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Using the USPTO Against Itself
fidget42 writes: "This article in the LA Times tells of how a scientist went about using the patent office as a mechanism for trying to force a change in that office's rules. To quote from the article: 'Nearly 10 years ago, a friend called Stuart Newman with an intriguing challenge: Could he think up a new form of life that would be scientifically useful and possible to patent--yet so disturbing that the public would recoil?' Could the same be done with the US Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) concerning software patents? I know some companies have used the rules of the USPTO to 'spoof' it, most notably Despair, Inc.'s trademarking of the frowney."
" Just visited Dispair.com and low and behold the Classic Frowny is free to license, for a limited time. No pushing, no shoving, there are plenty to go a round."
Classic example of submarine patents. Tell everyone it's free to use, get it established as a de facto standard, and then POW. They'll probably try and use some kind of viral marketing, for example getting people to embed them in emails (what happened to the days when emails where plain grammar?).
Don't give in. Stick to Open Source emoticons, even if it does involve a length process of installing and configuring a chinese character set.
Phillip.
Property for sale in Nice, France