“Amazon.com’s patent on its affiliate program has roiled the
Web, but such protections may actually promote
innovation.”
“When Amazon.com last week won a patent for its “customer
referral system,” the Web community mobilized with characteristic
speed, splashing the Net with caustic comments, letters of protest
and calls for a boycott of the bookseller turned superstore.”
“By Wednesday, some 1,300 people had united at NoWebPatents.org,
agreeing to boycott Amazon unless it gives up its strategy of
patenting “obvious” and widely used technologies.”