Microsoft Sues Salesforce.com Over Patents 243
WrongSizeGlass writes "CNET is reporting that Microsoft is suing Salesforce.com in Seattle federal court, claiming it infringes on nine patents. Two of the patents in question are a 'system and method for providing and displaying a Web page having an embedded menu' and a 'method and system for stacking toolbars in a computer display.'" Microsoft says it first notified Salesforce more than a year ago about the alleged infringement.
If you cant beat them...your Microsoft. (Score:5, Funny)
The're just pissed that SalesForce is using FireFox in all there screen shots.
Rage inducing (Score:5, Funny)
I consider myself a pretty calm person. I don't get riled up about much. I've never been one to throw a game controller, to punch a pillow to vent frustration. I see stupid things and I don't like them, I talk about how stupid they are, but that's as far as it goes. I'm about as easy going as they come.
And yet every time I see a story about the activities supported by the US Patent and Trade Office, I want to lift the nearest piece of electronics and dash it against a distant wall.
Re:Rage inducing (Score:1, Funny)
And yet every time I see a story about the activities supported by the US Patent and Trade Office, I want to lift the nearest piece of electronics and dash it against a distant wall.
Wow, your keyboard can really take a pounding and still work great... which brand?
Patent Armageddon? (Score:4, Funny)
First Apple turns patent troll on HTC, now it's MSFT's turn? I thought these two were kinda well behaved and used patents only as a defensive measure, guess I was wrong.
Re:Rage inducing (Score:2, Funny)
When the world ends, the only thing left will be cockroaches scurrying across Model Ms.
Wait, Seattle? Not Texas? (Score:3, Funny)
Guess I better go register to vote so I can hopefully get jury duty for this. lol
Hahaha I've got them (Score:2, Funny)
Microsoft is screwed.
I have a patent (#666666) on applying basic logic and common sense, with a smattering of visual composition intuition, to any problem at hand.
You've been punk'd
Re:Leader AND innovator? (Score:5, Funny)
Microsoft, like most other companies, has indeed had it's share of "innovation", popular opinion not withstanding.
It's easy to find things that are "kind of like" a new invention, that can be said for every single product in existence. It's just fun to do it for Microsoft.
Can you name a single software invention by anyone else that was truly unique? Anyone? Bueler? I guarantee anything you name can find something that is "kind of like" something else. That's how invention works, and that's why patents always have a list of references to other patents which the new patent draws upon. Unfortunately, you can't list things that aren't previously patented.
A short list of things which Microsoft has innovated (off the top of my head, without even googling) in would include (whether you like the ideas or not)
The Ribbon
Photosynth
COM (originally OLE)
Internet Explorer Protected Mode
If you google around, you find lots of tongue in cheek and sarcastic comments, and comments like yours that say point blank that microsoft has never innovated anything. It's certainly true they've bought a lot of their technology, but not all of it and even when you consider technology they bought, they've often improved it with their own new technology (IE Protected Mode, for instance).
Also, Microsoft certainly has their share of bad technology they've implemented. ActiveX, for instance. Whether it's a good idea or not, it's still a novel idea (no, plug-ins weren't novel, but auto-installing them, and creating a generic model that could be used by more than just web browsers was).
So in reality, comments like your really are just hyperbole. It's simply not true that Microsoft has never created anything novel. Hell, Clippy anyone?
No you haven't (Score:3, Funny)
Nope. No way have Microsoft ever applied common sense. You'll never make money from that patent.
Re:If you cant beat them...your Microsoft. (Score:3, Funny)
Re:What's the angle? (Score:3, Funny)
Re:Leader AND innovator? (Score:3, Funny)
You show a fundamental lack of knowledge of what you're actually talking about. Assistants weren't simply animated ways to access help text, they could actually analyze what you're doing and supply recommendations. That was innovative. Annoying, but innovative.
What part of "Whether you like the idea or not" don't you understand? You or anyone else liking the idea has no bearing on its novelty.
You don't do your argument any justice by making fallacial comments like this.
The star had document embedding, but it wasn't live document embedding. You couldn't edit documents in place, and you couldn't update the document elsewhere and have it be updated in the embedded document.
Don't confuse "Someone once did something kind of like that" with lack of novelty. It's not just the base concept, it's the entire concept.
That's interesting, sicne I can find no reference to any word processor called Spellbound... And the only reference to a spell checker is the firefox extension, which certainly did not come out 8 years before Word 95.
I'm also suspect of your IBM reference, given that you seem to conflate way too many concepts to believe your arguments. Do you have a reference?
Re:If you cant beat them...your Microsoft. (Score:2, Funny)
Fragment (Consider Reversing)
- Brought to you by the kind people at Microsoft. While you're here let me tell you about our CRM offerings.
Re:Leader AND innovator? (Score:3, Funny)
Yes, I did use google. It's very obscure and there exist very few relative links even when adding "sector software" to the search criteria. and it turns out, it was just a TSR like all those others. This is not the same thing.
You glossed over the "it does more than you claim it does" part. You're using a ridiculous argument, and not coincidentally, it's the same argument most people who criticize software patents use.. focusing on a tiny portion of functionality and ignoring the rest.
The ribbon doesn't merely hide toolbars that are not useful in a given context. Hell, Word did that going back years. The ribbon is entirely context driven, it builds the toolbars dynamically given the current context. It does live previews of how clicking on buttons will affect your document just by hovering over it, just to name a few of it's features.
By the way, care to explain how Microsoft could have claimed that Windows 95 was the first 32 bit PC operating system when Microsoft themselves had created Windows NT (a 32 bit PC operating system) several years earlier?
I think you're still making things up, and attributing them to Microsoft to "prove" your point.
I might stop believing marketing hype if the hype you claim i'm believing actually existed.