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Apple's legal sharks to protect developers from patent troll Lodsys

The news is making rounds that Apple is going to protect iOS developers from copyright infringement claims by patent troll Lodsys which claims its in-app purchase patents don’t extend to third-party apps distributed on the App Store. FOSS Patents explains that Apple’s legal team has filed a motion with the Eastern District of Texas to intervene as the defendant in a lawsuit from Lodsys:

If the court grants Apple’s motion to participate as an intervenor, Apple has already submitted its answer to the complaint, and its counterclaim. Lodsys can oppose Apple’s motion to intervene. That may happen, but I believe Apple is fairly likely to be admitted as an intervenor.

The publication specialized in patent-related cases has provided the filing which reads:

Apple’s rights will not be adequately protected by the current defendants in this case, because Lodsys has chosen to assert these claims against developers who are individuals or small entities with far fewer resources than Apple and who lack the technical information, ability, and incentive to adequately protect Apple’s rights under its license agreement.

In short, Apple is going to challenge Lodsys’ claims that its licensing agreement with Apple, Microsoft and Google does not extend to third-party developers that use in-app purchases in their apps via system APIs. The same publication reported yesterday that a Michigan company named ForeSee Results Inc. has filed a declaratory judgment suit against Lodsys’s four patents with the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Illinois, seeking to invalidate Lodsys’ patents. You can read Apple’s filing in its entirety right below…

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0. Apple Motion to Intervene Against Lodsyshttp://www.scribd.com/embeds/57508610/content?start_page=1&view_mode=list&access_key=key-bin5ccd3u6mkxkk9rcb

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