Billionaire Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen is one of the top twenty richest Americans, and life gets hard when you’re at the top. Those megayachts aren’t exactly easy on the gas pump, if you know what I mean. So what’s a poor billionaire to do, you say? Why not sue the biggest companies on the Internet by claiming patent infringement!?
Yes, Paul Allen – a man who once did some cool things with his Microsoft money – has become a lowly patent troll, claiming his company invented a number of web technologies. His claims are absurd, in my view, and strike me as being a money grab. Allen’s reputation has dived deeper than the submarines he keeps on his yacht.
See Engadget, Ars Technica, or the FOSS Patents site for the techie nitty gritty, or ABCNews for the non-geek version:
Interval Licensing LLC, a company owned by billionaire Microsoft Corp. co-founder Paul Allen, has filed an amended lawsuit against Facebook, Google Inc. and nine other companies, claiming they infringed on patented Web technology.
Interval Licensing, based in Seattle, owns the rights to information systems, computer science and communications technology developed in Silicon Valley by Interval Research, which Allen co-founded in the 1990s. Interval Research no longer exists.
The filing is a revision of the lawsuit Interval Licensing filed in August against Facebook, Google, Google’s video site YouTube, AOL Inc., Apple Inc., Yahoo Inc., Netflix Inc., eBay Inc., Office Depot, OfficeMax, and Staples.
via Paul Allen Refiles Suit Against Internet Giants – ABC News.