US Patent - The process of tagging photos in order to identify them for distrubition/sale

[essaytee]

Apparently in the US a patent has been lodged by Mr. Peter Wolf of Photocrazy.com, in which Peter Wolf claims to have invented/discovered the process of tagging photos, which are subsequently uploaded to the internet whereby potential customers can search for photos by inputting an identifiable reference. Think of sports events photography, photographing runners or cyclists, tagging their photos with their bib number, whereby entering the bib number into a search returns their photos.

The patents Peter Wolf refers to can be found here and here.

Needless to say, I received correspondence from Peter Wolf claiming that I was violating his patent, that a licence agreement can be entered into.

My host is Smugmug and checking their terms and conditions reference is made to Peter Wolf of Photocrazy.com at the very end. I'm reproducing the relevant Smugmug reference here;

Notice for Professional Account holders: Uploading more than 500 photographs of participants in a single sporting event may require a License from PhotoCrazy, Inc. To avoid patent infringement, please contact:
PhotoCrazy, Inc.
Attn: Peter Wolf
509 Raindance Street
Thousand Oaks, California 91360-1219
Email: peter@photocrazy.com

With my little research to date, I believe this patent has only been filed in the US and Japan. I don't think it has been filed here in Australia.

I can post a copy of the email I received from Peter Wolf, if people are interested.

A question that comes to mind at the moment is what relevance is this to Australia? Has anyone from Oz come across this issue?

[kiwi]

Can you explain what triggered the email you received ?

I have not heard of this, there is a discussion on sportsshooter though if you google away

http://www.sportsshooter.com/message...html?tid=28052

I do not know if US patents are valid here sorry

[essaytee]

Can you explain what triggered the email you received ?

I have not heard of this, there is a discussion on sportsshooter though if you google away

http://www.sportsshooter.com/message...html?tid=28052

I do not know if US patents are valid here sorry

I am not sure what triggered his interest in my site, which is hosted by Smugmug.

I'm assuming, somehow he was able to establish what domains Smugmug host and thereby checking each and every one. I believe he's targeting major hosts, Smugmug being one of them, and taking things from there. For some reason he's set a criteria of not more than 500 photos from any one event; I have more than that.

There is also discussion over at dgrin : http://www.dgrin.com/showthread.php?t=26266 .

My site is www.fstop5.com and as you can see it's more a hobbyist site.

[Kym]

This is the sort of patent that should never have been allowed in the first place.
The USPO allows software and business processes to be patented - it has caused a bunch of issues over the last few years.

Now the stupidity is overflowing into photography.

Comment Tony?

[Kym]

If you want a clue to what is broken in US Patent Law (and we are not far behind) then hop on over to Groklaw... http://www.groklaw.net/staticpages/i...50402193202442

[kiwi]

Hmm, reading that site dgrin its a tangled web.....if it were me Id simply ignore it. Im guessing its a bit like a nigerian money scam.

[Kym]

I do not know if US patents are valid here sorry

Only when you host in the US (AP is hosted in the US) etc.
I presume Sumgmug etc are also hosted in the US so images hosted there will get hit.

[Xebadir]

If you are seriously concerned on the relevance of the patent or infringement from this patent in Australia you would probably do well to contact a patent attorney firm such as www.davies.com.au and ask. It would pretty easy to determine whether jurisdiction affects your items, and if its being sought in Australia (thought it would be easily to establish).

[arthurking83]

Sounds like stupidity at it's best, and we can only hope that the USPO is clever enough to reject his 'patent'.

If a piece of software allows the owner of the images to tag images(in any amount) than won't that burden(of violating any patent) be on the producers of the software? Has the software company provided any warning as to this patent on tagging images?

.. anyhow... I'm off to see my local patent lawyer to see if I can patent the process of 'producing ideas'.

idiots!

[essaytee]

Sounds like stupidity at it's best, and we can only hope that the USPO is clever enough to reject his 'patent'.

If a piece of software allows the owner of the images to tag images(in any amount) than won't that burden(of violating any patent) be on the producers of the software? Has the software company provided any warning as to this patent on tagging images?

.. anyhow... I'm off to see my local patent lawyer to see if I can patent the process of 'producing ideas'.

idiots!

The patent has been granted in the US.

[farmer_rob]

Hmmm... From Kiwi's sportshooter discussion, the Smugmug case appears to have been filed in Texas - the patent troll's court of choice. I haven't looked at the patent ( can't read the pdf at present), but suspect from what has been said that if you don't use 'his' method, you might be OK. At the same time, since he is targeting you (and not smugmug) there might be an argument to say that the patent needs to be filed in Australia.

Taking note of AP rules (no legal advice ...) and the fact that I am NOT a lawyer, I'd suggest you have two options - speak to a lawyer or get a lawyer to send him a letter saying (in brief) "P... Off". How much you want to spend on legal fees fighting what is a heap of crap is your business.

[mjp]

USPO accepts any crap. It lets the courts system determine, if they are valid.