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USPTO Grants CA Lawyer Domain-Naming Patent
SpecialAgentXXX writes "Geek.com reports
that as of Dec 30, 2003, CA lawyer Frank Weyer holds patent #6,671,714
which is 'a method for assigning URL's and e-mail addresses to members of a group comprising the steps of: assigning
each member of said group a URL of the form name.subdomain.domain and assigning each member of said group an e-mail
address of the form name@subdomain.domain.' He's now, in SCO-like fashion, suing Network
Solutions and Register.com for infringing on his patent. This is
nonsense. My friend who ran for political office in 2000 used this exact naming scheme for his web site. All of us here
can see how asinine this is. Will our legal system?"
And I warned the "On Duty" editor, but i guess they're just asleep at the wheel.
All we need now are:
1) references to the McDonalds coffee lawsuit
2) SCO jokes
3) a comparison to Falling down at Walmart
4) Posts bemoaning the loss of Goatse
And it'll be a typical Wednesday morning on Slashdot!
In the future, I would want to not be isolated from my friends in the Space Station.
Link to patent text
Its not like the patent office don't deserve a good slashdotting.
Norman Cook's Ode to Sl
When I worked for an ISP many years ago (Galaxy Star Systems), we did that very thing with the domain "tulsa.net". We put their webpages at hostname.tulsa.net. Any email to hostname.tulsa.net was forwarded to their single email account.
We're talking 1995 technology here, and it was obvious at the time.
I'll just link to my previous comment ;^)
It's better to vote for what you want and not get it than to vote for what you don't want and get it.
- E. Debs
How about the US Government? This is how all .mil address are done, AFAIK. the domains are structured base.branchofservice.mil, and all email address associated with them are structured as fname.lname@base.BOS.mil. That being the case, this method of domain name assignment is as old as the internet itself, since DARPA used this method while setting up ARPANet way back in the 70s. This begs the question of 'How the hell did this patent get approved?'
I have no regrets, this is the only path.
My whole life has been "UNLIMITED BLADE WORKS"
Get angry, folks, and tell these people what you think. Hell hath no fury like a Slashdotter.
Frank Weyer,
Beverly Hills patent attorney
also the founder of EveryMD.com
EveryMD.com
323/874-2567
866-EveryMD (866/383-7963)
fweyer@everymd.com
His address:
264 S. La Cienega Blvd., #1224, Beverly Hills, CA 90211
I missed posting on version one of this story (doing work... frustrating how that gets in the way) so I'm posting my prior art example here.
My personal email address for a long time has been with MailBank.com (now called NetIdentity.com). This is how their ENTIRE BUSINESS has been working since 1996: you pay them (yearly) to get email/web addresses using your last name; they own domains like smith.net, and they give you (supposing your name is bubba):
bubba@smith.net
http://bubba.smith.net
Again, the operative year is 1996 (I got my email from them in 97 or 98).
There are only 10 types of people: those who understand decimal, those who don't, and, uh, 8 other types I forget.
USPTO, you have pissed us off too many times.
/.ers might like to note first, that the filing date of the application leading to this wretched patent was Nov 23, 1999, so anything done in 2000 can't be relied on as prior art.
Prepare to be slashdotted.
This sure does look to me like yet another patent without any apparent ingenuity at all.
But before getting ignored by the USPTO,
Second, the subject of the patent appears to be the coordinated allocation of email addresses and matching web addresses, such as an email address of willrobinson@physicians.org, along with a web address of http://willrobinson.physicians.org.
While I would personally agree that this is a case of 'Eureka - not!', that won't cut any ice at the USPTO. In reality, evidence of relevant prior art would be needed to take this out.
The prior art would include (a) anything that was used in the US or published in print before 23 Nov 1998, (b) anything used in the US or published in print in the period 11/23/98-11/22/99 -- except insofar as the 'inventors' don't prove that they 'invented' it first, and (c) anything 'invented' in the US before the named inventors did it, whenever that was.
-wb-
Mailbank.com at Archive.org, Nov. 11, 1998.
Just send me my reward money now. I've been using those domain hijackers for years for email/web.