US Xbox 360 Ban Recommended

[mankind]

Things seem to be going from bad to worse for Microsoft. At the start of the month the Xbox 360 was handed a distribution ban in Germany. That saw an appeal and is still tangled up in legal hearings. Now, a judge from the International Trade Commission has recommended an import ban on the machine entering the United States and a block on all sales of existing stock.
Microsoft’s argument against the ban – which is recommended due to a copyright infringement claim by Motorola – is that it would leave consumers with limited options. Judge David Shaw counters that argument with unintentional hilarity by saying that Sony and Nintendo can probably deal with any extra demand. It’s a little bit strange that Microsoft would insist that a potential copyright infringement would be okay, as long as it offers more consumer choice but it seems equally odd that access to other games consoles be used to defend the recommendation. Surely they either broke Motorola’s copyright or they didn’t?
Previous blocks on import and distribution of games consoles in the US and Europe have always been challenged, leading some to claim that bans were never in place. These legal challenges are very real though, and even if they rarely stop the sale of goods, they offer up significant hurdles for manufacturers to overcome. These patent wars only seem to be getting worse.
Judge Shaw’s recommendation will now be discussed by the commissioners on the ITC and if they agree it will be passed on to the president’s advisors for a final decision.
Source: MCV

http://www.thesixthaxis.com/2012/05/...n-recommended/

[Daggers21]

Maybe now my friends will shut up about that Ps3 Blackout last year....

[Cuguy]

Just another company out for a buck. They will settle, 360 sales will continue... this is a non-story.

[akhi216]

Microsoft currently has Motorola by the balls as Motorola has to pay Microsoft for every Android phone that they sell. Motorola is simply responding in kind as a professional courtesy.

Sent from my DROID BIONIC using Tapatalk 2

[AaronSOLDIER]

Didn't they win in Germany though?

[Cuguy]

Didn't they win in Germany though?

yeah Motorola won a temp injunction.

Motorola has to be pretty obtuse if they think MS will sit down and let the entire US market get halted. LOL

[Two4DaMoney]

Microsoft’s argument against the ban is that it would leave consumers with limited options. Judge David Shaw counters that argument with unintentional hilarity by saying that Sony and Nintendo can probably deal with any extra demand.

Very funny argument. Sony sales would sky rocket and the Wii U will take off also.

I want to see it happen. It might bump up the release of xbox720 and it would make for a funny e3. But I doubt any ban will happen.

[Soldier 95B]

yeah Motorola won a temp injunction.

Motorola has to be pretty obtuse if they think MS will sit down and let the entire US market get halted. LOL

I suppose MS could just buy Motorola

[Cuguy]

Thing is, another company tried the same thing with Office not too long ago, saying MS violated some obscure patent about the xml language used to integrate MS Word into Office and connect all of the Office programs together.

They wanted an immediate ban on sales of all versions of Office.

Same song, different subject here. Court battles may be won, but this is for sure never going to see fruition.

[akhi216]

Thing is, another company tried the same thing with Office not too long ago, saying MS violated some obscure patent about the xml language used to integrate MS Word into Office and connect all of the Office programs together.

They wanted an immediate ban on sales of all versions of Office.

Same song, different subject here. Court battles may be won, but this is for sure never going to see fruition.

You have no idea. Motorola has over 17,000 granted patents and over 7,500 that are pending. Microsoft started this bullshit with them and they will pay just like Apple did.

Sent from my DROID BIONIC using Tapatalk 2

[TRF]

Microsoft currently has Motorola by the balls as Motorola has to pay Microsoft for every Android phone that they sell. Motorola is simply responding in kind as a professional courtesy.

Sent from my DROID BIONIC using Tapatalk 2

What does Microsoft have to do with Android? Microsoft has its own mobile OS, and Google does Android.


Tapatalking from my bed. Ya mutha says hi.

[Soldier 95B]

What does Microsoft have to do with Android?.

http://androidcommunity.com/barnes-n...tail-20111114/

Here’s all the patents Microsoft is using, and Barnes & Noble’s rebuttal:

I. ’372 Patent (Web Browser Background Image Loading)

The ’372 patent was filed April 18, 1996. Very generally, the patent relates to an outmoded system for retrieving an electronic document like a webpage that includes an embedded background image, which may have a bearing on very old web browsers connected to the Internet via slow, dial-up connections, but has little application in the context of improved, modern Internet connections….

II. ’522 Patent (Operating System Provided Tabs)

The ’522 patents was filed December 13, 1994. The patent relates to a single, simple tool provided by an operating system (such as Windows) that allows applications running on that operating system to have a common look and feel. Since operating systems provide many such tools, the patent amounts to nothing more than a trivial design choice. In particular, and despite the fact that this concept is in the prior art, the ’522 patent’s method allows for the creation of tabs. The tabs are analogous to dividers like those found in a notebook or to labels found in a file cabinet, and allow the user of an application to navigate between multiple pages of information in the same window by clicking on the tabs….

III. ’551 Patent (Electronic Selection with “Handles”)

On its face, the ’551 patent purports to claim priority back to a November 10, 2000 filing date. Generally, the ’551 patent relates to another simple and trivial feature that is not only disclosed by numerous prior art references, but is certainly not central to an operating system like Android — selecting or highlighting text or graphics within an electronic document. The patent provides that a user selects a word or phrase, for example, by tapping on a touch screen display or clicking with a mouse. Such a selection may be shown by highlighting the selected word or phrase. The user is presented with “selection handles” on one or both ends of the selected areas. These “selection handles” can be moved by the user to highlight more or less text or graphics….

IV. ’233 Patent (Annotation of Electronic Documents)

The ’233 patent was filed December 7, 1999. Like the other Microsoft patents, the ’233 patent relates only to one small feature that has long been present in the prior art and is not central to Android or any other operating system. More specifically, the patent generally relates to a method for capturing annotations made in an electronic document (like an electronic book), without changing the electronic document itself….

V. ’780 Patent (Web Browser Loading Status Icons)

The ’780 patent was not filed until May 6, 1997, long after the first web browser came to market. In addition to being late to the game, the patent is directed to a very simple and obvious feature — a temporary graphic element or status icon that is displayed to indicate that a hypermedia browser (such as a web browser) is loading content. When a browser is intended for use with a portable computer system with a limited display size, the ’780 patent notes that it is desirable to maximize the browser’s content display area (the portion of the browser that actually displays a website, not the menus, toolbars, or buttons). Thus, the patent makes a trivial design choice and provides that the graphic element or loading status icon is to be temporarily displayed in the content display area of the browser as opposed to a separate space such as the browser’s menu bar, tool bar, or a separate status bar….

and was settled:

http://www.fosspatents.com/2012/04/m...le-settle.html

Is one of many examples.

[Cuguy]

You have no idea. Motorola has over 17,000 granted patents and over 7,500 that are pending. Microsoft started this bullshit with them and they will pay just like Apple did.

Sent from my DROID BIONIC using Tapatalk 2

And you see how much it hurt apple. hence why i call this non-news.

[Sub-stance1]

This probably won't end well...........for Motorola.

[Mo-green28]

Very funny argument. Sony sales would sky rocket and the Wii U will take off also.

I want to see it happen. It might bump up the release of xbox720 and it would make for a funny e3. But I doubt any ban will happen.

That would make very interesting E3 lol... and @ your avatar pic d a m n lol

[The Sith]

Very funny argument. Sony sales would sky rocket and the Wii U will take off also.

I want to see it happen. It might bump up the release of xbox720 and it would make for a funny e3. But I doubt any ban will happen.

This may force MS to release there next console early if that was to happen.

There's nothing to see here folks it will get settle out of court and it will be business as usual for MS.

[Ghost-Rhayne]

Will be a BIG ASS settlement...

[Cuguy]

Will be a BIG ASS settlement...

Not big enough to really be a concern. the MS Office lawsuit was settled for 290 million.. sales of Minecraft would have payed that off.

This one will likely be bigger, but even still, MS won't be overly stung. If this was going to be some monumental case, or one potentially so large in settlement that it would be highly damaging, this would be in national news, not internet news only.

[gangsta_795]

No way this is going to happen.

[Soldier 95B]

If it happens, it will be a drop in a bucket for MS. They are a monopolistic 800 pound gorilla. They don't care about a settlement amount!

[AaronSOLDIER]

No way this is going to happen.

Same was said about the case in Germany...

Its very unlikely but its not impossible, if anything it'll just be a slight halt in production.

[R3D D3V!L]

I hope this happens, if only to prove to big corporations that they can't get away with copyright infringement.

[Cuguy]

There's no lesson here. Apple, Samsung, nearly every company has been involved in a copyright case.

They will settle and move on, no detriment, no problem, just move on like most all other companies do.

Here's the rest of the story being reported from IGN:

The recommendation alone doesn't ban the import of the two console models – a panel of six judges on the ITC board will review Shaw's recommendation and decide whether it should be made into law. Florian Mueller of patent site Foss Patents told GamesIndustry International that it's unlikely Shaw's recommendation will make it past its current point. "Unlike judges at courts, ITC judges don't make the decisions: they merely recommend them. Their recommendations are very frequently not adopted by the Commission, the six-member decision-making body at the top of the ITC," he said.

Moreover, Mueller pointed out that he's "never seen an ITC judge make any other recommendation than an exclusion order [the import ban in question] if his initial determination is that there is a violation." And given Shaw's initial determination earlier this year that Microsoft was in violation of Motorola's patents, today's news is actually "normal course of business," said Mueller.

[Soldier 95B]

So in other words, nothing to see here, lol.

[Sub-stance1]

So in other words, nothing to see here, lol.

Guess we will have to see how it all goes. The funny thing about this is that people who claim not to care about sales seems to have a change of heart....lol