Judge Slams Apple-Motorola Suit As 'Business Strategy' 140
jfruh writes "Faced with an Apple vs. Motorola lawsuit that involves 180 claims and counterclaims across 12 patents, a judge in Florida has thrown up his hands and accused both companies of acting in bad faith. Claiming the parties' were engaged in 'obstreperous and cantankerous conduct', he said that the lawsuit was part of 'a business strategy that appears to have no end.'"
Google (Score:2, Informative)
Can we stop pretending that Motorola is a separate company. It's Google. Motorola is now just a brand owned by Google. The company calling the shots is Google.
Re:Motorola? (Score:5, Informative)
The summary is wrong.
It's Motorola Mobility v. Apple, not Apple v. Motorola Mobility.
Motorola filed a lawsuit against Apple over patent violations in 2010, and expanded it in 2011 (with Google's permission as the Motorola-Google acquisition happened in the meantime) over more patents. Apple then charged Motorola (then) with patent violations as well.
Motorola Mobility LLC v. Apple Inc., 12cv20271, U.S. District Court for the District of Florida (Miami)
Hate the players and the Game (Score:2, Informative)
He is entirely correct.
Except this game(sic) as you put it did not exist [in the mobile sphere], everyone got along and licensed their patents to each other through FRAND, and them Steve Jobs with a few weak obvious interface patents and a few basic shape design patents...and a first out of gate [apart from that other phone] product, ever since then its been Apple patent raping one end of the phone industry to get the to sell Windows Phones [Seriously WTF?] to Microsoft patent raping them at the other to get them to License Windows Phone [and put a little in Ballmers retirement fund]...Lets call it what it is a misuse of Legal system through patents by companies who cannot compete through innovation [While slipping a few thousand into group troll companies].
Re:Motorola? (Score:4, Informative)
The blame must lay with the originator, in this case Apple.
From the article: "The lawsuit was filed by Motorola in January last year..."
It's only one page, and does not take long to read.
Re:Referee hates players for participating in game (Score:5, Informative)
Patents and Copyright are Government granted temporary monopoly's over that which has been patented or is under copyright.
Was originally granted to spur more creation of these things to enrich the public domain.
Problem is the temporary part has been massively subverted. Now almost nothing ever makes it into the public domain.
Re:Motorola? (Score:4, Informative)
The blame must lay with the originator, in this case Apple.
From the article: "The lawsuit was filed by Motorola in January last year..."
It's only one page, and does not take long to read.
The title of the action is "Apple v. Motorola", which means that Apple is the one who file the first lawsuit in the action; per protocol it's Plaintfiff v. Defendant. Motorola may have filed what is left, but only after Apple already filed.
And while TFA doesn't specially mention the official name of the suit, everyone tracked by Groklaw that I am aware of has Apple listed first.
Re:Motorola? (Score:5, Informative)
Look here for the timeline: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Smartphone_wars [wikipedia.org]
This list just shows who started what:
Nokia sues apple, apple counters, and nokia counters, etc.
Apple sues HTC, counters, etc
(HTC gives royalties to microsoft... WTF?)
S3 sues Apple
Oracle sues google, oracle fails!
Microsoft sues Motorolla, countered etc.
Motorolla sues Apple, countered etc.
Microsoft sues Barnes and Nobles
Apple sues Samsung, countered
Microsoft grabs more royalties from those without patent arsenal (le sigh)
And that is a little rundown of where we are at.
Re:Motorola? (Score:4, Informative)
No, the title of the action is Motorola Mobility, Inc. v. Apple Inc. [groklaw.net] (warning: PDF), case 1:12-cv-20271-WJZ