Microsoft’s Cynical Response to Google’s Patent Post - Timothy B. Lee - Disruptive Economics - Forbes:
Obviously, if Google bought patents in concert with Microsoft, Microsoft wouldn’t have to let Google use those patents to sue them. And they probably wouldn’t have let Google use them to sue other major tech companies, like Apple or Oracle, that are also trying to shake down Android. Microsoft knew perfectly well that Google wouldn’t join Microsoft’s bid and Smith is insulting our intelligence to suggest otherwise.
Patent Trolls Sitting Under The UX Bridge: How the U.S. patent system may affect your everyday UX work:
"The reality is that generic elements of digital interfaces or parts of websites are in fact owned by various corporate entities and some of these entities have no intention of commercializing them within their own products. Simple functions within UX design as basic as menu systems and “upgrade” buttons are patented. These patents cannot be freely used by the people who don’t own them. I am sure almost every UX designer has unknowingly infringed upon a U.S. patent."
Planet Money Continues To Show How Damaging Software Patents Are To Innovation | Techdirt:
"Of course, actually showing the specific costs is difficult, but Maskin and Bessen have a few different ways to show it. For example, Maskin talks about the research that shows an increase in patenting has not increased investment in R&D -- and, if anything, it's shown that investment in R&D has potentially been limited due to patents. They note that there's an overwhelming amount of evidence at this point that we would likely be seeing greater innovation 'if intellectual property were relaxed.' As he notes there are numerous 'natural experiments' that provide data to support this."
How NOT to try a patent case: Troll slain by Fed Circ:
The misdeeds of Eon-Net and its lawyer, according to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit, ranged from the bedrock violation of bringing the case in bad faith to litigation misconduct like routinely disposing of documents and presenting the court with misleading evidence. Eon-Net's principal, Mitchell Medina, had a wholly-contemptuous attitude toward litigation. According to the Federal Circuit ruling, Medina said his corporate-document retention policy, for instance, was simply not to retain documents. 'I don't save anything so I don't have to look,' he said.
Sci-Tech Today | Massive Intellectual-Property Attacks Linked To China:
The McAfee investigation is called Operation ShadyRAT, a reference to a remote -access tool used by hackers and experts to gain remote access to computer networks. Samani told the BBC that McAfee can trace where the traffic flow originated, and the objective, in many cases, seems to be intellectual-property theft.
Samsung eyes InterDigital patent portfolio for mobile technology | ZDNet:
Samsung is reportedly interested in acquiring InterDigital Inc.’s patent portfolio, which retains a catalog of patents related to mobile technologies used to transfer information.
However, Samsung isn’t the only one interested in making this deal. Both Apple and Google are potential bidders as well.
Lee Seung Woo, a Seoul-based analyst at Shinyoung Securities Co., told Bloomberg about just how serious this acquisition could be.
InterDigital has a lot of key patents. The fight between Apple and Samsung is getting serious, so if the assets go to Apple, it could be pretty risky for Samsung. To hedge the risk, Samsung could go ahead with bidding, although they may have to pay a big premium.
Google Should Publicly Oppose Software Patents - Timothy B. Lee - Disruptive Economics - Forbes:
"Google, whose Android operating system is currently on the business end of dozens of patent lawsuits, has a combative post accusing its competitors of ganging up on it with “bogus patents.” The company vows to fight back on multiple fronts:
We’re determined to preserve Android as a competitive choice for consumers, by stopping those who are trying to strangle it. We’re looking intensely at a number of ways to do that. We’re encouraged that the Department of Justice forced the group I mentioned earlier to license the former Novell patents on fair terms, and that it’s looking into whether Microsoft and Apple acquired the Nortel patents for anti-competitive means. We’re also looking at other ways to reduce the anti-competitive threats against Android by strengthening our own patent portfolio.
Conspicuously missing here is any mention of patent reform. Congress is currently working on a patent overhaul called the America Invents Act. Google is one of the world’s largest and most prominent victims of our innovation-taxing patent system, so lobbying for better patent laws seems like an obvious way to fight back."
iOS devs put out a call to unite against Lodsys, other patent trolls:
Move over Apple: some independent app developers plan to begin banding together to fight off lawsuits brought by Lodsys and its ilk on their own. On Monday, renowned iOS developer Mike Lee announced the Appsterdam Legal Defense Team, which will be made up of indie developers fighting patent trolls as a single unit and funded by contributions from participating companies. The goal, aside from the obvious one of being free from frivolous patent lawsuits, is to become 'the ants of East Texas, minding their business until someone invades their anthill.'
Verizon loses ActiveVideo patent suit, owes $115M — Online Video News:
Video-on-demand technology startup ActiveVideo was awarded $115 million by a jury in a patent infringement against Verizon on Tuesday. The decision comes a little more than a year after ActiveVideo took the telco to court over patents related to interactive TV and video-on-demand applications.
The patent infringement lawsuit was originally filed in May 2010 and involved four ActiveVideo patents:
- U.S. Patent No. 6,034,678, titled Cable Television System With Remote Interactive Processor
- U.S. Patent No. 5,550,578, titled Interactive And Conventional Television Information System
- U.S. Patent No. 6,100,883, titled Home Interface Controller for Providing Interactive Cable Television
- U.S. Patent No. 6,205,582, titled Interactive Cable Television System with Frame Server
