FARK.com: Blog (190): A very brief note on the patent lawsuit, and then Fark's favorite Headlines of the Week for 1/9

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A very brief note on the patent lawsuit, and then Fark's favorite Headlines of the Week for 1/9 - 1/15
Posted by Drew at 2011-01-18 3:25:33 PM (182 comments) | Permalink

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Sup everybody, I don't have much to add to the Headline of the Week writeup this week. I've got my head down in this patent lawsuit thing that you probably already heard about. I'll have more for you on that soon, but in the meantime we're gearing up for a horrifically expensive legal fight.

We're hoping it won't go that way, but others who have been in similar situations have spent a lot of time (i.e. years) and a metric assload of money proving their innocence. I'll tell you more about it later.

Headlines Of The Week for Sun 2011-01-09 to Sat 2011-01-15:

Smoking could disappear by 2050. Unlikely tag laughs and coughs up some brown phlegm

Bank building badly damaged on 9/11 is finally scheduled to come down. Truthers to be watching carefully for signs of controlled demolition

Lizzie Borden museum gets the ax

To battle contraband cellphones, state prisons may start jamming them, which, ironically, is how they usually come into a prisoner's possesion to begin with

Scientists using ginger to attract endangered stags. Proving once and for all that she is hotter than Mary Ann

Do not cure sides of beef by stringing them from your roof; the steaks are just too high

Accountant's blood alcohol was more than five times the legal limit when he parked in the middle of the highway to sleep. Guess he couldn't handle his ten fortys

Moose attacks skier and dog. Squirrel accomplice in custody, considered flight risk

Proof the town just ain't what it used to be: Vegas showgirl found dismembered and encased in concrete turns out to have nothing to do with the mob, instead was whacked by one of the fruity French clown guys from Cirque du Soliel

Massive quake hits South Pacific. Oklahoma OK

Wikipedia is ten years old [celebration needed]

Sports:

Dead bird epidemic continues: 53 eagles found dead on a field in Philadelphia

Favre to bail his sister out of jail. *UPDATE* Favre to let her sit in jail. *UPDATE 2* Favre to bail her out. *UPDATE* Maybe

Cam Newton to take pay cut by declaring for the NFL draft

Geek:

How to make snow ice cream. Hmmmmm, this makes no mention of how to get it in a stunning yellow hue like my older brother used to make

Nobel prize winning scientist claims to have proof that DNA can transport itself across short distances, although it reaches further if you have a quick rest between experiments

How PhDs talk: Reverse Dispersal Translocation obviates need for lethal option. Human translation: If we plant bushes the prairie dogs will stay away and we won't have to poison them

Showbiz:

Matt Damon vows to do his own Bourne movie. Look for Still Bourne some time in 2013

"Taylor Swift is the new Jennifer Aniston." Wow... that was unnecessarily harsh

The Trump gods are displeased by your lack of viewership of civilian Apprentice, and have cast their plagues upon you. YOU SHALL NOW SUFFER GARY BUSEY, MEAT LOAF AND A REAL HOUSEWIFE

Politics:

Manufacturers ask GOP Chair of the House Oversight Committee to eliminate regulation of toxic dumping, worker health, and air pollution. Chair asks if he can get them a cappucino while he's up

Obama pleads for civility, deletion of Politics tab, in message of healing

Openly gay man marries straight woman for art project. In subby's day, you just rubbed your genitals in paint, ejaculated on a canvas, and called it a day

Music:

Lady Gaga teams up with Polaroid. More on this story as it develops

What's-her-name doesn't want you to forget her

Tom Waits says all proceeds from his poetry book will go towards eliminating the homeless problem. Probably because he's tired of people mistaking him for one of them

Business:

Best Buy is expanding their buy back program to buy back your old stuff but you have to buy into the buy back program when you first buy the stuff at Best Buy. Well.. bye

British banker's monocle falls out as he insists his $14 million bonus this year is an act of self-restraint

Fiat's Turin plant workers approve new union contract, the details of which are shrouded in secrecy

· · ·

(view entire blog)

182 Comments (+0 »)

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IXI Jim IXI

2011-01-18 03:52:09 PM

UncleStumpy:
I appreciate the effort..now if only the lawsuit was something I could care about...

thanks for googling

Googling? Hell, I just scrolled up a story or two...

Barnstormer

2011-01-18 03:52:14 PM

Drew, be sure to spin your totem. Make sure you're not in someone else's dream before you send that check to the lawyers!

Your friend,
Cobb

wmoonfox

2011-01-18 03:52:15 PM

As many people as they're suing at once, I can't really believe they have any chance at winning. Is this one of those "shake some lawyers at the money-makers in hopes of a settlement" things?

UncleStumpy

2011-01-18 03:52:56 PM

UncleStumpy: FARTNOISE FARTNOISE JUNIOR: UncleStumpy: what lawsuit?

I worked long and hard to find this link, so you damn well better appreciate it:

Link (new window)

I appreciate the effort..now if only the lawsuit was something I could care about...

thanks for googling

Nevermind I'm a tard and just looked at the main page.

dark side of the moon

2011-01-18 03:53:39 PM

Can anyone please explain (in very basic terms) what the lawsuit is alleging? What do they claim Fark and the others have done?

/Confused

Felgraf

2011-01-18 03:55:49 PM

dark side of the moon: Can anyone please explain (in very basic terms) what the lawsuit is alleging? What do they claim Fark and the others have done?

/Confused

Patent violation. They claim to have patented some version of.. I think it was "a system for generating a news or press release online"

Basically, patent troll.

cowman8989

2011-01-18 03:56:12 PM

I say we rise up against this unjust lawsuit and fight back similar to our "friends" on 4chan but in our own Farker way.

I will start this revolution by cracking open a beer and trying to make this into a "Hot Busty Asian Girl" thread. Liva La revo... ah fark it, good luck Drew we are rooting for you.

patrick767

2011-01-18 03:56:28 PM

Wow, so this Vertigo LLC is a shell that owns other shell companies and it all exists simply to patent troll. Among other things, they're suing a ton of banks and credit unions over a different patent (6,115,817), which claims to broadly cover sending secure messages over an insecure network

What a load of bullshiat. How do they ever get patents on shiat like this?

whidbey

2011-01-18 03:57:00 PM

Felgraf: Basically, patent troll.

The best ones are.

Oh. You said "patent."

VvonderJesus

2011-01-18 03:58:49 PM

patrick767: Wow, so this Vertigo LLC is a shell that owns other shell companies and it all exists simply to patent troll. Among other things, they're suing a ton of banks and credit unions over a different patent (6,115,817), which claims to broadly cover sending secure messages over an insecure network

What a load of bullshiat. How do they ever get patents on shiat like this?

Remember that many of these patents were issued in the early 2000's, and many of the nice things we have today (online banking, youtube, fark) were few and far between. Much of the innovation online was done in the last 5 years or so.

hp6sa

2011-01-18 03:59:12 PM

neversubmit: "a second Delaware-based shell company, Vertigo Holding LLC, owns Gooseberry"

So who owns Vertigo and did they have friends in high places help them get the patent?

According to the State of Deleware, Vertigo Holding LLC was registered on 10/08/2009... curious how they would own a patent that allegedly pre-dates Fark.

/well, I suppose someone could have sold them the patent.

wmoonfox

2011-01-18 03:59:32 PM

patrick767: What a load of bullshiat. How do they ever get patents on shiat like this?

Paper pushers are rarely up to speed on everything they sign and forward. With the kind of verbiage you can throw around in the IT world, even less so.

manimal2878

2011-01-18 03:59:33 PM

How does having it pass through shell companies help them? Wouldn't the lawsuit be based on the merit of whether their patent claim is valid, and not on who is making it?

/I'm obviously not a lawyer.

I_C_Weener

2011-01-18 03:59:39 PM

No 4chan. Pussies!

jesdynf

2011-01-18 04:01:38 PM

I for one welcome Fark's new dummy corporation overlords. Honestly, if they gave three-tenths of a shiat for the Politics tab they could hardly do worse than Drew.

/we finally found a troll Drew doesn't like

patrick767

2011-01-18 04:01:40 PM

Ah, I see Yahoo is among the defendants. Let them pay for it.

VvonderJesus
Remember that many of these patents were issued in the early 2000's, and many of the nice things we have today (online banking, youtube, fark) were few and far between. Much of the innovation online was done in the last 5 years or so.

Yes, but these are ridiculously broad patents.

jjorsett

2011-01-18 04:01:40 PM

Time to raise the TF fees.

khyberkitsune

2011-01-18 04:01:43 PM

"I've got my head down in this patent lawsuit thing that you probably already heard about. I'll have more for you on that soon, but in the meantime we're gearing up for a horrifically expensive legal fight."

No, Drew, you won't have an expensive fight.

Slashdot has tons of prior art, so that's not going to fly.

And I've already sent amicus briefs to the courts explaining some of my own prior art dating before slashdot (simple CGI scripting.)

You've got nothing to worry about.

JesseL

2011-01-18 04:02:04 PM

neversubmit: "a second Delaware-based shell company, Vertigo Holding LLC, owns Gooseberry"

So who owns Vertigo and did they have friends in high places help them get the patent?

Who owns vertigo is the big question. They're a Delaware corporation, so there are no records of their ownership and their physical address is essentially an answering service that specializes in producing facades for companies that only exist on paper.

The only way to find out who's really behind it all is to bribe or coerce Vertigo's lawyers or the people at "Successful Office" into revealing who pays their bills - which could very easily lead to another dead end.

Impasse

2011-01-18 04:02:24 PM

cowman8989: I will start this revolution by cracking open a beer and trying to make this into a "Hot Busty Asian Girl" thread.

Yeah, good luck with that. The modmins raped the ginger thread last week.

Geotpf

2011-01-18 04:04:41 PM

dark side of the moon: Can anyone please explain (in very basic terms) what the lawsuit is alleging? What do they claim Fark and the others have done?

/Confused

Sounds like they filed, and received, a patent on something obvious like "running a website that links to news stories from other websites and lets people comment on the links". So, anybody who has a website that does that owes them a metric assload of money. In theory. In practice, these types of patents either are invalid because somebody already made a website of that nature before they filed the patent. But you usually have to pay an army of lawyers to deterime this in court, so the patent troll graciously offers to settle for the price of half of an army of lawyers.

PepperFreak

2011-01-18 04:05:48 PM

We're hoping it won't go that way, but others who have been in similar situations have spent a lot of time (i.e. years) and a metric assload of money proving their innocence.

You'll get over it.

poonesfarm

2011-01-18 04:06:50 PM

Maybe you can find someone with a GED in law to take the case pro bono.

squidgod2000

2011-01-18 04:07:16 PM

neversubmit: Vertigo Holding LLC

The owners are Lewis W Barrett, Chris Mershon, and Alex Rubinchik.

The managers are Lewis and Lynne Dee Barrett who live in Seattle and own a 47-foot boat named "Rita".

/my two minutes of Google-fu contribution

gamepolice

2011-01-18 04:07:43 PM

So they're also suing Yahoo and AOL. This won't end well for them as they have a full legal department that will kick them in the balls badly.

Time to call up the Fark Army Drew.

Sgt. Gamepolice reporting for duty.

Call up the reserves

whidbey

2011-01-18 04:08:50 PM

squidgod2000: The managers are Lewis and Lynne Dee Barrett who live in Seattle and own a 47-foot boat named "Rita".

Sheeeit...Seattle always figures somehow. No wonder it's so expensive up here.

Display_Name

2011-01-18 04:10:10 PM

Fight it, and don't stop until they and their lawyers have to sell off their houses to cover the Rule 11 sanctions and 35 U.S.C. § 285 costs.

Highmark v Allcare Health Management Systems

The AlbinoSaxon

2011-01-18 04:10:25 PM

Impasse: cowman8989: I will start this revolution by cracking open a beer and trying to make this into a "Hot Busty Asian Girl" thread.

Yeah, good luck with that. The modmins raped the ginger thread last week.

Sad times. It was such a good thread too.

AnExaminer

2011-01-18 04:11:01 PM

Foxone: Why is it that anybody on the interwebs knows what patent trolling is but the patent office still after 10 years of trolling does not know.

Just to dismiss a few stereotypes: The vast majority of examiners are under the age of 30, and are very much up-to-date on technology of our fields. We're also all well aware of trolling.

When this patent issued in 2002 it was assigned to NewsGems LLC, so it's changed assignments at least once if Gooseberry Natural Resources is suing.

Also, when this patent was examined, the patent search tools were severely limited and access to NPL resources was severely limited. Which helps understand the "How the heck did this issue?" question.

And, most importantly, me and several other farking examiners are currently trying to "stumble upon" a 102b reference in our spare time. If this crossed my desk today (even with its old filing date) I could throw together a 103(a) rejection within a day, based on 2-3 references. But from my understanding of litigation, they really prefer the anticipatory references.

Krymson Tyde

2011-01-18 04:12:28 PM

air_wx: Ninja Wicked: Whoever did this has declared war on half the bloody internet.

They've taken trolling to an entirely different level

altogether.

I_C_Weener

2011-01-18 04:15:44 PM

I invented the F key on the standard keyboard. All of you owe me royalties for logging into Fark

Leeds

2011-01-18 04:16:01 PM

Didn't Fark come to be in March of 1999? (You know, when the squirrel pic came down and the links went up?)

The patent in question was filed in August of '99 and approved by some idiot in the patent office in 2002.

How can someone claim a patent violation when the purported violation predates the filing of the patent?

I blame the democrats.

infinitedigits

2011-01-18 04:17:15 PM

Doing some digging myself, as I am in the patent biz... Pretty interesting.

BenJammin

2011-01-18 04:17:20 PM

Dear occupant, please be advised that your method of using toilet tissue paper after a #2 may be in violation of several patents we hold on this process.....

oldebayer

2011-01-18 04:19:30 PM

Someone really should have mentioned that patent leather shoes have been out of style for some time now.

Mithiwithi

2011-01-18 04:19:43 PM

TofuTheAlmighty: Foxone: Why is it that anybody on the interwebs knows what patent trolling is but the patent office still after 10 years of trolling does not know.

Is it because they are a for profit and happy to get money for patents or is it really because the US patent office is managed by idiots?

Don't blame the patent office, blame Congress. They've screwed up IP law terribly. See: the continual extensions of copyrights on the likes of Mickey Mouse.

While we're blaming Congress, we can add "underfunding the USPTO so that it lacks the resources to properly review the deluge of crap patents, defensive patents, and other assorted legal spamming".

And no, you can't fund it off patent applications, or you'll shut out small inventors altogether (more so than the current broken patent system does already, that is).

Leeds

2011-01-18 04:19:49 PM

BenJammin: Dear occupant, please be advised that your method of using toilet tissue paper after a #2 may be in violation of several patents we hold on this process.....

That's why I use the seashells!!!

Mr_Fabulous

2011-01-18 04:20:29 PM

I_C_Weener: No 4chan. Pussies!

As someone mentioned in the other thread, relying on chans for this sort of dirty work is a lot like using a hornet's nest as a weapon. Very painful, and hellishly difficult to aim.

thoughtsausage

2011-01-18 04:22:23 PM

This patent was submitted in 1999 and approved in 2002.
Slashdot launched in 1997

Prior art much?

infinitedigits

2011-01-18 04:22:50 PM

What I find interesting is the fact that one of the inventors of this is also the registered agent of the first assignee.

/public info is public.

Barakku

2011-01-18 04:23:53 PM

hp6sa: neversubmit: "a second Delaware-based shell company, Vertigo Holding LLC, owns Gooseberry"

So who owns Vertigo and did they have friends in high places help them get the patent?

According to the State of Deleware, Vertigo Holding LLC was registered on 10/08/2009... curious how they would own a patent that allegedly pre-dates Fark.

/well, I suppose someone could have sold them the patent.

It's a fake company set up for the lawsuit. Look at the NEWS tag post on the front of Fark, we still don't know who ACTUALLY took out the patent. How sad is that?

thoughtsausage

2011-01-18 04:24:54 PM

I was about to comment that my fark ID outdated this ridiculous patent, but looks like they've got me beat by a few months.

/almost

bulldg4life

2011-01-18 04:25:17 PM

Maybe proper credit should've been given where it is due.

Is The Daily Show to blame for this?

infinitedigits

2011-01-18 04:26:20 PM

thoughtsausage: This patent was submitted in 1999 and approved in 2002.
Slashdot launched in 1997

Prior art much?

THIS. Continuity data shows the earliest priority date is 12-21-1999.

WhoGAS

2011-01-18 04:26:45 PM

So the Mafia's doing some good shake-downs with no violence. Cool...I guess.

Shell companies owning shell companies filing suits which are mostly settled out of court? Sounds like a great scam.

/insert sarcasm and rolling eyes where appropriate

Talon

2011-01-18 04:27:11 PM

nekom: Ninja Wicked: Whoever did this has declared war on half the bloody internet.

Reddit, Digg, Fark, Slashdot & TechCrunch. That's basically all of the internet. At least all of the internet that matters.

Read the article FARTNOISE FARTNOISE JUNIOR linked. The shell company that owns all the other shell companies has a half dozen other patents that they are suing a dozen other major websites over (match.com, eharmony, and match-making websites among others).

It's ridiculous, though, that people are able to patent obvious and common things. I'm going to go patent "a process by which ink is applied to paper" and sue every printing press and printer-producer company evar! Who cares that printing has been around since the 1600s, no one has patented it yet!! Derp de derp durr hurr.

AmazinTim

2011-01-18 04:27:28 PM

Leeds: BenJammin: Dear occupant, please be advised that your method of using toilet tissue paper after a #2 may be in violation of several patents we hold on this process.....

That's why I use the seashells!!!

Seashells aren't always straightforward.

cherryl taggart

2011-01-18 04:27:53 PM

The trolls behind this scam aren't so stupid. I note the unnamed chans are not in the many suits. Maybe they think there is no crossover between sites. If anonymous rises up, heaven have mercy on these trolls, because chan will have none.

vegasj

2011-01-18 04:40:46 PM

doglover: This lawsuit is insane. They're basically suing EVERY successful website online today through dummy corporations.

The lawyers instigating it should be disbarred.
The patents should be voided then burned.
The patent holders should be tarred, feathered, and chased out of their homes by an angry mob.

Agreed, except for the last part for the patent holders. For obvious trolling... their lives should be turned into a hell for them. They are no different imo than spammers or those cock suckers that created the ANTI VIRUS 2011!!! shiat that gets installed on your computer simply by switching an ad on some website.

Kenny B

2011-01-18 04:43:50 PM

Drews gonna need a good lawyer.

good luck

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