BountyQuest Announces First Winners for Prior Art

tessd writes "BountyQuest has been bragging for a few days that it was going to announce some winners -- looks like it wasn't kidding. Four winners -- $10k each -- with prior art that could bust patents held by Cisco, Walker Digital, InTouch and Oracle. Them's some big names. Check out the guy from Oregon who won $10k because he held onto an out-of-print copy of Snow Country magazine"

Comments

Let's make bad patents more costly.

[Anonymous Coward]

I am posting as an AC because I work for a company that gets a lot of patents... anyway I am definitely in agreement that the pantent system is broken, and news like this is great (I just wish more software and buisness method patents were in the list).

Anyway I just had an interesting idea for a way to discourage bad patents. What about imposing a fine on companies who patent things that are subsequently invalidated due to prior art (or any other reason)? The amount of the fine should be equal to the amount of royalties collected on the patent and should be paid to the person (or group) who provided the proof needed to invalidate the patent? I think something like this would go a long way to discouraging the market for stupid and unethical patent measures...

Poor Patent Incentives

[vergil]

I highly recommend Brian Kahin's excellent essay: " The Expansion of the Patent System: Politics and Political Economy" for anyone interested in learning how the U.S. Patent system creates incentives for/ rewards crappy business method/ software patents.

For example, Kahin sagely points out:

"In-house legal counsel advise against routine reading of issued patents because of the risk of treble damages for willful infringement."

In my opinion, such idiosyncracies in the U.S. Patent system only reinforce the probability of the U.S. government handing out specious monopolies.

I spoke to a former patent examiner a few weeks ago. He informed me that (based on his observations working for the USPTO) patent examiners typically spend about 7-8 hours examining individual patents, plus another 7-8 hours doing "other things." Additionally, he confirmed my suspicion that the USPTO rewards its examiners for approving as many patents as possible -- quantity over quality.

Sincerely,
Vergil
Vergil Bushnell

I know, redundant.

[AntiFreeze]

Slashdot has had so many articles about patents and patent-law that I know this is a moot point, but I'll repeat it anyway.

Just because there is prior art does not mean that the patent will become invalidated.

Read this response by werdna to the article about Archie posted a few days ago, I think it's very clear on this point.

Not necessarily.

[Booker]

This could help people seeking to hold patents, as well.

If you can get decisive information that the patent you were going to apply for has prior art, it could save you a lot more than the $10k bounty.

If Mr. Bezos puts up $10k for some seemingly simple, obvious patent, and nobody can refute it or come up w/ prior art, he can feel pretty secure about going ahead with it, and saving court costs down the line...

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