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...they'll be suing the US patent office for patent infringement! (Hint: the USPTO site index page violates the patent in question.)

Why perpetuate the misunderstanding of patents? There -is- no patent on the human genome, and the patent you refer to is to a specific cell line. The chances of anyone who didn't misappropriate that specific cell line infringing the patent is infinitesimally small.

'failed to deter "submarining" ("Submarine" patents are cases where an erstwhile inventor fails to prosecute an application filed with the PTO until such time as another entity has begun to develop the technology. The applicant then prosecutes the previously filed patent and sues the later party for infringement.)"

Prior art earlier than 1995-05 is bulletproof, but later work could still help.

FAQ from USPTO site describing these requirements here.

The letter to museumstore specifically lists claim 13 of the later patent. Here is claim 13:

13. A browser for navigating a document comprising a plurality of sections, the browser comprising:
a display window displaying a document; and
a user interface comprising a plurality of selectors automatically configured to correspond to a respective plurality of sections of the document regardless of what section of the document is being displayed in the display window;
wherein the plurality of selectors are not part of the document displayed in the display window of the browser and continue to be displayed after one of the plurality of selectors is selected.

The thing is, the claim covers a browser. Museumstore doesn't make a browser. IE, Netscape, Mozilla, etc. are browsers. I'd have to look more closely at the patent to see what they mean by "browser."

The letter to museumstore specifically lists claim 13 of the later patent. Here is claim 13:

13. A browser for navigating a document comprising a plurality of sections, the browser comprising:
a display window displaying a document; and
a user interface comprising a plurality of selectors automatically configured to correspond to a respective plurality of sections of the document regardless of what section of the document is being displayed in the display window;
wherein the plurality of selectors are not part of the document displayed in the display window of the browser and continue to be displayed after one of the plurality of selectors is selected.

The thing is, the claim covers a browser. Museumstore doesn't make a browser. IE, Netscape, Mozilla, etc. are browsers. I'd have to look more closely at the patent to see what they mean by "browser."

Find it in here. In particular, look for serial numbers 78139180, 76247902, 75689166.

Apparently the U.S. treasury has a legal monoploly on the printing of U.S. federal bank notes. These are the only recognized 'legal tender for all depts public and private' according to the same U.S. government department (read the fine print on any handy dollar bill.)

It would seem, then, that one would not be in the most legal of situtations to be printing and publishing your own tender. That could be seen as violating the 'monoploy on money.'

And we all no how important government backed monopolies are, don't we?

"Super Bowl" is a trademark of the National Football League. This is why most radio and TV ads you hear and see relating to the Super Bowl don't use the official name, but instead call it something like the "Big Game."

Actually, there are patents open on *nix: the famous example is patent no. 4,135,240, the setuid patent (this link may work), filed 1973, granted 1979.

I don't know if there were any post-assignation grants of ownership to the patent, or if Lucent (nee Bell Labs) still owns it.

A press release from SCO states that Boies, Schiller and Flexner has been retained in an advisory capacity, which isn't unusual when a company is trying to determine an IP strategy. We often forget that lawyers are often used for things other than suing people (such as, uh, determining under what statutes one may sue, who one may sue, contracts to enforce terms over which one may sue ... I'm not helping my case here, am I?). The press release (and this story) indicates that the UnixWare and OpenServer libraries are affected. Unfortunately, their "Intellectual Property Pedigree Chart" is one of the least useful displays possible, since it appears simply to be the "History of UNIX" chart with some colored lines added. Hopefully, a full clarification by SCO will be forthcoming.

I wonder what the implications on the OpenSource community are going to be because of this? Details can be found here.

The USPTO lists 105 patents assigned to the NSA. They're not all related to cryptography (some have to do with data capture, analysis, etc.) but a number are.

US Patent 4,558,302 was filed on the 20th June 1983. Under the laws at that time, it expires exactly 20 years after being filed.

fp.

A structured document browser includes a constant user interface for displaying and viewing sections of a document that is [sic] organized according to a pre-defined structure. The structured document browser displays documents that have been marked with embedded codes that specify the structure of the document. The tags are mapped to correspond to a set of icons. When the icon is selected while browsing a document, the browser will display the section of the structure corresponding to the icon selected, while preserving the constant user interface.

A [web browser] [works]. The [web browser] displays [HTML documents]. The [HTML] [uses IMG tags nested in A tags]. When [clicked], [the web browser] will [follow the link] [according to the TARGET property of the A tag].

Interestingly enough, it seems to cover both browsers that have the capability of multi-frame links and the actual use of such links. (I could be wrong; I quickly scanned it instead of reading. Correct me if I am.)

It also was submitted May 1996 and granted August 1999. So if we're looking for prior use, we need to be focusing on the 1996 date, I imagine.

Also of note: the assignee is AmeriTech Corporation of Hoffman Estates, IL. Wonder what relationship they have to SBC?

They're within their rights in asking that this guy pull the use of their logo, but beyond that, both they and he are overreacting.

Click here to search trademarks and verify this.

Well, some patents were filed from the very start, for example the patent on the SUID bit, owned (at the time) by Bell Labs, inventor: Dennis Ritchie.

The patent you point to does not look like something that graphiti would infringe on because graphiti is not rotationaly independent and graphiti uses a seperate area for numerals. Suppose this and other reasons are why the case was tossed out?

In any case, the patent itself is broad and very late. The referenced material dates back to 1982 and we can be sure that there was plenty of prior art. Yes, this is essentially patenting all styles of handwriting that might be easy for a computer to read. The same things make hadwriting easy for people to read as well. The is why most alphabets are mostly rotationally independent and involve as few strokes as possible. If Palm was ugly enough to keep others from using graphiti type systems, they deserve the same treatment, but it all goes to show how silly patents have become.

I'm going to miss graphiti as the replacements, short of a keyboard, just don't work. As Xerox managed to NOT file until 1997, it will be a decade before others may use this without paying Xerox a fee. I hope Xerox will be reasonable, ten years from now voice recognition will be good enough on portable devices and graphiti will be worthless.

The patent you point to does not look like something that graphiti would infringe on because graphiti is not rotationaly independent and graphiti uses a seperate area for numerals. Suppose this and other reasons are why the case was tossed out?

In any case, the patent itself is broad and very late. The referenced material dates back to 1982 and we can be sure that there was plenty of prior art. Yes, this is essentially patenting all styles of handwriting that might be easy for a computer to read. The same things make hadwriting easy for people to read as well. The is why most alphabets are mostly rotationally independent and involve as few strokes as possible. If Palm was ugly enough to keep others from using graphiti type systems, they deserve the same treatment, but it all goes to show how silly patents have become.

I'm going to miss graphiti as the replacements, short of a keyboard, just don't work. As Xerox managed to NOT file until 1997, it will be a decade before others may use this without paying Xerox a fee. I hope Xerox will be reasonable, ten years from now voice recognition will be good enough on portable devices and graphiti will be worthless.

A quick check of the USPTO searchable database turns up only TWO patents to SCO's name (Using SCO's name spelled out for the assignee name as the search criteria) and neither of the two seem to really apply to Linux in general.

Here's the link to the search request so you can see for yourselves

www.uspto.gov returns 2 patents for the Santa Cruz Operation as the Assignee Name: 6,362,836 and 6,104,392. Both are related to SCOs Tarantella (terminal serverish) product. I guess either or both might broadly cover the use of a Linux box as an X or VNC server, I have only skimmed them.

I looked a bit at patents listed for Novell and American Telephone and Telegraph, but I don't see anything obvious. Caldera comes up empty. I also don't see an obvious way to transfer a patent to a new Assignee, but I'm sure that there must be some method.

I'd sure like to see what patent numbers they intend to exploit....

According to US patent 6,327,652 that is indeed correct-- unsigned code simply doesn't get any access to secured data, and may not even be allowed to run on the same desktop as signed code. If the boot sector doesn't pass the BIOS's signature check, it's not given access to the machine private key, and therefore can neither unlock locally stored encrypted content nor pose as a trusted system to other machines on the net. The only bait-and-switch here is the possibility of a concerted push by software or content producers to require a trusted runtime. One minor wrinkle is that this will require boot-selector programs like LILO to either be code-signed or be unable to properly boot signed operating systems.

Worse, as far as domain names is concerned, is that there can be more than one holder of a trademarked term. "Firestone" might be the name of a tire, a pizza-cooking ceramic stone for ovens, or a donut shop. Unrelated use is allowed. Indeed, a quick search of the US PTO Trademarks database does show most, but not all, "Firestone" trademarks are related to tires.

How about "Klingon"? In any case, little things like lack of grounds for suit never stopped an IP lawyer from sending threatening letters...

Everytime there is an article about the Windows name, there are multiple people who post that MS doesn't have a trademark to Windows, but to Microsoft Windows. Microsoft owns registation number 1,872,264 for the mark WINDOWS. The original NYT article is about MS trying to enforce their registered trademark! How can you not deduce that, hey MS owns the trademark to WINDOWS. (Whether its valid or not is what is currently at issue in the case, but for now, MS does own the TM to WINDOWS).

My uncle is a researcher at Western Digital in Irvine, CA. He showed me his patents today ironically, check out "Disk drive employing spindle motor commutation time variation for reducing acoustic noise" over at USPTO. He explained it to me step by step, and it's quite interesting. Just wanting to share...

Hi there,

Just so you know, Apple Computers Inc has applied for a patent that covers your mouse: Unless you want to be paying Apple a fair few bucks, I suggest that you send information on your device to the Patent Examiners office for Prior Art

Apple's pending patent: DN/20020190975
I put a link to the patent here

The particular product that I would use as prior art if I were you:
http://www.dynamism.com/grast/index.shtml

Cheers!
Travis Smith

Anyway, go to the USPTO website, select "Trademarks" and hit "Go", then select company name for your search criteria, and enter "Microsoft". You'll get all 1148 trademarks they've been granted.

Actually, Microsoft does have just "Windows" trademarked, in addition to "Microsoft Windows", "Windows NT", "Windows XP", etc. They even have a bunch of strange ones like "Edit-Windows" and "View-Windows". Oh ya, and the letter "I" (well, actually that one is a graphic).

Check here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here here and here. Or see the full list here.

Actually, Microsoft does have just "Windows" trademarked, in addition to "Microsoft Windows", "Windows NT", "Windows XP", etc. They even have a bunch of strange ones like "Edit-Windows" and "View-Windows". Oh ya, and the letter "I" (well, actually that one is a graphic).

Check here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here here and here. Or see the full list here.

Actually, Microsoft does have just "Windows" trademarked, in addition to "Microsoft Windows", "Windows NT", "Windows XP", etc. They even have a bunch of strange ones like "Edit-Windows" and "View-Windows". Oh ya, and the letter "I" (well, actually that one is a graphic).

Check here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here here and here. Or see the full list here.

Actually, Microsoft does have just "Windows" trademarked, in addition to "Microsoft Windows", "Windows NT", "Windows XP", etc. They even have a bunch of strange ones like "Edit-Windows" and "View-Windows". Oh ya, and the letter "I" (well, actually that one is a graphic).

Check here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here here and here. Or see the full list here.

Actually, Microsoft does have just "Windows" trademarked, in addition to "Microsoft Windows", "Windows NT", "Windows XP", etc. They even have a bunch of strange ones like "Edit-Windows" and "View-Windows". Oh ya, and the letter "I" (well, actually that one is a graphic).

Check here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here here and here. Or see the full list here.

Actually, Microsoft does have just "Windows" trademarked, in addition to "Microsoft Windows", "Windows NT", "Windows XP", etc. They even have a bunch of strange ones like "Edit-Windows" and "View-Windows". Oh ya, and the letter "I" (well, actually that one is a graphic).

Check here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here here and here. Or see the full list here.

Actually, Microsoft does have just "Windows" trademarked, in addition to "Microsoft Windows", "Windows NT", "Windows XP", etc. They even have a bunch of strange ones like "Edit-Windows" and "View-Windows". Oh ya, and the letter "I" (well, actually that one is a graphic).

Check here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here here and here. Or see the full list here.

Actually, Microsoft does have just "Windows" trademarked, in addition to "Microsoft Windows", "Windows NT", "Windows XP", etc. They even have a bunch of strange ones like "Edit-Windows" and "View-Windows". Oh ya, and the letter "I" (well, actually that one is a graphic).

Check here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here here and here. Or see the full list here.

Actually, Microsoft does have just "Windows" trademarked, in addition to "Microsoft Windows", "Windows NT", "Windows XP", etc. They even have a bunch of strange ones like "Edit-Windows" and "View-Windows". Oh ya, and the letter "I" (well, actually that one is a graphic).

Check here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here here and here. Or see the full list here.

Actually, Microsoft does have just "Windows" trademarked, in addition to "Microsoft Windows", "Windows NT", "Windows XP", etc. They even have a bunch of strange ones like "Edit-Windows" and "View-Windows". Oh ya, and the letter "I" (well, actually that one is a graphic).

Check here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here here and here. Or see the full list here.

Actually, Microsoft does have just "Windows" trademarked, in addition to "Microsoft Windows", "Windows NT", "Windows XP", etc. They even have a bunch of strange ones like "Edit-Windows" and "View-Windows". Oh ya, and the letter "I" (well, actually that one is a graphic).

Check here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here here and here. Or see the full list here.

Actually, Microsoft does have just "Windows" trademarked, in addition to "Microsoft Windows", "Windows NT", "Windows XP", etc. They even have a bunch of strange ones like "Edit-Windows" and "View-Windows". Oh ya, and the letter "I" (well, actually that one is a graphic).

Check here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here here and here. Or see the full list here.

Actually, Microsoft does have just "Windows" trademarked, in addition to "Microsoft Windows", "Windows NT", "Windows XP", etc. They even have a bunch of strange ones like "Edit-Windows" and "View-Windows". Oh ya, and the letter "I" (well, actually that one is a graphic).

Check here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here here and here. Or see the full list here.

Actually, Microsoft does have just "Windows" trademarked, in addition to "Microsoft Windows", "Windows NT", "Windows XP", etc. They even have a bunch of strange ones like "Edit-Windows" and "View-Windows". Oh ya, and the letter "I" (well, actually that one is a graphic).

Check here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here here and here. Or see the full list here.

You've never seen one of those little toys that changes color when warm? Or seen a chameleon in action? Or how about those fiber optic toys at novelty shops? Or things that have special inks or paints so that they look different colors depending on angle you look at them (one example is US currency)?

I don't know how novel the idea of a device that changes its color really is. However, the patent shouldn't be on the vague idea, but rather on a novel instantiation of the idea-- that is the specific device or mechanism or chemical/electrical process to do this. Or maybe I'm still misunderstanding patents, I always thought they protected specifics, not generalities-- not that you have to have a working demo available, but that you had to have a very exacting description of the invention.

To wit, here is a quote from trademark law itself (p. 21 of Consolidated Patent Laws): The specification shall contain a written description of the invention, and of the manner and process of making and using it, in such full, clear, concise, and exact terms as to enable any person skilled in the art to which it pertains, or with which it is most nearly connected, to make and use the same, and shall set forth the best mode contemplated by the inventor of carrying out his invention.

Alas, what's a pimp to do? Next thing ya know, they'll patent hydraulics.

bling bling

The patent doesn't even include a smart way to find repeating sequences, it covers just the dumb idea. I have no sympathy for Stac here.

Sun's patents are much more worrisome as far as I'm concerned. For example, patent number 6,477,702, held by Sun, would seem to be infringed by any conforming Java implementation. And Sun has pulled out of every and any process that would have required them to make a declaration or commitment on patent and IP issues related to Java. Furthermore, while Sun PR likes to talk a lot about openness, I have yet to see a legally binding declaration by Sun that would guarantee that third party implementations of Java may use Sun's patents.

I don't trust Microsoft any further than I can throw the entire stack of printed MSDN documentation (which is to say, I don't trust them at all). But, all things considered, I think the risk of patent infringment claims from Microsoft over Mono are very slim indeed. All that hot air from Microsoft CEOs and Microsoft PR folks doesn't change that. Sun, on the other hand, holds known patents that could create real problems for any non-Sun Java implementation.

If you are very worried about patent problems, there is a very easy solution: don't use either Mono or Java--there are plenty of other languages a round, many of them better. If you are slightly worried about patent problems, then Mono looks like a safer choice to me than Java. And probably, you don't really have to worry about patents with either of them.

check out this patent for advanced wireless technology

And there's more where that came from.

6,473,738 Multiple-person buying information system with application to on-line merchandizing

That patent already covers the stuff being talked about in this thread; the patent application referenced by the article just adds an extra feature, namely the ability to associate different billing addresses with different shopping carts.

Trademark for Playstation name registered to sony!

• PlayStation
  • (REGISTRANT) KABUSHIKI KAISHA SONY COMPUTER ENTERTAINMENT CORPORATION JAPAN 1-22 AKASAKA 8-CHOME, MINATO-KU TOKYO 107 JAPAN

• PlayStation
  • (REGISTRANT) Kabushiki Kaisha Sony Computer Entertainment CORPORATION JAPAN l-l Akasaka 7-chome Minato-ku, Tokyo JAPAN