17348286
submission
FlorianMueller writes:
In February, Apple asked the US International Trade Commission to ban the entry of several Nokia products into the US market because of patent infringement. In a pre-trial hearing that started this week, the ITC staff presented an analysis according to which "the evidence will not establish a violation ... as to any of the asserted patents", reports the IDG News Service. However, most media reports don't mention that this relates to only four of the patents Apple asserted against Nokia. The case hit a fork in the road back in April. Nokia's alleged infringement of five other patents now forms part of the case Apple filed against HTC. Even if those four patents turned out invalid (or valid but not infringed), Apple could still prevail over Nokia. Also, not counting the patents the ITC views skeptically, Apple has 24 different patents in play against HTC and Motorola. Android has become a popular target of patent suits.
17347224
submission
FlorianMueller writes:
Computerworld reports that the US International Trade Commission takes Nokia's side in a patent battle in which Apple wants a number of Nokia phones to be banned from entry into the US market. According to a preliminary analysis by the ITC staff (which could theoretically still be overruled), "the evidence will not establish a violation ... as to any of the asserted patents." But this relates to only four of the patents Apple asserted. The original complaint listed five more patents but those are now part of a case involving HTC as well. Three of the four patents analyzed by the ITC so far are also used against Android phone makers HTC and Motorola in different US district courts. But so are 24 others, including several multi-touch patents. Even after the ITC's findings, Android still faces essentially the same crossfire of patents.
16760958
submission
FlorianMueller writes:
In addition to suing Motorola in a district court, Microsoft also lodged a complaint with the US International Trade Commission. The USITC provides a fast track to an injunction: while court cases most often take years, the USITC could ban imports of Motorola Droid phones within about 18 months. Apple's complaint against HTC was also filed with the USITC in addition to a court. Oracle could complain against vendors of Android-based phones to step up pressure on Google. At any rate, Android is caught in a formidable crossfire of patents covering a wide range of technologies.
16624270
submission
FlorianMueller writes:
The EU still hasn't finalized its European Interoperability Framework v2, a set of IT procurement guidelines focused on interoperability and avoiding lock-in. Glyn Moody reported on "Double standards on open standards", mentioning the Free Software Foundation Europe and criticizing the position of the Business Software Alliance. In the ensuing discussion, FSFE president Karsten Gerloff and FSFE counsel Carlo Piana face tough questions about why their organization lobbies for "open standards" hand in hand with IBM, Oracle and Google, given that IBM is being investigated by the EU over a mainframe interoperability issue, Oracle doesn't turn Java into an open standard, and Google's search index is also closed.
15765430
submission
FlorianMueller writes:
The European Commission's antitrust investigations against IBM has a cloud aspect. The probes were launched only a week after the new zEnterprise mainframe, a device that IBM calls a "system of systems" or "datacenter in a box". It "assimilates Unix and Linux servers", said a Trekkie at V3.co.uk. Fantasy fans might call it "one box to rule them all." With 80% of the world's business data residing on mainframes, many enterprise clouds (private, public and hybrid) will need to be tethered to a mainframe. An entire datacenter can now come under the control of one administrative tool (Tivoli). However, IBM doesn't allow the opposite approach: the execution of mainframe legacy workloads on Intel-based servers through virtualization.
15574458
submission
FlorianMueller writes:
In a recent Slashdot discussion, a Linux evangelist from Google, Jeremy Allison, said that "Google submitted an anti-software patent brief in the Bilski case." He disclosed his affiliation and encouraged double-checking. I have performed a detailed analysis of Google's amicus curiae brief in re Bilski. While it cites some patent-critical literature, the document stops far short of advocating the abolition of software patents. The brief supports the idea that patent law should expand according to technological progress. It complains about some software patents being too abstract and others making only a "conventional" use of a computer, but under patent law, that doesn't mean that all software is conventional by definition. Google's own patents, such as the PageRank patent, are (at least intended to be) non-abstract and non-conventional. Is anyone aware of Google ever having spoken out against the patentability of all software, including the software Google itself patents every day?
15102376
submission
FlorianMueller writes:
Oracle announced a patent infringement suit against Google, claiming that Android infringes seven Java patents. Oracle also says there is copyright infringement (without specifying). This patent attack raises serious questions. Is Java now less open than C#? Did Oracle try to reach an agreement with Google on a license deal or is Oracle pursuing purely destructive objectives? What is the Open Invention Network good for if one licensee (Oracle) can sue another (Google) over patents in a Linux context? What do the open source advocates who supported Oracle's takeover of Sun say now?
14847448
submission
FlorianMueller writes:
The Register reports on a "strangely worded statement" according to which Microsoft and Salesforce.com have settled their patent dispute, with the net effect that Salesforce pays Microsoft an undisclosed amount of royalties for patents "in the areas of operating systems, cloud services and customer relationship management software." The reference to "operating systems" suggests very strongly that Salesforce joins Amazon.com, HTC, TomTom, Samsung and who-knows-how-many-others in paying royalties to Microsoft for using Linux. The Open Invention Network (created by IBM, Red Hat and others five years ago) claims that it shields Linux from patent claims. But where is the OIN when it's actually needed? Apparently large companies like Amazon and Salesforce determined that the OIN couldn't help them and decided to pay. One can only wonder what the OIN's agenda actually is.
14740190
submission
FlorianMueller writes:
When the EU Commission launched its antitrust investigation against IBM last week, some were wondering whether there would still be mainframes around when the case is settled. But not so fast: eWEEK Europe just conducted a poll on mainframe spendings, and 30% of the respondents even plan to increase their mainframe capacities. At a recent presentation of the new mainframe generation, an IBM executive boldly said: "Western civilization runs on this system." So does IBM, owing 25% of its revenues and more than 40% of its total profits to the mainframe business. Mainframe software is a $24.5 billion market, twice as big as the Linux market. 200-300 billion lines of legacy code (much of it in COBOL) are still in use. So it's not just Microsoft and patent activists who take an interest in this.
14619292
submission
FlorianMueller writes:
The European Commission announced today that it launched two parallel antitrust investigations into IBM's mainframe practices, following complaints lodged by T3 Technologies last year and French open source startup TurboHercules in March. EU regulators suspect an abuse of a dominant position and illegal tying of IBM's mainframe hardware to its proprietary mainframe operating system z/OS. There's even the possibility of a third case based on a complaint filed very recently by NEON, and the DoJ is also looking into this matter. IBM now finds itself in a situation previously experienced by Microsoft and Intel. This may also affect IBM's credibility when lobbying in the EU for open standards.
14417976
submission
FlorianMueller writes:
The FreeType project celebrates the expiration of Apple's TrueType bytecode patents. The open source font rendering engine now has the bytecode technology enabled by default. The relevant code existed for some time, but the project felt forced to disable it and advise everyone not to use it due to patent encumbrance. The 20-year maximum of validity of software patents is long, but sometimes the stuff that becomes available is still useful. The Unisys GIF patent was an example. And anything open-sourced 20 years ago would also be patent-free by now (except for the code that has since been added).
13874214
submission
FlorianMueller writes:
After pursuing Microsoft and Intel, European Commission Vice-President Neelie Kroes is now preparing an initiative that could have an even greater impact on the IT industry: a European interoperability law that will affect not only companies found dominant in a market but all "significant" players. In a recent interview, Mrs. Kroes mentioned Apple. Nokia, RIM and Adobe would be other examples. All significant market players would have to provide access to interfaces and data formats, with pricing constraints considered "likely" by the commissioner. Her objective: "Any kind of IT product should be able to communicate with any type of service in the future." The process may take a few years, but key decisions on the substance of the bill may already be taken later this year.
13850574
submission
FlorianMueller writes:
US software company Versata has lodged an antitrust complaint against SAP with the European Commission, accusing the business software giant of withholding information necessary to interoperate with its enterprise resource planning (ERP) software. It also wants SAP to unbundle its pricing software from its ERP product. And for a topper, SAP should be fined. Interoperability is generally a good idea and all major players should provide it, but the same Versata sapped $139 million out of SAP last year through a US patent infringement suit. If a patent aggressor demands access to interfaces, it's difficult to take a side.
13806828
submission
FlorianMueller writes:
Yesterday's Supreme Court decision on the Bilski patent application disappointed some software patent critics and outraged others. I have put together my personal list of the top ten losers (besides Bilski himself): the FOSS community; software patent critics; those small and medium-sized companies who aren't trolls; bogus treatments for the patent problem; a movie on patents that needs a remake; Red Hat; Google's new business areas (Android, WebM); Salesforce.com (Marc Benioff); the "captive court" theory; and the credibility of a company that told the court that software patents foster open source. Any other ideas and conclusions?
13707248
submission
FlorianMueller writes:
ZDNet blogger Dana Blankenhorn reports that "[t]he efforts by open source TurboHercules to break IBM’s mainframe monopoly through the European Commission got some proprietary support this week when NEON Enterprise Software LLC of Austin, Tex. filed an EU complaint alongside a U.S. antitrust lawsuit." NEON's founder co-founded BMC, so the company is well-funded for this fight. In comments given to the IDG News Service, IBM claims that NEON's product, which saves mainframe customers money by optimizing the use of coprocessors, "offers no innovation" and accuses the "copycat" of violating IBM's "intellectual property". That's basically what IBM also said about the Hercules emulator. The European Commission is expected to take a decision on an investigation in a matter of months. Since IBM lobbies the EC over the Open Document Format, it's now accused of double standards.
