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Google Patents Its Home Page
theodp writes "A week after new USPTO Director David Kappos pooh-poohed the idea that a lower patent allowance rate equals higher quality, Google was granted a patent on its Home Page. Subject to how the design patent is enforced, Google now owns the idea of having a giant search box in the middle of the page, with two big buttons underneath and several small links nearby. And you doubted Google's commitment to patent reform, didn't you?"
That is all.
Design patents are for very distinctive but not functional items.
EG, Apple has tons, TONS of design patents on the iMac, as they had on the NeXT cube and pizza boxes, as so on and so forth...
That google did NOT already have a design patent on their home page is strange and noteworthy, not that they just got one now.
Test your net with Netalyzr
It is of course perfectly possible that they have no intention of abusing this in any way, and merely wanted to make sure they didn't end up fighting any stupid law suits from some bright spark who had the idea of filing something similar and going after them with it.
Time will tell how 'evil' this is.
Let me defend google. One thing is wanting to reform the status quo, another having to live with it. They are pragmatic. It doesn't make sense to close your eyes to reality. Google has been fighting off patent trolls for a long time. They have to be careful.
Combine this with Microsofts Idea that the whole world follows US Patentsand the idiots who think that patent infringement should be a crime and it won't be long before someone does time for the layout of their web page.
There must be some functionality that is patented, so I doubt the patent is just "a search box with a couple buttons".
Google creates a lot of IP and for the most part gives it away to users in the form of useful, free products and services. The only way to protect IP is to maintain legal control of it, otherwise you never know when someone may try to sue you.
Much like Microsoft, Google is extending its patent portfolio to preempt litigation, not to come down hard on little guys. I would be a bit hesitant to start screaming about Google at this point because I disagree with their methodology. They have a reason for getting these patents, and for all the patents that they've generated, there are few examples where they've used it as anything but a defensive weapon.
First, there's the outages. Google NEVER used to go down, it was part of their "mystique"--their engineering was SOOO amazing, and so well designed. The Cloud could NEVER go down!
Second, there's the Evil. I feel like I saw this one coming, years ago, having spent a good portion of my career in the advertising industry. It's a simple equation, right? Google is a publicly-traded company, and their core business is selling advertisements, which means their REAL business is selling your eyeballs+buying habits to anybody and everybody with cash. Eventually, there had to be some visible, significant conflicts between the basic reality and their high-concept, geek-chic PR fantasy.
Finally, and this is more personal, there's the lack of responsiveness from developers, and the perception of a "one-way street". Go look up the API for Google Tasks, and you'll see what I mean: Not only doesn't it exist, despite a lot of begging from interested users/developers, but Google keeps responding (when they do respond, which isn't often) that they have a corporate policy of not discussing pending release schedules. I understand that they have finite resources and have to make their own development roadmap, but their attitude seems to be "we're not going to acknowledge the gripes of our base". Which basically is the same attitude that any Big Software Company takes.
So, I'm not saying that Google is a crap company, or that I'm going to stop using Gmail, or that they're the new Evil Empire. But they're not really fundamentally different from every other Evil Corporation that we like to villify, here on Slashdot. There are no "good guys" and "bad guys"--there's just an open field of self-interested actors, each with a shitload more money, engineers, and lawyers than you.
Let me get this straight.
Google goes to a library and begins to scan every book they can get their hands on for the "Altruistic" reason of making the book available for a wider audience. This is without asking the author's permission, and to make things appear fair they make a scheme that authors have to follow to "opt-out". This is basically changing the enforcement of the current copyright law for Google's benefit.
While at the same time they are defending their right to copy the contents of a book without the author's permission in court, they patent their home page so other's can't copy it without Google's permission. Bizarre. Pot meet Kettle...
These comments are my own and do not necessarily reflect the views or opinions of my employer or colleagues...
I love hearing people going "But wait, it's not THAT evil! Think of it like this...". If this was Microsoft everyone would be shitting on them, going "Microsoft being an evil dickwad as normal...". But I guess that's the popular band wagon Google love/Microsoft hate train of /.
I'm sorry, in advance, for ranting and raving, but this is absolute lunacy. A web page design is copyright protected at best. What makes the central search box and a couple of buttons and nearby links a unique business process? Google's structure of algorithims, cache servers, and distributed search processing are (IMO) a patentable business process. In fact, I'd argue that there's an abundance of prior art out there against this patent. Does anyone remember the early Webcrawler page? It might not have been centered (but that's just formatting), but it had a very basic search box, a search button, and a list of category links below (from October 1996: http://web.archive.org/web/19961023234707/http://www.webcrawler.com/).
Google might have a relaxed and hip work environment, but some people in their legal and/or IP departments must be (IMO) taking some really bad trips. This is downright stupidity that does nothing to help promote meaningful patent reform unless Google uses this patent as an example of the type of schlock that is getting approved, and makes it the 'poster boy' for patent reform.
I use irony whenever I can, but my shirts are still wrinkled...
This is a design patent, so it is patenting what it looks like, not the functional effect of the page. The two pages look completely different, so an Altavista-like page would not infringe the patent.
No.
There are numerous public companies that won't make a profit this year. In fact there are numerous public companies that have never made a profit.
The obligations of a public company are to file various securities reports. The rest is the same for public and private companies.
It's hard to be a good 'idea' company in America when using the patent system at all is an act that will move your alignment towards evil.
It's a design patent you twits. It doesn't cover anything but the appearance of the home page. It doesn't imply any coverage of an idea of a "simple home page" or anything else like that.
Seriously Slashdot editors should be required to take a few lessons on the various types of patents, basic copyright law and trademark law. The amount of misinformation on these topics here is frightening.
Or... it's a cunning ploy to show how idiotic Patents are in this day-and-age.
It is what it is. A patent. Reason being, those are the rules of the game today.
Just because you're for patent reform doesn't suddenly mean that the whole rest of the world will leave you alone while you're off crusading. You still have to play by the rules of the game as they are today. If they were suddenly to not pursue patents, they'd be bulldozed over by the competition. When you're dead and buried it's hard to fight for change.
So as for now, they're in it to win by the rules of the day. Here's hoping they work to make a better ruleset for tomorrow, but I don't begrudge them fighting tooth and nail within the system as it is today.
Weaselmancer
rediculous.