Angry Birds maker Rovio sued over app patents

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-14245047

by watkdab • 15 years ago

38 45 15 years ago

bbc.co.uk

wccrawford3• 15 years ago

So yet another 'You've violated our patents, but we aren't saying which ones' story?

I don't say this often, but I'm going to this time:

That should be illegal.

It's a threat, clear and simple. It's an attempt to force them into action without actually having to have anything concrete. It causes a ton of pain and anguish, and costs a lot of money, even if they never actually sue. It's absolutely ridiculous and should never be allowed.

Is it really that different than libel or slander? You're accusing someone of something without providing any proof that it's true. And if you just say 'whoops' afterwards, you're scott-free, but they've still got damages to their reputation and bottom line.

It's disgusting and cowardly.

Produce2• 15 years ago

Kind of similar to how some companies with a lot of money bully people into submission by suing them with the intent of forcing them to run out of money, even if when the company wouldn't actually win the case.

gte910h7• 15 years ago

I so wish we'd get Euro-style loser pays (it's really Judge assigns fees, and one party doesn't pay everything, nor do they let expensive lawyer fees be billed if they're unwarranted, etc).

Then companies could be more "Bring it on" when things are totally out there.

almightygod• 15 years ago

I liken it to fraudulent DMCA takedown notices which are illegal

Produce2• 15 years ago

Just out of interest, could you provide any articles/resources that describe why they're illegal?

gte910h7• 15 years ago

Unfortunately Barratry isn't enforced in the US that much:

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

sandstrom• 15 years ago

If I'm not mistaken Rovio are based in Finland, where software patents don't hold much water.

rkalla• 15 years ago

It reminds me of the Monster Cable lawsuit against Blue Jeans Cables[1] and any other company using "Monster" in the name; including, but not limited to, a go-cart racing company.

Fortunately, the BJC owner was a lawyer in another life and peeled back the layers of the lawsuit to find exactly what you describe... a giant, non-sensical, non-cohesive set of documents showing nothing in particular, not even addressing the specific complaints, just meant as a "pile of scary papers" to make people freak out and write checks.

You are absolutely right, this IS extortion and it IS illegal, but there aren't a whole lot of protections in the system for a little guy trying to counter-sue a firm full of lawyers that have more financial resources to drag it on.

[1] http://www.bluejeanscable.com/legal/mcp/index.htm

greatreorx• 15 years ago

The amended complaint clearly shows what patents Lodsys is accusing Rovio of infringing.

"On May 22, 2007, U.S. Patent No. 7,222,078 (the "'078 patent") was duly and legally issued for "Methods and Systems for Gathering Information from Units of a Commodity Across a Network."

...

Rovio makes, sells, uses, imports, and/or offers to sell infringing applications, including but not limited to Angry Birds for iPhone and Angry Birds for Android, which infringe at least claims 1 and 24 of the '078 patent under 35 U.S.C. § 271."

http://www.scribd.com/doc/60587096/11-07-21-Lodsys-Amended-C...

wccrawford3• 15 years ago

There are 2, actually.

Rovio makes, sells, uses, imports, and/or offers to sell infringing applications, including but not limited to Angry Birds for iPhone andAngry Birds for Android, which infringe at least claim 27 of the „565 patent under 35 U.S.C. § 271.

U.S. Patent No. 7,620,565 - 27. A tangible computer readable medium having stored thereon, computer executable instructions that, if executed by a computing device, cause the computing device to perform a method comprising: monitoring a product for an occurrence in the product of a trigger event of a predefined plurality of trigger events, incrementing a counter corresponding to the trigger event upon detection of the occurrence of the trigger event in the product; displaying a user interface, configured to probe for information regarding a use of the product, if the counter exceeds a threshold; storing an input received from the user interface on a device; and transmitting the input to a server.

U.S. PATENT NO. 7,222,078 - 1. A system comprising: units of a commodity that can be used by respective users in different locations, a user interface, which is part of each of the units of the commodity, configured to provide a medium for two-way local interaction between one of the users and the corresponding unit of the commodity, and further configured to elicit, from a user, information about the user's perception of the commodity, a memory within each of the units of the commodity capable of storing results of the two-way local interaction, the results including elicited information about user perception of the commodity, a communication element associated with each of the units of the commodity capable of carrying results of the two-way local interaction 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 and collecting the results of the interactions at the central location.

U.S. PATENT NO. 7,222,078 - 24. The system of claim 1 wherein the two-way local interactions comprise a transaction for sale of a product or a service contract for the commodity.

That first one looks like a counter that triggers a data push to a server when it reaches a certain number. Really?

That second one is a simple feedback form that pushes the data to a server? Really?

I can't believe these. Cripes.

IANAL.

dpcan2• 15 years ago

This part confused me the most. So, if you infringe on even one claim of all the claims in any patent, you are infringing a patent? We're all screwed.

bcl• 15 years ago

Software Patents Must Die.

protomyth• 15 years ago

Some patent must die, but I am not sure defining it as software is going to help. I get the feeling the goal should be all "business process" patents. Not mechanical or chemical, but the the patenting of procedures. I think that would take care of this stupidity. I worry that saying software will allow another open avenue.

krobertson• 15 years ago

These patent lawsuits are getting ridiculous. Going to get to the point where it stifles innovation. Progress on platforms is slowed, indie developers who are hoping for a viral hit will get smacked with some BS lawsuit, etc.

suking• 15 years ago

I think we're already at that point unfortunately.

null_ptr• 15 years ago

Looks like they went after big companies and studios too, maybe they will get counter-sued out of existence.

roc• 15 years ago

How? At best, the big pile of big defendants will manage to get the patent(s) in question invalidated after millions in legal expenses. But as we've seen with Lodsys, they have no shortage of patents in their portfolio.

There's nothing to stop them from taking another patent out of their portfolio and applying the same strategy: shake as much easy settlement money out of the small shops as possible, then swing for the fences.

gte910h7• 15 years ago

The could lose the other patents as part of a counter suit if they step out of line.

talmand2• 15 years ago

For a while now I have considered getting into development for mobile devices. With all the stupid lawsuits lately I think I'm close to deciding not to bother. At the least not release anything I do for public consumption.

sireat• 15 years ago

While the lawsuits are stupid, that is not a reason to avoid development.

Do not let the bad guys win.

talmand2• 15 years ago

Well, I would probably develop just for the experience but I'm not sure about releasing unless it was something quite interesting.

gte910h7• 15 years ago

They can only really effect the American sales. MOst apps sell a very sizable percentage overseas (I've seen about 45%, I've seen other devs with more like 60-80% overseas).

Don't let these assclowns stop you.

dpcan2• 15 years ago

I only develop on Android at the moment, and sell in the Android Market, and if I limited sales strictly to overseas, I'd be dead in the water. ~80% of all my sales are in the U.S.

shareme• 15 years ago

anyone notice that MS and Nokia are not sued?

This is a MS patent troll dog and pony show..

astrodust2• 15 years ago

It's because Microsoft would rip their head off. You don't patent troll a bigger patent troll. Paul Allen is much bigger than Lodsys.

Meai• 15 years ago

And how exactly would that work? They don't have any products of their own, so they can hardly be sued for infringing on anything.

flocial• 15 years ago

Now the Angry Birds have something to be angry about. Weaving this into the game would be epic. The Angry Birds Lodsys Defense Fund Edition where your favorite birds destroy the patent pigs.

JacobAldridge• 15 years ago

And Congress give up half-way through Level 1, not because it's too hard, just because they don't care enough to win?

smokeyj• 15 years ago

I never understood how the patent office measures "non-obvious". If two companies are using the same technology, it couldn't have been that non-obvious. Add that to the list of central planning gone awry. Of course it started with the best of intentions tho.

seles• 15 years ago

I kept expecting lodsys to just go away. It is now clear they won't.

Now that they have demonstrated how profitable it can be to exploit the laws of patents, there probably will be new companies popping up trying to do the same thing, and it won't stop until their is patent reform.

wallflower• 15 years ago

Ideally, a consortium of Apple+Microsoft+Nokia+Google+HTC+Samsung would buy out Lodsys to silence it.

The price would be in the 9 figures though.

However, if only Apple bought out Lodsys, would it go after Google with its new weapons?

orangecat• 15 years ago

Ideally, a consortium of Apple+Microsoft+Nokia+Google+HTC+Samsung would buy out Lodsys to silence it.

That would be very bad. It would provide a strong incentive for future patent trolls to do exactly the same thing.

dmooney1• 15 years ago

So maybe get these companies to spend nine figures founding a non-profit to systematically challenge the patent trolls' portfolio.

Angry Birds maker Rovio sued over app patents

Related Stories