Google, Yahoo, Others Sued Over Solitaire Patent

An anonymous reader writes "Back in 2004, Slashdot posted about computer solitaire being patented. It was a ridiculous patent and made it onto the EFF's list of worst patents. However, not much had been heard about that patent until now. It turns out that the patent holder, Sheldon Goldberg, is now using that patent to sue a bunch of different online publications, including Digg, eBaum's World, the NY Times, Cnet and the Washington Post. He's also suing Google, Yahoo and AOL (why not?)."

Isn't this the best possible thing to happen?

[Ochu]

We have a fly-by-night organisation, suing at least eight major companies, with a patent that is clearly a joke.
Our legal system works as much by precedent as by legislation.
When the NYT, CNet and Google fight this as hard as they are going to, this will set that precedent, and it will set it hard. It will make it that bit harder for frivolous patents to ever reach court, and might, just might, prompt a re-evaluation of the entire system.

MUD

[Marcion]

One of the patents is for a method for playing games on a network. Network gaming systems have been around for as long as networks. For example, in 1977 there was a little game called MUD.

Obviousness in to the US patent office is of course different than the rest of humanity.

Use it or lose it

[Marcion]

I don't like the idea of owning ideas and other things that do not exist, but if we have to have a patent system, then I think there should be a "use it or lose it" element to the patent system. If you can prove that you are trying to make a product out of it, or have licensed it to someone who is trying to make a product out it, then you are allowed to approach the courts to try to have your patents enforced. Otherwise, all bets are off.

70% of patent actions are by people who stockpile patents but produce no products. These patent trolls are just leeches are should not be allowed to hinder real companies who actually make things.
 

Is it too late......

[edwardpickman]

To patent chess or checkers? How about tick tac toe? Yes it's a new use for it but you might as well say printing on ePaper requires a separate copyright since it was never copyrighted specifically for that purpose. There has to be a limit set on persuing these claims as well. You shouldn't be able to wait until lots of deep pockets are involved for multiple years to sue so you know the damages will be high. The absolute maxium should be 12 months since a product was released but they should be required to give notice the moment they are aware of the infringement. Solitare is like traditional folk music which can't be copyrighted. It's been around too long and simply doing a computer version isn't changing it enough to warrant a patent. The code would be patentable but not the game. If they were all stealing code then that's a different issue.

Re:Why not microsoft?

[conlaw]

So, the Windows Solitaire is less susceptible than a Web-based card game with advertising/leaderboard.

If you go back to the original article, http://trolltracker.blogspot.com/2008/01/4-interesting-new-cases-from-last-2.html [blogspot.com], you'll see that this guy also claims to have patented on-line game rankings, and pop-up advertising!

Time to sue

[DuctTape]

For some odd reason I think that it's a grand and glorious idea to sue people left and right on silly patents just to perhaps get it through Washington's head that the patent system is broken and needs to be fixed. I'd bet you'd be hard-pressed trying to come up with any new business process or idea that somebody else hasn't patented or at least partially done by someone else that wouldn't be an invitation by that someone else to sue you if you did a better job than they did.

Or perhaps we just need to put a bounty on lawyers.

DT

Re:Why not microsoft?

[Zeinfeld]

Because the claims don't read on a single-player card game.

But Hearts is a multiplayer, network card game.

The troll might not want to go after Microsoft with a patent filed in 2001 for a game that has been in Windows since '95. Might be a teensy bit difficult to prove priority, lack of obviousness etc.

If I was looking for prior art that is where I would probably start. But there are entire histories of networked computer games.

I am not a lawyer, this is not legal advice. Although I am qualified to act as an expert witness I am not your expert witness. This post should not be relied on by anyone for any reason.

Depends on the meaning of "use it".

[argent]

"Use it or lose it" doesn't mean "make it or lose it", it can also mean "actively promote or license it" as well.

Re:Why not microsoft?

[afabbro]

I am a patent lawyer, but I don't represent you. This post should not be relied on by anyone for any reason. This post is my personal opinion, and is not endorsed by Jackson Walker LLP, its agents, or partners.

No one would know the name of your silly little firm if you DIDN'T ADVERTISE IN YOUR SIG. If you're so concerned that you have to put this obnoxious disclaimer in your posts, then either drop the advertising or post anonymously and quit being a self-important wanker.

Re:cut 'em off

[HiThere]

It's more difficult than that.
1) The current patent system is broken in ALL industries, but some sort of patent system is probably desirable.
2) For inventions that require a lot of up-front investment, a longer patent is more justifiable.
3) For industries that don't require the patent to reveal sufficient information to allow others to reproduce the invention easily, patents should be invalid.
4) When the system requires a patent lawyer to understand what the patent means, individuals who are not patent lawyers should not be affected.
5) There are a lot of undefined terms in the area of patents. These should be removed. Examples are "obvious", "skilled in the art". These need to either be made more precise, or removed from patent law...and if they are only well-defined to lawyers or patent-lawyers, then the laws containing those terms should only apply to lawyers or patent-lawyers.

A lot of these problems stem from the problem that nobody can define what a patentable invention is. As long as this is true, you're going to have either bad patent law or none ... but it doesn't need to be as bad as the current law.

But remember, some things are cheap to copy, but expensive to invent. It's for the protection of these that patent law is reasonable. And it's unfair to second-guess how expensive it *should* have been to invent after the fact.

Sometimes I think a patent should be not a license to manufacture, but a prize, rather like the X-prise. Each year in January congress should appropriate a certain amount of money, during the next January the "Patent Prize Commission" should allot that money among those filing for inventions during that year. It would be necessary to reveal sufficient information to allow others to copy the invention cheaply (i.e., without going through either the process of invention or of reverse engineering). If you don't win, your process remains your secret. You can file as often as you desire until you have won, but there's a fee for each filing that is estimated to cover twice the cost of handling and evaluation. If two or more entries in the same year are essentially identical (in the judgment of the judges), and it is still deemed a worthy invention, then the prize is split. All winning entries become public domain.

I'm not really sure that the prize would be better than the current system, but it's hard to see how it could be worse.