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IBM Breaks Patent Record, Wants Reform
An anonymous reader writes "IBM set the record for most patents granted in a year for 2006. At the same time, IBM points out that small companies earn more patents per capita than larger enterprises and pushes for reform to address shortcomings in the process of patenting business methods:
'The prevalence of patent applications that are of low quality or poorly written have led to backlogs of historic proportions, and the granting of patents protecting ideas that are not new, are overly broad, or obvious.' And the company has been committing itself to a new patent policy: 'Key tenets of the policy are that patent quality is the responsibility of the applicant; that patent applications should be open to public examination and that patent ownership should be transparent; and that business methods without technical content should not be patentable.'"
More and more people realize that patent clercs don't have the foggiest clue when it comes to the IT biz and start filing for ridiculous patents. Simply because it's been proven time and again that this is your way to big money for essentially no research. Just manage to get one of those trivial patents granted and you're set for life.
Is there really anyone wondering why there's a backlog from here to Albuquerque? Hell, it's more profitable than frivulous lawsuits for spilled coffee or being a general moron but there was no warning label for it.
If you want to solve this insane situation, reform the patent system. Now.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
Thinks that the IBM formal Patent program has become too cumbersome. Patent authors pass through a series of committees that either reject them or pass them on before they are ever considered for filing. If they were awarded 3700 patents then probably 20x that amount of submissions were made at the beginning of the process. Employees are awarded for patent submssions not patents. So this new rule will thin the submissions down greatly and will force most patent submissions to come out of the research areas. With fewer higher quality patents they'll have to do far less work to process them and will award far less in bounty money.
WTF.. IBM is complaining about frivelous/obvious patents?
IBM has a friggin' patent on the wheel!
THE WHEEL!
Look it up if you don't believe me! "Vehicle Wheel", bitches.
What isn't getting reported (at least not on Slashdot, for whatever reason) is that IBM's current actions are schizophrenic, if you view them in the best possible light. In the worst possible light, these actions can be viewed as an attempt to by-pass the Patent Office. To make absolutely certain that the big guys retain control over the process, and aren't pestered again by the little guys.
A superb example of this is the fact that IBM is ACTIVELY fully supportive of Software Patents, and has even used what appear to be rather bogus ones (against a company which is using Linux, no less), in order to stifle the competition.
I'm speaking about IBM's lawsuit last month against Platform Solutions. Here's one quote and link from a press article:
"IBM's decision to sue Platform Solutions is another indication that the company is becoming more aggressive about defending its intellectual property in an effort to extract more revenue from its extensive patent trove."
There are other links if you do a Google search; but it's pretty clear that IBM wants to keep this as quiet as possible.
The point remains though, that IBM is being extremely agressive with Software Patents, against what appear to be Linux-based products. And anything IBM says about "improving the quality" is utter BS. Their priority is to improve the bottom line.
Sorry if that pops some people's bubbles about IBM. There is no question that IBM has been helpful to the Open Source community. But it's quite clear that this only goes so far. And as long as they are actively working as a Patent Troll to stifle competition, IBM cannot be trusted.
Let us hope that it doesn't go so far as submarine patents. But honestly, I've never seen a big company play nice out of the goodness of their heart yet, when it comes to their competition.
IBM might have struck me as leaning that way before last month. But not any more.
The best way to predict the future is to create it. - Peter Drucker.
Companies like IBM normally require employees to file patents to keep their jobs, no matter how trivial they are.
I know many, many long term IBM employees in technical positions who have never filed a patent. Filing patents at IBM is viewed favorably, but it certainly isn't a requirement for holding onto a job.
Patents aren't worth much unless you've got the resources to defend them in court. What they do is give one a legitimate reason to go to court. This concept predates the more modern version of court lawsuits that permit ostensibly poor people to sue ostensibly rich people/companies just because the people/company was in the general area when a wrong was done and well heck - the wrong doer didn't have enough resources to pay the lawyer and make the victim rich.
Patent are necessary to have any standing in court when another company attempts to steal the efforts and ideas of that which you worked and invested in to offer the world. Patents exist ultimately for the benefit of society so that those ideas developed are not kept locked in a vault and protected as trade secrets to be potentially lost for a thousand years like some inventions have been. Note this is about real innovation not variations on a theme of the one minute manager book.
The patent is a temporary monopoly granted its owner by the government (instigator of all true monopolies) to reward the owner for sharing the information with the world rather than keeping it secret. The US patent office has issued only a few million since the founding of the nation.
At present, it needs reform to cater more to the lone inventor than the foreign megacorporation. As I stated, without a patent, there is no protection for an invention in court and there is no way that investors will risk money in startup ventures without the prospect of protection. Just imagine if there were no trade mark protection what you might wind up with at the local store while trying to by an Apple i-pod.
Also, there is no guarantee that a patent applies to something that works or is of value. They're pretty good at kicking out the outrageous stuff like perpetual motion machines and 200mpg carburators for Mack 18 wheelers but beyond that it's rather difficult to analyze. Hey, that $50,000 nonreusable mouse trap might work really well and even avoiding existing product's disadvantages like disposal of the mouse or smells because it instantly incinerates the critter in a phaser blast, but, it's never going to make it in the marketplace.