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Lodsys Takes On Gaming Heavyweights Including Rovio, EA, and Atari in Patent Dispute

cgc said:
Does Lodsys actually produce anything or do they sit on patents and wait years/decades for someone to "steal" their intellectual property?
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If they have a patent for something then they should protect that patent. Don't tell you me you wouldn't do that same thing.

Rafterman said:
What if a drug maker finds a cure for cancer, patents it, then sits on it and prevents others from manufacturing it or something similar to it, so that the billions that drug companies make in current cancer treatments are protected?
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If you made a cure to cancer would you not want to make sure that what you created is protected? I am sure the companies that make money treating cancer would rather pay you tons of money for the cure and then sell that cure for even more money.

I know that if I made a cure for cancer the first thing I would do is make sure it is protected so I could make money off it. Even if I sold all the rights to a company that wants to sit on the patent and do nothing about it then that is their choice.
 
subsonix said:
BTW, if someone knows any specific examples of prior art there's money to be made. :D http://ipwatchdog.com/2011/07/08/wanted-prior-art-to-invalidate-lodsys-patents/id=18006/

Apparently these patents where bought of another patent holding firm, which further indicate that Lodsys are trolls, IMO.
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So would it still require a court of law to consider the prior art? If so, this is another broken attribute of the patent system. The US Patent Office should be adjudicating and invalidating such patents without requiring a drawn out legal process. After all if they so easily award patents in the first place, then they should just as easily be able to revoke them. There is simply too much trivial slush out there that has been patented.
 
benhollberg said:
If you made a cure to cancer would you not want to make sure that what you created is protected? I am sure the companies that make money treating cancer would rather pay you tons of money for the cure and then sell that cure for even more money.
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I'd hope if someone found the cure for cancer, the governements of the world would revoke any IP rights to it to force prices down and make treatments available to all who need it.

Profiting off the health of the population is a morally grey undertaking. There comes a point where the benefit to society in the widespread manufacture of a cure is more important than a corporation's profits.
 
KnightWRX said:
I'd hope if someone found the cure for cancer, the governements of the world would revoke any IP rights to it to force prices down and make treatments available to all who need it.

Profiting off the health of the population is a morally grey undertaking. There comes a point where the benefit to society in the widespread manufacture of a cure is more important than a corporation's profits.
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HA! What rock do you live in?? Most governments have their hands in the pockets of the drug companies. Politicians are only out for themselves, they no longer care about the people.
 
PapaStu said:
Unfortunately 'Atari' (or should I say Infogrames) hasn't been a heavyweight for some time in the gaming world. I guess one big game has made Rovio a gaming heavyweight as well? Yes Rovio has gotten lots of downloads, but they haven't released anything in over a year that isn't an Angry Birds update.

The fun will end soon enough for Lodsys. I'm sure at some point they're going to sue the government for the way the some state/national entity collects money online and really end things for themselves.
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EA is kind of big though.. Not Apple big but their cap is 8 billion and they do 3.5 billion a year in gross revenue with a 60%+ margin..

Atari is sitting at a 80 million euros in revenue, so considerably smaller, but still bigger then just about everyone else Lodsys has pursued with this exercise.
 
People are suggesting that Lodsys are persuing this, because they are protecting something they designed.

They have not designed anything; several emails I have sent to Lodsys, asking them for examples of their work, so I can avoid implementing the same time of in-app delivery and purchase system they specify in their patent have gone unanswered.

They cannot provide to me any evidence of how they have made use of this 'idea' that they have. If they were protecting something they created, then they would be able to show me an application (web based, mobile, or anything else!) and point out what it was that I may be infringing.
 
KnightWRX said:
The patent is not about delivery methods. Go read it. Apple claims that 3rd parties are covered, but not for delivery methods, it's for IAP and customer feedback from iOS devices back to the App Store.

A customer device starts an interaction with the user. This interaction asks for feedback about the experience with the product. This feedback is then packaged and sent back to a central location.

This is the gist of it (the claims are much more complex than that). Lodsys now states that :

An iOS app presenting a page asking something like "Liked this app ? Click here for the full version/other apps by us!" is an interaction. The user clicking on the link is providing feedback, and the loading of the App Store page is sending back the positive feedback to the App Store.
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The thing is, developers are never sent any of this information. Developers don't even know who buys their apps. They are sent a royalty payment every month, that's it. No list of people, email addresses, or anything. So Lodsys should be after Apple only not individual developers, and Apple has already paid for the use.

If a customer buys an app from a link inside another app, the developer has no idea if the customer clicked on that link or just found the app by another method. Therefore no information is being collected by the developer and they should be not be sued by Lodsys!
 
KnightWRX said:
I'd hope if someone found the cure for cancer, the governements of the world would revoke any IP rights to it to force prices down and make treatments available to all who need it.
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I hope they wouldn't. Because if they did, you can bet that a lot less capital will flow to attempts to cure diseases (because not a lot of people are going to invest in something that doesn't pay them back).
 
edison was a great businessman, networker, and patent troll. Makes sense to quote him. Someone like Joseph Swan should stand up and sue Lodsys over an earlier patent.
 
SvP said:
edison was a great businessman, networker, and patent troll. Makes sense to quote him. Someone like Joseph Swan should stand up and sue Lodsys over an earlier patent.
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Edison actually sold stuff - he wasn't a patent troll.

How can you sue Lodsys? They can't be infringing any "earlier patent" because they don't sell anything (do they?)
 
benhollberg said:
I know that if I made a cure for cancer the first thing I would do is make sure it is protected so I could make money off it. Even if I sold all the rights to a company that wants to sit on the patent and do nothing about it then that is their choice.
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That's pretty despicable.
 
cmaier said:
Presumably it cost money to come up with the cure (otherwise we'd have it already). Do you get paid for whatever you do for a living, or do you just give away all your labor for free?
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Of course, cancer research is funded by a lot of charities and other social fundraising, so frankly, that makes the point moot. I'd hope the pharma that would find the cure wouldn't even need government intervention to just give it away, just the PR benefits would be plenty of profit right there.

Anyway, this is quite off-topic.


Muskyman said:
The thing is, developers are never sent any of this information. Developers don't even know who buys their apps. They are sent a royalty payment every month, that's it. No list of people, email addresses, or anything. So Lodsys should be after Apple only not individual developers, and Apple has already paid for the use.

If a customer buys an app from a link inside another app, the developer has no idea if the customer clicked on that link or just found the app by another method. Therefore no information is being collected by the developer and they should be not be sued by Lodsys!
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You'd have a point, if Lodsys' patent was about collecting feedback for the developer. It's not. It's simply like I stated, gathering feedback and sending it to a remote location. There is no need for anyone to then have access to this feedback, as that is not covered by the patent itself. Hence why Lodsys' believes the IAP users and other developers (the lite app linking back to full apps) are infringing.

Read my post again and understand it. That's the patent, and that's what Lodsys' claims is infringment. It's also what Apple claims is covered by their own license in the case of IAP (and maybe all uses since the App Store, the central location, belongs to them).
 
aeaglex07 said:
Right but the app store is the delivery method, which is licensed. The developers are adhering to Apple's rules so this one definitely falls on Apple, not the developers.
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This seems to me to be the proper defense. Not whether the patent is valid or invalid, but that Apple's license covers it use.

If it is not for this purpose than what they heck did Apple pay the licensing fees for? I think that would ultimately be Apple's argument as they fought to get any monies back they paid because they were not actually getting the promised licensing.

Debating the merits of the patent is not the way to go at this point. Supporting the claim that Apple's licensing covers all this software is the way to go. If it does not, then what exactly did Apple pay to license?

Ultimately it is going to come down to the interpretation of the contract between Apple and LodSys.

It seems Apple should be given standing in this case as their licensing is the cornerstone issue for every single Defendent named.

As for how this might impact Android developers or those same developers and their Android products, that is something else. I do not know if Google has a license with Lodsys for these patents.
 
KnightWRX said:
You'd have a point, if Lodsys' patent was about collecting feedback for the developer. It's not. It's simply like I stated, gathering feedback and sending it to a remote location. There is no need for anyone to then have access to this feedback, as that is not covered by the patent itself. Hence why Lodsys' believes the IAP users and other developers (the lite app linking back to full apps) are infringing.

Read my post again and understand it. That's the patent, and that's what Lodsys' claims is infringment. It's also what Apple claims is covered by their own license in the case of IAP (and maybe all uses since the App Store, the central location, belongs to them).
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Looking at 7,222,078:

Claim 1 and dependents - seems to require more than one "units of a commodity." It also may require a network to "carry[] results ... from each of the units of the commodity to a central location" and a "component capable of managing the interactions of the users in different locations."

Can a developer provide a "component capable of managing the interactions" of multiple users - that seems to be done by Apple? Does a developer provides the network. Does a developer, or even an end-user, have multiple "units of a commodity."

Claim 66 and dependents - same issues.

Claim 69 and dependents - same issues. In fact, it requires actions to take place both at the "unit of the commodity" and the "remote database."

In each case, a single person or entity can't infringe (at least that's one theory). In order for their to be an indirect infringement, there has to be direct infringement. The only way to reach direct infringement may be a "mastermind theory" (http://www.ipeg.eu/?p=2566). The steps performed by Apple are allegedly licensed, and if some steps are licensed, I don't get how anyone using Apple to perform those steps can infringe.
 
benhollberg said:
If they have a patent for something then they should protect that patent. Don't tell you me you wouldn't do that same thing.

If you made a cure to cancer would you not want to make sure that what you created is protected? I am sure the companies that make money treating cancer would rather pay you tons of money for the cure and then sell that cure for even more money.

I know that if I made a cure for cancer the first thing I would do is make sure it is protected so I could make money off it. Even if I sold all the rights to a company that wants to sit on the patent and do nothing about it then that is their choice.
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What if they just sit on it forever and not do a thing with it? A one-time dose/cure for cancer, or any disease, would be a drop in the bucket profit-wise, versus millions of people needed months, if not years, of equally expensive current cancer treatments. Drug companies make money off of chronic conditions, not one-time cures for people. They would have a vested interest in keeping a lid on a cure for cancer.

Eminent domain laws already exist for property - where the good of the people and their progress outweighs the rights of a landholder. The same should happen with patent holders who just sit on patents.
 
Hypocrites!!!!

Many Hypocrites here in this Forum!

When Apple sues HTC for IP infringement than everybody here in this forum backs Apple's for their move against HTC, now Lodsys sues other companies for infringe their patents and you go against Lodsys...??????

Why is that? They own the patent!! So what are they doing wrong??

Apple did it with Creative,Walker Digital....etc!!!

I am expecting all the cowards to reply on my comment but dont forget that if you think that Lodsys is in the wrong than you are too!!

:apple:
 
jw2002 said:
So would it still require a court of law to consider the prior art? If so, this is another broken attribute of the patent system. The US Patent Office should be adjudicating and invalidating such patents without requiring a drawn out legal process. After all if they so easily award patents in the first place, then they should just as easily be able to revoke them. There is simply too much trivial slush out there that has been patented.
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So would it still require a court of law to consider the prior art? Yes i think so!
 
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merismus said:
Many Hypocrites here in this Forum!

When Apple sues HTC for IP infringement than everybody here in this forum backs Apple's for their move against HTC, now Lodsys sues other companies for infringe their patents and you go against Lodsys...??????

Why is that? They own the patent!! So what are they doing wrong??

Apple did it with Creative,Walker Digital....etc!!!

I am expecting all the cowards to reply on my comment but dont forget that if you think that Lodsys is in the wrong than you are too!!

:apple:
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You have clearly figured that out wrong. And you are clearly out of line here, you are becoming very aggressive.

The difference between Apple and Lodsys, is that Apple actually produces something. They have products, produce OSes, hardware... And in many areas they innovate. Lodsys doesn't. That's why I can accept Apple suing other companies, and other companies suing Apple.

And let's not forget that companies sued by Apple are big ones. They can handle a battle in court. In the list of developers sued by Lodsys you can find many who can't afford court battles.

A great article I happened to stubble upon, is this:

http://www.npr.org/blogs/money/2011/07/22/138576167/when-patents-attack

I recommend all of you read it. It explains the patent frauds behind non-practicing entities like Lodsys and other companies, all in a great way.
 
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It's so sad to see how many Macrumors readers apparently have no clue that America's patent and litigation systems actually promote this type of abusive behavior. Make no mistake, Apple isn't any sort of grand savior of the American consumer. They're just as married to the current system as Lodsys is and joining one single lawsuit won't fix the system that promoted and incubated it no matter what the outcome is.
 
cmaier said:
Presumably it cost money to come up with the cure (otherwise we'd have it already). Do you get paid for whatever you do for a living, or do you just give away all your labor for free?
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Absolutely. What this world needs is more people like Ben Hollberg and fewer people like Jonas Salk. Right Cmaier?
 
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