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Microsoft Seeks Latitude/Longitude Patent
theodp writes "Q. What does Microsoft feel is unpatentable? A. Apparently nothing! On Thursday, the USPTO published Microsoft's patent application for the Compact text encoding of latitude/longitude coordinates, in which the software giant explains how a floating-point number can also be represented as a less-precise integer that's displayed in base-30 notation!" If ever I have seen a silly patent, this is it.
If I patent a method for encoding my dick length in a 16 bit integer, will Microsoft be willing to enter a cross licensing agreement with me?
1. The USPTO recieves about 350,000 applications per year and issues about 70,000 per year. The numbers alone indicate that many applications are rejected, disproving the parent's point.
2. Of the roughly 350,000 that were issued in the last 5 years, the parent has found 5 silly patents. The percentage of silly patents is best expressed in scientific notation with a negative exponent, disproving the parent's point.
3. The parent is clearly unaware that a patent is worthless untill it has been tested in a courtroom. Step 1 of any infringement defense is to attempt to invalidate the patent, something I think would be trivial for every patent he's listed. If he has ANY evidence that these patents have survived an validity challenge, he MIGHT have the BEGINNING of a clue WTF he's talking about, but he doesn't have any of that evidence.
4. Nice link to IEEE - they're clearly legal experts. Oh wait, they know about technology, not law. Patents are legal animals that have technology as content. With my thinking cap on, I declare that IEEE does NOT possess patent law expertise.
5. The parent believes that the "US Patenting Office" appears to "patent just about everything", demonstrating that he doesn't have a clue. There is no such thing as a "US Patenting Office", but if there were, I imagine they would "patent just about everything". There IS a US Patent & Trademark Office, but it does not patent anything. Inventors patent things, the USPTO issues patents. While this is not material to the topic at hand, it goes a long way to reveal that the parent is talking out of his ass about something he does not understand.
So in conclusion: If you care to reply to me and talk about how stupid I am, etc. etc., blah blah blah, please include an analysis of exactly how enforceable you think those patents are. Please stress the part about "you think". For example, please outline how the infringement lawsuit for "Method of Swinging on a Swing" would play out in a courtroom.
What's a stupid patent? Something you hang on the wall. What's a strong patent? Something you use to protect your IP. Next time you think you have a point, look at the patent and decide whether it is a stupid patent or a strong patent (including strong patents for stupid things.) If you don't feel qualified to make that judgement, maybe you don't have the slightest clue what you're talking about.