Patent trolls have been a thorn in the side of the tech industry for as long as we can remember, claiming ownership over general ideas like Wi-Fi or podcasts and then suing anyone who uses that technology. Now one developer is fighting back after he was sued for putting his flight simulator app on Google Play.
Austin Meyer is the developer behind X-Plane. A few years ago, he uploaded the app to the Google Play Store and was very unexpectedly hit with a lawsuit from Uniloc in 2012. The firm claims it patented the idea behind the app market. That’s right, Uniloc isn’t going after the Meyer for making a flight simulator; it’s going after any company that uses Google Play. It’s already targeted a bunch of other popular apps, including Minecraft.
So Meyer did a bit of digging and discovered a few pretty shocking details. We already knew that the vast majority of patent lawsuits happen in Eastern Texas, even if the specific case has no relation to that region. Now we may know why.
It turns out the judge in that district may have a direct relationship with the prosecuting lawyer in many of these cases. The judge, Leonard Davis, is apparently known for almost never throwing out patent lawsuits. Meyer claims that his son, Bo Davis, is the lawyer representing many of these patent trolls.
It’s worth noting that Judge Leonard Davis announced last year he’s leaving the bench to join a private law firm focused on patent litigation, according to The Wall Street Journal. We assume that means he isn’t currently presiding over the X-Plane case, though Meyer doesn’t mention this in his video.
Meyer says on his site the lawsuit is still ongoing, causing plenty of stress and a huge financial burden for him and his wife. It’s possible this video, which was uploaded over the weekend, could help draw some attention to the case and help finally put an end to the ordeal.
Citigroup Sues AT&T For Saying 'Thanks' To Customers
Whenver we discuss a particularly egregious case of trademark abuse, usually centered around the trademarking of some insanely common word or phrase, there's always at least one instance of "that joke" in the comments. You know the joke I'm talking about: well, I'll just trademark X and sue everyone, where X=super-common word or phrase. For example: "I'll just trademark "trademark" and sue anyone who uses a trademark!", or, "I'll just trademark "the" and sue everyone who uses it!" These jokes play on the common problem of generic terms being granted trademarks, but of course they are examples so ridiculous that it couldn't happen for those specific words and terms. Still, to our lovely commenters, we say, "Thank you."
Or not, because it appears Citigroup has a trademark on "THANKYOU" and is currently using it to sue AT&T for using "Thanks".
I hope this bullshit will help bring capitalism down one day
Sharks eating sharks can't be good for sharks, right?
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