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Supreme Court Rejects Microsoft Eolas Appeal
mixmasterjake writes "The U.S. Supreme Court has decided not to hear a Microsoft appeal in the software company's ongoing Web browsing patent dispute with the University of California and Eolas Technologies. The dispute arises over the Eolas patent for 'a system allowing a user of a browser program ... to access and execute an embedded program object.' From the article: "With today's decision, the Supreme Court decided not to hear Microsoft's argument relating to how damages in the case should be calculated. Microsoft had been asking the court to reject a previous ruling that damages should be awarded based on Microsoft's U.S. and foreign sales, saying that the Eolas patent should only apply to U.S. products. The Supreme Court did not give a reason for its rejection of Microsoft's appeal."
Being a Justice on the Supreme Court is the best job ever. You can pick and choose which cases you want to hear, and you need offer no justification whatsoever!
Microsoft gets to eat it's own medicine. Maybe they'll start to realize how bad software patents really are. Patents aren't an universal tool that should be used in every field of science.
has to be reformed. Such a basic idea shouldn't be patentable, even when it costs a giant like Microsoft.
Ok, this is Slashdot, and therefore anything that Microsoft does is supposed to be bad. But, I still can't bring myself to embrace obvious software patents. I did RTFA, but I have not looked at the patent itself -- so perhaps it isn't obvious. Still, I can't help but think this does not bode well for the internet in general.
Sure MS has strong-armed some competitors in the past and probably stolen an idea or two (Stac compression comes to mind), but I would have preferred to see the patent overturned...
Wanted: witty unique signature. Must be willing to relocate.
I run Gentoo Linux, how does this affect me?
Allow me to compile an answer for you. Please check back in 7 hours.
Eolas's patent, which covers web browser plugins, should never have been awarded -- let alone validated by the USPTO. As it stands, no browser that supports plugin technology is immune from Eolas, a one-man-show run by a university professor.
The patent needs to be thrown out immediately; the amount of prior art must be staggering.
For the future of the web, this is a case you'll want Microsoft to win, ultimately.
I say this as someone who is no fan of Microsoft, and who is actually a student at the University of California--Microsoft's loss is bad for open source. Microsoft was simply the biggest fish Eolas could go after. Now they're going to demand royalties from all other browser makers, which could spell big trouble for Mozilla.
... to access and execute an embedded program object." Sounds like it would cover browser support for Java and perhaps JavaScript embedded in web pages.
I hope I'm wrong--please tell me this isn't going to kill open source web browsers.
The UC/Eolas patent covers "a system allowing a user of a browser program
Crap.
Ars has better coverage.
It's a bit confusing, but as I understand things, this is the story: Eolas were awarded big damages against Microsoft based on their browser plugin patent. This patent was overturned in March 2004, which means Microsoft no longer had to pay those damages. Micosoft's appeal to SCOTUS was against those damages that it doesn't have to pay any more. So, I imagine the SCOTUS were like "WTF?" when they declined to hear the case.
Microsoft's not totally insane, though, because the patent has been reinstated, so MS and Eolas will be going back to court, and MS might lose again and have to pay money again. So they were looking for a precedent to keep a lid on those damages which they might get.
Repton.
They say that only an experienced wizard can do the tengu shuffle.
What about the Mozilla foundation? Opera? KDE? Apple? Because armed with this precendent Eolas is going to go after anyone who has ever coded a browser with the ability to host an applet.
Does it sound bad enough now?
This story is really about the invidious patenting of ideas rather than actual inventions. Such patenting of software processes is not about protecting intellectual property or a partuclar working design of some new gizmo.
The entire point of software patents like this is to stifle innovation by preventing anybody, including Microsoft, from reverse engineering the process by any means. That's not patenting because you have a product on the market that you're trying to protect, it's a form of intellectual highway robbery by digging a big hole in the road and then charging people to cross the hole using the one bridge and the police preventing people from going around the hole.
As far as Microsoft is concerned, I feel no sympathy. Microsoft has aggressively tried to corner and stifle competition by collecting as many of these software or business process patents as it can. Now it gets bitten by somebody else doing the same thing. "He who lives by the software patent also get shafted by the software patent"
Microsoft should be like Earl: call it "karma" and seek to redress people for what it has done. But first, Bill Gates needs to get caught in a hit-and-run accident while holding a winning scratch card.
Unless there is urgent action to void these "business process through software" patents, then it will be the rest of the world, China, India and especially Europe which will benefit from innovation and not the US. In America, software patents are causing the pace of innovation to slow while costing eveybody more money, and jamming up the Patent system with these mendatious patent claims.
Tubby or not tubby. Fat is the question
"Microsoft had been asking the court to reject a previous ruling that damages should be awarded based on Microsoft's U.S. and foreign sales, saying that the Eolas patent should only apply to U.S. products. The Supreme Court did not give a reason for its rejection of Microsoft's appeal"
Here's a good reason for you: as a US company, you should abide by US patent law, even if you sell overseas. Just because the business is done outside the US does not mean it's exempt from patent protections.
Microsoft above all should be aware of this sort of thing--it's exactly like the tactics they were using with Lee going to work for Google. Washington (the state) would say "He can't go right to work there", and California would say "Come on in, here's your desk".
Roberts who answered very little in his Senate Confirmation hearings, did mention he was open to the idea of either getting rid of the 'cert pool' concept and/or increasing the courts caseload each year.
Being a Slashdot editor is the best job ever! You can pick and choose what submissions you want to post and disregard all others without any justification whatsoever!