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Inside Look at Patent Examination
KingFatty writes "This article written by a former patent examiner describes patent application as a matter of luck when it comes to the competency of the examiner. "Every examiner starts with his or her first patent application after receiving just two weeks of training at the USPTO Patent Academy, where he or she learns the basics of the Manual of Patent Examining Procedure. Will your patent application be examined by that newly recruited examiner? If so, will the examiner's supervisor (supervisory patent examiner or SPE)[be] sufficiently skilled in the art in which the patent application is classified?" Gives insights as to the problems with the US Patent and Trademark System."
Why aren't patents exposed to peer review, like academic articles are? The invention (if it is) will be protected by the patent pending laws while it's reviewed.
It's quite clear to me that most of the problems in our patent system were caused by Albert Einstein.
Now patent clerks everywhere do half-assed work, their brains busy trying to come up with the next great theory of time, gravity, and light.
There are only 10 types of people: those who understand decimal, those who don't, and, uh, 8 other types I forget.
Politicians don't waste their time trolling on /.. Find a better way to make fun of *nix geeks if you feel the need, or just maybe actually go for this politician goal of yours. Of course, that'd involve effort and thoug- wait. Politics. Okay, so do it mindlessly.
Stuff.
I feel the largest problem with the patent system is allowing people to patent "ideas" without a working prototype. I think this can and will lead to intuitive innovations being passed over because the manufacturer would have to pay patent fees to the "inventor". Total BS.
If the "inventor" didn't have the balls to put his/her money where their mouth is, then they don't deserve shit! Let's not punish companies willing to put forth money into a great idea by making them pay some lazy ass moron who payed a small patent fee to patent his idea of clapping to turn on a light.
From the article:
"The salaries of entry level patent examiners presently range from $32,819 to $70,959. Overtime is strongly encouraged after several months of experience is accrued, and it is not unusual for a junior examiner with three or four years experience to make more than $100,000 annually with overtime and bonuses."
Sounds like they're trying pretty hard to entice people to become patent officers, because the pay scale seems abnormally high for a governmental job. Starting salaries up to $70k per year? Geeez.... Or maybe the salary range is required because the job sucks so much.
Then why the hell do companies have to write 'Patents Pending' on their products for decades? You'd think that incompetency of this sort would speed up the process.
"Did a search on Google for some of the keywords in their description, but only a few thousand webpages came up... Patent Granted, next!"
Mr. Smith: I've come to patent a theory. I call it "Smith's Theory of Relativity".
Einstein thumbs through the papers.
Enistein knocks out Mr. Smith, and runs.
"If we let things terrify us, life will not be worth living."
- Seneca
This is exactly why I keep my anti-grav generator under wraps.
When we graduated my wife received a job offer to work as a patent examiner. Despite the fact that she has a degree in computer science I do not believe it would prevent absurd and obvious invention patents from going through the system. As best as I can tell the examiners are limited to prior patent applications and official publications in searching for prior art. Little room seems to be reserved for common sense. Quite thankfully she did not accept the job offer because I didn't want to move to D.C. and the pay wasn't that great for someone with that degree.
I wonder what kind of technology patent examiners use. Probably ancient PCs running Internet Explorer 3.0 and a cached version of AltaVista from 1994.
Every examiner starts with his or her first patent application after receiving just two weeks of training
So, what is the turnover rate at the USPO?
What percentage of the examiners are seasoned examiners of patent applications etc.
What percentage of the examiners have worked there for less than 2 years?
Howdy Doodly Doo!
Anybody want some Toast?
In order to even sit for the patent bar you have to a B.S. degree (usually in a physical science, some engineering degrees qualify, and CS degrees count depending on if the program is CAC accredited.) You also have to have a J.D.
Patent lawyers tend to be very intelligent; patent agents generally have the same education as patent lawyers, minus the J.D.
I was talking to a lawyer about patent applications once . . . his comment was that they are always rejected on the first round, so it was best to actually not submit all documentation in the first round so that there would be additional documentation to submit during the second round. His claim was that patent employees are overworked and often underskilled (because they are required to have such a broad breadth of knowledge) and if they don't know a lot about the particular technology, they would reject the application based on some general ground rules . . . if you gave a lot of extra data, etc. in the resubmittal it would often go through. I don't know if this is a common practice and IANAL, but I think its more than a bit sad that a lawyer would have such a cynical view . . . and perhaps even more sad if the system is actually deserving of this cynical view.
Sorry to disagree with the article, but the best way to get an inside look at a patent examener is with a blunt object.
Yeah, I know its a hard job.. but even the worst fuck-up gets it right once in a while.
The solution is simple. Pay the experts what they are worth to do the job. Just like they should with teachers. Its never going to happen.
There is way too much money to be made in having IP control over an uneducated populace.
Norman Cook's Ode to Sl
One thing I've thought about recently as a help to the patent problem is putting a cap on the number of patents granted each year. If only 25,000 patents are awarded per year (for example), that would in theory cut down on the number of crap patents. Atleast they would have to think a little longer about what really deserves a patent, and many people would be discouraged from filing if they knew there was a good chance it wouldn't get approved. Just an idea...
It can also be used to change the tense of a verb, perhaps before it was "have been" or something.
Damn! How much do you get?
Generally, bash is superior to python in those environments where python is not installed.
What does an examiners skill level matter to an
agency and process which should not exist?
Excellent [Stupid] question.
Jeez, how many words do I have to use to say a pot with holes in the lid??:}
Harpo Tunnel Syndrome--my wrist feels funny.
you dont need a J.D. to take the patent bar, OR to be a patent examiner...
In the early days of the patent office, they used to require a working model. I think they should return to this requirement. In my experience, ideas themselves, which can be patented, aren't nearly as valuable as the implementation of those ideas. This would probably also cut down on a lot of bogus patent submissions.
Sir, I have a patent on the black quadrilateral with equidistant corners.
"All examining positions require at least a bachelor's degree in computer science, physical science or engineering"
Apparently a bachelor's degree ain't what it used to be...
--Stephen
Did you ever notice that *nix doesn't even cover Linux?
The real problems for other manufacturers are the submarine patents, where the inventor keeps the application alive for 15 or so years, tweaking the application. Since there is an application pending, all other applications for the same thing get denied. An example would be single-chip-microprocessors. Since everyone in the industry tried to patent it and were denied, they assumed that it was not a patentable idea. Big surprise when the submarine came up to sink the industry. When I went to a police academy, we were taught never to assume anything. The saying goes, when you assume, you make an ass out of u and me.
The big problem for the software industry is that there have been enterprising crooks filing patents based on obscure theses and books, hoping that no one notices it was plagiarized. The patent examiners are not stopping duplicate patents now, they want the user fees, and to the devil (err the courts) with the details.
Examiner: Let me see... [thinking] mmmm... `One Click Shopping'... what on earth is that!!!... Oops, shouldn't show that I didn't understand anything about it... passing things this way and that... there's something about saving... should be a cool way to save money... it's a tough one to figure out, and quite lenghy too... they won't write all this for a trivial one... better approve it and get rid of it... [after an hour of empty gazing] Yes, that is a very innovative one!
We already have lots of patents for perpetual motion machines, apparently.
..The length of your application was shorter than the palm of the examiner. Yes that's right! You are not dreaming
From the article
Many examiners are taught the "one palm rule," whereby if the independent claim is shorter than the palm of their hand, they should reject, reject, reject.
Now that the Patent Office has kindly placed a lot of patents into their database; they should begin the process of writing programs which help them to eliminate patents based upon (if nothing else) their documentation.
;-)
:-)
I would think the rejection of Patents would fall into a few categories: 1)Bad Spelling, 2)Bad Grammar, 3)Bad Idea. Once these are past - THEN - the object could be compared against pre-existing documents.
I know there are probably millions of documents which might match a new document but, like Google, they could be pared down based upon how closely they look like another invention. Google has how many servers and how many pages to look at and decide upon? Yet you get feedback in only a few seconds. Why not base how the PTO works on Google's model? The PTO could even sell priority for first consideration to companies.
Truly though, since every invention has to be written up, and since we already know that millions of pages can (and are) rejected by a good search engine - this is what the PTO really needs.
Which brings up the question: How many patents are filed for items which are not really in that category? Like an idea for a game which might overlap how something is done in the real world. Would that patent be enforceable because it was already given out? Or does the fact that the patent is filed in different categories mean that you can patent something which has already been patented - but in a different category? So a toothbrush used by a robotic servant (and is a part of the robot itself) can be patented separately from a regular, toothbrush which is held in the hand?
If the former - then that cuts down on the number of patents which has to be searched. Otherwise, all of the patents have to be searched. Which is why it becomes so hard to determine the merits of a given patent. A good search engine though - could shave a lot of time off of how long it would take to determine the merits of any given patent.
This does not, however, eliminate the need for people who are smart enough to know that a flashlight is still a flashlight. No matter if it is called a flashlight or an object which emits a beam of light. This too (the phrase "an object which emits light") should become a part of the search engine. Or, in other words, you create a relational database which relates single words to phrases so the search engine can make better judgement calls.
Just a few thoughts.
Someone put a black hole in my pocket and now I'm broke.
Let me save you a R of the FA by answering those questions here: No, No and No, the examiner will most likely be an idiot, experienced or otherwise, but slip in a nice bribe and you'll get the result you want.
This comment does not represent the views or opinions of the user.
People will file pattents regardless, if you place a greater burden on the reviewer to identify "good" ones it will only increase the scale of the task. These people should not have to decide if a patent was good at all. Instead make it easer by lowering the review process requirements.
..... or single click ordering ....is too general. That leads to the legal mess we have with copy rights.
Probably the solution is not in caps, but in narrowing the scope of patents and requiring a prototype. Then all the examiner needs to do is review if it A.) works and B.) is new / different enough for legal protection. Then grant the pattent in that form only. This will make through put fast and efficient by perminting approval of those clames that are demonstrated in the prototypes. The manufacture would prove if it was usefull and actually did a decent job of what ever it was supposed to do to the customer. If they lie or cheat to make the prototypes work then they get exactly that a pattent on a fake due to the narrow scope.
This would eliminate most frivolous clames. The narrow scope would in some cases allow people to revise and significantly build upon a thing and pattent the revision as well. However that is ok, as making the scope to wide is much worse. Patents like anyting to do with magnetic fields
my silly example:
so I submit a pattent for a new sort of hub for protocol X. i include a scimatic and prototype electronics of that device. i also provide the test hardware. Patent guy plugs it in and it works as described...... Then he searches to see if any one else built a hub for protocol X, and then if so was it nearly exactly like mine. If no i get my pattent on that package. If you build version with different hardware than you can patent yours too.
*if you build a thing you have something to sell, if you only have an idea you have exactly what you started with, nothing.
The people protect patented IP rights by funding the PTO and courts in which IP cases are tried. Patents ought to be filed with a tax on their owners as a percentage of returns on the IP. So there's no barrier to filing, but cashing in on the protected asset pays for its protection. The owner's IP assets:income ratio would be applied to the IP, and say a 0.01% tax would be applied to the IP's share of the revenue. The taxes would be spent on a small administration of patent process managers. The actual examinations and tests would be outsourced to certified private American engineering firms. Thus the engine of American ingenuity would be harnessed to drive around the seatbelts, airbags and ABS brakes of the entire infrastructure. Until then, the IP holders are getting a free ride.
--
make install -not war
Setting a quota would merely result in one of two problems:
a flood of applications held till the "new year" began
OR
a massive backlog of applications that haven't been considered yet because 25,000 was already reached
Why does each patent officer have to spread their knowledge so thinly? Wouldn't departments with specific fields of knowledge make more sense (i.e. a motors dept. and a plastic mold dept. and a computer/electronics dept.)?
I was taking one day at a time, but then several days got together and ambushed me. (from a Rhymes with Orange comic)
Some very good thoughts. Too bad they are unlikely to make much of a difference as long as companies have such a strong lobby.
I remember a while back reading an interview in ZDNet with someone from Cisco. He said that though they patent a lot of stuff, almost everything they patent would have been developed and used anyway, even without patents. He also pointed out that companies are discouraged from searching for similar patterns, because patent infringement isn't going to be too big an issue unless you knowingly infringe. Especially when filing, it pays not to know about similar patents. Very unfortunate situation we're in.
What patent examination? I don't think the patent office even does those anymore.
Then you create a web voting system where people can rate the validity of a patent. If the ratings of the patents an officer approves is average at the end of the year, then his next year bonus will be average, giving him the same salary he would get without the system.
However, you slide it for those that are over or under the average. Thus, an office that gets low validity ratings would receive less pay, and an office that receives higher validity ratings would receive higher ratings would receive a higher bonus.
This would permit peer review of patents after they are approved, while at the same time create an incentive for the patent officers to give more weight to the validity of a patent!
Isn't this our number one complaint, anyway? Patents lacking validity being approved, requiring high legal costs to overturn?
Open Standards Portal
"Every examiner starts with his or her first patent application after receiving just two weeks of training at the USPTO Patent Academy, where he or she learns the basics of the Manual of Patent Examining Procedure."
...
It might not only be inexperience which leads to stupid patents. There could well exist young patent clarks spending their time building a new theory of relativity
... is when people who have held obscure patents for years without even trying to realize something come out and sue some guy or company for making a product to which they have a copyright on a small aspect of it's functionality.
Hope that makes sense, I'm very, very tired.
[offtopic]Oh yeah, I'd just like to point out that I have great respect for police officers, and admire very much that you have chosen that path for your life. (Although, it is a bit obscure in your text whether you actually *finished* police academy)[/offtopic]
Q.
Insert Signature Here
because first it costs a fortune to hire a patent lawyer , second, if you don't have any money to sue someone that has infringed on your patent, it is pretty useless. Just make your products and save the money you would have had to spend on patents. Besides, only a "utility" patent is worth anything...a design patent can be rendered useless by changing one small detail of the product that is being copied.
If only Einstein was around today to comment.
I've searched and can find no opinion expressed by him on patents.
Can anyone give some thoughts as to why this seems to be, or find evidence to the contury?
A blog I run for the wealth
Some 4 years ago, in my previous company we submited a software patent (the investors insisted we apply for lots of patents) that most likely landed on a first-timer inside the PTO. It was clear that he did not had a clue about computer architecture, when we challenged we got routed directly to his supervisor who was probably pretty pissed of about having to do his subordinate work. As far as I can tell the examiner algorithm is: 1) read patent application, mark words you don't understand. 2) goggle such words 3) if a match on any, reject all claims, type a letter and cite all goggle hits as previous art. 4) upon challenge from inventor, call your super 5) super is overloaded w/ work and will concur with me (examiner) so keep rejecting patent claims. Keep collecting extension fees. 6) the inventor will find a recognized person in the field and make him do an affidavit. Now I get that he has money and really wants his patent, so accept some of the claims at random. 7) the inventor will change the wording on the other claims and resubmit. Collect more fees. 8) keep faking knowledge about the subject and accept 50% of the claims that had been reworded. 9) inventor has gotten by know 80% of the claims accepted. You wont hear from him again. 10) go to next patent
I wonder how does the USPTO process compares to the one followed by e.g. IBM prior to filing a patent.
I think it would be interesting to compare and contrast both processes: academic qualifications of the people involved, work flow and logistics, information they have access to... This article gives us the first half, I wonder where could we get the second one or better yet as I said a comparison.
The revolution will not be televised.
In litigation, patents are given a strong presumption of validity. If examination is truly this bad, then the presumption of validity may need to be dropped.
The variation between examiners (new vs old; dedicated vs. lazy) leads to another solution. During litigation, perhaps the quality of the examiner/examination should be an issue that the parties can argue about.
past the first few paragraphs. The article is actually pretty interesting and shows more about the patent examining process.
Did anyone also notice at the bottom of the web page that Volpe Koenig had a design patent for thier website, and they have a pending utility patent for the site?
Also here is an example of overworked examiners... the poor examiner who has to examine these applications? [uspto.gov]
Well I am a patent examiner and I whole-heartedly agree, we are all idiots.
Note to self, submit patents in 24-point font.
Karma: It's all a bunch of tree-huggin' hippy crap!
Pretty impressive considering the differences in pronunciation. "a/u nul", versus "ay-n[schwa]l".
Here are all of the patents that he issued...
Sounds like the training people receive for answering tech support lines.
Coder's Stone: The programming language quick ref for iPad
is to change the limit of how long a patent lasts for to date of filing, not date of grant.
For 99.99% of patents, the time between filing and grant is a small time (and so the time period before the patent expires) could be extended by said small time.
But it would put an end to peope who attempt to delay granting by backhand tricks (in an attempt to hide their patent)
And once its public knowledge, China starts producing it...
There should be a law requiring/prohibiting that (Please circle one)
The Patent Bar is the hardest fucking test I've ever taken (and I passed 1st time, BTW). I'd rather take 5 state bar exams than take the USPTO exam again.
Example question (paraphrased):
Below are 5 obscure sentences taken from somewhere in this New York Yellow Pages sized book (the MPEP). We have inserted the word "not," or changed the word "or" to "and" in 1 sentence. You have 2 minutes to figure out which sentence we altered.
It is a sadistic test that tests nothing about your knowledge of patent law. It merely tests your ability to find a needle in the haystack known as the M.P.E.P.
That should at least give them some incentive to not pass questionable patents or even opaque ones.
Free Software: Like love, it grows best when given away.
The goal of the PTO is to accept truly valueable patents to encourage their commercialization, while rejecting those that are obvious, or fail to meet a host of other requirements. If the PTO was given a "cut of the action" this would change their whole calculation as to how to reward patents...
Aha! An inside look at patent examination, presented to you in WeensyFont (patent pending).
Why do web "designers" persist in thinking that they know what size font looks better on my screen for my eyes than I do?
"It sure was strange to see something on Usenet about me that didn't involve Klingon gang rape." -- Wil Wheaton
Interestingly enough, Einstein was influenced by patents he saw. You see, at the time everyone was submitting patents for ways to syncronize clocks. This led Einstein to think about the nature of time and light and such, thus leading to special relativity. I'm sure someone can post a link or more information.
All I wanted to point out is that this stuff shouldn't really surprise anyone. Which 16 year old in the US isn't hoping they get the lazy hungover driving examiner instead of someone that takes their job super-seriously? Have you ever been to the post office looking for lost mail? Same story- some people say 'nope, it's gone', others say 'fill out this form', and still others might get off their chair for you.
Anyway, that being said, the trademark side of the PTO works just the same. If I could count the number of times I've heard a lawyer advise that a mark might be considered descriptive but there's still the luck of the draw on examiners, I would be able to amaze you with my counting skills.
The parent post is total garbage. Like it's bad to ensure that someone who will be able to represent anyone before the Patent Office knows something about their process?
I can believe state bar exams don't matter when you've got a shingle out and will work on anyone's will, custody case, criminal defense, whatever, but to suggest that knowing the front and back of the source of 90% of the junk you need to know to get the application through is too hard on you, that's just laziness.
I mean, I certainly wouldn't want to hear 'oops, we got a notice of abandonment, I guess it's over.' I'd rather hear, 'well, I'm quite familiar with the CFR sections on reviving abandoned applications, as well as the MPEP sections where the standards for evaluating those submissions are discussed, I think we might be able to do something.'
Sorry, guess I wasn't done:
tests nothing about your knowledge of patent law
But you don't need to pass the patent bar to litigate a patent, you just need to pass the patent bar to work on patent applications. Why is it unreasonable to require that you know enough about the rules and procedures when any "patent law" issue is secondary or at least rare-and-in-the-future?
Think about it; if 75% of your calls are from people who can't turn a computer on, then you can train an applicant to field at least 75% of your calls within minutes. Working tech support doesn't really require an understanding of computers or even machines in general.
Member of Orkut? Annoyed with spam?
.....away, on center, on a line that follows the curve indicated in figure 75, is another 1 mm in diameter spaghetti rinse drainage hole. Following that.....
By INQUIRER staff : Donnerstag 15 April 2004, 14:03
*A CONFERENCE* chaired by the Federal Trade Commission, the National Academy of Sciences and the Berkeley Center for Law and Technology kicks off in California in a few hours time.
The idea is reform the patent system without stopping innovation, but the industry is along there in the shape of giants Intel, Microsoft, Symantec and others, and we're sure they'll try to pursue their own agenda.
There will also be representatives from the European Patent Office and the US Patent and Trademark Office.
Luckily, they are counterbalanced by legal organisations and academics.
The agenda for the workshop is here http://www.ftc.gov/bcp/workshops/patentsystem/pate ntsystemagenda.pdf, and
there's a very lengthy discussion document about proposed reform on the FTC
site, here http://www.ftc.gov/os/2003/10/innovationrpt.pdf.
The FTC document proposes a number of changes to the current system including a new admin procedure to challenge a patent's validity without having to go to law, allowing courts to find patents invalid on the preponderance of evidence rather than clear and convincing evidence, and the limiting of awards of "treble" damages.
It's pretty clear that for many large companies, patent actions have become a wing of marketing. Kicking off big patent cases can tie a smaller competitor up for years as the painful battle continues through the courts. Let's hope sanity prevails. But don't hold your breath for that.
Day 1: Thursday, April 15, 2004 at the Bancroft Hotel
1. 12:00 - 1:00 pm, Press Conference
- Mark Myers: NAS & Xerox Corporation
- Commissioner Mozelle Thompson: FTC
1:30 - 3:00 pm
Overview of the Patent System and FTC Proposal for Reform
- Susan DeSanti: Senior Policy Analyst, FTC
- Prof. Peter Menell: BCLT & Boalt Hall School of Law
- Prof. Robert Merges: BCLT & Boalt Hall School of Law
Day 2: Friday, April 16, 2004 at the Bancroft Hotel
8:00 - 8:30 am
Opening Remarks
- Dean Designate Chris Edley: Boalt Hall School of Law
- Robert Merges of BCLT and Boalt Hall School of Law
- Mark Myers: NAS & Xerox Corporation
- Commissioner Mozelle Thompson: FTC
8:30 - 9:40 am, Non-obviousness Panel (Reinvigorating the Non-obviousness Standard)
- Rochelle Dreyfuss: New York University
- Rebecca Eisenberg: University of Michigan
- Ron Laurie: Inflexion Point Strategy, LLC
9:45-11:00 am, Opposition and Post-Grant Review Panel
- Robert Blackburn: Chiron Corporation
- Prof. Joe Farrell: Economics, UC Berkeley (CPC)
- Bronwyn Hall: Economics, UC Berkeley
- Dietmar Harhoff: European Patent Office
- Steve Kunin: Patent and Trademark Office
- Prof. Robert Merges: BCLT & Boalt Hall School of Law
- Douglas Norman: Eli Lilly
11:00 - 11:15 am, Break
11:15 am - 12:45 pm, Litigation Panel (Including Presumption of Validity)
- Mark Janis: University of Iowa
- Mark Lemley: BCLT & Boalt Hall School of Law
- Lynn Pasahow: Fenwick & West
- James Pooley: Milbank, Tweed, Hadley & McCloy
- Matthew Powers: Weil Gotshal & Manges
- Arti Rai: Duke University
12:45-2:00 pm., Lunch
2:00 - 3:45 pm, Industry/Institutional Issues Panel
- Carl Shapiro: Haas School of Business, UC Berkeley (co-moderator)
- Commissioner Mozelle Thompson: FTC (co-moderator)
- Robert Baechtold: Fitzpatrick Cella Harper and Scinto & AIPLA
- Robert Barr: CISCO
- Bart Eppenauer: Microsoft
- Sean Johnston: Genentech
- Jay Monahan: eBay
- Ron Myrick: Finnegan, Henderson, Farabow, Garrett & Dunner
- Kulpreet Rana: Google
- Robert Sacoff: Pattishall, McAuliffe & ABA IP Section
- David Simon: Intel Corporation
- Herb Wamsley: Intellectual Property Owners
3:45-4:00 p.m., Concluding Remarks
Commissioner Mozelle Thompson
Open Standards Portal
There needs to be some better evaluation of the tradeoffs inherent in the process today.
If we allow a greater scope of potentially patentable things, then we need to spend a lot more time in review, because the negative effects on innovation and the economy in general are potentially higher.
On the other hand, limiting the scope would then allow for a looser process, for the same reasons I just mentioned.
Since we seem to be heading toward a very wide scope, those that do get patents should have to work hard to get them.
The way it is set up today, we have a wide scope combined with a large number of patents. Innovation is suffering as a result as is the tech economy. If we spend a lot of time paying each other for minor or poorly assigned IP rights, we lose out on the ability to generate wealth.
Blogging because I can...
OMG, its Biff from Back to the Future ... :-)
"why should I share my idea?"
Why not? If you aren't going to implement it, why not share it? Right now, it costs thousands of dollars to put through a patent application. If you think you might get a patent, you have a strong incentive not to tell anyone (hard to prove that they didn't have the idea first if they file first). Thus, the current system provides a strong incentive for people who do not have the resources to get a patent to keep quiet.
How many patents are actually sold that way? How many individuals pay thousands to get a patent, find a manufacturer, get the item made, and sell enough to recoup their investment? Don't forget to include the opportunity cost (you could have been flipping burgers at McDonalds) of all the man hours of finding a manufacturer and distribution channel.
If this was a valid path to riches, then all those invention submission companies would pay to get the patents for you and split the proceeds. Instead, they want you to pay $6000 to them to patent the idea and "try" to find a buyer. Instead of making money off licensing, they plan on making money off gullible "inventors." Even with the ability to cherry pick the good ideas, apparently patents can't even provide a reasonable return with any consistency.
Note how IBM and other big companies use patents. To protect their research? No, to keep other companies from patenting things and holding them up for ransom. They invent things to use them and patent to keep others from keeping them from using their invention. The guy who ran IBM's patent licensing division was considered innovative for coming up with the idea of licensing some of these defensive patents for some extra cash. Even so, IBM still does not make enough from licensing to cover the research costs.
The point of invention is not to license the patent. The point is to improve your own product. Most inventions will occur in engineering on existing products.
Look at the 1-Click Shopping patent. Would Amazon have implemented 1-Click Shopping without the patent? Of course they would have. It enhances their business by improving their customers' experience. Even if they knew for certain that it would lead to all their competitors adopting it, they still would have (i.e. no competitive advantage).
The only area in which patents are a requirement for distribution is pharmaceuticals. The expensive trials required to get FDA certification cannot be funded without patent protection (or equivalent).
My cousin's wife has an idea that she would like see implemented. In the current system, she keeps quiet in the hope that someday she'll be able to patent it. Without patents, she would have no incentive to keep it quiet and would talk it over or send an email to the appropriate manufacturer in the hope of getting a few free samples (it's a disposable product, so individual items are very cheap).
Bizarre, I've never heard this angle. Most references I find are related to claims in Galison's book "Einstein's Clocks, Poincaré's Maps: Empires of Time ". Everyone else seems to regard this as a bit apocryphal. Still interesting, though.
From the linked book review:
The young Einstein was not, of course, employed in the academic world but in the Swiss Patent Office. And Switzerland, as we know, was a centre of invention and innovation in clock technologies. The patent office at Bern was a clearing-house for new timing technologies, and Einstein's job afforded him a veritable grandstand seat from which to become acquainted with new electro-technological advances.
Slashdot quality declines as the number of hot grits posts decreases. - Provolt's Law, Apr-09-2005
actually most applications are reviewed by primary examiners, they have to process a lot more applications than junior examiners
the number of hours per case is dependant on paygrade and technology, so for example a gs-5 examiner (basically someone straight out of school) might have to do 2 cases a biweek, while a primary examiner might have to work on 8. Electrical/computer technologies get more hours than mechanical/chemical.
The more senior guys dont need as much time as they readily know what references to use, i.e. they spend less time searching as they have no need too.
Turn over rate in the first year is rather high as most engineers have a hard time working on a quota system. Additoinally, an expereinced examiner can leave the office and make considerably more money as a patent agent or attorney or searcher for a private firm. Salarys were increased signifigantly a few years back as retention was a problem and there were 15% signing bonuses.
Examiners with less than 2 years of experience is common as the office has plans to hire roughly 750 examiners a year for the past few years and the next few years as the current application backlog is 500k, that means applications are taking up to 4 years to get a first office action!
What the article fails to disclose the the review programm the new certification process, the primary examiner program, quality review, the ongoing training required, and the entire year long training process for a new examiner.
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
April 15, 2004
PUBPAT challenges microsoft patent to protect competition in software markets: Patent Office Shown New Evidence Proving FAT Technology was Obvious
NEW YORK -- The Public Patent Foundation filed a formal request with the United States Patent and Trademark Office today to revoke Microsoft Corporation's patent on the FAT File System, touted by Microsoft as being "the ubiquitous format used for interchange of media between computers, and, since the advent of inexpensive, removable flash memory, also between digital devices." In its filing, PUBPAT submitted previously unseen prior art showing the patent, which issued in November 1996 and is not otherwise due to expire until 2013, was obvious and, as such, should have never been granted.
"Microsoft is using its control over the interchange of digital media to aid its ongoing effort to deter competition," states PUBPAT's Request for ExPartes Reexamination of U.S. Patent No. 5,579,517. "The '517 patent is causing immeasurable injury to the public by serving as a tool to enlarge Microsoft's monopoly while also preventing competition."
Last fall, Microsoft began to demand royalty bearing licenses for the entire portfolio of patents around the FAT File System. However, the fact that Microsoft has not offered licenses for use in Free and Open Source Software has led some to speculate that Microsoft intends to use its patents to fight the competitive threat posed by Free Software.
"We'd like to give Microsoft the benefit of the doubt and believe that they are not adopting a strategy of foreclosing competition through the use of dubious patents," said Dan Ravicher, PUBPAT's Executive Director and Founder. "Unfortunately, their past anticompetitive behavior combined with their recent launch of a comprehensive patent assertion campaign causes us to have serious concerns about their intentions."
Although PUBPAT's filing only directly deals with one patent, the fact that it is the oldest of the patents in the FAT File System portfolio makes it more likely that, once it is held invalid by the Patent Office, each of the other patents will be viewed similarly.
"In the end, our beef is not with Microsoft per se," says Ravicher. "It's with our broken patent system that is completely failing to ensure only deserving patents get issued."
The Request for Reexamination can be found at PUBPAT Activities > Protecting the Public Domain.
Contact:
Daniel Ravicher, Executive Director, Public Patent Foundation: 212-545-5337;
info@pubpat.org; www.pubpat.org.
About PUBPAT:
The Public Patent Foundation ("PUBPAT") is a not-for-profit legal services organization working to protect the public from the harms caused by the patent system. PUBPAT provides the general public, particularly those persons or businesses otherwise deprived of access to the system governing patents, with representation, advocacy, and education. To be kept informed of PUBPAT News, subscribe to the PUBPAT News List by sending an email with "subscribe" in the subject line to news-request@pubpat.org.
Open Standards Portal
Hmm. I thought that was an allusion to the Matrix and read the whole thing in a Hugo Weaving voice until I realized what I was dealing with.
I love all of the jokes about antigravity devices. They are lovely. Curiously though not only have methods of developing antigravity been developed, they have in fact been demonstrated and are the focus of some research.
The issue of antigravity efforts seems to center around scaling the demonstrations to a practical level. A considerable amount of natural evidence exists for antigravity functions as well. Tornados for example have clearly demonstrated this function.
Essentially the issue seems to center around the definition of an orbit. A classical orbit is described by an eliptical path for a ballistic mass which does not intersect the mass at the focal area(s) of the elipse. This is usually seen as an elipse that must occur along a plane slicing through the center of mass of the central body for the orbit.
Hydrogen and Helium gasses have a nuclear spin elipse that is at or above escape velocity for the earth. They tend to allign this elipse parallel in two axis to the normal orbital elipse plane of the earth but seperated along the z axis from that plane by large distances. They achieve escape from the planet while the "orbital speed" is adequate it is all an elipse within the nuclei of the atoms.
I am sure this is all getting into your head pretty deeply but it is pretty simple. Hydrogen and Helium orbit but they do so above escape velocity and they leave the planet as a result. They demonstrate "antigravity" to the earth. They are not "Displaced" they are levitated away. They continue to leave when on displacement exists in the exospheric areas.
This has been demonstrated by taking substantial masses and spinning them at very high speed. They lose a percentage of their mass equal to the velocity of the orbit indicated by their net rotation. The problem is that to get close to escape velocity the rotation with metals and ceramic disks disintergrates the masses into fragments. Nuclear Magnetic Resonance efforts have demonstrated essentially the same thing.
The solution appears to be one which causes the nuclear mass to accelerate without disrupting the structure. The problem generally has been that the plane of the orbit must allign to the z axis of the earth. This is somewhat of a problem. It is clear that some super conductors do this when in a strong magnetic field but shortly after leaving the field they misallign and lose the effect.
A tornado being a very large natural particle accelerator in some cases has demonstrated that intact items weighing over 100 Kg can be levitated for miles upwards and sustain this for extended periods of upwards of hours. These masses tend to be ferric in type.
This is very closely tied up with electo-magnetism. There seems in this to be absolutely no evidence to support the idea of Gravity as many people believe exists. Rather it appears that "Gravity" is an electromagnetic effect corresponding to a "Pressure" in a media. But I am sure the Higher Physics types will deny this obvious reality. Well the facts may alter their arguments a bit.
Never Politically Correct ~ I prefer the facts If you don't like what I say, get a life, or comment yourself.
Well, that's no surprise. I have yet to read that book, but my physics professor did.
> Rather it appears that "Gravity" is an electromagnetic effect corresponding to a "Pressure" in a media.
I suck at Physics, so I apologize if this a is a completely stupid or obvious question. Does something have more gravitational pull if it is compressed? IE, if the earth were compressed to the size of a basketball or something, would the gravity be roughly the same?
Of course, I realize that gravity is measured from the center of the object, so you would have to be floating in space at the same radial distance as the Earth's original surface.
Perhaps, if we're going to have a patent system at all, its processes should be as democratic as our (American) government allegedly is? I wonder if reformulating the USPTO as a peer-review organization might provide a fairer result?
In answer to your question you are correct about the earth "being compressed" but you may have missed something. This concept says that things are "pushed" not attracted. As such the the thing itself would not have more "Gravity Pull" the area around it would be pressing harder.This is why the earth would be "Compressed." (Obvious I know but...) It appears the same just the cause is different. Actually I misstated in my previous post saying corresponds to a pressure, more precisely to a pressure differential like more on one side than another. The earth or any other body with "Gravity" is actually a low pressure area like a hurricane and the area around it is high pressure.
Of course the physics types will say I am totally wrong. So if you want to get along in Physics class don't admit you even read this post. Naturally the Physics types have died and become God anyway so I guess it is best to get along with the "Gods." They adhere to a "religion" who punishes its heritics more certainly than the most dedicated Islamic militant or other religious extremist. They have a dogma or writ more rigid than any such persons as well.
For a simple proof of the issue of it being an electromagnetic effect, all you have to do is look to a Hydro lake. The water in the lake falling out of the lake releases the energy of the "Higher Pressure" and generates electricity. If you return the water to the lake it is accomplished by adding EM energy equal to that corresponding to the altitude. (Equation balanced no Gravity just EM forces) Of course the Physics types have written into the system a "Potential Energy" concept rather than recognizing that it is merely an energy content issue.
Of course to believe in Gravity as a force you have to deny the laws of Motion (Equal and opposite reaction etc) but that never bothered the Physics types. They write their own laws any time they conflict with reality.
It is lots of fun to watch them spend billions hunting around for the latest "Quark" or "Charm" or "Strange" something trying to get a unified field when the answer lies in Electro-Optics and Quantum Mechanics
If you want to understand why they get so messed up take a long trip into the history of "Natural Philosopy" which evolved into their art and look at the Ideologies they took from verious religions and political Philosophies of the various times. It is funny and about as hopeless as a trip to an insane assylum. For short let us just say that they decided something was a fact and went about to frame the world that way rather than checking a hypothesis and throwing it out if it was wrong.
Never Politically Correct ~ I prefer the facts If you don't like what I say, get a life, or comment yourself.