Mon, 12 Jan 2009

20+ Companies Sued Over OS Permissions Patent

A really ridiculous example of patent trolling, but one of the commenters in the Slashdot thread has an interesting point: what if management and shareholders of the corporations that file these kind of suits were held personally liable for their outcome? That would sure put the brakes on patent trolling, eh?

I say let's extend this: libertarians demand freedom, but understand that with that freedom comes responsibility. You're free to sue whomever you wish - and you're also free to face the consequences. The "artificial people" constructed by the State (aka "corporations, "limited liability companies", etc.) are designed specifically to dodge this responsibility.

And that's the root of a lot of problems with the business culture of "capitalism".

According to the article on Ars Technica, Microsoft, Symantec and 20 other companies are being sued over patents covering 'systems for governing application and data permissions, as well as ensuring application integrity.' The patents were granted in the 90's to the Information Protection and Authentication of Texas (IPAT). From the article: 'A response from any of the defendants is still forthcoming, and it is unclear whether the authentication and permissions systems that IPAT's patent describes are precluded by prior art. Even if IPAT has a leg to stand on in court, however, it certainly didn't take the easy route to recovering any damages by suing 22 companies.'

(link) [Slashdot]

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