End of the Road for U.S. BlackBerry Users ?

_termx23 writes "US BlackBerry users may have to find an alternative source for their email addiction after the U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Washington rejected a request by Research in Motion to rehear its appeal of a patent infringement case brought by NTP, which holds a portfolio of wireless email-related patents violated by RIM." From the article: "As part of that litigation, NTP, whose only assets are wireless e-mail related patents, had been granted an injunction banning the sale of BlackBerry devices in the United States and forcing Research in Motion to stop providing e-mail services to all American customers except government account holders. While the court declined Research in Motion's request for a complete rehearing by all 12 of its judges, it did order the panel of three judges to review some aspects of NTP's patent claims." We've discussed this previously.

Comments

What if..?

[Dynamoo]

What if RIM was a US company and NTP was Canadian. Do you think that the judgement would have been different? Consider also that Microsoft has been found guilty of patent infringments many, many times and yet it has never had an outright ban on those products being sold or used.

Exactly what has NTP done with these patents? The USPTO keeps striking them down (see here). Did NTP actually use or license the patents to make a product? I can't think of any.

Of course, this was nearly all settled but seems to have fallen apart.

RIM vs NTP is a complicated case.. many patent cases are. But when it boils down to it, the approach doesn't not appear to be consistent between different cases. If the judgement remains, then RIM's revenues will take a huge hit, US Blackberry users will not be able to use their devices and I can't see any product on a comparable quality anywhere on the horizon.

Re:What if..?

[AnObfuscator]

Exactly what has NTP done with these patents? The USPTO keeps striking them down (see here). Did NTP actually use or license the patents to make a product? I can't think of any

That's what really, really whigs me out about this whole case.

Here, we have one company that has developed an innovative, unique, and popular device that sells well, thus stimulating the economy. There, we have one company that merely owns the "intellectual property", and has done NOTHING to develop it, and is now trying to use that property to shut down the economically successful (and therefore, arguably socially beneficial) RIM.

This is clearly damaging to the public good, as now jobs will be lost, shareholder value will be lost, captial will be lost, and tax revenue will be lost.

Thus, by extension of the recent SCOTUS Kelo v. New London ruling, should not the patent be taken from NTP and given to RIM, via Eminent Domain?

Re:What if..?

[Dausha]

"What if RIM was a US company and NTP was Canadian. Do you think that the judgement would have been different?"

I don't think that has any relevance. If NTP was Canadian, it would have a U.S. subsidiary to hold its U.S. IP rights. So, even in that situation, it would be a U.S. company. Although, I could be wrong in thinking it wisest for a foreign company to have a U.S. subsidiary for such a purpose. I'm in law, not bidness.

I recently read a case involving an alleged intentional business tort where one of the parties (defendant) was Canadian. Without getting to much into the case, the Canadian company survived what read to be a marginally valid claim. So, federal courts appear to be sovereign-neutral when it comes to resolving disputes--as well they should be.

Besides, such a posture is bad for business. If U.S. courts had a preference for U.S. companies over foreign, then there would be less foreign investment. This does not work in the global market and would only serve to isolate the U.S. more.

RIM compensation

[Anonymous Coward]

With the amount of corporate users Blackberry targets what sort of compensation package will RIM have to provide for loss of service?

Of course this matters on the contracts the user's signed but surely this could result in filing for bankrupcy protection.

Re:Racketeering

[mysticwhiskey]

Yeah, certainly seems that way. On the other hand, what an almost perfect business model - Purchase patents, produce no product, then profit on the litigation. Sigh, business != ethical behaviour. In my naive world, actual product is greater than idea.

While the USA Sues Itself Out Of Existence

[NZheretic]

The USA will fall behind because ever more intellectual property will be locked up behind a multitude of corporations and individuals effectively ruled by lawyers who are more interested in earning legal fees rather than bothering to actually manufacture anything.

Other Governments and Europe's bureaucracies will not hesitate to forcibly acquire the necessary intellectual property needed get things done for large projects. That's how the European airline industry managed to get the Concord, Euro-fighter and even the latest Airbus built.

Other countries and even Europe's parliament will also not hesitate to adopt more liberal intellectual property structures if you demonstrate that doing so will better benefit their economies as a whole, instead of just a few major corporations.

The USA administration and even more myopic major corporations will continue to let more and more manufacturing and service industry be off-shored resulting in importing permanent poverty into the USA.

You want to see the future of the USA? Visit the remnants of Detroit motor city works and despair.

I'd stop the government contracts first

[Anonymous Coward]

The government make the law, they decide how it's enforced, why shouldn't they feel what it's like to be on the wrong end of a dumb decision.

Oh Snap

[FoxDude0486]

Now I have to go talk to the higher up's in my company and let them know their Blackberry devices are going to be useless in the near future. At least warn them before they come to me about it. And just to think, our office managers just started getting blackberry's and have to stop useing the email services before I even set them up with it hahaha.

TSG isn't a good example

[roystgnr]

We have companies like [The] SCO group, Forgent Networks and NTP who do not really have any products

The SCO Group has several products, and they haven't officially canceled all of them yet. They're not immune to a patent-based counterattack because they don't have any products, they're immune because they don't have enough customers or money. You can't squeeze blood from a turnip, especially not after the turnip farmers have already juiced it while laughing at you.

Change to patent law?

[MacGod]

It seems logical to me that when granting a patent, the USPTO should stipulate that the invention being patented actually be produced or used to some degree, within a certain timeframe. Now, I realise that it would be important to come up with a clear definition of what consitutes implementation, but other than that purely logistical point, can anyone see a reason why we shouldn't do this?

Put another way, are there any valid reasons to allow companies to hold patents for devices that they have no intention of ever developing?

Re:Racketeering

[bhmit1]

So how do we fix it? Do we require companies to prove that they are developing or selling a product that uses a patent for them to maintain it? Do we require that damages have been incurred (e.g. loss of revenue) due to a competing product? It seems appropriate to have a way to protect a small company from competition from a larger copy-and-destroy company (e.g. Microsoft). But then with so many patents out there, how does a small company ensure that they are not infringing on someone else's patents for a reasonable cost (free) and in a reasonable time (should it take one person hours, days, months, or years to do the checking)? If RIM failed to verify this, what hope does anyone else have? I think the world has gotten too complex for an easy answer to this problem, and the knee-jerk reaction to get rid of software patents would only trade one problem (long if not impossible research process) for another (copy-and-destroy business model).

Lin Yutang quote

[threaded]

When there are too many policemen, there can be no liberty.
When there are too many soldiers, there can be no peace.
When there are too many lawyers, there can be no justice.

Does this happen outside software?

[brlewis]

Are there companies whose only assets are patents, say, in the mechanical engineering field? Pharmaceuticals? Aerospace? I wonder if this phenomenon happens only with software patents.

Yet another reason gutless CEOs will jump to MS

[natd]

Blackberry was about the only thing we used where MS have a stated interest in the market. Our CEO and other top level guys just loved their Blackberries. Forget other good technologies, we are loyal MS customers...except Blackberry

NOw they will see that they got their fingers burned, will recognise that this COULD NEVER happen to MS, so will play even safer next time.

It's pathetic.

Re:Racketeering

[nanoakron]

Exactly. Why are government account holders allowed to keep their service, but the rest of us folk aren't?

-Nano.

Re:If I were RIM...

[dcw3]

Now if I were RIM and a branch of the US government handed me down this ruling, I'd shut the whole system down in the US. I'm allowed to keep providing service to government account holders, but I can't keep my business account holders? No thanks. I'll just kill everything in the US until we get this straightened out. Up yours, government.

Disclaimer: I don't like the current IP/patent system any more than you do, and I'm aware and concerned with the gripes that you've got against the U.S...I've got plenty myself. That said, I don't know the details of the case, so I won't comment on it validity.

What portion of RIM's income comes from the U.S.? Do you suppose that it's enough to put them out of business (hopefully not the case) if they can't continue providing service here? Do you think that (as others have mentioned) this may actually be a good thing because it's going to hit so many managers where it hurts, and possibly force a change?

Yes, our patent system is out of control (and no, you can't blame George for this one...it was heading down this path long before he arrived). I was appalled when my company held mandatory IP training for all the engineers recently, and we were told about how we should be sending more stuff in for evaluation, and keeping detailed notebooks, etc. (like we don't have design documents...DOH!). However, until the laws change, you can expect nearly all companies here to act that way, just to cover their own collective arses.

Trade deals

[orasio]

I live in Uruguay, and they are right now negotiating a trade deal that says exactly that: that we should take the same "IP" protection provisions.
That point is being debated, but in the end, the strongest part does get what they want.

Re:Trade deals

[Dr Caleb]

Take it from someone who's lost their job to US companies several times under NAFTA - do everything you can to fight 'free' trade agreements with the US. If they do sign them, it's always in their favour. If they lose a trade dispute, they'll ignore the judge or panel anyhow. Believe me, any IP trade deal with the US can only hurt Uruguay.

Re:Slight Factual Error

[Anonymous Coward]

False, Rambus settled with Infineon, has licensed its patents to various others, its patents have been upheld to date in court, and it is still pursuing lawsuits against Samsung and others.

Similarly, in March, the German chip maker Infineon Technologies agreed to pay Rambus, a California chip designer, quarterly amounts totaling nearly $50 million until 2007 with the possibility of further payments of up to $100 million to settle a U.S. patent. The suit could have entitled Rambus to as much as a 3.5 percent share of all memory chip sales in the $26 billion industry, or revenue of about $910 million annually, said Michael Cohen, a California-based analyst with Pacific American Securities.

Rambus, which is expected to earn about $21 million this year from licensing patents, spent $23.1 million on litigation in 2004 and has pending fights with other chip makers, including Samsung of South Korea, which continue to accuse Rambus of making overly broad claims to ownership of vital chip technologies.

Re:Racketeering

[AstroDrabb]

Sorry, but that's just dumb. Copyrights and patents don't overlap at all:

No, then tell that to Amazon, MS, ...

you cannot copyright inventions, and you cannot patent something that's not an invention.

I guess Amazon doesn't have copyright _and_ a patent on their "one-click" "IP" crap. I guess you consider Microsoft's "Office XML" crap an "invention"? I guess you consider Amazon's "one-click" crap and "invention"?

Additionally, patents are still perfectly capable of being beneficial, and often are.

Yes, _ALL_ patents are "beneficial". It just comes down to exactly WHO they are beneficial to. Amazon's "One-Click" crap is "beneficial" to Amazon, yet a major burden to tons of commercial websites trying to do a _very_ basic task that Amazon DID NOT INVENT. Microsoft's "XML" crap is "beneficial" to Microsoft, yet it is a major burden to many developers/companies that have been doing the same thing for much longer.

I would venture a guess that about 20% of all software patents are even close to being an "invention" (and 20% is extremely generous). Heck, I don't think _any_ software patent is an "invention". Why should one person/group/company be allowed to patent a method of doing something with software? Is a chef allowed to patent his/her method of preparation of a recipe? Nope. Is a mathematician allowed to patent his/her method of a proof? Nope. Can I patent my "method" of telling you how to inflate your tires? Nope (well, maybe, the US PTO is really that bad). Software patents are no different than the above examples. Software IS NOTHIGN BUT INSTRUCTION TO A COMPUTER! Why should you be allowed to lock anyone out of telling a computer how to do "one click" to buy an item for a repeat customer? Why should you be allowed to lock people out of telling a computer how to react to certain mouse clicks (MS)? Sadly big business has once again bribed our "representatives" into allowing laws to protect their business methods.

I have a good idea. Software patents should cost $0 for people who do not work for a large corporation (say, any company doing less than $500 million a year). Oh, and that small corporation must not have any ties, financial or whatever, to a large corporation. This way, all the little guys out there could rack up a boat load of patents and sue the crap out of the big corps.

I am personally glad that this group of non-producing pond scum is suing RIM. I personally hope to see any successful product be sued out of existence by a group/person that only owns "IP". This way maybe the big corps will throw around their bribe money to the crooked politician and maybe we would see the end of software patents.