Slashdot Mirror
Venture Capitalists Lobby Against Software Patents
ciaran_o_riordan writes "No matter which side the US Supreme Court's Bilski decision pleases, it will be just the beginning of the software patent debate in the USA — the other side will start a legislative battle. The lobbying has already begun, with venture capitalist Brad Feld arguing against software patents, mailing a copy of Patent Absurdity to 200 patent policy setters. As Feld puts it, 'Specifically, I'm hoping the film will bring you to an understanding of why patents on software are a massive tax on and retardant of innovation in the US.' The patent lawyers and big patent holders often tell us that patents are needed to secure investment, so it's interesting to see now that venture capitalists are refuting that. And Brad Feld isn't the only vocal one; there's a growing list."
Every now and again the United States does get it right.
Before the United States government forced aircraft manufacturers and patent holders into the Manufacturers Aircraft Association there was a patent war that resulted in lots of litigation in the United States but no aircraft manufacturing or innovation once the patent war started.
When a real war broke out, WW1, the United States had to buy aircraft from France because the United States business ventures were more interested in lawsuits than making aircraft.
After ending the patent war by forcing everyone into a patent pool the aircraft industry in the United States took off.
There are other similar cases that plainly show how the patent system has been a failure from the beginning in serving the Constitutional requirements. To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts.
My hope is that software patents will be made irrelevant one way or the other... by those countries that don't implement them.
In effect, it's trying to force a (IMHO: ridiculous) concept onto the rest of the world. Some countries may go along with that, and patent holders (& lawyers!) will profit. But other countries may not, and will be able to do things that would require lots of red tape elsewhere. And thus: be more competitive by ignoring software patents.
Any type of 'intellectual property' is only a profitable starter if you can get others to go along. But the more you push things into the realm of ridiculous, the fewer people/countries actually will. And when that happens, you have the red tape slowing you down, they don't.
Copyrights may have a place, patents may have their place (I'm not so sure about either), but patents on pure software constructs are totally uncalled for. The sooner they're abandoned, the better.
Let patent owners state a value for their IP. Let them be taxed at a certain percent, say 1% per year. Allow anyone to buy the IP into the public domain for the stated price. Ideally this idea would be applied to both patents and copyright. I claim this idea as my own. I had it while taking a shower about eight years ago. Please make use of it.
Patent Absurdity explores the case of software patents and the history of judicial activism that led to their rise, and the harm being done to software developers and the wider economy
Call it a fallacy, but using that term automatically destroys a significant amount of your credibility. Particularly when you use it incorrectly. It does not mean, "any judicial decision which I dislike." Judicial activism is when a judge writes new law... For example, if a judge were to look at 35 USC 101, which says that patentable subject material includes "any new and useful process, machine, manufacture, or composition of matter" and pretend that software is not a process, or that "process" doesn't include software, that would be judicial activism.
In fact, technically, the rule that everyone who's against software patents points to for why software should not be patentable - no patenting abstract algorithms - was a judicial decision writing a new limitation into the law, and was therefore "judicial activism". But we don't call it that, because we like that decision.
This is so true! According to "Innovation for Dummies" book, a patent only grants the right to forbid others to make a product. Patents do not give you any right to make anything. This is a very important distinction. A patent is the ability to deny others, not the ability to make something.
If you build a better airplane, you can patent all the innovative features (and not so innovative ones) as much as you like... and then you probably still can't make the plane... because there will be other patents or IP that your innovative airplane incorporates. If you can't get all the patent holders to agree to let you make the airplane, then you cannot make a product. The only way to make money off of your patent is to further deny others the ability to use the idea until they pay.
The notion of counting the patents issued in a country to measure "innovation" is terrible. It really means the opposite; that progress is actually slower in that country the more patents are issued. It doesn't mean that the whole idea of patents are bad, but each patent already issued slows future product development for the country as a whole . Given the societal costs of an issued patent, we really should put the bar higher, and grant patents only for really great innovations. Each current issued patent is like a grit of sand gumming up new product development... so each patent issued, if any, had better be worth quite a bit.
There was this event in history commonly referred to as The Great Depression which was followed by many of the same regulations that were removed because prior to implementing these regulations there was a similar financial melt down in many cases caused by similar financial bubbles and out of control chicanery.
I find it to be more than a coincidence that the S&L crisis followed deregulation and the current financial melt down also followed deregulation.
And the fact that the regulations, like the Glass-Steagall Act of 1933, came after the Great Depression suggests your conclusion about the regulations causing the crisis are dead wrong. Hell, the deregulation is what created "To Big to Fail" not the enactment of regulations.