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Supreme Court Continues to Address Patent Concerns
The Supreme Court has taken on another possibly landscape-changing patent case that will determine if patent holders are able to sue everyone up and down the food chain for a patent infringement. "This case, officially between LG and Quanta, really concerns the question of how many times patent holders can get a cut of any component found violating a patent. Currently, patent holders will often sue up and down the food chain. So, if you happen to have a patent on a component within a motor that is used in automobile wipers, you could sue the motor maker, the wiper maker and the auto manufacturer -- and get all three to pay, even though the same product is used throughout the supply chain. This case will look at whether or not it makes sense to allow for that type of double, triple or quadruple dipping."
the car dealer, the owner when she sells the car, the used car dealer, the shop for replacing the wiper motor when it breaks, and the parts store for selling them the replacement
...are the lawyers.
Yeah? Well I think you're overrated too.
Of course it doesn't make sense to sue the whole food chain. Sue the manufacturer of the specific part, and leave it at that. Imagine how much fun it'd be if someone discovered that Award (or some other major BIOS manufacturer) had violated a patent in their BIOSes. There is no way the rest of the food chain can verify that no patents have been violated. Of course they can sue Award for damages, but imagine 400 companies suing Award. Anyone get any money? Nah. It would be incredibly expensive for a large manufacturer (eg. Dell) to verify that each and every component it uses does not violate any patents or IP. Same way with a car. Car manufacturers manufacture a fraction of the components themselves, and buy eg. wiper motors from Bosch.
This case will look at whether or not it makes sense to allow for that type of double, triple or quadruple dipping.
That depends. who's asking? It always makes sense if you're a lawyer.
The theory of relativity doesn't work right in Arkansas.
If you deny legal redress, with exception for 'first sale' defendants, then you could certainly expect to see shady companies simply subcontracting out for any possible patent infringing items.
1) Setup a puppet company
2) Infringe all you want
3) Profits!!! stay safe (safely stolen) from patent holders
The real problem is who do you have to sue based on what your patent claims.
Let's take the example used in the summary of a component used in a motor in a windshield wiper blade. What does the new component do that made it patentable?
- Is the innovation purely in the use in a motor? (Reducing wear and tear?)
- Or maybe is the innovation in its effect on the wiper? (A smoother wiping motion with less noise?)
- Or maybe is the innovation in how the car performs? (Allowing a more aerodynamically friendly wiper?)
What if the patented item does all three and claims all three things? Does a SCOTUS decision ruling that you can only collect once open the door for a finger-pointing exercise between defendants (something the courts like to avoid) in trying assign infringement? Does going straight to the bottom of the supply chain always make sense? (For example, what if it doesn't do anything for the motor itself but only for the higher level functions?)
These are very important balance issues that the SCOTUS will have to consider.
If it's for-profit but free, you're not the customer -- you're the product (e.g., the Slashdot Beta's "audience").
IANAL, etc.
I think that the Roberts court has done an admirable job of tackling real legal issues and helping to make the law consistant, just, and effective. For example, they have addressed:
1) Can religions use otherwise illegal drugs in their ceremonies? Yes (interestingly, as a matter of statutory rather than constitutional law). See UVD v. Gonzalez.
2) What constitutes a patent being "obvious?" An obvious innovation is now defined in a way which is meaningful and can be meaningfully used as a defense.
Now if we can only get a few more questions answered such as:
Are exclusive copyright licenses divisible? (9th circuit says no)
Under what circumstances can a non-exclusive copyright permission (such as the BSDL) grant given to all third parties be changed (i.e. in the Atheros incident)?
LedgerSMB: Open source Accounting/ERP
I propose a axillary test for obviousness. If two or more companies already implemented your patent before your initial application date then your invention was too obvious to patent. This seems like a common sense idea. That if someone is already using your proposed idea you ought not to be able to patent it. This would drastically cut down on patent trolling.
"There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy."
Ever wonder why lawyers write the laws? And no this isn't about some vast conspiracy by the megacorps to make people hate lawyers. A lawyer acting in your best interests involves you not being in court anymore and protected in the future, which is entirely counter to their best interests of being in court and continuing to bill someone. The common man can do nothing until the laws are written by common men, common men cannot write the laws so long as people attempt to exploit them. The folk clever in manipulating the law for exploiting are lawyers, so you must hire another lawyer to defend yourself against that, and the cycle continues forevermore. The underlying desire of men to exploit eachother lead to the creation and continuation of lawyers. The best you can do is get a lawyer from out of town so that the opposition's lawyer isn't his golfing buddy and he might actually do a decent job of representing you.
The only change I can believe in is what I find in my couch cushions.
While it is refreshing to see an outburst of sanity from the Supreme Court, remember that Congress can proceed to pass new laws (a point made by the blogger.)
If the commercial interests in the patent system in its current form are able to purchase enough political influence, Congress may take the steps needed to make software and friends explicitly patentable under the law.
The only answer to something like that would be to vote in people who would change the law back to something sane. Will it happen? Who knows. It doesn't seem too terribly fantastic given the current system...
"I object to doing things that computers can do." -- Olin Shivers, lispers.org
Of course it makes sense to sue as many people as you can, because after all, each lawsuit makes money for lawyers. More law suits means more work for litigation experts, and after all, keeping the lawyers and judges employed is what this is all about REALLY.
Seven puppies were harmed during the making of this post.
First sale doctrine already does apply to patents. More commonly referred to a patent exhaustion. The linked to -> linked to "patently o" reference explains it:
"Exhaustion - also known as the first sale doctrine - serves as a default rule in both patent and copyright laws. Under the principle, a license fee is only be charged one time per object. Thus, a rights holder controls the first sale of a protected object, but does not control subsequent sales. The copyright rule is codified in Section 109. The patent rule, however, is only based on case law."
You can ignore this if you prefer hysteria and misinformation to reality.
"Ladies and gentlemen, my killbot features Lotus Notes and a machine gun. It is the finest available."
This is not particularly new. People have been saying for a long time now that when it comes to the legal system, sometimes the winning move is not to play.
"Ladies and gentlemen, my killbot features Lotus Notes and a machine gun. It is the finest available."
...the good ones actually mount insightful arguments against abusive patent strategies.
IANAL.
;^)
In any case, I'm pretty sure Dell doesn't patent a computer design using an Award Bios chip (since a bios is software and generally flashed into a commodity rom device).
But for arguments sake, if Phoenix had a patent on a method and apparatus for combobulating a XYZ-Bus device which they reduced to practice in their Bios code and Award implemented this in their Bios and licenced their bios to Dell. If Dell had another patent on a method and aparatus for discombobulating a ZYX-Bus device using a XYZ-device combobulator, Dell's patent doesn't need to be reworked or recalled at all even if some other Phoenix won some patent suit against Award. Although it might be tough for Dell to implement their patent withough infringing on an XYZ-device combobulator patent from Phoenix, but then again, no competitor of Dell could implement their patent for discombobulation on a ZYX-Bus device either using Phoenix's XYZ-device combobulator without violating Dell's patent (which is why Dell probably wouldn't re-work/recall their patent even if Dell couldn't work out a deal with Phoenix to be able to implement their own patent. They would just keep the patent to screw Phoenix's other customers).
Even if Phoenix doesn't sue Dell, it probably does cost Dell some small money to work around this, but it doesn't mean Dell's patent is worth less money or would have to be invalidated and/or need to be reworked, though. Dell or Award would just find some way to implement ZYX-Bus device discombobulation that didn't violate Phoenix's patent, patent this new thing and Dell would just carry on. As it stands today, Phoenix could sue Dell, but some might argue that this is unfair and they should just be able to sue Award.
Having said all that, there's no way in hell that Phoenix would ever sue Award (since they are the same company now). AMI on the other hand might consider it
Your milage may vary of course...
Maybe next they'll look at how many people the RIAA can sue over the P2P distribution of the same song. They've settled with Napster, KaZaA, some sort of deal with the major ISP's, and are now after normal consumers and college students.
"It's the height of ridiculousness to say for those 9 lines you get hundreds of millions."
Fabulous display of ignorance Ping. The sole inventors and the small businesses are the groups that stand to lose the most by a weakened patent system If patents are weakened, the biggest bullies... i.e. those with the most money... always win. Patents give the little guys a boost. And who do you think all the "patent trolls" are? Right, they're little companies who have nothing but patents and sue big companies for royalties or injunctions. Remember the "Blackberry Scare" last year. Who owned the patent that almost brought down everyone's Crackberries? Why it was a tiny little company.
Hey look at this, I found the origional patent for fire. Guess I get to sue anyone that uses fire for infringing on my family patent. Anyone who makes lighters, firewood, fireplaces, stoves, ovens, cars, planes, etc. Im rich man Im rich!
eh I can dream anyway
There goes my patent for using a gas turbine to power a ducted fan for the purpose of generating thrust for aircraft.
LedgerSMB: Open source Accounting/ERP
SCOTUS
Supreme Court Of The United States.
Most people figure this out from context.
Come on mods, don't be stupid. Or are you being partisan? I can't tell which. Neither is excusable.
This post is exactly on topic. If you wish to argue facts, accuracy, or politics then that's something entirely different than Offtopic.
This "article" is about the Supreme Court (SCOTUS, aka "the Roberts court") dealing with a "real legal [issue]". This post is arguing that they have "[helped] to make the law consistent, just, and effective". It implies that they will do so IN THIS CASE TOO! This is simply not offtopic. Whatever else it is, it is NOT offtopic.
Meta-mods, would you please (electronically) whack these idiots down so they don't get mod points in the future? Thanks.
The Principle of Final Sale should act as a firewall against this kind of touring lawsuit - justice is based in intent. Punishment should not derive from ignorance.