EFF Attacks Online Gaming Patent 126
I Don't Believe in Imaginary Property writes "The EFF is attacking more bogus patents. This time they're going after the 'method and system of playing games on a network' which covers tournament ladders, online rankings and advertisements. The patent in question has already been asserted against a number of small companies who know that licensing it is cheaper than litigating. Ars Technica's coverage mentions that Netrek looks like a good source of prior art. 'Netrek, an online multiplayer game with origins in the mid 1980s, makes use of much of the same technology described in Goldberg's patent. Much of the code for Netrek is open source, and its development is archived online; the source code was first posted to Usenet in late 1989. The EFF has also documented other instances of prior art with the assistance of students at the Cyberlaw Clinic at the Berkman Center for Internet and Society at Harvard Law School.'"
Re:Netrek!? (Score:1, Interesting)
I wish there was a Nintendo DS client for it (and people actually playing it).
Make the patent granter liable. (Score:3, Interesting)
Further discussion about that, here [url].
EFF vs Internet Fax Patents (Score:5, Interesting)
Those fax patents are bogus. But destroying them would cost something like $millions which is more than any of its single licensees has to pay, so individuals just license it because that's cheaper.
If the EFF could organize potential licensees to fund an EFF suit to eliminate the bogus patent, it would free up Internet faxing for everyone. Which would mean that there would no longer be that single exception to "telephone service" that requries cutting in a patent extortionist. Which would mean FOSS Internet faxing SW could get development the way the rest of telephony has. Which would mean complete telcos could be started up without the costs and barriers that still keeps it an exclusive club for AT&T, Verizon and occasional VC funded "little giants" like Vonage.
Snipes (Score:3, Interesting)
Snipes (diminutive for Snipers) is a text-mode networked computer game that was created in 1983 by SuperSet software. Snipes is officially credited as being the original inspiration for Novell NetWare. [2]
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Snipes [wikipedia.org]
Enjoy,
Re:Prior art? (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:EFF vs Internet Fax Patents (Score:3, Interesting)
Not the first time Netrek used as prior art (Score:4, Interesting)
http://www.freepatentsonline.com/5822523.html [freepatentsonline.com]
I didn't get involved in consulting for the Goldberg patent, but I did in 2000. Had a few long face to face meetings with the defense's lawyers, showed them the game, did a technical presentation, presented a few packet logs, and got a few free meals out of it. From that, they understood the claims well enough that they got the appropriate declarations from the appropriate original developers.
The result of which the defense submitted a motion to declare the claims invalid, and the judge had a draft ruling granting the motion and was about to issue a final ruling, but the plaintiffs either dropped the case, or settled out of court. The parties were Lipstream vs. HearMe. (Lipstream were the defendants, HearMe the plaintiffs)
I have a PDF copy of the ruling somewhere in my archives. It used to be on netrek.org, but got dropped in a recent site-move and redesign.