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Appeals Court Puts Amazon 1-Click Patent in Question
sallen writes "An article in the Internet News which can be read here indicates the Appeals Court handed Barnes and Noble a victory by overturning the the injunction of the lower court based on the Amazon Patent. In the article it stated "The United States Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit found, after careful review, "that BN has mounted a substantial challenge to the validity of the patent in the suit." All I can say is, it's about time!"
I'm gonna sit back and watch their stock price soar.
- A.P.
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* CmdrTaco is an idiot.
"Remember when the U.S. had a drug problem, and then we declared a War On Drugs, and now you can't buy drugs anymore?"
> Congress really should get around to fixing the broken US Patent Office processes, too.
Unfortunately, that doesn't fit in with most well-heeled lobbyists' agendas.
Most businesses look at the internet more as a gold rush than an opportunity for sober economic expansion, and they won't take too kindly to having the Congress spoil the party.
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Sheesh, evil *and* a jerk. -- Jade
> If I was an investor, I'd want to know why Amazon is so intent on giving money to lawyers to protect a buisness model that isn't even making them any money.
Actually, I think A is realizing that e-commerce isn't all it was hyped up to be as a business plan, so now they are looking for other means of turning a buck.
Ditto for all those companies who tried to score big during the "portal" rage.
However, RAMBUS has a business model that actually works (if they win enough lawsuits), so you can expect more e-commerce companies to tranform themselves into IP holding companies.
Which should give the public a hint at what's wrong with patent policy in the USA.
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Sheesh, evil *and* a jerk. -- Jade
I "disembrace" that idea. Vigorously.
The constitutional grounds for patents (in the USA) is about promoting progress, not promoting monopolies. If you read it carefully and think about what it says, you'll realize that the only things that could be patented and still promote the constitutional goals would be things that people could not figure out by examining. The philosophy stated in the US Constitution calls for patents as a way of getting people to share ideas that would remain hidden otherwise.
For example, if I invented a new way to rifle a gun barrel efficiently, people could look at it and see that it had been rifled, but they probably could not see how my clever method did it. They would be free to come up with their own methods of rifling, but if mine was truly more efficient they would want to know what they couldn't see, and a patent would motivate me to share my idea -- all to the good of the public (assuming the public needs rifles), not all to the good of me.
US Constitution to the side, there's also an ethical issue. Anything you think of is built on millenia of prior ideas and technology. Can you fairly milk the public for the use of "your" idea, when 99.9999...% of "your" idea is just the traditions of your culture? A fair patenting system would read like the terms you get when you buy a house:Sorry, but there's just not much personal credit left over in a technological idea, once prior credit has been given where due.
Finally, how "ingenious" is any idea? Look at the history of inventions, and see how often an idea was independently proposed and/or developed. Technology is like a wavefront; once the wave reaches a certain point, certain ideas become feasible and people will start to harvest them. I don't see where an individual is entitled to get rich just for being at the right place at the right time. Even if Amazon happened to be first at the one-click business, someone else would have come up with it within a very short period of time afterward if Amazon had not, once the technology was there.
FWIW, I do support copyrights, though I do not support attempts to take away Fair Use (for my works or any others), nor do I think copyrights should be perpetual.
As for the patent system as currently practised in the USA, well, it's totally fucked. Powerful interests have a notion that everything should be 0wned, and the gold rush is on. It's a convenient scam for ensuring that the rich continue to get richer, since the patent owners just give each other tit-for-tat licensing, and leave the have-nots to pay what they don't have.
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Sheesh, evil *and* a jerk. -- Jade
All that I can say is, I know the patent attornies who are working for Barnes and Nobles, and these are the best guys in the business.
I've worked with them before, and I've got to say, if anyone can change the tide of Intellectual Property law, it's these guys.
If any of you were wonderring, they're Pennie & Edmonds, LLP. Expensive as hell, but worth every cent.
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"Of course, that's just my opinion. I could be wrong." --Dennis Miller
And I hate to say it but you shouldn't expect the courts to reverse the trend. The current opinion is that everything under the sun which is made by man can be patented. That paraphrase comes from Diamond v. Chakrabarty which iirc went to the Supreme Court. While the patent is for a micro-organism that statement from the Supreme Court was used to uphold a business model patent which atm, I cannot recall. :P
The only way to fix the patent system, imo, is to ammend patent law. Being the cynic I am, I cannot see that ever happening. Be prepared to fight business model patents a few million dollars and a decade at a time.
I don't want knowledge. I want certainty. - Law, David Bowie
of invalidating lots of stupid business-method patents.
Congress really should get around to fixing the broken US Patent Office processes, too.
the methodology involved was first developed at amazon, so they may have some claim to it.
Being first hardly gives you a claim to a patent, you also need the patent to be non-obvious, a test which one-click fails. When humans colonize other planets, there will be a first person to build a hotel on another planet, although this person is the first to do it, this does not qualify the person for a patent because they are doing something obvious, the only reason nobody did it before them is because it was not until recently that technology allowed them to do so. It is the same with the one-click patent, the technology of cookies was new, and Amazon happened to be first to use them to make one-click shopping, but this doesn't mean it wasn't an obvious idea -- that Amazon immediately thought of using cookies to enable one-click shopping indicates that it was an obvious application of the new technology. Had it taken years for someone to use cookies for one-click shopping I would say that it was an innovative use, but that it was thought of immediately implies it wasn't (not that every use of a new technology is obvious, but if you hear of a new technology, the first uses that pop into your head are likely to occur to other people as well).
"Electronic Gift Certificate System" (Thinkgeek, are you violating this one?)
"Internet-based customer referral system"
"Method and system for placing a purchase order via a communications network"
"System and method for refining search"
"Identifying the items most relevant to a current query based on items selected in connection with similar queries"
"Uh, a spellchecker"
"Hypocritical and inherently contradictory process for the written and/or verbal justification of ridiculous patents by an exploiter (and beneficiary) of an easily-abused Patent Registration Office"
Here's an idea for you...
:P
The zero click ordering process.
It basically works just like the Columbia House selection of the month. Every month you'll get some crap that you didn't want mailed to you, along with a nice little bill for you to pay. Just remember you heard it here first
The sad part of the story is this: everyone I talk to about amazon and software patents has no idea of the problem. It seems like over half of even the technical people are not aware of the problem. How do we increase publicity on the problems with the software patents?
For our voice to be heard, we need to make sure everyone understands the problems. For our government to act against the wishes of big companies (those who like patents), it takes lots of public outcry. It's just sad to say, but money has way too much influence on politics.
People need to understand that the internet exists due to the open standards found on the internet. They need to realize that trivial patents on software can be pushed through the system by merely providing a complex sounding description of their "invention".
The patent system was designed to increase innovation for inventions. Manufacturing inventions demand patents because it requires lots of funding to setup a factory to build an invention. But software (and especially the internet) is quite a different story.
Everyone, do your best to explain the situation. Do your best to make sure voters understand this topic. Put pressure on the legislature to change these laws.
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Twivel
I don't know how that cleared the patent office in the first place. If patents are going to be granted for technical innovations, shouldn't they be reviewed by specialists in the fields they affect?
If I was an investor, I'd want to know why Amazon is so intent on giving money to lawyers to protect a buisness model that isn't even making them any money.
The 1-click patent has always been part of a war between Barnes & Nobles and Amazon. The fact that it touched off so many passions on Slashdot is just an unexpected side effect. Read my earlier post about the punches that B&N has thrown Amazon or even better do a search for Amazon, B&N and the words lawsuit or sue and you'll be rather surprised to see the amount of blows that have been thrown by both parties. The rivalry between both companies is similar to the irrational hatreds that run deep within the Sun and Microsoft camps. The reason few geeks know about is that it's been mainly news for the book industry and few else.
After all, you'll note that Amazon hasn't sued anyone else for violating their patent.
Now hopefully they start going after other frivilous patents like British Telecomm (the hyper-link) and AltaVista. In both cases (and so many more), prior art has been shown but the patent office still issues patents! Are they stupid or just dump? Perhaps the patent lawyers that worked on the cases should be looked into, too, and barred from patent cases if nothing else.
This is clearly a case of companies grabbing technology and honing it for money and name-sake, but they didn't invent it! This is bad business practice as well, and I urge you /. readers to keep usage of such sites to a minimum (obviously you can't with the hyperlink very easily).
Maybe it's time courts (like the Supreme Court?) start evaluating whether or not people should be able to patent certain technologies that have become a mainstay in the Internet community, like XML, HTTP, the hyperlink, SGML, indexes, etc. If companies keep privatizing what they don't own in the first place, bye-bye Internet, hello big-brother rule again!
You can get the opinion at either Findlaw(HTML) or at the Federal Circuit(MS-WORD) web pages.
Associated Press
Washington, D.C.
With all the hype of 1-click patents, the patent office has decided that they would like to actaully implement such a solution. Anyone will be able to create thier patents with just one click from the patent office's web site with this new system being introduced. A spokesman with the patent office stated "We at the patent office have decided that we would like to move in to the 21st century. To do this we will leave behind the cumbersome ways of registering patents like we have in the past and move to our new 1-click system of registering patents." This new method of 1-click patents will make it easier then ever to register a patent. This plan was annonced just after the appeals court put Amazon's 1-click patent in question.
Remember, though, this is just a ruling on the injunction, not on the actual court cases. An injunction is simply used as a preliminary step to prevent one side or the other from significantly damaging the other; there was obviously no need to apply an injunction here as Barnes and Noble's use of a one-click shopping scheme has only a tenuously connection at best to damages to Amazon. An injunction not a final decision by any means. (Note that the Napster "ruling" was also just a ruling on an injunction.)
A full trial is still on its way (starting in September, according to the story), so we could see a different result then -- or the same one. (Barnes and Noble actually stands a better chance of victory in a full trial, as their lawyers will have more of a chance to outline the flaws in the "one-click shopping" patent. Amazon would want to put this case through as quickly as possible so that the jury wouldn't get to hear all the arguments that could be levied against them.)
Yu Suzuki
Yu Suzuki
Deamcast. It's thinking.
I'm really surprised more companies aren't fighting for the same rights we are. Why aren't the MP3 patent holders fightiing alongside Napster? There is MUCH less incentive for me to pay for MP3 software (and they get a cut of that purchase price) without Napster
The reason is most International Commerce at this level is happening in the same circles. There are massive Groups, Technology Partners, Associations etc etc etc where you will find that 95% of MultiNatinonals are in bed with one another. Why would MS want to fight Apple? They own ~10% of Apple. Why would Frauenhoffer want to sue the RIAA? They are probably involved in half a dozen 'Audio Technology Consortium' bullshit Non-Competition clubs.
The answer to alot of the the 'World Trade' crap were seeing (otherwise known as the Great Capatalist Swindle) would be to have the UN create a World Declaration of Citizen/Environmental/Social Rights and include *ALOT* of strong Anti-Trust legislation.
Then have all UN members ratify it...
I would be asking for a refund!
::I will not moderate my opinions for your stinking karma
Although the idea of the "click" as obvious prior art, the actual patent touches on many idea's for the methodology of grabbing the cart information from the db, storing that data, and calling it later.
i think its a pretty lame thing to patent, but the methodology involved was first developed at amazon, so they may have some claim to it.
There's nothing Intelligent about Intelligent Design.
It never ceases to amaze me how companies that are struggling to turn a profit are willing to spend money on silly lawsuits.
If I was an investor, I'd want to know why Amazon is so intent on giving money to lawyers to protect a buisness model that isn't even making them any money.
Honestly, it's like having a patent on "exfoliating creams for ring tailed lemurs" or something. It may or may not be patentable, but if you can't turn a profit on the invention even with a government enforced monopoly, is it worth patenting? Is the pattent then worth enforcing? Of course not.
--Kara
--Kara
Before you ask, I already have a boyfriend and he's more of a man than you'll ever be.