Group Attacks Bad Software Patents Before They're Approved

Posted by samzenpus on Wednesday September 18, 2013 @02:01PM from the not-on-our-watch dept.

Curupira writes "Ars Technica discusses how the Linux Defenders group are exercising the rights granted by the America Invents Act to identify and fight the patents that potentially threaten Linux and open source software. From the article: 'In a session at LinuxCon today, Linux Defenders director Andrea Casillas explained how the group is using rights granted by the new law to fight patent applications. A project of the Open Invention Network, Software Freedom Law Center, and Linux Foundation, Linux Defenders examines the 6,000 new patent applications published each week, attempting to identify those that are potentially threatening to Linux and open source. Then, the group looks for prior art that would invalidate at least some of the claims in the patents.'"

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Re:Good intentions but potentially harmful by Anonymous Coward · 2013-09-18 15:17 · Score: 5, Insightful

Actually, I would say the opposite. Only a very, very small percentage of patents are ever actually asserted. Looking at every patent application that is published and submitting prior art with descriptions of the prior art is vastly more time consuming than simply looking up previously identified prior art and killing only those patents that are later asserted. Also, it is much harder to patent owners to amend claims after the patent has issued.