Written the night of 2/1 through 2/2

After that great series of reports from BurstingSquidoo, you are probably waiting with bated breath to see if I will, or will not, confirm his impressions.

Well, you can consider it, CONFIRMED!

That was such a good reporting job, I'm going to take Joe's reports and use them as a guide to type my own impressions. I'll try not to just repeat what he wrote, but fill in where I can. That's the benefit of having several people in the courtroom at the same time. One person cannot be expected to catch all the language, arguments and nuances of same. For example, he made a lot of observations that I missed, because I was frantically writing down copious notes to help me later with preparation for the Claims Hearing itself in 7 days. Thank god that BurstingSquidoo is such an excellent observer of the minutest details. Between his reports and mine, you will have the benefit of being in that courtroom as the Claims Construction drama began its surprising first day!

It was quite a bevy of lawyers in the room! I was particularly surprised by the number of Apple people. When J. Patel asked for a show of hands of how many were attorneys, I noted about 3 or 4 "new" legal "hands" in the back of the courtroom. I disagree with Joe a bit here. It seemed to me that the two sides were almost "in balance," compared to previous meetings where Burst's side greatly outnumber the Apple side.

The important point here, I believe, was the large number of add'l attorneys. Some knew each other, and they remained separate from Power's firm's group. It seems apparent that they were from Apple's Legal Department!

Yes, indeed, this case has finally risen to the level of interest (probably GREAT interest) of the boys (and girls) in Cupertino. This may have explained Powers' very aggressive presentation style. Just maybe, he is feeling the heat from Apple Hdqts.! At a minimum, the hot glare of the Apple Legal Dept. is focusing on him from this day forward. I can't say whether or not the new general counsel, Rosenberg, was in court today. But I wouldn't be surprised to see Rosenberg in the courtroom on 2/8. In fact, I would be surprised if he were NOT! Rosenberg would be almost DERELICT in his duty if he did NOT appear in court for this next hearing. It seems to me that Apple is digging itself a hole from which it may be difficult to get out of. If so, the cost to Apple is not going to be cheap.

The intro of Dr. Hemami was FANTASTIC! Parker Folse ticked off her credentials: full professor of electrical engineering, Cornell University, 13 years on the faculty, Ph.D. Stanford University. (Doesn't hurt that Stanford is the top school in the Bay Area, just down the road in Palo Alto.), Fulbright Distinguished Lecturer at the Faculte de Sciences, Rabat, Morocco, member of the IEEE where she chairs the Image and Multidimensional Signal Processing Technical Committee, and author of over 100 "peer-reviewed articles" in her field. Prior to her post at Cornell, Dr. Hemami also worked at Hewlett-Packard Labs, also in the nearby Palo Alto.

WOW, WOW, WOW!