Apple ceasing sales of Apple Watch 9/Ultra 2

I guess the argument is less of whether the term “poaching” is used in this context, which it inarguably is, but rather if it should have been adopted as it is indeed very anti-employee. And I agree with that. Which is why I’m also glad that California law restricts companies from using clauses designed to stop the practice and it should be noted Apple used such clauses and people have used the term to describe employees who left Apple to other companies. So I hope if it comes up in future, if we are going to push back against the use of the term poaching in this case, then we should push back against its use in all such cases.
 
Last edited:
The word "poaching" goes back decades (at least in silicon valley when I was working). And can have a wide range of meanings.

At one end, it can mean targeting specific engineers/scientists (generally friends also working in SV) with specialized knowledge/skills/track-record and specific areas of expertise with the goal of building up a group or laboratory wanting to better compete in particular areas of interest (say, high speed signal acquisition/processing). To simply acquiring talented/experienced well-rounded engineers from other companies to staff up a lab for general projects that come in through the process of writing proposals and winning contracts.

"Poaching," depending how it's used, can have a nefarious connotation. But often that's not the case.
 
The word "poaching" goes back decades (at least in silicon valley when I was working). And can have a wide range of meanings.

At one end, it can mean targeting specific engineers/scientists (generally friends also working in SV) with specialized knowledge/skills/track-record and specific areas of expertise with the goal of building up a group or laboratory wanting to better compete in particular areas of interest (say, high speed signal acquisition/processing). To simply acquiring talented/experienced well-rounded engineers from other companies to staff up a lab for general projects that come in through the process of writing proposals and winning contracts.

"Poaching," depending how it's used, can have a nefarious connotation. But often that's not the case.
I like poached eggs.
 
Apple appealing and asking for a stay:


Tough to know their chances without diving in, but their argument about the prior art (which is provided in this document only in summary) seems promising to me, if true. (They are arguing that the ITC judge dismissed the prior art because it wasn’t related to wrist-based measurements, despite the fact that the claims of the asserted patents don’t require wrist-based measurements. In patent law, a patent claim can be found invalid if the prior art teaches all the limitations of the claim. The accused products are irrelevant to a prior art analysis. So if the claims really don’t say anything about wrists, and if the judge really dismissed the prior art because it didn’t mention wrists, that does seem suspicious).
 
The only one engaging in the practice of using sensationalism to drive a narrative (like equating the term "poaching" to human trafficking: "kidnapping Masimo employees or stealing their property, and making them their own")—is you. From everything thing I've seen, you're more interested in game-playing and trolling than engaging in honest discourse.

Absolutely stop. Poaching is absolutely used as a pejorative. Stop accusing people of coming here to troll. I was also accused of this, and then I wrote one of the longest messages on this website after someone accused me of that. Just because he or she disagrees with you doesn’t mean he or she is trolling. I hold the same viewpoint as them, and yes poaching has been used to describe employers hiring one another’s employees before, but he or she is right in describing it as a pejorative. It is too widely misused as a term to describe innocuous behavior. Simply hiring another’s employee is not poaching, yet tech blogs and sites always use it because it’s sensational. I’m not trying to be rude here and I’m sorry, but I feel like i understood the point they were trying to make and I just wanted to voice my own opinion.
 
Last edited:
What's your basis for saying this, i.e., that Masimo's suit has no merit? I don't know who's right or wrong here, but there is a history:


"This particular story started about 10 years ago when Apple reached out to Masimo about a potential partnership around blood oxygen features on its wearables. Soon after, Apple reportedly poached several Masimo engineers and its chief medical officer. And then in fall 2020, Apple released the Apple Watch Series 6 — its first Apple Watch to feature an SpO2 sensor to measure blood oxygen saturation levels."


Here is one source and a summary of the situation.
 
Masimo's total capitalization $6.7B

Apple's free cash - $68B.

Why is this a problem? Apple could simply take over Masimo, get the patent and then dump it if they chose.
 
Masimo's total capitalization $6.7B

Apple's free cash - $68B.

Why is this a problem? Apple could simply take over Masimo, get the patent and then dump it if they chose.
Putting aside that price tag is many multiples of the NeXT acquisition… which brought a lot more to the table than Masimo’s patents ever would to say the least lol:

Because the patent board invalidated 15 out of Masimo’s 17 patents related to this case. Apple licenses fair technology, like Amazon’s one click purchasing patent. Apple is prudent in knowing when something is worth something and when something isn‘t.
 
As far as I’m concerned, and the more I look into them, Masimo seems to me to be a patent squatter. Furthermore, it would seem that the patent in question—the patent they’re attempting to leverage against Apple—should be invalidated due to prior art. Though admittedly, I haven’t looked into it too deeply. Where’s Masimo’s shipping product utilizing said patent?
 
As far as I’m concerned, and the more I look into them, Masimo seems to me to be a patent squatter. Furthermore, it would seem that the patent in question—the patent they’re attempting to leverage against Apple—should be invalidated due to prior art. Though admittedly, I haven’t looked into it too deeply. Where’s Masimo’s shipping product utilizing said patent?

Masimo ships products.
 
Alright, let me rephrase that… Where can I buy Masimo-developed mass market consumer based products a la Apple? Maybe they’re big in Medtech, but where’s their in/house developed, non-rebranded consumer gear? And they recently expanded into the consumer *audio* industry via acquisition of Sound United to leverage HEOS to create a home health hub?? We’re to trust this to be dead secure protecting personal user medical data? Yeah, OK. Sounds like a disaster in the making. They just don’t seem to have the engineering chops (let alone vision) to pull that off. That acquisition to my mind was a pure patent grab that they’ll likely attempt to leverage in the future. They should have partnered with Apple when the offer was made.
 
Absolutely stop. Poaching is absolutely used as a pejorative. Stop accusing people of coming here to troll. I was also accused of this, and then I wrote one of the longest messages on this website after someone accused me of that. Just because he or she disagrees with you doesn’t mean he or she is trolling. I hold the same viewpoint as them, and yes poaching has been used to describe employers hiring one another’s employees before, but he or she is right in describing it as a pejorative. It is too widely misused as a term to describe innocuous behavior. Simply hiring another’s employee is not poaching, yet tech blogs and sites always use it because it’s sensational. I’m not trying to be rude here and I’m sorry, but I feel like i understood the point they were trying to make and I just wanted to voice my own opinion.
I thought this was settled, but you're stirring the pot again. So no, you're the one who needs to stop:

1) Facts matter and I NEVER, NOT ONCE, argued that the term poaching wasn't pejorative. As you are perfectly capable of seeing from my posts, that was never my argument. So please stop misrepresenting that as though it was. You appear to be engaging in a classically unfair argumentative technique known as a straw man:

1703738982706.png

Source: https://languages.oup.com/google-dictionary-en/

Instead, these are the arguments I made about "poaching" (and they weren't directed against you): (A) It makes no sense to insist the term doesn't exist or has no meaning, when it does. I even cited two articles from the Harvard Business Review that used it. (B) It's absurd and sensationalistic to say the term actually means "kidnapping Masimo employees or stealing their property, and making them their own", since that's essentially a description of human trafficking.

I can see that, for some, this is a charged term. But just because someone finds it charged doesn't mean they can assert it doesn't exist or is meaningless. And just because someone finds it charged doesn't mean they can equate it to human trafficking.

2) Not only are you misrepresenting my argument, but with your statement "Stop accusing people of coming here to troll", you're misrepresenting me, as if this is some sort of ongoing behavior in which I engage here. Facts matter, and I have 547 posts on this site, including numerous posts in which I've expressed a different view, and that is the ONLY ONE in which I've accused someone of trolling. That should tell you something. The reason I accused the one poster of trolling isn't because he disagreed with me. It's because he made such an outrageous argument in response to my post (see "B", above), which is what trolls do.

3) As I made clear from the beginning, I don't have a dog in this Apple vs. Masimo fight. I took pains to say, in my first post to you, "I don't know who's right or wrong here". But you clearly do have an axe to grind. Quoting from your first and second posts: "Utterly disgusting behavior from that Masimo" and "again, screw Masimo". Isn't it hypocritical to complain about pejorative terms, when you feel free to use phrases like that? You know, glass houses and all?
 
Last edited:
I thought this was settled, but you're stirring the pot again. So no, you're the one who needs to stop:
Note: When I quoted the post and it saved into my quote thing, it was before parts of your stuff was edited. It doesn’t look too different to me, so I’ll keep my quotes I have from the old post, but I wanted to specifically say this to be fair and so it doesn’t look like I’m trying to misrepresent what you wrote.



WHAT was settled? Nothing was “settled.” There is nothing to settle.
You assumed that after your post, because you believe your opinion to be right, that disproved his or her point.

1) Facts matter and I NEVER, NOT ONCE, argued that the term poaching wasn't pejorative. As you are perfectly capable of seeing from my posts, that was never my argument.
The guy or girl was claiming that poaching is an intentionally charged term.
He or she wrote, and I’m quoting only ONE of their posts for brevity and conciseness, “Poaching is scary and charged term. That’s why it’s being used. Nothing more. You can’t poach an employee. Period. Full stop.

To which you replied, which I’ve edited for brevity and conciseness again, “Yet another dishonest argument. First you deliberately redefine employment poaching in a way that no one but you uses. … The only one engaging in the practice of using sensationalism to drive a narrative (like equating the term "poaching" to human trafficking: "kidnapping Masimo employees or stealing their property, and making them their own")—is you.

Poaching is a term referred to illegal behavior towards animals. It’s a deliberately sensational term used by blogs to imply something. I’ve always disagreed with it. It irritated me from the moment I first ever saw it being used in a blog article.

I voiced my opinion that I agree with him or her on this. I disagreed that you called them a troll for having an opinion.


So please stop misrepresenting that as though it was. You appear to be engaging in a classically unfair argumentative technique known as a straw man:

View attachment 27774
Source: https://languages.oup.com/google-dictionary-en/
I am fully aware of base fallacies. Thanks for giving me a definition.

Instead, these are the arguments I made about "poaching" (and they weren't directed against you):
I am aware they weren’t and that you weren’t coming after me with this poaching conversation. I appreciate you saying that nonetheless. I just want to say I know and I was not under the impression.

I only took the troll accusation personally because someone said the same shit to me recently.

(A) It makes no sense to insist the term doesn't exist, when it does.I even cited two articles from the Harvard Business Review that used it

I said in my reply to your comment, “yes poaching has been used to describe employers hiring one another’s employees before, but he or she is right in describing it as a pejorative.”

(B) It's absurd and sensationalistic to say the term actually means "kidnapping Masimo employees or stealing their property, and making them their own", since that's essentially a description of human trafficking.

This is what I’m referring to. He or she was describing why it’s a shit term to use, though it’s associated with the forbidden taking/killing of animals from the wild, technically. Blogs that haphazardly use it to describe an employee just merely hiring another employee with better pay/benefits are ridiculous. It’s not sensationalistic to use a definition to explain why he or she believes that term shouldn’t be used to describe a behavior that ISN’T that.

I can see that, for some, this is a charged term.
It’s a charged term period. The actual use of the word is defined by Oxford Dictionaries as “To catch and carry off (game or fish) illegally; to capture by illicit or ‘underhand’ methods such as a poacher uses.” I refuse to acknowledge their existence generally, but for the sake of an example, recently with Donald Trump Jr., this term describes, as reported by ProPublica, “Donald Trump Jr. Went to Mongolia, Got Special Treatment From the Government and Killed an Endangered Sheep.”

But just because someone finds it charged doesn't mean they can assert it doesn't exist.
Again, in my reply I said to you: “yes poaching has been used to describe employers hiring one another’s employees before, but he or she is right in describing it as a pejorative.”

And just because someone finds it charged doesn't mean they can equate it to human trafficking.
Again, as I stated in this reply:
“He or she was describing why it’s a shit term to use, it’s associated with the forbidden taking/killing of animals from the wild, technically. Blogs that haphazardly use it to describe an employee just merely hiring another employee with better pay/benefits are ridiculous. It’s not sensationalistic to use a definition to explain why he or she believes that term shouldn’t be used to describe a behavior that ISN’T that.”

2) Not only are you misrepresenting my argument, but with your statement "Stop accusing people of coming here to troll", you're misrepresenting me, as if this is some sort of ongoing behavior in which I engage here. Facts matter, and I have 547 posts on this site, including numerous posts in which I've expressed a different view, and that is the ONLY ONE in which I've accused someone of trolling. That should tell you something. The reason I accused the one poster of trolling isn't because he disagreed with me.
Yeah, one thing you are right in this is that I should have instead said, “don’t accuse them of coming here to troll.” And then proceeded with the rest of my argument. That was not my intention, and I did not word it properly.

It’s because he made such an outrageous argument in response to my post (see "B", above), which is what trolls do.
He or she isn’t a troll. I’ve described why in this reply.

3) As I said from the beginning, I don't have a dog in this fight. I took pains to say, in my first post, that I don't know who is right or wrong when it comes to this dispute.
The courts have, thus far, invalidated 15 out of 17 patents Masimo used to ban the sale of certain Apple Watch models. 6 out of 7 jurors sided with Apple. Those are the facts. I linked an Anandtech article that does a more detailed job of explaining stuff than me.

But you clearly do have an axe to grind. Quoting the first sentence of your first post: "Utterly disgusting behavior from that Masimo." Isn't it hypocritical to complain about pejorative terms, when you feel free to use a phrase like that? You know, glass houses and all?

It is disgusting behavior from Masimo.

Their patents are broad and invalid, and despite not even being in the same market as Apple Watch and other companies/products similar, they go after companies with their patents with the intention of extorting money for licensing, otherwise they threaten them with lawsuits.

Also it should be noted that Masimo buys a bunch of companies irrelevant to being a “pure medical company” as I’ve seen some people try to argue. Example: they bought out major audio companies like Bowers & Wilkins, Denon, Marantz, Polk Audio, Definitive Technology, Classé, HEOS, and Boston Acoustics and own all of their technologies and patents.

There is a reason Masimo’s CEO was not exactly happy about the sales ban. Not only has Masimo’s supposed IP practically vanished into thin air upon review, now they will be responsible for any missed sales of Apple Watch during a sales ban upon appeal and reversal. This was not the outcome Masimo actually wanted. They tried to extort Apple for licensing on invalid patents, and Apple called their bluff, because Apple knew Masimo did not have jack shit.

Believe what one wants about Apple, but they aren’t dumb. They are capable of knowing when something has worth and when something doesn’t, and they absolutely license or straight-up buy out fair technology that they don’t come up with themselves and need for their vision.


Yeah, of course I take this bullshit personally; because I am not only an Apple fan, but a human being. Everyone can take it personally.

The product in the sales ban is not iPad or Mac or iPhone or AirPods, it is Apple Watch.
Apple Watch has saved numerous people’s lives of all ages. It is a health and wellness device that can help you detect and prevent bad health events from occurring by early notification of bodily function aberrations. Combine these advanced health sensors with advanced connectivity and motion sensors, it is the Apple product designed specifically with the intention of truly changing someone’s life: saving their life.

It’s one thing for a patent dispute and if those patents were valid and if Apple actually infringed upon that technology, and even if all of that were the case, I’d argue a sales ban is inappropriate and the ITC can arrange other payment upon request by Masimo. But that’s not what this is and what happened

Masimo is not even in the same consumer space as Apple and others. But further than that, not only are the Masimo patents in question not even valid, they are from a company that goes after numerous companies, including startups, with the intention of using these overly broad patents to extort money, even if it’s not in the same industry space. And all of this towards products that are designed to and have saved numerous people’s lives.
All of this in the context of a fucking pandemic of an airborne vascular degenerative disease that continues to ravage the planet. It’s disgusting to me.

Filing overly broad stuff they know isn’t legit, using it to extort money from companies small and large, alongside buying out companies completely irrelevant to their being “medical company,” and going on a bullshit PR tour not explaining any of this and directly lying to people, is not the mark of a team who gives a shit about people’s health. Masimo gives a shit about its profits, not helping and saving people’s lives.

So yes, I do take it personally. And everyone can and I believe should upon learning more about the situation. It’s not fair to Apple, but beyond that and way more importantly, it will literally cause net harm to many people’s lives by preventing access to a product like this. I constantly read articles about how Apple Watch has saved someone’s life, of any and all ages. Even if all the cards were in their favor, Masimo is being a piece of shit — that the cards aren’t in Masimo’s favor, it makes their bullshit even more heinous.

I hope that explains more and makes it understandable about why I said what I said about Masimo in the beginning.
 
Last edited:
The courts have, thus far, invalidated 15 out of 17 patents Masimo used to ban the sale of certain Apple Watch models.

Not sure what the point is here. That leaves 2 patents that, so far, have survived invalidity attacks. Should you be allowed to infringe somebody’s patent as long as their other patents are found invalid?
 
Not sure what the point is here. That leaves 2 patents that, so far, have survived invalidity attacks. Should you be allowed to infringe somebody’s patent as long as their other patents are found invalid?
The point is multifold:
first, since Masimo wanted Apple to license its patents, Apple should be only paying for fair patents. Why should they be paying for 15 patents that aren’t valid?

Second, the point I was trying to make was that Masimo is going after Apple and causing a sales ban with nearly a majority of patents that are invalid. That’s kind of bullshit. The only reason it’s going through to a sales ban is because Masimo complained to the ITC. and the situation is worse given what product is actually banned, as I stated in my reply.

Third, I stated it to also provide evidence for my claims. Also Masimo doesn’t just go after Apple. They’ve gone after many companies unfairly. So that Masimo is going after companies with a supposed litany of patents that aren’t even valid seems bullshit to me. You and I have both stated “thus far” and “so far,” of course it’s also possible all 17 patents become invalid. But it’s not exactly like only 1 or 2 patents are invalid and Apple is the big bad monster that infringed on 17 patents. A sales ban of a device, which includes hundreds of features one of which being blood oxygen, based on only 2 valid patents seems like a really big overreach to me. That’s my opinion. Masimo is going to have to pay up if the ban is overturned permanently.

People, including and especially Masimo with their PR tour, keep commenting that Apple is stealing stuff and using those 17 patents as proof. Given that, again thus far, nearly all of them have now become invalidated upon review, it puts the whole situation into some real perspective. Someone here floated buying out Masimo for $7 billion dollars theoretically and being done with it. That would’ve been a tremendous waste of money, then. Let Apple be Apple and pay for what is fair technology. They do that regularly, either buying out small companies or patents. That a company is trying to extort money doesn’t mean Apple is what that company is trying to make them out to be.

Again, all with a device that’s supposed to save lives. Apple Watch, not an iPad or Mac.
 
A sales ban of a device, which includes hundreds of features one of which being blood oxygen, based on only 2 valid patents seems like a really big overreach to me.
Precisely. And if the patents are eventually invalid because of prior art… Well.
That a company is trying to extort money doesn’t mean Apple is what that company is trying to make them out to be.
Also true.

It’s funny, when Apple was the small fry looking to collect more than fair and reasonable licensing fees for their tech (e.g., Firewire among others), it was always too much to ask. How dare that annoying little pipsqueak, who is about to go out of business any day now! Now when they are quite literally the largest of them all, they’re made out to be monsters. The moral of the story here is that Masimo should have cut some sort of deal with Apple. It was in Masimo’s best interest to make that happen. And who knows what other blood O2 tech is in the pipeline…
 
Last edited:
Back
Top