[VoIP] (no subject)

[Kirt Stanfield]

Personally I found the report I read about this in the Washington Post a 
bit alarming. A jury has agreed with Verizon, and so has a judge. I see 
it as something I have been fearing, the re-emergence of Ma Bell and her 
monopoly. If this ruling stands,  then I imagine it won't be long before 
they cook up a way to stop all VOIP that isn't run by a Bell - and then 
it is bye-bye CNET, and of course competition in the phone industry.

In the Judge Green era, the solution would probably ahve been to say OK 
Verizon, you have the patent, but in the interests of competition you 
must license it at a reasonable fee. I can't see that happening today.

Unfortunately  if the shoe was on the other foot, Vonage probably 
wouldn't have a chance against Verizon. Shades of Armstrongs battle 
against RCA over FM.

Kirt

John R. Covert wrote:

>If you haven't been following this, yesterday the judge ordered Vonage
>to stop infringing the patents.  He found (as Verizon had requested)
>that paying royalties would not be sufficient to "prevent erosion of
>[Verizon's] customer base."  Vonage must stop operating gateways from
>the Internet into the PSTN.  The judge did not immediately sign his
>order and scheduled another hearing for April 6th at which Vonage
>will argue against the shutown.
>
>I've gotten the details of the specific claims and patents that the
>jury found to have been infringed, and it's really ridiculous.
>Basically, the claims in first two patents are the supposed invention
>of using ENUM to route a call to a PSTN gateway, and the claims in the
>third are the supposed invention of using a SIP or IAX REGISTER command
>from a device using wireless access to the Internet.  Everything they
>claim is covered by the relevant internet RFCs.  Of course, simply
>being in an RFC doesn't make the patent invalid.  Construction, whose
>art is the earliest, and other elements all come into play.
>
>If these claims hold up, they appear to me to be sufficiently broad
>that the would require all VoIP egress from the Internet into the PSTN
>to stop.  I think that is unlikely.
>
>Specific claims infringed:
>6,104,711
>
>20. A method as in claim 15; wherein:
>the first and second destination address includes a numeric Internet Protocol
>address; and the second destination address further includes information
>relating to call routing via a public switched telephone network.
>
>[15 not listed as infringed, but needed to understand 20]
>15. A method comprising:
>receiving a name translation request at a server coupled to a public packet
>data network; executing a conditional analysis in response to the name
>translation request; if the conditional analysis produces a first result,
>translating a name included in the name translation request into a first
>destination address; if the conditional analysis produces a second result,
>translating the name included in the name translation request into a second
>destination address; and transmitting a response message containing the
>first or the second destination address to a calling device for use in
>establishing communication at least partially through the public packet
>data network. 
>
>6,282,574
>
>27. A method as in claim 26, wherein the address is an Internet Protocol
>address.
>
>[26 not listed as infringed, but needed to understand 27]
>26. A method comprising:
>receiving a name translation request at a server coupled to a public packet
>data network; translating a name included in the request into a destination
>telephone number associated with a name included in the request; and
>transmitting a reply containing both the destination telephone number
>and a packet data network address of a telephone gateway coupled between
>the public packet data network and a telephone network through the public
>packet data network to a calling device.
>
>6,359,880
>
>1. A method comprising:
>registering a wireless telephone terminal in a localized wireless gateway
>system; transmitting registration data identifying the gateway system from
>the localized wireless gateway system to a home location register database
>through a public packet data communication network; receiving a request
>from a calling computer coupled to the public packet data communication
>network for a call to the wireless telephone terminal; in response to the
>request, accessing the home location register database and obtaining a packet
>data address for the localized wireless gateway system; using the address to
>set up a voice communication through the public packet data communication
>network and the localized wireless gateway system between the calling computer
>and the wireless telephone terminal. 
>
>6. A method as in claim 1, wherein the public packet data communication
>network is a packet switched network.
>
>7. A method as in claim 6, wherein the packet switched network comprises a
>system of interlinked data networks using TCP/IP protocol.
>
>8. A method as in claim 7, wherein the system of interlinked data networks
>comprises the Internet.
>
>/john
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