wireless lav with built-in recorder?

[Noiz2]

But that's what's bizarre...it has nothing to do with Amazon. But the reason they aren't allowed to ship that product here because it's not allowed to be used in the USA because the company who owns the technology inside of it will not allow it.

Maybe I should clear some things up since I worked for a couple of inventors back when and we had a number of patents. A patent does not make it illegal to sell something. A patent, as our patent attorney put it, "is a license to litigate". You can not patent ideas so the "concept" of a wireless that records can not be patented. Only mechanisms can be patented, actual hardware, chemical formulas etc. And it has to be unique, with no foreshadowing by an older patent. So the basic problem is Tascam doesn't think their profit would justify the lawyer costs. It is extremely unlikely that Zaxcom has a patent on anything that the Tascam unit would be in actual conflict with. And while I haven't checked I would almost bet that what Zaxcom has is a "patent pending". Which means they are trying to get a patent on something and if they are smart they will drag that out for as long as possible because the minute they get an actual patent the patent becomes public. So for instance if you are old enough to remember Dymo labelers, they kept competitors out with a patent pending for a bunch of years. nobody knew what was actually going to be protected so it was risky to try and get in on the market. Finally they got their patent and it was for the adhesive on the tape. Knock offs flooded the market within a year because nothing in the mechanism was actually protected.

Only 10% of US patents hold up in court. Usually they get killed by "prior art" which just means someone thought of it first and can prove it. The US system is actually pretty good. In Japan you can patent almost anything even if it doesn't work. Which is part of the "Prior Art" problem. The Japanese (and others probably also but the Japanese were kind of notorious for the practice) would brainstorm a problem and then patent everything anybody thought of. In the US this wouldn't fly. The result is that there is a HUGE amount of "prior art" in Japanese patents that can be used to kill other countries patents.

So in the American market the trick is to stall that process till you have a chance to become the "Kleenex" of whatever it is and dominate the market. If Zaxcoms patent is pending they may not care if they ever get it granted as long as it keeps competition out for some years.

 

[NorBro]

That is a nice breakdown and thank you, but the bottom line is we have no other options.

 

[Paul F]

It is extremely unlikely that Zaxcom has a patent on anything that the Tascam unit would be in actual conflict with. And while I haven't checked I would almost bet that what Zaxcom has is a "patent p ending". Which means they are trying to get a patent on something and if they are smart they will drag that out for as long as possible because the minute they get an actual patent the patent becomes public.

Zaxcom's patent was awarded in 2010 and has been vigorously defended against all comers. It was challenged in court as not being novel and won and actually set precedence about what is novel. Similar 'obvious' inventions have been patented. Combining a camera and a recorder (back in the tape days) was awarded a patent.

People seeking a patent have to be prepared to spend a lot of money defending a patent. If you have a competitor that has a lot of money, and wants your idea, and you don't have a lot of money, you have to find a lawyer with deep pockets that knows they can win and will take the case. Patents last 20 years.

So in the American market the trick is to stall that process till you have a chance to become the "Kleenex" of whatever it is and dominate the market. If Zaxcoms patent is pending they may not care if they ever get it granted as long as it keeps competition out for some years.

While a patent application can remain unpublished at the request of the assignee, anyone can copy the idea and compete. It would be an open market until the patent is granted and the assignee is willing to take people to court. In this case, the idea is well known and can be copied by anyone without seeing the patent. So there is nothing to hide. Paragraph 6 of the claims in the patent is the key to the patent:

"at least one control unit in communication with said local audio device receiver, said audio input device, and said memory for creating local audio data from said locally generated audio and storing said local audio data in said memory;"

 

[Noiz2]

Well a couple of things that are not quite correct. First off patents are 18 years not 20, unless that just changed. Zaxcoms patent was for 18 years. As to publication. There may be some exclusions for some very specific cases (national security comes to mind) but as a rule all patents are published once granted. It is a major reason for the system in the first place, you get a lock but you need to share the concept so others can be inspired by it. US patents are honored in most of our trading partner countries so if this was a patent that could really hold up companies would not be selling versions in other countries. Or maybe more accurately Tascam et al don't actually infringe on the Zaxcom patent. The US is VERY litigious and it's easy to sue on the flimsiest grounds so it is a lot bigger threat in the US than just about anywhere in the world.

Patent applications are not disclosed till they are approved, so yes someone could be working on a copy before the patent was issued BUT it would be a strange coincidence or industrial espionage. It would also be a bit of a waste since Zaxcoms prior art in their application would prevent you from getting a patent and put you in violation the minute theirs was granted.

Coping a patented mechanism (that is still under protection) is generally foolish unless you are a hit and run operation and are just planing to sell till sued and then folding. There are those but generally for things that are cheap to make. Mostly what happens is that your competitors pour over your application looking for a work around for the (usually small) part you actually have protection for. So what most filers do is keep applying for patents on different aspects and versions of a device. Zaxcom for instance has filed 12 patents related to the first one (that I could find) all on "improvements" or enhancements. A number were filed before the first was issued. So in this case there are up to 13 issued patents on this "system" and probably another six or so pending. If I'm going to produce something in the US in competition to a company that loves to sue it's kind of pointless unless there is a BIG $ in the wings. The cards are all on their side since you might well be infringing on something that is pending since you have no idea what that might be.

BTW winning a suit against a company is not a patent challenge. The 10% I was talking about is when company A challenges the validity of company B's patent, usually based on prior art. That happens in the patent office system not in the court system. And if I were Tascam and I really wanted to sell my product in the US that is what I would do. It's a lot cheaper, but a lot longer. Tascam and Deity, etc don't need to do that. THey learned from the DAT wars that weird US restrictions can be safely worked around by producing international editions. People buy those and bring them to the US. Mid late 1980's all the mini DAT recorders that friends had had come in the country from elsewhere because in the US only "professional" (ie $$$$) DAT decks could record/ play at 44.1k. If it wasn't for the virus I could drive over to Windsor and buy one and be back home in under an hour.

The part you highlighted is not a patentable structure, it's a concept or description of what that structure facilitates. The game for the patent holder is to describe the function as broadly as possible, detail a unique patentable structure, and try to start filing on the least significant bit first. File on all the tent pole structures and keep them pending as long as you can. Zaxcom ket the first application pending for five years. The rest have taken from three to five years. The last ones were filed in 2016 and issued in 2019, if they keep up the pattern they have four or five pending.

There is just not a big enough market to risk the US civil courts. You would have 12 people who probably have no clue about the technicalities who could award a HUGE amount of money. That is just not possible in other countries.

 

[Noiz2]

BTW related to this the "Patent Trial and Appeal Board" invalidated some of Zaxcoms patent claims on may May 26 2020. Zaxcom is of course appealing. Apparently Lectrosonics took the tack I mentioned and attacked the patent on merits and won, for now.

The Suit against TEAC, BTW was not "won", Zaxcom dropped it. The Quit Pro Quo apparently was that TEAC would not sell wireless with recorder in the US. Zaxcom wanted a big jury settlement, legal fees, court fees, and Tascam to hand over all of the devices for destruction. Their argument was the deep damages that the Tascam product had done to them. So bad in fact that they dropped the case when Tascam got out of Dodge...

 

[Run&Gun]

There's no reason why their patent should prevent a transmitter or recorder from having a pass-through that works all of the time. If I was Lectro, I would build transmitters with a pass-through and label it as a loop out to a second transmitter for redundancy(to my knowledge, no one is or has done that or patented that). Then tell Zaxcom to "come sue me Mother F*****'s and let's see how it plays in court and add the "looser pays" clause and see if they really wanna play for blood.

 

[Run&Gun]

BTW related to this the "Patent Trial and Appeal Board" invalidated some of Zaxcoms patent claims on may May 26 2020. Zaxcom is of course appealing. Apparently Lectrosonics took the tack I mentioned and attacked the patent on merits and won, for now.

The Suit against TEAC, BTW was not "won", Zaxcom dropped it. The Quit Pro Quo apparently was that TEAC would not sell wireless with recorder in the US. Zaxcom wanted a big jury settlement, legal fees, court fees, and Tascam to hand over all of the devices for destruction. Their argument was the deep damages that the Tascam product had done to them. So bad in fact that they dropped the case when Tascam got out of Dodge...

Glad to hear that. One of my sales reps had hinted around several years ago that Lectro was going after Zaxcom, because he said the "new" transmitters that have built-in recording capabilities were just a firmware update away from being able to transmit AND record simultaneously(currently they can only do one or the other, at least here in the US)(surprised someone never hacked the firmware to fully enable it, like with the Sony F5 4K debacle).

 

[Noiz2]

Here are two articles on this
https://www.ipwatchdog.com/2020/06/...winning-microphone-tech-heads-cafc/id=122079/
This one is on the firts decision to invalidate and this one is a defense of Zaxcom
https://www.ipwatchdog.com/2019/08/...-microphone-technology-invalidated/id=112135/

While the second guy may have a point about trials about technology with judges that don't understand it, I am solidly on the side that Zaxcom made overly broad claims of "originality" and has been overly aggressive to hinder competition. The irony is that Tascam was not a threat to Zaxcom. Nobody ready to pop a bunch of grand for a pice of high end professional gear is going to instead choose a hundred dollar consumer one. BUT Lectrosonics IS going to be a viable alternative for Zaxcom potential clients.

The second article really ignores the fact that Zaxcom has claimed and gone after anybody trying to add recording to a transmitter and that is just not a patentable thing.

The appeal according to the second article is set for October 25th. So you might be able to buy one of the Tascam or Deity units in the US by the end of the year?

 

[IronFilm]

Now that I think of it does seem odd someone hasn't come out with something sooner. Not sure why there would be a patent issue basically a recorder with wireless capability.

It is a silly patent that should never have been granted in the first place IMHO.

But it costs megabucks to dispute in court even a bad patent. Thus it is unlikely people will put in a real effort to get rid of it, as the patent is for such a super niche market (as let's admit it, working professional sound mixers is indeed a very very niche market) it will be hard to make your money back that you invested into lawyers even if you win the case against Zaxcom.

Anyway, it is much more likely this was simply a user error by @highdefvideo. Because:
1) @highdefvideo is using Sennheiser G2 wireless, which is very old! And even back in the day, barely prosumer. If this was a paying job where audio matters, then you should be using something better.
2) did he scan for clean RF beforehand?
3) the G2 is so old, what's the chances he was using an illegal frequency anyway? No wonder you're getting interference.

 

[IronFilm]

Well a couple of things that are not quite correct. First off patents are 18 years not 20, unless that just changed. Zaxcoms patent was for 18 years.

Zaxcom got their patent in 2010, thus we'll see some big big BIG changes in the wireless market happen in 2028! (wonder if the Lectronics SMWB/SMWDB will simply get a firmware update? Without Lectrosonics even needing to bring out a new product)

Will keep this in mind and not do any major new wireless investments in 2026/2017!

Have just done a massive big spend on many channels of Lectronics SRb/VRT/UCR411/SMV/SMQV/MM400/LMb/LT already anyway! So I'd be foolish to do it again before say 2024, as I need to get my money's worth out of them. And by that point in time I'm practically just about at 2026 anyway. Thus I reckon I'm sticking with these all the way through to 2028 now!