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I agree. While he is doing his best to answer the hard questions (instead of avoiding them outright), his answers are not very satisfactory. See this thread: http://www.reddit.com/r/Android/comments/ww982/iama_patent_e...

Whenever someone defends software patents, I bring up Amazon's one-click patent. It's so obvious! I use the one-click-checkout feature on Amazon all the time and dearly miss it on every other website out there. Imagine if Pizza Delivery sites or Flower Delivery sites had that feature. People would order things a lot more if they didn't have to go through extra screens to confirm things every single time. The funnel gets smaller as the number of steps rise. And now one company has a patent on short funnels.

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I think he did a decent job answering. However, /r/Android is being needlessly confrontational and cynical.

For instance, this question from your linked thread: http://www.reddit.com/r/Android/comments/ww982/iama_patent_e... was answered satisfactory. There is a difference between

"a plurality of heuristic modules, wherein: each heuristic module corresponds to a respective area of search and employs a different, predetermined heuristic algorithm"

and

"searching different sources of data wherein you search each with a method that makes sense for its contents"

But the replies from random commenters and vote totals would have you believe the opposite.

I wonder how important the actual wording is vs what appears to be the intent on what the patent covers.

To me (and I know I'm simplifying just like the random commenters you speak of), the patent is _intended_ to cover 1. performing heuristic searches on multiple areas (modules) 2. using a different search on each area

However, it uses the word "predetermined" when defining the heuristic algorithm to use for each area. If my code randomly picks between two slightly different heuristics (even with a very low probability), would it still be covered under the patent?

Also it says "heuristic algorithm" meaning singular algorithm. If I ran 2 algorithms in parallel (even one that always returns no results) and then chose the "better" of the two, would that get around the patent too?

Are patents vulnerable to this sort of work-around due to subtle interpretations of wording, or is it really the intent of the patent that matters?

I'm not sure if you remember the whole thing where John Carmack had to change some 3D shader code in Doom 3 because of a patent dispute. The change was adding four lines of code and changing two.[0] So I would say choosing between two similar algorithms, running two algorithms in parallel, or running an additional algorithm that always returned empty would be a valid workaround.

[0]: https://twitter.com/id_aa_carmack/status/137189212519792640

I can think of very few algorithms that don't have sub-algorithms. Isn't any composition of existing algorithms also an algorithm? I can't think of any restriction that algorithm (singular) makes relative to the plural.

The method of choosing the best of two algorithms is itself, a heuristic, so I can't see how that would get around it.

How important is the wording: You can't normally just claim an obvious extension without evidence. We have to provide prior art for every limitation in a claim, and every word must be considered within a claim.

It seem every last adjective counts.

"In order to jump to an obvious argument, you'd have to prove this device reads on all the limitations minus the unlock image that is slid. Then you'd have to show something else that uses an image to unlock something. Then you'd have to provide rationale why the combination between the two things would have been obvious at the time of the invention, in this case 2005."

In other words, obviousness might seem, uh obvious as a defense for most this stuff. But actuality it's categorically dismissed with the "you can't prove it" argument. Plus the "but was it obvious in 2005, with phone!" (lovely to see those so-and-so's trying to wiggle out of that one but essentially coming back to it).

Strictly speaking those statements are indeed different as you've pointed out. The former has additional stipulations in that there must be multiple heuristic search algorithms used and they need to be organized in some modular fashion.

What I believe the commenters were getting at is that those aren't very meaningful limitations. One of the most straightforward implementations of a system where a user can search multiple orthogonal sources of information would be to define separate algorithms in a pluggable modular form. I also imagine most search algorithms could be described as having heuristic components, probably especially those tailored for a particular type of information.

Are you saying Amazon actually enforces that patent? I doubt the Flower Delivery sites are purposely adding clicks to the process because of the Amazon patent.

Do you know of even one US-based site with one-click ordering?

Valve's Steam games checkout. Does iTunes qualify as well?

Apple pays Amazon for a One-Click license. I imagine Jobs was really in love with the simplicity and just had to have it.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1-Click#Apple_Inc.

On Steam, you click add to cart (which takes you to a checkout page), and then you have to check an "I agree..." box before hitting the actual purchase button.

I don't think this qualifies as one-click.

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