:-( Samsung, Research In Motion Sued For Making It Easy To Use Emoticons
from the thus,-infringing-a-patent dept
All the way back in 2001, we wrote about how the brilliant satirists at Despair Inc. successfully trademarked :-( and announced that they planned to sue 7 million internet users for violating the trademark. The actual announcement was pretty funny -- even though not everyone got the joke. In 2006, we also had a story that mentioned a whole bunch of patents and patent applications related to emoticons.It appears that one of those is now being used in a lawsuit against Samsung and RIM for having the gall to create a button that makes it easy to pick an emoticon without typing it in. The patent in question (US Patent 7,167,731) really is for having a button that lets you pick emoticons. How this is possibly patentable is beyond me. But, for some reason, examiner Lee Nguyen thought it was somehow non-obvious. The patent was originally assigned to Wildseed, a mobile accessories firm that AOL bought in 2005. The patent itself then went to Varia Mobil, who moved it to Varia Holdings to Varia and back to Varia Holdings. It's Varia Holdings bringing the lawsuit. Varia appears to just be a trolling operation (of course).
It's fairly stunning that anyone considered this a valid patent at any point. That it's now being used as the basis for a lawsuit should (once again) raise significant questions about the USPTO's approval process for patents.
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Filed Under: emoticons, patents, software patents
Companies: rim, samsung, varia
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Re:
Part of it will be seizing the computer you used and all the area around it. Shame on you for stealing my original idea that no one would have ever thought of had it not been for me.
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Re:
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Re: Re:
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If using a laser pointer to tease a cat is non-obvious, then why should we be surprised when anything else is found non-obvious?
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Re:
Also, I did not type this on a Windows machine that uses both carriage return and line feed to represent new lines and are both entered when pressing the "Enter" key. That is a violation of this patent, obviously, and my use of that vile, patent infringing OS would be aiding and abetting the enemy.
Also, EVER!
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patent examiner Lee Nguyen
Especially since this was filed after examiners were allowed to use Google and a cursory search should have led patent examiner Lee Nguyen to realize that sending many more characters than keypresses happened every time patent examiner Lee Nguyen used the "paste" function on patent examiner Lee Nguyen's computer.
Attn: patent examiner Lee Nguyen
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Re: patent examiner Lee Nguyen
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And that is how you get a patent for an obvious device. In this case a piece of double sided velcro wrapped in a circle.
Oddly the cat loves this more then any of the other toys. Go figure.
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Re: one click
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Re:
These patent wars are like a Mexican standoff where somebody was actually stupid enough to fire first. Now everybody is suing everybody else, and the only ones innovating are the lawyers with their "I'm gettin' richer by da moment" dance routines.
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Can I patent patent trolling?
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Re: Can I patent patent trolling?
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Re: Can I patent patent trolling?
And why is that? Because the guys at the USPTO are morons or greedy bastards who wave anything through just to make a dime?
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I met a patent examiner once
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Re: I met a patent examiner once
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Opera Mail calls that button insert>Smiley, not Emoticon
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You have GOT to be kidding!
This got a patent?????????
Does any sentient creature not understand now why software patents are a horrible, bad, terrible thing?
(Sentient creature automatically rules out the majority of IP maximalist trolls here, by the way.)
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Re: You have GOT to be kidding!
FTFY
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Re: Re: You have GOT to be kidding!
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What a joke
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For goodness sake...
And while you're at it, patent the idea of patenting stupid ideas by adding "on a mobile device" and "on the internet".
Don't worry about prior art... the patent office doesn't.
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Software patents
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The one word I haven't seen mentioned....
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every IM client and forum I used from mid to late 90's through early 2000's had this [useless] feature
Lee Nguyen... c'mon man
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*Frowns
*Quickly looks around to make sure no lawyers saw
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My only comment on this is
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admit it
But why stop at Samsung and RIM? Just saying.
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Re: admit it
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Re: admit it
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Junk Patent Problem
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Patent/Copyright status: Expired.
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For the benefit of those inclined to criticize the patent examiner, while I suspect that subjectively he probably felt the same way of most persons commenting here, he is bound by law to use objective evidence in considering the allowability of patent claims.
I have no doubt there is objective evidence residing somewhere. The difficulty, however, is finding it, a task that is not as easy as many seem inclined to believe.
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Ridiculous patents
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I remember quite clearly Netscape's e-mail client also had a button for inserting smilies.
This "invention" or "innovation" wasn't just obvious. Everybody was already doing it. The USPTO seriously needs to be sued for incompetence on the job.
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