A Look at the US Patent System

cheesedog writes "The LA Times published an interesting editorial on the current state of our patent system. From the article: 'on many levels, the U.S. patent system is profoundly flawed. Too many patents are issued for 'innovations' that are obvious, vague or already in wide use.' Online reaction has been mixed, with PatentHawk striking out in defense of the patent system, and Right to Create providing some support for the LA Times editorial."

Comments

Yes

[FST]

I agree. It has becomming horrible... where I worked up until last summer, we were actually paid a bonus of approximately $1000 to file for obvious patents for the sole purpose of hoping that our competitors will accidentally use this idea in their products. Though those were stupid, I would have to say that the record goes to this: http://patft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?patentnu mber=4,022,227

Patents discouraging entrepreneurs?

[Anonymous Coward]

Well here is just a question for my fellow techies who probably recognize that making a startup and selling it would be a better life than that of a salary man. How is our perception of the patent system affecting our plans for possible startups? Does the state of the patent system frighten you away from entrepreneurial ventures, or do you just plan to keep things closed source and ignore patent laws? Or would you try to stay out of the radar and get acquired before anyone with a patent portfolio came for a shakedown?

The late 90s were really fun, I'd like to see that entrepreneurial vibrance happen again, especially because it was fun for the nerds and irksome for the old guard, but I'm worried that perhaps the legal overhead is discouraging a lot of creative and competent people.

Go back to requiring models..

[wanax]

Many of the problems with the current patent system go to the fact that you can now patent things that can't be represented as physical devices. Reinstating the requirement that all patents are accompanied by a detailed description of a physical device would remove all the absurd business concept patents, as well as many unreasonable types of software patents.

Before you scream that novel and non-trivial algorithms wouldn't be patenable (like, for example, a new algorithm for encoding images etc), all algorithms can be represented by specifically designed analog or digital electronics (example of a non-trivial algorithm that can also be represented by a physical device: http://patft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?u=/netah tml/srchnum.htm&Sect1=PTO1&Sect2=HITOFF&p=1&r=1&l= 50&f=G&d=PALL&s1=4803736.WKU.&OS=PN/4803736&RS=PN/ 4803736).

Things that require code, like hyper-links, one click web ordering, and other patents that most people consider ridiculous would still be protected by copyright on the code... and last time I checked MS, Oracle, Sun, IBM, Apple etc.. didn't have all that much trouble protecting their intellectual property as start-ups without software patents.

Rolling back the clock to require a description of a physical device would both make patents a lot less vague as well as making the obvious harder to obsfucate, without requiring a massive paradigm change for what patents are supposed to protect (this isn't to say that I'm not in favor a more rational system for challenging a patent, especially for prior art issues, but reform tends to move in baby-steps)

it's obvious

[Anonymous Coward]

I have a family member working there, and he's overworked and overpaid (yes, they're on a different GS schedule). And they need to meet quotas which appear to get higher and higher each year, along with their rates. The funny thing is a lot of these examiners burn out, get a law degree and then go private. They then exploit the system for all it's worth. It's an endless, vicious cycle of making money "from" red tape I say.

Hence, it's just like our good-ol politicians leaving service for some dinky, high-paying lobby job and then exploiting the system since they've worked both sides. It's sad that you'll only see 10% progress from 100% effort, where 90% goes in the pocket of the ex-govvy. What a racket.

I've been in the brand spanking new complex. It's nice, looks like lots of money when into those buildings, though the commissary is crap (then again, old town's a step away for nice $$ lunches). Aside from serving political agendas set by politicians, they have one goal: make money and lots of it--sort of like the rest of government nowadays. Where do those profits go? Now that's what the tax payer should be asking!

Agencies that run this way always remind me that we are currently under another form of government than your ideological democracy

So much for serving the public good.