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Patent Ruling Against Microsoft Upheld

By Ed Oswald, BetaNews

August 23, 2006, 6:13 PM

A Texas federal judge has rejected calls by Microsoft and Autodesk to hold a new trial regarding a patent infringement case it lost against David Colvin, the founder of z4 Technologies. Both companies were found guilty of infringing on Colvin's patents surrounding anti-piracy technologies, and were fined $133 million.

Colvin's patents were used in Microsoft's Office productivity suite and Windows XP operating system, as well as Autodesk's AutoCad software, the suit alleged.

In rejecting the motion by the two companies, U.S. District Judge Leonard Davis also increased the fines by $25 million. Microsoft's fine was increased to $140 million, plus $2 million in legal fees, while Autodesk's $18 million penalty was upped by $322,000.

Representatives for Microsoft and Autodesk were not immediately available for comment, while z4 technologies declined to comment.

In terms of the size of fines, the fine is the second biggest ever against Microsoft for patent violations. The biggest would be the $565 million judgment against it in the Eolas case, where it was found guilty of infringing on patents related to the embedding of plug-ins within a Web browser.

However, in other cases the payouts have been much larger. One of the largest Microsoft has had to pay was in an antitrust suit with Sun, where the company paid $1.6 billion to settle claims that it misappropriated Java technologies.

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By sucrets

posted Aug 24, 2006 - 6:24 PM

Remember when Microsoft patented a Red Delicious Apple Tree?

Pat no: PP14,757

Maybe they should start capitalizing on that one :-)

Score: 0

By tirpider

posted Aug 25, 2006 - 11:35 AM

i just looked that up...

http://patft.uspto.gov/n...quot;Red+Delicious";

that is so crazy ....

Score: 0

By tirpider

edited Aug 24, 2006 - 12:08 AM

bah... noone is good communist anymore....

Score: 0

By dhjdhj

posted Aug 24, 2006 - 1:06 PM

Just as well, since communism doesn't work!

Score: 0

By tirpider

posted Aug 25, 2006 - 8:29 AM

I think is's a scale issue.

A smaller group of people will agree on how and when to do stuff a lot better than teeming hordes of people can.

Score: 0

By Grazer

posted Aug 24, 2006 - 1:09 PM

Communism would work if people weren't flawed.

Score: 0

By ryusen

posted Aug 24, 2006 - 5:07 PM

most isms could work, if people were not flawed .p

Score: 0

By PC_Tool

posted Aug 25, 2006 - 9:01 AM

Great.

But since people are, and always will be flawed, can we stop with the isms now and maybe work on something that might actually be realistic and relevant?

/rant

Score: 0

By fewt

posted Aug 25, 2006 - 9:54 AM

Shouldn't you be ptorping an iss or something?

heh

Score: 0

By Grazer

posted Aug 24, 2006 - 5:37 PM

Too true, too true.

Score: 0

By BIL

edited Aug 23, 2006 - 9:55 PM

I agree that patent sitting scum should not benefit from other peoples hard work. On the other hand theft of Java, plugin code, and anti-piracy codes are technology theft. Someone worked hard to develop them and companies that want to use that technology (especially wealthy companies) should pay to license them rather than steal it and try to get their scumbag lawyers to claim they were the actual inventors. Maybe we need to limit the amount of money a company can spend on lawyers to bust patents by the people that actually invented these technologies. At the same time we can limit the amount of money patent sitting companies can spend too.

Score: 0

By JacenSolo

posted Aug 24, 2006 - 8:29 AM

Ah, but if someone stole Java, it'd be a breach of copyright anyway

Score: 0

By BIL

posted Aug 24, 2006 - 3:54 PM

Do you suppose that is why Microsoft had to pay so much to settle?

Score: 0

By JacenSolo

posted Aug 23, 2006 - 7:00 PM

Gah! I'm getting sick of hearing about patents :( Let the companies do their jobs rather then suing them.

Score: 0

By dhjdhj

posted Aug 24, 2006 - 1:07 PM

Companies are doing their job - they're entitled to protect their IP

Score: 0

By ladylust

posted Aug 23, 2006 - 10:16 PM

Actually thats incorrect. I have a patent pending at the moment for the software industry. Most of the time big companies steal ideas from the little man when you try to sell your idea, so its good once in a while when the big guys get a slap on the wrist. The whole point of a patent is to sell it for a large sum 99% of the time.

Score: 0

By gilboa

posted Aug 24, 2006 - 4:26 AM

The problem with software patents begin and ends with the lack of guidelines on what could be patented.
-IF- you allow Microsoft to patents "Use of Icons to notify user when an update is pending" and the "IsNot" operand, you are opening the road to patent wars.

I'm willing to accept that a revolutionary compression algorithm should be defended against theft (By copy write instead of patent), but "Using 'Buy-Now' in auction site" (latest Ebay vs. good-knows-who patent case) -should not- be given any protection as these are simple abstract ideas (as opposed to complex algorithms).

- Gilboa

Score: 0

By dhjdhj

posted Aug 24, 2006 - 1:08 PM

Correct - the problem is not with the concept of patents but rather with how they are currently implemented....this needs to be fixed.

Score: 0

By Grazer

edited Aug 24, 2006 - 1:07 PM

Yeah, anyone who thinks the patent system is ok the way it is needs to check out the EFF's page on patents. I did a presentation on it in my computer ethics course. It is just insane what some of the patent holders are granted and what they claim it covers; and then when you actually examine the patents, you find no source code and no specific equipment...just the "abstract" in alot more words, and about every conceptual way to accomplish the task the patent will cover. Part of the problem is that most are not "technology" patents but "business practice" patents that usually involve taking a normal business practice and appending "on the internet" to it. Fortunately, most of the ones that are literally that blatant are thrown out, which is why we don't see anyone with a "selling stuff on the internet" patent. Unfortunately, it is often cheaper to settle a patent dispute than litigate it, so many undeserved and/or ludicrous patents go unchallenged.

I am almost tempted to try to patent "a sorting algorithm that sorts in linear time". Afterall, it is not like the patent office requires working code or even pseudocode.

Score: 0

By JacenSolo

posted Aug 24, 2006 - 8:23 AM

Patents... what's the point?

Products you make and distribute are automaticly covered by copyright.

Score: 0

By Secret Agent Man

posted Aug 24, 2006 - 8:36 AM

The problem is any big-name company can sweep in, steal your idea, and take the credit (i.e. money) for it. If they patent it, the assumed copyright won't do you much good, as you can't prove that you were the original inventor.

I agree with what was said already: There needs to be some sort of limit for making patents: Patentin g a complicated algorithm is one thing, patenting clicking on a button is a whole other story.

Score: 0

By tazandpig

posted Aug 23, 2006 - 9:13 PM

Agreed.

And the ridiculous sums of the awards given are just astonishing.

Score: 0

By sophist_dreams

posted Aug 24, 2006 - 7:40 AM

The awards are based on the amount of money made by the thief and the known/projected loses to the person or company who applied for and received the patent. Microspsud is not shy in trying to get it's money's worth when it's patents are infringed upon, why should the little guy be any different?

Score: 0

By tirpider

posted Aug 24, 2006 - 10:34 AM

"loses" implies that they could have made money on it...... but... um.... didn't?

So here comes some ppl who could and did.

So a guy buy's a lottery ticket and when the numbers are anounced, he misreads them or something, then throws it on the ground. He later sees someone pick it up and start to sing and dance with joy as he makes preperations to be rich... then the first guy ......um.... gets a lawyer?

Score: 0

By JacenSolo

posted Aug 24, 2006 - 8:24 AM

Cause the little guy is the guy no one cares about?

and besides, if the little guy wants to protect his copyrights, then by all means...

Score: 0

By The MAZZTer

posted Aug 23, 2006 - 8:58 PM

That's easy, all you have to do is something clever, like patent suing someone for patent infringement. Then you win!

Score: 0

By JacenSolo

edited Aug 24, 2006 - 8:27 AM

I should patent something cool sounding, that Microsoft would likely include with Vista. Wait to see if it's in then sue em for it! Sure beats working anyday [/bullcrap]

Score: 0

By dhjdhj

posted Aug 24, 2006 - 1:09 PM

Nobody is stopping you AND THAT'S THE POINT!

Score: 0

By daq

posted Aug 24, 2006 - 12:21 PM

I agree completely because so far, most of the large lawsuits with huge payoffs that made it here were exactly about that.

Score: 0

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