IB - Booktrader 906 no more single click!

[BigFunky]

I hardly think Trading Technologies could be described as a patent troll.

The usual method of a patent troll is to collect a bunch of software patents of dubious novelty and inventiveness, mostly by purchasing them of the original inventors for a modest fee. Then they wait until it appears someone is infringing one of the patents, threaten them with law suits, then try and negotiate an out of court settlement that is lower than what it would cost the defendant in court - thus the validity of the patent is never tested but they get a few hundred thousand for their 'efforts'.

TT on the otherhand, apparently invented the method, actively created and promoted their products that use the patented technology,and actively enforced and licensed it to other software suppliers. This is standard practice for any inventor and patent holder in any field, not the practice of a patent troll.

I realise there is much debate other the novelty and inventiveness of TT's patent, but they did apply for it in 1997 - if it weren't novel and inventive back then, feel free to point out why- otherwise the patent is valid until it expires.

It probably should also be noted that it would be very unlikely that anyone designing software for daytrading would never have seen X Trader. So anyone copying features from it only have themselves to blame.

- The actual usefulness or benefit to society of software patents in general is a different debate.

 

[Paul805]

Quote from Cdntrader:
I guess TT musta won the case.

Well it would appear it did against espeed but the others settled.

What I'm trying to discover is what aspect of their patent(s) is this latest round of suits based upon that wasn't settled previously?

Adding a confirmation step to booktrader doesn't address the so-called 'moving scale issue'.

 

[Paul805]

Quote from BigFunky:

- if it weren't novel and inventive back then, feel free to point out why-

I don't think novelty needs to be the issue here but impossibility might be.

My (admittedly limited) understanding of patent/copyright laws is that you can't have one where compliance is impossible (please feel free to correct that assumption if I'm wrong).

If so, then their hairsplitting use of the terms 'move' and static' in the 2007 suit should probably have been met with an equally pedantic defence.

e.g. In the 2007 case TT objected to a scale being static at ANY time.

The company even went so far as to claim that a manual or auto-centering only provides compliance for the time that the centering is being performed and is in violation again once that process has completed when the scale is once again 'static'.

It is debatable whether a scale can ever 'move' on a screen. It's only an illusion of movement - caused by a different portion of the entire scale scale being displayed as a result of the PRICE moving.

Yes, I know what TT meant by 'moving' but it was their choice of wording in their patent and it does not address redisplaying a different part of an infinite but always static scale.

Furthermore, when the price is not moving, the scale has no reason to be re-displayed (or 'moved') and would therefore be in violation during those periods. Therefore, compliance with such a patent would be impossible.

 

[BigFunky]

Quote from Paul805:

Well it would appear it did against espeed but the others settled.

What I'm trying to discover is what aspect of their patent(s) is this latest round of suits based upon that wasn't settled previously?

Adding a confirmation step to booktrader doesn't address the so-called 'moving scale issue'.

Trading Technologies appears to have at least 173 granted patents in the US - so take your pick I guess.

I assume the booktrader change would be related to one of TT's earlier patents regarding single click trading on the DOM.

 

[BigFunky]

Quote from Paul805:

I don't think novelty needs to be the issue here but impossibility might be.

My (admittedly limited) understanding of patent/copyright laws is that you can't have one where compliance is impossible (please feel free to correct that assumption if I'm wrong).

I not exactly sure what you mean by by compliance is impossible, but I assume you mean that it would be impossible to avoid infringement while carrying out previously known methods of the prior art. In which case, yes this is a well known test for novelty - if you were to do something that was known before the date of the patent, and doing so would infringe a claim of the patent, then that patent claim can not be novel (with a few provisios).

With your broadest interpetation of the TT claim, a non-static price ladder, one where the prices move up and down corresponding to the market prices, would also infringe, because the price is static at least momentarily between each price movement. Assuming that this type of display was known before the patent, then the patent wouldn't be novel.

I wouldn't really agree with this interpretation because the terms used in the claims are 'static' and 'dynamic' - which would need to be construed in light of the specification and what is common knowledge in the art - in particular that the bid and ask price are not always moving. So if the bid and ask are 'dynamic' - they move in correspondence to the market price - which means a 'static' display is one that doesn't move in correspondence with the market price. Accordingly 'static' isn't the same as never moving, and dynamic isn't the same as always moving.

In any case, the claim construction found it to be much narrower, otherwise the whole point of the patent didn't make much sense. Although just reading the claims I would have construed it as being static except when it needed to move, but I didn't read the specification which apparently makes it clear that not moving the price ladder (except manually) was essential for clicking on the right price.

Their bad luck for drafting it that way - it wouldn't have taken much to broaden the scope of the claims to include how there software actually works - which includes automatic centering of the price.

 

[1prometheus]

they may not be "classic" patent trolls but it is parasitic, rent seeking behavior. Patent law is out of control and needs serious reform.

 

[BigFunky]

I'm not really sure why you regard TT as being so different to a normal patent holder. It appears to me that they developed a lot of different technology that went into X Trader, which was then copied by everyone else. Why shouldn't they sue them for infringement?

Maybe I just have a different perspective on it. What aspects of patent law do you think should be reformed? Software patents in general, or is there something in particular about how TT is using patents that you don't like?

 

[Paul805]

Quote from BigFunky:
I not exactly sure what you mean by by compliance is impossible.

I mean that 'not violating' is impossible. e.g. you can't take out a patent on a number sequence unless it is 'original'. TT's patent pertains to the entire range of numbers from -Infinity to +Infinity. Price sequences (or any other sequential string of numbers for that matter) are anything but original and NOT using them is impossible. I know that the patent has to do with how that sequence is displayed and redisplayed but vertically displaying and redisplaying different sections of a large numerical sequence is equally unoriginal.

http://www.helium.com/items/1876113-patent-law-exclusions-from-patent-protection

"Facts, even newly discovered facts, cannot be patented. A person's name, telephone number, address, and so on, is always in the public domain. Standard arrangements of facts, such as alphabetical or numerical order, are also in the common domain. Databases, directories, and other compilations of facts may be protected by intellectual property rights under copyright law if their arrangement or selection is original.

Only a specific application of an idea can be protected as intellectual property. The underlying idea or theory is always in the public domain. Algorithms and other mathematical formulae fall into a gray area, with specific designation varying based on location and purpose."

So, as we're not dealing with algorithms or mathematical formulae, displaying a sequence of numbers on a computer screen in standard, public domain, numerical order can't be described as 'original' and fails your 'novelty' test. By extension, redisplaying (or not redisplaying) another portion of the same, infinite but static, sequence at indeterminate periods is equally novelty free.

With your broadest interpetation of the TT claim, a non-static price ladder, one where the prices move up and down corresponding to the market prices, would also infringe, because the price is static at least momentarily between each price movement.

I agree and that's my point. At no time is it possible to NOT violate the patent because even if the screen was refreshed a billion times a second, with a different scale being displayed each time, for the instant between the refresh, the scale is static and in violation.
FWIW, auto-centering the price and continually re-displaying the scale around it is how Patsystems changed J-Trader when they were targeted by TT. However, as you rightly point out, they are still in violation for a split second between refreshes - and it is impossible for them (or anyone else) not to be.

Assuming that this type of display was known before the patent, then the patent wouldn't be novel.

It isn’t novel. A vertical display of a sequential list of the numeric type was far from novel before the patent.
e.g. MS weren't the first by any means but did you ever look at the first column of an Excel spreadsheet?
Would they be in violation if that column was scaled to prices and wasn't continuously scrolling?

I wouldn't really agree with this interpretation because the terms used in the claims are 'static' and 'dynamic' - which would need to be construed in light of the specification and what is common knowledge in the art - in particular that the bid and ask price are not always moving. So if the bid and ask are 'dynamic' - they move in correspondence to the market price - which means a 'static' display is one that doesn't move in correspondence with the market price. Accordingly 'static' isn't the same as never moving, and dynamic isn't the same as always moving.

From the 2007 claim: ".... plaintiff asserts that part-time infringement - infringement for any length of time, regardless of whether the accused product or process has times of non-infringement - covers its claims".

In other words, it isn't 'dynamic' that is being defined as 'always moving' - as you assumed - but that avoiding violation of their 'static' state, at ANY time, requires an 'always moving' process which, as I mentioned before, is impossible.

In any case, the claim construction found it to be much narrower, otherwise the whole point of the patent didn't make much sense.

None of it makes sense and why a lawyer hasn't driven a truck through it yet is a mystery to me: e.g, regarding one-click trading:

Patent 304 Claim 1, sections 4 and 5 read:

[4] displaying an order entry region comprising a plurality of locations for receiving commands to send trade orders, each location corresponding to a price level along the common static price axis; and
[5] in response to a selection of a particular location of the order entry region by a single action of a user input device........

Moving a mouse to a region of the screen and clicking the mouse is NOT a SINGLE ACTION. It comprises:
'On Mouse Move',
'On Enter',
'On Got Focus',
'On Mouse Down',
'On Mouse Click' and
'On Mouse Up'.

Each of these can (but don't have to) have a different action performed as the event occurs but all must and do occur in the submission of an order.
The wording of their patent limits the restriction a single action of a user input device (not ANY or EVERY action). Even if 'single' was interpreted as any 'ONE' action. The process could be split across two or more events.

So to which one of those actions are they limiting it?

 

[learner2007]

I've no real knowledge in these matters and just out of curiosity
wanted to ask one question.
If someone such as IB were to simply change the display of the DOM to where the ASk Size is on the upper left and the Bid Size is
on the lower right, would that make the DOM different enough to where it would not infringe on TT's patent?

Thank you.

 

[Ghost of Cutten]

Quote from BigFunky:


TT on the otherhand, apparently invented the method

How do you "invent" a sequence of numbers? Their "method" is just a spreadsheet whose cells change contents. This is like patenting the wheel, or paragraphs.