TiVo and DISH / Echostar head back to Texas for another patent duel
Well, just when it was starting to look like TiVo and DISH / Echostar may finally have put their seemingly never-ending patent dispute behind them, the two companies now look to be rekindling things in Texas this week, where they've landed in court once more to sort out that pesky patent involving TiVo's Time Warp software. As patent dispute junkies may recall, TiVo first wound up being awarded some damages in the matter way back in 2006, after which Echostar was forced to develop some workaround software that it claims no longer infringed on TiVo's Time Warp patent, which allows for recording of one channel while the user watches another. In the meantime, Echostar / DISH continued to fight back against TiVo, with things finally, apparently coming to an end when the Supreme Court ultimately denied DISH's appeal and awarded TiVo those aforementioned damages (plus interest) for real. Now, TiVo is alleging that the DISH's "workaround" software does still violate its patent after all, and it's asking a U.S. District Court Judge in Texarcana, Texas to sort it out. If this latest round plays out as TiVo hopes, DISH could be forced to disable most, if not all, of its DVRs, and potentially buy new DVRs that don't infringe on TiVo's patents.
