Lots of IP news today

Three news items I saw today related to past, present or future IP litigation in the IT industry:

1. By now, everyone’s heard about how Viacom wants $1 billion from Google for copyright infringement. Apparently they don’t buy the GooTube business model either. Donna Bogatin, who claims to have predicted this before the YouTube acquisition, seems sanguine there will be a labor-efficient technical fix (i.e. digital watermarks). I’m not so sure.
2. After losing a patent lawsuit to Verizon, Vonage must be looking for a win somewhere. But here’s one award Vonage doesn’t want: worst one-year performance for a 2006 IPO (down 75%). Somehow, saying shareholders could have lost 96% doesn’t lessen the pain.
3. The looming Nokia-Qualcomm showdown over Nokia’s expiring CDMA license, which was a major topic at the Qualcomm shareholders’ meeting.

I spent the day at the Qualcomm meeting, so I haven’t kept up on the news, but thought I’d mention all three. I expect to have more to say on the Qualcomm-Nokia case when I can offer more specific observations.

Technorati Tags: Google, intellectual property, Nokia, Qualcomm, Vonage