11 replies to this topic

[humaneasy]

This may be old news or no news but I decided to pass the word :oops:

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San Diego Company Owns E-Commerce

Kernel Panic writes Looks like you can now be sued for using graphical and textural content on your e-commerce site. As everyone who has an e-commerce site does.

A company in San Diego was granted one patent for using graphics and text to sell things on the web and another for accepting information to conduct automatic financial transactions via a telephone line & video screen.

They have started their crusade with smaller companies that do not have the financial resources to fight back so as to build a "war chest" to take on larger companies like Ebay and Amazon. One site has taken the offense after becoming one of the first defendants of 50 companies so far.

Curiously it appears the company was formed in March of 2002, less than a month before filing for the first lawsuit.

in http://slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=02/10/23/197234

8) Lopo

[veverkap]

From http://www.youmaybenext.com/ikb/cgi-bin/ik...T;f=2;t=2;st=10

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The letter from Divine is vague. I suspect it is carefully designed that way so they can feel out each of their marks and extort whatever each one may be able to afford. Here is the text of the letter from Divine:

October 22, 2002

Via Overnight Courier
Chief Executive Officer
(company name)
(company address)

Re: Notice of Patent Infringement

Dear Madam or Sir:

divine, inc. ("divine") owns a patent portfolio consisting of over thirty U.S. patents and an even greater number of foreign patents. In addition, divine has nearly one hundred patents pending. Several e-commerce patents are included in divine's portfolio, including those that had been issued to Open Market, Inc., a company acquired by divine on October 19, 2001.

The information and functionality contained on the website of (web site URL) indicates to us that your company is infringing on one or more of divine's patents, for example, U.S. Patent Nos. 5,715,314 and 5,909,492. These patents and their potency have been recognized in numerous articles, such as those enclosed herewith.

If you are interested in obtaining a license under these patents, please contact me. If you are not interested in obtaining a license, please confirm that your company has terminated its infringing activities and contact me so that we can discuss how to amicably redress the infringing activities that have occurred to date.

Regardless of whether or not you want to obtain a license to the patents, we require a response to this letter within seven days or we will assume you do not want to amicably resolve this matter.

I look forward to hearing from you.

Very truly yours,

Richard E. Nawracaj
Assistant General Council
divine, inc.

[veverkap]

http://www.youmaybenext.com/ikb/cgi-bin/ik...act=ST;f=2;t=26

This is the funniest, though. The United States Patent Office is actually using e-commerce themselves. And one of the members there surmises:

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We may muse about the PTO office's use of e-commerce, but we really have a strong point here. There are several possibilities.

1. Assuming that the PTO hasn't licensed the technology from PanIP, we can infer that in the opinion of the PTO, PanIP's patent does not cover what PanIP claims, a typical e-commerce site. It seems that this would represent a disqualification of PanIPs case. While it doesn't prevent PanIP from pursuing the issue legally, having the ultimate authority on patents in the country through their actions deny the validity of PanIPs claimed scope of their patents should strongly hurt their case in court.

-or-

2. In the highly unlikely case that the PTO actually has licensed the use of the technology, and unless very specific measures by the licensor have been taken to avoid it, the licensing by the PTO, which is a branch of the government, results in that the People of the United States has acquired the license to use it. The result of this, of course, would be that the technology has been placed in the public domain.

3. Again assuming that PTO hasn't licensed the technology, and PanIP does nothing to prevent their (the PTO's) continued use of it, one could argue that this amounts to allowing the PTO to use it. In essence, this is a license. Based on this, it would be worth arguing that by allowing the PTO to use it, they are allowing the People of the United States to use it. In other words, another approach for the argument about public domain.

Hmm.

[SinisterX]

hmm another violation for Microsoft! Microsoft's online store is next! like Microsoft copied Apple in making a GUI interface. Microsoft those pirates

[dreamscape]

only in America would something like this happen... only in America (and I can say that being an American my entire life)

[zzfritz]

For what it is worth, the coined term "e-commerce" is considered sufficiently generic that the US trademark office requires it to be disclaimed in any application to register a mark containing it. The form of such a disclaimer is "NO CLAIM IS MADE TO THE EXCLUSIVE RIGHT TO USE "E-COMMERCE" APART FROM THE MARK AS SHOWN"

One example of a registered mark in which the application contains such a disclaimer is "SPRINT E-COMMERCE SOLUTIONS" (Reg. No. 2538071, Feb. 12, 2002). So, this registered mark is infringed only by a mark confusingly similar to the whole phrase.

No one owns exclusive rights in words or phrases which are the generic names for things. That is an important and reasonable principle deeply embedded in trademark law.

[humaneasy]

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No one owns exclusive rights in words or phrases which are the generic names for things. That is an important and reasonable principle deeply embedded in trademark law.

Sorry to say but you should have red my post very fast and you didn't realize the subject I was talking.

It's NOT a case of Trade Mark in the way of using it in a name... Read it again, please.

Best,


Lopo

[zzfritz]

Lopo, I know the topic well. That's why my post began "For what it's worth" -- to point out one little positive thing in this topic: at least PanIP and divine, inc. have not claimed ownership of the term "e-commerce".

Since I am a lawyer (don't frown), lawsuits don't frighten me as much. I am staying alert to these evil scammers, and waiting for the opportunity to roast them properly. If they ever sue an osC site, they should find that the open source community responds with the full force of all its members.

We should be vigilant, but we should not be paralyzed by fear of these meritless lawsuits. When there is a bully, you stand up to him and teach him a lesson. We are not powerless, right is on our side. And at least one very aggressive attorney ...

[humaneasy]

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Lopo, I know the topic well. That's why my post began "For what it's worth" -- to point out one little positive thing in this topic: at least PanIP and divine, inc. have not claimed ownership of the term "e-commerce".

Yeah! I did what I claim you did: red without attention your post

I saw my mistake latter on but... the phone rang and then I never remember again to correct my mistake. Sorry :-)

Best,


:cool: Lopo

[timbeckham]

For a broader view of the situation with the patent office, check this out:

http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-pate...ome%2Dheadlines

[cxm322]

Sorry guys. What I get from this is that no one can leaglly use an e-commerce site using They claim that if you use graphical and textual information on a video screen for purposes of making a sale, then you are infringing on their patent. How silly.

I think it is a waste of time to give it attention or worry about it.

Perhaps I am wrong :roll:

But aI will keep selling and not give it any attention. After all, it is just the attention these people want and to give it to them is just silly. Can you imagine the traffic http://www.youmaybenext.com/ must be getting? Soon, you will see an add on their site. Sorry, no offense to http://www.youmaybenext.com/ and its owners.

Just get osc, buils a site, and keep selling. Forget about this nonsense. There ia money to be made out there

Nevertheless, an anteresting thread, I guess.

[derek02]

I'm with Carlo on this one. Just stick with your original plan and don't worry about it. There are so many "legal crooks" in this world it makes no sense to let them bully us. Perhaps they will receive a dose of their own medicine such as a class action lawsuit from all owners of ecommerce sites. Maybe someone should start a crusade against this company to make them shut their trap.
Derek Cox