This is an older news item - from August 2 - but hasn't been widely reported. The Federal Trade Commission has finally
issued a ruling in the Rambus case. Rambus you may recall is a notorious patent troll - famous for never actually building a memory chip, but for collecting royalties. In the ultimate submarine patent manuever, they not only patented an obvious idea and kept it secret, but then joined a standard making body, and without revealing they held a patent on the idea encouraged the body to agree on a standard that infringed their patent. This was a little too much apparently
In June 2002, the FTC charged Rambus with violating federal antitrust laws by deliberately engaging in a pattern of anticompetitive acts to deceive an industry-wide standard-setting organization, which caused or threatened to cause substantial harm to competition and consumers. The Commission complaint alleged that Rambus participated in the Joint Electron Device Engineering Council (JEDEC), a standard-setting organization that "maintained a commitment to avoid, where possible, the incorporation of patented technologies into its
published standards, or at a minimum to ensure that such technologies, if incorporated, will be available to be licensed on royalty-free or otherwise reasonable and non-discriminatory terms." According to the FTC complaint, Rambus nonetheless participated in JEDEC's DRAM standard-setting activities for more than four years without disclosing to JEDEC or its members that it was actively working to develop, and possessed, a patent and several pending patent applications that involved specific technologies ultimately adopted in the standards.
The FTC has now ruled unanimously on the matter
In an opinion by Commissioner Pamela Jones Harbour, the Commission found that, through a course of deceptive conduct, Rambus was able to distort a critical standard-setting process and engage in an anticompetitive "hold up" of the computer memory industry. The Commission held that Rambus's acts of deception constituted exclusionary conduct under Section 2 of the Sherman Act and contributed significantly to Rambus's acquisition of monopoly power in the four relevant markets. The Commission has ordered additional briefings to determine the appropriate remedy for "the substantial competitive harm that Rambus's course of deceptive conduct has inflicted."
Chalk one up for the good guys.
As Michele indicates in the previous post, we are looking for compelling examples (about three) that we can use in a book introduction to draw in the average reader - convince them that IP is a problem they should be concerned with. In the comments on Michele's post, Michael suggests that it would be helpful if we discuss some candidates. Here goes:
AIDS drugs in Africa
the invention of television (Sarnoff stole it from Farnsworth)
Diebold using the DMCA to cover up the fact their voting machines don't work
the Canadian (?) farmer sued because genetically modified crops got on his property
mp3.com put out of business by RIAA lawsuit
replay TV sued out of existence
destruction of the Italian pharmaceutical industry when patents are introduced
story of the movie Tarnation - cost 0 to make, $400K for music rights
near shutdown of Blackberry network
Quattro pro "look and feel" lawsuit - Lotus versus Borland
why DAT never caught on (due to legally mandated DRM)
why HD DVD probably will never catch on - delayed until obsolete by DRM disputes
the Sony Betamax case
RAMBUS's use of a submarine patent to blackmail the memory chip industry
theft of the telephone by Alexander Graham Bell
obstruction of the industrial revolution by James Watt
movement of the chemical industry from England/France/US to Germany/Switzerland due to strong UK type patent system - story of red dye, story of delivery of chemicals to US by U-boat during WWI
