Apple, Microsoft Sued Over Online Software Updates

[Mac Reporter]

By Peter Cohen pcohen@maccentral.com
July 20, 2004 7:10 pm ET

Using Mac OS X's Software Update system preferences pane to update your operating system and Apple-made applications could become a thing of the past, if a lawsuit pending against Apple Computer Inc. and Microsoft Corp. gets its way. Both companies have been named as defendants in a lawsuit recently filed in the Federal Court for the Northern District of California. The plaintiff in the case is Teleshuttle Technologies LLC. The suit alleges that Apple and Microsoft are infringing a patent that covers online software updates.

The software technology's inventor is Richard Reisman, who filed the patent on April 20, 2000 -- a continuation of other patents dating back to 1994. The US Patent and Trademark Office on April 29, 2003 granted Reisman patent number 6,557,054. The patent describes a "Method and system for distributing updates by presenting directory of software available for user installation that is not already installed on user station."

Reisman's Teleshuttle Corp. and licensee BTG International Inc. claimed in a statement published Tuesday that Reisman's work dates back to the early 1990s, "well before the Internet became mainstream." Intellectual property and technology development company BTG said that it's the exclusive worldwide licensee of the technology developed by Reisman.

Read the full story @ MacCentral

[rudeboy]

this guy just wants to get paid thats all. i'm sure apple and microsoft can pay him his dues.

[mgd]

Isn't this technology employed by ant-virus services as well? Shouldn't they be included in the lawsuit? Or have they been paying their "dues"?

[monster]

everyone wants to get paid. even those with the vaguest of codes...