The ongoing patent dispute between Sony and LG appears to be heating up – “several thousand” PS3s have been seized by Dutch police, according to The Guardian.
The units have been taken from Sony’s biggest European warehouse, suggesting LG is deadly serious about all this, with Sony being forced to attend an emergency hearing at the Hague today to battle the blockade.
The newspaper suggests that LG will apply to have the consoles destroyed as part of the judgment over Blu-ray patens, allegedly infringed by Sony in the games machine.
“If Sony is found to have infringed LG patents,” say The Guardian, “it could be forced to compensate the South Korean manufacturer for each PS3 it has sold around the world, which could cost hundreds of millions of pounds.”
This is in addition to blocks at both Rotterdam and Amsterdam’s Schiphol, where most of the imports of PS3 comes from for both UK and Europe. There are approximately 100,000 PS3s imported this way each week.
“This is only a preliminary injunction,” said a Sony spokesperson, “that has resulted in shipments being temporarily withheld. It does not indicate any acceptance of LG’s allegations. We consider these allegations unwarranted, and will take appropriate measures including filing a claim of opposition to courts in the Netherlands. We will not comment on any further details.”
Embo1
lol, lg are super duper serial!
BIGAL-1992
A bit of a draconian measure that was. Does anyone else agree?
teflon
LG want Linux on their PS3s again. Also, Microsoft clearly paid for their legal fees and stuff…
I think I may be getting my stories mixed up. :S
Dan Lee
“LG will apply to have the consoles destroyed”
NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO, what a WASTE.
Mr-Flame-Head
im wondering if the the place these consoles are to be destroyed in are taking on staff round about now i mean nobody will notice if a few go missing will they, i doubt anybody will do an inventory count after destruction
hazelam
yeah, i’d be only too happy to assist in “disposing” of a few ps3s. ^_^
Ed the Penguin
@Mr-Flame-Head You’d be surprised, what with the environmental WEEE regulations that go on these days.. Madness!
bajere
yea they will count each one destroyed for stock,tax,and balance sheet reasons. i wouldn’t be surprised if they note all the serial numbers down as well to keep proof
hazelam
you missed one important part.
“LG has won a court order enabling it to seize all new PS3 across the Netherlands – including those already in Dutch homes”
so even the ps3 in your home, if you live in the netherlands, might not be safe.
Boomshanks
Oh my God. This… is… a… nightmare.
The Lone Steven
Boomshanks was arrested the following day for possessing a ps3 and a lot of games.:P
They cannot grab people’s ps3s from them just because of a lawsuit. They are effectly robbing people who paid 300 euros for a console. There will be a lot of p*ssed gamers but we might see a surge in xbox360 sales over there.:P
Voganlight
Whaaaaaaaatttt!!!
jayjay119
This is rediculous on the part of LG. I can see that they have a point if Sony have indeed infringed copyright but why wait this long? It’s just completely stupid and makes LG look rather petty, whether they win or not, they will come out worse in this in terms of public opinion. Not that they care I´m sure but I’m certainly put off by buying another LG product in future. Also, it’s quite hypocritical of them considering Sony have a counter claim on their mobile phone copyright enfringements. Thank god the rest of the worlds juidicial systems seem to have some sense, no offence intended to any Dutch people.
BIGAL-1992
Can I just ask, what is a ‘Paten’? Anyone?
Mike
A patent without the ‘t’ :p
SpikeyMikey23
is that T going spare? could do with a cup….
BIGAL-1992
It was meant to be sarcasm. I just wanted to see the reaction.
hazelam
i think it’s an ypo.
TheDeathAvenger
Don’t you mean ‘think it’s a ypo’? ;)
amiga_dude
This is called karma. From extrem levels of builling of Geohot.
And Sony should know about Karma coming from Japan.
Watchful
Why? Karma is a part of primarily Indian religions, not the Shinto religion which is indigenous to Japan.
Of course I accept that Japanese citizens can and do follow other religions, but there’s no reason they should know any more about the principles behind the belief in Karma than anyone else on the planet.
Though they may well know more about Karma than at least one person I can think of.
ScottW-1976
Would you like a hand down of that horse Watchful, it does look very high……
TheDeathAvenger
You’ll need to shout it, he can’t hear you! ;)
The Lone Steven
*looks at aging PS3* i hope the levels of stock in the uk won’t be affected by it. You just know somewhere a fanboy is raging over this while another fanboy is dancing with joy. If LG wins would this mean an early death for the PS3? I hope not. There must have been some shocked employess when the ducth police turned up to take the ps3s away. All LG is doing is punishing people who have nothing to do with it if their ps3 dies and they can’t get one due to a shortage.:(
bunimomike
Seeing as the places they’ve intercepted are the two main ports for all of Europe (yes, including us) then we’re already suffering. Ten days ago, they thought most retailers could only hold out for a month, tops!
moshi
Or they could just ship the PS3’s from some other country and Europe’s console live to see another day.
dnlgee
What patents are apparently infringed? Like said above, why wait for so long?
Watchful
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