Copiepresse, an organisation which manages copyright for the Belgian French- and German-language press has won its suit against Google in a Belgian court which has ordered it to stop reproducing article snippets from French-language newspapers in an unprecedented copyright crackdown over what is a common online practice (link here).

Google, which is planning to appeal the ruling, said that it had removed links to the newspapers from news.google.be and was in the process of taking them down from its news sites in other countries.

Agence-France Presse has brought a similar suit and is seeking monetary damages.

If this becomes widespread, it will really damage Google's usefulness and popularity .

Joe Nocera wrote a fascinating story about a nasty patent suit between a patent-trolling company, whose board is chaired by none other than Paul Allen, and audible.com. The story begins:

Nocera, Joe. 2006. "Tired of Trolls, a Feisty Chief Fights Back." New York Times (16 September). "Patent disputes have become part of the dark underbelly of American business. So-called patent trolls acquire patents, often from bankrupt companies -- and often overly broad patents that should never have been issued by the United States Patent and Trademark Office in the first place. Instead of using them to build a commercial product, they extract licensing fees from companies that are making and selling real products. As The New Jersey Law Journal put it not long ago, "They exist solely to exact a tax"." "The deck is stacked against target companies, even when their product is not infringing. Patent litigation is expensive, and the judicial system tends to be sympathetic to the patent holder. So companies usually come to the obvious conclusion: it makes more sense to pay than to fight. For its part, the patent troll often prices the licensing fee below the cost of litigation, to encourage such behavior." Abuible refuses to settle, spends a million dollars rather than pay the demanded $300,000, only to find out the troll company does not even have legitimate ownership of the patent. "After a year of legal wrangling, Digeo dropped its price. A clearly frustrated Mr. Blaisdell wrote an astonishing e-mail message in May 2006 to Audible's internal lawyers, saying he was "perplexed as to why Audible has not taken Digeo up on its offer to settle for $300K." After all, he pointed out, that was far less than the "high legal fees" Audible was paying. He added, "Surely you understand that the prospect of convincing a Jury that Audible doesn't infringe or that the Patent is invalid is an expensive one." Digeo may or may not be a patent troll, but rarely has the economics of patent trolling been so baldly stated." "As it turns out, Digeo did not have the complete ownership of the patent that it thought it had. Documents that had been turned over to Digeo when it bought the patent showed that Edward Chang, one of the four co-inventors, had died, and that another -- his brother -- had assigned the rights to the patent to the company that later sold the `823 to Digeo." "Edward Chang, however, was very much alive, and his brother had never assigned the rights to anyone. The documents had been forged -- though it's not yet known by whom. The forgery was discovered by Mr. Kelber, the Audible lawyer. Audible then went to Mr. Chang and got him to sell it a license for $70,000. Last month, when this new evidence was presented, a judge ruled that Digeo was entitled to no monetary damages from Audible."

Scott Carpenter has started a nice blog Moving to Freedom on free software and related issues about ideas and intellectual property. Among other things he has a nice post reminding us of Ben Franklin's views of patent law.

Click here to see and hear Weird Al Yankovic's "Don't Download This Song." It's great!

Hat tip: Roderick Long

Slashdot has recently posted a depressing interview with Ray Beckerman, a defense attorney representing people sued by the RIAA. Beckerman is also author of the blog Recording Industry vs The People

The European Commission has warned Microsoft about tying security features into its new operating system, Vista, thus putting other security programs at a competitive disadvantage. A spokesman for the competition regulator, Jonathan Todd, is quoted by the New York Times as saying it was up to Microsoft, as "a near monopolist," to ensure the new software complies with antitrust rules (link here).

Microsoft has responded by suggesting it might have to delay the sale of Vista in Europe.

The regulator had previously ordered Microsoft to sell a version of the current operating system, Windows XP, without Windows Media Player. The stripped version is said to be a poor seller, given that XP with Player is still available. It remains to be seen whether the new requirement will effectively maintain competition.

Greg Mankiw comments on his blog about a Wall Street Journal article [subscription required, so I haven't read it] on the fashion industry lobbying for three years of monopoly power. Thus lies the road to serfdom. Here is an industry that is competitive and people copy each other like mad. Yet Raustiala and Sprigman have shown there is thriving innovation and plenty of profit for everyone involved. It is a great example of how well markets work without the artificial government interference of "intellectual property." Lobbying for government favors isn't about "promoting the progress of science and useful arts" but rather about "a conspiracy against the public, [and] some contrivance to raise prices."

There is a thoughtful article by Todd Bishop in the Seattle Post-Intelligencer on the Microsoft application to patent a computer method of conjugating verbs. It is thoughtful not only because Todd quotes my earlier post, and talked to Preston McAfee and Mike Masnick, but because he also talked to the people at Microsoft. So it makes sense to discuss: is this kind of patent a good idea or not? Microsoft argues that there is innovation that seems to largely revolve around switching from one language to another. No doubt compared to other computer programs this is an innovation. However, as Preston correctly remarks - it is a feature of every language textbook ever written. So does it make sense to allow every existing idea to be patented the first time it is ever done on the computer? Obviously the only "innovation" is in the specific computer code that achieve the purpose - but that isn't what is patented - anyone else implementing the idea would likely write somewhat different code, and probably wouldn't benefit that much from the "innovator"'s code. Moreover, the purpose of the patent system is to encourage innovation. On the one hand the cost of Microsoft's "innovation" is trivial - you and I could whip up some code in a few hours. On the other hand, the negative impact of the patent on innovation may be substantial - anyone who wants to write a computer translation program or textbook program now has to contend with the Microsoft patent - and how much worse if I take nouns? So regardless of whether Microsoft deserves to be a laughing stock for patenting such an obvious idea, issuing and enforcing patents like this cannot possibly be a good idea.

The previously reported Plavix drug story gets more interesting (link here). The Economist suggests a few alternative explanations for why a patented drug holder and a competitive generic maker would do a deal rather than compete; that happened in the Plavix case, (although it was subsequently overturned by the government).

One reason might be to "to delay its introduction of a cut-price product". A second might be that "the cost and legal uncertainty associated with patent trials are simply too great." Finally, it may be that the firm may know that "its patent was mistakenly awarded, perhaps because the purported breakthrough was too minor or obvious."

David Balto, a former official at the Federal Trade Commission, is quoted as saying, "Branded pharmaceutical firms have been stretching the limits of what deserves a patent, and the courts are just catching up."

It seems they have a long way to go.

Monopoly loves to expand. Pharmacists around the world are finding ways to preserve their exclusive right to sell drugs. Do you want to buy "Plan B," a "morning after" contraceptive hitherto sold only as a prescription drug in America. Rather than allowing it to be dispensed freely, the FDA forced a "voluntary”"accord on Barr Laboratories, the drug's maker, for it to be sold from behind the pharmacist's counter. If an identity check reveals the purchaser to be under 18, Plan B will still require a prescription; if the buyer is 18 or over, the pharmacist can dispense it freely. This landmark decision could prove to be the thin edge of a very big wedge. The arrival of Plan B may herald the emergence of a class of pharmaceuticals unknown in America: behind-the-counter (BTC) drugs (link here)”.

Enough said.