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Sony Sued By University Over PS2 Chip

Posted by simoniker on from the full-recall-expected-soon dept.

Mike Hawk writes "Cry me a river! Sony is being sued over the creation of its 'Emotion Engine' PlayStation 2 chip. The University of Wisconsin (Madison) has filed the suit claiming the "EE Core" violates a 16 year old U-Dub patent. And you guys have been gaming with 16 year old technology the whole time - those PS2 jaggies make perfect sense now..." Since this story broke on Friday, a CNET News article has added a little more information, quoting a University spokesman as saying the patent involves "advanced chipmaking technologies and has been licensed by a number of technology companies", but not Sony or the chip's co-creator, Toshiba.

4 of 40 comments (clear)

  1. Nice Timing for a lawsuit by mrshowtime · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Gee, right after Sony sells it's 60 millionth PS2, this University finally figures out that Sony "Stole" their (ancient) technology. Sounds awfully fishy to me.

    --
    "Jeremy, you need to get to an internet cafe and cut and paste some appropriate sentiments about me from the world wide
    1. Re:Nice Timing for a lawsuit by NanoGator · · Score: 4, Insightful

      "Gee, right after Sony sells it's 60 millionth PS2, this University finally figures out that Sony "Stole" their (ancient) technology. Sounds awfully fishy to me."

      Coincidently, Sony recently changed their manufacturing process to make the systems cheaper. I couldn't tell you if that's what sparked the suit or not, but I can tell you that anything smells fishy when you are missing a good deal of detail like we are right now with this story. It's too vague.

      --
      "Derp de derp."
  2. "Good Faith" - uhhuh by Kris_J · · Score: 4, Funny
    "We hope the lawsuit will encourage them to bargain in good faith,"
    How very SCO of you.
  3. Re:Question by bubblewrapgrl · · Score: 4, Interesting

    I don't know about other schools, but UW-Madison has been patenting the research of professors and other researchers on campus since 1925. There is a private, non-profit organization called the Wisconsin Alumni Research Foundation. Basically, they hold patents and license them out. The money that is collected is used to fund the university and other research on campus.

    Check out http://www.warf.ws for more information.