My point is that the rationale used by the author of the parent post in support of the proposition that IP should be "rejected" as property could just as easilly be applied to other forms of property.
Your rationale could also be applied to other types of IP, not just software, which come about in rapidly developing fields. The same "sky will fall" arguments were made in the past (some over 100 years ago) and they proved to be dead wrong or wildly exaggerated.
Software patents have only been arround since 1998 (date of the State Street decision) so I don't really give much credence to your conclusion that they "do not result in more prosperity or innovation." There just hasn't been enough time to develop evidence in support of such a proposition.
I could respond by saying that the US leads the world, by far, in the software industry and is the only country that allows software patents. But that would be an oversimplification of the complex issues involved.
For every one of the "studies" you refer to, I can probably point to another "study" that says the opposite.
As for the unnamed company you refer to, I believe that all buggy whip manufacturers went belly-up around the time that automobiles became widely available. Such is the price of progress.
Well, the costs partly act as a check to prevent frivolous filings. If it was free, everybody would file frivolous objections and no patent would ever issue. It would also make it infitely more expensive for the PTO to handle the objections forcing a rise in fees. Can you say vicious cycle?
Lets face it, we live in a capitalistic society and our system has helped this country to develop into a very prosperous nation. It is very easy for another country to reject anything as property (why stop at IP, lets reject land as property) when it doesn't own it and has not invested anything to develop it.
The reason countries do not issue such blanket "rejections" is that they know are better off. If they want the rest of the world to respect their "property" when and if they acquire it, they must abide by the rules now.
First, cost. Just looking at filing fees, the fee for an ex-parte reexam is $2,520 while that for an inter-parte reexam is $8,800. And that is just the filing fees. An inter-parte reexam is very much like a mini-trial so you can expect the attorneys fees' involved to be probably 10 to 20 times what they would be in an ex-parte. I cannot see any lawyer worth his salt doing an inter-partes for under $30,000. An Ex-parte can be done for under $10,000.
Second, startegic considerations. If you file an inter-partes exam you must agree to forego any federal court action in connection with the relevant patent and cited prior art. With an ex parte, that is not the case, if you loose you can still file a federal lawsuit seeking to invalidate the patent. So, in essence, you can get a second bite at the apple with an ex parte.
It doesn't take "outrage and political pressure" to get a patent reviewed. If you know of invalidating prior art it is fairly simple to request a re-examination. It is also fairly inexpensive if you choose to request reexamination inter partes since it involves only filing a single paper.
But you do have to do some research. Something which most people here are unwilling to do for any purpose other than to rant about the USPTO's inadequacies.
Inter-partes re-examination proceedings have been available in the US since 1999 (See 35 U.S.C. 311 to 318). They have been rarely used but are available. At last count, less than 20 inter-partes reexams had been filed since 1999. This compares to over 1,000 ex-parte reexams filed in the same period.
The concept you are referring to is acquired genericism. When an otherwise fanciful or arbitrary trademark becomes "genericized", its owner looses the right to enforce it. Genericizm occurs when the trademark becomes part of every day bocavulary. Good examples are Xerox and Kleenex. In essence, a good trademark is a victim of its own success.
Although it is difficult, a trademark owner can prevent "genericide" by policing its marks and through a concerted public relations program of correcting public misuses of its trademark (i.e., writing letters advising newspaper editors, etc. that they are misusing a trademark.)
Xerox is the only well known mark I can think off that was declared generic at one point but was sucessfully "rehabilitated"by its owner through a lot of effort. It is no longer considered generic and if you try to use it in a generic sense you will surely hear from its owner.
I think Google is well on its way to becoming generic and it is up to its owners to do something about it.
I beg to differ. Who cares whether they are "proper" doubles (whatever that means). The parent's point is that the doubling form size to size is not limited to "euro-sized" paper.
Two "A" size sheets make a standard "B" size sheet. Two "B"s make a "C", two "C"s make a "D" and two "D"s make an "E". In other words, you can get exactly 16 sheets of "A" size out of a single sheet of "E"... no trimming.
I went through 4 years of engineering school never having to "trim" or use ISO sized paper. The only way I know this is that I always had trouble remembering the exact dimensions of anything except "A" size and you can figure them out easilly just by doubling.
Seeking a patent you know you are not entitled to is called "inequitable conduct" before the USPTO. The only penalty the USPTO can impose, however, is invalidating the patent. However, when you submit an application, the inventor must sign a declaration to the effect that he is not defrauding the USPTO. If the inventor lies, he is guilty of perjury and subject to imprisonment and a fine. If a lawyer filed the application and knew, he is subject to disbarrment.
Suing somebody on a patent you know to be invalid is actionable as a frivolous suit and, possibly, depending on what state this occurs, fraud. If the conduct is eggregious enough, a judge can "throw the book" at the frivolous plaintiff by issuing punitive damages. At the very least, I would expect the court to award actual damages and attorneys' fees.
I often see the posts on/. generally stating that there ought to be a procedure for the public to raise issues of prior art before the USPTO grants a patent. Well, guess what? there is such a procedure. And it is very very simple.
37 C.F.R. 1.291 gives members of the public the right to protest a pending application by simply advising the patent office of any reason why a patent should not issue, including prior art. The essential aspects of this are that you must (a)correctly identify the application; (b)provide a concise explanation of the reason for the protest; and (c)provide a copy of the prior art your protest relies on.
So, rather that the usual pablovian reflex of ranting about this stuff on/. why not do something to help the USPTO do a better job?
Nobody said anything about copyrighting "function". Copyrights cover only expression. Only patents can protect fuctionality.
As for the case law, honestly, it is 7:30 PM, I am ready to go home and too lazy to get the case cites... allright here you go (god, I am a karma whore!):
This is form Arthur Rutenberg Corp. v. Parrino, 664 F. Supp. 479 (M.D. Fla. 1987):
In order to establish copyright infringement, a plaintiff must prove (1) his ownership of the copyright and (2) "copying" by the defendant. Ferguson v. National Broadcasting Company, Inc., 584 F.2d 111, 113 (5th Cir. 1978).
Copying may be proved by showing access of the allegedly infringed material by the defendant and substantial similarity. Id. This showing may be rebutted by the defendant with evidence of independent creation. See, e.g., Miller v. Universal City Studios, Inc., 650 F.2d 1365 (5th Cir. 1981). Alternatively, copying may be proved if the two works are so "strikingly similar as to preclude the possibility of independent creation." Ferguson, 584 F.2d at 113. Although, arguably, the plaintiff has shown "striking similarity," the Court does not rest its decision on that finding.
How's that? I threw in the "striking similarity" test as a bonus.
You raise a good point. The devil is in the details. Whether a work is a derivative is a factual question which generally only a jury should decide. But I will indulge you.
"a work based upon one or more preexisting works, such as a translation, musical arrangement, dramatization, fictionalization, motion picture version, sound recording, art reproduction, abridgment, condensation, or any other form in which a work may be recast, transformed, or adapted. A work consisting of editorial revisions, annotations, elaborations, or other modifications which, as a whole, represent an original work of authorship, is a 'derivative work'."
That really cleared things up, didn't it?
But seriously, my point was that what the parent was stating as an absolute is actually untrue. You can be guilty of copyright infringement even if you dont "copy."
IAAL. What you are saying is simply not true. Even if you don't copy verbatim you can be guilty of copyright infringement if you create a "derivative work" from copyrighted material. MS would probably argue that your "perusal" of their code and subsequent creation of a work based on such "perusal" would constitute creation of a derivative work. Its done all the time since only a complete moron would copy source code verbatim.
Also, because the act of copying is incredibly hard to prove unless you are dealing with a complete moron, it is not necessary under the law today for a copyright plaintiff to actually prove the act of "copying." Generally speaking, it is sufficient for them to prove "access" to the copyrighted work and "substantial similarity" between the two works. There is tons of case law on this stuff.
The attack on the Liberty took place to avoid a premature US censure of Israel in the United Nations.
I see, what better way to avoid US censure than to attack a US vessel. I like your logic.
Egypt was withdrawing. It's a fact. It's one of the reasons why Israel was so successful in the Sinai.
The reason Israel was so sucessful is that it caught Nasser with his pants down. Besides, Nasser was a complete military incompetent and his generals were all skillless lackeys. Nasser didn't know he was loosing the war until 100% of his air force and most of his army was completely destroyed. He learned his lesson by the time '73 came around. Still lost, though! I guess in the end the difference was that the Jews were figthing for their very survival while the Arabs were fighting for sand and rocks.
Israel attacked first. Israel began the war. The war was not justified. It was justified earlier in the year, but not when it took place. The timing of the war made it clear that it was a calculated landgrab
True. True. False. True, false. Landgrab? Sure, land which was exchanged for peace with Egypt in 1979, land which helped Israel survive the next war (which was surely coming) by fighting only on enemy soil, land which has kept Syria at bay for nearly 4 decades. You talk about it as if it was Hawaii or New York. Its desert and rocks which are only valuable if you intend to make war on your neighbors. Israel will gladly give back the Golan and West Bank in exchange for peace treaties. But the truth is that to Syria and the PLO the land is worthless if it comes at the price of having to make peace with Israel.
First of all, I never said you were anti-semitic, just ignorant as to the seo-political and military aspects of the Israeli-Arab conflict. Your obstinance als proves you are anti-israel. Not to mention your need to inject arab/israeli politict into a topic that has nothing to do with it. You have proven as much:
(1) The USS Liberty was shot on off the coast of Egypt. So how does shooting down a US vessel hunderds of miles away help to keep "covert" the operation? And how "covert" was the operation? Everyone knew it was coming. Syrian harassment for the past 2 decades from the plateau was a major cause of the war. And what about the dozens of Soviet ships in the area? If Israel could keep its plans "covert" from the Russians it surely could have done so vis-a-vis the US without having to shoot at a navy vessel of its ONE ally in the entire world. Your story just doesn't hold water.
(2) Egypt was withdrawing? Check out Nasser's speech on May 22, 1976 (less than 2 weeks prior to the beginning of the war) http://www.us-israel.org/jsource/Peace/aqaba.html Sure doesnt sound like talk of a withdrawing army or "standing down" to me.
(3) I don't get your point about Israel not "needing" to attack because Egypt was not strong enough. So, they should wait to attack until their demise is assured? Are you nuts? Even you must realize that Israel's one hope of survival is anticipating the Arab's moves and acting before it is too late. What you are asking for is suicide.
Stargoat you are either very misinformed or unbelievably biased, most likely both.
The treaty of Westphalia (may want to check your spelling next time) ended the 30 years war in Europe and has nothing to do with anything that has been mentioned here. If you think the Treaty of Westphalia is some kind of uber-law that is applicable to the entire world in modern time then I hope you are Christian since under that treaty non-Christians (and their dominions) have essentially no rights. Kind of ironic to try to apply that to the Israel-Egypt conflict.
The "casus belli" (again with the spelling) was not only the closing of the canal to Israeli shipping which is clearly an act of war under international law. This was tolerated by Israel for some time because of its outlet at the port of Elat. The more flagrant violations of international law were the blockade at the Bab el-Mandab Straits and the constant harassment to Israeli shipping from Sharm el-Sheikh, effectively denying Israel the use of Elat, its only east-bound outlet for imports/exports.
Not to mention the expulsion by Egypt of UN peacekeepers from Sinai which had been put in place as a condition for the armistice following the 1956 war. I guess the amassment of hundreds of thousands of troops, tanks and artillery at the border of Israel by a megalomaniac (Nasser) who had been rallying the entire Arab world for most of a decade to "throw the Jews into the sea" and who was still at a state of declared war with Israel is not a good reason for a pre-emptive strike. Perhaps Israel should have waited for a joint Egyptian-Syrian strike to respond (like they did in 1973 and almost were annihilated but for the buffer provided by the lands gained in 1967) so that you could have your sensibilities covered? Right on!
The USS Liberty case has been one of the most investigated and written upon military incidents in history. Every serious investigation has concluded it was a case of mistaken identity. Please tell me ONE reason why Israel would have been motivated to kill U.S. sailors and destroy a USS toward the end of a very short, and otherwise very successful, war?
Perhaps you could benefit from reading some history, it does not have to be Michael Oren, anyone else with his reputation for veracity will suffice.
You make a valid point. But like most things in a capitalistic system, our patent examination system is a compromise based on the scarcity of resources.
In a perfect world, the patent office would have a million examiners and they would all have the time and resources to examine every application in infinitesimal detail to insure no bad patents are issued. But this is not a perfect world and we do not have the resources to hire a million patent examiners and let them take as long as they want.
So, in our system, the patent office examination is only the initial threshold step to achieving ultimate monopoly over an invention. The courts have the ultimate say as to validity. And the courts relie on litigants to exhaustively examine patents and, if warranted, challenge them in court. If a patent is insignificant, then nobody will give a crap and its validity (even if suspect) will not be tested. So what? se la vie, the patent is insignificant.
If, on the other hand, the patent is momentous, then there will be plenty of people who will challenge it and, if warranted, the patent will be invalidated.
The downside to all this is that patents that fall in between these two types will only be of interest to a few who may not have the wherewithal (i.e., money) to challenge their validity. So, the system is not perfect. Like I said it is a compromise.
I think it was Churchill wo remarked that democracy is the worst way to run a country, with the exception of every other system tried by mankind. It is easy to criticize the system but we need to see the forest from the trees. Our patent system is in great part responsible for the technological status our country enjoys vis-a-vis the rest of the world.
Binding contracts are only binding on those who agree to be bound by them. So what are you going to do? have everyone who buys a product which embodies your idea enter into a contract with you? How about everyone who just sees your invention? How are you going to prevent the consumers of products, or the competitors of the entity you are contracting with from copying the invention and running with it? Faced with those odds, who in their right mind enter into a contract with you?
If you have no way of protecting an invention (notice I didn't say idea, you can't patent those), it is unlikely you will put in any of the hard work needed to make it a reality. After all, why spend your sweat and blood to create a car that runs on water when as soon as you sell the first one Ford, GM and Chrysler will buy it, copy it and sell their own? In that case, because if there was no way for you to protect your invention the entire world would be deprived of its benefits.
The USPTO IS in the black. Has been for years. It is one of the few agencies that makes money for the gov't. The problem is that the funds incoming to the USPTO from the public go into the general government fund, not in the USPTO's fund. Then, every year, the USPTO has to grovel to congress for money. It usually gets less than it asks for and ALWAYS gets less than it generates (its called diversion and many think it amounts to an unconbstitutional tax on inventors).
Also, the USPTO actually looses money on the examination fees it charges. Although it can cost upwards of $20K in attorneys' fees to prepare and file an application, the governement filing fees are usually less than $1,000. The USPTO makes about 2/3 of its monry from the maintenance fees that existing patent holders have to pay to maintain their patents in force.
I bet if you look up every slashdot topic ever started in the past 5 years on the topic of patents, this same "joke" has been made at least once. Give it a rest. Who modded this up?
Have you ever done a search? Or are you just waiting for others to provide "confirmation"?
Here are some results from a 15 second search:
6,574,645-Machine for drafting a patent application and process for doing same 6,502,081-System and method for classifying legal concepts using legal topic scheme 6,501,421-Method and system for providing a location-based legal information service 5,774,833-Method for syntactic and semantic analysis of patent text and drawings
Slashdot Mirror
I disagree, I think transoceanic sub-orbital flights are pretty interesting from a commercial standpoint.
My point is that the rationale used by the author of the parent post in support of the proposition that IP should be "rejected" as property could just as easilly be applied to other forms of property.
Your rationale could also be applied to other types of IP, not just software, which come about in rapidly developing fields. The same "sky will fall" arguments were made in the past (some over 100 years ago) and they proved to be dead wrong or wildly exaggerated.
Software patents have only been arround since 1998 (date of the State Street decision) so I don't really give much credence to your conclusion that they "do not result in more prosperity or innovation." There just hasn't been enough time to develop evidence in support of such a proposition.
I could respond by saying that the US leads the world, by far, in the software industry and is the only country that allows software patents. But that would be an oversimplification of the complex issues involved.
For every one of the "studies" you refer to, I can probably point to another "study" that says the opposite.
As for the unnamed company you refer to, I believe that all buggy whip manufacturers went belly-up around the time that automobiles became widely available. Such is the price of progress.
Well, the costs partly act as a check to prevent frivolous filings. If it was free, everybody would file frivolous objections and no patent would ever issue. It would also make it infitely more expensive for the PTO to handle the objections forcing a rise in fees. Can you say vicious cycle?
Lets face it, we live in a capitalistic society and our system has helped this country to develop into a very prosperous nation. It is very easy for another country to reject anything as property (why stop at IP, lets reject land as property) when it doesn't own it and has not invested anything to develop it.
The reason countries do not issue such blanket "rejections" is that they know are better off. If they want the rest of the world to respect their "property" when and if they acquire it, they must abide by the rules now.
Off the top of my head, a couple of reasons:
First, cost. Just looking at filing fees, the fee for an ex-parte reexam is $2,520 while that for an inter-parte reexam is $8,800. And that is just the filing fees. An inter-parte reexam is very much like a mini-trial so you can expect the attorneys fees' involved to be probably 10 to 20 times what they would be in an ex-parte. I cannot see any lawyer worth his salt doing an inter-partes for under $30,000. An Ex-parte can be done for under $10,000.
Second, startegic considerations. If you file an inter-partes exam you must agree to forego any federal court action in connection with the relevant patent and cited prior art. With an ex parte, that is not the case, if you loose you can still file a federal lawsuit seeking to invalidate the patent. So, in essence, you can get a second bite at the apple with an ex parte.
It doesn't take "outrage and political pressure" to get a patent reviewed. If you know of invalidating prior art it is fairly simple to request a re-examination. It is also fairly inexpensive if you choose to request reexamination inter partes since it involves only filing a single paper.
But you do have to do some research. Something which most people here are unwilling to do for any purpose other than to rant about the USPTO's inadequacies.
Inter-partes re-examination proceedings have been available in the US since 1999 (See 35 U.S.C. 311 to 318). They have been rarely used but are available. At last count, less than 20 inter-partes reexams had been filed since 1999. This compares to over 1,000 ex-parte reexams filed in the same period.
The concept you are referring to is acquired genericism. When an otherwise fanciful or arbitrary trademark becomes "genericized", its owner looses the right to enforce it. Genericizm occurs when the trademark becomes part of every day bocavulary. Good examples are Xerox and Kleenex. In essence, a good trademark is a victim of its own success.
Although it is difficult, a trademark owner can prevent "genericide" by policing its marks and through a concerted public relations program of correcting public misuses of its trademark (i.e., writing letters advising newspaper editors, etc. that they are misusing a trademark.)
Xerox is the only well known mark I can think off that was declared generic at one point but was sucessfully "rehabilitated"by its owner through a lot of effort. It is no longer considered generic and if you try to use it in a generic sense you will surely hear from its owner.
I think Google is well on its way to becoming generic and it is up to its owners to do something about it.
I beg to differ. Who cares whether they are "proper" doubles (whatever that means). The parent's point is that the doubling form size to size is not limited to "euro-sized" paper.
... no trimming.
Two "A" size sheets make a standard "B" size sheet. Two "B"s make a "C", two "C"s make a "D" and two "D"s make an "E". In other words, you can get exactly 16 sheets of "A" size out of a single sheet of "E"
I went through 4 years of engineering school never having to "trim" or use ISO sized paper. The only way I know this is that I always had trouble remembering the exact dimensions of anything except "A" size and you can figure them out easilly just by doubling.
Their idea of "relevant" may not exactly match yours or mine, or the USPTO's. I'd stick with sending it to the USPTO.
Seeking a patent you know you are not entitled to is called "inequitable conduct" before the USPTO. The only penalty the USPTO can impose, however, is invalidating the patent. However, when you submit an application, the inventor must sign a declaration to the effect that he is not defrauding the USPTO. If the inventor lies, he is guilty of perjury and subject to imprisonment and a fine. If a lawyer filed the application and knew, he is subject to disbarrment.
Suing somebody on a patent you know to be invalid is actionable as a frivolous suit and, possibly, depending on what state this occurs, fraud. If the conduct is eggregious enough, a judge can "throw the book" at the frivolous plaintiff by issuing punitive damages. At the very least, I would expect the court to award actual damages and attorneys' fees.
I often see the posts on /. generally stating that there ought to be a procedure for the public to raise issues of prior art before the USPTO grants a patent. Well, guess what? there is such a procedure. And it is very very simple.
/. why not do something to help the USPTO do a better job?
... set ... go!
37 C.F.R. 1.291 gives members of the public the right to protest a pending application by simply advising the patent office of any reason why a patent should not issue, including prior art. The essential aspects of this are that you must (a)correctly identify the application; (b)provide a concise explanation of the reason for the protest; and (c)provide a copy of the prior art your protest relies on.
So, rather that the usual pablovian reflex of ranting about this stuff on
Ready
As for the case law, honestly, it is 7:30 PM, I am ready to go home and too lazy to get the case cites
This is form Arthur Rutenberg Corp. v. Parrino, 664 F. Supp. 479 (M.D. Fla. 1987):
How's that? I threw in the "striking similarity" test as a bonus.
Sorry, no typo. I'm really bad at detecting sarcasm but I think I got your meaning.
17 USC 101 defines a derivative work as:
That really cleared things up, didn't it?
But seriously, my point was that what the parent was stating as an absolute is actually untrue. You can be guilty of copyright infringement even if you dont "copy."
IAAL. What you are saying is simply not true. Even if you don't copy verbatim you can be guilty of copyright infringement if you create a "derivative work" from copyrighted material. MS would probably argue that your "perusal" of their code and subsequent creation of a work based on such "perusal" would constitute creation of a derivative work. Its done all the time since only a complete moron would copy source code verbatim.
Also, because the act of copying is incredibly hard to prove unless you are dealing with a complete moron, it is not necessary under the law today for a copyright plaintiff to actually prove the act of "copying." Generally speaking, it is sufficient for them to prove "access" to the copyrighted work and "substantial similarity" between the two works. There is tons of case law on this stuff.
I see, what better way to avoid US censure than to attack a US vessel. I like your logic.
The reason Israel was so sucessful is that it caught Nasser with his pants down. Besides, Nasser was a complete military incompetent and his generals were all skillless lackeys. Nasser didn't know he was loosing the war until 100% of his air force and most of his army was completely destroyed. He learned his lesson by the time '73 came around. Still lost, though! I guess in the end the difference was that the Jews were figthing for their very survival while the Arabs were fighting for sand and rocks.
True. True. False. True, false. Landgrab? Sure, land which was exchanged for peace with Egypt in 1979, land which helped Israel survive the next war (which was surely coming) by fighting only on enemy soil, land which has kept Syria at bay for nearly 4 decades. You talk about it as if it was Hawaii or New York. Its desert and rocks which are only valuable if you intend to make war on your neighbors. Israel will gladly give back the Golan and West Bank in exchange for peace treaties. But the truth is that to Syria and the PLO the land is worthless if it comes at the price of having to make peace with Israel.
Keep it coming goat
You truly are delusional.
First of all, I never said you were anti-semitic, just ignorant as to the seo-political and military aspects of the Israeli-Arab conflict. Your obstinance als proves you are anti-israel. Not to mention your need to inject arab/israeli politict into a topic that has nothing to do with it. You have proven as much:
(1) The USS Liberty was shot on off the coast of Egypt. So how does shooting down a US vessel hunderds of miles away help to keep "covert" the operation? And how "covert" was the operation? Everyone knew it was coming. Syrian harassment for the past 2 decades from the plateau was a major cause of the war. And what about the dozens of Soviet ships in the area? If Israel could keep its plans "covert" from the Russians it surely could have done so vis-a-vis the US without having to shoot at a navy vessel of its ONE ally in the entire world. Your story just doesn't hold water.
(2) Egypt was withdrawing? Check out Nasser's speech on May 22, 1976 (less than 2 weeks prior to the beginning of the war) http://www.us-israel.org/jsource/Peace/aqaba.html Sure doesnt sound like talk of a withdrawing army or "standing down" to me.
(3) I don't get your point about Israel not "needing" to attack because Egypt was not strong enough. So, they should wait to attack until their demise is assured? Are you nuts? Even you must realize that Israel's one hope of survival is anticipating the Arab's moves and acting before it is too late. What you are asking for is suicide.
I'm done with you. I'm getting back on topic.
Stargoat you are either very misinformed or unbelievably biased, most likely both.
The treaty of Westphalia (may want to check your spelling next time) ended the 30 years war in Europe and has nothing to do with anything that has been mentioned here. If you think the Treaty of Westphalia is some kind of uber-law that is applicable to the entire world in modern time then I hope you are Christian since under that treaty non-Christians (and their dominions) have essentially no rights. Kind of ironic to try to apply that to the Israel-Egypt conflict.
The "casus belli" (again with the spelling) was not only the closing of the canal to Israeli shipping which is clearly an act of war under international law. This was tolerated by Israel for some time because of its outlet at the port of Elat. The more flagrant violations of international law were the blockade at the Bab el-Mandab Straits and the constant harassment to Israeli shipping from Sharm el-Sheikh, effectively denying Israel the use of Elat, its only east-bound outlet for imports/exports.
Not to mention the expulsion by Egypt of UN peacekeepers from Sinai which had been put in place as a condition for the armistice following the 1956 war. I guess the amassment of hundreds of thousands of troops, tanks and artillery at the border of Israel by a megalomaniac (Nasser) who had been rallying the entire Arab world for most of a decade to "throw the Jews into the sea" and who was still at a state of declared war with Israel is not a good reason for a pre-emptive strike. Perhaps Israel should have waited for a joint Egyptian-Syrian strike to respond (like they did in 1973 and almost were annihilated but for the buffer provided by the lands gained in 1967) so that you could have your sensibilities covered? Right on!
The USS Liberty case has been one of the most investigated and written upon military incidents in history. Every serious investigation has concluded it was a case of mistaken identity. Please tell me ONE reason why Israel would have been motivated to kill U.S. sailors and destroy a USS toward the end of a very short, and otherwise very successful, war?
Perhaps you could benefit from reading some history, it does not have to be Michael Oren, anyone else with his reputation for veracity will suffice.
You make a valid point. But like most things in a capitalistic system, our patent examination system is a compromise based on the scarcity of resources.
In a perfect world, the patent office would have a million examiners and they would all have the time and resources to examine every application in infinitesimal detail to insure no bad patents are issued. But this is not a perfect world and we do not have the resources to hire a million patent examiners and let them take as long as they want.
So, in our system, the patent office examination is only the initial threshold step to achieving ultimate monopoly over an invention. The courts have the ultimate say as to validity. And the courts relie on litigants to exhaustively examine patents and, if warranted, challenge them in court. If a patent is insignificant, then nobody will give a crap and its validity (even if suspect) will not be tested. So what? se la vie, the patent is insignificant.
If, on the other hand, the patent is momentous, then there will be plenty of people who will challenge it and, if warranted, the patent will be invalidated.
The downside to all this is that patents that fall in between these two types will only be of interest to a few who may not have the wherewithal (i.e., money) to challenge their validity. So, the system is not perfect. Like I said it is a compromise.
I think it was Churchill wo remarked that democracy is the worst way to run a country, with the exception of every other system tried by mankind. It is easy to criticize the system but we need to see the forest from the trees. Our patent system is in great part responsible for the technological status our country enjoys vis-a-vis the rest of the world.
Binding contracts are only binding on those who agree to be bound by them. So what are you going to do? have everyone who buys a product which embodies your idea enter into a contract with you? How about everyone who just sees your invention? How are you going to prevent the consumers of products, or the competitors of the entity you are contracting with from copying the invention and running with it? Faced with those odds, who in their right mind enter into a contract with you?
If you have no way of protecting an invention (notice I didn't say idea, you can't patent those), it is unlikely you will put in any of the hard work needed to make it a reality. After all, why spend your sweat and blood to create a car that runs on water when as soon as you sell the first one Ford, GM and Chrysler will buy it, copy it and sell their own? In that case, because if there was no way for you to protect your invention the entire world would be deprived of its benefits.
The USPTO IS in the black. Has been for years. It is one of the few agencies that makes money for the gov't. The problem is that the funds incoming to the USPTO from the public go into the general government fund, not in the USPTO's fund. Then, every year, the USPTO has to grovel to congress for money. It usually gets less than it asks for and ALWAYS gets less than it generates (its called diversion and many think it amounts to an unconbstitutional tax on inventors).
Also, the USPTO actually looses money on the examination fees it charges. Although it can cost upwards of $20K in attorneys' fees to prepare and file an application, the governement filing fees are usually less than $1,000. The USPTO makes about 2/3 of its monry from the maintenance fees that existing patent holders have to pay to maintain their patents in force.
I bet if you look up every slashdot topic ever started in the past 5 years on the topic of patents, this same "joke" has been made at least once. Give it a rest. Who modded this up?
Oh, and BTW, such a patent does exist.
Unequivocally, YES!
Have you ever done a search? Or are you just waiting for others to provide "confirmation"?
Here are some results from a 15 second search:
6,574,645-Machine for drafting a patent application and process for doing same
6,502,081-System and method for classifying legal concepts using legal topic scheme
6,501,421-Method and system for providing a location-based legal information service
5,774,833-Method for syntactic and semantic analysis of patent text and drawings
What's that? You want hyperlinks too?