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Patents

One Click Setback for Amazon 56

Posted by Hemos from the legal-salvos-ho dept.
dbrutus writes "Amazon lost its bid to continue a preliminary injunction against BarnesandNoble.com. You can find a press release to give you all the details."
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One Click Setback for Amazon More

One Click Setback for Amazon

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  • Exactly - That's what they taught me, during a brief stint as Patent Examiner: "Think Broadly", that is, if someone is trying to claim a memory scheme they created in silicon chips, it may be rejected based on prior art that might include a similar scheme that was realized using wooden wheels or whatever.
  • I sometimes think that I do not take life seriously enough. I agree totally with Rogerborg that it is a sad state of affairs when we're surprised that a court comes down on the side of of common sense!



    I have never figured out why the law is just not rewritten, in a normal, simplistic fashion that everyone understands.


    A major requirement for a free and fair justice system is the availability of said system to everyone. I find that the only winners nowadays in the legal system are the lawyers.


    Maybe someone should take up the challenge, and advocate for a total rewrite of the laws of the land..... What happened to though shall not steal. If you do we will chuck you in prison for 5 years per £100000 in the value of whatever you have stolen.


    That is more my idea of the law. simple, blind, and impartial. That the number/quality of lawyers that you have determines the outcome of a case suggests a serious flaw in the justice system.

    How does this relate you ask... the threat of litigation from amazon/priceline over stupid patents will surely hold back many enterprising folk. Even if they do go to court, the complicated justice system means that their eyes are taken off the ball (competition in the marketplace) and the only people who win are the lawyers (on both sides).

    sigh....

  • Quoting from the court decision [emory.edu]: "The evidence before us indicates that the billing process for the electronic stock chart would not actually commence until the client system sent a message to the server system indicating that the electronic stock chart had been received at the client system. In its brief, Amazon argues that this feature of the CompuServe Trend system amounts to an additional "confirmation step necessary to complete the ordering process," and that the CompuServe Trend system therefore does not use "single action" technology within the scope of the claims in the '411 patent."

    If I understand this, Amazon says that Trend doesn't count because the client's computer had to send something back to the server after the click that ordered the chart. Now... when does a modern one-click shopping system check the user's cookie to see who clicked on their one-click button? Doesn't it retrieve the cookie after receiving the click?

    Does this mean that Amazon has argued that no actual one-click system using cookies is covered by their patent???

    Chris

  • Lots of programming and design is trivial, but companies outsource for these ideas all the time. Even when it can be reproduced easily enough in house, a lot of companies will go out of their way to obtain the "expert" in the field.

    It could also be argued they are purchasing the goodwill of "one click shopping" which I believe Amazon has tried to trademark as well.

  • ...and would the original have been funnier if the Japanese translators had done their job right on the original 'Zero Wing' ?

    By deliberately misquoting it, I'm not gonna be named in any of the major lawsuits from Sega for misappropriation of their game content. Anybody think this is maybe a publicity stunt from Sega in order to claw back some major revenue from cancelling the Dreamcast ?.

    Zero Wing II anyone ??

  • I don't think that's a good analogy. Amazon has been reported to not have a ton of extra cash right now. They'll have to decide whether they want to put some serious bucks into fighting this. If they go bankrupt trying to fight for this silly patent or if they give up on the patent those are both Good Things(TM)... :)

    If Amazon loses this fight and Rambus loses their fight, it might make some people think twice about trying to use the patent system as a source of income... (I know I'm dreaming)
  • Go B&N.

    Remember, if you want to prove prior art, log it legally. Posting to the web is not enough. How do you prove that your was up and running using apache and perl in 1996?

  • that your #web app that has been patented by RANDOMBIGCORP INC# Plain text posts still strip anything that looks like it may be HTML... :-(
  • In particular, I like the part about patents being distinguished by technique and not application, so you don't necessarily get a new patent just for writing down some existing art and pencilling "...but on a web page" on the end.
    It reminds me of the Fortune Cookie Game, you know: "You are bound to find happiness and success... in bed!"
  • >To quote one of my co-workers: no one should be able to patent something that could be designed by a marketing department.

    This gives marketers too little credit. I'm a techie myself, not a marketer, but I've seen plenty of technical people plod along for years with blinders on, seeing only the option they are trained to see... they have a hammer, and they see only nails. Sometimes marketers come up with some pretty innovative stuff, and sometimes it can be technical, and patentable.

    I'm not saying that the Amazon innovations are patentable, just that sometimes marketing people can come up with patentable ideas.

    Now on to Amazon.

    I really appreciate what Amazon has given us in terms of innovation, the ability to browse for books in multiple ways which were previously not available. Purchase circles, people-who-bought-x-also-bought-y, sorting options for price, availability, selling rank, average customer review, date, etc., book recommendations, user reviews, rating of reviews... the list could go on. I'm sure you could find examples where many of these have been offered before, but they hadn't been brought together with the large database of books before and presented as a useful package until Amazon. Amazon pushed the envelope and raised the standard that others had to meet, benefiting all of us, even users of competing sites. For that reason I support Amazon... and I forgive them their patent silliness because it was done as a defensive measure against the behemoth Barnes & Noble, which has been copying all along. Copying ideas is the standard model on the Internet; fine. But I still like to reward the innovator.

  • I thought that when all this originally blew up that Bezos weighed in with the opinion that it was only a "defensive" patent, to be used by Amazon to prevent someone else from patenting it and suing them. If he did indeed say that, (I can't recall exactly), then he is a no-integrity spin peddling bum.
  • Of course, this court battle will continue for years and years, as Amazon needs to make money off of infringement lawsuits, seeing as it doesnt actually make any money selling books.

    For once, though, it's nice to see a *bit* (about this much -->.--) of common sense prevail.
  • I wasn't talking about ideas, I was talking about the technology, the code.

    Remember, we're talking about: setting cookies.

    Show me cookie setting experts.
  • I think's it's been painfully obvious that the patent office grants patents, and leaves it up to the court's determine validity. They're proud that they pumped through xxx # of patents. If people didn't submit idiotic patents, then the patent office would make less money.

    I could go on, but it's all been said before
  • Why does it always have to be about money to you people? Can't Amazon be happy providing a service which brings cheer to their customers instead of fussing about the almighty buck?
  • Totally agree, our system rules are based on the almighty buck (aka CAPITALISM!) and inorder for them to make money they'll try and do it anyway they can.

    Not that I'm sideing w/ Amazon.com mind you. But I won't hold it against them for trying.

    Just like I won't hate/harbor bad feelings against the guy who tries to break into my house and steal all of my beer & computer equipment...(but I will blow him away all the same!)

  • I've been thinking alot about patents and the USPTO as of late, and I've begun to realize a much more politically effective and valid way to make the non-technical understand just how corrupt the US Patent system really is.

    Covert taxation backing a none-too-subtle amount of graft.

    What, did you think those patents are free?

    The United States Patent and Trademark Office has taken to delusions of grandeur. It is not illegal or questionable for a government body to charge for its services--a bill from the USPTO does not a tax make. Taxes achieve their special nature by the fact that they're enforced charges--if you meet conditions x, y, and z, then you pay the tax or face government enforced penalties.

    There's obviously a charge element to patents--last I checked, patents cost thousands, sometimes tens of thousands of dollars to file. Every time a patent is rejected for having some trivial grammatical error, that's more money for the USPTO--more cash per patent, more charge per service rendered. The enforcement is, however, where things get hairy. Since everybody else has accepted the concept of attempting to patent any idea, obvious or not, anyone who refuses to pay for patent "protection"(we've heard this word before) is placed at the mercy of their protected competitors. And good luck to any company who crosses a competitor so armed--all profits can disappear with the signing of a court mandate. These same courts, of course, have been muzzled from attacking the USPTO's decisions, so those facing kangeroo justice aren't going to find much support from those who came before. Even genuinely invalid patents cost in the ranges of half a million dollars to address, so even if you win, you lose.

    Even the (now kinder and gentler) IRS isn't/wasn't this nightmarish. Imagine if Cisco and 3Com could sue eachother for taking excessive deductions, and thus competing unfairly. The USPTO doesn't need to lift a finger to enforce its taxation--those who have paid to join their little club will be more than happy to emasculate their competitors.

    Of course, such emasculation requires nice and expensive patent attorneys, and thus comes the graft. By assigning as many patents as they can get away with, patent attorneys (who, I'm sure, have quite a bit of pull at the USPTO) have more material to wield when hired to attack competing companies, more material to defend with when a company is attacked, greater stakes on either side from which to calculate an hourly rate, and much less predictability and guaranteed freedom for the clients--this translates directly into a greater need for highly trained patent attorneys to be on retainer, as well as longer time spent in court jousting-for-millions. (Look mah, longer hours!)

    More taxes for the Agency, and more cash for the agencies apparent constituents. Disguised behind claims of being understaffed and underpaid are patent office employees intentionally overworked and paid to accept, not reject. The lower ranks are mismanaged such that the upper ranks will be richer for it. "It's Net So It's New" has become the mantra for a thoroughly corrupted government body with delusions of being superior to the Judicial Branch, the IRS, the United States Congress, and the American People.

    Such oppression is out of place for the otherwise free and democratic ideals the Net so powerfully engenders, and particularly out of line with regards to the separation of powers between the governmental structures.

    We need reform. Complaining about patents on a technical level is effective, but needs to be prefaced by an explanation of not only how such patents are ludicrous and valueless, but why.

    Your livelyhood could be next. Call your congressman.
  • It only lasts 48 hours? Finally, I can go back to see the picture of that 1U half rack plexiglass computer! I knew there was a reason that I kept that "Older Stuff" box turned on!
  • OMFG that was funny. I love segfault! Mod me down and ^him^ up please.
  • Quite frankly, this '1 click shopping' has always made me wonder:

    If it's so simple to buy something with just 1 click of your mouse, just how easy would it be to so fraudulently?

    Suppose some cracker somehow gets some Amazon's customer's cookie (which apparently can be done through Gnutella and such if you're naively share your whole drive [theregister.co.uk]), and installs it on their browser, couldn't they just do '1 click frauds'.

    I wonder if it's happened already...

  • and this has already been reported...
  • No, probably not. Did they license the patent or did they license the technology. It seems to me that it would be easy enough to justify some fuzziness there so that Amazon could say in court: "Oh, they licensed the patent, but they also licensed technology from us". I also think Apple was the only company that licensed the one click patent.

    I'm not sure what the deal terms were, I'm very suprised that the deal wasn't that Amazon would sell Apple products.

  • As far as I know, Apple didn't pay, they just swapped licenses to some dubious patents of their own. The only way they could lose is if their patents do hold up in court _and_ are something Amazon would have been willing to pay for...
  • There are big problems at the patent office in finding prior art in business methods and software patents. Some of the problems have to do with the PTO budget (too low--Congress is stealing part of the fees for other agencies) and the bureaucratic incentives (examiners have a quota # of cases to close per month, the fastest way to close a case is to grant the patent, the PTO only gets sued when it doesn't grant a patent, and nothing adverse happens to an examiner who grants a bad patent). But the biggest problem is that the PTO almost entirely relies on their database of patents to research prior art; since software and business methods used to be non-patentable, the prior art isn't there.
  • Sigh... even used the preview on that one too.
  • i don't want any ONE PERSON/COMPANY to become to powerful on the web competition is good. c-bob
  • yes. you would like it if everything was free after you leave home and go in search of a life.
  • I cannot understand how Amazon got this patent to start off with. It is one of the stupidest things I have ever seen. I'm very happy to see that they are (hopefully, fingers crossed) not getting away with this!

    Well... after getting rid of the doubleclick patent [bountyquest.com], it is time to get rid of the single click patent :)
  • I am glad that that patent is closer to getting busted up but really... who cares about there patent? Hasn't anyone noticed that there patent isn't on "one click shopping" but rather "one action shopping"? That means if we can incorporate another action like a mouse over into the purchasing method then we have "one click and one mouse over" shopping wich is distinct and different than amazons "one action purchase over a network" patent!!

  • The only reason this had to go to court was because Amazon itself didn't have the common sense to realize that the patent had no merit.

    The argument that Bezos and others gave for enforcing this patent was that of fiduciary responsibility: their responsibility to make full use of the "assets" at their disposal. The claim was made that they could be sued by shareholders if they failed to exploit this patent.

    So now, what's needed is a disincentive. Losing the actual patent in court (as I'm sure they will) is not enough. By pushing this patent against all common sense, they have wasted company money, squandered goodwill, diluted their management focus, and generally done a bad job of doing what they're supposed to do, sell stuff on the web.

    A shareholder lawsuit would be symbolic, and perhaps give the next dumb corporate management group something to think about next time such a worthless patent is being sought or enforced.

  • Slashdot is just trying to make sure it's covered, in case the Patent Office is about to issue a 1-Post patent to a lawyer-happy corporation.

    --
  • First of all, in terms of web technology patents, this seems to be very, very good news.

    After I RTF-D (read the f---ing decision), the main thing I came away with is the sense that the bar has been raised for what a company can get away with in terms of preliminary injunctions related to the so-called "business method, internet, etc." patents. To quote the article:

    the CAFC ruled that preliminary injunctive relief is only appropriate in patent cases if the patentee can show a likelihood of infringement by the defendant, and that the infringement claim would likely withstand challenges to the validity and enforceability of the patent. "
    No one questioned whether or not Barnes and Noble, et. al were using "one-click" type website buying mechanisms that most likely violated Amazon's patent. But the circuit court found that unless the patent is solid enough to withstand a challenge, a preliminary injunction shouldn't be granted. Which I agree with, BTW.

    Correct me if I am wrong, but the practical meaning of this is that before Amazon or anybody decides to go for a preliminary injunction, they had now better be prepared to spend the legal dollars for a full-fledged trial to defend the validity of a patent right up front.

    My concern is this: what about the little inventor who gains a patent, and does not have the money to fight that kind of legal battle against, for example, a larger company? Could this decision be used by companies with deep legal pockets in a way that actually makes it alot more difficult for the small guys to succeed in developing, patenting, and bringing a product to the market? What do you think?

  • I think you make a very good and oft forgotten point - despite this patent ridiculousness (and I consdier it ridiculous no matter why it was done), Amazon.com has done a lot of good things, done them well, and helped people take net business seriously.

    I've got to give them that.

    However, I the one-click patent actually hurt the company in the end - it made them look petty, it made their competitors angry, it perpetuated the copyright-as-a-weapon mentality, and it was a distraction from needed efforts.
  • Books ain't workin'

    Selling more stuff ain't workin'

    Frivolous lawsuits ain't workin'

    I know! Let's set up an honor box service and then skim 15%+ off of each transaction! Maybe the Doernbecher Children's fund or Jerry's Kids could use someone to help them accept internet donations!

  • This CAFC decision is remarkable only because Amazon.com's patent was not discussed as a "business-method patent," an "internet patent," or a "software patent." The CAFC properly treated Amazon.com's patent as it would any other type of United States patent.

    I, for once, applaud the Court of Appeals on their very common sense application of the law. But honestly, we're not done yet. This appeal applied ONLY to the injunction. They still have yet to go to trial.

    Hopefully, the USPTO will get a clue and consider all patents equal. That will make certain that these types of foundationless patents cease to be issued.

  • Every time a multinational corporation attempts to bully people with unfair patents and fails, an angel gets it's wings.
    ----
  • Ok, this is obviously either a troll or an idiot, but it's early in the morning and I'm bored so I'll bite.

    You see, Amazon is a publically held corporation. Therefore, they are required to pursue the almighty buck. That's kind of the point. And I don't dislike Amazon, in fact, I think Amazon has done some good things - I like their new "honor system" that they're rolling out, both because it's kind of a slick marketing move, and it's a move away from ad based revenue for sites.

    However, this patent is so obviously bogus that it's kind of a smack in the face to legitimate IP. And while the debates over IP rage long and furious and pointless on /., the fact remains that it does exist, and the laws need to be able to separate the real McCoy from the schmucks trying to patent anything they might be able to sue people for.

    I've been trolled, I think. Now ask me if I care.
  • Well, the technology here is the code.

    Part of the argument about one-click is that it's trivial.

    So, who'd be daft enough to license trivial code?

    I don't think Apple or anyone else would have licensed "One-Click Technology"(TM).

    Anyone care to make me reel in disbelief?
  • What about the small ones who try to fight, and go bankrupt in the process?
    Personally I think that money extorted under false pretences should be recoverable. That would be the Darwinism I'm looking for - patent something stooopid, and get fucked upside the head a few years later when everyone who ever paid you comes demanding their money back. That puts the frighteners on those making the dumbass patents.

    FP.
    --
  • I say no. If Apple and the other firms didn't have the cojones to fight this bogus patent, then doom on them. Maybe this will lead to a kind of patent darwinism; the companies willing to fight bogus patents and not pay major bucks for licensing will end up saving money and become more profitable, while the executives of the companies who gave in will be ruthlessly grilled by their shareholders as to why they threw away large sums of money licensing a bogus patent.
  • Here's the full Judgement [emory.edu]. It's from Feb 14th, but it seems to have all the phrases quoted in the articles so I assume some other news got in the way!
  • Yes, but the important thing here is that the patent was already *granted*. The fact that it was overturned is highlighting an ever increasing problem which is that the people granted patents are seemingly no longer adequately qualified to do so and are making a mockery of law.

    I'm staring at a patent which is a threat to my business which basically patents a network using IP with some particular use. It's clearly a pile of crap, but the patent office granted it. And as with other points of law, they're assumed to be right unless proven wrong. Who has the money to challenge this?

    Something has to change and soon. This victory is a great step forward.

  • Has anyone gotten the "double click" or maybe the "middle click"? Personally I would like to get my patent on the "emulated third button click"
  • It's good. It basically says that if you want to patent a business method, or a process related to the internet or software, which all have been very controversial, you will have to specifically show through patent claims that your patent would provide significant advantages, and not be obvious.

    In a way they're just reiterating what US patent law says in the first place. But AFAIK this is the first time a court explicitly makes it clear that just moving something onto the internet doesn't make it "new", and doesn't make it patentable by default.

    Compare this with the flurry of patents lately that takes an existing business method or process and say "on the internet", and assume that because they're doing something on the net instead of in their offline business or on a proprietary data network, it is suddenly something new.

  • Look, I'm not trying to troll here, but who spend the 1990s body-slamming mom & pop bookstores out of existence? Oh, yeah, that's right, Barnes & Noble. Sympathizing with them over Amazon is just substituting one corporate good for another.

    I understand that to some degree, the above assertion is irrelevant. Amazon still made a dumb move with the patent, and should be rebuffed. Obviously the outcome of the one-click case could set a really bad precedent, but it's hard for me to get up any sympathy for B&N.

  • In particular, I like the part about patents being distinguished by technique and not application, so you don't necessarily get a new patent just for writing down some existing art and pencilling "...but on a web page" on the end.

    I fail to see what do you like about it. I was planning to patent a smart little idea I had. It consists of a piece of text or image, that when clicked upon, will load another web page in your browser, effectively redirecting you to that other page. I planned to name it superlink, or something of the kind, and make everybody (it might well be already in use although unpatented) pay through their noses. Now this pesky ruling is ruining my dreams. Um!

  • I am a lawyer, but this is not legal advice. If you need legal advice, contact an attorney licensed in your jurisdiction.


    I've never looked at it in the intellectual property realm, but a general principle of contract law is that "mutual mistake" makes a contract voidable.


    Presumably, both parties to a license agreement believed the underlying IP to be valid, so a discovery taht it woas not would be a mutual mistake. However, it is also possbile that the contract terms provide otherwise, anc ould even recite that there is a disagreement between the parties as to valididty, and that the agreement is in settlement. In that case, the agreement would continue and be enforceable.


    hawk, esq.

  • Good or bad? (Score:3)

    by KrunZ ( 247479 ) on Friday March 09, 2001 @03:28AM (#374910)
    This seems to be the essence: "...critics of business method patents can read this decision as signaling that the CAFC will require patent applicants to be very specific in the terminology which is used to define their iventions..."

  • Re:Good or bad? (Score:3)

    by vidarh ( 309115 ) <vidar@hokstad.com> on Friday March 09, 2001 @05:08AM (#374911) Homepage Journal
    Keep in mind that it isn't yet overturned. Unly the temporary injunction was overturned.

    Also, this court decision could help to reduce the problem, since it clarifies what patents should be considered valid.

    Hopefully there's a chance that the USPTO will actually react to that. And in any case it will be powerful help for companies trying to overturn overbroad or just plain silly patents.

    I certainly agree with you that the court decision is a great step forward... But it's only a start.

  • I'm speechless... (Score:3)

    by comic-not ( 316313 ) on Friday March 09, 2001 @03:48AM (#374912) Homepage
    One billion mosquitoes stalking in the jungle. One gets swatted. Now there are one billion and fifty mosquitoes stalking in the jungle.

    Quite frankly, this is an exercise in futility as long as the basic machinery which keeps on rubber stamping genuine idiocies does not get reformed one way or another.

  • A refreshing breth of rationality - I hope (Score:4)

    by Badgerman ( 19207 ) on Friday March 09, 2001 @03:47AM (#374913)
    Well this isn't a total victory, IMHO, but is close to one. At least the legal and governmental entities involved are starting to actually think about the big picture.

    Personally, I'm hoping that this causes a review of other ridiculous patents, and raises public awareness of patent abuse. Certainly the one-click patent is so breathtakingly stupid that if the general public hears about it, it'll be extremely humiliating for Amazon (and those who liscenced the idea).

    To quote one of my co-workers: no one should be able to patent something that could be designed by a marketing department.

  • Re:Refunds for Apple and the other (Score:4)

    by Black Parrot ( 19622 ) on Friday March 09, 2001 @05:47AM (#374914)
    > Refunds for Apple and the other firms who licensed the one click?

    Yeah, Amazon is setting up a one-click refund site.

    --

  • Refunds for Apple and the other (Score:4)

    by The Mutant ( 167716 ) on Friday March 09, 2001 @03:25AM (#374915) Homepage
    firms who licensed the one click?

    And while we're at it, how many other firms all together paid Amazon for a license?

    Does anyone out there know the terms? It is an annual license fee or lifetime? And how much?

  • Re:Deja Vu (Score:4)

    by onion2k ( 203094 ) on Friday March 09, 2001 @05:03AM (#374916) Homepage
    Hehehe

    http://www.segfault.org/story.phtml?mode=2&id=3aa6 5ca7-043108e0 [segfault.org].. read the last line..

    Onion

  • Deja Vu (Score:5)

    by Masem ( 1171 ) on Friday March 09, 2001 @03:24AM (#374917)
    Boy, this sounds familar [slashdot.org].

    (Note to editors, if there is a date in a press release from a submission, and if that date is more than a few days old, it's a good chance the story's been posted already, particularly in this case. But of course, this assumes that editors read the articles that are submitted).

  • Praise the law (Score:5)

    by Rogerborg ( 306625 ) on Friday March 09, 2001 @03:37AM (#374918) Homepage

    It's a sad state of affairs when we're surprised that a court comes down on the side of of common sense. That said, this is a nice preliminary finding, and we can but hope that the rest of the case proceeds in a similarly reasonable manner (whatever the result).

    In particular, I like the part about patents being distinguished by technique and not application, so you don't necessarily get a new patent just for writing down some existing art and pencilling "...but on a web page" on the end.

    Is the US legal system in danger of finally getting a clue, do we think? ;)

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