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Charlie Northrup's One-Man Patent Grab Continues
FirstEdition writes "Will this never end! Linux Business & Technology writes that Charlie Northrup, the guy in New Jersey whose prior art on what looks to be Web services dates back to 1994 and appears to trump anybody else's IP, has gotten another patent. Of course, he has transferred the IP to a spin off company populated mostly by lawyers. More details here."
which has lawyers as its main labor force, should be destroyed!
Yes, we all know it's ridiculous, none of you reading this have to point that out in excruciating detail. The worst part about these kinds of stories is the avalanche of posts making bad jokes ("I'm going to patent air! I'm going to patent the alphabet!"), constructing elaborate metaphors, or making snide comments about MS, Amazon, or what have you. Don't preach to the converted. We all know.
If you read the patent, it reads like a description of CORBA. The OMG started working on CORBA in 1989. That's all the prior art that should be needed.
As someone who's recently started operating his own company I'm astounded by how many ways the legal profession has of taking your money without actually providing any benefits. I'm starting to believe that we have a large parasite feeding off of (American) businesses. This is not to say that the entire legal prof is a leech... only that legislation is abused for the sake of acquiring money that isn't legitimately earned. I seems that a lot of patent suits fall into this category. I hope I'm wrong, but my experience makes me believe this is one of the more serious and unnecessary threats to progress here.
OK, this guy got the patent, and yes, someone probably has prior art, and the courts will probably throw it out as long as the President doesn't interfere with the judicial system to help this guy. But there's still a problem: Who want's to be the first poor SOB to have to defend himself in a lawsuit? I'm sure this guy isn't stupid enough to make his "liscensing fee" more expensive than defending one's self in a courtroom, which means he can use those firms who choose the cheaper option of paying the liscense, to legitimize his claims against those who do fight.
Me? I say to hell with Iraq, we need a regime change at the USPTO!
Lagito ergo expectabo
I look at it this way...
IBM did significant development of computer theory. They've probably contributed more than any other company combined. Granted, they have screwed up at times, and screwed up royally, but they don't appear to be running around smashing others with only lawyer-based divisions, a'la Rambus. They're also contributing back into something that I use on a daily basis as my primary computer platform, even when they didn't invent UNIX. Right now, IBM is a community player, and while that could change in theory at any moment, they're more my friend than this freak who is trying to demonstrate a patent on hypertext transfer protocol...
Do not look into laser with remaining eye.
MOD PARENT UP. ...Not that I agree with you. While I would understand someone wanting to patent something he/she actually did, doing it nine years after the fact? Seven years after the limitations expire?
And it's not always clear what the patent is actually for. It sounds like IRC, Apache, SlashDot, or all of the above; anybody have any guesses? It's such a basic, fundamental thing (as far as I can tell, reading through that 100-page-ish pile of gibberish) that it's a root part of the Internet- and if it is IRC or basic message board protocol, it's very provable that it existed long, long before '94.
I'm pretty sure he only pushed the patent through with either a few well-placed bribes, or more likely well-placed obfuscation so nobody can figure out what the hell he just patented.
Hopefully, if it's the latter, that trend will continue so he can't defend it either.
Warning: Poster of this comment is a nerd. Just like everybody else here.
That would be about the worst thing that could happen because individual inventors (except thouse who were rich) would have no power.
Imagine the following situation. You invent a chemical compound in your garage. Let's say its a new form of rubber that never wears out. Great! Now you can start making tires. Except you can't. Unless you have millions of dollars to build a tire factory. Fine. Sell the patent to Goodyear. Can't. It's been outlawed. Well, at least you can prevent Goodyear from using the rubber, right? No. Goodyear takes your formula, you try to sue, but you can't afford to pay the lawyers, so the lawsuit ends before it begins.
From the USPTO site:
For over 200 years, the basic role of the Patent and Trademark Office (PTO) has remained the same: to promote the progress of science and the useful arts by securing for limited times to inventors the exclusive right to their respective discoveries.
As much as I agree that this is a laudable goal, I think it's obvious from this case and others that in today's high-paced climate, patents often serve to do exactly the opposite.
The truth of the matter is that after 20 years, modern technology is most likely so far behind the curve that it's useless or, at best, so developed that no right-minded business is willing to spend anything on it's continued development. Thus, patents such as these no longer serve to give a small advantage to inventors and protect fledgling technology. Rather, they tend to provide a means for the Chucks of the world to significantly inhibit development for the entire useful life of the technology. This isn't the industrial age anymore; to think that 20 years still represents a "limited time" is both ignorant and counterproductive.Note how things seem to change abruptly when things get bad enough.
Remember when the Standard Oil Company had a stranglehold on anything to do with petroleum? Then one day, BAM!
The Bell System had just about monopoly on anththing telephonic? You could not even put an extention phone in, despite fully agreeing to pay for any use of the line?
I get the idea we just sit back and let the USA paralyze themselves. While we spend our resources having all sorts of petty arguments, the rest of the world will go on.
Its all about economics.
Its what did USSR in. It can do the USA in too.
Once our government realizes we are seriously losing our capability of supporting ourselves, they will start paying attention. Once another world power ( probably China ) becomes strong enough that they could take control, where we could not do anything about it if they did, we will see action. Of course, by then, it will be too late. Especially if that new power sees no logic in recognizing the lifestyles or property of those here who don't produce anything. Kinda like we don't recognize any power or property of the Iraqi ex-powers-that-was. They may have been billionaires, now they are just bobbling heads hocking up words. While the new powers-that-be not only ignore them, but may even consider them a pest that needs to be exterminated. I mean, who do you think will be needed in the country, a wealthy landowner, or someone who can make the water pump work?
Remember how our Government actually encouraged youth to go into the sciences during the cold war? I think when the time comes where we really need to get our nose back to the wheel and start doing something, legislation will be passed to "clear the clutter" so things can happen.
Until then, its gonna be the same ol, same ol. The big kids get to the playground, call dibs on everything that can be played with, then rest on their big butts collecting extortion from anyone who tries to play with anything.
"Prove all things; hold fast that which is good." [KJV: I Thessalonians 5:21]
His patent describes the application layer of the OSI network model (presentation layer, too, in the old 7-layer version)...
Doesn't the OSI model predate all of his patents?
What makes you so sure this would blow up in his face? Pan-IP has taught us weasels of this sort go after small fish until they have sufficient war-chest, not to mention a slew of precedent, to throw in IBM's face. I case you haven't been paying attention, our favorite whipping boy Rambus has been making some headway, thanks to some judges overlooking their devious behaviour while a member of JEDEC.
The damn shame in all this, and I'd love nothing better at this date than for someone to dig something like this up, is that the founders of the internet didn't make some blanket statement such as, "Whomsoever shall conduct business using these tools shall forgo any claim to intellectual property of methods or procedures pursuant to conducting commerce." Perhaps back in the DARPA roots there may be such a thing as, all your base are belong to public domain in the interest of furthering research. Sadly the lack of reason appears to hold sway.
"Ah ha, sent one packet, have it processed, get one packet back! A novel idea, I shall patent it and all subsequent technology!"
Given the chance, some bastard would attempt to patent breathing air and the way things are going they'd be awarded the patent.
A feeling of having made the same mistake before: Deja Foobar
Let's see.
"Whacking competitors is a business tool" and "Life isn't fair. Deal with it."
That was fun.
"Industrial espionage is a business tool" and "Life isn't fair. Deal with it."
Better, better.
"Insurance fraud is a business tool" and "Life isn't fair. Deal with it."
Nice.
"Defrauding investors and employees is a business tool" and "Life isn't fair. Deal with it.".
Whoo Hoo.
"Dumping toxic waste illegally is a business tool" and "Life isn't fair. Deal with it."
Yum.
You know? Life is so much easier when one doesn't have a conscious. Thanks dude.
So what happened to the theory that only megacorps could use patents? Seems like one guy named Charley can do it.
What about 1991: Archie for file searching, WAIS for document searching, or all the public sites you could telnet into? Weren't those services? Or 1992: Gopher as a not too distant predecessor of http(d) and Veronica a year later as a menu service for Gopher pages. The 1+ million hosts on the Internet by late 1992 were not just at universities. How can all the servers that were running out there not qualify, at least in part, as prior art for 'Web Services'. Even NTP was around in 1992 - that's purely an automated web service - a client application getting data from a server application and doing something with the response in an automated fashion. I'm sure a good long browsing session through the RFC's would yield enough prior are to kill this patent.
No, it isn't. Their job is to phrase the patent in a precise language, closed to individual interpretation. There should be little doubt whether a particular work infringes on a patent or not. The fact that just about every patent case requires a lawsuit to clarify benefits no one except the lawyer.
the accepted strategy is to make the application as broad as possible, expecting to lose on some points, but protecting the invention as thoroughly as possible.
The intent of the patent system, however, is not only to protect the inventor. In this case, I think the following reforms should happen:
Note how neither reform hurts an honest inventor. In fact, there are two benefits: