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Comment by Steko | Hacker News Reader

"anti-Google", "disingenuous", "deep dishonesty", "willfully dishonest". "very twisted", "oblivious", "shill", "clown"

The Engadgetization of HN comments is nearly complete. Get off your high horses, Gruber is exactly right that this screed by Google's counsel is incredibly hypocritical.

Regardless of what you think about patents, Google, Apple, etc. the following argument is total bullshit:

Group A has a right to bid on X. Group B is an evil cartel for bidding on X.

Regardless of what you think about patents, Google, Apple, etc. the following argument is total bullshit:

Group A bids 4 billion. Group B bids 4.5 billion. Group B is paying way beyond what they are really worth! Group B has inflated the value of patents! Group B has created a patent bubble!

Gruber's conclusion is spot on:

"No one other than Nathan Myhrvold and his cronies sees the U.S. patent system as functioning properly, but Google’s hypocrisy here is absurd."

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That argument seems completely fine to me. If you have more funds then you can block a competitor from competing by buying up all the resources. Another example of this is cellular providers in Canada. New spectrum opened up, but somehow the established duopoly managed to by all the new spectrum in Quebec leaving none for the incumbent providers. They are not even using the spectrum, but effectively locked competitors out of the market.

Regarding Gruber, your argument may have merit if it wasn't the case that Gruber never publishes anything seriously negative about Apple, and also never says much good about competitors. Sadly, I knew the article was going to be a negative piece about google the minute I saw it was by Gruber.

People are simply calling it as they see it. There is no real favorite here between Apple and Google that I've ever seen.

Gruber is fairly critical of Apple at times but generally takes a "I wish Apple would do X but I understand why they're doing Y (or ~X)" position when he does so.

Apple's a company that hasn't missed that often or that big recently though so it's hard for me to judge where he should have gone hugely negative on them in your view.

MobileMe was a nearly complete failure. The original Apple TV was not a strong product at all. The new iCal and Contacts in Lion are a huge design failure. Their server line was pretty much a failure too.

Those are Apple's biggest failures in recent times. Looking at Gruber's blog archives, I don't think it's a much of a stretch to say that he's a biased writer.

MobileMe was a modest money maker and ok reviewed product. if you grade on a curve, I guess that's a "complete failure" next to Apple's core products.

The original Apple TV was always seen as a hobby, just as the new, more successful one is. They still sold what 6-7 million of them, made a bundle of money. Compare to Google TV 1.0 it was a roaring success.

Cant vouch for iCal and Contacts in Lion but reviews overall are positive. You seem to be reaching here.

The server line was another well reviewed product and modest money maker.

You seem overall to be grading everything on a huge curve as if anything short of a home run is a massive failure.

People are simply calling it as they see it.

So is Gruber.

Isn't your comment and Gruber's entire premise ignoring empirical evidence of how Google and (basically everyone else) uses their patents? I don't see Google rushing to make a cut from iPhone sales, and I don't see Google making more off of WP7 sales than Android sales. (Much the way Apple is wanting to make some ridiculous amount for each of Samsung's sales and the fact that Microsoft gets more revenue from Android licensing than WP7).

You're right.

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