Patent Markings May Spell Trouble For Activision

Posted by Soulskill on Monday February 22, 2010 @11:41PM from the almost-rocket-docket dept.

eldavojohn writes "If you pick up your copy of Guitar Hero and read the literature, you'll notice it says 'patent pending' and cites a number of patents. A group alleges no such patent pends nor are some of the patents applicable. If a judge finds Activision guilty of misleading the public in this manner, they could become liable for up to $500 per product sold under false patent marking. The patents in question seem to be legitimately Guitar Hero-oriented, and little is to be found about the mysterious group. The final piece of the puzzle puts the filing in Texas Northern District Court, which might be close enough to Texas Eastern District Court to write this off as a new kind of 'false patent marking troll' targeting big fish with deep coffers."

1 of 82 comments (clear)

Min score:

Reason:

Sort:

Re:If they're trolls, so are the EFF by tepples · 2010-02-23 01:10 · Score: 0, Offtopic

Slashdot is a collection of individuals. Some of them tell you one thing, others tell you something different.
Until you get to moderation. For each comment, moderators and metamoderators can choose to promote or bury it, with cause (Insightful, Flamebait, etc.) or without cause (*rated). The "consensus" or "groupthink" on Slashdot can be observed from what comments get routinely modded up and what comments get modded down. The editors can influence this consensus by banning moderators.