No IPIX!

The Interactive Pictures Corporation (IPIX) is trying to obtain a monopoly on immersive VR development through a patent that covers slight variations on pre-existing technology.

Helmut Dersch is the author of a suite of free Photoshop and Gimp plug-ins (Panorama Tools) that provide some very powerful tools for editing panoramic VR content, primarily in QuickTime VR format. They have been an extremely viable alternative to very expensive proprietary tools.

As a result, the Interactive Pictures Corporation, maker of a proprietary spherical VR system, is trying to stop him. IPIX has taken out various patents and other protections on their "spherical VR" system that excludes the development of similar technologies. Unfortunately, the technology is nearly indistinguishable from certain types of "cylindrical VR" technology (QuickTime VR shot with extremely wide-angle lenses, for example - they claim any panorama shot with an 8mm lens infringes on their patent.) There are some spherical VR developments that predate the Interactive Pictures Corporation (Ned Greene's 1986 paper, for example - 5 years before IPIX precursor, Telerobotics, received their patent, for example.) There is also a possibility that IPIX stole their initial implementation of the technology from another developer. IPIX threatened legal action against Prof. Dersch for alleged copyright violations.

Recent threads on Apple's QuickTime Developer List have brought to light various other unsavory practices on the part of IPIX. For example, careful perusal of the IPIX license agreement reveals clauses that prohibit its use by and for competitors of its business partners (Discovery Communications, which includes Disney, Turner Broadcasting, National Geographic, and the TerraQuest web site.) It also prohibits the production of images of apartment units until the year 2001.

Recently, the Interactive Pictures Corporation has become aggressively litigious, successfully pursuing cases against Infinite Pictures, Live Picture and other VR companies for patent infringement. It appears that either the IPIX patents should never have been granted or that the Interactive Pictures Corporation is succeeding in having them interpreted in an overly broad manner.

IPIX technology was used recently in a VR walkthrough of Anakin's house on the Starwars.com website and is in use by several other major entertainment media organizations. IPIX recently completed another ($28M US) round of investment funding (press release removed by IPIX c. 3/2000.) New investors include Liberty Media (TCI Cable Company Spinoff,) General Electric (US) Equity, American Express Travel Related Services, Motorola, Cendant, JP Morgan, Invision, and Stephens Capital.

The Interactive Pictures Corporation is currently preparing for an IPO. Potential investors should be advised that the Interactive Pictures Corporation has already alienated much of the VR developer community (its customer base) and, consequently, shows little chance of showing acceptable returns.

Evermore Enterprises does not condone the Interactive Pictures Corporation's abuse of intellectual property laws, the legal system, the VR community, or consumers. We will not support the Interactive Pictures Corporation, its format, or its investors and will actively discourage others from doing so.

Ned Greene, Environment Mapping and Other Applications of World Projections, in IEEE Computer Graphics and Applications, November 1986, vol. 6, no. 11, pp. 21-29.