The much feared lawsuit of Eolas vs. Microsoft seems to be over, to the relief of Web professionals around the world. The US Patent and Trademark office has invalidated Eolas’ patent on web browser plug-in technology.
Last year, Eolas won a $521 million lawsuit against Microsoft as well as an injunction that forced Microsoft to remove the technology from it’s Internet Explorer browser. This would have resulted in chaos in the industry as sites all over the world would need to be redesigned.
Eolas has 60 days to respond to the invalidation, but this is probably going to stick.
