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In fact, the whole purpose of patents it to teach an individual of ordinary skill in the appropriate art how to produce the invention.

So:

http://patft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?Sect1=PTO2&Sect2=HITOFF&p=1&u=%2Fnetahtml%2FPTO%2Fsearch-bool.html&r=5&f=G&l=50&co1=AND&d=PTXT&s1=%22landmark+digital%22&OS=%22landmark+digital%22&RS=%22landmark+digital%22

http://patft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?Sect1=PTO2&Sect2=HITOFF&p=1&u=%2Fnetahtml%2FPTO%2Fsearch-bool.html&r=2&f=G&l=50&co1=AND&d=PTXT&s1=%22landmark+digital%22&OS=%22landmark+digital%22&RS=%22landmark+digital%22

Go read how they made what they made.

As an aside, I wonder if an argument could be made to invalidate their patents on the grounds that their fear of useful teaching of their own invention being made public is an indication that they themselves do not believe that the patents represent sufficient information to teach one of ordinary skill in the art.

Is it the palendromic, connect-either-way bit?

That may be part of it, but it seems that the magnetic nature of the connector is the key component. All the abstract mentions is the magnetic attraction between the plug and the receptacle, not the layout of the pins. I haven't tried plowing through the legalese of all 57 claims to see if the layout is considered.

Apple's patent cites a fair number of other patents, many of which also cover magnetic connectors in different applications. So yeah, it's been done before, but there's something (rather, 57 somethings) which are considered to be significant deviations from earlier designs.

U.S. patent number 7,311,526 for those of you playing at home.

Here it is, patent number 5,794,230. Incidentally, reading a patent is about the most miserable thing you can ever do. I suggest using the search function to find your quote within the patent.

To find it I used Google patent search.

Well, it is actually true. You can read it for yourself (page 58). We all know about the stupid cat exerciser, but I am curious as to what other patents you think it is impossible to go a single day without infringing. I don't think your last statement is true either. It may well be that a court is not going to award significant damages for home infringement, but a court could certainly issue an injunction against such use.

Yeah, they can take civil action against you:

http://www.uspto.gov/web/offices/pac/mpep/documents/appxl_35_U_S_C_281.htm#usc35s281

In practice, that means they might get a judge to take your infringing papers and radio away. I doubt a magazine would publish such an article without permission.

Actually, both of you are making distinctions that are meaningless. The true goal was to get bought out by IBM, same as Platform Solutions Inc

IBM Corp. and plug-compatible mainframe startup Platform Solutions Inc. (PSI) moved their battle from the courtroom to the negotiating table, and now Big Blue plans on buying its onetime adversary.

Since late 2006, the two have been engaged in a lawsuit in which IBM sued PSI for patent infringement on its z/OS operating system. In early 2007, PSI countersued, alleging that IBM had shut out competition by coupling z/OS with its own hardware.

Since then, motions have been filed back and forth, but nothing has been settled. Until Wednesday, July 2, that is, when IBM announced it would acquire privately owned PSI. Financial details of the deal have not been disclosed

Sound familiar?

The difference is that PSI had some proprietary stuff that IBM could use. Turbo Hercules doesn't so no buy-out.
from the USPO

United States Patent Application 20060085599
Kind Code A1
Woffinden; Gary A. ; et al. April 20, 2006
Processing of self-modifying code in multi-address-space and multi-processor systems

Abstract

A method and system of storing to an instruction stream with a multiprocessor or multiple-address-space system is disclosed. A central processing unit may cache instructions in a cache from a page of primary code stored in a memory storage unit. The central processing unit may execute cached instructions from the cache until a serialization operation is executed. The central processing unit may check in a message queue for a notification message indicating potential storing to the page. If the notification message is present in the message queue, cached instructions from the page are invalidated.

From IBM: http://www-03.ibm.com/press/us/en/pressrelease/24560.wss

ARMONK, NY - 02 Jul 2008: IBM (NYSE: IBM) today announced it has acquired Platform Solutions, Inc. (PSI), a privately held technology company headquartered in Sunnyvale, California. PSI's technologies and employees will become part of the IBM System z business unit of the IBM Systems and Technology Group. Financial terms were not disclosed.

PSI's technologies and skills, along with its intellectual capital, will become part of IBM's long-term mainframe product engineering cycles and part of IBM's future product plans.

"IBM's strategy is to continually evolve our mainframe technology to help our clients tackle the most demanding business issues," said Anne Altman, General Manager, IBM System z. "We will continue to move the mainframe forward through both IBM innovation and by acquiring new technologies. We welcome Platform Solutions, Inc. and look forward to collaborating with them."

"We are pleased to become part of IBM, knowing IBM has the industry's most comprehensive vision for the future direction of enterprise computing, and has the requisite technologies to realize that vision," said Michael Maulick, President and CEO, Platform Solutions, Inc. "This acquisition makes the most sense for our companies -- to collaborate on future technology offerings and maximize our combined knowledge and skills for the benefit of IBM clients globally."

As part of this acquisition, both IBM and PSI dropped their respective claims against each other.

Actually, this 'valuable' patent is worth the application fee and the stream of maintenance fees for the life of the patent! That's, er, about $8k over the life of the patent. http://www.uspto.gov/web/offices/ac/qs/ope/fee2009september15.htm
And that's not counting all the patent litigation fees to keep the lawyers' children fed!

Sadly, there are no longer many worthy patents that are on the scale of a lightbulb, where the realized implementation of an idea is patented after some incredible effort and trial and error. Nowadays, a patent would be just the idea: "a method of generating light from electricity". The carbon filament lamp in 1879, the tungsten filament lamp in 1915, the tungsten halogen lamp in 1959, etc. would all just details that fall under the original idea.

http://inventors.about.com/od/lstartinventions/a/lighting_2.htm

In order to establish a pretty much unassailable prior art, you may wan to file for a provisional patent.

Good luck

Few people have heard of the true inventor of both air conditioning and the artificial ice machine, Dr. John Gorrie, of Apalachicola, Florida, who received the first patent (number 8080) for a machine to make ice, on May 6, 1851. While it was reduced to practice (he used it to cool the rooms of his fever patients, and gave iced drinks to his guests at parties -- a fantastic novelty in 1850s Florida) he was unable to make a financial success of the venture. His machine was the first to make use of the refrigeration method of air conditioning.

The application was filed in 2008, true. But look! Here's another patent with essentially the same disclosure (different claims) that was filed in 1997! Magic!!

Amazon went back and looked at their old technology, thought about it a bit, and realized that they had already all the core components of Facebook, they just hadn't realized it as such. And in the US system, even if you didn't realize it at the time, as long as you disclosed it you win.

This kind of nonsense can be stopped if you tell applicants that they have to claim everything they're going to claim in their first application (keep divisionals based on restriction requirements but otherwise curtail continuation and CIP practice, to be technical). This is not a theoretical argument, either: Europe has just recently adopted a system like this, major pieces go into effect on October 1. See this PDF for more information. Executive summary of the European system: your invention is locked down two years after the first time the patent office sends you a letter. You don't get to go back 10 years later claiming you invented Google or something.

In order for an invention to be patentable it must be new as defined in the patent law, which provides that an invention cannot be patented if: "(a) the invention was known or used by others in this country, or patented or described in a printed publication in this or a foreign country, before the invention thereof by the applicant for patent," or "(b) the invention was patented or described in a printed publication in this or a foreign country or in public use or on sale in this country more than one year prior to the application for patent in the United States . . ."

If the invention has been described in a printed publication anywhere in the world, or if it was known or used by others in this country before the date that the applicant made his/her invention, a patent cannot be obtained. If the invention has been described in a printed publication anywhere, or has been in public use or on sale in this country more than one year before the date on which an application for patent is filed in this country, a patent cannot be obtained. In this connection it is immaterial when the invention was made, or whether the printed publication or public use was by the inventor himself/herself or by someone else. If the inventor describes the invention in a printed publication or uses the invention publicly, or places it on sale, he/she must apply for a patent before one year has gone by, otherwise any right to a patent will be lost. The inventor must file on the date of public use or disclosure, however, in order to preserve patent rights in many foreign countries.

Even if the subject matter sought to be patented is not exactly shown by the prior art, and involves one or more differences over the most nearly similar thing already known, a patent may still be refused if the differences would be obvious. The subject matter sought to be patented must be sufficiently different from what has been used or described before that it may be said to be nonobvious to a person having ordinary skill in the area of technology related to the invention. For example, the substitution of one color for another, or changes in size, are ordinarily not patentable.

But hey, feel free to go ahead and make stuff up about continuous development - that'll get you an upmod, despite it being hogwash. Not that GP was completely correct - there's that one year window where somebody else can describe / publish an invention that you have been working on but haven't filed a patent for. If you can file within the year and prove you started inventing it before the other person, then you have a chance of a valid patent. But after the one year window, it doesn't matter when you started working on your invention.

#include "ianal.h"

The patent has a valid priority chain going all the way back to 2 November 1997. That means that the effective filing date of this patent is 2 November 1997.

See 35 USC 120.

This Amazon patent cited other Amazon patents going back to 1997 (filing date) - approved 2001: 6175831
Abstract: A networking database containing a plurality of records for different individuals in which individuals are connected to one another in the database by defined relationships. Each individual has the opportunity to define the relationship which may be confirmed or denied. E-mail messaging and interactive communication between individuals and a database service provider provide a method of constructing the database. The method includes having a registered individual identify further individuals and define therewith a relationship. The further individuals then, in turn, establish their own defined relationships with still other individuals. The defined relationships are mutually defined.
I also found this patent reference very odd: 5263160
Abstract: Augmented doubly-linked list search and management method for a system having data stored in a list of data elements in memory

This Amazon patent cited other Amazon patents going back to 1997 (filing date) - approved 2001: 6175831
Abstract: A networking database containing a plurality of records for different individuals in which individuals are connected to one another in the database by defined relationships. Each individual has the opportunity to define the relationship which may be confirmed or denied. E-mail messaging and interactive communication between individuals and a database service provider provide a method of constructing the database. The method includes having a registered individual identify further individuals and define therewith a relationship. The further individuals then, in turn, establish their own defined relationships with still other individuals. The defined relationships are mutually defined.
I also found this patent reference very odd: 5263160
Abstract: Augmented doubly-linked list search and management method for a system having data stored in a list of data elements in memory

I saw this story on the local CBS news station.

I also learned they are very interested in this.

I saw this story on the local CBS news station.

I also learned they are very interested in this.

I saw this story on the local CBS news station.

I also learned they are very interested in this.

Yeah, that's not the same thing, is it? I don't want Google getting their hands on free bulk electronic government data before anyone else.

The TESS has been in place since 2000, for example, with subscriptions available to anyone who wants them and without favouring any particular corporation or individual. Notice how many months newer the searchable database is than the bulk downloads available from Google?

I mean, what could a corporation do with early access to an electronic copy of trademarks and patents data? How could that possibly be abused?

Probably the extra data will be the patent file wrappers. That's where all the good stuff is when you're trying to challenge a patent or defend against a patent lawsuit. Speaking from experience, the wrapper can be orders of magnitude larger than the patent itself. Generally, the wrapper is not readily available. You have to pay a $200 fee to get a copy of it, more if it's over 400 pages.

The USPTO has had their patent files on line for years. They're at the USPTO site. There's a reasonable search engine. Not only are the patents themselves there, but the whole "file wrapper" history information is available. However, it's rate limited to about 1000 patents per day per user.

What Google is doing, apparently, is making the entire database available for bulk download. The USPTO sells that database, and the other patent-indexing services buy it. But you have to get it on Digital Linear Tapes (DLT) and it costs several thousand dollars, because of the size of the data set. Google is apparently willing to put that data out for full download in exchange for getting their copy for free. And the USPTO gets out of the tape copying business.

http://patimg1.uspto.gov/.piw?docid=D0601700&SectionNum=1&IDKey=8AC2B1E20BCC&HomeUrl=http://patft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?Sect1=PTO2%2526Sect2=HITOFF%2526p=1%2526u=%25252Fnetahtml%25252FPTO%25252Fsearch-bool.html%2526r=1%2526f=G%2526l=50%2526co1=AND%2526d=PTXT%2526s1=D601700.PN.%2526OS=PN/D601700%2526RS=PN/D601700

if a judge were to look at 35 USC 101, which says that patentable subject material includes "any new and useful process, machine, manufacture, or composition of matter" and pretend that software is not a process, or that "process" doesn't include software, that would be judicial activism.

I think I understand and in part agree with your logic, however, your conclusion is wrong for two reasons. First there had to be a starting point where software was considered by the courts for patent-ability. Since there was no precedence the conclusions by the court were not activism as the courts were not trying to bring about change. And second, in reading some of the early cases that concerned software patents and the conclusions it becomes readily obvious that the decisions were in fact based on previous case law and 35 USC 100 through 35 USC 104. It was in no way judicial activism.

Yes, that's my point... It would be judicial activism to start carving out non-patentable subject matter from the list of process/manufacture/machine/matter, since the statute says nothing about "oh, and algorithms aren't patentable." Therefore, when SCOTUS said that, they were being activist. But we don't call it that, because it was the right decision.

In the case Diamond_v_Diehr where the tide turned and lawyers started to find ways of patenting software it may very well be judicial activism and there was a very strong and well reasoned dissenting opinion.

Not strong enough, or it would have been a majority opinion.

I cannot say without a doubt that it is judicial activism as that type of conclusion would require more research to understand how the the justice's came to their conclusions that seemed to change several years and cases of precedence. I will only say it is a possibility and that I believe the dissenting opinion was correct in pointing out the flaws and errors in the majority opinion.

Bear in mind that the most neutral definition of "judicial activism" is a judicial opinion that goes against the will or intent of the legislators who wrote the statute. It's the judges rewriting what the legislators did.
Given that broad and neutral definition, consider... Diamond v. Diehr was almost 30 years ago, and in that time, Congress has not amended 35 USC 101 to exempt software, in spite of the fact that they've amended 35 USC several times to comply with TRIPS and other treaties. So, Congress has essentially said "35 USC 101 is correct as it is currently written and interpreted." So, if the Supreme Court were to suddenly claim that software isn't patentable would be going against the past 30 years of legislative history. That would be judicial activism.

if a judge were to look at 35 USC 101, which says that patentable subject material includes "any new and useful process, machine, manufacture, or composition of matter" and pretend that software is not a process, or that "process" doesn't include software, that would be judicial activism.

I think I understand and in part agree with your logic, however, your conclusion is wrong for two reasons. First there had to be a starting point where software was considered by the courts for patent-ability. Since there was no precedence the conclusions by the court were not activism as the courts were not trying to bring about change. And second, in reading some of the early cases that concerned software patents and the conclusions it becomes readily obvious that the decisions were in fact based on previous case law and 35 USC 100 through 35 USC 104. It was in no way judicial activism.

In the case Diamond_v_Diehr where the tide turned and lawyers started to find ways of patenting software it may very well be judicial activism and there was a very strong and well reasoned dissenting opinion. I cannot say without a doubt that it is judicial activism as that type of conclusion would require more research to understand how the the justice's came to their conclusions that seemed to change several years and cases of precedence. I will only say it is a possibility and that I believe the dissenting opinion was correct in pointing out the flaws and errors in the majority opinion.

The beauty here: this is patenting the problem and not the solution.

Where are the code snippets, the algorithms to detect the motions, the heuristics to reject false positives in this patent application?

It would have been so much easier for Edison if he could patent the idea 'glass bulb that produces light when electricity flows through it', instead of actually showing that he could do it.

The USPTO seems to think that this is fine these days though - patenting an idea instead of an invention.

United States Patent Application 20100125816 MOVEMENT RECOGNITION AS INPUT MECHANISM

From the claims, it looks like it is limited to a portable computing device:

1. A method of interacting with a graphical user interface on a portable computing device, comprising:obtaining a first image using an imaging element of the portable computing device, the first image including a facial feature of a user of the portable computing device;obtaining a second image using the imaging element, the second image including the facial feature of the user of the portable computing device;analyzing the obtained first image and second image, with the portable computing device, to determine a change in the position of the facial feature of the user with respect to the portable computing device; andaltering (sic) information displayed within the graphical user interface based at least in part on the determined change, wherein the information displayed within the graphical user interface excludes a representation of either or both of the obtained first and second images.

Amazon patented that last year - http://www.techflash.com/seattle/2009/06/Amazon_patents_electronic_pen_technology_49100176.html (see patent here: http://patft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?Sect1=PTO1&Sect2=HITOFF&d=PALL&p=1&u=%2Fnetahtml%2FPTO%2Fsrchnum.htm&r=1&f=G&l=50&s1=7,546,524.PN.&OS=PN/7,546,524&RS=PN/7,546,524 )

"An electronic input device such as an electronic pen is provided to annotate a paper document. The input device records an annotation and an image of human-comprehensible content in the document sufficient to identify the document and possibly a location in the document. The human-comprehensible content is used to locate a digital version of the document and determine a corresponding location of the annotation in the digital version of the document. A computer system such as a server system may receive and store the annotation in association with the digital version of the document. The server system may further augment the digital version of the document with the annotation and send the augmented version to an output device for display and/or printing."

I think the relevant US patent is this (5487069).

It appears to describe an special antenna setup as well as how to use the radio/antenna to get a data rate/ghz of bandwith ratio much better than previously practical.

So its not a math patent, or a pure software patent (although part of the implementation is software). It looks like something the patent system was designed to protect.

The earliest live 'iRobot' trade mark was filed September 2002.

There is one from Nov 1999 that is 'dead'. Both from MA, so I'm not sure if it's the same company.

The iMac was released in 1998, the iBook in 1999.

The earliest live 'iRobot' trade mark was filed September 2002.

There is one from Nov 1999 that is 'dead'. Both from MA, so I'm not sure if it's the same company.

The iMac was released in 1998, the iBook in 1999.

I found it: US Patent 6,410,835. It has some hardware claims about the construction of the controller, followed by more software-ish claims starting at 28.

Indeed, use by others does need to be public, but the objection to your original statement about publication still stands. See, for instance MPEP 2132 for the case law indicating "(t)he knowledge or use is accessible to the public if there has been no deliberate attempt to keep it secret." Or are you saying Salk's decision not to patent was a decision to try to keep it a trade secret? Seems more likely a decision not to file is evidence of lack of a deliberate attempt to keep it secret.
 
Yes, a completely secret first inventor can't stop the later patent. But given the minor amount of disclosure to make it public, their decision not to file, and the lack of a one-year grace in 102(a), I think that the likelihood of the assumptions coming out on your side in this is smaller.

Yes, but your patent is still invalid if "the invention was known or used by others in this country, or patented or described in a printed publication in this or a foreign country, before the invention thereof by the applicant for patent." See 35 USC 102(a). Even if we assume that StemCells was diligent in reduction to practice, if Salk was actually doing this stuff before StemCells conceived of the invention, their patent is not valid.
 
They must be afraid they'll lose- that is, that they did not reduce the invention to practice early enough to prevail against StemCells- because otherwise the right answer is 'screw you, come sue us for infringement and we'll see how long you still have a patent to assert against others.'

Lowest patent number in there is 5,644,737, highest is 7,251,653. Now I wrongfully assume that between those two numbers there are only software patents. which makes 1,606,917 patents.

Yeah, that's pretty wrong. Patent numbers are on all patents - they don't have different numbering schemes for different areas.

How in the hell are they making sure none of those patents cover the same thing? And how in the hell should I find out if something I made infringes any of those patents?

Google Patents, Patentstorm, or even the USPTO's own search tool at http://patft.uspto.gov/.

There's (figuratively) tons of software things which should be patented because they require extremely clever thinking and/or a lot of work to design and get working. There are things out there that the average programmer would *NEVER* come up with, eg. the BWT transform used for bzip compression.

OTOH that's only a tiny fraction of software patents. Most of it is pure junk

There's (figuratively) tons of software things which should be patented because they require extremely clever thinking and/or a lot of work to design and get working. There are things out there that the average programmer would *NEVER* come up with, eg. the BWT transform used for bzip compression.

OTOH that's only a tiny fraction of software patents. Most of it is pure junk

There's (figuratively) tons of software things which should be patented because they require extremely clever thinking and/or a lot of work to design and get working. There are things out there that the average programmer would *NEVER* come up with, eg. the BWT transform used for bzip compression.

OTOH that's only a tiny fraction of software patents. Most of it is pure junk

Once again a Slashdot patent story is posted with reference to the titles of the patents. Patent titles are legally meaningless. The patentee doesn't even have to supply one; the Patent Office will write one for you if you leave it out. What matters are the claims read in light of the specification.

Anyway, from the complaint, the patents in question are:
7,251,653
5,742,768
5,644,737
6,263,352
6,122,558
6,542,164
6,281,879
5,845,077 (the leading 5 was left off in the complaint, but this is the right patent)
5,941,947

The '768 patent was originally assigned to Silicon Graphics. It was one of several SGI patents assigned to Microsoft in 2002 as part of a $62.5 million deal.

Some of the patents are related. The '164 patent, for example, was the result of a continuation application based on the application that eventually became the '879 patent.

Anyone looking at these from a prior art perspective should bear in mind that the patents have quite early priority dates. Most of them seem to date from the mid-90s. The '164 and '879 patents, for example, stretch back to June 16, 1994.

Once again a Slashdot patent story is posted with reference to the titles of the patents. Patent titles are legally meaningless. The patentee doesn't even have to supply one; the Patent Office will write one for you if you leave it out. What matters are the claims read in light of the specification.

Anyway, from the complaint, the patents in question are:
7,251,653
5,742,768
5,644,737
6,263,352
6,122,558
6,542,164
6,281,879
5,845,077 (the leading 5 was left off in the complaint, but this is the right patent)
5,941,947

The '768 patent was originally assigned to Silicon Graphics. It was one of several SGI patents assigned to Microsoft in 2002 as part of a $62.5 million deal.

Some of the patents are related. The '164 patent, for example, was the result of a continuation application based on the application that eventually became the '879 patent.

Anyone looking at these from a prior art perspective should bear in mind that the patents have quite early priority dates. Most of them seem to date from the mid-90s. The '164 and '879 patents, for example, stretch back to June 16, 1994.

Design patents are not the same as utility patents. You may not want design patents to be covered under copyright law, where they would last for a century or so. Design patents cover things that provide distinctive design but are not necessary to the utility of the device. Such designs might not be copyrightable but can still get design patents. They are shorter in duration, in the US lasting only 14 years compared to 20 years for utility patents, 90 years for corporate copyright, and life plus 70 years for personal copyrights.

You should really look at what the current maintenance fees are before making stupid statements as there appears to be prior art on a sliding scale that increases as time progresses.

http://www.uspto.gov/web/offices/ac/qs/ope/fee2009september15.htm#maintain

The current patent fees top out at about $800 with the basic filing fee for small entities being $82

Uhhh.. you are drastically under estimating the patenting cost in USA. $82 is for the initial online filing fee yes, but they are also increasing the other fees. The article specifically mentions the increases impact maintenance fees which are the biggest portion of the overall cost.

Online filing (small entity): $82
Provisional application fee (small entity): $110
Search fee (small entity): $270
Examination fee (small entity): $110
Issue fee (small entity): $755
Publication fee: $300
3.5 Year Maintenance fee (small entity): $490 (will occur about 8 months after approval given 34 month backlog)
7.5 Year Maintenance fee (small entity): $1240
11.5 Year Maintenance fee (small entity): $2055

Total before maintenance fees: $1627
Total after maintenance fees: $5412

http://www.uspto.gov/web/offices/ac/qs/ope/fee2009september15.htm#patapp

5,533,183, entitled “User Interface With Multiple Workspaces for Sharing Display System Objects” which issued on July 2, 1996

5,394,521, entitled “User Interface With Multiple Workspaces for Sharing Display System Objects” which issued on February 28, 1995

Source: http://www.groklaw.net/pdf/IPvRH-1.pdf

5,533,183, entitled “User Interface With Multiple Workspaces for Sharing Display System Objects” which issued on July 2, 1996

5,394,521, entitled “User Interface With Multiple Workspaces for Sharing Display System Objects” which issued on February 28, 1995

Source: http://www.groklaw.net/pdf/IPvRH-1.pdf

5,533,183, entitled “User Interface With Multiple Workspaces for Sharing Display System Objects” which issued on July 2, 1996

5,394,521, entitled “User Interface With Multiple Workspaces for Sharing Display System Objects” which issued on February 28, 1995

Source: http://www.groklaw.net/pdf/IPvRH-1.pdf

I think you got the whole FUD dilemma wrong. Or maybe I do.

The pattern with the HTC/Android case is the same as with the Novell situation. MS and HTC make a deal on whatever they think is beneficial to their businesses. In the light of the deal a MS-rep claims MS patents are being violated and they won't go after HTC or their customers.

These press releases leave an impression in people like me, that are evaluating the rollout of Linux and/or Android deployments, that if it's not being done with products being covered by an agreement like the above, MS is gonna come after them. Some now might be too scared of using Linux and either buy the MS-sanctioned products or go with something else entirely. I for one think, this is just saber-rattling; MS legal department doing the job of their marketing department. Microsoft is a company like every other. They have to report to their shareholders/owners and noone else (apart from legal entities). Since their agreement with Novell in 2006 they didn't do a thing to enforce their right they'd be entitled to. They could have made a fortune in court by suing commercial linux customers in the US or at least doing business with entities based in the US.

The reality is, that they didn't. It's 3 1/2 years and Microsoft didn't enforce their claims a single time. 2009 was a good year for them, but in 2008 they would defenitely have needed to make their shareholders a little happier than it did. I don't know why they didn't go after commercial linux customers, but a few scenarios come to my mind: a) Microsoft fears that after a first strike a patent war might evolve and they might face a confrontation with IBM. b) They make more money with their OSS partners than they ever thought was possible. c) Their patent claim is, apart from a few minor things like the double-click being implemented in the major window managers, nothing but FUD

Seeing how Canonical and Red Hat didn't buy in their initial claim and how Intel and Nokia are about to roll out their joint Linux stack without having an IP licence agreement with MS makes me opt for c). Also, patents are not secret. Everyone can find them in the US Patent and Trademark Office's database. Given that there's no report of anyone with more insight in the Linux code than I have has found a single case of infringement in ~40 months strengthens my claim.

The reality is, mind me not using caps lock, so far Microsoft's patent claim has been nothing but sabre rattling. The reality is that all of the companies that have made an IP licence agreement with Microsoft are all affiliated with them in one way or another. Alltogether their agreements rather look like a tactical positioning to me than to enforce violated IP.

The reality is, we all pay MS tax one way or another, but not because Torvalds and friends ignored MS' patent portfolio and, to quote you, bury their heads in the sand. We pay that tax, because MS seeks allies for a possible future IP war. We pay the MS tax to fund a strong lobby for stronger IP laws. We pay the MS tax, but only if we buy products and services from MS or their Allies. (on a 2nd thought we might better call them the Axis)

Wrong. The patent protects the encoding process, not the format. It's the software which implements the encoding, hence, it's a software patent.

Better still, let's stop pretending Jobs actually invents the things Apple makes.

You might want to reconsider your claim. Jobs is listed on a number of Apple's patents. He may not engineer the inner workings, but he is involved in many projects from start to finish.

Third parties can pay the USPTO a fee (currently $180) to put references into the file of a pending application and have those references considered by the examiner. However, you have to do this within two months of the date of publication (or two months after a notice of allowance in the application, whichever is earlier), and you cannot make any commentary whatsoever concerning the references you cite. You also have to serve the applicant with notice that you filed the references with the USPTO.

See 37 CFR 1.99 and MPEP 1134.01 for more details.

If you read the description, the claimed invention is not about trial and error development. The idea is that every time code is refactored, the development environment will tag the refactoring. Refactorings that could affect performance are transparently undone at compile time, so long as it wouldn't change the functional behavior of the program. Thus, the developer sees nice, neat comprehensible code, and the compiler sees more optimized, compiler-friendly code.

Also, if you look the application up on PAIR (the PTO's public patent application database, which contains more detail than the regular patent search or Google Patents), you'll see that it's a new case. That is, the Patent Office hasn't examined the application yet. It's highly likely that after a few rounds of office actions the claims will not look like the current ones. They will probably be narrower and hew more closely to the description in the specification.

anyone remember way back 40-50 years ago when the Patent Office was still... well... COMPETENT and denied patents for "discoveries" that were either (a) the logical next step (which according to law is nonpatentable) or BLATANTLY FUCKING OBVIOUS?

They're supposed to. 35 USC, Section 103(a).