Doesn't this seem a big odd? Going after the developer? Wowzer. Probably due to the fact they know legal action with the smaller people would be less of a struggle than dealing with apple and their billions?

So odd.

Damn, can Apple do anything nowadays without being sued?

I know the story says there isn't any evidence so far that Apple has been sued for this, but I guarantee they have been.

I wonder how generic those systems for data collection are. If the patent is one of those mindless ones where they describe something obvious which gets thrown out of court, then this company may just be trying to scare developers into submission, knowing that Apple would kick their asses.

I hate these patent sitters and the lame patent office that doesn't understand IT or what is and is not innovation.

This is obviously an extortion racket, with the "patent holder" going after app developers rather than Apple with the expectation that they'll be able to force them to pay for licensing to avoid the legal costs.

I wonder if developers could circumvent the patent troll by registering their entity in another country and operating from there. Then said troll would have to sue Apple for providing the content infringing on the patent and that's not going to happen.

Dear Patent Troll,

I appreciate your absurdity. I am merely a pawn in Apple's plan to dominate the world. I use their tools, their guidelines, their framework, and do their bidding. Take it up with them.

Thanks,

developer

This is stupid. I'm still waiting on a decent overview of the lawsuit to see what's going on, but from what I've read they're basically suing developers who us IAP to "upgrade" an app from a trial version to a paid version.

Aka, they're suing over an upgrade button. Are they also suing all those companies that provide upgrade options via their computer programs?

According to Nilay Patel, Intellectual ventures (a known patent troll) is involved. Most likely they are going after individual developers hoping to get quick payoffs because their patent would struggle to hold up in court. It's also apparently very similar to a patent Microsoft received at a later date. No doubt if they went after Apple, they'd lose the patent so they're hoping to scare some devs into paying out first.

It's just another sign that US patent law is completely broken.