Last week, a consortium that included Apple, EMC, Ericsson, Microsoft, Research In Motion and Sony won 6,000 Nortel patents for a cool $4.5 billion. Google had started the bidding with a $900 million stalking horse bid, reportedly got cute with Pi-related offers and lost its best chance to defend Android in the courtroom. Nortel's patents are one swell swan song for the bankrupt telecom equipment provider that has already been split up and sold in chunks.