 9 or linux or anything like that). That's 5 years ago and apple's market share has only gone up.

So yes, you WILL see the superior os take market dominance eventually. Remember that windows had been the better os for over 15 years.

To repeat what I said in my last post, since you didn't seem to read it. I said: Let's give apple a chance. Instead of changing the subject to become one of the windows fanboys just choose your platform based on the merits of all platforms. Apple makes superior mp3 players, let them dominate the market for now, it will entice other people to make better products. This is exactly what happened with windows/mac os. Microsoft had a better product and market dominance. Apple created a better os (or, more accurately, bought NextStep + steve jobs and turned it into osx) and is now gaining market share since it is now the superior os. If you try both you can make your own decision, yet, just as with the iPod, it doesn't necessarily matter what YOU think the better product is (creative in this case), what matters is which is better (iPod in this case). So how about we all just stop complaining and b****ing about it and use whatever platform we want. I dont see why it matters who is better or who is dominating... just pick a platform based on your experience (not some preconceptions) that works for you.

There are many reasons to choose either platform, and no real reason to argue about it. This is supposed to be able creative suing apple becuase they filed for some random patent first, not which os is better... so i'll apply this to that discussion.... WHO CARES, buy whichever product you like better. For 80% of people, that's the iPod and the fact is that creative is just being a bunch of babies cuz their products aren't as nice and people just dont want them, clearly.

Stop kidding yourself. The iPods are extremely durable, and SQ is easily on par with Creative. Admittedly it's got nothing on iRiver, but that's why iRivers cost more. :P

Creative is suing because they can't win. They realise they have an inferior product and strategy, so turn to lawsuits. Hopefully the judge just throws the case (and them) out of court. I'm sick of it.

And don't get me started on how Creative has destroyed the sound card industry.

Creative Zen SNR = 97dB. All other Creative players since Nomad have SNR in excess of 95dB.

Sony NWA-3000 SNR = 98dB.

Apple iPod (Gen 3&4) SNR(measured as Apple are ashamed to publish specs) = 82dB.

Thats a considerable difference. As for build quality, it's not so easy to measure, but compare the cheapo feel of a Gen 4 ipod to a NW-A3000 or a iRiver, or a Creative ZEN, and you will see how poor the iPods are.

Ipods battery life is also very poor (in both time between charges and actual lifetime).

As I said, buy an iPod, buy a nice UI and slick Marketting, everything else is below par and overpriced.

Obviously 75 percent market share could care less about 97dB-98dB-82dB. It's an MP3 player ffs!

Creative is suing because they can't win

That doesn't make sense dude. if they knew they could win why waste time and money on it

which bring up another thing, don't do crack

Man, this makes me want to sell my Creative Microphoto and get an iPod.

Its the same as AMD and Intel.

Did anyone else know that Creative is a Singapore based company?

I didn't know that. . .

*A spokesman for Apple was not immediately available to comment. Creative has been threatening action against Apple since shortly after it received the patent.

[Several Creative engineers working in California filed the patent application on January 5, 2001.]

Creative shares are trading at 4-1/2 year lows. Earlier this month, it reported a quarterly loss that it blamed on a plunge in music player prices and the need to write down unsold inventory.*

Apple Computer, Inc.(NASDAQ NM:AAPL) 65.81

Creative Technology Ltd(NASDAQ NM:CREAF) 5.73

If you know anything how stock is priced, you would understand stock price doesn't determine how a company perform. And if you going to list price, use market cap, not per share price. Share price for Intel is around 19, and amd is around 31, but Intel's market cap is 110 bil while amd is 15 bil

Thank you CNN business news

good job on the "cut" & "paste" from CNN's website xyzcb1

Yup it is.

In history past its rise is nothing short of amazing, but along the way they resorted to ruthless capitalistic tactics to shut out soundcard competitors, and now they're using wimp tactics to try to shut Apple out.

I'm kinda ashamed, cos I'm a Singaporean myself. Their marketing is full of bulls*** often, and I'm glad that at least when it comes to portable players, most people aren't buying it. The enlightened anti-iPod-ers here go for iRiver, iAudio, or Samsung.

I really like Creative... I really hate Apple...

Yet, even I must be sensible enough to realize that this is just another effort to capitalize and profit on lawsuit rather than competitive marketing and sales.

I'm really getting sick of hearing about lawsuits for every little "idea" that people think they're the first genius to figure it out, but prove time and time again they're too slow and incompetent to act on it.

I like Apple. They are a little different, like the Newton. Anyone remember that? It was nice, recognized hand writting, was good speed, not blistering, decent app support, kind difficult to sync, but it was HUGE for a PDA. It wasn't very wieldy. I like Apple machines, and they make good stuff, the iPod, no so much. Its just weird.

iTunes I think is the majority of the problem.. maybe the software support, but whatever it is, I just don't like the iPod..

I truthfully haven't found an MP3 player I do like all that well, but the Nomad, I like.

I like stuff for my car more, because that's where I spend my time..mostly. So portable devices don't do much, my portability is limited to things I can take with me in my car...

I don't hate Apple, but I can agree the Creative is better.

However, I don't think Creative is trying to capitalize.. What they may be doing is keep that "Ace" in their pocket until the need it..

Well, I think they need it. Its like calling in a marker.. you reserve it for later. Creative is probably thinking "Hey, if things start to go sour, we can always pull the menu lawsuit card...".

That's shady business, but there really isn't anything illegal.. They should have said something before now, because NOW it looks like they are crying wolf.

Ah the ransom of success. Apple also stole another famous interface :) However Creative is yet another almost-would-have-been monopoly. Does anybody remember their arrogance in the mid-90's?

You mean sound blaster and AWE32? Yeah, they were on the high horse, however, what company ISN'T arrogant? you have to make the world believe you HAVE the best product.

Walmart is arrogant, home Depot, Sears WAS, Microsoft, Sun, Linux is Arrogant, Firefox, come on.. business, its not personal, its just how business is done.

Show me a company that isn't arrogant, and I will wager they are small time.. which is good, if you want to REMAIN small...

EVERY company is arrogant, not just some. Either lead or get run over, that's the nature of business.

This has to be one of the biggest overlooked fact in the industry. Bravo!

in what way linux is arrogant?

Are you kidding? Have you ever asked for helping on a debian forum?

I have, and it has been awesome!!! I really like Linux guys, they always try to help each other, but I always try to find the answer on Google first, people gets anoyed when others ask always the same questions without even tried to find the answer by themselves before...

And have you ever been in the Ubuntu forums??? That's incredible!!! People is very used to help in these forums, I think you went to the wrong forum to ask (or you did the wrong question)

Well its about time.. I was waiting for this lawsuit..

Creative had the idea for the MP3 player first, but I kept wondering why Creative was so quiet about it.. Well here it finally is.

While we're busy suing instead of innovating, the Chinese will quietly use this time to gain expertise in hardware and software development. When the suing is over, they will have been drained of capital and Apple will have been acquired by a Chinese company, and Real will be acquired and split up by several Chinese companies. My computer and the software on it are about the ONLY things I have around me that aren't made in China. My Chevy truck was built in Canada, but that's about it for North-American manufacturing.

Don't even start with that communist regime, BS. They don't innovate either. They STEAL technology..

Not to mention they support Pirating, yeah they are setting a real good example.

So this is why China is inviting American companies to move in, because they are sooo good at technology too right? Give me a break, the Asias don't have an advantage here, its just good old capitalists at work. The rest of the world doesn't have this free enterprise we enjoy, and they CAN'T do anything about their situation.. but in USA, we might fight, argue, bicker, and slam one another, but its our perogative..

Take this lawsuit to a Chinese government and see what they do with it, you will be thrown into a prison so fast, it would make your iPod lose its data..

and as far as being made in America.. Your computer, Intel, dude.. Taiwan, china, those parts are in there, I GUARANTEE its 50% chinese, maybe more.. the software may be written here, but your chevy truck.. Let's see that would be a GM product, hmm.. GM, yeah, this the same company that invests like billions in overseas outsourcing like every other company? That Chevy truck?

It may be ASSEMBLED in Canada, but its MANUFACTURED using Taiwan, Chinese parts.. Nice try.

"Don't even start with that communist regime, BS. They don't innovate either. They STEAL technology.."

what exactly did they steal?
intellectual art?

oh, and just because you and the COMMUNISTS like you have labeled sharing ideas as piracy, doesn't make it so

dude, the chinese goverment admitted they condone pirating, its part of their culture, they don't believe intellectual property, they are a communist society, you moron.

They have articles written all over the net about how Chinese government openly suggests copying software, and stealing technology, because that's their way of life.

It is partly due to communism, but they flat out dont' care about western politics or laws. that's just the way they are.

I am not a communist you anti-capitalist lame ass, I am merely stating a fact. Call the damn state department, before you argue these poinst, numb nuts. These are easly proven.

Chinese government condone all kinds of crime, that we don't allow.

here is a link, just for you.. if you will even take the time to read it.

http://www.brandchannel....res_effect.asp?pf_id=30

you're right, i'm an anti-capitalist
no one person needs millions of dollars, when there's people starving in your own country, not to mention several others.

i also don't believe in intellectual property
every human should be able to freely share ideas to promote advancement of the human race. and it should be the implementation of those ideas that distinguish us, not patents and lawyers.

and yes, the chinese are communists, and that is wrong, i believe in democracy, but not capitalism

i did read your link
i don't believe what the chinese do in SELLING pirated merchandise is right. BUT, i see nothing wrong with them taking our ideas and creating their own products. as long as you can distinguish between them.

WOW! I never espoused communism as "unique", "innovative" or ideal in any respect whatsoever. I'm only saying that we're (western tech culture) slipping badly, and leaving a hole through which the east could easily exploit and pass us by. 10 years ago, we would have replaced "China" with "Taiwan", "Korea" or "Japan" (maybe), but things have changed since then. I don't want to see it happen, but US corporate stupidity is making it happen.

Wow, what a unique perspective. Flawed, myopic, but unique.

The failure of socialism and communism stems from the fact of human nature. There are always a few with high ideals of sharing and collective success, but these are so rare. By and large human beings are not this way. They work only when properly motivated, and they never feel that THEY have enough.

As long as this fact of human nature remains unchanged, socialism and communism are doomed to fail. And don't think that properly educating the masses will help either. It is a flaw in our nature not in our education. There is a reason that one of the first orders of business for any new "revolution" of a communistic regime is to to kill or imprison the teachers and highly educated members of society. They are replaced with mindless automatons who spout the party line. There is a reason that communistic countries suppress free speech. Their ideas cannot stand on their own. They must be propped up with fear and censorship.

Yes I know you said Communism is wrong but you can't have a collective (anti-capitalist) society without a socialist or communist government structure. Capitalism is the way that free people buy and sell. For one to tell another how much money is enough is something that cannot be enforced outside of a tyrannical govermnent. Also, there are many things that you enjoy today (like new drugs, the internet, etc...) that would not exist had someone not stood to make a profit. That is why they worked and risked and created. If no-one can gain by that, then what is the incentive to do it. There is a reason that we don't see a great deal of innovation out of communistic countries.

If you want to feed the hungry, then be successful and feed them on your own. I believe it is the duty of all to reach out to help the hungry and needy and that it should be done as close to the problem as possible. That way you get accountability. Don't try to tell others that you know better how to spend what they have earned.

There is no accountablility in a government program. There cannot be. On the other hand if I am helping my neighbor who is out of work and hungry and I see that he is not even trying to find work...I can motivate him by withholding aid until he does his part.

So many times well-intentioned but poorly thought-out solutions actually make things worse (welfare anyone)

Back to the topic...the net effect of this lawsuit is to enrich the trial lawyers and stifle innovation. Yes they have a thin reason to sue, but they should not have. It only makes them look pathetic and innefective.

i agree with your post
but
alas
i am an idealist

Why doesn't anyone sue Apple for that stupid ipod service they install on your box without warning ? (not serious here folks!)

If I wanted an Ipod service, I'd buy an Ipod and load the drivers!

/rant

Um... its called a "license agreement". And they DO give you warning. Don't you bother to read the damn readme files and instructions?

It CLEARLY outlines the services and programs it will install.

So you are stupid for not reading the directions..

LOL

I read them, I understood them.

This is why I don't use Itunes and I consider it like REALPLAYER.

You are just too stupid to pass on attacking me I guess.

well evidently reading and understanding aren't you strong suits then huh jack ass?

Quit complaining when they don't work, dork. Because you are the one that thinks there is a damn problem. They clearly illustrate what will happen WHEN you install their product, maybe you need help reading them?

I won't pass up an opportunity, you dim wit, you aren't fucntionally literate to challenge me enough, dumb ass, so don't go calling me stupid.

I won't have a battle of wits with an unarmed opponent, maybe that's why I don't attack you, you stupid ass.

LOL

"you aren't fucntionally literate"

OMFG, at least spell check your pathetic attempt at a verbal onslaught.

What a loser.

Havent you realized by now that insults and childish name calling are all the argument rijp can offer?

That's why I start most of my comments to him with "LOL"

heh

Can you say frivolous?

Creative is just grabbing at straws and they know it.

I want to put a pattent on the lawsuit, and a pattent on the pattent process, I'd make millions suing everyone else. Hopefully at that point all of it would stop and people would focus on more important issues, like making better technology.

Don't blame Creative but blame the US Patent Office and the law about those patents. As long as it's possible to get patents for every stupid little thing and given the abbility to sue others over this, companies will use this. If one doesn't, another one will.

The USPTO hasn't done anything related to this yet. So why start shooting at them? Creative is the one crying foul and begging for mercy in the courts to save their company from sinking in the mud. Have you read the patent in detail from start to finish? If not, you shouldn't make comments like that.

Here you go. Be sure to drink plenty of coffee to avoid falling asleep...

http://patft.uspto.gov/n...28,433&RS=6,928,433

The patent is thin (IMHO). It could be argued that it doesn't provide a unique instance from that of a desktop interface (WinAmp, MusicMatch, etc. etc.) Software is software and assumes a certain level of portability by nature. Java and .NET are examples that prove this point that the app can be made to be portable, so if a prior art can be established on a "non-portable music playing device", it could be thrown out as invalid. Again, hair-splitting litigation is expensive and tends to irritate the courts to no end. The RIM/NTP case was forced into settlement by the judges comments, I would expect this will also.

Good post, thanx for the link.

I still didn't read the whole patent (didn't have any coffee nearby) but I agree with you that the patent is thin. That's why I said in my first comment that such patents shouldn't be awarded in the first place.
One of the USPTO tasks is to research prior art and if the portable-desktop arguement is confusing laws should be changed/made.

Don't get me wrong. I hate those simple patents. It never seizes to amaze me what can be patented in the US. But as long as it is possible to patent such things companies will do this and have to do this. If they won't somebody else will. That's why I blame the USPTO.

And to speak for creative. They at least use their patent in their products. Their are far more companies that sue over patents that they don't even use themselves (you know what i mean).

Why doesn't Apple just buy Creative? That would be a laugh. But you have to admit guys, Creative was the first with a harddrive mp3 player.

Well I'm glad to see they're finally going to make apple pay up for infringing on their patent. Now if only Microsoft would come down on Apple for infringing on their click wheel patent, maybe Apple would finally be out of our hair.

What's wrong with Apple? The iPods are actually probably the best MP3 players out there, they look good (or at least clean), they are simple at which Apple is great at. The Creative MP3 players look like crap, all apart from the Zen Xtra are "fat" and just don't look good, I'm not sure about the features but I'm pretty sure that they are worse than iPod's.
I say that this lawsuit is just a cheap shot at getting some money from Apple's product and I hope it doesn't go through because people in the US will be forced to buy an inferior product.

I wouldn't say the Zen Vision looks crap and it's features certainly trump the video Ipod's (support for codecs is better, bigger, higher res screen, etc).
Their much older Jukebox 3, although looking ugly compared to today's devices (still looked like a fat but smaller CD player), had features that most Mp3 players including the Ipod could only dream of today, like digital optical line-in recording to MP3 or WAV and had a 40GB hard drive at the time was a lot for an MP3 player. Creative's menu navigation does kick ass. Unforunately that has gone downhill too as they removed some key features that made it stand out. Nothing a firmware update could not improve, but, if only they released firmware updates. They bother with a few until the product dies down and leave it. iRiver rules in the firmware department, constantly releasing new stuff with extra features.

They have gone downhill with MP3 players though. The features they used to have were pushing the boundaries. It's a shame really.

They look good, and the UI is good, but that's about it. The build quality is cr@p, the sound quality is dire, battery life is pretty poor, and they are overpriced.

I could carry on about it ties you into crap sounding MP3, or Apples proprietary AAC format, hence locking you into iTunes..

A short list of what's wrong with iPods.

That said, there is nothing out there that's perfect in the portable audio market. The closest I feel, is the Creative ZEN, and Sony NW-A3000 (both need their PC software sorting out thou).

EVERYTHING!! that has a beginning has an end...

Well that is very true.. I think its poeple more than anything else. People are very fickle..

you think so eh?
start counting, beginnig at 1, and tell me when it ends

Lawsuit No. 3,452,198 for the US this year...

Moving right along. :P Win at any cost. Even if you cheat. :P

HAHAHAHAHAHA!!!

Wow, I always though Creative was good at making sound cards, selling sound cards, and then coming back with speakers for the sound cards too. That was their bread and butter. I remember my first MP3 player, it was a Creative Nomad Jukebox. It had a Radio, Line-In, and 64mbs of Mp3 goodness. Yesterday I found it under my backseat and saved the little guy for a camp fire tonight, I want to honor the Creative b*tches for their ingenuity. :)

GO APPLE!!!

I am a Zen Jukebox Owner. I wish it operated more like an iPod. I wish it looked more like an iPod. I wish it was an iPod actually. I bought it off eBay without researching properly based on the prior models' reputation for having a line-in recording feature. That feature was taken away and everything left was inferior to Apple.

I see no merit in this lawsuit at all. Add this to the 114.33 million loss.

yeah creative is just going down hill in my opinion. their latest soundcard has a ton of problems still. they usually never get sound cards or speakers right until the second go. They just can't seem to get MP3 players right either. although again i don't see why so many people love their ipods though i had one and it sucked.

Creative Lab's MP3 players may be crappy, but they have always had the absolute best sound cards. There has never been a single company that has come close to the quality of Creative Lab's sound cards.

The original Soundblaster outperformed the Adlib sound card in every area and Creative Labs was first to market with a great sounding hardware based wavetable synthesis sound card (AWE32).

Now it seems like everyone else has thrown in the towel in the sound card market. If anyone has spent more than $20 on a soundcard and it's not a Creative Labs sound card then you've probably wasted your money considering the (non Creative Labs) sound card is a nearly worthless circuit board that wastes CPU time.

Are you kidding?

Anyone who has ever used a real sound card, geared for the professional market slash musician, is laughing big time about right now.

I'll agree, Creative makes great sound cards, but certainly not the best. I like my Audigy just fine, but I happen to know what else is out there.

Ditto. I like my Audigy as well. Great noise floor, and since I don't record on it, it's absolutely adequate for my 5.1 setup. That said it's probably the best consumer/gaming card brand.

If you put a few toes into production, you better be limited to sampler rendering. Anything else, and you'll be eating words about Creative cards. I'll give the benefit here though - my guess is the first poster was just giving props for Creative putting out good consumer/gaming cards. For that, props. They were the first to bring decent midi to the masses.

I've never ever heard crappy sounding midi music, but even in the DOS days my parents made sure we had a sound blaster pro. Now I use whatever onboard stuff comes with this nForce 2.

The onboard stuff actually sounds quite nice, so I'm guessing my old old speakers are the limitting factor. :P

So ok, what is better than the Audigy, because I am looking to upgrade my sound card?

I think the Creative Sound cards are expensive.. I want the MP3 one, but its $250.00.. that's a bit much for a sound card, so what would you suggest?

You kid, right?

"Creative X-fi XtremeMusic"

Retails online for around ~$110.

Linky goodness:

http://www.soundblaster....y=208&product=14066

You can browse the other x-fi products from that page as well, but overall, this one is probably the best.

No, but I wanted to hear from the other. I like Audigy, he doesn't. I want to know what he thinks is better.

I know Audigy is the best, but he seems to think otherwise, so I am interested to know what "better" is.

It's not an audigy. :P It's better.

..just sayin'.

Sorry, your highness, I knew what I was thinking, and X-Fi, was what I meant.. not Audigy.

In my defense, I did mention the "MP3" version, which would imply the version of the product to which this applies, does it not?

You seriously expect me to page baclk to the creative website to look it up and verify *your* typo?

Heh..

Perhaps it's just the Chipotle talking, but that's just silly.

I never got the Audigy. Figured my SBLive Gaming was good enough until they came out with somethign signifantly better.

Hence, my next upgrade will include the X-Fi.

Turtle Beach.

Even Turtle Beach has thrown in the towel on hardware DSP based sound cards. The company's latest sound card is host based like all of the other non Creative Labs sound cards out there.

Wahhhhhh....Mommy, I'm losing. Mommy sue the bad ol' company.

Sounds to me like they screwed up and went into the wrong product area. So, fire the CEO and move on.

HAHAHA!
I agree...does sound like a 2-and-a-half-year-old-baby

GO APPLE!

Well you know what they say, if you can't beat them sue them.
M$ has been dealing with that for 20 years.
That's what happens when you have more than 75% of the market.
Just wait till the word monopoly is mentioned and they start talking about breaking up Apple.
And that would really suck for Apple since they're only turning a profit because of iTunes.

Hey, before you guys get in Creative's grill, how do you know that this doesn't have at least *some* debatable merit? Are you all that sure that first-to-market-domination is a free pass? The same people that want MSFT's throat stepped on should be the same that want AAPL's utter dominance in music crushed. Right? I mean, this is Apple owning end-to-end a virtual monopoly on the legal music/dl business. This patent about menu systems has been around for some time, and frankly I'm surprised Creative have waited as long as they have.

http://patft.uspto.gov/n...28,433&RS=6,928,433

Blah, blah, blah. All anybody ever does anymore is sue. Memo to all tech corporations: make better products and compete, or go out of business.

Maybe somebody needs to sue Creative for their near monopoly in the sound card area???

Creative is trying to justify their losses, nobody cared about the menu system, and it's Creatives last resort before they get written into the 11th Chapter.

Fickle, if they legally justify it, they might find a few million reasons for trying. I'm not saying who might win; I have no clue. However I suggest you look at the patent.

IMHO, I find it a stretch that the patent was issued. A menu system? If you read the patent in the vein of, say an ATM, creative holds a massive, overreaching patent. How do you offer a patent for a menu? That's the unfathomable part to me. I don't blame Creative for trying here. They own it, and it's only of value if it's enforced.

But to the pinhead at PTO -- it's a MENU. There's nothing special about it. Poo poo on you for issuing something so dumb.

It's a longshot, but since the lawyers will be compensated if they lose anyway, Creative has nothing to lose except for taxpayers' dollars. *sigh*

"Facing increasing losses and running out of options in your battle against the iPod"?

Sue!

Why is it that every company that's getting it's a** kicked lately resorts to petty bickering?

When did these companies get bought out by 4 year-olds?

Why? Because it's a public company. Unfortunately, when a public company takes a dive, shareholders tend to sue management for failing to take every desperate action possible. In this case, it's basically sue or be sued. Don't assume that Creative's management is enjoying it. Ultimately, no one ever enjoys lawsuits except the lawyers.

Here is the problem with Creative's case against Apple. They patented a menu structure that Apple has been using for years now. Apple described the menu structure back in the 70's the the Lisa. http://home.san.rr.com/deans/UIpix/Dec1980.gif If anyone has a problem here, it is Creative and the US Patent office.

the US patent office definatly has problems

it is true the US patent office certainly has problems, but the creative patent holds far more credance than say the NTP patent. maybe you guys should read the patents before talking out of your rainbow colored apple backends.

God forbid we should expect any company to actualyl stand up and say, 'Look, we screwed up.'

Nah..cave to the shareholders. Why conduct businesss with any semblance of ethics, integrity, or honesty...

*Nah..cave to the shareholders*

"The Customer is ALWAYS right"

And apparently the customers want iPods. :P

I tell you what would be funny - if Apple were to create a high-end soundcard for the x86 platform. Now that really would be stepping on Creative's toes!