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Microsoft Asks US Court To Ban Kyocera's Android Phones
angry tapir writes: Microsoft has asked a court in Seattle to ban Kyocera's DuraForce, Hydro and Brigadier lines of cellular phones in the U.S., alleging that they infringed seven Microsoft patents. The software giant charged in its complaint that some Kyocera phone features that come from its use of the Android operating system infringe Microsoft's patents.
>complaint that some Kyocera phone features that come from its use of the Android operating system infringe Microsoft's patents.
Wouldn't that mean Microsoft should be going after Google, and not Kyocera? Google produces the software, after all.
There is a catch 22 in the law here... Patents are public records so anybody can just copy a patent and claim they came up with it... If you hide patents from public view, you'd never be able to know if you violated one prior to the holder filing suit, but you'd have a obvious "it's obvious" argument in that case. IMHO: Patents are issued for way too many obvious things and rarely really have any unique content. I wonder if they really are necessary.
"File to fit, pound to insert, paint to match" - Aircraft Maintenance 101
That's an example of moral misery. In my opinion.
For everyone who thinks that Microsoft has turned over a new leaf under Nadella, here's the proof that they are still evil at heart.
Disclaimer: IANAL. This post is, however, legal advice, and creates an attorney-client relationship.
I keep hearing about Microsoft's Android patents but I still don't know what they are?
The patents are that they will tie you up in court for years at costs way beyond what you'd pay if you just gave in.
Apparently it's a new idea when you add: on a cellphone to it.
Be seeing you...
I really hope Kyocera doesn't back down & settle out of court. I'd love to see this go forward and see if Microsoft's patents really would hold up legally. I doubt they would, but that's all theory 'til it's tested out.
@ ZorinLynx: "Wouldn't that mean Microsoft should be going after Google, and not Kyocera? Google produces the software, after all."
:Steven J. Vaughan-Nichols: Patent trolls under attack, but not dead yet.
It would except microsoft knows it doesn't have a legal leg to stand on and the smaller players are easier to extort than the behemoth of Mountain View, California.
@Sylak: "IIRC Google negeoated patent protections/licensing for certain things in android, anything beyond that is the responsibility of the phone manufacturers because it's their software changes"
No, google never negotiated patent 'protection' from Microsoft in relation to Android. Microsoft has refused to reveal what these patents are. but is quite happey to fund Patent Trolls to go after legitimate companies. See
All 7 U.S. Kyocera phone owners cried foul!
The nature of the way patents are written is that they *are* hidden from public view -- while in plain sight.
And are they necessary? Economists Michele Boldrin and David Levine make a *very* compelling case that they are not. The purpose of patents and copyright is to provide incentive to cause creators to create ("Promote progress" in the words of the Constitution), but the evidence that they show makes a really strong case that intellectual property actually retards progress.
And Gates made that point himself in an internal Microsoft memo many years ago. "If people had understood how patents would be granted when most of today's ideas were invented and had taken out patents, the industry would be at a complete standstill today."
Ignorance killed the cat. Curiosity was framed.
Well, it seems that despite Microsofts NDA to try to keep its patents secret, the Chinese government simply published the list of claimed infringing patents Microsoft asserts. Sadly its in Simplified Chinese, but the english in brackets tells yo what they're about (badly spaced).
It's difficult to take fluff like this seriously (Method and System for Managing Changes to a Contact Database?? Method And System For Configuring A Timer?? Garbage FFS, the patent office joking again).
Common Name Space for Long and Short Filenames
Method And System For Configuring A Timer
Loading Status in a Hypermedia Browser Having a Limited Available Display Area
RadioInterface Layer in a CellPhone witha SetofAPI's Havinga Hardware-Independent Proxy Layer and a Hardware-Specific Driver Layer
System Provided Child Window Controls
Context Sensitive Menu System/Menu Behavior
Flexible Architecturefor Notifying Applicationsof StateChanges
Handheld Computing Devicewith External Notification System
Browser Navigationfor Devices Witha Limited InputS ystem
Methodand Systemfor Managing Changes toa Contact Database
Simulating Gestures ofa Pointing Device Usinga Stylusand Providing FeedbackThereto
Highlevel Active PenMatrix
SoftInputPanel SystemandMethod
Synchronizing OveraNumberof Synchronization MechanismsUsing FlexibleRules
MonitoringEntropic Conditionsofa FlashMemory DeviceasanIndicatorfor Invoking ErasureOperations
Methodand Systemfor Creating Multi-Lingual Computer Programs by Dynamically LoadingMessages
Communicating Multi-Part Messages Between Cellular Devices Usinga StandardizedInterface
Methodand Apparatus ForCapturing And Rendering Annotations For Non-ModifiableElectronicContent
Selection Handlesin Editing ElectronicDocuments
Methodand Systemfor File SystemManagement Usinga Flash-Erasable,Programmable, Read-OnlyMemory
Remote Retrievaland Display Managementof Electronic Documentwith IncorporatedImages
Computer Systemfo rIdentifying LocalResources
Event Architecture For System Management in an OperatingSystem
Exchange ActiveSyncEAS
Extended FileAllocationTable,exFAT
Remote Desktop Protocol,RDP
ah but paying ms and then getting the money back in wp, windows etc licenses - and cross licenses - helps samsung.
it keeps the smaller players out from the market.
never noticed how the western phone market is lacking all the new manufacturers? that's not a coincidence and this is how they're keeping them out.
world was created 5 seconds before this post as it is.