Vonage May Have Way Around Patent Disputes

nevillethedevil writes "Bloomberg is reporting that Vonage may have found a way around the current patent issues they have been facing with Verizon and others. They are applying technological solutions to a legal problem, changing the way that Vonage's communications software operates at a basic level to ensure that they no longer infringe on patent claims. 'Vonage's new technology can be installed through software downloads and shouldn't be costly to deploy, Citron said. The company will continue to appeal the court decision that requires it to pay Verizon damages for infringing patents on technology that translates Internet-based calls to standard lines.'"

Re:Totally Off-topic

[MindStalker]

Because slashdot has sold out!!

Actually slashdot uses some dynamic ads that simply trust the ad provider won't do shit like that. The admins here will fix it soon I bet.

Re:Blame Flash on Linux.

[XiticiX]

Nah I'm using XP and whatever most recent version of flash is. I hate it when ads interfere with websites. If this wasn't /., I wouldn't be coming back.

patent workarounds...

[moochfish]

How come you read about companies violating patents one day and then finding "work arounds" the next? Seriously, if a patented technology is a crucial component in an application, how is it that the expected reaction is to bypasses it and yet keep the application functioning *exactly* like it was before.

If that doesn't show that software patents are bogus, I don't know what will.

Re:What other patents are they violating?

[lothar97]

I have to agree with this one, it's likely that whatever they're doing may infringe someone else's patent. Then again, perhaps Vonage has learned its lesson and have properly licensed the new technology that is being implemented.

A final point, Vonage better beware of the doctrine of equivalents [wikipedia.org]. The doctrine of equivalents holds a party liable for patent infringement even if the infringing device/process does not fall within the literal scope of the patent's claims, but accomplishes the equivalent to the claims. It holds that if the patent claims A, B, C and D to accomplish E, and your product does B, C, and F to accomplish E, then you're liable under the doctrine of equivalents.

Re:Two Useful Links

[arivanov]

I would read the background in the links with a grain of salt. The author of the top one missed the well known industry fact of "Noone in his sane mind sues Level3 on VOIP IP". I bet a lot of people had the itch, but AFAIK noone ever did.

The reason is that Level3 once upon a time bought one of the first softswitch developers. AFAIK it ever tried to use it in production, but it can still use it as a great defensive legal weapon.

If Verizon tries to sue Level3 it will be presented with code which does what is described in some of their patents and is dated at least several years prior to that. So while I agree that Vonage is an obvious "soft target" the conclusion that there are "other" targets is fairly off the mark.

Missing The Point

[asphaltjesus]

If Verizon tries to sue Level3 it will be presented with code which does what is described in some of their patents and is dated at least several years prior to that.

I wish Verizon would sue Level3, but they won't. They'll sue every ISP/VOIP provider that doesn't pay the Verizon Patent Tax. That costs them a couple of lawyers salaries for a huge return.

Re:What other patents are they violating?

[Mr2001]

Is that doctrine actually good for anything besides stifling innovation? I mean, shouldn't we be encouraging people to come up with new methods that produce the same result in a way that isn't already patented?