The final section of this nineteen-section historical sequence reaches the formal litigation document in which Richard Baker set out his asserted patent claims and preliminary infringement contentions against the accused defendants and products.
The Plaintiff's Disclosure of Asserted Claims and Preliminary Infringement Contentions, filed 8 February 2016, is preserved as a primary litigation record. Rather than reconstructing the case from later commentary, FINALSTEP uses the original filing to show the position actually advanced by the plaintiff at that stage of Baker v. Microsoft et al.
Patent infringement contentions identify the claims being asserted and explain how the plaintiff contends that accused products or systems satisfy the limitations of those claims. They provide a structured statement of the infringement theory during the litigation process.
For FINALSTEP, the document is especially important because it brings together subjects that appear separately throughout the earlier historical record: the patent claims, later sensing technology, commercial products, technical evidence and the legal theories relied upon by Baker.
The filing identifies the patent claims Baker asserted in the litigation. Those claims, rather than the broader historical description of the invention used throughout FINALSTEP, define the legal framework for the infringement contentions.
This distinction is essential. The historical archive may explain the invention as an adaptive personalised instructional architecture, but patent infringement requires analysis of the actual limitations of the asserted claims.
The infringement contentions identify the defendants and accused commercial products that Baker contended infringed the asserted patent rights. The filing and its supporting charts remain the authoritative archive source for that complete identification.
Earlier sections introduce representative Kinect-era products and companies so the historical development can be understood. Section 19 does not replace the original filing with a newly constructed list. This avoids changing, expanding or narrowing the allegations that were actually made in the case.
The supporting infringement charts compare asserted claim limitations with features Baker identified in the accused products. These charts are important because they show the detailed basis upon which the infringement allegations were made.
The charts should be examined alongside the supporting technical documents, product demonstrations, patent material and other evidence cited within the litigation record. Their function is more specific than the general functional comparisons used on earlier FINALSTEP pages.
The infringement contentions preserve the legal theories Baker relied upon when comparing the accused systems with the asserted patent claims. Those theories included arguments concerning literal claim coverage and, where applicable, the Doctrine of Equivalents.
The legal background to the Doctrine of Equivalents, prosecution-history estoppel and After-Arising Technology is preserved separately in Section 15. Section 19 is where those concepts become part of the formal litigation position.
A recurring part of Baker's position was that later-developed sensing and computing technology should not automatically avoid comparison with an earlier patented system merely because the later implementation used technology unavailable or impractical when the patent was originally developed.
That position connected the litigation directly with the technology history preserved in Sections 8, 9 and 17. The earlier record documents the architecture and the limitations of contemporary hardware; the later record documents the development of processors, graphics, communications and sensing technologies capable of implementing increasingly sophisticated interactive systems.
Whether that legal position succeeded is determined by the court record. Its importance here is that it formed part of the plaintiff's explanation for why later Kinect-era implementations were considered relevant to the earlier patent rights.
The videos preserved in Section 13 and the product material discussed in Sections 17 and 18 help readers understand the accused technology visually. The infringement contentions perform a different function: they identify how Baker contended that specific product features corresponded with specific patent claim limitations.
FINALSTEP therefore maintains the following separation:
The infringement contentions represent the plaintiff's side of a contested patent case. The defendants disputed Baker's allegations and advanced their own positions concerning infringement, claim scope and other legal issues.
For that reason, FINALSTEP does not present the February 2016 contentions as a neutral technical finding. They are preserved as an important primary litigation document within a larger court record containing arguments and decisions from both sides.
The litigation subsequently proceeded through the United States District Court and later the United States Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit. The complete procedural history, motions, orders, summary-judgment record and appeal material are preserved separately within the FINALSTEP court archive.
Those later court documents establish the legal outcome of the case. Section 19 has a narrower purpose: to preserve the infringement case Baker placed before the court and to connect that formal filing with the historical and technical record developed throughout Sections 1 through 18.
Sections 1 through 19 form a continuous documentary history. They begin with the conception of computer-assisted personalised instruction using camera/video capture of current performance, follow the early patent record, technical investigation, commercial outreach, academic development and later U.S. patent work, and then document the technological changes that made increasingly sophisticated implementations possible.
The sequence then moves through Microsoft patent prosecution, notice records, Project Natal and Kinect demonstrations, commercial success, the legal framework considered by Baker, the Kinect rollout, depth-sensing technology, accused commercial implementations and finally the formal infringement contentions.
The purpose of FINALSTEP is not to erase the distinction between historical evidence, personal interpretation and legal outcome. Its purpose is to preserve those materials in an organised form so that the development of the technology and the later dispute can be examined from the surviving record.
The following selected files are preserved as primary sources for Richard Baker's formal infringement position and the subsequent litigation record. The infringement contentions should be consulted directly for the asserted claims, accused defendants and products, claim charts, supporting material and legal theories actually advanced at that stage of the litigation.
Archive note: The infringement contentions record allegations advanced by the plaintiff in contested litigation. Their inclusion establishes what was alleged and how the position was presented; it does not convert those allegations into adjudicated findings.