Wow, he comes across as such an arsehole! I didn't realize he sued Disney for technology relating to Tangled also!
http://patentexaminer.org/2011/10/disney-sued-for-infringing-virtual-hair-raising-patent/ "The Westlake Village resident claims Disney “reverse engineered” his technology, tweaking it along the way to help bring to life animated characters in Toy Story 3, Up, Finding Nemo and some of its other blockbuster films of late. He declined to speculate on whether the company copied his technology. Given Disney’s size and scope, Alter says, the infringement “will create a multi million dollar hole in [his] income and will dilute his brand.” “It’s a giant corporation that’s made a lot of money with my ideas and is now going to put me out of business, essentially,” Alter told The Patent Examiner during a phone call." DAN On Sun, Apr 29, 2012 at 12:20 PM, Thomas Helzle <[email protected]> wrote: > > Poor guy that Joe Alter person. > I still have the dongle for the initial "Shave and a Haircut" for Lightwave on the shelf. > It never really worked properly and when Softimage bought into it, he showed all the Lightwave users who did the endless beta-testing of his broken code the highly raised middle finger, bragged about his 6-digit-sale, slapped some people verbally in the face as a good bye and was never seen again... > Since then I keep hearing weird stories about his patent and how he deals with it. > > Tragic in a way if you are pinned down by a patent like that instead of being able to go on with your life and come up with new cool ideas... > > Cheers, > > Tom > > > On 28 April 2012 19:15, Eric Turman <[email protected]> wrote: >> >> One could only hope that it will steer potential yeti customers to ICE hair solutions ;) >> >> >> On Sat, Apr 28, 2012 at 12:00 PM, Todd Akita <[email protected]> wrote: >>> >>> Wow I'm sure that's gonna steer all those potential Yeti customers right to Joe Alter. >>> >>> -T >>> >>> On Apr 28, 2012, at 12:45 PM, Luc-Eric Rousseau <[email protected]> wrote: >>> >>> > Industry gossip: Joe Alter has been on a patent warpath lately, and >>> > Yeti announced they can't be sold in the US >>> > http://peregrinelabs.com/2012/04/to-our-us-customers/ >>> > >>> > On Thu, Apr 12, 2012 at 7:17 AM, Raffaele Fragapane >>> > <[email protected]> wrote: >>> >> It's not really, but it isn't a standard grooming toolset either. It's a >>> >> hybrid approach of scope targeted graph managers that many companies in the >>> >> high end of the business have had excellent luck with, and it does hair and >>> >> grooming specific things (shaders, rendering partitioning and injection etc) >>> >> that something as general purposed as ice can't do. >>> >> >>> >> Again, it doesn't go against ICE nor shave. >>> >> It's a promising product to keep an eye on for the mid and small sized >>> >> studios >>> >> >>> >> On Apr 12, 2012 6:50 PM, "Andi Farhall" < [email protected]> >>> >> wrote: >>> >>> >>> >>> looks clunky to me, but then everything looks clunky compared to soft >>> >>> imho. >>> >>> >>> >>> Andi >>> >>> >>> >>> -----Original Message----- >>> >>> From: [email protected] >>> >>> [mailto:[email protected]] On Behalf Of Stefan >>> >>> Kubicek >>> >>> Sent: 11 April 2012 22:29 >>> >>> To: [email protected] >>> >>> Subject: Nodes galore II (not ICE) >>> >>> >>> >>> Just stumbled over this one, it looks like mbFeathers and Kristinka >>> >>> combined: http://peregrinelabs.com/yeti/ >>> >>> >>> >>> Not much to see in terms of videos or screenshots, but the price hints >>> >>> at quite a bit of self confidence there. >>> >>> >>> >>> Stefan >>> >>> >>> >> >>> >> >> >> >> -- >> >> >> >> >> -=T=- > >
