Internet Patent Trolls

In the 90's when the internet was getting started there where a few smart business men who tried to get ahead of the game and patent ides and concepts that were not even developed.  Sounds good right?  But what has happened was they were granted patents on very general concepts and on the technology that implements them.

What does this mean let me give you a few examples.  There is a legal battle right now over Amazon.com feature of "One Click Purchase". There are a few companies that claim they own the rights to this "One Click Purchase" because they thought of the idea. They did not create not the programming code or actual method of implementation and technology to do it.  Just the idea.   That is just ridiculous because you cannot patent the Wheel or a car with 4 wheels and 2 doors.  These are just general concepts and cannot hold a patent.  You cannot patent a Television. you can patent the way you make a television and the technology  and materials used.  But you cannot patent the concept of a television.

The reason these type of patents were allowed because at the time of the filling the technology did not even exist and we did not for see the future business model that the internet would become.

Another example of a patent troll is a company that claims the right to internet podcasts.  They don't claim the name 'podcast' they do not claim the technology that creates and distributes the podcast.  They claim to hold the patent on the idea of  "episodical content automatically downloaded to your computer".  That is such a broad concept that is is criminal to claim you own that idea.  That is as if I patent the idea of a flying car and the wait around for someone else to actually make one then claim i came up with the idea and i should get the credit.

These type of frivolous lawsuits may not hurt big companies like Apple and Amazon because they can afford to fight it legally.  But this will effect the ability for small business to start up because these type of litigation can cripple a small company.  So in the vain of net neutrality and open internet we need to follow the path to further innovation.