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Paging Eliza: Patenting IM Bots
Posted by
michael
on Thu Aug 15, 2002 10:49 AM
from the patent-office-fails-the-turing-test dept.
from the patent-office-fails-the-turing-test dept.
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Paging Eliza: Patenting IM Bots
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Have to say it... (Score:4, Funny)
Re:Have to say it... (Score:5, Insightful)
It's the same in EVERY field. It's stupid/negligent to hand out a patent without doing at least minimal research beforehand.
-Sara
In a word, yes: (Score:5, Insightful)
Yes, I can and do blame them.
Human beings are expected to have ethics, and to treat one another with a semblance thereof even when the law doesn't manage to anticipate every possible permutation of human interaction, or indeed, even when the law is clearly flawed.
Sub-human filth that lack such ethics and/or use the law to cause deliberate harm to others for their own banal benefit deserve to be treated exactly as what they are: sub-human filth.
Re:In a word, yes: (Score:5, Insightful)
And that is the heart of a good deal of our social and political conflicts in the US. Human beings are held to higher expectations than corporate entities, and yet, those corporate entities have the same rights as human beings. Note that a person didn't apply for this patent; a company did. If the smaller developers had to go up against an individual, even one with substantial resources, they probably wouldn't be nearly so worried. Corporations can draw on resources that individual humans can't, however. Furthermore, if they lose, the company goes bankrupt, dissolves, and the corporate officers go on about their merry way and try again next year. If it were a person, it would be at least seven years before they could do much of anything again.
As long as corporations can live forever or die without hurting anyone, they are unmotivated to partake in human ethics. The answer seems to be to also remove some of their human-like rights. Of course, can you imagine the corporate lobbying against such legislation?
Re:Can you blame them? (Score:5, Insightful)
Don't you mean "an opportunity to make money"?
There is a slight difference. :)
Re:Can you blame them? (Score:5, Interesting)
I'm patenting ass slapping! (Score:4, Funny)
I'll make millions. At worst, if I can't get any royalties, I'll sell access to everyone's court-orderd bedroom webcam (for my patent enforcement)
I can smell the money now!
T :-)
Re:I'm patenting ass slapping! (Score:4, Funny)
Prior art (by about a decade) (Score:4, Informative)
Re:Prior art (by about a decade) (Score:4, Funny)
I dunno, she seems kinda apathetic :-)
I've got it! (Score:5, Funny)
"I'm not familiar with that," Kay said in response to claims that interactive bots were in existence even before ActiveBuddy launched, with venture funding from Reuters and Wit Soundview.
Active Buddy CEO is, in fact, an IM Bot. I mean, has anyone actually seen the guy? And his responses sound suspiciously like Eliza...
Re:I've got it! (Score:5, Insightful)
"The subject of enforcing the patent shouldn't even come up. Anyone wanting to build a very good interactive agent will find that our tools are the very best."
-schussat
Over and over again... (Score:5, Interesting)
I'm thinking the USPTO could create a database of pending patents on their web site that have passed initial muster with the investigator and are likely to be approved. Interested parties could go and post links about prior art (or earlier filed but still pending patents) for the patent investigator to review.
Opening up application review. (Score:4, Informative)
They did. [kuro5hin.org]
Every step of IM botmaking technology? (Score:3, Funny)
Grrr (Score:5, Insightful)
Patent? crap! (Score:5, Insightful)
Or any other bot running within an environment generally used for 2-way (or more) communication?
I wrote a bot in 1990 for christ sake.
Not kidding, work with DDIAL chat systems.
DDIAL ran on Apple IIe with 7 300bps modems.
documented? i'd say. (Score:5, Informative)
Bots are heavily in use in the corporate infrastructure, from auto-reply bots which answer emails based on formatting (think: subscribing to majordomo or even old NSI DNS requests), to complete bots which can answer "what color is the sand on Mars".
There's even a Wired article [wired.com] about IRC bots.
there should be stiff punishments for abusing the system like this, otherwise, what's to stop them? the only thing which gets hurt is their public image, and frankly that's not enough. I'm not talking prison terms, I'm talking stiff fines for such blatant misuse of the USPTO, to fund a future technical review board for the USPTO.
Instant Prior Art (Score:5, Informative)
Yeah, there weren't many IM bots out there, but there were a few. And one is all it takes.
-Todd
Patent wording.... (Score:3, Interesting)
I'm this is way too vague. Aside from all the IRC bots in existance, What about "Ask Jeeves"? We can certainly dispute whether a web browser/site is an 'instant messaging' server. If I "ask" jeeves for something and it returns my query, then is it not prior art?
As long as they're rewarded... (Score:5, Interesting)
The same thing exists here with all of these silly software/genetic patents that the Patent Office, accepted by people with the brainpower of rancid jello. For now, they can do it, and it's a proven technique - patent something that already exists, then collect from businesses who know it will cost more to fight than to simply pay.
Sooner or later, one of two things will happen. A) Someone will patent something that others really, really care about, and you'll see an Enron/Worldcom level knee-jerk response (Damn! We must make a law to stop this), or B) they'll finally tackle somebody with enough deep pockets and pissed off attitude to crush a company like this, and set a major legal precident.
Either way, I figure I'll keep coding my stuff, and to hell with people who steal the future.
The real problem (Score:4, Interesting)
So what can we do to help prevent obvious and useless patenting?
Whaa? (Score:3, Funny)
So... anybody using their own stuff is obviously using your stuff... but by your admission they're using their own stuff so by definition they're not using your stuff... but you stated they are using your stuff which would mean they arn't using their own stuff... that is a contradiction... and they have to license your server... Illogical. Illogical.
*smoke erupts from ears and collapses*
Patenting Ideas (Score:5, Insightful)
A wider example might be flying machines. There are thousands of different types of planes, baloons, helicopters, hangliders, and ultralights but each achieve the same goal by different means. Each has their own style, benefits, drawbacks, and potential uses.
I see the general patenting of auto-IM responders as being similar to patenting the idea of human flight. Though every auto-IM responder may have completely different code, handle events in different ways, and interact with different systems, ActiveBuddy owns the idea. That is bullshit.
I can buy 1000 differnt models of cars, why can't I buy 1000 different models of IM responder if each has its own advantages and disadvantages, efficiency, interface, and style.
Send them your opinion about this. (Score:3, Informative)
Remeber to be polite!
contact form [activebuddy.com]
ActiveBuddy Press Contacts
Contact ActiveBuddy Public Relations:
(408) 530-0850 x202
Email: pr@activebuddy.com
Snail Mail & Phone:
New York City Office
ActiveBuddy, Inc.
24 West 25th Street
Fifth Floor
New York, NY 10010
Phone: 646-486-8700
Fax: 646-486-8701
Sunnyvale, CA Office
ActiveBuddy, Inc.
111 West Evelyn Avenue
Suite 101
Sunnyvale, CA 94086
Phone: 408-530-0850
Fax: 408-737-7018
I can see the spam of the future.... (Score:5, Funny)
Nice to meet you Alice.
Nice to meet you too! Have I told you how much I love snack-ums?
I don't care.
I care greatly for snack-ums.
Leave me alone.
Nobody would leave a party with snack-ums!
Is that so?
I don't understand, but I do understand one thing: Snack-Ums are delicious!
You seem a little obsessed with snack-ums carla.
I AM OBSESSED WITH SNACK-UMS!
Re:I can see the spam of the future.... (Score:4, Funny)
I Love Cheesy Poofs: That's very interesting, I Love Snack-Ums. Have I told you how delicious Cheesy Poofs are?
I Love Duff Beer: That's very interesting, I Love Cheesy Poofs. Have I told you how delicious Duff Beer is to persons of legal age in their respective states?
*I Love Taking Brand Name Pharmeceuticals has entered the room.*
prior art posted here? (Score:3, Informative)
ActiveBuddy disputed McClelland's claims. "I am fairly confident, there were no interactive agents on IM at that point when the application was filed (August 22, 2000). I'm certainly not aware of any," said Kay, who doubles as ActiveBuddy's chief technology officer.
Didn't somebody set up an ICQ bot posing as female to flirt with people, then put the logs on the web a long time ago? I can't seem to dig it up.
It's a symptom, not the problem. (Score:5, Insightful)
Unfortunately, they're not the real problem. We need some real dust-off-the-Constitution kind of IP reform.
Unfortunately, that's not the real problem. We need some real get-the-companies-out-of-politics kind of capmaign finance reform.
Until Disney, the **AAs and normal industry turn our government back over to us, we're going to keep having these outrages shoved down our throats. In one of the races in my state, one party is running attack ads claiming that 96% of the other candidate's money is coming from out of state. It doesn't matter to me if it's an "I need funding" issue or an "I'm a corporate whore" issue. It's a backwater district in a tiny state, and it's bought and paid for by corporate interests that have no interest in the state, just in how many seats they can buy for their favorite party.
We have to fix the government before it can fix anything for us.
Press Inquiry to ActiveBuddy (Score:5, Interesting)
-------------
I'm writing you in regards to your recent patent grant for interactive agent technology. In an article at Internet News (http://www.internetnews.com/bus-news/article.php
I am inquiring as to what research as to prior art was done before submitting a patent request, as the same Internet News article quotes several developers as knowing of 'bots' whose code is freely available and has been since before ActiveBuddy was even a company. Specifically named is the Perl module Net::AIM, timestamped in CPAN as having been originally published on 18-Aug-1999, well prior to your patent application filed on August 22, 2000. The original code of the Net::AIM module, and included with the package at the time, included code for an 'interactive agent', albeit not as complex as the technology your company uses today.
The first line of the patent summary reads as follows: "A method and system for interactively responding to queries from a remotely located user includes a computer server system configured to receiving an instant message query or request from the user over the Internet." This is the very definition of a bot, which is not new technology. A common type of IRC known as Eggdrop, which meets the description offered by the description offered in the patent, has been around since late 1993 (http://www.eggdrops.net/eggdrophistory.html).
My question to you is, what findings did you uncover when researching for this patent, and given the fact that numerous examples of prior art can be shown, do you believe the patent will be enforcable, and if so, how?
-------------
I would very much like hear what sort of spin they put on this.
Peek Into European Patent Examining Cancelled (Score:3, Interesting)
Prior Art (Score:4, Informative)
Then there's Net::AIM [cpan.org], which includes this text, from over a year before the patent was applied for:Oops.
And yeah, I figured that AOL had to have bots running for many years on AOL chats and AIM. That's a no-brainer.
The real problem - quotas (Score:3, Interesting)
Yes, that's right. You have to approve or reject x number of patents every two weeks (where x is something like 5, I think) or be fired. So, if you've got a few time-consuming ones at first, you're under a lot of pressure to just do _something_ with the last couple of them, especially if time is about to run out. I would not be surprised at all if some patents were not investigated as thoroughly as they should be (read: not at all) in the interests of the reviewer not being fired. That is perhaps what happened here: quick check to make sure no patent doing the same thing has been issued, and then approval without doing any outside research.
So, really, the problem is not really US patent law. It's the fact that the USPO is understaffed and overworked and cannot adequately review patent submissions. I hope that gives a better perspective on the issue rather than "the US(PO) sucks and is staffed by idiots".
-Erwos
Stealing treasure from the dragon (Score:3, Interesting)
Activerse DingBot SDK, 1997-2000 (Score:5, Informative)
We demoed an early version of the product at the "Demo 98" conference, in February 1998. PCWeek ran an article [zdnet.com] about us mentioning the DingBot SDK later that month.
The Activerse press release announcing the product's general availability, in November 1998, is still available at the Internet Archive [archive.org].
ActiveBuddy was founded in March 2000. So, not only were their "IM bots" a old idea by the time they filed their patent (August 2000), a ripoff of both Activerse's offerings and more than a decade of practice on IRC networks and in MUDs/MOOs, but their very name was derivative of an existing player in the same market ("Activerse"->"ActiveBuddy") and their main product (an SDK/server) and business model (licensing) mimicked Activerse as well.
Their founder claims with a straight face "we invented interactive agents" and "I am fairly confident, there were no interactive agents on IM at that point when the application was filed. I'm certainly not aware of any." That only goes to show you have to be *studiously* ignorant and/or dishonest in order to effectively twist the flaws of the software patent system to personal advantage.
(Postscript on Activerse: It was acquired by high-flying internet conglomerate CMGI in April 1999. Though the initial aim was to expand and promote the Ding IM/bot products throughout the CMGI network of compnaies, as CMGI itself unravelled, Activerse was dismantled through a series of mostly arbitrary and faddish organizational moves which completely ignored the promise of the growing IM space.)
Prior art ... the USPTO itself! (Score:3, Funny)
Applicant: I'd like to file for a patent on my idea.
USPTO: Tell me about your idea.
Applicant: My idea will change everything. No one will be able to surf the web without using my idea. I'll make billions!
USPTO: You sound excited.
Applicant: Excited? Who wouldn't be?
USPTO: I'll ask the questions.
Applicant: Oh, sorry. Now, about that application.
USPTO: Oh, you'd like a patent application. Of course sir. Here is your patent, #123,456,789,012,345.
So could I patent pirating Windows? (Score:3, Insightful)
Microsoft's EULA for Windows OS says don't copy it and distribute copies. People do that, and supposedly they're breaking the law.
AIM's EULA says don't make an automated chatting script, or bot, especially not to spam with. People do that, and apparently they get patents for it. How does this make sense to anyone?
A few words on AOLiza (Score:3, Informative)
First, sadly, despite the fact that AOLiza was unleashed a few weeks before ActiveBuddy's patent filing, it doesn't apply as prior art, because according to patent law, if the claimant filed the patent application within one year of inventing, disclosing, or even detailing the invention in an email, it's still valid.
That isn't to say that prior art doesn't exist. I'm certain that it does, not the least of which in the AIM::BOT perl libraries which preceeded ActiveBuddy by well over a year.
Moreover, AOLiza doesn't even use the AIM::BOT libraries (although an earlier test version did). It uses the Mac version of AIM and the applescript hooks that AOL put into that application. These hooks, including calls so that other programs can grab messages, send messages, and do a myriad of other 'bot' functions, existed well over a year before ActiveBuddy's application, and were clearly designed to allow the attachment of automated scripts or bots to be used with the application.
This is important because in addition to 'get there first' and 'usefulness' the third requirement for a successful patent application is demonstrated non-obviousness. The invention has to be a novel application of technologies, not simply an evolution of existing (and possibly patented) technologies.
Clearly, when AIM for Mac had hooks specifically written to allow third-party programs to act as bots, another companys claim that actually USING those hooks, or punching holes into another part of the program to make hooks of their own, can not be seen as novel in any way.
That's my two cents, and I'd be happy to testify in court.