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Linux Patent Infringement Lawsuit Filed Against Red Hat/Novell
Posted by
Zonk
on Fri Oct 12, 2007 08:26 AM
from the same-dang-thing-over-and-over dept.
from the same-dang-thing-over-and-over dept.
walterbyrd writes "Just months after the last nail in SCO's case, and on the same day as Red Hat's brave words about patent intimidation, a company filed the first patent suit against the Linux operating system. IP Innovation LLC filed the claim against Red Hat and Novell over U.S. Patent No. 5,072,412. PJ points out there is prior art here: 'You might recall the patent was used in litigation against Apple in April 2007, and Beta News reported at the time that it's a 1991 Xerox PARC patent. But Ars Technica provided the detail that it references earlier patents going back to 1984.'"
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An anonymous reader writes "The one summary judgement that puts a stick into SCO's spokes has just come down. The judge in the epic SCO case has ruled that SCO doesn't own the Unix copyrights. With that one decision, a whole bunch of other decisions will fall like dominoes. As PJ says, 'That's Aaaaall, Folks! ... All right, all you Doubting Thomases. I double dog dare you to complain about the US court system now. I told you if you would just be patient, I had confidence in the system's ability to sort this out in the end. But we must say thank you to Novell and especially to its legal team for the incredible work they have done. I know it's not technically over and there will be more to slog through, but they won what matters most, and it's been a plum pleasin' pleasure watching you work. The entire FOSS community thanks you for your skill and all the hard work and thanks go to Novell for being willing to see this through."
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mrcgran writes "Eweek is reporting on Red Hat's assurances that can continue to deploy Linux without fear of legal retribution from Microsoft. This, despite the increasingly vocal threats emanating from Redmond. 'In a scathing response to Ballmer's remarks, Red Hat's IP team said the reality is that the community development approach of free and open-source code represents a healthy development paradigm, which, when viewed from the perspective of pending lawsuits related to intellectual property, is at least as safe as proprietary software. "We are also aware of no patent lawsuit against Linux. Ever. Anywhere," the team said in a blog posting.'"
[+]
Red Hat Enlists Community Help To Fight Patent Trolls 166 comments
Stickster writes "Back in 2007, IP Innovation filed a lawsuit against Red Hat and Novell. IP Innovation is a subsidiary of Acacia Technologies. You may have heard of them — they're reported to be the most litigious patent troll in the USA, meaning they produce nothing of value other than money from those whom they sue (or threaten to sue) over patent issues. They're alleging infringement of patents on a user interface that has multiple workspaces. Hard to say just what they mean (which is often a problem in software patents), but it sounds a lot like functionality that pretty much all programmers and consumers use. That patent was filed back on March 25, 1987 by some folks at Xerox/PARC, which means that prior art dated before then is helpful — and art dated before March 25, 1986 is the most useful. (That means art found in a Linux distribution may not help, seeing as how Linus Torvalds first began the Linux kernel in 1991.) Red Hat has invited the community to join in the fight against the patent trolls by identifying prior art. They are coordinating efforts through the Post Issue Peer to Patent site, which is administered by the Center for Patent Innovations at the New York Law School, in conjunction with the US Patent and Trademark Office."
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"...filled against Linux" (Score:5, Informative)
Re:"...filled against Linux" (Score:4, Funny)
But would it apply to screen? lol
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Re:"...filled against Linux" (Score:5, Funny)
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Re:"...filled against Linux" (Score:5, Funny)
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Re:"...filled against Linux" (Score:5, Insightful)
Wrong. They're not attacking GNU/Linux. They are attacking companies that make money selling Linux. They're not after the people who won't pay for an operating system, they're after the people who will. This suit is against Redhat and Novell, who provide a system with a GUI, that GUI infringes on the patent.
My question is, what product does this company sell that they can claim to have lost revenue on? Or is IP law so crap that there is no need to even have made an attempt at creating a product to be able to sue someone for damages? I mean, I can understand royalties, but damages?
Also, it will be interesting to see when they informed Redhat and Novell of the infringement since they are suing for willful infringement.
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Re:"...filled against Linux" (Score:4, Insightful)
I don't know what happened in this case. It could be that the patent holder asked Red Hat to license the patent for a fee and Red Hat refused. Given Red Hat's recent statements that suggest that they feel no obligation to honor patents (at least patents held by companies they don't like), it wouldn't surpsise me.
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Re:"...filled against Linux" (Score:5, Insightful)
Anyway, this particular patent will be struck down on examination -- it fails both the novelty and obviety tests (to say nothing of being invalid in most countries in the world). Red Hat should submit a motion that the case is entirely without merit and IP Innovation LLC are being vexatious litigants.
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Re:"...filled against Linux" (Score:5, Insightful)
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Re:"...filled against Linux" (Score:5, Informative)
Gerry
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Re:"...filled against Linux" (Score:4, Funny)
"ALL companies have ex-Microsofties on the payroll, with some recent hires. Microsoft is the largest software company in the world. Go ahead, ask around. I'll bet you have a former Microsoft employee on your team! :)"
None here. If there were, I'd be making their life miserable.
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Follow the money (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Follow the money (Score:5, Informative)
Maybe.
IP Innovation LLC is a subsidiary of Acacia, and Acacia recently appointed Brad Brunell, who worked for 16 years at Microsoft as general manager, intellectual property licensing. He's now a senior vice president. Other ex-Microsoft executives have also recently migrated to Acacia.
Acacia are known as patent trolls.
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Re:Follow the money (Score:4, Interesting)
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Re:Follow the money (Score:5, Informative)
Wow, after hearing that Acacia has anything to do with this, I am not surprised at all. I worked in the distance education department for a University a few years back. At that time, they were making rounds among the education industry, and sending letters asking for several hundred thousand dollars, or 5% of all profits made from a series of patents.
The patents? "A system of distributing video and/or audio information employs digital signal processing to achieve high rates of data compression" over cable, tv, telephone, and as they were implying, the internet. Their claim was that anyone streaming video or sound needed to pay up. I mean, honestly, transferring compressed data over a medium!? And of course they didn't go after larger University's that flat out told them they wouldn't pay...
Acacia is one of those companies at the bottom of the barrel. Even worse than SCO, because their whole business is suing over patents, like NTP.
Here is the link if anyone's interested: http://www.streamingmedia.com/article.asp?id=8559&c=13 [streamingmedia.com]
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Re:Follow the money (Score:5, Interesting)
However, there is a principle in law (or Equity) that one cannot do indirectly what he cannot do directly. An interesting question for practicing lawyers (I am a retired one and not up on all of this) would be, is there a way to attribute the Plaintiff's actions to Microsoft, canceling their GPL rights? Would it in fact be too late to do this based on their provable support of SCO (the massive loans arranged by MS to keep SCO afloat)? I'd sure like to hear what Eben Moglen has to say about this.
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Re:Follow the money (Score:5, Insightful)
Since these Acacia people don't actually do anything other than patent troll defensive patent portfolios are useless against it.
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Too Late (Score:5, Insightful)
Saved me some effort (Score:3, Informative)
Its about time! (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Its about time! (Score:5, Informative)
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Re:Its about time! (Score:5, Insightful)
This is exactly what Mr Ballmer said would happen and is the best weapon Microsoft can use in pushing their "Linux infringes patents" attack. Obviously if they were to bring any cases themselves they would be swamped under a wave of counterclaims from Linux friendly companies such as IBM and Novell so this way they have a proxy which cannot be stopped in such fashion and which on the face of it has nothing to do with Microsoft should there be any negative repercussions from the action. I'd expect to see a lot more of this sort thing from now on.
Even if Red Hat go to court, win and have the patent thrown out ( which we hope they will ) it's still going to cost them a lot of money and quite likely drag on for a good long time sapping money and resources which Red Hat would otherwise be using to expand its business. This obviously is to Microsofts benefit and gives them a hook to hang their "Linux is tainted by illegal patents" hat on.
In the worst case scenario Red Hat go to court, lose and the patent is validated costing Red Hat lots of money for damages and an on-going outlay if they're allowed to licence the patent. Even worse than that since Red Hat no doubt use a very similar version of whatever component of the Linux system that everyone else does it's going to be a lot easier for this company to get money from them too. Even worse than that is the situation for freely distributed Linux, obviously there's no one to pay licence fees to use the patent so it's possible that restrictions would somehow be placed on such free distributions ( not sure of the legal situation with one ). Clearly this would be a huge win for Microsoft.
If this patent is thrown out then you can bet there will be hundreds more coming out of the woodwork each one carrying the risks outlined above if they're not thrown out and each one costing Linux companies money to defend against.
As PJ says the real solution is for the US to harmonise it's patent rules with the rest of the world and cut support for all software patents because if what we're seeing now continues the US is going to lose out to other countries where such patent laws are not in effect and Linux can flourish.
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Re:Its about time! (Score:5, Interesting)
There is another alternative, which could happen ... all development moves off-shore. Heck, RedHat could just move almost everything to Europe and trade there. (Alan Cox refuses to visit the US because of the stupid software patent issues).
Sell the core system in the US with from RedHat US with no Window Managers, and a link to repositories to download all the Window Managers you want, from software-patent-is-bad countries. Sell the full system everywhere else.
This is just one more step for the US in its continual technological decline. Whole industries are already gone - ram, most hard drives, lcd screens. Why not almost all FLOSS development?
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Re:Its about time! (Score:4, Funny)
I've information that I will hold for law suits that are dear to me,
I know the kings of software, and I sue them quite hysterical
From IBM to Red Hat , in order oh most technical;
I'm very well acquainted, too, with matters about the SCO law suit,
I understand the law, both the simple and the theoretical,
About collecting payment I'm teeming with a lot o' news,
With many cheerful facts about the demise of software use.
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Interesting. (Score:5, Insightful)
So they are Suing RedHat and Novell for using whatever it is that violates the patent. Isn't that a bit like suing Dell because Microsoft's OS infringes on a patent and Dell distributes it?
Re:Interesting. (Score:5, Interesting)
You mean like investigating Dell because they sell hard drives that might infringe on a patent [slashdot.org]?
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Re:Interesting. (Score:5, Interesting)
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Re:Interesting. (Score:5, Insightful)
It's good to see that the original inventors and holders of this patent will finally be compensated for their innovation.
Oh wait... the company that holds the patent now (IP Innovation) has nothing to do with the original inventors? Well, I hope any damages they are awarded will encourage them to innovate.
Our patent system is broken.
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Re:Interesting. (Score:5, Insightful)
I've come to realize that this is a misconception. The patent system isn't broken, corrupt, or overwhelmed. Unfortunately, it is working exactly as it was designed.
From an early age we are taught idealist interpretations of patent law and how it is a wonderful tool to spur innovation, research, business, etc. and provide a level playing field for the little entrepreneur. However, when confronted with the reality of what patent law is, a forced impedement on human nature to invent and create which turns out to be contradictory to the idealistic intent, it is assumed it must be because it is broken.
http://www.movingtofreedom.org/2006/08/31/ben-franklin-on-patents/ [movingtofreedom.org]
An ironmonger in London however, assuming a good deal of my pamphlet, and working it up into his own, and making some small changes in the machine, which rather hurt its operation, got a patent for it there, and made, as I was told, a little fortune by it. And this is not the only instance of patents taken out for my inventions by others, tho' not always with the same success, which I never contested, as having no desire of profiting by patents myself, and hating disputes. The use of these fireplaces in very many houses, both of this and the neighbouring colonies, has been, and is, a great saving of wood to the inhabitants.
- Benjamin Franklin, Autobiography
If Ben was around today I'm sure he would approve of the open source movement and he would likely be called a smelly long haired communist and have chairs thrown at him.
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Re:Patent markets DO reward original inventors (Score:4, Insightful)
I think the problem is that patents are being (c) sold to people who have no intention of (a) manufacturing the product themselves, nor (b) of licensing the patent to someone else. In which case, the patent doesn't promote innovation in any way. Sure, the original inventor is monetarily compensated, but if the invention isn't being used at all, what's the point? If the sale of the patent is to someone who is actually going to do something with it, instead of just sitting on it for a decade and then suing people, I wouldn't have a problem with that.
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Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Patent troll rule #1: Go after the deep pockets.
Patent troll rule #2: Go after the high profile lawsuit. When more notable companies get sued, you get more press, and therefore more respectability when you enter the negotiating table (their bread and butter is settlements).
It should be noted, however, that a very decent amount of Gnome development goes on at Novell, so that target isn't so ba
Re:Interesting. (Score:5, Informative)
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Re:Interesting. (Score:5, Insightful)
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Re:Interesting. (Score:4, Informative)
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If this doesn't stop EU swpatents nothing will (Score:5, Interesting)
There are lots of people in EU using linux distributions without any legal concerns that would be very damaged the very day that EU suddenly recognizes this troll patent.
Re:If this doesn't stop EU swpatents nothing will (Score:5, Interesting)
This way EU benefits from the extra tax from companies moving to EU and US might be forced to change their law or face loosing lots of tax dollars.
But then again, I might be dreaming...
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Start of a patent war? (Score:3, Interesting)
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
What I have found, though, is astounding. Acacia has sued hundreds of defendants in 213 different patent lawsuits brought by 36 different Acacia subsidiaries. That's right - they have sued in 36 different names! By doing so, Acacia, a publicly traded company, has increased its market cap by tenfold, going from a 35M company in early 2003 to a 350M company today.
This company doesn't make anything, it is a patent troll pure and simple.
Re:Start of a patent war? (Score:5, Funny)
Edmund Blackadder summed it up beautifully:
Edmund: You see, Baldrick, in order to prevent war in Europe, two superblocs
developed: us, the French and the Russians on one side, and the
Germans and Austro-Hungary on the other. The idea was to have two
vast opposing armies, each acting as the other's deterrent. That way
there could never be a war.
Baldrick: But this is a sort of a war, isn't it, sir?
Edmund: Yes, that's right. You see, there was a tiny flaw in the plan.
George: What was that, sir?
Edmund: It was bollocks.
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PJ points out no such thing (Score:5, Informative)
A couple of things I noticed (Score:4, Interesting)
But this patent was granted to Xerox, NOT "IP Innovation LLC". So why the hell is this 3rd party suing over a patent it wasn't granted?
The content of this patent is given in a language that is so obtuse that I can't tell whether it's describing something that was obvious, or if it's describing a single large virtual desktop, or if it's talking about something completely different than the "workspaces" we're used to seeing today. And I really don't have the time this morning to try deciphering it.
An Acacia subsidiary (Score:5, Informative)
Re:An Acacia subsidiary - More Info (Score:5, Insightful)
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Re:An Acacia subsidiary (Score:5, Informative)
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But wait... (Score:5, Interesting)
So you mean that making a patent deal with Microsoft doesn't really protect Novell from patent infringment suits? Well, isn't that the strangest thing...
I think Novell is about to figure out that no matter how you look at it, they got the short end of the stick in the Microsoft deal. They paid a lot of money so that firms other than Microsoft could sue them for patent infringement. Wonder if they'll just pay off this company like they did Microsoft. Wonder if they can afford to pay off all of the companies that will bring patent infringement suits against them.
What a way to paint a big, red, sue-me-for-patent-infringement-target on their company.
Are they building up a war chest? (Score:4, Insightful)
So, perhaps they are going after what they perceive as the 'weaker targets' in order to solidify this?
So, they go after red hat and novell, hoping they will pay...
IBM, etc have far more cash and they are not going after them because they would get pummeled into the ground.
Smells like a pump and dump, or a pump and sell deal with this patent troll, especially with the M$ goon with them.
Anybody remember "Sidekick" for DOS? (Score:4, Informative)
Of course Sun had stuff that predates this too. Their Open Look Window Manager (olwm) was around for quite a while before this. Olwm was the first window manager that I used under Linux too. That would have been in 1991 or so which may or may not pre-date the patent.
--
This space for rent
Yep, MS is behind of this (Score:5, Interesting)
It all appears MS is making up a new SCO.
A rational question is to ask "why also Novell"? Yes, we all know Novell and MS are buddies and all so this is a reason to think MS is not behind this lawsuit.
Imho what's going to happen is that Novell will be VERY collaborative and willing to accept to pay royalties for this BS patent, the game will be make Red Hat play alone. The expected aftermath (for MS-Novell) would be to make Red Hat look like a rogue company that does not respect IP. And yes, thanks to Novell the case will be much harder to solve for Red Hat than before, probably Novell will rush in making a deal so there's precedent...
Laugh at the ridiculous theory all you want, I just hope Novell does not prove me right on this one. But if they do, then I hope nobody will argue to me whose side Novell is playing for.
Novell cant make a deal. (Score:4, Interesting)
GPL prevents the distrubution without a license that would be passed right along to Redhat and its customers for free. Besided the patent is more about XWindows/KDE/Gnome than it is about Linux. Sun is the one going to be hurting on this; They use Gnome for Solaris and that is GPL'd. They wont be able to ship Solaris without a license that can then be used by everyone for free, even those who are not Sun customers. The Linux kernel doesn't have a workspace interface; thats a userspace program.
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Re:Extra! Extra! Read all about it (Score:5, Funny)
This is a game of two halves and four quarters right? Hope they stop for some entertainment mid-trial.
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Re:By this you will know... (Score:4, Informative)
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