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UK Judge: Who needs software patents?
Glyn Moody writes "C|Net has a surprising story about a seminar given by a top judge at the U.K.'s Court of Appeal who specializes in intellectual-property law. According to the article, he has "questioned whether software patents should be granted, and has criticized the U.S. for allowing "anything under the sun" to be patented." Is the tide turning?"
While this judge's message may seem absurd, remember to pay royalties when you code a progress bar in your application.
... I should e-mail Mr. Andreas and Mr. Foster--the Catholic Church has got deep pockets!
That's right, a whole lot of people owe William S. Andreas and Jeffery P. Foster of IBM a whole lot of money.
Oh, and this was filed in the U.S. but approved by a European patent office so I don't think it's fair for this judge to bash only us Yanks.
My church had a fundraiser once and I believe they used a progress bar on a website to track their earnings
Say, have any of you Java swing programmers ever typed
JProgressBar myJPB = new JProgressBar();
? Because I was thinking of starting a patent lawyer career, I just need you to reply with your name, contact information and the application you used it on and distributed.
My work here is dung.
Is the tide turning?
No. Judges aren't The Borg. One judge's opinion (and that's little-o opinion, not an opinion handed down) is hardly a watershed event.
The opinions stated herein do not necessarily represent those of anybody at all. Deal with it.
When the patent process actually changes, THEN you can say the tide is turning. Until then, the tide is just growing, like it has been for a long time ...
just so you can see how retarded the US patent system is, see this santa hat patent
it seems to me that the purpose of the USPTO is not to grant patents but to make money from applications etc
i could probably patent my ass if i tried to
Marge, get me your address book, 4 beers, and my conversation hat.
I concur 100%. If I see Bill Gates or Sam Palmisano (or even Darl McBride hhahaahahahaha) make these types of statements I might change my mind. However, until the powers that be (i.e. the ones w/money buying up and enforcing all these patents) take the necessary measures to fix the problem they have created, I don't foresee any improvement regarding software patents.
Beware of he who would deny you access to information, for in his heart he dreams himself your master.
I agree you should be able to patent a process. However the US system defines no logical limits on such a definition. The RIM Blackberry versus NTP is only one good example. NTP patended the process of sending communication to a device from a server, this is basically the concept of all TCP/IP traffic, however since NTP was successfull in making certain claims they OWN this process, and others must pay royalties to use it, regardless of how obivous it is.
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www.kybe.com
^its an adult text and image search engine i'm working on.
I think their idea is to keep trying again and again until we get sick and tired of protesting it.
That's exactly it. The IP companies only need to get lucky once, the rest of us have to be lucky time and time and time again. Eventually, they'll get through, and then we'll be stuck with software patents forever, as to atempt to dislodge them would be "theft" of IP rights.
May the Maths Be with you!
Where is "here" in your case?
Perhaps a compromise is for patent examiners to assign a rating to the patent. For example, C are weak patents, B are medium ones, and A strong ones. If all the "one click" and "same as 1940 except with a computer" patents get a C ranking then judges will be more likely to overturn them.
Judges don't understand technology and generally give the patent office the benefit of the doubt if they don't get something or are confused. A rating system will allow them more leeway to turn down questionable stuff.
Table-ized A.I.
The tide is never going to turn in countries that let themselves be ruled by lobbyists.
Sheesh, evil *and* a jerk. -- Jade
The patent system has never been terribly great, but by allowing software patents it becomes an obstacle to development, a costly legal hurdle that has produced a business whose sole purpose is licensing. It's a cruel joke, but because so many of the big players like Microsoft, while being victimized by a corrupted patent system, are themselves players in that very system, using outrageous patents (like the FAT file system) as a means to actually stifle innovation and protect monopolistic practices.
The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
It doesn't seem to me that the patent process is inherently ill-suited to software. In fact, it's a far better fit than copyright because of the nature of the resultant work. The patent system requires full disclosure of the invetion (the copyright laws do not) and the term is definite (20 years v at least 70 years for copyright). With the copyright system (the only system left for protection if patents are withdrawn), there is no disclosure, so you end up with DRM to protect access to copyrighted elements even though not all the elements are copyrightable. However, circumventing the DRM to discover non-copyrightable elements is either a violation of the law or it is a violation of the EULA that you agreed to. If the software could only be patented, the applicant would be required to disclose the entirety of the invention and thereby promoting science. It would, by definition, only allow those elements that are protectable to be protected and the patent would clearly disclose what those are. Copyright laws only act to obfuscate the promotion of science.
The problem with software patents is not that patenting is ill-suited but rather that discovery of prior art and laziness by the PTO have resulted in questionable patents being issued. Even this isn't a problem, because when challenged and scrutinized those patents that are bad are discarded and those that are good are upheld. The problem lies in the cost to litigate this - essentially ensuring that the "little guy" must bow to the pressures of the multi-national corporation.
Instead, maybe the PTO should adopt a cheap ex-parte reconsideration procedure (to my knowledge only the applicant can request reconsideration for a patent that is denied) that lasts for the lifetime of a patent where the challenger only needs to present some evidence of a patent-destroying issue. This would eliminate the huge costs of trying the patent in a court of law and make the process a little more fair. If there is evidence of non-obviousness or prior use for a "progress bar" the patent will destroyed, otherwise, why shouldn't the patentee be rewarded for his new and novel invention (it should be to his benefit that such an invention is widely used!)
I had a choice between modding this down and replying, but I'll give you the benefit of the doubt here. Anything can be described as a mathematical model based on a set of axioms, from which operations on elements can be performed. That's right, your toaster has many underyling mathematical principles, so does your microwave, and any other device. There really isn't a whole lot you can't use some mathematical model to explain. So given your reasoning, there ought to be no patents. Even such ideas as relational databases can be explained quite well using Tuple Calculus. Complex operations within relational databases can be derived from broad mathematical definitions. It's a property of emergence, and in the future I don't see many, if any, fields not represented by some subset of mathematics.
To put it succinctly, if you don't like patents, simply say so. If you're going to be grabbing for excuses not to like certain kinds of patents, you're not helping the problem.
The thing is a PDF, you read it, write your answers separately and send them all to an email address.
I just read the damn thing and it's basically HEAVILY BIASED towards companies... Seeing that, I'm not sure my answer would do anything, but I'll do it anyway... take for instance this introductory exert from from the PDF:
Strange, I was under the impression that patents were there to protect INVENTORS, not businesses.
Pisses me off (pardon my french)
One shall speak only if what one has to say is more beautiful than silence
The USPTO grants both DESIGN patents and UTILITY patents. They are completely different animals. A design patent protects only the ornamental appearance of an invention, not its utilitarian features. The santa hat received a DESIGN patent, which is perfectly reasonable. It provides stronger protection against knock-offs, clones, and imitations.
The difference between a toaster (which would be patentable if it was a new invention) and software is that the toaster isn't implementing a mathematical algorithm. The resulting actions of the toaster can be explained by physics and chemistry, but isn't the result of pure manipulation of numbers. RSA is just a way of manipulating numbers. A toaster, or any other physical invention should do more than manipulate numbers. unless it's a computer, and it's purpose is manipulating numbers. I have no idea why nobody ever patented the computer. Basically it should work like this. If you can't patent something without adding "software","a computer", or "the Internet" to it, you shouldn't be able to patent something simply by adding "software","a computer", or "the Internet" to it. If you could patent RSA you wouldn't need to patent software that implements it, because that would be covered by the existing patent. Since you can't patent RSA, you can't patent a piece of software that implements it.
Anthropic principle: We see the universe the way it is because if it were different we would not be here to see it.
Patents are not the problem. It is ill-equipped patent reviewers and weak reviewing guidelines that are.
Innovative work expressed in software (a virtual machine) should have the same protection as any innovative work expressed in mechanical form (a physical machine). It is the non-obvious innovative work part that the patent office seems to not understand when it comes to software as well as they do when it comes to physical machines.
IMHO, what is needed are stricter rules, guidelines and use of software experts to review software patents.
Many of us *don't* consider something like RSA to be patentable. It's an algoritm, basically just like using a**2 + b**2 = c**2 to calculate the proper length of a diagonal when building a house. Most people would scoff at the idea of patenting the pythagorean theorem, and making home builders everywhere pay a royalty to some random guy who patented it.
For some reason, people are more willing to accept a patent on an encryption algoritm. But, it is basically the exact same thing. Some math, and a description of what to do with it. That's all an algorithm is. Patenting math is non-sensical to a reasonable person. It has been possible to invent and publish new math for years without the benefit of patent protection. So, the notion that patent protection is somehow a prerequisite for the advancement is utter poppycock.
Personally, I have no problem with patents on things. But, algorithms patents should be abolished completely. When you start trying to figure out where to draw the line between pythagoras and RSA, you realise that you should just put the pen away.
In every discussion like this there is always somebody who don't know the difference between patents, copyrights, trademarks, and trade secrets.
Addressing your actual point, up till now the development of computer algorithms has progressed very nicely without much patent protection. It's a bit like saying, "without patent protection, where's the incentive to develop new physics?"
If you can't patent code, where is the incentive to research new algorithms.
The fame of having your name immortalized forever in Computer Science textbooks?
A* search algorithm by Peter Hart, Nils Nilsson, and Bertram Raphael.
Bresenham line algorithm
Floyd-Warshall algorithm
etc...
"That type of patenting must be stopped and all previous such obvious patents reversed."
Really agree with you. This has to stop or it will ruin innovation. Patents and trademarks were developed to launch entrepreneurs, not protect vested interests. The whole system has become elitist and un-American. Benjamin Franklin hated patents. He was an open source type of guy. Never took out a patent on his stove. Wanted it for the public good. (Not that his original worked all that well.) But the lightning rod did. Sure hope the worm is beginning to turn.
I am not against patents in general, but this torrent of garbage patents is just legal landfill.
"No fear. No envy. No meanness." Liam Clancy