Antiquated Rambus Corporation Calls on ITC to Ban Sales of Semiconductors.

[Kludge]

"Technology licensing firm Rambus has gone to the International Trade Commission (ITC) to file a complaint asking for a very simple, even humble thing. They want the ITC to block the import and sale of any product infringing on its semiconductor patents. Sound reasonable? Well, it turns out that covers products from Broadcom, Freescale, NVIDIA, and more. As for the types of products Rambus thinks are infringing, that would be "personal computers, workstations, servers, routers, mobile phones and other handheld devices, set-top boxes, Blu-ray players, motherboards, plug-in cards, hard drives and modems." In case you haven't noticed, that's just about everything that makes us happy around here.

Rambus has been involved in a number of long running patent disputes with the likes of Nvidia. After trying in vain to work out licensing deals with everyone that's ever gone near a semiconductor, Rambus felt only legal action would get their point across. That's probably the real goal of this filing with the ITC. It is supremely unlikely that the commission would see fit to ban the sale of all these items. ITC complaints are a regular part of patent disputes, although they are not usually this expansive.

There is at least some validity to Rambus' claims. They won a partial victory over Nvidia last summer. But they do have quite the reputation at a patent troll these days. Should the world's technology companies just pay off Rambus, or is this just a lot of bluster?"

Article by Ryan Whitwam of Maximum PC
Original article link: http://www.maximumpc.com/article/new...ale_everything

[Fox McCloud]

I absolutely detest this company, the only thing they've done in recent years is license patents....true rent-seeking behavior.

All I can say is, I hope cases like this eventually lead to the destruction of our patent system....we can only hope IP gets taken out with it.

[Kludge]

It seems IP infringement cases are becoming increasingly ridiculous.

Here's a very recent story of a company suing another because it claims they stole their turkey preparation text.

"Thanksgiving may be over, but right before the holiday, Greenberg Smoked Turkeys (which, as you might guess, sells turkeys) sued competitor Goode-Cook for copyright infringement, claiming that the following bit of turkey care instructions violated its copyright:

Our turkeys arrive at your door ready to eat. Refrigerate immediately. The turkey will keep in the refrigerator for 6-8 days. If you do not plan to use it in that length of time, it should be frozen.
We recommend that our turkeys are eaten chilled or at room temperature -- just slice and enjoy!
If heating is required, follow these instructions: place turkey in a Reynolds® Oven Bag, which can be bought at your local grocer. Do not add flour to the bag. Cut 6 to 7 small slits in the top of the bag. Heat at 300 degrees for 6 minutes per pound.

What's unclear from the complaint (which we've included after the jump) is whether or not Greenberg actually registered the copyright on this. If it did not, it would greatly limit the likelihood of this lawsuit getting anywhere. It's also not clear if Goode-Cook copied the whole thing or part of it, as the "exhibit" is not included. It actually took a bit of searching, but I think I found the actual website for Goode, and I don't see those instruction anywhere (in fact, there's an entirely different set of instructions), but it's possible that the originals were taken down following the lawsuit.

Of course, the bigger question is whether or not the text above is actually copyrightable. As has been discussed numerous times, you can't copyright a recipe, but might be able to protect "substantial literary expression in the form of an explanation or directions." The question is whether the statements above qualify as "substantial literary expression," beyond just the basic factual description. There might be a few parts where it strays into such territory, but it seems like a very thin amount of copyright coverage there. Furthermore, is there really any argument that the use of this text in any way harms Greenberg? That seems like an even bigger stretch. This seems like a lawsuit based on anger rather than a legitimate copyright claim."

Article by Mike Masnick of Techdirt
Original Article Link: http://www.techdirt.com/articles/201...ructions.shtml