Patent Troll Asking For $5 Billion For Patents Google Doesn't Appear To Be Using
from the seems-a-bit-pricey dept
Earlier this week, we wrote about how Google was being sued by a company holding a patent on "least cost routing" technology for phone systems. We noted at the time that it seemed unlikely Google was infringing on those patents, seeing as Google Talk doesn't use the phone system, so there's no least cost routing to deal with just yet. However, the latest details are that the company is claiming $5 billion for this slight -- more than the (already ridiculous) price eBay paid for all of Skype. The patent holding firm in question also complains that Google is arrogant, which, as far as we know, is not an offense you can sue about.
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USPTO
"But obtaining a patent from the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office and getting a court to say the patent is enforceable are very different things."
It should be the job of the USPTO to ensure that patents are enforceable not the court. This is biggest problem I have with the patent system in the US: it grants patents that should have never been granted in the first place. But the patent defenders have no problem with this and why should they? Afterall, they stand to profit from these problems.
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No Subject Given
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Re: No Subject Given
+1 rep points for you, with an obvious tag (my 2 references for the evening)
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Re: No Subject Given
This is actually something now taught in my High School's Discrete Math class (took it in 11th grade even though you need to be in 12th, lucky move I guess, refer to page 33 of the WICSD HS Course Catalog for more info).
I quote that document: "Some of the topics studied include networking, telecommunications, computer design, cryptanalysis, robotics, operations research and social choice theory (group decisionmaking theory)."
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Re: No Subject Given
Ok, given my first experience on this site a week ago I probably shouldn;t even waste my time here, but I'm a glutten for punishment so I'm going to anyway.
Congrats on the fact that you are learning this stuff in highschool now. BUt the patents at issue were issued in 1996 and probably filed much earlier. I haven;t read everyones posts, but can anyone point to a reference prior to the filing date of the patent that teaches the claimed technology? Everything looks obious in hindisight.
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No Subject Given
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HP a victim of patent abuse?
Companies like HP and Microsoft are well known for stealing patented technology from little guys.
So who is greedy after all ?
Also, the real reason why they file 1000's of junk patents every year is to water down the patent quality, so they can still use their huge patent portfolio to supress competition at the expense of everybody else (e.g. startups with just few patents).
Those large companies (IBM,HP, etc.) are the real greedy bastards and the biggest patent trolls (ever heard about IBM tax ?)
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This is America!
woo hoo!
Google just needs to realize that and sue the patent troll back for being, well, a patent troll.
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Re: This is America!
How many Americans does it take to screw in a lightbulb?
Hey! We don't like that joke! WE'RE SUING!!!
I still don't think that google is infringing on anything. They don't offer the services that the company is suing about.
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No Subject Given
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Google arrogant???
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Re: Google arrogant???
That would actually be horrible. I hate IP law in general, but imagine if this WERE the case - the patent office would not be likely to get the massively increased funding it would need, patent examiners would still be overworked, underpayed and frankly not very expert (you going to have experts in every possible field working for the PTO?)
So while the volume of patents would decrease, there still would be plenty of room for stupid patents to slip through - only now they would have the legal standing of settled case law, meaning people harmed by bad patents would find it essentially impossible to do anything about it.
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wow
Is it obvious to anyone else that this company just wants money? Sueing is supposed to be about punishing the guilty (there is no guilty party here), not rewarding the "victim".
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Re: wow
Welcome to the world of patent trolls. Even I, a staunch defender of the U.S. Patent System, HATE these people with a passion.
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Re: wow
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Plaintiff = troll
How can you defend patent system and, at the same time, hate people who just defend their legal "right to exclude" ?
It looks to me that the good old word "inventor" gets nowdays substituted almost automatically with the mean "patent troll" each and every time some patent gets enforced in court.
Enough is enough. This "patent troll" talk is just a cheap BS coming from big corporate infringer's PR departments.
The only serious issue here is patent quality, but once a patent is found valid it MUST be enforced to be of any value.
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Re: Plaintiff = troll
I don't question any patentee's "right to exclude." There is a difference in my mind, however, between individuals who legitimately engage in research and development to advance a technology and those who read a lot of patent literature and file applications based on their "prediction" of what the next advancement in the art will be (the quintessential "patent troll" behavior). Is what these people do legally permissible? Certainly. Is what they do viable from a commercial perspective? Certainly? Is this thye type of behavior meant to be fostered by the patent system? Probably not.
Don't get me wrong, I am all for people exercising patent rights. I just personally find people who engage in troll-like behavior distasteful and a blight on an otherwise generally functional system.
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Re: Plaintiff = troll
I've heard a lot of people (usually non-creative types) claiming that Bell's patent was obvious, and Gould's patent was obvious, and, of course, the Wright's patent was utterly obvious to everybody...
Human nature never changes:
Jealousy and Envy deny the merit or the novelty of your invention; but Vanity, when the novelty and merit are established, claims it for its own... One would not therefore, of all faculties, or qualities of the mind, wish for a friend, or a child, that he should have that of invention. For his attempts to benefit mankind in that way, however well imagined, if they do not succeed, expose him, though very unjustly, to general ridicule and contempt; and if they do succeed, to envy, robbery, and abuse.
-Ben Franklin, 1755
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Re: Plaintiff = troll
I agree 100%
"I've heard a lot of people (usually non-creative types) claiming that Bell's patent was obvious, and Gould's patent was obvious, and, of course, the Wright's patent was utterly obvious to everybody..."
Well, I'm not a "creative type," but I am a scientific type, and I've worked in the patent field for many years. There is a legit argument that Bell's patent was anticipated or obvious in view of another inventors (earlier) work. As for wright, I don't know. Lots of stuff re: flying had been tried at the time they made their plane (i.e. Davinci's glider model), but none of them actually worked.
Nice quote by the way :)
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Google is a CIA front
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