ZOMG! TEH PATENTS INFRINGE11!!!

[FiendWithoutAface]

Related to 1996 patent on device ID transmission

A patent infringement lawsuit was filed against Nintendo and Sony in the Pennsylvania Western District Court on December 27, 2007.

The lawsuit, being brought on behalf of the Copper Innovations Group, alleges that the companies have infringed upon a 1996 patent that "covers a method for connecting devices to a system and sorting their inputs by means of hardware identification numbers tied to each transmission."

Microsoft has not been named in the suit, as Sony and Nintendo are the ones using Bluetooth to connect their controllers to the PlayStation 3 and the Wii, respectively.

The plaintiff is seeking financial damages as well as an injunction to stop Sony and Nintendo from further infringing upon the patent in question.

Sony and Nintendo have not yet filed an answer to the complaint and were unavailable for comment at the time of writing.

http://www.gamesindustry.biz/content_page.php?aid=32066

[toastman]

So they are claiming a patent on the concept of enumerating wireless devices. If Sony and Nintendo are guilty, then so is anybody who implements Bluetooth. All Bluetooth devices must transmit an ID so they can be uniquely identified among others.

Fucking patent trolls.

[APE]

"tied to each transmission"

That right there means to me that each time a signal is sent from the device it's a transmission, but would you count every time the device syncs with the console to when it's powered down a single transmission or each time it sends a packet?