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Google Patents Displaying Patents
theodp writes "Google has actually managed to patent displaying patents. The USPTO issued US Patent No. D603,866 to six Google inventors for their 'graphical user interface for display screen of a communications terminal.' Among the six inventors is the guy who introduced Google Patents. Ironically, Google Patents can't seem to find the new Google patent for Google Patents."
They got a design patent. That's something complete different from a regular patent.
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It's a design patent. Please learn how the patent system works before posting patent stories.
I don't think Google is here who is to blame. We see these kinds of news everyday by Microsoft etc too. It's just how the (broken) US patent system works and companies have to cope with that too.
Ironically, Google Patents can't seem to find the new Google patent for Google Patents.
To be fair, there's no translation of the papers online everywhere else either.
Also;
The copyright owner has no objection to the facsimile reproduction by anyone of the patent document or the patent disclosure, as it appears in the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office patent file or records, but reserves all other copyrights whatsoever.
So like with many other computer patents, they just seem to be covering their own asses against patent trolls. Blame the system, not those who need to work with it.
Yo dawg, herd u liek patents, so I put a patent on displaying patents so now you can violate my patent while ur lookin at patents.
The summary's misleading. It isn't the displaying of patents that Google patented, it is the particular Web GUI that they patented. Which is, mind you, fairly unique in that it displays the original images quickly and uses particularly unique layout for the display of the very intuitive controls.
Not that I agree with software patents, I think they're stupid, but under current patent laws, what they patented seems to meet the standard for what is patentable.
(IANAL, TINLA, bleh.)
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Just makes me think of an old Danny D'vito quote from Other Peoples Money.
"Of course I've got lawyers. They are like nuclear weapons: I've got em coz everyone else has. But as soon as you use them they screw everything up."
Not even the web GUI, the exact visual layout of the GUI, just like people patent other designs (textiles for example).
Not news like 90% of Slashdot today (what the fuck, an OLD VERSIONS OF IE exploit is news here? 10 of those are uncovered a day)
Google isn't "patenting displaying patents", they are getting a design patent on the look of Google Patents. Design patents are harmless; they just mean that if you display patents, it should be visually different from Google.
This is a design patent; design patents are harmless.
Ford Seeks to Stop Imports of Replacement Car Parts: Ford Motor Co., the second-biggest U.S.-based automaker, filed a trade complaint to block imports of replacement parts for Mustang cars, saying they impermissibly copy its patented designs..."The car companies are intentionally looking to wipe out competition and using the ITC and the patent system," said Eileen Sottile, the coalition's executive director. "This is going to hit consumer pocketbooks."
"It's a coffee table book... about coffee tables!!!"
Science advances one funeral at a time- Max Planck
Never mind that... I sense a business opportunity...
"Google Patents can't seem to find the new Google patent for Google Patents."
I am going to patent the process by which Google Patents will be able to find the new Google patent for Google Patents. ;-)
Everything I write is lies, read between the lines.
No. Google's main business is advertising. If you search, you are the product, not the customer.