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.'"

Comments

Re:Slightly funnier take

[psxndc]

Obvious things are patented every day. If a rule isn't enforced, it doesn't exist.

You obviously don't prosecute patents for a living. I see 103 rejections all the time and for non-obvious material (35 USC 103 is the statute that bars the patenting of obvious subject matter). Contrary to what everyone on /. thinks, you don't just whip out a patent app, give the PTO a check, and poof, you have a patent. Most patents take years, and several Office actions, to get through if they do at all. You only think the rule does not exist because a patent or three a year comes up that is "bad." No one says "look at the hundreds of useful, new, and non-obvious patents that are issued" because it's easier to tear apart the one or two that are broken.

psxndc