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Court Blocks Controversial New Patent Rules
An anonymous reader writes "InformationWeek is reporting that a court in Virginia has issued an injunction against controversial new patent rules that were supposed to go into effect tomorrow. The court granted a motion filed by GlaxoSmithKline, which is suing the US patent office over the issue.
Among other things, the new rules would limit the extent to which existing patent applications can be modified. The patent office says the new rules would speed up the patent process, but critics say they hurt inventors."
Name at least one genuine inventor who put in the hard work, personally received at least 10% of license revenues and did not take advantage of other people's work by patenting vaporware and waiting for someone else to build an actual product. Current patent system only benefits large companies by driving startups out of business by requiring prohibitive legal costs to ship any product. Lets cut the crap about benefitting the little guys.
It's the number one way to fight for something that the facts tend to be against. If you're on the wrong side of the facts you can't exactly make an Argument from Logos. You may or may not be able to make an argument from Ethos, depending on how well known you are, patent trolls tend to be unknown or disliked, so they can't use that.
They're left with just Pathos, trying to get people emotionally rallied behind an argument by asking them to think about what effect (insert strawman that's highly unlikely to happen but sounds like what the other side is arguing for) will have on (insert group that looks small and poor, someone whose life depends on the current system).
It's the same system the RIAA uses, some argue the government does the same thing (I happen to agree), it's the last argument of those unable to argue from reason, as such it's used a lot by groups who are heavily disliked as they have nothing else to turn to.
There are two kinds of fool One says 'This is old therefore good' Another says 'This is new therefore better'- Dean Ing
One of the tenets of the capitalist system is clear ownership of property. How can one invest if the ownership can be taken away.
Yet, the current patent system dies exactly this. The abuses that are possible under the current system allow for someone to develop a product and later, through the monopoly granted under the patent system, effectively have that intellectual property taken away.
The problems are many: submarine patents, the fact that the possible award of punitive damages discourages searches for pre-existing patents, the over-broad patents that may or may not apply. Uncertainty kills investment and the current patent system provides plenty of uncertainty.
The real "Libtards" are the Libertarians!
Don't you think patenting PCR as a tool to screen for cancer is still insanely broad?
You really should be trying to patent a sequence of your gene transcript (GATTACATACA...) as it applies to pancreatic cancer, and not the entire PCR technique.
It's not exactly the breakthrough of the century these days that PCR might be used in some way to screen for cancer, you know.
Obama likes poor people so much, he wants to make more of them.
Why oh Why are the courts involved at all?
Checks and balances again. The courts are involved because Congress, once again, dropped the goddamn ball.
You know, when dogs get rabies, becoming irrational and dangerous to humans, they are taken out and shot. Congress may or may not have rabies (although some its members often act like they do) but they have certainly become irrational and dangerous. What are we going to do about them? Shoot votes at them?
The higher the technology, the sharper that two-edged sword.
Isn't GlaxoSmithKline the company that patented Prilosec? And then when the FDA would no longer let them charge inflated prices for Prilosec "to cover their development costs", didn't GlaxoSmithKline then repackage Prilosec in purple capsules and re-patent it as Nexium, for which they could in turn charge inflated prices? Gee, why would GSK be concerned about greater patent scrutiny?