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British inventor seeks to take $18bn bite out of Apple in bitter patent war
(www.theguardian.com)
This is a most excellent place for technology news and articles.
The patent was filed in 1999 but wasn't granted until late-2000s. I dunno what US patent law states but I would have thought it's back dated to when it was applied.
But I think this all part of the battle because the US patent office has refused to release internal emails that could shed light on all this.
Something fishy is going on and he's already won some cases.
The US didn't do things that way until Nov 2000. Patents filed for before then were given a term based on their publication date. So sometimes applicants deliberately tied up their applications with filings and amendments to delay their publication date and give them a bit more time when the patent ca be enforced.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Submarine_patent