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07.07.15

Alice Case Beats Microsoft Patent Troll, USPTO Director Michelle Lee Wants Reform

Posted in America, Microsoft, Patents at 6:57 am by Dr. Roy Schestowitz

USPTO panel

Summary: Latest developments surrounding software patents and patent trolls in the United States

For somewhat of a change, today we have some good news. Amid complaints about the patent system (see for example “Patent abuse hurts in Lansing, nation”) the USPTO‘s Michelle Lee, whom we wrote about before [1, 2, 3, 4, 5], remarks on patent reform at The Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) Patent Reform Forum. She said that “there are certain changes that only Congress can make via legislation. Which is why I’m pleased that patent litigation reform legislation is currently moving forward.”

“Legacy of software patents may be short-lived if this carries on.”But with or without a reform (Congress involvement), there are changes that are made at the courts. According to patent lawyers and the pro-patents circles (even lawyers’ sites), “the Federal Circuit has affirmed that Intellectual Ventures’ asserted patent claims are invalid for lacking eligible subject matter. Intellectual Ventures v. Capital One (Fed. Cir. 2015) (Patent Nos. 8,083,137, 7,603,382, and 7,260,587).”

This is Microsoft’s patent troll, which also attacks Android/Linux these days. “The Federal Circuit on Monday rejected patent licensing giant Intellectual Ventures Management LLC’s bid to overturn the invalidation of several online banking patents it asserted against Capital One Financial Corp., saying they cover abstract ideas under the standard set by the U.S. Supreme Court’s landmark Alice ruling.”

What we have here is Alice vs. Microsoft’s main troll and the ruler, surprisingly enough, is the court most friendly towards software patents (and their originator). This is pretty big news. Those who celebrate it are on a roll. “Matthew Moore argued three Federal Circuit appeals in a single week in May,” says The Recorder. “He won all three cases.” See page two of the original decision [PDF] to see Moore’s involvement in this case. These people now know how to kill software patents even in the most hostile environment (CAFC). Legacy of software patents may be short-lived if this carries on.

On the other hand, Newegg, which was hit with millions in ‘damages’ due to software patents, finds out that it is unable to appeal. As a trolls expert put it: “Online retailer Newegg has developed a reputation for taking on so-called “patent trolls,” even when that means going through lengthy litigation and unpredictable jury trials.

“The company’s last patent trial concluded in November 2013, when Newegg faced off against a patent troll called TQP Development. TQP used US Patent No. 5,412,730 to make a vast claim to basic Internet encryption technologies, saying that anyone using the common combination of SSL and the RC5 encryption algorithm was infringing. By the time of the trial with Newegg, TQP had sued more than 120 companies and earned $45 million in settlement payments.”

This comes after a 20-month delay, so it basically predates the SCOTUS ruling regarding Alice — a ruling that would have possibly helped Newegg win this case. █

Links 7/7/2015: Lenovo ThinkPad With GNU/Linux, More Containers Hype

Posted in News Roundup at 5:45 am by Dr. Roy Schestowitz

GNOME bluefish

Contents

GNU/Linux

Free Software/Open Source

  • Why we changed our software from proprietary to open source

    Why would a software company choose to change its product from proprietary to open source? It turns out there are many good reasons, says Dan Mihai Dumitriu, CEO and CTO of networking software company Midokura. In this interview with The Enterprisers Project, Dumitriu explains the benefits.

  • Should open source leaders go native?

    Anthropologists who traveled to the jungle to study various tribes would debate (half jokingly) whether to “go native”—that is, whether to adopt the lifestyle of the people they were trying to understand, or to keep their distance (and scientific objectivity). It was a research design choice, but also a fundamental choice about one’s identity as a more-than-interested visitor.

  • Plant volunteers, grow an organization: an interview with Stormy Peters

    Stormy Peters and Avni Khatri will present Grow an organization by planting volunteers at OSCON 2015. Peters is the vice president of technical evangelism at the Cloud Foundry and Khatri is president of Kids on Computers. In this talk, they share their experiences and lessons for growing a healthy garden of volunteers.

  • What is upstream & downstream software?

    This question came up during conversations with Red Hat’s Chris Wright, a Linux kernel developer and a principal software engineer with the company.

    Of course, in non-tech business speak, upstream tends to refer to production processes that involves searching for (and extracting) raw materials — in software, this is not the case.

  • Web Browsers

  • SaaS/Big Data

  • Oracle/Java/LibreOffice

    • LibreOffice 5.0: A Unique Release

      LibreOffice 5.0 is planned for release in early August and today Charles H. Schulz said this is “an unique release.” When it comes to features and styles Schulz said the broad range of changes and improvements will be easily visible to the user. With things like the Breeze iconset, enhancements to the sidebar, and improved menus “this is a very special and exciting release.”

  • CMS

    • ECM Buyers and the Open Source Question

      It sparked a heated debate. At that point, Open Source Software (OSS) wasn’t as widely received in the enterprise as it is today and many thought that its perceived advantage was limited to price (as in “it’s free software”).

  • Business

    • Openwashing

      • SAP’s commitment to open source is paying off

        SAP SE is dedicated to helping businesses respond to market demands around the clock, according to Steve Lucas, president of Platform Solutions at SAP. Its partnership with Red Hat, Inc. is a key part of its strategy. In an interview with theCUBE at RedHat Summit, Lucas explained further.

      • More Big Name Technology Corporations Are Going Open Source

        Recently, Apple released its programming language, Swift 2, to the public. By releasing Swift to the open source community, Apple is giving software developers more access to and control over the programming language. This release opens up a myriad of exciting possibilities for application development, software advancements and increased functionality.

  • Project Releases

  • Public Services/Government

    • EC publishes open source code of legislation editor

      The European Commission is about to make available as open source a prototype of LEOS, a software solution for drafting and automatic processing of legal texts. The software currently supports legal texts issued by the EC, yet can be extended to support other legislative processes.

  • Openness/Sharing

Leftovers

  • Hardware

  • Defence/Police/Secrecy/Aggression

    • Hillary Clinton: “If I’m President, We Will Attack Iran”

      She endorses using cluster bombs, toxic agents and nuclear weapons in US war theaters. She calls them deterrents that “keep the peace.” She was one of only six Democrat senators opposed to blocking deployment of untested missile defense systems – first-strike weapons entirely for offense.

    • Laos After the Bombs

      From 1964 to 1973, the US dropped two million tons of bombs on Laos. The horrendous effects are still being felt.

  • Environment/Energy/Wildlife

  • Finance

    • Ecuador Fights for Survival – Against its Elites

      It is great news for majority of Ecuadorian citizens – but terrible nightmare for the ‘elites’.

      They no longer feel unique, no longer is this country their huge, private playground and a milking cow. The ‘elites’ still have money and their villas, as well as servants, luxury cars and regular trips to those lands they are faithfully serving – North America and Europe.

      But their status is diminishing. No longer they feel admired, no longer they are feared. Increasingly they are forced to play by rules and to respect local laws. That would be unimaginable just ten years ago. For some, this is the end of the world!

      The rich, the ‘elites’, are sour losers. In fact, they have no idea how to accept defeat. Never before in the history of this country they actually had to. To them this is new reality, this nation ruled by the government, which is working on behalf of the people. The ‘elites’ feel let down, cheated, even humiliated. They have no idea how to respect democracy (rule of the people). They only know how to make decisions, and to give orders, and to loot.

      This could lead to inevitable conflict, and Ecuador is not an exception. To greater or smaller extend, the same is happening in Venezuela, Bolivia, Brazil, Argentina, Uruguay and even in Chile. Immediately after people vote a socialist government in, immediately after the government begins working for the majority, the elites start reacting. Their goal is clear and predictable: to discredit the administration and to reverse the course.

    • Varoufakis resigns as Greek finance minister ‘to aid deal’

      After securing a ‘no’ vote at Greek referendum on bailout, Finance Minister Yanis Varoufakis resigned, saying it would help Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras negotiate a better deal with foreign creditors.

    • After Greece Cuts a Quarter of Its Budget, WaPo Asks if It’s Willing to ‘Trim Spending’

      So from 2010 to 2015, Greece has cut government spending from roughly 13 billion euros to 10 billion euros–a cut of 23 percent. Unsurprisingly, this has had a devastating effect on Greece’s economy, with unemployment stuck above 25 percent since the end of 2012.

      In the Washington Post‘s eyes, though, Greece has not yet demonstrated the willingness to “trim its spending” that would merit a bailout.

    • Bail-Out or Sell-Out?

      I think the lesson from this is that the 21st Century corporate and banking state is beyond amelioration. Any change needs to be a fundamental challenge to the system. It will seem strange to future generations that a system developed whereby middlemen who facilitated real economic transactions by handling currency, came to dominate the world by creating a mathematical nexus of currency that bore no meaningful relationship to real movements of commodities.

  • Censorship

    • Reddit users want CEO Ellen Pao fired

      Reddit has been on a very rocky road lately, and now some of the site’s users are demanding that CEO Ellen Pao be replaced. The petition to remove Pao follows the CEO’s decision to remove popular Reddit employee Victoria Taylor.

    • Reddit CEO Pao Under Fire as Users Protest Removal of Executive

      More than 130,000 people have signed a petition demanding the removal of Ellen Pao, Reddit Inc.’s interim chief executive officer, after she dismissed an executive and was accused of censoring online message boards.

  • Privacy

    • The Shocking Scope of the NSA’s XKEYSCORE Surveillance

      Every time anyone uses a computer to send an e-mail, watch a video, do a Google search, or update a Facebook status, the National Security Agency (NSA) is probably collecting and collating that activity on one of its many servers.

      XKEYSCORE — the codename of the computer code used by the NSA to perform these actions — is massive and more intrusive than most people understand.

    • Hacking Team hacked, attackers claim 400GB in dumped data

      On Sunday, while most of Twitter was watching the Women’s World Cup – an amazing game from start to finish – one of the world’s most notorious security firms was being hacked.

    • Sloppy Cyber Threat Sharing Is Surveillance by Another Name

      Imagine you are the target of a phishing attack: Someone sends you an email attachment containing malware. Your email service provider shares the attachment with the government, so that others can configure their computer systems to spot similar attacks. The next day, your provider gets a call. It’s the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), and they’re curious. The malware appears to be from Turkey. Why, DHS wants to know, might someone in Turkey be interested in attacking you? So, would your email company please share all your emails with the government? Knowing more about you, investigators might better understand the attack.

    • Lawmakers want Internet sites to flag ‘terrorist activity’ to law enforcement

      Social media sites such as Twitter and YouTube would be required to report videos and other content posted by suspected terrorists to federal authorities under legislation approved this past week by the Senate Intelligence Committee.

      The measure, contained in the 2016 intelligence authorization, which still has to be voted on by the full Senate, is an effort to help intelligence and law enforcement officials detect threats from the Islamic State and other terrorist groups.

  • Civil Rights

    • Leaked Documents Show FBI, DEA and U.S. Army Buying Italian Spyware

      The FBI, Drug Enforcement Administration and U.S. Army have all bought controversial software that allows users to take remote control of suspects’ computers, recording their calls, emails, keystrokes and even activating their cameras, according to internal documents hacked from the software’s Italian manufacturer.

  • Internet/Net Neutrality

    • Loose words sink EU net neutrality bill

      EU officials jubilantly announced a deal on setting internet rules and ending roaming surcharges early Tuesday morning but the details of the deal contain several loose ends.

    • The Privatization Of The Internet

      Remarkably, this buyout of cyberspace has garnered almost no protest or media attention, in contrast to every other development in cyberspace such as the Communications Decency Act, and cyberporn. What hasn’t been discussed is the public’s right to free speech in cyberspace. What is obvious is that speech in cyberspace will not be free if we allow big business to control every square inch of the Net.

  • Intellectual Monopolies

    • Copyrights

      • Israeli Court Lifts Ineffective Popcorn Time Ban

        Israeli Internet providers are no longer required to block access to Popcorn Time websites. A District Court has lifted a preliminary injunction arguing that access restrictions are ineffective. The decision is a major disappointment for the local anti-piracy outfit ZIRA, which was also ordered to pay the legal fees of one of the ISPs.

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