Amazon Using Patent Reform to Strengthen 1-Click

theodp writes "As some predicted, lawyers for Amazon.com have recently submitted 1-Click prior art solicited by Tim O'Reilly under the auspices of Jeff Bezos' patent reform effort to the USPTO, soliciting a 'favorable action' that would help bulletproof the patent. Last June, an Amazon lobbyist referred to deficiencies with the same prior art as he tried to convince Congress that 1-Click was novel, prompting Rep. Howard Berman to call BS."

Re:1 Click

[The Rizz]

[Re: Buying from Amazon]

What's the alternative?

I find that buy.com is generally better for books, and DeepDiscountDVD, DigitalEyes, and other sites are better for DVDs. Some of the other areas (power tools, food, etc.) I don't know about, but I can't imagine there aren't better places on the 'net to buy the same items for cheaper, and with as good or better customer service.

Software patents "at lawyerpoint" and under fire

[Anonymous Coward]

As pointed out by Professor Jeremy Phillips [blogspot.com], on the unfortunate occasion of political maneuvering to bring the marvels of software patents and business method patents to Europe as well, this article [grosche.com] in Oxford University Press's International Journal of Law and Information Technology does a great job of debunking the whole approach - while citing and synthesizing the views of IT&IP luminaries through the past few decades or even centuries. Hopefully, so will the U.S. Supreme Court, finally, at least if Justice Breyer's remarks in Microsoft v. AT&T [zdnet.co.uk] (transcript [supremecourtus.gov]) are any indication:

We're operating under the assumption that software is patentable... but we've never held that in this court, ever.

The relevant testimony

[TubeSteak]

The Summary is wrong
Misener (who gets called out by Berman) is not an Amazon Lobbyist

Mr. Misener = Vice President for Global Public Policy, Amazon.com
Mr. Smith = Chairman of the Subcommittee on Courts, the Internet, and Intellectual Property & Rep from Texas
Mr. Berman = Rep from California
Mr. Issa = Rep from California

(this seems like a good spot to start}
And, Mr. Misener, one last question for you. This goes to the 1-Click patent for which Amazon.com is becoming famous. And of course it's under review by PTO. But--I know your answer, but could not Amazon.com be accused of being a troll for patenting the 1-Click?

Page 79 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC
Mr. MISENER. Oh, we have for about 6 years now. But it's inaccurate, and here are the reasons why. First of all, there's been a lot of complaint about whether or not it was an innovation. And truly it's not innovative only in hindsight. At the time it was a radical departure from the shopping cart model which was ubiquitous on the Web. But more to the point, we have exercised this patent only against a competitor who at the time we exercised it had publicly announced their intention to crush our business. This was not some scheme to hit up small users of 1-Click or similar technologies, it was really to get at a competitor who had not invested anything in developing this technology and had, again, avowed to crush us.

Mr. SMITH. Okay. Thank you, Mr. Misener. And thank you all.

Mr. Berman, do you have any additional questions? Mr. Berman is recognized.

Mr. BERMAN. Thank you.

Paul Barton David, one of Amazon.com's founding programmers, called the 1-Click patent an extremely obvious technology. And Tim O'Reilly, who's been involved in shaping Internet trends, describes the 1-Click patent as an attempt to----

Mr. SMITH. Mr. Misener, we did not coordinate our questions here.

Mr. BERMAN [continuing]. Has not gotten up to speed on the state of the art in computer science. It's been a raging controversy, and I have no idea whether it's valid or not--because I'm a lawyer. But the controversy itself was one of the issues that got at least a few of us 5 or 6 years ago thinking about some issues of reform.

Page 80 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC

Let's talk about in your testimony you state last year for $40 million we settle with Soverain, owner of a host of broad e-commerce patents, nearly two dozen of which were purchased for less than a million dollars. We settled for 40 million. Did you believe these patents to be invalid because they were too broad?

Mr. MISENER.We still believe them to be invalid.

Mr. BERMAN. Because they were too broad?

Mr. MISENER.In part because they were too broad.

Mr. BERMAN. Did you attempt to initiate a reexamination?

Mr. MISENER.Yes, we did. And it was not going to be completed in time to be relevant to the case.

Mr. BERMAN. Do you consider this company a patent troll because they purchased the patents for less than a million dollars, which presumably didn't represent the value of the patents?

Mr. MISENER.I've shied away as defining them as a troll or not. We were----

Mr. BERMAN. Nobody has shied away from calling you a troll over one claim.

Page 81 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC

Mr. MISENER.That's true. We worked, by the way, with Mr. O'Reilly; we came and met with Members of Congress 6 years ago because we agreed that there were areas to improve the patent system

Re:One-Click?

[mtmra70]

I purchased an item the other day witb "1 click".

I did the following:
  -clicked the "1 click" button
  -confirmed my order (2nd click)
  -confirmed my credit card (3rd click)
  -confirmed my address (4th click)
  -confirmed that I did actually want the item, again (5th click)

The blind leading the blind

[Mydron]

Obvious is difficult to define. Sure, it's obvious now in 2007 a whole 12 years after cookie functionality was added to Netscape. But was it obvious in 1997? Maybe. Maybe not. Obviousness is such a slippery slope that it's pointless to even argue about -- in court this argument boils down to a personality contest between attorneys and expert witnesses. No one wants to win or loose on those odds.

If 1-click isn't Amazon's idea, then produce some proof that it isn't. This is the sure fire way to invalidate the patent and the basis on which patent applications are vetted in the patent office. It helps to know how to do this. Start with the claims and work from there. Unless there is some funny terminology you shouldn't even have to read the rest of the application -- for novelty only the claims matter. As an example of what not to do bountyquest provides a good illustration:

US Patent #4734858 "Data terminal and system for placing orders," filed March 29, 1988. This excellent submission, dating back to the late 80s, describes the use of a remote data terminal to place orders. It was a highly relevant patent that was not cited in the original 1-Click application but probably should have been. It's a good example of how electronic shopping systems can be connected via a dial-up connection to legacy computer systems without using the Web. It also describes a simplified ordering system not dissimilar to 1-Click, as it states: "Transmission of orders is manually initiated by actuation of a function key at any time after an order is stored in the send memory." Sounds a whole lot like 1-Click shopping, doesn't it? Unfortunately it doesn't say anything about the use of HTML, the Web, and such, so it wasn't a winner. But kudos to the submitter for coming very close to the target!

The author(s) of the article dismisses this art, but failed to read Amazon's claim. Nowhere in Amazon's first claim does it mention anything about HTML or the Web. I haven't looked at the patent the author cites, but if this is really the only deficiency then it is no deficiency at all.

Bountyquest has dismissed other art for similarly specious reasons such as "[reference] isn't web specific". Well neither is Amazon's claim -- only that there be a client and a server - but these terms can be read very broadly: there are lots of client-server systems that pre-date the web. Similarly "[reference] doesn't include 1-click" is no reason to dismiss art because Amazon's claim only requires "a single action being performed". If you find art that includes a single action being performed, then Amazon is going to have difficulty narrowing the claim by specifying that the action is a mouse click because mouse clicking was a well known method of producing single actions.

Bountyquest makes yet another ridiculous assertion when it says: "However, the [reference] is not a winner, because we don't have evidence that someone . . . implemented [reference] . . . before our Prior To date. " There is absolutely no requirement that prior art must be implemented -- only a person skilled in the art would be ABLE to implement it from the description.

If bountyquest (or anyone else) is serious about digging up prior art they should educate themselves on rudimentary patent prosecution.

buy.com vs. amazon.com

[The Rizz]

Buy.com has a fraction of the number of books that Amazon offers.

If you mean they have a fraction of the books listed, then yes - but whenever I do a search, over 50% of the titles that pop up on Amazon are not even sold by them, and most likely never were. As for the rest, that's probably because Amazon.com opened their doors years before buy.com did - buy.com won't have books in stock that went out of print before they opened for business.

Quick review of top 10 selling books on Amazon and Buy.com show that Amazon lists them cheaper

In that case, Amazon and/or Buy.com are giving you different prices than they're showing me.
Polling the top 10 books from amazon.com [amazon.com] and comparing them to buy.com's prices gives me 3 prices within 1 cent of each other, 3 prices better at buy.com, 3 prices better at amazon.com, and one book that isn't listed at buy.com (however, this book is from the 90s and isn't even in stock at Amazon).
Polling the top 10 books from buy.com [buy.com] and comparing them to Amazon's prices gives me 6 within 1 cent of each other, and 4 better prices at buy.com.
This leaves Buy.com with a lead in the number of cheaper books.

Free shipping for purchases over $25 on Amazon (not Buy.com) and no cost shipping if you are an Amazon prime member.

OK, now I know you're on crack, a shill for Amazon, or both. Buy.com has had free shipping on $25 orders for as long as I can remember.
As for the "no cost shipping if you are an Amazon prime member", that's not true: You're paying monthly/yearly membership fees to be an Amazon Prime member, so you are paying for that "free" shipping - you're just paying in advance.

Customer Service at Amazon is year after year rated very high by independent surveys (*much* higher than Buy.com)

I've actually never had a single problem with either of them, so from my perspective Buy.com is indeed "as good or better". I also was referencing sites other than Buy.com in that sentence, and I'm sure there ARE other sites that are definitely better for customer service (small shops with that personal touch, etc.)

What are the reasons you say Buy.com is better for books????
Price - No, Selection - No, Customer Service - No.... what?

Price: Yes, by a 7:3 margin, if you don't count the books identical in price.
Selection: Debatable - Amazon lists just about every book ever published (many they have never stocked), but have an older inventory than Buy.com.
Customer Service: Debatable - They are pretty comparable from my point of view.