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White House Announces Reforms Targeting Patent Trolls
andy1307 writes "According to Politico (and, paywalled, at The Wall Street Journal), the White House on Tuesday [released] plans to announce a set of executive actions President Barack Obama will take that are aimed at reining in certain patent-holding firms, known as 'patent trolls' to their detractors, amid concerns that the firms are abusing the patent system and disrupting competition. The plan includes five executive actions and seven legislative recommendations. They include requiring patent holders and applicants to disclose who really owns and controls the patent, changing how fees are awarded to the prevailing parties in patent litigation, and protecting consumers with better protections against being sued for patent infringement."
Do these measures address arguably the most fundamental problem: too many things are patentable in the US and patents are awarded too easily in the first place?
If you disagree, post your argument. (-1, Overrated) isn't your personal censorship tool for views you don't like.
"Reining", not "reigning". Think horses, not kings.
"No, no, no. Don't tug on that. You never know what it might be attached to."
I've been thinking patent trolls are more a symptom of the problems. I see as reasonable:
1) You don't need to produce a product to have a patent (think small inventors looking for partners).
2) Patents should be transferable (can sell them)
3) You can sue for infringement
Simple as that you can now have companies that buy patents and sue for infringement. I suspect the real issue is #2 - if they are non-transferable then the inventor will have to license them. I think there would still be some troll law firms that represent a pool of inventors, but they'd have to share the "profits" and I suspect it would be less of a problem.
Another issue is probably the duration - 20 years is a long time for a patent, but primarily they should not be transferable.
I would argue that they should not be transferable from inventor to employer either, but that's a bit off topic - short version: your employment papers might include automatic licensing of inventions to the company under some terms. The US does not recognize companies as inventors - and rightly so IMHO.
"Executive Actions" mean diddly squat. Executive Orders are nothing more than directions to executive agencies how to enforce the existing law. He can't create new law (well I guess he can try) by fiat. So, unless Congress gets off its lazy ass and fixes patents, this does nothing.
The you clearly haven't read the law.
Section 271 of Title 35:
(a) Except as otherwise provided in this title, whoever without authority makes, uses, offers to sell, or sells any patented invention, within the United States or imports into the United States any patented invention during the term of the patent therefor, infringes the patent.
The "uses" part covers customers who have bought the infringing product. It is not common to go after the customers but it is legal and there are examples.
From the same administration that rammed through first to file, now we're supposed to believe they're out to help innocent patent victims? Seems more likely that someone decided that patent trolls were getting dangerous to the big boys. Expect to see no steps to prevent monopolists from using obvious patents to destroy potential competition.
... and protecting consumers with better protections against being sued for patent infringement.
How's that new? I thought consumers were exempt from these type of lawsuits. Should I have been reading patents before wasting money on my iPhone?
Do you not remember that case of the people who "invented wifi" in patent form? They went around suing small businesses using wifi. They did an interview where they were asked "have you gone after any home users?" to which they replied "not at this point".
No one is safe from the reach of their filth. It's just that suing home users probably isn't profitable. I would be curious though as to what would happen if you acquired an obvious patent and tried to sue a politician with it
This is indeed one aspect of the many problems with our patent system,. Another is the corporate strategy, initiated over a decade ago, which has virtually eliminated the interaction between innovative small firms and larger firms with the need for innovation and the deep pockets required to drive innovative products to market. After my small firm was purchased in 2000, I was ordered to inform all engineers that it would be a major (i.e. firing) violation of corporate policy if they let themselves become aware of the intellectual property of any other firm. I was told that this had recently been adopted as corporate policy by most major firms as a brilliant defense against the feared "triple damages" awards for patent infringement. Corporate policy explicitly banning any effort to learn about other firms' patents currently eliminates any possibility of a court awarding triple damages - even if patent infringement were proven. Since most innovative small firms lack the financial resources needed to take on a multi-year legal battle, even if they were able to show infringement on their patent, this new corporate policy amounted to a free pass for large wealthy firms to simply steal innovations from innovative small firms. The worst thing that could happen would be that the small firm won in court, at which point the worst-case punishment would be to pay 'damages' - which are defined as simply the amount that the stealing firm would have had to pay had they properly licensed the patents from the small firm in the first place. While this is considered a brilliant legal strategy, it is a disastrous national policy for technological innovation. It virtually eliminates the financial incentive for small firms to invest in innovation, by providing carte blanche for larger firms to simply steal that innovation; the logical large firm strategy in this case is to never discuss intellectual property with any small firm - simply steal it and defy them to take you to court. We do indeed need to make war on patent trolls, but even more importantly, we need to make war on patent thieves - by punishing deliberate ignorance of patent theft with large penalties. If it is proven that infringement occurred, and that the infringing firm had a policy of deliberate ignorance, the damage award should be at least tripled. Or - we should start letting speeders go free if they claim ignorance of the speed limit because they chose to deliberately avert their eyes every time a speed limit sign came near.
The you clearly haven't read the law.
Section 271 of Title 35:
(a) Except as otherwise provided in this title, whoever without authority makes, uses, offers to sell, or sells any patented invention, within the United States or imports into the United States any patented invention during the term of the patent therefor, infringes the patent.
The "uses" part covers customers who have bought the infringing product. It is not common to go after the customers but it is legal and there are examples.
As an example of going after customers, see the story about patent trolls extorting money from business who use scan-to-email functionality. There are more recent stories on this subject, but this one from January is what I can find right now.
Just call it "System and Method for use of a Combination of Reciprocating Frictional Motion and Visual Stimuli for the Production of Half-Sequence Genomes in a Saline Solution."
They'll approve that in no time.
If he can ignore the 4th amendment, occasionally the 1st amendment, and target citizens for assassination why should patent law be any different?
When I buy something, I do not enter into a license with everyone who owns a patent on every aspect of what I buy. I buy a friggin' product -- the pissing contests aren't my problem.
Like I said, by the time I can walk into Wal Mart and buy something, you need to indemnify the consumer. Because at the check out, there isn't a place where I initial a license with some company I've never heard of. If the vendor isn't compliant, well, that's their problem.
Lost at C:>. Found at C.
If two people independently invent something, then I think it should be non-patentable by definition.
The whole point of patents is to make public information on how to do something *that would otherwise be lost*. If multiple people independently invent something, then it seems to me that it is not in danger of being lost.
If the only reason something is patentable is because nobody ever had that specific problem before, but the solution is obvious to an expert, then it shouldn't be patentable.
Making the competition paying them 1b dollars, or limit their distribution, over patents should count. And trolling with patents won't make you a patent troll, after all?