12 Steps: May Still Not Be Enough For 101
Gametek LLC v. ZYNGA Inc., Case No. 13-2546 (Judge Seeborg) (Related to Case Nos. 13-3089; 13-3472; and 13-3493)
Not every patent case must be litigated on the merits through summary judgment or trial in order to end with a finding of invalidity. Rather, at least when challenging § 101 patent eligibility, an early Rule 12(c) motion for judgment on the pleadings can stop a case before it even takes off, as Judge Seeborg's April 25, 2014 Order, finding Plaintiff Gametek's sole asserted patent invalid, makes clear.
The case involved U.S. Patent No. 7,076,445 directed to facilitation of in-game purchases "without interrupting the gaming action." Representative claim 1 recites "twelve steps" which Plaintiff believed to establish patent eligibility:
A method of managing the operation of a game which includes a game environment, and is programmed to control a gaming action for at least one of a plurality of users, said managing method using a programmed computer to effect the following steps:
tracking the activity of the at least one user in the course of the gaming action; permitting the at least one user to create an account for receiving a consideration of the at least one user, the at least one user having a set of demographics; determining the eligibility of the at least one user to purchase at least one of a plurality of game objects, said eligibility determining comprises the following sub steps: permitting the at least one user to select the at least one game object, setting the purchase price of the at least one game object, and comparing the account balance of the at least one user's consideration with the set price of the at least one game object and, determining if the balance of the user's consideration is not less than the set price, determining the at least one user to be eligible to purchase the at least one game object; displaying in the game environment a purchase price of the at least one game object; presenting to the at least one user an offer to purchase the game object dependent upon a group of game parameters comprising the tracked activity of the at least one gaming action of the at least one user and, the one game environment or the one set of demographics of the at least one user permitting the at least one user to purchase the at least one game object at the set purchase price without interrupting the gaming action of the at least one user; and supplying the at least one purchased game object to the at least one user...
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