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IBM Sues Amazon For Patent Infringement
A large number of readers wrote in about IBM suing Amazon over commerce patents. The Ars Technica coverage linked is one of the few sources that goes beyond the brief AP or Reuters stories that everyone is running. Here is IBM's press release. Some of the patents in question go back to the 80s and they do seem to pretty much wrap up the idea of online commerce, if they prove valid. IBM says many others are licensing the patents but Amazon won't give them the time of day on the subject.
Looks like the monopoly-conviction-avoiding-patent-hoarding beast that is the true soul of IBM managed to escape for a few moments. I'm sure he will be back in his cage before the new IBM true-believers notice him.
As crazy as this patent insanity gets, I can't help but think of the phrase, "Live by the sword, die by the sword."
IBM just wants amazon to let them use the heralded one-click "invention" without royalties. this is their first offer.
The article says that Amazon is fighting unfairly against their competition with their One click patent. They are trying to close down other web sites. They just receive their own medicine. I'm sure these connoisseurs will appreciate it.
It would be interesting, but, in the long run, ultimately futile.
I for one do not beleive patents are in and of themselves a bad thing. The problem with patents is that the best way to use them, business-wise, is to patent obvious things, obfuscate that in your application, and then sue, sue, sue. There are ways to reward innovation that do not encourage this model, however, and that is what we should adopt.
So, how? I would argue that we should use a method in which patents are universal, that is, a patent holder can either keep everyone from using his patent, or no one. Thus, the impetus is on the filer to file a good patent, so that a company or a consortium of companies (or, potentially, the USPTO if they weren't such a mess) would buy/liberate/open the patent. At that point, it would be open competition on the free market. Companies would no doubt try and pay as little as possible for patents, but that's the case as well today. The gains would be well worth it: Patent litigation would center on only issues of innovation and prior art, not on licensing follies. Innovating companies could continue to do full-time innovation, and the public would see dramatically reduced prices.
I'm sure I'm missing things, of course, so feel free to point them out...
groupthink: It's good for self-esteem.
If IBM holds a patent for 'Posting messages to an interactive service' there may well be. I mean, some of these are pretty broad:
US 5,796,967 - Presenting Applications in an Interactive Service.
US 5,442,771 - Storing Data in an Interactive Network.
US 7,072,849 - Presenting Advertising in an Interactive Service.
US 5,446,891 - Adjusting Hypertext Links with Weighted User Goals and Activities.
US 5,319,542 - Ordering Items Using an Electronic Catalogue.
Without reading the actual applications, it sounds to me like that covers like 99% of anyone selling or storing anything on-line. I mean, WTF? Storing data in an interactive network? How broad is that net?
What if the Hokey Pokey really is what it's all about?
I have no idea whether this is true or not, but it's a decent story anyway.
IBM is negotiating with Sun regarding a patent of some sort (which one doesn't matter). Sun goes through this whole dog-and-pony about exactly where Sun's patent comes into play and how much it's going to cost IBM.
Long silence.
An IBM lawyer clears his throat and says they're going to go back to Armonk and dig through their thousands of patents and see just which ones Sun has violated since the company started.
IBM gets the patent license for free.
Like I said, no idea if it's true or not, but it's illustrative of the power of IBM and their patent catalog.
"My God...it's full of trolls!"
Doesn't SCO or somebody have it locked up with:
"A Method for Doing Stuff with Things" and
"A Method for Doing Stuff with Things Involving a Computing Device"?
My other car is a 1984 Nark Avenger.
Normally I'd say you have a point, because I agree that the patent system is a load of BS, but at the time in which the patent was filed, I would very much doubt that e-commerce was as "fundamental" as you make it out to be.
Name a form of communication that has NOT been used for commerce.
--Phillip
Can you say BIRTH TAX
It would have been cheaper for Amazon to just license the patents.
// TODO: Insert Cool Sig
IBM's patent portfolio is truly frightening in that the only thing preventing it from doing massive harm to the industry is self restraint and the enlightened self interest of wanting to remain relevant in the industry. Let's just hope their business never goes south. If you thought that the IP trolls that make money by buying the patents portfolios of failed start-ups was bad, just imagine the hell that will be unleashed if IBM enters a downward spiral and decides to "refocus the company revenue strategies on their intellectual property licensing opportunities".
And I'm absolutely sure that there is no point in reading the applications. After all, there is no possible way that the actual claims might be substantially more specific and narrow.
The other day I flipped through the card catalog at my local library. In a few hours I absorbed a subtantial fraction of Western culture and learning.
The title of a patent is intentionally broad. The issue is that otherwise patent infringer's can argue in court that they earnestly looked for applicable patents before they implemented their widget but they couldn't find any such patents. They will argue that if they did infringe they did so by accident. (Patent holders get thrice damage from infringer's who willfully infringe compared to infringer's who do so by accident.) A patent holder doesn't care to entertain such arguments so they intentionally title their patents very broadly, thus ameliorating the issue.
People are thinking that IBM bought these patents or just went fishing. I'm sure these patents are from the IBM-Sears joint Prodigy service. Prodigy really was ahead of its time in many of its concepts.
Actually, it isn't as obvious as the title would make it seem. Google it and read the actual application.
Essentially, it is about automating B2B supply chain management. Catalogs from several vendors are stored on publicly available servers. A potential purchaser makes a private copy combining the items from several vendors into a single catalog, then modifying that catalog with privately negotiated price structures and terms for those vendors. Then the PO is generated and transmitted directly to the vendor.
So it is not about simply doing what we've always done with mail-order, it is about efficiently comparison shopping and maintaining private price lists for use by procurement functions in a business.
"Some of the patents in question go back to the 80s..."
Wow, I thought that patents were fairly short lived! Can someone tell a layman how long can software patents potentially crush innovation?
The race isn't always to the swift... but that's the way to bet!
Not to mention the fact that if you're a software developer, the standard advice is to avoid knowing anything about the details of software patents. If they can argue you "knowingly infringed" on a patent you're up for triple damages.
I suspect this is one of those things where the situation is so stupid, no one can believe it's the case -- the patent system is designed to encourage publication of useful technical information, but this triple-damages rule means that no one can read it.