By Tony Smith for The
Register.
This article has been reproduced with permission.
Burst's complaint, filed with the US District Court in San
Francisco, is a response to an Apple lawsuit filed against it
earlier this year. The Apple suit seeks the dismissal of Burst's
patents as
invalid and a non-infringement ruling.
In 2005, Microsoft put such a request at the centre of
its defence against similar infringement claims made by Burst,
though it soon after entered into an out-of-court settlement that
saw it pay $60m for a licence to use Burst's technology. Burst.com
sued Microsoft in June 2002.
Burst's anti-Apple countersuit asks the court to force Apple to
suspend sales of the iPod, QuickTime streaming software and the
iTunes jukebox application. It also wants the iTunes Music Store to
be shuttered. All four products and services, Burst alleges,
infringe its patents. Burst also wants the court to impose
"reasonable" royalty payments on Apple.
"While we had hoped to avoid litigation and negotiate a
reasonable license fee, it is Apple's own actions that have forced
our hand," Burst said in a statement which mistakenly claims Apple
introduced the iPod in 2002 in fact, it was launched in
October 2001.
© The Register
2006
