Have
you ever driven your cat crazy with a laser pointer? It seems like such
innocent fun to make Fluffy dance around the room chasing the red light.
In reality, you were infringing on U.S. Patent #5443036. That’s
right—the U.S. Patent office actually issued a patent for this method of
feline fun.
The
recent approval of a patent for “affiliate marketing” given to
Amazon.com only continues to fan the fires at the U.S. Patent Office.
Amazon.com
decided that it would be a good idea to patent its “1-Click” buying
method—certainly not an obvious idea—and then decided that it would be
an even better idea to patent their “affiliate program.” The affiliate
program rewards people for referrals—certainly this has never been done
in business before!
Believe
it or not, all of Amazon.com’s business method patents caused quite a
stir. A Web site was even constructed to urge everyone to boycott
Amazon.com. http://www.noamazon.com. Publisher Tim O’Reilly published an open
letter to Jeff Bezos, even though Amazon.com is a main distribution
channel for O’Reilly. To Amazon.com’s credit, Mr. Bezos replied and a
number of conversations followed, resulting in Mr. Bezos himself calling
on the patent office to change its ways.
On
March 29, 2000 the U.S. Patent office announced that it is changing the
review practice for Internet related patents. A second review will now be
required and a more intensive search for prior art will be conducted. They
would like everyone to know that this is not
in response to the recent scuttle caused over the issuance of patents to
Amazon.com. They thought this one up all by themselves.
It
seems that two reviews are not the answer to the problems with the patent
office. Instead, perhaps a big dose of common sense would do the trick. .
. or does someone hold the patent on thinking?
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