X/Z color demodulation.

[wa2ise]

Originally Posted by old_tv_nut

There absolutely were strong efforts to work around the RCA patents, coupled with court fights to make RCA unbundle their patent package - it did no good to find a work-around if you still had to pay for all the patents anyway. Zenith did not start producing color sets until the industry got more favorable license terms.

What they did do was invent their own patents that improved or made cheaper color TV sets, and after a while RCA, Zenith and others would cross license. Imagine something like a poker game where RCA would lay on the table a patent, Zenith would counter with one of their patents, and so on. "I'll license you if you license me..."

[old_tv_nut]

Originally Posted by wa2ise

What they did do was invent their own patents that improved or made cheaper color TV sets, and after a while RCA, Zenith and others would cross license. Imagine something like a poker game where RCA would lay on the table a patent, Zenith would counter with one of their patents, and so on. "I'll license you if you license me..."

Exactly - two companies would go to court, each with a stack of patents, and they would first argue which were irrelevant and would be thrown out of the contest, and then compare stacks to see who ended up with something that the other company had nothing to trade for.