Amazon Scores Gift-Delivery Patent 91
theodp writes "In May, the USPTO rejected Amazon.com's patent claims (PDF) for its Method and System for Placing a Purchase Order Via a Communications Network (a 1-Click spin-off). At the time, a USPTO Examiner cited Bilski, explaining that elements of CEO Jeff Bezos' gift-delivery invention 'may be performed largely within the human mind,' coming to essentially the same conclusion a NY Post reporter arrived at in 2002. But Amazon's attorneys have worked their legal wordsmithing magic (PDF), convincing the USPTO that 'obtaining delivery information for a gift from one or more information sources other than the gift giver and recipient' is indeed novel and patentable. A Notice of Allowance for the patent was mailed to Amazon on November 17th, just in time for Holiday Season injunction-giving!"
Re:Should Patents be done away with? (Score:4, Interesting)
Greed, it strikes me, is one of the great moral questions of our time (considering how it has brought to the world economy into its worst position in 80 years). Exploiting a broken patent system to gain ludicrous patents to use to stifle competition is as much a cause and/or symptom of the insane push for profit regardless of cost or merit. I doubt very much that anyone thought patents would simply become one vast extortion racket.
Re:Patentable? (Score:3, Interesting)
"the thing IS, in fact, obvious *specifically* because it isn't novel"
So I'll repeat my question: if that's so, why isn't anyone doing it? There may be a legitimate answer to this, but I notice that instead of offering one to further the discussion, you've opted to repeat the asswertion that prompted the question in more aggressive terms. That suggests to me that you probably don't have an answer.
"Your "objective, healthy skepticism" is not warranted in the field of patents... they've been too thoroughly abused for far too long (and Amazon is one of the very worst abusers, mind you) to go tiptoeing around wondering if maybe our backlash is a tad too judgemental. YOU go read the patent and scratch your head. The rest of us see that the house is on fire."
I'm curious to meet this "the rest of us" you think you speak for.
Well, "the house is on fire" could accurately describe many innser cities. People get robbed, murdered, etc. This abuse has been going on far too long (and the poor are among the worst abusers, mind you). So following your logic, should the court system do away with the "objective, healthy skepticism" that leads us to presume any given defendent guilty (at least when the defendent is poor and from the inner city)?
If you want to call waiting to hear the facts and arguments "tiptoeing around", so be it. You certainly can choose to see the house on fire and react by throwing more fuel if you really think that's gonig to help.