Why now?

Why do these people wait for years after the technology hits the market before they decided they invented it?

Did they forget they invented it? Were they sitting in their living rooms one day looking at their new Blu-ray player and they thought "hey that reminds me, I invented blue lasers years ago! I must remember to start a lawsuit on Monday morning"?

Or maybe they sleep in the lab and never get out and then one day someone comes in and says "hey, you know that laser thingy we invented - they are actually using them now out there, and guess what? They are blue as well!"

Yeah, I know there's more to it than that, but please ...

I was wondering when..

this was going to happen. I remember seeing a huge deal about blue laser diodes in Popular Science around 6 years ago, give or take a year (my memory isn't what it used to be). They were ranting and raving how this new technology would revolutionize the DVD way of life.

It seems to me that a lot of these patent-holders will let a technology gain a foot-hold in the market before they release allegations about infringement. Whether or not that is the case, or if they just finally realize they had their idea stolen, they always seem to speak up at a pivitol point. How many other stories in the past few MONTHS has everyone seen other patent infringement cases here on INQ?

Now you see what I mean.