The Jaded Tech

RICHMOND, Va., July 9 /PRNewswire/ — NTP Incorporated, the company founded by Tom Campana, the inventor of wireless email, yesterday filed lawsuits against Apple, Inc., Google Inc., HTC Corp., LG Electronics Inc., Microsoft Corporation, and Motorola, Inc. in the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia for infringing NTP’s eight patents related to the delivery of electronic mail over wireless communications systems.

(Read full article here)

Did you see that ‘laundry list’ of companies?  Geezus, these guys have got big balls!  It’s such a pathetic bunch of systems (both the legal and patent) that allows a company to simply buy any patent they want then turn into a business of suing other companies.  Hell, vultures get more respect.

These guys(NTP) pray on companies and their PR departments as well as litigation bank accounts.  can anyone tell me how they HELP a bad economy?

6 years ago in 2006 NTP sued RIM(Blackberry) for the same patents, and the case continued for next 5 years when at the end in 2009 RIM and NTP had a $612 million settlement.

Here is the legal definition of settlement:

The act of adjusting or determining the dealings or disputes between persons without pursuing the matter through a trial. (source)

That means noone was found guilty or innocent.  From the same sound “Settlement is a popular option for several reasons, but a large number of cases are settled simply because defendants want to avoid the high cost of litigation“.  Hey, would you pay $50 million to get $612 from RIM?  Them’s good odds and significantly better than any lottery out there!

Let’s look at another definition:

A pyramid scheme is a business model that involves the exchange of money primarily for enrolling other people into the scheme, usually without any product or service being delivered. (source)

Hmm….no product….kind of like buying ‘intellectual property’ but NTP doesn’t actually sell you (or anyone else for that matter) anything.