IBM is suing Amazon over its alleged abuse of IBM ecommerce and customer customization technologies. The court filings are not yet public anywhere that I can find (on the ridiculous Texas Eastern District Website), but the patents allegedly violated are:

  • US 5,796,967 - Presenting Applications in an Interactive Service.
  • US 5,442,771 - Storing Data in an Interactive Network.
  • US 7,072,849 - Presenting Advertising in an Interactive Service.
  • US 5,446,891 - Adjusting Hypertext Links with Weighted User Goals and Activities.
  • US 5,319,542 - Ordering Items Using an Electronic Catalogue.

The most thorough article that I could find summarizing the implications is at BusinessWeek:

IBM seems to have come down on both sides of this issue. In December, the company filed an amicus brief in the U.S. Supreme Court case of Laboratory Corp. of America Holdings v. Metabolite Laboratories, arguing that method patents have been overdone, and acknowledging that some of its own business-method patents may be invalid. “I will be looking to see if IBM has had a change of heart since last December,” says attorney James W. Dabney, partner at Fried, Frank, Harris, Shriver & Jacobson LLP.

From Monsters and Critics:

‘We filed this case for a very simple reason. IBM`s property is being knowingly and unfairly exploited,’ said Dr. John E. Kelly III, senior vice president of IBM Technology and Intellectual Property. ‘IBM is one of the world`s leading creators of intellectual property and one of the most progressive in embracing new, highly collaborative ways of driving and managing innovation.

I’ll post more when I can either read the briefs or summarize a lawyer who has. My initial reaction is similar to that or The Register:

Mercifully, a quick search of the United States Patent and Trademark Office revealed that IBM does not appear to hold a patent on the entire concept of ecommerce.

Another PR strike against the kindly open source giant.

UPDATE 11/8/2006

This article has a great line about the case:

In the Amazon case, the stakes are high. IBM’s patents include “storing data in an interactive network,” “ordering items using an electronic catalogue” and “presenting advertising in an interactive service”. These could be considered fundamental to e-commerce on the web. If the patents stand up, it could let IBM impose what amounts to a tax on online shopping.