Judge's Ruling Spares 1-Click

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Judge's Ruling Spares 1-Click

Posted by timothy on Sunday October 17, 2004 @05:00AM from the press-1-for-dismissal-or-stay-on-the-line dept.

theodp writes "Agreeing with Amazon's characterization of its 1-Click feature as a feature of an electronic product ordering system and not an electronic fund transfer or transaction system, a Judge has tossed out a $50M lawsuit that threatened Amazon's 1-Click patent. But outside of Court, Amazon touts its patent-pending Amazon Honor System as a way for Web sites to use 1-Click shopping technology for voluntary payment transactions - most notably for 9-11 donations and campaign contributions - that do not involve consumer goods or Amazon-specified prices, which the Judge argues are essential 1-Click ingredients."

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This is what happens when... by DAldredge · 2004-10-17 05:04 · Score: 4, Insightful

This is what happens when you are the ones who give the whores in DC money to write laws and regs for you.

Large companies in the US are not held to the same standard as others are.
Re:but... by Daengbo · 2004-10-17 05:05 · Score: 4, Insightful

Regretfully, what happens in civil court doesn't orften reflect the outside world. I think another suit will have to be filed with Amazon's claims as part of the complaint for them to be taken seriously and the patent thrown out (or at least clarified).

--
Put identity in the browser.
One-click shopping by memodude · 2004-10-17 05:08 · Score: 4, Insightful

How can a company patent one-click shopping? If you think about it, one-click shopping is just a system for storing credit card info and address info in an account, then facilitating purchases without requiring to enter that info again. Software patents are just pathetic.
1. Re:One-click shopping by stinerman · 2004-10-17 05:14 · Score: 5, Insightful
  
  Indeed, how is it different from clicking submit when I complete this post?
  
  The /. servers store my username, preference settings, etc. I only have to login the one time to my account so I can single-click the submit button to post my statement.
2. Re:One-click shopping by Dashing+Leech · 2004-10-17 05:26 · Score: 4, Insightful
  
  How can a company patent one-click shopping? If you think about it, one-click shopping is just a system for ...
  You objection seems to be that such a system is obvious. I wholeheartedly agree with you there. There are rules against patenting the obvious, and things like this seem to be slipping through. However, then you say:
  Software patents are just pathetic.
  It's not clear how the former justifies the latter statement. The patent on 1-Click appears to violate the existing rules for patents on obviousness. There are also plenty of non-software patents that violate such rules (playing with a cat using a laser pointer, the combover, etc.). So how does any of this show that software patents in particular are pathetic? Or was it a non-sequitor?
3. Re:One-click shopping by Sebby · 2004-10-17 05:53 · Score: 4, Insightful
  
  So how does any of this show that software patents in particular are pathetic?
  
  The other non-sw patents you mention are simply ridiculous. Software patents are pathetic since they are purposly broadly written so that pretty much anything done with a computer (even if it already exists in the non-software world) will infringe. That's pathetic.
  
  --
  
  AC comments get piped to /dev/null
4. Re:One-click shopping by iabervon · 2004-10-17 08:40 · Score: 2, Insightful
  
  Software patents are pathetic since they are purposly broadly written so that pretty much anything done with a computer (even if it already exists in the non-software world) will infringe.
  
  The LZW patent (which caused problems with GIF) was (despite it's other flaws) written sufficiently narrowly not cover anything done with a computer other than compression, and not cover the methods of compression used in gzip, JPEG, or PNG, or run length encoding. So your statement not only isn't true of all software patents, it's not even true of all bad software patents. (The inventor of LZW published a paper about it more than a year before filing for the patent; this is supposed to prevent getting a patent, because people will learn of the invention from the paper and think the technique is unencumbered, which is what happened with GIF).
  
  The patents on techniques used to compress and decompress MPEG4 seem to me to be just as valid as patents on new can opener designs.
5. Re:One-click shopping by johnny_sas · 2004-10-17 09:04 · Score: 2, Insightful
  
  " So your statement not only isn't true of all software patents, it's not even true of all bad software patents." Yeah, riiiight, ok, so how about an example of a *recent* software patent that *doesn't* include everything but the kitchen sink in its description, instead of an ancient, no-longer-valid patent as a poor example for a poor argument?...... .... ... Thought so.
6. Re:One-click shopping by the_2nd_coming · 2004-10-17 11:05 · Score: 2, Insightful
  
  algorithms are mathematical constructs. mathematics are discovered which means that algorithms are discovered as well, unless you want to suggest that mathematics should be patentable as an invention.
  
  --
  
  I am the Alpha and the Omega-3
7. Re:One-click shopping by Dashing+Leech · 2004-10-17 15:21 · Score: 2, Insightful
  
  algorithms are mathematical constructs.
  Very over-used, over-simplified, and wrong argument. Algorithms are procedures and methods. Mathematics is only one technique for writing the method down. But even if written in mathematics it does not mean it was "discovered". Discovery implies it is a universal truth and is inevitably achieved. This is true if the mathematics is a proof(e.g., Pythagoras theorum) or new form of performing mathematics (e.g., Calculus). It is also true of physcial laws. But it is not true of a procedure (e.g., image processing algorithms, data mining techniques, etc.). These procedures are neither fundamental truths nor are they inevitable; they are often works of innovative and ingenious individuals.
Mutter, mutter by jd · 2004-10-17 05:24 · Score: 4, Insightful

Amazon "wins" by telling the judge the one-click stuff is for one thing, but tells the public it's for another. I thought lying to a judge was contempt of court. And if they didn't lie to the judge, then they're lying to their consumers, which is false advertising and possibly fraud.

I don't see how any company thinks it can win by trying to pull this kind of stunt. Well, other than by the fact that companies usually do win by pulling this kind of stunt, because nobody really pursues it, since they expect the company to lie through their teeth anyway.

That, I think, is the biggest problem. Because nobody expects a business to have any integrity, they don't do anything when that proves to be the case. If you want better, sometimes you've got to believe you deserve better and do something about it.

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It's a small world and it smells funny; I'd buy another if it wasn't for the money; Take back what I paid (SoM)
Re:Welcome to Reality by tindur · 2004-10-17 05:40 · Score: 4, Insightful

A republic can be an oligarchy.
Heh by Mephie · 2004-10-17 05:56 · Score: 4, Insightful

And yet, still, virtually every time a slashdotter posts a link to a book it's an amazon.com link.
Look, if you're so outraged by Bezos and his stupid fucking patents, STOP SHOPPING AMAZON and STOP ENCOURAGING OTHERS TO DO SO. Might I recommend bn.com or, God forbid, get off your ass and drive to your local Mom and Pop bookstore? The latter is almost certainly more deserving of your loyalty than is Amazon.

--
Buy the President
BMG has had zero click shopping for years. by Belial6 · 2004-10-17 06:01 · Score: 2, Insightful

It's been around for ages. BMG "music club" has had zero click shopping for years. If you don't tell them NOT to ship the cd, you get it and are billed.
Re:So... by lspd · 2004-10-17 06:42 · Score: 2, Insightful

Basically, the judge said that the 1-click system Amazon implemented does not infringe the '055 patent. Whether and what Amazon has a patent on one-click doesn't matter.

But as a nice bonus, anyone using a 1 click ordering system can expect to be sued by two companies now. Keep up the good work USPTO.
Re:How about workarounds? by LiquidCoooled · 2004-10-17 08:43 · Score: 2, Insightful

One click is actually 2 events if I'm not mistaken.

I am going to impliment the all new

"MouseDown/MouseUp Purchasing Combination" ;)

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liqbase :: faster than paper
Re:Welcome to Reality by Anonymous Coward · 2004-10-17 10:43 · Score: 1, Insightful

In short, because it matches the requirements:

Extremely nationalistic.
Anti-liberal, anti-socialist (diametrically opposed to Marxist Communism)
Uses violence, propaganda and censorship to supress political opposition.

Note that 'political opposition' certainly does not include the current interchangeable main parties or other parties that are happy to operate within the existing system. It would be more accurate to say that America is developing into a Fascist state - since the Constitution is taken an holy writ, the First Amendment has only recently been eroded due to a novel interpretation of freedom of speech to not mean freedom to be allowed to do it where someone can hear you.

It could also be argued that it's closer to Nazi fascism due to it sharing the additional attributes of:

Corporatism.
Goal of prosperity at the expense of everything else.