Comments on: Vonage: We Ain’t Got No Work-arounds

By: Jonney_dam

Jonney_dam — Sat, 28 Apr 2007 01:23:02 +0000

Hi, my name is Jonney, I am from Zaire.
Just like your resource .

By: Jonney_dam

Jonney_dam — Sat, 28 Apr 2007 00:23:02 +0000

Hi, my name is Jonney, I am from Zaire. Just like your resource .

By: dimitris

dimitris — Sat, 21 Apr 2007 20:12:43 +0000

I haven't followed the V vs V case closely enough, but does anyone know whether obvious prior art has been brought to the court's attention?

By: dimitris

dimitris — Sat, 21 Apr 2007 19:12:43 +0000

I haven't followed the V vs V case closely enough, but does anyone know whether obvious prior art has been brought to the court's attention?

By: Doug Lay

Doug Lay — Sat, 21 Apr 2007 13:45:27 +0000

Russell Shaw of zdnet did some work abstracting the patents down for us. Decide for yourself:

http://blogs.zdnet.com/ip-telephony/?p=1517

By: Doug Lay

Doug Lay — Sat, 21 Apr 2007 12:45:27 +0000

Russell Shaw of zdnet did some work abstracting the patents down for us. Decide for yourself:

http://blogs.zdnet.com/ip-telephony/?p=1517

By: Richard Bennett

Richard Bennett — Sat, 21 Apr 2007 11:09:07 +0000

Tim claims the Verizon patent covers “converting IP addresses to phone numbers.” While I haven’t read the patent in question, I doubt that it’s actually quite that broad, because of prior art and whatnot. It would be interesting to see what the case is really about, without the breathless hyperbole.

By: Richard Bennett

Richard Bennett — Sat, 21 Apr 2007 10:09:07 +0000

By: Luis Villa

Luis Villa — Sat, 21 Apr 2007 00:41:15 +0000

Of course, this doesn't address the point that granting a broad patent on the very concept of interfacing between two types of network - especially networks as broadly used as the phone network and the Internet - is anti-competitive, anti-capitalist, and anti-consumer.
Of course- this does not help the big picture; if anything, eBay (by taking away a pain point) makes real solutions less likely. But in the small picture, it seems worth noting that this is not necessarily the bad sign for Vonage so many people seem to think it is.

By: Luis Villa

Luis Villa — Fri, 20 Apr 2007 23:41:15 +0000

Of course, this doesn’t address the point that granting a broad patent on the very concept of interfacing between two types of network – especially networks as broadly used as the phone network and the Internet – is anti-competitive, anti-capitalist, and anti-consumer. Of course- this does not help the big picture; if anything, eBay (by taking away a pain point) makes real solutions less likely. But in the small picture, it seems worth noting that this is not necessarily the bad sign for Vonage so many people seem to think it is.

By: Doug Lay

Doug Lay — Fri, 20 Apr 2007 23:29:13 +0000

Luis:

I agree that it’s possible the CAFC may overturn the district court injunction and cite Ebay for justification. That’s certainly the outcome I hope for. Time is of the essence though – even a few more months of uncertaintly will be enouh to put Vonage out of business.

Of course, this doesn’t address the point that granting a broad patent on the very concept of interfacing between two types of network – especially networks as broadly used as the phone network and the Internet – is anti-competitive, anti-capitalist, and anti-consumer.

By: Doug Lay

Doug Lay — Fri, 20 Apr 2007 22:29:13 +0000

Luis:

I agree that it's possible the CAFC may overturn the district court injunction and cite Ebay for justification. That's certainly the outcome I hope for. Time is of the essence though - even a few more months of uncertaintly will be enouh to put Vonage out of business.

By: Luis Villa

Luis Villa — Fri, 20 Apr 2007 21:51:38 +0000

Note that per the court's recent decision in eBay, this may work in Vonage's favor in defeating the proposed injunction in this case. If the option is 'no injunction' or 'make Vonage implement a workaround', then the court is supposed to favor making Vonage implement the work around. If the option is 'no injunction' or 'completely screw Vonage's several million users', the court is supposed to at least take that into consideration when discussing the injunction (though it may not be decisive.)

By: rkillings

rkillings — Fri, 20 Apr 2007 21:21:37 +0000

>

This is what Stallman has been saying about software patents for years.

By: Luis Villa

Luis Villa — Fri, 20 Apr 2007 20:51:38 +0000

By: rkillings

rkillings — Fri, 20 Apr 2007 20:21:37 +0000

This is what Stallman has been saying about software patents for years.