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Scientific American On Bad Patents

Posted by timothy on from the reading-slashdot-is-patented dept.

dltallan writes: "Scientific American has a short article in which Gregory Aharonian presents his picks for the four worst patents granted. I like the patent for training with manuals (1998)." The Bustpatents site is worth spending some eye-rubbing time on.

1 of 227 comments (clear)

  1. Suggested Guidelines for Patent Application by EraseEraseMe · · Score: 5, Insightful
    Maybe it's time to stop the revolving door policy and really push for a more strict guideline to what is acceptable for a patent application.
    • Documented Research and Development
    • Resource Usage on R&D documented
    • Professional Acceptance of Patent (Maybe a part of the USPO acts as a mentor program(?)
    • Possible Prior Art and Explanations why it is not (I really like this one)
    • Penalties for Obvious Patents
    • Business Models and complex sociological functions unpatentable
    • Physical patents require working model
    • Web related patents with comparable real-life applications unpatentable (Amazon One-click)
    And the list goes on and on
    --
    "Anybody who tells me I can't use a program because it's not open source, go suck on rms. I'm not interested." (LT 2004)