Online Auction Industry In A State Of Limbo

theodp writes "It seems the online auction industry is in a state of limbo after last week's ruling that eBay violated patents belonging to MercExchange. MercExchange said it will file an injunction against eBay to keep them from using the technology, eBay said it will file motions to overturn the verdict, and MercExchange is ultimately looking to sell its entire portfolio of auction-related patents. Names being bandied about as possible acquirers include Amazon, Yahoo and eBay itself. Whoever holds the patents may require other sites to pay them licensing royalties."

Comments

such is the fate of humanity

[Anonymous Coward]

to suffer from selfish individuals bent on thwarting innovation of technologies.

Ya think?

[rjamestaylor]

• Whoever holds the patents may require other sites to pay them licensing royalties.

Going out on a limb with that one, huh? Yeah, I can't think of many reasons for a company to buy the patent portfolio of a company whose patents on a key Internet technology were just upheld in court. Besides pulling a SCO, that is.

Can we just refer to this kind of manuover as "pulling a SCO" from now on?

This is ridiculous

[rsilvergun]

How the heck do you patent doing something that's been done for generations just because it's on the internet. It'd be like patenting giving stock quotes over the phone. It really ticks me off to see all these companies with nothing real to offer humanity getting patents for using other peoples technology. If I were ebay, I'd try and kill this patent based on the shear obviousness of it.

Still, I can't help but wonder if the reason America is so patent crazy lately is to get a leg up on the rest of the world. I'm pretty sure large parts of Europe will be tricked/cajoled/forced into honoring this crap eventually, and I know Iraq will (whether they want to or not).

Re:This is ridiculous

[rsilvergun]

How is this a large step? The only difference is the medium used to transfer information about the auction. If the company had at least invented the medium, they might have a point. All they did is apply pre-existing technology and knowledge. Auctions + database + web form = online auction. To anyone who grew up using computers, and for whom using computers was a daily part of their lives (and for whom a computer isn't some magic black box they refuse to understand) the idea is blatently obvious. A computer is nothing more than a tool, and it's ridiculous that you can patent the application of that tool. It's like patenting driving nails into wood in one hit. I can see it now, Amazon's new one-hit hammering.

You'll say "why didn't you patent it then?". It's not because the idea wouldn't occur to me, but because my mind isn't devious enough to think such a thing patentable.

Re:This is ridiculous

[rsilvergun]

This is not a case of "Existing Invention + Existing Invention = New Invention". This is nothing more than a the application a pre-existing communication tool (the internet) being used to expedite the running of auctions. The key here is that the internet isn't some magical place where web pages pop up, it's a communication tool. Anyone with a background in computer science can see that plainly enough, and anyone who can see that can clearly imagine using this communication tool for all manner of commerce, auctions included.

The technology may have existed in the 60's, but the tools weren't widely available or in use. The technology for printing books in mass has existed for hundreds of years. Should the very notion of printing books in mass (rather than a particular implementation of a printing press) be patentable? That's the differece between the invention of a tool and the application of it. They've patented the application of a tool.

Oh, and the quick sort algorythm, along many complex mathmatical ideas, aren't blatently obvious in even hindsight. There's lots of things not obvious in hindsight. Using a pre-existing communication tool for communicating about auctions isn't one of them.

How silly

[metalhed77]

What truly is non-obvious? The fact that this can be patented is truly ridiculous. I can't see how this is a case of patents protecting the economic goals of this country. In this case the patent produces the exact opposite of its original goal, it removes competition in the sector. Yet another reason to search for alternatives to our current IP system.

Maybe this won't be so bad in the long run

[dafoomie]

This might be an important case, if ebay decides to try and challenge the legitimacy of the patents. If they win, it could set a good precident. If they lose, it'll be a disaster. I hope thats what ebay does, allowing MercExchange to make money off these absurd patents will only encourage others. Oops, it appears that I have a patent for electronicly displaying letters and numbers...

Re:Is this why...

[PurpleFloyd]

Lawyers don't deserve all the blame, but they do deserve a significant portion. Many corporations (especially large ones) will employ a legal team that makes recommendations to the upper management regarding legal matters like lawsuits. Thus, a lawyer may recommend a frivolous lawsuit to the higher-ups in a company, who don't understand the situation and don't care very much. They just sign what their legal team puts in front of them and let the lawyers run free. After all, if the law allows them to file these lawsuits, then it must be okay, right?

The job of these lawyers is to find and exploit legal loopholes to benefit the corporation they work for. A lot of them are scumballs. That's not to say that all lawyers are bad; that's an attitude I don't understand. There are many lawyers committed to things like bringing criminals to justice or fighting for the poor. They just aren't the ones driving brand-new Porsches. Still, many lawyers are willing to take a pay cut to work in the DA's office, because they simply can't stand the "do-it-for-money" attitude of many big law firms and corporate legal departments. If people were willing to look at the entire legal picture, they would find that it's like many others: a few high-profile assholes, and many people who toil away for good causes in relative obscurity.

By the way, I'm not a lawyer, but I do know several. I do not associate with assholes. End of story.

Killing American economy

[phorm]

I'm thinking more along the lines of businesses moving out as opposed to citizens. How about ebay moves its entire operations to Canada, or maybe Aus? We have decent webserver pricing, there's already ebay.ca, etc. Swap the domain name to a Canadian nameserver.

Such an incredibly stupid patent would have less chance of surviving Canadian court... not sure about Aus... but it seems that America is slowly poisoning its own economy. I mean, X years from now America will be so bogged down by bad patents and innovation-stifling technology/laws that it will be far behind the rest of the world in a technological sense.

Electronic securities exchanges

[hughk]

The biggest precedent should be the use of electronic securities exchanges. These have existed since the eighties, matching buyers with sellers. A financial security is essentially an intangible represented by a document, but it is easy to swap that intangiable for something tangiable with very little change to the technology.

This has been going on since the eighties. Maybe not on the Internet, but definitely within private networks of cooperating organisations.

Re:Is this why...

[Dun Malg]

Are there asshole lawyers? Sure. But there are assholes in every profession - why single lawyers out?

Because lawyers have actually encouraged the creation of a legal system where advocates must use any dodge or ruse they can cook up under the rationalization that "the other guy's doing it too". Law school seems to encourage this sort of rationalization. I have two cousins and a high school friend who're lawyers and they've basically admitted to this, albeit under the rationalization that "they owe their client the best representation they can provide". One cousin, at least, also admits to the fact that it's rationalizing; but the other, he still proudly tells the following story: as a lawyer in the Army, he defended one soldier who robbed another soldier at gunpoint, which was seen by a third soldier. This third soldier was a key prosecution witness and repeatedly affirmed that yes, the gun was clearly a real gun. So my cousin gets the guy on the stand and, for forty minutes asks him a series of questions, all of which had been asked before, all of which were answered yes. So he's firing off these useless queries, and the guy is getting bored answering "yes...yes...yes...yes..." ad infinitum. So then my cousin slips in the question "is it possible the gun wasn't real?" and the guy says "yes...oh, sorry. I mean 'no'". He then hammered on this totally contrived "witness uncertainity" and got the guy down from "armed robbery" to just "robbery". He tells this story proudly at family gatherings. The fucking scumbag.

That's the problem with lawyers: they're encouraged to believe that the ends justify the means.

Re:Intellectual Property for Auctions

[theancient1]

Intellectual Property for Auctions ...now available to the highest bidder.

There's a bit of truth to that statement that nobody seems to have noticed yet. Take note of the following statement from the story:

MercExchange is ultimately looking to sell its entire portfolio of auction-related patents. Names being bandied about as possible acquirers include Amazon, Yahoo and eBay itself.

Doesn't it seem like MercExchange is using the threat of litigation in order to coerce eBay into purchasing these patents? A week from now, I expect to read the following story: "MercExchange has settled its lawsuit against eBay. eBay will acquire the intellectual property from MercExchange for an undisclosed amount of cash." eBay can then go after Yahoo and Amazon, if they so choose.

Alternatively, Yahoo or Amazon could purchase the patents, and then go after eBay. We know from past experience that Amazon isn't beyond suing its competitors over trivial patents.

MercExchange doesn't seem to have a competitive position. Personally, I've never heard of them -- eBay, Yahoo, and Amazon are the big players in the online auction market. Any of these players might be interested in acquiring the MercExchange intellectual property in order to use against the other two.

As for MercExchange, since they're aiming to sell their patents anyway, they can probably fetch a higher price by using a lawsuit as a bargaining chip.