

HTC Sues Apple Using Patents Obtained From Google Last Week - flamingbuffalo
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-09-07/htc-sues-apple-alleging-infringement-of-four-u-s-patents.html

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reader5000
I think what they should do is just mutually agree to make a big bonfire, burn
a couple billion in cash each, and then get back to business as usual.

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throwawaylols
I think that's how Burning Man started.

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skeletonjelly
Makes sense. The heads of these companies are on psychedelics!

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skeletonjelly
Ouch. Why are we so humourless today?

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coderdude
Is there anyone _not_ simultaneously suing and getting sued over patents? It's
like a war zone where each company tries hard to screw over every other
company in their space. Then they go collaborate on Web standards. If these
were people instead of businesses you'd have to assume they had mental
illnesses.

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zmmmmm
> Is there anyone not simultaneously suing and getting sued over patents?

Yes. Google is getting sued lots but they are not suing anybody. I suppose
selling (or giving??) a patent to HTC who then sues using it is sort of
indirectly suing though.

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crenshaw
I thought only Oracle was suing Google Is someone else suing Google?

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Steko
Well according to a search for "sues google" there's also at least Skyhook,
Paypal, Ebay, Zynga and Paul Allen's Trollco. I'd say the lawsuits from Apple
and Microsoft count even though they are indirectly suing Google.

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crenshaw
Umm... I think you read my question wrong. Who's not suing Google? :-)

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victorpimentel
It's difficult to consider this an attack while, previously, Apple sued HTC.

Honestly, I don't know who started it, but this doesn't benefit anyone. Well,
maybe some lawyers...

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Tyrannosaurs
Agree that it's not an attack per se, it would appear to be a more aggressive
form of defence though.

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mcritz
It'd be nice to see the end of commoditized patent holding. E.g. Only the
creators of a technology can benefit from the patent process. The "proxied
from a third party to sue a second party" without any original innovation is a
pathetic puppet show.

Create or die.

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yariang
I agree with the spirit of your post but realize that selling patents is one
way inventors can realize value. If companies couldn't use them as
commodities, their value might be diminished.

The trading may pose some downsides, but it's not all bad.

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chc
I thought so at first, but that just begs the question: _So what_ if they're
less valuable that way? The purpose of the patent system is not to maximize
the monetary value of patents. I mean, the status quo makes patents less
valuable than they would be if the government offered a pile of gold to
patent-holders every five years, but that doesn't mean the government _should_
offer them gold.

The question is, would patents still serve their purpose well enough under
such a system? Would inventors be unduly discouraged from getting patents?
That doesn't seem likely. Solo inventors would just sell a license to the
patent rather than the patent itself. And the biggest deterrent for lone
inventors has always been the expense of getting a patent in the first place.
That wouldn't change.

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Ainab
After all, it seems Google bought Motorola for patents and attacking Apple and
co'. I know, Google is not directly suing Apple, but the act of giving those
patents to HTC constitutes to suing Apple.

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chollida1
Microsoft and Nokia are doing the same thing as Google with a company called
Mosaid.

This lets Google and Microsoft sue other companies over patent issues without
actually doing it themselves.

it seems to be the new style of patent warfare.

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pohl
The Cold War proxy-war model applied to patent suits.

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pcj
how does proxy war help? the one who is sued knows that the company who's
suing them is just a proxy for XYZ

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pohl
Interesting response. Are you suggesting that the Soviet Union was unaware
that the Mujahadeen was getting weapons and training from the U.S., or that
the United States didn't know where North Korea got their MiG-15s and who was
flying them? I suppose that may have been true for a time, but it's not like
the jig was up as soon as intelligence reports revealed the truth.

The real benefit of the proxy wars was that the level of indirection was
believed to make an all-out nuclear conflict less likely, and that large
chunks of the general population could be kept in the dark, unable to wrap
their heads around "why we're over there".

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miratrix
If you're interested in these patent issues, you should add FOSS Patents
(<http://fosspatents.blogspot.com/>) to your RSS reader.

Florian has the list of patents being asserted by HTC and some analysis of
them at [http://fosspatents.blogspot.com/2011/09/these-are-patents-
go...](http://fosspatents.blogspot.com/2011/09/these-are-patents-google-gave-
to-htc-to.html)

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thisisnotme
Anyone have a brief description of the patents that are being thrown around
here. It would be nice to see how "legit" they are.

It might make an interesting little website. PatentShootout.com (take it and
run with it)

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brisance
Wonder what was the price that was paid. Don't think they were given away free
(as in beer), otherwise Google executives themselves would face lawsuits.
Breach of fiduciary duty and all that.

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amatheus
Now, if Apple and HTC reach a cross-licensing agreement that includes these
patents, could apple later sue another android manufacturer using them?

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Tyrannosaurs
Depends what the agreement says but in theory yes.

Certainly once Apple have a license to these patents they lose any
defensive/offensive capability they have in relation to Apple.

Possibly one of the terms of the sale of the patents (or licensing or whatever
it is - a straight sale seems wrong to me, why would Google, who have a
notoriously weak patent portfolio, sell part of it when they could protect HTC
without actually losing the patent) is that any agreement has to relate to all
devices running Android, not just HTC devices.

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ryanhuff
Do we know how much HTC bought these patents for?

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wbienek
Awesome. This obvious patent crap has to go. Unless real blood is shed the
government will do nothing...

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linuxhansl
It's either 5 decades of patent of cold war or a few years of all out patent
war, after which the major players will beg US authorities to change the law.

This is insane. So much money and time wasted over legal monopolies such as
"multi function buttons", "dropdowns on a webpage", "rounded corners", etc,
etc, etc.

Now even Google is dragged into this crap hole by moronic companies such as
Oracle and Apple.

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linuxhansl
Oh no. I said something against Apple. (Unless there was something else
objectionable)

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jsz0
It will be amusing to see how this is justified from people who have
previously claimed Google has played no role in offensive patent warfare. I
don't blame them for doing it. The system is what it is. Google has to arm
their client-states with weapons at this point. Until the laws change they
would be stupid not to.

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rictic
Is this offensive patent warfare since HTC is merely countersuing? (serious
question, I'd like to know the answer)

