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05.26.09 Microsoft Ordered To Pay XML Firm $200 Million  By Doug Caverly Sometimes, the figurative little guy wins. Sometimes, the figurative little guy is an XML company. And this is both of those times, since Microsoft's been ordered to pay i4i $200 million for patent infringement. Many years ago, Toronto-based i4i was granted a patent related to "[s]ystem and method for generating an XML-based fault model." The abstract specifically mentioned Word documents, and then such documents were named many more times throughout the rest of the application. As for the subject of legal contention, Emil Protalinski reports, "Word 2003 and Word 2007 use extensible markup language (XML) for encoding and customizing the XML in a way that i4i believes infringes on its patent."
Now, a federal jury's sided with i4i, and you might judge the importance of the decision in light of the fact that i4i's website is down (think traffic overload). With most tech-related companies, that sort of thing doesn't happen every day. Unfortunately for i4i (and perhaps XML pros who would look to the company as something of a hero), Microsoft does intend to appeal the $200 million verdict, so it may be quite a while before anything's final and money changes hands. About the Author: Doug is a staff writer for WebProNews. Visit WebProNews for the latest eBusiness news. |
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