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Legislation To Overhaul US Patent System
FutureDomain sends us to a PC World report on the filing yesterday of legislation to overhaul the US patent system completely. The US has the only system worldwide that tries to ascertain who first invented a thing — everywhere else the criterion is who filed first, and the new legislation would bring the US into line. Identical bills were introduced in both the House and the Senate by, in each case, bipartisan sponsors. The corporate roster of backers includes Microsoft, IBM, Amazon, and nearly everyone else. From the article: "The provisions of the Patent Reform Act would... restrict damages that patent holders can receive for infringement lawsuits, create a new procedure to challenge the validity of a patent after it has been granted, and boost resources for the US Patent and Trademark Office."
Er... I mean "Prior art!"
Meta will eat itself
This legislation basically sounds like a free pass for companies to do this, and throw out the idea of "prior art" altogether. It's little wonder the big IP corporations are behind this (since they have the resources to file scores of patents, strong-arming out the little guys who may have actually invented them). And it's little wonder the patent office is behind it (since it GREATLY simplifies their job). But, for the consumer in particular, and for innovation in general, this could be one of the biggest bonehead moves out legislators have ever made (and that says a LOT).
SJW: Someone who has run out of real oppression, and has to fake it.
This only magnifies the problem with the existing system where only the big guys can AFFORD to file patents and actually enforce them.
"God fights on the side with the best artillery." - Napoleon, Marshal of France - speaking truth to power
I think I understand the rationale for changing the law, but as an application developer it worries me. I'm not interested in trying to patent software that I create, or any of the techniques that I use. I'm more interested in creating applications that are so compelling that they set a high standard that is difficult for competitors to meet, and then continously innovate to stay ahead of them. However, I have always felt like I could rely on the fact that I would be able to prove that I had "invented" the software techniques I use in my applications by keeping good records of my design documents, source code control history, etc. My worry with this new proposed law is that someone could take advantage of the fact that I don't care to go through the hassle of patenting aspects of my software and swoop in and patent the concepts themselves. It almost seems like it could foster a new age of "patent squatters" similar to URL squatters. Opportunists took advantage of the fact that many companies didn't acquire their trademark URLs in the web's infancy. I could easily see a similar technique arising with patents. All you would have to do is: - pick some successful web sites - check to see if they're doing anything remotely worth patenting - see if there's a patent yet for that - file the patent if there's not - blackmail the web site, threatening to shut them down if they don't pay you a royalty/settlement for the use of "their" technique. Am I off base here? Of course, I haven't read TFA yet, so I very well could be.
No. Prior art stays the same. If anyone has published a the same idea before it is not patentable (in theory, in practice USPO will still not check it),
The old system just had the option of companies not filing patents and not publishing their results could come in and claim they invented the idea first.
The new system is much less corrupt and more open.
Each of these companies is well-known for abusing Software patents; the first two in order to maintain their monopolies. Usually "reform" by these folks means "give me a bigger piece of the pie in order to stifle innovation and keep the little guys out".
Pardon my suspicions, but I doubt this so-called "reform" is here to help us. TFA isn't clear on this, but it sounds like this is just to establish the first-to-file basis of patents, rather thna first-to-invent. First-to-invent is advantagous for the little guy, so it's no wonder the big companies are behind this dubious "reform". This is not good legislation.
If they really wanted to reform the system, it would be better to either toss out Software Patents (and harmonize our system with much of the rest of the world) or at least require a working prototype before a Software Patent is granted.
The best way to predict the future is to create it. - Peter Drucker.
And, that in turn means that innovation will stagnate because it will become impossible for any small company of individual to invent ANYTHING which doesn't infringe on some big corp's patent. Only the most powerful corps (with the connections, reciprocal patents, and $$ to make deals with OTHER big corps) will be able to innovate. The little guy (like the guys who founded Netscape, Google, YouTube, etc.) will be completely shut out of the game.
SJW: Someone who has run out of real oppression, and has to fake it.
Judging from the article this does nothing to limit the "Doing something that everybody has been doing for years ... over the Internet"; "Doing something that everybody has been doing for years ... wirelessly" kind of patents.
Or the "Get a bunch of specialists in a room and ask them 'How would you solve problem X' and then patent the solutions" approach to "innovation".
Not to mention that the change from a "Prior-art has precedence" system to a "First to patent wins" one means the anybody that has loads of ideas but no money to patent them will loose against "Big corp with loadsa money for whom the costs of filling a patent are short change".
Couple this with the ability to patent business methods (whether encoded as a software/hardware mix or not) and you'll see things like "selling ice-cream on a beach" being patented.
The real revolution would be dropping patents for business methods (software encoded or not) altogether.
The fact that BSA is for it (read: the big boys in the software world), should be ringing alarm bells in everybodies minds.
In the rest of the world published prior art still disallows patents.
Filed first is just the decider when two applications are made for the same invention (which was secret until the applications).
In most of the world the person who gets to the patent office first gets the patent and the one who gets there second gets nothing. In the US you can claim that you invented it before the other party and try to prove it with dated notes etc. which were previously not published. In theory the first to have the invention gets the patent not the first to file. This leads to messy legal fights.
In the rest of the world the incentive is to file (and therefore publish) first which gives a clearer decision on this issue.
Joseph
It isn't just money, you know. It is the promise of jobs after government employment. Low-rate loans. "Speaking" engagements. Lecture tours. Book deals. Boats. Houses. Sex. Vacations, junkets and "fact-finding" missions. Access to people in power. Tips - market and otherwise. All manner of free dinners and drinks. Power for its own sake. Oh, and of course - money.
There is no more corrosive environment than a political position in Washington DC. It's a wonder our representatives don't outright grow horns the first day on the job. Sadly, a 100% corrupt person looks just like one that isn't.
I've fallen off your lawn, and I can't get up.
The provisions of the Patent Reform Act would... restrict damages that patent holders can receive for infringement lawsuits
Ahhh, I love that. So it's going to be enough for the big guys (who are all backing it) to kill upstart competition. But if the big guys think they can ship a lot of product, they can simply; ignore the little guy's patent, bury him in lawyers if they do get sued, and in the unlikely event that the little guy can withstand that onslaught, the most the big guy risks is one quarter's worth of profits. Excellent.
Stop-Prism.org: Opt Out of Surveillance
He's right, it never does, it's like slave reform. Any "solution" that puts off complete elimination only openes itself up to the next level of abuse. Patents are arguably more evil than slavery. Like 15 million impovrished Africans being sued in the world court not to purchase generic AIDS drugs from India, like safety devices in cars held back 20 years while over a million people died in auto accidents. Like 20 million elderly being subjected to overpriced drugs that have unknown chemichal distortions only because safer classes aren't patentable. It's amazing the number of people we are willing to torture and kill in the name of fradulent property rights. People say "well, we would never be so barbaric as to allow fradulent use of the word 'property' to justify the torture and murder of innocent people like they did in 1850, we would never be like those idiots who just wanted the slave states to get along with the free states". NOT!
Last time they did "patent reform" they created a patent court. But being a patent court means they had more incentive than ever to expand their influence by expanding the scope, role, and influence of patents. It totally blew up in our faces. This time it will probably mean that all the small company innovators who can't hire a staff of lawyers to file first are going to get screwed. Yeah, they may have prior art, but yeah they will need to hire an army of lawyers to defned it.
The bottom line is that innovators and scientists are good at inventing things. Lwayers and governments and conglomerates are good at controling things. Think about it. Patnets punish people who share and collaberate, and now with first file that will be more true than ever, who will share R&D when that very sharing could lock them out and screw them. If people think R&D costs are high now, just wait, and watch .... then they will say "wahhh, we need more patnets because R&D costs more than ever". The phrase, "the bad tree bears bad fruit has never been so true as with patnets."