Sony, Blizzard, Activision, NCsoft, Turbine named in patent suit

a lot of people are not reading the article I think... "What took them 12 years" It didn't take them 12 years, the company was bought in 2001, the software isn't originally Paltalk's its Mpath's which was bought. As with any selling and contractual change, a new agreement must be made with the new owner (same goes with renting an apartment) It has been 8 years since the purchase and the company probably took that long for research make sure they were being infringement and legal documents, a simple lawsuit I had a few years ago took over 2, can't imagine what it is for big companies. There is too little vague information to determine whos at fault. Maybe the companies had a contract, it did say the were "licensees" meaning at one point they had permission, and the contract ran out. Either way, I don't think it will hurt games much, if anything I would think it would hurt Paltalk. The companies can find another company to host, but Paltalk will be losing a lot of business that might be hard to catch on a worldwide basis. Who Knows, never got into politics anyways:)

Congratulations paltalk I never liked you and now after this stunt taking stabs at the gaming industry and making it harder on devs to make great games for us I'm never buying your shi7 or even using trials or anything your PR stunt is a PR fail and paltalk you fail have fun living off the $90mill cause thats all your going to have left after this cause people aren't going to like you now.

@mine20000 What software? Unless I am mistaken, this is not a software patent, it's a conceptual patent. It's not the question about someone using a software. They claim that all MMOs violate their patent, because they basically patented the idea of MMO. Their whole idea is abusing the patent system to sue for money.

Yay Paltalk! It is never too late to get what u deserve people. Look at Microsoft bowing down lol! Sony and the others are real DEAD MEAT!

this company must be blind took them 12 years to notice people where using their tech. Though mabye they can show they dont use paltalk's tech. mabye more people will sue, mabye the first game maker will sue because it's his idea to create an interactive medium where people can play against a machine. Or the first arcade manufactures will sue anyone using a joystick, sony will sue over natal being like eyetoy an ninty will sue sony for their wiimote ripoff, capcom and team ninja will sue over dante's inferno and all originality will be dead becuase everyone will be afraid it will have already been done by someone else. mabye the creator of pong will sue every tennis game ever made only to be sued by the reall tennis players for copying tennis. i could be going a lil OTT

and NOW they decide to speak up

I have complete respect for this mob taking back what is theirs, UNLESS it really hurts these fine companies (as a Guild Wars fan, I'd be especially filthy if it damages NCsoft too much).

@mine20000 Well said, there's nothing wrong with a company fighting for what is theirs. If everyone rolled over when someone stole/used a product that they had patented then no one would ever have the chance to claim their own intellectual properties! Here's an example, do you think J.K. Rowling of Harry Potter fame would have just let someone take her manuscript and earn millions off her book because people worldwide were enjoying it and it'd be a bit mean to intrude upon the book's success? Heck no, she'd want her money and her property and that's all that Paltalk is looking for. xD

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@Grandpa1676 I don't think you fully understand what is going on here. Someone has created and legally patented technology which all of these big shot gaming companies not only use, but aren't paying to use. Don't you think there is something wrong with that and the company that develops such technologies (not games) should be reimbursed for the damages caused, not limited to lost profits. If we let Sony, Microsoft, Blizzard, Activision etc get away with using someones intellectual property without paying for it then where does it end? The company revolutionized the way we communicate in games, VOIP, etc they deserve to reap the benefits of their efforts.

Instead of law suits, why not channel the $ and efforts into game improvments instead of lining pockets!!!

You forget Activision and Blizzard are technically the same now, and what do you mean Blizzard is the best game designers? If anything it'd be between Rockstar(any territory)/Eidos/Square Enix/Ubisoft. Activision/Blizzard? ....pshhh common... Even EA probally have more brawn than them. pssh

sorry didn't think i wrote so much but the retarded limit to words you can post is silly and makes annoying multi post like his imminent to happen. hopefully they'll make it where 5k max words at some point to make long bloggers messages easier to post! hope everybodies enjoying the new batman arkham asylum map packs!

I was SO mad that rockstar aggreed on the $50 million dollar deal for the GTAIV expansions and almost decided to drop support being they would had made a WHOLE lot more money releasing the exclusives on both consoles. Then for rockstar to say PS3 will get an exclusive Agent(GTA like game) exclusive(which prolly will turn out multi plat as M$ loves to gamble like gambit and blow up the competition with their electrical cheatful deck of unlimited dollars). Also GTAV was announced at one point to be released exclusively on PS3 because they said the calibur and size of the game gives them exclusive and more reliant tools to work with with more deph and just more flexibility to make the game more advanced than most games that're being made but advidly ported from 360 to ps3 which is why all the games on ps3 ported from 360 LOOK SO BAD, a game made for a console that utlilizes an ATI chipset will always look better than a console that utilizes an Nvidia chipset and vise versa. I just wish devs/pubs like activision would SHUT UP about how much it costs to make games on the ps3 when ALL activision have EVER done was PORTED games FROM 360 to PS3. So how the HELL are you spending so much more money for ps3 just porting than on 360 when you actually MADE the game on it.

Sounds like Bobby Ko. aka ceo of activision is a little prejudice of the ps3 and has shut up advidly since he complained that ALL consoles should be UNDER $200.00 by 2009... My opinion if he was the world president of how video games were manufactured then gaming would be no more. Even more he said games "quote from Bobby ko" Games prices should be $80.00 or just to put it simpler "games should have their price risen". Now haven't all of us stressed how much over priced games actually are? Maybe if it's a game with 30+ hours $50 dollars sounds fair, a game with over 50+ hours should be $60.00 and as rumor the new final fantasy XIII is going for $89.00 in japan being the date for japan release for FFXIII is dec. 17th. I'm VERY sure Final Fantasy XIII will be well over 100 hours as most are since the playstation days, that is if you take time to get ALL the ultimate weapons and summons and so such and not just run through the game as fast as you can you'll net 100+ hours EASILY on any ps oriented FF game. So with FFXIII i'd pay $90.00 for a 100+ hour game ANYDAY. I LIVE for long games and Dragon Age: Origins will be the first for PS3 to rock the 80+ hour revolution of gameplay.

Unless you count games you're continuiously play to get trophies and the time adds up there too, and that's why I strongly advice trophies/achievements(but xbox has all their games with achievements, BLAH), like games like assassins creed for ps3, eidos could EASILY patch in trophies for that game, they're EXACTLY the same as the 360 achievements and all they have to freakin do is patch it in ps3 format and that'd actually make me want to play and FINISH assassins creed 1. I was far through it but my saved games got erased due to some BS but I have MUCH more desire to play games with trophies than I ever will again for games without.

I feel trophies/achievements give more deph to the game and gives you more reason to play the game. I'm sure lots will agree and some hate the concept but if you're a hardcore video game player like me, then you understand trophies are a dire need for extra things to do and it's ALWAYS funner to have to meet extra conditions just so you have MORE to do in a game rather than just beat it and that be it. I LOVE beating the game and SLAMMING A PLATINUM TROPHY DOWN ITS THROAT!!! To all Xbox 360 users, I really think you guys are REALLY lucky, i would get an xbox 360 if it didn't break so much and if xbox live didn't cost, i could care less about online features, all i care about is demos and DLC. If I could just play games multiplayer for free without a darn fee that'd be cool but the red ring of death I don't think I can handle... Plus Xbox has alot of cool RPG element'd games, but until microsoft STOPS all this exclusively stealing or trying to steal exclusive games aka FFXIV.

Seems Square Enix is selling out on sony aswell. Made sony look dumb to say FFXIV is exclusive at e3 on stage but yet turns out it will be on xbox 360 IF they can fix the Xbox live fees which go against FFXIV because FFXIV is a free to play MMORPG so aslong as Microsoft keep charging they're only making it easier for us PS3 fans because atleast we hopefully won't have the 360 to screw up space limitations for FFXIV and possibly PS3 advantages that they advently took out of FFXIII just to make the game "dead even" which microsoft should be penalized for sending their development kits LATE to square and let the ps3 fans get the free roam version of the game and 360 users get the limited roam version being it's system isn't worthy enough to run like it was originally supposed to. And to all whom think the ps3 is crap, TELL me ONE game that the PS3 CANNOT run that the 360 have or could make. Also tell me this, it's already been proven that the 360 can't run a game EXACTLY PERFECT ported from PS3 as if it DID then FFXIII would be free based like FFXII. But now we won't see starting areas we visit til way later in the game, so when we're at the starting of FFXIII we won't be abe to revisit it for a long long time, and the usual PS3 made version was set to be able to return anytime to any location unless it's story oriented and locked until you hit that part of the story to open up a new zone/etc.

"The company has also petitioned the court to prevent the companies from continuing to violate its patents, among other requests. " I think the companies are gonna fight back on this one cause like hell is Blizzard gonna shutdown its biggest moneymaker, aka WoW, just cause some poor as little bizatch suddenly comes complaining about the use of the internet for gaming, which is at the base what he's complaining about. Also Blizzard is one of the top gaming company's if anyone has the money to take on another company in court its Blizzard, even though Paltalk is within there legal right there still a-holes and I think Blizzard is gonna make them a really big a-hole.

and this people is why the economy is like it is now

Runescape? really? that's juts being a bully

if they used their tech without paying them...sue them to ehl

And yet they don't sue the guys who made Second Life or Habbo Hotel because they aren't big money-makers. Paltalk are just suing the million dollar makers because they want the millions of dollars they make because they can't accept that people come up with similar ideas that you did.

Shoot I forgot to put the cover on my T.P.S. report they must have thrown it out sorry Microsoft and yes I did get the memo

y keep sueing. u already got enough money from microsoft. give it up. whats this world coming to

Here's how patents should work. They last for an certain amount of years (Let's say 20 since that's what it apparently is in the USA), if you dont use\implement it in 5-7 years, you lose it.

the larger an industry gets, the more its gonna be like every other one out there.....look at EA, their like the first big videogame corporation out there, their probably the only game company that actually had to LAY OFF workers...

@% Paltalk apparently greed knows no bounds

It does really sound like this guys tech has been out for a long while then he all of a sudden decides that it's his property and goes crazy suing people over it. As Gandaf007 said "They'll probably win, because in all technicality they're right, and they have every right to sue. Is it morally wrong and shady? Yes, but they're legally right." Is true. This will just cause a ton of set backs to companies and makes the guy doing this look greedy.

@omnilet Patents in the U.S last 20 years

Another lawsuit? My god, the gaming industry sure is serious business... :P

Three times what they would normally be for damages? Please, they couldn't find a more blatant way to say "times are tough so we're gonna sue you to make money" than if they deliberately tripped and fell on these companies' front steps.

software patents are absurd. Business process patents are even more absurd.

oh joy more things to halt console and game developers DX. patents only seem to hurt not help the industry

Aw, that's cute. Don't hurt youselves too badly, okay?

I guess Ford should sue all other car manufactures for using automobile assembly lines.

I thought patents on things only lasted 3 years..

@partytimekegs They'll probably win, because in all technicality they're right, and they have every right to sue. Is it morally wrong and shady? Yes, but they're legally right. I hate software patents because they're always vague, like this one. In all truth, it's halting progress. Thousands of programmers can get a lot more done than a small team of them.

@scrode Well the whole issue is that it is intellectual "property." It would be like if you bought a bunch of land, and then someone decided to build a casino on it without checking if anyone owned the property. Then now they are making a bunch of money on land you own. Would you then not sue the casino for a portion of the profits or to shut them down altogether?

He's going to go door-to-door to every online game you have ever played that is sucessful and look for a hand out. I love how this guy didn't do anything remotely with his patent for a large sum of years to just come out of the shadows and pilfer everyone's money. If the courts actually buy this.. then every online interactive device, even flash games, are at fault for breaking a copyright on his patent. I mean, what next? Sue NeoPets?

I think it is pretty clear why Microsoft settled; The cost of court proceedings, lawyer costs, transportation and research into the case was not worth the money they would not have paid Paltalk in the end. Rather than take a loss in money, they most likely paid them less than what they would have paid for all their lawyers, jet fuel, and time. Court cases in real life actually take a LONG time to actually do something. Imagine how much Microsoft pays for the lawyers (we are talking a team here, not one guy), plus for their transportation, accommodation (theirs and the lawyers...housing, food, etc). Lots of money, even if they didn't use their own jets. We're talking big time lawyers, in this case, patent ones, who would be getting paid in the high thousands per hour, each. They'd be lucky if the case ended next year. Oh and if you think the lawyers will only wait in Texas for court dates, they won't. So they either have to hire them full time, or pay expenses for the constant shuttling. My guess, they threw a few hundred thousand at PalTalk and said GTFO.

@underdog11297 I disagree with him, and with you, I guess. If someone comes up with an IDEA, everyone should be able to "steal" it. A certain technical implementation, however, is a different matter. That should be patentable, for say, a couple of years.

I think i am going to patent photorealistic images used in virtual worlds, wait 5 years and sue Crytek.

@Mr_Bodywave - I don't think anyone disagrees with you in that if someone comes up with an idea, someone else shouldn't be able to steal it. That's what patents are for, anyway. But look at what Paltalk is doing... waiting multiple years, without having an actual product that uses their patents, and suing for an exponential amount compared to actual value... for what? They got their feelings hurt? Apparently MS didn't appease their lust for retribution with their settlement. If any of the companies that used the technology in this case didn't, you could possibly say goodbye to all interactive online gaming (or have Paltalk take over - wouldn't that be nice!)

As an avid WoW player, I wouldn't mind seeing Blizzard take a hit, it's a love/hate relationship for me.