Patenting RPC Compression?

slantyyz writes "Here's an interesting article in eCompany that talks about a company named TechSearch that buys patents for very common innovations and then chases infringers. One of the patents these guys own involves a remote server compressing and decompressing files. This one is so broad that anyone using a web server/browser is an infringer. Some companies, including United Airlines and Sara Lee have paid the license fees to avoid the legal hassles and costs. They have even chased a known patent critic for infringing (because he has a web site, which infringes on the patent). This software patent silliness has just got to stop. Only in America..."

Comments

Re:My patent

[scrytch]

I now own a patent for "encoding english language characters for transmission over a network". Muhawhaw, everyone on the Internet is an infringer!

Maybe that's why they call it Andover.net. Because we keep seeing the same damn jokes overAndoverAndoverAndoverAndoverAndoverAndoverAndo verAndoverAndoverAndoverAndoverAndoverAndoverAndov erAndoverAndoverAndoverAndoverAndoverAndoverAndove rAndoverAndoverAndoverAndoverAndoverAndoverAndover again...

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Re:this is why violent revolution was invented

[HiThere]

Where do you get your water? Nearly any real popular revolution in the cities of the industrialized countries can be controlled by turning of the water.

How long do you have food for? I understand from estimates after the last earthquake that the area that I live in has food for about a week without outside deliveries.

Large scale revolution may not be totally impossible, but you have no idea of how difficult it would be, or the amount of suffering it would create. Far better would be to think of another approach. If you want it to be successful, you will probably have to think of one that isn't dramatic. The dramatic choices attract "radicals", so they tend to be discovered quickly and guarded against.

Now for the hard question: How can you guarantee that what you end up with would be any better than what you started with?

Caution: Now approaching the (technological) singularity.

Re:Damn that's broad

[CoughDropAddict]

Patents don't keep anyone from USING something, they keep someone from SELLING it (as their own).

With all due respect, what the hell are you talking about?

If that were true, then Unisys wouldn't have the ability to bully the GIMP and webmasters who create images with a non-licensed program. No one's selling anything. Because Unisys owns the patnent on LZW compression, no one else can USE it, period.

If that were true, then Amazon wouldn't have been able to force Barnes and Noble to eliminate their "one-click shopping" capability on their web site. Barnes and Noble doesn't sell anything but books. Amazon is preventing them from USING the IDEA of one-click shopping.

Make no mistake, when someone files a patent, they're claiming exclusive USE of an idea. From lawguru.com:

What competition does a patent prevent?

Patents provide the right to exclude others from making, using, selling, offering for sale or importing the invention described in the claims. This is perhaps the most powerful monopoly legally obtainable for products.

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Novelty?

[ebh]

I think that the PTO would reduce its own effort a great deal, and issue more deserving software patents if it would set a simple objective standard for the novelty requirement.

Do you recall the old Hayes modem trick of using one second of inactivity before and after the +++ to distinguish it from three plus signs occurring in data so that file transfers wouldn't throw the modem into command mode?

Some coworkers and I invented that.

Not for Hayes, and not that exact procedure, but we did come up with the same general idea, before Hayes patented it. Had the company we did this for not gone under, we probably would have had a legal battle on our hands. We would have won it (IMO, IANAL) on prior art, provided we weren't bankrupted by legal fees (and Hayes was the 800lb gorilla in those days).

The problem here is that we didn't do anything special. Any competent engineer given the same problem would have come up with a similar solution. To me, that fails the novelty test. If you need to challenge a patent, it should be legal to put some random engineer (or even an undergrad) on the stand and tell him or her to solve the particular problem the patent addresses. If their solution is similar enough to the patent, the patent is thrown out.

Here's the patent...

[Boulder Geek]

here

Interesting points. The origin appears to be Bell Labs. The patent was originally filed, but according to the legal status link, it looks like the maintenance fees weren't paid, and the patent was allowed to lapse. Apparently AT&T didn't think that it was worth keeping. And then something funny happened. A year and a half later, TechSearch found the patent, paid the deliquent fees and started enforcing it.

Hmmm.....

UH OH

[7-Vodka]

Rambus is going to sue this company for infringing on their patented buisness model.

"just connect this to..."
BZZT.

this is why violent revolution was invented

[fatmantis]

I mean, really, the 'master class' ie., corporations have twisted the laws around until common citizens are little better than French peasants. There will never be another Thomas Edison or Leonardo DaVinci with such intractable legal and finacial restrictions in place. I predict that soon, here in the western world at least, Corporations will step on so many rights that the only recourse for change will be violence. I do not condone this, but it's true. So the next time you make a sloppy or lazy decision at work, in your employers' name, that effects the citizenry, be it through rude costomer relations or anti-piracy measures in your software, you are directly destroying our civilisation.

And

[Bob Abooey]

In an effort to streamline my efforts and become a more effective troll I have devised a new Do It Yourself (TM) troll, patent pending. The premise should be fairly self evident however in the true spirit of trolling I would encourage you to choose the selection which would build the most offensive troll for your personal tastes.

As a (a: long time computer programmer b: fortune 500 consultant c: linux user since 1994) I feel I must speak my mind here. Normally I sit quietly on the sidelines but my voice must be heard. As most professionals in the field I'm sure will agree, I can safely say that as a technology (a: java b: c++ c: OOP d: Visual Basic) has been a complete and total failure. While fans of (same as last selection) have reached the rabid state of a (a: amiga user b: Apple Mac user c:Debian/GNU/Linux user) that cannot detract from that fact that (same as selection 2) is a (a: bloated convoluted mess b: terrible crime against humanity c: the most braindead idea since (a: Betamax b: freeBSD c: Python))
For (a: God's sake b: Buddha's sake c: fuck's sake) how in the hell can they expect us to (a: use a mouse with only one button b: remember to free all the mallocs c: fight for our freedoms when we can't carry a handgun in public)

I have in fact seen benchmarks which (a: show IIS cruching Apache b: even a scientologist couldn't deny c: Linus Torvalds advocates) when compared with (a: the efficiency of the Nazi regime b: OS/2 c: Fortran 77) Why this data is not readily made available to the public is beyond me. I shudder to think that (a: Microsoft is paying to stop the documents from being published b: the one click patent is not valid c: Debian/GNU/Linux is impossible to install) but that is the only conclusion I can come to. Please post information to the contrary if you posses it. Until then I will maintain my position. If you think I am over-reacting let me assure you that I (a: have written a patch which adds multi-threading to the BSD kernel b: have installed Gnome hundreds of times with no problems c: think KDE r0x hard) and my reputation is un-impeachable.

I would like to (a: thank slahsdot for giving me this forum to express myself b: drink potato vodka and have sex with my cousin c: know if these pants make my butt look big)



Yours,

Charity

[clinko]

Funny things you have to look at on this site. They put a charity page to show that they're nice. HAHA

Also aparently owning the patent on webservers also means you don't have to label the title of the page. Unless it's supposed to be "untitled document"

hmm, interesting quote

[Dr. Awktagon]

I was going to post a pithy quip about how these guys are just like the old mob bosses. But then I read this quote:

The company's counsel of choice, a tough-talking trial attorney named Ray Niro, insists that he prefers not to sue, but that sometimes companies leave him with no alternative. "It's unfortunate that you have to litigate," he says. "But as Al Capone said, 'You go a long way in this world with a bouquet of roses. You go farther with a bouquet of roses and a gun.' "

That's real inspirational. Al Capone.

Too bad this doesnt apply anymore...

[maxpup979]

It was never the object of patent laws to grant a monopoly for every trifling device, every shadow of a shade of an idea, which would naturally and spontaneously occur to any skilled mechanic or operator in the ordinary progress of manufactures. Such an indiscriminate creation of exclusive privileges tends rather to obstruct than to stimulate invention. It creates a class of speculative schemers who make it their business to watch the advancing wave of improvement, and gather its foam in the form of patented monopolies, which enable them to lay a heavy tax on the industry of the country, without contributing anything to the real advancement of the arts. It embarrasses the honest pursuit of business with fears and apprehensions of unknown liability lawsuits and vexatious accounting for profits made in good faith.

--U.S. Supreme Court, Atlantic Works vs. Brady, 1882
(from the article--not bad btw)

flagrant disregard

[deran9ed]

Companies who abuse legalities like this should be banned from ever obtaining a patent on anything. Well here's some links regarding patents so someone can post something informative:

U.S. Patent and Trademark Office:

Software Patent Institute

Bustpatents.com

invalid/withdrawn/pathetic software patents.

"Software Patents Tangle the Web,"

With billions of dollars in Internet sales at stake, the proliferation of broad e-commerce patents is sowing confusion, uncertainty and a good deal of cynicism among many software developers and business leaders. Some legal experts, such as Robert Merges, a law professor at the University of California, Berkeley, believe the sheer number of patents now pending on business methods has "pushed the patent system into crisis."

Chaotic Internet isn't the word. Congress should enact a law that states all judges must know the fruits and details of a technology based case before trying the case in a court of law. If this was the case (judges knowing and understanding whats going on,) there would be an extremely low amount of mockery of broad laws, and companies would suffer severe penalties for attempting to manipulate the justice system.

Amazon.com 5,960,411 one-click purchasing
Amazon.com has used its patent to force changes to Barnes & Noble's Web site.

CyberGold 5,794,210 attention brokerage
Patent covers rewarding Web surfers for paying attention to online advertisements.

E-Data 4,528,643 download-based sales
A judge blocked E-data's attempts to enforce this pre-Internet era patent.

Netcentives 5,774,870 online incentives
One of several recently issued patents covering reward systems for Internet purchasing.

Open Market 5,715,314 electronic shopping carts
This patent may be infringed by many e-commerce sites on the Internet.

Priceline.com
5,794,207 buyer-driven sales
Priceline has sued Microsoft and its Expedia travel site for copying its patented business method.

Sightsound.com 5,191,573 music downloads
Sightsound is demanding a 1% royalty from all online music sellers, and has sued Time Warner's CDNow.com music site for infringing its patent.

And the winner is.... Sightsound who can now sue the entire Internet and 95% of students on campuses worldwide for patent infringement.

An OpenSource company should teach one of these companies a lesson and misconstrue the GPL just to piss these abusers off.

more Patent infringments

Damn that's broad

[BillyGoatThree]

"This one is so broad that anyone using a web server/browser is an infringer."

Anyone USING a web server/browser? No. Patents don't keep anyone from USING something, they keep someone from SELLING it (as their own).

I was going to explain who it really WOULD hurt, but it brings up a question for the lawyers: Let's say someone patented a system for something like "server-based calculations that are sent in an OS-agnostic and standardized format which is then interpreted and displayed on a client PC". Then Adam Aadvark comes along, starts a company called Association A that makes software S1 that runs on a server and can spit out any data you want. Bob Bankroll starts Business B that sells a standardized format F that works with Assoc A's software S. And Charlie Cookie starts Company C whose software S2 displays the data transported by Business B's format F.

There is no collusion between the companies and the founders don't know each other. The system just evolves by natural market forces. Who is infringing on the patent?
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