USPTO Issues Email Address Patent to Microsoft

theodp writes "On Tuesday, Microsoft was granted U.S. patent no. 6,895,426 for treating electronic mail addresses as objects, which Microsoft notes allows email addresses to be easily added to a contact list, copied to the computer's clipboard, or double-clicked to open the related contact information for that email address sender. After the reaction to news of his first patent, betcha inventor Dan Crevier isn't too eager to let folks know about this one."

Comments

My new patent:

[TripMaster Monkey]

Since we're on the subject, I thought this would be a good time to let all of you know that I have just patented the .sig file. That means that all you suckers who use .sigs now owe me a dollar every time you post. You'll all be recieving bills very soon now.

^_^

Seriously, though, I think the exchange on Dan Crevier's blog regarding his last patent is pretty telling...he gets a barrage of posts criticizing him for stifling innovation, and instead of addressing them, he closes the thread. Yes, yes, I'm well aware it's his blog, and if he doesn't want to play, he' s well within his rights to close the thread...just like that kid who would always take his ball and go home when the game didn't go his way...remember that kid?

Re:My new patent:

[Anonymous Coward]

You insensitive clod, I was that kid!

Re:My new patent:

[stinerman]

I own the patent on whitened fluff pulp, you insensitive clod!

Re:My new patent:

[Uruk]

That means that all you suckers who use .sigs now owe me a dollar every time you post. You'll all be recieving bills very soon now.

That could seriously damage my .sig business! I've been in the business of selling high-quality signature files for quite some time now. I figure I may as well get my plug in:

This .sig is free shareware. Register now for only $49.95 to get its full 10MB version!

Re:My new patent:

[mo^]

Welp, my new formula has now increased the toxicity of my chemical agent and I can kiil 2000 people simultaneously in a low wind environment!

I am so happy about this as I am guarnateed to be able to seel this to some regime or another.!!

Please wirte below and congratulate me on my discovery

Re:My new patent:

[Java Pimp]

...he gets a barrage of posts criticizing him for stifling innovation, and instead of addressing them, he closes the thread. Yes, yes, I'm well aware it's his blog, and if he doesn't want to play, he' s well within his rights to close the thread...just like that kid who would always take his ball and go home when the game didn't go his way...

Actually, what would anyone expect him do do? Arguing the current patent system is as bad or worse than arguing religion. There are good and bad points to both sides of the argument and nothing anyone says could possibly sway the other side's opinion. Especially when their opinion is strong enough to cause them to take the time out of their day to bitch slap someone on their blog...

That being said, I'm sure Dan doesn't want to sit there and get flamed all day... or waste his time getting into a religious argument. The only thing defending himself would do would be to invite more flames... Really, I can't blame him for closing the discussion...

Re:My new patent:

[TripMaster Monkey]

That being said, I'm sure Dan doesn't want to sit there and get flamed all day

Well, then perhaps he shouldn't have boasted about his new patent on his blog, and invited others to respond. I'm sure he would have kept the blog open if all the conversation was mindless adulation for his cleverness (which it looks like he was expecting), but since he got a little heat, he just shut down and ran.

As to what I expect him to do...I expect him to follow through. If you're going to open a discussion, don't shut it down because things aren't going your way. Heck...he didn't even have to post anymore if he didn't feel like it, but killing the thread is just plain cowardly.

Re:My new patent:

[AviLazar]

remember that kid?

Well you know what, I was always fucking tired of being the first one knocked out at dodge ball. So THERE!

Re:My new patent:

[Solra Bizna]

By "this post" I meant "the parent post" of course. >_<

-:sigma.SB

P.S. I mean in the parent post, of course.

Re:My new patent:

[jcaren]

Here is an idea.
If a company registers a patent and that patent is shown to have publically visible prior art (no "did'nt see it" excuses allowed) then the company loses ALL registered patents.
This would stop the big shots such as MS etc from issuing shoddy patents and force them to provide prior art details to the PTO.
Further to a company having its patent portfolio revoked, all companies funding that company (and its investors) would also have thier portfolio revoked.
This would stop MS,IBM etc from setting up dummy companies to file bogus patents.

Re:My new patent:

[Java Pimp]

Well, then perhaps he shouldn't have boasted about his new patent on his blog, and invited others to respond. I'm sure he would have kept the blog open if all the conversation was mindless adulation for his cleverness (which it looks like he was expecting), but since he got a little heat, he just shut down and ran.

Yeah, perhaps he shouldn't have, but as you pointed out, I don't think he was expecting to get flamed for it either. I'm sure we've all done something we've perceived as a personal achievement and sought recognition and congratulations from our peers only to be less than enthusiastically received (I know I have...). They knock you down a few pegs and you want to crawl under a rock for a while...

Granted, a public forum probably wasn't the best place to boast. However, I would think it reasonable for him, since it is his blog, to expect that most (surely not all) people reading his blog are his peers (or atleast people who think like he does) and he would receive a warm reception. It's not like he posted it to Slashdot...

As for not following through, he wasn't planning on getting into the religious argument in the first place. He post wasn't "Hey, software patents kick ass and here's why...". He was just looking for a pat on the back from his peers...

Re:My new patent:

[TripMaster Monkey]

They knock you down a few pegs and you want to crawl under a rock for a while...

Excellent point...except that's not what he did. What he did was stuff the thread under that selfsame rock while plugging his ears and singing "lalalalaIcan'thearyoulalalala".

However, I would think it reasonable for him, since it is his blog, to expect that most (surely not all) people reading his blog are his peers...

peers != fans

I guess he knows that now.

As for not following through, he wasn't planning on getting into the religious argument in the first place.

Apparently, he's been too busy coding to keep up on the controversy regarding all these software patents and their purported deleterious effect on innovation in the field. Pity he closed his thread so soon...he could have learned quite bit.

Re:My new patent:

[SnapShot]

The GPP should be modded down as "troll" or "flamebait" because, COPYRIGHTS are not PATENTS!! Bitching about the "Hypocracy" of GPL defenders in another article about patents doesn't add a lot to the conversation. But, to be honest, either does this post so I'll shut up now.

Re:My new patent:

[Speare]

This .sig is free shareware. Register now for only $49.95 to get its full 10MB version!

Is Kibo's .sig file up to 10MB already? Seems like only yesterday that it was merely a few hundred kilobites.

Re:My new patent:

[fitten]

OK... so... if I can ignore the copyrights of the MPAA/RIAA/EULA and use their material as I see fit, then by the same token, I should be able to ignore the GPL and use the code any way I see fit, including using it in a piece of commercial code without making my code GPL as well.

Because the MPAA/RIAA/EULA defines in which ways that you are allowed to copy copyrighted material is not logic to claim that they "remove rights". Removing rights would most likely be an actionable offense. Suppose they said that you weren't allowed to make a backup copy (fair use), then you could do something about that because they are trying to remove a right that you have. That isn't the case though. They are defining (under terms of their copyright rights) what you can and cannot do with their 'stuff'. If any of this violated consumer rights or the like, it would quickly be brought up.

Compared to the GPL, it doesn't "give" you anything. They are defining (under terms of their copyright rights) what you can and cannot do with their 'stuff'.

Copyright holders have kind of a dial to dial in how much of their rights as copyright holders that they can claim. MPAA/RIAA dials their in tight (they want to reserve all their rights that they can under the copyright laws). GPL dials theirs more lose and give up some of their rights that they are otherwise entitled to. They don't "give" YOU anything. They simply forgo some of the rights that they have which ALLOW you to do certain other things with their stuff.

Also, the FSF have not been found guilty of price fixing and collusion for the same end. RIAA have.

This is neither here nor there. Claiming (or not claiming) rights as a copyright holder is independent of then going off and doing activities like you mention. You are ALLOWED to retain your copyrights (or not, as you choose) regardless of whether or not you then go off and price fix or whatever.

Re:My new patent:

[Queer Boy]

he' s well within his rights to close the thread...just like that kid who would always take his ball and go home when the game didn't go his way...remember that kid?

NO, it's totally different. It's like the kid who tells you to get out of his house and YOU'RE the one that has to go home.

His blog is not your public playplace. Some of the posts he had could be likened to vandalism on private property. It amazes me more and more when I read slashdot the amount of people that believe the internet is public property. It's not.

Reading stories about companies that only comply with the license and somehow they are evil and bad because they don't do more than what the license requires, yet somehow that's not the fault of whomever decided on that license for that software. Bloggers should now let people run rampant on their private blogs.

A blog is not a public forum. It's a private discussion with only one moderator.

Re:My new patent:

[unapersson]

Yes, especially as there's no "-1 foaming at the mouth gibberish" moderation. You should be allowed to invent your own.

Re:My new patent:

[Adrilla]

Um...don't you think that's just a little bit too harsh? While I don't agree with the patent at all, and I don't like a lot of Microsoft's tactics, I can't blame them for trying. In this case the fault is the patent office (as is with most bad patents issued). Microsoft simply saw an opportunity and tried to take it, they just happened to succeed. The patent office needs to come up with a better review process, because there's blatant prior art in this case. There was a suggestion that I've seen on /. before that said, there should be a challenge period, where patent applications become public for a period of time where anyone that can prove prior art can submit to the patent office to have a submission like this halted. It may take more time to get the patents out, but that's what the pending period is for. What Microsoft is doing here is a bit shady, but that's only because the PTO let's it happen, which has got to change. Now on the subject of the dummy companies, that is the fault of the corporations creating them, and they should be penalized for that.

Re:My new patent:

[geoffspear]

The "invent your own moderation" idea sounds good in theory, but it has one major flaw.

Right now if I like flamebait messages, I can give them a +2 modifier and read all of them. Your idea doesn't address the needs of readers who enjoy foaming at the mouth gibberish (at least, not without a hierarchy of moderation types and really making the preferences page unusable).

Re:My new patent:

[Raphael]

BTW, patents are kind of designed to stifle competition... why else would they exist? They give the patent holder rights to something and time to attempt to make money off the ideas. That is kind of the definition of stifling competition.

The idea of patents sounds nice in theory but does not work well in practice, especially for software patents. In exchange of publication of a new, non-obvious solution to a problem, the patent gives the inventor a temporary monopoly, protecting him/her against blatant copying by others. That's the theory.

However, it can easily be shown that for most of the software patents granted today, the threshold for novelty and inventive step are much too low, for claims that are much too broad. As a result, there is a lot of independent innovation that ends up being threatened because someone else happened to have filed a patent application for something similar a few months earlier.

Besides, with all the hypocracy over copyrights - you MUST obey the GPL copyright agreement but MUST NOT obey the RIAA/MPAA/Software copyright agreements - pretty much most of the F/OSS folks aren't worth the time to talk to about it.

This looks very much like a troll, but I will bite anyway: personally, I try to respect copyrights. This applies for the GPL as well as for the works that are protected by the RIAA, MPAA and others (i.e., movies, music, software, etc.).

If I disagree with the inflated prices of some items, then I just ignore them instead of trying to get an illegal copy. However, I disagree with the RIAA, MPAA and others when the methods that they use for protecting their copyrights interfere with my fair use rights. If I have purchased a CD or DVD, I want to be able to enjoy its contents on any of the devices that I own and I also want to be sure that I will be able to enjoy these contents in the future. So I prefer to buy CDs and DVDs that are not crippled by some annoying copy protection mechanism. I also buy some copy-protected things from time to time when the contents are worth it (so I'm not a zealot), but I tend to avoid them whenever I can. Not because I want to copy them but because I want to be able to listen to music, watch movies and use programs without having to get around the copy protection mechanism.

If you would pay a bit more attention to the people who post here, you would find that there are some people who respect copyrights without being hypocrites. This applies to the GPL as well as other things.

Re:My new patent:

[johnnyb]

I think you are confusing things.

Most people here, at least who argue for GPL/FOSS, agree with OBEYING copyright. They disagree with evil companies ABUSING copyright.

The RIAA, for example, is:

• stupid - for not recognizing the ability to make money from P2P
• greedy - because, well, they are
• arrogant - because they think that they should be working against, rather than with, their customers
• abusive - even this week there was an instance of the RIAA suing someone for downloading music they already owned

All of these make the RIAA objects of wrath and disgust and much blogging against them. None of this means "therefore we should make unauthorized copies".

I actually think that if you really look into it, you find much less hypocrasy in the F/OSS world than in the proprietary world. F/OSS came about because people wanted a legal way to share with each other. People in the proprietary world often steal software and music because they don't care if it's legal or not. That's the fundamental difference -- F/OSS was wanting the freedom and wanting to do so within a legal framework.

I have a friend who is a business owner, who uses unauthorized copies of software. When I pointed to the fact it was illegal, he didn't care. He didn't want to use F/OSS software because he didn't care about the legality. If he had cared, then his choice would either be to pay (but he didn't have the money) or use F/OSS. F/OSS thrives because it is a legal and ethical way to do what we always wanted to do with software -- share.

Re:My new patent:

[jcaren]

In the UK it is your responsibility to provide proof that you have taken all reasonable steps to search for prior art.
I see no reason why if this is proven to be false, punitive action should not be taken.
Yes I do belive it is harsh but if implemented MS, IBm et.al would be divesting themselves of large numbers of patents - or registering them overseas instead.

Re:My new patent:

[VitaminB52]

Removing rights would most likely be an actionable offense. Suppose they said that you weren't allowed to make a backup copy (fair use), then you could do something about that because they are trying to remove a right that you have. That isn't the case though.

Nonsense. Some copyright protection schemes make making a backup copy (almost) impossible. So they are taking rights away, and as a consumer you don't have a change in court because you're bankrupt long before the MPAA/RIAA runs out of money.
No, they do not say you're not allowed to make backup copies - however, they make it technologically almost impossible to make that backup copy. And if you circumvent the anti-copy system, then the MPAA/RIAA will throw the DMCA at you.

Making a backup copy is fair use, but if you're not a geek, then some anti-copy systems will prevent you from making that backup copy; and if you're a geek who can and does circumvent, then they'll hit you with the DMCA.

Re:My new patent:

[Penguinoflight]

Yeah, but is it 64bit?

Re:My new patent:

[PierceLabs]

This post is NOT a troll and deserves to be modded up insightful. I mean come on, this is a straightforward opinion. Certainly not flaimbait.

Re:My new patent:

[going_the_2Rpi_way]

There are good points? Like what? Defending inventor's rights? Ummm no.. quite the contrary the fact they will grant a patent to most non novel ideas with or without priror art simply makes for an easier legal challenge. More lawyers, time money wins... Patents are becoming worthless (or worth 10 hours of a lawyers time) under the current review process. Letting ideas eventually reach the public domain? And what about when a couple of companies gang up to extend a patent well beyond it's expiration date ( see http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?articleID=000AF01 8-31CA-1FFB-B1CA83414B7F0000 ) So please tell me what the USPTO is doing that is worthwhile. Seriously.

Re:My new patent:

[TripMaster Monkey]

His blog is not your public playplace.

By initially allowing responses to his post, that's exactly what he made it.

Some of the posts he had could be likened to vandalism on private property.

Wrong. In effect, he handed out cans of spray paint to everyone and encouraged them to write their thoughts. It was only after he found that some of those thoughts were not fully complimentary to him that he squealed 'vandalism' and knocked the spray cans out of everyone's hands.

If he didn't want people posting their opinions, he shouldn't have started the thread in the first place. Period.

I guess he knows that now...why is it so difficult for you to grasp?

Re:My new patent:

[cl0secall]

I think you've completely missed the point, which was that "he' s well within his rights to close the thread", but that it's childish and somewhat cowardly to do so. I'd throw in arrogance as well, personally. Your argument that it's "totally different" because it's a private forum instead of a public forum is correct -- in pointing out that the GP's analogy is flawed. You seem to completely ignore the subjective assessment of pettiness.

I would be one of the first to defend anyone's right to remove offensive, obnoxious, or other "inappropriate" posts to their forums, blog, etc. I'm also willing to call people arrogant, childish, etc for doing so. Statements like "I'm going to get the last word in, because I can" are prima facie towards that judgement.

Re:My new patent:

[AK Marc]

Besides, with all the hypocracy over copyrights - you MUST obey the GPL copyright agreement but MUST NOT obey the RIAA/MPAA/Software copyright agreements - pretty much most of the F/OSS folks aren't worth the time to talk to about it.

Well, without copyrights, GPL wouldn't exist, nor would it need to. I've read the arguments as "the system sucks, but as long as it's there, we're going to use it to defend our interests." It isn't hypocritical to condemn the system and work to change it while using it to your advantage at the same time. Wanting to improve things doesn't mean that you can't use the system before it is improved.

Re:My new patent:

[dfiguero]

This is exactly the problem we face these days: people are too stupid to make an argument.

They vomit something and when they can't think of an intelligent way to defend their position they simply use the "talk to the hand" method. :(

Re:My new patent:

[Adrilla]

I am in agreement that the rules should be changed, and I like the UK's approach (sounds better than what we have here now), and I even agree that if they broke the rules they should be penalized, they should have the particular patent revoked and even a fine, maybe even in certain extreme cases, a probation period where they can't file new patents. But these are all scenarios that should happen IF they broke the rules. In this case they didn't, they played the USPTO's game and they play it well. Which is why I think the patent office is at fault and needs major change, so behavior like this is not encouraged and these shenanigans wont happen.

Re:My new patent:

[nametaken]

Don't feel bad. Most of us lost our first game of kickball and took up video games instead.

Re:My new patent:

[Experiment 626]

If I can ignore the copyrights of the MPAA/RIAA/EULA and use their material as I see fit, then by the same token, I should be able to ignore the GPL and use the code any way I see fit, including using it in a piece of commercial code without making my code GPL as well. Because the MPAA/RIAA/EULA defines in which ways that you are allowed to copy copyrighted material...

For the most part, your copyright-RIAA-MPAA-GPL analogy is pretty good, but it completely misses the mark in adding EULA to the list. Copyrights, the GPL, etc. all deal with who is allowed to make duplicates of a copyrighted work, and under what conditions. The default is "you can't copy copyrighted works", but content creators can then loosen this a bit by stipulating "unless you pay me a lot of money", "unless you distribute the source code too" or whatever appeals to them.

A EULA, on the other hand, tries to define under what conditions you can USE a particular work. Rather than specifying a set of exceptions to the powers the creator has under the law, a EULA is an attempt to grab additional powers over and above what copyright grants, typically by holding a piece of software a user has already bought and paid for hostage and not letting it run until the user "agrees" to a bunch of unilaterally dictated conditions that were never part of the purchase agreement. These demands don't necessarily deal with copying, as copyright does, but make crazy stipulations like "you can't look at how this works", "you must use this only on platform such-and-such", "you can't sell this when you're done with it" and so on.

Re:My new patent:

[fitten]

I think you are confusing things.

Most people here, at least who argue for GPL/FOSS, agree with OBEYING copyright. They disagree with evil companies ABUSING copyright.

The RIAA, for example, is:


stupid - for not recognizing the ability to make money from P2P

And this is abuse.... how exactly?

greedy - because, well, they are

And this is abuse.... how exactly?

arrogant - because they think that they should be working against, rather than with, their customers

And this is abuse.... how exactly?

abusive - even this week there was an instance of the RIAA suing someone for downloading music they already owned

Let's see the outcome of this. Did the fact that they already owned it came *after* the suit or before it? If "after", then where is the abuse if the case is dropped? If before it, then I might agree with you on this.

All of these make the RIAA objects of wrath and disgust and much blogging against them. None of this means "therefore we should make unauthorized copies".

So.... two wrongs make a right...

I actually think that if you really look into it, you find much less hypocrasy in the F/OSS world than in the proprietary world. F/OSS came about because people wanted a legal way to share with each other. People in the proprietary world often steal software and music because they don't care if it's legal or not. That's the fundamental difference -- F/OSS was wanting the freedom and wanting to do so within a legal framework.

The F/OSS zealots are no different from any other religion. They have it and are blinded by it. They won't budge.

I have a friend who is a business owner, who uses unauthorized copies of software. When I pointed to the fact it was illegal, he didn't care. He didn't want to use F/OSS software because he didn't care about the legality. If he had cared, then his choice would either be to pay (but he didn't have the money) or use F/OSS. F/OSS thrives because it is a legal and ethical way to do what we always wanted to do with software -- share.

Well... as long as he's ready to step up to the plate when the boom comes down, no problem here. If he's willing to accept the consequences of his actions in this case if he gets caught, then I don't have any beef with him.

Re:My new patent:

[nanoakron]

And if you don't remember that kid.....you WERE that kid!

Re:My new patent:

[richardtallent]

As one of the people who replied in the original thread, my post was not meant so much as a flame as it was an admonishment. I didn't attack his character, only the idea that he was proud of his employer's activity. However, I did not think less of him for closing the comments--I know I opened a can of worms on his site, and I don't expect his blog to be the forum for a national debate on the viability and limitations of software patents.

Re:My new patent:

[siriuskase]

I think much of what is wrong with America today is because so many people busy at their vocation don't work too many hours, then crawl into the cave they call home and never really notice a lot of these issues until they directly affect them, or they do, but they are too tired to care. A lot of apathy is simply lack of time or energy to do more than make a living and then relax. This guy invited folks into what he thought was his safe cave to have a poke at him.

Re:My new patent:

[value_added]

Since we're on the subject ... I have just patented the .sig file.

^_^

And since we are on the subject, a sig is not a set of extraneous ascii characters sometimes followed by a name. A sig is denoted (putting on my pointy pedantic Slashdot Public Service Announcement hat, here) by a

dash dash space return

followed by a name, extraneous ascii characters, advertising, and/or a pity quotation that is incidental to the content of the message. It facilitates email and usenet clients from appyling syntax colouring to the incidental text to distinguish it from normal text, and further allows for it's automated removal from quoted text when a reply is made. Among other things.

Slashdot makes allowances for sigs so that those of use who use the Disable sigs don't have to view them. Among other things.

Re:My new patent:

[ultranova]

Yeah, perhaps he shouldn't have, but as you pointed out, I don't think he was expecting to get flamed for it either.

First, he abused the patent system and screwed over his peers - remember that the purpose of a patent is to prevent others from using the patented thing - and then he went and bragged about it to those very peers.

If he didn't expect to be flamed, he's an idiot.

Granted, a public forum probably wasn't the best place to boast.

There is no good place to boast about dirty deeds.

However, I would think it reasonable for him, since it is his blog, to expect that most (surely not all) people reading his blog are his peers (or atleast people who think like he does) and he would receive a warm reception.

And instead, he got what he deserved.

As for not following through, he wasn't planning on getting into the religious argument in the first place. He post wasn't "Hey, software patents kick ass and here's why...". He was just looking for a pat on the back from his peers...

Autocompletion has been done by anything from Nethack (extended commands) to GNU Readline Library. Coming to think of it, OpenOffice.org does the same, and even autocompletes words as you type without you having to specifically command it. So does FireFox browser (and most other browsers) for that matter, in their address fields.

This patent is simply fraudulent, and the victims of that fraud are likely to be this persons peers. Expecting them to "pat his back" for screwing them over was absurd.

Re:My new patent:

[bit01]

It's flamebait. Like a lot of trolls he pretends that OSS people have a monolithic opinion so he can create a straw man to rubbish.

His posting history shows he's been round here long enough to know better.

---

Commercial software bigots - a dying breed.

Re:My new patent:

[Baricom]

but killing the thread is just plain cowardly.

I agree that he shouldn't be proud of himself for "inventing" the claims in that patent, but I disagree that he's a coward. A coward would have deleted the negative messages, not left them in plain sight.

Re:My new patent:

[vsprintf]

The idea of patents sounds nice in theory but does not work well in practice, especially for software patents.

Agreed, patents have no place in software, which is essentially patenting an algorithm or series of steps. Patents in their original form, as applied to actual things for a short period of time were fine. Say you were the inventor of the Wanker^Hl engine, which slowly beats itself to death but is truly unique. The patent is justified even if the engine is not very practical in real life. Giving patents for ideas like XOR'd cursors has no benefit for the public, who are supposed to be the real beneficiaries of patents.

Re:My new patent:

[kernel_dan]

merely a few hundred kilobites

That bytes.

Re:My new patent:

[SeventyBang]

You mean like the guy who showed up on Dr. Phil for a 2nd time today? He was considered the "Worst Husband in the US". He was the one who told his wife to shut her suckhole and respect what the told her to do because he was the man of the family and she should do everything his way. This included how she brushed teeth. The Mrs. (on the first visit) made some comment about how she showered:

Dr. Phil: "He shows you how to shower?"
Mrs: "No, he just tells me I do it wrong."
Dr. Phil: "She stands up for him!"

Apparently, Dr. P got through to him but even more, the comments from all of the readers on the messageboards basically said he wasn't worth whatever it cost to buy something used to wipe him out and it really hurt his feelings enough to see the error of his ways.

When he came back on today, he was as laid back as someone who was p%ssy-whipped like someone who had been part of a two-week daily test of Cialis.

Re:My new patent:

[Baric]

"A blog is not a public forum. It's a private discussion with only one moderator." I disagree. He paid for webspace that is publicly accessible and then intentionally installed software that allows the general public to respond. In addition, he posted his ideas without (initially) disabling the ability to respond. He was CLEARLY soliciting responses to his post. If does not his blog to be a "public forum", then he can simply disable all responses.

Re:My new patent:

[Solra Bizna]

"Troll" and "flamebait" do not equal "fundamentally wrong." This is the sort of thing moderators should respond with rather than simply modding down in this sort of case.

Everyone has the right to their opinion, but everyone else has the right to tell them they're wrong.

-:sigma.SB

Re:My new patent:

[Solra Bizna]

Oh, and by "this" I meant "parent post." I do this a lot, apparently. >_<

-:sigma.SB

Re:My new patent:

[Hungry Admin]

"Does this make me look fat?"

Re:My new patent:

[TheoMurpse]

I have just patented the .sig file

So...does that mean that we have to take off every sig or else face great justice?

Time to fight back

[fishdan]

What needs to happen is someone needs to sue the Patent Office for negligence. There must be some case out there where it can be shown that the USPTO's negligence in issuing patents so casually has caused some company monetary damages. If a city can be held liable because of damages caused by a pot hole or a supermarket because of floors being slippery, or McDonalds for coffee being too hot, can't we hold the USPTO responsible for issuing patents for which there is BLATANT prior art? I don't mean this as a rhetorical question. Why is the USPTO never held accountable?

Hit them in the pocketbook. It's the only sort of censure a government office understands.

Re:Time to fight back

[julesh]

Because the USPTO has a right to issue patents, this kind of action could not succeed. My understanding is that the laws that enable them to issue patents do not require them to ascertain that the patent isn't for something ridiculously trivial like this one, therefore they have performed their duty as described in relevant laws and there is nothing anyone can do about it.

Except bring political pressure against it. Have you talked to your political representatives at every possible level of government and asked them to do something about this problem?

Re:Time to fight back

[donnyspi]

I wouldn't do that if I were you. I have already patented the process for sueing the USPTO for negligence. Sorry.

Re:Time to fight back

[peragrin]

No but they are responsible for looking up prior art.

That look up is most likely a quick search through their own files. Of course if they used a computer to research the topics they would realize people have been doing this for years.

or maybe not they are that smart after all.

Re:Time to fight back

[LO0G]

I know this is /., but RTFP.

The patent's actually not about treating email addresses as objects.

The patent's about tagging the origin of an email address and altering the display of that email address based on the origin of the email address - if the email address came from the address book it looks one way if it comes from the internet it looks differently.

And whatever else they added to the patent.

It's NOT about patenting .sig files.

I'm not aware of prior art in this one - do you know of an email client that visually differentiated between internet based email addresses and ones from the address book?

Re:Time to fight back

[rben]

Actually, the USPTO is supposed to apply a standard that demands that a patent be for something that is not obvious to someone appropriately trained and familiar with the technology.

If you read the patent, it could be interpreted as something innovative, until you start looking at the examples of how it's meant to be used. All of those concepts are obvious and have prior art associated with them. I think the patent examiner should have insisted on some example applications that were not rehashes of technology that is decades old, since that might make clear what is actually being patented and thus narrow the scope enough that the patent would be enforcable and reasonable.

Re:Time to fight back

[TripMaster Monkey]

It's NOT about patenting .sig files.

Of course it's not. That's MY patent, you insensitive clod!

BTW, your use of the word '.sig' just cost you $0.14. You will be billed shortly.

^_^

Re:Time to fight back

[955301]

Pegasus mail.
Netscape mail.
AOL.
UUNet.

Re:Time to fight back

[magefile]

Compu$erve.

Re:Time to fight back

[Anonymous Coward]

The term of art is "one of ordiary skill in the art at the time of the invention".

Re:Time to fight back

[seestuffgo]

Uhm, actually, the patent office must meet several requirements when issuing patents. Mostly: must be innovative and non-trivial. In fact, I think they even use the word non-trivial.

Re:Time to fight back

[mungtor]

I dunno... Are you aware of any prior art where two strings can be compared? And what if the program *did* something if the strings were the same?

Yeah, I can't think of any either.

Re:Time to fight back

[Hognoxious]

The patent's actually not about treating email addresses as objects.

Lucky it's not about treating employees as objects - it seems EA Games have prior art.

Re:Time to fight back

[julesh]

Yes, and they keep saying "how much did you give to my campaign?"

Then kick them out and replace them with a new bunch that do care about the ordinary people. One the main points of democracy is to help prevent corruption, but it doesn't work if the people sit back and let it happen.

Re:Time to fight back

[Seraphim1982]

So? Should all the coffee & tea sold in the US be served lukewarm as a result? Many of use like hot coffee. Without using boiling water, you lose a lot of flavour.
[...]
And frankly, has this woman had coffee before? Has she made coffee at home? She must have known that coffee is hot. She has no one to blame but herself.

Have you ever had really good coffee? Using boiling water destroys flavor. Try having coffee made in a french press and compare it to the stuff brewed in a machine.
The ideal temperature for coffee is ~165F, so like a kit of people she probably expected her coffee to be ~165F. McDonalds served their coffee at ~200F, and after repeated complaints (and a few incidents) relating to how it could seriously injure people at that temperature, didn't change anything. I would say that "Hey our coffee is about 40 degrees hotter then everyone elses" would be atleast worth a mention somewhere.

Re:Time to fight back

[Rosyna]

Well, seems that people are fighting back. blogs.msdn.com has been /'d. I guess community server can't handle the load from slashdot. Doesn't say much about Microsoft's products, does it?

Yeah, I'm evil.

Re:Time to fight back

[Queer Boy]

The patent's about tagging the origin of an email address and altering the display of that email address based on the origin of the email address - if the email address came from the address book it looks one way if it comes from the internet it looks differently.

It's Apple's creator and type scheme just applied to an e-mail address.

Re:Time to fight back

[CodeBuster]

can't we hold the USPTO responsible for issuing patents for which there is BLATANT prior art?

Have you ever tried to sue the Federal Government before? Try it and see how far you get and don't forget that these agencies have the power to make your life miserable while your case winds its way to defeat through the courts.

Re:Time to fight back

[Alioth]

Prior art or not, given the problem it is supposed to solve, the solution is obvious to a practitioner ordinarilly skilled in the art. It should not be patentable because it's obvious.

Re:Time to fight back

[smittyoneeach]

You don't seem to grasp the situation.
What we need to do is convince, say, Lessig, to run for office, with the following platform:
<Joker voice>
This government needs an enema!
</Joker voice>

Re:Time to fight back

[AnotherJake]

>What needs to happen is someone needs to sue the Patent Office for negligence. Better yet, someone needs to patent the Patent Office.

Re:Time to fight back

[rmstar]

do you know of an email client that visually differentiated between internet based email addresses and ones from the address book?

Yes: the web client of mail.yahoo.com. It adds a "View contact details" if it is in your addres book, or an "add to address book" if it is not.

Re:Time to fight back

[lildogie]

You can't sue the U.S. Government. The best you can do is get an injunction.

Re:Time to fight back

[andreMA]

It's Apple's creator and type scheme just applied to an e-mail address.

Apple is actually most of the way toward what this patent apparently covers in Mail.app. The contextual menu on email addresses differentiates by the presence or absence of an "Add to Address Book" item. Adding a bullet or an icon (<X-Face> (?) header, or assigned locally to indicate Address Book groupings) seems a trivial next step in terms of adding functionality and feedback.

I don't recall when this first appeared in Mail.app, but I don't think it's terribly new; might date back to 2001.

Re:Time to fight back

[dmaxwell]

I've been doing this with KMail for months now. Well, I divert mail into a suspect folder based on whether or not a person is in my address book. Where the mail shows up in my folder tree IS a visual indication.

If the guy hadn't closed the thread on his blog, I'd be heading over there to roast and toast him myself. If I wind up losing the feature on account of this ass, I'm going to add any product associated with him to my sh*tlist.

Re:Time to fight back

[NekSnappa]

Unfortunately if they where to deny some of these more idiotic software patents the opposite would happen.

Example:

-Microsoft submits application to patent the use of a password comined with a username to login to an account for any type of software.

-USPTO denies it as silly.

-MS decries denial of patent as restraint of trade, and gives an assload of money to some congress critters.

-Congress critters re-write laws governing USPTO

Not exactly a suit but mostly the same effect

Re:Time to fight back

[grozzie2]

I'm not aware of prior art in this one - do you know of an email client that visually differentiated between internet based email addresses and ones from the address book?

I see the root of the problem in this comment, it's obvious you have never dealt with clients that use methods other than 'internet' to send and recieve email. That's likely because the smtp protocol has become ubiquitous, and anybody that's been introduced to the concept in the last 10 years, knows nothing else. On the other hand, if you deal with mixed systems, as was common 15 years ago, it was _normal_ for a client to differentiate between different addresses based on thier source/destination. I can clearly remember the days of addresses having different coloring/presentation based on which route would be travelled to deliver the correspondance, with the options being lan/uucp/fidonet/inmarsat with a few other more obscure options available. Differentiating was important, because each route had a different cost involved in the delivery.

Even today, the setup I use categorizes addresses based on delivery method. It goes much farther than that, and when I compose a large note for delivery over inmarsat, I even get an 'are you sure you want to send this' popup, with a requirement for password entry to enable the send of that note. When a 1kbyte note can cost on the order of $20 to deliver, it's rather important that you deploy a system that makes damn sure folks do not accidently click on the wrong address, and send large file attaches over a data link that charges per bit, vs going out over a flat rate broadband connection that's totally unmetered.

Go take a good look at the pricing of inmarsat c data cairrage, and you'll realize immediately, when the costs are 'per bit', it becomes blatantly obvious to any developer, addresses on that system require special treatment, part of which is color coding and hilight fonts.

It's wonderful to see the USPTO continue down the road of granting patents for obvious things, so obvious we've been using it for 15 years. I love it every time I see this, it's one more nail in the coffin. I'm involved in a very active political movement to have my country abandon it's agreements with the USA involving patent recognition, this is just more cannon fodder to make our cause even more reasonable.

It's only a matter of time at this rate, and the rest of the world is going to abandon the concept of recognizing IP as defined by the USA, and move to standards that are reasonable. That's going to be a rather catastrophic event for the american economy. Patents like this make it inevitable.

Re:Time to fight back

[slipstick]

What country are you in? If it's Canada I'd like to get in on that, if it's not I'd like to hear what your doing to get the ear of your government on this.

Re:Time to fight back

[martinX]

Novell's Groupwise does this. Apple's Mail app does it to, and if you click on the "name" address, it gives you the real email address.

Just want to be the first

[JWeinraub]

More more patents for microsoft makes me want to get apple more and more

Re:Just want to be the first

[Aldric]

Apple would be just as bad if they were in Microsoft's position.

Re:Just want to be the first

[dAzED1]

so? then one supports yet another company. It's called informed consumerism...

Re:Just want to be the first

[123abc987]

I think Apple would be worse...
At least with "MS" PCs you can switch to Linux, upgrade your hardware components. Apple would lock you into Apple-only software AND hardware, and any accessories associated with your computer.

Re:Just want to be the first

[freedom_india]

Apple would be just as bad if they were in Microsoft's position.

More worse. Considering how apple protects itself against journalists and sues its own customers, an Apple dominated world would have been worse.

And for you Mac-fanatics, i own an iBook an d i HATE windows for its "improved" security. Satisfied?

Re:Just want to be the first

[cahiha]

Apple? The company that started look-and-feel lawsuits and wanted to keep everybody in the world from using GUIs? Apple patents a lot, and they try to enforce their patents--they are no better in this regard than Microsoft, just smaller.

If you want to do something against these sorts of patent system abuses, use (and contribute to) open source software on generic hardware.

Re:Just want to be the first

[DigitumDei]

And you think Apple don't patent completely arbitrary "inventions" either?

Re:Just want to be the first

[bygimis]

For your information you can run Linux on Mac PPC hardware, so your arguement makes little sense. If MS could lock Linux out of the PC platform, do you think they would do it?

Re:Just want to be the first

[freedom_india]

industrial espionage is NOT publishing photos of products being printed before the product is released. Industrial espionage is WHEN the photos are used by a competitor to build a similar product and release it BEFORE the original company and earning profits in the process.

Apple always expects to be worshipped and even though it has been beaten in the desktop wars by Microsoft it's oh-so-superior attitude hasn't changed a bit.

Microsoft doesn't go about suing customers.

Apple's view to others (and external world) seems to be one of a superior attitude brought on by a superior product.

Granted their products are far superior compared to MSFT, but that doesn;t mean you have treat customers like either dirt or to be sued.

Re:Just want to be the first

[l3v1]

Apple would be just as bad if they were in Microsoft's position.

Yeah, and what do you get for this: insightful. Yup, right, /. alright.

In other news, every other politician would be as bad as the current ones of they were in the position. So why do we have them ?

Point is, we don't know how they would behave given such market position. And you surley also don't have a reasonable clue. Still, you trash them, and get insightful for it. Good job.

In your face MS

[Timesprout]

EMailAddress timesprout = new EMailAddress("timesprout@gmail.com ");

while(1) {

timesprout.spamMSLikeFuck();

}

Re:In your face MS

[julesh]

While this is funny, it shows that you only read the summary and not the actual patent, which is for displaying e-mail addresses in a particular fashion in the user interface of an e-mail client, that is showing them with adjacent icons that vary according to the type of address and can be manipulated (e.g. via drag and drop), as Outlook does.

Re:In your face MS

[SnapShot]

Well it does say "In a preferred embodiment... {blah, blah, obvious stuff about user interface}". If you were Microsoft trying to make a buck off of this patent, do you honestly think they would limit their lawsuits to applications that exactly implemented the user interface decisions described in the patent?

Back the question of objects, wouldn't any patent that begins "blah, blah, treat X as objects" be invalidated because of prior art due to the existance of pure OO languages like Smalltalk. I mean if there has ever been an email client implementated in Smalltalk or other OO language wouldn't the email address be treated as objects by the definition of that language?

Re:In your face MS

[julesh]

It depends what you mean by 'object'. In this case, the patent is talking in terms of user interface objects, possibly intending reference to other MS technologies like OLE that use the term in a very specific fashion. This is a lot more advanced and specific than the kind of object that you need to use to program in a pure-OO programming language.

Re:In your face MS

[ashot]

a real programmign langauge doesn't need brackets.

Re:In your face MS

[SnapShot]

OLE isn't mentioned in the entire patent. You would think that in a legal document like this if they meant OLE they would have said OLE.

In any case, if you read through the patent it appears that they took the user manual(*) for an email client, sprinkled in the word "object", and ran it through a lawyer filter to get a patent.

* Here's an examples:

A single click on one of the object icons of the present invention will select the entire text of the object. In addition, multiple objects can be selected via conventional cmd-click (discontiguous) or shift-click/shift-arrow (contiguous) procedures. A click and drag operation can be used to move the object within the email headers (e.g., between any of the To, From, cc, or bcc fields). The object can also be copied (by selecting the object and employing a copy command) for placement outside the address fields (e.g., the subject field, newsgroups field, the body of the message, or the Desktop). Double clicking on the icon will open the item associated with the address after looking up the contact in the local contact store (e.g. address book), or prompt the user to create an associated item if the address was manually entered or captured from a LDAP server. In this way a user can readily edit or add email addresses to his or her contacts list, thereby facilitating its inclusion in future outgoing email transmissions.

Re:In your face MS

[julesh]

You would think that in a legal document like this if they meant OLE they would have said OLE.

Patents are often left intentionally ambiguous, so that they can later claim that something slightly outside what they were originally intending is covered by it. They said something that might be construed to mean OLE, or indeed any other mechanism that provides a similar function. It certainly is clear that they were talking about objects as a user interface level feature, not a code level one.

Re:In your face MS

[SnapShot]

I don't disagree that this patent is intentionally ambiguous. However, I fear that they (and your argument) want to have it both ways: ambiguous references to "objects" that can mean whatever their lawyers want it to mean to increase they scope of the patents, but defending it to the technical crowd as "oh, don't worry, it really only applies to this subset of implementation decisions; it's not really an abuse of the patent system..."

In any case, I'm not sure I get your distinction between objects as code vs. user interface level features. OLE is code. An ActiveX object is implemented as code but it generally has a UI. Is a Java Bean a user interface level feature? How about an EJB? Are you saying that "the idea of a button is a user interface level object, but a JButton is a code level object?".

Re:In your face MS

[julesh]

In any case, I'm not sure I get your distinction between objects as code vs. user interface level features. OLE is code. An ActiveX object is implemented as code but it generally has a UI. Is a Java Bean a user interface level feature? How about an EJB? Are you saying that "the idea of a button is a user interface level object, but a JButton is a code level object?".

Effectively, yes. What I see here is a patent on a specific type of interaction which doesn't really refer to implementation details, except in passing. The core of the patent is about how the user can interact with the e-mail addresses, not how the program is organised to achieve this effect.

Which is even worse than an implementation detail patent, IMO. The software industry tried to protect 'look and feel' through copyright in the 80s, and failed. Now they're trying to do it through patents, instead. And they might succeed.

Re:In your face MS

[bwcbwc]

I disagree. When you speak of clicking on an "object icon" you are speaking of a user interface to an OO program Object. When you speak of a user interface object, that would be clicking on an "icon object".

so...

[rwven]

About that patent reform... Isn't it about time? The lamebrains behind awarding patents must really not understand these things. I remember when a person had to spend weeks or months proving that they should get a patent and that it's valid. Now i think they employ a bunch of 6th graders to stand around and stamp reams of applications with "Awarded" or something...

Re:so...

[KernelHappy]

You know what's even sader? It takes them almost five years to rubber stamp these things. The microsoft patent in question was filed October 17, 2000 and was approved May 17, 2005. You would think that with over four and a half years to research it that they would have at least stumbled on someone who could explain to them why this is stupid or at least shown them examples of prior art.

Is there any sort of public submittal process for showing that prior art exists against someone elses patent application? There should be some formal workflow with a public RFC period for any patent application. I understand why they would be hesistant to do this, as it could be potentially used as a fillibuster against someones application. Thats why I think it should be like all patents should be reviewed within 2 years and any public concerns should be formally submitted no later than 12 months into the process. If after that point no objections are raised and a silly patent slips through the cracks we revert to the current style of fighting.

Regardless of the mechanism used there needs to be some sort of public accountability for patent applications. I'm sure there are plenty of people willing to put some time into preventing frivilous patents from being approved.

Re:so...

[happyfrogcow]

It's usually about a year before your first hear back from the patent office after submitting something. That's usually a rejection, because claims x, y, and z aren't adequate for some reason. You then have some ammount of time, either 3 or 6 months maybe, i forget, to resubmit changes based on the first rejection. I don't know how long it takes then to hear back again, i'm still waiting. It's been 5 months i think so far. Each iteration costing more money. I've got a little home project that I'm playing the patent game with. It's hardware though, not software. And we actually developed a prototype, which should be required I think. Or atleast a simulation should be.

So while the patent office is slow, it also takes some time for the people filing the patent to make corrections and changes, and move to the next step. I really would like to see the filing cabinet where my application has been sitting untouched for the last 5 months. Once they get their hands on it, it's probably a days work.

The USPTO is Moderately Broken

[Uruk]

People have a lot of theories for why bad patents are granted. In reality, it's a bunch of different problems combined. I've dealt with a few trademarks and I've been involved in some patent review talks. Here's my IANAL take on some of what's involved:

• The examining attorneys don't get it. They don't have sufficient people with sufficiently deep knowledge in any particular field, so what's obvious to the practitioner isn't necessarily obvious to the examining attorney.
• They don't know how to search for prior art. If you don't know that "a digital identifier associated with an individual user of digital (web-based resources) intended to act as an identifying mechanism" is commonly called a cookie, you might grant a patent related to that because you didn't know how to search for similar stuff.
• In some cases, examining attorneys are paid by the office action, or how many letters they send back and forth contesting a mark or patent. In some cases, this provides opportunities for applicants to add much more supporting information to the application, and get a feeling for the thinking of the USPTO and what they need to say in order to get around the USPTO's mental biases
• Lawyers have the time and money to browbeat and appeal USPTO decisions. USPTO doesn't have the time and the money to fight every one to the bitter end. The reality is that the only way to make some attorneys go away is to grant it.

There's a company out there called M-CAM that does IP valuation - in other words they can tell you if what you have is a bogus patent worth nothing that shouldn't have been granted, or if you've got something that is fundamentally innovative. I saw a presentation a while back from the guy who runs the company, and they really get it. (The presentation started off by likening bogus patents to counterfeit money, particularly since companies use these patents to inflate perceptions of their valuation when sold)

Re:The USPTO is Moderately Broken

[sharkb8]

I've used M-Cam, it works great. THe problem is, it only searches the patent database.

One thing to note, the people examining patents are not attorneys. All you need is a techinical degree, like chemistry, physics, or engineering. You need only qualify to sit for the patent agents exam. I don't even think you actually have to take the patent agents exam to be an axaminer, and if you're an examiner for 5 years, you can waive the exam to become a registered patent agent. As an aside, the USPTO is recruiting at my law school for patent examiners, and I don't think anyone can afford to pay back $100K+ of law school loans on what the government pays (around $35K i believe).

The problem is that you get a lot of people who have english as a second language that go into government service because you don't have to be particularly qualified or competent, you just have to pass a civil service exam. Most examiners leave the PTO after a few years to make bigger money prosecuting (filing) applications.

Having dealt with the USPTO, the biggest problem is that PTO examiners generally only examine the US patent database. They don't realy search online for more prior art. Additionally, even if there is something that eveyone in the field knows about, but nothing is written down, the examiner probably can't point to it and say it's prior art. That's the reason so many software patents get granted. As a former programmer, I know I may comment my code, discuss my solutions on message boards, but rarely did I write a book or post a webpage on a clever hack. There's no paper trail.

The United States used to be the country aothers looked to for patentability. If a patent had been granted in the United States, then it was pretty certain that other countries would grant the same patent with little examination. Now, the U.S. has been slipping, and Europe and Japan do a much more thorough examination.

Re:The USPTO is Moderately Broken

[Dragon218]

The problem is, software patents fall under the "buisness process" paents. This type of patent has only been around for about 20 years or so. Now, in the search for prior art, Standard Operating Procedure is just looking at older patents and seeing if any of them conflict. They don't really do an outward search on the technology. The bigger problem comes with the fact that very few patents have been filed in this field, so the pool of "prior art" is very shallow.

And just to let you know, this is the truth. I had to do a research paper on it, so I'm very familiar with the workings / problems.

Re:The USPTO is Moderately Broken

[Lettuce B. Qrious]

It says on the patent form:
Primary Examiner: Thompson; Marc D.

This guy doesn't look too foreign to me, but English is a difficult language...

Re:The USPTO is Moderately Broken

[sharkb8]

BUt you have to be able to understand English well in order to really understand what these patents cover. Like the difference between the phrases "one of " and "one of a group of". I may have given the wrong impression, stating that the examiners have english as a second language. What I meant to convery was that their English is limited, and therefore wily lawyers can get things past them. I would point to the recent Australian patent on the wheel as an example.

Re:The USPTO is Moderately Broken

[sharkb8]

Law is a professional degree, so you need an undergrad degree as well as a law degree to be a lawyer. To be a patent attorney, you need a techinical undergrad degree as well as a law degree. Therefore, lawyers are more likely to be better educated than examiners. Most of the examiners get their jobs straight out of undergrad, and have little practical experience.

Re:Bull Hockey!

[Intron]

If you look at the article, the patent is on treating an email address as an object. This means that the patent office has opened the door to any "treat X as an object" patent. Essentially, they have just killed OO programming.

In other news...

[Anonymous Coward]

It has been shockingly revealed that the United States Patent Office has granted patent "31337d00d" to Apple. This patent guarantees Apple the rights to the idea of "A system of processes by which intellectual property may be applied for, accepted or rejected, in the form of patents". The only response from their press office is that they plan on suing the US Patent Office for its infringement, and backpay for the last century for lost revenue.

Re:In other news...

[Al Dimond]

I never knew that patent numbers were in hex! Maybe the patent office really is made up of geeks... and all these crazy patents are being let in intentionally!

Women as objects

[Anonymous Coward]

Ok, in light of this patent let me be the first to patent women as objects. ..

I kid. I kid.

Re:Women as objects

[maxwell demon]

Well, I'll probably patent whitespace. Thenifyoudon'twanttowritelikethis,you'llhavetopay.

Re:Women as objects

[FerretFrottage]

but I'll patent womaen as objects of desire so you can only lay claims to those that nobody wants.

Re:Women as objects

[aug24]

Could've been worse, you could have suggested they were only Interfaces...

Anyway, for most people here they are probably Abstract anyway.

J.

Re:Women as objects

[Undertaker43017]

I think the porn industry can trump your patent with prior art...

Re:Women as objects

[123abc987]

So too can the Church and the US gov't.

Re:Women as objects

[coolcold]

or_maybe_like_this?

Re:Women as objects

[Undertaker43017]

So true, I would be more afraid of the porn industry though, since I don't believe they would use the legal system to quash your patent, more likely large men in suits and blunt objects...

Re:Women as objects

[gstoddart]

Could've been worse, you could have suggested they were only Interfaces...

Anyway, for most people here they are probably Abstract anyway.

If not Virtual. =)

Re:Women as objects

[Hosiah]

Har, har! No wait, I've got one: patent the method of using brackets ()[]{} to delimit any program instruction. Then you'd own every piece of software on Earth!

Re:Women as objects

[Repton]

Oh no! In one fell swoop, you have patented all my code!

On the contrary...

[tezbobobo]

... we can now sue microsoft for all that lost productivity. Somehow they must be responsible if they own the patent which made me sift through herbal viagra for 40 minutes each day

Re:On the contrary...

[arbitraryaardvark]

To: Bill Gates
From:Mom
Re: Mother's day.
Bill, I sent you an email but you didn't respond.

From: Bill Gates
To: Mom
Re: Pending litigation

Mom, you used email as an object. I have a patent on that. You'll be hearing from my lawyers.
--
+3 Stupid

YES! YOU TOO!

[jspectre]

can have a patent! one free with every box of patent-o's brand (tm) (not to be confused with (c) or (r) or a pantent) breakfast cereal!

1000 different patents each with unique super-powers, descriptions and battle-histories!

collect them all!

I get dibs on everything else!

[blcamp]

Ok, fine. I hereby declare that I have patented everything that has not been patented yet.

I just gotta get my staff to write legalistic-sounding descriptions for everything (as if I had personally invented them), and get them over to the USPTO.

In the meantime, all of you please send me your mailing addresses so I can forward the royalty bills (I patented those, too).

First violation

[77Punker]

struct emailAddress
{
string name;
string location;
emailAddress()
{
name = defaultname;
location = default@example.com;
}
}

Re:First violation

[77Punker]

Good point.
I usually only code when I have to do homework on my way to my CS degree...

Re:First violation

[William Robinson]

Idiot.... You used IE. They know it already. Cops are on the way.

You can't sue the government

[bigtallmofo]

IANAL, but from what I recall the doctrine of sovereign immunity basically says that people can't sue the government unless the government gives them permission to sue them.

More interestingly, the government is generally not responsible for the acts or omissions of its employees even if they acted negligently or in bad faith.

Good luck with that.

Re:You can't sue the government

[Anonymous Coward]

(Score: -1, Troll)

You can't sue anyone unless the government gives you permission, cocknose. That 3rd branch of the government? Yeah that's the judiciary. Stop hiding behind FLAs and say it like it is - "I know nothing, ignore me, I should'nt have wasted your time making you read this crap."

God slashdot would be so much better if people only posted when they knew what the fuck they were on about.

Re:You can't sue the government

[Paul Crowley]

What about judicial review?

Re:You can't sue the government

[Suppafly]

Luckily in america you can still sue the gov't, other countries have sovereign immunity, not the US.

Re:You can't sue the government

[m50d]

I suspect he was simply thinking of the British system, where you can't sue the crown unless you get permission to from them. Or something like that.

Re:You can't sue the government

[bani]

You can sue the US govt and the US govt does get sued all the time. And civilians win judgements againt the US govt too, and on rare occasions against the individual government officials responsible as well.

Suing the USPTO would just be more of the same. Though I'm unaware of anyone having sued the USPTO.

Wheel patent

[anandpur]

M$ do not patent WHEEL, lawyer will sue you.

http://edition.cnn.com/2001/WORLD/asiapcf/auspac/0 7/02/australia.wheel/
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/asia-pacific/1418 165.stm

This shows utter Incompetence at the USPTO

[iPaul]

After scanning the claims in the patent, I think this pretty much shows the USPTO has no technical capacity to judge software patents. While I would think of patenting broad categories inventions and even software if it were truly a unique invention, this is just beyond the pale. This is not unique, people have been doing it for years, etc. etc. How did these people get their jobs?

Re:This shows utter Incompetence at the USPTO

[Uruk]

A couple of other things to keep in mind about the USPTO - this doesn't in any way excuse their behavior, but makes it at least somewhat understandable. First, this was filed in 2000, so the examination about its merit probably happened a long time ago. Whatever standards the USPTO has now for examination of these patents, they didn't have standards even that high at the time this thing was being seriously considered.

There are also quite a few claims with some specificity in them, which might have led the USPTO to think this was a new idea. One problem with these "obvious" ideas is that if it's really obvious, no one ever publishes anything on it, which lends credence to the claim it's a new idea. After all, if it wasn't a new idea, wouldn't someone have written about it?

Keep in mind also that a patent is frequently used as a defensive mechanism. There's a difference between having a patent with the claims that they have attached, and having something that will lead to a successful suit in open court against an infringing party. Sometimes though just the threat of an expensive lawsuit is enough to get people to back down.

My guess though would be that this is so widespread, MS probably patented it to prevent someone else from doing the same and then beating them over the head with the patent.

Re:This shows utter Incompetence at the USPTO

[iPaul]

You're right. No one writes articles about detecting sentences (for example) by looking for the first capital letter and then the period that follows. However, it is unfortunate that this occurs and it really irritates me and causes me to engage in posting while angry. I think the one thing that's hard to swallow is that this is defensive patent. IE they get "sued" by someone and need to fire back. I think the only way this patent is defensive, is if some mail program starts eating into their Outlook/exchange market share. This is an abuse of the patent system, which should be protecting real innovators from being ripped off. I think a lot of people look at this kind of patent and realize it has one purpose - to stop competition by closing off every little feature in your software.

Re:This shows utter Incompetence at the USPTO

[marcosdumay]

"Keep in mind also that a patent is frequently used as a defensive mechanism. There's a difference between having a patent with the claims that they have attached, and having something that will lead to a successful suit in open court against an infringing party. Sometimes though just the threat of an expensive lawsuit is enough to get people to back down.

Do you care to explain how using the threat of an expensive lawsuit is a defensive action. The way I see it is a very offensive action to bypass the law system using economical power.

Re:This shows utter Incompetence at the USPTO

[Uruk]

You're right. No one writes articles about detecting sentences (for example) by looking for the first capital letter and then the period that follows.

That is a problem that has a solution though - the examiners need to know the area. If you filed a patent for what you just described, and a perl programmer was examining your patent, the guy would laugh himself to death. No so if you're dealing with a pointy-headed lawyer with no background in technology other than a several-day seminar he took in technology licensing.

I think the one thing that's hard to swallow is that this is defensive patent. IE they get "sued" by someone and need to fire back

Actually, the point of the defensive patent is the opposite - the reason you'd get sued in the first place is because someone else had the patent. If you had the patent, (hypothetically) no one would sue you in the first place, so there'd be nothing to defend. On the other hand, if you don't patent, someone else might, and then use that patent as a cudgel. If you don't think that defensive patent is a valuable strategy, just ask yourself: "Wouldn't it have been wise for Barnes & Noble to patent one-click in retrospect?" They may have won or settled their case, but $50,000 for a patent application sure beats $500,000 in defense fees.

This is an abuse of the patent system, which should be protecting real innovators from being ripped off.

That remains to be seen, based on how MS enforces the patent. Given their patent portfolio, if they really did litigate everything that they might have standing to litigate, MS and IBM would practically be the only producers of software worldwide. I think it's more plausible that they've done this intentionally as a defensive move, and don't have interest in litigating because (A) MS wants people to develop software for its platform, even if it's with MS's own techniques (B) the patent probably wouldn't stand up to a serious challenge (C) They got the patent in the first place to avoid being sued, not to do the suing themselves.

Re:This shows utter Incompetence at the USPTO

[Spy der Mann]

My guess though would be that this is so widespread, MS probably patented it to prevent someone else from doing the same and then beating them over the head with the patent.

How funny. I was told the same thing about the nuclear bomb.

Re: Apple

[JWeinraub]

I am just so sick of Microsoft's pantenting everything. Next thing, my email is property of microsoft. Using Outlook is now going to be the only way to send email. Is this there way of staying strong over Apple or even the Linux threat. Perhaps.

Race ya to the patent office...

[SpinyNorman]

There's obviously a goldmine waiting for whoever can first patent people as objects, telephone numbers as objects, sandwich types as objects...

Lemme try to fire up my creative juices...

class Person {
std::string name;
}

Whoopee! Patent office here I come!!!!!

Translation from Dec. 2004 blog

[Anonymous Coward]

That said, I'm going to have the last word, because I can!

Hello everybody, I'm an asshole!

Next: Microsoft patents the air you breath

[romanval]

Every object has attributes and methods-- . That's the whole point of OO-based MVC programming. This sounds like the realm of presentation (which IMO shouldn't really be patentable). Is it me, or should the USPO hire at least one computer scientist/historian to look these things over?

Re:Bull Hockey!

[PaxTech]

If you look at the article, the patent is on treating an email address as an object. This means that the patent office has opened the door to any "treat X as an object" patent. Essentially, they have just killed OO programming.

Luckily, it won't damage the porn industry, they have plenty of prior art on record for treating women like objects. But that scared me for a minute..

WTF?!

[LoSLapPy]

I'm filing for a patent on the keyboard, everytime you type a letter, send me a nickel. Thank you.
:)
I cant believe that they are issuing patents on objects... absolutely insane.

fast.....patent the zips

[codefather]

I am going to patent the zip codes' string representation - so big brother corporations can't send even a legal notice coz the notice contains the zip code which would be a patent violation...wow!

Sorry!

[mathmatt]

I already patented that technique. (And this one).

Re:both sides of the story

[Anita Coney]

"Patents are a good defensive strategy for any company"

That's BS. Let's assume that a company admits the patent system is screwed, so it obtains patents for defense. That makes no sense unless it is also working to change the current patent system so defensive patents are NOT necessary.

Obviously because Microsoft is not working to fix the current system, it is using these patents for offensive means, not defensive means.

The new Patent Oriented Object Programming

[eddy]

First we had OOP with its "is-a" and "has-a".

Now, Microsoft(R) Innovation(TM) presents: POOP, featuring "patent-as-a" and "use-as-a".

Think Different: POOP - The Resource Locator Is An Object!

Researching prior art.

[AltGrendel]

Once again, Groklaw comes to the rescue. Check out the sixth article down.

My patent

[Anita Coney]

Wish me luck:

A process by which imaginary problems are solved by painfully obvious methods which have previously been utilized to solve the same imaginary problem for decades.

parent is a fudder

[Anonymous Coward]

Wow, that may be the craziest post of the hour for slashdot! Congrats! http://news.google.com/news?hl=en&ned=us&ie=UTF-8& q=sue+court+federal+government&btnG=Search+News

Re:parent is a fudder

[bigtallmofo]

Yeah, it's real easy to play the Google search link game:

http://news.google.com/news?hl=en&ned=us&ie=UTF-8& q=doctrine+of+sovereign+immunity+

Read that, you might actually learn something.

Re:parent is a fudder

[fishdan]

Ease up. Expressing a countrary opinion does not make one anti-American. I disagree with his statement that you can't sue the gov't, and actually agree with you. Your point is really weakened by your juvenile 1st two sentences, and it makes it difficult to be on your side.

Your links are great examples though -- they are the only thing that stopped me from modding you a troll, and inspired me to post instead.

Re:parent is a fudder

[bigtallmofo]

To all the anonymous cowards that gave such witty comebacks replete with namecalling, I offer:

Sovereign Immunity

Text:

Sovereign immunity in republican democracies

The doctrine of sovereign immunity is also used in republican democracies such as the United States and India. Because the legal systems in these countries devolved from English Common Law, the concept of sovereign immunity is retained. In these systems, governments, agents, or officials of the government may enjoy immunity for various acts, usually limited to acts that emanate from the function of government, and not those acts that would normally come within the ambit of the activities of private citizens such as contractual relations or liability for negligence. In the United States, most U.S. states have waived their sovereign immunity by statute. These statutes, called a tort claims act, allow individuals to sue the U.S. state government and officals of the state government for constitutional violations or negligent acts. In many cases, an individual cannot personnally sue an offical of the government, such as a police officer, unless the agent acted with malice or was grossly negligent. Because it is hard to prove that a government official acted with malicious intent, most lawsuits against individual police officers are dismissed. The individual may, in many states, sue the state itself for the injury caused by the government official. However, most states limit the amount of damages an individual can recover from the state (i.e. awards are capped at $100,000 or $200,000). Furthermore, the United States Supreme Court has enunciated an abrogation doctrine, which permits the U.S. Congress to remove the sovereign immunity of the states pursuant to its Fourteenth Amendment enforcement powers.

Prior art

[Espen]

Quoting Dan Crevier:

* We did innovate in this space in MacOE.

Well, not quite. A number of e-mail clients on the Mac treated e-mail addresses as 'objects' well before Mac OE. It was the natural evolution of Apple's push from Drag-and-Drop functionality across the OS from MacOS 7 onwards (which was on-going from 1990-97 and beyond). Off the top of my head an example would be MailDrop from Baylor Univ. doing this well before OE was even released.

Re:Prior art

[julesh]

That post was about a different patent, which I haven't read, that concerned automatic completion.

Also, this patent isn't about treating e-mail addresses as 'objects'. That's just a gross oversimplification of what it deals with that has been snagged from the summary. The claims talk about displaying e-mail addresses in a message preview pane with icons attached to them to provide more information and enable the user to manipulate them.

Re:Prior art

[kalirion]

The linked blog thread talks about a different patent from.

Re:Prior Art

[back_pages]

Lotus CC:Mail in the late 90's did this, as did all of the early mail apps which had to contend with Internet vs. FIDOnet vs. etc... networks. -David Barak

Then why didn't you submit this under 37 CFR 1.99?

I haven't read the prosecution history for that patent, have you? Just an observation. Neither of us know of Lotus was used (and defeated) as prior art. Just an observation.

I don't know if you're trained to perform a legal analysis of prior art, or if you have even a passing knowledge of 35 USC 102 or 103 and the volumes of case law surrounding those statutes. It does require at least a basic knowledge of these things to make even an initial judgement of what is anticipatory or teaching prior art.

I'm not deliberately trying to be an ass, but there is such a cataclysmic misunderstanding of US patent statutes and case law around Slashdot that I really wish they'd quit carrying the stories - As an IP professional, I hereby certify that Slashdot is a more reputable forum for prenatal medicine than the US patent system. (Hell, there are even people who believe that the "obvious" doctrine of 35 USC 103 is not completely and wholly based on the existence of prior art. See for yourselves MPEP 2143, the manual for proving something is obvious. "References" refers to prior art.) I'm not trying to put words into your mouth, but instead trying to balance the offering of Lotus as prior art with the thought that maybe, just maybe, the existence of Lotus is not a valid point of criticism of this patent unless we have seen the prosecution record.

Re:Prior Art

[thegameiam]

I'm neither a patent attourney, nor an examiner. I do however, have three good friends who are examiners, one who is a former examiner, and two who are patent attourneys. I am pretty familiar (from a lay perspective) with some of the concepts involved, but make no pretenses that I know whether the behavior of Lotus CC:Mail meets the technical definition of "prior art."

My comment, and I stand by it, was that CC:Mail did differentiate between email sourced from the Internet and email from internal systems, and showed that difference obviously. I was responding to a prior request for examples. One of the things my friend who used to be an examiner has told me is that it's often hard to find the places to begin looking because the patents end up covering tremendously specific cases, and then later on in court, the companies try to broaden them.

I'm not deliberately trying to be an ass... I'm not trying to put words into your mouth...

Then stop. I don't think too many people treat Slashdot as a source for informed legal opinion (and those who do are fools), but rather, one can get a sense of what people (specifically the geeks who read /.) think about an issue.

-David

Re:Prior Art

[Znork]

"As an IP professional, I hereby certify that Slashdot is a more reputable forum for prenatal medicine than the US patent system."

Truly. Looking at Slashdot to read reputable articles about patent law is like looking at the USPTO's patents for new ideas.

"there is such a cataclysmic misunderstanding of US patent statutes and case law around Slashdot that I really wish they'd quit carrying the stories"

Indeed. Of course, there's also such a cataclysmic misunderstanding about inventions and obviousness around the USPTO and the US court system that many slashdotters wish they'd stop issuing patents.

In other words, the very idea that the existence of Lotus possibly not being a valid reason to kick the patent out is a valid reason to kick the entire patent system out because it's 'obviously' defective.

Re:Prior Art

[back_pages]

Then stop. I don't think too many people treat Slashdot as a source for informed legal opinion (and those who do are fools), but rather, one can get a sense of what people (specifically the geeks who read /.) think about an issue. -David

What they think about an issue is essentially based in fantasy, rooted in media misinformation, and basically devoid of any factual understanding. My disclaimer should have indicated that I was offering my opinion for the benefits of discussion rather than to reprimand you.

Re:both sides of the story

[iPaul]

People innovate in all sorts of ways every day. For example, I had to come up with an innovative way to let Cold Fusion applications find collections of non-application related files that would be consistent across several development and testing environments. However, using a shared drive mapped to a particular drive letter is an obvious solution. In a perfect world I would no more get a patent for this than detecting e-mails in an e-mail message. Apple had a toolkit called Apple Data Detectors that scanned text and found things like e-mail addresses. I've used other mail tools that take the e-mail address and match it against an address book and even offer to add the contact to the address book. Apple Mail already does this and has been doing it for years. Where's the innovation? What's the non-obvious part?

Re:both sides of the story

[thogard]

* Patents are written in legalese, not in english. Unless you are a patent lawyer, I don't think you can really judge them

Its more than that. There are parts of Patent law that state that the only people that can decide about patents are registered patent lawyers.

When the law says lawyers must make technical decisions, something is very broken.

Re:Bull Hockey!

[BabyDave]

I don't think it means "object" in the sense of OOP. The patent covers things like "click on From: address in an e-mail you've just been sent, drag-and-drop to Contacts folder -> Creates new contact for that address".

USPTO has been broken since State Street.

[gdek]

Re: software patents, there's a whole lot going wrong. More to the point, just about everyone knows it's wrong -- except for IP lawyers, for whom this is all a tremendous boon, and who will fight tooth-and-nail to keep the system that way. It's just a matter of:

1. Understanding why it's wrong;
2. Formulating a clear position;
3. Taking that position to your congressman;
4. Over and over and over.

Did you know that the USPTO has a public advisory board? Did you know that it's populated almost entirely by IP attorneys?

http://www.redhat.com/magazine/007may05/features/p atents/

Interesting question

[Uruk]

Interesting question: What would constitute due diligence in searching prior art? Answer carefully; go overboard, and you'll cripple the USPTO and their ability to grant legitimate patents. Answer too loosely, and you'll end up with people patenting ridiculous things.

This is a very real and practical issue that the USPTO is facing. I'm not sure that there is a good answer.

One of the problems IMHO is that the review and litigation process is too slow, too expensive, and too difficult. People can threaten suit and get others to back down even if the person being attacked knows they have a winning case. (A "winning case" though sometimes takes 3 years and $1 million, which may not be reimbursed, even if you could front the money to do it)

One potential solution would be to streamline the courts - make it quicker and simpler to bring a patent issue to court. It would disincentivize people from bringing false patent claims against other people (since they could lose in short order if they didn't have a case) and things could get properly reviewed. I don't pretend to know how this actually would be done. It's easy to suggest, but practically speaking it would be really, really hard. (Streamlining the courts)

Re:Interesting question

[sharkb8]

Some very wise observations Uruk.

Streamlining the courts is exactly why the Federal Circuit was created. The idea was to hear cases on specialized fields not seen very often by regular circuits. Mostly they do maritime and patent law. Patent cases can end up in state courts, or regular federal courts, but tat usualy happens when the underlying issue is something other than a patent.

And don't forget the jury trial. Do you think that anyone wants Ma and Pa Kettle deciding whether Pfizer is infringing on Merck's patent? (I know this is why there are Markman hearings, but you can still have a jury determine factual infringement.)

The reason patent litigation is expensive is because so much is riding on it. For example, look at Eolas v Microsoft. half a billion dollars? rately do we see cases with that kind of money tied to them. Even class action lawsuits don't generaly get that high.

As a side note, patent law practitioners carry the most expensive malpractice insurnace on the planet because of the associated costs. Screw up, and you may cost someone billions.

Re:Interesting question

[SnapShot]

You write that as if crippling the current USPTO would be a bad thing? We've already tried the "answer too loosely, and you'll end up with people patenting rediculous things" route. I, personally, am ready to give the "go overboard" route and see if there is any possibility that it could be any worse.

As long as business process and software patents (as opposed to copyright for specific code implementations which I whole-heartedly support) we will continue to see worthless patents like this one that devalue the contribution of real inventors.

My solution is much easier than yours; end business process and software patents.

Re:Interesting question

[Uruk]

The consequence to going overboard in the other direction is probably not very desirable.

There are those who would say people would stop innovating. Personally, I don't buy that. I think the more realistic consequence is that they would go places where they felt their interests were better protected. Practically, that might mean applying for intellectual property protection elsewhere in the world, or incorporating their business elsewhere.

One of the things that I'm not sure has been decided is burden of guilt/proof in patent evaluation. In the court system, the US bias is clear: we would rather see 2 guilty men go free than 1 innocent man falsely imprisoned. That's what "innocent until proven guilty" and "burden of proof on accuser" practically means. What's the patent analog? Option A: we would rather register 5 false patents than deny a legitimate patent registration. Option B: We would rather deny 5 legitimate patents than allow one false patent. Option B sounds scary to me. What important drug, breakthrough software, life-saving medical device, biotech invention, or other such thing may be germinated elsewhere as a result of choosing option B?

It's not deniable that inventors go to specific places they see in their interests from the perspective of intellectual property. (Examples would be the Chinese and Europeans who come to the US to develop ideas because of perceived better protection)

My solution is much easier than yours; end business process and software patents

I don't think that this is a good choice, because it presupposes that there aren't any really new ideas in this area that should be protected. In other words, it biases the discussion towards Option B.

Re:Interesting question

[sharkb8]

The USPTO didn't officially start granting software patents until 1996. As we all know, software patents were getting granted before that. The trick? Just claim a mthod for doing something that can be run on a computer. It's a smarter way to file anyway, because it prevents people from getting around a pure software patent by implementing something solely in hardware, or even manually.

As for doing away with all method patents, most patents have some method attached to them. Patent holders generally don't create that many new physical devices. (And most of those get design patents, not utility patents). Most of the new inventions are processes. The United States is no longer a manufacturing powerhouse, we don't make that many tangible goods, we create ideas. Doing away with method patents would also create a disincentive for people to improve how things are made. Got a cheaper way to make solar cells? If you can't patent the method, you just keep it secret. If it were patented, people could use the idea after 20 years, when the patent expires. With no patent, the idea may never get into the public domain.

Re:Interesting question

[mellon]

Um. Where is innovation happening these days? More and more, it's moving to places where there is less respect for intellectual property laws, not to places where there is more. The U.S. is the bastion of IP protection. In ten years, it's quite possible that there will be no innovation going on here - we will have to move to other countries in order to work.

When you talk about where innovation happens, remember that most of the really amazing breakthroughs in computer science happened _before_ software patents were legalized. Have you ever read Knuth, or read old JACM issues from the sixties and seventies? Stuff like that would get patented now, and would never make it into a journal at all - the first we'd hear about it was when the owner of the patent sued someone who'd invented it independently.

You could argue, in fact, that since software patents were legalized, the software field has been fighting a losing battle to continue to innovate, and that slowly but surely, the we are being dragged under.

The idea is that there is some kind of great risk that if I come up with a cool idea, and implement a really nice application on top of it, I won't be able to make a profit because my competitors will just look at what I did and copy it. The reality, though, is that if you give me a patent, I won't bother to make my app cool - I'll just do the minimal thing I need to to exploit the patent, and then charge whatever the captive market will bear.

Result: hardly anyone will be able to afford my app, and those who can afford it will be getting a really crappy app, because I have no incentive to spend money making the app easy to use, reliable, et cetera - my customers are trapped, for longer than the forseeable life of my company, so why should I bother? The incentive system right now is ass-backwards.

Re:Interesting question

[slipstick]

I'm not sure that this is a good argument against removing "method" patients. Just because "most patents have some method attached" doesn't tell me method patents are a good thing. It could point to the idea that people have stopped truely innovating and simply patenting otherwise obvious changes to existing methods.

Furthermore just because it has "some method" to it, doesn't make the method patented, it's the other parts of the idea that likely make it patentable. For instance in your example of making cheaper solar cells, if all that is done is to take existing methods and reorder them or apply them in a different context doesn't or shouldn't(IMO) make it patentable. However, it's likely that the new process would require a new machine, a new chemical composition or some other new "thing" that has never been seen before, that is what would be patentable.

Lastly, just because something may be a "good idea" doesn't necessarily mean it should get a patent or even deserve to get one.

Re:Interesting question

[sharkb8]

Actually, the method itself is patentable int he current patent rules. Regarding my example you cite on solar cells,
1) reordering a process is to inventive, as there are no new inventive steps. Your opinion on that one is correct.
2)Applying them in a different context is a different use for the solar cells, which is not the subject of the solar cell produciton method patent.
3) If the process requires a new machine, you can patent that. The problem is, you did all the work to come up with and perfect a new method for making the solar cells. If someone can get around the patent on the machine, they can still use your method if you can't patent method. That's because your patent would only be on the machine, and not the process or product.
4) The 'thing' you speak of that would be patentable is the actual method.
5) Good ideas are not patentable. The term used is 'reducing the invention to pratice'. YOu may have a great idea, but until you figure out how to get the idea to work, yo do not have anything patentable. Once you get the idea to work, it's no longer an idea, it's an invention, whether it is a method or a physical object.

Re:Interesting question

[slipstick]

Yes methods are currently patentable, the question was open regarding reforming this which is what I was speaking to.

As to your points 1) we agree on 2) I was implying that manufacturing processes currently in use in other areas(e.g. semi-conductor manufacturing) but applied to solar cell production, wouldn't be patentable(even now I presume). Sorry I wasn't clear.

3) You won't like my response but "that's too bad". That's what patents are supposed to do, for instance it's long been known that "doping"(the addition of small amounts of one chemical to another not the use of drugs) is useful in many contexts. You shouldn't(and can't as far as I know) be able to patent "doping", but a particular machine for doping or combination of doping chemicals may be patentable. If someone finds a way around your machine, well that's what innovation is about. In fact that's what drives innovation. It's the fact that "method" patents are pervasive that appears to have stifled innovation. There's no incentive for anyone to invent a new machine because even if they do they can't use it because "it's essentially the same method".
4) I was obviously too vague "thing" in my context isn't meant to imply a "method". If that's all the invention is than again I say 'too bad'. I know the current climate is against me, but I'm arguing against it.
5) That was half of my point. But even if you have a great idea this doesn't mean that it "should" be patentable even if you can make it work in practice. For instance, I think it would be a "great idea" to clean my house. Big deal, I can't patent "cleaning houses". Thinking on this point, leads to this "great idea". I think it would be a "great idea" to coat everything in my house in a thin layer of teflon, thus making it easier to clean my house. In practice there are many difficulties. But let's run with this, let's say that I start by just wanting a non-stick paint. So I decide just to add a little teflon to the paint. Maybe this works maybe it doesn't. If it does work but all I did was mix the teflon with the paint, I don't see how that is patentable. But, if I had to bond the teflon to the paint molecules in a very specific arrangement or create a new chemical compound that incorporates the paint & teflon molecules, or create a new machine to cause the teflon & paint molecules to bond, than IMHO, that should be patentable.

Re:Bull Hockey!

[Markus Persson]

Yeah, in the future, code won't be structured at all as a result of this patent! There'll be spaghetti code and god objects all over the place! *looks at own code* AAH, IT'S STARTED ALREADY!!

This is what the uspto spends their time doing...

[aphaenogaster]

I get at least 400 hits a month by somebody at the uspto. (biodiversity.georgetown.edu ptohidec.uspto.gov - - [21/Apr/2005:08:38:43 -0400] "GET /tree/order/Homoptera HTTP/1.1" 404 339 ptohidec.uspto.gov - - [21/Apr/2005:08:38:44 -0400] "GET /tree/order/Homoptera HTTP/1.1" 404 339 ptohidec.uspto.gov - - [21/Apr/2005:08:38:46 -0400] "GET /tree/family/Cicadellidae HTTP/1.1" 404 343 ptohidec.uspto.gov - - [21/Apr/2005:08:38:46 -0400] "GET /tree/family/Cicadellidae HTTP/1.1" 404 343 ptohidec.uspto.gov - - [21/Apr/2005:08:38:47 -0400] "GET /tree/family/Cicadellidae HTTP/1.1" 404 343 ptohidec.uspto.gov - - [21/Apr/2005:08:38:52 -0400] "GET /images/counter/infosearch/leafhopper%20bug.jpg HTTP/1.1" 404 363 ptohidec.uspto.gov - - [21/Apr/2005:08:38:52 -0400] "GET /images/counter/infosearch/leafhopper%20bug.jpg HTTP/1.1" 404 363 ptohidec.uspto.gov - - [21/Apr/2005:08:38:55 -0400] "GET /images/counter/picture/leafhopper%20bug.jpg HTTP/1.1" 404 360 ptohidec.uspto.gov - - [21/Apr/2005:08:38:55 -0400] "GET /images/counter/picture/leafhopper%20bug.jpg HTTP/1.1" 404 360 ptohidec.uspto.gov - - [21/Apr/2005:08:38:59 -0400] "GET /images/counter/infosearch/leafhopper%20bug.jpg HTTP/1.1" 404 363 ptohidec.uspto.gov - - [21/Apr/2005:08:39:02 -0400] "GET /tree/family/Cicadellidae HTTP/1.1" 404 343 ptohidec.uspto.gov - - [21/Apr/2005:08:39:04 -0400] "GET /images/counter/infosearch/leafhopper%20bug.jpg HTTP/1.1" 404 363 ptohidec.uspto.gov - - [21/Apr/2005:08:39:06 -0400] "GET /images/counter/picture/leafhopper%20bug.jpg HTTP/1.1" 404 360 ptohidec.uspto.gov - - [21/Apr/2005:08:39:09 -0400] "GET /images/counter/infosearch/leafhopper%20bug.jpg HTTP/1.1" 404 363 ptohidec.uspto.gov - - [21/Apr/2005:08:39:11 -0400] "GET /tree/family/Cicadellidae HTTP/1.1" 404 343 ptohidec.uspto.gov - - [21/Apr/2005:08:39:13 -0400] "GET /images/counter/infosearch/planthopper%201.jpg HTTP/1.1" 404 362 ptohidec.uspto.gov - - [21/Apr/2005:08:39:13 -0400] "GET /images/counter/infosearch/planthopper%201.jpg HTTP/1.1" 404 362 ptohidec.uspto.gov - - [21/Apr/2005:08:39:14 -0400] "GET /images/counter/picture/planthopper%201.jpg HTTP/1.1" 404 359 ptohidec.uspto.gov - - [21/Apr/2005:08:39:14 -0400] "GET /images/counter/picture/planthopper%201.jpg HTTP/1.1" 404 359

Prior art... any more examples?

[MouseR]

Er... Apple's Mail has been using "names as objects" since early Panther developer releases something like, nearly two years ago.. ?

I seem to recall Netscape doing something similar to their mail system.

I know for a fact that Oberon-F (the OS w/ the Oberon language) has had object-like self-contained thingies that could be used to send emails to.

What the heck is a vCard if not a contact object?

Any more examples?

Re:Prior art... any more examples?

[NetNifty]

I'm pretty sure that on YAM (Yet Another Mailer) on the Amiga you could drag and drop names from the address book into emails you are composing and it adds the email address to the list of people the email is to. IIRC first version of it was released in 1995 or so.

Re:Prior art... any more examples?

[julesh]

None of these are actually prior art for this patent, which is about a specific user interface for manipulating e-mail addresses. If you can find an application dating from at the latest mid-90s that showed e-mail addresses with an icon that varied according to the results of a database lookup to determine what kind of address it was, that is prior art.

The problem is that while this is an obvious idea, I think MS were actually the first to do it.

Re:Prior art... any more examples?

[o_kenway]

Except Mail.app does this and has done so for some time - if the address is in your address book and that entry in the address book has a photo, it will put the photo in the top right of the e-mail window.

You could try and argue (I guess) that it's not an "Icon" but it looks pretty damn icon-sized to me.

Re:Prior art... any more examples?

[SirTalon42]

Except has Mail.app even existed since the mid 90's?

Re:Prior art... any more examples?

[Inspector Lopez]

This is also not a problem. It doesn't matter *who* demonstrated the prior art. The only requirement is that it be prior.

If NASA today tried to patent "putting humans on the Moon" they would be denied the patent because of prior art ... demonstrated by NASA.

Of course, NASA might then try to claim that the prior art was actually real Art, in the sense of "it was only a movie!" so that in fact putting humans on the Moon hadn't actually been demonstrated yet. The tinfoil hat crowd would immediately begin to suspect that the movies were faked, and that humans actually had landed on the Moon.

Re:Prior art... any more examples?

[nickfrommaryland]

That an idea os "not obvious" is one of the tests the USPTO should be using to judge worthyness of a patent, along with being unique and novel. It doesn't matter who's first to market on this one, it fails the test.

Re:Prior art... any more examples?

[shking]

Except has Mail.app even existed since the mid 90's?

Yes, as part of the NeXTStep (late 80's)

Re:Prior art... any more examples?

[sloth jr]

Mail.app was part of NeXTStep in the late 80s. Whether it had photo lookup out of address book, I don't know. It certainly had support for Faces, which should in itself be considered prior art that invalidates this patent.

This might actually work

[mwvdlee]

A: Ha, my flubbomon uses +5 water power on you!

B: No way, my lawyermon has 10 patents on water.

A: Oh f**k...

B: Lawyermon uses +10 patent lawsuits on your flubbomon!

A: Flubbomon rolls a 7 for "prior art defense" and takes.

B: D****d! I've now got only 3 patents left on water.

A: That's +5 water attack minus 3 patents... 2 damage for your lawyermon!

And as an example: OS X!

[Domini]

Mail.app in OS X has been doing this for some time now... kinda cool one can drag and drop e-mail addresses. (and do many other things with them...)

Not an email as an object

[Anonymous Coward]

What they describe is not treating an email address as an object, but creating an object with an email address as a property that gets displayed (like the code example somewhere above). Email addresses are not objects, they're just simple strings with a specified format telling a network where to direct the mail. Now, if all mail servers could receive an object with all this other crap attached and then decide what to do with it, you could consider the 'address' as an 'object', but it would be inefficient to pass real addresses and whatever other information the 'object' holds.

Is MS the only corp that files "obvious" patents?

[jonwil]

Or are they just the only company who gets said patents mentioned on Slashdot?

Do companies like IBM file these kinds of patents too (if not, why not or conversly why does MS do it?)

Re:both sides of the story

[cahiha]

Patents are written in legalese, not in english. Unless you are a patent lawyer, I don't think you can really judge them.

Patents are supposed to be written by practitioners for practitioners. If only lawyers can understand what a patent means, then the patent is a bad patent no matter what it covers (and it may also be invalid).

This is not a patent for autocomplete. It is much more specific.

Yes, it is more specific: it is autocompletion for Email addresses, which is a straightforward extension of autocompletion for everything else.

We did innovate in this space in MacOE.

No, they did not. The fact that they thought they innovated is just a testament to their ignorance.

Re:E-mail autocomplete

[BiloxiGeek]

Don't know about Lotus, but PMMail which started as an OS/2 mail client and eventually got ported to Windows, sold to Blueprint Software Works, and is now effectively abandoned has been doing the auto complete for quite a few years. It auto-completes on the email address or the nickname you assign it. Nice feature, hardly new and/or innovative.

sounds similar to arguments from movie studios

[profaneone]

Dan's closure of the response to his first patent (ie -
-Patents are a good defensive strategy for any company.
-We get sued all the time. Witness the current Eolas lawsuit.
-I think there are a lot of things that are lame about the patent system.)

sounds like he is mouthing the opinions of some 'mentor' he has at microsoft

It sounds similar to 'reasoning' kevin smith says he was given during Mallrats (please listen to the Mallrats commentary) by some studio exec. While he thought her advice sounded good during production, in retrospect things didn't work out exactly the way she said

-wouldn't it be better if we changed this aspect of the movie to make it appeal to more people

-more people people means more money for everyone while the audience all enjoys a great movie

my head is spinning

[distantbody]

The Future Is Longhorn!

Re:Bull Hockey!

[raider_red]

I'm patenting the process for treating a patent as an object. Everybody owes me money.

Prior art, anyone?

[hal9000(jr)]

Hello000. Filed in 2000? Let's see, I think Lotus Notes did something similar. So did Groupwise. Eudora, Pine.

Come on.

Re:Prior art, anyone?

[sharkb8]

You can submit the prior art yourself. Just send soemthing in in writing to the USPTO, showing where, the prior art is written down. The art gets include in the Patent's file wrapper. If it's really good prior art, you can ask the Patent Commisioner to re-examine the file, which he may do for free. If he delicnes to re-examine for free, you can send in a check (I think its $7000) to get the re-examination done.

Problem is, MS get to have their say as well.

US IP will become worth less and less

[bitswapper]

The more often USTPO does things like this, the less US patents will be respected around the rest of the world. Meaning, if someone in another country infringes on a legitimate patent held in the US, the less likely the US patent holders have recourse in that other country. Currently, the infringed upon victim might convince the US government to prevent the foreign parties infringing on the patent from selling/doing buisness in the US, but that's not likely. After all, if for example, the party infringing on a US patent is in China, for example, it is not likely the the US will want to get into a trade conflict with a country that holds nearly 50% of our government's foreign debt instruments.

So, the current direction the USTPO is taking us with nonsense like this is to make it easier for people in other countries to simply copy our intellectual property.

Apple already has this...

[Legato895]

the big thing in panther was email (and url's) as objects where you can drag and drop, or pull-down menu them...

Re:This is what the uspto spends their time doing.

[JudicatorX]

Might we ask what's on that webserver, and what's so significant about it to the USPTO?

Re:Bull Hockey!

[julesh]

If you look at the article, the patent is on treating an email address as an object.

And if you look at the patent, it's about a user interface that displays icons next to e-mail addresses to give extra information about them (having looked them up in your address book to find that information).

don't laugh, it's been done, sort of

[davidwr]

Computer keyboards of various styles have received patents for the unique features they embody. Fortunately, the manufacturers pay a one-time-per-keyboard or one-time-period fee and we don't have to pay-per-use.

BUT some items, particularly 5-figure-and-up medical instruments, do incur a per-patient or per-use royalty. Certain eye-refractive-correction-surgery devices come to mind.

RFC821

[mwvdlee]

RFC821, the specification for SMTP, refers to "path" as an object.

A "path" is either a forward-path or reverse-path in this document. Elsewhere in the document these paths are described as being what we now know as "e-mail addresses".

So from the very start of e-mail, even before it was called e-mail, e-mail addresses have been described as "objects".

Is this prior art?

Prior Art

[thegameiam]

I'm not aware of prior art in this one - do you know of an email client that visually differentiated between internet based email addresses and ones from the address book?

Absolutely.

Lotus CC:Mail in the late 90's did this, as did all of the early mail apps which had to contend with Internet vs. FIDOnet vs. etc... networks.

-David Barak

Re:EMACS has prior art (BBDB)

[julesh]

I don't think so. I haven't used this project, but I don't suspect it includes some of the features that are included in this patent's claims, specifically displaying a graphical icon adjacent to e-mail addresses.

It might be that this is an obvious extension of something BBDB does, but that's for a court to decide, unfortunately.

Blame USPTO, not MS

[Autobahn]

If patents like these are this easy to get, MS really has no choice but to get them. If they don't, there will be 8 million Eolases suing them over BS. It's all well and good to say the system should be different, there should be no software patents, etc., but in the meantime it's either take out frivolous patents or get sued by someone else.

DDOS

[MaGogue]

How much does it cost to apply for a patent? Or to get them to even read the application? Maybe small companies could launch a DDOS attack on USPTO by applying for vast amounts of 'patent X as an object' patents?

I think we should all pursue this kind of drivel

[Colin Smith]

How much does it cost to get a patent? Applying is only about £200 in the UK if you don't use a patent lawyer, thousands if you do.

I mean, If I'm likely to be sued by some company with a patent portfolio I want something I can use to sue back.

How to read a patent

[radtea]

IANAL. The following does not constitute legal advice (if it did, you'd have to pay for it :-)

The patent does not claim "treating an e-mail address as an object" except in the most incidental sense.

There are various parts to a patent: Abstract, References, Claims and Description. The Abstract gives a broad and often-misleading overview of the patent. The References give the references, and the Description gives a human-readable description of the invention. None of these have any legal force or meaning, except possibly as guidance with regard to how the claims might be interpreted.

The only part of a patent that has real legal teeth is the Claims. Unlike the Description, Claims are not human-readable.

Each claim is a single sentence, which is often broken into separate sub-clauses to give it a quasi-sentence structure. However, all the sub-clauses in a claim stand and fall together. That is, a claim to a process [X, Y and Z] does not cover a process only involving X and Y.

Claims may have conditional clauses, but they still stand and fall together. That is, a claim to a process [X, (one of P or Q) and Z] does not cover a process [X, Y and Z], because neither P nor Q is used.

Claims come in two forms: independent and dependent. The typical structure of the claims is:

1) A claim to everything.

2) A method/process/machine as described in claim 1 but specialized in some way.

3) Further dependent claims...

4) A method/process/machine as describe in claim 2 but further specialized in some way.

5) A claim to everything else.

6) A method/process/machine as describe in claim 5 but specialized in some way

7) etc...

That is, patents are typically written in claim groups, with each independent claim having a number of dependent claims following it. Dependent claims may be dependent on either an independent claim or another dependent claim, as shown above.

Independent claims are typcially made a broad as possible.

To read a patent you should first read the abstract, to get a vague sense of what the thing is about. Then skim the description and figures, but don't get too caught up in them because a lot of the stuff they describe will not be covered by the claims. The description usually deals with "the prefered embodiment", which is the best concrete example of the patented systems the author can come up with.

Reading the claims is the important thing. First, look for each set of claims. That is, find the independent claims and their dependents. Count the independent claims. This is a measure of how long you'll be at it. The thing that really matters to understanding the patent is the independent claims: the dependent claims are just specializations.

I prefer to read each independent claim out loud, very slowly. If one is particularly complex, I try re-writing it in human-readable form. After a few minutes of this it is usually possible to figure out what the general intent of an independent claim is. I then try to think of examples of systems that would and would not be covered by the claim, because the claim describes a boundary between covered and uncovered things.

Patents can be daunting to the uninitiated, but anyone who can navigate the complexities of C++ or Perl should be able to make a reasonable patent yield up its meaning without too much difficulty.

To return to the patent in question here, it has a single independent claim. It consists of 11 unconditional sub-clauses and 1 series of conditional sub-clauses with 6 options. So to violate this patent a system would have to perform all of the actions in those 11 sub-clauses and at least one of the actions in the conditional sub-clause. This includes actions like the following:

"upon establishing correspondence with said one or more servers, determining if the address corresponds to an address in a contact list of at least one server;"

Rea

Re:How to read a patent

[Anonymous Coward]

. . . the patent in question here, it has a single independent claim. It consists of 11 unconditional sub-clauses and 1 series of conditional sub-clauses with 6 options. So to violate this patent a system would have to perform all of the actions in those 11 sub-clauses and at least one of the actions in the conditional sub-clause.

There's the rub. When you see a patent with a claim this narrow, you can bet that the USPTO kicked the applicant's butt. MS would never have put all that stuff in the claim if it didn't have to.

This patent is useless as an offensive weapon. It is only useful as prior art to some later, broader, stupider patent.

YIAAPLBIANYPL. GYODPL. YMNO.

Re:How to read a patent

[Hosiah]

Thank you! Finally, somebody who can explain this stuff so it makes sense. Where were you when we were all trying to figure out if it was OK to use GIFs?

Trivial

[mopslik]

The patent's about tagging the origin of an email address and altering the display of that email address based on the origin of the email address - if the email address came from the address book it looks one way if it comes from the internet it looks differently.

Trivial. Seriously.

"Check the address against all entries in the address book. If it's there, underline it. If it's not, italicize it."

I'm not aware of prior art in this one - do you know of an email client that visually differentiated between internet based email addresses and ones from the address book?

Remember, kids: just because you do something first, doesn't mean that it deserves a patent.

Re:Trivial

[youknowmewell]

I agree, it is not a novel concept that is deserving of a patent.

Just a little nitpick, the patent says that it uses icons to differenciate the different kinds of addresses, not text manipulation.

Re:Trivial

[mopslik]

Just a little nitpick...

That's fine. In any case, the pseudocode is nearly identical, and would require only a small amount of changes to the code -- ie. "load graphic" instead of "slant text" -- to achieve the same result.

Re:Trivial

[mobiGeek]

Remember, kids: just because you do something first, doesn't mean that it deserves a patent.

Unfortunately, it appears that if you patent it first you do deserve it...

Re:Trivial

[Mateo_LeFou]

"indicators other than icons (e.g. attributes of the text itself such as typeface, bold, italic, underline, etc.) could be employed to identify ..."

ObLebowski-ski

[ajlitt]

Soviet Russian Bill Gates... treats objects... like email... man...

Re:This is what the uspto spends their time doing.

[aphaenogaster]

those 404s are from a server that monitors a website on biodiversity (pictures and information http/biodiversity.georgetown.edu). I send a request to a fake page on my own server whenever somebody hits my production website. The U does not monitor hits on the 'big' server for web developers.

we need an organization that lists and documents

[the_2nd_coming]

all prior art. that way the USPTO does not just give patents for crap like this.

can't use Java, c#, Ruby, ... anymore

[lphil69]

Since Java, C#, Ruby, Smalltalk, and other languages have strings as objects in the language itself, doesn't representing an email address as a string infringe on the patent?

"myEmail@doofer.com"

There, this email address is an object already!

Re:can't use Java, c#, Ruby, ... anymore

[Husgaard]

No, this patent does (IMHO, IANOPL) not cover a simple email address object like javax.mail.Address. There is way too much prior art for that.

It looks that what they are trying to patent is a mail address object that calls another server to see if the mail address is known.

So if, for example, you had a mail address object that did a call to your company LDAP server to implement a method isCompanyMailAddress() you might infringe on their patent.

It is a sad thing. Even though there might be no prior art published, this is obvious to a trained software developer. How else would you implement the isCompanyMailAddress() example above?

Re:both sides of the story

[Lifewish]

1) Patents are written in legalese, not in english. Unless you are a patent lawyer, I don't think you can really judge them. That's why you see stories like Microsoft patenting the double-click or Apple patenting alpha compositing.

The patent system definitely shouldn't be that way, and I have trouble believing it is intended to be that way. If this were the case then it would be impossible for any small inventor to check that they weren't infringing a given patent without hiring an expensive lawyer.

2) This is not a patent for autocomplete. It is much more specific.

From what I can tell through a 5-minute read of the patent document, it's a patent for a combination of "hunt for email addresses everywhere we can think of" and "autocomplete". Basically it covers a broadening of existing techniques, with a couple of fairly nice ideas for GUIs (which aren't patentable, of course). This isn't that much more innovative. I could have misread it, but if there's any truly innovative stuff in their it's quite well hidden.

3) We did innovate in this space in MacOE.

That may be the case. However, the patent in question probably doesn't count as innovation.

4) Patents are a good defensive strategy for any company. We get sued all the time. Witness the current Eolas lawsuit.

(Surely the best way to deal with that situation would be to lobby for patent reform rather than encouraging software patents in Europe?) As a rule I'll accept this as a reason for patenting dodgy stuff if and only if the filer gives written assurance that they will never use their patents against anyone who isn't suing them.

5) I think there are a lot of things that are lame about the patent system.

No kidding and I'm sorry that slashdot ruined your good mood at getting your first patent - first anything is always fun.

Calling the Public Patent Foundation...

[sharkb8]

We need a bat-signal for the Public Patent Foundation and the Electronic Frontier Foundation. Looks like I know where this year's charitable donations are going.

*sigh* here we go again

[copper]

Microsoft did not get a patent on treating an email address like an object. Always ignore the abstract in a patent unless you need it to understand the background. The only stuff that matters is the claims. In this case, here is what Microsoft actually patented:

1. A computer-implemented process for allowing a user to manipulate an email address contained in the preview pane or full message window of an email message of an email program as an object, comprising using a computer to perform the following acts:

identifying an entry in the preview pane or full message window of an email message as an email address, said identifying comprising,

finding at least one field in the preview pane or full message window containing an email message header of the email message containing one or more email addresses, and

parsing at least one email address from the at least one field in the preview pane or full message window which contains one or more email addresses;

checking the email address against addresses in one or more contact databases to determine if it is contained in a contact database, wherein a contact database is a set of stored contacts and corresponding addresses, and wherein said checking comprises at least one of,

determining if the address corresponds to a single contact in the contact list,

determining if the address corresponds to a mailing list in the contact list,

determining if the address corresponds to a newsgroup address in the contact list,

determining if the address corresponds to an invalid email address or internet address,

determining if the address corresponds to a valid email address not found to match any addresses in the contact list, and if so,

ascertaining whether the user's computer is in correspondence with one or more servers,

if the user's computer is not in correspondence with said one or more servers,

appending an icon indicating to the user that more information is needed before sending the email message,

flagging the address such that an act of determining if the address corresponds to an address in the contact list of said one or more servers must be performed prior to sending an email message,

prompting the user to establish correspondence with said one or more servers, and

upon establishing correspondence with said one or more servers, determining if the address corresponds to an address in a contact list of at least one server;

marking the email address with an adjacently placed indicator; and

upon selection of the indicator by the user, allowing the user to manipulate the email address as an object.

Doesn't sound terribly innovative to me but can we at least be sure to criticize the right thing?

Kool Aid anyone?

[MrLint]

from his blog
"Patents are a good defensive strategy for any company. We get sued all the time. Witness the current Eolas lawsuit."

This is a split decision. Let us examine. "Patents are a good defensive strategy for any company." No patents are supposed to temporarily protect your monetary investment in *INNOVATION*. The only reason its used as a defense strategy is because the system is broken and none of the big boys want to step up and demand it be fixed.

We get sued all the time. Witness the current Eolas lawsuit. Ok Dan lets apply your logic to this, why isnt the Eolas patent an example of a defensive patent? Assuming it was, as we can see your 'defensive' patent advocacy all falls down when a greedy law firm gets involved. Unless MS wants to put money in a trust guaranteeing that it be used to defend people from patent lawsuit brought by MS these words are just more empty BS.

I don't want anyone to think this is a personal attack on Dan, i don't know him at all. However I think hes a tad too 'hopeful' that power doesn't get abused by the hand that feeds him.

Good Defensive Strategy?

[LifesABeach]

Sounds like Plan 'A', (build a useful product), has been allowed to fail. I remember a time when the master's of redmond plans were not cursed in everyday conversation. I find myself unable to discuss redmond actions at the dinner table.

Why Not Patent the Wheel?

[GaryPatterson]

... except that in Australia, a lawyer did just this to highlight the stupidity of the patent system.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/asia-pacific/1418 165.stm

Of course, the patent office claim that it'd be an invalid patent, but the point is they wouldn't know about the invalidity until a third party actually made a case in court.

How many dollars would be wasted in legal fees before sanity prevailed? Who knows?

So we have IT giants patenting stuff that's obvious or stuff that has existed in other products for several years before the patent was filed. Maybe some of these are invalid patents as well (and yes, I know that the Australian patent laws are different to the US ones, but the point remains).

So... I'm off to the patent office here in Australia to patent a system of storing a microscopic circuit's state using a simple but elegant set of logic gates that allow two states to be stored one at a time (but not both together).

And then I'll take every RAM manufacturer on Earth to court.

If I worked at the Patent Office..

[Free_Trial_Thinking]

If I worked at the patent office, I would reject everything that came across my desk. I wonder if I would get in trouble? Maybe we should all get jobs there??

Patent #123456789

[iPaul]

Removal of trace fecal matter from the rectum by use of a matrix of cotton, fiberous matter and recycled paper placed into sheets. This invention allows the user to remove trace fecal matter from their own posterior, or the posterior of another without soiling their hands. After going to the toilette, many users are burdened by the clumps of fecal matter which my not fall into the toilette. This invention allows users to safely, and in a sanitary manner, remove the excess fecal material from their posterior. To dispose of the fiber sheets, the user simply flushes the soiled sheets in a standard toilette.

1. Using the protective sheets of fiberous matter to protect the users against dangerous fecal matter.
2. Using aborbant fiberous matter to trap trace amounts of fluids or liquids.
3. Placing sheets in a easy to use roll, which may have periodic perforations.
4. The sheets are composed of fiberous material which biodegrades easily.
5. The sheets are small enough for disposal using a common houshold toilette.
6. The fecal matter adhears to the sheet.
7. For ease of transportation the rolls of the sheets of fiberous matrix are placed in plastic wrap, in groups of 4, 6, 8, 12, and 24.
8. The sheets may be scented to provide users with the illusion their posterior will be cleaner.
9. Advertising or other designs may be incorporated on the fiberous sheets.
10. Abosorbency allows for the removal of excess urine from their genitalia.

The point of this exercise was to show we can take sufficiently well crafted language and make wiping one's ass with toilette paper seem non-obvioius.

Re:The times they are a-changin'

[MaGogue]

You may be right, maybe they are granting so many patents lately because their attention is fully cunsumed with the new TOE(theory of everything) they've been working on for the last 10 years.

In this case things could balance out in the end.. .

are they f***in serious

[b17bmbr]

holy crap. email addresses are strings. strings are objects in java. fill an arraylist or vector with strings. serialize it. bingo. object data. associate it with a particular action, open the application, and go. if that works, then here's my patent idea:

since this is just a combination of already established comptuer science methodolgies (object serialization, etc.) I propose the following:

1. user goes to mexican restaurant
2. user eats spicy burrito
3. user consumes spciy sauce
4. user drinks strong coffee afterwards
5. user takes huge shit

clearly the user serialized his data (i.e. the burrito), put it into a container (his stomach), then treated his data as an object by running it through drinking application (coffee) then running through another application (colon) and receiving final confirmation. toilet bowl full of shit.

so, who's with me?

Re:both sides of the story

[dcw3]

That's BS. Let's assume that a company admits the patent system is screwed, so it obtains patents for defense. That makes no sense unless it is also working to change the current patent system so defensive patents are NOT necessary.

Well, if you're a business manager, you learn to work within the system. You don't necessarily spend your firms money to try to change it, especially when your chances are slim to none. I can guarantee you that your shareholders would hang you out to dry if you spent their profits on it.

Yes, the system is broken, but don't expect the business community to put forth an effort to fix it...just ain't gonna happen unless there's some incentive for them to do so.

Re:both sides of the story

[hey!]

Well, I endorse the sentiment, but your view of business is not how business views itself.

First approximation:

Businesses aren't there to fix society's problems. They are there to make a buck for the stockholder.

Second approximation:

OK, that's not completely true: we as a society grant them incorporation and all its benefits because as a side effect they do solve a lot of society's problems. Hunger is not wiped out in the US, but all the hunger than can be wiped out by the profit motive is, which it turns out is a lot more than a 100% government driven system has ever been able to accomplish.

SO:

Corporations, from their own internal viewpoint, are machines that exist to generate profit. They do this in a framework of laws and regulations and norms that we as a society fix with an aim to maximizing the public good of their work.

If that framework incents them to damage the public good, then righteous indignation only takes us so far. Energy is better directed at reforming the framework. Unfortunately, this means politics, but there you have it.

Patents and MAD

[phorm]

Using patents like this is like the principle of MAD (Mutually Assured Destruction). Both sides had nukes, neither can use them for fear that the enemy would also, leaving both a smoking ruin.

So here you have two countries with potential world-destroying force aimed at each other... each depending on the other side being too afraid to use their weaponry for fear of retaliation. Sound like a good way to do things? I thought not.

USPTO didn't even check the grammar

[Husgaard]

From the fourth paragraph of the first claim: "parsing at least one email address from the at least one field in the preview pane".

Did somebody at USPTO really read this, or have they begun to simply rubber-stamp "granted" on all applications?

Re:USPTO didn't even check the grammar

[Husgaard]

Moderators may moderate my patent post "troll", but this grammar error really worries me.

Errors like this really should have been corrected before the patent was granted, and this indicates that there has been spent too little time examining the patent.

This is not just a grammar error somewhere in the patent. It is a grammar error in the only independent claim of the patent. Without the sentence that contains this grammar error the entire patent would be useless in court (and would probably not have been granted).

Re:USPTO didn't even check the grammar

[RyanAXP]

The "error" you pointed out is a formalism used all the time in patent claim language--in this case, the claims recites "the at least one field" to indicate the fact that the term "at least one field" was established earlier in the claim. This is in concordance with a practice in claim drafting called "antecedent basis," and in fact this style of referring to a previously-mentioned "at least one field" as "the at least one field" is the preferred practice in patent prosecution.

The important thing to understand is that patent claims are NOT written in normal English, but a stylized and specialized jargon and syntax that have been developed over the decades in response to the requirements of patent law and various court decisions. You can think of patent claim language as comparable (in some senses) to a computer programming language like PERL: although both are based on English, and at first glance resemble written English, they are in fact specialized to a particular task and necessarily depart the rules and grammar of natural English because of that specialization.

Re:USPTO didn't even check the grammar

[Husgaard]

After re-reading the patent I have to agree with you. I already knew that software patents were not written in normal english language, but in a special patent-jargon hard (near to impossible) to understand for both software engineers and other english-speaking people.

It took me a lot of time to learn the special patent language. I read hundreds of patents, but eventually I was able to understand most of the software patents I read.

But this... are we getting into a state where only people skilled in the special patent language are able to understand the meaning of a patent?

Re:USPTO didn't even check the grammar

[RyanAXP]

First, let me apologize if I came across too stridently in my first reply--I did not intend to be patronizing or insulting, but after reading what I wrote, I was chagrined that it sounded as harsh as it did.

Now, as for "getting into a state where only people skilled in the special patent language are able to understand the meaning of a patent"--frankly, we reached that point about, say, 150 years ago with the first shift from a patent-registration system (established in the 1780s) to the current patent-examination system in force ever since the 1860s or so :).

Like you, it took me a long time to understand the workings of the patent system and patent law--and often, it seemed extreme or broken. These days, however, my conclusion is that the system works fairly well--although it could always use some fine-tuning, like any decent system of any appreciable complexity. In fact, knowing what I do now about the way patents work (not just in this country but also in the world-wide system of international patent treaties), I marvel at just how well the system does work. At least patents work better than copyrights, and have a much more rational term! (i.e., 20 years from date of filing rather than life-of-the-author-plus-seventy-years, as in copyright.)

Re:USPTO didn't even check the grammar

[Husgaard]

At least patents work better than copyrights, and have a much more rational term

I don't agree. Unlike copyrights patents can act as land mines, as somebody doing an independent innovation can be hit by the patent without even knowing that the patent existed. This problem is worse in the case of software patents than in most other kinds of patents.

And the special language that patents are written in makes this problem a lot worse. A patent is expected to be understood by anybody skilled in the application area of the patent, but almost no software engineers understand software patents.

When patents were introduced they were a deal between the public and the inventor: In exchange for the publication of the invention, the inventor got a time-limited monopoly on the invention.

But if nobody skilled understands the patents issues today, where does that deal leave us?

Your claim that this happened in the US 150 years ago only makes me wonder why the US hasn't reformed their patent system a long time ago.

Re:USPTO didn't even check the grammar

[RyanAXP]

To be fair, the switch to an patent examination model from the older patent registration model was by no means localized (or even initiated by) to the United States. The trend began in Europe (the U.S. having the status of quite the backwater in the mid-19th century), and spread because it had certain advantages at least for those times, and is now by far the dominant model in nearly all industrialized countries. If patent law reform is called for, the effort should be international (given the now quite international nature of patent law generally), not confined to one or another country.

As for the specialized language of patent claims, I understand your concerns about the potential "landmine" issue and share them to some extent. However, while patent claims are indeed written in a stylized manner and use a somewhat odd application of grammar, they are still clearly readable by ordinary persons and certainly are only slightly more specialized than, say, the language in which law statutes are written.

And although law statutes can be complicated and confusing, and written in a specialized form of the language, the public is still expected to conform to them nonetheless, of course :). The same case might be made for patents, which after all are equally as public as laws.

One of the stranger things about patent law

[Metasquares]

One of the more interesting bits of patent law (and one that I found out much to my own chagrin) is that if Microsoft themselves presented this idea to the public, it is still considered to be prior art. I think the USPTO gives a grace period of about a year between one's own presentation and the filing of a patent, though. I'm also not sure if use in software would qualify as "presentation".

Re:both sides of the story

[foobar_fred]

Mod this down. Summary:
1. Quote someone else
2. Oversimplifying rhetoric
3. Flamebait

Like it or not, patents ARE a good defensive strategy. Let's ASSUME company CEOs even dislike patents, and ASSUME they care to fight them in some way. (Very broad assumptions, both!) They still have to be practical ... patents exist, and their is NO pending battle to change that anytime soon. Working within the system does not preclude trying to change the system.

not quiet true

[Anonymous Coward]

actually in order to be promoted to GS-13 at the PTO you need to either pass the patent bar or pass the internal version of the exam

examiners usually start at grades gs5-9 (though you can start as an 11 with the proper background) pay is usually 50-65k to start, with a law degree you would likely start as a gs-7/9 (these grades require advanced degrees or 1-2 years of work experience to be appointed to). Promotion is rapid, you can go from gs-7 to GS-13 in 3.5 years and have about a 30k pay increase

there is no civil service exam requirement for the PTO.

the exam is no longer waived for examiners who had less than 4 years of service as of last summer, instead you need to recieve a certificate of legal competency (which requires passing the bar or passing the internal legal certification exam which is 50 questions from the bar exam) and certificate of bargaining authority

examiners do search online in computer based arts, i know, I am one. likewise an examiner can use an affidavit to estabish knowledge of a particular process they have personally used or seen and apply it as prior art. Only problem is it may not hold up if the applicant appeals it.

the japanese and european systems also dont work on a first to invent basis like the us, go check out some PCT searches some time and you will see what i mean, art indicated allowable in an international search will be rejected in the US simply because certain references can not be provided.

A law degree is not really necesscary as examiners dont argue case law very often.

Re:not quiet true

[sharkb8]

Out of curiosity 1) did you have any professional experience in the field you examine before going to work at the USPTO. 2) Do you find that a large portion of the lower level examiners, or a large portion of the examiners actually doing front line examination speak English on a highly fluent level? Maybe I have the wrong impression.

By the way, shouldn't you be looking for prior art on some obvious patents instead of posting on /.? I keed, I keed.

Re:not quiet true

[sharkb8]

Well, I think your posting here could be claimed as "keeeping up with current technology trends".

My understanding is that examiners' effective work performance is essentially rated by the number of apps and OAs that they crank through. If that's the case, is seems a shame as some applications certainly require more stringent scrutiny.

And don't you think that learning the art on the job kind of keeps examiners from discovering what other experienced praticioners in the field would think of as commonplace?

See any good perpetual motion machines come through lately?

This is getting rediculous

[korekrash]

Is anyone on this site over 16 and do you have a brain? Patents are bad, selling software is bad....when does it stop? When were all broke? I agree some patents are going too far and the patent office should review the way they issue them. What I can't agree with is the way people here vilify anyone for registering a patent.
If I don't want to make money supporting software, I want to make money writing software, and if my software is good and does something that no one else has figured out, then I want to patent that software. It's a little idea called CAPATILISM! You guys need to go start a hippy-hacker commune that is as socialistic as you guys would like it to be and leave those of us alone that want a career and not a hobby....Just because they thought of it, and you didn't doesn't mean they should have to give it away.
Luckily for me there are many others out there who would like to make money also, so you socialists can keep complaining all you want, since the capatilists have the money and hence the power.

Re:This is getting rediculous

[narcc]

...if my software is good and does something that no one else has figured out, then I want to patent that software.

Personally, I'd like to copyright that software...

Patents were designed to foster innovation by offering a temporary monopoly on an invention in exchange for sharing the idea with others. Patents are all about sharing information. Patents are NOT about keeping ideas proprietary or secret.

What I can't agree with is the way people here vilify anyone for registering a patent.

The article is about a specific patent which should never have been issued in the first place. The main idea here is that the patent system is broken. (Which I doubt anyone can disagree with)

As for software patents in general, there are numerous arguments against them -- many of which are very compelling. Do a little research and see what you can come up with -- I guarantee you'll be suprised.

Re:This is getting rediculous

[pjaromin]

....or ridiculous...

I'm all about capitalism and the free market. Except that patents are a government-granted monopoly which is a way of defeating the free market. I am also significantly older than 16 and am not against patents in general. I'm against obvious patents and all software patents.

"What I can't agree with is the way people here vilify anyone for registering a patent."

I think your perception is due to the fact that the only patents we tend to see posted here are of the absurd kind. I believe that if it was newsworthy enough to post a reasonable, non-obvious/trivial, non-software patent here, you would see a much different reaction.

Re:This is getting rediculous

[korekrash]

As to copyright, I would copyright my code not the idea. The patent would cover the idea. Just as I would not trademark my code, but just it's name. Your play on my words to try to make me sound like an idiot wasn't good enough.

Patents do serve the original function of sharing information but, now especially, they are also intended to PROTECT the idea from being taken by everyone else and letting them profit from it upon inception......Thats what science and technology publications are for. Patents these days are more commonly used to make sure you have a fair amount of time to profit from and develop the idea before handing to the rest of the world.

E-Mail address objects??

[BeemerBoy]

I'm sorry... but I think IBM had that over a DECADE ago with their object oriented "Workplace Shell" in OS/2 2.1 and up! I can certainly remember doing a "Drag and drop" of E-Mail addresses to contact lists, E-Mail composition windows, etc. How do they get away with this nonsense??

Get you nowhere; republicans are in control

[WindBourne]

Part of the reason why I switched to Libertarian is that republicans (and the democrats, but not as bad) allows the gov. to stomp all our rights and not have any responsibilities for them. If you sue, they will simply pass a law that says that you can not do it. Good Example of this.

Re:Useless patents

[Alioth]

However, if you are a small company, and MS decides to sue you over the use of their trivial patent, you may not be able to afford to defend yourself. Even if you independently came up with the same 'invention'. Also you get IP-only firms who use trivial patents to blackmail other firms - if a small firm cannot afford to defend a patent action, they must pay up.

I agree that patents aren't automatically bad, but it says something when the USPTO has to distinguish between non-innovative patents and "pioneer patents" (of which they say only a very small number are - in the single digits percentage wise). Really, only the "pioneer patents" should be granted, the other 95% or so need to be thrown out on grounds of obviousness.

How the future should be...

[christose]

Riker and Picard together (horrified): Lawyers !!
Geordi: It can't be. All the Lawyers were rounded up and sent hurtling into the sun in 2017 during the Great Awakening.

Re:Useless patents

[nagora]

Just because you have a patent doesn't mean that you are entitled to lots of cash.

That's not the issue. The issue is that when people who already have a lot of cash are given patents like this they can use them to threaten the competition regardless of the validity of the patent, because they can afford to take you to court and bankrupt you while you wait for the pathetic legal system to throw out their case. Which is not even a given since the judge will know squat about the issues or IT or basically anything else for that matter and will almost certainly decide the case on the basis of which lawyer s/he liked more.

MS don't apply for these sort of trivial patents in order to get money, they do it to prevent you from making money.

In short, if you don't think the patent system needs to be reformed, and drastically, then you don't understand the patent system (or you're one of the billionaires making money of the current mess).

TWW

Generic Problem with Modern Political Thinking

[Morosoph]

As many have said in the article, and indeed in Dan Crevier's blog, this is ridiculously obvious, and is in addition the natural way to solve the problem in an OO system.

I don't know how you solve this problem more generically with the steady growth of doctrinare propertarianism in politics throughout the world, especially since property, to many, appears as "common sense", without the more sophisticated, economist's understanding of what property is, and means.

The battle to promote educated opinion is a difficult one indeed, requiring a honing of arguing skills so that the informed opinion can be presented as common sense over the prejudiced one.

I think, personally, that the root of the problem is deeper than patents.

Re:Useless patents

[tie_guy_matt]

Just because the courts are messed up doesn't mean the patent office is. The patent office documents what people think are inventions and then leaves it up to the courts to decided which are worth something and which are not. If the courts don't do their part right it doesn't mean it is the patent office's fault. Let's reform the courts but leave the patent office more or less the way it is.

Different Lifespan for Software Patents

[Mr. Ghost]

Maybe since we are stuck with these infernal things we should try to get them ammended to make them a little more palatable.

Maybe we can create a tiered patent structure with software patents being lower down on the list giving them a 3 or 5 year lifespan.

I know this is not the ideal solution since it would be better if they didn't exist at all but maybe this could be a compromise that fixes some of the headaches.

Oh come on!

[Spy der Mann]

A teenager could make a simple class out of an e-mail address! Where has the brain of the patent office ppl gone?

Re:The next battefront

[symbolic]

If you read the patent, it could be interpreted as something innovative, until you start looking at the examples of how it's meant to be used.

Correct. Now, I'd imagine that the innovation tagged by use of the phrase "...on the internet" will be replaced by "...as an object". What absurdity. What companies have started doing is disecting broad areas of knowledge/application, and staking claim to individual pieces. In this case, "...as an object" is exceedingly trivial to anyone even mildly familiar with object-oriented programming...ANYTHING can be an object. And to think that having an icon to denote some kind of state, or classification is something new or innovative....

Here's a better idea!

[Anonymous Coward]

If a patent is approved that is shown to have had publically visible prior art, then the Patent Examiner who approved the grant of the patent goes to jail for malpractice.

I wonder...

[MWGentry]

I wonder if I should submit a patent application for treating "air" as an object allowing it to be manipulated via but not restricted to processes of inhallation and expiration. Perhaps extending the application to include parsing "air" into distinct elements, i.e. oxigen, as a pre-process function for enhanced system distribution... If they can patent email addresses as an object, my idea just might pass muster.

in other news

[psbrogna]

I've submitted my patent application for storing addresses in a varchar(255). I suggest if anybody's storing a certain type of data in a certain data structure they act quickly.

Re:we need an organization that lists and document

[geoffspear]

Ok. You can be in charge of funding this orginization that keeps track of every single thing that anyone's ever done. Let us know when you get the first trillion dollars so we can begin.

Bill Gates alone on a seesaw

[patentlysilly]

This is where coders who patent frivoulous inventions end up: alone on the patent playground.

Patents for sale!

[zarozarozaro]

Why is it that I know people who have applied for patents for original ideas and have been rejected, but these non-inovations from MS seem to easily get patented? Is it just a matter of throwing money and lawyers at the USPO?

So the've patented WHITELISTING

[MythoBeast]

Or maybe just the idea of storing metadata about an email address with that email address. I'm fairly certain we can find prior art for this one.

What do they mean?

[Senor_Programmer]

An email address is, well an email address.
It's a bit of data.
Displaying it, parsing it, sorting it, messing around with pointers to it, keying it to a pointer to other information that's related to it, hashing it, putting it in a fancy database, assigning it to a variable, calling it monkey brain soup, I just don't get the patent.

Perhaps because I do not understand what an 'object' is or what makes it so special. I always thought an object was just a variable that one decided would hold a certain sort of data, or pointer to a certain sort of data.

I'm serious here, I've just never been able to get my brain lump wrapped around the concept of an 'object' in programming.

If one of you guys who is adept at concise lucid explanations of programming stuff would help me out here...

Dan Crevier's rationale....

[galdur]

* Patents are written in legalese, not in english. Unless you are a patent lawyer, I don't think you can really judge them. That's why you see stories like Microsoft patenting the double-click or Apple patenting alpha compositing.

I guess we should be going for a law degree instead of a CS to be qualified programmers, then.

prior fucking art

[hqm]

When I worked for Symbolics, makers of the Lisp Machine, their window system had a hybrid command line/ GUI called the "presentation manager".

Each object (yes, object) in the system had a 'presentation' method, so it could present itself in the GUI. The window system could this present any type of object, and allow object or application-specific operation by the user clicking the mouse OR by entering them in the command line. Thus, clicking over, say, an email address object, would allow you to do operations on it.

If Microsoft can patent this, I ought to be able to patent pressing "enter" to end a line in an email message.

This software patent stuff is just so psychotic.

Prior art out the wazoo..

[jcr]

Apple's been keeping e-mail addresses in objects, and letting you drag and drop them, etc, since the Address book application in 10.2. Other software developers were doing the same back in the NeXT days (Simson Garfinckel's SBook app springs to mind.)

-jcr

Re:Prior art... examples?

[ElitistWhiner]

SBook.app by Simson L. Garfinkel 1993 used sed/awk to capture email addresses provided by a "Rolodex" style GUI window. SBook supported tokens which enabled email addresses to be treated as an object that could be searched or actions performed provided buttons/switches/etc... in the GUI.

Sbook is available in the MacOS X downloads section for an example of this app which performs database functions through the use of flat-filed data.

Narrow focus

[mikeborella]

My interpretation of the claims is that the patent is fairly narrow. It's broadest claim outlines a process consisting of many steps, all of which must be performed in order for the patent to be infringed.

You have to read the clauses of the claim as logical AND statements.

I'm patenting the Buffer Overflow...

[antispam_ben]

Microsoft owes me $25 for each violation, or a total of $500,000,000.

Hypocrisy

[QMO]

So, now we know that doing something stupid suddenly becomes smart if you're ragging on some else for doing the stupid thing.

Whitespace

[Sepodati]

Wouldn't the Whitespace programming language be prior art? ;)

---John Holmes...

prior art!

[GodLived]

Good grief, I'm reading Dan Crevier's e-mail autocomplete patent and am aghast.

Why is his prior art such a piece of crap? Having written patents before, it is beholden on the author to do a reasonable search for prior art.

Clearly, Dan is either incompetent at locating e-mail packages that do precisely what his patent claims, or he is willfully omitting them in the interest of scoring a quick patent.

Somebody ought to create a legal fund designed at shooting this crap down. Honestly.

Well, on the good side, at least my patents don't suck as badly now, comparatively.

Off Topic: Google ads relevance?

[EvilStein]

Mods: I've already noted this is off topic. Modding it down would be silly. That being said, I thought that the Google text ads were supposed to be relevant. I've been seeing the same ads popping up a lot.. not just on slashdot.

Image here

More & more "Christian" services popping up. WTF?

Re:both sides of the story

[Mateo_LeFou]

"They do this in a framework of laws and regulations and norms that we as a society fix with an aim to maximizing the public good of their work"

Do we, then? I haven't made any laws recently, have you? No?

Do you know anyone who has? Do you know why?

e.g. I know one guy: Orrin Hatch (first example off the top of my head). He wrote up a law called the INDUCE Act. Why? To maximize the public good of corporations' work? Maybe. Maybe not.

And unfortunately

[Sycraft-fu]

The question isn't really how innovative is it. The questions are:

1) Were they the first people to patent this?

2) If so, did anyone else actually implement it without patenting it?

3) If not, is it an obvious idea, one that anyone with knowledge in the field could have easily reached?

If not, then it's a legit patent. Our system doesn't require patents to be innovative to any level other than non-obvious.

Re:And unfortunately

[copper]

Yes, you're right, and in my opinion, putting all those steps together to solve an address validation problem is arguably obvious to "one of ordinary skill in the art". That was my measure of "innovative".

Re:Useless patents

[tie_guy_matt]

I am going to reply to my own post and am going to add karma bonus to this message because I think that this is an important message. I am obviously going against the opinion of the moderators and most people on slashdot but I don't care.

People on slashdot don't seem to realize what a great resource the US patent office is. Every single invention -- or what people thought was an invention -- from anyone in the US (or dealing with the US) since the time we became a seperate country is available for the world to see. Most inventions are posted online at http://www.uspto.gov/ (except for those that are too old.) And if they aren't online then you can get a hard copy of them

EVERYTHING!!! from the steam powered skate board to the light bulb. And if it is older than a certain date then everything is in public domain. Want to know how your ipod works? Check out uspto.gov apple probably put a patent on it (they may even have been nice enough to print the patent number on the back of the product.) You can read the patent which will point out how the invention works (in great detail) why they think the invention is new, and the applications that they thought of.

I don't like big companies taking the little guy to court anymore than you do. But if MS can't use useless patents to try to sue open source into nothingness then they will simply try something else. Useless lawsuites that only hurt the little guy are a problem of the courts not the patent office. If you want to get mad at something get mad at the courts and the corporate lawyers who try to sue everyone into submission!

And no, we should not raise the bar on what can or can't be patented. Everything that anyone thinks is a good idea should be documented and then posted at uspto.gov for everyone to see. Because if you raise the bar then there is a chance that someone who does have a patentable idea won't be able to get one. Imagine that you tried to patent something but the patent clerk didn't understand it so you weren't granted a patent; then some big company comes along and steals it only to make millions off of it. If companies get scared that they will not be able to patent their ideas then they will not publish them. No one will be able to work off of anyone else's idea and technology will be slowed.

Yes it would be nice if everyone were to open source their ideas so we wouldn't need the patent office, but that isn't going to happen. If someone invents something, and it really is a new idea, then they have the right to make a little money off of it. But with the patent office in a few years then that idea will become open source -- it will make it into the public domain. Soon everyone will be able to use it.

BTW, there is nothing stopping you from reading and then building a prototype of something that is patented. You can even try to improve on the invention to make your own patent. You only have to pay royalties if you try and sell it and make money one it. Imagine the billions of dollars worth of research that went into the patents that are available free online. Most of those ideas are now free and open because most of the patents have expired.

All I am saying is: yes the courts suck. Yes big companies will always try to find ways of suing the little guy. That is life today. But the patent office doesn't suck. The patent office's purpose in life is to try and eventually open source everything!

Re:The next battefront

[Anonymous Coward]

"ANYTHING can be an object"

Except for NULL ...

Out of Curiosity

[megarich]

On a related topic manner, lets say company a has been using this method for years. Company b comes along and patents that method effectively stopping what company a has been doing. Can company a sue company b in court and get the patent nullify since they been using it alot longer than what company b has.

Yes I know the answer should be obvious but the legal system is so screwed up now I don't know anymore.

Re:The next battefront

[symbolic]

touche : )

Re:Useless patents

[pjaromin]

You can read the patent which will point out how the invention works (in great detail) why they think the invention is new, and the applications that they thought of.

Perhaps you have a point for mechanical inventions and even non-trivial/obvious software...however I see none of this in the patent we're discussing. The real work here is in the code...the idea costs nothing as is obvious. The code isn't published with the patent. Therefore we gain nothing from the publishing of this "invention".

BTW, there is nothing stopping you from reading and then building a prototype of something that is patented.

I've seen this one fiercely debated here...and the consesus seemed to be that in fact, it *is* a violation to build your own for your own personal use - it's just unlikely that you'll be sued and if you are, damages would be minimal. Although, I must admit personal ignorance on this one.
http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=80328&threshol d=1&commentsort=0&tid=159&mode=thread&cid=7079953

But with the patent office in a few years then that idea will become open source -- it will make it into the public domain. Soon everyone will be able to use it.

20 years for software patents. 20 years! Your definition of soon is way out of line with the pace of the software industry.

I just don't see how you can justify your position ...sometimes the majority does get it right.
The patent office does suck.

Re:*sigh* here we go again

[Keeper]

The validation steps are obvious and many programs already do them, the database queries and state icons are obvious and many programs already do them.

The patent is only valid as a whole. The fact the other things did bits and pieces of what they're doing do not apply, as they did not perform the whole. Most inventions build on existing concepts and technology and add a new twist to it.

In other words, the mere act of allowing the user dealing with an email address as a UI element wouldn't violate this patent. You'd also have to do all of the other things listed in the claims.

Microsoft did not get a patent on treating an email address like an object.

They got a patent on allowing the user to manipulate an 'object' (not programming object, but UI element) based on the operations taken in the previous steps listed in the patent.

Re:Useless patents

[tie_guy_matt]

Well 20 years is too long, and if it is illegal to make a prototype of someone else's patent then it shouldn't be.

Again the problem here isn't the patent office, the idea of the patent office, or people applying for and getting useless patents. The problem is once again big companies spending large amounts of cash lawyers and buying expensive washington lobbyists that take a good idea (patents expiring in a few years) into and turning them into an insane idea (patents expiring in 20 years.)

I will say it again and again, patents are a good thing. Patents are not the problem. Patents are part of the reason why we have had such a large technological explosion. What is the problem is big companies spending billions on corporate lawyers and lobbyists who do all they can to hurt the little guy and make even more money. This problem is actually a lot bigger than the patent office. Soon the middle class in this country is going to wake up and realize that they are poor. This won't happen because of patents but because of large companies buying politicians and lawyers and forcing everyone into a sort of debt slavery.

Time to patent the Red Screen of Death

[WillAffleckUW]

when your OS in your car results in a Fatal Exception.

.

.

.

Geez this patent insanity is getting silly.

Re:Licensing...

[vsprintf]

So, does your keen sense of humor get you invited to a lot of parties? :)

This is pretty new.

[man_ls]

This is pretty new, I think.

Before Office 2003, e-mail addresses were just text, some where auto-hyperlinked.

In version 2003, E-mail addresses and web links have a "hover" menu for their smart tag, allowing you to look up, add to contacts, send mail or files to, the address in question. It detects the normal text is an e-mail address and turns it into an object with properties and behaviors.

That's pretty interesting, in my opinion, and I like the feature a lot.

Umm.. they do.

[leonard_chung]

That's BS. Let's assume that a company admits the patent system is screwed, so it obtains patents for defense. That makes no sense unless it is also working to change the current patent system so defensive patents are NOT necessary.

Dude -- you need to get your facts straight. Microsoft *is* calling for patent reform as well.
Check out this infoworld article at http://www.infoworld.com/article/05/03/10/HNmicros oftpatent_1.html

Obviously because Microsoft is not working to fix the current system, it is using these patents for offensive means, not defensive means.

By your own argument, it is likely using them for defensive means for now.

Have idea - dont have any money

[sublimespot]

I have some ideas I would like to patent but I am poor. Does anyone have any information on where one could go to "partner" with someone who would put in the investment? What does one with no money do when they have a invention idea? It seems patents are just for the rich to get richer.

I 0wn object "object"

[xv4n]

FYI I patented the object "object". And since every other object inherits from my patented object everybody (meaning all of you) must make a deposit on my bank account paying for royalties. My team of lawyers would be contacting you soon to give a description on the details. Thank you.

Corrupt or Incompetent

[sankyuu]

The USPTO is either extremely dense not to realize the obviousness of this patent,
Or
they're being greased my Micro$oft.

Re:Useless patents

[PPH]

That's not the courts' job, its the patent offices. They are supposed to review applications for, among other things, prior art (which is where this particular patent really falls on its face). By not doing so, and delegating their responsibility to the courts, they are imposing serious financial burdens on people or companies who may already be using this technology. Many cannot afford either the licensing fees or defense in court.

A patent is similar to a property title in many ways. Prior to issuing a title, the government is obliged to conduct a search for other claims against that same property, not just blindly hand them out and say, 'Let the courts sort it out'.

One interesting approach to solving this patent mess would be for existing users of prior art to sue the government for a 'taking' of property. This would be similar to suits used when a government agency encumbers or confiscates real property. Once actual damages (license fees, legal defense costs, or costs to re-engineer a product) were incurred and the existence of prior art could be demonstrated, a suit could be filed against the USPTO for the loss.

Patent for displaying images on URL bar

[jayan]

Is there ay patent for displaying "a small image" with the website name on URL bar?
Is there any patent for displaying a "lock" on user viewable area on my web browser?
Is there any patent on displaying "junk" if the my e-mail client thinks the e-mail is junk?
My termninal shows files and directories in different color. Is that patented..

Any application development can team come with a hundreds of patents. Whom does it help?

Someone should quickly patent the process of patenting software patent and stop others from filing any more gibberish patents..

Re:*sigh* here we go again

[donnz]

You are correct. Not only does it sound not terribly original, it sounds like pseudo code. Innovative, maybe, but inventive, no.

Re:*sigh* here we go again

[derubergeek]

Sounds suspiciously like Mail.app.

perhaps

[alizard]

he hasn't figured out how to delete messages on his blog software yet?

The nature of his, er, patent doesn't exactly argue for his being the world's foremost computer genius.