Here's my understanding/oversimplification of the history of of this lawsuit.
The basis was laid in the Nokia-Apple lawsuit over FRAND patents. During negotiations for the license of Nokia's FRAND patents, Nokia asked for a cross-license to Apple's UI patents instead of money. Apple said no, negotiations fell apart and the matter went to court.
In court, both parties lost. Nokia didn't get the cross-license they wanted. Instead, they got a ridiculous amount of money out of Apple.
Precedent has now been set that FRAND patents can be worth a ridiculous amount of money. Motorola/Google now also want a ridiculous amount of money for their FRAND patents.
My assumption is that what Google really wants is a cross-license, that their demand for ridiculous amounts of money is only a negotiating position. The alternative thesis, that Google has gone over to the dark side, is looking increasingly plausible though.
I don't think that's anywhere near a correct summary. First of all, AFAIK Apple and Nokia settled out of court. So there was no legal precedent.
Second, it was already well-established that FRAND patents could be worth silly amounts of money, not just a cross-licensing poker chip. For example Qualcomm and Nokia had an extended series of lawsuits over 15 years, including exactly the kinds of antics that are going on now (e.g. complaints to authorities about misuse of FRAND patents). The final lawsuit was settled such that Nokia licensed Qualcomms patents for $billions (much more than Apple paid Nokia), while Qualcomm didn't license Nokia's patents (giving Nokia the option of going after Qualcomm's customers).
Third, the amounts that Google is demanding aren't actually ridiculous by the standards of the industry. And sure, what Google is really after is likely a cross-licensing deal, given Apple's and Microsoft's patent extortion rates.
Thanks for the corrections. In other words, I think I got the gist right, but so many details wrong that calling my synopsis "wrong" would be accurate. Unfortunately, it appears that your reply isn't quite stand-alone. If it was I'd just delete my post and let your very informative one be the only one people had to read.
I'm not sure why you'd imagine Google ever wasn't on the "dark side". They're a company. They exist to make a profit. Anything else is just PR and attempts at image manipulation.
I don't believe all companies are inherently evil. I was making assumptions about what was meant by "the dark side" based on what people usually want to believe about google.
Comments
Here's my understanding/oversimplification of the history of of this lawsuit.
The basis was laid in the Nokia-Apple lawsuit over FRAND patents. During negotiations for the license of Nokia's FRAND patents, Nokia asked for a cross-license to Apple's UI patents instead of money. Apple said no, negotiations fell apart and the matter went to court.
In court, both parties lost. Nokia didn't get the cross-license they wanted. Instead, they got a ridiculous amount of money out of Apple.
Precedent has now been set that FRAND patents can be worth a ridiculous amount of money. Motorola/Google now also want a ridiculous amount of money for their FRAND patents.
My assumption is that what Google really wants is a cross-license, that their demand for ridiculous amounts of money is only a negotiating position. The alternative thesis, that Google has gone over to the dark side, is looking increasingly plausible though.
I don't think that's anywhere near a correct summary. First of all, AFAIK Apple and Nokia settled out of court. So there was no legal precedent.
Second, it was already well-established that FRAND patents could be worth silly amounts of money, not just a cross-licensing poker chip. For example Qualcomm and Nokia had an extended series of lawsuits over 15 years, including exactly the kinds of antics that are going on now (e.g. complaints to authorities about misuse of FRAND patents). The final lawsuit was settled such that Nokia licensed Qualcomms patents for $billions (much more than Apple paid Nokia), while Qualcomm didn't license Nokia's patents (giving Nokia the option of going after Qualcomm's customers).
Third, the amounts that Google is demanding aren't actually ridiculous by the standards of the industry. And sure, what Google is really after is likely a cross-licensing deal, given Apple's and Microsoft's patent extortion rates.
Thanks for the corrections. In other words, I think I got the gist right, but so many details wrong that calling my synopsis "wrong" would be accurate. Unfortunately, it appears that your reply isn't quite stand-alone. If it was I'd just delete my post and let your very informative one be the only one people had to read.
I'm not sure why you'd imagine Google ever wasn't on the "dark side". They're a company. They exist to make a profit. Anything else is just PR and attempts at image manipulation.
The world is more complicated than "all corporations are inherently evil."
I don't believe all companies are inherently evil. I was making assumptions about what was meant by "the dark side" based on what people usually want to believe about google.