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Patent Reform Bill Introduced in U.S. House
kanad wrote to mention a ZDNet article covering the introduction of the Patent Reform Act of 2005 to the U.S. House of Representatives. From the article: "Probably the most sweeping change would be the creation of a process to challenge patents after they are granted by the Patent and Trademark Office. 'Opposition requests' can be filed up to nine months after a patent is awarded or six months after a legal notice alleging infringement is sent out. The bill is supported by the USPTO and Microsoft who have been recently asking for patent reforms ." More details of the bill are available at the Congressman's website."
Why not introduce a peer review process by which a patent in a particular industry is reviewed by patent holders in the same industry? In this manner, a frivolous patent could be easily circumvented with a simple review request. A few hundred peers simply review the patent and then decide if it is legit.
The same method could be used to avoid costly court battles. This seems like a no-brainer. What am I missing?
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...that the same people that accepted a stupid patend in the first place would be the one to read a reasonable request to why the patent is to be removed?
It sound like this is a perfect plan carried out in the worst possible manner..
Scully: Should we arrest David Copperfield?
Mulder: Yes we should, but not for this.
Failing that, how about starting the patent challenge clock when the patent holder issues a claim instead of starting the clock when the patent is issued. It'd deal with submarine patents as well as eliminate the need to look over the patent office's shoulder on each and every patent they issue.
1. So they'll have a whole department sitting like hawks watching the patent office and challenging everything remotely connected to their markets, and you and I will not have a department challenging every BS patent Microsoft submits.
When you come to challenge it, they'll say "well he didn't challenge it within the alloted time...."
2. "Another major change would be to award a patent to the first person to submit their paperwork to the Patent Office. Currently, patents are awarded to the first person who concocted the invention, a timeframe that can be difficult to prove."
No need to invent now, just have to have a patent office ready and waiting to patent other peoples invention! And best of all its completely legal!
That's what patents are in the first place. And not just software-patents.
We're being swamped by genetically modified whatever, just because some company managed to get a patent on it and thus has no incentive to keep its bacteria in the tank. So what if the whatever just produces some disaster like polluting fields of non genetically modified crops? Its patented, you can sue the victim of the pollution.
And even better, some companies managed to patent parts of viruses (which they didn't invent, of course) -- now, whoever wants to identify them in something like a HIV-test has to pay royalties. The international red cross who wants donated blood checked for instance..
Now talk about "growing costs in health-care". The whole affair is just stacking up costs everywhere, in the judical system, taxes, health-care, ecology, you name it. Patents are a frigging financial catastrophe.
That's fucked up beyond any repair, the whole thing has to be ditched.
"The more prohibitions there are, The poorer the people will be" -- Lao Tse
Doesn't this create the possibility that someone who isn't the actual inventor could get the patent, just by beating the inventor to the patent office? I think that this "first to file" rule would incent massive amounts of corporate espionage and other such shenanigans, with resource-rich large companies feeding off of the innovative efforts of small businesses and independent developers. Just imagine, you're trying to raise money to get started, so you reveal your new technology to a VC. That VC then turns around and tells one of his Fortune 500 limited partners about it. That limited partner then rushes a patent application to the PTO while the VC politely declines to invest in your start-up. You eventually file for a patent. Three years later, you discover that someone else filed before you, so you lose.
Microsoft built their business by seeing the innovations of others and using their resources to act on those innovations more quickly and more decisively than the actual innovators. This proposed new rule just seems like a thinly-veiled attempt by them to be able to steal not only the markets for those innovations, but also the patents from the rightful innovators.
Also, Article I, Section 8, Clause 8, of the Constitution gives Congress the power "to promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries." Any change to the patent law that allows anybody other than the actual inventor to get a patent would appear to be blatantly unconstitutional.
This is my concern with this reform. The prior art search and requirement under section 102 seems that it would be pointless. If I am the first to file something, EVEN though I didn't invent it first, what the hell is the point of even doing a prior art search. There is none. This will, as it seems on its face, not only change who can receive the patent, but also change a large chunk of the MPEP (Manual of Patent Examiner Procedures) which dictates how patents are to be researched before being issued. What this will effectively do is limit prior art ONLY to issued patents. If it is not an issued patent, even if it has been published, disclosed, or even in a pending status, it will not prevent someone from filing. Finally, provisional applications would be useless now as well because provisionals are used to hold a date. I believe (not 100% sure) that provisionals are published. If that is the case, any company with oodles of cash could rummage through provisional apps which are actually filed yet, file them, and screw whoever filed the provisional. All in all, it seems as if this bill is more sweeping then they allude to. This could change much more than opposition requests and who can file, but also the way patents are examined.
"Why not forever?" I can imagine one malicious scenario that could be exploited with a challenge-at-any-time system (check my logic and let me know if I messed up):
Under a time-limited system where a patent wasn't being actively litigated, this couldn't happen.
Note also that the provision that allows for a challenge after the patent holder litigates makes it possible to challenge a patent after the initial 9 month window for any patent that is being actively enforced.
(So, this concept doesn't seem bad to me, but that doesn't mean I like the bill as a whole -- it's soundling like it tips the balance too far in favor of big corporations.)
..wayne..
From what the /. write-up says, this sounds good (well, except for Microsoft backing it, that worries me), but what about reforming/fixing copyright? There's just no need nor justification for copyrights lasting as long as they do, nor for the things the DMCA does to people who just want to watch movies how they want to, not how the media corporations want them to.
All I know about Bush is I had a good job when Clinton was president.