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$4.5 B. Nortel Bid Shows the Disastrous State of Software Patents

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Re: $4.5 B. Nortel Bid Shows the Disastrous State of Software Patents

#21

Post by sorbus »

monochromatic wrote: post #15
jbooth wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, it creates a market for filing patents by monetizing patents. Innovation means coming up with an idea, implementing it, and bringing it to market in a way that's cost-sustainable. Filing a patent just requires a lawyer. The evidence that things are broken is that a bunch of otherwise productive companies just paid a boatload of money for a grab-bag of IP, primarily to immunize themselves from lawsuits from compan…

There are plenty of instances where someone comes up with a good idea, and the only way he is able to monetize it is through patent protection.

If the only way you can make money off of a good idea is by suing other people who are using it, then it's not a good idea.

Re: $4.5 B. Nortel Bid Shows the Disastrous State of Software Patents

#22

Post by SoftwareMaven »

GHFigs wrote: post #17
SoftwareMaven wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The complaining was around companies needing to spend $4.5B in pre-emptive legal defense. The $4.5B being pre-emptive is extrapolated by me (and I'm assuming the author) from Google stating their $900M was. Nowhere in the article did it even imply any of the players in this transaction were trolls.

What was the point of saying that the size of the winning bid "echoes the sentiment" of a rant about Lodsys?

The whole article was about "Software patents are bad". The Nortel auction was just one example of why patents are bad. Fred Wilson's comments were to back up that theme. Lodsys is just another example.

Read it in that light, and things tie together much more smoothly. Whether it is good writing (e.g. effectively conveying a point) is questionable, since it obviously has cause confusion.

Re: $4.5 B. Nortel Bid Shows the Disastrous State of Software Patents

#23

Post by og1 »

Probably coincidental, but the math lines up where Google could retroactively buy into the group at the price of it's 900M bid. After that the 4.5 Billion would be split evenly between the five companies.

Edit: Looks the BetaBeat article excluded EMC and Ericsson, so the split wouldn't work so nicely.

Re: $4.5 B. Nortel Bid Shows the Disastrous State of Software Patents

#25

Post by [deleted] »

monochromatic wrote: post #15
jbooth wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, it creates a market for filing patents by monetizing patents. Innovation means coming up with an idea, implementing it, and bringing it to market in a way that's cost-sustainable. Filing a patent just requires a lawyer. The evidence that things are broken is that a bunch of otherwise productive companies just paid a boatload of money for a grab-bag of IP, primarily to immunize themselves from lawsuits from compan…

There are plenty of instances where someone comes up with a good idea, and the only way he is able to monetize it is through patent protection.

[deleted]

Re: $4.5 B. Nortel Bid Shows the Disastrous State of Software Patents

#26

Post by jsnell »

cube13 wrote: post #18
scubzero wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think the patent law being broken arguement that the article is trying to make is as follows: the consortium that bought nortel's patents didn't do so for the patents themselves, they did so to prevent google from having the patents. And they didn't want google to not have the patents not because they were afraid of google bringing products to market based on those patents, but because they didn't want google to be…

Nortel has several 4G LTE-related patents in the pool( http://mobile.eweek.com/c/a/Mobile-and-Wireless/RIM-Not-Goog... ). Those are HUGELY valuable to Apple, RIM, Sony Ericsson and Nokia. I would be very surprised if none of those companies came out with 4G phones in the next year or so. Getting control of the patents can save them a pretty tremendous amount of money on licensing fees. These were probably the ones th…

How exactly would Google owning "several" patents on LTE translate to them being a sole owner of the technology? My understanding is that there are a couple of thousand patents on parts of LTE, with companies like Qualcomm, Nokia or Ericsson controlling hundreds of patents.

Re: $4.5 B. Nortel Bid Shows the Disastrous State of Software Patents

#27

Post by brudgers »

cube13 wrote: post #18
scubzero wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think the patent law being broken arguement that the article is trying to make is as follows: the consortium that bought nortel's patents didn't do so for the patents themselves, they did so to prevent google from having the patents. And they didn't want google to not have the patents not because they were afraid of google bringing products to market based on those patents, but because they didn't want google to be…

Nortel has several 4G LTE-related patents in the pool( http://mobile.eweek.com/c/a/Mobile-and-Wireless/RIM-Not-Goog... ). Those are HUGELY valuable to Apple, RIM, Sony Ericsson and Nokia. I would be very surprised if none of those companies came out with 4G phones in the next year or so. Getting control of the patents can save them a pretty tremendous amount of money on licensing fees. These were probably the ones th…

>"MS is probably the only one that did it specifically to hurt Google"

Exactly what is the basis for this?

As you noted Nokia with whom Microsoft shares some interest would benefit from owning those patents. In addition, Microsoft as owner of Skype now has a substantial interest in patents applying to telephony networks.

Re: $4.5 B. Nortel Bid Shows the Disastrous State of Software Patents

#28

Post by monochromatic »

sorbus wrote: post #21
monochromatic wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are plenty of instances where someone comes up with a good idea, and the only way he is able to monetize it is through patent protection.

If the only way you can make money off of a good idea is by suing other people who are using it, then it's not a good idea.

My point is that patents give inventors a way to cash out early without having to go to litigation. It's this property right that they can sell to someone else who wants the use of the idea. Maybe the buyer wants to make money off lawsuits, maybe he wants to produce the product. Doesn't matter. The patent lets the inventor sell his idea to someone who can make better (more economically efficient) use of it.

Re: $4.5 B. Nortel Bid Shows the Disastrous State of Software Patents

#29

Post by brudgers »

sorbus wrote: post #20
yalogin wrote: post #19

Isn't it better that a coalition won instead of Google? Now at least these companies will not sue each other. Its much better that way. Google should have joined the group rather than going itself. Also Nortel was a really huge company and a really good one at their peak. So its not surprising it amassed that many patents or that they fetch that much value.

Google expressed an interest in using the patents defensively, and implied that it would share them with the open source community. If the coalition intends to use the patents offensively, which is very plausible considering the companies involved, then it is not better that it won.

Nations express an interest in obtaining nuclear weapons for peaceful purposes. One side effect of obtaining them is that it limits their neighbor's options when the tanks roll into their back yard.

Google is no more benign than any other company.

Re: $4.5 B. Nortel Bid Shows the Disastrous State of Software Patents

#30

Post by bproper »

petegrif wrote: post #24

Lame poorly written piece without clear argument or even any remotely convincing substantiation for its disconnected assertions.

The software patent system in this country is broken.

Google said so in its initial blog about the Nortel portfolio.

Many VCs have been expressing the same thing in recent weeks.

These two separate actions represent the very early and very late stage of the technology game.

The fundamental problem, however, remains the same.

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