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USPTO Rejects Amazon's One-Click Patent
igdmlgd writes "A while ago I filed a reexamination request for the Amazon.com one-click patent and recently checked out the USPTO online file wrapper -it seems they have rejected all the claims I requested they look at and more!" And it only took many many years to remove what would have been obvious to the most incompetent web developer.
here is the printer friendly version of an article with some good info. about this over at the Register.
It's hard to believe that's how Micronians are made. Why don't we see it right now by having you both kiss one another?
So, recently we heard that the One-Click Rejection was rejected, which has now itself been rejected and now the one-click patent has been totally rejected?
I read that there was a rejection review during which the rejection examiner found prior art that was obvious. This however was not the case and so the rejection was rejected and now I hear this guy making claims that some of his obvious prior art is infact obvious and should be counted on so the patent is now invalid.
What I don't understand is What is a Wookie doing on Endor?
Can someone give me one thing I can click which will explain this whole thing?
liqbase
There was a non-final rejection mailed on October 9. There is still at least one more round of prosecution before Amazon's lawyers decide to choose any number of paths to continue prosecution beyond a final rejection.
"And it only took many many years to remove what would have been obvious to the most incompetent web developer."
You know, I think it's unreasonable that patents can so greatly reduce people's freedom to create things, for fear that some of it may infringe upon some fairly trivial patent... Obvious or not, it places an unreasonable burden on developers, to use what they've learned except for those things they've learned about which are patented.
But was Amazon One-Click really "obvious" before they adopted it? I mean, the whole idea of
1: Storing user information (pretty obvious and common)
2: Launching a user order as soon as they click "buy it" (Not too challenging, except for the other issues that #3 solves)
3: Ensuring that situations where a user accidentally orders something can be readily corrected by the user (basically boils down to giving them the opportunity to back out)
It's easy to say the idea is obvious once someone else has thought of it and presented it to you - but was it "obvious" to people before Amazon did it? If so, then why was Amazon the first?
Bow-ties are cool.
Chances are that anyone who's paid up for a license from Amazon is SOL, since the contract would almost certainly include a provision that they can't sue even if the patent ends up getting spiked. Anyone who hasn't executed a contract with Amazon, but has incurred expenses in defending themselves might be able to recover some damages.
-jcr
The only title of honor that a tyrant can grant is "Enemy of the State."
I helped to start Amazon (I was the 2nd employee there). I've spoken out against the 1 click patent in the past. However, this comment "And it only took many many years to remove what would have been obvious to the most incompetent web developer" is not the reason why the patent should be permanently rejected. 1 click shopping was "new" at the time - if it was obvious, we would have done it right from the beginning on the web site. The issue with 1 click is not whether or not it was obvious to a web developer. It is whether or not business method patents that fundamentally simply map a practice in the non-online world ("put this on my account") to the online world ("1 click") should be permitted.
I don't believe that they should, and I am glad to see the patent struck down.