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Microsoft Continues Android Legal Assault
shmlco writes "According to an article on AllThingsD, Microsoft is continuing its legal assault on Android. On Monday the company sued Barnes & Noble, Foxconn International and Inventec over the company's Nook e-reader, alleging patent infringement. To quote Microsoft deputy general counsel Horacio Gutierrez, 'The Android platform infringes a number of Microsoft's patents, and companies manufacturing and shipping Android devices must respect our intellectual property rights. Their refusals to take licenses leave us no choice but to bring legal action.'"
This is what happens when you institutionalize bribery in government. If our politicians weren't so easy to bribe, and the voters weren't so stupid this would not be an issue.
Garbage in, garbage out. And Americans vote for corrupt garbage.
Why is it that if they hold the patents for what the android phones are doing, then why didn't they make a decent phone themselves to start with? How is it that google took their intellectual property they dreamed up and made something so much better than their own crap?
SCO didn't die in vain, they were just sacrificed to make this kind of insane posturing and attitude of corporate entitlement seem normal. We got most of our shock at those tactics out of the way over the years McBride & Co attacked Linux, clearing the path for bigger fish, like Microsoft, to publicly act the same without as much backlash.
Good marketing effort. Idiots.
While I am uneasy about patents, a case for truly innovative products can be made. But this is not innovation. This is patenting whatever one can. Like:
Enable display of a webpage’s content before the background image is received, allowing users to interact with the page faster;
You have got to be effen kidding me. That's a patent? Who was the bonehead that thought something like that is innovation?
"You can't make a race horse of a pig"
"No," said Samuel, "but you can make very fast pig"
'For we walk by faith, not by sight.' II Corinthians 5:7
you're as witty as microsoft is innovative.
This is the result of letting companies get patents that boil down to numbers and abstract generic processes. I think the only way to fix it is to reform how patents are granted, for what, and for how long. If USPTO simply can't handle the load they're under, then they should complain to their bosses for more resources, reform their practices, or change applicant's expectations.
The specific patent claims are not very well described in the article but of what I can tell they have some patent claims for widely used, basic GUI features. I feel this may affect more than Android if they're gonna win.
They seem to act just like a patent troll in this situation. In my industry (Pharmaceutical) there's a company that has a patent on validating user input in web applications by verifying it at the server. They've been going around and threatening all EDC (Electronic Data Capture) makers with that. Of what I know, they have never won a single court appearance with this and never got a nickel out of it. It's just way too easy to patent something in the US.
I hope Microsoft will not win anything here for the sake of the precedent it would set. It's bad enough some companies already settled with them over this. It's just what happened a while ago with their claims on Linux. Novell and RedHat cut a deal with them. Canonical never settled for their claims and nothing ever happened. It's a good example.
If we did it would be a happier country.
Not perfect, maybe - but happier.
Paranoia is a Survival Trait!
For a very short period it seemed to the more gullible among us, that you're starting to be a decent company. Thankfully, you've show in no uncertain way that you have not changed, and are still that douchebag bully in dire need to be body-slammed on concrete. I hope that one day it finally happens.
"The agriculture ministry is not in charge of Gundam" - Japanese ministry official.
Alright, where are all the Microsoft astroturfers telling us why this is actually a good thing?
They're still in shell-shock from having their last piece of FUD (that Android has a "bigger problem than Java" because of the linux kernel headers) blow up in their face. That has all the appearance of a support operation for today's announcement, but they've clearly lost the momentum.
They'll be back ... right after the Beast from Redmond receives a new batch of chairs.
Didn't Microsoft promise not to use their patent portfolio in this matter?
Of course, i wasn't one that believed them and i know they are evil, but it would be nice if the media would pound them with being hypocrites.
---- Booth was a patriot ----
The fight over the laser patent was over the idea not a working model. See for example, http://tc.engr.wisc.edu/uer/uer97/author5/content.html
HP's deep patent warchest would make them a significantly less appealing target than such patent lightweights as Barnes and Noble, Foxconn, or Inventec.. Furthermore, if I understand correctly, Microsoft has cross-licensing agreements with most major computer companies that specifically prevent many lawsuits of this sort.
makes me want to buy an Android Phone even more if they think theirs cannot even compete in the marketplace.
So, MS sues US companies into oblivion... Are htc and samsung etc, in international waters, subject to such extortion?
If not then all these giants of Asian tech need to do is open a web shop with international shipping. I doubt O'Bama is going to hunt down private citizens purchasing goods online.
No GSM carriers with decent SIM only plans? That's another story but illustrates, even in my own country, what a cartel the entire phone industry is. i.e. where it's often cheaper to buy a phone on an expensive contract than prepaid + own phone.
They have to show damages (lost sales) to obtain a large settlement. Android is open source. Google isn't really selling any hardware in the US anymore. Motorola, HTC, they DO sell stuff, and in large quantities. MS already got to them. B&N is doing pretty well with the Nook. They are the juicy targets.
-d
"Here Lies Philip J. Fry, named for his uncle, to carry on his spirit"
They're attempting to make money in the smartphone market. Remember, they gave Nokia over a $billion. They also have the development costs, so say another $billion. And now there's the advertising blitz, half a billion and counting, that just doesn't seem to be working.
You've got two and a half billion in sunk costs. How many handset licenses do you have to take in at $20 each to pay that off? 125 million.
Keep in mind that MicroNokia - oops, Nokia - has said they won't be releasing Windows smartphones until 2012, and that the other manufacturers are NOT happy about the MicroNokia deal, which they see as Microsoft helping Nokia compete against them in the Windows phone market.
WP7 might eventually earn back it's sunk costs, but it's looking pretty doubtful, especially since Microsoft leaked a WP8-based smartphone.
So that brings us to another question. Why is Ballmer still at Microsoft? The answer is simple - remember how he dumped a bucket-load of stock? Look at the timing. That was a warning to the board of directors - dump me, I dump the rest of your stock, and the price goes through the floor.
The pressure to call him on his bluff is just going to intensify, and someone's going to make a fortune shorting MSFT.
That's the cute part. They didn't sue Google, just the companies that sell products using Android.
Any sect, cult, or religion will legislate its creed into law if it acquires the political power to do so.
RAND doesn't work for FLOSS projects because "reasonable" is in terms of "reasonable fee" and non-discriminatory is "same price to all comers" so while it didn't present a barrier to entry when it was dreamed up, it does to FLOSS where a fee is never charged.
The inability for FLOSS to work with RAND patent licensing is why MPEG is thinking of moving to FRAND - F being Free as in Beer.
Look who is being sued -- Barnes and Noble and other companies that use android on their device. Correction, relatively small companies without large legal staffs that use android on their device. If android is the problem, then why isn't Microsoft suing Google for infringement? Oh, wait, Google has as much money and as many lawyers as Microsoft does. This is much like locking the drug user up in jail, but ignoring the pusher. If Microsoft really believes that android is infringing, then they should go directly after Google.
Who's to say that Google isn't going to give Microsoft a taste of their own medicine and fund B&N's legal battle?
im leaving aside all the discussion about microsoft's patent trolling, debauchery, two-faced practice and so on.
fuck your intellectual property 'rights'. i havent given the right to monopolize LOGICAL constructs to you. it was done in my stead, despite me, and is maintained as a 'right', despite me.
noone has the right to ownership of LOGIC processes. i dont recognize any such right, regardless of what party bestowed you with it.
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Now, now, now... that's uncalled for. He's far more witty than MS is innovative. To match MS's innovativeness, he'd have to have posted "this".
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.