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SBC Patents Links, Dynamic Pages
Oculus Habent writes "Robert Cringley has an article on a patent that SBC aquired. Patented in 1996 is the concept of linking to dynamic content with a static element of a page. First approaching museumtour.com, a small site, and asking them to obtain a revenue-based license, SBC appears to be trying to set precedent. He goes on to note that SBC is not a villian for doing this - it is after all a valid patent, and that what is needed now is prior art."
Patent reform is a great idea, but I'd be more interested in hearing how you plan to implement it.
Despite millions of years of evolution, human beings, taken as a group, are still stupid, panicky animals.
Three letters: P H P
Conceived in 1994, first public version in 1995.
Hypercard came out in 1987.
One thing I don't understand about this (probably because IANAPL) is why the prior art search has to be limited to web applications. It seems as though the patent covers a pretty common user interface element. And slapping words like "over a computer network" on the end shouldn't be enough to differentiate (though, didn't some company get a patent for dutch auctions on the web?).
So what I'm saying is, isn't something like the "bold" button in Microsoft Word prior art for this. Or, if we want to get more related, can't we look for prior art in the CD-ROM applications that were common in the early nineties? They had user interfaces very similar to web sites.
Gopher was exactly that.
Links to dynamicly changing pages. So it existed before the web.
I am also pretty sure that I made an assignment with hyperlinks around 1988 at university. Think it was a help system.
manx / xman is actually prior work. Represents a list of links in one windows, and when you press it, it will compile the corresponding man page and display it in the same or another frame.
This is way older than 1988.
The best part of the article has to be that they approached museumtour.com (a site based in Oregon that sells educational toys over the Net) first. I WONDER WHY.
This is obvious. You knock over a small site to set a precedent, and then you go after someone with some real money. Build up your cash to knock over some real players out there.
This is its best moment in the article:
To its credit, SBC Intellectual Property was very polite in its approach to Museumtour, pointing out the existence of the patent, citing specifically how it believed Museumtour is in violation and offering to sell the company a license based on some percentage of gross sales.
I specifically love how they say they initially came in and asked nicely for a gross percentage of sales... it reminds me how the mafia is so polite, explaining how that you could avoid an "financial incident" by "licensing out protection" from said "financial incident" say, from, somebody you just met. Capiche?
If they really want to do this right, they need a fat man in a fedora and wingtips saying this to them in a raspy voice:
"Ya know, not saying that it is going to happen, but if it did happen it might cause you to lose some money there, pal. You better just license with us on your gross earnings, cuz, well, you never know. We live in strange times."
Yes, the article is right. They are very polite.
Until they attack you.
one word "Ebay" Founded in September 1995. Try running an internet auction without static and dynamic elements.
Get a free ipod.
In the US, you have one year to file for a patent, so prior art needs to beat the filing date by a year. This is not true for patents in the rest of the world, which have an "absolute novelty" requirement.
:)
If the only prior art that can be found is from early '96, we will have to relocate all our websites to Europe, which will really show how US IP laws protect American business
Before you start looking for prior art you need to know when the patent was applied for.
Like the infamous one click shopping of Amazon, the reason they could enforce it was they applied for the patent before everyone started doing it. If the application date is before the prior art, the art isn't prior.
I don't know the particulars, but keep that in mind when searching for prior art. And did they purchase the patent from someone else?
This is the best comment I've seen so far, but it doesn't really prove prior art. The page you refer to is dated 1999. As with many innovations, the presence of an enabling mechanism does not necessarily indicate prior art.
Can you prove that frames were intended for use as contemplated by the patent, i.e. a consistent user interface across a document or site? Not from that article. Remember too that not only frames are at issue here -- a navigation bar using tables or divisions would appear to be covered by the patent as well.
While it is blatently obvious with hindsight that frames can be used in this manner, some Googling around will show that a huge amount of web design material at the time references a document called "Ameritech Web Page User Interface Standards and Design Guidelines" by Detweiler, M.C. and Omanson, R.C. (1996), on the matter of creating a consistent user interface by using frames. If that doesn't ring a bell, Ameritech was the original holder of the patent, and recently acquired by SBC.
Reading the patent provides some more insight too: they contemplate a document with embedded codes indicating document sections, that conforms to a predefined structure. Read this way, the patent does not partain to HMTL frames, because HTML is a hypertext linked collection of documents, not a single document. A navbar or frame moving the view to named references within a single document, however, would clearly violate the patent.
So is the patent valid? Well, that involves proving prior art; not just that frames existed, but that they were used for the purpose of navigation, both in a single document and between documents. Any evidence of tables to do the same thing would also be useful. Also crutial is having an incontestible source -- printed information is best, a reputable online news source or journal is the next best thing.
w3.org records Edelstein's Sep 1995 proposal to include frames in the HTML specification, but the example page he sites is no longer available.
The Netscape Navigator 2.0 announcement contains "Frames, a new page presentation capability that enables the display of multiple, independently scrollable panels on a single screen, each with its own distinct Internet address. They also enable a region of the screen to be frozen in place as the user scrolls through information on a page". Tantalising, but it doesn't mention using the frozen region for navigation.
Most promising are the Mozilla 2.0 release notes. Two of the example links are broken, while third doesn't work in my browser, although the pages appear to be there. It clearly demonstrates the use of a navigation frame to select different pages in a site, and view them in a "dynamic" frame. That said, the navigation frame itself is not entirely static (it scrolls, but does not change), and there is no navigation inside a single document from the frame.
There is a lot of effort required to find proper evidence of prior art that will hold up in court. The Wayback Machine would provide great evidence, if only we can find it.
i-name =twylite [http://public.xdi.org/=twylite], see idcommons.net
I'd be more interested in hearing how you plan to implement it.
Alright, here goes.
1. Hire patent investigators who are qualified to appraise the value of patents. The original patent clerks were supposed to be "skilled in their profession." Require a Master's Degree in the field they work (ECE, CS, etc) or equivalent experience. Pay patent clerks enough that people with Master's Degrees will apply. Make it so that patent clerks have no incentive to actually grant a patent. The default case should be "think about it more" and after that "deny until it's further clarified."
2. If you file a patent and while it's under investigation (as this takes a while), you discover other people using technology which might infringe, you should be required to send them notification formally stating what you feel might infringe on your IP, and exactly what remedies you desire should your patent be granted.
3. Patents should work like Trademarks: if they are unenforced, they lose their enforcability. You should be required to file for redress IMMEDIATELY upon hearing that somebody uses technology which may violate your IP. No submarining patents. No going after 100 small fish instead of actually filing a lawsuit against IBM or somebody who might have the power to take you out. You want your IP, you must defend it vigilently.
4. Patent terms for technical innovations last 20 years. In today's fast-changing society, this is far too long. Software patents should last no more than 4 years, hardware for no more than 10. A 20-year patent on the WWW filed in 1990 would set it back until 2010 for public use!
5. Patenting business practices is just fucking stupid. Disallow this.