Now, after two years of litigation, it's back to square one. The East Texas judge overseeing Lodsys' systematic patent attack on app developers has refused to even consider Apple's motion. Instead, he allowed the patent-holding company to settle all its cases—and then dismissed Apple's motion as moot. By doing so, US District Judge Rodney Gilstrap—who has inherited the patent-happy East Texas court that once belonged to patent-troll favorite T. John Ward—has enabled Lodsys to threaten developers for months, and perhaps even years, to come.
The legal actions by Lodsys originally started in May 2011, where the firm threatened to sue App Store developers over In-App Purchases and upgrade links, claiming that it had a patent to the process which was originally filed in December 2003 as a part of series of continuations on earlier patent applications dating to 1992. The patent in question was credited to Dan Abelow, who sold the patent portfolio to Lodsys in 2004. The move prompted Apple to back developers against the patent threats, stating that iOS developers were “undisputedly licensed” later that month in 2011.At that point, Lodsys also targeted Android developers with patent infringement claims, and Apple eventually filed a motion to intervene within the Lodsys lawsuits. While Apple was granted limited permission in April 2012 to intervene in the Lodsys case, this permission was overturned today.
This past April, Lodsys specifically targeted Disney’s “Where’s My Water?” title among others in a new round of lawsuits over in-app purchasing, stating that Disney had infringed its ’565 and ‘078 patents had been infringed upon by the entertainment corporation. However, Lodsys agreed last month to dismiss a patent case against developer Todd More, for a charitable donation. Overall, Apple has been the number one target for patent trolls with 171 cases in five years, with U.S. President Barack Obama targeting patent trolls such as Lodsys, announcing proposed legislative changes this past June.
With the amount now being charged for IAP's these day, I think Lodsys are not the only trolls under the bridge.
I have no sympathy for the Dev's who are actually charging for an App then getting kids [and adult's] to pay up to £60+ for useless gem packs and upgrades etc.
At least if an App is free, I know not to bother downloading it as it will invariably be full of adverts and IAP con-tricks.
It has all become like those awful UK holiday resort chains (you know who they are), who get kids to pump arcade machines with money to obtain tokens, who's prize value is a fraction of the money you paid.
So if the Dev's are abusing the system [making huge amounts of money from it] and ruining the spirit of the original idea, what is so different to what Lodsys is doing?
They can all burn in patent hell.
The whole system is one giant waste of time. Intellectual property doesn't exist. You can't own something that you can't define with objective criteria. Inventing something shouldn't require a slew of lawyers. All that does is make people less productive. Don't want somebody selling "your" product that you invented? Lock in your customers with long-term contracts with escalators. Be creative. Making a law to entitle people to something that doesn't exist is the most backwards idea I've ever heard.
Lodsys are claiming they have some unique process when almost every application on any platform has an update button, it's not a huge leap of anyones imagination to link in purchases and extras.
This patent is not even helping innovation, there is no alternative to in-app purchases.
Patents need an overhaul ASAP.
Also i disagree that the developers need to be licensed to sell in app when apple owns the ecosystem and are licensed to do so. Lodsys are just trying to extort money from apple.
The developers were given the option by apple to have in-app merc not the other way round. Apple are culpable for it's use. Developers will settle and claim off apple anyway but it involves laywers who are going to suck everyone dry for no reason.
If I were a developer I would refer lodsys to apple as they control the developer ecosystem and that if lodsys wanted to settle with myself as a developer that they would need to be able to handle getting all the money needed to settle a license back from apple before paying out anything.
"claiming that it had a patent to the process"
The "patent" link goes to an error page.
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Here's one of their patents. Seems like an extremely vague blanket patent: http://www.google.com/patents/US5999908
The patent link will almost always go to an error page. That's how the USPTO web works.
Don't know why MR posted a link.
IAP which target children and include 'pay to win' options are horrible and shouldn't be encouraged. They're wrong, plain and simple.
But IAP can be beneficial to consumers and developers. Listen to the 'Real World Price Dynamics (http://developingperspective.com/2013/09/27/app-store-pricing/)' podcast with Lauren Smith or read Marco Arment's thoughts on it (http://www.marco.org/2013/09/28/underscore-price-dynamics).
I'm happy to pay up front and you may be too, but it seems that we're not representative of the majority of app purchasers. These articles suggest the majority of consumers want free apps and once there's a perception of value, they'll purchase extra functionality.
In app purchases have a place. The fact that big hitters are getting behind them may just mean trolls like Lodsys will be forced to disappear. Disney and EA, for example, are two companies using IAP with deep pockets who will fight them.
In App purchases have gone from a reasonable supplementary revenue stream for developers, to an abomination.
With the amount now being charged for IAP's these day, I think Lodsys are not the only trolls under the bridge.
I have no sympathy for the Dev's who are actually charging for an App then getting kids [and adult's] to pay up to £60+ for useless gem packs and upgrades etc.
At least if an App is free, I know not to bother downloading it as it will invariably be full of adverts and IAP con-tricks.
It has all become like those awful UK holiday resort chains (you know who they are), who get kids to pump arcade machines with money to obtain tokens, who's prize value is a fraction of the money you paid.
So if the Dev's are abusing the system [making huge amounts of money from it] and ruining the spirit of the original idea, what is so different to what Lodsys is doing?
They can all burn in patent hell.
I love how people argue that without patents, nobody would invent anything. Because nobody ever invented anything before patent offices started sprouting up, right?
The whole system is one giant waste of time. Intellectual property doesn't exist. You can't own something that you can't define with objective criteria. Inventing something shouldn't require a slew of lawyers. All that does is make people less productive. Don't want somebody selling "your" product that you invented? Lock in your customers with long-term contracts with escalators. Be creative. Making a law to entitle people to something that doesn't exist is the most backwards idea I've ever heard.
Haha, no. What happens when a normal person like you or I slave away at something that no one else would have been able to do only for a huge company to say " o hey that cool, lets copy it and slap our sticker on it!"?
via apple - Google News http://news.google.com/news/url?sa=t&fd=R&usg=AFQjCNHTQLGay2RvlcOWh5Bd24ckeaQnEA&url=http://www.macrumors.com/2013/09/30/lodsys-free-to-continue-patent-threats-against-developers-after-judge-tosses-apples-legal-challenge/
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