Yahoo's Own Lash Out At Company Over "Weaponized" Patents 89
Velcroman1 writes "Yahoo is suing Facebook for patent infringement — and the people responsible for Yahoo's patents are outraged. Andy Baio sold Upcoming.org to Yahoo in 2005 for an undisclosed sum, and agreed at the time to help the company file for patents based on the site he had invented and the code he had written. Baio was hesitant to do so, but told Wired.com that he thought he was helping as a precautionary measure. 'I thought I was giving them a shield,' Baio said. 'It turns out I gave them a missile with my name permanently engraved on it.' He helped Yahoo file for eight patents, four of which were later granted. And while none were cited in the Yahoo complaint, Baio said a handful were now 'weaponized to use against people like me.'" bdking points out that Mark Cuban is sick of the patent fiasco as well but his approach is slightly different. "He's rooting for Yahoo to 'destroy' Facebook in its patent lawsuit. Why? Because if Yahoo collects, say, $50 billion from Facebook and forces the social networking company out of business, consumers will revolt and demand patent reform."
Re:But you still cashed the check, right? (Score:5, Insightful)
(shrug). People make mistakes in life, and then later regret their actions. I'm not going to get all incensed at Andy Baio.
Re:But you still cashed the check, right? (Score:4, Informative)
But Yahoo assured us that their patent portfolio was a precautionary measure, to defend against patent trolls and others who might try to attack Yahoo with their own holdings.
Assuming he is telling the truth, it is absolutely nothing like your comparison at all.
Tell it to Alfred Nobel (Score:4, Interesting)
Inventor of Dynamite and the conscience easing Nobel Peace prize. Virtually every weapon is built upon something invented for peace. Forged metal works for plowshares and well as swords. You can't expect a promise like "do no evil" to assure that the future fate of developments made under that banner won't turn evil when sold. Dynamite was revolutionary to safe mining. And at the time it was thought might even end war since the prospect was so terrifying.
But I think the real prize here is neither of the options. that is to say Yahoo won't land a killer blow. All it needs to do is win even a token amount.
Then they can sell this "technology" to Google+. This will allow Google+ to be indemnified as it encroaches on Facebook, and also for google to shut out other competitors from apple or amazon that crop up.
Tat outcome would be good in the sense it would provide competition for Facebook. THat's good for everyone. But it's bad from a general competition point of view
Mark Cuban: still clueless (Score:5, Insightful)
Destroying Facebook will not result in a "consumer revolt". The users will hop on the next big thing. They might go on G+, where they will incessantly upvote each others "Fuck Yahoo I miss Facebook" posts, without actually doing anything about it.
Social media is dangerous in that respect, because it encourages people to talk about doing right, in order to get recognition from their "friends", without actually following through. Everyone suddenly thinks they're an activist because they shared some viral pic.
Re:Mark Cuban: still clueless (Score:4, Interesting)
And you square your beliefs with the SOPA/PIPA backlash... how?
SOPA/PIPA may have never meant to be passed to begin with... if you give the Government an inch, it will take a mile. In that respect, they attempted to take a mile- and the outrage allowed them to take 100 yards instead. They'll come up with another tool, worse than SOPA/PIPA, and use that to grab more power.
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This is the danger of declaring compromise to be a virtue. Naive compromisers always lose, and whatever cunning compromiser owns (by any/all definitions) the newspaper usually wins.
Compromise is a tactic, not a virtue.
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s/Government/business interests/
FTFY
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Lets take a look at SOPA / PIPA. Because enough people actually contacted their senators and got media attention, legislators thought twice about their stance.
The real question is would FB alone be enough to get people to act and get the media coverage they need to influence the legislators? IMO it's doubtful unless somet
Re:Mark Cuban: still clueless (Score:4, Insightful)
Mark Cuban is a moron, and always has been. His major claim to fame is that he found an even bigger moron at Yahoo to pay $6B for Broadcast.com. If Yahoo hadn't given him all of that for no results they might not have had to start patent trolling to survive...
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He may be a moron, but he's entertaining as hell on "Shark Tank".
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Actually, moron is a bit harsh. He was smart enough to talk someone out of $6B and then hold onto it once it fell in his lap. And even better, he was smart enough to sell all of his Yahoo stock immediately because he knew what a pile of crap he had sold them. Ok, maybe he wasn't a moron at all, just a guy who is much better at getting people to give him money than building anything useful.
I should have said "one lucky bastard". And as usual, it's better to be lucky than good...
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I've been told that many patents are rejected, but 4 out of 8 sounds pretty poor. I'm 22 of 22, even though some prior art I found made me try to retract one, but the patent officer found a narrow interpretation that let it stand in a limited form. All mine have been used defensively. It turns out that you either have to have no viable business, or a ton of cash you're just itching to burn to start patent wars. The rest of us live in fear of being sued by someone with either no money and a bunch of lawyers,
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In democracy, a large number of social media supporters worth more than a handful of fanatics.
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So much so that I refuse to capitalize it's name.
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KONY 2012
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Oh, sorry, I forgot the closing tag. /sarcasm
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Yahoo will not destroy Facebook. They wouldn't do that even if their patents would be found to be valid - instead they would extort some money from Facebook. They may not be the sharpest knifes in the drawer, but they aren't completely stupid either - destroying Facebook doesn't generate income. Chances are this wouldn't affect the users in the least. What does a Facebook user care where the advertising money is paid to, and who owns how many shares in the company?
I also wouldn't affect Yahoo much, becaus
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And awarding $50bn in damages against Facebook won't "destroy" anything, it'll just mean Yahoo! will own Facebook.
As far as the users are concerned, nothing will change. Well, except maybe a new button or two will start to appear.
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Well now, I posit that if Yahoo were to inherit Facebook, they would fold in a millisecond. Top brass would cash out, the remaining suckers would continue Yahooing everything into mediocrity, and Fuckerberg would just start all over again.
This is why we can't have anything nice. (Score:4, Informative)
That is all.
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No, this impacts all patent scenarios - to some extent, all software patents are becoming "weaponized".
Is this a trend? (Score:5, Insightful)
High profile employees bashing their own employers over company ethics and purpose - Google, Goldman Sachs, Yahoo, all just today.
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Is this a trend? High profile employees bashing their own employers over company ethics and purpose ...
We can only hope.
We read far too much here from the "Governments are always evil; corporations are always pure and good" crowd. In reality, since they're both run by humans, they tend to have roughly the same amounts of good and evil. And if either is allowed secrecy, the good part has a real disadvantage.
Sheeple don't revolt (Score:5, Insightful)
People don't even revolt when stimulus helps unions and banks and congressional pork rather than real people.
People don't even revolt when gasoline and food prices go up, double, largely because of currency destruction which is a Presidential choice due to budget choices.
People don't even revolt when police set up random checkpoints on highways, airports, train stations, and their own front yard.
People are not going to revolt if Facebook stock gets crushed due to an outsized Patent award. It will simply mean Yahoo owns 50% of Facebook. The site will continue to function uninterrupted. It worked just fine with $40m so it will; work better with $5000m.
JJ
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This word is used exclusively by those it describes most accurately.
Re:Sheeple don't revolt (Score:5, Insightful)
I don't know if I would make the same argument as your parent, but I know I stop reading when posters start talking about sheeple. Invariably, the post contains two things:
* an unsupported statement that large swathes of the population are being actively mislead by a minority cabal whose goal is to destroy said swathes of the population
* indignation that no else one sees the dangers in following said cabal, and that everything would be better if the swathes of population would follow the opinion of the poster.
Finally, those posts also reek of internet tough guys: tough talk about how bad something is, about how bad something will get if nothing is done, and about how people should follow them in revolt. But there is never any action that is demonstrated.
In other words, when I see the word sheeple, I see someone who talks a big game, but does nothing. And I just move on.
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I voted for Ron Paul.
soap, ballot, ammo. Boxes to be used in that order.
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At which point you'll be gunned down by the Government's far superiorly trained/armed army. Good work.
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And (Score:2)
This rebuttal is used by morons who can't think
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Well... (Score:5, Insightful)
Because if Yahoo collects, say, $50 billion from Facebook and forces the social networking company out of business, consumers will revolt and demand patent reform.
As awesome as this fantasy scenario that takes out 2 birds with one stone sounds, lets be honest, it's just that. A fantasy.
Facebook isn't going to crumble any time soon, unfortunately.
Re:Well... (Score:5, Insightful)
If Facebook feels that threatened, it can just buy Yahoo. What's the value now, $1.25, or is that including a cheeseburger?
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If Facebook feels that threatened, it can just buy Yahoo. What's the value now, $1.25, or is that including a cheeseburger?
I'm sure Google would just sit by and let Facebook buy Yahoo.
Re:Well... (Score:4, Funny)
Re:Well... (Score:4, Insightful)
Maybe this is the real goal of Yahoo. To force someone to buy them and maximize their cheeseburger multiplier.
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If Facebook feels that threatened, it can just buy Yahoo. What's the value now, $1.25, or is that including a cheeseburger?
I'm sure Google would just sit by and let Facebook buy Yahoo.
Actually, they probably would. The FTC would come down on them hard for anticompetitive acquisitions. Actually, didn't they already try (or consider) that once before and got shot down for that very reason?
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Actually, they probably would. The FTC would come down on them hard for anticompetitive acquisitions
Oh, you mean like they did with Sirius and XM, the massive merger of news companies, and how many options do we have for cellphones service providers?
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Microsoft has Google tied up with Anti-trust mongering right now. (ironic that the only actual monopoly was so quick to turn the DoJ on somebody else) Microsoft has a deal with Yahoo that is basically a "poison pill" if Google tried to buy them. Microsoft couldn't buy Yahoo either, so they are just going to help their buddy Facebook drag them under.. And Microsoft will line up for the useful bits.
Like all Microsoft's deals, they are really betting Yahoo will not just get the short stick, but go under... "a
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I imagine Google would want some real patents. Yahoo may get a bit of push in stock price, but ultimately it will continue it's inevitable decline.
If Yahoo wants to go after those that fucked it over, it could start by hunting down Jerry Yang and selling his organs to the highest bidder. That would probably make the company more money than this idiotic lawsuit.
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You can buy a company with stock. You don't need cash. And you don't need to buy all of it. If Yahoo is only worth 17 billion dollars then probably 5 billion dollars will get you a controlling interest. You'd need to buy from the right investors, but 2 billion in cash and 3 billion in facebook stock looks like a much better place to have your money than 5 billion dollars in yahoo right now.
This works the other way too. Yahoo will probably ask for 5% of facebook or the like. Suddenly that increases the
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I think that was SCO's thinking when it sued IBM
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It won't come to that, I like the "buy me" option. Of course if Yahoo! offered a "buy it now" price with a "one click" option they would then get sued by eBay and Amazon.
Fortunately, (unfortunately) Microsoft has quite a bit of cash in BOTH horses and Uncle Bill won't like to see it pissed away.... I see merger/buyout/Microsoft forcing them to the table and building some new "open standard" for social networking patents between them.
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AT&T uses Yahoo... therefore, it is the default home page and mail client for anyone using AT&T as an ISP. They have similar agreements with a number of other ISPs.
Microsoft also uses Yahoo data for a number of their services.
Yahoo switched from being an end-user directory-based search service to being a tiered data and networked service provider years ago. You're likely using Yahoo services right now and don't even know it.
Does anyone think Facebook deserves this? (Score:5, Interesting)
Is Yahoo's lawsuits just karma catching up with Mark?
Re:Does anyone think Facebook deserves this? (Score:5, Insightful)
Look, Zuckerburg didn't invent social networking and neither did twins, and neither did Yahoo. The twins' case was bullshit, and so is Yahoo's.
Yahoo's lawsuits designed to pump up Yahoo's share price so someone with sufficiently deep pockets and small brain will buy them up. I suspect Yahoo is hoping Facebook will, just as SCO hoped that IBM would put them out of their misery and make the executives rich. Yahoo was completely fucked over by Jerry Yang, who refused Microsoft's outrageously large offer, and now it's down to this. This isn't the end of Facebook, this is the end of Yahoo. Either Zuckerburg will call their bluff and that will be it and whatever value is left in the company will be sold piecemeal to the highest bidders. But the company, well, it's worth shit. For chrissakes they're renting Bing as their search engine. They're utterly pointless.
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Ceglia is a convicted scam artist, and the Winklevosses aren't exactly short of money. They showed up in court with 5 lawyers from 2 different firms. They lost because their cases had no merit.
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Yeah, I forgot that a random slashdotter and a Wired reporter represented a more objective and thoroughly-demonstrated truth than a public trial. My bad.
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Yeah, I forgot that a random slashdotter and a Wired reporter represented a more objective and thoroughly-demonstrated truth than a public trial. My bad.
Yeah, we've never had examples of bad verdicts. Never ever. Perfect justice system is what the US has.
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Just as many as we have had strawmen on Slashdot
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The movie had it right. If the Winklevosses were going to invent Facebook, they would have invented Facebook.
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Facebook.... well, Mark Zuckerberg, kind of deserves this. It's well known he stole Facebook from several people. [wired.com] Sure he wrote the code, but he was paid to write Facebook. Yes I know Paul and the twins [wired.com] ended up losing their lawsuit, but just because they couldn't afford to fight a billion-dollar legal team doesn't mean they're wrong. Is Yahoo's lawsuits just karma catching up with Mark?
No, it's a ton of lawyers making tons of money by going after another ton of lawyers. Mark will not give one fuck, he's made his money.
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Anal probe (Score:1)
The vast majority of patents are just ... (Score:4, Interesting)
... used as economic and financial TERRORISM by big corporations.
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Eh? If you object to monopolies, you should object to breaking up monopolies? Makes no sense.
All patenting is trolling (Score:1)
"weaponized patents", that's like saying a weaponized gun.
Anyways, Facebook can defend itself. But think about the chilling effect on smaller companies like semi-successful startups.
There can be no ownership of an idea, unlike ownership of physical things. It is not defensible philosophically, as it is incompatible with control of your body (brain) and contractual agreements. Patents are simply monopoly privileges, which have as destructive effect on innovation and competitive entry when applied systematica
Only if happens soon enough (Score:2)
Mark Cuban doesn't understand what is going on (Score:2)
If Facebook were to be destroyed as a going concern because a verdict in Yahoo!'s favor exceeded Facebook's ability to pay (which is fantastically unlikely, but let's ignore that for a moment), its assets (including software, databases, and domain names, trademarks, etc.) would be sold off to pay its debts -- most likely sold to the same buye
Really? (Score:3)
'I thought I was giving them a shield,'
Yeah, this country came along and asked me to make them a nuclear weapon, but promised they'd only use it if they were attacked. So I made it for them. And now that they're on the verge of collapse they're using it to extort their neighbours.
Who's surprised? Patents aren't defensive.
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if he wanted to give them a shield.. ...he should just have published it as a prior art.
he was never giving them a shield, he was giving them a knife to be used if attacked - that's quite far ways from giving a shield.
Uh... (Score:2)
Has there ever been a patent that *wasn't* weaponized?
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Yes. Many patents aren't weaponized, and are defensive. The media, and many here, are focussing on the case where desperate companies like Yahoo are using them as weapons. I would wager the vast majority of patents are not used in this way.
Many arguments here focus on the philosophical "you can't own an idea." This may be true, but the practical reason for patents (justifiable philosophically or not) is to incentivize the development of new technologies. I've experienced the benefit of this thinking first h
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Fact of the matter is they wouldn't have worked on these technologies if another company could legally come in, replicate their product exactly, and take a significant slice of potential market share.
Really???!! What were your parents, owners of the companies that used those patents? Or were they for some other reason paid a percentage of company's revenue or profits over some extended period of time?
If not, it is no loss for them.
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The problem is patents on intangible things that were not until recently patentable like software and processes. I don't think patents on tangible inventions were used as weapons nearly as often. Now, it's not possible to write software and be confident you haven't unwittingly infringed someone's patent.
There is no such things as a defensive weapon (Score:2)