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Posted in Courtroom, Formats, Microsoft, Novell, Office Suites, Open XML, OpenDocument, Patents, Red Hat at 8:52 am by Dr. Roy Schestowitz
Summary: McKool Smith and i4i may take Microsoft Word off the market — claim
THE SHORT story — for those who have not heard yet — is that Microsoft Word is banned — embargoed if you will (deja vu) — based on a court’s decision which will probably be reversed or mitigated by the time it comes into effect. David Gerard says that it “doesn’t take effect for 60 days, MSFT will certainly get it overturned. but amusing nevertheless!” McKool Smith is the shameless law firm and the so-called ‘victim’ is i4i. Microsoft’s patent dispute with i4i is not new, as it was previously mentioned in:
Microsoft Accused of “Willful and Deliberate” infringement and “Discovery Misconduct” in Another Patent CaseXML Patents, Microsoft Aggression, and ODF HostilityMicrosoft is Again Paying the Huge Price for Wanting Anti-Free Software LawsReader Explains “Microsoft Innovation”
Things have escalated somewhat now that McKool Smith, a patent troll litigator whom we mentioned when it attacked a Free software project and also when it attacked Microsoft, succeeds in blocking sales of Microsoft Office.
> The national law firm of McKool Smith is announcing a permanent injunction and total damages and interest of more than $290 million against software giant Microsoft Corp. (Nasdaq: MSFT) in a Texas patent infringement lawsuit won by Toronto-based technology provider i4i Inc.The Order and Permanent Injunction were signed today by Judge Leonard Davis of the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Texas, Tyler Division. Today’s ruling follows a May 20, 2009, verdict of $200 million after jurors found that Redmond, Wash.-based Microsoft willfully infringed an i4i patent covering a document system that relies on the XML custom formatting function.
The patent at hand is an XML patent, of which Microsoft has several, as we previously (and more recently) noted in:
Signs That Microsoft Might Prepare for ‘Patent Terror’ Against Rival Office SuitesMicrosoft’s OOXML Patents, Apple’s Endorsement, and the Rise of OpenOffice.orgMicrosoft Keeps Trying to Inject Software Patents Into ODF and Other StandardsMicrosoft ‘Patents’ ODF Whilst Also Harming ItMicrosoft Hostility Towards XML Expands to Hostility Towards HTMLPatents Roundup: OASIS Takes Stance Against Software Patents, Microsoft Loses AgainXML Patents, Microsoft Aggression, and ODF HostilityMicrosoft’s ‘ODF Patent’ as Vacuous as Its Promise of InteroperabilityReader’s Article: The Microsoft Patent Threat to ODFOn Microsoft’s Software Patents and ODF Fragmentation
Harry McCracken, whom Microsoft gave a nice laptop, writes about this latest development.
> In the latest apparent case of the U.S. patent system run amok, Judge Leonard Davis of the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Texas issued a permanent injunction on Tuesday preventing Microsoft from selling versions of Word that handle custom XML in the form of the .DOCX, .DOCM, and .XML file formats. Which would mean that Microsoft is now forbidden from selling Word 2003 or Word 2007. And since it also forbids Microsoft from testing such versions of Word, there would seem to be implications for Office 2010 as well.
The Microsoft PR-ish blog from Seattle goes with the dramatic headline “Judge: Microsoft can’t sell Word anymore.”
> Judge Leonard Davis, of the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Texas, ordered a permanent injunction that “prohibits Microsoft from selling or importing to the United States any Microsoft Word products that have the capability of opening .XML, .DOCX or DOCM files (XML files) containing custom XML,” according to an announcement by the plaintiff, Toronto-based i4i Inc.
Guess which other formats are impacted by this? Sun has an ODF (XML) plug-in for Microsoft Office and Microsoft has XML patents of its own. It is truly becoming a mess and none of those so-called ‘inventions’ are novel at all. As one person puts it, “Another patent problem: #Microsoft patented #XML-based file formats, which effects both #OOXML and #ODF #OpenOffice”
Ironically enough, Microsoft deserves some of the blame for this lawsuit against it. Microsoft was relentlessly lobbying in favour of software patents. As OOXML puts it:
> We may add that while Microsoft always pays lip service to patent reform and patent quality, it effectively obstructed even moderate steps of pragmatic reform in the field of software patenting with massive lobbying investment and an ideological agenda. An ideological motivation you don’t find among all the other players which have a real business. The massive lobbying also applies to colonial attitudes towards patent regimes of third nations in which the American company operates, or the European Union, our main area of operations as the FFII e.V. Ironically Microsoft itself is a favourite target of troll challenges and no one knows how much profits Marshall Phelps actually generates by selling their Microsoft FAT patents. In the spectacular case of TomTom we were told it was a very small amount. Some American critics as Brian Kahin speak of a patent bubble of low value patents but how is it going to burst? When you have a licensing business a good patent is one that hurts. Maybe the Encyclopedia Brittannica is an example, it failed commercially and now became an (unsuccesful) patent enforcement agency against actual market players.In the recent referral G03/08 about software patentability an European Patent Office case named T 424/03 (Microsoft) was center to the debate. Find the Amicus letters here. Currently you also have a pending referral on Bilski in the US Supreme Court which is more far reaching than software. In the US many examination tests were dismantled such as the machine or transformation box test which opened the flood gates and unbalanced the system. It was reintroduced under the Bilski ruling but appealed at the supreme court. The Bilski test does not rule out software or business method patents but provides means to reduce the pressure within the examination system in later stages.First you wreck the law, then the trolls wreck you.[...]Right now ISO/IEC 29500 (“OOXML”) is patent encumbered and cannot be called an “open standard” according to conventional definitions and looks unusable for the public sector.
It ought to be added that we found the blog of Microsoft’s Amruta Gulanikar, which bears the tag line “Office Interoperability”. Now, watch who is under “Blog Links”; it’s Microsoft employees and the usual lobbyists for Microsoft and OOXML, notably Jesper Lund Stocholm and Alex Brown. The complete list is:
> Brian JonesDennis HamiltonAlex BrownErika EhrliGray KnowltonJesper Lund StocholmStephen PerontDoug Mahugh
They fail to even make the illusion that anyone except Microsoft (and partners) is accepting OOXML. There are a few exceptions.
In other patent news, the patent troll known as Acacia is still harassing GNU/Linux, based on this new report.
> Red Hat, Novell Still Face Interface Patent ClaimsHanding down a claim construction that accommodates the plaintiffs, a federal judge has refused to invalidate one of three user interface patents Linux providers Red Hat Inc. and Novell Inc. allegedly infringe.
Software patents. It figures. Is anyone (other than patent lawyers and trolls) actually benefiting from them? █
“[Y]ou’re creating a new 20-year monopoly for no good reason.”
–David Kappo, Director of the USPTO
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