Inventor Says Google Is Patenting His Public Domain Work (arstechnica.com)

Rob Riggs writes: Jarek Duda, the inventor of a compression technique called asymmetric numeral systems (ANS), dedicated the invention to the public domain. Since 2014, Facebook, Apple, and Google have all created software based on his breakthrough. Google is now trying to patent a video encoding scheme using the compression technique. The inventor is fighting Google in the European courts and has won a preliminary ruling. The fight's not over and Google is also seeking a patent with the USPTO. A Google spokesperson says Duda came up with a theoretical concept that isn't directly patentable, "while Google's lawyers are seeking to patent a specific application of that theory that reflects additional work by Google's engineers," reports Ars Technica. "But Duda says he suggested the exact technique Google is trying to patent in a 2014 email exchange with Google engineers."

Comments

Dumb smart people

[fluffernutter]

There's a lesson here. If you have a good idea, don't fucking tell Google about it! Don't put it on your android phone, don't discuss it in email, don't type more than you have to in the search bar.

Re:Dumb smart people

[tlhIngan]

That's ridiculous. You had up to a year to file before Obama changed that if you were the inventor. Now, Obama changed the rules to first to file so that has destroyed the concept of the small guy using patents to protect their work.

The only difference between first to invent and first to file is when two people try to patent the same thing. In first to invent, the patent office has to examine all the documentation behind it and figure out who rightfully invented it first. In first to file, it's simple - whoever gets their application to the patent office first wins.

The "1 year disclosure" is a separate issue - in the US, you could disclose your idea to the public up to a year before filing your patent. That's it. Obviously, under first to file, this is no longer workable (since someone could see your idea and patent it first).

Be aware the US was the only country in the world with first to invent and 1 year disclosure. Every other country in the world was first to file, and no disclosure.

The implications are bigger - first, no disclosure means the first time someone speaks out in public about the idea, the idea is no longer patentable. By spilling the beans prior to filing the patent, you've invalidated your right to the patent (after all, what's to keep someone else from filing a patent somewhere else and stealing it from you?).

First to file makes no attempt to figure out who invented something first - so the little guy no longer has to prove he got this idea while hanging a clock, slipping and bonking his head on the toilet. BTW, it was rumored that Bell got the patent for the telephone by beating whomever else it was by about 15 minutes to the patent office.

This way, disclosure trumps patenting worldwide. The fact this guy's algorithm is public means you cannot patent it at all. What can be patented is a novel modification to it, though I'm not sure what Google did to it to make it work with video.

Re:It's called Prior Art

[ShanghaiBill]

All inventions are built on the complex work of others. But you cannot preclude someone from inventing new things using your public domain technology.

Did you RTFS? He is claiming that Google's extensions are also documented prior art.

Re:It's called Prior Art

[lordlod]

If he invented the machine screw, Google is claiming a patent for a machine screw used to hold together a bookcase.

There is no transformative act, simply a straightforward application in an expected field.

The patent system is broken

[viperidaenz]

Patent examiners only look at prior patents for prior art. They don't have the time to look else where.
If you share an invention that isn't patented, someone will find it and apply for a patent. It it really is novel and nothing like it has been patented before it will be granted. They will then use it to sue everyone you shared the information with. Starting with the little guys who can't afford a decent lawyer.

It's extremely time consuming and expensive to invalidate a patent.

Re:The patent system is broken

[StormReaver]

[If] it really is novel and nothing like it has been patented before it will be granted.

If you work for a large company, use the phrase, "with a computer," and can pay the application fees, it will be granted.

Re:The patent system is broken

[shanen]

Slashdot needs an IOttMCO mod point for such comments. Moot for me (of course), since I never get a mod point to give. Actual solution would be fixing the moderation system properly, but you know that ain't never goinna happen because whoever owns Slashdot [whipslash et al. are owners #4? #7? Or someone else now?], no one can figure out a better financial model to pay for the MUCH needed improvements.

Maybe the real problem is "No patent here"? If Slashdot were a patent-generating profitable corporate cancer, there would be PROFIT galore. Some of that profit could then be invested in fixing Slashdot, eh? What a hilarious theory.

To actually display insight, I think the OP needs to link the increasing EVIL of the google with the brokenness of patent (and copyright) law. The original objective of patent law was to encourage innovation (and creativity) for the benefit of society and all the human beings therein. Now the objective has evolved to profit maximization for the corporate cancers with the mostest and the bestest lawyers.

The article is moot and pointless. If suffices for the EVIL google's purposes if the lawyers on this front make sure this approach is never patented by any other corporate cancer. Meanwhile, they have sent engineers out on flanking attacks and as soon as they devise an alternative approach that can be patented, they will capture that patent and win the battle.

All pointless, of course. A corporate cancer can NEVER win the war of maximizing profit because there is no biggest number. There are bigger numbers than googol.

As usual, it all derives from the combination of my sig and the religious dictum "There is no gawd but Profit, and the google wants to be Profit's #1 prophet."

Did you know that Barney Google existed long before the google? Some corporate cancer should buy that copyright and use it to extract profit from the google. Either that or force the google to change its spots (like the leopard). That battle of the cancers could actually be funny to watch.

Re:The patent system is broken

[eddeye]

Patent examiners only look at prior patents for prior art.

You mean, like electronic journals (not the slashdot kind)? Yeah too bad USPTO doesn't have any of those. Well not many. Just a few:

"The Scientific and Technical Information (STIC) provides examiners access to Non-Patent Literature (NPL) through multiple electronic tools purchased from various publishers.... NPL encompasses all the TC subject areas and includes electronic books, periodicals, conferences, standards, dissertations, and much more. STIC currently subscribes to 78,000+ electronic journals and over 359,000 electronic books in full text."

Yep, it's a real shame they only look at patents as prior art. Except, you know, thousands upon thousands of other sources. A real shame.

I'll just leave this here... USPTO prior art electronic search resources

This is just an algorithm right?

[Trogre]

Then how the hell did it get anywhere near a patent office?

Re:FIRST TO FILE

[voss]

First to file only protects against a competing patent. It does not prevent a patent from being invalidated because someone else invented it prior to disclosure,

Re:It's called Prior Art

[PPH]

Which is no longer novel or non obvious. Google should not be granted a patent. Even on the derivative use.

Re:It's called Prior Art

[Anonymous Coward]

Which is no longer novel or non obvious. Google should not be granted a patent. Even on the derivative use.

The problem is: How do you know some other company won't patent it, and the USPTO or courts won't allow it? If so, they can sue Google for using it.

If I were Google, I would file the patent. If it gets rejected, then there is a paper trail showing that the invention is not patentable.

Re: It's called Prior Art

[gl4ss]

care to explain the extensions to the patent then?

is it like "oh but we coded this up in a programming language and used it to encode a stream that has video inside it and thats a novel invention" ?

Re:It's called Prior Art

[PPH]

This is a good point. And many companies do this with no intention of milking obvious patents for profit. They just don't want some patent troll to cause them problems in the future.

Re: It's called Prior Art

[darkain]

"with a computer"

Re:Be evil

[Deep Esophagus]

I'm sure he'll do fine in the courts. After all, Google doesn't really have the resources to fight this and they have a history of just rolling over in the face of adversity.

Re:FIRST TO FILE

[Anubis IV]

Prior art can only invalidate a patent if said prior art was itself patented.

That’s patently (pun intended) false. Prior art, patented or not, can be used to invalidate a patent. You can’t patent an existing invention, regardless of if you’re the first to file. If nothing else, that should be patently obvious (pun oh-so-intended) on account of the filing’s failure to pass the “non-obvious” test. If someone else has already invented it, the idea is obvious at that point, particularly so if the inventor verifiably disclosed it to you prior to your filing.

Re: It's called Prior Art

[LostMyBeaver]

Ok... I just read up on ANS. It was quite an enlightening read and it's humorous because I remember thinking of a similar pattern when working with arithmetic coding 10 years back.

Here's the thing. The simplicity of ANS is elegant in its nature.

It's also extremely obvious in hindsight, though I'll be absolutely shocked if anyone in the courtroom except for Duda will understand that.

I would however say that because ANS is effectively so amazingly simple in its nature, if Duda's argument is to keep Google from patenting their extensions as opposed to trying to file for a patent himself later, I believe it would be much easier to suggest that the base math as well as the extension are non patentable under the pretense that they are not as much algorithms as opposed to mathematical discoveries or formulas.

There are some catches to this.

The probability distribution S may justify the math as an algorithm rather than as a formula.

But I would say otherwise that no part of this compression should be able to be patented under the same grounds that a Taylor series couldn't be patented. And while I haven't become an expert on the math yet for ANS, it reminds me of a generalized infinite sum problem.

So... call me crazy, but I'd imagine that pretty much anyone with a masters degree in some form of math should be able to act as an expert witness to simply say that this is a discovery and not an invention and therefore is not patentable.

Re:FIRST TO FIL

[Anubis IV]

So the US is in a first to file mode now and prior art doesn't mean a thing to invalidate a patent. Only a previous patent can.

Wow. You really need to read your own link, because that’s not at all what first-to-file means. From your linked article’s second paragraph:

[...] early disclosure under the FITF provisions is an absolute bar to later EPO patent.

Or, in English, an inventor who discloses their own invention before filing will never be able to patent that invention in Europe. Their own (non-patented) disclosure acts as prior art that invalidates the application.

First-to-file deals with who has the right to the patent, but most nations lack any form of grace period, so if the invention was already disclosed they will say that no one has the right, regardless of who did the disclosing and whether it was patented. Moreover, had you read your link, you’d have realized that the page spends quite a bit of time describing the distinctions between the first-inventor-to-file system that the US uses, which extends some grace to inventors who disclose their own inventions before filing, and the systems used in most of the rest of the world. Either way, however, filers aren’t protected from anyone else’s prior art.

Duration, Importance and Protection

[ath1901]

Let's see if we can find a pattern here:

1. Creating a general algorithm that can be applied to many different problems - No protection since math is neither patentable nor copyrightable.
2. Apply the algorithm to a specific problem - Patentable. 25 years of protection.
3. Writing a shitty almost off-topic post on slashdot in a thread about the algorithm - Copyright. Life + 70 years!

So, the less important the creative work is to society is, the more protection it gets.

Re:Duration, Importance and Protection

[Theaetetus]

Let's see if we can find a pattern here:

1. Creating a general algorithm that can be applied to many different problems - No protection since math is neither patentable nor copyrightable.
2. Apply the algorithm to a specific problem - Patentable. 25 years of protection.
3. Writing a shitty almost off-topic post on slashdot in a thread about the algorithm - Copyright. Life + 70 years!

So, the less important the creative work is to society is, the more protection it gets.

Only 20 years for patents, not 25. But yes, copyright term is significantly longer, but it's much narrower. Copyright only protects that specific item. So if you copy-paste someone's source code, you violate their copyright. If you reverse engineer it and rewrite it, then you don't, but you may violate their patent. In fact, if you independently come up with the same code, even if it's 100% identical down to variable names, you don't violate their copyright because you haven't actually "copied" anything, but you would violate their patent.

Re:It's called Prior Art

[Attila Dimedici]

We will soon be able to know if this was Google's intention because, if it is, they will not send their lawyers to defend their patent submission. However, the opposite appears to be the case: Google appears to be fighting the European finding that their patent is invalid.

Further, if Google was doing as you suggest I would think they would take a better PR stance...something along the lines of, "We believe that Duda's algorithm was non-patentable, but we have developed an extension to that which is patentable. However, we will be perfectly content if the USPTO or courts rule that we are mistaken."

He should have patented it.

[Registered Coward v2]

yes, that can be expensive, at least in the US, but then he could have freely licensed it and have an easier time preventing other from patenting his idea. if it gets rejected as not patentable, that also helps prevent others from trying to patent his idea later since there would already be prior art.

Re:We Do Evil - Google

[Immerman]

Google: Do Know Evil.