Re: Not so dead, *dead*, DEAD!

On 11 Jan 2006 14:33:31 -0800, "David Kanter" <dkanter@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:

>> >My point was that a major graphics chipset company is using their PHY,
>> >which probably means that they do a good job. Obviously, both ATI and
>> >NVidia have good engineers, yet one of them decided to work with
>> >rambus...
>>
>> But there's no mention of either ATI or nVidia at that URL.
>
>Yup, that's right.

So why the URL? I've already indicated that their PHY is in use in some
PCI-e implementations.

>> >> If I'm the only guy selling something
>> >> I'd figure I have a right to charge whatever the market will bear; if the
>> >> market is short of something, like e.g. refined petroleum, you pay more.
>> >> Rambus' whinging on this issue is pathetic; one assumes they must
>> >> fab-outsource for prototype parts - let them do similarly for production...
>> >> or build a fab. They have been documented as behaving unethically in
>> >> business
>> >
>> >Hardly worse than anyone else in the DRAM business...
>>
>> Your keyhole.<shrug>
>>
>> >> - people would rather not have done business with them... that's
>> >> how it works. So Samsung copped a plea to end the angst... BFD... but
>> >> another enemy for Rambus... the only "friend" they had in the memory
>> >> business.
>> >
>> >> 50:4 is a poor ratio by any standards - at that level it reeks of a
>> >> plundering exercise gone wrong.
>> >
>> >As I said before, that's a LAWYER issue, not a technology/patenting
>> >issue.
>>
>> Rambus is the company which is heavy on lawyers.:-) It's technical in that
>> the claims have been brushed aside in the specific case of memory
>> applications, which they clearly targeted.
>
>And? Your point about 50:4 (or any number of non-infringement
>findings) is still just as irrelevant to whether the patents were
>fraudulent in the first place.

If you can't see how badly the eliminations reflect on Rambus' case here
and in general, that's your problem.

>> >> They should have been censured for wasting
>> >> the court's time with frivolous claims - in many cases a court would have
>> >> been correct in rejecting the whole 50, on principle.
>> >
>> >Uh?
>>
>> One assumes that the ~46 were not just rejected out of hand - somebody had
>> to waste time deciding. If it was me who had to read & consider them, I'd
>> be pissed.
>
>If you wouldn't be willing to read them with an open mind,

I didn't say that.

>> >> >You have provided no evidence that relates to 'bad patents', only
>> >> >patent violations, which as I have said is distinct from a misbegotten
>> >> >patent.
>> >>
>> >> Facts are facts. The courts are there to hopefully correct the
>> >> inadequacies/incomptence of the patent system. If a court will not stand
>> >> behind a claim the validity of the patent is certainly in doubt. D'oh, it
>> >> cannot be enforced.
>> >
>> >Invalid patent --> no violations, yet somehow you think this goes the
>> >other way? That makes no sense. How do you know the defendents didn't
>> >just show noninfringement? I don't seem to recall the courts finding
>> >the patents invalid...
>>
>> Look those claims were very specific to the memory industry - they just
>> don't have any other circuitry targeted. It's possible that they failed
>> due to conflicts with the defendant's patents but the fact is that the
>> court has decided to not enforce them. When a patent cannot be enforced in
>> the specific domain it addresses it's dead. No patent is a rubber stamp of
>> approval - only something which has to be defended in the courts.
>
>No, the court decided that whatever the defendent did was
>non-infringing. When a patent cannot be enforced, it loses value;
>however, that's fully orthogonal to a patent being declared invalid.
>Invalidity usually means it shouldn't have been granted in the first
>place, which is really quite different.

No, you're misreading this to put a Rambus angle on things - they made
violation claims so were clearly confident of infringement; their royalty
demands are based on all 50! There is nothing orthogonal at all - Rambus
has made 46 claims which are without merit in this case. A highly
technology/industry-specific patent which has failed the test in one case
has lost most of its weight in any future potential case which will be no
less specific. Do you really think another court is going to let them
represent all 50? I'd think Micron must be pleased.

>I have worked on a court case where one or more patents was declared
>invalid, due to illegal behavior on the part of the company making the
>patents. That opened said company up to some really really nasty
>litigation, and they paid for it. From what I have seen and read about
>Rambus, they were like children in a park compared to the case I worked
>on.

That's one for the book: Rambus like children in a park.<guffaw>

--
Rgds, George Macdonald
.

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