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A small videoconferencing company is laying claim to the ubiquitous JPEG format, igniting a backlash from some consumers and from a standards organization. Austin, Texas-based Forgent Networks posted a press release to its site earlier this month claiming to own a patent covering the technology behind JPEG, one of the most popular formats for compressing and sharing images on the Internet. According to the firm, the devices covered by the patent include cameras, cell phones, camcorders, personal digital assistants, scanners and other devices. It took a little more than a week for the statement to find its way to the...

By Andrew Orlowski in London Posted: 07/18/2002 at 11:35 EST A video conferencing company based in Austin, Texas says it's going to pursue royalties on the transmission of JPEG images. And it's already found a licensee: Sony Corporation. Formerly known as VTEL, Forgent Networks acquired Compression Labs in 1997, acquiring this patent into the bargain. The patent claim was filed in 1986 but Compression Labs never pursued royalties. Forgent last week declared that it has "the sole and exclusive right to use and license all the claims" under the patent and is seeking a deal wherever JPEGs are transmitted, with...

By Andrew Orlowski in LondonPosted: 07/10/2002 at 08:27 EST In January we revealed that Microsoft had acquired a chunk of SGI's graphics portfolio. At the time we mused if the Beast had a plan to scupper OpenGL. This was taking paranoia too far, wise heads told us. But in the minutes of the OpenGL developer meeting, it's clear that Microsoft has staked an IP claim on portions of the OpenGL spec, and it's willing to license it's patents on RAND terms. "Microsoft believes they have patent rights relating to the ARB_vertex_program extension. They did not contribute to the extension, but...

Intel faces coughing up to Intergraph again On-going Itanic courtcase could cost Intel $250mil By Paul Hales: Thursday 04 July 2002, 09:43 CHIPMAKER INTERGRAPH must be miffed with Intel -- or grateful. Chipzilla paid Intergraph $300 million earlier this year after the five years of legal wranglings in a courtcase that charged that Intel had infringed Intergraph's patents in the design of the Pentium processor. Now, a district court judge in Texas is to decide whether Intel has again infringed Intergraph's patents again, this time on the Itanium processor. And, Intergraph says Intel has already agreed to pay Intergraph $150...

For education and discussion only. Not for commercial use. PHILADELPHIA -- An American company can resume producing those grimacing, spiky haired troll dolls because a federal appeals court has decided that the company may have the copyright privileges to produce the dolls. The trans-Atlantic copyright dispute has spanned decades, with Dam Things from Denmark and Russ Berrie & Co. squabbling over who owns the right to make the lovable little figures. The 3rd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals lifted an injunction on Russ Berrie, which was ordered by U.S. District Judge Nicholas H. Politan to stop making all troll dolls...

<p>Biotech stocks broke an important psychological barrier last week when a leading index closed below 400 points for the first time since the sector took off in 2000.</p> <p>The American Stock Exchange biotech index, a basket of 17 leading stocks, closed at 383.34 Friday. The index first passed 400 in January 2000, when biotech stocks soared on excitement over the imminent completion of the Human Genome Project.</p>

A company has a patent that essentially derives a fingerprint (hash, certificate, digital signature) from files on a client computer. It then sends the fingerprint to a server to see if they already possess the file. If they do, they just indicate in a database that this computer client has this particular file, and sets a pointer to it. If not the file is then backed up over the LAN/Internet (really the same thing). My question is, is this patentable? And if it is, does this mean the whole process is patented, or are all of its parts also patented....

The patent office has been criticized for allowing a ticket of patents to grow in recent years. In today's economy, driven as much by ideas as by actual products, patents are more critical than ever. Just ask iSurfTV, a four-year-old electronic-programming provider that still hasn't signed any cable companies as customers, because those companies fear Gemstar-TV Guide (which holds nearly 200 patents on its television guides) will sue them. The startup expects several of its 80 filed patents to be approved this year, but it has already eaten more than $13 million in venture funding.Startups hoping to capitalize on their...