Liquid Audio unloads its download technology. The online music company agrees to sell its digital encoding patents to Microsoft for $7 million in cash, moving the company closer to its proposed merger with Alliance Entertainment. [CNET News.com]
I just wish they had sold their patents to somebody else. But who? The very idea of patents gives me a tummy ache.
I'll post a story about Liquid Audio later on today; I still have my real job to do. Suffice to say that I am angry that this is the same deal that I proposed 18 months ago. At that time the egos of the engineers and the CEO got in the way of the decision to drop their format. They could have done the deal back then and saved the company.
