Free Republic

NEW YORK, Aug 23 (Reuters) - A U.S. federal judge on Thursday rejected a claim by Britain's BT Group to have invented the basic means for navigating the Internet, in a case considered a test of who owns the basic Internet technology. BT Group, the former U.K. telecommunications monopoly known as British Telecom, had sued Prodigy Communications, a pioneering U.S. Internet service provider, demanding that Prodigy pay BT royalties for using hyperlink technology. In a decision issued late on Thursday, Judge Colleen McMahon of the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York denied BT Group's claim...

CORRECTED: NY Judge Narrows Terms in BT Internet Patent Case Fri Mar 15,10:43 AM ET By Eric Auchard NEW YORK (Reuters) - An initial ruling by a U.S. judge has narrowed what British Telecom can say to prove its claim to have invented hyperlinking, in a high-profile case that could give BT rights to demand royalties on Internet use. U.S. Federal Court for the Southern District of New York Judge Colleen McMahon issued an opinion from her White Plains, N.Y. court late on Wednesday that only partially accepted the wording of BT arguments that its 1970s patent should cover modern...