Amazon's ludicrous 1-Click patent "confirmed" after a re-examination that lasted 4 fucking years.

http://www.techflash.com/seattle/2010/03/amazons_1-click_patent_confirmed_following_re-exam.html

After killing all software and business method patents and banning future such patents from being filed, the USPTO can lay off at least half its dead-weight staff.

Software patents have no right to exist. Most of the ones making news over the past few years are out-right counter to some of the basic premises of patents in the first place. Many fail to acknowledge prior art, don't pass the non-obvious test, etc.

I have personally, examples that I've created or been involved with, demonstrated to the public, that qualify as prior art and could potentially affect a number of patents by Apple and Tivo for example, or their competitors. One most perfect example is from a patent troll that went after Apple regarding iTunes. I described, illustrated the app in final UI detail and distributed a RFQ for something similar a couple of years before they had created their implementation. An implementation they claim Apple employees saw at a trade show and based iTunes on. My stuff was from 1991/92.

I'm going to patent serving food with napkins.

hmm... I'm late to lunch, too.

I tend to agree with you, but I think there probably is a place for software patents. It makes enough sense for, for example, a compression algorithm to be patented. (I'm not happy about it, but I don't think it makes sense for a complex mechanical contraption to be patentable, but not a complex logical contraption. After all, patents are just logical explanations to begin with; you needn't have produced any sample of the item.)

It's these bullshit non-non-obvious patents that are the problem. I think we actually need to hire people at the USPTO that understand software and can recognize the ridiculousness of these things.

I just skimmed through the 1-Click patent, and there's a little more there than you might think. It details conglomerating orders and points out the (questionable) security benefits of transmitting your financial data as few times as possible. Still, there's nothing there that isn't obvious. Any decent software engineer would design basically the exact same system, given the most basic of design parameters.

Patents shouldn't be about who got there first. It should be about who created a new place to be.

How about the Patent application for the process of patent trolling?

Maybe some good Samaritan should patent the process of generating non-non-obvious software patents and then start suing others who use their method.

I'm pretty sure you can't patent an algorithm at all right now. That is to say, you can't call your invention an "algorithm." That's why you'll see everything called "system and method."

I would still say no to all software patents, sorry. The purpose of a patent is to make public the information so that others can learn from it, but so they can't copy and market it (without your consent/license). If your algorithm is a trade secret, then you won't want it to be listed at the USPTO. Someone would have to reverse engineer your software to figure it out. And in that case you still have recourse against someone ripping off your implementation.

Patents should all be specific. Something too broad should automatically fail the basic test for patentability. But many don't. Many law suits are file by companies achieving the same result but with different methods. That's not patent infringement, but good luck arguing that with a company that has deep pockets and nothing to loose by spending years in court.

I hate the order system at Amazon, patented or not. It's cumbersome and I don't know why it's not called "100-Click Ordering."

Weird. I may think that the patent is absurd, but their implementation of it works just fine for me. Assuming I'm logged in, which I usually am, and I'm on the page for the product I want, I click a single button and it gets ordered.

So just because you or I can't see anyone's desire to do something, it has to be outlawed? That's just stupid. The goal of all tools, including the patent office, should be to provide a framework for people to do things that the creators of the tools never foresaw. Sometimes that has negative consequences, but dealing with them is a pale penalty for the benefits it reaps.

In fact, what the patent office describes is rather GPL-like. You can look at it all you want, and do anything you want with it. And if you extend it for public consumption, you make your new plans available. Patents merely add the additional caveat that you can't reproduce it for monetary gain.

Outlaw? I never said anything about creating laws. I'm trying to keep people out of the courts.

No one patents anything for the good of anyone else. No one.

The patent system as far as software goes, is very broken, but beyond what any mere human can hope to fix. It's been demonstrated over the course of so many years that it's just not possible to have someone at the USPTO able to hold back on giving out patents on the most absurd applications.

I've already been held back enough in my lifetime by patents. The way the system is now developed it makes it very difficult for the small fry or startup to innovate in many areas for fear of being litigated to death. That doesn't foster development nor creativity. As another example, while at ATI, I came up with a number of neat implementations of a visual television guide. We couldn't move on any of them for fear of being sued by Gemstar. I read most of their patents up and down and from a laymen's perspective we seemed to be in the clear. Ooops, lawyers insisted that we NOT read the patents and certainly absolutely never ever mention the patents or Gemstar with regards to the patents in any emails or other written documentation. Obviously once it's been proven that you knew about an existing patent it's apparently a lot easier to prove you were copying or had intent to copy. Anyway, the higher ups didn't want to chance even the possibility of upsetting Gemstar, even if the designs didn't fall under their patents.

As a software designer and publisher, I'm against software patents. I could benefit from the corruptible USPTO. I could have benefitted from them quite a few times already. Just needed to spend some money on lawyers and filing fees. And that's where the expense is for many filings. Not in the discovery and research that are what a patent is supposed to help you recoup by giving you a window of exclusivity.

If the system can't be dismantled then it needs strong reform. To start, making software patents last no more than 5 years, but more meaningfully 3, would be a start. Right now it's 20. Ludicrous.

Did I pull 5 (or 3) out of my ass? No.. That's enough time to establish a market or brand or both. Along with a leadership position and a fighting chance at making back the investment put into the development of the "invention."

How, exactly, does reform happen up there? Monarchical mandate?

I meant, creating laws banning or to prevent in response to your "outlaw" comment. In other words, not to create new laws. I didn't mean that that existing patent law doesn't need reform. So I suppose it would take some amending and rewriting.

The other area of reform is in the procedural/functional aspects of the office itself. Clearly, even the existing letter of patent laws are often being ignored when granting many patents.

glol

Here's a better author than I, covering what's wrong with software patents. He also mentions and links to a number of other individuals against software patents in the first few paragraphs.

http://redmonk.com/sogrady/2010/03/19/software-patents/

His reasons are ridiculous. To summarize, skipping past all of his not-his-reasons, he thinks software patents can't work because (1) there are way too many of them to be handleable, and (2) the USPTO doesn't have enough software experts.

His argument for number one is that, if one can patent trivial things, then there are a huge number of trivial things to patent. Well, they don't allow people to patent physical trivialities; why should they allow them to patent virtual ones? I recognize that they do now, but just because they do now doesn't mean that they have to continue to do so.

His argument for number two is that in order to judge whether someone has made a legitimate software innovation requires an expert. Fair enough. But is this not also true of physical devices? I don't think that anyone would now argue that the transistor was not worthy of a patent, but who were the experts who judged that it was back in 1948? Clearly they weren't very expert, as it had been patented three times already.

I don't see any benefit to society from software patents. Zero, zilch. So I'm not quite sure what their purpose is, other than to siphon more money to lawyers. ?

Bitt, you're assuming a perfect world. An ideal. And perhaps in such a world software patents could be made to work. But given that we're in a far from perfect world and we have had decade after decade of proof that the USPTO is flawed, his arguments are sound. The arguments made by others are relevant as well, but this is just simpler.

I don't believe a we can make a system that will work and add any benefits. Patents right now are filed on a daily basis by larger companies primarily as defense mechanisms. Just look at all the patent coverage for Apple in the blogs. Some of those are interesting ideas that one day Apple may do something with and others are interesting ideas that Apple may already decide they never want to touch, but that they believe competitors might. Competitors that may come after them on other fronts.

See, even hardware patents can be total and complete bullshit.

Apple's filed patents for gaming accessories for the iPod/iPhone:
http://www.intomobile.com/2010/04/01/app...ory-patent.html (filed Sep 30 2008)

The main issue here is that this is ALL based on prior art and I don't see anything new at all. Multiple companies have demonstrated physical and even working versions of this idea as far back as 2+ years ago (translation: before Apple's filing)

Most of Apple's patents are for defensive purposes, but even so, these applications should be summarily thrown out since the ideas don't actually belong to Apple and were already publicly available and demonstrated by at least two other parties.