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Parties Behind Eolas Patent Reexam Revealed

Posted by timothy on from the party-like-it's-5,838,906 dept.

theodp writes "While news accounts credited Tim Berners-Lee's mighty pen with triggering the USPTO reexam of the Eolas plug-in patent that could negate a $520+ million judgment against Microsoft, newly released USPTO interview notes suggest the reexam may owe more to an alliance of tech giants who appear to have quietly advanced the same arguments to the USPTO weeks prior to Berners-Lee." See also some previous coverage of the Eolas patent circus, and more below about the USPTO reexam.

theodp continues "According to a 4-27 Interview Summary, the USPTO presented Eolas with a 10-14 letter signed by in-house counsel from Microsoft, AOL and Macromedia, a 10-15 letter from Adobe, and a 10-22 letter from the law firm of Sidley Austin (aka Microsoft's lawyers) in connection with its proposed rejection of Eolas' patent claims. All predated the 10-24 letter from the W3C's counsel as well as Berners-Lee's widely-publicized 10-28 letter, which seems unlikely to have prompted the USPTO's detailed 10-30 Reexam Order. The W3C has repeatedly had no comment when asked if the 'newly cited art' provided in its 10-24 filing had already been supplied earlier to the USPTO by others. UPDATE: In response, the W3C's Danny Weitzner points out that the preceding words are mine and should not be confused with those of a distinguished journalist."

2 of 84 comments (clear)

  1. Re:This is good but... by torpor · · Score: 4, Informative

    Why don't we create an industry funded board whose job is to make sure that silly software patents are no longer awarded

    I asked the same question a few days ago on another /. story about patents, and was referred to PubPat...

    If only people knew more about these things, and cared about them. As a developer, I despise the fact that the obvious things that I may design/develop to assist my fellow man in using my software have become 'owned' by someone else in order that they may profit.

    Patents suck. Period.

    --
    ; -- the corruption of government starts with its secrets. a truly free people keep no secrets. --
  2. Re:half-backed, recycled and slopped up to the USP by SquarePants · · Score: 4, Informative

    It doesn't take "outrage and political pressure" to get a patent reviewed. If you know of invalidating prior art it is fairly simple to request a re-examination. It is also fairly inexpensive if you choose to request reexamination inter partes since it involves only filing a single paper.

    But you do have to do some research. Something which most people here are unwilling to do for any purpose other than to rant about the USPTO's inadequacies.