In article <7m40r5-tpd.ln1@xxxxxxxxxx>, Homer <usenet@xxxxxxxxxx>
wrote:
> >> So how come you can't point to a single instance of Microsoft
> >> attacking anyone with a software patent? (I mean a real,
> >> documented, instance. Not one based on your thoroughly discredited
> >> theory that Acacia works for Microsoft).
>
> Considering the ex-Microsoft senior management at Acacia, I'd say it's
> more than just "theory". The Acacia suit against the Vole was little
> more than a smokescreen.
>
There's ex-Microsoft senior management at Google, too. Do you think
Google works for Microsoft?
Roy based his entire "Acacia is a front end for Microsoft" theory on the
fact that one lawyer and one manager at Acacia once worked at Microsoft,
and Acacia has a lawsuit going against a couple open source companies.
Acacia has many lawyers and managers, who have worked at many other
companies before they ended up at Acacia. Looking at a few from their
corporate info page, I see one who was a research engineer at IBM, a
program manager at Intel, and an IP and corporate law attorney at one of
the most important law firms in the country before he went to Acacia. I
see another who was manager of software development at Cray Research,
then Director of Software Development at Sun, before going to Acacia.
Do you really think Microsoft is *actually* organized like the Borg,
with everyone plugged into a group mind, and every time someone goes
from Microsoft to another company, they are still connected to the hive,
and it's all part of the plan? (Roy thinks that, it seems).
The fact is people leave Microsoft for the same reason the leave Sun,
and Google, and IBM, and Red Hat, and Oracle, and all the rest. Most
likely that senior MS lawyer moved to Acacia for the simple reason that
the work was probably more interesting. Think for a moment what it must
be like for a lawyer at Microsoft. You're always dealing with people
attacking you--people suing you for patent violation, or threatening to
do so, regulators all over the place, and so on. And when you do get
sued, they are going to bring in outside counsel to handle all the fun
stuff--the best you can hope for is to be the MS lawyer supervising the
case, but all that means is that you provide high level input. It's the
people from the litigation firm that get to do the cool lawyer stuff.
Now think what he probably gets to do at Acacia. He's probably much
closer to litigation, and making more tactical decisions, instead of
just high level directional decisions.
Roy also ignores the fact that the lawsuit against a couple open source
companies was clearly in the works long before that particular manager
and that particular lawyer came to Acacia. Check the patent assignment
database at the patent office. Acacia acquired the patents in suit a
long before the suit.
It takes years from the time you acquire a patent to reach the point of
filing suit, so it is likely they've been working on it since close to
the time they acquired the patents.
--
--Tim Smith
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