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i4i Says OpenOffice Does Not Infringe Like MS Word
I Don't Believe in Imaginary Property writes "After the permanent injunction barring Microsoft from selling Microsoft Word, many armchair lawyers and pundits wondered how the ruling would affect OpenOffice. The company with the patent, i4i, believes that OpenOffice does not infringe upon it. But lest anyone think that therefore ODF will win out over OOXML, keep in mind that Microsoft has its own broad XML document patent, which issued just two weeks ago, having been filed in December 2004, and they're telling the Supreme Court to apply the Bilski ruling narrowly, so that it doesn't invalidate patents like theirs (and i4i's). After all, unlike most companies and individuals, Microsoft can afford $290 million infringement fines. Then again, given that Microsoft's new patent has only two independent claims (claim #1 and claim #12), and both of those claims 'comprise' something using an 'XML file format for documents associated with an application having a rich set of features,' maybe they wouldn't be that hard to work around if you just make sure any otherwise infringing format is only associated with an application lacking in the feature richness department."
Well, if they're filing an amicus curiae brief, those tend more towards telling than asking. It's literally an outside party interjecting its opinion as to the law and the facts. With the court's permission, Microsoft is telling the court its opinion as to relevant facts or legal arguments not covered by the court. Strictly speaking, they're not asking the court for a specific ruling unless they're an original party or an intervener. Officially, they're telling the court what standards they think the court should apply to patents, but they have no official standing to ask the court to implement those standards, they can only offer input. Yeah, that's a technicality, but "telling" is the correct word, even if the summary isn't great.