Editor's Pick The current iteration, IP version 4, has its roots in 1980, around the time when people like Ken Olsen, founder of Digital Equipment Corp, still said stupid stuff like: "There is no reason for any individual to have a computer in his home."
Many more mobile companies are filing patents to protect their ideas, and that's not necessarily a good thing.
Editor's Pick 3D printing is moving fast, and existing copyright law is having a rough time keeping up.
Consider yourself preemptively re-served, Apple. At least Samsung had the good grace to wait until the phone was announced, unlike one Chinese company.
Google and Apple's chief executives are reportedly having chats about each others' intellectual property. The reported calls follow a lawsuit between and Apple and Samsung that resulted in $1 billion in damages awarded to the iPhone maker.
Intellectual Ventures has spent over $1.2 billion on at least 1,000 patent acquisitions, reportedly buying patents for an average $40,000 from companies, individuals, and up to 50 universities, including CalTech, Duke, Clemson, Brigham Young, Rutgers, and my alma mater, the University of British Columbia.
Editor's Pick
We now know that patent trolling costs the US economy $30 billion a year, give or take. And patents can effectively be used to stifle competition. What’s an embattled CEO to do when the patent trolls come calling?
Fight like …
After putting the end to Apple’s epic court case against Motorola Mobility, renowned federal appeals court judge Richard Posner is now wondering whether patents for software (and some other industries) should even exist.
In an interview with Reuters, Posner said …
The wheels of justice may grind slowly, but they do grind. Who they grind, of course, is another matter.
And whether or not you believe that Kim Dotcom’s file-sharing business MegaUpload was a legal business or a thin front for …
Companies that create or acquire portfolios of patents but produce no products with them cost the US economy $29 billion last year.
At least, that’s what a study completed by James Bessen and Michael J. Meurer of Boston University recently …
Microsoft announced today that it will be selling hundreds of patents to Facebook, a sign that it wants to protect its investment from litigation as the social network heads towards an IPO next month. But this wasn’t a sudden change …
Facebook is paying Microsoft $550 million for access to 650 patents, All Things Digital’s Ina Fried reports. Facebook is facing a patent lawsuit from Yahoo and is expected to IPO in May 17th.
It appears that a number of these …
Editor's Pick
As the third most popular source of content on digital pin-board site Pinterest, Flickr and its photographers are subject to frequent acts of copyright infringement. But a site-wide update to Flickr promises to better protect members and their copyrighted works.…
Intellectual Ventures is suing AT&T, Sprint and T-Mobile, accusing them of infringing on 14 separate patents. In a suit filed in U.S. District Court in Delaware today, Intellectual Ventures, a private company that has made a business of producing, collecting, …
Curebit co-founder Allan Grant has posted a public apology to 37signals for stealing its design and code.
Social-referral startup Curebit made the admittedly boneheaded mistake of ripping off design and assets from 37signals, one of the best-known schools of UI …
Curebit, the Y Combinator friend-referral startup that got busted over the weekend for stealing code and design work from web megashop 37signals, has been caught stealing again, this time from an independent musician.
The startup used music from Random Rab, …
Yah, you read that right. As of today, Microsoft’s patent licensing agreements with Android manufacturers now cover more than half of all Android devices, thanks to the recent addition of Taiwan-based Compal.
Compal is the tenth company to form an …
Take-Two will likely publish more Duke Nukem games despite its most recent title, Duke Nukem Forever, being one of the most disappointing games of the year according to critics.
It’s a risky move, considering that most gamers might ignore sequels …
Networking giant Cisco and smart meter leader Itron have joined forces to deliver an IP-based communications platform to the smart grid market, but the announcement is light on details, such as when the companies will deliver on their promises.
The …
In a surprising move this morning, Microsoft announced that it has formed a patent agreement with cellphone manufacturer HTC. The deal gives HTC coverage under Microsoft’s patent portfolio for its Android phones, and Microsoft will receive royalties from the company …
