Our apologies to Microsoft
p2pnet.net News:- Apologies to Bill and the Boyz.
In Microsoft wants to patent smilies, we say, well, Microsoft wants to patent smilies.
But if we’d taken the trouble to unravel the dense abstract wording, or bothered to read the complete patent description, we wouldn’t have posted the item in the first place. :(
Because as a reader points out, “The headline is wrong – this is not about patenting smilies! If the author would have read the patent application cited in the article, he would have found that the inventors do not want to patenting smilies. Instead the invention is about adding complex emoticons to a lean message without increasing the data size of such a message. In other words, this new technique helps to keep chatroom conversation or instant messaging performing fast.”
In the application, Microsoft says:
“[0019] Many real-time messaging applications aim to minimize data for transmission. An instant message or chatroom communique that contains very streamlined data is referred to herein as a ‘lean’ message. To include one or more custom emoticons in a lean message would degrade the performance of many instant messaging or chatroom applications. Thus, the subject matter also includes exemplary techniques for sending a lean message to a receiver wherein one or more custom emoticons appear in the lean message at the receiver’s end.
“[0020] ‘Real-time’ as used herein means that participants can converse back and forth via text, image, or sound without unreasonable delay while they are online.”
Without wishing to minimize our culpability, we were inspired by an article in ZDNet UK which quoted Mark Taylor, executive director of the Open Source Consortium, as saying, among other things, “I would have expected to see something like this suggested by one of our more immature community members as a joke on Slashdot, and probably would have chuckled at the absurdity of the notion.”
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AND ….. just to do it up properly, as the first comment says, and another Reader’s Write below (”thanks – “) reiterates, “[...]this is a patent application, not an issued patent, which means the patent office hasn’t looked at it yet”.
Again, we apologise to Microsoft sincerely and unreservedly.
Now we can get back to sticking it to Bill and the Boyz with a clear conscience : ) // 6:43 pm Pacific
Jon Newton – p2pnet
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July 24th, 2005 at 5:15 pm
Although, if Microsoft was IN FACT patenting smilies… I would have easilly believed it!
I wouldn’t put this kind of crap past MS… they have and will do this kind of stuff forever… XD
July 24th, 2005 at 5:41 pm
but not everyone admits it when they do – hehe, or should I say =)
July 25th, 2005 at 12:47 am
It’s still ridiculous to try to patent computer software.
It’s not an invention! It’s an idea!
Copyright is already completely against the public interest,
why stoop so low as to try to prevent people from using IDEAS
and implementing them in a new and original way?
Soon you won’t even exist except as part of corporation XYZ,
much less be allowed to have frivolous rights like freedom of speach
or the right to live decently and comfortably.
Oops! That last part is gone already.
July 25th, 2005 at 1:33 am
Wow. I am used to seeing anti-Microsoft and anti-patent posting in general getting most of the details wrong, but I think this is the first time I have seen someone own up. Thanks.
If you want to do your readers a further favor, you can also point out that this is a patent application, not an issued patent, which means the patent office hasn’t looked at it yet. Often the claims of a patent (the only legally enforceable portion) undergo serious change when the patent is examined by the patent office.
Further, even if the patent office accidentally issues a patent on something that is obvious or has prior art, those issues will be revisited if the patent is ever litigated. A company like Microsoft with enough PR issues already would never assert a patent it thought would be vulnerable to such prior art or obviousness attacks. It would be a waste of a lot of legal dollars for no outcome. BillG didn’t get rich by making a lot of stupid business decisions.
There is a pattern now of journalists waiting for a batch of Microsoft patents to publish, choosing a few juicy titles, and without further research, writing a doom-crying article such as that posted on ZDNet proclaiming the end of open source software. The false dicotomy of having to choose between patents and Open Source is just that, false. People who hate Microsoft like to hate Microsoft, so those articles will probably always be popular, but thanks for trying to correct this one.
Two things to remember: It don’t mean a thing if it isn’t an issued patent, and it isn’t in the final claims.
July 25th, 2005 at 4:37 pm
A patent application has many claims, which includes claim 0019 and 0020, but if you look at the abstract and summary of the application it says that Microsoft is patenting “Methods and devices for creating and transferring custom emoticons allow a user to adopt an arbitrary image as an emoticon, which can then be represented by a character sequence in real-time communication.”
Also, the US Patent Office does not automatically publish every patent it receives hence the delay between Microsoft filing the patent and the application being published.
I look forward to you revising your apology to Microsoft!
July 26th, 2005 at 3:41 pm
I’m a former US patent Examiner and here is my take on the issue. If you read claim 1, it is clear that they are claiming the invention so broad that it doesn’t even go into the details of the transmission protocol. Thus, if they get at least claim 1 allowed they will be getting at least 1 patent claim on smileys. Remember that there is a clear difference between what one invents and what one claims as the invention. Now, I want to beleive that the Examiner at the USPTO will make a complete and fair search and examination of the application. In conclusion, if they drafted a claim so broad like claim 1, then they are definitively “TRYING” to patent smilies. That’s just my two cents on the issue.