Paltalk sues Microsoft on patents for tens of millions

Those Redmond Rough Riders have been busy as of late, what with the launch of the Zune and all today. But while Allard and his gang are celebrating the launch of his latest brainchild, his old baby, Xbox Live, is getting sued for patent infringement in the wilds of East Texas. Paltalk, a video chat and community site, sued Microsoft on September 12th for infringing its 1998 patent on "Server-group messaging system for interactive applications" -- but really, doesn't that sound like every other program that talks to a server? The video chat company claims that Microsoft's Xbox Live gaming system stole the idea of in-game chats from Paltalk and wants "tens of millions of dollars" in damages. Now, again, when it comes to cases like this, we invoke the "WANL" (we are not lawyers) clause and postulate that the reason Paltalk isn't targeting a different company (such as Blizzard) is because Microsoft has a market cap of over a quarter trillion dollars, and Paltalk wants some of that pie. We remind the court of public opinion that Blizzard's mid-1990s titles like "Warcraft II" and "Starcraft" came out well before the Xbox and had game-based chat -- we know because a few of us spent many a'night typing things like: "4v4 No n00bs."

[Via Ars Technica]

[netdroid9 @ Sep 15th 2006 7:21AM]

...Wow. When was this patent made? Can you say 'prior art'? Should've just kept it to yourself, Paltalk.

[Professional Development Engineer @ Sep 15th 2006 8:13AM]

Software patents are plain crap. Funny that M$ as the biggest proponent of SW patents are regularly targeted by patent trolls.

[Michael @ Sep 15th 2006 9:08AM]

4v4 no noobs, I was ranked in the top 100 at one point with Starcraft. I am in, either Protoss or Zergs for me, and heck, I currently have it installed on my computer, anyone up for a quick game? Thanks for the memories, now off to kill some Zergs...

[Gadget Kings @ Sep 15th 2006 9:15AM]

This only shows how desperate paltalk is after dicovering their system is crap and are out of money....

Softwre patents make this possible... Software patents are killing development.... Paytalk stinks...

[Pete L @ Sep 15th 2006 9:49AM]

Come on editors! At least understand what you are trying to debunk. Though this patent is very "obvious" and though I strongly suspect there is prior art here, your complaints show that you either never read the patent or have no understanding of the technology involved. For instance, when they refer to "messaging", it is quite clear that they're not talking about text or voice communications, but about the control messages themselves (e.g., move player1 3 units to the right). Furthermore, the critical claims of this patent pertain to the specific implementation of how to implement the large scale multiple player online games with which you're so familiar, namely, by aggregating all control messages in a game/session from all players (hosts) in fixed time interval into 1 message (to reduce latency and bandwidth demands). In addition it seems, based on my brief scan, that they're referring to a master server configuration -- whereby one server may host several games simultaneously...

In any event, this patent was filed in Feb 96. Starcraft wasn't released until 99 and Warcraft II didn't have true internet multiplayer as I recall until the battle.net version was released in 99. Quake 1 is about as close as I can recall to this patent, off the top of my head, but even Quake didn't host multiple games in one server instance....and I'm not absolutely positive it was aggregating messages (though that is highly probable).

[kerunt @ Sep 15th 2006 10:23AM]

"4v4 No n00bs"

Ah, the good ole days...

[FSK405K @ Sep 15th 2006 10:49AM]

There's no way that in-game chat was available before 1998. This must be legitimate.

What game that featured some great new in-game chat did Paltalk DEVELOP anyway?

[FSK405K @ Sep 15th 2006 11:30AM]

"Pete L" has you guys nailed...the patents have nothing to do with "idea of in-game chats" so much as the computers simply communication to one another, in general.

[Pete L @ Sep 15th 2006 12:14PM]

FSK,

Quake 1 did "chat" in 96, if by that you mean the basic ability to send text messages to other players in the game. However, the display just overlayed the message on the screen for a second or two and, if memory serves, it would disappear from screen after someone else typed another line... though it may have been visible from console. Duke3D and I'm sure other games as well had in-game chat earlier than that even, though I'm pretty sure Quake was the first game to really support internet game-play directly with server support (not just peer to peer or 1 v 1 games)...at least it was the first to nail it on the head and make it a commercial success to my knowledge. I could be wrong about that though :-)

[Kaze @ Sep 15th 2006 12:33PM]

Don't the patents go into public domain in two years anyway?

[tristanfey @ Sep 15th 2006 1:22PM]

"Don't the patents go into public domain in two years anyway? by Kaze"

The following is from the US Patent Office website"

"The term of the patent shall be generally 20 years from the date on which the application for the patent was filed in the United States or, if the application contains a specific reference to an earlier filed application under 35 U.S.C. 120, 121 or 365(c), from the date of the earliest such application was filed, and subject to the payment of maintenance fees as provided by law."

[Jason @ Sep 15th 2006 1:51PM]

Isn't every "idea" stolen from something else? Maybe MS stole the idea, but if they took the time and effort to create every line of code themselve and not just copy peltalk's software and config it for xbox isn't that ok?

Look at the automobile, yes, someone (or several someones) had an idea for a horseless carriage and built them. Someone else saw it and thought they could build a better one and did, I bet they didn't have to pay royalties, except to certain patentable pieces, e.g. the combustable engine (or they created their own), not the car as a whole.

Oh, and by they way... my great^5000 grandfather invented the wheel, can I get some retro-royalties?

[Pete L @ Sep 15th 2006 3:46PM]

Jason,

"Isn't every 'idea' stolen from something else?"

No, not exactly. It is true that many ideas are built upon the knowledge gained from other ideas (e.g., seeing the approach someone else takes to the same problem and changing your tactics accordingly). It is also true that many ideas are also highly derivate copies of other ideas, merely adding a doo hickey and reselling it, but for (strong) patent protected ideas these are generally required to occur some 20 years after original patent was filed. This is a critical part of our highly innovative economy. If anyone is able to merely copy a difficult to create innovation, even if they merely reimplement it, they can remove the incentive for future innovators to do anything truely hard and innovative.

Think of it this way. If it costs me 20 million dollars to invent and develop, say, Gizmo_A and 5 years to successfully find and develop a market for that idea, it would disasterous for me if any number of people could simply come in overnight and spend a couple thousand dollars copying my hardwork. Not only would my potential market be divided into fractions of what it would otherwise be, but I could potentially be at a disadvantage because my competitors wouldn't have the millions in dollars of overhead to support the creation of the idea. I would have to build into my product price the costs and risks for actually developing the idea; my competitors wouldn't have to.

"Maybe MS stole the idea, but if they took the time and effort to create every line of code themselve and not just copy peltalk's software and config it for xbox isn't that ok?"
In terms of patent law, the answer is probably no, assuming this patent is valid and enforcable and assuming that Microsoft violated the patent (based on the claims made within). Re-writing the idea from scratch would keep microsoft free and clear of violating the other company's copyright, but not their patents.

"Look at the automobile..."

The automobile is a valid comparison, but not for the reasons you may think. This company does not have a patent on, say, multi-player computer games. They have a patent on a key piece of innovation: aggregating updates from multiple gamers into one update (or packet) so that latency can be reduced. Game designers could still make computer games without violating this patent. (The fact that this particular patent is highly obvious and probably invalid due to prior art is besides the point)

Automobile patents are not that different. The modern automobiles is built upon hundreds of thousands of innovations, some minor and some major, and there are tens of thousands of automobile patents that allowed the innovators to make a profit. You may not appreciate it, but the car, as you know it today, is A LOT more than just 4 tires and an IC engine. The modern engine alone, which is vastly superior to the original IC engines, involves lots of distinct patentable ideas...they are solutions to various problems such as how to: produce greater HP/torque, better dispose of heat, produce fewer fumes, improve combustion, improve durability, improve reliability, reduce maintenance, run in smaller and different shaped spaces, run faster, use different gas mixes, and so on.

There seems to be a general misunderstanding of how patents actually work in theory and in practice. Patents are rarely about owning the whole idea or the end result (e.g., a car or a means of transportation), what is generally contained in the title of the patent, but about INNOVATIONS or SOLUTIONS to problems that might make that idea feasible. The meat of a patent is always in the "claims" section and object of the claims is to describe the innovation in terms broad enough to cover key parts of the idea, without being so specific that someone can merely make a trivial modification and so circumvent your patent. (Or to make them too broad as to make the patent invalid). When patents are brought to trial they are rarely even close to as strong as what is claimed (though they can be no stronger than that). Interpreting how these claims would be upheld requires a lot of experience and knowledge of the courts, precedent, the specific field, and so on.

[hokorii @ Sep 15th 2006 4:24PM]

Microsoft stole someone else's idea? No!! It can't be true!! *shockshock* -_-

[Nick @ Sep 15th 2006 4:56PM]

Paltalk was a program created many many years ago. We are talking about the time frame when ICQ was just coming into beta. They were the first real big IM program. I remember running the software in Win 3.1 Allowed you to meet up and play games and do whiteboard stuff well before any other program.

[yman @ Oct 15th 2008 9:10AM]

With the new version of PalTalk you can see all rooms support voice, video and text for thousands of members simultaneously. I got the new version from here: PalTalk and it seems to work very well.

[yman @ Oct 15th 2008 9:12AM]

The correct adress is: http://www.rosoftdownload.com/download/Windows/PalTalk