Cisco asks court to bin Rockstar patents Cisco has thrown on the armour and couched the lance to defend itself and its customers from the zombie Nortel patent lawsuits. The Nortel patent portfolio, bought by the Rockstar Consortium and since partly spun out to subsidiaries Bockstar and Constellation (yes, these are the real names), has been the basis for an ongoing …
I think we need something more than an utterly unsubstantiated claim in the last paragraph to believe that's the case. You can't invalidate existing agreements like that unless the original contracts state they're only valid so long as Nortel is a going concern. Since Nortel would have been the last company to believe they'd go under as quickly as they did, I highly doubt they'd even think to include such a clause, let alone find others foolish enough to agree to it.
If I rent you a building on a 10 year lease, just because I sell the building, or I go bankrupt and my creditors take it over and sell it to someone else, that doesn't invalidate the lease contract you have. The assertion the article makes is ridiculous.
haha... Tell that to the people in SF evicted under the Ellis Act.
Tell that to a friend of mine who's been evicted from his room rental because former roommate refused to pay rent. The landlord allowed my friend to move in, but and he upheld his rental obligations. The other tenant, however, reneged. My friend got no protection.
As for these patents, when companies go bankrupt, state or federal courts should escrow the patents and release -- parse -- them out to companies that ALREADY KNOW they will take over, honor, and respect contracts, and ALSO will no put a hot gun barrel up the butts of other companies that built business models on viable pantents. Courts should hold them out for bidding and deny PAEs. ANY entity wanting the patent should be:
-- required to make no predatory or hostile use of the patents until they release licensees and match licensees up with comparable products/services
-- require bidders to put up a bond (escrowed) to cover for any licensees the entity subsequently creatively or viciously savages out of greed or remorse or revenge.
PAEs should be branded, right down to the individuals running or supporting or enabling them, and banned from related activities.
"PAEs should be branded, right down to the individuals running or supporting or enabling them, and banned from related activities"
More fun - if it's a non-performing PAE (ie one which does no R&D of it's own, just tries to make money off the efforts of others), then the accussed infringer should be allowed to choose random members of the PAEs management, staff and/or subcontractors, and make them explain under oath what a random patent clause means. If they can't, case dismissed and PAE required to pay all costs plus a huge punitive, with all claimed patents owned by that PAE granted a new status of "free of charge for any use whatsover", Oh, and it's lawyers disbarred.
"Joint and severally liable" - where two or more persons are liable in respect of the same liability.
The full rent for the property was due by all the occupants. Unless they had separate agreements with the landlord then all occupants were equally liable for the full rental and anyone not paying was an internal disagreement between the occupants and had nothing to do with the landlord. Until they didn't pay in full, at which point he would have an option for eviction.
<smash head on desk>
Someone please explain to how a Patent Troll is allowed to go after customers of a company whose products allegedly infringe said patents? Have we come to the point where every customer, including Joe Public, needs to go through a lengthy and expensive Due Diligence search before buying any tech product?
"Someone please explain to how a Patent Troll is allowed to go after customers of a company whose products allegedly infringe said patents?"
Because they are often the ones making the real money out of the stolen patents - and patent infringement damages are mostly based on demonstrable losses.
Google is a good example of this - they have stolen technology from Microsoft, Apple, Nokia, Oracle, etc. in Android, but because they give the resulting product away for free, it makes more sense to go after those that actually sell it....
It is not surprising that Microsoft and Apple, who are widely considered by many entities in USA and worldwide as the two most slimy extortionists in existence, would be leading this unsavory group.
All of the "legitimate" and more innovative competitors of these doofus Rockstar Coonsortium clowns are by coincidence the very targets of specious patent claims, unless of course the hapless - like Sony, Blackberry and other sniveling cowards join in the witch hunt to extract billions in blood money.
It is not possible in 2014 and beyond that such draconian and questionable illegal actions will help the USA in maintaining a technological advantage over other countries, particularly since many International jurisdictions, including the European Union (27 nations), China, Russia,India, South Korea and most other Asian nations, New Zealand and much of South and Central America are moving quickly to outlaw "software patents" as viable and prudent step to prevent themselves from being victims of US Mafia style gangland extortion as well.
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