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12-29-2004, 06:22 AM
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#1
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Regular User
Join Date: Dec 2003
Location: BC, Canada
Posts: 530
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mustang sued
http://www.prweb.com/releases/2004/12/prweb186804.htm
Ford's New Mustang Sued for Infringing Patent on User Configurable Multi-Color Instrument Panel.
Beverly Hills, CA (PRWEB) December 8, 2004 -- Frank Weyer, a patent attorney and inventor of U.S. Patent No. 5,975,728 issued on Nov. 2, 1999 announced today that he has sued Ford Motor Company for patent infringement. According to the complaint filed in the U.S. District Court for the Central District of California as Civil Action No. 04-08630 CBM (SHx), the "MyColor" TM option that is part of the interior upgrade package on the highly touted 2005 Ford Mustang infringes Mr. Weyer's patent for "Method and Apparatus for Providing User Selectable Multi-Color Instrument Panel Illumination." Mr. Weyer conceived of his invention while a graduate student at M.I.T. After the U.S. Patent Office granted the patent in 1999, Mr. Weyer sent a letter to Ford and other automobile manufacturers offering to license his invention. Ford did not respond.
Now, five years later, the new Ford Mustang features a user color-changeable instrument panel lighting system Ford calls "MyColor" that Mr. Weyer claims infringes his patent. Mr. Weyer is seeking damages and an injunction that would prevent Ford from selling or delivering any new Mustangs with the "MyColor" option. Mr. Weyer, filed the complaint on October 19, 2004. Prior to formally serving the complaint, Mr. Weyer contacted Ford, and offered to reach a cooperative resolution. Ford initially requested additional time to respond, which Mr. Weyer granted. After two months without a substantive response from Ford, according to court rules, Mr. Weyer was required to formally serve Ford with the complaint.
Mr. Weyer has informed Ford's in-house counsel that he is preparing a preliminary injunction motion that he intends to file in the near future. The preliminary injunction, if granted, would immediately bar Ford from offering for sale, selling, manufacturing or delivering any 2005 Mustangs with the infringing MyColor feature. That could prove to be a disappointment for Ford, which has launched a massive media push behing the 2005 Mustang, hoping that sales of the Mustang will drive its passenger car sales as a whole.
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sw20
eg6
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12-29-2004, 06:29 AM
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#2
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Regular User
Join Date: Apr 2004
Location: Bellevue, Washington
Posts: 3,694
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i gotta say Ford is getting PWNED!!!
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12-29-2004, 07:44 AM
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#3
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Regular User
Join Date: Nov 2003
Location: NoVA/Ohio, USA
Posts: 946
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nicely done ford! that's right up there with losing the rights to the GT40 name
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Xbox Live Gamertag: TheSlusbe
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12-29-2004, 09:59 AM
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#4
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Regular User
Join Date: Jun 2003
Location: Ljubljana, Slovenia
Posts: 665
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Hmmm ... I wonder if Mustang instrument panel changes the colour in the same way (technically, meaning that they use same type of equipment and so ...) as this guys patent. Cause if it's just the changing of the colours that he's bitching about, well ...
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L 555 BAT
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12-29-2004, 10:00 AM
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#5
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Regular User
Join Date: Jun 2003
Location: Texas
Posts: 15,413
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Maybe they should have put in a decent engine and sold the car with a MySpeed option... 
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12-29-2004, 11:36 AM
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#6
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Regular User
Join Date: Aug 2004
Location: Solihull, UK
Posts: 2,766
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If I was him I'd sue for royalties - i.e. for each car they sell, they have to give him $5 or whatever!!
How many of the old shape are out there???
He could be a very rich man.
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Current: 2008 BMW 118d SE, 2002 Honda S2000, 2007 Honda CBR600RR
Previous: 2003 Z4 3.0i SMG, 1995 Aprilia RS250
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12-29-2004, 12:08 PM
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#7
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Regular User
Join Date: Oct 2003
Location: Charleston, S.C. USA
Posts: 985
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Originally Posted by RC45
Maybe they should have put in a decent engine and sold the car with a MySpeed option... |
That's a good one RC ! They also implemented a MyGod sticker price when it first came out.
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1996 Mustang Cobra. Vortech Kompressor installed.
 Many pilots of the time were the opinion that a fighter pilot in a closed cockpit was an impossible thing, because you should smell the enemy. You could smell them because of the oil they were burning.
Adolf Galland
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12-29-2004, 12:30 PM
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#8
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Regular User
Join Date: Jun 2003
Location: Texas
Posts: 15,413
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Originally Posted by FoxFour
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Originally Posted by RC45
Maybe they should have put in a decent engine and sold the car with a MySpeed option... |
That's a good one RC ! They also implemented a MyGod sticker price when it first came out. |
No kidding - some people in Houston paid thousands over sticker - for the V6...
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12-29-2004, 01:50 PM
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#9
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Regular User
Join Date: Jun 2003
Location: Minnesota, United States
Posts: 3,120
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nicely done ford! that's right up there with losing the rights to the GT40 name
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Thats because they didn't trademark the name. Someone else did it. Who then tried to screw Ford over. Ford said, "Homie don't play dat"
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No kidding - some people in Houston paid thousands over sticker - for the V6...
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A GT on Ebay went for $12k over sticker. Fricken morons.
That said, I want a 2005 Mustang GT. In black please.
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12-29-2004, 05:26 PM
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#10
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Regular User
Join Date: Oct 2003
Location: Hellaware USA
Posts: 3,865
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actually.. this is pretty much bunk... a man patented the idea of a dash board that changed colors.. there have been cars made be4fore that did this in some way.. Its the case of some jackass making random patents to sue.
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12-30-2004, 02:46 AM
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#11
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Join Date: Aug 2004
Location: VA, Norfolk.
Posts: 833
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omfg i'm gonna go sue ford for winning Le Mans. Why? you may ask. because it was my idea.
I geuss the guy who invented the cd-rom can sue DELL for using them in their computers and PS and XBOX.
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"No poor dumb bastard ever won a war by dying for his country. He won it by making the other poor dumb bastard die for his country."-Patton WW2
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12-30-2004, 03:38 AM
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#12
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Regular User
Join Date: Jan 2004
Location: Detroit
Posts: 9,929
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Originally Posted by FordGTGuy
omfg i'm gonna go sue ford for winning Le Mans. Why? you may ask. because it was my idea.
I geuss the guy who invented the cd-rom can sue DELL for using them in their computers and PS and XBOX.
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well actually (regarding cd's)
phillips owns the rights to the TM Compact Disc, and had (or at least attempted) to sue cirtain record labels for making discs bearing the logo that didnt conform to the Compact Disc standard~being unable to be read in computers, old cd players etc.
im unsure how that has turned out, or if its still being persued.
what the guy is suing over is something called intelectual properties, or rights, rather then a phisical property... sometimes they hold weight, other times they dont... this seems to be a case of the latter.
in the case of intellectual properties that do hold weight, GM Daewoo is suing some chinese automaker for coping one of their cars... so successfully, that many parts are interchangable... such an intelectual property would definately stand up in western courts... who knows about chinese courts.
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12-30-2004, 06:26 PM
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#13
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Regular User
Join Date: Oct 2003
Location: Hellaware USA
Posts: 3,865
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phillips owns the rights to the TM Compact Disc, and had (or at least attempted) to sue cirtain record labels for making discs bearing the logo that didnt conform to the Compact Disc standard~being unable to be read in computers, old cd players etc.
im unsure how that has turned out, or if its still being persued.
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Another example.. sony gets royalties for every dvd player made..
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such an intelectual property would definately stand up in western court
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My nderstanding is that this individual one might be a little harder due to the broad ness of the patent as well as previsous uses there of
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12-30-2004, 06:43 PM
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#14
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Regular User
Join Date: Dec 2003
Posts: 1,062
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big company trying to out muscle the little man - hope the guy gets his money worth.
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12-30-2004, 08:42 PM
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#15
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Regular User
Join Date: Feb 2004
Location: Chicagoland
Posts: 3,627
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Originally Posted by ikon2003
big company trying to out muscle the little man - hope the guy gets his money worth.
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Actually this is the other way around it seems he is trying to out do the corporate guys. he will get bitch slapped by corporate lawyers that will dig up the most minute flaws in this man's case. and just to rub it in I think Ford should offer it in all their cars for free.
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