Xfire, Yahoo near terms for settlement

  • By Curt Feldman, GameSpot
  • Posted Nov 23, 2005 2:57 pm PT

Pivotal hearing in early December scrapped as parties seek to settle patent infringement lawsuit out of court.

With an important hearing looming, Xfire attorneys have petitioned the court hearing the Yahoo! v. Xfire patent infringement case, seeking a delay in further proceedings while the parties themselves negotiate the final terms of a settlement.

In documents filed on November 8, 2005, with the federal district court hearing the case, attorneys for Xfire state "Plaintiffs Yahoo! Inc. and Defendant Xfire, Inc. believe they have reached agreement on key terms for settlement of this dispute."

The dispute revolves around patents that apply to the Yahoo Messenger instant message service. Yahoo alleges that an Xfire client application provides a similar service to its users and taps protected technology.

The Yahoo patent was granted to two once-Yahoo employees Brian Gottlieb and Chris Kirmse in March of 2004. After his tenure at Yahoo ended, Kirmse transitioned to Xfire, becoming its vice president of engineering. Yahoo claims that "after Kirmse joined defendant [Xfire], defendant began to develop, test, and offer instant messenger 'client' software and a messenger server that, when operated with game servers, offers the capabilities of the invention."

In January 2005, Yahoo filed a lawsuit against Xfire in US District Court alledging the infringement.

On December 9, 2005--in what would have been the latest chapter in the dispute--Xfire was to have presented its Motion for Summary Judgment of Non-Infringement to the presiding judge, the Honorable Jeremy Fogel.

The November 8 filing states that "the parties wish to work to reach a final settlement without consuming either their or this Court's resources." The filing asked that the December 9 hearing be stricken from the court docket. On November 21, Judge Fogel signed off on that request.

While the documents filed this week in district court do not specifically outline a settlement nor state that one has been reached, a settlement now seems likely.

Xfire reps declined to comment on the filing. Yahoo reps were preparing a statement at press time.

22 Comments

  • sprawwl

    Posted Nov 28, 2005 9:07 am PT

    yeah. I'm assuming that the guys signed ndas in this case. that would mean that if Yahoo could prove anything, there would be big trouble. The settlement means that they realized they couldn't prove anything- a good sign for us xFire lovers out here.

  • danielsmith2020

    Posted Nov 27, 2005 5:41 am PT

    If you invent something in a big company the patent belongs to the company not you personally, it's stupid buts that is how it works. Yahoo was basing there case on this assuming that the 2 former employee's copied the code for xfire without any proof, that is probably why there settling out of court as they couldn't prove anything.

  • Fable68

    Posted Nov 26, 2005 4:44 pm PT

    Way to take out the competition pretty gay move on yahoos part

  • homsuplo75

    Posted Nov 26, 2005 9:41 am PT

    Since AIM came out before both Yahoo and MSN messangers there is no way Yahoo can claim anything on that technology. Microsoft messanger is built on top of an internal messaging system that operating systems have so it would be much easier for them to have their own software than to try and use Yahoo's.

    Yahoo is going after Xfire because of the proprietary, patented code that Xfire is using.

  • D3j1k0

    Posted Nov 26, 2005 7:53 am PT

    yahoo is just sueing Xfire b/c it can, if it thought it could win a lawsuit against the other messangers they would sue them too =P

  • griftgfx

    Posted Nov 26, 2005 5:03 am PT

    The only thing I know for sure is that Xfire rocks.

    They could use some help cleaning up the interface a bit--but it's a great IM client for gamers. Not as full featured as AOL AIM, but given what it does that other IM Clients can't really provide--it's well worth running it in addition to another client (I prefer trillian for my other connections) if you're into Windows gaming.

  • Jimbokundesu

    Posted Nov 25, 2005 9:50 pm PT

    But doesn't the patent belong to the actual inventors, not the company? If the patent is theirs, they should be able to use the technology they are credited with inventing no matter what company they work for.

  • i_like_toast

    Posted Nov 25, 2005 8:52 pm PT

    the concept it that the guys, who worker for yahoo, used pattened techology(therefore only yahoo can use) in order to create xfire.

  • skyswordsman

    Posted Nov 25, 2005 8:34 pm PT

    I believe its true that xfire hasnt 'infringed' on anything yahoo has. Maybe its jelous and wants xfires code to incorporate it into itself.

  • punishing1

    Posted Nov 25, 2005 10:00 am PT

    It's gotta be partly driven by Yahoo's purchase of All-Seeing-Eye - a competitor to something like X-Fire...which happens to be a pay-for service dontchaknow.

    Way to beat the competition!

  • Mulder123

    Posted Nov 25, 2005 3:54 am PT

    I think that Yahoo are too greedy for money and I believe they soon will be out of business with GMail and Skype as their concurents. This is just a waste of money for both sides. Yahoo will one day be closed!

  • gamealot

    Posted Nov 24, 2005 9:19 am PT

    Damn, makes me want to sue my neighbor for using the same oxygen as me. HEY, they also use the same type of pencil i do to make art, so there art is gonna be just like mine, even though you cant tell

  • gamealot

    Posted Nov 24, 2005 9:18 am PT

    Damn, makes me want to sue my neighbor for using the same oxygen as me. HEY, they also use the same type of pencil i do to make art, so there art is gonna be just like mine, even though you cant tell

  • nemes1s3000

    Posted Nov 24, 2005 3:28 am PT

    XFire is free, but the team earns cash with advertising and so forth.

  • Swampthing

    Posted Nov 24, 2005 2:23 am PT

    It's pretty obvious to me that Yahoo wants to acquire Xfire and are using this tactic to drive them into sale submission .

  • NorthsReturn

    Posted Nov 23, 2005 6:45 pm PT

    Isnt xfire free though? Seems silly to go after something that isnt costing the company money. (Seems to me Yahoo is just jealous of Xifre's popularity among gamers, but what do I know?)

  • xaos

    Posted Nov 23, 2005 4:14 pm PT

    They are probably suing based on non-compete agreements that the named inventors would have signed at Yahoo, under the assumption they are taking the patented technology they invented but that Yahoo owns and selling it somewhere else.

  • Escapingjail

    Posted Nov 23, 2005 4:03 pm PT

    Ive never seen anything like Xfire on Yahoo sooooo this leads me to Believe they are sueing over nothing.

  • Sabooya

    Posted Nov 23, 2005 3:29 pm PT

    Yah isnt it weird how to lesser known/used companies are going at it?

  • Spartan2929

    Posted Nov 23, 2005 3:14 pm PT

    if yahoo is sueing xfire, why dont they go after aim or msn

  • Donkeljohn Site moderator

    Posted Nov 23, 2005 3:14 pm PT

    That is how the US Justice system should work. When two parties have a business conflict they settle their dispute without using valuable civic and government resources. Especially if it involves large sums of money.

  • fizzlefist

    Posted Nov 23, 2005 3:09 pm PT

    first

    now i feel silly

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