
Cost of the Uniloc Lawsuit - mmastrac
http://www.x-plane.com/x-world/lawsuit/cost/
======
nikcub
The most embarrassing part of this story is that Ric Richardson, the
Australian founder of Uniloc, is portrayed in the media in Australia as an
entrepreneurial hero.

He had his own 'Australian Story' feature:

[http://www.abc.net.au/austory/specials/thebigdeal/default.ht...](http://www.abc.net.au/austory/specials/thebigdeal/default.htm)

And has been profiled numerous times as brilliant genius entrepreneur in the
newspapers:

[http://www.smh.com.au/technology/technology-news/the-
beautif...](http://www.smh.com.au/technology/technology-news/the-beautiful-
mind-of-the-aussie-who-beat-microsoft-20110810-1ilm6.html)

<http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2009/04/19/1240079538770.html>

As far as I am concerned this type of coverage is a complete embarrassment for
the Australian tech scene and honest entrepreneurs from this country. Not once
in any of this coverage of Uniloc is the issue raised of small companies being
sued and threatened.

If you follow me on Twitter you would have seen that I have been tracking his
media coverage for years now and getting in touch with journalists in order to
get the other side of this patent trolling out and known to the public. It was
all to no effect.

This guy didn't invent anything, he is simply taking advantage of an
antiquated patent system to profit from the work of others. It is funny how in
none of these stories is it mentioned that what he does only works in the USA.

If you are from Australia help us out the next time you see a story or feature
on Ric and paste in a comment about how he is helping destroy small software
startups.

~~~
lengarvey
He presented at the recent SydStart event/convention here in Sydney. The crowd
was largely skeptical of him and his patents, and he had to cajole the
audience into agreeing with him that one of his "inventions" was actually
patentable.

I find it sad that a man like this is invented to speak to 900 entrepreneurs
and actually given some credence. He seems like a smart guy, but patents
aren't a friend of the startup community.

If you want to contact @pc0 who organised the latest SydStart event and
register your displeasure at Ric being one of the main speakers at this
largely awesome event that might be interesting.

~~~
nikcub
I had somebody email me about the same event, I am definitely going to follow
up on it - thanks for the info.

I am also going to write a post about it this weekend and forward it to the
journalists who have covered Uniloc in the Australian media, to try and get
the other side of the story out.

~~~
ricricho
Nik, Im sure if you actually talked to me you'd find that Im just a normal
bloke who likes inventing things that hopefully someone will use. Ive sold a
few inventions over the years and its great to make a living at what I love
doing...Id ask you as one fellow technologist to another to not make it
personal. Please.

------
nekitamo
If Uniloc wins this lawsuit they will have a precedent with which to sue every
app developer on the Android Marketplace who uses the Android License
Verification Library. Given how this can be a crippling blow to the Android
Marketplace, I'm interested to see what Google's reaction will be to this
lawsuit.

~~~
DanBC
MS fought for 8 years and then settled.

([http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-03-05/microsoft-
settles-f...](http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-03-05/microsoft-settles-
fight-over-uniloc-anti-piracy-patent-1-.html))

~~~
ricricho
Yes but not this patent. They will have to fight for a precedent like everyone
else in the US legal system.

------
adanto6840
I'm involved in a similar legal 'dispute' and was quoted very similar numbers
by several large firms. I was eventually able to find representation that is
substantially more economical and that is likely of higher quality. Feel free
to contact me directly if interested (same or similar jurisdiction even!)...
Email is in profile.

~~~
jcurbo
It is highly possible the Laminar Research people didn't post this or don't
read HN. If you have good advice to give them, you should probably contact
them directly.

------
xsmasher
I was surprised to see that this lawsuit seems to be about copy protection,
specifically Android app signing, not anything specific to flight simulators.

The specifics of the suit were two clicks away from the linked page:
<http://www.x-plane.com/x-world/lawsuit/details/>

This seems strange; does android app signing even use "communication with a
server to perform a license check"? That sounds more like serial/license
number verification.

~~~
danielweber
Yes, it took a while to find. This is one example where changing the headline
on HN to match the headline of the blog, where it expects to sit inside a lot
more context, is just confusing.

------
mistercow
It seems to me that it would be very much in Google's best interest dig some
change out from under their sofa cushions and provide legal support for these
developers. There should be no question that the patent will be knocked down,
but knocking it down will take money, and it would behoove Google to let their
developers know that when the patent trolls come a-knockin', they won't be
left on their own to defend their use of basic API calls.

------
pyalot2
This is unacceptable. I found it unacceptable last time that Uniloc sued
mojang for minecraft. And I find it more unacceptable now that they're
pounding on a guy who's not got the deep pockets that Notch has.

This is unacceptable. Entirely unacceptable.

Tomorrow it could be me, or it could be you. This has to stop, like right
fracking now. Take Uniloc down. Take all patent trolls down. Stop this patent
law bullshit. Right now!

~~~
josephcooney
How? I would love to do it!

~~~
fatbird
Do you remember how anti-abortion activists would put up a website listing the
names and home addresses of abortion doctors? And every time one of them got
shot, the activists would gleefully strike through the name of the doctor on
that site?

Put up another such site, starting with these guys:
<http://www.uniloc.com/index.php/company/>

~~~
biot
Are you advocating incitement to murder as a solution to a legal issue?

~~~
noonespecial
It does happen. It happens to divorce lawyers too. If you choose a profession
where you put people in the most stressful position of their lives and then
abuse the system to unfairly take everything they have, a small minority of
them try to kill you. It's not right, but it is true.

[http://query.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=F20A13F7395A1...](http://query.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=F20A13F7395A137B93C6AB178FD85F4D8784F9)

------
creamyhorror
The general background, necessary reading for basically all of us:

<http://www.x-plane.com/x-world/lawsuit/>

Specific lawsuit details:

<http://www.x-plane.com/x-world/lawsuit/details/>

Hilarious, it's a patent troll called Uniloc suing a guy for implementing a
license-check-with-a-server in his Android app - apparently the one provided
by Google for use in Android apps.

LANGUAGE OF THE DISPUTE: _Paragraph 12 of the lawsuit states: ”Laminar
Research is directly infringing one or more claims of the ’067 patent in this
judicial district and elsewhere in Texas, including at least claim 107,
without the consent or authorization of Uniloc, by or through making, using,
offering for sale, selling and/or importing Android based applications for use
on cellular phones and/or tablet devices that require communication with a
server to perform a license check to prevent the unauthorized use of said
application, including, but not limited to, X-Plane.”

Section 107 of the patent, which they claim I violated, contains: “107. …code
for verifying the license data stored on the licensing medium by communicating
with a registration authority having verification data….”_

These guys seriously need to be beaten down. Their website says:

 _“In the device recognition space, for example, we believe that we have
uncovered a billion dollar market … And it fits our straightforward
development model. Look at many ideas. Pick an outstanding one. Patent it.
Commercialize it. Reap the rewards.”_

Either they were really careful with the patent application phrasing, or the
PTO flubbed this one.

THE PATENT IN QUESTION: I'm reading the actual patent and seeing that it's
about a license system which is in 3 parts: device, "portable license medium",
and registration authority (presumably a remote server).

[http://patft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-
Parser?Sect1=PTO1&Sec...](http://patft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-
Parser?Sect1=PTO1&Sect2=HITOFF&d=PALL&p=1&u=%2Fnetahtml%2FPTO%2Fsrchnum.htm&r=1&f=G&l=50&s1=6,857,067.PN.&OS=PN/6,857,067&RS=PN/6,857,067)

MAIN IDEA: The primary claim is that the device checks the data on/from the
license medium and compares it with verification data from the registration
authority. The data may be a hash of the license data; it may be encrypted by
a private-public key system; it may contain hardware identifiers so that the
authority can check if the hardware is on an authorized list; it may be
updated with new data from the authority; it may be limited by an expiry date;
so on and so forth.

It goes on to talk about securing the licensing medium and data by means of a
double verification process (through a "license manager").

LICENSING MEDIUM: The definition of the licensing medium:

 _The licensing medium 120 is a portable component that contains information
concerning the software or other licensed electronic data that the user is
authorized to access. When a user seeks to access a vended piece of electronic
data, the client program communicates with the licensing medium 120 to verify
that the user is authorized to access the electronic data.

In general, the licensing medium 120 may be any type of portable electronic
data storage medium that has a unique, unalterable serial number or other form
of identification that can be transmitted electronically. Examples include
smart cards, memory sticks, magnetic strip cards, floppy disks and other
removable computer storage media. The licensing medium 120 and the electronic
device that uses the licensed electronic data need not have a wired
connection. A wireless connection, e.g., an infrared or radio frequency (RF)
link, may be used._

DOES THIS PATENT APPLY?: In general, this seems to be a patent on a license
system involving a separate, "portable" license module (like a dongle or
smartcard) that provides license data and can be updated with new license data
from the server. Putting aside the question of whether this deserves a patent
in the first place, I wonder what about the guy's Android app involves a
separate, removable license medium. What's their basis for suing?

Especially in the light of:

 _Speaking for Laminar Research, we used only the technology that was provided
to us by Google for copy protection in our Android App ‘X-Plane’… we used
exactly the copy protection Google gave us! And, of course, this is what
Google provides to EVERYONE ELSE THAT IS MAKING A GAME FOR ANDROID!_

KEY CLAIM: And here's the claim at the heart of the dispute, which I should've
gone to at the start:

 _107\. Computer code executable on an electronic device to prevent
unauthorized access to electronic data stored on the electronic device, the
computer code comprising: code for storing license data on a portable
licensing medium configured to communicate with the electronic device; code
for determining whether to allow access to the electronic data based on the
license data; code for verifying the license data stored on the licensing
medium by communicating with a registration authority having verification
data; and code for providing updated license data received from the
registration authority to the licensing medium._

This very clearly says that the license data is stored on a "portable
licensing medium". If they're referring to license data stored in the internal
RAM or SD card of a smartphone, then it collapses to the traditional license-
data-and-server model and it doesn't make sense to talk about a portable
licensing medium any more.

It's patent nonsense, literally.

~~~
DanBC
The SIM card is the removable medium. I think. I'm not sure.

Let's not forget that while this patent is a joke MS fought them for eight
years and eventually settled.

([http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-03-05/microsoft-
settles-f...](http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-03-05/microsoft-settles-
fight-over-uniloc-anti-piracy-patent-1-.html))

~~~
creamyhorror
Oh, wow, it's the same company that sued Mojang over "Mindcraft" not long ago.
And over the same claim 107 too. (Good info man. But the Microsoft patent is
'216, not the '067 that the X-Plane developer is being sued over.)

[http://www.joystiq.com/2012/07/21/uniloc-sues-mojang-over-
al...](http://www.joystiq.com/2012/07/21/uniloc-sues-mojang-over-alleged-
patent-infringement-in-android-v/)

If the SIM card is the source of the license data, surely the data must have
been put there together with the app, and be directly relevant to it. If
simply checking an account identifier on the SIM card before providing access
is a violation (since it might be considered "license data"), then probably
every smartphone in the world is in violation.

 _Uniloc has filed suit over the same patent against software companies in
federal court in Tyler, Texas, including Symantec Corp. (SYMC) and Adobe
Systems Inc. (ADBE) Some of those, including Adobe, have reached settlement
agreements._

If even giants like Adobe...I don't know how much hope an independent
developer has. Either Google does something, or the defendants will have to
band together to gather the resources. What a terrible mess, that they
actually managed to get money through their ridiculous claim 107.

edit: It turns out Laminar Research (the guy in this story) was already
mentioned in the Reddit thread on Uniloc suing Minecraft. Along with Square
Enix, EA, and other games companies.

[http://www.reddit.com/r/Games/comments/wx2pg/notch_being_sue...](http://www.reddit.com/r/Games/comments/wx2pg/notch_being_sued_over_server_authentication_patent/)

OF PARTICULAR INTEREST:

edit2: It turns out that the case against Microsoft was overturned in 2009 by
the District Court of Rhode Island:

<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4524170>

and very interestingly, "the Court found that _jury members were not able to
sufficiently understand the technical details and legal issues to reach a
reliable verdict_. There is also concern over the obstacles presented by
increasing patent litigation to high-technology entrepreneurs and companies,
which may inhibit innovation."

!!! A judge who actually said a jury wasn't sufficiently capable of
understanding the details in a patent case! !!!

~~~
creamyhorror
To add to this, Drew Curtis (founder of Fark.com) gave a talk on how he
defeated a patent troll:
[http://www.ted.com/talks/drew_curtis_how_i_beat_a_patent_tro...](http://www.ted.com/talks/drew_curtis_how_i_beat_a_patent_troll.html)

There are some good insights in this short talk, but there was also this
comment by a user called Troll Busters:

 _This is unfortunate because Mr. Curtis was scammed. No, not by the patent
troll, but by his lawyers who was more concerned about charging excessive fees
when there was a much more cost-effective solution to his problem. The problem
is not patent law but legal economics. This patent was easily invalidated by a
simple and cost-efftive post-grant proceeding called a reexamination. However,
law firms have been steering clients away from cost-effective proceedings in
favor of much riskier and higher cost litigation to resolve disputes. Why?
Because law firms need the high fees associated with patent litigation and
discourage use of cost-effective post-grant proceedings to determine patent
invalidity at the Patent Office.

I was familiar with the patent mentioned and proposed to wipe it out for $50K.
We had the prior art needed to invalidate the patent. But each defendant's
lawyer wanted to charge their clients fees and not give up the high-billing
litigation legal work for such a simple solution that could have been shared
collectively among the defendants. Instead, it allowed the troll to divide and
conquer and force lucrative settlements for "nuisance fees" or the amount that
would have to be paid to lawyers._

I don't know if the threat of a reexamination would have been enough to scare
the patent troll away, but it would be very interesting if this were a viable
method of nullifying the patent. I'm guessing it's not as easy as $50K-and-
we're-done, else one of the victims in these cases would have attempted it
already. But it seems like a successful invalidation would certainly kill the
troll and save everyone the trouble and legal costs.

~~~
danielweber
A former colleague of mine had information in his thesis which could
invalidate a certain patent. For various unplanned reasons his thesis was not
available online nor through his alma mater.

For a while, every year or two he would get a call from a lawyer who was
willing to pay him a hefty fee for a copy of his thesis. For the lulz he
always asked "do you want me to publish this somewhere?" and the lawyer always
said "NO!"

------
nsxwolf
Does anyone know of a "Big List Of Things You Should Not Implement" that would
help developers avoid stumbling into patent traps?

~~~
TazeTSchnitzel
Any possible mechanism, algorithm, or feature with an explanation that can be
reasonably expressed using the English language.

------
tibbon
Why are judges not throwing out these lawsuits more?

What can we do to stop these and fix the system? Clearly, there are _real_
patent violations that occur and need stopped, but there are so many ones that
benefit only trolls and attorneys.

~~~
dschuler
Presumably, judges need to assume that granted patents are valid and
defensible. On the other hand, Eastern Texas probably gets a good amount of
revenue from allowing this sort of nonsense to be litigated.

~~~
caf
Is the court system really a profit centre for the state?

~~~
andreasvc
That's about the only reason I can think of for why they handle such a
striking amount of patent lawsuits.

------
Avitas
What are the full names, home addresses, business/home/cell phone number,
e-mail address (etc.) of every principal and/or shareholder of Uniloc USA,
Inc.?

I found the following, but I'm sure there is much more:

Mr. Bradley C. Davis, CEO

Mr. Craig S. Etchegoyen, Co-Founder

Mr. Michael Lin, CFO

Mr. J. A. White, VP Sales & Business Development

Mr. Joe Mordetsky, VP Engineering

For many states where companies are incorporated, much of this is often
required to be released as public information for articles of incorporation
and annual report filings--even for privately-owned corporations.

~~~
biot
You can share your opinion of the merits of this case c/o Uniloc's corporate
office or through the attorney in this case. Or feel free to file an amicus
curiae brief with the court having jurisdiction over this case. The latter
approach will at least have a chance of helping if you are an expert who is
well versed in the subject matter.

Or is your motivation is to mount a campaign of distributed harassment of
these individuals?

~~~
malandrew
"You can share your opinion of the merits of this case c/o Uniloc's corporate
office or through the attorney in this case."

You and I both know that this is a worthless avenue to take. Any organization
of sufficient size generating externalities and ill will certainly has a
"catchall" mechanism for making sure that such opinions regarding merit will
probably never be read and considered.

Publicly publishing their contact info ensures that they receive all feedback
unfiltered (assuming they would have received such feedback at all). Yes, it
is likely that these people will be exposed to distributed harassment by
_some_ members of the public that are unhappy with what they are doing, but it
will also give other members of the public the opportunity to write something
thoughtful that gets to the intended recipient.

It's an unfortunate dichotomy, but between approach A that will more than
likely filter out all dissenting opinion before arriving at the desk of the
recipients and approach B that will result in the delivery of thoughtful
comments and harassment, the latter is far more desirable because at least it
has the opportunity to have an impact.

~~~
Avitas
I wasn't thinking about directly sending Uniloc, its officers or its investors
feedback.

After reading the article, I immediately thought of how I would feel and what
I would do. I have had some experience with having a "diamond" that I had
spent years figuratively cutting and polishing suddenly smashed to bits. But,
my metaphorical diamond is not of the same scale as the original author's
corporation. I didn't see it coming and it only amounted to a loss of a few
thousand dollars. If I knew months or years beforehand that someone was
building a case for some wild claims about my supposed mega-diamond that were
false (e.g., the original diamond was theirs and was stolen even though I
personally mined the rough diamond with valid mineral rights), but that those
claims were going to be presented in a courtroom where I was at a significant
disadvantage, I would want to explore plans of defense that were reasonably
complete.

Given my inexperience in these matters, I also would really appreciate and
perhaps greatly benefit from help. It could even be help in a form that might
first appear meaningless without perspective that was later provided by future
developments or other information.

Would I fantasize that some heavy hitters in the media would investigate and
perhaps assist with informing the public of my plight and the plight of others
who are increasingly victimized by these tricky diamond thieves or patent
trolls? Sure. Should someone from the media want to start investigating
exactly what is happening in this case, it would be nice if one of the first
hits they see is this Hacker News thread. The opinions and details contained
herein--the who, what, how, why, where, etc--might be quite helpful if someone
digs up a small nugget that leads to something bigger. There may be (or there
may not be) several obvious items that are just under the surface of this
matter that just need some bits to come to light before the dots can be
connected.

It's possible that we are unaware of some real eye-opening items relating to
this matter that someone just needs to dig a bit to find within the mountain
of publically available information. Has Uniloc intentionally targetted a very
specific corporate demographic? Has Uniloc already successfully settled with
thousands or tens of thousands of small companies already with just some
persistent and carefully-worded threats?

Then, there's the matter I originally bought up. Should the individuals behind
this be subject to public scrutiny that would normally only be expected for
people like senatorial, mayoral or presidential political candidates? If this
were my diamond that was going to be taken from me and I had time to do
something, I think I would agree with this level of scrutiny. Would I want to
let the perpetrators of these legal maneuvers grow in their direct and
indirect dealings that appeared to be directly harming me? No. I don't think
it's wrong to look at publically available information if there may be some
aspect of that public information that might be helpful. Why not know every
single thing that is possible to know? If this were happening to me, I would
feel remiss if I did not pursue perfectly legal and reasonable avenues of
investigation.

In addition, the information gathered and communicated during investigation
can be used by others. There are so many obvious ways in which those involved
can be discouraged from doing these things. I'm talking about using gathered
information in the most obvious ways such as:

* Abstaining from the purchase of products or services from:

\- those bringing lawsuits

\- other organizations which are owned by the principals and/or investors
(e.g., a restaurant owned jointly officer X and spouse)

\- other organizations which funded/are funding and/or assisting them

Before any of this can be done, some basic investigation has to be done...
search, identify and communicate any and all public information which might be
of use to reporters, the writer of the original article or other HN users
which are trying to help.

------
utopkara
What is needed, is a fast track evaluation of technology claims. The speed can
be achieved by streamlining the process of finding the field expert, providing
archives and secretarial services during the evaluation, and coaching the
expert about the process. The task can be taken up by an industry foundation,
which can also drive down the cost.

Any expert with some experience in dealing with patents can figure out if a
patent in his/her area has any merit. But doing it in court is a different
matter, and takes time.

The problem is, the court has to do this evaluation by appointing established
experts, who don't have much time anyway, so even the search for experts take
time. And the experts have to evaluate the claims with respect to historical
state of the art at the time of patent application.

We are lucky that the internet now remembers most of the past, so we can go
back to comments in HN, and say, "see, people were already talking about that
in public at the time of this patent". But, for older patents, the experts
have to dig through conferences, magazines, emails, journals, etc. as
reference, and evidence that something was known. Without such diligent work,
plainly declaring that an idea is trivial, will not be something an expert
will be willing to do in court.

All this can be sped up and the costs can be reduced if an organization took
the task. I) Hire a group of neutral distinguished academics in several key
fields, who will find and appoint technology experts. II) Put together the
tools and archives the experts will need in their evaluation. III) Coach the
experts about the process, and provide secretarial services during the
process.

~~~
utopkara
This could be the Free Patent Foundation, similar to FSF, but for everybody.

------
msmonroe
This patent looks too broad. It's a joke, challenge the patent. Then sue
Uniloc.

<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/OReilly_v._Morse>

------
vetler
This is scary.

------
debacle
I was with him until the unborn child bit. Then it went off the deep end.

~~~
oogali
If a project I put a lot of sweat into and providing a revenue stream I
depended on for my family was now threatened by a large entity, and the
monetary cost was more than the combined value of my total app revenue and my
personal savings, plus the time cost is more than I'm willing to bear... I'd
be there with him.

Being sued is stressful.

Being sued and losing a revenue stream, when you want to bring this thing into
the world that eats, breathes, and needs you and your time is doubly
stressful.

Being sued, losing a revenue stream, wanting to have another child, and having
your significant other tell you that while this cloud is hanging over your
head, we won't take on the additional responsibility in the shrinking window
of her fertility, is heart breaking.

Those daydreams you have of building a successful product, while your kids
play in the backyard, now evaporate.

To call it the deep end, is very dismissive.

