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I looked at the USPTO's Public PAIR system (https://portal.uspto.gov/pair/PublicPair https://portal.uspto.gov/pair/PublicPair) and this patent was rejected mult

I looked at the USPTO's Public PAIR system (https://portal.uspto.gov/pair/PublicPair https://portal.uspto.gov/pair/PublicPair) and this patent was rejected multiple times before finally being accepted. (Non-final rejection 6/7/2016, final rejection 2/21/2017, non-final rejection 1/3/2018, final rejection 1/7/2019, patent issued 7/16/2019.) Seriously patent office? You should have paid attention to your 4 previous rejections instead of giving in to Facebook's lawyers and persistence. If you see a patent in the application pipeline that you know is bogus (obvious or prior art), you can do a preissuance submission: https://www.uspto.gov/patent/initiatives/third-party-preissuance-submissions https://www.uspto.gov/patent/initiatives/third-party-preissu... I challenged a patent application and it was rejected. Now, I can't say if the patent examiner already knew that the patent was both obvious and had prior art, or if my application informed him of that, but it was rejected.

vallismortis 7y ago
Not such a bad thing. Each rejection results in a narrowing of the scope and claims of the patent. The resulting claims that are granted will be far narrower than scope of the original specification.
- foobiekr 7y ago
  it's actually worth looking at the claims just as an exercise. they are incredibly narrow, there must have been many objections here.
  - kabdib 7y ago
    Hint: Just read the claims. Skip right to them, and ignore everything else. The claims are effectively the legal part, the pretty pictures and verbiage that usually precede them are essentially useless (and sometimes have little to do with what is being claimed).
    - NoodleIncident 7y ago
      > 1. A method comprising: receiving a comment from a posting user of a social networking system, the comment posted on a page within the social networking system; determining, by a processor, that the comment includes proscribed content; and responsive to the determination: identifying users of the social networking system who are connected to the posting user in the social networking system with a specified connection type, wherein the specified connection type is a one-to-one friend connection; determining, by the processor, a social networking system audience for the comment without input from the posting user, the processor determining the social networking system audience before providing the comment for display; and displaying the comment to the audience by: formatting the page including the comment to the posting user, and formatting the page not including the comment to users of the social networking system accessing the page who are not connected to the posting user with the specified connection type. This sounds like it's not exactly shadow banning; your direct friends can still see your comment. I'm vaguely aware that they have special comment sections on "public" pages, articles, etc, that filter the giant thread down to stuff your friends actually wrote. I'm guessing that at some point, if you were banned from the page/etc, then your friends also couldn't see what you wrote. If that's true, then this is a little nicer to the banned user than a shadowban.
      - Zak 7y ago
        > * I'm guessing that at some point, if you were banned from the page/etc, then your friends also couldn't see what you wrote. If that's true, then this is a little nicer to the banned user than a shadowban.* More importantly, it's more effective because it's less likely to be detected. It still shouldn't be patentable because there's prior art involving a bunch of systems with various forms of audience selection such that how to implement this specific set of audience selection rules is obvious to most software developers. Patents cover how, not what, and they do not cover inventions whose implementation is obvious to most experts in the field.
        kabdib 7y ago
        > and they do not cover inventions whose implementation is obvious to most experts in the field This is (ahem) patently not true; there are plenty of patents whose implementation is incredibly obvious. Insultingly obvious. As in, "Did that company try to patent string comparison?" Look up the "standard network byte order" patent, for instance. It's now expired and was never enforced. The friend-of-a-friend who got that patent was heard to exclaim "I can't believe they gave that patent to me!", which should tell you a lot about the quality of the patent industry then -- IMHO it hasn't changed for the better.
- derefr 7y ago
  You're talking about a non-final rejection (where some, but not all, claims are rejected), which is helpful, yes. In Facebook's case, though—see above—there were two final rejections. A final rejection happens when all the claims are invalidated, so your submission is now vacuous.
  - patentatt 7y ago
    No. A rejection on any claim can be made final after it’s gone through two “rounds,” i.e., the attorney has argued it twice (more or less). Most non-final rejections also address all the claims. There isn’t really a difference in degree or “finality” between a “non-final” and “final” rejection, despite the name! Just pay a fee for a continuation and you can argue your final rejection again.
    - AaronFriel 7y ago
      Seems like the USPTO could use a patent for implementing exponential backoff and double the fee every time it comes back.
      - pfisch 7y ago
        The fee would have to increase exponentially, and that still probably wouldn't work.
        lugg 7y ago
        You know double is exponential right?
        lugg 7y ago
        Ugh no need to downvote him, just wanted to make sure his mental model was in check. Exponential growth is a life skill a lot of the population lacks.
        cryptonector 7y ago
dctoedt 7y ago
To quote the legendary Judge Learned Hand from nearly a century ago (on a different but analogous subject): "Courts have descanted upon the abuse again and again, but the antlike persistency of [patent] solicitors has overcome, and I suppose will continue to overcome, the patience of [Patent Office] examiners, and there is apparently always but one outcome." Lyon v. Boh, 1 F. 2d 48, 50 (S.D.N.Y. 1926), https://scholar.google.com/scholar_case?case=9696597566965196877 https://scholar.google.com/scholar_case?case=969659756696519...
- IIAOPSW 7y ago
  Learned Hand writes epic prose.
  - gumby 7y ago
    He's definitely somebody who's done an amazing job and is being recognized more and more, but his output dropped dramatically years ago and frankly it's been a while since he's had anything useful to say.
    - IIAOPSW 7y ago
      I was going for a double meaning. Literally a learned person's hand writes epic prose. But also the person named "Learned Hand" writes epic prose.
- phnofive 7y ago
  descant: to discuss at length
  - throwaway3627 7y ago
    Prolix Garrulify Enucleate Perorate Expatiate
    - Fjolsvith 7y ago
      Such a wasteful existence. To create brief and unremarkable identities and experience rejection of expression.
dctoedt 7y ago
Was there a 101 "abstract idea" rejection? EDIT: Evidently not, judging by a quick glance at the Office actions rejecting the claims.
- vallismortis 7y ago
  Look in Public Pair for the Office Actions. The 101 will usually be the first objection raised if it applied. There are many ways to overcome these, even in a Final Rejection, by narrowing the claims or revising the specification (however, the latter resets the priority date).
- dboreham 7y ago
  Oh but this is "on a computer"...
patentatt 7y ago
The fact that there were several rejections before allowance is entirely, 100% mundane and normal. This is how patent prosecution works.
- readams 7y ago
  Yes this happens on essentially every patent a you start absurdly broad and winnow the scope in response to the rejections.
deleted 7y ago
[deleted]
dragonsh 7y ago
It's good that Europe and most of the world, except USA, does not support software patents. No need to spend countless hours in defending against frivolous patents. It's like Amazon's single click buy patent, hopefully will be struck down in future like the former.
- partiallypro 7y ago
  Isn't that patent expired as of recently?
  - dragonsh 7y ago
    Yes it did but it lost earlier. But still wasted a lot of resources which could have gone in something of real value to nature or humanity. https://www.researchgate.net/publication/220290418_Amazon's_One-Click_Patent_Loses_Its_Teeth_Micro_Law https://www.researchgate.net/publication/220290418_Amazon's_...
    - fastball 7y ago
      But still wasted a lot of resources which could have gone in something of real value to nature or humanity That's arguably 90% of law in hindsight. The problem is that humans aren't psychic, and without the legal system we have a hard time getting along.
      - RugnirViking 7y ago
        I'm genuinely unconvinced that we would be worse off with a reduction or removal of patents' scope over much of modern monopolising in many industries. Sure, it's difficult to know with any certainty that changing the law wouldn't have bad knock-on effects, but what is clear to see is that the implimentation as it currently stands allows for some flagrant abuses.
- rjmunro 7y ago
  "Software patents" are not allowed in Europe, but in practise you just have to call them "computer implemented inventions", and write them in legalese nonsense that is even less readable than a pure software patent would be, avoiding mentioning any keyword known in the fields of computer science or software engineering. More detail: https://fsfe.org/campaigns/swpat/swpat.en.html https://fsfe.org/campaigns/swpat/swpat.en.html The law should be something like just manipulating the electronic state on an otherwise non-infringing machine is never an infringement. You have to actually connect it to new hardware.
mcthrowaway123z 7y ago
Why don't they just charge a $1,000,000 filing fee for a patent? Anything worth less seems hardly worth the trouble to society.
- wyxuan 7y ago
  Yeah but there are so many patents needed for the most mundane aspects of products. Plus it's prohibitively expensive for individual people who invent
  - quadrangle 7y ago
    Patents aren't needed for people to invent things.
    - colejohnson66 7y ago
      No. But they allow the little guy to take on the big guy for stealing their invention. Look at Robert Kearns[0]. He invented the intermittent windshield wiper and demoed it to the “Big Three.” They then took his idea and implemented it themselves. So he sued them and won. Maybe removing patents would spur innovation, but what then do you do when you’re the little guy? [0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Kearns https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Kearns
      - quadrangle 7y ago
        Without patents, the little guy can actually do innovative stuff with all the technology we're surrounded with. Patents are primarily used by the big players to maintain their power. Inequities in wealth and power are serious problems. Patents are a horrible method to deal with them though. If you set out to have a goal of supporting little-guy innovators, we'd do best to institute things like UBI and universal health care. That whole windshield wiper story isn't too far from patent-trolling situations. Big companies get sued all the time by "inventors" who got patents on things that the companies would have come up with on their own anyway. The overall net effect of patents is harm for the public interest.

vallismortis 7y ago

Not such a bad thing. Each rejection results in a narrowing of the scope and claims of the patent. The resulting claims that are granted will be far narrower than scope of the original specification.

foobiekr 7y ago
it's actually worth looking at the claims just as an exercise. they are incredibly narrow, there must have been many objections here.
- kabdib 7y ago
  Hint: Just read the claims. Skip right to them, and ignore everything else. The claims are effectively the legal part, the pretty pictures and verbiage that usually precede them are essentially useless (and sometimes have little to do with what is being claimed).
  - NoodleIncident 7y ago
    > 1. A method comprising: receiving a comment from a posting user of a social networking system, the comment posted on a page within the social networking system; determining, by a processor, that the comment includes proscribed content; and responsive to the determination: identifying users of the social networking system who are connected to the posting user in the social networking system with a specified connection type, wherein the specified connection type is a one-to-one friend connection; determining, by the processor, a social networking system audience for the comment without input from the posting user, the processor determining the social networking system audience before providing the comment for display; and displaying the comment to the audience by: formatting the page including the comment to the posting user, and formatting the page not including the comment to users of the social networking system accessing the page who are not connected to the posting user with the specified connection type. This sounds like it's not exactly shadow banning; your direct friends can still see your comment. I'm vaguely aware that they have special comment sections on "public" pages, articles, etc, that filter the giant thread down to stuff your friends actually wrote. I'm guessing that at some point, if you were banned from the page/etc, then your friends also couldn't see what you wrote. If that's true, then this is a little nicer to the banned user than a shadowban.
    - Zak 7y ago
      > * I'm guessing that at some point, if you were banned from the page/etc, then your friends also couldn't see what you wrote. If that's true, then this is a little nicer to the banned user than a shadowban.* More importantly, it's more effective because it's less likely to be detected. It still shouldn't be patentable because there's prior art involving a bunch of systems with various forms of audience selection such that how to implement this specific set of audience selection rules is obvious to most software developers. Patents cover how, not what, and they do not cover inventions whose implementation is obvious to most experts in the field.
      - kabdib 7y ago
        > and they do not cover inventions whose implementation is obvious to most experts in the field This is (ahem) patently not true; there are plenty of patents whose implementation is incredibly obvious. Insultingly obvious. As in, "Did that company try to patent string comparison?" Look up the "standard network byte order" patent, for instance. It's now expired and was never enforced. The friend-of-a-friend who got that patent was heard to exclaim "I can't believe they gave that patent to me!", which should tell you a lot about the quality of the patent industry then -- IMHO it hasn't changed for the better.
derefr 7y ago
You're talking about a non-final rejection (where some, but not all, claims are rejected), which is helpful, yes. In Facebook's case, though—see above—there were two final rejections. A final rejection happens when all the claims are invalidated, so your submission is now vacuous.
- patentatt 7y ago
  No. A rejection on any claim can be made final after it’s gone through two “rounds,” i.e., the attorney has argued it twice (more or less). Most non-final rejections also address all the claims. There isn’t really a difference in degree or “finality” between a “non-final” and “final” rejection, despite the name! Just pay a fee for a continuation and you can argue your final rejection again.
  - AaronFriel 7y ago
    Seems like the USPTO could use a patent for implementing exponential backoff and double the fee every time it comes back.
    - pfisch 7y ago
      The fee would have to increase exponentially, and that still probably wouldn't work.
      - lugg 7y ago
        You know double is exponential right?
        lugg 7y ago
        Ugh no need to downvote him, just wanted to make sure his mental model was in check. Exponential growth is a life skill a lot of the population lacks.
      - cryptonector 7y ago

dctoedt 7y ago

To quote the legendary Judge Learned Hand from nearly a century ago (on a different but analogous subject): "Courts have descanted upon the abuse again and again, but the antlike persistency of [patent] solicitors has overcome, and I suppose will continue to overcome, the patience of [Patent Office] examiners, and there is apparently always but one outcome." Lyon v. Boh, 1 F. 2d 48, 50 (S.D.N.Y. 1926), https://scholar.google.com/scholar_case?case=9696597566965196877 https://scholar.google.com/scholar_case?case=969659756696519...

IIAOPSW 7y ago
Learned Hand writes epic prose.
- gumby 7y ago
  He's definitely somebody who's done an amazing job and is being recognized more and more, but his output dropped dramatically years ago and frankly it's been a while since he's had anything useful to say.
  - IIAOPSW 7y ago
    I was going for a double meaning. Literally a learned person's hand writes epic prose. But also the person named "Learned Hand" writes epic prose.
phnofive 7y ago
descant: to discuss at length
- throwaway3627 7y ago
  Prolix Garrulify Enucleate Perorate Expatiate
  - Fjolsvith 7y ago
    Such a wasteful existence. To create brief and unremarkable identities and experience rejection of expression.

dctoedt 7y ago

Was there a 101 "abstract idea" rejection? EDIT: Evidently not, judging by a quick glance at the Office actions rejecting the claims.

vallismortis 7y ago
Look in Public Pair for the Office Actions. The 101 will usually be the first objection raised if it applied. There are many ways to overcome these, even in a Final Rejection, by narrowing the claims or revising the specification (however, the latter resets the priority date).
dboreham 7y ago
Oh but this is "on a computer"...

patentatt 7y ago

The fact that there were several rejections before allowance is entirely, 100% mundane and normal. This is how patent prosecution works.

readams 7y ago
Yes this happens on essentially every patent a you start absurdly broad and winnow the scope in response to the rejections.

deleted 7y ago

[deleted]

dragonsh 7y ago

It's good that Europe and most of the world, except USA, does not support software patents. No need to spend countless hours in defending against frivolous patents. It's like Amazon's single click buy patent, hopefully will be struck down in future like the former.

partiallypro 7y ago
Isn't that patent expired as of recently?
- dragonsh 7y ago
  Yes it did but it lost earlier. But still wasted a lot of resources which could have gone in something of real value to nature or humanity. https://www.researchgate.net/publication/220290418_Amazon's_One-Click_Patent_Loses_Its_Teeth_Micro_Law https://www.researchgate.net/publication/220290418_Amazon's_...
  - fastball 7y ago
    But still wasted a lot of resources which could have gone in something of real value to nature or humanity That's arguably 90% of law in hindsight. The problem is that humans aren't psychic, and without the legal system we have a hard time getting along.
    - RugnirViking 7y ago
      I'm genuinely unconvinced that we would be worse off with a reduction or removal of patents' scope over much of modern monopolising in many industries. Sure, it's difficult to know with any certainty that changing the law wouldn't have bad knock-on effects, but what is clear to see is that the implimentation as it currently stands allows for some flagrant abuses.
rjmunro 7y ago
"Software patents" are not allowed in Europe, but in practise you just have to call them "computer implemented inventions", and write them in legalese nonsense that is even less readable than a pure software patent would be, avoiding mentioning any keyword known in the fields of computer science or software engineering. More detail: https://fsfe.org/campaigns/swpat/swpat.en.html https://fsfe.org/campaigns/swpat/swpat.en.html The law should be something like just manipulating the electronic state on an otherwise non-infringing machine is never an infringement. You have to actually connect it to new hardware.

mcthrowaway123z 7y ago

Why don't they just charge a $1,000,000 filing fee for a patent? Anything worth less seems hardly worth the trouble to society.

wyxuan 7y ago
Yeah but there are so many patents needed for the most mundane aspects of products. Plus it's prohibitively expensive for individual people who invent
- quadrangle 7y ago
  Patents aren't needed for people to invent things.
  - colejohnson66 7y ago
    No. But they allow the little guy to take on the big guy for stealing their invention. Look at Robert Kearns[0]. He invented the intermittent windshield wiper and demoed it to the “Big Three.” They then took his idea and implemented it themselves. So he sued them and won. Maybe removing patents would spur innovation, but what then do you do when you’re the little guy? [0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Kearns https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Kearns
    - quadrangle 7y ago
      Without patents, the little guy can actually do innovative stuff with all the technology we're surrounded with. Patents are primarily used by the big players to maintain their power. Inequities in wealth and power are serious problems. Patents are a horrible method to deal with them though. If you set out to have a goal of supporting little-guy innovators, we'd do best to institute things like UBI and universal health care. That whole windshield wiper story isn't too far from patent-trolling situations. Big companies get sued all the time by "inventors" who got patents on things that the companies would have come up with on their own anyway. The overall net effect of patents is harm for the public interest.