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Apple Advertises "1-Click" Licensing
scout.finch writes: "Looks like Apple wasn't kidding. Their new front page proudly advertising "1-Click Buying" complete with registration mark." Very depressing. Usually I don't pay much attention to the stock market, but seeing what happened to Apple's stock this week... well, I don't feel bad for them at all. The more credit given to Amazon's lame patent, the harder it'll be to overturn.
or you might want to think about the fact that cookies go across the wire unencrypted
Cookies go across the wire encrypted on shopping sites that use https (HTTP over SSL), don't they?
<O
( \
XPlay Tetris On Drugs!
Will I retire or break 10K?
I too was of the mind that one-click shopping is so easy to implement that the patent is absurd. but then I worked a bit with some programmers to implement a user interface, and I had a second think coming.
having a programmer (admittedly, they were very bright but not trained in user interface design) implement a user-friendly interface, not adhering to Microsoft's GUI standards and without confirmation buttons for every single move was a task! it seems programmers have a built-in affinity for implementing "Are you sure?"-directions, and that making them not do so is enormously difficult.
from the point of view of a non-programmer, one-click shopping, albeit a technically trivial concept, seems to be a massive intellectual feat, and as such worthy of patenting.
-- Rolf Lindgren, cand.psychol
The only company you named was Xerox, who, while admittedly did all the R&D for GUI wouldn't, couldn't, and didn't bring it to market. Instead, they sat on it for years and Apple purchased the idea (admittedly for far less than it was worth) and brought it to the table, which was my point.
I don't care whether firewire is successful or not. They're an actual company (not a research group, not an open source hacker) who is willing to take the risk on things like that. Incidentally, it is successful. Call it "Firewire", "I-Link", or "IEEE 1394", it's the standard for DV communications.
Using the BSD kernel in a user-level OS is a major step forward. It brings a lot of power and technology to the hands of developers who want to program user level apps.
And regardless of whether or not they needed to do one click shopping, what's wrong with doing it?
I think you (and most of the slashdot crowd) just get thrills off of playing armchair critic to the corporate world.
Cheers.
What the finagle are you talking about?
1-Click (SM) shopping allows you to go back and view, change, or delete your order for 90 minutes after you make it! Check out their About 1-Click Ordering page.
I'm not fond of the entire 1-Click Patent mess, but that's no excuse to throw around sloppy falsehoods. I've been using 1-Click since Amazon introduced it, and it's always worked this way.
"It is our blasphemy which has made us great, and will sustain us, and which the gods secretly admire in us." - Zelazny
You may not like it, but they couldn't offer that feature any other way.
They could test the patent in court, prove how ridiculous it is, then use it as they wish. However, they chose to license it, making things even harder for anyone who comes after them to win in a court battle.
Quick! Someone patent 2-Click shopping and license it to Microsoft!
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On the one hand, we get articles on Slashdot completely supporting Apple for turning to a BSD-based OS and then we get articles lambasting them for completely logical business decisions, all because someone thinks a paten is dumb.
...
/.
It's not like Apple is one person. A corporation can do both stupid and intelligent things at the same time.
Do you guys know how many dumb patents there are?
I think that's kinda what we're complaining about...?
Yes, of course you can say, "Well, duh, it's obvious that you can do that," but these guys did it and said, "Hey, we did it first," and I haven't really seen a conclusive proof against that.
They sure did. And unless someone has proof that someone did do it before them, that is undisputable fact. I don't have proof otherwise, maybe someone else does; but they haven't come forward, AFAIK.
Boohoo that the world
Boohoo that Apple...
Boohoo that you...
The point is not that comapnies abide by laws, or that companies are interested in their bottom line, or that we didn't do it first. The point is that the 1-click patent undermines exactly what the internet is founded on! What would happen if all those RFC's were actaully patents?!? There would be NO internet, because the patented RFC owners would demand royalites...!
Sometimes Slashdot sounds really insightful, and then sometimes, it sounds like a bunch of naive kids whining because things aren't going their way.
Actually, YOU sound like a kid whining because he didn't like what he read on
Call it "Firewire", "I-Link", or "IEEE 1394", it's the standard for DV communications.
Screw DV communications, I want it on my motherboard. In fact, I want it on every motherboard. I want there to be as many Firewire devices as there are USB devices. More.
Does this have anything to do with Apple? Not really. Most of Firewire's success (or lack thereof) lies in PC land where Apple has little control. So, all in all, this post wasn't really pertitant to the discussion.
The moral: it's not Apple's fault, though I still don't consider it successful enough.
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Not quite. Apple announced that they expected to be significantly short of analyst's expectations (I think your figures are correct) when they announce earnings on October 18th. The actual news might be somewhat better or worse than this. Now, the strange thing is the 50% fall in the stock price leaves the company with a P/E ratio of 13 or so, which is just bizarre in the current market situation. So either Apple is oversold, or life is about to get waaaaay too interesting for my taste.
Babar
You may not like it, but they couldn't offer that feature any other way.
I agree with you on that, but you have to ask yourself: Why would you want to one-click shop for computers?
As far as I know, the idea behind one-click shopping is you go to a site and order something. They keep your details - CC#, address, e-mail, telephone - in a big-assed database and give you a cookie. Next time you come to the site, they get the cookie back and say 'Hey, you must be John Andrews, CC# 1234 5678 9101 1121 exp. 01/01!'.
Now, this could be good if you were ordering, say, books, because you can get through a lot of books and the price is quite low.
Computers, however, are another matter. Most people only want a new computer every one or two years, if that often. I don't know about you, but I'd rather type out my credit card number once every two years than have if floating around in some online database that may or may not be secure.
Just my $0.02
Michael
...another comment from Michael Tandy.
"Goodness me, how unlike the FBI to abuse the trust of the American public." -- The Onion
Apple didn't file the patent. Amazon is, and there is a relevant patent because at the middle of this discussion is whether Amazon has the right to patent the technology. In this case, Apple has licensed the technology from Amazon, which Slashdot has misconstrued as somehow lending credence to the patent.
a) Apple's licensing of the technology does not lend any validity to the patent. The patent is already completely valid. Apple's just making sure they can use the technology without getting sued for patent infringement
b) The only thing that's going to invalidate the patent is if someone shows prior art. Then, I'm sure, Apple would quit paying royalties.
About two seconds after I posted, I saw the link. I felt really stupid, but realized that I couldn't rescind it. Oh well, I feel like a jackass.
The (r) still refers to the trademark... not that that helps my stupidity. I'm shocked that they don't mention that it is a registered trademark to Amazon on the page.
Alex
Logic has nothing to do with it. The actual number of mouse clicks a buyer makes has nothing to do with it. It is a marketing warm fuzzy ploy:
Amazon has One Click (TM, patents, etc.), the coolest way to buy stuff on the planet. It's even *PATENTED*!!! Oooh! Wow! (other expressions of extreme hipness included here)
Apple makes the iMac (TM, patents, etc.), iBook (TM, patents, etc.), iCube (TM, patents, etc.) and all the really iCoolest computers on the planet. But Apple doesn't have One Click (TM, patents, etc.). So the Apple Store (TM, patents, etc.) has a serious lack of coolness going on. iBoo iHoo. iSob. (other expressions of extreme iUnHappiness included here)
So Steve Jobs, our iHero, steps in. One quick icall on the iphone, and the Apple Store has officially licensed the (now i)One Click (TM, patents, etc.). iJoy! iJoy! All is now iCool again! (TM, patents, etc.)
See, it is all one big marketing game. Anyone can play. All it takes is either offically licensing the coolness, or coming up with something cooler.
Of course, the US Patent Office does need its head examined for patenting marketing ploys (One Click should be a service mark, not a patent). Then again, since when has the government been catering to the wishes of the terminally logical?
This actually depends on a multitude of factors. First would be the fact that if the protocol was released free of patent restrictions, the barrier to it's introduction would be extremely low, the the momentum to get it accepted above all others would be much more substancial.
Entirely true, particularly in today's environment. However, this ignores another point I'd made.
If I were writing up a patent for the IP protocol, I wouldn't write it in such a way as to strictly define this protocol itself, but as to also apply to as many other protocols fulfilling the same purpose as possible. If there's already prior art and you're creating Yet Another Protocol, that's a whole different issue -- but if, back when the concepts behind such protocols were new, such a scenario is entirely feasible. In short, not only your protocol would necessarily be encumbered by the patent; if you were succesful, you could apply your patent to competing protocols and thus (by refusing to license your patent to those w/ competing protocols) force YOUR protocol to become the standard.
As a result of this, you wouldn't need momentum from people deciding to use your patent; you could legally force them to use it by refusing to license use to them should they use a competing, yet infringing, patent.
If sufficiently broad patents -- rather than open standards -- had been created early in computing's history, 'twould be a different, and bleaker, landscape, and this is the point that I'm trying to make. Sorry if I was somewhat unclear earlier. As for software patents being in general a Bad Thing, I entirely agree.
Indeed. I suspect that both Apple and Amazon (even more than Apple) have a lot to gain from this. Amazon of course wants the patent validated, and Apple seems to also like to be nasty about IP. So I also wouldn't be the least bit surprised if Apple's not paying anything for this.
Apple *used* to innovate. Now they just copy, badly. Their current generation of G3/4 Motorola processors is undoubtably innovation by Motorola, but I was shocked when I recently bought a new iMac at just how little of the system architecture was designed by Apple and that they had *completely* turned their back on their old installed user base of peripherals by removing external ADB, Apple serial and scsi ports... ATi make their graphics cards. Oh, and another thing: I used to have respect for Macs because they usually could run the *pre*installed software without crashing very often. I powered up my brand new iMac, put in a dvd and... it crashed. I try to run a web browser, it crashed... etc etc. Bye bye Apple...
Before accussing /. of libel, how about reading Apple's own press release about it? /. is guilty, at times, of posting stuff without fully thinking about it, but if you're going to complain about it, you might want to make sure you're not doing the same.
Of course, this is akin to expecting Usenet spelling/grammar flames to be straight out of the Northwestern English department . . .
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-- Geof F. Morris
That's not prior art. That's stretching an existing circumstance to try to relate it to a new 'invention'.
/pa tents.html
No, the original poster is completely right, that a patent has to be (in theory) non-obvious to someone "learned in the art".
e.g. see http://otl.stanford.edu/inventors
Way to go, Jobs. I'm sure this is exactly what Ghandi would have done, too.
Now I can buy $3000 computer systems without the time-wasting drudgery of having to review and confirm my order to make sure it's the exact model and configuration that I wanted!
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As copyright owner of this comment, I authorize everyone to defeat any technological measure which limits access to it.
But the point is well-taken: why does Apple need one-click shopping? The idea of one-click is that it simplifes impulse purchases, which are generally small-dollar.
I, right now, would really like some Ben & Jerry's. If I could snap my fingers and some would appear, I'd do so. But what I actually need to do is put on my shoes, leave my apartment, walk about 3 blocks to a cash machine, another 4 blocks to the convenience store, and then buy some. Either way it costs me around $2.67. But I'm only interested in one method.
I would not use the former process to purchase, say, an Apple. I want to proceed carefully; there are few people for whom $2500 is a small expense.
It does seem like a really weird use of one-click.
-Waldo
Just think of it. In a way, Apple and amazon.com have just contributed to the "instant gratification, now, damnit!" mentality. Pretty soon, hackers will design the "one-click DDoS" (oh wait, that's already been done) and the "one-click Carnivore killer." Corporations will demand the "one-click litigation" and "one-click buyout." Terrorists will spend millions to acquire the "one-click remote EMP." Gee, what will be the next threat to civilization spawned by this?
"Ancillary does not mean you get to rule the world." --U.S. Circuit Judge Harry Edwards, speaking to the FCC's lawyer
"Buy now with One Click"
*Click*
"Sign up for One Click"
*Click*
"Set up a new Account"
*Click*
"Turn One Click On"
*Click*
YES!!! Now I can buy stuff with only One Click!!!
Soon, I'll be able to buy Apple with one click.
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Moreover, licensing 1-Click in no way makes it "harder ... to overturn" as CmdrTaco claims.
If some party wants to challenge the patent, Apple's use/license of it will have no effect on that challenge.
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He lives in a world where those who do not run the client software of the omnipresent meme are unacceptable.
So I went to google to find an appropriate link to this story. Tried a search for "paperclip patent." I hit "I'm Feeling Lucky."
This the link. Freaking weird.
coalition (n): An alliance, especially a temporary one, of people, factions, parties, or nations.
Wouldn't big business benefit as a whole if predatory patents like this gain legitimacy? With all the bad press Amazon has gotten for this stupid patent, wouldn't it be a great way to influence public opinion in favor of it by making it look reasonable and useful?
Just a thought...
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You have heard of Akamai, haven't you?
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Quite an observation there.
Hey, look what I just noticed: Compaq is the only company offering Compaq computers. Chrysler is the only company offering Chrysler automobiles. Nike is the only company offering Nike shoes. Wow, this is amazing!
Or do you think Apple is the only place to purchase an Apple computer from? Then you would be wrong.
I choose where over 100 million goes on desktops each year.
I'm supposing you just call up Dell and do a big bank transfer to them.
I will not get a single Apple.
Good. We wouldn't want you to come back bitching about not being able to play HalfLife on it all day.
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Do Slashdotters find a need to search out causes? On the one hand, we get articles on Slashdot completely supporting Apple for turning to a BSD-based OS and then we get articles lambasting them for completely logical business decisions, all because someone thinks a paten is dumb.
Do you guys know how many dumb patents there are? Have you ever looked at a McDonald's fry package? There's a patent there. There are patents on things like lamps, CD cases, even wrapping paper. We can look at it and say, "Oh, it's so obvious that wrapping paper should be like this," but that doesn't change the fact that the person/company/entity invented it first.
I still haven't seen a worthy challenge to the 1-Click philosophy. Yes, of course you can say, "Well, duh, it's obvious that you can do that," but these guys did it and said, "Hey, we did it first," and I haven't really seen a conclusive proof against that.
So now, a company decides to use this technology, technology which will obviously make it easier for consumers to purchase online things that Slashdot has already come out in favor of and you turn around and criticize them?! Shame on you. Boohoo that the world didn't turn out the way you want it and companies actually abide by laws instead of filling our courts with worthless and expensive litigation. Boohoo that Apple turns out to be interested in its bottom line rather than what you want it to be interested in. Boohoo that you didn't go out and register an idea that seems completely obvious (to you) with the patent office before some big company could.
Sometimes Slashdot sounds really insightful, and then sometimes, it sounds like a bunch of naive kids whining because things aren't going their way.
BTW, on another topic, this page was updated a good 10 days ago. What's that say about Apple when a geek news site doesn't notice this sort of thing for ten days?
Nice use of rn to fake an m, but Carmack (assuming he has a /. ID) is probably well below 100,000.
For all intensive purposes, "whom" is no longer a word. That begs the question, "who cares"?
EVERY link on their homepage takes you to a stupid explanation of what "1-click" means... I didn't searching yet... that'll probably do the same. Jeez.. 1-Click ... its not THAT novel and new you know...
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In short, AKAMAI GOOD!
-30-
Apple to charge Licensing Fees for FireWire
Or for that matter the fact that MacOS is closed-source and non-free (in all senses).
I mean, if the headline was "RMS adds '1-Click' to gnu.org website. '1-Click is easy and fun and makes purcasing GNU software so much easier,' Stallman said.' that would be one thing, but, I mean it's Apple. Has the reality distortion field gotten to all of you too?
Apple may be a cooler company and Steve Jobs could probably kick Bill Gates' ass, but there is absolutely NO REASON for Apple to be all "Down with IP" when it comes to acquring a technology they want. They expect everyone else to adhere to the idiocies of IP laws, so I don't know why it sounds so strange for them to do the same.
> Apple stock went down because they are trying to innovate. They are trying new things.
Hey, now. Just because something hasn't been done before doesn't mean it's worth doing. Penis bird guy and the goatse.cx guy were both innovative too.
BTW, what was Apple "innovating" that caused their stock to plummet? This is a serious question, I didn't realize the company was having problems above and beyond (below & behind?) the usual Apple woes.
Ryan
The shares of Apple I was "stupid" enough to buy are still worth four times what I paid for them.
I'm still laughing all the way to the bank.
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Now, no matter what side you take in the open/free/closed software battle, you should at least give Apple a little respect in the business department. If the challenge to Amazon's patent is successful, what has Apple lost? Nothing, really, if they were smart about their licensing. While IANAL and I haven't seen the agreements, it'd make good sense to have Amazon return all licensing fees if their patent is eventually shown to be revoked. If the patent is held up--now doubt to the chagrin of the Slashdot crowd--Apple has simply beaten the competition to the punch, like Amazon did in patenting one-click in the first place.
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-- Geof F. Morris
One-click order cancellation
Sorry, Steve and Jeff, I thought of it first and I'm going to transfer the patent to the public domain.
And by third quarter of 2001 I should have another completely new technology ready to patent: one-click stock fraud.
I think Apple is just playing by the book.
I mean, look at their track record. Apple is one of those companies with trigger happy lawyers; they go after EVERYTHING. You can't even post pictures of upcoming hardware without getting in trouble with these guys.
Wouldn't it be hypocritical if Apple *didn't* license this from Amazon?
The absurdity of Amazon's patent isn't at issue here; it's the fact that when Apple goes after someone with legal letters, they're not just barking loudly. They mean it, and are willing to bite the bullet and tolerate the absurd if it keeps their record spotless.
Kind of a lame way to define integrity, but hey. In this world I guess you gotta take it from wherever you can.
I don't care if it's "clickless" shopping, I am not paying $59 for a mouse.
I want to delete my account but Slashdot doesn't allow it.
Now I hate Amazon for the whole 1-Click patent deal, and I don't really see that why Apple has to roll this out with the tremendous amount of hype they are giving it (dedicating their front page to 1-Click?), but it *does* kind of make sense for them to do it.
The legal term of art "unobviousness" refers to the provisions of 35 U.S.C. s. 103, and it doesn't mean what you think it means.
What makes you think so? How do you know what I think it means?
obviousness is a highly technical legal issue
Obviousness isn't a highly technical legal issue. It's the most subjective and debatable aspect of any patent - despite the mythical "person of ordinary skill in the field, and omniscient of all prior art", there doesn't exist a N point rule to decide on the obviousness of a supposed invention.
Unfortunately for everyone, Apple, as a publicly traded company, cannot just do an about face and become a new company.
They could have simply not used a 1-click shopping method, that woudl have been fine.
But if they want to, they HAVE to license it from Amazon. If they don't, they would be knowingly exposing the company to lititgation.
Note: In big business, you don't let a small licensing fee on a little patent ruin your business.
The legal term of art "unobviousness" refers to the provisions of 35 U.S.C. s. 103, and it doesn't mean what you think it means.
The claim is the thing -- you compare the elements of the claim with those elements in a single piece of prior art. if all the elements are present, you have what is called anticipation, or invalidity under Section 102. If even one element is not present, then the patent is valid unless the DIFFERENCES between the claimed patent and the single piece of prior art would have been obvious to a person of ORDINARY SKILL in the art.
This issue of obviousness is a highly technical legal issue -- essentially, the question devolves to whether there exist other pieces of art that have the missing elements, and whether there exist prior art or teachings suggesting the combination. In the absence of that, obviousness is almost impossible to show.
In the present case, substantial art has already been presented to suggest invalidity on theories of anticipation and nonobviousness, yet the Court still found cause to grant a temporary injunction. This is a very unusual occurrence (patent temp injunctions are rare), and does not bode well for those claiming this patent to be invalid.
Time will tell, of course, but no one has yet to propose prior art here on Slashdot that gave me reason to think this patent was invalid.
So this is what happens when you take both the red and blue pills... You get stuck somewhere between the "Real World" of cool hardware and software and the "Matrix" hell controlled by the likes of Amazon and the USPTO.
But here you have a place to buy computers. I mean how realistic is it that i, when buying an iMac will forsee the need for more iMacs at a frequency that would warrant me not wanting to put in my login name and password?
Not very likely...
Ñ'
It may be one click shopping, but these are macs we're talking about.
So it's Shift-Option-Click!
I've used Amazon's one click before (once), not fully realizing that it truly is a "done deal". No amount of clicking let's you change your mind, or preview an order. So let it be known that I am proud to announce my
Two Click Shopping (TM)
U.S. and foreign patents pending.
With this revolutionary technology you will now be able to "check" an order, or "preview" it before we ship to you. If you want to back out for any reason whatsoever, or change the order, you can do that with a "second click".
But Two Click Shopping is even more versatile now, as you can use the "second click" to "affirm" the order. It will henceforth be processed in a prompt manner and you can expect speedy shipment.
If you have any problems with the above, or disagree with it in any manner, or want to use any "multiple click" technology, this will be in violation of the EULA of this post. Moderating this post "down" as "troll" or "flamebait" will be considered as circumvention of the original intention of this post. Please consider this as your Cease and Desist Notice. If you do not bring youself into compliance immediately, I will be forced to contact Dutch l33t h4x0r Nohican who will change your password and email it to the penis bird troll.
Thank you for your attention, and I hope we can come to a satisfactory
resolution to this matter.
Very Truly Yours,
Slashdot user eclectro #227083
Take the cheese to sickbay, the doctor should see it as soon as possible - B'Elanna Torres, "Learning Curve"
First off, just because you didn't think of it, doesn't mean other people haven't. I remember saying to myself lots of times after ordering something, that I wish it could be as simple click to order something. It's just the way my reductionist mind works. However, I don't have a web site that sells stuff, nor would I ever imagine that such an idea would be patentable. It's possible hundreds or thousands have had the same thought. Just because it was no implemented, doesn't mean that no one thought of it. Quit making assertations you cannot prove.
Secondly, the original author said it was one of the reasons it was a stupid idea. I always love it when morons get on and say things, when they don't even read the article carefully enough to make an intelligent statement.
Thirdly, you say it's a dumb idea, because it's a dumb idea. That kind of circular thinking will never get you your long sought after membership into Mensa.
Can you really blame Apple on this one?
Seriously, Apple was fully aware of what Amazon did to Barnes and Noble when they attempted to go forth with their own one-click plan. Now one could argue that Amazon was only aggressive because Barnes and Noble was also an online book retailer, but I doubt Apple's legal team advised whoever not to take any chances.
If Apple wanted 1-click shopping badly enough, yet didn't want any thorny legal issues to deal with, it was really the only way to go.
I don't like the fact that Amazon has the patent either, I think the USPTO needs to be looked over and reviewed, but hell, I don't blame Apple for making the move they did. I'd prolly would've done the same thing.
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I guess last week they debuted their 1-click stock selling.
A Dick and a Bush .. You know somebody's gonna get screwed.
War is necrophilia.
Let me sum this idea up in other terms. All of your personal information including your credit card number is stored somewhere that you don't have control over so that with a single click you can spend thousands of dollars. What's to distinguish your click from someone who stole your computer's click, or someone who used the public terminal after someone who doesn't understand the technology logs out. I'm surprised that the companies that use this can get insured. It's like an invitation for fraud.
Anyway, One-Click is a patently original idea, but if I Had though of it I would never have admited it to anyone. I'm done ranting now.
Granted, I don't follow the stock market very often, but I just looked at their 3-month prices,and they dropped abou 50% in the last week! Anybody know what caused such a drop? (Granted, the entire market didn't so hot in the last week, but stilll....)
Apple has had the announcement for 1 click up on the site for ages. In fact it went up as soon as they announced they were patenting the technology. This is old news and adds nothing to the previous story when apple announced they were patenting 1 click.
I honestly don't see why everyone is so pissed off at Apple about this. They wanted to offer a service to their cutomers and amazon has a patent on the service. If they had started using the 1click "patent" without licensing it they would get sued. So what would the rational action be? lincense the patent or get into a protracted legal battle that some other huge company already lost before? Once Amazon won against B&N this thing was over because a precedent was created. Every person who tries to fight Amazon on the patent will have to face an uphill battle. Im sure the cost of litigation would have been much higher so end of story. If you want to be mad at someone be mad at Amazon. I guess it is cool to diss apple on slashdot so everything they do is open to being ridiculed here.
On the validity of the patent. It does seem pretty silly to be able to patent something as "simple" as a 1 click shopping system. I used to buy lot of books from amazon and i remember when 1 click began to be offered as a service (I for one made so many impulse purchases because of it...). I also remember that my first reacition was "Oh how cool. Whata great idea. so simple yet so convinient." I also remember going to B&N later on and seein their blatant copy of Amazon's 1 click technology. My first reaction to that was: " It figures. everything they with their website is a bad attempt at copying whatever Amazon does." I felt that B&N was ripping Amazon off and that they were going to try to muscle Amazon out of the business by using their clout and provide similar services by copying Amazon's every move (This was years ago and Amazon was not the market cap monster it is now. It was more of a fledgeling internet copany). My fear at the time was what looked like a half hearted attempt by B&N to move into the internet market and win by simply being the established one. So while a patent for 1 click seems excesive I can understand wanting to keep it and patent it. I guess what i mean is that I can see both sides of the argument and it simply isnt as clear as most people here on slashdot want to make it seem.
An object in motion tends to stay in motion unless acted on by an outside force. No duh, that's why I go through the windshield when I try to stop my car really fast, unless acted on by my seatbelt. Seems pretty obvious to me. Why did it take thousands of years to be discovered? Sometimes things seem quite obvious after the fact. Sometimes the more obvious it seems after the fact, the more ingenious it really was.
Would one-click shopping have been "invented" if it weren't for the patent? Hell yeah. Not only would someone have come up with it by now if it weren't for Amazon.com, Amazon.com would have still "released" the idea if it weren't for patent law. Amazon.com's patent is legal, it's the law that's messed up. Amazon's (and Apple's) executives are required by law to perform in a way to maximize their companies profits. But go ahead, boycott away, but I hope you intend to live alone and build everything you ever use by yourself, if you intend to boycott every company that follows bad laws.
ok then your [sic] infringing on my copyright! Could you as [sic] me next time before STEALING my comments for your own?
The more credit thats given to Amazon's lame patent, the harder it'll be to overturn. I'd like to know where people get these ideas. The FACT of the matter is that the validity of a patent has NOTHING to do with whether or not someone takes a license and pays the fees. Lots of companies make the decison to license a patent for the simple reason that it is far cheaper to take a license than to contest it in court.
Why doesn't apple just skip all this one-click nonsense and just use zero-click shopping?
I mean, Apple knows what's best for you anyway...
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Soma: because a gramme is better than a damn.
He probably went outdoors and got a life..
Unilke us...
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"No se rinde el gallo rojo, sólo cuando ya está muerto."
$HOME is where the
-- silver_p
Well, this is somewhat speculation, but it seems to me like investors are nervous because of stuff like OSX and the G4 Cube.
Most companies don't rewrite their OS from scratch (I know it's got a BSD kernel, but that's just a good foundation). Also, pushing dual processors, firewire, gigabit ethernet, desktop video, creative hardware design... these are fairly gutsy moves for a mature corporation, and people seem to like to see them fail (I guess it justifies their own laziness?).
I'm not saying these are all necessarily good ideas, but I wish that companies got points for trying new things, since it's a sign of vitality, in my opinion. Instead, companies get points for being predictable.
On a factual level, the stock went down because they reported profit growth. Except it wasn't as much growth as analysts had predicted. Why that shows poorly on the company (they grow and their stock drops 52%?) I don't really know.
Just my 2cents.
And what have you got against goatse.cx? ;)
(a) Secure and unable to shop (with 1 - click)
(b) Unsecure and have script kiddies able to shop (with my credit card).
Hmmm. what a choice.... Steve Jobs - well done!
Microsoft - not all bad.
I see a $3,000 Cube. Gotta have it. <click> Oh, shit, wait... I can't afford that! Damn.
"Hello, Visa? I need a credit extension, quick!"
I don't think I've ever heard such a strange disconnected take on morality before. Apple abides by US law which (like it or not) has been around for over a century, and you're glad their stock dropped? And the stock dropped for reasons entirely unrelated to this?
Like Apple or not, that type of statement is just childish. I'm glad to see that some people on the board realize that real companies don't have the freedom to give everyone the finger like the majority of the sit-at-home Slashdot crowd. You only have that freedom because of your anonymity. Try actually running a business and keeping that attitude. You're stock will end up as wallpaper.
Good luck, Apple. I'm glad some companies are taking the risk of doing innovative things. And no, 1-click shopping isn't one of them.
It would be pretty easy to clear up... the merchandise would go to the preregistered One-Click address.
[
I recall seeing '1-click' style mechanisms on several sites prior to Amazons patent.
...'?
Well then name one! This is what I'm talking about when I say a 'worthy challenge'. People are very quick to say, "Well, I remember seeing 1-click-style shopping" but they can't say where. That's what happens when someone patents what might be an obvious idea. Everyone says, "Well, duh, everyone did that," and then they can't think of anything. That's because what they're really thinking is that it's such a great idea that of course everyone should've been doing that. Of course, they weren't, and the patent holder jumped on it.
So, can you name a company that had '1-click' shopping before Amazon filed their patent? Or is it always going to be 'Well, I recall seeing
Their is no mention on the site of the patent. It may or may not be licensed from Amazon. HOWEVER, their is NO evidence on the site that they are licensing Amazon's patent.
I see 1-Click(R), meaning a registered trademark. As there is no mention that the trademark is registered to Amazon, I am inclined to believe that Apple trademarked 1-Click (in the realm of buying or e-commerce if their is a new catagory, or whatever).
Trademark means only THEY can refer to their feature as 1-Click, not that they own the term.
I am SICK of factually erroneous stories being passed for news, especially with the "editorial" staff adding the incorrectness.
If a submitter is wrong, you should verify it. If you are adding commentary, do SOME homework. Last time I checked, what you are doing is close to libel.
Alex