Red Hat Prevails Against Patent Troll Acacia 89
walterbyrd writes with news that Red Hat and Novell have won a patent case brought by a subsidiary of Acacia Research Corporation. The company had "accused Red Hat and Novell of infringing three patents that cover a computer-based graphical user interface that spans multiple workplaces, and lets users access icons remotely, according to court documents. A jury in Marshall, Texas, yesterday sided with Red Hat and Novell's defense that the patents were invalid." Red Hat's Michael Cunningham said, "The jury knocked out three invalid patents that were masquerading as a new and important inventions, when they were not. We appreciate the jury's wisdom and remain committed to providing value to our customers, including through our Open Source Assurance program. We also remain stalwart in resisting bogus shakedown tactics."
Epic patent trolls? (Score:5, Informative)
Correct me if i'm wrong but these guys look like epic patent trolls - http://www.acaciaresearch.com/pressreleases.htm [acaciaresearch.com]
Re:Which Patents (Score:5, Informative)
5,533,183 [uspto.gov], entitled “User Interface With Multiple Workspaces for Sharing Display System Objects” which issued on July 2, 1996
5,394,521 [uspto.gov], entitled “User Interface With Multiple Workspaces for Sharing Display System Objects” which issued on February 28, 1995
Source: http://www.groklaw.net/pdf/IPvRH-1.pdf [groklaw.net]
Re:yay! (Score:3, Informative)
Please tell me you are not mistaking this for Marshall the college. Not really aware of Football being a major thing that Marshall, TX is known for. It is known as one of the places where the Civil Rights movement centered out of in the south, but I'm not aware of it being particularly noted as a great high school football school, in terms of other Texas High Schools. A quick search online shows that most sites that rank high schools in their classification (4A) shows them to be a middle of the pack football school.
Re:Epic patent trolls? (Score:3, Informative)