Deeplinks Blog posts about Patent Busting Project
In choosing this month’s Stupid Patent, we realized that we couldn’t choose just one. Instead, we decided to give the award to the entirety of patent class 705.
It's time to take a closer look at EFF's recent victory against bogus patents and highlight what we and others concerned about our patent system are up against. The United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO), acting on our request for review, last week invalidated claims from a patent Personal Audio LLC was using to assert that it invented podcasting. At stake was the right of bloggers, podcasters, and broadcasters to air content, including popular shows like "This American Life" and "Stuff You Should Know," online and operate their websites free of costly "settle or we’ll sue" threats from Personal Audio. The USPTO's decision works to stop the self-described "holding company" from using these patent claims to go after more companies, after previously targeting comedian and podcaster Adam Corolla, CBS, and others with patent lawsuits.
At the end of last year, patent trolls were filing more suits than ever before. At the same time, efforts to restore sanity to the patent system were in full swing. The House of Representatives had overwhelmingly passed the Innovation Act and it seemed legislative patent reform would arrive soon. That didn’t happen. Instead, the bill stalled in the Senate.
We’ve been closely watching the trial in the Eastern District of Texas between podcasting patent troll Personal Audio and CBS. Today we heard disappointing news: after five days of trial, a federal jury found Personal Audio’s podcasting patent valid and infringed by CBS. The jury awarded $1.3 million in damages (which is likely less than the amount CBS spent defending the case all the way to verdict).
The patent office has issued its first ruling in our challenge to Personal Audio’s so-called podcasting patent. The Patent Trial and Appeal Board (PTAB) found that we have established a “reasonable likelihood” that we will prevail, based on two key pieces of “prior art” evidence. This isn’t a final ruling, but it is an important step forward.
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