Live data from Hacker News

E-commerce will evolve next month as Amazon loses the 1-Click patent

thirtybees.com

41–50 of 237 posts

Re: E-commerce will evolve next month as Amazon loses the 1-Click patent

#41
post #7
post #2

Still can't believe that this was a patent!

As someone who has a software patent, you don't want to know what it's like, as an engineer, to see your work get abstracted into generalities for a patent. By the end of it, everything was so generically described that I couldn't even recognize it anymore. This entire system needs to be reworked or thrown away entirely.

Software patents may be "strange", but patents are very useful in the rest of the engineering world.

Re: E-commerce will evolve next month as Amazon loses the 1-Click patent

#42
post #7
post #2

Still can't believe that this was a patent!

As someone who has a software patent, you don't want to know what it's like, as an engineer, to see your work get abstracted into generalities for a patent. By the end of it, everything was so generically described that I couldn't even recognize it anymore. This entire system needs to be reworked or thrown away entirely.

[deleted]

Re: E-commerce will evolve next month as Amazon loses the 1-Click patent

#44
post #33
post #6

I ran an ecommerce company for about a year, and one click checkout was the least of our concerns when it came to Amazon. The speed of delivery, prime benefits, brand recognition, and willingness to lose money on many if not most items are absolutely brutal to compete against. I'm glad one click checkout will be more broadly available, but it's probably not going to make much of a difference...

I love paper books, I love seeing them in my shelf, but since I bought a Kindle I just stopped buying paper books. It is just too easy to buy a kindle book with one click. The process goes like this, someone recommends a book in HN, they provide an Amazon link, I read a couple of reviews, at this point I'm convinced about buying the book or not, or even if I'm not totally convinced, the price, and the easiness of jus…

Would you buy less books if you had to click a confirmation window?

It's much easier to buy books when you don't need to wait for delivery, unpack, carry around, get up to get them, etc. But your process already consist of several clicks and waiting for many pages.

Re: E-commerce will evolve next month as Amazon loses the 1-Click patent

#45

I have been buying from Amazon for 20 years and have not once used 1-Click.

I'm using it because I know I have time to cancel it if it's a mistake, and worst case scenario it's very easy to send them back stuff. Just print the return slip.

Re: E-commerce will evolve next month as Amazon loses the 1-Click patent

#46
post #9
post #2

Still can't believe that this was a patent!

Agreed, it seems quite obvious even if there was no prior art (which I doubt, even in 1997, and security issues aside, sites using PHP or ASP or Perl could have been storing credit card data for express checkout functionality). I also don't see the huge advantage of this. I never use one-click checkout on Amazon. I like to review everything before I buy. I guess for totally impulse purchases it helps eliminate a step…

As liron said, one-click is optimizing the user flow, but allowing easy undo.

It is good UI design:

Optimize the common flow (buy the item) and provide easy undo (from the post-purchase confirmation page, and in the delay before shipping).

But I've still only used it a couple of times - the psychological barrier, wanting to include an add-on item, etc.

Re: E-commerce will evolve next month as Amazon loses the 1-Click patent

#47
post #35

I have been buying from Amazon for 20 years and have not once used 1-Click.

it very rarely works... you click it and then it asks to update your credit card details (even though I've been buying using that card for years)

hmm works for me all the time... but i'm curious i wonder are you running a standard browser, locally without proxy, from within the US? Not that i'm advocating you must, but curious if you hit on any of these?

Re: E-commerce will evolve next month as Amazon loses the 1-Click patent

#48
post #11
post #3

NOTE that the Registered Trademark of "1-Click" will still be valid and owned by Amazon http://tmsearch.uspto.gov/bin/showfield?f=doc&state=4808:d4r...

Quick, register "1-Tap" as a trademark! We're gonna be rich, boys!

thanks done. What do you mean we? /s

Re: E-commerce will evolve next month as Amazon loses the 1-Click patent

#49
post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I found > the patent will expire and the technology behind it will be free to be used by any e-commerce site particularly specious. There is no "technology" behind it. It was a concept or busines process that the vaguaries of patent law deemed worthy of rewarding. Not to mention that any technology ("source code") Amazon used to implement the patent will remain under copyright essentially indefinitely.

this is nonsense

Explain?

Re: E-commerce will evolve next month as Amazon loses the 1-Click patent

#50
post #39
post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Absolutely. They have the capital and the scale to outcompete you and anyone that tries to go against them. Bar regulations to protect competition, you have no chance.

That's great for consumers.

Not necessarily. It could easily lead to inferior products as every point on the pipeline from manufacturers to distributors cut costs. It can, in addition, lead to a monopoly situation providing for relatively unconstrained pricing.
Post reply on HN