Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen sues Apple, Google...everyone...for infringing patented Web technology

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Apple, AOL, eBay, Google, Yahoo, YouTube, Netflix, Staples, Office Depot and OfficeMax have reportedly breached this patent.

Two others enable ads, stock quotes, news updates or video images to flash on a computer screen, peripherally to a user's main activity.

Apple, Google, Yahoo and AOL violated these patents, according to the lawsuit.

The lawsuit seeks damages but has not specified the amount. It also seeks an order to permanently restrain the defendants from infringing the patented technologies or pay royalties for doing so.

Interval, which owns a portfolio of technology patents but is not into manufacturing, said the lawsuit is to put an end to violations of patents that, it feels, are fundamental to e-commerce and search.

Allen, the 37th richest man in the world according to Forbes, and David Liddle, a former Xerox Corp. researcher co-founded Interval Research Corp. in 1992 to research and develop communications and computer technology. At one point, the company employed more than 110 engineers, physicists and scientists and developed technologies, including cellular voice-processing technology and motion-detection technology used in games that allows a computer to "see" commands.

Over a period of several years, Interval Research was issued about 300 patents but its work was phased out as plans for commercializing the technologies it developed didn't pan out as expected.

Now Interval Licensing, which is into the business of licensing Interval Research's existing patents, claims Internet giants like Google, Facebook, eBay and Yahoo have built their businesses around its patented technology.

Google and others said they will vigorously challenge Interval's claim.

"This lawsuit against some of America's most innovative companies reflects an unfortunate trend of people trying to compete in the courtroom instead of the marketplace," a Google spokesman said.

Agrees Facebook spokesman Andrew Noyes. "We believe this suit is completely without merit and we will fight it vigorously," Noyes said.

However, Interval spokesman David Postman said the lawsuit was the only way for the company to protect what is rightfully theirs.

"We are not asserting patents that other companies have filed, nor are we buying patents originally assigned to someone else," Postman said. "These are patents developed by and for Interval."

The lawsuit is the latest in the string of patent infringement claims that have found their way into the courtroom in recent months.

Earlier this month, Oracle Corp. attacked Google and shocked the open-source community by filing a patent and copyright infringement lawsuit against Google which, it claimed, has unlawfully used its Java technology in its Android mobile platform.

Last month, NTP Inc., a Virginia-based patent holding company, sued several smartphone makers including Apple, Motorola, HTC and LG, saying they are infringing eight patents relating to delivery of email "over wireless communications systems."

NTP is known for its aggressive legal tactics and has often been criticized as a "patent troll" for enforcing its patent rights without making products.

However, the lawsuit suggests that Interval, whose operations were bankrolled by Allen is not a "patent troll."

Interval Research had worked on numerous projects with goals to create technology to use in Allen's ventures in cable-TV and telecommunications. In later days, it also focused on developing technology to license to others.

The lawsuit also claims Interval Research was listed in Google's "credits" site in 1998 as an outside collaborator and one of a handful of sources of research funding for Sergey Brin and Lawrence Page's research that resulted in Google.

According to IP expert Ron Laurie, neither Allen nor his companies are regarded as "patent trolls" because they have generally avoided aggressive litigation though Postman has characterized the lawsuit as "part of an ongoing process for years to monetize (their patent) portfolio."

And, though the licensing market is as much as $500 billion according to Ocean Tomo, a Chicago-based merchant bank that tracks the intellectual-property market, it's not that Allen needs the money. In fact, Allen, who is worth an estimated $13.5 billion, in July had pledged most of his fortune to philanthropy after his death.

However, everybody is wondering about Interval's selection of defendants as every legal entity in the world that runs or owns a website or an e-commerce site has possibly infringed the company's patents.

Conspicuously missing from the list of defendants are Microsoft, in which Allen still has a substantial investment, and Amazon.com, which is based in the billionaire's hometown of Seattle.

Allen was not available for comment.

People are wondering who will win this lawsuit. However, the answer will have to wait as patent infringement lawsuits generally take several years to settle and most of them end in a licensing agreement.