<story><title> A Brief Explanation of Microsoft&apos;s Anti-Google Patent FUD</title><url>http://www.groklaw.net/article.php?story=20110805154137803</url><text></text></story><parent_chain></parent_chain><comment><author>nextparadigms</author><text>&lt;i&gt;&quot;If Google doesn&apos;t have enough money to buy up patents, who does? Twice it has tried and been outbid, not by a single competitor but by a group of them joining together. In fact, that&apos;s where, to me, the real antitrust issue surfaces, that by joining together to squeeze Google out of two auctions, Google&apos;s competitors appear to have been plotting against it in ways that really must invite scrutiny, which, by all reports is now happening again.&quot;&lt;/i&gt;&lt;p&gt;I think this is the main point of this story and this whole issue, and that&apos;s what Google wanted to show us. If Google can&apos;t  even get patents to protect themselves, because all the others keep banding together and not letting them win any auction, then something is very wrong here.&lt;p&gt;You may say, yeah but then why doesn&apos;t Android have its own patents? Well, I don&apos;t think it would&apos;ve been possible for them to get that many patents in this short amount of time, and I don&apos;t think it would&apos;ve been possible for Apple either.&lt;p&gt;Look at Apple, they are winning with patents &lt;i&gt;not&lt;/i&gt; related to smartphones. If Apple wasn&apos;t this 30 year old computer company, their patent chest would&apos;ve probably been close to zero, and a lot of these companies would&apos;ve come after them, too.&lt;p&gt;Here&apos;s a look at the &lt;i&gt;mobile&lt;/i&gt; patents everyone has. You can see Google is not in top 10, but take a closer look - neither is Apple.&lt;p&gt;&lt;a href=&quot;http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/the-biggest-ip-war-chests-08042011-gfx.html&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/the-biggest-ip-war-ches...&lt;/a&gt;&lt;p&gt;So what would&apos;ve happened if Apple didn&apos;t have any of their computers patents from before, and they actually were a new smartphone company? They would&apos;ve probably gotten sued into oblivion as well, especially since they seem to make a lot of money from iPhones. Their handful of mobile patents would&apos;ve meant nothing in the face of the mobile patent war chest of Nokia, Samsung, Microsoft, HP(Palm patents) and Motorola.&lt;p&gt;You can&apos;t create something as complex as a smartphone and a smartphone OS today, without infringing a &lt;i&gt;ton&lt;/i&gt; of patents. So if a new mobile company can be crushed because others have more patents than them, then what does that say about the patent system? It says the patent system does nothing to  protect and encourage innovation, but it lets the big incumbent companies crush the new guys with their large patent war chests. It&apos;s bad enough when it&apos;s just one of them, it&apos;s much worse when they all join together against that company.&lt;p&gt;If you can&apos;t build anything complex, without being a 10+ year old company (in &lt;i&gt;that&lt;/i&gt; market) and not having thousands of patents - then something is very wrong with the patent system that was supposed to help start-ups and innovation. I think they all know this, but since they know they have the upper hand with current broken system, they will fight to &lt;i&gt;maintain&lt;/i&gt; the current system.</text></comment>
<story><title> A Brief Explanation of Microsoft&apos;s Anti-Google Patent FUD</title><url>http://www.groklaw.net/article.php?story=20110805154137803</url><text></text></story><parent_chain></parent_chain><comment><author>technoslut</author><text>This is a very odd article to say the least.&lt;p&gt;Why is it disturbing that Google is unable to buy these patents? These patents were sold to the highest bidder and the bidders were approved by the gov&apos;t.&lt;p&gt;How are MS, Apple &amp;#38; Oracle unpatriotic in bidding against Google for patents? Last time I checked Google, Apple &amp;#38; MS all have their cash in tax havens overseas. That, to me, sounds unpatriotic.&lt;p&gt;Why are these three companies specifically to blame for the bogus patents that are thrown out in court? This seems to put the blame squarely on the shoulders of the USPTO for even validating them. There are also the claims that were found valid in the courts. Are they bogus as well?&lt;p&gt;Has Apple or MS sued OHA members with these purchased patents? I realize the situation with Oracle is far more in the gray but it seems Apple has sued with patents they applied for and used in their products. Why should Google have the benefit of purchasing patents to leverage against Apple &amp;#38; Microsoft&apos;s own patents?</text></comment>