Software Installation/Update via Internet Patented 519
RKBA writes "My wife just handed me an article from the Wednesday, October 22, 2003 issue of the Wall Street Journal about a tiny Austin, TX company called Bluecurrent that has been awarded patent No. 6,636,857 covering the Internet installation of any software or settings on new computers. The patent was granted by the USPTO on October 21, 2003. It will be interesting to see if it can be enforced. I think it's time for someone to file a patent on Earth, Fire, and Water. ;-)"
It Gets Worse (Score:5, Informative)
"Mr. Thomas said Bluecurrent intends to seek royalties of $10 to $25 for each time a new computer has software or other settings updated over the Web."
RTFA! (Score:5, Informative)
NO! This is *not* a patent "covering the Internet installation of any software or settings on new computers".
This is a patent covering backing up preferences on a remote server so that someone can safely upgrade their OS or move computers.
To recap:
I wish /.ers would check their facts before screaming how the sky is going to fall on our heads every time the USPTO grants a patent.
Sigh (Score:3, Informative)
(And please don't tell me this applies "originally" to the World Wide Web... if that matters I'm applying for a patent to do the exact same thing "for IP block 90.x.x.x".)
I know, I'm Karma Whoring... (Score:3, Informative)
I hope someone counter-sues them into the dust!
RTFA, this patent is quite specific! (Score:5, Informative)
It looks like this is a bit more specific than the original post would lead one to believe. It does not cover installing software remotely. This patent is more about saving a user's settings remotely, then transferring them to a new computer. Looks like it is a way to facilitate the use of a remote IT staff. It does not look like it covers downloading software install packs, nor does it seem to cover software updates. But hey, IANAL :)
Easy to get around this patent... (Score:1, Informative)
It repeatedly refers to using the "world wide web" to do its magic.
As most slashdot geeks know, the internet is far, far more than the world wide web. The web is a small subset of the internet.
So do everything outlined in the patent, just use ftp, ssh, NFS or samba.
I think the lawyer/patent agent who wrote this thing needs a cluestick.
Too bad for the company.
Parent correct -- read the abstract! (Score:5, Informative)
Now, in my opinion, the actual patent is also ridiculous and way too broad in scope, but not nearly as bad as the picture painted by /.
NOT about software updates (Score:5, Informative)
The scary part of this patent isn't the user settings stuff, it's this claim:
This seems to cover cases where every computer on a network (say in a corporate IT environment) uploads a bit of information about itself to a server, and then someone prepares a report based on that information. But there must be prior art on this one. And it would be pretty easy to get around this claim anyway -- just poll the machines for information rather than having them upload it to a central server.There must be some prior art before Dec 2002 ! (Score:2, Informative)
Prior Art? (Score:3, Informative)
Re:It Gets Worse (Score:2, Informative)
And if apt-get is in trouble, then so is emerge. So that would screw Debian AND Gentoo users.
Re:It Gets Worse (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Parent correct -- read the abstract! (Score:3, Informative)
Apache itself is prior art (Score:3, Informative)
My own web site is prior art to claim 25 of this patent. Here's how access to a web site running on Apache HTTP Server [pineight.com] goes:
25. A method for asset management using the World Wide Web, comprising: accessing the World Wide Web through a series of computer-related hardware devices connected to a network;
People visit the web site, looking for a recently released open-source NES game [pineight.com].
transferring information regarding each computer-related hardware device in said series of computer-related hardware devices to a remote storage medium;
Web browsers send User-agent: HTTP headers to the web site whenever pulling a file.
compiling information related to said series of computer-related hardware devices derived from said information residing on said remote storage medium;
Apache collects User-agent: information in a log file.
and preparing and disseminating reports compiled from said information.
The web site uses Webalizer to produce reports from the server logs, and the webmaster digests the reports into posts on the site's news page.
Re:RTFA! (Score:3, Informative)
> court.
Patents mean quite a lot until tested in court. They are presumed valid until proven otherwise.
>
> the patent struck down.
Right. I'm sure it wouldn't cost more than a few hundred thousand dollars and take more than a few years.
Re:RTFA! (Score:2, Informative)
Unix / Windows has been doing this since ~1994. (Score:2, Informative)
(2) At the school I went to they even did the same thing with the Windows 3.1 machines. Because they couldn't secure the installations, the machines were re-imaged every time they rebooted. When you logged out, your files were written to your network drive and the entire machine erased. I'm fairly sure that Windows has been capable of doing something like this (syncing with a network drive) without any extra software since Windows 95.
(3) The book "The Diamond Age" by Neil Stephenson describes a similar process whereby user settings were stored on a server (YT's mom in her federal job whereby the earliest arrivals sit at a computer close the front of the room - those who are late sit at the shameful back).
(4) Microsoft Hotmail has an Outlook Express interface that works over port 80 using web services to access and read your mail. Any changes you make to your mail files locally is then mirrored on the remote Hotmail server.
You only need to substitute "world wide web" in the patents text with "LAN" or "WAN" (which is essentially the same damn thing - it's just a protocol over TCP/IP) to get a good description of 1, 2 or 3. Item 4 covers web-based access over port 80 - which, really could be applied to anything.
With these sort of patents being filed (and approved) - the patent office should be shut down permanently. It has lost it's original purpose of protecting the truly original thinkers amid a sea of pathetic scam artists and lawyers who have never done a day's real work in their lives.
I've used it (Score:2, Informative)
Accuracy smackuracy (Score:2, Informative)
I can see now why Patent Lawyers get paid the big bucks. Though they obviously still can't afford proofreaders.
Oh no, not again... (Score:2, Informative)
1. The patent only covers anything that does everything in the claim, just like it says. It cannot be generalized. If you don't do all of the steps, you don't infringe.
2. Claims are often narrowed by stuff you don't see in the patent itself, but which are contained in the file wrapper, that is, the documents exchanged by the applicant (or applicant's attorneys) and the patent office. These documents must be obtained from the patent office, and are often very revealing. Typically every patent gets rejected in the first instance, on grounds of insufficient novelty, and will be appealed by the applicant saying "...but we only intended application in this narrow set of circumstances, which are different from the prior art...". All those documents are recorded and form part of the validity of the patent. They are admissible in court. It usually turns out that patents are much narrower than a reading of the patent alone implies.
Read the claim carefully. It applies only to "web" transfers, and you must upload from an existing computer and download to a "new" computer. I'd be willing to bet that there are specific circumstances contained in the file wrapper also.
I don't think this is very alarming, in summary. It's probably a much narrower patent than it first appears. Really, this kind of thing happens all the time and it isn't a big deal. Move along, nothing to see here.
Krill
WTF??? (Score:2, Informative)
Wrong, as usual. RTFP (Score:4, Informative)
Wrong. Since very few slashdot readers can be bothered to actually read the patent before complaining about it, it covers this process:
This little game of outright lying about the content of a patent and then joining in a chorus of ignorant bleating about the awful, awful patent system accomplishes nothing. I hope that no legislator or decision-maker ever reads this drivel, as he'll be convinced that patent reform is championed only by cretins.
No! RTFC! (Score:3, Informative)
The claim is the thing, and must be read carefully in view of the specification and prosecution history.
Re:It Gets Worse (Score:3, Informative)
Provisional patent Dec 2001. Filed Dec 2002. Granted Oct 2003. I don't think there should be a problem finding prior art.
Re:It Gets Worse (Score:5, Informative)
Nonononono. Wrong bug report. The problem is elsewhere. The USPTO definition of prior art is the same as the one in the US patent code (35 USC sec. 102) [cornell.edu], and this includes _much_ more than prior patents and non-patent literature. (E.g., prior inventions of other inventors in the USA are also part of the prior art even if not published, but unpublished material is quite hard to bring into the process and hard to prove.) Novelty searches in the patent office could be more thorough than they are, and sometimes are careless. But the examiners do sometimes look at non-patent publications.
The USPTO issues a patent if it doesn't find relevant prior art. This means that a careless USPTO search is likely to result in the issue of a patent with claims that should not be patentable, or at least are too broad.
Currently, there are access-to-justice issues (the law does not yet provide enough, or effective, opportunities for third parties to challenge issued patents). That means correcting mistakes like this is usually an uphill struggle, slow, and likely very expensive. So in the meantime, the beneficiary of the USPTO mistake, the owner of the patent, may be able to cash in on it.
The Federal Trade Commission recently made proposals [ftc.gov] aimed at correcting these defects of the system. The FTC proposals might or might not go far enough, but either way, between now and possibly getting them adopted, there would be another hard slow struggle ahead for their advocates
But the bug in the system is not the one diagnosed by the parent poster (inadequate definition of prior art)! It lies in either or both of two other places (a) the skill/thoroughness of patent examination before patent issue and (b) lack of proper opportunities to correct mistakes after patent issue.
This ./ post is wholly inaccurate... (Score:3, Informative)
I wasted 5 minutes on this because I deal with this kind of tech at my company... geez..