Paul Allen alleges patent infringement - sues apple, google, aol...

Status
Not open for further replies.

silverpig

Lifer
Jul 29, 2001
27,703
12
81
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748703294904575385241453119382.html?mod=e2tw

Mr. Allen, 57, Friday through his firm Interval Licensing LLC filed suit in federal court in Seattle asserting the companies are using technology from his laboratory. Named in the suit, along with Apple and Google, are AOL Inc., eBay Inc., Facebook Inc., Netflix Inc., Office Depot Inc., OfficeMax Inc., Staples Inc., Yahoo Inc. and Google's YouTube subsidiary.

Read more: http://online.wsj.com/article/SB100...75385241453119382.html?mod=e2tw#ixzz0xph2uLwC

So he funded some research firm which went tits up, now he owns the patents, and he sues everyone under the sun who does anything possibly related to commerce on the web except of course for microsoft and amazon.
 

BoberFett

Lifer
Oct 9, 1999
37,562
9
81
The state of IP in this country is to the point that it strangles innovation rather than rewards it. Time to bring copyrights back to a reasonable length and only allow patents on real inventions, and not bullshit that's obvious to even the most casual observer.

Taking an existing method and adding "on the internet" does not make it a new invention.
 

heyheybooboo

Diamond Member
Jun 29, 2007
6,278
0
0
Hey .... the dude has had a bad decade.

Paul is still pissed that he pumped a cool $8b into Charter, ran them into bankruptcy, emerged from bankruptcy the end of last year with a 2% stake (in a company which now has a market cap of $3.87b).

That would put his interest now at $77,400,000 (or roughly 0.009675 percent of his initial $8b investment).

Hey .... at least the Portland Trail Blazers made the playoffs last year.

(Can't say the same about the Seahawks, however :) )




--
 

Craig234

Lifer
May 1, 2006
38,548
350
126
This guy has seemed sleazy to me for a while. He tried to push a deal in Seattle that screwed the taxpayers for his profit on a sports team out of 'sheer greed'.
 

Infohawk

Lifer
Jan 12, 2002
17,844
1
0
With google and apple rising and the price of computers continuing to come down, MS's business model will eventually fade. They just aren't that good with web apps, which is where a lot of the innovation is concentrated in. Probably better if they are a patent holding company and someone has to pay them every time a link is clicked.

It's too bad 'cause I thought both vista and win 7 were good. Yes, even vista.
 

1prophet

Diamond Member
Aug 17, 2005
5,313
534
126
The state of IP in this country is to the point that it strangles innovation rather than rewards it. Time to bring copyrights back to a reasonable length and only allow patents on real inventions, and not bullshit that's obvious to even the most casual observer.

Taking an existing method and adding "on the internet" does not make it a new invention.
They had to do that with aircraft patents because the lawsuits were stifling and holding back progress.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Wright_brothers_patent_war

Patent war

Orville Wright Wilbur Wright Glen Curtiss In 1908, the brothers warned Glenn Curtiss not to infringe their patent by profiting from flying or selling aircraft that used ailerons. Curtiss refused to pay license fees to the Wrights and sold an airplane to the Aeronautic Society of New York in 1909. The Wrights filed a lawsuit, beginning a years-long legal conflict. They also sued foreign aviators who flew at U.S. exhibitions, including the leading French aviator Louis Paulhan. The Curtiss people derisively suggested that if someone jumped in the air and waved his arms, the Wrights would sue. The brothers' licensed European companies, which owned foreign patents the Wrights had received, sued manufacturers in their countries. The European lawsuits were only partly successful. Despite a pro-Wright ruling in France, legal maneuvering dragged on until the patent expired in 1917. A German court ruled the patent not valid due to prior disclosure in speeches by Wilbur Wright in 1901 and Octave Chanute in 1903. In the U.S. the Wrights made an agreement with the Aero Club of America to license airshows which the Club approved, freeing participating pilots from a legal threat. Promoters of approved shows paid fees to the Wrights.[8] The Wright brothers won their initial case against Curtiss in February 1913, but the decision was appealed.
The Wrights' preoccupation with the legal issue hindered their development of new aircraft designs, and by 1911 Wright aircraft were inferior to those made by other firms in Europe[9]. Indeed, aviation development in the US was suppressed to such an extent that when the U.S. entered World War I no acceptable American-designed aircraft were available, and the U.S. forces were compelled to use French machines.
In January 1914, a U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals upheld the verdict in favor of the Wrights against the Curtiss company, which continued to avoid penalties through legal tactics.
The patent pool solution

In 1917, the two major patent holders, the Wright Company and the Curtiss Company, had effectively blocked the building of new airplanes, which were desperately needed as the United States was entering World War I. The U.S. government, as a result of a recommendation of a committee formed by Franklin D. Roosevelt, then Assistant Secretary of the Navy, pressured the industry to form a cross-licensing organization (in other terms a Patent pool), the Manufacturers Aircraft Association[10][11][12].
All aircraft manufacturers were required to join the association, and each member was required to pay a comparatively small blanket fee (for the use of aviation patents) for each airplane manufactured[10], of that the major part would go to the Wright-Martin and Curtiss companies, until their respective patents expire[7][13]. This arrangement was designed to last only for the duration of the war, but in 1918, the litigation was never renewed. By this time, Orville Wright had sold his interest in the Wright Company to a group of New York financiers (in October 1915) and had retired from the business. The "patent war" had come to an end.
Aftermath

The lawsuits damaged the public image of the Wright brothers, who were generally regarded before this as heroes. Critics said the brothers actions may have retarded the development of aviation[9][14], and compared their actions unfavorably to European inventors, who worked more openly.
The Manufacturers Aircraft Association was an early example of a government-enforced Patent pool. It has been used as an example in recent cases, such as dealing with HIV antiretroviral drug patents to give access to otherwise expensive treatments in Africa.
 
Aug 14, 2001
11,061
0
0
Some of the patents seem to be from the mid 90's...so perhaps they're novel for that time period and look dumb now. Well, hopefully.

But this is nothing...who knows what Paul Allen is going to do with Intellectual Ventures.
 
Status
Not open for further replies.