• Bloomberg, Thursday, January 4, 2007 12:15 PM

Online movie distributor Intertainer Inc. has sued Apple Computer, Google and Napster for "willful and deliberate" patent infringement. Intertainer issued a complaint in federal court in Marshall, Texas, that Apple, the maker of the ubiquitous iPod music player, Google, the world's biggest search engine, and Napster, a distributor of online music, have infringed on its patented technology for distributing digital entertainment over the Internet.

The small movie distributor, whose backers include Microsoft and Intel Corp., is requesting an order to halt the companies' digital distribution services as well as cash compensation, claiming irreparable harm. In August 2005 Intertainer received a patent covering a "digital entertainment service platform," according to court papers. The three companies each declined to comment on the pending litigation.

The digital age makes the laborious system of filing and waiting for a patent to be issued look outdated. Even if Intertainer's technology was created before Apple's iTunes or Napster's music store, which are each nearly 5-years-old, there's scant chance those companies willfully copied any technology developed by Intertainer. Things move so swiftly these days and so many similar ideas are developed and fleshed out at the same time. It may be time for the U.S. patent system Web 2.0 overhaul.

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