Why, our cup runneth over! Just yesterday we dished up a dollop of sweet legal drama when we noted reports that Apple had fired its British lawyers in its trade mark tussle with the Beatles; that implied that a settlement was unlikely and we can look forward to actual courtroom histrionics coming our way. Well, okay, maybe not histrionics, exactly, seeing as British courts are probably a little more staid and reserved than your average episode of Judge Judy, but still, there's some darn fine drama headed thisaway. But guess what? This week we've got a two-fer!

Check it out: according to MacCentral, Apple's just been sued again-- this time by Honeywell, who claims that Apple has infringed on its 1994 patent for technology that "increases the brightness of images and that reduces the appearance of certain interference effects on a liquid crystal display." According to the suit, "Apple has been and is engaged in the manufacture, importation, offer for sale, and/or sale of products that include a liquid crystal display... such products include at least one of the following: laptop computers, cellular phones, PDAs, digital still cameras, video cameras, portable DVD players and portable televisions, and/or portable game systems." Wondering why Honeywell doesn't seem to know exactly what Apple products it's suing over? It's because Apple is only one of over thirty companies to get smacked with an identical suit. That's right, kids, it's a form lawsuit. How sick is that?

Meanwhile, we admit that we aren't exactly legal beagles over here, and we certainly didn't get up off our kiesters and actually look at the patent in question, but we still feel perfectly entitled to emit a Feissian "Nnng?" over why Apple is one of the targeted companies. After all, Apple doesn't make the panels, it just buys them and slaps 'em into PowerBooks and whatnot; surely if there's some technology in those panels that steps on the toes of Honeywell's patent, they should be suing LG and Samsung and anyone else making the LCDs that Apple uses-- and they probably would, if it weren't for the fact that both LG and Samsung have already paid to license the very same technology from Honeywell.

So let's get this straight: Honeywell has a patent on technology that makes LCDs brighter. LG and Samsung license the technology from Honeywell and incorporate it into their panels. Apple buys those panels and sticks them in PowerBooks-- and gets sued by Honeywell? What gives? Especially since, in Samsung's case at least, "the license agreement extends to LCD products that employ Samsung SEC's LCD modules."

Oh, what the heck-- in for a penny, in for a pound, and we were getting up anyway: here's the patent in question, and apparently it covers "a display apparatus including a light source, a liquid crystal panel, and one or more directional diffuser lens arrays disposed therebetween." So presumably Honeywell figures that Apple is buying just panels (not full modules) from LG and Samsung and then sticking them into PowerBooks with its own lamps and diffusers, which we imagine is entirely possible, and in which case the suit probably has merit. Which would be a shame, not just because Apple might have to shell out still more cash to settle another lawsuit, but also because we would really have liked to hear the courtroom arguments in which Honeywell accused Apple of "buying properly-licensed technology" and Apple accused Honeywell of "smoking low-grade crack." Maybe next time.