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Steal This Idea
Most of the themes and arguments in Steal This Idea will be familiar to anyone who's read a Slashdot thread on patents. Michael Perelman is an economics professor at California State University. In Steal This Idea, he takes the position that patents (and trademarks, to a lesser extent) hurt science and the economy more than they help. He makes a pretty convincing case.
Roughly half the book is devoted to the negative effects of patents on scientific research. Perelman claims that tying research to intellectual property skews the balance of study away from basic research on fundamental problems, and toward short-term research geared toward improving existing products. Several real-world examples are given--many of the most potent come from the world of biological and pharmaceutical research:
Two decades ago, Philip Needleman, then a researcher at Washington University, in St. Louis, and his co-workers postulated the existence of two cyclooxygenase enzymes, COX-1 and COX-2. By 1990, Dr. Needleman, then chief scientific officer at Pharmacia, had guessed that the COX-2 enzyme plays a critical role in inflammation. By 1992, three other groups, including one at Rochester, had confirmed the existence of the enzymes by describing the genes that control their production. Although Rochester won the patent, the competing teams at UCLA and Brigham Young University claim that their work was fundamental.
Whether UCLA, Brigham Young, or Rochester deserved the patent is beside the point. More important is the idea that the granting of a patent on a bodily substance permits the owner to demand royalties from any company that produces a medicine that targets the substance.
Perelman gives historical evidence of IP hampering the development of new technology. His best example is the thicket of radio patents that entangled the baby radio industry, until the U.S. government voided many of them in the interest of accelerating radio technology during WWII.
Finally, Steal this Idea makes the case that scientific progress in the last half of the twentieth century owes a greater debt to basic research from academic and publicly-funded scientists and researchers than to corporate research. The concern is based on the large amount of time (decades, rather than years) needed for basic scientific discoveries to become marketable products is largely ignored by corporate research, which is focused on quarterly results.
It's curious that the internet--maybe the most obvious example of this, is barely mentioned. After all, business research has failed miserably at defining network protocols that match the resilience and utility of the network designed by publicly-funded scientists in the 60s. This may be because Perelman is less interested in obvious examples than lesser known ones, of which there are several in the book.
The second half of the book argues against patents (and Intellectual property in general) in terms of economic theory. Economics is Perelman's area of expertise, but it is not mine. I had to read most of these chapters twice before I understood them. They're interesting stuff, though. Perelman illustrates various ways economists attempt to shoehorn non-tangible goods (information) into economic models based on "lumpy objects." He illustrates the flaws in several of these models, and how these flaws translate into inefficiencies in actual markets.
Good: The book isn't just a rant, although it sometimes reads like one. Perelman is firmly biased against IP, and he sometimes uses a few paragraphs to rail against corporations in general. But the book is logically laid out, and presents evidence in well-defined pieces, always clear about what each example is meant to illustrate.
The examples. Those mentioned above are just a few of the many real-life events noted in Steal this Idea. They comprise the bulk of Perelman's case against patent IP. It's always tough to build an argument on anecdotal evidence, but in this case, there's a great deal of evidence.
The scope. I had doubts that a 211-page book could do justice to the issues with every type of intellectual property. Fortunately, Perelman doesn't attempt to cover copyrights, and barely touches trademarks. The overarching theme of the book is that intellectual property (mainly patents) in the hands of corporations works against the original goals of its creators--to encourage innovation and help the economy. The book does a solid job of supporting this claim.
Bad: IP is supposed to be a "limited" monopoly. Patents are, arguably, the most "limited" of the three types of IP in the US (copyrights, patents and trademarks). Perelman could have acknowledged this, and given concrete examples of why the limits aren't enough to balance the monopoly power. He doesn't explicitly do so.
Copyright is nowhere to be found. That's not all bad, since any book would be hard-pressed to do a better job of handling copyright issues than Jessica Litman's Digital Copyright . Still, Steal this Idea might have included a few more references to copyright-specific cases or works, if only to encourage further reading (patent & trademark examples include many references).
Perelman gives some illustrative figures about why the patent mess is so bad, and why the USPTO is unable to control it. But there's not much meat there. Hopefully, someone will take a more in-depth look at the USPTO itself, and how it operates.
Conclusion: Steal this Idea has a great deal of information, packed into a fairly short book. It's a good companion to Digital Copyright, and well worth reading for anyone interested in how IP works (or doesn't work).
You can purchase Steal This Idea from bn.com. Slashdot welcomes readers' book reviews -- to see your own review here, read the book review guidelines, then visit the submission page.
...for a free subscription to Slashdot for a day!
Comment removed based on user account deletion
geez, what's with all the theft in book reviews as of recent?
Mike
does this mean free subscriptions now?
Wow, people pay for this? but I didnt pay...
Glitch in the Matrix
This book does the exact same thing all the slashdot posts do, nothing.
Until our goverment is more worried about pissing off the constituents instead of the "sponsors" we'll get a government run by the corporations.
Money talks, bullshit walks. Welcome to the U$A.
Screenshot
Colossians 2:8
D@mn that's a bright red titlebar -- and without adequate sleep my eyes are already bloodshot.
Painful, painful.
-- @rjamestaylor on Ello
Comment removed based on user account deletion
... that was my idea!! You stole it!
Hey, this book looks exactly like one I wrote! Hold on a minute!
but pay for the book, godammit!
lysergically yours
Anybody else noticed the red bar?
Or have I got a virus?
How small a thought it takes to fill a whole life
75% of the comments here will be about the bug in slashcode.
Another prediction from the mysterious future.
The author patented the concept of writing a book arguing against patents.
Just like anything else..... all IP isn't necessarily bad. There's a heavy anti-IP slant on Slashdot, and that's a shame.
What's wrong with being able to make a few bucks off of something unique, new and original of yours?
Just like anything else, *abuse* of the system is the problem. How do we sort the wheat from the chaff?
I'm not entirely sure. I think part of the problem lies in the USPTO. They probably need to have some subject-matter experts on hand who can check all the patent applications thoroughly.
Part of the problem is that there are *SO* many applications, that the USPTO can't handle it.
Any suggestions on how to improve?
Wow! Now if only the U.S. government would do the same thing with computer patents, things would be grea ...Oh, wait. I forgot that the U.S. government is now formally a subdivision of Microsoft/AOL/TW/Fox/MPAA/RIAA. Oh well. Nice while it lasted.
An older reference to patents in general can be found at Don Lancaster's site Tinaja.com. There's a pdf of the original paper, and some e-book links. Don's been an active author in the technology world for several decades. His site has some other amusing opinion pieces as well. Enjoy!
Do patents slow down scientific growth? Sure, if you have to go through the patent owner to do something, it creates a bottle neck, and increases expenses. But you also have to understand, patents motivate people. It encourages them to invent, and discover, because they know if they find something knew, or create something, they can patent it and make money from it. If inventors couldn't make money off their inventions, there would be alot less of them.
"Much work is lost, for the lack of a little more." -Edward H. Harriman
Roughly half the book is devoted to the negative effects of patents on scientific research Kind of hard to justify this sort of claim when you consider how much we have advanced in the last 70-80 years. It might not be a perfect process but it does seem to work.
Do not try to read the dupe, thats impossible. Instead, only try to realize the truth
What truth?
There is no dupe
I think it's ironic that the Hoffman book is found online in it's entirety after being brought to mind by a book about copyright protection and IP law. The universe has a strange sense of humor/justice...
US Democracy:The best person for the job (among These pre-selected choices...)
A slashdot review that's
a) Coherent and proofread.
b) Fairly meaty.
c) Reasonably Unbiased.
d) Actually talks about the author's writing.
e) Not a political vehicle.
??? Wow.
Well maybe not e), but 4 out of 5 ain't bad.
Although Rochester won the patent, the competing teams at UCLA and Brigham Young University claim that their work was fundamental.
I don't believe the patent was on the COX-2 enzyme itself, only it's application for medicines to reduce inflamation. If someone found a different use for the enzyme, I don't think the patent would cover it.
Who cares if it was fundemental. They researched it, found it, and claimed "FIRST POST!^H^H^H^H^HPATENT!" It's their right to get a patent for their work. Yes, it would be great if other drug companies could compete and make said drug for cheaper. However, you get into the "chicken and egg" problem of drug companies not doing research because it's not profitable. Besides, the author states that "scientific progress in the last half of the twentieth century owes a greater debt to basic research from academic and publicly-funded scientists and researchers than to corporate research." So why didn't they find it first? Prior art would have killed the patent. The truth is that corporate research provides an important contribution. If it didn't, this wouldn't be an issue.
However, when searching for the mythical Novell Unix patent a the patent office I was really struck by how bad every software patent was.
For example, when searching for patents assigned to Novell (search criteria AN/Novell), the very first patent returned is number 6,567,873, which is a patent having to do with spinlocks in an SMP kernel. Basically, the patent covers the idea of exponential backoff for a contented resource. This is something which ethernet has done for 30 years, and I'm sure there's even further prior art.
Another Novell patent involves resizing FAT file partitions on the fly, and involves no real insight at all.
But it's not these two patents. Almost every single patent is either just this obvious, or just this derivative of prior work. Check it out yourself -- pretty much every computer program ever written must violate hundreds of patents.
it turns the title of the most recent article on slashdot red.
forward this comment to twenty friends or all the rest of the titles will turn red and other horrible things will happen.
David Fleer in Manitoba, Canada only forwarded this comment to 19 friends and this is what he said: "My god, it's full of red titles"
George Tan of Maine completely ignored this comment and later died of syphillis.
Coincidence? you be the judge.
also, if you forward this comment to five hundred people Bill Gates may or may not send you a check for $535(five hundred thirty five dollars) and you may or may not see a hilarious animation of some sort.
lysergically yours
a slightly offtopic comment. patents can be abused by drug companies. when a patent for a drug is about to expire the company will release a similar drug and patent it to stop the generic companies from being able to profit. examples would be the weekly prozac and clariton-d. i am sure there are many more. i watched a dateline special on it once.
Have to disagree there. At least I can't violate copyright without actually copying someone else's work. Patents can deny me the right to my own, independently developed ideas. They don't last as long, but they're much more powerful.
Amazon could patent the business process covering the sale of books against patents. Then they could prevent anyone from buying the book by just not offering it on Amazon.
I'm all for intellectual property, I mean, if I have wasted MY time and MY money on something it's my god given right to claim it's mine! But it's gone too far in this day and age. Amazon has a patent on One-clicking. That's insanity! How can you patent something like that? I guess somebody should patent one-clicking opening folders, or maybe double-clicking links in the web browsers. Yes, I know it's not the actual click that's the patent but what it does. But still, it's pretty stupid. Maybe I should patent the wheel and see if I can get it through all the way. That'd be cool. Huhuhuhhuhuh. Yeah.
What's so bad about being lazy? What if there was a war and nobody showed up?
This review really made me want to read this book. I think the centeral problem with Intellectual Property is the whole notion of defining a right as a property. The legal system should go back to treating patents, trademarks and copyrights as temporary rights to exclusive use, rather than the newer notion of equating them with physical property.
His best example is the thicket of radio patents that entangled the baby radio industry
Baby radios are a fucking stupid idea. I'd rather listen to country and western, even.
Its not just the stupidity factor. It's also the encompassing nature and impact to our lives and our choices that makes a stupid patent one which is controversial. Patenting Video On Demand will decide for you whether you watch MS programming, or none at all. Novell's patent is hardly visible to the majority of people. Hell, I'd venture a guess that most /.'ers didn't even know. I didn't.
"Last one in is a rotten goblin!" - Kepp
of companies that need an improvement in some field. They would hire inventors to come up with the improvement and share the benefits.
As it is, inventors rarely make money from patents. They usually have to hand them over to the employer and just get a fixed salary. So individuals won't lose much.
Of course, there would be problems like motivating companies to join the consortium rather than just waiting for others to develop the technology. But the patent system has many problems as well. Who knows which is worse?
doesn't it just make you sick when you read about companies like RiceTecs and attempts to patent Basmati rice.
and I'm also an Economics major. The economics is really mostly dead-on, except that the author seems to imply that research is of more worth than profit. Which is of course true, but not in a free-market system--or anything related to it. If anybody's interested on how you and I get screwed over, though, go read some Noam Chomsky. All the government thinktanks develop cancer drugs, malaria drugs, whatever, and once they're perfected, they're sold for pennies to corporations who then sell them for $102/pill. Really, the only way to salvage this is to either have the government manufacture drugs (but socialism is just one step from COMMUNISM BOO HISS) or impose rules on drug makers (which again is regulation--companies hate this.) The people need to realize that health care is a right, not a privilege. And that's why I scoff when Bush declares himself a compassionate conservative and then cuts welfare programs, or cuts his oil buddies' tax rates. Disclaimer: I'm a member of the Green Party, and I think that we should have a maximum income... better to screw those that live well than those that are too busy being hungry to sit around with bags of money and diamond back scratchers.
I'm on a road shaped like a figure eight; I'm going nowhere but I'm guaranteed to be late.
His name is Lemelson, and he has licenses of over $1 Billion. There are various places to find information on him, such as the Lemelson Foundation and The Lemelson Center.
Kind of odd to see him being hailed as a hero on /., considering his heirs are suing anyone they can think of based on very loosely related technologies. I would think /. would villify him. He is many times worse than Amazon, in some respects. See Lemelson Patents Online, a reference for those being sued by Lemelson, as well as Lemelsoninfo.com. There is also a long article on The Lemelson Situation.
He is quite infamous for his use of submarine patents--he filed his first applications in the 50s, and kept filing continuations on them, getting some patents issued in the 90s, but with priority from an application in the 50s. You can see a short PDF article on the courts striking down the practice of submarine patents.
The only problem is:
The main point that the author is trying to make is ironically derailed because the university of Rochester cox-2 inhibitor patent has been subsequently ruled invalid by a judge.
Just a small point that was overlooked when trying to portray the point of view of a fringe, left wing California intellectual as valid in the innovation/reward debate.
Get rid of patent protection?
Move to China, they seem to flourish in their anarchistic IP world, lots of R&D going on over there.
A tangible object only becomes property when rights attach to that object. The core property right is the right to exclude others from using the subject property. To use another real estate example, think of the law of trespass. Trespass laws prevent others from using real estate.
Take this now to the next level - intellectual property. Because IP is based on an intangible ("an idea" as the author of this book has called it), the property is defined by the bounds of the rights in the intangible. The right to exclude is inextricably bound with the intangible and becomes part of the definition of the right. Therefore, the right is coextensive with the property because it IS the property.
To go back to the real estate example, the right to exclude is coextensive with the physical boundary of the land in question. That is why estates in land and the land itself are two very different things. The land itself is nothing. The estate in the land (that is, the rights attached to the parcel) is the property.
Most people (even most lawyers) never make this distinction when it comes to patents. You will sometimes hear talk about the "patent monopoly," but this term has been rejected by the Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit (the federal appeals court with exclusive jurisdiction over patent cases in the United States). The Court has made clear that patents define the metes and bounds of a piece of property and do not grant monopolies. There are sound reasons for this distinction that I hope you will forgive me for not discussing here. it is enough for this post that the distinction exists.
Laws affecting technology will always be bad until enough techies become lawyers.
Steal This Album!.
Folks,
.... All patent offices around the world need to shut down for a few (maybe 10) years. After a decade let the international court decide (and streamline) patent laws. I always chuckled at (the stupidity) a company owning the human gnome [definitely global community assets/property].
...).
... or developed supporting whatever. It appears more like the first to take all the credit with believable BS-smoke.
How can one company/person/university/... take the credit for creating anything that is unique, novel, and useful today with global communications and travel, internet seminars/conferences and universities,
I am not sure, but after many years of reading and experience, it appears that patents/USPTO are now a global government supported Welfare Institution for whoever claims all the credit first (patent variations patents, human/natural and mutations organic patents, obvious and stupid patents,
It is no longer who really did make
OldHawk777
Reality is a self-induced hallucination.
Unaccountable leaders are masters, and unrepresented people are slaves. How do US and EU fare?
Are you implying that amazon and Microsoft have not yet patented the idea of collecting ideas together in the form of chemical marks on bound sheets of processed trees?
:)
They both have patents pending on this. Since neither of them have found any prior art, the PTO will probably grant one of them
"One man can change the world with a bullet in the right place."
- Mick Travis, "If..."
I think what should be done is that every product has to pay a "patent tax" of a fixed percent, just like sales tax.
How that portion is divied up is between patent claimants, not the manufactures. Thus, if you use ideas or potentially use ideas, then the different patent claimers will have to battle with each other instead of the manufacturer or user.
It might look like "yet another tax", but we pay anyhow now, just in a less organized fashion. This recommendation just moves the legal haggling to an area that does not hinder patent usage.
Table-ized A.I.
The few examples that are mentioned in the book are what's wrong with patents. Patents that are too broad. Patents that cover things that happen in nature. Patents awarded without researching prior contributions.
What is missing are patents cases show their real purpose to help the little guy against bigger bullies. For example, the intermittent windshield case against Ford. Stac Technologies vs. Microsoft.
Really, he should advocate reform so that the abuses he exampled are curbed.
Well, there's spam egg sausage and spam, that's not got much spam in it.
the current focus of the executive branch is forcing smaller government.
What a crock of shit.
Non-defense federal spending under Bush the younger is increasing at a rate of 6.70% per year as of FY 2002 (with his subsequent budgets this rate is increasing even faster).
Under Bill Clinton non-defense federal spending increased at a rate of 4.24% per year, almost 200 basis points lower than the lowest recent Republican administration.
Go to cbo.gov and look for yourself.
The best of both worlds.
and does not rely on IP to do so. I am paid to come up with "new and original" work, by people who believe they need it, just like most people are.
Comparable few people make a living of selling their IP rights directly.
He independently created the song "My Sweet Lord", but the authors of the song "He's So Fine" sued and prevailed, saying Harrison copied the song.
That is not my reading of the document you linked to:
"With all the evidence pointing out the similarities between the two songs, the judge said it was "perfectly obvious . . . the two songs are virtually identical". The judge was convinced that neither Harrison nor Preston consciously set out to appropriate the melody of HSF for their own use, but such was not a defense."
"Harrison conceded that he had heard HSF prior to writing MSL, and therefore, his subconscious knew the combination of sounds he put to the words of MSL would work, because they had already done so. Terming what occurred as subconscious plagiarism, the judge found that the case should be re-set for a trial on the issue of damages."
According to this finding and admission, the work was not independently developed, but was copied from the original, even if subconsciously.
Imagine how many people could jump off a cliff emulating him while the anti-IP book industry is still in its infancy.
And then I'll patent other commies pretending to be perfect conservatives or perfect environmental managers or perfct people-persons or perfect whatever garbage comes out of their mouth, and pointing to that mismanagement as a reason for adopting their latest hare-brained scheme.
No, they'll grant both. What a Pain in The Orifice (PTO).
It doesn't really matter, but I couldn't just let it go; the book title isn't very original.
In 1971 Abbie Hoffman wrote a book with the title 'Steal this book'. The book was about how to get things like food, transportation, housing and communication for free.
According to this finding and admission [in Bright Tunes v. Harrisongs], the work was not independently developed, but was copied from the original, even if subconsciously.
What specific steps can a songwriter take when writing a song to avoid subconsciously copying a published musical work?
Will I retire or break 10K?
The Court has made clear that patents define the metes and bounds of a piece of property and do not grant monopolies.
I still don't understand. What is the fundamental difference between property and monopoly when the property has no close substitutes?
Will I retire or break 10K?
After getting tossed out of a job a few years back, I toyed with the idea of becoming a patent agent. The logic being that I already had a strong engineering background, it would make a good part time job that could turn into a full time one and vise versa, and finally it would be a great differentiator on my resume.
In Canada, you do not have to go to law school to become a patent agent. You simply work as a trainee at a firm for at least one year then write the appropriate exams.
After going through a series of interviews with various law firms. The following attitude became disturbingly clear:
The agents and lawyers couldn't give a damn about the validity of the patent. They will happily write up a patent application for anything - even things that can't be patented under Canadian law (eg. medical procedures). Why do they do this? Money.
Writing applications results in billable hours, fighting with the patent office to get it issued results in billable hours and litigating crappy patents in bogus disputes results in even more billable hours.
In the context of running a law firm, this is a perfect strategy. In the larger context of "what's right", it's pretty shady in my opinion.
If there's going to be reform, it's got to either start with the Patent Office or the inventors themselves.
For nontechnical ideas, a lighter form of protection based on peer-review could offload some of the USPTO's burden, while also making it easier to get good basic ideas into the world. This is the idea behind my site, Premises, Premises. It's an extension of the LazyWeb concept with added legal and technical infrastructure designed to prevent people from stealing. And yes, I'm trying to promote it-- but I do think it's a contribution.
There Ain't No Such Thing As
Money is Freedom.
So, let's print more money!!!
Seriously, I understand what you're saying, and I agree that there is an *almost* undeniable correlation between money and freedom. I too believe that personal wealth very much affects personal freedom, and I believe in creating wealth.
I also understand that nazi pro-consumer law hurts free enterprise when it restricts free trade, but I'm *ALSO* very familiar with pro-corporate laws/intitutions that do just as much if not more to restrict trade.
Examples of Anti-Consumer Laws/Institutions that Restrict Trade
* FCC Regulation of TV/Radio which favors long-range/high-ratings broadcasting with expensive licenses.
* Local/County/State/FCC Regulation of local telecommunications giving one company exclusive access to right-of-ways and infrastructure built with public money.
* The US Patent Office - Costing up to $500,000 in legal fees to disqualify a patent, this institution (with the courts help) restricts the free trade and innovation of both obvious and nonobvious technology by giving every asshole the opportunity to "call dibs" for it's exclusive use while bearing very little risk to both the patent office and the filer if the patent was fucking obvious and/or shortly inevitable.
If you want to keep believing that we're #1 because purely because we're a capitalist then you need to learn a lot about "other factors".
Other Factors:
* Trade Negotion Leverage
* Natural Resources
* Corruption (Equal Justice under Law)
* Workforce Skills
* Infrastructure
That's just to name a few...
"Communism is like having one [local] phone company " - Lenny Bruce
I read a few good points that Don Lancaster Made on his website. I have to admit that his audience is people who really has mastered a technology and can do something better than anyone else, for them putting out a patent is an invitation to theft. But it is also a good read for anyone thinking of patenting their good idea, it might be more sound to be beaten down in your shoes and walking away feeling like a looser than being talked into protecting something that wouldn't really hold on closer scrutiny.
The bottom line is that patents is really for corporations that can afford to be ripped of because they know that their legal legions are still going to be there and win the case in ten years time.
Personally I feel that on a global scale we should learn from history and admit that patent ripoffs is what made first america, then japan prosper. It's not a pure good thing, sure R&D must pay off but the things that pay's off in a limited time isn't all there is so lets just make sure it's limited and find other ways to advance.
Since something like the 14th or 15th century patents have been around. Talking about the patent system like it's a broad affront to free trade looks a lot like biting the hand that fed you.
Maybe with a few more hard facts than you're likely to find on /.?
So that's what, a half-a-dozen? Ten maybe?
The book review states
The parent poster states
Neither of you appear to know what you're talking about when you argue in terms of "IP" (intellectual property). I would hope that this thread would bother to distinguish between the disparate areas of law that are covered under the largely useless term "IP".
Trademarks, copyrights, and patents (just to name three such areas of law) do not cover the same things, have different histories, raise different social issues, are acquired in different ways, and offer powers that last for differing amounts of time. Sometimes the power you gain via a copyright license conflicts with an extant patent. You simply cannot think clearly about these laws if you lump them together as if they were part of a cohesive whole.
For more criticism and enlightenment on the term, read the FSF's take on "intellectual property" and listen to RMS' talks on the U.S. Patent system or read the transcript. His breakdown of the major problems with patents on algorithms used in the development of computer software (so-called "software patents") are still very relevant.
Digital Citizen
American capitalism goes most ugly to me at the point of international trade, apparently with tons of help from the rest of the globe.
Yeah, and I was upset with all the logic chip system patents. Today, a trillion logic operations are just one key-press away. I can understand the frustration at being so inhibited with one's expensive toys made by the companies that never explained exactly how to conquer the world with them.
Okay, so I made it up. Point is -- the veil is lifted, the whining ensues, much wailing and gnashing of teeth commences.... much sound and fury....
I'm guessing you have never read a PCT search report from the EPO OR JPO. If that is representative of the quality of the searches they do for their own domestic patent applications I would be seriously worried if those patents were valid in the US.
PCT=PAtent cooperation treaty.
Not a big setback. Just print it on recycled paper instead.
actually, the wheel has been patented in 2001 by an austalian guy:
a short article
the patent intself (i think)
It's ironic, but the Amazon one-click purchase patent is a bad example of a "bad" patent. It's actually quite a good patent.
No site had, and no programmer before or since would ever feel comfortable letting someone buy something without a second click for a confirmation. This is well documented, and any programmer of any age would tell you this. It was a true innovation in thought to both the online community and the programming community.
A better example would be something that was an imminently obvious next step, like rendering "frames" in 3D to provide animation. Whatever happened to that guy and his patent and his lawsuit against the big 3D card companies?
"Has [being a kidnapped teenage girl, raped repeatedly for months] changed you?" - Katie Couric to Elizabeth Smart
I wasn't disputing that patents don't have merit.
Since something like the 14th or 15th century patents have been around. Talking about the patent system like it's a broad affront to free trade looks a lot like biting the hand that fed you.
What I am disputing is your simple minded argument. Oh, and patents go far back as the 12th century in Italy.
I'm not going to debate whether patents are good or bad, because this is a stupid debate. I understand that the patent system has given the right people the right amount of incentive to develop technology to accellerate us into the future.
Edison is a perfect example. Would he have really been so persistant if he knew he wouldn't be rewarded? Probably not.
His invention was TRUELY novel, one of a kind and would be the catalyst for an explosion of technology.
Unfortunately, the world isn't full of Edisons. Most people's ideas are stupid, obvious or pointless. We want to AVOID rewarding stupid and obvious ideas and some how reward the novel ones, especially when they make it harder for smart people to innovate.
All this is supposed to be balanced out with:
* Intelligent Patent Clerks
* A backup system to nullify obvious/imminent patents when the Patent Clerk fails to indentify obvious/imminent patents. (Let alone prior art)
* Adjustable expiration times for classes of technology so as to balance incentive so it does not obstruct innovation.
* Common Sense
Instead we have a system run overrun by lawyers who have an incentive to file as many frivilous patents and sue as many people who violate these privilous patents.
* The Little Guys gets Screwed
* The Corporations get Screwed
* Only The Lawyers Win
Do you get it now?
"Communism is like having one [local] phone company " - Lenny Bruce
A patent doesn't confer any ability to market something and shut others out of the market. The right to exclude is to exclude others from making, using, or selling only what is claimed in your patent.
What if the claims of a patent are so broad that the patent pretty much covers an entire market?
Will I retire or break 10K?
How about rolling over some screen widget, and WHAM! you've bought something. Absurdly simple. Completely unethical. Utterly patentable.
SAD!
you fake developers and programmers.. stop whinging about it.
from your friendly patent attorney
mhack
Building a better ribosome since 1997
Your arguments make you sound like an antagonist from an Ayn Rand novel. Tell me, how much intellectual property have you been personally responsible for?
In light of your efforts to sound authoritative in this matter, might I suggest that you spend less time studying ways to rationalize theft from people like myself, and more time studying ways to actually contribute to society?
Only on slashdot can a posting be rated "Score -1, Insightful".
For a good example of a bad patent, try US Patent 6,314,574 which claims the method of storing HTML on CDROMs or other read-only media.
Stole my name! The nerve!
A lot that we "know" as "truth" about Edison isn't.
Telsa's contributions were certainly more important.
That Edison is well known and Telsa is generally known as a crackpot who made telsa machines has to do with what are now considered illegal business acts and little to do with the vagaries of patent law.
Telsa did get patents but he didn't consider them to grant him the rights to "print money. He viewed the money from the patents as merely the means to do more research. In other words, he would have do everything he did even if he couldn't get patents, although without the patents, he might have had less money to pursue his work.
"My new innovations are patented by the company"
Wrong! Patent law recognizes that only individuals can invent something.
The more names on the patent, the more likely the idea is either not new or is obvious.
Consider: I walk into a room of 50 people and describe a problem and ask everyone to jot down a solution. I collect the notes and find that 40 people have the same idea. I check the patent databases and can't find a patent on the idea and no one can identify anyone else using the same solution.
How many names are put on the patent?
Zero, because the idea is obvious.
Each person's contribution to a patent must be clear and concrete. So, a corporate can't be granted a patent.
What has confused you is the overly broad and general requirement for you to assign any and all patent rights to your employer, and to ensure that there is a valid contract, most companies pay you a piddling bonus when the application is filed and another when granted. A company may spend $50,000 to draft a patent, so giving you $500 is nothing. Giving you another $500 when granted is also piddling.
One of the things that a lot of employees should do is step back a moment and frame the problem in the terms they understood it a day before they "invented" something and ask their coworkers how they would solve the problem. I'll bet that they'd get a lot of "easy, do this", meaning the solution is obvious.
Just because I spend days understanding a problem, going down dozens of dead ends to come up with an understanding of the problem, and then struggle for a day to figure out the solution to the right statement of the problem, doesn't mean that the solution is "not obvious", merely that my mind was clouded by all the extraneoous details of the problem.
The patent office examiners certainly has few veterans of the computer industry working for them, especially software veterans. 25 to 50 years ago, programming especially was a craft learned in a guild. The approach to problems and the construction of solutions was learned from peers, or solved by working with peers or passing a problem around until a solution was found. When books were written, or algorithms published, the ones written up were either the simple ones that showed how to refine a solution, for example the bubble sort, or the solutions which were most creative or insightful, such as quicksort and heapsort. While a bunch of sort algorithms were published in the 60s, a comprehensive compilation wasn't produced until Knuth's book.
My guess is that if patents were granted for software in the early 70s, a lot of sorts would have been patented even tho Knuth had already cataloged and analyzed them but hadn't published because he was developing TeX.
But more important, software development is as much about the process of analyzing a problem and reframing it into a set of problems that have known solutions. A process just like much of mathematics.
The problem is to find the winners of a dutch auction...think think think...I'll put the bids in order by swapping adjacent bids until all pairs are ordered...ah I'll patent interatively ordering bids pair wise until all are in order.
Whoa, there is nothing to patent because a bubble sort is an obvious method of sorting, a bad one, but obvious.
That's why people who have been programming for a decade or two find almost every software patent to be bogus.
First, I'm not a moron, so I know there are a million other factors involved; I was just making a small point in a few words.
Second, I agree that our legal framework is essential to maintaining the competition that allows our economy to thrive, and that some of the factors you mention do inhibit free trade.
But to know whether the PTO actually inhibits development, you must consider what would happen in its absence. Although there may be anecdotal evidence to support this claim, it's not clear to me that investors would be clamoring to develop new technologies without at least the promise of IP protection.
Companies don't like paying lawyers any more than other people. Companies (their patent committees) tell the lawyers what to file for a patent, the lawyers don't decide this. When lawyers file frivolous patents, they are usually rejected and waste the company's money. When frivolous patents do get issued, they are usually invalidated by other lawyers when it comes time to sue for infringement. This also wastes the patent owner's money.
My point is this: You argue that the present system provides incentive for lawyers to file frivolous patents, but you ignore the fact that companies hire these lawyers, and the company tells the lawyer what to file. Companies don't want invalid patents because they are a huge waste of money. This is a natural limit to frivolous patents that arises from market forces. Some questionable patents get a lot of press, but lots of good patents get issued (we're at about 6 million now I think) and they support our technology economy in a good way.
Aside from the market limit to frivolous patents (which you seem to think is totally inadequate), what are you suggesting we do about all these lawyers involved? Get rid of them? You know, there is no law that requires you to hire a lawyer to file your patent. The inventors themselves can draft and file the patent. Why do you think companies spend all that money if they are just getting "screwed?"
Edison is a perfect example. Would he have really been so persistant if he knew he wouldn't be rewarded? Probably not. His invention was TRUELY novel, one of a kind and would be the catalyst for an explosion of technology. Unfortunately, the world isn't full of Edisons. Most people's ideas are stupid, obvious or pointless. We want to AVOID rewarding stupid and obvious ideas and some how reward the novel ones, especially when they make it harder for smart people to innovate.
We also don't want to limit patents to only "killer apps" or there would be very few patents issued. You may be setting the bar too high in your example of what should be patentable. Even minor improvements on existing products require R&D. Which requires investment. Which requires protection.
All this is supposed to be balanced out with: * Intelligent Patent Clerks * A backup system to nullify obvious/imminent patents when the Patent Clerk fails to indentify obvious/imminent patents. (Let alone prior art)
How exactly would you do this? Add another examination procedure and double the cost of our patents system?
* Adjustable expiration times for classes of technology so as to balance incentive so it does not obstruct innovation.
That is a very good idea. I would argue it is even more imprtant in the area of copyright, since copyrights have been repeatedly extended in length and now cover tools (i.e., computer programs) not expression (e.g., a novel or art).
A quote from IP Worldwide, Dec. 2002:
"Those who doubt the impact of patent protection on the availability of biotechnology funding should look at the infamous Clinton-Blair announcement in 2000. At the time, President Clinton was misquoted as opposing gene patents just as the first draft of the human genome was nearing completion.
"The biotechnology sector lost over $5 billion in market capitalization that day. Even after the President's remarks, it took six months for the biotechnology sector to recover."