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URLs Patented, Domain Registrars Sued
theodp writes "A newly formed company is suing Network Solutions and Register.com for infringing on its e-mail and domain naming patent, which covers assigning each member of a group a URL of the form 'name.subdomain.domain' and an e-mail address of the form 'name@subdomain.domain.'"
Just when you thought they'd run out of silly patents to sue over, here comes another one. According to the good folks at News.com, a couple of Nizzas (the name of their company) have sued Network Solutions and Register.com. As Marguerite Reardon so eloquently puts it, "Two Internet entrepreneurs are suing Network Solutions and Register.com for allegedly infringing on their e-mail and domain naming patent." I take issue with the term entrepeneurs, as scum-sucking bottom feeders seems more appropriate, but you get the idea. Basically, they patented the method of assigning an email address of fake@name.com to the guy with the website fake.name.com. This might be the lamest excuse for a patent ever granted; a 2-year old could have come up with this idea.
OK since when can we patent how URLs and email addresses are assigned? That is the most bullshit non-sense I've ever seen to this day! Whoever is approving these patents needs to be taken out back of their home and shot!
This space is not for rent.
hen I first saw this, I thought it was a hoax! But its mentioned a few times on google already.
A brief check on the authors shows that there isn't much on the web about these guys.
Troy Javaher is listed as being at ICANN 99 here, and the other guy here.
Dotmd is a strange site
Either way... When did the business model "I created a patent just so I could sue you" a socially acceptable business practice? I have no love for register.com, but I don't think that this is an acceptable thing to do to anyone.
These guys are morons. They patent a technology and sue with groundless accusations. Usually when a company claims patent infringement, they try to find a small defenseless company in hope they can set precident. These guys? They go after NetSol and Register.com, two companies with enough legal firepower to make just about any company disappear.
This will be a fun one to watch.
There is no reasonable defense against an idiot with an agenda
:wq
Also be a great example to the EU of what not to allow.
I don't want knowledge. I want certainty. - Law, David Bowie
Oh, my God... how in the blue fucking hell did these two clowns get a patent for this shit????
I knew the USPTO was full of 'tards, but this just takes the fucking cake.. Only a freaking chimpanzee could think this patent deserved to be granted... no, wait, I take that back... a moderately intelligent chimp could see through this...
AAaaagggghhhhhh!!!!!!!!!!!!!! These fools are gonna cause me to pull every last hair I have out of my head....
// TODO: Insert Cool Sig
I haven't actually dug through the patent, but even if it just covers third-level domains, it most certainly could be applied to .com, .net, .org and so on. What's to stop someone who owns example.com and uses emails like user@example.com from also using user.example.com as a website?
For an example a little closer to home, look at sourceforge.net. project.sourceforge.net is how they hand out URLS. If they allow email addresses project@sourceforge.net, they'd be violating this patent as well, right?
"I feel that if a person can't communicate, the very least he can do is to shut up." -- Tom Lehrer
I ran a BBS in the late 1990's that was the first to provide internet e-mail at the time. I did it by piggybacking folks off the real internet provider at the time called EFN. People e-mailing my people had to send e-mail in a similiar fashion as I recall. I wish I could recall it exactly [its been a long long timt ago] but this is hardly new. I think it was daf.stargazer@efn.org became daf@stargazer locally. This is hardly something they need to fear!
That the institution of the state serves only to facilitate the bourgeisie's controll over the ability to controll the means of production and distribution leaving us out in the cold. Despite the fact that this is taking money away from one robber barron to another this only serves as a detriment to the working class because it continues to institutionalize money-grubbing. We need to do away with patents, the state, and capitalism.
http://www.anreabhloid.org
I hope here in Europe we do not import the US stupid Patent problems.
The only way round this is for US citizens to lobby US congresmen to change the patent laws to something sensible. Also publishizing things like this in the popular press is a good idea.
To the citizens of the US - Do you really want to live in a country where these IP pirates disrupt all? Where they in effect steal monies from businesses (who will pass the loss onto the customer)? You live in a democracy - do something about it!
Web Sig: Eddy Currents
The first was in the 1890's when the Supreme Court gave corporations Eminent Domain which meant they had the rights of citizens but without the consequences.
The second was in the 1980's when they relaxed the patent process for software. Up till that time, software was considered to be nothing more than mathematical formulas which could not be patented.
How I long for the glory days!
How 'bout requiring a bond which is given to the first person to invalidate the patent.
-- this is not a
URLs start with the "http://" prefix, or probably more correctly "|protocol|://" prefix.
They have a domain name there, that is all, not a URL.
If they get the terminology wrong in a patent, does that mean it is invalid, because the "inventor" doesn't understand the topic well enough to be explicitly correct ? I would have thought patents have to be explicitly correct, as the government is granting the patent holder a monopoly, and therefore, the patent must be very clear and correct.
The Internet's nature is peer to peer - 20050301_cs_profs.pdf
Well, U.S. patent law used to be far more pragmatic: for example, you had to actually demonstrate a working invention before you could patent it. Doesn't mean you had to have a finished production model, but you sure had to provide the examiner more than a piece of paper. Re-instituting that requirement would go a long way towards restoring balance here, I think.
The higher the technology, the sharper that two-edged sword.
No. There needs to be some kind of punitive damage for the people who approve a patent application that is not only covered by prior art, but are in the Public Domain, for over 20 years before the application!
I say we need to start holding the U.S. Patent Office accountable for the actions of their "lazy, incompetent, government" employees.
BTW, I am a government employee. And if I did my job as poorly as they do, I'd expect to get my ass booted out into the cold, pronto!
"terrorism" and "pedophilia" are the root passwords to the Constitution
Easy prior art: NetIdentity has been making their collective living with this very technique since 1996 ...
Too bad their prices have increased about tenfold in that time. It's not as cool now that you can get an entire full-service hosted domain for a bit more than their e-mail plus 5mb web site.
Yes, the patent office is in a very sorry state indeed. I go to a respectable public university, and last week I caught sight of a flyer that said "Not know what you're doing after graduation? Try Patent Law..." Now I think it's good that they're trying to recruit people from decent universities, and it's okay to not know exactly what you want to do after college, but I thought it was appealing to the lowest common denominator. Which didn't exactly fill me with hope.
"the same naming convention."
There should not be any need for prior art to defeat this. You're saying it yourself 'this naming convention'. Patents are for inventions, not conventions. It's called the nonobvious test for a patent.
(note: IANAL).
--- Hindsight is 20/20, but walking backwards is not the answer.
..so then how exactly did this get through?
That made me realize something. The future will be just like the movie "Demolition Man", only instead of being constantly fined for swearing in public, you will be continuously microcharged for everything you do or say that some putz has a patent, trademark, or copyright on.
Go, Lemmings, Go!
I know this is going to sound wrong but I really hope Network Solutions and Register.com lose this and then file for bankruptcy.
Even though this group of f*ckwits tries to screw people more than NS and R.com, the patent system is even worse. And until the majority understands that it was horribly broken a long time ago, nothing will change.
We need much more stupid patent lawsuits. Bring it on!
Future Wiki -- If you don't think about the future, you cannot have one.
I'm sure some university way back used the same naming convention.
Easier than that. The patent was filed in November 1999. In the patent itself it references websites, including:
Webpage: Freeyellow.com, Apr., 1998.*
Webpage: switchboard.com, Jun. 1996.*
As in, Freeyellow (subdomain) . com (domain) and switchboard (subdomain) . com (domain). These frickin' crackheads used prior art three+ years before they filed the patent, and referenced it in the patent. Tell me it's April Fools' Day.
The requested URL