Macromedia Countersues Adobe - Page 2

to court. We just didn't have a choice."

Steven Dellett, a patent lawyer at the Dallas-based Fulbright & Jaworski, said it was hard to tell how the suit would shake down because very few Internet-related patent suits have made it all the way through litigation.

"The significance of this patent depends on whether or not there are commercially viable alternatives for Macromedia," Dellett said. "They have to decide whether it is worth the cost of litigation to fight it, or if they want to find other solutions."

As for Macromedia's "prior art" argument, Dellett said the claim is used in nearly every patent case.

"Parties may also rexamine the patent," he said. "In this particular case, Adobe's patent is very brief and not very technical -- only two-and-a-half pages long, which is unusual. This may call into question the validity and may be a cause for reexamination."