Judge rules for the Finns in Nokia/InterDigital spat

A US International Trade Commission judge has ruled that Nokia is not infringing four disputed patents owned by InterDigital, paving the way for the Finns to walk away from the lengthy spat come December. The ruling is an Initial Determination that won't be confirmed until December. But it is a win for Nokia in the long …

[Hugh_Pym]

Oh man. not more bloody IP

Protracted IP battles must be costing the industry billions. No wonder they can't afford to pay their contractors anymore. It's all such crap.

I'm thinking that as a solicitor's letter cost anywhere between £50 and £2,000,000. If you sent an email to every company you could think of claiming to be in the process of patenting a pen an paper based information transfer system which you would licence in perpetuity for £40. They might as well settle rather than involve the legal dept. Quids in!

[Anonymous Coward]

No sympathy for Nokia

They've tried repeatedly to patent software, stuff they must know is common practice, yet they try to get it past the patent office anyway.

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2008/03/19/patents_software_online/

So it would have been better Karma if Nokia had lost. But either way, Nokia need to stop trying to game the system in their favour at the expense of everyone in the software industry and start developing some killer phones again.

The sooner we get the patent offices by the scruff of the neck and remind them, especially the EPO and USPTO, just what damage their games do to competitive markets, the better.