Remember back in February when a federal jury found that Microsoft owed Alcatel-Lucent $1.5 billion dollars for violation of 2 MP3-related patents held by that company? Yeah, looks like Microsoft isn't going to have to pay up after all.

A federal judge has reversed the decision, after finding that Lucent did not solely own the rights to one of the patents, and that Microsoft had properly licensed that technology from the co-owner of the patent.

And the other patent? Yeah, the judge ruled that Microsoft simply hadn't infringed on that one.

Alctael-Lucent plans to appeal the latest decision. While the lengthy appeals process could get rather expensive, it's not likely to approach $1.5 billion any time soon, so what does the company have to lose, besides face? And some money. And time.