Patent nonsense: News that could change the way we work and play

Last week provided a lot of legal fun for Apple, complete with news of the US Federal Communications Commission (FCC) sending a letter to the company asking for information about the removal of the Google Voice app from the App Store, and word that upstart Mac cloner Psystar has retained a new law firm. Meanwhile, over at the hallowed halls of the U.S. Patent Office, things were afoot that could cause even more problems for not only Apple, but most of the personal computing world.

The first hint of patent madness appeared earlier this week when online auction house eBay filed its Form 10-Q for the quarter ending June, 2009 with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). One of the nuggets of information in the 10-Q was a warning from eBay that its popular voice over IP (VoIP) service Skype could be forced to shut down over a patent licensing dispute.

When eBay bought Skype for US$2.6 billion in 2005, one key piece of patented technology from Joltid Limited was not included in the purchase price. eBay and Joltid signed a licensing agreement, and Skype continued to flourish. Since 2005, eBay has apparently revealed details of Joltid's patented technologies in the course of litigating other lawsuits. Joltid, under the terms of the license agreement with eBay, unilaterally terminated the agreement as a result. eBay has now filed suit against Joltid in the UK, asking that eBay and Skype be declared not in violation of the agreement, and that the licensing agreement be reinstated.
eBay's comment in the Form 10-Q included this dire warning: "the continued operation of Skype's business as currently conducted would likely not be possible" if the disagreement is not resolved or some alternate technology is not developed by Skype.

Will Skype, a service used by millions of people daily and the heart of the TUAW TalkCast every Sunday night, be forced to shut down? Nobody knows at this time, but this dispute should be closely watched.

The second round of patent wackiness occurred on Wednesday, when media analytics firm VoloMedia was granted a patent for the basic elements of podcasting. Patent number 7,568,213, "Method for providing episodic media content" was awarded Wednesday to Volomedia after almost 6 years of study by the Patent Office. Volomedia's founder, Murgesh Navar, claims that the patent filing in 2003 was made "almost a year before the start of podcasting." Wikipedia's entry on podcasting bolsters this claim, noting that podcasting "began to take hold in late 2004."

A quick Google search provided some interesting commentary on the patent. Blogger Eric Susch, for example, made these comments in a post in his new media blog on Wednesday: "What a bunch of vague gobbly-gook. This patent claim could apply to iTunes, my DVR... heck it could even apply to Twitter and Facebook. There's no mention of an RSS feed at all which is essential for a podcast. I don't think this patent is enforceable but they could certainly cause trouble for a lot of people."

That last comment echoes the concern of many in the podcasting world. Enforcing the patent could theoretically result in such ridiculous outcomes as license fees to podcasters. Once again, the patent has just been awarded, but as with the Skype situation, this bears close scrutiny by the personal computing community. Apple, which provides millions of people with audio and video podcast content through iTunes, should be particularly vigilant in making sure that podcasting remains free and open.

[via Macworld and The Mac Observer]