An Insider's View of Software Patents

An anonymous reader writes "Ross Gittins at the Sydney Morning Herald has published an interesting insider view of software patents. This kind of thing is starting to be a hot issue down here with the US-Australia Free Trade deal about to be ratified and bring our intellectual property laws in line with Micros^D^D^D^D^D^D^D America's."

Comments

Poster has the wrong idea

[Anonymous Coward]

...and bring our intellectual property laws in line with Micros^D^D^D^D^D^D^D America's

No. NO. Don't you EVEN fucking blame Microsoft for this mess. Blame the WIPO for having the idea, and Bill Clinton for whoring the United States into compliance.

Re:Poster has the wrong idea

[Anonymous Coward]

who's idea was it to allow software to be patented in the first place ?

Re:Poster has the wrong idea

[Bruce Perens]

Software patenting has been driven by court cases in the U.S. brought by a number of companies that wanted to be able to patent software and business methods. Do a web search for State Street Decision.

WIPO has been driven by the U.S. (reacting to its corporations) to get the same bad software patent system going elsewhere.

If you want to blame Clinton for some intellectual property matter connected to WIPO, digital rights management and associated treaties requiring anti-circumvention law would be more accurate.

Bruce

Re:Poster has the wrong idea

[Anonymous Coward]

Software patenting has been driven by court cases in the U.S. brought by a number of companies that wanted to be able to patent software and business methods.

Of which Microsoft is conspicuous by its absence.

Re: Poster has the wrong idea

[Black Parrot]

> Software patenting has been driven by court cases in the U.S. brought by a number of companies that wanted to be able to patent software and business methods.

I read an analysis somewhere that claimed that it also stemmed from the creation of a single court to handle all the cases.

Re:Poster has the wrong idea

[WindBourne]

Far from it. MS has their hands in just about everything. While not direct, MS always has their hand in it. If nothing else, think about how SCO is simply a proxy for MS and Sun.

MS (and companies such as Sun) have been gearing up for a patent fight for the last 4 years. Right now, they are hoping that Astralia, EU, and Asia will swallow the hemlock that we are offering.

Re:Poster has the wrong idea

[Anonymous Coward]

Because all patent history started four years ago.

Re:Poster has the wrong idea

[js3]

I think it is weird that microsoft gets the brunt of frustrations about software patents. Who got sued half a billion dollars for violating a patent? microsoft. What is wrong with the patent system is small fry getting these broad ridicilous patents that cover almost every variation of the patent and chasing big companies for payout.

The effect is big companies patenting everything in sight they can possibly imagine just to prevent leeches like that from benefiting from patents they never implemented. EOLAS didn't go after everyone, they specifically went after microsoft.

Anyways how do you solve this? make patents more specific not broad. Patent officers should really reject patents are worded in a way that applies to anything in that field. The law should be changed so that if a company hasn't created anything useful for the patent in 5 or so years then they can't go around sueing everyone who implements it.

Re:Poster has the wrong idea

[Anonymous Coward]

I blame Micros^D^D^D^D^D^D^D

Re:Poster has the wrong idea

[Anonymous Coward]

http://www.dfat.gov.au/trade/negotiations/us_fta/f inal-text/chapter_17.html

Re:Poster has the wrong idea

[Groote Ka]

Poster has the wrong idea

I beg to differ.

The WIPO is a multilateral organisation, whereas the US-Australian deals are bilateral. The WIPO has nothing to do with this. Perhaps you mean WTO, with TRIPs, but that does not apply in this case, either.

Furthermore, I do not know when negotiations between US and Australia have started, but I would be surprised when they would have already started under Clinton.

So, this might very well be a unilateral US thing, with a policy possibly to a large extent dictated by US corporations. Why unilateral? Because when Australia would not comply, they would miss interesting trade deals and seriously loose economy.

So, if there's a politician to blame, it's Bush. When there are companies to blame, they're US.

As for the story: yes, that's the way it goes. IAAPA.
Beat them or join them (to beat them).

Re:Poster has the wrong idea

[Anonymous Coward]

The world leaders should now be officially declared insane. Software patents will unfairly burden freedom of expression and creativity. To say that - software companies own the tricks of the trade - is a bunch of hog-wash. If there is a great idea it is the creation of an individual programmer, not a corp. And the indv. will seldom be paid what the idea is worth by the corp.

First they want to police how machines think, then the will police what programmer are allowed to think and express.

WIPO: these are the mind police.
And world leaders are ignorant as to what programming is (as an art and skill).

It is just another way to bash small creative companies and The People down, So clones can protect the hegemony of corporate cronism.

Software patent monkey business : the dark ages of programming beckoning.

Our world leaders should stop listening to the devil (as in the devil made em do it) and think of how they are bastardizing the future freedom of human thinking.

Re:Poster has the wrong idea

[Anonymous Coward]

So, if there's a politician to blame, it's Bush [not Clinton, whom the previous poster was blaming].

This is madness, this idea that the US president should take credit for every good thing that happens in his term, and be blamed for every bad thing.

Want to blame Clinton for the DMCA? Hang on a second - when he signed that into law, he went along with the wishes of both major political parties. That's what the leader of a democracy is supposed to do; he'd have been failing his duty if he'd opposed it. Debate and opposition are the job of the people's representatives, and I seem to recall a clear majority of those supporting it.

Want to blame Bush for the disastrous invasion of Iraq? Hang on a second - when he ordered the invasion, he did so with the full support of Congress. Did he lie to us? Perhaps, but it's more likely that he was misled by inadequate intelligence. The thing is that the majority of the American people kind of wanted him to order that invasion; to turn round and blame the leader of a democracy for following the wishes of the demos is kind of silly, don't you think?

POTUS is a figurehead, not a deity; he is not omniscient or omnipotent, and his job should be to represent the wishes of the American people to the world, not to push his own agenda.

Re:Poster has the wrong idea

[TRACK-YOUR-POSITION]

And when that happened, did they start a campaign to end software patents, or did they start gathering a huge pile of their own patents--which would be utterly useless defesively, because the companies suing microsoft don't actually make any products, so defensive patents don't stop them.

Microsoft may not have created this system and may be paying now, but they're definitely the ones with the most to gain from software patents should they decide to use them to further their monopoly--and they've done nothing to suggest that their intentions are otherwise. The submitter was right--when you think of software patents, you should think of Microsoft owning everything.

Re:Poster has the wrong idea

[True Grit]

1. The thing is that the majority of the American people kind of wanted him to order that invasion

Not surprising since the Bush administration went out of its way to link Iraq to Al Qaeda, and thus psychologically imply to average Americans that attacking Iraq is retaliation for 9/11. While the belief in WMDs may have come from the CIA which got suckered into believing bad intel, this whole business of trying to link Iraq to Al Qaeda and thus justify attacking it, is where the deliberate lies and misleading statements of this administration are to be found.

1. to turn round and blame the leader of a democracy for following the wishes of the demos is kind of silly, don't you think?

No its not silly, if the leader in question *lies* to that democracy to convince them to let him do what he wants.

1. his job should be to represent the wishes of the American people to the world, not to push his own agenda

Which is *exactly* what George Junior did. Without the strong sell of WMDs and the like and the repeated implications that Iraq was somehow responsible for 9/11 and was in bed with Al Qaeda, I do not believe there would have been majority support for attacking Iraq *then*. He just cynically played on America's desire for revenge after 9/11 to get approval for his own empire-building ambitions.

Re:Poster has the wrong idea

[HuguesT]

The US/Australia talks were started about nine months ago, as a "reward" for Australia's involvement in the Iraq war. Both Bush and Howard (Australia's PM) are big fans of bilateral talks & deals and don't believe in large multilateral rounds like those of the WTO, Kyoto, etc.

"Re:Nothing for you to see here." The answer is 42

[Animaether]

I got the same message - then wondered if it occurred more often.
So I turned to google :

site:slashdot.org "nothing for you to see here"

There are a total of... 42 ...results.

The answer to everything, indeed.

Monopolies are the only way to way money...

[Sasha Slutsker]

I agree with the writer of the article, software patents do do a lot of harm to programmers. Saying that monopolies are the only way to make money and should be encouraged is just crazy...

I'll say it again....

[Sebby]

Until we see the Patent Office being sued by someone/company that suffered financially or otherwise because of a bogus patent that the PTO granted, we won't see any significant changes to the way things work now. After a lawsuit or two they might finally get the hint to stop granting such bogus patents and maybe even (gasp!) start reviewing past ones once they realize those might become a liability.

And for those that say such lawsuits would be a burden on the taxpayers, well, I'd say these bogus patent infrigment cases are taking away needed resources to convict criminals.

And besides, the taxpayers might finally take action once they see the PTO's bogus-patent-granting actions is raising their taxes, instead of only bitching and whining all the time.

Re:I'll say it again....

[NightWulf]

Unfortuneatly what will happen is after said lawsuits, the Patent Office will just raise the fees to file a patent. They won't actually change anything, just keep raising prices. It will be even harder for regular people to file for patents, while the corporations still can afford it.

Re:I'll say it again....

[Sebby]

Then we also need to have the PTO and IP laws changed: file all the patents you want, even the kitchen sink; when an infringment suit comes along, the patent is re-examined before any lawsuits are allowed to go forth. Then when there truely is patent infrigment and the patent holds up, let the lawsuit go forth.

This would avoid the common scenario where the defendant is sued out of existance even though the case has no merit!

Re:I'll say it again....

[Sebby]

That's right I forgot: "The government can do no wrong", right?
</sarcasm>

Re:I'll say it again....

[Anonymous Coward]

Can you even sue the patent office?

Probably not... as another poster said "the government can do no wrong" apparently...

Funny how the government can open up floodgates to make frivilous lawsuits possible, but washes its hands of any responsibility.

Re:I'll say it again....

[AuMatar]

Its expensive enough already. I looked into the possibility of applying for a patent with the intention of freely licensing it to any GPLed product. A defensive patent really. But the patent, even without a lawyer, is expensive enough to put it out of my range unless I'm sure I can make money on it.

Re:I'll say it again....

[e9th]

The courts will never allow that to happen. Whether a patent is infringing calls ultimately for a finding of fact, which the courts view strictly as their prerogative.

The PTO might have good standing to offer an expert opinion, but not to the degree that such an opinion would preclude bringing a lawsuit.

Re:I'll say it again....

[Bull999999]

I didn't think you could sue the Federal Government or something like that. (since they are a part of the Feds anyways)

The funny thing is that you can sue the federal government but the government must give you permission first. While there are cases where the government has given permission to sue, I'd imagine that suing the patent office may be more diffcult than suing a business.

Re:I'll say it again....

[Sebby]

Then the system is broken.

So much for freedom to innovate
So much for justice
So much for the "free world"

Re:I'll say it again....

[e9th]

The system is broken. But allowing the opinion of a bureaucracy (e.g., the PTO) to bar recourse to the courts is not an answer.

Re:I'll say it again....

[Anonymous Coward]

Then what is Einstein?

• you can't sue if you get sued wrongfully.
  
• you can't get a wrongful lawsuit dropped before it happens
  
• you can't possibly hope to even last a week if you do get sued.
  

It's now clear: the US is a hell hole of monopolies and bought politicians that have no regard for anything but themselves.

Re:I'll say it again....

[Sebby]

You can always "publish" it so as to make it piror art; of course if you wanted to make it painfully expensive for non-GPLed stuff then I guess you would really need a patent...

Re:I'll say it again....

[jkabbe]

Then the system is broken.

Saying the system is broken and saying your idea for fixing it is a good one are two completely different things.

Re:I'll say it again....

[Anonymous Coward]

Putting words in people's mouth.... niiiiice...

Re:I'll say it again....

[Flower]

The question is where do you publish it so it becomes prior art that the USPTO will consider when examining a patent.

Re:I'll say it again....

[debrain]

The funny thing is that you can sue the federal government but the government must give you permission first. While there are cases where the government has given permission to sue, I'd imagine that suing the patent office may be more diffcult than suing a business.

It's not necessarily that simple. State immunity comes about in many forms, from what I gather. In the USA, it is likely that there are several ways to sue the government, or its agents.

1. Sue the agency itself, for harm arising from its negligence. As part of the Feds, it might be immune to civil lawsuits through Federal legislation.

2. Appeal to a tribunal, such as human rights tribunals (if the USA has those), or justice tribunals, or what have you. They sometimes pointedly get around state immunity legislation.

3. Sue the Patent Agent as part of the Agency; his negligent acts mean the Patent Agency is vicariously liable for damages. This may be different from suing the Agency itself, depending on the immunity legislation. If the Agent acted 'negligently' in their role, they may make the Agency liable.

4. Sue the Patent Agent as acting outside their duties. If they were so irresponsible as to have acted outside the boundaries of their job, they may be personally liable for your losses. Shallow pockets; sets a nasty precedent,though.

Mind you, you probably want to find a lawyer if it gets to that. Lobbying your senator or congressman, or whomever your elected representatives are, is probably the best option.

Re:I'll say it again....

[Anonymous Coward]

The question is where do you publish it so it becomes prior art that the USPTO will consider when examining a patent.

No it isn't. The question is where to publish so the particularly the date of such publication becomes an indubitable matter of public record in a form admissible to a court as evidence.

Whether the USPTO is aware of this publication (and whether any patent is subsequently granted) would seem to be largely irrelevant.

Re:I'll say it again....

[Sebby]

One obvious place would be something like sourceforge, but of course if you wanted to keep its source closed, then I suppose something like a shareware program, or just write up the concept and publish in a magazine, book, etc...

Of course I'm no patent expert (unlike some other./ trolls pretending to be), so even that might not be enough (for the poor little "examiners" at the PTO that is...) but as I understand it if the concept already exists 'in the open' before the application, then it can't be patented.

Re:I'll say it again....

[Anonymous Coward]

I think, Archimedes, he's saying he'd rather the final decision was up to a judge/jury in open court than a desk-warming PTO lifer.

Re:I'll say it again....

[Bull999999]

#2 doesn't exist in the US and even it did, good luck linking software patent with human rights issue. And as for the rest, you are still suing the government as the staff is the legal agent of the government. Beside, lawyers aren't going to go after the lowly clerks because there's no money to be made.

While I agree that lobbying the senators and/or comgreemen can be helpful, this is USA, where you sue first and ask questions later.

Re:I'll say it again....

[dewatf]

Gittins is writing about the extension of the US IP regimes to Australia. Truth be told it doesn't make much difference. The entertainment and software industries are global and dominated by the US and Europe. Even if you write software in Australia you are going to want to sell it in the US or markets where US companies have interests they will defend.

These days the commercial software market is dominated by off-the-shelf applications, which tend to be be either propriotary systems written in India or Open Source. So there is either a lot of IP costs already or none, it won't make much difference.

The solution to the problem is for the US Congress to fix the US IP system, and the rest of the world will follow. That however is unlikely to happen. The corporations who benefit get large sums of money while the consumers lose only a few cents at a time and don't notice, so they are unlikely to ever get mad enough to exert pressure on Congress for change.

Re:I'll say it again....

[killjoe]

"It will be even harder for regular people to file for patents, while the corporations still can afford it."

you realize that it already takes about 20K to get a patent don't you. It's already out of the regular peoples reach. I get a patentable idea every day. If it was cheap and easy every single one of those ideas would be a patent by now.

Re:I'll say it again....

[PabloJones]

3. Sue the Patent Agent as part of the Agency; his negligent acts mean the Patent Agency is vicariously liable for damages. This may be different from suing the Agency itself, depending on the immunity legislation. If the Agent acted 'negligently' in their role, they may make the Agency liable.

IANAL, but I believe you have to skip right to #4, as you can sue the individual but not the agency, as the federal agency would be an entity of the sovereign.

The 11th amendment states:

"The Judicial power of the United States shall not be construed to extend to any suit in law or equity, commenced or prosecuted against one of the United States by Citizens of another State, or by Citizens or Subjects of any Foreign State."

Which basically means that the federal government has no obligation to let individuals sue it, but does not prevent the feds from allowing to be sued.

Re:I'll say it again....

[Jameth]

"The Judicial power of the United States shall not be construed to extend to any suit in law or equity, commenced or prosecuted against one of the United States by Citizens of another State, or by Citizens or Subjects of any Foreign State."

Which basically means that the federal government has no obligation to let individuals sue it, but does not prevent the feds from allowing to be sued.

That amendment just says that citizens of other countries can't sue the government. US citizens are not "Citizens of another state" or "Citizens or Subjects of any Foreign State", is it wouldn't apply to them.

Re:I'll say it again....

[the_brat_king]

Until we see the Patent Office being sued by someone/company that suffered financially or otherwise because of a bogus patent that the PTO granted, we won't see any significant changes to the way things work now. After a lawsuit or two they might finally get the hint to stop granting such bogus patents and maybe even (gasp!) start reviewing past ones once they realize those might become a liability.


Unfortunately, you cannot sue the federal government in it's official capacity, nor can you sue the employees in their professional capacity. In order to bring suit, you have to first request permission to sue them! A fox-n-hen-house thing... It would have to be a fairly gross violation (say a patent issued on breathing, and then half the US sued for violating the patent), before you'll garner the public attention necessary to warrant the court allowing a suit against a big-money winner like the PTO.

Re:I'll say it again....

[mdfst13]

No, that's not what it means. The 11th amendment exists to overturn a Supreme Court decision allowing a citizen of one state to to sue another state in federal court. "One of the United States" means a member state of the US (currently there are 50; at the time there were closer to the original 13). "Another State" refers to another member state of the US; "any Foreign State" refers to foreign countries--that's why it says both.

Note: the 11th amendment does not say that states can't be sued; just that they must be sued in their *own* courts, not federal courts. Further, it doesn't say that the feds can't be sued. It explicitly addresses the question of whose courts have jurisdiction when someone sues a state (the state would generally find its own courts more amenable than federal courts). It was in direct response to a Supreme Court decision that was unpopular.

The 11th amendment is largely disregarded by the legal fiction of suing an officer of that state in federal court (with the state paying damages in the case of a loss). This of course was the the original poster's point, that suing an officer of the government is different than suing the government itself.

Re:I'll say it again....

[mdfst13]

Not preclude bringing a lawsuit, simply predate. I.e. before bringing the lawsuit, the patent office engages in a new review. If the results of the review are disputed, either party can still go to court. The problem with the current system is that a big party may threaten a lawsuit based on dubious patents. Under this system, the patent office would invalidate the patent prior to the lawsuit. Thus, the burden would be on the plaintiff to demonstrate that the patent office was wrong. Under the current system, that burden is on the defendant.

This also offers the possibility of the patent office being the defendant when they invalidate the patent. This could help protect against patent abuse by deep pocketed plaintiffs. The government isn't going to be spent into bankruptcy: not even by an IBM. Small companies can easily be overwhelmed by legal action.

The basic point is to shift an overburdened patent office's focus from an initial review where they must finish within a fixed amount of time to a later review where they can spend as much time as necessary. Further, these reviews would be adversarial: one side for the patent and one side against. Currently, only the patent office is checking the against side, and they have no real incentive to decide against the patent.

Re:I'll say it again....

[mdfst13]

That's a straw man though. The final decision is still up to a judge/jury. This is just another step in the process. In particular, this step allows the patent office to express a second opinion on a patent once it knows the patent matters (most patents expire unenforced). For valid patents, this would simply be part of the discovery phase of the lawsuit. For invalid patents, it puts the burden on the filer to convince a judge that the patent has merit. Ideally, the court case would then proceed with the patent office defending its decision to invalidate the patent. This would avoid the problem of deep pockets overwhelming a smaller defendant.

Re:I'll say it again....

[HuguesT]

Here in Australia a dated lab notebook with the signature of your line manager is enough evidence of prior art admissible in court. Of course in the proceedings they'll look for evidence that corroborate the date, but it's a good start.

^H^H

[hey]

Er, it's control-H (^M) not control-D (^D) that erases. Control-D is eof. Get outa your GUI!

Re:^H^H

[Dwonis]

Do you use a Dvorak keyboard layout?

Re:^H^H

[manabadman]

Though control-H acts like backspace, and control-D is eof, in most Unix shells (and cisco's IOS) control-D will delete the character directly under (to the right of?) the cursor.

So ^B^B^B^B^B^B^D^D^D^D^D^D would work (^B moves the cursor on character to the left). If you really want to nitpick though, he deleted 7 characters even though 'Micros' is only 6 characters.

PS Only heterosexual gay chimpanzees support software patents.

Re:^H^H

[Xzzy]

I hit ctl-s the other day, does it stand for "slow" or something? :( Been waiting 48 hours for a ps -eaf to finish.

Re:^H^H

[hey]

Stands for Stop. Hit control-Q to resume.

Re:^H^H

[Anonymous Coward]

-1, Didn't Get the Joke.

Re:^H^H

[trewornan]

Whoosh!

Re:^H^H

[RobertB-DC]

Er, it's control-H (^M) not control-D (^D) that erases. Control-D is eof. Get outa your GUI!

Just a typo, I know, but control-M (13) is carriage return. That might still be valid, though... assuming a word processor that doesn't assume control-K (10, line feed) with control-M, you could return to the beginning of the line and overtype.

^Ks this post a waste of karma, or what?^M

Re:^H^H

[jamesh]

control-D will log me out of all the unix shells I use. In which unix shell will control-D not do that - or is it a configuration issue?

PS but there's no such thing as a gay heterosexual!

Re:^H^H

[name773]

thank you! you would not believe how many times i did this habitually in a text editor....

Re:^H^H

[Anonymous Coward]

control-D will log you out if there is no character to delete

Re:^H^H

[kholburn]

control-D will log me out of all the unix shells I use. In which unix shell will control-D not do that - or is it a configuration issue?

Ummm, only if it's the first character on a commandline, in other places it does different things. And only if your shell variable/option is set to allow it (ignoreeof).

Democracy imposed from without is the severest form of tyranny. -- Lloyd Biggle, Jr. Analog, Apr 1961

Re:^H^H

[Stinking Pig]

Maybe he's thinking of an editor... I frequently use a vi key sequence to indicate this sort of thing instead of typing ^H thirty times :)

Then again, ^D in vi is page-down, so who can say what was rattling around in the ole cranium.

Re:^H^H

[dryeo]

ksh

Re:^H^H

[Anonymous Coward]

Yea right. Stop with the unix superiority. Its a damm keyboard. You punch the keys and characters go up on the screen. You nit wits - thirty years ago we were booting the machines by the toggle switches on the front panel. Times have changed, how about learning to use a GUI. Idiots abound.....

I just get sick and tires of all these young wet behind the ear, know it alls, who are unable to stand anyone else making any type of mistake.

Re:^H^H

[Anonymous Coward]

... and in some versions of the korn shell that only if you're using emacs mode.

Re:^H^H

[ResidntGeek]

I suppose I shouldn't point out that you made mistakes in that post.

Re:^H^H

[LighthouseJ]

Actually, to really nitpick, the 7th character deleted was a space before "Micros", but after all the ^D's, there is another space to rewrite the space back in there after "with". The story was correct terminal-wise (other than the fact it should be ^H).

Here's the relevant line:

... property laws in line with Micros^D^D^D^D^D^D^D America's.

Re:^H^H

[kraada]

See, he knew ^D is EOF. However, he was trying to exit the Microsoft (or just corporate) controlled America, and can anybody entirely blame him for wanting out of (at least) that part of it?

Re:^H^H

[Anonymous Coward]

That's ^J, not ^K...

As bad as software patents are...

[Sheetrock]

It does make sense to standardize on one set of intellectual property laws internationally.

It gets really confusing to try to figure out the different times at which copyright expires across different countries, or to know where your intellectual property is already protected and where you have to jump through additional hoops.

Settling on an international standard that is mutually agreed upon strengthens the companies within those nations because they don't have to cope with several sets of rules. Like the standardization on the Euro, it reduces complexity and ultimately is a good thing.

Re:As bad as software patents are...

[gid13]

Uh... Would you standardize on one horrible dictator for the sake of strengthening the collective?

I mean, really. You're right that it strengthens the companies, but does the economic good of certain companies really balance out the evil of stupid patent law? Remember that when a company makes money, they make it from other people.

Re:As bad as software patents are...

[lpontiac]

It does make sense to standardize on one set of intellectual property laws internationally. It gets really confusing to try to figure out the different times at which copyright expires across different countries, or to know where your intellectual property is already protected and where you have to jump through additional hoops.

Here's the thing. I place more importance on having the laws of my country reflect the wishes of myself and my fellow citizens, than I do on making it easy for you to come over here and engage in commerce.

Re:As bad as software patents are...

[Wolfbone]

This is the 2nd feeblest, most cripple minded argument I have ever seen as a justification for software patents. For a start, you've made the very stupid mistake of lumping everything together under the term 'intellectual property' and then gone and waffled on about copyright duration - you should've been modded offtopic, not insightful!

As for "having to cope" with several sets of rules, well if you can't cope with a handful of different languages, national bureaucracies and patent application procedures, my heart just bleeds for you but how is your marketing and distribution going to fare if you are so poor at adaptation?.

Perhaps you could just hire some staff that are up to the job rather than pushing for laws that favour big companies with entrenched monopolies, destroy the business success chances of small companies and individuals and are an unwarranted assault on freedom of expression anyway?

Re:As bad as software patents are...

[CarrionBird]

Completity isn't always a bad thing. Espically when it protects you from another countries bad ideas.

Re:As bad as software patents are...

[Anonymous Coward]

In that case, let's standardise on China's or India's IP laws. They have the numbers and are up and coming economies. Why is there a presumption that the US must be the standard?

Re:As bad as software patents are...

[JInterest]

Settling on an international standard that is mutually agreed upon strengthens the companies within those nations because they don't have to cope with several sets of rules. Like the standardization on the Euro, it reduces complexity and ultimately is a good thing.

Sure, it helps the rich and powerful stay that way, keeps the small and weak from upsetting the apple cart, and assures that the status quo ante favors those already on the top of the heap.

Grrrrreat.

For my part, I think that a little anarchy is a good thing, for those who love freedom. It was the early "standardization" of the Chinese nation, united under the uniform rule of one Emperor, united under one authority, that caused the eventual stagnation of their culture. Similarly, the more "uniform" power and authority became in the Roman Empire, the more oppressive and rotten it became.

Voluntary standards, i.e., those that can be disregarded, are good. Involuntary standards, i.e. those that are backed up with bayonets, prisons, and all the powers of the modern State, are less good, particularly when their effect is to concentrate wealth and power in the hands of a few.

Sorry, this isn't a good thing from my point of view.

Re:As bad as software patents are...

[Alan Cox]

Sure it does. The US violates those rules by allowing software patents.

WIPO provides that software is a literary work. The copyright convention provides that the author of a literary work shall have sole rights...

Re:As bad as software patents are...

[baadfood]

Uh, no, YOU think its a good thing. Which ironically is WHY its a bad thing. Because standards ARE different all over the world, people have different ideas as to what works and what doesn't. To stnadardize on a one size fits all approach is dangerous, and only a good idea if youre in a position such that the option taken is YOUR option. Imperialist dog.

Okay, but what's the alternative?

[oostevo]

Since this is a bit of a viscious cycle (the more patents that the Patent Office gets the more it says "Sounds good"), there obviously needs to be a change, but I've yet to see a truly plausible example of what would be a successful change to our patent system.

Patents, at times, actually are good things, so entirely doing away with the patent system wouldn't be a good idea, nor would adding more money to the patent office budget (the same problems we have now, just more of them), and making the patents harder to apply for would just benefit the offensive-patenting corporations with the money to hire expensive lawyers.

So what do we do about it?

Re:Okay, but what's the alternative?

[Anonymous Coward]

As one in the industry I am only too aware of the multitude of tenuously 'inventive' patents which are granted. However the problem does not only reside in the fact that there are _extremely_ few computing patent examiners, but in fact mainly stems from a different source. Court judgement! Although the Act states that to be patentable an invention should contain, inter alia, an inventive step, the Courts have defined this as requiring _only_ a 'scintilla of invention'. (Following the lead of the net IP exporting US, which has justification for such an approach) Therefore when a patent examiner looks at a case and says - 'bugger off' a patent attorney can simply respond with 'scintilla of invention'.

What constitutes this scintilla of invention, an extra radio button, a particularly visible background colour?!? Humbug!

Re:Okay, but what's the alternative?

[gid13]

Abolish them. Seriously. Children in grade school tend to get chastised for immaturity when they cry "I thought of it first". Why does this behaviour get rewarded as an adult?

Or, if you ABSOLUTELY cling to the idea that greed is the only way anything will ever get done, at the very least shorten terms to the point that patents aren't so lucrative that they're considered the only important thing about doing business. Also, require an implementation to be submitted along with patent applications (to help prevent patenting things to prevent others from doing it).

Re:Okay, but what's the alternative?

[Cynicx]

Here's an idea: The charge levied for filing a patent would be a percentage of the company's revenue.

Re:Okay, but what's the alternative?

[Cynicx]

[Sorry - replying to myself]

Actually, I've been thinking about this a little and have a few more suggestions:

1. Same as above ie. charge % of revenue
2. Patents filed must have a working prototype
3. Patents filed a put into a sandbox for public review for 1 year before being granted to allow submissions of prior art etc.

Re:Okay, but what's the alternative?

[lightknight]

School == Socialistic Institution. It doesn't matter who thought of it first, it gets distributed equally.

Also, require an implementation to be submitted along with patent applications (to help prevent patenting things to prevent others from doing it).

You just described the whole point behind a patent: the ability to restrict others.

Or, if you ABSOLUTELY cling to the idea that greed is the only way anything will ever get done, at the very least shorten terms to the point that patents aren't so lucrative that they're considered the only important thing about doing business.

How about this: we keep the patent system the way it is, but actually let the system KEEP the fees it collects. I mean, WTF is Congress doing siphoning funds off of them anyway? Paying for Social Security and other failed programs. This whole situation could be summed up in a single line: "Sacrificing your future (technology) to pay for gramp's past (SS, Medicare, etc.)".

I need a drink.

Re:Okay, but what's the alternative?

[jkabbe]

First, patents were created so people would disclose inventions. If we abolished patents people would just go back to obfuscating and hiding. A good patent system is a huge boon to society.

Second, turning in an implementation is both redundant (you already have to be able to implement the invention to file for a patent) and doesn't force the inventor to use it. What you seem to want is a requirement that the inventor actually bring the product to market. That's something entirely different.

Re:Okay, but what's the alternative?

[AnotherBlackHat]

Patents, at times, actually are good things, so entirely doing away with the patent system wouldn't be a good idea, nor would adding more money to the patent office budget (the same problems we have now, just more of them), and making the patents harder to apply for would just benefit the offensive-patenting corporations with the money to hire expensive lawyers.

So what do we do about it?

Well, the question isn't "is doing away with the patent system a good idea?",
it's "is doing away with the patent better than any other alternative that's available?"
I've seen very little evidence that patents are good, and a lot of evidence that they are bad.
Doing away with them might be better than living with them.

However, taking it as a given that eliminating the patent office is not an option, what then would be better?

IMO the real problem with the current system is one of risk.
It's almost impossible to do real work without facing the possibility of being sued (successfully) for patent infringement and losing 100% of your efforts.
I.e. you're constantly at risk of total ruin.
And there doesn't seem to be any way to protect against this catastrophic failure.

One solution might be a compulsory licensing fee.
If any patent filed could be released to the public domain by paying the holder
100 times the filing fee, then we could at least make a reasonable risk estimate,
and patent insurance would be a realistic possibility.

Another possibility is a set of guidelines which if followed guarantee that you will not be infringing on a patent.
For example, declare that software which runs on an unmodified computer built before a patent was filed does not infringe that patent.

-- less is better.

Re:Okay, but what's the alternative?

[rollingcalf]

"Second, turning in an implementation is both redundant (you already have to be able to implement the invention to file for a patent) and doesn't force the inventor to use it."

No you don't have to have an implementation to get a patent in the US. You just have to write about it. There are patents on things like antigravity and other stuff that may forever remain impossible.

Re:Okay, but what's the alternative?

[thephotoman]

Actually, there are patent laws that would make antigravity patents illegal, unless physically demonstrated to the Patent Office. Some things have to be more than just schematics and equations on paper.

However, outside of the stuff that they deem the world of "science fiction", the patent office has full authority to issue patents based on as little as humanly possible.

Re:Okay, but what's the alternative?

[mOdQuArK!]

How 'bout this idea, or a variation thereof? (Yeah, yeah, I'm linking to my own message...)

Re:Okay, but what's the alternative?

[Lonewolf666]

School == Socialistic Institution. It doesn't matter who thought of it first, it gets distributed equally.
In that case, it's OK. School is for learning, not for building patent portfolios ;-)

Also, require an implementation to be submitted along with patent applications (to help prevent patenting things to prevent others from doing it).

You just described the whole point behind a patent: the ability to restrict others.

Maybe he should have written "the ability to restrict others without doing something useful yourself".
Filing patents for something you actually sell is OK as defense of your income. Patents without actual innovation are a problem and should be killed.

How about this: we keep the patent system the way it is, but actually let the system KEEP the fees it collects
Fair enough, but let it pay for its failures as well. For instance, make the patent office pay some of the legal costs if a patent is declared invalid in court. That would give some incentive to do the job well.

I tried to patent my time machine...

[NightWulf]

But Microsoft beat me to it. But it's still useful for the early Slashdot posts! I may go back and patent the printing press though, that'll show you all.

I implore you all

[Anonymous Coward]

Can we _please_ have some unbiased reporting?

Nothing wrong with MS-bashing in the comments, but can we keep the stories themselves objective at least?

Re:I implore you all

[Anonymous Coward]

> Nothing wrong with MS-bashing in the comments, but can we keep the stories themselves objective at least?

Show me a news source that ISN'T biased.

One quick way to improve the situation

[theluckyleper]

IANAL, but one way to improve the patent situation (and the IP situation too, for that matter), which I didn't see mentioned in the article, would be to impose a statute of limitation on infringement suits. This is how they do things in China.

China?! Yes, that's right. Some of their laws are better than ours...

This would prevent asshats like Unisys (and, if applied to IP, asshats like SCO) from suing for infringement WELL after they became aware of the issue. A statute of limitaion would ensure that underhanded tactics such as allowing the public to become addicted to GIFs, and then suing years and years later, would no longer be effective.

This wouldn't solve all of the problems with software patents, but I think it's a step in the right direction!

Re:One quick way to improve the situation

[Anonymous Coward]

What, may I ask, is an "asshat"? And where can I get one?

Re:One quick way to improve the situation

[Anonymous Coward]

If you're asking the question, you're already wearing one.

Re:One quick way to improve the situation

[Unordained]

... how 'bout we require patent holders to very obviously be seeking to do something useful with their patents, immediately? you don't get to sit on it, you don't get to hold it and wait for someone else to get the idea ... and you absolutely don't get to claim patent rights if someone else invents the same thing without your help (though it'd be hard to prove they didn't see your patent application, even if you don't document elsewhere.) regardless, patent holders should be required to obviously be trying to find buyers from day 1, or be building their own solution (not vaporware) based on the patent. the whole point is to give you a little extra time (advantage) to get your shit together before the competition comes in, -not- to give you a nice legal monopoly to sit on. besides, if companies are already innovating ... do we need patents? the point was incentives -- if they're going to create new algorithms and machines because there's a market for them (if there's no market within a few years of an invention, the patent is just an expense to you) ... then we don't need patents at all. (reminder: incentives of this sort are created out of the clear blue sky, and should be just as easy to repeal.)

Re:One quick way to improve the situation

[janbjurstrom]

Or, they could make good on their implied threats (Mutual Assured Damage/Destruction).

I just hope that one of the big'uns start a fight! And we'll get to watch all the Microsofts and the IBMs and the Novells and all the rest of the patent pimps Mutually destroy each other. Oh, man, it would be so great:

"Feel the pain of our 'one-click-purchase'!!"

"You call that pain?! Taste our 'listing-photos-BY-DATE'!! *ka-boom*

"Ouch, DAMN YOU! Attack!! 'hold-down-mouse-button-to-make-something-happen'! !!!!!

"GAaaaaaaahhh, it burrnnnsss!!"

"Yes, the smell of burning IP in the morning!! Load another round of 'incentives-to-watch-ads'! Fire!!"

"AAAAAaaaaaaa...aa.. we can't feel our legal department... it's getting dark ... the stock is dropping ... *NO CARRIER*

Barring that, your thing might have some merit :)

Re:One quick way to improve the situation

[styxlord]

Couldn't agree more. Companies that have nothing but a patent portfolio and use it to extort money from others are amongst the lowest forms of life.
The big fish don't need to have patents (other than to protect themselves from leeches who do), they can compete head to head. May the best product, or marketing campaign, win. If its something really new, the competition will lag by however long it takes them to reverse engineer your invention and develop their own, once it hits the market. The little fish either need to get some investors to see them through to market or just sell out to a big fish. I must be missing something here, what's the point of patents again? To fund research with no intention of production?

Re:One quick way to improve the situation

[BrynM]

That is the funniest damn thing I've read all week. Nice job.

Re:One quick way to improve the situation

[janbjurstrom]

My humblest thanks :)

The cynical/downright nasty people quoted in the OP article had me really fuming. My choices were either gallows humor or starting another 50-hour work week with an even more damaged faith in our industry's future, the corruption of ethics, the plight of the common nerd, et al...

Couldn't bare the latter alternative, hence the post (and now, off to work ..yay).

Re:One quick way to improve the situation

[jedimark]

You hit the nail on the head...

Re:One quick way to improve the situation

[HiThere]

And that's why they form patent pools.

The only people who get hurt by patents are those who don't already own enough of them to be invited into the pool.

Re:One quick way to improve the situation

[Archibald Buttle]

Requiring patent holders to use their patent immediately would only encourage ideas to stay secret and not be patented until such time as it's practical to exploit the idea embodied within the patent. Many ideas are already "trade secrets" rather than patents, and so long as they are kept secret they'll never be released to the public domain. This is an advantage of patents after all - they do expire.

Patents used to be for a shorter period and could be extended. I would suggest that is a better solution than the current one, however I would be reluctant to see a proviso added that a patent must be in the process of being developed into a product. Some patented ideas really can't practically be turned into products until quite late into their life.

Re:One quick way to improve the situation

[meringuoid]

I just hope that one of the big'uns start a fight! And we'll get to watch all the Microsofts and the IBMs and the Novells and all the rest of the patent pimps Mutually destroy each other. Oh, man, it would be so great:

The victor would emerge stronger than either, and free from doubt.
-- Gandalf

The last man standing in a patent war would 0wnz0r. That, or the Chinese just ignore patents completely and inherit the earth...

Hmm...

[bobhagopian]

I'm all for free software and everything, but this article seems a little ridiculous at points. For example, it says the following:

"The whole idea of software patents is a bit strange, really. A traditional patent is for a mechanical invention that may have taken a long time to design, produce and bring to market, and provides protection for the original inventor while eventually allowing their ideas to enter the public domain.
Software, however, is mercurial. A good programming idea may only be useful for a few months and, even after the dotcom crash, it's still the case that after a couple of years generally there is a complete generational change in the tools, techniques and even programming languages used."

Despite my unreserved support for OSS, I can recognize a tenuous argument when I see one. Software development takes time and effort, just like the development of mechanical devices.

Re:Hmm...

[Anonymous Coward]

But as the article also points out, it's not the developed, final product that is patented, it's the very idea of doing something. It doesn't take long to come up with a random idea, even if the implementation time is quite long. It's also worth noting that it wouldn't take more than a day for most programmers to implement a working test of the sort of small idea that gets patented. We're not talking about a full-fledged accounting system or operating system or something like that.

Re:Hmm...

[Bruce Perens]

I think the point about software being "mercurial" is vague, but what he was probably thinking about it that it's a medium better protected by copyright. Now having both patent and copyright apply to it is indeed strange.

Bruce

Re:Hmm...

[LordLucless]

The real difference between software and hardware patents is the time taken to bring it to market. If you invent a mechanical device, if you want to market it, you need to find some way to mass produce it. Unless you are independantly wealthy, that means finding someone who owns a manufactuting plant or two, and getting them to make the device for you. This means that you have to let somebody into your confidence. After you've gone around having meetings with ten or twenty manufacturers, there's ten or twenty people who know a good deal about your invention. You need a patent to ensure that they can't just start ripping off your invention without cutting you in.

Software, on the other hand, as intangible data, is dead easy to replicate and distribute. Put up a website, buy a bit of bandwidth - and nowadays, setup a torrent, and bingo - the equivelant of mechanical "manufacture and distribution". You don't need a patent to protect you while you struggle to manufacture your software and bring it to market.

Re:Hmm...

[Anonymous Coward]

This is a problem with the patent system, not with software patents themselves. If software patents were granted only for non-trivial, non-obvious software inventions, then the problem you describe would go away. You have fallen for the "all software patents are evil" lobby group's biggest false dichotomy.

Re:Hmm...

[BiggerIsBetter]

Maybe I misinterpreted your post, but I'd argue that's not quite what's going on. In my view, there's two things being protected here. The copyright protects the software implementation, while the patent protects the process behind the implmentation. Kinda like patenting the painting of a bowl of fruit on a table. You have a copyright on the resulting artwork, but you also have a patent on the process involved to stop others painting something similar.

It seems like a helluva good way to kill the industry to me.

Re:Hmm...

[Bruce Perens]

My point was that if it is possible to protect the implementation, it should not also be possible to protect the process.

Bruce

Re:Hmm...

[Anonymous Coward]

Why? Because you say so? Implementation does not equal invention but you would have both lumped under the same weak copyright protection. Your statement is as weak an assertion I've seen on this topic.

Re:Hmm...

[Anonymous Coward]

Because micropayment torrents are a great source of income these days. Yep - you certainly thought that argument through.

Re:Hmm...

[LordLucless]

Um....who mentioned micropayment torrents? Torrents are just a distribution method, same as HTTP or Electronic Boutique.

Re:Hmm...

[jkabbe]

Not only that, but the primary reason for patents, disclosure of the invention, is often inherent in releasing a software product. Software is so easy to analyze and reverse-engineer that patents are basically unnecessary for disclosure.

Re:Hmm...

[Anonymous Coward]

Except that HTTP and torrents have no associated billing structure, while EB does. One of these three costs of bunch of money to participate in - one doesn't. Funny that.

Re:Hmm...

[j. andrew rogers]

You've got to be a kidding. Setting up a website is not "bringing it to market". Only someone stuck in some kind of engineer or geek-centric perspective would think that it is. Bringing a software (or any) product to market is seriously capital intensive, particularly if you are competing against ripped off clones of your own product. Copyright doesn't protect you against incumbent billion dollar marketing machines.

So you spend 3-5 years on the ultimate piece of software with a whole collection of spectacular algorithms never seen before in computer science, and put it on the web at your little website that no one has heard of. Among the trickle of people that buy your product is BigCorp, who make their own implementation of your secret algorithm sauce and sell it through their billion dollar marketing machine to every PHB on the planet. You barely cover the cost of your website, and BigCorp makes hundreds of millions on your research and development effort. You disappear into obscurity, not making a dime.

In short, without a patent the algorithm inventor would be at a HUGE disadvantage in the market in virtually every single aspect of doing business. Copyright doesn't help with this, only a fool thinks "bringing something to market" is practical in the complete absence of design protection and very limited capital, particularly if the design is genuinely worth something in the open market.

So its either trade secrets or patents. Both have their upside and downside. The "copyright is protection enough" argument is a sham. Its virtually no protection at all.

Re:Hmm...

[Anonymous Coward]

Oh, totally....no one has EVER set up a shopping cart on a website.

Re:Hmm...

[LordLucless]

What you're talking about is "marketing" not "manufacture" or "distribution". If you manage to create a new super-algorithm, how is BigCorp supposed to figure it out just by purchasing a binary copy of your program? If the algorithm is obvious enough that a look at the working program is sufficient to show how it works, then it shouldn't qualify for a patent in the first place. If BigCorp downloads your program, looks at it, and creates their own algorithm that does a similar thing in a different way, then that wouldn't be covered by your patent anyway.

In the mean time, all the BigCorps of the real world have patented obvious algorithms all over the place, so if an inventor comes up with something new, he'll have to cross-license his patent to them anyway to avoid being sued into bankruptcy for violating their "summation of two integral numbers via electronic manipulation logic gates" patents.

Re:Hmm...

[Ontheotherhand]

If you imagine a small company could make a patent violation stick against a huge coporation, you're dreaming. there will be exceptions, but remember the Biro (you have got these in the states, right?) or ballpoint. patented but not able to chase the big companies who ripped it off. or was the sapphire stylus (remember LP's) a good idea? ripped off by polyXXX and left inventor in penury after years of legal action. In fact, your only real chance is to get the big coporations to patent it for you, but then, thats not the point, surely?

Re:Hmm...

[Anonymous Coward]

Bruce, you forgot "Trade Sevret" - if you *can* get the source code, you *must* sighn an NDA. That is a trade secret.

Ah, all three methods of "IP" protection available to the highest bidder.

I would like to have it down as available to one version only. E.g. if you patent something (source code must be available so you can recreate the work and enhance it for when the patent expires), it is neither secret not copyrighted. If you have copyright on it (must have the code, otherwise you cannot deploy a copy after copyright expiration, excerpt passages or review the code) then it cannot have patent applied on any method it applies and cannot be secret. If you keep your code secret, then you cannot enforce patented methodologies in the code and you cannot get copyright protection.

This will be a huge PITA because software CAN be made up of elements you want protected by different methods. If so, copyright the bloody thing and be done with it.

Follow the lead of the anonymous author!

[YankeeInExile]

This article brings up a point I have been thinking about for a long time: The OSS/FS community is losing sight of the trees for the forest with regard to software patentability.

We need to fight the patent war on two fronts - the first front: Lobby to make software patents more difficult to obtain.

And the second front, equally important: Until the rules change in our favor, we need to build up a portfolio of patents, to share and trade with our friends (which anyone in business will tell you is the true purpose of a patent).

Instead of screeching to the heavans, Software Patents Are EEEEEEEEEVIL, the movement would be better served by gaming the system. If a portfolio of patents is what is needed to keep Free Software Free, then so be it - put our minds to making the application and examination system as easy as possible, and assign patents to some organization (a role that would be well served by FSF if they could stop their jihad.

For the record, I do not think that software patents are intrinsically evil. I believe in my heart-of-hearts that algorithms are just as much an invention as a better mousetrap, and I disagree with the article author's assertion that the copyright protection granted to an implementation is sufficient protection for this inventive process.

Plus, you forget that one of the Principles of Free Software, transparency, is fundament in the patent process. The wisdom of the patent system is, In exchange for exclusive right-to-use on your invention, for a limited time, you must fully disclose that same invention.

I am seriously concerned that the patent process may suffer the same slow creep in the meaning of limited time that has happened surrounding copyright, but that is a separate problem for another posting.

Re:Follow the lead of the anonymous author!

[Anonymous Coward]

A History of Software Patents

http://www.bitlaw.com/software-patent/history.ht ml

Re:Follow the lead of the anonymous author!

[Bruce Perens]

You may need to think this through a lot more.

First, going for our own patents in the Free Software community doesn't really help unless we have a huge legal fund behind us to 1) prosecute others and 2) defend ourselves from their patents.

Second, you should think through whether or not algorithms are mathematical in nature, and whether mathematics is discovered or invented.

Thanks

Bruce

Re:Follow the lead of the anonymous author!

[YankeeInExile]

You do bring up an excellent point that a patent without the backing to fight for it is worthless, and I am sorry to say I have no answer for that. Perhaps finding some white knight (IBM) to help underwrite that would be worthwhile.

As to the second point -- I think there is a continuum - some algorithms are clearly mathematical in nature, others are much more procedural.

I am reminded of an era when to patent an algorithm, it was necessary to show that it could be implemented in hardware, patent that hardware, and then make an additional claim of "any process that simulates the physical artifact."

Re:Follow the lead of the anonymous author!

[RedWizzard]

And the second front, equally important: Until the rules change in our favor, we need to build up a portfolio of patents, to share and trade with our friends (which anyone in business will tell you is the true purpose of a patent).

The article brings up another point that you may have missed: that company was spending $50,000-$200,000 per patent. Where is the OSS community supposed to get that sort of money?

Re:Follow the lead of the anonymous author!

[Flower]

You'd effectively kill off FOSS. As Bruce mentioned we would need a warchest to effectively wield the proposed portfolio but we'd also need a warchest just to build the portfolio. Software patents require lawyers to go over the claims and work on making them as broad as possible.

So you not only have to pay patent fees but you also have to retain a lawyer and pay legal fees over a couple of years to get the patent pushed through. How many FOSS developers are going to pony up that cash? How many FOSS developers want to hit IRC and spend a night debating which ideas are going to be good ones to patent? Who will track those patents and who is going to make the decision on whether a patent is to be used in litigation? So now we're not just talking about money to create patents or even use patents but now we need money to maintain our patents. Oh and we all have to agree on how we're going to do that.

And who wants to cross-license patents with a GPL project? It seems you'd have to virtually give up your patent to avoid litigation since the GPL requirements are going to force you to free up your "IP." Under the circumstances,it might be worth the risk to blow the $2million and litigate. So unlike what currently happens in the industry the FOSS patent industry would probably always be in litigation instead of cross-licensing. At least that's what I see happening worst-case.

Re:Follow the lead of the anonymous author!

[YankeeInExile]

Where is the OSS community supposed to get that sort of money?

The same place we got the n-zillion dollars to develop the software in the first place. Not all that support OSS/FS write code.

Re:Follow the lead of the anonymous author!

[plierhead]

And the second front, equally important: Until the rules change in our favor, we need to build up a portfolio of patents, to share and trade with our friends (which anyone in business will tell you is the true purpose of a patent).

Sinking to everyone else's level may not be the best, or even a practical option.

A seldom-mentioned way to defeat patents is just to publish your work and place it in the public domain. This creates the prior art which can be used to strike down patents in the future.

The main problem is, of course, that most peoiple don't want to publish their work, they want to keep it locked up and secret. Thus this avenue is not open to most commercial software firms. They are forced into the patents arms race.

Open source is exempt from this problem. The best way to defeat patents is for there to be a published open source version of the "invention" (and I use the word with wry amusement) which pre-dates any patents. There is no need to go to the hassle and expense of actually procuring a patent.

Re:Follow the lead of the anonymous author!

[YankeeInExile]

Software Patents can be the end of OSS/FS whether we win the game or not, but nobody has ever won by staying home and whining that the rules suck.

They (meaning the OSS, FS community) provide tens of thousands of dollars of "value" - that is, avoided cost by doing their craft (writing code) for free. Some are masters in their field whose time, if purchased on the open market would be in the hundreds of dollars per hour - comparable with a top-flight attorney.

Who is to say that masters of patent law cannot apply the same level of dedication to the advancement of Free Information that people like Randy Schwartz or (insert some luminary from your pet project here)?

An organization I was once afilliated with, had a suit filed against us that would have bankrupted us, if it were not for the fact that one of our members, besides being a member of our non-technical SIG, was an attorney, admitted to appear before the Supreme Court of California. The cost of fighting the suit, and getting it dismissed was on the order of hundreds of dollars, instead of tens of thousands.

As to the second point, how many FOSS developers want to debate ideas worth patenting. Perhaps you know a different subset of the community than I have met, but I would say, All of them. It is precisely the kind of intillectual challenge that really turns a Great Hacker's crank!

How to protect the portfolio -- well, there is the achilles heel. I do not have the answer to that one. [1]

As to the third point: Who would want to cross-licesnse patents? Well -- I need to think about this some more, and I think it will require a substantial reformation in FOSS dogma. Let me cogitate and come up with some ideas.

Footnote 1: It really burns my toast when people put untold amounts of energy into firehosing. (Not to pick at you Flower -- this is a rant against The World) - I once worked in a place where I said, "DAMMIT! The next engineer in this meeting who comes up with an argument why such-and-such won't work is FIRED! If you find a problem, I want to hear three possible paths to SOLUTION at the same time!"

Re:Follow the lead of the anonymous author!

[Flower]

No offense taken. I just couldn't articulate anything more to say and wanted to get the post off before I started getting any more grey in my hair. I felt my points were sufficient at the time :)

For the record, I don't think it's worth fighting patent for patent. I'd rather see prior art established instead. Maybe it would be worth having the creation of a non-profit that would publish these ideas in a dead tree format or in the form of a digital database would be effective. I think it would also be useful to have a defense fund established that could be used to challenge any patent litigation against an opensource project. Kinda like what RH created for the SCO debacle. Finally, I want more studies financed to determine if the issuance of software patents is harmful to the industry. If that data proves what I believe to be correct and it is harmful I want to money spent to litigate against the government that software patents are unconstitutional since they can be proven not to advance the arts and sciences.

There. Thanks for the kick in the ass. Sorry I had to burn your toast in the process.

Re:Follow the lead of the anonymous author!

[Calroth]

A better way of thinking of this is, do what the GPL has done to the concept of copyright. As I understand it, the FSF isn't a huge fan of copyright and intellectual property as it currently is, so it's twisted copyright into "copyleft", using it to further its goals within the framework of law.

We need something similar for patents. I'm not smart enough to think of how, but the parent poster is.

As to the money needed: the FSF seems to have done fairly well to raise the money needed to chase GPL violations.

Re:Follow the lead of the anonymous author!

[0-9a-f]

Surely another way is the way of the militant?

Get a large group of people - around the nation or around the world - to work on a project to implement one idea that has been stupidly patented. Get a democracy together to publicly vote on the stupidity of the patent. Then implement that idea under GPL or public domain - IN VERY CLEAR VIOLATION of the patent.

Make certain the list of contributors is large and public. Make certain the goals are public. Make certain that when one person is hauled before the courts, it is absolutely obvious that they were not acting alone.

The question is - do enough people REALLY believe the law is stupid? Or is it somebody else's problem?

Re:Follow the lead of the anonymous author!

[Anonymous Coward]

Bruce,
You seem like an extremely cluey guy, and I find myself agreeing to everything that you've said on this issue.

Maybe you can tell me then, how we should go about resolving the patent problem? What are some strategies that could work? Or should we just wait until it's painfully obvious to even the law that their patenting is stiffling innovation?

It seems to me, that corporations are more worthy citizens than citizens these days. And I can appreciate that stance. It's kinda capatalism gone wrong - The mega corporations pay more taxes (and patent tax etc) than the citizens so they get the most rights.

Does the fix require a fundemental change in the way our governments work? or is there a simple solution?

Re:Follow the lead of the anonymous author!

[Bruce Perens]

The least draconian solution would be to tremendously improve patent quality. This means good tests before patents are granted regarding triviality - give the problem to other engineers and they come up with the right solution right away - and prior art - probably requires an easy challenge process -, and preciseness of claims. We have a serious vague-claim problem right now, as people write vague claims so that they will be maximally applicable rather than specifically applicable. Then shorten the term to fit the field.

But I'd be just as happy to do away with them.

You are wrong about corporations paying more taxes. The burden is very slanted toward individuals, and within individuals toward lower income.

Me, I'd not allow corporations to be immortal, and I'd set a minimum tax rate for them and make sure it was enforced.

Bruce

Re:Follow the lead of the anonymous author!

[Omnifarious]

Here is the criteria I've decided to use for whether a patent is worth granting or not...

Is the public served by the disclosure of the technique in the patent?

This eliminates one-click immediately. The public gains not a thing by disclosure of the technique, as the technique is obvious as soon as you look at the site.

I think the patent system as a whole is of dubious value. But, perhaps if that criteria were strictly applied the damage they do could be mitigated significantly, and they might even do some good. In strictly applying that criteria, the patent would not be granted if it could not be easily understood by the average engineer. not the average patent lawyer. A patent application written in legalese doesn't serve the public at all.

If you look at the case of cryptography for example, patents have set the security of computer systems across the world back significantly. The cost to the public of granting those patents is very high. I think the benefit is dubious. Would RSA or Diffie-Hellman been lost as trade secrets if they hadn't been patented? I suspect not. I think they were published in research journals before the patents were even applied for. So the public got nothing for granting the monopoly. Not a fair trade at all.

Re:Follow the lead of the anonymous author!

[Halo1]

For the record, I do not think that software patents are intrinsically evil. I believe in my heart-of-hearts that algorithms are just as much an invention as a better mousetrap, and I disagree with the article author's assertion that the copyright protection granted to an implementation is sufficient protection for this inventive process.

Most studies on that subject (slow server) disagree with you. Hell, even the head of intellectual property at Cisco disagrees that software patents are a good thing. In his words (during the FTC hearings of 2002):

My observation is that patents have not been a positive force in stimulating innovation at Cisco. Competition has been the motivator; bringing new products to market in a timely manner is critical. Everything we have done to create new products would have been done even if we could not obtain patents on the innovations and inventions contained in these products. I know this because no one has ever asked me "can we patent this?" before deciding whether to invest time and resources into product development.

Plus, you forget that one of the Principles of Free Software, transparency, is fundament in the patent process. The wisdom of the patent system is, In exchange for exclusive right-to-use on your invention, for a limited time, you must fully disclose that same invention.

And one of the nice things about free software is that it results in this full disclosure (more so than the patent system, since that one never includes source code) without all the costs and downsides of the patent system. Otoh, software patents are exactly the reverse: they grant a monopoly on something which they were going to fully disclose (in the sense of the patent system at least) anyway, because using it is the same as publishing it (e.g. a business method or an interface paradigm).

Re:Follow the lead of the anonymous author!

[RedWizzard]

The same place we got the n-zillion dollars to develop the software in the first place. Not all that support OSS/FS write code.

What n-zillion dollars? OSS software may be highly valued, and expensive to replace in a corporate scenario, but don't confuse that value with the cost of development. Very little money has gone into the development of OSS software, and there is little evidence that OSS' corporate benefactors will also want to donate or fund patents.

Re:Follow the lead of the anonymous author!

[Anonymous Coward]

What you're proposing isn't militant. What you're proposing is civil disobedience.

Militant activism implies violence/destruction and then running away WITHOUT taking your punishment. Civil disobedience is openly breaking the law, then getting arrested to create a public debate on the issue. When you're practicing civil disobedience you do NOT avoid the police and you don't fight back.

Militant activism is to attempt to break the system by interrupting it. Trying to stick something between the cogs to stop them from spinning.

Civil disobedience is to stick your hand into the cogs, possibly losing your hand in the process, but you bring the system itself into the spotlight. People might question why the system let that happen to you, and if it's actually fair to have it that way.

Re:Follow the lead of the anonymous author!

[l4m3z0r]

Does the OSS/FS community really need to care about getting patents? Let's for a moment assume someone was able to "patent linux" and then say all you people can't use that. It wouldn't change much aside from coporate adoption going away. You or I would still be using/developing that and sharing it via p2p or with easy to find websites operating in the face of the patent until these websites are shutdown. Without a doubt in order to enforce those patents on the world would require substantial financial resources, probably resources that no company would be able to expend. They would crumble against what would be an unprecedented level of civil dissobedience. So before the OSS/FS community goes and wastes time and effort getting software patents they should just consider the possibility that the important OSS projects are bigger than the patent and could probably just ignore it.

Re:Follow the lead of the anonymous author!

[sean.peters]

And who wants to cross-license patents with a GPL project? It seems you'd have to virtually give up your patent to avoid litigation since the GPL requirements are going to force you to free up your "IP."

Without taking a position on the larger issue of whether Free Software and patents go together... it's not at all clear to me that the sentence I quote above is true. Say Acme Software releases software package X. Then they get a letter from the FSF saying "We've patented two of the techniques you use in X. We need to come to an agreement." It's possible that the FSF could ask Acme to release the software under the GPL. But it's also possible, and in my view more likely, that the FSF would allow Acme to use one or more of its (FSF's) patents in exchange for Acme allowing the FSF to do the same with one or more of Acme's. This is the same way that corporations use patent portfolios. By definition, the technique is already publicly disclosed (in the patent application), so there's no issue of company secrets getting out.

What the FSF can't do is FORCE Acme to release package X under the GPL, because the GPL doesn't apply. The GPL is about copyright, not patents.

Sean

Re:Follow the lead of the anonymous author!

[Tablizer]

As to the second point -- I think there is a continuum - some algorithms are clearly mathematical in nature, others are much more procedural.

I think they are interchangable if you diddle with them enough. It would make an interesting case to re-define a patent in terms of math.

Re:What?

[Dwonis]

Depends on your termcap/terminfo.

Re:"Re:Nothing for you to see here." The answer is

[mattjb0010]

Other neat tricks on Google:

1. Do a search on "1" and then "2" ... "9" and for each number plot the number of hits returned versus the number, and you end up with something like Benford's Law.
2. On Babelfish, enter a phrase in one language, and keep translating it through the set of languages until you hit a limit cycle.

Money talks

[usefool]

I think the core of the article implies that the company with most 'spendable' money will win by default in any case.

Patent Office will grant any plausible applications because "The feeling is that anything contentious can be sorted out in the courts."

And what happens in the courts? Small guys are burdened with legal fees, which is related to the time spent on preparation, which big guys can just throw a lot to you. If you don't hire enough lawyers to read each and every line properly, you might get caught even if you are the rightful owner of a patent.

So with or without a patent, big company will eventually monopolize the market by (1) holding a patent and scare everybody off or, (2) taking the patent-holding company to court or, (3) buy out small guys.

Re:Money talks

[maximilln]

Small guys are burdened with legal fees...So with or without a patent, big company will eventually...(2) taking the patent-holding company to court

Any properly naive /. reader will tell you that's what the guaranteed right to an attorney is to protect you against. What? You're calling to question the quality of public defenders and pro bono work? :-)

Does anyone else find it strange..

[ReidMaynard]

It seems (on a very high level) the Lawyer has just found a new market. Look at the small effort he puts forth and all the income it generates for his firm. And he admits, the patents can be fought over later in the courts...more legal fees for him!! If I were your CEO I would feel a lot like the "SUCKER" in the old Bugs Bunny cartoons. I'm sure there is *some* truth to his position, but I find it bad business to go for the "monopoly" brass ring. Its sad when our CEOs go for these get rich quick schemes. just shows you Lawyers and CEOs are greedy SOBs.

Re:Does anyone else find it strange..

[nothings]

I have been beating this horse for over ten years. There are three kinds of people who come out in favor of software patants:

• the Patent Office
• patent lawyers
• people with profitable software patents

These people offer various reasons one should be in favor of software patents:

• the Patent Office: because patents are, like, good, duh!
• patent lawyers: because patents are, like, good, duh!
• people with profitable software patents: because inventors should have a moral right to not have their ideas ripped off

However, these people, and nobody else, stand to gain something obvious from software patents:

• the Patent Office: money
• patent laywers: money
• people with profitable software patents: money

Changing the lawyers' minds isn't going to be easy. So the first order of business is to make patents not a profit center for the PTO. If patents are something worth having, let the taxpayers foot most of the bill.

PS. Man, LZW expired. I need to make a new shirt.

Patents are for the rich

[Anonymous Coward]

The current patent system is borked. Its for big companies to squash little guys. This article sums it up.

Re:^D ?

[azzy]

What's more

Micros is 6 characters

^D^D^D^D^D^D^D is doing 'something' to 7 characters

Comment removed

[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

here ya go...

[zogger]

...want an alternative? Anything you can physically hold in your hand or touch = OK to patent. Some theoretical concept, process, algorithym, arrangement, etc commonly referred to as an "intellectual property" = *not* OK to patent, but OK to copyright if the creator chooses to.

simple easy solution

Re:here ya go...

[Valar]

The problem is that a patent is really better for an algorithm. Why? One way to think about it is that patents cover ideas and designs, whereas copyrights cover expressions of these ideas. The problem isn't that some ideas related to software are being patented, it is that the patent office is granting patents for obvious or trivial algorithms and ideas, as well as ones with substantial prior art. Without a significant overhaul of the way copyright works, however, patents are still the most appropriate ip protection for a lot of software related stuff. copyright protection for a concept, process or algorithm would easily be avoided by simply "rewriting" it differently (rearranging some code, or adding some minor steps to the process). and if you think patenting a process is crazy, think about chemical companies and manufacturers that have been patenting important innovations to their production processes for years.

Re:here ya go...

[Wolfbone]

Good grief! you're arguing for the exact reverse of that which is right, just and equitable. Algorithms are mental processes, mathematical ideas which when enacted in software cost next to nothing to manufacture and distribute. To use the patent system to exclude others from even using them is an assault on the very foundations of natural justice, not to mention economically unjustifiable. No-one ever sold a bare algorithm in a shrink-wrapped box - in case you hadn't noticed, each saleable software product is likely to contain many, many algorithms and ideas, and for that reason and others it is appropriately protected by copyright.

I don't think I really care whether the chemical companies consider patents on their expensive to build and operate production processes to be crazy or not - it's up to them. I do however think your idea of allowing ideas in mathematics and computer science to be patentable to be both crazy and evil.

I have never committed a crime on slashdot before, but I shall do so now, by manufacturing and distributing a patented invention:

echo -n $'__________\r'
for ((i=0;i10;i++))
do echo -n "#"
sleep 1
done
echo

The patented progress bar, enacted in the shell in a few lines and all protestations that this one is trivial and should have been excluded by the patent office are meaningless unless you can describe specific criteria that the patent office bureaucrats can follow to allow them to discriminate. The RSA algorithm is just as trivial and yet I have heard many people mistakenly claim that it deserved a patent for it's originality and cleverness - but that cleverness was all in the maths - the idea, not the algorithmic expression of it and so a justification of patentability of software ideas is a justification of patentability of mathematics. An outrageous position.

Re:here ya go...

[oogoliegoogolie]

copyright protection for a concept, process or algorithm would easily be avoided by simply "rewriting" it differently (rearranging some code, or adding some minor steps to the process)

And that's why copyright works for software, and exactly why software patents should not be allowed. You have a right to protect your work and avoid your work from being copied, but not stifle competition and prevent others from producing similar, yet different, methods.

There are multiple methods of achieving the same results with software, sorting for example, but what is being patented are blanket concepts that are so vague that they cover all possible alternatives, so that anyone attempting to work around them are still in violation of that patent. Instead of patenting specific methods, algorithms, and code, granted patents often resemble something like "a method of sorting data and saving it to semi-permanent storage media", or "a way of storing user information from a website so the user only has to click once to reload his userdata" To me, these broad patens would be like a chemical company patenting "a way of extracting gold from ore", or a manufacturing company patenting "a method of using robotics to fasten screws"

As much as I dislike them, software patents are here to stay, at least in the US. Lawyers make too much money off them to let them go, and what field do most politicians come from?

Re:here ya go...

[zephyr1256]

Your progress bar has a bug(missing less-than sign on line 2). Guess its not such a trivial invention after all, is it? ;)

Re:here ya go...

[Wolfbone]

Actually I cut 'n' pasted it out of an email and it seems that the slashcode reproduction mechanisms mistakenly thought I intended an HTML tag. So I would say it was a non-obvious (to me at the time) quirk in the manufacturing process rather than any inherent non-triviality in the 'invention' itself.

Re:here ya go...

[Valar]

A patent wouldn't protect against a similar method or another method for doing the same thing-- if the patent office kept patents to the right scope. However, if I add a couple of lines of code here and there, that has no effect on the operation of the algorithm, it is already outside of the scope of the copyright. It is pretty much like you said about the "a way to extract gold from ore", etc. That shouldn't be allowed (there are certain requirements for getting granted a patent, obviously. The problem is that these requirements are not beiing enforced to stop stupid patents), but it happens everyday, for whatever reason.

Re:here ya go...

[Valar]

You say that you don't really care whether the chemical companies are get patents on their processes because those are expensive to implement anyway, but think about it. They aren't protecting the implementation (in this case lab and/or factory equipment) they are protecting an idea, just like someone could protect an idea in the software world. The issue with your progress bar example is that the patent should never have been granted (it is in violation of currently existing requirements for patents). My argument was that if we actually stuck to the rules on patents, it wouldn't be an issue. As far as the RSA algorithm, it looks trivial now, because the actual steps of the algorithm are so simple. However, the standard for the triviality clause of patent requirements is that if an idea is obvious to an expert in the field, it is trivial. RSA was not trivial to any mathematicians when it was invented. In fact, people had been searching for a long time for a good solution to the problem RSA solves (an encryption routine that allows the key to be known without the encrypted message being immediately obvious). I agree with you that the core of mathematics should not be patentible, however, it has already been made unpatentible. Also, just about every design involves some mathematics-- where do we draw the line? Designs for a building? Unpatentible (they contain measurements, and they are designed based on calculations of structural integrity). Designs for a computer part? Unpatentible under your system, because they are merely an expression of a mathematical process (take these bits here, turn them into these bits here, maybe do some output). You can continue forever almost.

Re:here ya go...

[Wolfbone]

"They aren't protecting the implementation (in this case lab and/or factory equipment) they are protecting an idea, just like someone could protect an idea in the software world."

Stating it that way is tautological - of course; they would use security guards and dogs to protect their own physical implementation of their own invention but in that sense a patent does not and cannot 'protect' ideas anyway. In fact patents are supposed to do exactly the opposite and make widely known that which would otherwise remain secret. They do not 'protect' ideas, they protect the artificial right of the patentee to temporary and exclusive use of the idea or invention - and for what reason? - so that the effort and expense of invention is economically worthwhile for the inventor and that such inventions are deemed unlikely to have occurred if that incentive were not in place. But that justification for such an imbalance and inequity of rights between inventor and other citizens simply doesn't exist in the software world - as is convincingly proven by the existence of free software and the growth in software development before software patents.

The idea that software development would cease or be in any way impaired if software 'inventors' were unable to claim exclusive use of software ideas by patent is absurd. The reverse is true - even the F.T.C. agrees with that at last! Software ideas were made patentable in America by accident for Pete's sake and now that the stupidity of that error is finally bringing the inevitable detrimental economic effects to the attention of anyone who cares to look, what is the response of the U.S. government? Well naturally they want to impose their self-inflicted illness on the rest of the World too.

"As far as the RSA algorithm, it looks trivial now, because the actual steps of the algorithm are so simple."

The RSA algorithm looks trivial now and always has done. That is because (as I said before) it is the immediate consequence of the pure mathematical idea on which it is based. There is no invention at all in turning the simple lemma into the software algorithm. So as I pointed out before, the invention you consider deserving of patentability is not in fact a software idea but a mathematical idea. It may come as a surprise to you and others but I will lay down my life before I see the day mathematics is made patentable here in Europe and I'm sure I'm not the only one who would feel this way. Indeed it is just this issue that motivated me to support the fight against software patents in the first place - when I saw how many of them were effectively legally erected barriers to the free use and communication either of bits of mathematics itself or of the useful and essential tools of mahematicians and other scientists.

"I agree with you that the core of mathematics should not be patentible, however, it has already been made unpatentible"

But it has not - the distinction between mathematical ideas, best expressed by being written down in textbooks, papers and journals and mathematics applied as computer algorithm, enacted by computer for some mundane purpose and as such, only of interest to businessmen does not exist. Think of the Appel and Haken proof or the whole field of fractal geometry or symbolic dynamics etc. There is much in pure mathematics these days (let alone the theoretical branches of other sciences) for which the expression of ideas as computer algorithm is an essential part of the exposition. Computer languages are languages after all and if you consider the ideas expressed in those languages to be justifiably patentable then you must say why they are special and why that is not the case in literature or music.

At which point we return to the fact that a positive justification is needed for any kind of patentability and that justification cannot exist for software ideas any more than it can exist for ideas expressed in Inuktituk. The Inuit may already have invented the finest language constructs in which to expresss ideas about the

Re:here ya go...

[mdfst13]

"One way to think about it is that patents cover ideas and designs"

But that's not what a patent is designed to do. A patent exists to protect *implementation* not ideas. Ideas are not IP. Both patents and copyrights regard implementations, just for different kind of things (copyright protects written work; patents traditionally protected physical items).

There is no reason to protect brilliant ideas, as brilliant ideas do not require work to create. IP protection is needed for the conversion of those ideas into working products. I.e. don't patent producing light from electricity (lightning has prior art anyway); patent the particular combination which Edison found through experimentation.

Your use of patents is akin to someone patenting the plot "Boy meets girl. ???. They fall in love." That plot is not IP, but any of the movies or books made with it are. Copyright is heavily dependent on derivativeness. Simply rearranging or adding some minor steps is not enough to escape copyright infringement.

2 words: Sovereign Immunity

[ahbi]

Until we see the Patent Office being sued

Remember, due to the concept of sovereign immunity you can't sue the government unless they say you can.
(Unless, you sue for injunctive relief claiming that the action is unConsitutional, and, after Eldred, I won't hold your breath there.)

Re:2 words: Sovereign Immunity

[Sebby]

Who says it needs to be Americans or an American company doing it? I would love to see the EU or a group of UK companies sue the ass off the PTO

Re:2 words: Sovereign Immunity

[Anonymous Coward]

Well that's not very fair now it is?

PTO grants bogus patents, opening the floodgates for frivilous lawsuits
Frivilous lawsuits destroys legitimate company because of bogus patents
PTO comes out scott-free

That total BS

Re:2 words: Sovereign Immunity

[mikael]

Who says it needs to be Americans or an American company doing it? I would love to see the EU or a group of UK companies sue the ass off the PTO

This would be very unlikely, since we have companies like BTG Plc which license patents worldwide. Plus European contractors for government DBMS are extremely keen to maintain their monopoly. To quote David Blunkett on ID Cards "we have to keep the terms of the contract strictly confidential and away from the public in order to guarantee value for money".

Re:2 words: Sovereign Immunity

[Sebby]

You mention only 1 company - I'm sure there are hundreds out there with a valid reason to sue for bogus patents, be it the PTO or a company that has abused the system

Re:2 words: Sovereign Immunity

[ahbi]

It doesn't matter who the plaintiff is. As long as the defendent is the government (and the concept works for most governments, US or not; since sovereign immunity is based on the idea that "the king can do no wrong," hence the sovereign is immune to suit), sovereign immunity kicks in and the suit is at an end.

That said, the US government has waived immunity in plenty of categories of suit, but I doubt the PTO and granting of IP rights is one of them.

Now, a foreign government could sue another foriegn government in some abritration body (WTO, etc.) where the defendent government has waived a portion of their immunity, but if this was possible (based on the treaties signed and what the arbitration panel has jurisdiction over) it would have happened long ago.

Re:2 words: Sovereign Immunity

[mikael]

I doubt that - all the major technology companies over here seemed to have been bought up by North American/Japanese companies. Psygnosis by Sony, Rare by Microsoft, Criterion by Electronic Arts. And the small companies wouldn't have the financial backing to file a patent lawsuit (any kind of litigation scares away future financial investors).

Tending the coals

[acidrain]

This article doesn't say anything we don't already know. Yes the American software patent system is fucked, and they are in the process of exporting it.

It is all very absurd, small companies won't be able to write code, hobbyist coders will need legal insurance.

What do we do? I am frothing at the mouth after reading the article (yayyyy slashdot) but really, is it worth thinking about without a realistic response? ... sigh ...

Personally as a Canadian working for a Canadian software company that is being sued with a FUCKING STUPID US software patent, I would be happy to invade the USA and blow up the patent office.

Would any of you Americans mind? Could someone provide GPS coordinates and photos with targets circled in red? Call it "compassionate terrorism."

Re:Tending the coals

[Mike Hawk]

I have forwarded your offer to bomb a government building to John Ashcroft. Have a nice day.

Re:Tending the coals

[Rheingold]

Ooooh... So you are the reason D. C. is at orange now.

Re:Tending the coals

[PepsiProgrammer]

If we start putting sane restrictions on patents.... The terrorists have already won.

Re:Tending the coals

[Anonymous Coward]

Obvious answer here: don't sell your product to anyone in the US. And make sure to tell these almost-customers *why* you can't sell your product to them. Of course, as a business you have to weigh the lawsuit costs against this geographical restriction, factoring-in licensing costs (assuming you lose/concede the court case), etc....
Not an easy maze to work your way out of.
Perhaps an easier solution would be to just wall-off the entire USA? Or at least the portion of it that contains most of the lawyers.

Re:Tending the coals

[Methuseus]

I'll provide coordinates with one condition:

You let me help bomb the shit out of the patent office, as well as select other governmental offices (Dept of Homeland Security anyone?)

Re:Tending the coals

[Anonymous Coward]

So have you sent ashcroft your hand made Valentines-day Card yet?
I'm sure he's excited to hear from his "special" pen-pal.

Re:Tending the coals

[Fortress]

As a fellow Canadian, I would like to point out that the views expressed in the parent post are those of acidrain and do not in any way constitute those of the benevolent, democratic government of Canada or its peaceful people.

We Canadians love our friendly, heavily-armed neighbors to the south and wish them well in their just war against the evil warfare technique, terrorism. We gape in awed silence at the graceful architecture of your Patent Office and other government buildings, and would try to stop someone who wanted to destroy them from entering through Canada.

We have no need to see overhead photos of your buildings, and the only thing we use your ever-so-useful GPS system for is for guiding our fishing boats and helping hikers in our vast wilderness, which you are free to visit anytime as long as you don't bring your gun.

We have oil, but we sell it to you cheaply.

Regards,

The Canadian People

Utah, maybe?

[theluckyleper]

Go to Lindon, Utah, find Darl McBride, and get him to sit on your head. Instant asshat.

I bet that all you'd have to offer him is some evidence that Linux is infringing on SCO's IP...

Easy!

Re:^D ?

[nazh]

you have to take in count the extra whitespace, so its 7 with that.

Contradiction

[j. andrew rogers]

People need to either accept the idea of all patents or no patents. You can't legitimately have it both ways and be consistent.

1.) The argument that software patents are bad because most software patents are frivolous is a strawman. Most non-software patents are also frivolous. This is not unique to software, people here only notice software patents because they work in software. If you don't like the frivolousness of patents granted then deal with the general frivolousness of the patent system, because "software" patents and "frivolous" patents only intersect and neither contains the other in its entirety.

2.) Software is hardware is software. If you can't patent software, then you shouldn't be able patent hardware either. This was settled the better part of a century ago, in case anyone was paying attention. Pretending that software is a special case that is different from hardware creates a distinction where none exists.

3.) A minority of software patents, just like a minority of normal hardware patents, cover inventions that took substantial research and development effort that no one could reasonable claim to be "obvious". This would seem to be precisely what is supposed to be protected by patents under ideal circumstances and I can't see a reasonable argument that says these inventions should be treated differently than all other patents. Otherwise we would be in the position of allowing frivolous non-software patents and disallowing heavy-duty substantive "software" patents.

That said, it seems to me that the biggest reason a lot of geeks don't like software patents is that it is inconvenient for them. Every rationalization that disallows "software" patents but allows other types of patents has been uniformly weak and inconsistent. If you think patents are bad, then ALL patents are bad, not just the ones you wish you didn't have to abide by.

Re:Contradiction

[Bruce Perens]

Inconvenient is an understatement. We are moving toward a point beyond which only the largest companies will be able to engage in software development. Forget about individuals doing it when the cost of defending a single patent suit is about $3 Million (American IP Law Association estimate).

So, I'd suggest that "discriminatory" is a lot more accurate than "inconvenient".

And yes, hardware is software these days. Which means that all would better be protected with copyright. Applying both patent and copyright to the same material is too much.

Thanks

Bruce

Re:Contradiction

[LionKimbro]

Actually, this is about Democracy.

If you haven't noticed, Machines are Power, and that power is intensifying daily.

If you want the ability to program to be strictly managed by the very few powerful patent holders, based on an illigitimate ownership of ideas, be my guest.

If you care a FUCK about the world, and you don't think our interactions and capabilities and powers should be under the strict ownership of a very few, then you should be vigorously against software patents.

It's about POWER.

The patenting of software in the age of machines is the biggest power grab we've ever seen. Fight the patents as intensely as you can.

Re:Contradiction

[Anonymous Coward]

Alarmist bullshit. Software patents are not inherently evil but the current system of granting frivoulous software patents for everything and anything is stupid.

If you care about software fight for a change in patent laws but don't get railroaded into the flawed "all software patents are evil" mantra that is pushed by minority open source extremists.

Re:Contradiction

[Stinking Pig]

I think you're wrong that individuals will be forced out; remember that pursuing an individual past a C&D is also quite expensive, both in terms of money (relatively cheap) and in terms of political capital (relatively expensive). It is very rare for massive numbers of infringing individuals and small companies to get sued, IMHO, and when large numbers do get sued the end result is very much as we're seeing with the RIAA: a scorched-earth result of well-earned hatred.

The end result is that large companies with large portfolios and small groups of individuals with ad hoc agendas will be the centers of software development... in other words, nothing will change.

Re:Contradiction

[Drishmung]

Let's go back to first principles. What is a patent?

It's actually two things. It's a goal, and a mechanism.

The goal is to encourage inventors to release useful ideas into the public domain for the betterment of society.

That's what patents are supposed to do. If that's not what is happening, then the mechanism is busted and needs to be fixed.

At one time, people saw no financial incentive to disclose inventions. Invent a better mousetrap and you could make money selling mousetraps, but if your rival found out how it was done, then you got no benefit from your idea. For instance, the Chamberlen family invented obstetrical forceps in the early seventeenth century---and kept it a secret. Many women died needlessly in childbirth because it was more profitable to the Chamberlens to maintain their secret. Lacking the patent mechanism they kept it a trade secret. See here for a reference to a book about the subject. (The trade secret option of course is still available today.)

If you were Isaac Newton you might invent---or discover---calculus, and your incentive might be fame or respect. Something like calculus or a new moon of Jupiter would be pretty useless as a trade secret.

Now comes the mechanism. Letters Patent were a means for the Crown (the government) to confer a monopoly. This became the patent mechanism we think of today. In return for disclosing the invention, which would thus become generally available, the inventor was granted a limited monopoly. Simpler and more elegant than the previous 'mechanism', which seemed to be to petition parliament to grant a pension in recognition and gratitude for your invention.

So, do we need patents to encourage software writers to write useful software? Evidentially not. Do we have an adequate mechanism to protect and reward software authors? Yes, it's called copyright.

Re:Contradiction

[quiot]

Software is hardware is software. If you can't patent software, then you shouldn't be able patent hardware either. This was settled the better part of a century ago, in case anyone was paying attention. Pretending that software is a special case that is different from hardware creates a distinction where none exists.

I'm not sure whether I agree with you or not on patentability, but I'd like to point out a way to make a distinction between software and hardware: software may be (pratically) numerically identified, while hardware may not. Any particular algorithm may be written in some encoding, e.g., the C language, x86 binary, or some specification of Turing machine, which has (on a computer, which exists as) a unique numerical representation. Any other algorithm either is or is not exactly the same (though it may not have the same encoding, and there is no general process for determining said sameness). A particular algorithm can thus be described by a particular number, meaning the algorithm which in a given encoding corresponds to that number, and any other (algorithmically) identical encodings. No such reduction exists for hardware; conceivably, the position and state of every atom of a particular device could be recorded, or some less tiring scheme could be created mapping general arrangements of materials to numbers, but no such thing exists and is practical to do. Software is, and in fact, to be executed on computers, must be, numerically reducible, while hardware exists in the realm of the imprecise. I hope that all doesn't sound as convoluted to you as it does to me (it sounded very clear in my head), and I don't know what it has to do with software patents (draw your own conclusions), but it is a distinction between software and hardware.

Re:Contradiction

[Wolfbone]

"People need to either accept the idea of all patents or no patents. You can't legitimately have it both ways and be consistent."

What does that mean? All areas of human endeavour should be patentable? Maths, Science, Art, Literature... ? Or perhaps you mean all software patent appklications should be accepted by the patent offices? Either way, your statement is nonsensical.

1) Software patents are bad because they are unethical, unnecessary and arbitrary restrictions on the right to freedom of expression. There has never been a sound economic argument for them - quite the contrary - but even if there were it could not justify the deleterious effects on individual civil liberties of patents on pure ideas. Since when did the desires and conveniences of large commercial organisations and the financial interests of lawyers trump the fundamental rights of man?

2) Why then are there special protections for integrated circuit designs? Software ideas are not software are not software ideas - software is the expression of the idea and has copyright protection. Abstract ideas are now being patented, so excluding any expression of them at all and that is simply wrong, no matter how clever or original they are. Too many people seem to have forgotten that there is more to society and justice in society than the protection of the interests of lawyers and large commercial organisations.

3) Name one that is not simply the algorithmic expression of a mental process or idea made capable of computerised speed up by expression in a computer language. What is wrong with trade secrets in these exceptional cases anyway - if a proprietary software package contains the expression of an idea so fiendishly clever and complex that it is 'not obvious' it will not be obvious how to 'steal' it or easy to do so either.

"That said, it seems to me that the biggest reason a lot of geeks don't like software patents is that it is inconvenient for them. Every rationalization that disallows "software" patents but allows other types of patents has been uniformly weak and inconsistent. If you think patents are bad, then ALL patents are bad, not just the ones you wish you didn't have to abide by."

Again you are trying to get us to equate software idea patents with all patents and your assertion that the arguments against software patents have been "uniformly weak" is utterly risible. From Salin to Stallman, they have been uniformly strong - as strong as any arguments against the patentability of ideas in maths or art or music or literature and geeks don't like them because they are an outrageous infringement of their fundamental human rights - not just because they are an inconvenient nuisance. Yes they are 'inconvenient' but how does the convenience of large companies and lawyers outrank the freedom to engage in the arts and sciences of individual citizens? I know I don't regard fundamental human rights as mere conveniences, to be abandoned and abolished on the basis that to do so would make life easier and more profitable for large corporations and their lawyers.

Re:Contradiction

[Wolfbone]

"I think you're wrong that individuals will be forced out; remember that pursuing an individual past a C&D is also quite expensive,"

Except that it is not usually necessary, as many developers have discovered - see gnu.org,ffii.org and other sites for examples. Who would continue to develop software that has the ever present threat of legal action hanging over it?

"It is very rare for massive numbers of infringing individuals and small companies to get sued,"

That's probably because it's rare for "massive numbers" of individuals and small companies to simultaneously release software competitive enough with a commercial organisation's product to make it worth their while taking action. So ignoring a hypothetical and absurd scenario, what you're saying is that it's okay to have software patents because your project will only be destroyed by wealthy competitors if it gets too popular for their comfort. Great.

"The end result is that large companies with large portfolios and small groups of individuals with ad hoc agendas will be the centers of software development... in other words, nothing will change."

I don't know what you mean by "ad hoc agendas" but things have already changed - commercial and FOSS projects have already been closed down or aborted by the threat of patent trouble and whole areas of development have been closed off or are in the process of being closed off to all but the holders of large patent portfolios.

It is not just a matter of what might or will happen but what has already happened, is happening now and is getting progressively worse. It is unethical, detrimental to progress in the sciences and the arts and economically unjustifiable to continue granting software idea patents. What justification is there that there should be such "centers of software development" anyway and what justification is there that the existence of those centers should be enabled and reinforced by a legal right to exclude everyone else from pursuing those activities instead of by their own innovative excellence and productivity?

Re:Contradiction

[Anonymous Coward]

Software is hardware is software.

Written description is physical realization is written description? You've completely ignored the substantial reasons that make software unpatentable that others have addressed in response. The biggest reason patent lawyers don't like current EU software patent law or reality is because it is inconvienient for them. The irony is killing me, way to be a hypocritical self-serving idiot.

Re:Contradiction

[Alsee]

People need to either accept the idea of all patents or no patents. You can't legitimately have it both ways and be consistent.

Ok, fine. I want to patent this new shade of red. And the number 4.7789341612792348 which nobody ever thought of before.

Oh, what? Colors and numbers are not patentable subject matter?

You can only get patents on patentable subject matter, and there is absolutely nothing contradictory in refusing patents on non-patentable subject matter.

Math is non-patentable subject matter.
Human thought is non-patentable subject matter.

Both of those statements should be bloody obvious.

The US *reversed* it's own rules and ran contrary to accepted preactice of the rest of the world when we started granting software patents. The US abandonded its well established "mental steps doctrine" which quite reasonably and apropriately rejected the patentability of any process or calculation carried out mentally, or that could be carried out mentally. Mental steps are not an invention.

Absolutely every peice of software is in fact nothing but a fance math equation. Executing code mentally is a routine part of writing and debugging code.

So the argument isn't that software patents are "bad" (which they are), but that they are as nonsensical as patenting math or patenting thought.

If I pick some software patent and I do in fact execute it mentally, have I committed a patent violation? An illegal sequence of thoughts?? And if not, then how the hell does it *become* patent infringment to take the obvious and non-novel step of using a computer merely to speed up a non-patentable non-invention? I do not beleive you can provide any sane answer. Software patent advocates, failing to provide any answer, have consistantly tried to pretend the question/problem doesn't exist. If you try to reply in defence of software patents and fail to address that question then I will simply repeat the question. Sorry for yelling there, but I have had numerous people reply and refuse to answer that question.

-

Re:Contradiction

[Stinking Pig]

Funny thing is, I agree with all your points on a point-by-point basis...

What I don't agree with is that the sky is falling.

"our project will only be destroyed by wealthy competitors if it gets too popular for their comfort."

This has always been the case. That's just the way it is, whether you're running a company or an OSS project or a hobby club or a common interests group. Is it fair? Of course not. The concept of "fair" in American business is about as useful as the concept of "The Tooth Fairy." It's about competition, and if your project is nibbling at their market share, they're going to take action against you. That action might be to make a better product than yours, but only if the cheaper and faster expedients of buying you out or suing you to death don't work.

Re:Contradiction

[Wolfbone]

"If I pick some software patent and I do in fact execute it mentally, have I committed a patent violation? An illegal sequence of thoughts??"

Heh! - God help us all in 2050 when the BSA goons, intent on recovering their 'stolen property', are hiding in the bushes with their icepicks and brain scanners, waiting to pounce on any of us cybernetic implant users who've inadvertently leaked a patented algorithm across the neural interface between mind and machinery. :(

Re:Contradiction

[Ben Hutchings]

For instance, the Chamberlen family invented obstetrical forceps in the early seventeenth century---and kept it a secret. Many women died needlessly in childbirth because it was more profitable to the Chamberlens to maintain their secret.

Or, in the modern day, the drug companies who find it more profitable to price their patented AIDS drugs well out of reach of the average third-world AIDS victim. Looks like patents don't solve that problem.

Re:Contradiction

[Alsee]

I realize you're on my side, but I don't think you took me literally enough. Screw 2050, screw cybernetic machinery.

I want, in 2004 or 2005, to personally sit in a courtroom before a judge - better yet before a judge AND jury - and in fact mentally execute a software patent. I would sit there and defy them to hold me liable for infringing a patent by thinking.

Even better I want to sit in a court room and mentally descramble a DRM'd e-book and illegally access the contents (also known as reading the book), and defy them to throw me in prison for circumvention crime.

People tend to think something like decryption is hard and mysterious. Once you know the decryption method it is nothing but tedious and simple math to do decryption. I took a look at the DeCSS code and it's almost trivial. It would take a long time, but I have absolutely no doubt that I could do DVD decryption with pencil and paper - or even do it purely inside my head if I took one of those advanced memory training courses. However I think decrypting an e-book would make a much better demonstration because you could easily verbally show that you read the text.

-

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[account_deleted]

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Moral dilemma

[r.jimenezz]

From the article:

Since we receive a bonus of $8000 per patent, if all goes well we'll share well over $150,000. And there seems no reason we can't keep this game up indefinitely. We should be able to manage around 50 a year, and this nice little earner will see the mortgage paid off in no time.

Now I think that's interesting... This comes from a software engineer, not from the lawyer. Most developers (and presumably the one from the article too) despise this whole mess, yet this guy is being "gently persuaded" by his employer to play the game.

I'd rather not find myself in such a situation, for it's easy to say what I am going to say without having to actually face it. But I'd like to believe that I can be part of the solution and not of the problem; that I can be brave enough to stand by my beliefs and refuse to be part of something like this and still manage to pay my bills.

Re:Moral dilemma

[Bull999999]

Don't forget that for every evil businessman/woman, there's a team of staff (including IT) to do his/her evil bidding.

Re:Moral dilemma

[danila]

The problem is that ANY computer specialist can "invent" as fast as these guys. Just look at your screen right now and there are tens of things just waiting to be patented.

1. Selective antialiasing (don't antialias all fonts/sizes/colors, just some of them for better legibility)
2. Computer clock that displays seconds
3. An icon that changes part of the image procedurally to reflect changes in the state of the application
4. A tab that intelligently expands to fit the text on it, unless the text is too long (there is a width limit)
5. Using colors that genetically represent some ideas in a computer interface (yellow/black to warn about something)

et cetera. Yes, most of these things are prior art, because the programs I am actually looking at are already written, but if you do the same with the program you are developing, you can easily make hundreds of equallly obvious ideas and patent them.

Richard Feynman described in his book ("Surely you are joking, Mr. Feynman") how the government asked him (and other researchers in the lab) to give ideas related to nuclear energy in order to patent them. It was like "nuclear reactor on a plane" - a patent for nuclear plane. On a submarine, on a ship, etc., etc. A minute of thinking and a patent is ready - totally defies the intention of the patent system... BTW, Feynman and everyone else got paid 1$ per patent.

Re:Moral dilemma

[karlandtanya]

I would be very surprised if the engineer saw all of that money.

Hell, I'd be surprised if he saw any of it.

Most incentive programs like the one described have caps. Also, in most cases, if someone (HR) decides that the work you did was in your normal job scope, you get no bonus.

That's what you're being paid for.

I got a toaster.

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[account_deleted]

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People who claim the US patent office is stupid..

[Anonymous Coward]

Are looking at it from the wrong angle.

It seems to me someone has decided that it can only benefit the US in international agreements to have its citizens patent rubbish.

The Australian patent office, for example is very professional. None of the junk that is patented in the US would be allowed here. So, when the US/Aust FTA comes into existence, US companies have a huge advantage over Aust companies.

The only way for Aust to compete is to race the US patent office to the bottom of the barrel.

I think ou mean...

[march]

Micros^D^D^D^D^D^D^D

Micros^H^H^H^H^H

The ^D's just wouldn't accomplish what you want. :-)

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[account_deleted]

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EOF

[Morosoph]

Hmmm. ^d. Isn't that EOF?

Re:EOF

[Anonymous Coward]

i don't know, i just use the backspace and delete keys, so much easier. Your OS does support these keys, doesn't it?

Re:EOF

[Morosoph]

No good if you want EOF!

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[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

Patents are worthless...

[neil.orourke]

... until they are tested in court. So says the lawer at the company I work for, and who is involved in patent (not software) battles on our behalf in a few countries.

Essentially, he says, the granting of a patent means that you were able to convince some guy in an office that your idea was new, un-obvious etc. etc. So the patent is granted.

The fun starts when your product hits the market and someone else tries to do the same thing. Then it goes to court, and only then is the validity of your patent tested.

Re:Patents are worthless...

[Anonymous Coward]

Already mentioned a million times before, but the problem with this viewpoint is that only other big players can possibly see things this way.

Any company or individual without the money to challenge the patent in court is already done for, whether the patent has any merit or not. Consequently the solution has to be at the point of granting the patent.

What this is really about...

[Goonie]

Gittins is writing from an Australian perspective, where the debate whether the minority party should ally with minor parties in the Senate and block the FTA is getting particularly heated.

From an American perspective, however, what you should be concerned about is the kind of things that this FTA, and subsequent ones, are going to do to lock in the current, ridiculous intellectual property regime. This applies not only to software patents, but restrictions on generic drugs, copyright terms, and so on. In the next decade or so, it's highly likely that there will be serious attempts in Congress to fix some of these issues. What will likely happen, though, is that the executive will come back with the argument "You can't do that! We'll be violating the terms of the free trade agreements we signed with Australia, Albania, and Andorra" (to pick three countries of similar importance to the United States) and the bills will quietly die.

The EFF and other groups in the "less overbroad IP protection" crowd might do well to pay more attention to international treaties, IMO.

Re:What this is really about...

[anto]

It would not be the first time the US has decided to just drop an international treaty because it was domestically convieanant at the time. Then again you can just ignore them like say the Geneva convention.

Re:What this is really about...

[pegacat]

Mmm... and as another poster has pointed out, this is the first of a two parter; the second came out today:
http://smh.com.au/articles/2004/08/01/109129857684 0.html
'Trade Deal a Free Kick for Software Racketeers'

In this article the same anonymous author points out that the reason the U.S. are so fond of their wierd patent system is that they own most of the wierd patents, and can make a bunch 'o cash if they can fast talk others (Australia in this instance) into accepting the same system.

What if someone just said "no"?

[RayTardo]

If you're a small developer being leaned on by a larger company that thinks you've used their patented idea, just tell them politely to go screw themselves. They'll take you to court. You defend yourself. You lose. You refuse to comply with the court order to stop producing the software. You're in contempt of court. You go to jail for a short time.

But your case will show the futility of the system, and the public outcry will be large enough to bring change.

It just takes enough victims to say "Hell, no!"

Re:What if someone just said "no"?

[Cynicx]

You go to jail for a short time.

... and of course you'll be the first to step up to the plate?

Re:What if someone just said "no"?

[user32.ExitWindowsEx]

what about the "federal marshals simply take control of your facilities and stop you through force" part?

Re:What if someone just said "no"?

[Anonymous Coward]

How is civil law ever a legitimate federal matter?

Why not criminal law

[Bruce Perens]

Lying on your patent application is perjury. It's a federal crime, and you can do serious jail time. But nobody does. It might be possible to show a federal prosecutor that some of the more blatant patents were filed even though the filer knew they were not inventions, and that the filer should be prosecuted.

Bruce

Re:Why not criminal law

[Sebby]

Acutally I wouldn't mind seeing the individual examiner sued when it's determined a patent is invalid...

Wishful thinking....

Re:Why not criminal law

[jkabbe]

Acutally I wouldn't mind seeing the individual examiner sued when it's determined a patent is invalid...

The problem with slashdot is that lots of people suggest things that get applause but don't stand a chance of working. Do people really not think before they make suggestions?

The biggest cost to the USPTO is labor. It costs money to pay examiners to do their job. Examiners can't currently do their jobs because they are overworked. And even under good circumstances an examiner won't have access to all the information possible. So patents will always be overturned.

If examiners could be sued they would need incentive to be examiners (otherwise they would do something else). This would probably increase the cost of getting a patent 5- or 10-fold. Just the thing to help the small inventor, right?

Re:Why not criminal law

[Anonymous Coward]

blah blah blah...

Someone get this troll out of here!

Re:Why not criminal law

[Anonymous Coward]

The problem with slashdot is that lots of people suggest things that get applause but don't stand a chance of working.

Then there are those that point this out and have nothing to contribute to the discussion themselves; in one word: trolls.

Re:Why not criminal law

[jkabbe]

Then there are those that point this out and have nothing to contribute to the discussion themselves; in one word: trolls.

And, unlike you, I did actually post a meaningful contribution. Whoops! Anonymous Troll is wrong again!

Re:Why not criminal law

[Anonymous Coward]

You wish! Ha! You give yourself *FAR* too much credit!

Re:Why not criminal law

[johnny_sas]

The biggest cost to the USPTO is labor.

I don't know, but I think a 13 yr old could just as easily do the simple rubber-stamping of everthing that comes across their desk the PTO is doing at minimum wage

Re:Why not criminal law

[Anonymous Coward]

"Whoops! Anonymous Troll is wrong again!" That's right, you were wrong.

Re:Why not criminal law

[Sebby]

Buddy, acquire yourself a sense of humor (and/or better reading skills!) - I clearly wrote "Whishful Thinking".

Sheesh!

Re:Why not criminal law

[jkabbe]

Buddy, acquire yourself a sense of humor (and/or better reading skills!) - I clearly wrote "Whishful Thinking".

"Wishful thinking" tends to imply that you believe it would never become law, not that it wouldn't work. I mean, why would you wish for something that would never work?

Sheesh

Re:Why not criminal law

[Anonymous Coward]

Could never work? WRONG!

So kindly STFU and get back into your hole!

Re:Why not criminal law

[Anonymous Coward]

Oh god! you *must* be one of the lawyers in that article!

Re:Why not criminal law

[jkabbe]

Since when do 5, Informative posts on slashdot with merely a suggestion and no indication why the suggestion would actually achieve a positive result actually constitute proof? My how low we have fallen.

If you're going to tell someone to STFU you should at least have the balls to post with your name.

Re:Why not criminal law

[Anonymous Coward]

And lose the moderation I've done on other posts? Sorry to break it to you troll, but you are most definitively NOT worth it.

Re:Why not criminal law

[jkabbe]

I feel like I have a digital stalker. Not everyone has one of those. I think it's really neat. And it makes me feel really special.

Re:Why not criminal law

[bit01]

And even under good circumstances an examiner won't have access to all the information possible.

It's worth stressing that. It's simply not humanly possible for a small government office to assess all human knowledge to discover prior art. To pretend otherwise is dishonest.

In any case lack of prior art is a necessary but not sufficient pre-condition for inventiveness.

Patents are frequently for inventions "whose time has come". Many people indenpendently invent the same thing in a short space of time. One person gets a potentially multi-million dollar advantage and everybody else loses. That's wrong.

---

It's wrong that an intellectual property creator should not be rewarded for their work.
It's equally wrong that an IP creator should be rewarded too many times for the one piece of work, for exactly the same reasons.
Reform IP law and stop the M$/RIAA abuse.

Re:Why not criminal law

[Anonymous Coward]

The problem with slashdot is that lots of people suggest things that get applause but don't stand a chance of working If you're so sick of it why are you still here reading this site?

Re:Why not criminal law

[Anonymous Coward]

The real problem is that the so-called examiner don't even show even the slightest bit of common sense - much less than a 13 year old would - when granting these patents.

I'm sure you wouldn't even need any prior art to dismiss most of these patents as most are just a natural evolution of doing things, and many people will independently come up with the same idea, which obviously makes it not non-obvious (huh?!?) or unique

Re:Why not criminal law

[jkabbe]

Patents are frequently for inventions "whose time has come". Many people indenpendently invent the same thing in a short space of time. One person gets a potentially multi-million dollar advantage and everybody else loses. That's wrong.

IMO multiple people working on the same invention shouldn't preclude a patent. There were multiple groups working on finding a good light bulb filament. Would Edison, et al have been so willing to invest the time and money in the research if there had been no patent protection? I wonder.

I think this is where obviousness comes in. I am comfortable with the requirement that an invention simply be non-obvious. I am, however, uncomfortable with the way that standard is being currently applied.

The ghost of David Korn...

[Anonymous Coward]

^D is only delete left if your shell is set to Emacs mode. In vi mode, the delete-left is 'X'.

Not all lawyers..

[Anonymous Coward]

Just patent lawyers.

Patents are inherently bad for software industy

[NZheretic]

Business methord and software patents are detrimental to the software industry as a whole, but it is also one of the major driving forces to an interesting trend amongst most of the major IT vendors.

Applying game theory to long term software industry market, for both open and proprietary vendors, based on software patents...

1) Small software developers are unlikely to benefit from the overall balance of payments from licensing of their own and other vendors software patent portfolios, since other software vendors are just as likely to hold other software patents that the developer uses in his own products.

2) Larger software vendors are unlikely to benefit from payments from licensing of their software patent portfolio, as per above small sofware developers plus the software vendor is likely to hold the lion's share of the sofware target market, profit from software patent licensing will be much smaller in proportion to the overall sales of the vendors own products.

3) Third party intellectual property "holding companies", that do not actively participate in selling actual software, are the only class of organization that can benefit from licensing of their software patent portfolios. In most cases these entities have a very tenuous relationship to the ongoing development of the software methords patented

See Patents bad but also pushing interesting trend

3 MILLION smackers?!?

[zogger]

aaak, I guess me olden tymes practical penny pincher nature is too much for that figure.

Good quality hitmen are a LOT cheaper than that!

Patents=Good

[Anonymous Coward]

Patents may not be good for the open source community, they are on the other hand hugely important in terms of private rights. If you make it, you should own it.

Re:Patents=Good

[brlewis]

Sorry, but that's what I thought 20 years ago. It's my thought, and you are not allowed to think it now.

Re:Patents=Good

[Duhavid]

Sorry, it is your employer that owns that.

Second Half Of the Article Published Today

[femto]

A second half to Gittins' article was also published a few hours ago:

Trade deal a free kick for US software racketeers

...in line with...?

[FIGJAM]

What is Microsa's?

Re:^D ?

[Anonymous Coward]

Sorry, there's a patent on ^H as backspace.

The alternative is no IP laws, period.

[Louis Savain]

I've written this before but it's worth repeating. The only IP laws we should have are trademark and plagiarism laws.

Intellectual property laws exist only because we have a slavery system. Our livelihood depends on working for others so we can pay our taxes. The reason that we have to work for others is that 99% of people have been deprived of an inheritance in the wealth of the land. Income property is owned by a few and the state. The others are slaves. Artists, programmers and inventors depend on their work to make a living. Can we blame them for seeking protection? We all depend on our labor because we are all slaves. So now we are swimming in a ocean of IP laws and contradicting rules that take away our remaining liberties, one by one.

Let's face it, if you cannot put a fence around it or put chains on it, it does not belong to you. Makes no difference whether it is ideas, writing, software, music or what have you. Once you've released it, like the air, it belongs to nobody and everybody.

Intellectual property owners (such as Microsoft and the music industry) will fight freedom with everything they've got. Right now they have two formidable weapons: IP laws and powerful police states to enforce them. But those who yearn to be free also have a formidable weapon, the internet.

The internet and other communication technologies (e.g., file sharing systems) are the first major kinks in the armor of a sick system. As technology progresses, the system will eventually collapse. What will happen to a slave-based economy when robots and advanced artificial intelligences replace everybody, i. e., when human labor, knowledge and expertise become worthless?

And don't think for a minute this won't happen in your lifetime. The internet is the latest giant leap in human communication. Before that came mass telecommunication technologies and before that was the movable press. If history is any indication, we can expect a giant leap in technological progress and scientific knowledge. In fact, it is happening before our very eyes.

We should all demand a system where everybody is guaranteed income property (i.e., land), a piece of the pie, an estate if you will. There is plenty for everybody.

Communism confiscates all property and enslaves everybody. Capitalism gives property to a few and enslaves the rest. It's sad. The land should not be divided for a price. It should be an inheritance for us and our children and their children. It's the only way to guarantee freedom and a truly free market in a world where human labor is about to go the way of the dinosaurs. Demand liberty! Nothing less.

Re:The alternative is no IP laws, period.

[jonabbey]

I abhor software patents as much as (if not more than) the next Slashdot devotee, but we don't actually work to pay taxes.

We work to obtain scarce goods. And no matter what technology does, there will _always_ be scarce goods. Real estate. Food cooked in a certain style, available in a certain place (real estate, again). Garbage collection. Military defense.

Technology makes it possible to make an indefinite number of copies of any arbitrary pattern of bits at so close to zero marginal cost as makes no difference, but it doesn't have the same effect on other scarce goods. Without artificial scarcity in bit patterns (or in ideas that get turned into bit patterns), those bit patterns cannot be used in trade for the really scarce goods.

That's economics, but if you think that sounds in any way wishy washy, think of it as physics. It's reality that you can't avoid, no matter how hard you try.

Free software and a limitation on software patents makes sense for many reasons, but those have to do with users taking maximum economic efficiency out of that zero marginal cost, rather than pumping up a giant chokepoint on the economy like Microsoft. Bit patterns and ideas of a truly unusual level of originality, unobviousness (even in the face of a transformative technology like the Internet that makes all kinds of things suddenly obvious) and technical complexity generally should be able to be matters of economic commerce, otherwise those people creating ideas and bit patterns will ultimately fail to be able to afford real estate.

Re:The alternative is no IP laws, period.

[Halo1]

Bit patterns and ideas of a truly unusual level of originality, unobviousness (even in the face of a transformative technology like the Internet that makes all kinds of things suddenly obvious) and technical complexity generally should be able to be matters of economic commerce, otherwise those people creating ideas and bit patterns will ultimately fail to be able to afford real estate.

I agree with the bit patterns (after all, that's what copyright protects, among other things), but not necessarily with the ideas. Why ideas should be free (from an economical point of view), can be seen in this presentation. It doesn't mean that you shouldn't be able to sell ideas (so they can be objects of commerce in that sense), but it does mean one should not be able to own an idea.

Re:The alternative is no IP laws, period.

[Alsee]

I abhor software patents as much as (if not more than) the next Slashdot devotee

No, that is apparently a lie (or a delusion), because you then apparently go on to attempt to argue in favor of them.

But you don't actually appear to present any argument for software patents. You're areguments are actually in support of copyright for software. No, if you beleive or intend to suggest that arguing against software patents implies/equals arguing against software copyright, well that's pure straw-man nonsense.

You fail to provide and argument or explanation why software should be the only thing on earth to get double protection (and double restrictions) of both copyright and patents.

The US screwed up in abandoningg the well established mental steps doctrine - that you cannot patent processes athat are, or can be, carried out mentally. The US, and essentially the rest of the world, consistantly and systematicaly denied patentability where a mental operation or mathematical computation was the sole novel element or inventive contribution. The European Patent Convention explicitly excludes software from patentability.

Absolutely any software is infact nothing more than a fancy math equation. Absolutely any software can be run purely mentally (though quite slowly.

I defy you to argue that a person who does in fact "run" a patented peice of code through pure thought is violating the law (illegal thoughts?!?!), or alternatly to explain how that non-patentable thought process magically becomes a patent violation when you take the blatantly obvious and non-novel step of using an ordinary computer merely to carry out the exact same calculation faster.

For some reason software patent advocates refuse to answer that. Can pure thought be a violation of the law? And if not, then how does the obvious use of a computer to speed it up magically turn a non-patentable non-invention into a patentable invention?

-

Re:The alternative is no IP laws, period.

[jonabbey]

No, that is apparently a lie (or a delusion), because you then apparently go on to attempt to argue in favor of them.

Oddly, the words 'software patent' appears nowhere in my post beyond the sentence you quoted. "Objects of economic commerce" is a far weaker and more abstract statement than 'software patents, rah rah rah!', after all.

I do not advocate in any way for the current patent system as it is being applied to software, where so many patents cover processes that would be obvious to any intelligent programmer if you would but describe the general problem area. But I might indeed appreciate patents on software if they were granted, say, at a rate of 0.1% - 1% of the current rate. Microsoft gaining 3 to 30 patents a year worries me much less than their gaining 3000.

I have no real problem with something as novel and as involved as the original MP3 process being patented, for instance. Perhaps I'm simply ignorant of the prior state of the art in psychoacoustic modeling and compression, but so far as I can tell, MP3 brought something truly new into the world that others had not developed despite there having been plenty of time and motivation to do so. I can certainly see the benefit of allowing a patent on that, for a limited period of time.

As I said above, if something is _truly_ novel and unobvious, then it should be possible for it to be an item of commerce.. everything beyond that is you reading into my words.

As to the rest of your argument, I would agree and disagree in part. To the extent that the world is simulatable, either in our heads or in a complex computer system, almost any physical invention can be modeled to some level of fidelity. The distinction between physical object and algorithm can indeed blur in those cases, and a machine part that is made of metal and a machine part that is made of software may not be so very different in the end.

Re:The alternative is no IP laws, period.

[Alsee]

It's funny, every time this topic comes up I ask the same question, and every time the question gets ignored. Even when I write it twice in one post (like I did) and/or explicily defy the poster to answer it (like I did) and/or repeat it in consecutive posts (like I'm about to do) and/or point out that it never gets answered (like I did) and/or state that I will simply repeat the question if the reply ignores it (which I forgot to do).

Sigh.

Don't take this as anger, just general frustration at seeing it happen for the umpteenth time in a row. Well, maybe there's some anger but it's at people who repeatedly ignored the question in consecutive posts and then simply didn't answer at all.

---------------
I defy you to argue that a person who does in fact "run" a patented peice of code through pure thought is violating the law (illegal thoughts?!?!), or alternatly to explain how that non-patentable thought process magically becomes a patent violation when you take the blatantly obvious and non-novel step of using an ordinary computer merely to carry out the exact same calculation faster.

For some reason software patent advocates refuse to answer that. Can pure thought be a violation of the law? And if not, then how does the obvious use of a computer to speed it up magically turn a non-patentable non-invention into a patentable invention?
---------------

I don't think there's any answer to that. The only way to maintain a pro-software-patent position is to pretend the question/issue does not exist. For example you say:

I have no real problem with something as novel and as involved as the original MP3 process being patented, for instance.

Ok, and what if I sit down with a pencil and a piece of paper and mentally execute the MP3 algorithm? To keep it small lets say I run the MP3 algorithm on a 1 second (or less) sound clip. Sure it would take take me a while, but I could in fact do so as a demonstration. Did I violate the MP3 patent by thinking? Can certain thoughts violate the law? And if not, does it become a violation if I use a slide rule to speed it up? Does it become a violation if I use a calculator to speed it up? Does it become a violation if I take the obvious step of using a computer to speed it up?

I'm doing the exact same calculation, just faster.

To the extent that the world is simulatable, either in our heads or in a complex computer system, almost any physical invention can be modeled to some level of fidelity.

I'm not quite sure what point you are trying to make, but no matter how long you think about running a cotton gin, no matter how well and how long you simulate a cotton gin, you will never get a single piece of cotton out of it. If you have a novel and non-obvious physical object or a novel and non-obvious physical process, then you get a patent.

You can certainly invent a cotton gin, and even connect a computer to the cotton gin. But the computer itself can only implement calculations, it can only implement "mental steps".

If you have common place old hardware and a common place old physical process, then you do not get a patent. Period.

A math equations and sequences of thoughts are not inventions. They do not become inventions even when they are "novel and non-obvious". They do not become inventions when you claim them in combination with common place old hardware and a common place old physical process.

if something is _truly_ novel and unobvious, then it should be possible for it to be an item of commerce

It depends what that something is.

How about a novel and non-obvious plotline for a book? Boy meets girl, boy loses girl, boy and girl each meet the other's long-lost adopted identical twin. Do I get a patent on my plotline? Software patents are nothing but programming "plotlines". Plotlines are algorithms for books.

How about a novel and non-obvious number, like 4.23425673478? I doubt

Re:The alternative is no IP laws, period.

[jonabbey]

True enough. See the European Union's Directive on the Patentability of Computer-Implemented Inventions for some discussion of ways to limit software patents in just the sort of direction you're implying.

That said, how does your argument about mental processes versus implemented computational processes differ from me going over the plotline to the Harry Potter novels in my head and me publishing my own Harry Potter ripoff novel? The difference is that in the one case it's all in my head, and in the second case, I'm publishing a work for distribution that either brings me income on J. K. Rowling's property or which may, arguably, decrease her income.

Patent is like copyright, it generally only becomes an issue when distribution is involved.

Lawyers make big bucks because the law is designed to work in fuzzy situations, with room for interpretation and argument. I imagine a lawyer faced with your question would simply say that a patent for an algorithmic process comes into effect when a judge (or jury) says it comes into effect.

Nobody said the law was pretty, of course.

Re:The alternative is no IP laws, period.

[KjetilK]

I don't think there's any answer to that. The only way to maintain a pro-software-patent position is to pretend the question/issue does not exist.

I do not have an answer for that, and I find your posts +5 Insightful, as you may have noticed by the little blue dot.

Nevertheless, there is this issue, how do we encourage people to think up useful, boring stuff.

For example: I think it would be mighty useful to have a checksum algorithm that could make a very short (say one or two integer) digest of a number, that would take into account most common mistakes that humans make when they type numbers, so that you could actually check more reliably if the number had been typed correctly. Modulus 10 is often used for this, but it is not very well suited.

Doing this is going to be exceedingly boring. You would need to first find out typical mistakes, then how to guard against them.

I feel that if someone takes on this task, they should be rewarded for it. And I feel that just doing it should be enough to be rewarded, they shouldn't have to go through the possibly even more boring task of bringing it to the market.

So, how do we reward that kind of work, that's the question?

I also feel strongly that the level of control patent holders is allowed to excert now is not the way to go. Instead of a monopoly, perhaps, just that you do get a cut of whatever cash it brings. Something like that, or....

Re:The alternative is no IP laws, period.

[Wolfbone]

"That said, how does your argument about mental processes versus implemented computational processes differ from me going over the plotline to the Harry Potter novels in my head and me publishing my own Harry Potter ripoff novel? The difference is that in the one case it's all in my head, and in the second case, I'm publishing a work for distribution that either brings me income on J. K. Rowling's property or which may, arguably, decrease her income"

Errm... the mental process is the (forbidden) use of the actual patented invention, the plotline is not the actual copyrighted work. If you publish a copy of someone else's published work, you are violating their copyright.

You can 'distribute' the plotline as freely as you can 'distribute' most ideas. It is usually termed 'communication' in those circumstances and the freedom to do so is generally considered to be a fundamental human right. I don't think even lawyers can easily twist those simple facts so far that their legally qualified colleagues the judges will be misled.

Re:The alternative is no IP laws, period.

[jonabbey]

Are you sure the mental process is considered a forbidden use of the patent? That's not at all clear to me.. I imagine that distributing a machine that implements the patent, or profiting from the execution of the patent on a commercial scale (a la the Amazon 1-click patent) would be required in order for there to be an issue.

I grant that you can extend the edge case to what seems like a nonsensical result, but it's not clear that a judge or jury would actually do so.

Re:The alternative is no IP laws, period.

[Wolfbone]

"Are you sure the mental process is considered a forbidden use of the patent?"

I'm sure that it isn't - though perhaps that may not always be true - but the use of the computer as an aid to the mental process, and nothing more than that mental process, is forbidden. To forbid the use of a general purpose computer in this way is like saying you can hum a particular musical phrase quietly to yourself but you may not play it on any musical instrument. It is an absurd and unjust situation and utterly unlike the situation with ordinary patented inventions, in which the use of the invention and it's effect is quite obviously qualitatively distinct from the effect of simply imagining using it. You could stand on stage to give a musical recital and simply hand out copies of the score to the audience and ask them to imagine the music. They might not be very pleased but if you were an avant-garde composer you could probably get away with it. If you were a salesman in a shop and you handed over the design of a toaster instead of the toaster itself you would be taken away in a strait-jacket.

When you buy a musical instrument you do not then have to worry about what kinds of music you are allowed to play on it - what techniques and basic constructions you can use to create original music which you can also write down and freely distribute. And the fact that you can imagine the music just as well as if you'd played it aloud, shows that it too, like computer code, has the quality of being reproducible entirely by abstract mental processes - as do natural languages.

Likewise, I have every right to expect that my personal electronic computer - an instrument designed for the purpose of rapidly executing abstract mental ideas, expressible in computer programming languages, should be free for me to use in the way it was intended to be used (as an original invention in it's own right). Allowing ex post facto patenting of it's uses is as inane and unjust as that notorious U.S.patent on swinging sideways on a swing.

"I imagine that distributing a machine that implements the patent, or profiting from the execution of the patent on a commercial scale (a la the Amazon 1-click patent) would be required in order for there to be an issue."

Patents grant the right to exclusive _use_ of the invention; commerciality is not relevant, which is why free software and the foundation of the entire computing infrastructure I am pleased to rely on is threatened by them. And let's not forget that all this activity and freedom of legitimate use of computers is being forbidden for the mere convenience of a few large corporations and the community of patent lawyers. It is a disgrace and an outrage.

The nonsensical result is not to be found in any edge case but at the very heart of the matter - the offensive and unspeakably mindless notion that software ideas are justly and usefully patentable.

Re:The alternative is no IP laws, period.

[Alsee]

Yes, I have been following the EU SW-pat directive. I fully support the Parliment's version. It does exactly what I argue for - prohibit patents on what amounts to mental processes.

Patent is like copyright, it generally only becomes an issue when distribution is involved.

False. A process patent (and SW-pats are obviously process patents rather than object patents) restricts the use of the process.

So with SW-pats both the distributors and the innocent end users will both wind up liable. An important point is that this is not a "GPL problem". Grandma with a Windows machine is just as liable for infringing a SW-pat as someone using Linux. I guarantee you that Windows infringes more patents than Linux.

how does your argument about mental processes versus implemented computational processes differ from me going over the plotline to the Harry Potter novels in my head and me publishing my own Harry Potter ripoff novel?

Aaaakk! You missrepresent/missunderstand what I said!

I was talking about using a plotline from a book to create your own original novel. That would be perfectly legal to publish. Remember, the example I gave was "Boy meets girl, boy loses girl, boy and girl each meet the other's long-lost adopted identical twin." You are free to use that idea, you just can't copy actual characters and copy writing.

If you start copying elements of the writing - Parry Hotter with a lightningbolt scar over his eye and going to Pigwart's school, blah blah blah - then it's copyright infringment.

Yes, there can be borderline cases, but in general it is creative implementations that are protected by copyright, not ideas or non-creative elements (for example the phrase "A long long time ago in a land far far away" is a fixed and non-creative introduction to any fairytale). Creative vs non-creative elements has particular signifigance and substantial legal analysis in software copyright, but no need to get into that.

There is an excellent story/example from the birth of the home computer explosion. Compaq had a team of programmers reverse engineer the IMB BIOS software. They documented the ideas of what it did and all of the functions it preformed. They then gave this documentation to another team of programmers. These programmers never saw the original code, therefore it was physically impossible for them to copy that code, impossible for them to commit copyright infringment. They took that documentation of what a BIOS needed to do and wrote their own code to do the same thing.

That single event is widely recognized as sparking the entire home computer explosion. The flood of cheap compatible IBM compatibles.

Under copyright that was perfectly legal, Compaq did not copy any code.

Under patents - had IBM applied for and been granted software patents on the BIOS - it would have been illegal for Compaq to create their own implementation of the ideas and fundamentally mental processes involved in a BIOS.

Had software patents existed at the time the home PC explosion would have been strangled. There would have been no such thing as IBM compatibles - only a small number of expensive genuine IBM PC's. And those patents would have pretty much blocked the creation of a competing home computer platform because of those fundamental BIOS operating system patents. Inventing your own hardware and writing your own code doesn't help when it's illegal to do certain fundamental calculations.

-

Re:The alternative is no IP laws, period.

[Alsee]

Nevertheless, there is this issue, how do we encourage people to think up useful, boring stuff.

I think copyright does a pretty good job. And if it's a task someone needs done they generally hire someone to write the code to do it. That code can be sold as part of the larger package of whatever the code is for.

Software was never patentable anywhere before the 1980's, and only rarely patented in the US for the next several years. There was a veritable explosion of software unburdened by patent "incentives". The PC explosion itself would have been impossible had SW-patent "incentives" existed. Compaq never could have reverse engineered the IBM BIOS to make the first PC-compatibles. It was "PC-compatibles" or "clones" that heralded the home PC.

I think we are just fine with copyright protection for implementations. Patents protect inventions, and software just isn't an invention. Software = calculations = math = mental steps.

We didn't need patent incentives for calculus. It was certainly new and useful and non-obvious, but (hopefully) no one thinks calculus should be patentable.

I can understand why some people want to extend patents to software, but it's just a fundamentally broken idea. And even if it wasn't a broken idea, prevailing evidence is that it would cause far more harm than benefit.

Patents and copyrights and trademarks do not exist for corporate or private benefit/profits. They exist to serve the public. Trademarks tell the consumer who he is buying from, hopefuly so he will know it is a quality product and not a crummy immitation. Copyrights exist to give an incentive to create and get more works to the public and ultimately into the public domain. Patents have the dual purpose of the incentive to invent AND to fully disclose and document it to the public, with it lapsing into the public domain as well. With software we already have the copyright incentive, and (to a programmer) software discloses itself either obviously or with standard analysis. So both the incentive and disclosure goals of patents are redundant for software.

-

Re:The alternative is no IP laws, period.

[Anonymous Coward]

Without artificial scarcity in bit patterns (or in ideas that get turned into bit patterns), those bit patterns cannot be used in trade for the really scarce goods.

That's clearly untrue, since you can keep making new bit-patterns.

There are so very many counterexamples to what you're saying I don't even know where to begin.

Shakespeare's plays, while in the public domain, sell well both in theaters and in print.

Bottled water - since practically zero of the companies excluselively use their one special sprint - is practically cheaper than a CD, yet sells well.

The problem with the software industry is that it's like the manufacturers of a 2x4 lumber, or cloth, or wheat and rice arguing that they need artifical scarcity on the ideas of cloth and sticks and food.

I'm sure they argue "but if anyone is allowed to make cloth, we can't sell cloth to exchange for real-estate" or "but if anyone is allowed to grow wheat, we can't sell wheat in exchange for real-estate". Yes, you do sound that silly.

Re:^D ?

[i_am_pi]

It's a Unix EOF, seven times.

You're all blaming the wrong person

[microbox]

Don't blame M$, Bill Clinton or anybody else... the real problem is deeply routed in the definition of a corporation.

You see, some coporate lawyers in the late 19thC realized that they could make a lot more money if a corporation had the rights of a person, and the supreme court agreed they were, with all the rights and privileges there-of.

Now a coporation is a 'legal' person whose sole purpose is to make money for the shareholders. The CEO and board are legally bound to do so. Unfortunately, since corporations aren't real people, they don't have real morals... other than what will make $$$ for shareholders. Because shareholders aren't liable for the actions of corportions, they don't CARE how the corporation makes money on their investment.

That's the root of the problem.

Every corporation is in a free-fall race to the bottom to out-compete it's rivals and make 7% growth in profits. While that level of competition has many obvious good points, it has also created some terrible problems.

Once one corporation 'buys' a law (such as software patents), then everyone in the industry has to start using them or die. You don't even have to buy a law... if breaking the law and paying the fine (and paying a nice PR firm to make you look shiny) is cost effective, then that's what you HAVE to do if you're going to raise your stock higher than your rivals.

CEOs and lawyers are not all trolls, they are just cogs in a machine. Corporations have bought off politions all over the world, PR firms, marketers... all so that they can bend and create rules to make more $$$. As soon as one nasty little troll does it... they all have to. If they don't, well, only the fittest survive.

The solution?

We have to unravel the legal framework that has come to define what corporations are. Exactly how to do this???? Well, you tell me =)

Re:You're all blaming the wrong person

[baxissimo]

I believe this is the definitive book on the subject of the parent's post. A very interesting idea. I haven't read the book, but the author was interviewd on NPR a while back. If I ever start reading books again that's one I'd be interested in picking up. :-)

Re:You're all blaming the wrong person

[TheHonestTruth]

We have to unravel the legal framework that has come to define what corporations are. Exactly how to do this???? Well, you tell me =)

Sarbanes-Oxley. Here's a blog about it at Gartner. Basically Sarbanes-Oxley makes CEOs liable for the actions of the company. Though this does not redefine the corporation as a citizen, it does hold someone criminally accountable for the actions of the corp. It was in response to Enron at all and severly weaked the coporation as an entity that can act wantonly.

-truth

Re:You're all blaming the wrong person

[killjoe]

If the corporation is the same as a person then doesn't it have second amendment rights? This seems to make sense since it definately has first and fourth amendment rights.

The reason I am asking is that a corporation is a psychotic entity. Just like a mass murderer it can feel no empathy towards anyone and is unable to control it's compultions. Studies have definitively shown that lack of impulse control and inability to feel empathy towards others is a necassary (though not sufficient) attribute of being a mass murderer.

Maybe that's too harsh. Maybe the corporation is not like a person at all. Maybe it's more like a dog. A dog is a living being, it certainly has some rights but not the same as humans. There are laws against cruelty to animals and yet it's legal to put down a dog when it becomes harmful to others.

Corporations should be treated like dogs. The shareholders are the owners and it's up to them to make sure their dog is properly trained, contained and leashed so as not to harm others. Needless to say the shareholders are also responsible for cleaning up after their dog when it shits in the park.

If a dog becomes violent and hurts people then it should be put down. The corporation should be TAKEN AWAY FROM THE SHAREHOLDERS AND KILLED WITH NO COMPENSATION WHATSOEVER TO THE SHAREHOLDERS. Furthermore the shareholders should be tried for the crimes of their corporations just like dog owners are.

This would solve the problem once and for all.

Re:You're all blaming the wrong person

[wrecked]

Just for the record, the Corporation was also made into a documentary, by the same director of Manufacturing Consent: Noam Chomsky and the Media (both are National Film Board of Canada projects).

The Corporation has been a relative success here in Canada.

I took a (Canadian) Constitutional Law course with Joel Bakan, the author of the Corporation, at the University of British Columbia. He is one of most interesting professors that I ever had.

Re:You're all blaming the wrong person

[qopax]

so you're saying one dog would be owned by potentially thousands of people? and each one of them would be tried for a crime that their dog committed? this seems very confusing and difficult to enforce...

Re:You're all blaming the wrong person

[Bull999999]

Furthermore the shareholders should be tried for the crimes of their corporations just like dog owners are.

And passing a law like that will prompt most people to sell off their stock in panic and cause a stock market crash. I guess that's one way to solve the problem.

Re:You're all blaming the wrong person

[Bull999999]

And BTW, most of the corporations out there are actually small businesses as small business owners often incorporate for the propose of limited liability.

Re:You're all blaming the wrong person

[JamesKPolk]

No, "blame" the American voter. They've supported the politicians that supported these policies.

Re:You're all blaming the wrong person

[killjoe]

Only if they think their corporation will commit crimes or harm people.

Re:You're all blaming the wrong person

[killjoe]

Recently there was a case in which a rotweiler attacked a child. Both owners were tried.

In most corporations a relatively small number of people hold the majority of the stock. Frequently the majority of the stock is held by a single person or a familiy. there is no reason you can't try a few or a hundred people if a corporation kills hundreds of people or rips off a few billion dollars.

Re:You're all blaming the wrong person

[Anonymous Coward]

The problem isn't with the corporate entity itself, but the power it has over our governments.

Blame your crooked (or just stupid?) politicians, who give in to lobbying instead of caring about the common good.
Ultimatel it's your own fault for electing them, or at least for allowing your political system to exist in the silly shape it is. ;)

Re:You're all blaming the wrong person

[Anonymous Coward]

out-compete it's rivals

"its".

Re:You're all blaming the wrong person

[jellybear]

Maybe corporations need to be programmed to obey Asimov's laws.

Re:You're all blaming the wrong person

[Oddly_Drac]

" Maybe corporations need to be programmed to obey Asimov's laws."

Hun, you don't program corporations, but it's a brave attempt to be topical and funny at the same time. Well done.

Re:You're all blaming the wrong person

[hippo]

True, and the buggers won't die and you can't shoot them.

Re:You're all blaming the wrong person

[catherder_finleyd]

Actually, it's usually done to ensure that a failure of the Corporation does not cause the owner(s) to lose their homes (limited liability).

Re:You're all blaming the wrong person

[sbeener]

not to mention the definitive award-winning documentary made by the author, mark achbar and jennifer abbott

http://www.thecorporation.com/

Re:You're all blaming the wrong person

[NeoSkandranon]

If the corporation is the same as a person then doesn't it have second amendment rights?

Have you ever read any fiction set in the Shadowrun universe (post-apoc scifi) Anyhow, in the timeline leading up to when the ficion "starts' one of the things mentioned is exactly what you propose--corporations are allowed to keep their own armed forces. Cue global megacorp war.

Re:You're all blaming the wrong person

[Alphtoo]

killjoe, I admire both your logic and your humor, but there is one basic flaw: when was the last time you noticed the 2nd amendment being actually applied to human beings in the US? The same can be said of many of our constitutional rights. I agree corporations should be treated like dogs; it just won't make much difference until citizens are once again treated like the citizens of a free republic, as our Founders intended.

Economists viewpoint may effect change

[L1TH10N]

Reading about the abuses of patents really makes my blood boil, but at the same time it is comforting to know that economists are starting to react against software patents.

The economic papers (and probably many others) " Sequential Innovation, Patents, and Imitation" and " An Empirical Look at Software Patents" articulate in economic terms why software patents don't work.

I think that most economists believe that monopolies are bad and competition is good. I think that the more the economic viewpoint like those mentioned in the papers above start to have stronger acceptance amongst economists, then these viewpoints will start to hit the main stream press such as the Sydney Morning Herald (as a main stream newspaper in Australia). Hopefully, by this point, these viewpoints would start to influence government policy.

Geeks got on to the problem of software patents early. But the "geeky" point of view is often overlooked by governments. Economists are much more respected in government and probably can articulate an argument against software patents that probably will not be be overlooked. I'm looking from the perspective in Australia, I don't know how politics works in other parts of the world. But I hope that common sense will prevail.

Re:Economists viewpoint may effect change

[AnotherBlackHat]

[snip happens]
The economic paper... An Empirical Look at Software Patents" articulate in economic terms why software patents don't work.

I found this particularly choice;

Legal scholars sometimes argue that patent law should treat computer programs no differently than any other invention. This paper does not address arguments about legal consistency, but instead explores the economic effects of granting software patents in the U.S. during the 1990s. Our results are difficult to reconcile with the traditional incentive theory--that granting more patents will increase R&D investments. Rather, if legal changes have encouraged strategic patenting, the result might well be less innovation.

Perhaps software patents are exactly like other patents in this regard.
Maybe it's the traditional incentive theory that's in error.

-- less is better.

Standardized laws

[nurb432]

Why not take it to the next logical step.. One set of laws.. for the entire world..

Now, who's laws shall we mandate as the 'standard', mine? Yours?

This is the real danger of the WTO.. everything will have to fall to the lowest common dominator.

Re:Standardized laws

[Anonymous Coward]

Like it or not, your country divisions are pretty arbitary. I could live quite happily under a single worldwide democratic government.

Re:Standardized laws

[cbiltcliffe]

I could live quite happily under a single worldwide democratic government.

The problem is, a single worldwide democratic government wouldn't be happy with itself. It would rapidly turn into the same
ignore-the-people-except-at-election-time-what's-t he-worst-that-can-happen-they'll-reelect-us-in-fou r-years-anyway
crap that we have now. Or, possibly something even worse, considering how much more power a worldwide government would be perceived to have than any current national government.
Remember the old saying:
Power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts absolutely.

There's a lot of wisdom in those few words. And before you go saying how a world constitution would stop corruption, take a look at how well the constitution prevents unconstitutional laws like the DMCA.....

Damm pre-registration sites...

[Anonymous Coward]

Stop posting stories from sites requiring registration. If the site has a policy to not allow casual browsing then do as they wish and ignore them. Find an alternative site carrying the same story, for free.

Re:Damm pre-registration sites...

[seb249]

The article suggests pre rego - SMH are introducing it but at this stage you can still get to the article by clicking on the link at the bottom of the page!

Re:Damm pre-registration sites...

[pegacat]

Parent is on drugs. The Sydney Morning Herald DOES NOT REQUIRE REGISTRATION . They sometimes stick a page up suggesting that you register... but you are free to ignore it...!

Re:Damm pre-registration sites...

[hsoom]

The Sydney Morning Herald does not require registration to read articles. When you got to the page that says "Soon you will need to register to read this article" did you notice the paragraph underneath that says "We will be asking all readers to register for full access to The Sydney Morning Herald website in the near future (emphasis mine)." So, while your complaint may be merited soon, at the moment you can simply click the link down the bottom of the page that says "Register later and continue to your Article". It takes you straight to the article!

Also I think you'd have a hard time finding an alternative site carrying the same story because Ross Gittins, the author, is an opinion writer for Fairfax, and this article is not news but an opinion piece. I doubt this article would show up anywhere but in Fairfax owned newspapers (i.e. Sydney Morning Herald, The Age, etc.) all of which have the "soon you will need to be registered to read this article."

Re:Damm pre-registration sites...

[Anonymous Coward]

it would take me to the actual article if i had cookies enabled on my browser.
hence, i'm afraid, i should support this complaint :D

Re:Damm pre-registration sites...

[Alsee]

So, while your complaint may be merited soon, at the moment you can simply click the link down the bottom of the page that says "Register later and continue to your Article". It takes you straight to the article!

Actually the link doesn't work, at least for me. I even tried turning on cookies and javascript, still doesn't work.

Dumb-ass webdesign, on top of a dumb-ass registration system. Even if I *did* register I'd just fill in bogus data anyway. I really need to upgrade to Firefox and get the BugMeNot plug-in to automate the process of filling in bogus data.

-

A Question

[Nexum]

Ok, now I really have to ask.

At the risk of seeming frightfully out of touch and un-733t over the last few month's I've been seeing more and more of this "One wor^H^H^H^H^H^H Another word I should really have used" kind of stuff.

I know how it's used and roughly what it means and how to read it... but does anyone know it's origins or it's precise meaning?

Thanks for enlightening me... I just finally had to ask.

Re:A Question

[Keeper]

Once upon a time, while I was back in college, I could get a ^H character every time I hit the backspace key when I was telneting into certain machines (as opposed to deleting the previous character). Highly annoying. I suspect this is the 'origin' that you're looking for.

Re:A Question

[Anonymous Coward]

I remember finding it funny around 6 years ago when I first saw it. I have no doubt there were some people who thought it was an old joke then as well.

Re:A Question

[LighthouseJ]

Well, back in the days of early terminal programs where, to get good terminal emulation you had to massage the terminal client into emulating as close to how a native terminal would behave and this is what happens when it's not emulated close enough.

A backspace is the equivalent of Control-H. If you look at your ascii tables and skip the first NUL character, begin going down the line and counting off each letter of the alphabet. On H, you will land on BS (backspace). You can look at other codes and their equivalents on your own time.

Well, in Unix, it was written that when a keyboard sent a "^H" (which was recreated by holding down Control and pressing H), that it would backspace. When you are parked in your poorly-emulated remote terminal and press backspace, it sends the ^H over the line but it's not properly formatted and the terminal program thinks ^H is what the person wanted to type as plain text.

So some people are in a hurry, and want to send emails over their poorly-emulated remote terminal. They type, make mistakes, append ^H's that don't correct the typing mistake and then resume the email. It's just another call back to a golden age of computing, like how people still use vi... :)

Really lame ideas.

[twitter]

The defense given in the article echo's yours in a less rabid manner:

So we got another round of emails encouraging us to file patents, as a way of defensively time-stamping some of our work, and offering attractive bonuses for doing so. My area is particularly "bleeding edge", and my manager pointed out that we'd look pretty stupid if our everyday activities were patented by a rival.

This kind of time stamping and proof of prior work can be had for much less money than a patent. Call a notary, that's one of the things they are for. Make an deal with the local bank. There must be a simpler way to provide a court with definitive proof without validating software patents with mindshare, effort and money.

You also forward the bogus claim:

one of the Principles of Free Software, transparency, is fundamental in the patent process. The wisdom of the patent system is, In exchange for exclusive right-to-use on your invention, for a limited time, you must fully disclose that same invention.

That's the general idea, but you might note that it does not work like that at all. Engineers can not recognize their inventions after the lawyers get thought with them and it's a wonder that a court can enforce them anymore. Patents are being used to claim ideas, not inventions, and that's a perversion. Yes, software patents are the epitome of this abuse of principles.

If you want to share your source code, just publish it GPL in the usual ways. 10 points to the first person who can show me where Savannah or Sourceforge keep tabs on submissions to be able to show the definitive proof that's the reason so many lemmings are wasting so much money on so many lawyers and government processes.

MOD PARENT FUNNY!

[theluckyleper]

I agree with BrynM, that was a great post. You've earned the honor (?) of being the first person on my friends list :)

Re:MOD PARENT FUNNY!

[janbjurstrom]

You might regret that (it's "public information"!) ;).

Well, there's always the 'resetting' me to neutral if you find my ramblings tedious/irritating/dumb/all-of-the-above and stick out too much in your augmented /. perusal.

Thank you for the kind post and befriending :)

^D ?

[Anonymous Coward]

Erm.. If you're complaining about Micros... shouldn't you be using ^H or esc-6-X ?
^D delets in the other direction (depending on your mapping..)

Microsoft is the world's biggest patent loser . .

[werdna]

This kind of thing is starting to be a hot issue down here with the US-Australia Free Trade deal about to be ratified and bring our intellectual property laws in line with Micros^D^D^D^D^D^D^D America's

Boy, do you have this one all wrong.

Microsoft made one of the worst lists in America to get, the list of the top 100 verdicts for last year, three times, as a losing defendant. Microsoft has been on the business end of more 8 and 9 digit patent infringement verdicts than any other enterprise in recent times.

Not sure when it first appeared

[Azureflare]

But this page may help you with your interests in the slashdot subculture.

The direct link to the entry on ^H^H^H^H^H.

Patent office is 60% PROFIT!

[mabhatter654]

the patent office has an extremely high profit percentage... As officers of the US govt the have the duty to do their jobs properly.

Yes, I'd agree they're overworked...but if you put the examiner's ass in a sling for not properly investigating when the suspect purgry then maybe they will force the change on the management!!! It's a bit cruel to do to some poor sap, but you gotta fight the apathy in the system somewhere.

Personally, I think the system should be reformed to allow a limited number of patent grants per year...should have been done long ago! They should look at the numbers they granted for each subject for say 10 years, take an average, and knock half off that number. Then they could put more examiners from different fields on the patents and they would be a big deal again. Also, it would make the number managable for the citizens to "police" because there would be a limited number and times for awards...also there should be a challange period of 1 year after granting that any citizen with evidence can challange a granted patent. In addition, a company would be able to file in multiple years... i.e. 3 chances to apply, no amendments, additions, or clairifications!...then don't bother.

Re:Patent office is 60% PROFIT!

[deimtee]

How about another variation on that idea - only allow a certain number of patents in each field, but rather than limiting the number granted, expire the oldest patents to keep the number constant. The faster a field is innovating, the faster a patent expires.

Re:Patent office is 60% PROFIT!

[mabhatter654]

I like the contesting idea best. It helps eliminate playing the system. You'd have to have real deadlines to meet so your app would be on the table...or you'd loose 1 years turn! They'd have to be sane & reasonably worded because again, redos cost you a try. making it a public limit gives everybody a chance to see it. No more hiding or obfuscating patent apps. The limited number means you have to put the best ones up...crapflood the system and you're likely to never turn up! Overall it makes patents and even BETTER value for the company because they are publiclly vetted...people can try to get around or they know they gotta pay...but they'd be more willing to pay because they would be getting a much higher quality of information!!!

Re:Patent office is 60% PROFIT!

[deimtee]

If you limit the number of patents what's to stop companies crap-flooding the system with applications in the hope of getting a bigger share of the quota? If you limit the number of applications where do you set the limit? Does Joe Bloggs in his backyard shed get as many applications/patents as e.g. a large aerospace company with 30,000 employees?

I had no idea how much it cost.

[twitter]

This article doesn't say anything we don't already know.

Did you know how much it was costing these big dumb companies to act so stupid? $8,000 bonus for each patent granted as an incentive for engineers to waste their time. $50,000 to $200,000 for each filing. That the average engineer can generate more than a million dollars costs in two or three hours so that the company can earh what the insider called "dubious value" patents. These are shocking numbers in an economy where people who cost the firm $100,000 a year and do real things are not thought worth keeping. Think of it that way when your company is downsizing again. No, I had no idea just how stupid the whole thing was.

I also was unaware of how honest these companies were within themselves about what they were doing. "keep down small company competition", "Don't worry about whether you think the idea is worthy of patenting - that's for us to decide," "patent all the ways other people might do them as well, not so that we could actually do these things ourselves, but so we could prevent others from doing them." It's all very disturbing language.

Patents destroy rights

[Tony]

None of the pro-patent rhetoric bandied about these days ever addresses the topic of making software patents sensible, either. I can only imagine it's because it's impractical under our current system.

I believe a lot of us wouldn't mind seeing patents for truly brilliant methods, if we could be assured there wouldn't be one million bad patents for every one good one.

But, just to issue *my* anti-patent rhetoric:

Imagine if our criminal system convicted 99 innocent people for every true criminal, and attempts at reform have proven ineffective. Would you continue to pursue reform, when the damage done far outweighs the good?

The same holds for our patent system. If one patent in a hundred is good, and protects the rights granted by US law, those 99 other patents infringe on *my* rights (and the rights of millions of others) to freely use my knowledge.

That is a nontrivial right. In fact, it is fundamental to freedom.

So, our current patent system is indefensible. It destroys more rights than it protects, and should probably be dismantled, since attempts at reform have failed.

Anyway, end of rhetoric, for this post.

I'll make it even easier for you.

[twitter]

It does make sense to standardize on one set of intellectual property laws internationally.

Shrink copyright, patents and trademark all into one universal law? How about everything into one simple law, "do as I say"?

Re:Premise Beach

[`Sean]

Before or after you run away?

I agree, MS never objected to SW patents

[Anonymous Coward]

Back in the 1980's, when all this software patent nonsense was started, MS was the one company that kept quiet and didn't say anything about how stupid it was to allow software patents on something that, up till then, could not be patenable. now we have this insane situation where only large companies will make software, less innovation and open source software may vanish over time, people who want to program as a proffesion may have no choice but to work for the likes of MS???, so now what do we have, computers may as well not be a general computing device, but might as well have the cpu/memory directly wired to the likes of MS, because you can forget about writing your own software (and marketing it) ever again, or at least until all those patents expire!!!

Re:I agree, MS never objected to SW patents

[HiThere]

Ever again would be the correct answer, because the USPTO is allowing new patents to be issued on things already covered by existing patents. And it's allowing patents to be written so vaguely that nobody knows what they cover, which means that a new patent can cover the same area, because nobody knew what area was covered by either patent.

A patent is supposed to make things patent. i.e., it is supposed to be sufficient discription to allow those skilled in the art to recreate the work totally. The USPTO doesn't enforce that requirement, however, and the courts don't seem to enforce it either.

Oversimplified?

[Fortress]

When you patent a design for a physical object, like a wrench, you're not patenting the object itself, but the specifications to make more of them. You have potential rights to every other company that produces a wrench of the same design, even if it was developed independently. The patent itself is a form of intellectual property.

If instead of a wrench, you design a non-physical entity, like a compression algorithm, should you have the same potential rights? Even if someone arrives at it independently?

Maybe the whole patent idea in general is a bad idea. If someone has a better wrench, shouldn't anyone be able to make one like it?

MOD PARENT UP

[Anonymous Coward]

Mod parent up. It is just what I want to say.

KUMBAYA, COMRADE BROTHER!

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes, Brother! It's all about The Man enslaving The People! Forcing us to labor away so we can eat!

The food just wants to be free!

The housing just wants to be free!

The services (other people's labor) just wants to be free!

The land just wants to be free! Tragedy of the commons be damned! Together, Brother, we shall take back the land, for The People, from our Oppressive Masters and The Meek shall inherit The Earth (as a collective self sustaining unit to each according to his need and from each according to his ability).

Only this way can we all truly be free!

Human labor is about to go the way of the dinosaurs! Freely provided robots shall do everything for us! The robots just want to be free!

Kumbaya, Brother Comrade! I'm with you all the way to Freedom! Kumbaya!

Your silly opinon.

[twitter]

A very confident AC writes:

None of the anti-patent rhetoric bandied about these days ever addresses the topic of actually making software patents sensible by only granting patents for non-obvious, non-trivial, complete software inventions. Why? Because any kind of software patent threatens open source's competitive advantage and the anti-software patent brigade wants all software to be open source regardless of the rest of the world.

More than free software coders are worried about software patents. If you read the article you would have seen that big dumb companies are spending billions of dollars on patents of dubious value that none would ever want to use except against small companies. That opinion came from a software engineer at one of those big dumb companies who felt that most of his peers felt the same way.

Clearly, this is a larger problem for big dumb companies than it is for free software coders who incur none on the same cost. Nothing short of the destruction of free press and socialism can perpetuate the relative position of those companies pushing for "IP" protection. Companies like IBM are driving out of it a most productive way.

Also, if you look around, you will see most people telling you why software patents are bogus. "Non-obvious" software is an application of mathematics, something that's discovered not invented. "non-trivial" software does not exist, it just takes longer to write. Implementing ideas and business methods into the abstraction that software represents is not the inventive process you pretend it is. Free software writers think they get more out of the world by sharing their code with everyone instead of locking it up with expensive government "protection" from other people doing the same thing they do. Why would you expect people who don't believe what you think to reassure you in your wrongness?

No such thing as a white knight.

[twitter]

a patent without the backing to fight for it is worthless, and I am sorry to say I have no answer for that. Perhaps finding some white knight (IBM) to help underwrite that would be worthwhile.

I no more want to ruled by IBM than Microsoft. If you are dependent on someone in the way you propose, they own you.

The only useful answer is to eliminate patents for software and business methods. Both are absurd and a tremendous waste of money.

^D^D...

[Anonymous Coward]

Been fooling with your terminfo file I see. I own the patent for terminfo files. Pay up!

Darl

Better yet: ^W

[Anonymous Coward]

It's defined by default on most systems as delete word.

^D ?

[Anonymous Coward]

What the hell? Did the poster have a throwback to his Apple DOS days?

(For the ignorant, ^D or CHR$(4) was used in Apple DOS, inside of BASIC programs, to execute disk commands - PRINT CHR$(4);"CATALOG")

A friendly reminder to Xbox owners.

[Trejkaz]

If you're going to mod your Xbox, mod it now, because it will be declared illegal under the FTA. Better to get it out of the way now, and say that it was legal if someone tries pounding you for it.

I have no recollection with that

[microbox]

Unfortunately you'd have to get rid of the old 'I have no recollection with that' excuse.

For example, a corp will hire someone to find something out, and say they have no knowledge of how that person does business. That person is actually a spy, and everyone knows that he's going to break the law to get that information. But the CEO's aren't responsible unless you can prove that they knew that the spy was going to break the law when they hired them. Convenient that this situation has arisen.

It goes deeper than holding CEOs accountable... if you held shareholders accountable, then things certainly _would_ change, but everyone would cry unfair, and it would defeat the point of a corporation.

Greed is no more basic in shareholders than everyone else, so the definition of a corporation has to change to limit what it _can_ do, because anything it _can_ do it will, including extending the extension of itself, and what it can do.

For example, corporations fought do be able to patent living organizism back in the 80s. People didn't believe that you could own real life. Well a single firm argued in court that they had invented nothing more mundane then a standard chemical when they modified a bacteria.... and the supreme court (curse them!) agreed with the copr!

Now companies are patenting the DNA sequences of all the living creatures on earth. The USPTO said you couldn't patent the human genome (thankfully!), however, corps are patenting discoverings on human DNA - such as what the genes do (?!?)

The limitations I'm thinking of are more along the lines of:
"corporations have a limited lifespan", and
"this corporation is created to refine steel"

This would give a corporation a specific charter that they can't deviate from once it's created.

Obviously I don't believe that these specific examples would be practicle in the current world!

Re:I have no recollection with that

[Anonymous Coward]

"Now companies are patenting the DNA sequences of all the living creatures on earth. The USPTO said you couldn't patent the human genome (thankfully!), however, corps are patenting discoverings on human DNA - such as what the genes do (?!?)" Could you please given an example of this? I'm truly curious, I wasn't aware that you could patent a discovery into the workings of a biological system. Only that you could patent modifications made to such a system. On another note, as I was reading this comment I was taken to iomega's web page without having done a thing. Firefox 9.2. Suse 9.1. How can a redirect occur with my hand off the mouse and keyboard?

Re:I have no recollection with that

[msobkow]

Bottom line it's the US patent office and the corrupt American politicians who sell out the people to allow the corporations such unlimited power. That is part of what government is for, and why there are RICO acts and all the rest of it.

But when the corrupt politician sells his vote and still gets re-elected instead of turfed, I can't help but blame the irresponsible citizens who leave the losers in office instead of getting out there to vote for someone else.

They're supposed to be there to represent the people. They were supposed to be the check and balance that leashed corporations, not the lapdogs.

Re:I have no recollection with that

[msobkow]

Well now, that is just about the worst phrasing I have ever come up with. Serves me right for not re-reading before I hit "Submit".

US Congress, Canadian and British Parliament, etc. are supposed to be the check and balance that notice and stop corporate abuse. But as the people tolerate the continual fraud and sellout, the politicians no longer are held accountable for their actions.

There is also the significant issue of the USPTO's blatant incompetence and lack of domain-specific knowledge. If they can't make a proper assessment, the case should be rejected until the applicant can explain the patent in language plain enough for anyone to understand, not just a lawyer.

Or am I the only one who has noticed that instead of the 3-4 page patents with full schematics of the 1920's-30's, we now seem to have entire textbooks of legalese instead of a 3-4 line description. Does any of that verbiage help define the product being patented?

No.

But it does obfuscate the patent so that the USPTO can be baffled into approving the patent by it's sheer weight.

Re:I have no recollection with that

[Anonymous Coward]

"corporations have a limited lifespan"

That is a brilliant idea. I think it would cause just the shift in business that I want.

Corporations, if they survive long enough, tend to turn into bloated organizations that epitomize inefficiency. However, if they're big enough then inertia alone can keep them from being killed by shortcomings that would be fatal to a small business. With this abnormally long life, corporations can drastically reduce their productivity with little reprecusion. The end result is slow development, poor quality, and abnormal prices.

The big problem I see is that companies are focused on the means and not the end. In capitalism, money is not the goal. The product is the goal. Money is supposed to be an incentive to produce something that benefits the consumer. Corporations get this backwards, and treat the product as a means to get the money.

Corporations must be forced to focus on the product instead. My own idea is the same as one of yours; declare the intended output of the corporation when it is incorporated. Some corporations exist to make finished products. Others exist to create only ideas. "This corporation exists to create a car engine with X efficiency." Once the corporation has the patent, they disband and license it to a manufacturing corporation. A time-limited charter also sounds like a good idea.

In any case, something has to change to convert our economy back from a corporatist "money is the end" system to a capitalist "money is the means" system.

Re:I have no recollection with that

[microbox]

You're fighting against a media machine, which is owned by corporations, which is really a conflict of interest. You can blame irresponsible citizens, but we (yes including me) are dumbed into believing things by some of the cleverist marketers and image makers in the world.

If 0.1% of the population reponsed to something as cludgy and obivious as spam, think how we respond en masse to sophisticated and well-researched image making machines.

So perhaps we should blame the marketing firms which irresponsibly sell lies to the public, and distract citizens from the real issues at hand...

Well, unfortuanetly marketing firms are also corporations... and the marketing firm that pleases it's clients best is the won with the $$$, and that's the point of a corporation... right?

So as soon as one marketing firm starts selling lies, they all have to, just to stay in business.

So we're back to the problem of corporations again.

Certain measures can me made to limit this particular problem, such as preventing corps from changing names and limiting the number of trademarks and other corporations they can have. Unfortunately, it only takes 1 corp, and one bad administration to make these rules float away, and once they do... we're back to square 1.

Re:I have no recollection with that

[mr_mischief]

Make the corporation responsible. With the rights of a person comes the responsibilities of a person.

A corporation, being a legal entity equal to a person, should have the same taxes to pay as a person and get no extra tax breaks. Being a legal entity equal to a person, it should be forced to serve a sentence and pay a fine when breaking the law. Anything less than these things means that something which has been promised the rights of a citizen is being treated preferentially due to its origins of not being a person -- a complete contradiction.

So, if a corporation commits a crime for which the shareholders aren't responsible, make the corporation, as a virtual person, serve a virtual sentence. A crime punishible by five years in prison? Make the corporation pay all profits to the victims and the government for five years, plus restitution. That'd clean up their act considerably.

Re:I have no recollection with that

[abreauj]

It goes deeper than holding CEOs accountable... if you held shareholders accountable, then things certainly _would_ change, but everyone would cry unfair, and it would defeat the point of a corporation.

Who are these shareholders? I suspect that if you did a study, you'd discover that for most publicly-held corporations, particularly the largest multinationals, the shareholders are predominantly other corporations. Any corporation whose shares are more than 50% owned by other corporations has effectively escaped from direct human control.

That isn't practical

[microbox]

There _are_ good things about corporations and our free market economy. We should redefine corporations so that they keep the good and throw out the bad.

Making shareholders liable would defeat the original purpose of the corporation which was limited-liability. I don't think limited-liability is a bad thing, because is makes it easier to make investment decisions, and investment underpins economic growth.

For example, if you wanted to start a shop, you could borrow the money from you folks... should they be liable for you actions then!

I think the solution lies more in the direction of what a corporation can do. For example, corporations could be created with a set of specific goals, and the CEO is bound to those goals and not just the bottom line.

Now obvious it's not as simple as that, because there'd have to be lots of specific goals to make this work... not just the one current goal (7% return or whatever).

Someone else posted a link to "The Corporation" which is a Canadian documentary about the subject... it's well watching

Re:That isn't practical

[killjoe]

" There _are_ good things about corporations and our free market economy"

Of course there are. Just like there are great dogs that help people. In fact most dogs are great, the rabid ones are a small minority.

"Making shareholders liable would defeat the original purpose of the corporation which was limited-liability"

I guess this has to go. I find it offensive that there is an instrument whose sole purpose is to shirk personal responsiblity. It just goes against my moral training.

Re:That isn't practical

[danila]

There is an important distinction between financial liability and legal liability. Shareholders should be able to limit the former, but not the latter. The point of corporations should be to try risky ideas and implement them in business. If the business fails, shareholders don't lose anything other than the money they invested. But legal liability should not be limited. If the business idea involves abusing children in Africa (e.g. diamond mines), the shareholders and managers should be responsible for it from the day one.

Re:That isn't practical

[chthon]

The limited liability here in Belgium (probably also Europe) is in case of bankruptcy, but does not count in the first three years of the existence of the corporation, and neither when fraudulent bankruptcy can be proven.

We call it offensive patenting at our company

[loophard]

I am personally co-author of several patents where we took competitor patents as prior-art and created new patents with claims that anticipate competitor direction. You end up just expanding the independent claims to make them novel (the part you add is the anticipatory part). Of course, you can't use the invention yourself, because you'd be infringing the competitors patent. However, the competitor cannot practice the new patent either, potentially blocking their advance. They may need to licence from you in order to advance their art. Or, trade off licencing with other patents in their portfolio/ That's how it works. It's all legit, and a good way to maintain/gain/protect a competitive advantage. You can slag patents all you want, and yes there are BIG problems in the system, but, you need to play the game to not get squashed.

How can we win? --- Re:Contradiction

[Anonymous Coward]

Bruce,

As a US academic researcher in AI and computer science, software patents truly terrify me. The predatory IP environment is successfully compelling even those who recognize the absurdity of the current system to participate in this grand error. The greater the investments made by companies and individuals into securing their dubious property, the more strongly they will oppose change towards a rational system. As demonstrated by the pressures applied to other countries, this malignant system has a frightening ability to propagate

How can we beat this vicious cycle? Are there allies for reform among the plutocrats of the US? Can these issues be framed so as to motivate the masses for grass-roots change? Realistically, is there hope for the US? How long do you imagine this war will last before we see a reasonable system? Should I start looking for other countries in which to reside?

Thank you for any advice you might give.

-Patently Terrified

Auction variation of patent system?

[mOdQuArK!]

Personally, I think the system should be reformed to allow a limited number of patent grants per year...should have been done long ago!

Hmmm, how about a variation on that idea? How about allowing only a fixed number of total patents in the system (still subject to prior art & obviousness challenges, of course)?

Anyone who wants to can submit their idea for a patent. People (or companies) can bid auction-style for ownership of the various patents (with all the resultant rights), with the auctions occurring at reasonably frequent intervals (3 years?). The money from whoever wins the auction for a particular patent will be used as a payment to the patent's current owner (who might be the winner of a previous auction for this patent). The current owner of the patent has to compete in the auction with the others in order to maintain control of the patent.

The N top auction bids (where N is the fixed number) will be assigned to their new owners (after they've paid the previous owners, of course). Any bidding on patents which didn't make the top N will cause the issues covered by those patents to become public domain.

I think there are some benefits behind an approach like this - instead of depending on overworked, undertrained examiners, each company has to do due-diligence to decide how much it is worth to try and control a given patent (a patent which can be challenged with prior art or obviousness will obviously end up not being worth much).

Since anyone can submit a patent idea (although they won't necessarily control it), even little guys will end up getting paid for their ideas (and the amount they get paid will be determined by what the market think it's worth). If anyone wants to truly control the idea, then they'll have to treat it as a trade secret.

People will pay top-dollar to grab the new ideas, or to keep control of really important older ideas, but the stuff which isn't important enough relative to the top N ideas will get bumped out into the public domain. (Obviously, if you compete in an auction but it ends up in the public domain, you wouldn't be expected to pay for it anymore. Also, there should be an ultimate "reasonable" lifetime for patents so that a really good/fundamental idea doesn't get taken out of the public domain forever by someone with really deep pockets - who can use the idea to keep having really deep pockets.)

Not entirely sure what to do about the current owners of a patent bidding to keep control of it - obviously, it would be unfair to allow them to pay themselves if they win. Perhaps this "loose" money could channeled into R&D/education?

Wrong control code

[meowsqueak]

It's ^H (backspace) not ^D (end of transmission) to 'delete' the prior character.

o/t:Nothing for you to see here. Please move along

[Anonymous Coward]

everything2 whore. ;x

Re:Premise Beach

[Anonymous Coward]

Actually, I was only passing through as I ran away from someone else. I figured as long as I was in town I'd claim a post as I went by.

Steering Wheels - Explain the Difference

[Anonymous Coward]

If I were a judge, and someone came into my court room and said that they had patented the double click, after chuckling to myself I would turn around and ask them where the world would be today if the steering wheel and foot pedals used by every car today had been patented, repatented, and bought and repatented? It would have disrupted an entire industry that was the economic driving (oops pun alert) force of their time...

The industrial revolution would never have happened given they had the same number of lawyers that we have now...

We need a wild frontier without petty kings and lawyers to move to, and unfortunately there are none left. Sigh.

Re:Steering Wheels - Explain the Difference

[Wolfbone]

In free and open source software we do have a wild frontier - I think: It is just that the judges and lawmakers entrusted with the good and just governance of that territory seem to share the motivations, principles and insight of some of their earlier colleagues.

Re:Steering Wheels - Explain the Difference

[Duhavid]

Look up!

a hidden assumption

[latroM]

from http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/words-to-avoid.html# IntellectualProperty

Publishers and lawyers like to describe copyright as ``intellectual property''---a term that also includes patents, trademarks, and other more obscure areas of law. These laws have so little in common, and differ so much, that it is ill-advised to generalize about them. It is best to talk specifically about ``copyright,'' or about ``patents,'' or about ``trademarks.''

The term ``intellectual property'' carries a hidden assumption---that the way to think about all these disparate issues is based on an analogy with physical objects, and our ideas of physical property.

When it comes to copying, this analogy disregards the crucial difference between material objects and information: information can be copied and shared almost effortlessly, while material objects can't be. Basing your thinking on this analogy is tantamount to ignoring that difference. (Even the US legal system does not entirely accept the analogy, since it does not treat copyrights or patents like physical object property rights.)

If you don't want to limit yourself to this way of thinking, it is best to avoid using the term ``intellectual property'' in your words and thoughts.

``Intellectual property'' is also an unwise generalization. The term is a catch-all that lumps together several disparate legal systems, including copyright, patents, trademarks, and others, which have very little in common. These systems of law originated separately, cover different activities, operate in different ways, and raise different public policy issues. If you learn a fact about copyright law, you would do well to assume it does not apply to patent law, since that is almost always so.

Since these laws are so different, the term ``intellectual property'' is an invitation to simplistic thinking. It leads people to focus on the meager common aspect of these disparate laws, which is that they establish monopolies that can be bought and sold, and ignore their substance--the different restrictions they place on the public and the different consequences that result. At that broad level, you can't even see the specific public policy issues raised by copyright law, or the different issues raised by patent law, or any of the others. Thus, any opinion about ``intellectual property'' is almost surely foolish.

If you want to think clearly about the issues raised by patents, copyrights and trademarks, or even learn what these laws require, the first step is to forget that you ever heard the term ``intellectual property'' and treat them as unrelated subjects. To give clear information and encourage clear thinking, never speak or write about ``intellectual property''; instead, present the topic as copyright, patents, or whichever specific law you are discussing.

According to Professor Mark Lemley of the University of Texas Law School, the widespread use of term "intellectual property" is a recent fad, arising from the 1967 founding of the World Intellectual Property Organization. (See footnote 123 in his March 1997 book review, in the Texas Law Review, of Romantic Authorship and the Rhetoric of Property by James Boyle.) WIPO represents the interests of the holders of copyrights, patents and trademarks, and lobbies governments to increase their power. One WIPO treaty follows the lines of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act, which has been used to censor useful free software packages in the US.

As a European...

[haeger]

...I cannot for the life of me understand why EU would think that SWPAT is a good idea. I still live in this fantasy that the politicians should serve their people and their country, and I don't see that these patents do any good to either. I mean, we're all a bunch of whiny geeks here so they don't listen to us, but surely they must see the bigger perspective. If we allow SWPAT in the EU then we will practically give away the entire IT sector to the US (and subsequently India) since 90% or so of the SWPATs that's out there are owned by large American companies.

Why would the EU want to do that? What's the benefit? I just don't understand. Did someone wake up and think "Well, this IT thingy is too compllicated, let's just focus on agriculture instead. Let's give all IT stuff to USA, and let them figure it out."?

.haeger

Re:As a European...

[Anonymous Coward]

Easy answer... money...
The big proponents for software patents are major US companies anc companies like Siemens and SAP.
Once a politician retires you can expect that he/she will get a high position sponsored by one of those conglomerates and has another good income for the following years. Bribery the european way...

Re:As a European...

[Anonymous Coward]

The Parliment [b]did[/b] reject software patents as I remember, but was over ruled by the Commission. What a wonderful democracy this is!

Re:As a European...

[pommiekiwifruit]

But now we have Twice-Resigned-Mandy to take the commision by its throat and instill glasnost and perestroika...

Re:As a European...

[Alsee]

The Parliment [b]did[/b] reject software patents as I remember, but was over ruled by the Commission.

Not "overruled". The Commission wrote a pro-SW-pat directive. The Parliment re-wrote it into a directive rejecting SW-pats. The Commission re-re-wrote it throwing out everything the Parliment did and turning it radically and rabidly pro-SW-pats. They then tried to pass it off as a "compromise", LOL! As far as I know the Council still needs to make an "official" vote on this pro-SW-pat version (and they have lost some of their expected "yes" votes), and then it goes back to Parliment.

As I understand it (I'm no expert, I may well be wrong), the Parliment gets the final say. Assuming they don't change their minds that would mean they either pass a directive rejecting SW-pats or at worst they reject a pro-SW-pat directive leaving no directive at all.

The good news is that the pro-SW-pat directive was all set to be passed by everyone based on "expert" (corporate) advice, but the more attention paid to the issue and the more legislators learn, the more things shift towards rejecting SW-pats. It seems that SW-pat support is crumbling in the Council. People are learning that pro-SW-pat ministers have been misreprenting things and even outright lying. Governments are getting quite irritated at ministers voting in support of SW-pats in contradiction to national wishes/instructions.

I'm cautiously optimistic.

-

Re:As a European...

[Anonymous Coward]

I voted a Green Party MEP (minister of european parliment) recently because they reject software patents.

So not all of them think its a good idea. leemo

Re:As a European...

[Ben Hutchings]

About a month back I was among several local members of the Liberal Democrats who went to help out with a by-election. We shared the local Liberal Democrat MEP's car and had lunch together. When I told him what I did for a living he brought up the topic of software patents and we had something of a lively debate. Now the party has a policy against software patents, but its MEPs are part of a group that is for them with a few reservations. When I emailed him before the first full parliamentary vote his (probably canned) reply stated categorical opposition to software patents. Unfortunately it seems he has been swayed towards them since them. What depressed me most was his reply to my claim that small businesses were mostly against them: "we must represent the large companies too". Shit, and there I was thinking they were representing people!

Re:As a European...

[Ben Hutchings]

The Parliament cannot overrule the Commission either. In fact it must vote by a majority of total members (not a majority of members present) to make any changes to the Commission's version of the directive. If the Parliament and Commission cannot agree a final version, nothing happens. This is one of the fundamental weaknesses of democracy in the EU. (Another being, that MEPs represent constituencies of millions of people, whose individual voices are therefore infinitesimally quiet.)

Re:As a European...

[Alsee]

If the Parliament and Commission cannot agree a final version, nothing happens. This is one of the fundamental weaknesses of democracy in the EU.

The same thing happens in the US if the House of Representatives and the Senate cannot agree on a final version.

It may be a "fundamental weaknesses" in making it harder to pass good laws, but it is an advantage in that it gives you two shots at blocking a bad law. If there's that sort of division then there's a good chance the topic deserves more analysis.

-

Re:As a European...

[Ben Hutchings]

The House and the Senate are both made up of elected members, though. EU commissioners are appointed by national goverments and appear to be mainly politicians who are no longer popular at home but happen to be friends of their party leader (vide Peter Mandelson). They seem to have very little accountability. Yet the Commission has more power than the Parliament.

Re:As a European...

[Alsee]

Yes, yes.
However I was addressing the parent poster's comment "If the Parliament and Commission cannot agree a final version, nothing happens. This is one of the fundamental weaknesses of democracy in the EU.". That particular attribute is indeed identical here in the US. Obviously there are other differences, but that was the one he complained about. I just wanted to point out that it was not unique, and that aspect could indeed be a good in some cases rather than a weakness.

Other problems are, well, other problems :)

I've read some items that seem to indicate recent/future changes are shifting power more towards Parliment. I don't know much EU politics, but *just* based on the software patent stuff, I love Parliment and despise the Council :D

-

Re:As a European...

[Ben Hutchings]

I am the "parent poster". The weakness in democracy I see is not that two institutions would have to agree on legislation, which I see can be a good thing, but that in this case one of those two institutions is far removed from democratic control. (There is perhaps an interesting parallel with the original set-up of the US Senate which I believe was elected by state legislatures. I have no idea how well that worked.)

Re:As a European...

[Alsee]

I am the "parent poster".

Doh! Wasn't paying enough attention.
Chuckle.

-

Re:Tending the coals- later in the washinton post

[Ontheotherhand]

The us government has released a declassified message decoded from a secret post from a well known dissident anti american web site...(sic)
the democratic government of canada....just war against....heavily armed neighbours in the south. ...use terrorism..
goverment buildings...destroy them....see overhead photos of buildings...use gps..bring your gun...
We have oil...
hey, its more than they had to go on for Iraq...

separate patent law for software

[yuud]

I don't understand why US patents don't work differently for software? I was imagining: a) a much shorter lifespan of any patent (5 years maybe) b) if you don't develop anything to do with the patent after a year, it's considered void I know that b) might be hard to prove, but something along these lines are needed!

Re:separate patent law for software

[Anonymous Coward]

This is actually a good idea. The PTO already has precedent for doing this with design patents, and drug patents are often extended to include trials.

Creating a seperate utility patent (which is what software falls under, typically) for software processes and shortening the life span would appear to be an optimal compromise. Considering that most patents in the US have virtually no commercial value, and there are fees to maintain each patent thru-out it's lifespan... it would seem to be a good way of balancing out the nukes.

Re:Microsoft is the world's biggest patent loser .

[Halo1]

They've learned from their mistakes however.

(OT) - Re:Patents destroy rights

[JonnyCalcutta]

Imagine if our criminal system convicted 99 innocent people for every true criminal, and attempts at reform have proven ineffective.

You must not have been paying attention during the last few decades. Its here and its called 'The War on (some) Drugs' - a war being lost even given the fact that drugs can't drive tanks, fly planes or even shoot guns.

Re:(OT) - Re:Patents destroy rights

[Tony]

The war on drugs has only tripled our inmate population, not increased it a hundredfold.

But I'm on your side. Two of every three inmates has been convicted on laws that are unjust, laws that do not benefit society.

A simple solution

[Ignatius]

The idea of patents is to compensate innovators by temproarily restricting the freedom of all members of the jurististiction to which it applies, to take advantage of a fact (the invention), such that the original finder of that fact can make money, either by exploiting the fact itself or by charging others for the right to do so.

(Useful) facts are very much like real estate: You can only exercise you property right by limiting the rights of others. In any free society, you need a good reason for restricting the rights of the public; in the case of patents, this is done to compensate the inventor (the original finder of the fact) and thereby spur innovation. If patents aren't used to that end (and in the case of software patents, they rarely are), then they are damaging to society.

So what we need is a scheme, that encourages patents only if they are actually used to make money by making the benefits of the invention available to the public. This simplest way to do this is a price-dependent tax on patents.

Whoever wants to file a patent has to put a price tag to it, for which is is willing to sell out his patent to the public domain. He is completly free by selecting this price. However, to uphold his patent, he has to pay an annual fee of, say 1%, of this buy-out price. The price can be adapeted yearly but only in a range of, say, +/- 25%. If, during the runtime of the patent, anyone pays the patent holder the buy-out price, then the patent enters the public domain immediately.

If the patent is any good and actually used to produce goods or give away licences, 1% is a rather small amount. If its only used as a lockaway patent, to hinder innovation, protect an obsolete business model or as a weapon in court, then it is expensive, as it doesn't generate any direct revenue.

PLEASE make patents more expensive!

[TRACK-YOUR-POSITION]

I am PRAYING that they make these patents much more expensive. The patents system is useless for regular people with non-fraudulent intentions. So it costs a few thousands of dollars. Big whoop. The cost to the industry of a bad patent can extend into hundreds of millions of dollars. (witness recent ridiculous patent decisions against Microsoft.)

At the very LEAST, they should be required to pay the hundreds of thousand dollars or so necessary to pay for REAL experts in the field to sort out crap patents from good patents.

Wrong Figures....

[zungu]

A patent does not cost $100,000 to file. The maximum a usual patent application will cost is $15,000 for the full process till it is issued. No way is the $1 million in legal fees number is correct. Further, this article seems to think that patents apply only to mechanical inventions. That leaves out half a universe of electrical, electronics and related technology. Not to mention chemical, biotech and pharmaceuticals. I can understand the slashdot crowd jumping with glee at such patent bashing, but the facts ought to be correct.

Re:Wrong Figures....

[Anonymous Coward]

could it be possible that this australian newspaper is giving the figures in australian $ ?

Re:^D ?

[Krach42]

OH GOD! Thanks for REMINDING me... Sheesh... I had safely ducked that out of my memory, then you go an remind me.

Remember the two-letter significant identifiers in AppleSoft BASIC? So that $APPLE would be the same as $APPLICATION.

I swear, I was rebelling for years after that naming everything variable_which_I_use_to_do_that_thing, rather than $A $J $AA $AJ $BZ or what have you.

On the other hand, I can read code like no ones bussiness now, because in all that code, the variable names could NEVER accurately fit what they were used for. (Unless you were doing quadratic formula type stuff)

Good idea.

[blanks]

Why create the technology when you can claim ownership of said technology, and force people who did create the technology to pay you.

The US Supreme Court disagrees

[brlewis]

The US Supreme Court has always held that software and mathematical algorithms are nonstatutory material as far as patents are concerned, so they certainly define a distinction between software and hardware.

I really don't know about other engineering fields, but I have 14 years in software engineering. With the exception of the RSA patent (an egregious example of patenting math), I've never met, heard, or read anyone who said, ``I found this great algorithm in the patent literature.'' In other words, software patents make zero contribution to the art. The software industry grew by leaps and bounds before software was patentable, and will continue to do so even after the current error of the USPTO and lower courts is corrected.

Re:Microsoft is the world's biggest patent loser .

[Alsee]

Microsoft may have been hit by software patents, but they be been a driving force in support of them. Definitely pulling strings in the EU debate.

I'm not sure, but I think Micrsoft is hoping to lie low, weather any patent suits against them, and wait for (or induce) others to to strangle open source projects with patent suits. They could initiate such suits themselves in the US already, but for the fear of it blowing up in their face.

-

Here's an link to a paper on the ethics

[microbox]

about patenting human gene sequences Patenting DNA

The voter is putty in the hands of a marketer

[microbox]

Blame them for being human, won't change the fact that corps and politicians use a high-tech image making machine to "manufactor" the consent of the masses.

We're delibrately distracted from the issues that really matter. This isn't a conspiracy, it's just business.

backwards?

[brlewis]

IIRC, Unix did not take Ctrl-H to mean "delete the previous character". Thus the user of a terminal where backspace sent Ctrl-H would see the cursor back up on his terminal, but the remote system would just include ^H. The user didn't know that the text he thought he erased was visible to people reading his message. Those in the know started the joke of putting caret H in messages to simulate this phenomenon.

Don't patent....publish

[mdfst13]

There is no need to get patents. Just publish. Then you have prior art, and the patent is invalid. This is just as useful in defending against a patent as a patent. Further, it saves the patent application fees (and is thus possible for free beer projects). Also, one doesn't need to claim that something is patentable to publish. It is at least disingenuous to apply for a patent that you do not believe should be valid.

We're talking about *software* patents here!

[Anonymous Coward]

So stop using *physical* patents as examples for your flawed arguments!

No ww

[jkabbe]

So stop using *physical* patents as examples for your flawed arguments!

None of the suggestions I have responded to referred only to software patents.

If you want patents to only apply to physical things then your arguments (and those of many others) are flawed. Suggesting a change to the patent system that would affect all patents when you only believe there is a problem with soft patents (software and business processes) is the height of stupidity.

And if you had actually paid attention to my other posts you would see that I am, in general, not in favor of software patents. I have also provided solid reasons and arguments to back this up. That's far beyond your pathetic attempts at contributing to the discussion.

Re:No ww

[Anonymous Coward]

It's clear that all discussions on ./ are in the context of software patents. They never bring up stuff on physical patents Learn to read.

Re:No ww

[Anonymous Coward]

Score: -4, ignorant troll beating a dead horse

Re:No ww

[jkabbe]

Even if the reasons for suggesting changes are due to software patents, the suggestions themselves have mostly had to due with changing all patents. So which one of us is it that needs to learn to read?

Re:No ww

[jkabbe]

Woah! There are two of you!

Let's analyse the phrase "Ignorant troll", shall we?

Ignorant: I have studied patents extensively, including conversations with patent examiners

So far you're 0-1

Troll: On slashdot, anyone who appears to support patents is likely to be shouted down. It's amazing the hate the any defense of the patent system inspires in some people. Knowing this, it could be claimed that I am inviting a shouting match.

I'll give you this one, making you 1-2

Not bad for an Anonymous Troll

Re:No ww

[Anonymous Coward]

So you don't think sw patent can be considered any different than 'physical' patents? So I guess a mouse trap and a bear trap would be the exact same because they both trap animals, right?

Re:No ww

[Anonymous Coward]

"including conversations with patent examiners"

so now we know you're biased.

Re:No ww

[Anonymous Coward]

"Troll: On slashdot, anyone who appears to support patents"

Wrong; the correct definition is :"Troll: On slashdot, anyone who appears to support software patents"

So you're 0-1 on that one.

Re:No ww

[jkabbe]

What's funny is that it doesn't take much creativity to read my sig and infer how I feel about software patents. But people like jumping to conclusions when the conclusion lets them get in a good rant.....

Re:No ww

[Anonymous Coward]

And the fact that your own comments contradict themselves makes you a hypocrite

Re:No ww

[jkabbe]

And the fact that your own comments contradict themselves makes you a hypocrite

I would love for you to point out where my comments supported software patents in particular instead of the patent system as a whole. You don't even have to look far. This very thread totally disproves your premise

http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=116519&cid=9 86 0656

This is why most people don't make good lawyers: the inability to think clearly and make logical arguments.

Re:No ww

[Sebby]

perhaps learning how to properly make a working link on slashdot would be a good skill for you to learn

Re:No ww

[Anonymous Coward]

So I guess you don't have a response to this then?

Re:No ww

[Anonymous Coward]

Wow! You flip-flop more often than policitians do!

sorry...

[Anonymous Coward]

Should rephrase that: now we know you're a biased ignorant troll