Startup Claims Google Copied Web-Annotation Product

An anonymous reader writes "Web annotation startup ReframeIt claim Google copied their web annotation product when releasing Google Sidewiki. At first glance, the products do look quite similar, and this eWeek article has some interesting evidence, including suspicious user registrations by Google employees and an attempt by Google to hire off ReframeIt's lead engineer."

Comments

It's called capitalism.

[Anonymous Coward]

That's what capitalism is all about. Competition. If ReframeIt can't take the competition, whether it be for the product they're offering or for the employees they hire, then they need to reevaluate their business plan.

Re:From the end of the article

[tomhudson]

And it's not original. Other people have tired to launch similar products since 1999.

Here's a few of them:

http://www.icomment.com/
http://www.purplebunny.com/bbs/index5.php
joeblowanswers.com

Fishkin is an idiot for taking this approach without doing proper research. There's nothing they can sue google for.

Annotea

[Anonymous Coward]

A W3C project did something similar to this back in 2001. There was even a Firefox (then Mozilla) plugin.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Annotea

RTFA indeed.

[Anonymous Coward]

Following TFA and you'll eventually find this comment, apparently by Reframe It's CEO..

Thank you kindly for sharing your thoughts and for letting your readers decide if Side Wiki looked to Reframe It as an example to follow when they entered the market. We're flattered by the similarities to our pre-existing product from 2008. We're exhilarated by the challenge presented by Google to work even harder, and we expect our forthcoming release of our technology to knock the socks off of anything in the space. Bobby Fishkin CEO of reframeit.com

source Umm.. he doesn't seem to be considering any sort of legal action to me.

Re:Comparison shots didn't persuade me

[Anonymous Coward]

As I mentioned a bit further down the W3C made something like this in 2001.

Re:Yes, but is it illegal?

[stephanruby]

This is so ridiculous. They say they founded their company in 2006. They only registered their domain in 2007. Their patent filing is so fresh, it still says "patent pending".

Personally, I've been making tools like this one since 2001 (and I know I wasn't the only one at the time). Mind you at the time, I didn't have the Twitter/Facebook share buttons (but now, everybody has those -- so it's not like they have anything unique). Besides, the guy complains about the Twitter and the Facebook buttons they both have in common, but if you look closely, you'll see that reframe has five select boxes, and Google has four buttons, and not only is Google only using buttons (instead of checkboxes) -- it has two share buttons that reframe doesn't even have (and it's missing three options that reframeit has).

And don't get me started on those screenshots, they're way too small to read fully (even if you do view image). And the first three screenshots have the same complaint duplicated (so aside from the arrows, I'm guessing that we're missing two of his complaints).

And then, look at what he ends his blog post with.

In any case, pairing a Web annotation service with the leading search engine puts Google at the head of the Web annotation long tail, of which Reframe It, Diigo, JotSpot and others are a part.

Excuse-me!? I've never heard of Reframeit.com. Does he have third party citations to back up his claims? Traffic stats? User reviews? Anything? Personally, I have, and reframeit doesn't even make it in the top ten.

And what about jotspot.com? Weren't they bought out by Google two or three years ago. Shouldn't this guy know this if he's in the space? Besides, it's not like jotspot would even qualify as a good web annotation tool, it was way too feature-rich to be in that category the last time I saw it.