IBM Patents Web Page Templates 420
jalefkowit writes: "More follies from the US Patent & Trademark Office ... now IBM has been awarded US Patent #6,304,886 for software that automatically "generates [a] customized Web site without the Web site creator writing any HTML or other programming code", based on "a plurality of pre-stored templates, comprising HTML formatting code, text, fields, and formulas" that are then customized through the process of asking the user a few questions. In other words, they've patented the ubiquitous wizards found in FrontPage and other newbie-oriented HTML editors. This was submitted to the USPTO on June 19, 1998 -- surely someone out there knows of prior art for this?"
Sorry IBM (Score:2, Funny)
David
Re:Sorry IBM (Score:5, Interesting)
I was in a patent meeting when we were discussing filling a bunch of patents so that we would have amunition to fire back should some company come and fire at usthe patents that they orginialy filed for the same reason.
The reason I don't like doing that sort of thing is that besides being essentially fraudulent the fact is that no company has prospered long on the basis of a patent portfolio alone. Polaroid and Xerox are two prime examples of the long term effect of management thinking they have a monopoly in their market.
Re:Sorry IBM (Score:3, Funny)
Re:Sorry IBM (Score:3, Informative)
IBM should really be a little more carefull about crap like this; it obviously alienates the open-source community that they are trying to be on good terms with.
Online Merchant (Score:3, Interesting)
a quick and dirty product that uses a Paradox database engine under Windows to generate a mass of perl scripts to auto generate a simple web store, complete with graphics, etc., which are then uploaded by the program to you site on a Unix server.
By Stumpworld Services, the owners of which have since sold the company and got out while the getting was good. It is now integrated with a hosting service [sfcommerce.com], which cuts out the hassle of mom and pop businesses trying to deal with clueless ISPs.
The date of the original software press release to market was July 15, 1998, and there was an extensive beta period before then.
I think there is enough prior art to have this covered.
Re:Sorry IBM (Score:3, Informative)
--
Evan
Re:Speaking of timewarps... (Score:2)
--
Evan
Re:Sorry IBM (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Sorry IBM (Score:3, Informative)
Sigh.
Why can't /. read patent claims? This patent [uspto.gov] (somewhat cleaner presentation of the text than the top link) has a whole bunch of claims, and it actually has a detailed descriptive listing as to what the program's supposed to do.
I reproduce the list here.
IOW, it's more than just single-page templates. This system is multi-user, it supports a web page approval structure, and it supports web SITE templates.
That is, the templates will generate a whole bunch of pages.
Re:Sorry IBM (Score:2, Interesting)
[yawn] Been there... (Score:3, Informative)
Word wizards + HTML save = HTML wizard (Score:2, Funny)
Re:Word wizards + HTML save = HTML wizard (Score:2)
<html><body>
insert lame-ass content here
</body></html>
Press Alt-F A, call it "foo.html," select "Plain Text (*.txt)" from "save as type," and press Enter. I'd say the ability to save HTML from Word predates HTML or the Web, let alone this patent.
Notepad is less cumbersome, though. :-)
(Insert more smileys for the humor-impaired if necessary.)
Re:Word wizards + HTML save = HTML wizard (Score:3, Funny)
I tmay be humour, but it's the only way to get decent HTML out of word...
Typical IBM (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Typical IBM (Score:3, Insightful)
If they can smack Microsoft around for making Frontpage, then I'm all for it. If I was IBM, I'd do it just to see MSFT squirm...
Re:Typical IBM (Score:2, Insightful)
Uh huh. That kind of thinking is how we ended up with the Taliban.
Re:Typical IBM (Score:3, Informative)
Like most designs, it is not the idea itself that matters so much, but how you implement it.
Re:Typical IBM (Score:2)
Scary thought, but doesn't MSFT have a habit of buying out the companies that make them squirm?
Re:Typical IBM (Score:3, Insightful)
If they can smack Microsoft around for making Frontpage, then I'm all for it. If I was IBM, I'd do it just to see MSFT squirm...
Of course, FrontPage existed, IIRC, in 1996 if not even earlier - which looks like solid prior art. I'm as much for smacking MS around as the next guy, but not without a legitimate reason. Bogus software patents, of course, with years of prior art, aren't exactly legitimate reasons.
Re:Typical IBM (Score:3, Insightful)
Realistically, I doubt IBM would even bother to enforce this patent. It would behoove them nothing.
Re:Typical IBM (Score:2)
Re:Typical IBM (Score:2, Insightful)
IBM isn't holy, these are the same people that want to put hardware copy control on your hard drive. Though at the same time, I doubt they did this on purpose. There's probably an idiot in some idiot somewhere in IBM who honestly thought this was a new thing.
Re:Typical IBM (Score:3, Insightful)
IBM is way too big to have everyone on the same page. Just because some over-proud techie asked legal to patent something doesn't mean the CEO looked over it and made a strategic decision.
Re:Typical IBM (Score:4, Troll)
If you own their stock, you have to love them. Their patents are very likely what kept IBM from disappearing in the mid- to late '80's. What you probably don't realize is that IBM has formalized the process of patenting just about everything their engineers do. So much so that they talk about their "Patent Factory" inside the company.
In 1982, IBM was generating less than $20 million a year in patent license revenue. Over the course of the next 10 years, they made a concerted effort to formalize their patenting process. The result is now an engine that flings off patents and licenses them to the tune of $1.7 billion per year, and that's 95% cash.
IBM has mastered the art of manipulating the industry via patents. Their standard tactic has been to quietly file a patent, publicly discuss the technology through their technology journals, generate a huge adoption for this seemingly public technology, then 3 years later drop the granted patent on the rest of the industry. Sun, Intel, and others work directly from IBM's playbook now, too.
In an increasingly competitive landscape, IBM has simply become very good at working the process that the government has put in place to protect intellectual property. If you don't like their business practices, don't buy their stock or their products. If you don't like the way the Patent and Trademark Office works, talk to your Congressman.
But don't bitch out IBM for working the system. They have a fiduciary responsibility to maximize shareholder value. That they wring it out of competitors to the tune of $1.7 billion a year is a credit to their foresight and the lack of initiative on the part of their competitors. It's not that they're smarter than everyone else. It's just that most people don't play the game well. And if you don't like the game, you can either stop playing or get someone to change the rules. The current rules don't say that IBM has to be nice to people who aren't smart enough to create their own patent portfolio.
And finally, for those who think that patents are evil or somehow inappropriate for software, processes, and "obvious" inventions, consider this. There is a 100% direct correlation to a country's GDP, the strength of its intellectual property protections, and the number of patents filed by its citizens. If you want to rot in some Third World hovel while you and your buddy take turns pedaling the generator that powers your '386 laptop while you tweak the latest kernel hacks, then see what happens if you overturn the US system for protecting innovation. In the meantime, the rest of us will enjoy the fruits of an economy created by companies that work and a government that protects their work.
Prior Art (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:Prior Art (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Prior Art (Score:2)
or emacs....
//rdj
Re:Prior Art (Score:5, Interesting)
There's your prior art, and it's from Microsoft no less.
Re:Prior Art (Score:5, Interesting)
Tyler, Denise. Laura Lemay's Web Workshop: Microsoft FrontPage 97. Sams, Macmillan Computer Publishing. ISBN 1575212234, published Jan. 17, 1997. .COPYRGT.1997. Introduction, Chapters 3 and 5.*
Re:Prior Art (Score:3, Funny)
How about whatever system of "plurality of templates" the USPTO web site was using prior to mid-1998?
Re:Prior Art: 1995 (Score:5, Interesting)
Visual tools make modifications as simple as dragging-and-dropping.
...
- Drag-and-drop hyperlink editing
Desktop publishing features create professional-looking results.
...
- Hide HTML code with WYSIWYG editor
- Create "hotspots" on images with clickable image editor
- Add interactive forms with just a few mouse clicks
WebBots (tm) eliminate programming tasks while Web Wizards guide you through the creation process.
Built in WebBots let you:
...
- Create bulletin boards for threaded discussion groups
- Save information from fields automatically
Web Wizards simplify the development of:
- External Web sites
- Internal Web sites for corporate information distribution
Select from over twenty page templates or create your own.
So is this prior art or what?
My templates (Score:2, Insightful)
-foxxz
in other news... (Score:2, Offtopic)
Film at 11:00
Re:in other news... (Score:3, Offtopic)
Prior art, right here! (Score:4, Troll)
A friend of mine (Nathan Anderson) wrote something that I believe is quite like this, and posted it right here to slashdot, a number of years ago. Here is the article [slashdot.org]. Judge for yourself. When he sees this he'll probably post something about it as well. Does this count as prior art?
Prior art ... (Score:3, Interesting)
"customized Web site without the Web site creator writing any HTML or other programming code", based on "a plurality of pre-stored templates"
In 1996 I wrote JavaScript that would give a different action based on browser detection. This did require "programming."
I recently wrote a content manangement system (1999) and e-commerce site, the creator does no programming. Steuben.com [steuben.com].
Same workaround: different browsers see different-looking page (CSS or simplified version for IE 3.0, which cannot deliver different colored links on the same page). Similar effects for other features, pop-up windows etc. Also different menu actions. Many done with included page fragments ("templates").
Perhaps a lawyer would say I am the creator, although the tools were handed over to non-techies, they loaded all the images, content and products and now run the site.
Another answer is browser detection sending to a Flash or vanilla html site. Which are "templates."
Am I missing the point?
uhhhhhhhh (Score:4, Insightful)
wouldn't this cover any program that has a "save as HTML" option?? That lets you create HTML without typing any HTML codes, and somewhere in the guts of the program are some HTML templates, right?
Can you imagine.... (Score:2, Funny)
:-P
Re:Can you imagine.... (Score:2)
;P
Re:Can you imagine.... (Score:2)
A modest suggestion (Score:5, Interesting)
Simple... (Score:5, Insightful)
People should stop complaining when organisations do what they are designed to do - namely make money (in the Patent Office's case, this means granting as many patents as possible). Don't bitch about the RIAA when they push for freedom-curtailing laws - THEY DON'T CARE - their job is to protect the interests of those who pay their salaries. Don't bitch when a for-profit corporation exploits dumb laws to increase their profit margins - THEY ARE DESIGNED TO DO THAT.
Instead, bitch about the stupid laws which allow and encourage them to do this, and the customers who keep them in business (of course, very few of IBM's customers are likely to take a stand on this issue - but IBM does seem to care quite a bit about its reputation among the Open Source community these days).
Profit Motive as Justification (Score:5, Informative)
Every time a story about a company doing something irresponsible or evil gets posted on Slashdot, somebody invariably makes this argument. "Don't blame them! They're just trying to make a profit!" Apparently the idea is that anyone who's trying to make money is exempt from any moral responsibility whatsoever. I've never heard a good explanation for why this is supposed to be true. In fact I've never heard any explanation for it; some people just assume that the profit motive is enough to justify any misdeed, as long it stops short of breaking an actual law.
Abusing the system by filing frivolous patents is wrong. Yes, there should be a law against it, but the fact that there isn't doesn't mean that the people who do it shouldn't be criticized.
TheFrood
Re:Profit Motive as Justification (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Profit Motive as Justification (Score:4, Insightful)
You missed Sanity's point: They don't care about their moral responsibility.
Besides, "moral responsibility" is a vague and relative term. What you consider immoral, I may consider ingenious. Does that mean I'm wrong? You think so. Does that mean you're wrong? I think so. Where does that get us?
The question is, should businesses use "moral responsibily" or laws as a code of conduct. "moral responsibility" doesn't work since its open to wide interpretation, everyone would have a different set of rules and the game would be unfair. Laws are a lot more concrete and make a better set of rules.
The point is, arguing that businesses should follow a moral code is useless. They don't and can't.
Re:Profit Motive as Justification (Score:4, Insightful)
The patent office is not designed to make money (Score:3, Informative)
"Congress shall have power
Federal patent laws have existed since 1790. The first United States Patent Act, that of 1790 was a short act of seven sections only entitled "An act to promote the Progress of Useful Arts". Under its terms any two of the Secretary of State, the Secretary of War and the Attorney General were empowered to grant patents for terms of up to fourteen years for inventions that were "sufficiently useful and important" provided that the grantee submitted a specification describing the invention (and where appropriate a model thereof) to the Secretary of State at the time of the grant.
In 1793 this act was repealed and replaced by a slightly longer act, the drafting of which is largely attributed to Thomas Jefferson, who was at the time Secretary of State and therefore intimately involved in the administration of the 1790 Act. The Act is notable for its definition of what constitute patentable subject matter in the United States, which definition is almost unchanged up to now:
"any new and useful art, machine, manufacture or composition of matter and any new and useful improvement on any art, machine, manufacture or composition of matter."
In the same year the Supreme Court in Grant v. Raymond made it clear that failure to provide an adequate description of the invention was a ground under which a defendant might use when sued for patent infringement, it being held that
"as a preliminary to a patent a correct specification and description of the thing discovered (was required). This is necessary in order to give the public, after the privilege shall expire, the advantage for which the privilege is allowed and is the foundation of the power to issue the patent
A major review of the law was undertaken in 1836 in response to complaints about the grant of patents for things that lacked novelty. Under this revision the Patent Office was set up as part of the State Department and a specification had to be submitted to it and be examined for novelty before a patent would be granted. As a consequence of this provision of the 1793 Act requiring the inventor to distinguish his invention from the prior art was expanded upon to require the applicant to "particular specify and point out the part, improvement or combination, which he claims as his own invention or discovery".
Nowhere in there do I see anything about being designed to make money.
What I do see is that the Patent Office was set up to ENSURE sufficient novelty in those items submitted for patenting. If it fails in this IT IS FAILING IN THE ONE THING IT WAS DESIGNED TO DO!
Re:Simple... (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:A modest suggestion (Score:2)
And let's not even get into the copyright issue. Under American law, any monopoly which leverages intellectual property to preserve their monopoly has their work turned over to the public domain.
Anybody else have a solid reference?
Re:A modest suggestion (Score:2)
Sadly, it has already spread to Europe - we ARE fighting but there are already thousands of software patents in Europe :(
I see it every day (Score:2, Interesting)
Based on the (Score:5, Informative)
Having worked with content management systems in both PHP and ColdFusion using a WebBrowser and a VB client for managing the content.
The chances your specific interface emulate completely IBMs described interface are little to none.
Before I rise up to say how evil IBM is I will say this. Patents are an eventuality. It is like a nuclear arms race, if you don't patent it someone else will, and then they can use it against you or at least hold it over you.
Is this new, unique, exciting, or worth a patent? No probably not. It seems from their description to be little more than a super-duper WYSIWYAG (What you see is what you almost get) type site builder. WIth IBMs drive to do ecommerce this definitely fits with thier overall marketing and business plans.. This would obviously be for the low - medium end of the ecommerce spectrum
THe system also defines a system of content approval and rights of some sort
All in all I have designed systems this in depth or more. The systems may do similar things but the means of doing it are invariably almost completely different. (Of course my system focuses on already having a site and allowing an administrator to build the site without the overhead of really thinking up the design aspect at all.. just manage the content)
Again, this is just an incremental evolution.
Jeremy
Re:Based on the (Score:4, Insightful)
What? That's what prior art is for! If you don't patent it no one else can, because you have prior art.
Interning at IBM (Score:5, Informative)
We were constantly reminded that IBM was the corporate leader of patents (whoo hooo! How about getting my damned stock price up again!) and that meetings like this were common.
I found it to be pathetic.
Re:Interning at IBM (Score:2)
Re:Interning at IBM (Score:3, Interesting)
Indeed, it's one of the reasons I finally quit IBM. They even acknowledged that the crap only had to be "patentable, not rocket science." And that it "doesn't even matter if the patents stick, nobody challenges them anyway. Just as long as our stack is higher than theirs." This kind of egregious abuse of the patent system just made me sick, so I will no longer contribute to their portfolio. I wonder how much creative talent they're missing out on for the same reason?
ARgh (Score:2)
Yet more prior art (Score:2)
This is getting out of hand (Score:2)
Someone really, really needs to get a clue over at the old patent office. This and so very many other idiotic patents have slipped through the US patent office in the last few years.
There's TONS of prior art on this. I worked on a product for Proxicom in 1997 that let you fill out a fancy wizardy thing that built websites from your web browser.
Everyone has mentioned FrontPage97, etc, etc, etc. This really is criminal -- when you do a patent search, you're supposed to DO A PATENT SEARCH, which also includes A SEARCH FOR PRIOR ART.
And the patent office should ALSO DO A PRIOR ART SEARCH. What the hell?
-nate
Let's resume the patent system for a normal person (Score:2)
Of course this means, those who might actually BENEFIT from the system for a just cause cannot access it (well depending on your cashflow as a startup for example , you have that great idea, you get 100K$ seed money to develop a simple prototype application/device so you can demonstrate your idea and get even more financing... will you use 5 to 10% of that budget for a PATENT (which will bring even more fees in the process) or will you concentrate on the project itself? Yep.. you guessed it right, and as soon as you go for your round of financing and approach people with money, funny how those NDAs mean nothing for them (since anyways, you won't be able to sue them) and if you get thru all of that crap, normally you get bought out for a fraction of what you could have made, because probably the investors will tell you if you don't comply with their rules they'll invest in that X company that can pull out the same thing and even better (and drive you out of buisness) etc etc, so probably you lose control over your project (51% shares not to you), and if you're really unlucky, the appointed CEO is a jerk and makes the whole thing goes down... if it works and becomes a success, notice you probably not even have 1% of the company with the dillution and all the maths applied after. (still, 1% of 100M$ is not too bad if you get there
Of course with SOFTWARE it can be a bit more positive, but for let's say, some cool hardware application, or innovative invention, it's another story.
This is almost depressing. heh...
AT&T sues IBM!! (Score:2, Funny)
#include, found in the C language's preprocessor, was invented in the early 1970's by Brian Kernighan and Dennis Ritchie. "The #include directive is really a very innovative invention", said John Law, director of language sales at AT&T. "The technology landscape just wouldn't be the same without it".
Representatives from IBM were unavailable for comment, but were heard muttering something about how they "can't stand it when someone beats us to it".
Web-based content management tools? (Score:2, Interesting)
(I tried reading the claims of the patent to see if this is true, but got lost in legalese. The patent has 24 claims, and I'm assuming each of those claims must be violated in order to be considered patent infringement.)
FYI:Yahoo 1997 patent for dynamic pages (Score:2)
Not sure how this conflicts/contrasts with the IBM patent.
The Best Reason to Not Patent (Score:2)
RP
Some Prior Art (Score:2)
My old company released software in '96... (Score:2, Informative)
What can be done? (Score:5, Insightful)
What, other than making sarcastic comments about 1-click shopping, can actually be done to effect change on how patents are granted?
Who's e-mailbox should we all slam with requests for reasonable IPR laws?
Anyone?
-Rothfuss
Re:What can be done? (Score:2, Interesting)
Be like McSpotlight - do the research and force the main offenders into a public forum like a court.
Re:What can be done? (Score:4, Informative)
Here's what it's going to take (Pick 2).
1. Corporate backing (i.e. money. Find a company recently badly burned by patents to back up legislature)
2. Sacking people at the patent office. For what it's worth, the patent office is more of a product registration entity than an idealistic "never-seen-that-before" museum of greats. Hell, even I have a patent!
3. Changing the whole business of patents. Puttng hundreds of lawyers out of business.
4. Changing the view of product development and competition.
You see, sometime in the past, the patent office got spanked for the light bulb and the computer, and the transistor, others too. Whenever the patent office stuck by its guns, seems that they always got in trouble. Then in the 50s or 60s the people decided that the patent office was holding back innovation.. that they needed to move faster. So they gave them minimum patent creations. The effect was to expand the patent office to not only store the great ideas of the world, but to become a registry of products and service methods.
Lots of companies were looking to build new products based on old designs, but figured that they couldn't protect the product for a long enought time to make money off it.
The goverment saw a chance to fill in this practice with "lowering the bar" so to say for patents.
Whether you think this is bad or good depends mostly on which end of the stick you're on.
Getting a patent isn't that hard.. honestly. It just takes money, good lawyers, and a long time.
Getting a GREAT patent is. Because chances are that there are atleast one other patent that resemble yours at least in context.
Here's the stickler.. if you improve the patent office then open source will suffer... Why? Because companies will start enforcing their patents.
I can't imagine how much of the linux kernel/os/gtk/qt has patents associated already. I remember reading security patents in 89 from apple and sun that are SURELY broken by openssh. I'm sure there's alot of patents on GUI's, on cacheing, on scheduling, on file formats. But it's BECAUSE of lackluster patents that companies don't go after linux. Why? Because they're afraid of that other company that might have a simular patent going after them.
So the only way to really do it is to kill software patents, right? No.. then you'll see companies and universities going the "trade secret" route. Free Code could disappear like turkey on thanksgiving.
I think the real answer lies in improving the quality of patents. Raising the bar a bit, but not being too idealistic. To do this, the patent office should HIRE PEOPLE WITH A REAL SOFTWARE BACKGROUND. Most of them, I hear, are lawyers. (That's who they deal with, right?)
In other words, get the industry to pay for a comprehensive database like biomedical does. Allow people to "publish" in a journal to document prior art. This, and a good combination of standards committees will keep the playing field level, IMHO.
Anyhow, IBM has every right to get a patent on this.. you would too. Spending a few million bucks on development, only to get dragged into court later is NO FUN. Better to patent some basic novel method.
There's lots of patent holding companies who get their jollies off calling IBM and telling them their infringing on their patent.
Pan
Netscape Gold? (Score:3, Informative)
Given the length of time it takes to work a patent through the system, I'm sure we're going to have many more years of foolishness like this ahead.
So what? Patents are not just attack tools. (Score:3, Insightful)
Patents exist.
There are two things that patents do:
One is a sword, one is a shield.
If IBM doesn't use the patent as a sword, then who should care? Nobody. If they start charging royalties for those who "infringe," if they start trying to attack other companies who have since done the same obvious thing, then you can sound the alarms of righteous indignation.
Until then, STFU. Please.
Because the patent office is screwed up (Score:5, Insightful)
What if it wasn't IBM that got this patent, but somebody who would use it more like a sword? What if IBM in ten years changes their policy and starts to use patents for attacking? What if IBM indeed intends to use it as a weapon against somebody?
I think most of the aggression here was pointed against the patent office and not IBM in particular. The patent system has just become one big machinery who's main goal seems to be to sustain itself and all the lawyers working with patent issues. It simply doesn't protect and promote innovation anymore the way it was meant to, at least not in the fields of software and business models.
????????/ (Score:3, Interesting)
The birth of computers obviated the USE of computers to automate tasks that previously would have been done manually or with another device. Thus any use of a computer to automatically do anything that would have previously been done by hand or with another tool is obvious. This also applies recursively. In other words, any use of a computer to automate the operations of a computer to do work that would have previously been done through manual usage of a computer is also obvious.
This one simple, OBVIOUS rule would strike down just about every software patent in existence, and only grant software patents that were truly deserving. I can't think of a truly deserving software patent off the top of my head, but methinks the posibility COULD exist.
Either way. Why all the drama,
since when is this new? (Score:2)
I wrote several versions of this program for different companies, none of which (to my knowledge) managed to survive the dot-bomb. But I know for a fact that my idea wasn't an original one; several other sites were doing the same thing. I visited these sites to see what they did so that I could 'one-up' them with my own program and improve on what they had to offer.
So unless I've got the wrong take on IBM's patent *I* can prove prior art. I might even have the programs backed up somewhere in storage. But there are others that can prove prior art to *my* claim as well.
How can IBM expect to enforce this claim? This wasn't something new and innovative at the time the patent was submitted.
Max
RTFP, or, the claim's the thing . . . (Score:5, Informative)
Look to the patent claim, which governs the scope of the patent grant. Understand that the meaning of that claim may depend upon many other things. And be cool -- most patents are much narrower than they seem to a lay reader.
Re:RTFP, or, the claim's the thing . . . (Score:3, Insightful)
True, but I've read this one, and it is general enough to cover just about every Content Management System [cmswatch.com].
Only one thing left to do... (Score:2, Funny)
Re:Only one thing left to do... (Score:2)
Patents at Amazon.com made it sucky (Score:2, Informative)
We were told not to talk about the "one click" patent AT ALL. So people would write "I'm not talking about it", etc, on elevator whiteboards.
It was a sad joke. And oh yes.. The whiteboards went away as the layoffs came.
It's for browser-specific pages. (Score:2)
Prior Art: Homestead.com (Score:2, Informative)
Coincidince?
IBM, Come get me you skanky bastards (Score:5, Funny)
int main (int argc, char** argv) {
char buff[100];
printf ("Please enter in your web text: ");
scanf ("%s", buff);
printf ("Your web page: <HTML><BODY><b>%s</b></BODY></HTML>\n", buff);
}
Re:IBM, Come get me you skanky bastards (Score:2)
take((* with) grain, of->salt);
Re:IBM, Come get me you skanky bastards (Score:3, Funny)
Tsk, it's the mandatory backdoor for the NSA to use to ensure that the system that the binary resides on isn't being used by baby raping file sharing anthrax snorting terrorist monsters.
Re:IBM, Come get me you skanky bastards (Score:2)
Nando.net had this in 1994 (Score:3, Interesting)
I seriously doubt that they still use the same system, though.
This might be a flight of fancy, but.. (Score:4, Insightful)
After all, we've often discussed on this very site the notion of patenting everything we think of, as a community, as a hedge against the multinationals!
Big Blue could very well be on our side here. God knows.. given all of the support they've supplied, and how severely entrenched we are so far, pissing us off NOW would be a Bad Business Move(tm) on their part. They have everything to lose, and very little to gain if they actually think this patent is truly enforceable.
I vote a Benefit of the Doubt for IBM.
Who's with me?
PATENT: "A Mini Play" by Nathdot (Score:2, Funny)
MICROSOFT: "Well I patent HTML"
IBM: "Well I patent the whole internet."
MICROSOFT: "Well I patent all the computers."
IBM: "Well I patent YOU!"
MICROSOFT: "Well I patent you times one thousand"
IBM: "I patent you times one million"
MICROSOFT: "I patent you times infinity. No returnsy, personal jinx, sucks to be you!!!"
*SMACK!*
MICROSOFT: "MOM!... IBM hit me!"
MOM (aka US Supreme Court): "Stop your whining! I thought I told you: 'No more patenting after you stole Java from your baby brother'."
:)
Questionable? (Score:2, Insightful)
this patent? After all, the preferences allow you to customize the html presented to
you without the need to actually write any html on your own -- it asks you questions
about how you want it to be presented, and you get what you ask for. How long has this
system been in effect? Can any
Who needs prior art? (Score:2)
Open Source? Yeah, Right (Score:2)
We can't be pissed that they applied for the patent and still say that they're better than most companies in the computer biz, cause you can't have both. If Microsoft were to release a few open source apps, would that make them an open source friendly copnany? Make no mistake: IBM is a corporation too (a big one at that) and will do whatever it can to increase shareholder value, even if that means switching strategies whenever its convenient.
Prior art? Think 1992-1993 (Score:2, Interesting)
Looked on sunsite.unc.edu/pub/Linux/apps/www/converters for old code. (sunsite's been a linux host since '93 at least - or at least that's how long I've been using it
t2htmll.tgz - Aug 29 1997
webtex-0.96.tar.gz - May 29 1997
info2www-1.2a.tar.gz - Mar 2 1997
What this suggests to me is there's a lot of prior art. I'm using sunsite as an example as it's dating is fairly accurate btw.
Check perhaps postgresql95, MySQL, NCSA HTTPD-1.0 (perhaps), and maybe even original Netscape server and Netscape composer - circa '95 IIRC.
But I think the best connection is TeX/LaTeX WWW formatters which probably first came into existance in '92-93 when the physicists developed WWW. After all TeX is fairly common for documentation under unix...
How to earn money from finding prior art (really) (Score:2, Informative)
(It may be argued that the patent issuing process is broken beyond repair, but even if so, a viable alternative has yet to emerge.)
Disclaimer: I have no interest in the above site other than a registered user.
Student Software (Score:3, Informative)
Our client wanted to be able to post reports that were output from the software to the web. Our head programmer put a very rudimentary web template system in place that would output reports with choices of sort order, gawd-aweful background colors (from a 16 color palett), and customized headings and footers. This was all done without the user having to know any HTML. You can see samples here [bsu.edu] dating back to 1997.
The About SCORE [bsu.edu] page even references automated HTML authorship. From the page:
SCORE (Scheduling Classes with Order Reliability and Efficiency) is an application developed by a group of Computer Science students enrolled in the Software Engineering sequence at Ball State University. SCORE is an application that is a flexible scheduling advisor for use by faculty involved in the creation of course offerings by a department. SCORE has features which allow for powerful schedule reporting, class conflict catching and reporting, persistent and consistent data retieval and automated HTML authorship of documents for Internet/Intranet display.
Though ugly, I think these qualify as prior art and beat IBM's 1998 application.
Re:Is there a patent for the wheel? (Score:2, Informative)
Exactly (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:ABOUT: Box (Score:2)
Re:But will IBM enforce this? (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Patented Dirt (Score:4, Funny)