Google Sued For Patent Infringement For Keeping Track Of How Many Ads People Click On
from the thank-you-patent-system dept
It still seems rather amusing (if not twisted) that some patent system supporters are trying to convince the world Google would be harmed by an absence of software patents. Instead, it seems increasingly obvious that it would only serve to help Google, who is a regular target of questionable patent infringement lawsuits. Take the latest such case as an example. A company by the name of Web Tracking Solutions, which ironically enough, doesn't appear to have much of a web presence (if any), has sued Google for patent infringement, claiming that its patent on third-party on-line accounting systems is being violated by Google's AdSense offering.Try to read the patent without gagging over the question of what the USPTO was thinking when it approved this as a "non-obvious" process. Basically, it describes a system for tracking ad clicks on third party websites, and then showing that information (how many clicks, etc.) for customers of an ad service. In other words, apparently the USPTO thought that the idea of actually accounting for how many ad clicks were made by an advertising service to its clients is somehow deserving of monopoly protection. I would imagine that Google would be perfectly fine losing its own patents if it meant not having to defend against these sorts of lawsuits on an all too regular basis.
