22 Companies Sued Over Wi-Fi Patents

Newer Guy writes "Wi-LAN, another patent holding company, has sued 22 companies that make or sell wireless routers. Defendants include Apple. Atheros, Belkin, Best Buy, Buffalo, Dell, HP, Intel, and Lenovo. Wi-LAN has a portfolio of more than 280 issued or pending patents." Of course the two patent suits were filed in Marshall, Texas.

Comments

Good!

[Reality Master 201]

Maybe if enough scumbag IP holding companies extort enough money out of big corporations, those corporations will lobby congress to get the patent laws changed.

Cause it sure looks like neither the best interests of the country and its citizens, nor general sanity are enough to get them to do anything. Here's hoping there's enough pressure from this to get some corruption going in our favor.

And, yes, I know that's naive.

Re:Good!

[kebes]

Maybe if enough scumbag IP holding companies extort enough money out of big corporations, those corporations will lobby congress to get the patent laws changed. Only if those big corporations are losing more money to patent trolls than they are gaining through their own patent litigation (or via the market exclusion that their patents afford them). The problem is that the big companies generally benefit from the current patent system overall, even if sometimes they have to pay some small troll.

Consider the Vonage situation. This company is being sued by all the large incumbents. The established companies have a stake in keeping patents strong, since they are able to use this legal system to shut down competition. Having to occasionally pay some other company for a patent they neglected to get first is just "the cost of doing business."

I, too, wish that companies would lobby for a sane patent system. But, the problem is that even if big companies lose some money to frivolous patents, they are still sufficiently in control of the system that they win even more money from their own frivolous patents. Waiting for big business to save us from this mess is a mistake.

Missing the point of patents

[mcrbids]

The basic idea behind a patent is to allow the patent holder "shelter time" to develop, market, sell, and profit from their new inventions.

How can a company claim damages if they haven't done the above? Patents are what they are, but it strikes me as just silly - you might be in violation of the patent, but how can you, as the patent holder, claim damages without any proof that loss has occurred?

Re:Who's missing?

[644bd346996]

I see that another poster has pointed out that they sued Cisco 3 years ago. So, why don't Reuters and the other wire services ever dig up those details on their own? Shouldn't they try to answer some of the obvious questions, rather than just post a notice that the lawsuit exists?

I wish we had journalists instead of just reporters.

easy first step to reform, ban "Forum Shopping"

[plasmacutter]

Specifically, require all patent related cases to route through a centralized system in washington D.C.

Multiple courthouses/justices are fine, even keep the status quo with their method of appointment, but the cases (primary and appeals) filed should be randomly assigned to a given judge's court.

Removing the ability of troll companies to shop for particularly corrupt or incompetent forums should help reign in part of the problem and bring some regularity or balance to the overall system.