Technology, Lawsuit | featured news

A lawsuit by media giant Viacom against Google over copyrighted videos on YouTube can be heard in court again.

YouTube and Paramount Pictures have reached a deal to make nearly 500 films available to rent online, even while their parent companies continue to feud over a $1 billion lawsuit.

Facebook said Tuesday that it has filed a countersuit against Yahoo, claiming that Yahoo violates Facebook patents that relate to photo-sharing, the news feed, tagging digital media and other Web elements that build in social features in Web sites.

Ever find yourself frustrated with how smoothly Siri seems to work for the folks in Apple’s commercials but not for you? A New York man has filed a class-action suit against Apple, saying that the company has been “misleading and deceptive” about what the iPhone 4S virtual assistant can do.

Yahoo Inc sued Facebook Inc on Monday over 10 patents that include methods and systems for advertising on the Web, according to a copy of the lawsuit.

That was the headline on a conservative blog following a $2.5 million judgment this month against blogger Crystal Cox in a defamation case tried in federal court in Oregon. It’s a case followed closely in both the blogosphere and in the traditional media, as it highlights the proliferation of blogging, the blurring of lines between journalists and bloggers and more libel cases born out of blog posts.

Novell Inc. sued the software giant in 2004, claiming Microsoft duped it into developing the once-popular WordPerfect writing program for Windows 95 only to pull the plug so Microsoft could gain market share with its own product. Novell says it was later forced to sell WordPerfect for a $1.2 billion loss.

Carrier IQ threatens and then drops legal action against a developer who claimed that the company's code could be used to monitor smartphones.

Righthaven's dream of corporate enrichment via frivolous lawsuits is in tatters, and the company's erstwhile partners are abandoning ship. The new CEO of MediaNews Group, John Paton, announced this week that its partnership with Righthaven would expire at the end of the month and that the company has no plans to renew it.

Cameron and Tyler Winklevoss, Harvard University classmates and former business partners of Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg, have decided not to further appeal a settlement in their long-running dispute over the origins of Facebook.