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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.
I think Google needs a new motto.
Apparently she can't refrain from making Google be evil.
The only two good things I can think of regarding this are
Free Martian Whores!
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.
In retaliation, goatse has now patented mooning, and also all images of anuses.
That's not evil, that's a public service.
There must be some functionality that is patented, so I doubt the patent is just "a search box with a couple buttons".
It's a design patent, not a patent. That is, a patent on visual arrangement of elements.
...note that this a is a design patent . It is more like a trademark than a utility patent and covers only the "non-functional" elements of the design.
Warning: this article may contain humor, sarcasm, parody, and perhaps even irony. Read at your own risk.
Publicly lobbying for reform on patents they themselves own, doesn't this seem like a more defensive move than a necessarily malicious one?
I'm sure every doctor protesting tort reform has liability insurance regardless. Why shouldn't Google get some insurance of their own? It's a cut-throat world out there, after all. If you don't tread carefully, you'll get shut down.
It's been a long time.
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'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...
...or they could have simply published and established prior art without the need for a patent.
If you have an idea and you want to make sure you can use it, but don't think it is patent worthy, you can publish it to cite later when someone else attempts to patent it.
When I was designing manufacturing systems, we would often do this. Since it was internal technology, it would be difficult to identify infringers using it in their factories. However, we didn't want some machine vendor or someone visiting claiming our designs are an infringement.
I'll admit I don't trust Google as far as I can throw one of their private jets. I'll also admit that I believe patents are important to protect real innovations.
I love the sound of distortion in the morning -- webcommando
They probably should have published it as prior art, but prior art doesn't seem to mean much in this world. The USPTO seems to ignore any prior art and then issue the patent anyway. Then Google would likely get sued and have to spend the money to defend the lawsuit (likely in East Texas) and then get the patent invalidated. It is cheaper to file for it themselves then try to defend a lawsuit later. I honestly don't believe that's the reason they have done this. I wish it was, and I hope it does show how ridiculous the patent system has gotten, but I doubt that was the main reason google applied for this patent.
In case you hadn't noticed they did publish it. They even went to the lengths of making it the main feature of their website just to make it obvious that they really were publishing it.
I'm all for invalidating software patents, but this one seems logical to me. The Google home page is iconic
That makes it a trademark, not a patent. The difference is important. It's the difference between telling Disney they can keep their mouse silhouette as a symbol of the company and telling them they can sue anyone who creates animated animals.
Seriously, I don't know if I blame Google because someone else would probably patent the "HTML form with one text field" and sue them if they didn't. I'm hoping to patent getting frustrated with politics and politicians. Once that comes through I should be able to quit my day job.
Google doesn't have to spend money to defend a patent suit in East Texas. It would be cheaper for them to buy East Texas.