Yahoo Crosses The Line

http://www.avc.com/a_vc/2012/03/yahoo-crosses-the-line.html

by barrynolan • 14 years ago

525 230 14 years ago

smeg• 14 years ago

Yep. I don't even use/like Facebook, but I just deleted my 10 year old Yahoo account in protest (in truth it was only a secondary account after Google, but still).

IgorPartola2• 14 years ago

This is why I use my own domain for my primary email address. If Google decides to pull some kind of crap on me, I can always ditch them without having to write that silly "My new email is" message to all my contacts.

maximveksler• 14 years ago

I use a personal email domain on gmail[1] as well.

But for a different reason: It allows a "catch all" email, so I register on every site as <sitedomain.com>@vekslers.org and have my account act as a catch all sink. This allows me to both filter out spamming sources and trace back who leaked my email address to 3rd party sources. This approach is a pivot on the name+tag@domain.com email tagging which most js form validations devs are unaware of it being a legal email syntax and thus do not allow.

This relives me of the need to worry to post my email address, which is news.ycombinator.com_3698017@vekslers.org out in the open (true emails are very much welcome).

[1] http://www.google.com/apps/intl/en/business/index.html

rplnt3• 14 years ago

> I just deleted my 10 year old Yahoo account in protest

From Apple device?

tzaman• 14 years ago

Their actions just show how desperate they are. Bye bye Yahoo! and thanks for the fish.

barrynolan3• 14 years ago

US Patent 7406501 ... "Conversion of an instant message to an e-mail message" WTF...Is that it?

IgorPartola2• 14 years ago

Google does that! Quick Yahoo! sue them!

Andrex• 14 years ago

Google vs. Yahoo! would be even bloodier than Google vs. Oracle has been.

klez• 14 years ago

IMHO the linked article misunderstood what this is all about. I think it's more the "Reply to this thread by replying to this email" facebook does when you receive a message notification.

bbrizzi• 14 years ago

If you consider that an e-mail is a type of instant message, it makes even less sense.

pja• 14 years ago

Read the claims.

http://www.google.com/patents/US7406501?printsec=claims&...

The abstract doesn't define the patent. The claims are what defines the patent, in combination with the notes in the patent file which can often limit the claims even further.

Yahoo is claiming a specific method of seamlessly converting an instant message communication into an email one, not the general concept. Claim 1 narrows the claims from that general case immediately.

rplnt3• 14 years ago

Sounds like something from Apple's portfolio.

pagehub• 14 years ago

Totally agree, compete on innovation - not by patent troling! Goodbye Yahoo!, shame you decided to disgrace yourself in such a way.

polymatter• 14 years ago

The problem is innovation is measured as number of patents filed. Investors who want more innovation, judge how innovative a company is by number of patents. More patents -> more innovative. And so that's what managers optimize for.

The program is that is a ridiculously crude measure. Like measuring programmer output by lines of code, this idea that measuring innovation at such a micro level even makes sense, needs to die.

rplnt3• 14 years ago

They saw Apple going away with that over and over again and thought "What the hell, let's do it".

viggity• 14 years ago

I really don't like saying this, but here it goes:

Don't hate the player, hate the game.

We need real, substantive patent reform in this country.

nodemaker• 14 years ago

When the player is a huge corporation consisting of numerous layers of management, it is very hard not to hate them.

This player will most likely also lobby aggressively to thwart any attempts at reforming the patent system since it is one of its few remaining sources of revenue.

sparkie• 14 years ago

Absolutely. It's easy to bash at Yahoo, but we can't forget that while Facebook (and many other players, including Yahoo) are using one hand undermine the "intellectual property" of other companies, they're using their other hand to try and protect their own IP using the same laws.

Take this absurd Facebook patent as an example

>System and method for dynamically providing a news feed about a user of a social network (US2008040673).

While the situation is different, as Facebook aren't suing anyone (yet), we can imagine if the roles were reversed, the story might be a little different. Why else would they file for patents if their intent wasn't to defend "their ideas."

If we're calling out Yahoo's patents as junk, we should be doing the same for facebook and the rest, otherwise we're turning a bad system of "who dunnit first" into an even worse one, a popularity contest.

simonw2• 14 years ago

> Why else would they file for patents if their intent wasn't to defend "their ideas."

As the original article said, most SV web companies claim to file patents as a defensive measure - so if they get sued by someone else, they can hit back. Suing first is extremely bad form.

> If we're calling out Yahoo's patents as junk, we should be doing the same for facebook and the rest

I don't see anyone saying that Facebook's patents are fine and Yahoo!'s are junk - Yahoo! are being criticised because they're attempting to enforce their junk patents. If Facebook attempted to force theirs they would get exactly the same flack for it.

alsothings• 14 years ago

I agree completely. While Y! is clearly acting in desperation, this is an obvious and predictable act given the legal system in which they operate and patent portfolio they have. We can (and should!) demand that they not do the expected, but I the think anger is better focused on systemic reform then getting angry at any single company's actions. In a system of laws, what else should anyone expect but a legal entity to act in what it sees as its own best interest. Software patents need to end; working to that end is the best way to deal with this sort of event.

gaius• 14 years ago

We can (and should!) demand that they not do the expected

Then you are demanding that the board neglect its fiduciary responsibilities and go to jail.

beagle3• 14 years ago

It's not desperation it all. It is blackmail (or as it was once, and perhaps still, known, "claim-mail").

Facebook has a lot to lose if it is perceived that Yahoo can hurt them, now that they are going public. Which is exactly why Yahoo is doing that, and why they did exactly the same thing when google went public.

mmaunder• 14 years ago

+1. Nothing more to add. Other than: I think we're stuck with the current system for at least a decade because we just "did" patent reform which was really just a dog and pony show for the unwashed masses.

guard-of-terra4• 14 years ago

They don't have to play this game. Once they dared to: start your hate machine.

wladimir• 14 years ago

It's a chicken-egg problem. The game will only stop once people stop playing it, but people won't stop playing it until the game stops.

And you can be sure that companies once they have lots of patents will lobby mercilessly to keep the current "game" in place. Who wants to stop playing when they feel they are winning?

Apart from some sudden massive outbreak of sanity, there is no way out.

barrynolan3• 14 years ago

True. Very true. They are in a weak position, and this is their hand.

It may take all out war, and an overwhelming of the legal v startup ecosystem, before sense returns. Akin to the opinion piece in the NYTimes "Go to Trial: Crash the Justice System" over the weekend.

tytso2• 14 years ago

The more we have companies blatantly showing how unproductive and how software patents are actually hurting innovation, the more likely it is that change will happen.

Just remember though that right now the pharmaceutical companies are massively outspending the technology sector as far as lobbying Congress. (A Senator is a wonderful thing --- everyone should own one!)

As a Google employee I can contribute to Google NetPAC. I'm not sure what opportunities exist towards donations to organizations that directly lobby Congress. The EFF is an advocacy organization, which is a good start, but they are not a lobbying organization per se.

It's a horrible system and it's not a productive way to use money as far as society is concerned, but unfortunately, it's the way the game is structured, and if you don't play the game, you'll get run over by those who do....

endersshadow2• 14 years ago

Companies like Apple, Microsoft, Oracle, and IBM which hold a huge number of software patents and aren't exactly keen on seeing that system go away, either. But yes, big pharma relies almost exclusively on patents to recoup R&D costs.

wpietri2• 14 years ago

A) I'm perfectly ok with hating the player and the game. Patent reform would be great, but you can't legislate sanity or neighborliness.

B) This is not the game. As Fred Wilson explains, web company patents have been thought of as defensive. If this triggers a wave of patent lawsuit bullshit, then everybody will end up poorer. Except the lawyers, of course.

pavel_lishin• 14 years ago

Mutually Assured Litigation.

prof_hobart• 14 years ago

How about hating both?

Yes, current patent law is broken, but that doesn't mean that Y! have to use it. If this was a defensive move against a patent claim from Facebook, I'd have some sympathy. But as far as I can tell, it isn't. So I don't.

jazzsax• 14 years ago

what sort of substantive analysis of the patents in this case have you done to justify claiming that this case indicates we need patent reform?

kd5bjo8• 14 years ago

It seems that a lot of people think that we need substantive patent reform, but what I haven't heard is any real proposal except for scrapping the entire system (or possibly just for software). I've put together the basics of a proposal here:

http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3698637

I'm sure that it has a lot of problems, but we need to start having the discussion of how to fix the system, instead of just whether or not it needs fixing.

angersock8• 14 years ago

I replied to a couple points in your thread.

Long story short, kill patents, kill copyright, keep trademark.

olaf• 14 years ago

It's not very effective to hate. I would prefer "fight/act effectively against the people who make/are responsible for the rules of the (dirty) game."

shmerl4• 14 years ago

Not really. Those who act unethically bear the responsibility, and saying that since system is broken it's OK to abuse it just doesn't cut it. With that said, of course the system needs to be blamed (and changed) as well.

angersock8• 14 years ago

What's unethical about this?

Seriously, where is the moral imperative that says "Thou Shalt Not Patent Troll"?

nextparadigms• 14 years ago

They had a choice - not to use those patents they know are worthless, to make money from FB. So yeah, I'm also perfectly fine with hating the player in this case, too.

angersock8• 14 years ago

It's just business. They have a responsibility to their shareholders.

bborud• 14 years ago

Patent reform is not going to happen until people start hating the player. Whenever someone says "don't hate the player" we end up a little bit further away from patent reform.

nilsbunger5• 14 years ago

For reform, the trick is to find a solution that works at two ends of the spectrum:

1) A pharma company spends $1B on R&D to develop a drug and get FDA approval. If someone could knock off the resulting compound at 10 cents per pill, we wouldn't have the drug.

2) Software companies, where there are hundreds of potential patents to file or infringe on, and there is tons of iterative evolution.

nilsbunger5• 14 years ago

Maybe reform could happen by fixing how damages are awarded? Like if you infringe on some patent that is a small part of a product, you pay a $100 fine or something? That would remove the financial incentive to sue unless you can prove someone's whole business is built on your ideas...

slowpoke2• 14 years ago

>Don't hate the player, hate the game.

In case you missed it, it's the players who make the game and keep it running - a self-sustaining spiral of endless bullshit.

CPlatypus11• 14 years ago

The OP wouldn't seem quite so hypocritical if VCs didn't put immense pressure on startups to generate patents. Don't tell me those patents are supposed to be purely defensive, either. They were supposed to stake out a bit of technical turf, just like Yahoo's doing. I'm not saying it's right, but I don't think much of demanding patent generation on one hand and then complaining about their use on the other.

If you want to oppose software patents - and you should - then be consistent about it. Either forego them entirely, or require via contract that they be used only defensively. The latter is the approach taken by my employer, BTW, who also spends more money than anyone else fighting software patents. As schizophrenic as that strategy might seem, I believe it's the right one for the crazy world we live in.

corin_2• 14 years ago

It's quite possible that Fred's actions do make him a hypocrite here, but can you show that they do, rather than waving your hand at him and calling him a VC?

CPlatypus11• 14 years ago

His blog title is "A VC" plus right at the top of the page it says "Fred Wilson is a VC and principal of Union Square Ventures" so yeah, I think I was on pretty firm ground there.

route66• 14 years ago

Fred's official standpoint is here (the slug already says it):

http://www.usv.com/2010/02/software-patents-are-the-problem-...

Of course it is not clear if he lives up to that stance in all cases (http://www.usv.com/investments/) , but I read CPlatypus' statement more as pointing out the structural problem.

davemel37• 14 years ago

I think his point was that these "Specific" patents were bogus patents in the first place...

"None of them represent unique and new ideas at the time of the filing. I supect they all can be thrown out over prior art if Facebook takes the time and effort to do that."

I do think that pre- IPO this is a pretty dirty play. You might have a point if you can show a case where Fred Wilson or VC's sues other companies right before an IPO on bogus patents...I am not aware of any such instance.

CPlatypus11• 14 years ago

That's a fair point, but I don't think it gets very far. He also goes on to say, "I don't think there's a unique idea out there in the web space and hasn't been for well over a decade." That's a pretty common attitude. Have you ever seen anyone say "yeah, that software patent is truly novel"? Ever? I haven't, so he's not really making a distinction between these specific patents and others. Without such a distinction, he's essentially saying that any patent suit would be wrong . . . but then why do he and his ilk put such pressure on startups to generate the raw material for those suits? Whether Fred himself is actually hypocritical on this point is not clear, but without a strong statement from him about that kind of pressure - and there's none in that post - he still seems so.

Is it a bit dirty to do this immediately pre-IPO? Yeah, I think so, even absent other concerns. But Fred's comments go far beyond these specific patents at this specific time. He talks about a very general "unspoken line" that web companies shouldn't cross. It's the general statement I object to, not the specific one.

stevoski• 14 years ago

"Dima is Russian. Some Russians are crooks. Therefore Dima is a crook."

This bad logic is what you are applying here.

Karunamon2• 14 years ago

Firstly, an analogy to people is going to cause a lot of emotional load for no reason, so this is flawed from the word go.

More to the point, these patents are objectively BS. Go look at the claims. There is not a single, novel claim among the whole lot, and you could probably pay a college kid an hour's wage to find prior art on every single one of them.

nikcub5• 14 years ago

This comment is nonsense and is guilt by association. Fred has been on the record numerous times advising startups not to bother with patents.

CPlatypus11• 14 years ago

[citation needed]

spolsky• 14 years ago

Union Square Ventures, of which Fred Wilson ("the OP") is a partner, is an investor in my startup (Stack Exchange). They never put pressure on us to generate patents. They have been consistently anti-patent for quite some time. They have complained frequently that a third of their portfolio is under attack from patent trolls. They have organized fundraisers and meetings which I have attended with Senator Chuck Schumer from New York to press their position for patent reform.

Maybe YOUR stone-age, backward-ass VC thinks that startups should generate patents, but don't tar Fred Wilson with that brush.

brudgers2• 14 years ago

As a publicly traded company, Yahoo does not have the same discretion as a company like StackExchange.

I also suspect that startups capable of the sophistication StackExchange brings to the selection of a VC are a distinct minority.

CPlatypus11• 14 years ago

I got tired of this and other VC games after my tenth startup a couple of years ago, so I guess it is possible that attitudes have changed. Even if Fred is one of the good guys, though, I'd still bet that he's in a small minority. That's the real point, which of course has been missed by most of the responses. Pick a random startup and go look for patent applications. Most of them clearly are pursuing that strategy, and most of those are likely to be doing so at the behest of their investors. This has been going on for many years, so why is it suddenly evil when Yahoo! does the totally inevitable? Is there seriously any reason to believe that Etsy or Twilio - USV companies for which I've already found applications - wouldn't? This kind of thing won't stop until people like Fred refuse to invest in companies that are pursuing patents without a binding commitment to use them only in defense, and for all their strong words they don't seem to be doing that.

vidarh• 14 years ago

I've worked in, and co-founded, several VC funded startups, and even have my name on a patent. Despite that I have never come across a case where the VC's pushed for patents at all, and several where they thought it was a waste of time and money.

fredwilson4• 14 years ago

we don't do that at USV and never have. i agree that the VC industry is guilty of that practice, but we are not.

brudgers2• 14 years ago

I don't think that in general the practice is something over which the VC industry should feel guilty. Venture Capital has historically and continues to fund industries where patents are appropriate, e.g. semiconductors.

Software patents are problematic, but only because of the general features of the patent process and the fiduciary responsibilities of boards of directors to their shareholders.

bobv• 14 years ago

Not nearly good enough as an answer. I've watched dozens of investors pressure founders about patents. Usually it's in the guise of the valuation of a company - what intellectual property am I investing in? - and the idea of defending himself later is used as a rationalization.

It doesn't matter at all whether Fred's firm does this. Union Square Ventures isn't suing Facebook either, that's another behavior they're not engaging in. They're also not actually coding software.

What matters is that Fred wrote a seething post about the patent system without mentioning how many if not most bogus patents get created in the first place - at the urging of the other guys on his side of the table.

CPlatypus11• 14 years ago

"I encourage all of our portoflio companies to file for as many as they need"

http://www.avc.com/a_vc/2006/04/patently_absurd.html

If you're letting them spend your money on filing patents without any kind of binding commitment to use them only in defense, and there's plenty of evidence at USPTO that your portfolio companies are still doing just that, then you're not clearly any different than any other VC in that regard.

This madness will not stop until there's more retaliatory capability than first-strike, and that won't happen as long as there's money pouring into the acquisition of first-strike weapons. Those who fund the stockpiling are culpable, no matter what they say as they're doing it.

harryh• 14 years ago

Any chance you could post (or privately send to me) information about the process by which you contractually set up patents so they can only be used defensively? I'm very much interested in doing the same.

BTW, you're taking a lot of heat in this thread that you don't deserve. I work at a VC funded startup (with USV as an investor no less) and I basically agree with you.

CPlatypus11• 14 years ago

Don't worry about the heat. Karma here has no value, or perhaps even negative value, to me. What I'm saying about VCs, startups, and patents is real and important, even if some self-interested HN'ers don't want it heard or even if Fred was the wrong frame on which to hang that picture. I'll burn some karma to get the word out about the real source of the problem and the real solution.

To answer your question, of course IANAL but the way to do this is to assign the patents to an external entity such as http://www.patentcommons.org/ or http://www.openinventionnetwork.com/, where that entity has a charter allowing only defensive use - and preferably with other entities involved to enforce that charter. A public statement like http://www.redhat.com/legal/patent_policy.html doesn't hurt either, though it's not legally binding. Now, PC or OIN might not be the exact right vehicle for you, for other reasons, but that's the basic approach.

Disclaimer: I work for Red Hat, which is a strong proponent of this approach and supporter of these organizations. Until software patents go away - and Red Hat is supporting that effort too - this is the only way to play the game that is both safe and (IMO) moral.

bambax2• 14 years ago

> I used to care about that company for some reason

That's the strangest part. I never found Yahoo useful for anything (except Douglas Crockford, but he could have been employed anywhere).

bryanlarsen• 14 years ago

They were useful for navigating the web between 94 and 96 or so. They then proceeded to acquire a few sites which were also useful at one point in time, (Flickr et al), although they do seem pretty good at driving such sites into irrelevancy.

hessenwolf• 14 years ago

Their public finance pages are the best I have found (until some time later this year when we release, that is)

icebraining2• 14 years ago

Yahoo! Pipes is extremely useful.

bambax2• 14 years ago

I did try that and found it not very consistent; plus you never know when it's going to be discontinued.

frou_dh• 14 years ago

Hell yeah. Very cool service.

I mainly use it to correct strangeness in sites' RSS offerings. For example, BBC iPlayer offers feeds for channels but not per show (?!), and Penny Arcade doesn't offer a feed for just the comic without the news posts.

AznHisoka• 14 years ago

I actually like Yahoo News for some reason. Some of the stories they feature in the front page makes me want to click through and read it when I'm bored.

mirkules• 14 years ago

I'll second news.yahoo.com. It's better than Google's layout, and you can dive right into subregions of the world to get more specific world news.

Also, nba.yahoo.com has a better layout than nba.com itself for following stats and even following the games live (a really well-done java applet).

Finally, I've been playing around with switching search engines from Google to something else, and I found for most tech stuff, Yahoo! actually has more relevant search results than Bing or DDG.

jcfrei• 14 years ago

it's funny you mention this. yahoo actually got several maching learning algorithms in place, constantly adjusting headlines and summaries to get a higher CTR on the articles. i've visited the site occasionally and noticed and immediate desire to click on some of the links. Source: http://www.theregister.co.uk/2011/09/23/yahoo_core_personali...

cs7022• 14 years ago

This title is unnecessarily sensational. Why not use the actual title of the post ("Yahoo! Crosses the Line")?

arturadib• 14 years ago

It conveys the tone of the post much more than the original title. And those are Fred's actual closing words. I say this title is spot-on.

barrynolan3• 14 years ago

I did consider the title, and was about to go with the original. Fred is one of the best writers out there - insight, humor, compassion, humility, honesty. I thought his closing remarks really captured his rare but real venom at the shakedown. Nothing more than that.

cs7022• 14 years ago

barrynolan,

Thanks. Now that I understand your reasoning, I have no problem with the title. FWIW, I wish I could delete my comment, but unfortunately that's no longer possible.

michaelw2• 14 years ago

I'm in the mood to pick nits this morning.

The article links to the description of the patents http://paidcontent.org/article/419-meet-the-10-patents-yahoo... and tries to summarize each one in "plain English."

> Control for enabling a user to preview display of selected > content based on another user’s authorization level (Filed > 2005, Issued 2009) > In plain English: Share an item only with selected friends

This is actually about a preview of what a given user (friend) would see.

The reason software patents suck so hard is because for every 10,000 totally bogus patents there's one that when you read it makes you think, wow, that really is an invention.

JVIDEL2• 14 years ago

TBH it would be a true douche move if we were in say 2006, but right now FB is worth almost ten times more than Yahoo, so who cares? they can either buy Yahoo or even sue it into oblivion.

Is not that crazy to assume this may actually be a last-resort strategy to sell Yahoo once and for all. Most agree Yang dropped the ball when he refused MSFT's offer.

edanm• 14 years ago

The reason for the timing is because of the IPO. Yahoo! is using this as a way to make Facebook desperate to settle, so that their pricing is higher during the IPO.

JVIDEL2• 14 years ago

That too

PaulHoule• 14 years ago

The close analogy, for me, was Oracle's attempt to shake down Google.

Patents are a game that's a lot like Poker.

I couldn't blame any startup for accumulating a patent portfolio because that's something of economic value -- it could help an acquisition because a larger company would like to put together a broad portfolio.

So long as you can get value out of it that way, it's all roses. Once you get to a lawsuit, it's ugly, largely because the result is unpredictable -- if people settle out of court you get the desired result, but if your opponent can fight you to the end, you're very likely to end up with invalidated patents. That, of course, is why companies like this broad portfolios -- if there are ten patents involved, it's much more likely something will stick.

shareme• 14 years ago

And how many worthless patents doe USV firms have?

And where was Fred when MS started its shit?

Oh effing come one now, lets have a honest conversation Fred instead of some lame miss-direction..

fredwilson4• 14 years ago

i've been pretty loud and vocal on the anti-software patent thing for quite a while now

zyb09• 14 years ago

Well I hope he doesn't use any Apple products then. That would be pretty hypocritical.

funkah• 14 years ago

Good point, Apple is literally the only other company that has ever filed a patent lawsuit.

tmuir2• 14 years ago

Apple sits diametrically opposed to Yahoo in the overall internet zeitgeist. Apple is the hot girl everyone gives a pass to, and Yahoo is the band nerd that everyone laughs at.

fredwilson4• 14 years ago

i called Apple evil on stage at a conference a few years ago

http://venturebeat.com/2010/07/21/fred-wilson/

joering23• 14 years ago

I really don't understand what their weak market position has to do with this lawsuit. If Yahoo! believes Facebook violated their patents, they will sue. They _should_ sue. They do it now because apparently that's the way new CEO does the business. I can't blame him, can you? Now, whether FW post was an emotional rant or he has any business saying what he said, hard to judge. But I read his blog for a while now and don't recall last time stumbling at such an emotional rant.

Further, whether patent system needs "reform in this country" is relevant to the fact that one part believes other part infringe. If Yahoo!, Facebook or anyone else feels someone infringe and ended up saying "oh they system is broken lets wait until its fixed", then they may as well wait another 75 years.

I say good things can come up from this, especially if Yahoo! loses. Facebook is claiming that what they are being sued over was "nothing new" at that time. Cool! Have them win. Next time someone build highly successful social website with human connections done based on request/approve/reject, and Facebook will try to shut them down based on infringe of one of their hundreds of patents, you can say: "oh, none of this was new at the time of Facebook: MySpace, Fridndster, etc. Here, I am using Facebook own rules - they win, I need to win too".

guard-of-terra4• 14 years ago

No it should not. It's as if you said, if Yahoo has a gun, it should fire at Facebook.

Tech companies do not make their living by exploiting their patents directly (as e.g. pharma companies do). They make living from advertising to their userbase. They do patent some things they use to keep and monetize that usebase, but there is no direct relation.

So: Of course they should not sue "by default". It just isn't a winning strategy for them.

joering23• 14 years ago

so as long as I do a business in tech, I should not care about anyones patents (or IP in that matter) -- just open the patent book and look what I can steal (sorry: take) from others and use it to build my own tech company.

Okay then.

markokocic• 14 years ago

Well, I don't agree with the author.

Why would it be ok for Yahoo and other big companies to use patents "only" to threaten small shops and keep the status quo?

Let them fight between eachother, let Yahoo sue Facebook sue Gooogle sue Microsoft sue Apple sue HTC sue Samsung sue Sony sue Oracle sue ... let everyone sue everyone else. Let the total war on patents begin. Let the big players burn a ton of money on pointless legal battles. And then, and only then, they might push for a patent reform which will level playing field for all players, including new ones.

shasta• 14 years ago

Right, because that's what they're going to push through: legislation that levels the playing field.

michaelw2• 14 years ago

This is already what happens. Changes have reinforced and will further reinforce the status quo and ensure that only the mega corporations will be able to play.

bergie2• 14 years ago

The only Yahoo! property that I care about is Flickr, which I also pay for. It would be nice to find an alternative.

So: suggestions for a social photo archive service which is reliable enough to be the "master copy" of my pictures, and preferably has Flickr import ability?

pavs• 14 years ago

imgur.

They are not stagnant, improving all the time. Not as big as flickr, but big enough and reliable.

I used both imgur pro and flickr but now I only use flickr because I am too lazy to switch.

logic• 14 years ago

Take a look at 500px.com; it seems a large swath of the higher-end of the community is migrating there. At this point, it's probably where I'm going to land with my archive if I have to move.

Unfortunately, I don't believe they have the ability to automatically import your Flickr photos.

bergie2• 14 years ago

I was looking at the API, and it seems that import would be quite easy. But since they lack tagging and some other Flickr-like features, the import would have to be slightly lossy.

lrobb• 14 years ago

OP: "Yahoo! thinks they can bully Internet newcomers ..."

Wait... Is he still talking about the facebook lawsuit?

Porter_423• 14 years ago

The only reason for taking such decision is the money.We have noticed the same thing in the past.

Teef• 14 years ago

I suppose we all knew this day would come from Yahoo. The start of where lawyers take over the company and product make a steady march to complete crap. Pretty common pattern for companies that can no longer compete (SCO anyone). It is sad Yahoo still have a great brand and could reinvent itself. This entire thing is nonsense but I guess to try and squeeze some more revenue for the share holders is what they are obligated to do. I miss the old Yahoo.

badclient• 14 years ago

Today it's Yahoo, tomorrow Facebook.

mrgreenfur• 14 years ago

Facebook isn't a 'newcomer' and Yahoo! wouldn't bother suing anyone that wasn't already a giant.

polshaw• 14 years ago

I disagree with the patent situation as much as anyone, but that was massively melodramatic (and almost completely lacking any substance).

fredwilson4• 14 years ago

it was a rant. you are right.

Hoff• 14 years ago

Fred Being Fred aside...

Yahoo! could be aiming to be acquired by Facebook or Google.

Assuming the patents involved are tenable, this looks rather like a viable reverse-acquisition strategy.

wavephorm• 14 years ago

But this really isn't the way to make any friends.

I'd be surprised if anyone wants to do business with people like this ever again.

tmuir2• 14 years ago

Who manufactures the memory in Apple iOS devices? Samsung.

CamperBob3• 14 years ago

Corporations are like nations: they don't have friends, they have interests.

rooshdi• 14 years ago

You're kidding, right? It's kind of hard to tell with all these trolls nowadays.

jpdoctor• 14 years ago

I'd love to hear Fred talk about how Twitter is preparing, because it's a good guess that they're next.

Probably the reason for this post in fact.

iamgopal• 14 years ago

I wish I would have choose law instead of software.

rdl2• 14 years ago

Sounds like it is finally time to migrate off flickr. I wonder what the best options are -- self hosting of full res, plus FB Photos for social? Is Picasa worthwhile?

pullo• 14 years ago

same sentiment here. I've been using y! mail for a decade. Y! 'wall streetish' behavior is a good incentive to sever all ties. I am also certain , lot of their portal traffic comes when users are redirected to the portal home page when users sign off their ymail accnts.

rdl2• 14 years ago

I feel slightly more disgusted than usual because I bought YHOO stock a while ago, because it was cheap (when factoring in Asian assets, etc.).

I had hopes the new CEO would try to turn Yahoo around. I don't believe in shitty display advertising long-term, but it could be viable for another 5 years. At least, I had confidence he could fire enough Directors and VPs to make Yahoo at least as innovative as eBay (also not a particular paragon in Silicon Valley), and I was hoping Yahoo's boardmembers would start actually acting in the interests of shareholders.

I guess I was wrong.

monochromatic10• 14 years ago

This guy doesn't even mention the claims of the patents in suit, so why should I trust his opinion about their merits? If you don't know how to read a patent, you're absolutely not qualified to make pronouncements like this:

> None of them represent unique and new ideas at the time of the filing. I supect they all can be thrown out over prior art if Facebook takes the time and effort to do that.

Also, even the article that he links to just quotes the damn abstracts of the patents, as if that has anything to do with what they cover.

Honestly people, I know you like to rail against software patents and the patent system in general... but educate yourselves first, or you just come off looking ignorant to anyone who knows the first thing about patents.

carbocation• 14 years ago

Far more valuable than this contrarian response would be an analysis of the claims on their merits, since you allude to a knowledge of the subject. Care to share?

monochromatic10• 14 years ago

I haven't read the patents myself either, and I'm not willing to put in the time to pore over 10 patents just for the sake of curiosity and karma on HN. It just irritates me when I see such ignorant rage.

moldbug8• 14 years ago

Can we bring Hitler into the conversation?

No one needs to be "educated" in the intricate and fascinating political and economic power dynamics of the Third Reich to have a valid opinion about Hitler. All they need to know is that Hitler killed the Jews and was evil.

Similarly, no one posting here needs to know anything about the technical details of patentology, a subject in which I suspect you're quite expert, to know that the patent system is evil and needs to be eradicated from the earth - like Hitler.

Does that make you a bad person? Fact is, a lot of good people worked for Hitler. But at a certain point, they all had to reevaluate their career choices. I can only hope you'll do the same.

monochromatic10• 14 years ago

If ridiculous comparisons make you feel better about holding strong opinions on subjects you're ignorant about, then by all means.

> The best lack all conviction, while the worst

> Are full of passionate intensity.

Tossrock• 14 years ago

Are you seriously comparing patents to genocide? Is that really what's happening here? One, get some class. Two, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Godwins_law

rokhayakebe• 14 years ago

The guy is a VC with over a decade of experience investing in technology companies and selling a portfolio company to Yahoo for billions of dollars. He may know a thing or two about software patents.

monochromatic10• 14 years ago

This blog posting certainly makes me believe he does not.

justmyopinion• 14 years ago

I have no problem with someone being down on ridiculous patents. And think it is great that Joel stood up for Fred to say Fred isn't being hypocritical. However, i think that Fred should have dialed it back a bit before posting. He was trying to get noticed and Yahoo is an easy target as it has been sinking like the Titanic for a few years. But just because it is an easy target doesn't mean you should shoot at it.

ypcx• 14 years ago

Patent system doesn't need to be reformed. It needs to be flat out abolished. It's a disgrace to the human race. You can't own ideas. Patent system is a form of control, just as is oil, or just as the way the monetary system is run. All these must go, will go.

huhtenberg• 14 years ago

NB: Yahoo Mail is still an excellent source of widely-accepted disposable anonymous email addresses. If not the only one left.

nileshtrivedi• 14 years ago

What about Amazon then?

eroach• 14 years ago

SCO tried this crap to the tune of 45 million. What a stupid use of time and effort.

pedalpete• 14 years ago

I tried to find an example where Google sued a company for infringing on PageRank, but it doesn't appear that has ever happened.

If everyone really just uses patents for the threat of a possible lawsuit, is it still worth having them, even if you hope to never use one?

sopooneo• 14 years ago

Many others have already pointed it out, but how closely it parallels nuclear weapons philosophy is startling.

Rawgawd• 14 years ago

Well, I'd simply say that:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mh4jvDsNtEE

laconian• 14 years ago

The engineering soul of the company is being evicted from the body, and now this. They're like the zombie Husks from Mass Effect. :)

larrys2• 14 years ago

The title of this changed from:

"They are dead to me. Dead and gone. I hate them now"

to:

"Yahoo Crosses The Line"

Curious about the reason this was done.

duck• 14 years ago

Yeah, I just noticed that as well. Once something goes live you have the right to change it, but I would leave an update on why.

shapeshed• 14 years ago

This is like watching a once great sports team play in a rusty, deserted stadium. This hurts so much because Yahoo helped make the a web a beautiful, free place where humans could create and communicate. They once understood that but are now reduced to mugging full pockets in back alleys. Pretty clear the company is being run by stooges and fee chasing lawyers now and is sinking fast.

law• 14 years ago

Thomas Jefferson's 1788 quote, in a way, portends this: "the natural progress of things is for liberty to yield and government to gain ground." The dictionary definition of government ("authoritative direction or control") ostensibly extends this to encompass corporations. Patents are merely one of many tactics for corporations gain control; it's nothing new, and it ought to be expected.

Notwithstanding the foreseeability of patent warfare, I remain despondent toward "unwritten rules" in American law. Yes, they exist; it's no surprise that defendants in criminal cases who assert their 6th Amendment rights to a speedy trial that they subsequently lose will suffer a heightened penalty. The seminal case on this subject, Bordenkircher v. Hayes, specifically endorses threats of stiffer sentences to entice criminal defendants to waive their right to trial and plead guilty to a lesser offense. One can model this as a game of imperfect information, with society reaping the rewards.

So the author's reliance on this de facto "rule not to litigate" is flawed. The real problem arises when companies exclude others from practicing a technology in which that company's property interest is a mere subterfuge. Rarely do companies practice the technologies for which they've secured patent protection, and that brings me to my last Thomas Jefferson quote:

  A man has a right to use a saw, an axe, 
  a plane, separately; may he not combine 
  their uses on the same piece of wood? 
  He has a right to use his knife to cut 
  his meat, a fork to hold it; may a 
  patentee take from him the right to 
  combine their use on the same subject? 
  Such a law, instead of enlarging our 
  conveniences, as was intended, would 
  most fearfully abridge them, and crowd 
  us by monopolies out of the use of the 
  things we have.

However, we should be careful not to criticize the managers of these companies too much: they have a fiduciary duty of care to the corporation. Is there another "unwritten rule" that shareholders of a (struggling) corporation won't launch a derivative suit against the board of directors for failure to assert the corporation's patent rights against an infringing third party?

So in my view, the solution isn't at the corporate level; it's at the national level. As such, patent reform should be a national issue addressed by politicians. Patent term length [c|sh]ould be proportional to the research expenses actually incurred. Alternatively, we might want want a "patent abandonment doctrine" that moves to public domain those patents whose rights haven't been enforced (almost like in trademark law). Even still, we might want to wholly abandon the right to transfer or sell patents (and for that matter, all intellectual property) entirely. I haven't researched the ramifications of these potential solutions, so they're offered merely as points for discussion.

joshu• 14 years ago

Laws are generated by a largely accretive process. The corresponding ablative process is missing. I wonder if this is key to the imbalance?

Steko2• 14 years ago

"So the author's reliance on this de facto "rule not to litigate" is flawed."

And also historically ignorant. Yahoo did the same thing to Google when they went public in 2004. Somehow the world didn't end.

dodedo2• 14 years ago

No, they didn't. Your memory of history is incorrect.

Overture, a completely different company, sued Google in 2002, two years before their IPO.

Yahoo purchased Overture in 2003. After this, Google settled.

Google's IPO wasn't until 2004.

beatle• 14 years ago

>they have a fiduciary duty of care to the corporation

I absolutely agree. if you're the CEO of a publicly traded company, it is your fiduciary duty to extract value from the company's assets.

Exhibit #1: Sun Microsystems

if Sun had the cojones to sue Google (re: Java/Android) they'd still be in business today.

baddox• 14 years ago

In this case, it's unnecessary to make a leap from government gaining control to corporations gaining control, since patents are created and enforced by governments, not corporations. On top of that, a corporation is by definition an entity created by a government.

joshuahedlund• 14 years ago

My new hobby: googling abstract website techniques to see what kind of patents I'm violating on a regular basis. Did you know about the patent on mouseover (but not mouseclick!) dropdown menus?

http://www.m-cam.com/patently-obvious/intellectual-property-...

CamperBob3• 14 years ago

With treble damages, that could turn into an expensive hobby.

marizmelo• 14 years ago

yawho?

Yahoo Crosses The Line

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