Subject: Nintendo glove and VPL

From: [email-masked] (George Bragg)
Date: Tue, 21 Jan 92 17:07:48 EST

Sorry about my last message...  I'm still learning this mailer.  :)
Anyway, here's what I meant to send out to the world.
I found it on the university's CD-ROM today, and thought it was kinda
relevant to this group.

 *****  Computer Select (LAN), Jan 1992 : Doc #2734  *****

Journal:   Newsbytes  Nov 25 1991
           * Full Text COPYRIGHT Newsbytes Inc. 1991.
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Title:     Nintendo Power Glove in virtual reality patent controversy.
Author:    Rohrbough, Linda.
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Descriptors..
Company:   VPL Research Inc. (Patents)
           Nintendo Company Ltd. (Patents).
Topic:     Patent
           Virtual Reality
           Legal Issues
           Cursor Control Devices.

Record#:   11 552 152.
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Full Text:

Nintendo Power Glove In Virtual Reality Patent Controversy 11/25/91 PASADENA,
CALIFORNIA, U.S.A., 1991 NOV 25 (NB) -- Controversy has sprung up in the
virtual reality (VR) world over the Nintendo Power Glove, a glove originally
designed by VPL and marketed by Nintendo for its video game system.  VR
software designers say that they would like to allow users to use their Power
Gloves with VR software applications, but VPL Research says no.

A glove as an input device is very attractive for virtual reality
applications because the user can make hand signals the computer can
interpret as commands, like pointing to go forward or a fist to pick up an
object in a virtual world.

Companies that also make VR software like Vream in Chicago or Age in New York
would like users to be able to purchase and use the Power Glove with their
applications, but are wary of VPL's backing and potential legal tangles.

Company sources told Newsbytes that VPL has told these software makers they
cannot use the Power Glove or even write software drivers for it.  It is a
matter of intellectual property in VPL's eyes.

One source told Newsbytes: "It's like buying a Jeep and being told you can
only drive it in the mountains, or like buying a car from Ford and then being
told you can only buy gas for it from Ford."

Newsbytes asked Jaron Lanier, chief executive officer of VPL about the issue
with the Power Glove and third parties writing software drivers for it at the
recent Cyberarts show in Pasadena, California.  He said: "I have to walk a
fine line between being cool

and committing commercial suicide -- so all I can say to ally your fears is,
'Don't worry about it'."

Besides its involvement with Nintendo on the Power Glove, VPL has announced
that it is adding four new gloves to its line of gloves for VR use.  The new
Dataglove Model 2+ is an enhanced version of the DG2, but is more durable.

Three new VPL tactile feedback gloves are being introduced this year - the
THX, TSR and, FBX.  Tactile feedback gloves allow the playback of the feel of
an object through force sensitive resistors

(FSR) that line their inner surface.  When an object is grasped, a
proportional pressure pattern of forces is generated over the FSR's.  That
pattern can be played back on the Dataglove, VPL claims.

(Linda Rohrbough/19911125/Press Contact: Jaron Lanier, VPL Research, Tel:
415-306-1150, Fax: 415-361-1845, Edward R. LaHood, Vream, Tel: 312-477-0425)

---

From: Gregory B. Newby <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 24 Jan 92 11:42:15 -0600

Jim, that's incredible!!!!   How can someone patent such a thing
as a gesture input with body-based output!  VPL is certainly
not the first to use this technology (from the extracts you
quoted, Kruger's VideoPlace seems to match the description
perfectly).

UGH.  So, is this patent for hardware/software/whatever, or
is it limited to certain hardware-software combinations?

If this is the case, I might have to see if the idea of moving
a mouse to control a screen cursor is patented - obviously, 
it could be, if the VPL patent is as you describe.  For
that matter, so could using a keyboard to make letters appear
on a screen (or typewriter carriage....).

Thanks for the input, but now I'm pissed!  I didn't catch the
niceties of the VPL patent when you brought it up last time
on this list.  I wonder if the U of I lawyers would care
to fight this one?  I'm in the midst of seeing if the local
ACM chapter would like to distribute the AGE converter box,
possibly with some associated software.

-- Greg