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The Patent Office considers everything patentable. Last month they issued a patent on literally calling up two pharmacies to pick the one that offered your drug

The Patent Office considers everything patentable. Last month they issued a patent on literally calling up two pharmacies to pick the one that offered your drug cheaper. They even fast tracked that application and didn't ask a single follow up question about it.

dpe82 12y ago
I hadn't heard of that one and can't find anything about it. Do you have a source?
- WildUtah 12y ago
  Patent: http://www.google.com/patents/US8712797 http://www.google.com/patents/US8712797 Discussion: http://patentlyo.com/patent/2014/05/business-method-patent.html http://patentlyo.com/patent/2014/05/business-method-patent.h...
axman6 12y ago
Urgh, no, they don't. If you're ignorant about an issue, you should ask questions, not speak authoritatively about it. And yes, you are clearly ignorant about the issue. I'd guess you would also believe "Amazon just got a patent for taking a photo of something in front of a white background", right?
- Natsu 12y ago
  If you mean this [1], then they convinced the USPTO that their process for taking pictures with a white background and making it look good (F-stops, ISO settings, etc.) was patentable. And of course, the patent says "It should be emphasized that the above-described embodiments of the present disclosure are merely possible examples of implementations set forth for a clear understanding of the principles of the disclosure." Because you could, of course, use other F-stops, ISO settings, etc. That would be really obvious. The whole set it up with good settings a normal photographer might use? That's the original part. This reminds me of Apple's design patent on a design where "rounded corners" were basically the only feature anyone could name that was similar to Samsung's. So technically they didn't patent rounded corners... they just accused Samsung in court of infringing it with a phone where that was the primary similarity. This is all part of a big game where patent lawyers find meaningless "limitations" like this to distinguish themselves from the prior art to the USPTO, then come back to the federal courts and demonstrate just how meaningless they are as they assert what might as well be as bad a patent as is the popular understanding. [1] http://patft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?Sect1=PTO2&Sect2=HITOFF&p=1&u=%2Fnetahtml%2FPTO%2Fsearch-adv.htm&r=1&f=G&l=50&d=PALL&S1=08676045&OS=PN/08676045&RS=PN/08676045 http://patft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?Sect1=PTO2&Sect2=H...
  - axman6 12y ago
    I don't think I could agree with you less. The Amazon patent claims are EXTREMELY narrow and specific; any deviation from what's claimed (changing F-stop, ISO, number of lights, etc.) is not within the scope of the claim and is therefore not patented and free to be used. You emphasised that making such changes would be obvious, and yes, I agree, but that's irrelevant unless someone tries to patent a similar process with some of those changes made. "It should be emphasized that the above-described embodiments of the present disclosure are merely possible examples of implementations set forth for a clear understanding of the principles of the disclosure." Please read the above link about how to read a patent. That has absolutely no baring on the scope the pqatent covers. It's just there to cover the lawyer's arse when the examiner tries to say "Your claims don't match your examples so it's not [reasonably based on the description]#". Examples are necessary in a patent application, but should not be used to limit the scope of the actual invention defined by the claims if all the information to produce all embodiments of the invention would be reasonable ascertained from the description. Again, why on earth bring up the Apple DESIGN patent? They are practically unrelated topics. It's like saying a Nissan GT-R is a shitty car because you don't like the Tiida (hmm, does that geolocate me too much?). just because they both have patent in the name does not mean that one is related to the other. # I'm not sure what the US term here is, in most of the world it's "fully supported by the description"
    - easytiger 12y ago
      You may be right and can argue all you want. It is utterly meaningless in the real world sadly. What you are saying is how the patent system should work, but cannot. You are leaving out the human factors that ruin it. All it takes is someone to sue you for use of your novel use of an existing idea and you are dead in the water despite it being valid. Most small companies let alone open source communities have no legal resource to defend themselves even if they are demonstrably in the right. This is all precisely why it shouldn't not be possible to patent minor abstract symbolic expressions of basic human problem solving. It's like suing a child for learning how to walk for having a patent on walking. Simultaneous invention is normal and healthy.
    - Natsu 12y ago
- pgeorgi 12y ago
  I'd propose a more constructive reply next time. For example a reply that links to http://www.danshapiro.com/blog/2010/09/how-to-read-a-patent-in-60-second/ http://www.danshapiro.com/blog/2010/09/how-to-read-a-patent-... There's no need to be rude (and being right typically doesn't excuse it)
  - axman6 12y ago
    I believe that should be called out when they're outright lying as the commenter I was replying to clearly was (though probably doesn't know it). I've tried being more "constructive" in the past, and it never does any good; people like remaining ignorant so they can feel indignant
    - ThrowMeFar 12y ago
      You can't lie if you don't know it, lying has a purpose component.

dpe82 12y ago

I hadn't heard of that one and can't find anything about it. Do you have a source?

WildUtah 12y ago
Patent: http://www.google.com/patents/US8712797 http://www.google.com/patents/US8712797 Discussion: http://patentlyo.com/patent/2014/05/business-method-patent.html http://patentlyo.com/patent/2014/05/business-method-patent.h...

axman6 12y ago

Urgh, no, they don't. If you're ignorant about an issue, you should ask questions, not speak authoritatively about it. And yes, you are clearly ignorant about the issue. I'd guess you would also believe "Amazon just got a patent for taking a photo of something in front of a white background", right?

Natsu 12y ago
If you mean this [1], then they convinced the USPTO that their process for taking pictures with a white background and making it look good (F-stops, ISO settings, etc.) was patentable. And of course, the patent says "It should be emphasized that the above-described embodiments of the present disclosure are merely possible examples of implementations set forth for a clear understanding of the principles of the disclosure." Because you could, of course, use other F-stops, ISO settings, etc. That would be really obvious. The whole set it up with good settings a normal photographer might use? That's the original part. This reminds me of Apple's design patent on a design where "rounded corners" were basically the only feature anyone could name that was similar to Samsung's. So technically they didn't patent rounded corners... they just accused Samsung in court of infringing it with a phone where that was the primary similarity. This is all part of a big game where patent lawyers find meaningless "limitations" like this to distinguish themselves from the prior art to the USPTO, then come back to the federal courts and demonstrate just how meaningless they are as they assert what might as well be as bad a patent as is the popular understanding. [1] http://patft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?Sect1=PTO2&Sect2=HITOFF&p=1&u=%2Fnetahtml%2FPTO%2Fsearch-adv.htm&r=1&f=G&l=50&d=PALL&S1=08676045&OS=PN/08676045&RS=PN/08676045 http://patft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?Sect1=PTO2&Sect2=H...
- axman6 12y ago
  I don't think I could agree with you less. The Amazon patent claims are EXTREMELY narrow and specific; any deviation from what's claimed (changing F-stop, ISO, number of lights, etc.) is not within the scope of the claim and is therefore not patented and free to be used. You emphasised that making such changes would be obvious, and yes, I agree, but that's irrelevant unless someone tries to patent a similar process with some of those changes made. "It should be emphasized that the above-described embodiments of the present disclosure are merely possible examples of implementations set forth for a clear understanding of the principles of the disclosure." Please read the above link about how to read a patent. That has absolutely no baring on the scope the pqatent covers. It's just there to cover the lawyer's arse when the examiner tries to say "Your claims don't match your examples so it's not [reasonably based on the description]#". Examples are necessary in a patent application, but should not be used to limit the scope of the actual invention defined by the claims if all the information to produce all embodiments of the invention would be reasonable ascertained from the description. Again, why on earth bring up the Apple DESIGN patent? They are practically unrelated topics. It's like saying a Nissan GT-R is a shitty car because you don't like the Tiida (hmm, does that geolocate me too much?). just because they both have patent in the name does not mean that one is related to the other. # I'm not sure what the US term here is, in most of the world it's "fully supported by the description"
  - easytiger 12y ago
    You may be right and can argue all you want. It is utterly meaningless in the real world sadly. What you are saying is how the patent system should work, but cannot. You are leaving out the human factors that ruin it. All it takes is someone to sue you for use of your novel use of an existing idea and you are dead in the water despite it being valid. Most small companies let alone open source communities have no legal resource to defend themselves even if they are demonstrably in the right. This is all precisely why it shouldn't not be possible to patent minor abstract symbolic expressions of basic human problem solving. It's like suing a child for learning how to walk for having a patent on walking. Simultaneous invention is normal and healthy.
  - Natsu 12y ago
pgeorgi 12y ago
I'd propose a more constructive reply next time. For example a reply that links to http://www.danshapiro.com/blog/2010/09/how-to-read-a-patent-in-60-second/ http://www.danshapiro.com/blog/2010/09/how-to-read-a-patent-... There's no need to be rude (and being right typically doesn't excuse it)
- axman6 12y ago
  I believe that should be called out when they're outright lying as the commenter I was replying to clearly was (though probably doesn't know it). I've tried being more "constructive" in the past, and it never does any good; people like remaining ignorant so they can feel indignant
  - ThrowMeFar 12y ago
    You can't lie if you don't know it, lying has a purpose component.