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Tech Giants Pooling Cash To Buy Patents
theodp writes with a link to a Reuters report, based on a WSJ story, that "Verizon, Google, Cisco, and HP are among the companies that have joined a secretive group called the Allied Security Trust. Each of the companies will reportedly put $5 million in escrow to allow AST to snap up intellectual property on their behalf before it falls into the hands of parties that could use it against them. Patents will be resold after AST member companies have granted themselves a nonexclusive license to the underlying technology. According to AST CEO Brian Hinman, a former VP of IP and Licensing at IBM, the arrangement will keep member companies out of antitrust trouble." (The WSJ's story itself is more detailed, but it's subscriber-only.)
If this is to be used for defensive measures, it's another sign of how badly broken the US patent system is - and how expensive that brokenness is to big businesses.
If it's to be used for offensive measures, then it's another sign of how badly broken the US patent system is - and how expensive that brokenness is to small businesses.
Is crushing a suspect's child's testicles illegal?
John Yoo: "No, [if] the President thinks he needs to do that."
If ever this was a great boon to the IP Squatters! I see a bundle of the folks setting up "business models" based wholly on selling IP to this single group.
If you want news from today, you have to come back tomorrow.
If this doesn't send a clear signal regarding how totally broken the current patent system is what will?
I actually like the basic idea behind the patent system. I think it fosters innovation and provides reasonable reward but it's completely lost its way in the area of computing.
Unlike some I don't actually think we need a complete re-think of the patent system. What we need to do is think long and hard about the hurdle a patent in computing needs to jump over to be accepted because it appears the current hurdle is too low.
I used to have a better sig but it broke.
...is now shit out of luck, because there are 6+ companies that will smash them into the ground for trying to use every single practical approach to whatever they're trying to do, instead of a single one?
This is Slashdot. Common sense is futile. You will be modded down.
So here we are at the base camp to another bubble in speculation and hyperinflation, this time in the market of IDEAS.
The way things used to work, advertisers tried to convince you of the utility and attractiveness of their products. Speculators predicted how much a product or resource would sell for. Now we will have ads and speculators working in the field of ideas, which are thoughts, which is a little disturbing to me.
It will happen soon that ads will be for brand names (not products); campaigns will be waged with one trademark against another; mascots engaging in mudflinging; ads proclaiming that some product has the most patents...
I see mutual-fund-like holding groups for IP that will begin paying big dividends. I see the market changing from product- and service-driven to trademark-driven.
Dammit I told myself no more posting before coffee.
The point I'm trying to make is that I foresee a huge bubble in patents and trademarks, and speculation thereof, and I'm worried that it could be the last straw for our poor economy. OK.
-b
No offense, but I've stopped responding to AC's.
Spell this out to me. How does it sound like racketeering?
From what I can see, some companies have banded together to purchase patents related to stuff they might want to do in oder to give themselves a perpetual license, and then resell the patent. Unless they are going to hide the license in order to claim the patent is more valuable, I'm not sure where the evil is. If the Telecoms are the only companies that the patents are useful too, then it is no different then joe small selling them a license anyways, Most of the value of the patent will be gone once the license to the people most likely to use it is done. It is no different then you leasing a car for your family (wife and two teen age drivers) to drive. You'll get killed on the miles and it is a stupid idea but that doesn't make it illegal.
What we need is to fix the problem, which is a broken patent system and an unqualified oversight mechanism. Courts aren't much help to settle issues because an (un|de)qualified jury simply listening to testimony of experts just isn't effective or fair.
What's going to end up happening with all these companies spending billions is that they will come to embrace the current screwed-up system and probably defend it because of their investment. They even may end up lobbying to maintain the status quo.
The small developer is screwed in the butt as usual.
Lobbying congress to fix the patent system, instead of buying patents?
Nice to see that we're developing another system whereby giant corporations are free to operate, and smaller enterprises are barred from entry. I'm sure that is exactly what Adam Smith had in mind for free market competition.
Stop-Prism.org: Opt Out of Surveillance
These guys are going to be SOOOOOO pissed when they find out over 95% of the world isn't even under US IP laws, and those that are pay no attention ;)
- Adam L. Beberg - The Cosm Project - http://www.mithral.com/
Well, turnabout's fair play, right? How would you feel as the vendor whose religion forbids you to sell clothes without hoods to women, and still this foreign woman insists on buying a shirt without a hood? Would you throw your (religous) principles out the door to make that sale or would you refuse the sale?
If your answer is that you'd sell the shirt, I was right in my first comment; the problem with you is that you have no principles.
Now, I think that I and Migraineman above agreed that the rules of the free market most of the time requires one to let ones principles take the backseat to capitalistic concerns, but that does not mean that we cannot see that it is not always the most humane or even the right thing to do.
I stand by my point that society as a whole probably would benefit from people standing up more for their principles.
"Total destruction the only solution" - Bob Marley