Microsoft Admonished by U.S. District Court Judge

An anonymous reader writes "The Seattle Times reports that the judge in the z4 'product activation' patent infringement case has increased the jury's original $115 million verdict against Microsoft by $25 million. Both Microsoft and Autodesk (another defendant) were admonished by the judge for misconduct. The judge wrote 'The Court concludes that Defendants attempted to bury the relevant 107 exhibits ... in a massive pile of decoys' and called one failure to disclose evidence 'an intentional attempt by Defendants to mislead z4 and this Court.'"

Comments

Microsoft acting unethically?

[Whiney Mac Fanboy]

MS acting unethically? Willfully infringing on the patents of a small company? Engaging in litigation misconduct? Attemping to mislead the court?

I think Microsoft needs to read their own Put it in writing: Your business has ethics - particularly point 8:

Live it from the top down. It's critical that no one person in a company ever appears to be above a code of ethics. That means it's particularly important that executives and top managers also adhere to the guidelines of an ethics code. If managers say one thing but do something else, that's nothing more than a license for the rest of the company to follow suit. "Good role modeling by top managers is a must," Swanson says. "Without it, ethics codes can be seen as mere window dressing."

You ever read that Steve or Bill?

Mind you - I'm not exactly on z4's 'side' here - I don't like software patents (and it doesn't look like z4 have a product, but rather are an 'IP' company). That said however, live by the sword, die by the sword hey MS? Want to enforce your FAT patents? Expect more of this sort of shit in the future.

Re:For a few dollars more....

[Pollardito]

in this case it looks like $25M is the amount of money that "makes it all better", members of congress might charge more than that anyway

Re:Can't help but think of SCO

[nickfrommaryland]

There are provisions that can restrict what the big guy can do during discovery, but these mechanisms are rarely used, mainly because it is difficult to see what is and is not a decoy. Judges prefer to wait until it is clear, and that usually means at the end of the case. These are covered by Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 26(g). It seems to me, however, that the judge added a bit more, just because it was Microsoft.

Re:Ooh, the irony

[Haeleth]

So a large corporation has ripped off a small company's software, which was specifically designed to stop people ripping off software.

No, a large corporation has infringed on a small company's patent. The small company doesn't appear to actually produce any software or other tangible products; they just claim to own a bunch of ideas.

The software in question was written wholly by Microsoft, and probably without reference to anything owned or produced by z4 at all. Unfortunately for Microsoft, ignorance of an obscure patent is no excuse for daring to have the same idea.

Re:For a few dollars more....

[Red Flayer]

Here's (pdf) a tidbit. HTML version

Believe me, Kolitkoff is not alone in his predictions, though of course the US could take action to forestall the bankruptcy and reneging on its debts.

Look to Anjan Thakor (Olin School of Business) to discuss Kotlikoff's paper in the next Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis Review.

Re:Long Trial

[kilgortrout]

In federal court, each side submits a pretrial statement to the court listing, among other things, the exhibits they intend to introduce at trial. Most of the time, the parties stipulate to the admissibility of most exhibits, or at least to the authenticity of the document exhibits in order to streamline the proceedings. These things are generally not in dispute and the court leans pretty heavy on the parties to enter into these stipulations unless there is a genuine dispute. Absent a stipulation, you must call a witness to lay the foundation for each document entered in evidence.

Re:Can't help but think of SCO

[jackbird]

Roughly 2/3 of SCO's claims were recently thrown out by the magistrate judge for lack of disclosure - they have been nailed for something similar.

And when IBM's Lanham Act counterclaims start being litigated, there will be much wailing and gnashing of teeth in Lindon. For now, the judges are bending over backwards and then some to make the case appeal-proof.

Re:Everyone has to pay Royalty Eh?

[Anonymous Coward]

IBM is the 1000 lb Gorilla

Microsoft Patents 5418
IBM Patents 43891

a massive pile of decoys

[rs232]

I would be suprised if they didn't try and bury the relevant exhibits in a massive pile of decoys. They are lawyers after all. It's up to the plaintiff to unbury them.

As for the patent it is of course totally uninventive, obvious, there is prior art and any skilled person would have come up the the same thing without reading the method.

A method and apparatus for securing software .. requiring .. a .. password obtained from the.. authorized representative of the software after exchanging registration information.

When are they going to fix that crock known as the US patent system?

Re:Keep it in perspective

[spun]

I lived on the streets in San Francisco, not my parents basement you condescending fuckwit. I volunteered with Food Not Bombs, Earth First, and the IWW five days a week. You can shove your cookie up your ass. I've made a difference, what have you done you pathetic sack of shit?

You still haven't made a cogent point. You have fuck all for karma here and no friends. We are from roughly the same era, yet I have excellent karma and hundreds of friends. Not that that means anything definite, but it's interesting.

I'm done, debating with you has been a pointless waste of words. Have fun smooching Billy's ass.