Slashdot Mirror
Vonage and Verizon — Prepare for Round 2
According to the New York Times, Vonage is preparing to take it's case back down to the lower courts for a retrial of the lawsuit against them from Verizon. Their hope is that with newer approaches set forth by the supreme court that the lower courts will be able to decide whether Verizon's patent(s) are ordinary/obvious or deserve patent protection. I wonder if this time it will be more obvious to the courts that Verizon's patents aren't so original?
Because prior art that does not directly invalidate the patent will go a long way toward showing the obviousness of the invention it protects
Support NYCountryLawyer RIAA vs People
Aren't they basically the same thing? If it's obvious, there will probably be prior art, just because of its obviousness. And, if there's prior art, and these two companies developed systems parallel to each other, as well as other companies, it's probably an obvious invention/solution.
- Eddie
I'm a happy Vonage subscriber and was thrilled when the USSC essentially gutted patent law as it exists.
Not only do I think Vonage will prevail in this case, I also think they should pursue a case against Verizon for anti-trust.
And in other news, Verizon RI lost $9.7 million last year. I had long thought they'd lost at a maximum a third their business but it gets better, 43% of land lines in RI aren't Verizon land lines any longer. So what does Verizon do to counter the loss? They hike rates.
A good anti-trust action would be the kick needed to fracture Verizon into a million little pieces. Then the new at&t had better watch out.
Lets face it, VoIP was and is known as a disruptive technology. Brilliant little idea, use the IP capability built into most telephone switches to take advantage of excess switching capacity. And in the end, disruptive technologies almost ALWAYS win.
Aren't they basically the same thing? If it's obvious, there will probably be prior art, just because of its obviousness.
No, they're not.
"Prior art" means it's already been done that way, or exactly that way of doing it has been described publicly.
"Obvious" means that if a person "skilled in the art" sets out to actually do it, he's likely to come up with that way of doing it as one of his design options. It does NOT mean:
- It's already been done that way.
- That way of doing it has already been described.
There are a number of reasons an "obvious" invention would not be prior art. One of the biggest is that the technology might not have gotten to the point were it's practical to practice such an invention. Another is that the business environment may not yet make use of the invention a good business plan. Once these externalities are resolved and people are set to do the task, the "obvious" inventions are then detail-designed and implemented. Sometimes, once it becomes clear that they WILL be resolved, people begin planning and publishing.
Both of these apply here.
Once these externalities are resolved and people are set to do the task, the "obvious" inventions are then detail-designed and implemented. Sometimes, once it becomes clear that they WILL be resolved, people begin planning and publishing - for instance: in academia, or in standards organizations.
Both of these have happened here.
But if "obvious" is abandoned and "prior art" required, it becomes possible for an alert businessman to lock up the obvious ways of doing things by rushing to the patent office with a flurry of applications for every obvious solution that nobody has happened to have published on or done - often because it's so obvious they thought there was no point in mentioning it.
Think about it: What's "the internet way to build a phone company"?
- Use a stock streaming VoIP protocol to carry calls on the internet.
- Use VOIP/POTS bridge servers at price-convenient locations when you need to contact to a POTS phone (or connect two POTS phones to each other over your IP service).
- Use a database (such as DNS) to translate user identification information to routing information - which includes:
a) Phone number and preferred VoIP/POTS bridge address(es) when the called phone is on the POTS side.
b) Multiple possible sites and the preferred order for trying them (call forwarding)
c) A registration entry made by a portable wireless phone when it associated access point as it moved into range.
- Also use databases to authorize calls and record billing information when calls are made.
Obvious, right? If somebody set you to do this that's what YOU'D do, right?
Well a), b), and c) are what Verizon claimed are their non-obvious inventions - and got the patent office and a lower court to agree and almost KILL Vonage by blocking them from doing anything like it.
(I think they also claimed tying authorization and billing for VoIP or VoIP/POTS bridged calls into database authorization/billing systems, too.)
Bantam Dominique roosters crow a four-note song. Once you've heard it as "Happy BIRTHday" you can't NOT hear it that way
Ok, so this is going back to the lower courts and the SC managed to side-step the deeper aspects of this case...
Seems to me they hit the nail squarely on the head.
so it would be interesting to hear from the legal experts as to what broader ramifications we could expect to see from a Vonage win in a re-trial...
IANAL but it seems to me that SCOTUS just pulled the rug out from under all the bogus "do this well-understood thing but ON THE INTERNET" patents.
Verizon vs. Vonage might be the snowball that starts the avalanche.
Bantam Dominique roosters crow a four-note song. Once you've heard it as "Happy BIRTHday" you can't NOT hear it that way