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Filed under: Audio, News, Microsoft

Judge throws out $1.5 billion MP3 patent ruling against Microsoft

Microsoft MoneyRemember 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.

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Graveyard Shift - zombie-busting Time Waster

With Halloween fast approaching, it's a great time to get in some practice defending your territory against zombies. In Graveyard Shift, you take aim at zombies and other creepy-crawlies, blasting them into splatters of cartoony green guts. It's a casual first-person shooter, and it's very easy to get the hang of - use the mouse to aim, click to fire. Graveyard Shift has at least 15 levels, and it might even have some secret stages I haven't unlocked yet. They key to getting good at Graveyard Shift is learning to use ...

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