Microsoft Sued over Xbox Live

fiorenza writes "Ars Technica is reporting that Paltalk has sued Microsoft in the Eastern District of Texas over its Xbox Live service. The suit alleges that Microsoft's Xbox Live infringes on two of its patents, and that the company has suffered damages 'in at least the tens of millions of dollars,' which raises obvious questions about why they waited four years to file the suit (Xbox Live was launched in late 2002)." From the article: "Microsoft, as a company that runs multiplayer game servers, is alleged to be violating these patents. It's not clear how they're doing so--the initial complaint provides literally no evidence of Microsoft's guilt. The filing instead describes the Paltalk patents and the dates that Xbox Live went, err, live. After five pages of this, Paltalk simply claims that "gameplay on the Xbox or Xbox 360 through the Xbox Live online gaming service infringes the Paltalk patents," then goes on to ask for a jury trial. Presumably, actual information will be released once the trial begins."

Comments

Re:Give with one hand, take with the other

[cybermancer]

Actually a cold war is fairly accurate. Many patent rich companies use the patents they hold, that they know others are infringine upon as a defense to keep other patent rich companies from suing them.

Anytime a patent infringement lawsuit comes in they will examine the business of the one suing them to see which patents they can counter-sue on. Their goal is to counter sue for enough damages to exceed the original complaint.

Most companies in the computer industry know not to sue IBM because they hold so many patents that everyone is most likely infringing on. Occasionally some small company does attempt to sue them and IBM makes an example of them.