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?"

Comments

Prior art has to be out there...

[WIAKywbfatw]

This patent was filed on November 23, 1999.

There has to be prior art out there that shoots this down.

Re:Prior art has to be out there...

[YomikoReadman]

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?'

This is GOOD news.

[Anonymous Coward]

Patents like this cannot be enforced. With enough of these, the feds will be forced to re-examine the system.

Don't get mad. This is good news. It means we're one day closer to patent reform.

Link To Patent Text

[Mateito]

Link to patent text

Its not like the patent office don't deserve a good slashdotting.

He won't get anywhere with this.

[Guyle]

It's most definitely a case of "Hey, I wonder if I can nab this now and later screw the world out of their money..." Though when it comes right down to the letter of his patent, how can he sue Network Solutions and Registrar.com? THEY'RE not the ones who's actually DOING the process - all they're doing is lining up domains with IP addresses. It's all of the individual websites and ISPs that are supposedly infringing his patent - at least, the ones that set up e-mail and websites the way he describes.

This case won't stand up in court, and for it to stand up at all, it would have to be against an ISP or organization that assigns URLs and e-mails in the precise fashion his patent states - like my old website (now defunct) guy.thetaint.org with my e-mail having had been guy@thetaint.org.

Oh the irony

[Rosco P. Coltrane]

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.'

You know what's funny? the USPTO is supposed to do prior art research to grant patents. Well guess where you can find prior art for this method? at the USPTO itself. Here for example:

estta.uspto.gov is a live server, and
estta@uspto.gov is a valid email address at USPTO.

You gotta love these guys ...

Re:DUPE.

[RagManX]

I didn't think it was a dupe, I thought the USPTO had done it again. :)

While I was shocked recently to read that the USPTO awarded this patent, imagine how shocked I was today to read that they had awarded it *AGAIN* to someone. I wonder if the two guys who got it will sue each other now?

RagManX

worthwile reading

[Pivot]

While America works to protect intellectual property, everyone else is innovating.

Re:scaremongering

[Neurotoxic666]

The present invention overcomes the limitations of the prior art by providing a method, apparatus and business system that allow a user to quickly communicate online with a member of a particular business, professional or other group regardless of whether the member has an internet presence (e.g. e-mail address or website) and without the user needing to know or find the internet address for the recipient.

He's already refereing to prior art, and it actualy seems his "idea" is a bit different from what we already use and know.

The patented system would allow someone to write directly to some professional without knowing his email address. It would be a simpler system than to have to use a search engine and then search an email on the website to communicate.

I must agree this is a very subtle difference and the guy's interpretation is stupid. However, just because of that, I am vey curious to see how the lawsuits turn out.

Re:DUPE.

[vmfedor]

How about because the editors have to look at hundreds of stories at a time and you only see what they give you?

Seeing a dupe story isn't going to do anything more than cause you 5 minutes or less of inconvenience and considering Slashdot is provided free-for-everyone I don't think that slashdotters have any right to complain.

I'm not trying to be a troll and I'm not trying to insult you, but jeez, cut slashdot a break.

Re:DUPE.

[AndroidCat]

Because the "Editors" don't actually read Slashdot

Have a heart, they're probably all sharing Cmdr Taco's (56kbps) pipe.