[asterisk-biz] Update: Actual Verizon Patent Numbers and ruling from Verizon v. Vonage

[Matthew Rubenstein]

On Fri, 2007-03-09 at 00:39 -0500, Peter Beckman wrote:
> On Thu, 8 Mar 2007, Kristian Kielhofner wrote:
> 
> > It seemed like no one could find the actual Verizon patents involved
> > in the Verizon v. Vonage case that has been making the news.  So I did
> > a little digging.  Let me tell you - the US Federal Government does
> > not make these things easy! :)
> 
>   Honestly, I really believe that Vonage is happy with this verdict.  This
>   means they get to go to the Federal Appelate Court, where there are
>   actually judges who know and understand patent law, and have clerks who do
>   too.  The next trial will be huge for Vonage because the patents will be closely
>   examined by judges and clerks with a deep knowledge of patent law and
>   prior art research.  I would bet that the patents that this court said
>   they violated will be invalidated, thus the judgment overturned.
> 
>   I'm confident that Vonage will prevail, though I haven't looked at the
>   patents myself.  The jury didn't look at whether or not Verizon's patents
>   were valid, they looked at if they infringed on the patents, and Vonage
>   probably did.  That was the right verdict.  Now the appeal will state that
>   the patents aren't valid, and that will be the basis of the appeal (I
>   think), and this is where Verizon's patents will be heavily scrutinized
>   for validity and prior art.

	I'll be curious when Verizon's patents are used to compete with AT&T.
Without seeing that natural use of these patents, I expect there's
collusion between them to clear out the new/small competition before
competing with each other. Which is a cartel conspiring against the
consumer, probably flying in the face of many of the tariffs and other
regulations that have allowed them their duopoly and local monopolies
since at latest the 1980s divestiture. So unless I'm mistaken and
Verizon has used these patents against AT&T, Vonage (or another)
probably has a case against these telcos to prevent monopoly of VoIP,
which it didn't have before this patent abuse victory.


	I know that I'll be happier when these patents no longer exclude VoIP
from competing with Verizon's patent monopoly hold on the telco duopoly.
But in the meantime I'm very unhappy, as someone in the industry and
just as a taxpayer. VoIP should be a bubble at least as big as the Web
by now, but all the FUD largely stemming from telco patents and other
anticompetitive actions suppresses the critical masses, especially in
the investment community. Meanwhile, we're paying for all this
counterproductive legal wrangling, at least in taxes operating the
courts and patent offices in which these cases spend years and decades
working *against* "progress in science and the useful arts".


> Beckman
> ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
> Peter Beckman                                                  Internet Guy
> beckman at purplecow.com                             http://www.purplecow.com/
> ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
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(C) Matthew Rubenstein