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RIM Wins BlackBerry Patent Dispute in UK
Guinnessy writes "Research In Motion has won its first patent case against Inpro Licensing. Justice Nicholas Pumfrey rejected a claim by Luxembourg-based Inpro Licensing SARL that it holds a UK patent on the technology used by RIM to transpose images and Internet files onto BlackBerry screens ruling that all the claims at issue were either obvious or lacking in novelty. It is the second European legal victory this year for RIM, following a Munich court's invalidation of a German version of the same patent. The big court case of course is on Feb 24 when a U.S. court will consider whether the BlackBerry service should be halted for infringing patents held by licensing firm NTP."
This is a great thing!
Looks like they aren't going to go out of business after all. Maybe I'll send them an application, I always wanted a RIM job. I just hope they aren't anal about the dress code.
From TFA:
And here I was — silly me — thinking that this sort of thing consituted a "method" and was therefore unpatentable in the UK! From the UKPO's web-site, the following are excuded:
Don't 5, and possible 4, call this whole game into question?
Why are companies allowed to sit on patents and wait for someone to come allong and violate it? Why aren't they forced to A) license it or B) to implement it? (If they choose neither then the patent should expire.)
In 1996, the use of a proxy server to change data to suit the target device would have been very innovative.
True, if you're under 25, in which case you probably believe that information distribution (and indeed the world), was invented in 1980's.
On the fly format translation by in intermediary device was, of course, a new innovation in 1996 as long as you limit the context to "computers on the internet". Broaden the scope to the parent realm of information distribution and such methods have been around for decades and were VERY obvious in 1996.
With all due respect that's not a great idea. Only allow patents on actual products you can hold in your hand and you'd cut out 99% of the bogus patent applications. That would also be in keeping with the original spirit of the patent system.
And while your at it, completely destroy a reason and the means for individuals to invent and patent?
For he today that sheds his blood with me shall be my brother.
...10 years down the line. In 1996, the use of a proxy server to change data to suit the target device would have been very innovative.
Because back then we were still trying to figure that "bang the rocks together" thing.
If we had data headed for a device that couldn't handle it, we just threw up our hands. "If God wanted us to see this data on computer screens, "we'd say,"he'd make them in an A4 size." We hired people to hold two phone receivers, one to each ear, so that users on the PBX who had analog phones could talk to the digital phone users.
Post may contain irony: discontinue use if experiencing mood swings, nausea or elevated blood pressure.
Although I don't generally like sueing which got us in the case in the first place RIM should go after InPro with all their resources and crush them like a bug. Someone needs to put these patent companies in their place and set some precedence. This has cost not only RIM, but lots of other people money and time. If I was the government I'd go after InPro as well, think of all the tax dollars they have wasted.
But we all know the big fight is in the USA.
Why? The FP seems to take that stance as well, but I consider it really not very true.
Although the US may count as the biggest market for RIM, they have plenty of other markets now that have invalidated the offending patents. And most importantly, as a Canadian company, The US has no power to force RIM out of business (just out of the US).
If US courts thoroughly spank RIM, it will hurt them, a lot. But not quite the death-blow many people seem to consider it. The world doesn't end at the US border.
If I worked there, you can be damn sure that I'd deny 90% of the tech-related patents that came across my desk, fully justifying each decision, and wholly expecting to be disciplined or fired for not being a rubber-stamp. Then I'd sure as hell make a big stink about it. Why isn't this happening?
Sad as it is, most people value employment over principles.
God save our Queen, and Heaven bless The Maple Leaf Forever!
This is different. GP is lambasting companies that are formed solely to wage litigious war against other companies with an arsenal of patents that they have no desire to ever actually use.
Patents were created to provide incentives to creating new products (although they aren't necessary, as any economist worth his salt will be able to explain); they were created to promote innovation. A company that sits on its patents waiting to sue someone who infringes on them is doing nothing but stifling innovation. This is the equivalent of you asking me a question, and my saying "Yes, I know the answer," and not telling you, but also attacking anybody who DOES try to tell you.
This is wrong.
Hopefully RIM will learn their lesson with these things and maybe quit going after other people for stupid patents. In the latest issues I do side with RIM, but at the same time, they are getting what they deserve. RIM is hardly innocent here, they did this same crap with their stupid mini keyboard on the blackberry vs makers of PDAs with mini keyboards. Sharp Zaurus was doing the mini keyboard thing about 4 years before RIM put the first Blackberry on the market, so to me this is mostly karma coming back to RIM for their nonsense prior.
The only change I can believe in is what I find in my couch cushions.
RIM has hardly been above reproach in court or in its prior dealings with NTP, which after all does hold what are valid patents - at least the patents haven't yet been invalidated in a final declaration by the US Patent Office. And NTP is the company of the now-deceased inventor as opposed to a cabal of speculators who buy up patents wholesale and wait like vultures for a chance to strike.
But the primary reason for my position is the hope that NTP will succeed in obtaining the injunction to shut down RIM's operation in the US. Only then will the discomfiture of millions of Blackberry owners raise a big enough stink to force Congress into a reevaluation of the wisdom of allowing software patents at all.
The problem with finding prior art is that you need to find one piece of prior art that covers all the aspects of a claim. You can't mosaic them. The prior art we used in trial was the following:
The general concept was clearly obvious back then. But the patent had some specific details that Inpro claimed were not obvious. I believe they were obvious to someone in the field in 1996. Clearly the judge agreed.