Zordak - Slashdot User

Submission + - Pro bono Lawyer Fights C&D With Humor (gawker.com)

Submitted by Zordak on Thursday June 20, 2013 @07:51PM

Zordak writes: When Jake Freivald received a questionable Cease and Desist letter from a big-firm attorney, demanding that he immediately relinquish rights to his website http://westorage.info, his pro-bono lawyer decided to treat the letter like the joke that it was. In a three-page missive, the lawyer points out the legal, constitutional, and ethical problems with the letter that led him to conclude that the letter was a joke. He concludes, in a postscript, with an unsubstantiated demand for $28,000 in overpaid property taxes, and offers to lease the city the domain name "westorange.gov" in exchange.

Submission + - New Bill Would Require Patent Trolls to Pay Defendants' Attorneys (law360.com)

Submitted by

Zordak

on Thursday February 28, 2013 @11:24AM

Zordak writes: "According to Law 360, H.R. 845, the "Saving High-Tech Innovators from Egregious Legal Disputes" (SHIELD) Act of 2013 would require non-practicing entities that lose in patent litigation to pay the full legal costs of accused infringers. The new bill would define a "non-practicing entity" as a plaintiff that is neither the original inventor or assignee of a patent, and that has not made its own "substantial investment in exploiting the patent." The bill is designed to particularly have a chilling effect on "shotgun" litigation tactics by NPEs, in which they sue numerous defendants on a patent with only a vague case for infringement. Notably, once a party is deemed to be an NPE early in the litigation, they will be required to post a bond to cover the defendants' litigation costs before going forward."

Submission + - Micron Lands Broad "Slide to Unlock" Patent (patentlyo.com)

Submitted by Zordak on Thursday January 31, 2013 @12:20PM

Zordak writes: Micron has recently landed U.S. Patent 8,352,745, which claims priority back to a February 2000 application---well before Apple's 2004 slide-to-unlock application. While claim construction is a highly technical art, the claims here are (for once) almost as broad as they sound, and may cover the bulk of touch screen smart phones on the market today. Dennis Crouch's Patently-O has a discussion.

Submission + - Patent Attorneys Sued for Copyright Infringement (patentlyo.com)

Submitted by

Zordak

on Saturday March 03, 2012 @07:55PM

Zordak writes: "Patent blogger Dennis Crouch writes on Patently-O of a catch 22 for attorneys. Patent attorneys (I am one, but not yours, obviously) are required to submit all prior art that they know of to the patent office. Failing to do so is an ethical violation, and can result in a patent being invalidated. But now the Hoboken Publishing Company and the American Institute of Physics are suing a major patent firm for copyright infringement, because they submit articles to the patent office without paying a separate royalty."

Submission + - Amazon 1-Click Patent Survives Almost Unscathed (patentlyo.com)

Submitted by Zordak on Wednesday March 10, 2010 @03:42PM

Zordak writes: Amazon's infamous "1-click" patent has been in reexamination at the USPTO for almost four years. Patently-O now reports that "the USPTO confirmed the patentability of original claims 6-10 and amended claims 1-5 and 11-26. The approved-of amendment adds the seeming trivial limitation that the one-click system operates as part of a 'shopping cart model.' Thus, to infringe the new version of the patent, an eCommerce retailer must use a shopping cart model (presumably non-1-click) alongside of the 1-click version. Because most retail eCommerce sites still use the shopping cart model, the added limitation appears to have no practical impact on the patent scope."

Submission + - Federal Appeals Court Tosses Spam Patent (patentlyo.com)

Submitted by Zordak on Thursday December 03, 2009 @11:31AM

Zordak writes: Dennis Crouch's Patently-O is running a news item about U.S. patent 6,631,400, which has claims drawn to a method of making sure enough people get your spam. A federal district court had overturned the patent as anticipated, obvious, and not drawn to patentable subject matter. The Federal Circuit, the appeals court which hears patent matters, upheld the finding of obviousness, thus invalidating the patent.

Submission + - Replacing Metal Detectors with Brain Scans (cnn.com)

Submitted by

Zordak

on Tuesday December 02, 2008 @12:58PM

Zordak writes: "CNN is running a story about several Israeli firms that want to replace metal detectors at the airport with biometric readings. For example, with funding from TSA and DHS "WeCU ([creepily] pronounced "We See You") Technologies, employs a combination of infra-red technology, remote sensors and imagers, and flashing of subliminal images, such as a photo of Osama bin Laden. Developers say the combination of these technologies can detect a person's reaction to certain stimuli by reading body temperature, heart rate and respiration — signals a terrorist unwittingly emits before he plans to commit an attack." Sensors may be embedded in the carpet, seats, and check-in screens. The stated goal is to read a passenger's "intention" in a manner that is "more fair, more effective and less expensive" than traditional profiling. But not to worry! WeCU's CEO says, "We don't want you to feel that you are being interrogated." And you may get through security in 20 to 30 seconds."

Submission + - Federal Circuit Limits Business Method Patents (uscourts.gov)

Submitted by

Zordak

on Thursday October 30, 2008 @11:49AM

Zordak writes: "The Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit has just issued its much-anticipated opinion in In Re Bilski. This was a re-visit of the State Street issue of what constitutes patentable subject matter (including whether software and business methods are patentable). In summary, the court has affirmed and strengthened the "machine-or-transformation" test, upholding the patent office's rejection of claims on a method to hedging risk in the field of commodities trading. Although the court refused to categorically exclude software patents, it is likely that the reasoning of this decision will be used to reject many software patents (note that some of the dissenting judges would have completely overturned State Street and tossed out all software and business method patents). Although not as sweeping as some had hoped for, it is certain that this decision, along with the Supreme Court's KSR decision last year, will lay a difficult mine field for those who want to patent software and business methods."

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