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White House May Name Patent Reform Opponent As New Head of Patent Office
An anonymous reader writes The Obama Administration is set to appoint Phil Johnson, a pharmaceutical industry executive, as the next Director of the United States Patent and Trademark Office, according to sources. The move is likely to anger patent reform advocates given Johnson's past efforts to block legislation aimed at reining in patent trolls, and in light of his positions that appear to contradict the White House's professed goal of fixing the patent system. The top job at the Patent Office has been vacant for around 18-months since the departure of previous director David Kappos in early 2013. Currently, the office is being managed by former Googler Michelle Lee, who was appointed deputy director in December. Earlier this month, Republican Senators led by Orrin Hatch (R-UT) sent a letter to President Obama that praised Lee but that also described the current USPTO management structure as "unfair, untenable and unacceptable for our country's intellectual property agency."
Is anybody surprised? Claim to support Net Neutrality and give the power to the Cable lobby. He's done this before and he'll do it again. Hypocrite-in-chief.
At first I was fooled. Copyrights. Patents. Guantanamo Bay. What is it with this guy.
When all you have is a hammer, every problem starts to look like a thumb.
It seems like no matter what Obama says, he continues to appoint lobbyists with clear conflicts of interest to important positions rather than actually think about his choices. First it was Tom Wheeler at the FCC, and now a lobbyist and executive for Big Pharma in charge of patents. What causes him to keep doing this?
Who else to enforce draconian patent law bullshit as it is today? The guy who is pro that.
It seemed odd that only posts I see on this subject ("Classic Obama", "Obama ... What is it with this guy", and "Why does Obama keep doing this") all seem to suggest this hypocrisy is somehow unique to the current president.
Maybe I'm missing something as I was born in '88, was there a time when politicians weren't appointing people based on who would be best for the major corps in the industry.?How is this anything but the standard Corruption which we can expect from all future presidents?
This administration was supposed to bring health care costs down as everybody remembers. What we got was mandated coverage..Some deal. . NOW he has the nerve to appoint a pharma exec. to the gatekeepers post? Why do we never hear of bringing down the cost of medicine? Could it be...Wall street? So many questions .. so many siphons on the people.
This country is an Obamanation.
I'm an American. I love this country and the freedoms that we used to have.
What causes him to keep doing this?
Money.
But more seriously, this is one of the problems with electing a president with a short political CV/resume. His circle of trust doesn't have the critical mass of folks that can survive a vetting process (any than could have already got their job and gotten out after 4 years), so he has to rely on getting suggestions folks in an extended political operative/Washington insider circle which only knows people looking for a job from the pool perpetual bureaucratic lobbyist ruling class that's pretty much bought and sold themselves to the highest bidders...
The move is likely to anger patent reform advocates given Johnson’s past efforts to block legislation aimed at reining in patent trolls, and in light of his positions that appear to contradict the White House’s professed goal of fixing the patent system...
In December, Johnson testified before the Senate on behalf of the 21st Century Patent Coalition, a group of companies who opposed a bill that would have made it easier for defendants to challenge low-quality patents, and to recover legal costs in the face of frivolous patent lawsuits. (Johnson’s group ultimately prevailed last month when Senate Democrats killed the bill altogether.) Johnson has also opposed previous patent reform initiatives, describing them as “almost everything an infringer could ever want.”
"Patent reform" is not a single solution, with people lining up on opposites of a fence to either oppose or support it. There are many different issues, from patent trolls and shotgun litigation, to venue issues like the Eastern District of Texas, to the quality of examination at the USPTO, to patentability of software, to patentability of business methods (which is similar, but different), to patentability of medical diagnostic methods (also different), to issues of clarity and notice to potential infringers, to end user-targeted infringement lawsuits, to fee-shifting, etc., etc... Contrary to what the article believes, you can be in favor of some solutions while being opposed to others, and that doesn't make you a "patent reform opponent" or mean that your positions "contradict the goal of fixing the patent system." Rather, it means that you recognize that, like almost every other thing that reasonable people disagree about, there are shades of gray.
The reason these overly-broad patents used by the patent trolls are granted is because they don't get properly examined and rejected. The patent examiner isn't given time to do a sufficiently thorough search or to make a proper legal case against a patent application. Those cases become patents, and the costs that should have been paid in examination get paid many times over in litigation.
This guy has been part of the running of a pharmaceutical company. That kind of company deals with regulations of all kinds (from the FDA) and oftentimes manages to make a profit on generic medications. If he can provide better and efficiency to the administration of the USPTO, then he has my vote. That's the kind of reform that is truly needed...
This is a very dark development. ... after a 3 year delay .. a loophole in the law kicks in (basically they use 35 USC 135 (c) to trigger 35 USC 156 (a) ) and so they get 20 years from issuance date subtract 18 months until the patent expires. Their goal is to delay the patent issuance until the final quickly issued patent is about to expire .. then they will get the patent office to issue the new patents (the deliberately delayed ones). This allows them extended monopoly/royalties on LTE technology. This tactic is widely used. For example there are still patents from HDTV in the 1990s that have still not been issued. The patent law was changed in the early 90s to "prevent submarining" .. but a loophole was placed in there intended for pharmaceutical companies (cause FDA drug approvals can take a decade so it's unfair that they only get 10 years of monopoly).. but the problem with the loophole is that everyone else (non-pharmaceuticals) can use it too.
The patent system is being abused such that it is preventing product launches and stifling innovation/invention by anyone other than large entities. For example, let's look at what's happening with LTE. Currently corporations are submarining many of these patents so that it will be impossible to make a non-infringing LTE base station or smartphone even 30 years after most of the currently known LTE patents expire. Not all the patents on LTE are even known (this is deliberate so that lawsuit can be filed at a later date). Anyway, what do I mean by submarining? They filed some of these applications years ago and then saw to it that SOME the patents have not issued (while a few are issued)
This appointment needs to be protested properly.
This president would hire a Rapist to be in charge of a sexual assault prevention office with the goverment. You know, because of all the experience he could bring.
He is the most useless fucking tool of a president we've ever had. In fact useless would be an improvement. He's fucking evil. Fuck you Obama.
What was it called again? Corporate Plutocracy? Between todays SCOTUS ruling, and now a 'big pharma' exec. heading to US' top patent office position, how worse will things get before the corporate stranglehold faulters? I honestly did not see this coming 6 years ago, much less 2 or 3. I'm utterly in disbelief just how far things are swinging against the individual.
Blame Canada! Blame Canada!
t seems that everything's gone wrong
Since Canada came along
Blame Canada! Blame Canada!
They're not even a real country anyway!
WooHoo, a Obadman fanboi with mod points to burn! More overrated? Burn, Baby, Burn!
Of course, perhaps this one might be more accurate as "flamebait" for baiting the fanboi or "troll" for trolling the fanboi under the bridge with mod points. Or have you already burned all of yours on this article?
signed: Silly Offtopic AC
The move is likely to anger patent reform advocates given Johnson's past efforts to block legislation aimed at reining in patent trolls, and in light of his positions that appear to contradict the White House's professed goal of fixing the patent system.
Maybe they meant fixing the patent system, like people fix races.
Don't waste your vote! Vote for whoever you want, unless you live in a swing state it won't matter anyways
Obama campaigned as something of a techie, promising more government transparency, promised to uphold net neutrality, reel in the troops committed to the Land War in Asia, and has ended up having a shill for the media cartels as his Veep, actively supporting the NSA collect-it-all mentality, has appointed a former cable exec to chair the FCC, has slammed the press for calling him on his flip-flops, and generally shown an attitude of intellectual superiority and/or played the race card in criticizing his opponents. And now is apparently looking to book a Pharma rep as his PTO chief after Hatch (remember, the SCO Group apologist?) whined about it. I didn't vote for him either time, but he hasn't lived up to his PR by any stretch.
The fastest way to change someones opinion is to put them in charge of something that has the problem.
Obama is controlled by his white slave masters, such as the Rothschilds, Jp Morgans, Rockerfellers et all.
If Obama going against his white masters he will be assassinated.
The president of the United States has been completely controlled/powerless behind the scenes since Kennedy was assassinated.
Now you stupid fucks can stop wondering about "Why did Obama lie to me?" . It's because he's a slave.
To win the award for "biggest sellout in presidential history".
He's a very intelligent lawyer. I'm sure he's thinking very carefully about them.
dingo - a nominee to a federal office with anti-consumer/anti-voter conflicts of interest of sufficient depth & obviousness as to make hiring a dingo to babysit an infant seems sane by comparison. ex: Phil Johnson, Tom Wheeler, ... - wait, it's probably easier to name the ones who aren't... [crickets chirping]
obvious credit to John Oliver (or at least his writers)
I rather expected this.
You guys really have some learning to do. Obama promises very vague things, fundamental change or fix the XXX, and you read into it what YOU want rather than asking him for specifics. As long as you let your leaders get away with this sort of shenanigan you're going to be disappointed much or most of the time. "Patent reform" is another vague declaration. Patent reform to limit or eliminate patent trolling is specific. Patent reform to make it easier to obtain frivolous patents and use then for trolling is specific. Which one do you read into the statement, "I intend to see that the patent system is reformed?" Which one do you think will happen in reality?
Demand the specifics of your owners er legislators and POTUS. Then hold them to the specifics. Until you do you are going to be owned by the government rather than you being the government's owner. You should face any government officials with some strong well earned cynicism.
{^_^}
The Supreme Court did NOT just say your employer can dictate what kind of birth control you use your health insurance to buy... They ruled that the federal Government cannot force your employer to pay for your abortion BIG DIFFERENCE. You wanna kill yer kid? Go for it... BUT NOT ON YOUR EMPLOYER'S DIME (unless your employer agrees to pay, which many do). The Hobby Lobby people were perfectly willing to pay for over a dozen forms of conception control, JUST NOT THE FORMS THAT KILL A HUMAN EMBRYO. The Hobby Lobby people were NOT asking for the right to block employees from buying their own abortifacients or out-right medical abortions... they were only saying that they should not be forced to pay for a murder as part of the "cost of doing business"
Nobody forces anybody to take a job at Hobby Lobby, and Hobby Lobby's own employees were not sueing for this coverage... President Obama was simply demanding that the family that owns Hobby Lobby either violate their beliefs or go out of business; the man's an evil (supports child killing, refuses to uphold his oath to see that the laws are faithfully enforced, spies on everybody and uses drones to enforce his personal "kill list", etc) fascist (Merging corporate and government entities by force to push his policies) bastard (the bastard part is actual documented fact, read the mans AUTOBIOGRAPHY). You people on the left would be screaming bloody murder if President Bush had demanded that all employers buy a supply of Bibles (or Rush Limbaugh books, or other things YOU do not like) for their employees or be fined millions of dallars and be driven out of business; you're only angered here because your desire to jam your foul and obnoxious beliefs down other people's throats was thwarted.
"The guy we elected was smart, charismatic, capable, articulate; he ran a brilliant campaign that took out the heavily favored Hilary Clinton. He came across as a man with the intelligence, principles, and pragmatism to fix the nations problems"
I'm going to type something that will seem a slam against Obama, but that's really not my point (I'm not a fan of most politicians), read the whole post:
Where was the evidence for ANY of that? You were propagandized. All the democrat-run news networks told you he was "brilliant" and you bought it even though he sealed all his academic records (unlike all previous candidates) and you've still never seen them. The same people told you he was "capable" even though he'd never run ANYTHING, never been responsible for ANYTHING, never held a job that required ANY productivity or creativity. Now when he is unable to get things done, he blames the Republicans and those same news outlets help him (even though MOST presidents have had to deal with opponents in congress) Articulate? Have you ever seen him without a teleprompter? Sure all those same biased sources gushed about how "articulate" he was... but what was the true evidence? He stumbles and stutters like crazy without a teleprompter and even uses them to address elementary school kids (liberal Democrats ridiculed VICE Presidential candidate Palin for scribblying several words on her hand before giving a half-hour long speech without teleprompters). Was his campaign over Hillary TRULY "brilliant" or did she run a poor campaign (as she appears to be doing again) and was she jettisoned by a Democrat-leaning press that found a candidate it preferred to support? (Reminders: Hillary claimed the fairest coverage she got in 2008 was on Fox, and Bill is still bitter and said Obama "played the race card" against him and Hillary). As for "good intentions"... as the old saying goes: "The road to hell is paved with good intentions". George Bush and his supporters would say HE had "good intentions"...
My point is that people are easily manipulated, and the techniques politicians and their armies of advisors and campaign staff use are becoming increasingly sophisticated. Obama's own team brags about their "mirco-targetting" and other campaign breakthroughs (which, if you THINK about it are all just ways of manipulating people). The problem is made worse when 9 out of 10 journalists in the US have repeatedly admitted to being aligned with the Democrats. When that combined propaganda machine "kicks-in" and works on behalf of one person (no matter the skin color, gender, etc) the population is sadly ill-equipped to see through the marketing smoke screen and ask questions about actual abilities, actual qualifications, etc. Obama had NO applicable resume for the Presidency (and Hillary's was just as thin (former First Lady, and recipient of a donated Senate seat). Those two 2008 candidates did NOT have the qualifications of an FDR, a JFK, a Reagan, and LBJ, etc. and no amount of PR and friendly news coverage could cure it.
He has no skills doing ANYTHING other than "rabble-rousing"
He's great at standing at a podium and agitating a crowd with some abstract themes pushing quite-possibly unworkable ideas...and getting them to midlessly support him and adore him; It's a common trait of charismatic leftist leaders. WHAT EVIDENCE ever existed that [1] the guy knew how to DO anything? [2] the guy was sufficiently wedded to ANY promise to be willing to follow-through? [3] the policies were things he BELIEVED IN?
You bought a used car from a super-showy used car salesman without looking underneath for oil leaks and a straight frame, without opening the hood to see if it even had an engine, without checking its records to see if it had ever even been driven successfully as far as the corner store... and now with the "pink slip" in the hands of the Wall St bankers (who REALLY financed it) you've discovered that the care never worked and you cannot get it to go anywhere. hmmmmmm. Just WHO do you think made the bigger mistake here? Who failed to do "due diligence" before casting a vote? Are you STILL confused about how large masses of otherwise intelligent and decent human beings in places like 1917 Russia and 1930's Germany would form huge crowds to listen to charismatic leaders making broad promises of a bright future and then cast their support to him and fawn over him like brainwashed fools?????? No Obama is NOT Hitler or Lenin or Stalin, but you fell into that SAME trap that those populations fell into... you're just lucky the guy you fell for has not setup any death camps (well, there are 3 years left... and NO I'm not assertting he is going to, just that the average German or Russian did not see everything coming either...)
Knowing the business-ass-kissing^W^Wfriendly nature of your typical Republican Senator, I think the way to read that last bit is that the Republicans were unhappy that any restrictions are still in place on patentability and that they'd like the PTO to do nothing more than rubber stamp their campaign fund benefactors' patent applications and the quicker the better.
CUR ALLOC 20195.....5804M
Patents work like this: You have an idea? Don't publish it freely in the wide open for everyone to hear, instead come and apply for a patent at the patent office. Then they can show you their Bill-Marie, the patent attorney's hillbilly cousin with one eye and one tooth, from West VIrginia, came up with the exact same ideas as you 2 hours before you did, or you applied for a patent, and he beat you to do deadline by two hours, saying the exact things as you say. Which is why it's important to leave crucial details out of your patent, because if someone can understand it with eas , they kind of deserve to benefit.
And while we're at patents, a drug company executive has a lot more reasons to patent protect a drug invention, and he may not give a flying duck about math patents, untangible "innovations" with no real effect in the world..
He should do to the patent office what they did to labor relations. Just don't appoint a head at all and declare that all actions during that time are void.
Dam, I was half asleep writing that. Anyway, a drug company executive is not a bad idea to head the patent office, if you decide to have a patent office at all. In a post apocalyptic world patent policing and enforcement will be impossible anyway. Wait until we overgrow our limits and collapse, like Angkor Wat or the Aztec civilizations did. It happens to the best of the best too. I just saw the gas price dip back to 3.50's from near 4.00. Yeah, they are worried about bicyclization and motorized bicyclization. Which I'll have to do pretty soon to pinch pennies. Once I get an 120 mpg 66 cc gas motor on my bicycle, and make a commute that currently takes me 45 minutes at 60 mph in less than 2 hrs at 30 mph on a bicycle with a backpack, I'll have a method of transportation that can get me almost anywhere without needing car insurance, or even a driver's license. If really needed might have to limit speed to 20 mph, just to please the authorities who nitpick about 20 vs 30 mph, but they better limit this speed requirement to something like 5 mph, because it's coming. Especially when gas prices are over 5-8/gal. Check out this video https://www.youtube.com/watch?... How about this one, https://www.youtube.com/watch?... by the way electric bikes don't stink like lawn mowers, but they don't have the range of gas bicycles either, i.e. you can't commute to 50 miles with them. Bicycles make sense from the car repair standpoint too, it's like you can get a 500 dollar brand new super gas bicycle on the cost of a muffler job + brake job at the car repair shop. And that's when the repair guy can figure out what the heck the car chips are doing. The only problems with bicycles are rain and snow, but for rain I had a completely rainproof gear back in 07, and I never really got the chance to ride in snow much. So yeah, better keep the price of that gas under 4/gal, there is a whole lot at stake, including demand for gas, and sooo much of the economy goes into making cars, supplying cars, insuring cars, repairing cars, it's a major wallet sucker, that might simply go away past a tipping point. Life adapts.
Actually the ACA mandates that birth control be covered by insurance with no out of pocket expense to the insured so you're wrong there.