Court Orders Third Mediation Talk Between Google And Oracle

Judge William Alsup, the federal judge presiding over Oracle vs Google case ordered case statements from both parties with three deadlines. FOSS Patents think that while still hoping for a settlement between the parties, (Court is bringing two parties together on October 1st for the third settlement talks), judge has not given up on October trail date. You can find much more detail about the statement and the case at FOSS Patents, follow the link at the end of the post.

First order is asking Oracle for;

"By NOON ON SEPTEMBER 29, 2011, counsel for Oracle America, Inc. shall submit a case management statement listing each patent claim it will actually assert at trial and shall explain why the total number of such claims is consistent with prior representations made to the Court. In stating the claims to be tried, counsel must remember that any claim not asserted will be deemed foregone as to all accused matters."

The second is towards Google;

"By NOON ON OCTOBER 3, 2011, counsel for Google Inc. shall state separately as to each such claim the full extent to which counsel concede any such alleged infringement but for any issues of invalidity and shall specify, claim by claim, any and all invalidity defenses to be asserted at trial."

And the third is regarding the reexamination of Oracle patents and stay of the case.

"By NOON ON OCTOBER 4, 2011, both sides shall update the Court on the status of each re-examination pending for each such claim and shall explain why the case should not be stayed in whole or in part until the re-examinations are completed. Counsel are expected to honor their full duty of candor as officers of the court."

With all the judges work towards a settlement, which seem not to be working, case looks like ready for trial. If it will be stayed or not will be the next juicy bit of information.
You can find FOSS Patents post on the issue here. All the court statements above came here via FP as well.

Cablevision Did Not Violate Verizon's Set-Top Box Patents

ITC, the U.S. International Trade Commission has terminated the review of Verizon Communications Inc. (NYSE: VZ)'s complaint against the set-top models used by Cablevision Systems Corp. (NYSE: CVC).

Earlier an ITC judge ruled that Cablevision had violated U.S. Patent No. 6,381,748, which describes an "Apparatus and methods for network access using a set-top box and television," from among five Patents Verizon sighted.

The ITC, informed via a notice (PDF) issued Wednesday, about termination of the review and also found Cablevision not to be in violation. The ITC cited the results of another case involving the patent in question. A judge in that case, argued in a Virginia court between Verizon and ActiveVideo Networks Inc. (one of Cablevision's video technology vendors), invalidated two Verizon patents, including the '748 patent.

It is possible that Verizon appeal the ITC's decision.

Via Lightreading

REDHAT Is Fooling FOSS And Feeding Patent Trolls!

I am very happy that just a few weeks ago, I made a decision not to buy Readhat product and instead went with CentOS and private local support for a project requiring Linux servers.
The answer to why? is in the lengthy post by Florian Mueller revealing what Redhat is doing behind the closed doors.
Through  examining a series of a lawsuits, negotiations with patent trolls, litigations, Florian shows how  Redhat managed to fool FOSS community and feed the Patent troll at the same time. In this particular case, Redhat has paid 4.2 Million to the patent holders.

Red Hat coughed up $4.2 million in June 2008 to settle a patent infringement suit that had been brought by FireStar Software.

The content is too vast to summarize here but what matters is that
While patent license agreements are just a routine deal for traditional IT companies, the significance of this finding lies in how it reflects on Red Hat's credibility:

• In political and regulatory contexts, the market-leading Linux distributor insists on the false claim that open source licenses (especially the GPL) are absolutely incompatible with the payment of patent royalties (while this simply depends on the specific terms and conditions of a deal).
• The GPL also serves as Red Hat's pretext for refusing to offer its customers implementations of patent-encumbered standards such as the popular AVC/H.264 video codec.
• Another important credibility issue is that the world's largest open source company actually fails to be open about its patent-related dealings and positions, a fact that others have criticized before. It hides behind self-imposed confidentiality obligations and employs legalese terminology that in the eyes of many laypeople will appear far more favorable to Red Hat than a straightforward representation of the facts would.

If you are involved in FOSS, it is very important to learn these facts so I urge you to visit the source and read the article in it's entririty.
Thanks Florian.
Red Hat feeds the patent trolls and fools the FOSS community