EFF, Apache Side With Microsoft In i4i Patent Case 83
msmoriarty writes "Looks like Microsoft has gained some unlikely allies in its ongoing (and losing) i4i XML patent dispute: the Electronic Frontier Foundation and the Apache Software Foundation. The reason? Microsoft has decided the strategy for its Supreme Court appeal will be to argue that the standards of proof in patent cases are too high — this from a company that has thousands of patents it regularly defends. The EFF explains in a blog post why it decided to file the 'friend of the court' brief on Microsoft's side."
Re:EFF (Score:2, Informative)
I saw the Electric Frontier Foundation play at Madison Square Garden in 71'.
Man what a groove fest baby
Re:Damn hippies... (Score:4, Informative)
I think Microsoft and the rest of the software companies have realized that patent-trolls do more harm than good.
I call bullshit [slashdot.org].
Re:Careful with that brief, Eugene (Score:1, Informative)
So is the EFF filing an amicus curiae or an amicus diabolus brief?
That would be amicus diaboli.
/Latin & legal pedant
Re:Careful with that brief, Eugene (Score:1, Informative)
Friend of Venus doesn't really have the same ring to it.
Lucifer doesn't mean devil, it means Venus (the planet) when seen in the morning. It literally means "light bringer". The greeks knew it as phosphoros.
The only place you'll find it in a bible (unless you have one of the lame post-KJV translations) is the book of Isaiah. Babylonian rulers (and Egyptian, and Sumerian, and...) tended to think of themselves as gods. So one that had held the jews captive in the old testament liked to refer to himself as the morning star, and the jews were mocking him for it as they left.
How art thou fallen from heaven, O Lucifer, son of the morning! How art thou cut down to the ground, which didst weaken the nations! [biblegateway.com]
Re:Damn hippies... (Score:2, Informative)
Microsoft sued HTC before and got a settlement. They're trolling [google.com]. These lawsuits are nothing more than advertising for their Windows Phone 7 phone, which offers indemnification against lawsuits from... them [google.com]. "That's a nice phone you got there. It would be a shame if anybody sued you over it."
Microsoft is suing their own customers here, and not retail customers, but billion-dollar manufacturing partners. That's not a good plan. SCO tried that plan and even with the Microsoft-backed investments from unsuccessfully indirect [groklaw.net] partners, it didn't work out for SCO.
The patents are bullshit. They're software patents, and even Microsoft admits almost all [groklaw.net] software patents are bullshit. Microsoft is looking for help from all of us to solve this argument for them both ways in favor. It's a fool's game.
If this is their plan to put Windows Phone 7 over then they're hosed. "Buy it or we'll sue you" never works.
Re:Fun times... (Score:5, Informative)
Why pay the lawyers when you can just read the brief & they tell you? EFF thinks overturning the ruling because the ruling is based on "Clear and Convincing" evidence. In other words, a patent is given the same weight as a previous legal ruling - even though nobody is allowed to argue against the patent before it's issued.
First off you don't come in on an equal footing - patents are assumed to be valid. Next, the level of proof required to set aside a patent is higher than in any other form of IP case. The only other time I can find "Clear and Convincing" as the standard is when the court is stripping someone of their parental rights.
Between the 2 of them, it makes it almost impossible to invalidate a patent. When the standard was set, the Patent office was:
At that time, the standard made sense. Under the current process, where an intern with a chemistry degree is approving software patents, it no longer does. Currently, a patent clerk has less than 4 hours to determine if a patent application should be approved or not. Examine some of these patents -- many are upwards of 200 pages of legalese. Nobody can accurately determine the validity of a patent that complex in a few hours - and yet they are given the presumption of validity going in.