Twitter has drafted up what they’re calling the Innovator’s Patent Agreement (IPA). With it, the company is promising to only use their patents as the actual inventor intended — read: defensively, not offensively.

More specifically:

The IPA is a new way to do patent assignment that keeps control in the hands of engineers and designers. It is a commitment from Twitter to our employees that patents can only be used for defensive purposes. We will not use the patents from employees’ inventions in offensive litigation without their permission. What’s more, this control flows with the patents, so if we sold them to others, they could only use them as the inventor intended.

Excellent news. Twitter is promising to implement the IPA later this year and says that it will apply to all their patents past and present. Yes, this means things like Loren Brichter’s pull-to-refresh (which he’s excited about).

Hopefully other startups large and small will follow Twitter’s lead here. It would be really excellent if larger companies (*cough* Yahoo *cough*) did as well, but it’s hard to see that happening given the current state of things. This is a movement that will have to start from the ground up.

Big time kudos to Twitter for this.

I wonder how much money Yahoo is wasting by trying to sue Facebook? 

The strange priorities of a dying company… 

Yahoo should buy them to bolster their bullshit lawsuit against Facebook. There’s probably some patent in there about the use of the color blue within online systems. 

lilly:

I’ve been thinking about the situation with Yahoo suing Facebook regarding some older patents, and observing the reactions online in blogs and on Twitter. I’ve been struck by how unanimous it’s been, and the emerging narrative that Yahoo has somehow crossed a line, that Internet companies don’t…

A smart take on the Yahoo/Facebook patent situation by John Lilly. I think he’s right, there’s more fueling the outpouring of hatred directed at Yahoo than just their patent maneuvers. BUT, I also think their maneuvers are particularly bullshit in this case. Look at what it is they’re suing Facebook over. It’s things that nearly all social services use. It’s obvious things. Things that existed before Yahoo patented them. 

Lilly is right that many other patent lawsuits are bullshit as well — particularly in software. But Yahoo is being unreasonably evil and stupid here. Why didn’t they sue, say, 5 years ago? Why aren’t they suing 200 other companies “infringing” their silly patents? 

It’s because, like Kodak, they’re dying. And these are the actions that a dying company resorts to. With Kodak, it’s obvious — they’re bankrupt. And people feel sort of sorry for them as a result. Yahoo is not bankrupt, so it’s not-so-obvious. But they are still very much dying. And they clearly know it, hence, the lawsuit.

Maybe we should feel bad for Yahoo here too. But we don’t yet. But we will someday in the not-too-distant future. The saddest thing now is that they probably really think this lawsuit will help save them. It won’t.

Fred Wilson:

I am not writing this in defense of Facebook. They can and will defend themselves. I am wrting this in outrage at Yahoo! I used to care about that company for some reason. No more. They are dead to me. Dead and gone. I hate them now.

I have yet to read anyone not in agreement that Yahoo’s move here is total bullshit. They’ve really, truly (and probably irreversibly) fucked their reputation in the tech community here. That will be fatal. 

Just remember this when they’re chopped up and sold for parts in a few years. Or — more poetically — when Facebook buys them just to turn out the lights.

Put a fork in Yahoo, they’re now officially done.

As relayed by Michael J. De La Merced of The New York Times:

“Yahoo has a responsibility to its shareholders, employees and other stakeholders to protect its intellectual property,” a Yahoo spokesman said in an e-mailed statement. “We must insist that Facebook either enter into a licensing agreement or we will be compelled to move forward unilaterally to protect our rights.”

“We must insist”. It sounds a lot like one of those foreign leaders in the video game Civilization that is clearly losing and starts to make empty threats. 

But what’s really weird here is how much Yahoo now relies on Facebook for integration points and traffic. Is new CEO Scott Thompson insane, or just a huge ass? Or both? Hard to tell right now.

As a side note, remember five and a half years ago (!) when Yahoo almost bought Facebook for $1 billion? Best move Facebook ever didn’t do.

Betabeat’s Adrianne Jeffries is optimistic after sitting down with Flickr product head Markus Spiering and seeing a glimpse of what they’re working on. It sounds like it will be more of a gradual change over the year though, rather than one major revamp.

Three words not nearly mentioned enough: mobile, mobile, mobile. The only part of the story that mentions this says:

But Flickr is reorienting according to Yahoo’s “mobile first” strategy and the design is thoughtful and forward-looking.

That’s far too vague to be promising in any way. But Spiering was a mobile guy in his previous life within Yahoo, so maybe there’s some hope. 

A sad, oddly quiet exit of a man who co-founded a staple of the web 17 years ago. The statements are extremely vapid all around.

But maybe the fact that this didn’t leak is a positive sign for Yahoo. Patching up the holes instead of continuing to move forward with them as they slowly sink.

Big day for Microsoft. Spend another $10 billion or so and they may pass Lycos.