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Company Claims Ownership of Digital Messaging
An anonymous reader writes "Kootol, yet another patent troll, is going after everyone who makes messaging software for violating their soon-to-be-granted patent, which claims they invented one- and two-way messaging in 2005. From the article: 'Kootol, founded in 2010, says it has a patent license agreement with Yogesh Rathod for control of U.S. Patent Application 11/995,343. Rathod, in fact, is a co-founder of Kootol with his brother Vijay Rathod. According to Kootol, the patent application “covers core messaging, publication and real time searching technology.” Interestingly, the patent in question hasn’t actually been awarded to Kootol or Rathod yet. Rather, The U.S. Patent and Trademark Office has issued “A Notice of Allowance.” That’s the term for when the USPTO says that an applicant is entitled to a patent under the law, but must pay an issue fee (and potentially publication fee) first, within three months.'"
Surely the SMTP protocol is a one way messaging protocol - and is older than I am!
Good, the more ridiculous the patents get, the quicker something will be done to fix the mess. Personally, I'd like to see this patent granted, and dozens of companies ordered to pay lots of damages to the angelic company that is Kootol. ....if only to see the backlash from a thousand juggernauts against the current patent system ;)
Why OpalCalc is the best Windows calc
Here's the problem, even ignoring issues like software patents, and the morass they cause. The USPTO has stated that they're overwhelmed, so they're just checking the paperwork, and if its all in order, they rubber stamp it and grant the patent, the courts can sort out what patents are valid, they say. Meanwhile, the Courts are continuing to defer to the expertise of the patent office, and are EXTREMELY "reluctant" to void patents. So we get any invention, no matter how obvious, no matter how old, being patentable. And as long as you're smart about who you sue as a patent troll, (pick targets who can't afford to defend themselves, and file in known friendly courts), you're golden. The system is totally borked.
The "talk" program was available on the DEC PDP-11 computer system in the 1970s and in BSD v4.2 since 1983.
This looks very similar to the Andrew Messaging System that became the CMU campus wide mail system circa 1985.
In that case you owe me patent royalties, as I invented the digital computer last week.
Surely I have at least as sound a claim as Kootol does.
Check the HTML. A div is created, 4 links to random sites inserted, and then said div is hidden via javascript. Presumably some SOE-aimed hack/spam/bot/thing.
They will not stand in my way when I patent:
System of using punctuation marks in order to make blocks of text more readable.
That the USPTO is staffed with lazy incompetent morons.
You're doing it wrong, you need a block of text so obfuscated that the USPTO isn't quite sure what they're granting.
Method and Apparatus for use of SIlicon with additives to create electric motion in order to provide a system of postively charge regions thereafter called 1s and a system of negativly charged regions therafter called 0s in order to create, transmit,produce,transfer,convert,read,translate,display,distinguish,perform arthematic functions upon,simulate,compute information packets in order to allow a human user (HU) the ability to create, transmit,produce,transfer,convert,read,translate,display,distinguish,perform arthematic functions upon,simulate,compute further information packets which are then translated into motion of photons and EM radiation of specific frequencies by use of a 'monitor' in order to give Human Readable (HR) results which the human user (HU) is using.
IP multicast has been in active use on the internet since the 1980's.
IP multicast lets receivers join groups, defined by a special class of IP addresses. Senders emit packets addressed to those addresses and the IP mulitcast routing systems (of which there are several) build distribution trees to get those packets to those receivers.
So to the extent that this patent claims include subscription based addressing and transmission of data packets, IP multicast has been a running example of this for at least a quarter of a century.
Let's see:
Clauses 1-457 were canceled.
in 458 they describe a main frame (prior art by many, many years) so 458 should have been canceled, in addition to all of the clauses based on 458.
providing a central controller for controlling a plurality of processes involved in said information searching and sharing;
463 is based on 462 which is based on 458 so it should be canceled. 479 repeats the claim to prior art noted above. This leaves 478 as the only clauses not voided by the above prior art. Unfortunately for the patent troll 478 vaguely describes clustered computing as a means to duplicate the process of a main frame, which there are several instances of prior art as well.
Having to work for a living is the root of all evil.