Amazon 1-Click Lawyers Make USPTO Work Xmas Eve 117
theodp writes "In a move that would do pre-makeover Ebenezer proud, Amazon.com's 1-Click lawyers put the USPTO to work on Christmas Eve. On Dec. 24th, the USPTO acknowledged receipt of yet another round of paperwork submitted by Amazon's high-priced legal muscle, the latest salvo in Amazon's 3-year battle to fend off a patent reexamination triggered by the do-it-yourself legal effort of actor Peter Calveley. Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos' 1-Click patent is also under attack on another front — on Dec. 23rd, the USPTO received $810 from Amazon's attorneys together with a request that the agency invalidate Patent Examiner Mark A. Fadok's final rejection of 1-Click patent claims on the grounds of obviousness. On the bright side, patent clerks — unlike Bob Cratchit — get the day after Christmas off!"
Comment removed (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:More people should work on XMAS during these ti (Score:1, Interesting)
No.
Honestly. There are signs of a slight expression coming. World won't end. And we shouldn't give away our basic rights as employees (such as not having to work on Christmas) just because media tries to scare us shitless with the depression. If we give them up they will be really hard to get back five years from now when the depression is over. (And yes, atleast here in Finland this shows signs of becoming to resemble the depression of 1990-1993)
Honestly, few companies will weight the issue "We will either make them work on christmas or fire 1000 people". The economy isn't about such small rights lowering productivity.
I'm glad that IT is (as are all other areas of work) so strongly unionized here in Finland that companies won't be able to scare the people with "Give up your rights or we are less productive and will have to fire people" stick.
Bilski, anyone ? (Score:3, Interesting)
As far as I can tell this patent fails the Bilski test. It is neither tied to a particular apparatus or machine, nor does perform a unique transformation.
IANAL, but the test outlined in Bilski seems to make this patent NULL. Anyone can implement a one-click system on any machine connected to the internet.
The obviousness test is also valid in this case - at the time Amazon was pushing this through the USPTO... Well, my boss was handing me work from different clients that wanted a sign-in and one-click ordering system for their commerce sites. I had to tell him it was legally impossible each time.
So failing the "obviousness" test - it was a clearly obvious step to take. To both the people writing the code for commerce sites and to the people paying to have them written... And also seeming, to me (and I repeat - IANAL), failing the tests outlined in the Bilski case... Amazon can fight as much as they want, but this patent is a dud.
Re:What the law should really be doing (Score:5, Interesting)
There are certainly risks involved with letting people store your credit card number, but I don't think the government needs to babysit us quite that much. That said, there are some similar measures I would support:
1. Minimum standards for the secure storage of those numbers. The most obvious requirement, if one doesn't yet exist, being that they can't be stored clear-text. There should probably be requirements about where it can be stored (eg, not on laptops), who can access them, etc as well.
2. A law requiring that the storage of your CC number be optional, and even default off. Too many services simply don't let you tell them not to store the number if you want to use that service, and even those that do tend to store it until you remove it. I don't think the government should be making our decisions for us--it certainly is more convenient to check out if the number is stored--but they should do what they can to let us make those decisions for ourselves if we believe the rewards outweigh the risks.
...and probably more, though that's what comes immediately to mind.
Re:Obvious patent? Not back then. (Score:3, Interesting)
Um no it was not. People had been buying via Mail order for 200 years previous. Sears Roebuck were accepting checks and money by mail for over a century by then. and they were acceptng credit cards cince they existed.
Online buying was no different no innovative in any way. You're making the silly assumption that doing something normal "on the internet" is innovative.
It's not.
Re:Obvious patent? Not back then. (Score:3, Interesting)
If it's not obvious, why do children reinvent it every day?
Don't believe me? Go into a toy store and watch spoiled children. They'd point to a toy and say "I want that" and then say "I want that" and then say "I want that", etc, before their parents gather up their requests and go to the cashier.
The 1-click patent is not not only obvious, it has prior art in spoiled children. The key reason few people did online shopping before amazon is that http standards, and in particular encryption, wasn't common enough and up to the level that people would trust it. Also, people wanted to "see and feel" what they were buying. Amazon reviews and other Amazon features and trust in the technology made people feel it was "safe" to shop online.
Why Defend It? (Score:3, Interesting)
One wonders why Amazon bothers spending money on lawyers to defend a patent that's irrelevant now. All loss of the patent means is that competitors can create 1-click features on their sites, something that's far from a selling point in Amazon's favour now. Back in the day when ecommerce was the realm of pornographers, it was a slick feature to offer, but nowadays it would seem almost quaint to tout that as a reason to use one site over another.