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Amazon Patents Customized 404 Pages
theodp writes "Among the patents awarded to Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos on Tuesday was one for his invention of Error Processing Methods for Providing Responsive Content to a User When a Page Load Error Occurs, which covers displaying alternate web pages in response to HTTP 404 page-not-found errors. So is this the technology that causes Amazon's Home Page to be displayed when Bezos' MIA Patent Reform Page can't be found?"
They were going to sue everyone on the planet, but they couldn't find their websites.
And by the way, what constitutes "customized" when its open source software?
404'd!
The patent is not about the server serving custom
error pages (which is your post), but about a client
side process that communicates with a separate error server
to generate the appropriate response. So I would guess it
is a intended to be a plugin for a browser.
But then this is slashdot, why bother to read the article.
Atlas stands on the earth and carries the celestial sphere on his shoulders.
It's not a patent on 404 handlers. It's a patent on a client-side component that detects errors including, but not limited to 404s, then relays the error to an external server and receives an alternate URL or resource to serve the user. Blame the patent office for being idiots if you want, but this time *you* are the idiot.
If anyone else has read the patent, they'll realise that it's a CLIENT-SIDE component that's involved.
Most (all?) 'automatic redirect' systems I've seen are server based - the server runs a script which says 'That page couldn't be found, did you mean any of these...'
I can't imagine who'd put this on the client with client-server communication going on. It sounds like a vastly over-engineered and 'Enterprisey' solution to me. It DOES have the advantage that it can look back in the browser history, but I'm not sure I see how that could benefit the user (the component COULD tell the server what's in the history though, so it could benefit Amazon!)
Its not all the patent offices fault. They have to follow the rules, and those rules were not set up for the torrent of patents they receive these days.
If you get too many patent applications, the process of establishing if prior art exists also gets swamped. Thus without a special effort, patents which have prior art can still get granted.
I've skimmed the patent in question, and it sounds like a new thing to me. There may be bits and pieces that invalidate some of what it does, but since the USPTO allows patents for software products (which has always struck me as dumb), this is probably valid.
Much as I'm loath to hold it up as an example of anything ever, Internet Explorer has been using client-based action to generate a friendly "This page cannot be displayed" page in place of 404 errors for years and years.
Slashdot Burying Stories About Slashdot Media Owned
Which is exactly the situation with the 1-click patent. Cookies were invented to allow a site to recognise a returning user/customer, so patenting the act of using cookies to recognise a returning customer (and by "recognising" I mean linking them to an account) should never have been allowed a patent.
There is a VERY simple solution: don't buy anything off Amazon, and tell your friends not to too. I don't. If they want my money they can stop trying to prevent me from working.
TWW
"Encyclopedia" is to "Wikipedia" what "Library" is to "Some people at a bus stop"
... which is using a well known malware/phishing technique.
It is a client component (read adware/malware) that intercepts 404 messages, calls home to find out where to redirect the user, then redirects.
i.e. if you type in "slahdsot.org" it will search a database of misspellings and redirect you to "slashdot.org".
or.. in the case of malware.. if you type in "myinternetbank.com" it could redirect you to "myphishingsite.com".
I'd be surprised if there isn't prior art among the less ethical Internet inventions out there.
They should use Comcast, then. That should slow the torrents down a bit...
*cower (Rank 8)*
An Australian man has been issued with an innovation patent for the wheel after setting out to test the workability of a new national patent system.
:-)
John Keogh was issued the innovation patent for a "circular transportation facilitation device" under a patent system introduced in May 2001.
(read the rest...)
- Jesper
My security clearance is so high I have to kill myself if I remember I have it...
Bezos has stated in the past that he is patenting software methods as a defensive measure. "We're not saying we have bad patents," Amazon.com spokesman Bill Curry said. "We feel very good about our patents... [Bezos] makes the point very emphatically in the letter that we cannot unilaterally disarm in a world where there are big ugly players who aren't disarming."
It's like road rage. When people are cutting you off and breaking all the rules, you have to tailgate and cut them off as a defensive measure (sometimes, at least). Nice guys finish last. The entire system is broken and the Patent Office really needs more legislative direction because it has strayed from its original mission.
I think software and business methods should not be patentable in the same way that physical inventions are. Also, I question the concept of selling patents. We end up with these litigious patent holding companies that have no technical abilities of their own, only a lot of lawyers.
A few years ago I looked into making and marketing a telephony device that would be an incremental but useful improvement over existing equipment, and discovered that so many methods related to telephony and voicemail are patented that practically speaking there was no way to make a device without infringing. "A method for playing back a telephoned message by pressing a button"--give me a freaking break. No wonder the U.S. has slipped behind in technical innovation, when much of the incentive for incremental product improvement has been removed by the threat of instant litigation. Thank goodness the Asians still believe in incremental improvement.
I'm OK with Amazon patenting stupid obvious things, as long as they don't enforce those patents, which I believe they have done very little of, and as long as Jeff Bezos continues to crusade for patent reform. Just my 2c!
it's = "it is"; its = possessive. E.g., it's flapping its wings.