Rage Against Patent Troll.

On Friday May 13th, 2011 some iOS App Developers revealed that they are being sued by Lodsys for In-App Purchases and Upgrade Links. This lawsuit baffles many developers since Developers are using API in iOS SDK provided by Apple for In-App Purchasing. Lodsys so far is suing the Developers, but not Apple.

Adam C. Engst provided a great analysis on the matter.

It’s entirely unclear why Lodsys has chosen this approach — their lawyers have undoubtedly read the iOS Developer Program License Agreement and know that the iOS developers can’t settle. And they’ve chosen such small targets that there’s no way they could even cover their legal fees with what they could squeeze out. The only strategy that makes sense is that by targeting small developers, they put additional pressure on Apple to settle quickly.

Apple should respond to this lawsuit even though it is not yet directed at them.

In the meantime, this is what the iPad think about Lodsys:

That makes a lot of sense.

Where’s The Outrage? Microsoft Attacks Android Again.

Microsoft is on the offensive, suing Barnes & Noble, Foxconn International and Inventec over Android-based Nook e-reader. It’s not the first time Microsoft asserts that Android is violating its patents. It’s the same old song and dance.

Is Google on vacation?

Motorola Sues Apple for Patent Infringements.

Motorola announces that they are suing Apple.

LIBERTYVILLE, Ill. – Oct. 6, 2010 – Motorola, Inc. (NYSE: MOT) today announced that its subsidiary, Motorola Mobility, Inc., has filed a complaint with the U.S. International Trade Commission (ITC) alleging that Apple’s iPhone, iPad, iTouch and certain Mac computers infringe Motorola patents. Motorola Mobility also filed patent infringement complaints against Apple (NASDAQ: AAPL) in the Northern District of Illinois and the Southern District of Florida.

iTouch? What is that? There’s the iPod Touch.

Overall, Motorola Mobility’s three complaints include 18 patents, which relate to early-stage innovations developed by Motorola in key technology areas found on many of Apple’s core products and associated services, including MobileMe and the App Store. The Motorola patents include wireless communication technologies, such as WCDMA (3G), GPRS, 802.11 and antenna design, and key smartphone technologies including wireless email, proximity sensing, software application management, location-based services and multi-device synchronization.

MobileMe and App Store? This is interesting how Motorola sees it this way.

The timing couldn’t be any more convenient, just five days after Microsoft filed suits against Motorola. Any lawsuits takes time to prepare, Motorola wouldn’t have come up with the idea of suing Apple in just 5 days.

Without looking into the patents that Motorola alleged Apple infringes upon, so far it sounds pretty ridiculous. It is true that Apple came into the mobile phone business much later than Motorola. It is also true that the original iPhone is the first of what most smartphone today look and operate like. Motorola lawsuit against Apple is just as ridiculous as Microsoft lawsuit against Motorola.

In Motorola’s defense, they do make phones with physical keyboards.