“We have a high profile, and that attracts a lot of people
who think you can be intimidated or pushed around into
an easy settlement,” Ullyot says. “That’s not our style or my
style. If you try to take a pound of flesh, we’ll fight back very
hard. I am a Kirkland-trained litigator, and I like litigation.”
ULLYOT CONTINUED FROM PAGE 16
disclosure meetings related to patents to
understanding they are a necessary evil.
Now they look at patents as a means to an
ends. If we want to build good products
for the user, we have to minimize the
distractions that keep us from achieving
that—like the Yahoo litigation.”
Ah, yes—Yahoo. As Facebook was
preparing for its IPO, Yahoo Inc. sued
Facebook claiming patent infringement.
Within a few weeks, Facebook answered
the complaint—denying liability—and
filed counterclaims that accused Yahoo of
infringing on 10 of Facebook’s patents.
“People were surprised at our
willingness to push back and go to trial
in a patent case two years ago rather
than settle,” Ullyot says. “We have a high
profile, and that attracts a lot of people
who think you can be intimidated or
pushed around into an easy settlement.
That’s not our style or my style. If you try
to take a pound of flesh, we’ll fight back
very hard. I am a Kirkland-trained litigator,
and I like litigation.”
For his part, Ullyot says that Facebook
will continue to require “
outside-the-legal-box” thinking because of its
prominence and its position on the
leading edge of privacy and other
technology issues. He points to The Social
Network, the Oscar-winning movie that
depicted the beginnings of Facebook
by screenwriter Aaron Sorkin, creator
of Zuckerberg’s favorite TV show. The
movie was based on a book, so everyone
at Facebook could anticipate the movie’s
perspective, especially with its advertising
tag line “You don’t get to 500 million
friends without making a few enemies.”
“The traditional legal strategy should
have been to threaten litigation or
litigate,” he says. “But we’re a company
that’s about expressing views and
openness. We have a thick skin and can
take it.” Ullyot says the lawyers at Sony,
which made The Social Network, were
surprised that he expressed interest in
seeing the movie during his last phone call
with them. On opening day, Zuckerberg
took the entire company to view the film.
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