Award For “Stupid Patent” Draws A Libel Suit

Back in June of 2016, San Francisco-based Electronic Frontier Foundation bestowed its “Stupid Patent of the Month” award on an Australian company that provides strategic planning to businesses. That company, Global Equity Management SA, or GEMSA, also was known to file a fair number of patent infringement lawsuits in federal court in Texas, regarding two patents in particular. One of them is for an online “virtual cabinet” as a way to portray data storage. According to the Electronic Frontier Foundation, GEMSA is using that patent to sue “just about anyone who runs a website.” After receiving its award, GEMSA demanded an apology, and when it did not get one, it sued EFF n the Supreme Court of South Australia, and it won its case. That court ordered EFF to take down its award article, barred it from publishing anything about GEMSA’s intellectual property, and said if it failed to comply, its property could be seized and its directors imprisoned. EFF, unbowed, says it has no intention of complying and has filed its own lawsuit in U.S. court.