The new Facebook patent discloses location based services that include identification of members’ location through their mobile devices and publication of their location and status in the social network. The patent also discuses proximity based services. This patent may threat other social networks such as Foursquare, which provide similar location based services.

The general concept of providing location based services for social network members is not new and was already published in patent applications such as those of Dennis Crowley (founder and CEO of Foursquare) filed in 2005 and Malcolm Beyer, which was quoted in the examination of the Facebook application. I myself made a search and quickly found many relevant applications such as a patent application by Charles Huston, filed in 2005. All of these applications describe location based services of members of a network and publication of members’ information based on the identified locations. Crowley even covers the proximity based services.

So how did Facebook patent lawyers manage to overcome this overloaded field and still be granted a patent?

This can be studied from one of the main claims of the patent:

1. A method of sharing locations of users participating in a social networking service at a geographic location, the method executed by a computer system and comprising: receiving location information and status information from a mobile device of a first user of the social networking service, the location information representing a geographic location of the first user, the status information manually provided by the first user on an input module of the mobile device; associating the location information with the status information of the first user in a database; and sending the status information and the location information of the first user to a second user for display. (The underlined sentences are changes that Facebook  patent lawyers inserted during the examination)

In a nutshell, Facebook has narrowed down its claims and received protection for a process and a system which requires identification of a change in the user’s status, which was manually provided by the user using his mobile device. Once the system identifies the status s is updated, the identified location of the user is associated with the new status and the user’s update information is transmitted to  other members of the social network.

The Facebook patent is therefore distinguished from other inventions in the field by focusing on a specific way of  implementing the status update by receiving status updates that are manually inserted by the members through their mobile devices and associating their updated location from the mobile device .

This Facebook case exemplifies how patents protect the manner in which ideas are implemented and not ideas in themselves.

To receive a patent, two main conditions must be fulfilled: a first condition is that the invention is novel and the second condition is that a meaningful inventive step was established. This means that even if the invention is new over other inventions, systems, methods etc., this novelty must be non-obvious to a person skilled in the art for the patent to be allowed. This second condition is tricky and is subjectively decided by the examiner during the examination process.

The Facebook examiner was convinced that the Facebook claims are both novel and non-obvious under the prior art – others may think differently and claims that Facebook implementation was obvious..

In the US anyone can oppose a granted patent by presenting arguments and/or proofs that undermine any of these conditions. Let us wait and see if any of Facebook competitors will try and challenge this patent

Obviously, the 2008 search engine was search was limited when searching for patents and patent applications, since one could not conduct full text search or even search the abstract of the patents.

Recently, the IPO collaborated with WIPO and launched a new interface that allows searching through full text of over 40,000 Israeli patents as well as patent applications using WIPO PatentScope search engine. This finally allows comfortable and relatively efficient searching through IL patent applications.

Having said that, unlike other countries such as the US or Europe, where patent applications are published within 18 months from their priority date, in Israel, only patent applications that have passed the examination process and are allowable are published. Therefore, one can still only view title and bibliographical details of a patent application that is not yet allowed or that is abandoned. Since it takes an average of a couple of years or so until each application reaches an examination in Israel, you can imagine the time it can take until an application is allowed by the examiner. So here we are, still only half way through but getting there in our own time.

My advice is that if you are looking for an Israeli patent application try and see if it has any parallel non-Israeli patent applications through the new interface – and retrieve and view the full text of the parallel application.

Link to the new search interface:

http://www.wipo.int/patentscope/search/en/

PPH is currently available between Canada, UK. Germany. Europe, Australia, Japan and South Korea. The PPH procedure has some serious disadvantages. To request for an accelerated examination of an application in a patent office, based on a PPH, the application should be filed in the country in which a corresponding application is granted first.  This means that the applicant is required to plan his filing chronology carefully to be able to rely on a PPH for accelerating examination. The biggest of all disadvantages of the PPH procedure is that it only enables requesting for an acceleration in beginning to examine the application relying on a grant of a corresponding application and does not allow skipping main examination steps such as the search and review thereof and therefore does not really save much time and/or money for the applicant as well as for the patent office. The Vancouver Group Agreement overcomes these disadvantages.

According to the Vancouver Group Agreement, each patent office in the group can rely on examination of another patent office in the group when examining a corresponding application. This means that if a corresponding application was filed in more than one of these countries and if these applications are related, a first patent office can rely on examination results such as search results and/or allowance of the other patent office instead of initiating a whole new examination procedure. The procedure is indifferent to first filing; meaning that it does not matter in which patent office the application was filed first as long as they are related. The Vancouver Group Agreement allows these patent offices to save precocious time and money for the patentees while saving working hours of the examiners.

This does not mean that a patent office of this group is obliged to allow the claims which were granted or allowed by another patent office, but that the patent office can skip one or more steps of the examination procedure if it chooses to do so, under its own criteria. 

We can only hope that more countries will join this agreement especially the US, where the process is slow and cumbersome.

In software patents claims the mission of understanding the claims becomes even more complex, as software technologies have an “abstract” nature the patent attorney can describe the same invention using a verity of terms and phrases

Paice LLC, won in 2005 a patent-infringement case against Toyota over an older hybrid models and has further open pending patent infringement cases relating newer models

The patent dispute relate to US patent NO. 5,343,9730, filed on September 1992. The patent first claim discloses a hybrid electrical vehicle control mechanism enabling to shift between  an internal combustion engine and an electric motor, controlling the relative contributions of the internal combustion engine and electric motor to the torque driving the wheels and maintaining fixed ratio between relative ratio of both engines rotation.

Patent link:

http://patft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?Sect1=PTO1&Sect2=HITOFF&d=PALL&p=1&u=%2Fnetahtml%2FPTO%2Fsrchnum.htm&r=1&f=G&l=50&s1=5,343,970.PN.&OS=PN/5,343,970&RS=PN/5,343,970

Patent first claim:

1. A hybrid electric vehicle, comprising:

two or more drive wheels receiving torque for propelling said vehicle from an output shaft, and a power unit supplying drive torque to said output shaft, said power unit comprising:

a controllable torque transfer unit adapted to receive torque from two sources via first and second input shafts and transmit said torque to said output shaft;

an engine adapted to consume combustible fuel and supply torque to said torque transfer unit;

an electric motor adapted to receive electricity from a battery and supply torque to said torque transfer unit, said motor also being adapted to be operated as a generator, whereupon said motor receives torque and generates electric energy;

a battery for supply of stored electric energy to said motor, and for receiving and storing electric energy from said motor when operated as a generator; and

a controller for controlling the operation of said engine, said electric motor, and said torque transfer unit, such that said torque transfer unit receives torque from either or both of said internal combustion engine and said electric motor via said first and second input shafts and transmits torque therefrom to said drive wheels by way of said output shaft, and for controlling the relative contributions of the internal combustion engine and electric motor to the torque driving the wheels;

wherein the relative ratios of the rates of rotation of said engine and said electric motor to said input shafts, and the relative ratio of the rate of rotation of an output member of said torque transfer unit to the rate of rotation of said driven wheels, are fixed.

 ”A method for displaying a news feed in a social network environment, the method comprising: 

            monitoring a plurality of activities in a social network environment; storing the plurality of activities in a database;

            generating a plurality of news items regarding one or more of the activities, wherein one or more of the news items is for presentation to one or more viewing users and relates to an activity that was performed by another user;

            attaching a link associated with at least one of the activities of another user to at least one of the plurality of news items where the link enables a viewing user to participate in the same activity as the another user;

            limiting access to the plurality of news items to a set of viewing users; and

            displaying a news feed comprising two or more of the plurality of news items to at least one viewing user of the predetermined set of viewing users.”

Most of the changes are trivial and add almost no limitations. However, there are two interesting points: the news item “relates to activity that was preformed by another user”, the term “another user” is unclear, where is the first user?,  does it mean that “another user” is distinct from the “viewing user” or from the user whose activities are monitored?,  the claim language is ambiguous. Only when reviewing the response to the office action in the file wrapper(the documentation of the examination process), the limitation is clarified:  in prior art, claims the attorney of Facebook “the published information relates only to a particular user is merely a log activities of that user own action”. Hence, the feed news of this claim relates only activities shared by least two users.   A second interesting point relates to links attached to the news feed, the links are active scripts which   enable the viewing user to participate is the same activityof the “another user”. After analyzing the claim we now understand that the claim scope is not broad as it may seem, not any news feed of a social network, but only new feeds of activities shared by two users and only news feed attached to active link which enable the viewing user to participate in the same activity preformed by the monitored users.