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PTO Eliminates "Technological Arts" Requirement
MdntToker writes to tell us that the Patent Board has issued an opinion which removes the existing procedure of rejecting patents under 35 U.S.C. 101 as outside of the "technological arts". From the article: "Our determination is that there is currently no judicially recognized separate "technological arts" test to determine patent eligible subject matter under 101. We decline to create one. Therefore, it is apparent that the examiner's rejection can not be sustained."
Who's going to jump on the patent that eliminates the process for processing the elimination of patent requirements?
Time to go patent all my fiction writings, before someone else does it.
This is the dumbest thing I've ever even imagined. Just when you think it cannot possibly get any worse.
ad logicam Claiming a proposition is false because it was presented as the conclusion of a fallacious argument.
I think I'll patent the making of the "I have a patent on stupid patents" jokes that appear below.
If you don't know where you are going, you will wind up somewhere else.
...how it was that wrestlers could have "patented moves."
:\
I guess now they actually can.
You can never go home again... but I guess you can shop there.
This is an idea I wish I had patented. Imagine patenting the concept of patents before there was such thing as patents. The royalties from the patent office alone would be enough to retire on.
...In the direction of making patents completely and utterly useless.
Now all they have to do is remove the prior art clauses and were in patent utopia.
thank God the internet isn't a human right.
Reading the article, I'm made aware of two things: 1) I lack the training to be able to argue about this properly 2) I would like to know why exactly "a 'method of compensating a manager' that involved several steps of calculating a proper compensation based on performance criteria and then transferring payment to the manager" is not an abstract idea? What exactly does constitute an abstract idea? This sounds like a particular application of mathematical and economic principles, which I wouldn't have thought patentable at all. Anybody have a link to some reference materials that might help with these questions, without requiriring several years obtaining a law degree?
"I object to doing things that computers can do." -- Olin Shivers, lispers.org
So now they aren't even going to be limiting patents to software and "business methods"? In another 5 years we're all going to have to pay license fees to take a crap without being sued for violating a patent for "method of voiding bowels into a porcelain fixture while seated."
But that won't be the end of it: microphones in the toilet will be listening to make sure it doesn't sound like the tune to some Britney Spears song, while cameras examine the shape of the turds to see if they resemble a corporate logo. I can't wait to see which company owns the rights to each particular method for wiping your ass.
Come on, they had to do this at some point. All intellectual works are basically discovery of some *previously existing* but useful aspect of reality. If you invent a new mousetrap, you're discovering the previously-existing aspect of reality that some organization of different materials is better at catching mice. If you write a book, you're discovering the previously-existing aspect of reality that people like a certain combination of words. Trying to classify one kind as "technological" and the other as not gets really tricky.
Next on the list: the patent office stops rejecting discoveries as being "too theoretical". Imagine working around those patents!
Rank my idea: http://www.sinceslicedbread.com/node/531
The reason that the technological art standard does not come up much as a reason for rejection is that, generally, people whose invention didn't meet that standard wouldn't even bother filing a patent. Patent lawyers wouldn't waste their time.
Now that this particular court has ruled differently, expect a rash of filings that would previously have been rejected under this clause.
"Trolls they were, but filled with the evil will of their master: a fell race..." -- J.R.R. Tolkien on Olog-hai
It's discussed in a bit more detail here. It looks like any business process can be patented, from plotting a basic graph on a whiteboard, to having TPS reports notched according to the future employment status of the employee.
Vintage computer adverts: http://www.vintageadbrowser.com/computers-and-software-ads
A vibrant economy requires resources to be used efficiently. In theory, patents are supposed to help this process by increasing the incentive to invest in capital. Indeed, such investment can benefit both the inventor and the end user. As such, patents encourage the production of new capital, and the new capital is often more efficient at using resources than the previous capital. Thus the economy grows.
However, it appears as though America is reaching a point where patents interfere with the process so much that productivity is diminished. When an inventor has to search for patents when designing every portion of a capital work, less time is spent on developing the capital itself. Thus the creation of new capital diminishes, and resources are not used as efficiently. That can eventually cause the economy to basically rot.
This is not what the American economy needs, considering its various other problems (massive debt, inflated stock markets, a housing bubble, and so forth).
Cyric Zndovzny at your service.
Hello.
This is God.
I'd like to claim 'prior art.'
The greatest thing you'll ever learn is just to love and be loved in return.
It seems there are actually examiners at the USPTO that are willing to call bullshit on a bogus patent. That offers a bit of encouragement.
Please stand clear of the doors, por favor mantenganse alejado de las puertas
USPTO has no authority outside the realm of "Science and useful Arts" and patents granted outside the scope of that allowed by the Constitution are illegal. Nor does it matter what Congress has to say about it; granting patents on things not meeting the prior test is not a power granted to the Federal Government.
They "declined" to create a definition. Translation: we "chose" to ignore the law. Perhaps I'll "decline" to pay my taxes and see how that flies. Arrogant bastards; they need to be put against the wall.
Taking this doctrine to its logical extreme may, unfortunately, be the only way to force people to recognise how flawed it is. In that regard, this may be a useful decision.
It's become clear that since the patent office is willing to let anyone patent anything with very minimal checking on validity that patents will effectively end productivity and innovation in the US (and everywhere that has an enforcement treaty with the US). So either we cripple our economy and technological advancement or we modify patents so they don't strangle innovation. So ditch them or limit the duration to a more reasonable timeframe (given the current rate of advancement).
This decision is quite funny. A couple of months ago, Slashdot was running a story about a piece by Richard Stallman where he made the analogy with the works of Victor Hugo being covered by patents on literary plots. Then there were some posters who thought Dr. Stallman was making an absurd comparison, and that patents on literature would never happen.
Well, well...
Meanwhile, in Europe, we have chosen another road. After the victory on July 6, when the European Parliament rejected the software directive, we now have a chance to get one of our activists to win the title "European of the Year" in an open Internet poll organized by a big business magazine.
Please feel free to go to NoSoftwarePatents.com for instructions on how to vote, while you contemplate this latest madness by the US patent establishment.
Christian Engström, Former Member of the European Parliament 2009-2014 for The Pirate Party, Sweden
Your patent is supposed to not duplicate prior art and it is supposed to be non-obvious.
Both of these criteria are criteria honoured in the work to register a patent in good faith (a search for prior art) and after the fact, by the fact your patent can be challenged.
A lot of the most obvious patents will not be upheld if challenged and either meaningful prior art exists or if the patent actually *is* obvious. In the Litigious States of America, this mechanism for defeating patents should not be surprising.
It is, however, expensive to register patents. It is also expensive to challenge them. This gives the leverage to the financially wealthy. It gives even more leverage to larger companies that don't do anything but patent registration and litigation - they don't spend any money inovating, just patenting other people's ideas and chasing down infringers. Usually this results in out of court settlements rather than challenges, since it could cost you $100K to challenge a patent, and $20K to license it from the current patent holder.
We've created a system that has within it a built in niche for a group of butt-sucking parasites who do no actual work. I'm not talking about lawyers, but of patent attack/defense companies that don't *make* anything. They are just storehouses for intellectual property, not with the idea of protecting of the inventors or even their investors, but simply for profit. They act as leghold traps on innovation, rather than incentives.
This is the surest sign that the system is broken. The patent system itself now has so many companies co-opted into the machine that they can't imagine life without it. And their fear keeps the system going strong and growing. And of course, as it grows, it stifles invention and innovation, instead of protecting it as it probably did way back when the patents were first envisioned.
At one time, it did bring together investors and inventors because it helped ensure RoI for the investors, because anyone who knocked off their process or product could be litigated against and punished. Thus it fostered innovation.
That day is long past. What we have left is the rotting carcass of a system that protected innovation, and the only creatures that enjoy hanging around rotting carcasses are maggots, flies, and carrion eaters. And that's what the Patent system has develoved to.
Get rid of it, because it no longer serves the purpose it was meant for.
-- Mal: "Well they tell you: never hit a man with a closed fist. But it is, on occasion, hilarious."