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Remember PanIP?

I call "Bogus" on PanIP even before the patent review is over because if you really felt your patent is good, you'll go after the big fish. Go after Amazon.com or Buy.com for $50,000,000 instead of tiny companies for $5,000. PanIP probably wasn't expecting the little guys to group together.

The EFF is adding to their history of being a group defense for technological innovation in free speech areas. For example, Chilling Effects helps anyone dealing with a C&D letter. Their DirectTV fight helped protect individuals who couldn't afford to do anything but settle, given DirectTV's threats, even when innocent.

The EFF is small enough (come on everyone, buy coffee instead of TripleTallLattes for 2 weeks and DONATE to the EFF) and doing so much already that they're not going to choose patents just because the patent-holder is suing. They're choosing patents where the EFF thinks prior art exists or the patent isn't novel and the patent is hurting free speech and the right to technological innovation.

Even if there isn't prior art per se, a patent can still be far too obvious yet be granted. On this topic, I like this essay on telling good patents from bad:

"But I have found a common thread in many of the bad patents which could be a litmus test for telling the bad from the good. Patent law, as we know, requires inventions to be novel and not obvious to one skilled in the art.

But the patent office has taken too liberal a definition of novel. They are granting patents when the problem is novel, and the filer is the first to try to solve it. As such their answer to the new question is novel. The better patents are ones that solve older problems.

Amazon was one of the earliest internet shopping operations. So of course they were among the first to look hard at the UI for that style of shopping, and thus were first to file an invention called one-click-buy. But one-click-buy was really just an obvious answer to a new problem. The same applies to XOR cursors, browser plug-ins, and streaming audio and video

...While it would not solve every problem, I think if patent examiners asked, "How long has somebody been trying to solve the problem this invention solves?" and held off patents when the problem was novel, or at least applied more scrutiny, we would have a lot less problem with the patent system.... many of the bad patents (notably the bad software patents) that are causing trouble these days fail my test -- they were not very clever solutions to novel problems, not novel solutions to hard problems.

I bet there's not a single software-related patent that's been issued in the last ten years that couldn't be overturned by prior art. Stuff that seems cutting edge now was being mulled over twenty years ago, sometimes thirty or forty years ago.

At the risk of being off-topic but kind of still on-topic, have you all seen where PanIP's lovely "Automated Sales" patent got overturned recently? Unless PanIP can convince the USPTO to overturn its decision, it looks like there will be no more lawsuits against e-commerce companies coming from PanIP, unless they think they can stand on just their automated transactions patent, and that one under review, too.

There's a link to the story at the old website of the PanIP Group Defense Fund, at youmaybenext.com.

For C&D letters Chilling Effects is our group defense, as is the EFF in general.

I'd like to mention that this company is being sued by these assholes and is fighting back. Plesae support them.

So, my point is : why patent should not describe a "digital process" to handle immaterial data

I'll bite.

Software patents are bad because
1: The life cycle of a patent is about 4-5 times longer than the life cycle of software.
2: Patent language does not fit well with software language. Patent language often fails to cover a specific algorithm in the lawyer's attempt to cover everything possible.
3: Given a single patented algorithm, its impossible to tell if a given program is using THAT algorithm, or some other method of performing the same task. The "business process" patnets currently touted and used as the model for software patents only cover processes, not results, yet the outcome of these patents is that everyone who obtains the same results is lawsuit bait. Companies will be sued and forced to open their source for scrutiny.
4: The USPTO is unable to handle the current patent process, empowering them with even more oversight is certainly not what I'd call punishment for its failure to operate properly.
5: In the event of failure in the above mentioned government organization to perform its duties properly, the cost of undoing the patent is footed entirely by the victims. Assuming no court time is needed (ie, the patent holder does not appeal, which they ALWAYS do) it still costs a considerable amount of money just to present your prior art to the USPTO for a simple review, and a considerable amount more to pay the USPTO to actually listen to your argument. (in the cheaper review, the USPTO takes your evidence and you go home. The USPTO calls up the patent holder and asks them to explain, and if they have a good explanation for not citing the prior art, you loose. The more expensive version allows the victim to actually participate in the process.)

From the customer's POV, #1 makes it even worse. Lets imagine a few scenarios:

1) Xerox patents "the process by which a document is converted into data which the printer can understand" and suddenly has a 16+ year long monopoly on printers because no other company can write a driver for their printer.

2) Brother patents the word processor in the mid-80's (I really have no idea when they started making those things). If you wanted to do any word processing at all, you would need to buy a Brother word processor machine, and that would be in addition to the PC (if you even owned one, without a wordprocessor, it would be no more useful than a Nintendo).

3) Microsoft patents the operating system (or more accurately, the patented DRM required to boot the OS on their patented Palladium technology, which will only be licensed to companies who use it in every motherboard. The alternative is being unable to produce any motherboards that can run windows). Windows DRM2005 is released, requiring yearly fees of $700 per user. No further development on windows is done for 16 years as they rest on their government-provided monopoly.

4) A company called PanIP "renews" an old out-of-date patent by adding a few words to a patent on selling things using a display and a phone line. The USPTO, seeing that the patent is an "improvement" over their existing patent automatically grants it without even stopping to think. PanIP then goes about suing small e-commerce sites for infringing on its "new" patent from the early 80's... oh wait, this one's really happening .

Indeed. This San Diego company claims nothing less than the patent on internet commerce. They started by suing dozens of small businesses with the apparent goal of getting a $5000 settlement.

Tim Beere, owner of DeBrand Fine Chocolates, refused to settle and started a group whose purpose is to fight this. It looks like they're making headway, but it would be nice to see some of the bigger players in e-commerce kick in to crush this thing. So far, it's a bunch of small players refusing to be extorted who are bearing the brunt of the battle.

What amazes me is the enourmous amount of nonsense arguments.

Don't worry, they're probably equally bad in fields you don't know about :-)

an article in an on-line paper (sorry, Dutch only) that puts forward two really ridiculous arguments

First of all the meat of it is anti-swpat arguments filtered through an MEP and a non-tech journalist. (My impression) What did you expect?

Then there is the Stallmann quote. I think you're too quick at condemning it. "Combinations of tones" can mean simple chords as well - where copyright doesn't apply. (Except perhaps very theoretically.) Anyway, bad choice of words (or something lost in translation)

My first conclusion is that we are all talking emotions here, hampering clear sight and reasoning on what this is all about. I think this is all mainly about a big company located in in Redmond.

If we're talking emotions it's a lot more about "protecting free software" than about "stopping Redmond". (Need not be equivalent). In fact, Microsoft got slammed pretty hard by the eolas case, just like Bill predicted in 1991. There's also the e-tailers. And when it comes to non-slashdotters, the emotions may pretty often be pro-swpat as well.

"If you own or operate an e-commerce web site then you are us. And you need
to know that a company in San Diego, Pangea Intellectual Properties (PanIP LLC) is suing
companies all across the country. They claim that if you use graphical and textual information on a video screen for purposes of making a sale, then you are infringing on their patent. US Patent No 5,576,951.
And if you accept information to conduct automatic financial transactions via a telephone line & video screen, you're infringing on their patent. US Patent No. 6,289,319"

They are going to try to settle out of court to set precendent that they do indeed own the code..

It's the same concept that PanIP is using. Sue a couple of little guys, get settlements, use that as precedent in suits against bigger fish, profit...

That's an even worse scenario that current patent law allows - companies that patent overly broad ideas and business methods with no intention of doing anything with them, except waiting for someone else to build a business and then sue them.

I should have patented DVD subscriptions and sued Netflix.

Why? The patents don't appear to be of the obvious "one-click shopping" type and the holders are initiating the action (rather than some company that bought the rights, a la PanIP). Clearly the work took a lot of research and specialized knowlegde, and the researchers were granted a patent for their work.

Are you anti-patent in general or were you just exhibiting a typical slashdot knee-jerk response?

It's worth asking if it would be worthwhile setting up a fund, similar to the one created for battling PanIP, to defend against RIAA lawsuits. This student did nothing that Microsoft or Google doesn't do. Therefore, the RIAA does not appear to think there's something wrong with searching, but rather with a student developing a tool for searching. Students can not afford defend themselves and are threatened, corporations can afford to defend themselves and are not.

From reading the article it looks like the W3C proposal is about interoperability on the web. Does that mean that idiotic patents such as the one on e-commerce and streaming will be revoked? And while it may legally hold water, who was so on the take as to approve Amazon's One-Click patent? I suppose I should have placed a registered symbol or trademark symbol after that or something. Perhaps I should move now to get my patent on No-Click buying. By the way, you all owe me five dollars.

Little people are getting sued over doing business over the Internet. Slashdot itself uses .gifs. I violate the .gif patent every time I go to /. Maybe you use lynx or something. Do you have a webpage up? Until last summer you could have gotten sued by BT over hyperlinks for your website. They lost the case, but it was still something that was known waaay before they got the patent and they still managed to drag a company to court for months before it was thrown out. Do you have a program called XPaint in your version of Linux? I do. Have you ever distributed a copy of linux? If it had this program on linux, then you were distributing patented software. Even if you did it before you knew that Unisys was going to become anal about this. I admit that if you sit in your house and use your computer by yourself and never tell anyone what you're doing, and never distribute linux then you're not infringing. That's by definition since patents (AFAIR) don't cover private use. But, if you want to use the Internet, there are lots of things that you use and you probably don't think about that may be patented like the examples above. The point isn't whether or not these things get thrown out eventually, the point is that the legal system is willing to give the patent owners a chance to go after people, thereby costing the victims a lot of money and time.

I could use a commadore 64 to write code that runs on an intel pc...or even pen and paper. You can't prove that I used an infringing computer or methods to develop my software.

And you would never use any other type of computer anywhere else in your life? Do you believe that you have to go back to C64's to avoid infringement, or do you think that a modern OS on a modern computer can be run while doing the normal things that people do without infringing patents in any way?

I know that my post was a rant, but you're being pedantic here. Do you honestly believe that there are companies out there engaging in patent lawsuits and getting software patents that don't use modern computers? That don't use anything over the Internet that has been declared off limits by some company dredging up some 15 year old patent nobody ever heard of? I suppose that anything is possible, but not very likely. I would be willing to put up DO you code on a C64 to avoid patent infringement issues? Probably not. I don't. I will accept that peolpe who only use 20-year old+ computers and don't use the Internet can be sure that they're free of infringing on patents. And anyway, making software doesn't have anything to do with software patents, so the standard should be ever using modern computers.

They are and 99% of them (guesstimation) are not in violation of an patent laws.

I don't consider most of those devices to be computers. I think it would be very hard to go through life without being able to use real computers of some kind (including PDA's and such).

So you wrote this to hear yourself speak? I doubt that. Not asking for constructive criticism of your arguements is the surest way to always have crappyarguements. You have no idea that the method I'm using to access slashdot violates any patents. This blows another hole in your arguement with yourself.

You're right. It was a rant. OTOH, chances are, you ARE using a modern computer and you are accessing this site using that computer and you are infringing on somebody's patent while using that computer. And even if you're not accessing this post with modern computers, then you have in the past used them and you will in the future. Nice way to miss the point of my rant by coming up with a lawyerly pedantic counterexample. Just tonight I learned that somebody was still using an Atari 800 to do her word processing, so I know there are people who don't use mdoern machines. But I seriosuly doubt that you are, and I would guess that something in the process you used to get to this site v

I'd like to remind everyone that the assholes at PanIP are suing them and they are fighting back, please support them.

It doesn't matter if Apple is a favorite company of mine. I love Apple like I love my iBook but thais patent business is ridiculouslly out of control. The worst case of how bad this patent business has gotten are the companies that search out for patents and sue people to add to their bottom line.

Pangea IP activelly seeks out ecommerce firms and sues them because PanIP has a vaguelly worded patent that is letting them settle with small ecommerce firms for thousands of dollars a year. Patents like PanIP means if you create a candy store online, you can potentially get sued. Check out the Anti PanIP Fight Back Crew to see how serious one patent can be.

What really needs to be stopped is the Patent Office from issuing another ridiculous patent. OS and interface patents are hurting human-machine interactions because people have to bend over backward now to avoid patents. As a webdesigner, I really hope I'm not liabel for some sort of design I implement sheerly because some idiot has a Patent application on my design. I hope congress can frigging pay attention to this problem and how serious it is.

...one's missing from the list. That one would be PanIP v. everybody.

I am glad to hear " patents are not to be granted for previously off line processes that are merely submitted as internet automated inventions." Wonder how this applies to the PanIP patent on ecommerce Afterall an online catalog using text and graphics is no different in any way than the Sears Roebuck catalog of TWO CENTURIES AGO.

It looks like they are taking contributions for the effort ala PayPal.
http://www.youmaybenext.com/help.html
If everyone pitched in a buck I bet we could blow PanIP out of the water. I know that I don't want any of my clients getting sued and all of them fit in the category that is being preyed upon by these parasites. Shoot, I just talked myself in to contributing a buck for every website I manage. I would suggest that if you build sites for others that you do the same.

Take one look at the discussion boards on youmaybenext.com. There's tons of examples of prior art floating around there. All that is needed is 1) the will and 2) the financial means to bring those up in court to take this patent down. So far, there is a ton of will and not much in the way of financial needs... not as much as is needed, anyway (roughly $1mil). That's one thing that the web site is intended to organize.

Nice of them to start Round 4 on September 11th...

Check out this list

Uh-oh, I better alert www.dicksonchicks.com!

that, as the youmaybenext website pointed out, they are not suing anyone in California, especially considering that large parts of California are considered by the American Tort Reform Association to be judicial hellholes because of their tendency to dole out huge plaintiffs' awards. Anyone have any speculation as to why they are not filing suits in CA?

However, the cost of settling a case like this for $15 or $20 000 is less than the cost of a coupla' good IP lawyers.

Sucks, but you can put your money where your mouth is and help out.

Check out this list.

Seriously, how can you sue "The Little Pie Company" and still claim to have a soul?

I wrote:

...to ask about contributing to a defense fund (after reading about this on /. a few days ago). Here's what they had to say:

Thanks for your support. We are currently in the process of setting up the Group Defense and the PANIP Group Defense Fund. We hope to have it set up by the end of this week giving people a chance to contribute online through a PayPal account. The response has been very encouraging.

Stay tuned in and help us spread the word. PANIP thought they could extort money from small businesses without them making much noise. They were wrong.

Timothy Beere
DeBrand Fine Chocolates
http://www.debrand.com
http://www.youmaybenext.com


I'll also pick up some chocolates for my wife at their site...that way I can help their business and score some points with the bride at the same time. Double bonus!

Kathleen M. Walker 3421 Thorn Street San Diego, California 92104 Telephone: (619) 255 0987 Fax: (619) 255 0986 Taken from the first lawsuit filing, available here.

My more informed opinion is that we should assemble a group (like www.youmaybenext.com?) to sue the Patent and Trademark Office for issuing stupid patents, the recommended remedy being to shorten the life of technology- and pharmaceutical-related patents to six months. =P

...to ask about contributing to a defense fund (after reading about this on /. a few days ago). Here's what they had to say:

Thanks for your support. We are currently in the process of setting up the Group Defense and the PANIP Group Defense Fund. We hope to have it set up by the end of this week giving people a chance to contribute online through a PayPal account. The response has been very encouraging.

Stay tuned in and help us spread the word. PANIP thought they could extort money from small businesses without them making much noise. They were wrong.

Timothy Beere
DeBrand Fine Chocolates
http://www.debrand.com
http://www.youmaybenext.com

I'll also pick up some chocolates for my wife at their site...that way I can help their business and score some points with the bride at the same time. Double bonus!

its very sad that we have people who would actually use and abuse a system put in place that give freedom to people who have REAL AND WORTHY ideas. all we hear now are the people who ruin the system for everyone else. but if this really pisses you off, go to http://www.youmaybenext.com and help out if you like. its a site with good info on this jacka**.

www.dicksonsupply.com

Go to this site and offer to support their fight against these PanIP scum-bags.

I really don't believe that it's possible to have a faultless patent office: There are millions of inventions yearly, and patent examiners aren't infalliable - There is no way that they can know everything about everything, all while maintaining a brain history of every patent ever filed to avoid overlap. On top of that, the patent office really seems to have a policy of "grant the patent and let the courts settle it if conflict arises", which may be fair. If the swing guy (whose satirical patent is brilliant) tries to start suing children, then the real validity will come to play. Let's face it: Most patents filed have been filed just so that the maker can claim 40 patents on a plunger or flashlight (of course some of them are too lazy, and just claim the even more worthless "patent pending").

The real issue comes into play when courts are involved. It seems to me (personal opinion, not statement of fact) that this PanIP is a predatory patent abuser that engages in willful barratry, with specific intent to limit the venue of justice for their victims (i.e. the onus of responsibility to be forced to travel to their court district alone is financial incentive to just pay up to their, in my opinion, blackmail). If the patent office insists upon granting any patent, then lawsuits involving patents should be more balanced: If you want to sue someone for a patent, a summary judgement regarding the financial capability of both parties should be completed and if it's against a small, low income company (hence almost certainly patent blackmail), then the petitioner can go to their district and fight it out.

The PanIP Defendants web site mentioned in the article has a list of the 50 companies that have so far been sued by PanIP. Interestingly, despite the large number of e-commerce companies in California, none of the defendants are located in California.

Since the patent holder, PanIP, is located in San Diego the cases are taking place in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of California. Since all of the companies being targeted are small out-of-state companies they are unlikely to already have an established relationship with an attorney licensed to practice in California. I wonder if PanIP is specifically targeting companies that are not in California, perhaps on the theory that out-of-state companies will be more likely to settle when faced with having to litigate a case far from home?

Looking at the cache, I think they are now this site.