Amazon Sued Over E-Book DRM Patent

I Don't Believe in Imaginary Property writes "Discovery Communications, the parent company of the Discovery Channel, is alleging that Amazon's Kindle e-book reader infringes upon their patent for DRM-encumbered e-books (Discovery's complaint, PDF). The patent in question was filed back in 1999 and issued in 2007 — coincidentally one day after Kindle 1.0 went on the market — and has claims for DRM implemented with a great many particular symmetric key ciphers and key exchange algorithms, (the patent has 171 claims). Unlike most software patents, this one goes into quite a lot of detail about how the encryption is to be performed. But it will still be interesting to see if it can pass the 'machine or transformation' test now that In Re Bilski is being accepted as precedent. After all, it seems like all of these encryption and e-book distribution schemes could be run on a general-purpose PC, so is the 'invention' actually tied to a 'particular machine or apparatus' just because an e-book 'viewer' (not to mention 'home system', 'library', and 'kiosk') happens to be specified in the patent's claims? Or can the encryption of an e-book be claimed as some kind of 'transformation' when the law in that area is especially murky — when no one knows how In Re Bilski may affect the precedent of In Re Schrader?"

Comments

What about Prior Art

[DarkAce911]

Who in the world gave them a patent on ebooks in 2007? I could see it in 1999, but this sounds like one of those file then modify deals. I guess the patent office has never heard of a Rocketbook or Gemstar. I think the Rocketbook came out in 1998 and the Gemstar REB1100 with all the fancy DRM came out in 2001. I am pretty sure they were not the first. Lawyers and MBAs, there should be a bounty on them.

Re:What about Prior Art

[ndavis]

Who in the world gave them a patent on ebooks in 2007? I could see it in 1999, but this sounds like one of those file then modify deals. I guess the patent office has never heard of a Rocketbook or Gemstar. I think the Rocketbook came out in 1998 and the Gemstar REB1100 with all the fancy DRM came out in 2001. I am pretty sure they were not the first. Lawyers and MBAs, there should be a bounty on them.

According to my Father-in-Law who worked for the patent office over 15 years ago they started to outsource the some of the work and the people they outsourced to did not understand prior art and did not do hours of research on each patent to make sure. Also it is much easier to pass things through then fail things which is why he retired.

He still shakes his head when I tell him some of the things that have gone through and he doesn't know anything about computers.

Re:obviousness problems

[morgan_greywolf]

Maybe, maybe not. It's not just a known encryption algorithm, it's DRM, so there's a process for getting and exchanging keys and so forth. If that process is fairly unique for this particular ebook reader, they may pass the obviousness test.

The real question is posed in the summary: is this a 'particular machine or apparatus' or is decrypting an e-book a 'transformation' process.

This is very similar Microsoft v. TomTom. Since the courts have yet to apply In Re Bilksi beyond the original case, we'll see how it gets applied. It maybe be a race between this case and Microsoft v. TomTom to see who gets to set further precedent in the application of the In Re Bilski ruling.

Wow 171 claims!!!

[portwojc]

Big whoop that this patent has 171 claims. At a quick glance 168 of them are dependent claims. That means you find the main ones (1, 96, and 129) and look for holes there in what they claim. The other claims depend on those so they don't matter if you can break the parent.

Fails the Obviousness Test

[Nom du Keyboard]

This patent fails the obviousness test. Prior art is every notebook computer and tablet existing up to 1999, while cryptographic key exchange mechanisms predate that. If Discovery Channel could hold up their eBook reader actually built in 1999 next to a Kindle 2 and show the obvious similarities then they might have a case.

If they'd actually even sold even a single unit of what they patented (if they ever did it was such a miserable market failure that the rest of us have never seen or heard about it) then they might have a case.

If they could show contracts for content delivery to their device with commercial providers of telecommunications services then they might have a case.

If Discovery Channel could show where they went to Amazon with their patent application - or anyone else, for that matter - and said: "See what we have invented in our minds. Would you like to build it and we both get rich?" then they might have a case.

As I see it Discovery Channel is not, and never has been, in the eBook reader business. They never tried to license their design, nor build it themselves. They couldn't build at the time what they patented and it's a mystery why they even patented it at all since this is not, and never was, their business. Now they're just a big bunch of patent trolls, aided and abetted by an incompetent Patent Office. I hope Amazon challenges and overturns this patent. And I hope that Prior Art project gets involved.

If the Patent Office actually made you deliver a working model of what you were patenting then a lot of this garbage would go away immediately. Imagine a working model of a perpetual motion machine? :^) These days too many people try to patent a perpetual money machine that they could have never actually built or sold themselves. The Patent Office should not be protecting that to the determent of the rest of us!