Judge Bars Sale Of Microsoft Word For Patent Infringement (Though It Won't Stick)
from the nice-work dept
Just last week, plenty of tech publications were up in arms over the news that Microsoft had apparently secured a patent on XML word processing documents (patent 7,571,169). Of course, when you live by software patents, expect to die by software patents... as a judge (in East Texas of course) has now issued an injunction against Microsoft, barring the sale of Microsoft Word because it infringes on a patent that involves (you guessed it) XML word processing documents.The judgment against Microsoft in this case actually isn't new. We wrote about it and the $200 million judgment back in May, noting how insane it was that the company holding the patent, i4i, felt that it deserved $98 for every copy of Microsoft Word ever sold. For what? Its patent, 5,787,449, is about XML editing of a word processed document. How that could be worth $98 per copy of Word is beyond me. Actually, how it's patentable at all is beyond me... but that's another story.
Of course, there's about 0% probability that this will actually stop the sales of Word, but it's ridiculous for Judge Leonard Davis to issue this injunction in the first place. As he well knows, the Supreme Court ruled in the MercExchange case that injunctions often don't make sense in patent infringement cases. In that case, the Supreme Court says that a judge should weigh a variety of factors in determining if an injunction is reasonable. From the actual injunction, there's no evidence at all that the judge weighed anything at all. However, he gave Microsoft 60 days to comply, which is ample time for Microsoft to appeal the injunction, and in such cases it's quite common for the appeals court to stay the injunction.
But, honestly, the whole thing shows (yet again) how screwed up the patent system has become. The fact that a judge would ban all sales of Microsoft Word because it can edit an XML document? And that's on top of a $200 million award for infringing on this patent? How can anyone think that's a sane outcome?
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Filed Under: east texas, injunction, patents, xml
Companies: i4i, microsoft
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Re:
Sure, there's an offchance that Microsoft's lawyers sat around and drooled for the whole case, but I'm pretty damn sure that they'd want to have pointed out that this guy can't actually patent the concept of editing a file format that someone else invented...
Or can he? Is the system really that bad?
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Re: Re:
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Couldn't care less
I would not put this under the b category, but it defiantly a.
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None of this makes sense
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Company A makes a product that infringes the patent of Company B. Company B gets a ruling, which company A ignores. What is the next step?
The next step is clearly to get the sales of the product stopped, as they are infringing and unlicensed.
WHile you may or may not like the patent(s) in question in this scenerio, the reality is they company is doing what they are suppose to do.
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Re:
Company A makes a product that infringes the patent of Company B. Company B gets a ruling, which company A ignores. What is the next step?
Um. Microsoft did not "ignore the ruling." So not sure where that came from.
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Ha
I can't wait for the next case which involves a company named tooth4tooth.
Oh and btw, can I still use vi to edit xml ?
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Hate DOCX
Well done i4i, I hope this will either shake-up the retarded US patent laws or make Microsoft eat its own dog food.
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Time to Patent
I think that should cover just about every modern device... then I can get a judgement to stop the sell of EVERY electronic device!
BAHAHA!
The world won't know what to do. There will be chaos and turmoil.
The World Will Look Up and Shout "Save Us!"
And I'll whisper... "No."
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Re: Time to Patent
And I'll whisper... "No."
That literally made me laugh out loud. Thank you.
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Re: Re:
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Hey guys! Newsflash!
Don't be so quick to "ha ha" just because Microsoft is being brought to court. If lawsuits like this stick then everybody is screwed, not just the big players.
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Re: Hey guys! Newsflash!
terms or anything similar, and credit is given by OpenOffice, a freeware distribution using XML would not violate their patent, while its use in proprietary software sold for a profit would.
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Re: Re: Hey guys! Newsflash!
The way I see this going down, i4i is going to get licensing fees from everyone that they possibly can. And considering OpenOffice.org was initiated by Sun Microsystems, you'd better believe that they'll be next if they manage to get anything out of Microsoft.
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WORD?
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Besides, how can the patent troll demand that MS pays for every copy of Word ever released? Those before 2007 don't even understand XML. And the patent itself was filed in 2004. How can it apply to Word 2003 and previous versions?
Good to live in a jurisdiction that doesn't have software patents.
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Re: xlm
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If Microsoft's patent is enforced and the judgment against Microsoft is ofterturned then that double standard shows who the patent system truly stands to serve, the rich and the powerful.
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Wasn't the purpose of XML to create open standards that are free of retarded intellectual property? After everyone has gone through ALL the hard work of doing this why the heck does Microsoft get to parasite off of the hard work into developing this (with the intent of not having stupid intellectual property get in the way of EVERYTHING WE DO) and get a patent off of this work? This harms innovation and creates a disincentive for people to create new innovations with the intent of them being in the public domain knowing that some stupid evil parasite like Microsoft might grab a patent on it.
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XMLOpen Document Format related MS Word Injunction
Word is that the "judge" is from an old school that believes in an "eye for an eye".
Seriously though, accepting that he is simply passing the "buck" to an appellate jurisdiction which has greater authority and presumably more combined intelligence, how can our learned friends get it so wrong?
"Common good" if not "common sense" is plainly lacking ... next case!
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