The RIM v. NTP patent case has been hanging fire for so long that it's easy to lose sight of what it means in the big picture. Quite simply, a company that invented a truly innovative device and its customers are being held hostage by some invalid patents and a few legal sharks who know how to exploit our intellectual property system. And what that means obviously is that something is very, very wrong with this picture.
A number of my readers have grown increasingly restive as the media is filled with stories about the unlikely but nonetheless real prospect that a judge could order the Blackberry service shut down in the U.S. as early as this Friday. What really steams even some readers who aren't Blackberry users themselves is the idea that such a disruptive threat to so many could be based on patents the U.S. Patent Office seems certain to eventually invalidate. "What's with all the David and Goliath stuff?" wrote one reader in reference to news stories that have portrayed NTP as a brave little outfit challenging the much larger Research in Motion (RIM), creator of the Blackberry wireless email device. "Get a clue, people. If these patent attorneys and former patent examiners win, who is really going to benefit other than them? Only Microsoft or some other giant that can steal some of RIM's business because of it."
The seeming obliviousness of the "rocket docket" court in Virginia, homebase of the patent-holding firm NTP, Inc., in racing toward an obvious injustice also outrages many. "Basically the consumer may be up the creek because two companies are having a patent dispute," wrote another reader. "You buy a product and come to depend on it, only to find out at a later date that you may not be able to use that technology because of a questionable infringement claim. Ultimately, everything we do is based on someone else's work, but it seems like 'intellectual property' has become a hydra with endless permutations. I guess we should be paying royalties to the inventor of fire."
Of course, the readers who are most upset are those whose companies are using the Blackberry as a critical part of their communication infrastructure. "It is a real pain," wrote one reader of scrambling to make contingency plans for a corporate sales staff addicted to their Blackberries. "What really ticks me off is that they're going to make an exception for the government ... If they're going to turn the service off, they should turn it off for everybody!"
Therein might lie the one silver lining to this ludicrous situation. With the government having to contemplate the prospect of emergency workers and disaster response teams having their communications cut off, perhaps Congress will finally be motivated to do something about a patent system that everyone knows is badly broken. And if the Blackberry cases demonstrates one thing, it's that minor reforms like improved patent office reviews are not going to be nearly enough. Fixing the system has to start with the recognition, already understood by the rest of the world, that software and Internet business method patents are an abomination and need to be tossed out.
It is certainly far more likely that RIM and NTP will reach a settlement, or continue this already interminable legal fight for years to come, than that an earth-shaking injunction will be enforced in the next few weeks. And, for the sake of Blackberry customers, let's hope that's indeed the case. But let's also hope that we don't soon forget the image of perfectly innocent technology users being caught in the vice of an intellectual property system gone haywire. Keeping that picture in mind will remind us that patents are actually supposed to reward the inventors of innovative products, not punish their customers.
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