You do realize that telecommunications came about in 1832, with the (patented) invention of the telegraph, right? Transportation became much more accessible and capable with the advent of the first consumer-available, mass-produced (and patented) automobile in 1908.
As for literacy, anyone literate enough to read an economics book will understand that it's not worth the investment of time, money, and other resources to invent something in the commercial space when your competitors can undercut you from day one because they don't have R&D costs to recoup and you do. This is what patents are intended to address; without them, who would spend millions to bring you your $20 gadgets?
Population? Yes, that number that is allowed to grow and flourish, in large part due to better quality of life, enabled by (patented) medicine and medical procedures. It costs billions to develop a drug; who has the money to do that more than once if they can't sell at a price high enough to recoup their R&D costs?
With nobody investing in research and development and putting out new products, because that investment is a waste when your competitors (and I'm repeating myself now) can come in and undercut you on day one, since they don't have that overhead when they steal your work, who, exactly, is contributing to economic growth?
All of the above were helped, not hindered, by patents.
As for personal liberties, that one cuts both ways. If you're not allowed to invent, of course you can't invent. However, if you're allowed to leapfrog me in the market because I have to charge materials plus R&D plus some amount of profit, while you only have to charge materials plus some amount of profit, where is my incentive to invent? While you're partially correct, in that invention would cease absent the personal liberties which enable it, you're failing to see how not restricting personal liberties to prevent the immediate appropriation of someone else's ideas against their will very strongly disincentives invention and creation, often to the point where such activities ultimately become detrimental to those who carry them out. For an example, see the drug company reference, above.
Now, if you want to talk about how patent terms are way out of line with modern reality, I'm game for that. In 1790, when the 17 year patent term was set, it was reasonable in that it often took many years to bring a product to market in any meaningful way; now that it can be done in months, and most products don't see more than a year or two on the market anyway (by which point R&D costs are recouped, money has been raked in, and the inventor has moved on to something else), a year or two might be a more reasonable term. Certainly, increasing the term to 20 years in 1995 was a mistake.
It can't be that rare of an occurrence if I know, first hand, of multiple occurrences. I don't exactly work in a field where it's patent ownership is common.
Are you kidding me? How do you know whether patents actually make a difference?
How far did we advance before 1790? How far have we come since then? When were patent laws introduced in the US?
Our biggest advancements pre-1790 were in glassmaking and came in or after the latter half of the 1400's. Incidentally, Venice began granting a form of patent in 1450; care to guess what most Venetian patents covered?
How do I know whether patents actually make a difference? Because there are literally centuries-worth of evidence that speak to the fact.
On the other hand, we do clearly see lawyers prospering and small inventors and consumers suffering. That is counter to the spirit of patent law.
We also see broad and obvious patents being granted, which is counter to the letter of patent law, at least in the US where we're seeing it. The problem isn't patent law, the problem is corrupt and/or incompetent administration. Incidentally, one of the primary causes of the collapse of the Roman empire (which saw great advancement post 500BC, when it began issuing patents) was a similar form of corruption. Again, not the fault of the patent, which history shows actually does encourage investment of time, money, and other resources in advancing technology and the arts, but rather the fault of poor enforcement of patent laws.
Patents also encourage the creation of that medicine in the first place. Don't forget that no company is going to invest billions in the research and development of a drug when the first buyer can simply pop the pill into a spectrum analyzer, figure out what's in it, and, because there's no patent protection, make their own without spending billions; which, of course, enables them to sell it for pennies, while the company that actually did the work must sell for dollars.
Does it suck that companies must charge a higher price to cover their R&D costs? Sure it does, but if their ability to recover those costs was not guaranteed, many fewer would bother. Do some companies abuse their monopoly position? Sure they do, but many also do not; it's not inherent in the position.
How does Roche ensure that they, at a minimum, recoup the billions they spend developing a new drug, absent a patent? One way would be to charge billions for the first pill; that way, when someone reverse engineers it to make their day-one generic, Roche has already recouped their costs and can afford to compete on price. Can you think of another way? And, if not, who do you think is going to pay billions for that first pill? I'd venture to guess, nobody; but your shortsightedness blinds you to reality.
All of that said, drug companies are scum and, really, the worst of the worst in this regard. Really, they're the only entities which worse represent the concept of the patent than patent trolls.
Shortening patent terms to a year or so, as is more in line with how long it takes to get a product to market today versus how long it took in 1790 when those terms were set, would alleviate that issue to a large degree.
I, effectively, addressed your post before you wrote it. Here:
we should, rather, amend patent laws in a way that prevents such abuse going forward.
To elaborate on that, I suppose I really mean "enforce the non-obviousness and specificity clauses as they already exist" which, in reality, is what's no longer happening in many cases, allowing broad patents to be granted for things that are obvious to anyone skilled in the relevant field. Patent laws were specifically crafted to prevent this, and that wording still exists today; the problem is not with the law, but with its application.
Don't blame the concept of the time-limited patent for the corruption of the administration. Fix what's broken, not what's not.
Very well said. I'd like to expand on your first point, though, as I fear it may have flown right over the heads of our dear readers.
They are written vague on purpose, because to be specific, would allow others to build upon your patent, and patent their improvements, locking you into a stale old way of building said invention, never able to improve it.
This is precisely the type of abuse, by a handful of unscrupulous assholes (patent holders being, relative to the entirety of the population, a handful of people), which I propose we amend patent laws to prevent.
And, by amend, I truly mean "actually enforce the laws as written", since they already require some degree of specificity.
For the sake of our dear readers, continuing on with your comment:
As a libertarian, I am all for the repealing of most patents, and the shortening of the term of protection.
Indeed, repealing patents which do not follow the laws as currently written, which require a degree of specificity, lacking in many, and a degree of non-obviousness to a skilled professional in the relevant field, lacking in many others, would be the first necessary step in actually enforcing those laws as written.
It's debatable whether the term should be shortened; many would argue it should be extended, as was done with copyright. Personally, I believe that patents and copyright were given the terms they were originally given based on how long it took to produce and circulate a work at the time that those respective laws were written; as both now take considerably less time, yes, I agree that the terms should be shortened.
Are you saying it never happens that someone, inspired by someone else's patent, possibly even for a product or concept that hasn't been put into production, then comes up with their own novel, possibly even better, way of doing $thing? I, personally, know people who've done just that, who would not have had the resources to reverse engineer $thing in order to do so. In at least two of those cases, even having said resources would not have helped, absent the patent, as $thing was never in production and did not physically exist in order to reverse engineer.
Your "given that it was actually used in a product, service or production process" limitation is a straw man, at best.
Well... as a statistician, you should be familiar with basic math. If something has a probability of 0.1% and an event occurs that makes that thing 1000% more probable, 1000% being 10x (1000/100), it now how a probability of 1%. If another, similar event occurs, that thing, then, has a probability of 10%. Once more and it becomes 100% certain. Yes, as you statisticians like to point out, margins of error and all that also apply.
He may have worded it poorly, I'll grant you that; but his intent should have been obvious to anyone not hell-bent on being a pedantic prick.
No. No, I was right the first time. You can't own something that doesn't exist; and patents do server the purpose of forcing dissemination of information in exchange for temporary protection. That, in turn, allows others to build on previous work and make nice things, many of which we actually can own. That a handful of unscrupulous assholes has found a way to circumvent that should not negate all of the good aspects of patents; we should, rather, amend patent laws in a way that prevents such abuse going forward.
Except for the fact that you're flat out wrong, whereas I merely paraphrased in order to fit several different messages (as it changes based on which browser you're launching) into a single terse statement. Microsoft never used that qualifier; they did, however, say Edge is safer than Chrome and Firefox. Funny, I've never seen that popup for IE, Opera, or any other browser that isn't Chrome or Firefox.
But, they did specifically call out those two... then proceed to lose to them at Pwn2Own.
Oh, and before you say "the government will have thought of that and will keep said historians on staff or, at least, said typewriters in inventory"... yeah... sure they will... because people like you would never have said "this won't be an issue, we don't need to do that".
Oh... wait... that's right! If they do, it will be because of people like me, who can see the writing on the wall... while people still know how to write.
He could mean any multitude of lost skills as a result of current trends. As he specifically mentions losing the ability to write, I can come up with a number of scenarios in which that might be, well... less than ideal, shall we say.
Let's just say, a couple generations from now, only a select few "historians" know how to write. Typewriters are already a relic of the past, they aren't gonna be any easier to find 30 years from now, so all text-based communication is done via computers by that point. What happens when communication networks are taken out? No calls, because no communication network. No internet because no communication network. No pont-to-point because no communication network. Are you seeing a pattern here? Handwritten letters, delivered by courier, would sure be useful in that scenario.
And I don't just mean to let Grandma know little Johnny is okay. I mean for the dissemination of military intelligence relating to the attack that took out said communication networks; e.g. who just decided to start a war with us. It makes it a fair bit easier to send the missiles to the right location if we can get teams out to the launch sites (since the communication networks are down and we can't launch remotely) with the correct coordinates to send the missiles to, doesn't it?
If course, that's just the first scenario my just-woke-up, pre-coffee brain came up with, without really giving it much thought. I'm sure, if you put just a tiny bit more effort into it than I did, you'll be able to come up with others.
Oh, you've never seen it? I may have paraphrased, because the message is slightly different depending on which browser you're launching, but, well, it happens. In fact, it was reported here back in November.
Of course he can't, he's making a logically reasoned prediction. There can't possibly be sources, as the kids he's talking about are just now old enough to be in kindergarten; they haven't grown up to not know how to do any more than point.
I, for one, agree with him to a degree. It's entirely possible that is the path we are heading down. Unlike you, I also understand that there's no point in arguing about whether or not that's where we're headed, since it's too late to do anything about it if we are, and time will tell one way or the other. You won't be any more right or wrong in a decade when we find out, regardless of whether or not an anonymous internet commenter can provide sources today.
You mean like the perspective they cast by popping up an "Edge is the most secure browser" message every time you click a Chrome or Firefox icon in Win 10?
microsoft store: failed to compete with apple store and was rolled into best buy as a kiosk
Right next to the Apple kiosk in the Best Buy down the street from the mall with the Microsoft Store in it, which happens to be across from the Apple Store. In case you missed it, my point is that they both have both.
microsoft surface: failed to compete with iPad or android.
Mostly because it's not trying to; it runs a full desktop OS and is intended to replace desktop/laptop functionality on the low- to mid-end, with some useful tablet functionality mixed in. I don't use a Surface, myself, but I did just invest in a similar platform from Dell for my company; seems to be working well thus far.
Azure: failed to compete with aws/ec3/rackspace.
It's almost a completely different offering than the rest. Yes, there's some overlap in virtualized hosting and load balancing, but Azure does offer services the others do not, just as Amazon offers their own unique services; I'm not sure WTF ec3 is, I think you meant EC2, which is AWS, and Rackspace doesn't really offer anything unique of their own. In fairness, I thought like you do until I looked at Azure a month or so ago. While I wouldn't use it for all of my needs, I did find a place for some of what it offers (Azure AD and a handful of related services, for example) in my organization. Those are things I, quite simply, can not get from AWS/EC2 or Rackspace.
This is a new redmond, and with it comes moronic decisions like [...] porting random linux applications like SSH to windows.
SSH on Windows has been my primary use case for Cygwin for years, and I know I'm not alone in that. The fact that it's less random and more a full install of Ubuntu makes it all the more useful. Throw in XMing and, since Microsoft was actually responsive to complaints about things not working quite right early on, and fixed most of the issues in a single release, you can run most any CLI or GUI Linux application that you could run in a native Ubuntu install, right in Windows. I do wish they'd do something to make file sharing between Windows and Windows/Ubuntu a bit less completely-fuck-your-access-from-either-platform-y, but there are workarounds for that and the offering is still very much beta, so meh.
Have you used recent versions of Windows or Office? You could have stopped at "everything" and been just as right. I say this as a primarily Windows shop that keeps a few Macs handy and runs infrastructure primarily on Linux.
Slashdot Mirror
You do realize that telecommunications came about in 1832, with the (patented) invention of the telegraph, right? Transportation became much more accessible and capable with the advent of the first consumer-available, mass-produced (and patented) automobile in 1908.
As for literacy, anyone literate enough to read an economics book will understand that it's not worth the investment of time, money, and other resources to invent something in the commercial space when your competitors can undercut you from day one because they don't have R&D costs to recoup and you do. This is what patents are intended to address; without them, who would spend millions to bring you your $20 gadgets?
Population? Yes, that number that is allowed to grow and flourish, in large part due to better quality of life, enabled by (patented) medicine and medical procedures. It costs billions to develop a drug; who has the money to do that more than once if they can't sell at a price high enough to recoup their R&D costs?
With nobody investing in research and development and putting out new products, because that investment is a waste when your competitors (and I'm repeating myself now) can come in and undercut you on day one, since they don't have that overhead when they steal your work, who, exactly, is contributing to economic growth?
All of the above were helped, not hindered, by patents.
As for personal liberties, that one cuts both ways. If you're not allowed to invent, of course you can't invent. However, if you're allowed to leapfrog me in the market because I have to charge materials plus R&D plus some amount of profit, while you only have to charge materials plus some amount of profit, where is my incentive to invent? While you're partially correct, in that invention would cease absent the personal liberties which enable it, you're failing to see how not restricting personal liberties to prevent the immediate appropriation of someone else's ideas against their will very strongly disincentives invention and creation, often to the point where such activities ultimately become detrimental to those who carry them out. For an example, see the drug company reference, above.
Now, if you want to talk about how patent terms are way out of line with modern reality, I'm game for that. In 1790, when the 17 year patent term was set, it was reasonable in that it often took many years to bring a product to market in any meaningful way; now that it can be done in months, and most products don't see more than a year or two on the market anyway (by which point R&D costs are recouped, money has been raked in, and the inventor has moved on to something else), a year or two might be a more reasonable term. Certainly, increasing the term to 20 years in 1995 was a mistake.
The same, of course, applies to copyright.
It can't be that rare of an occurrence if I know, first hand, of multiple occurrences. I don't exactly work in a field where it's patent ownership is common.
He said "two generations in", as in "this applies to the current generation and the one before it".
Are you kidding me? How do you know whether patents actually make a difference?
How far did we advance before 1790? How far have we come since then? When were patent laws introduced in the US?
Our biggest advancements pre-1790 were in glassmaking and came in or after the latter half of the 1400's. Incidentally, Venice began granting a form of patent in 1450; care to guess what most Venetian patents covered?
How do I know whether patents actually make a difference? Because there are literally centuries-worth of evidence that speak to the fact.
On the other hand, we do clearly see lawyers prospering and small inventors and consumers suffering. That is counter to the spirit of patent law.
We also see broad and obvious patents being granted, which is counter to the letter of patent law, at least in the US where we're seeing it. The problem isn't patent law, the problem is corrupt and/or incompetent administration. Incidentally, one of the primary causes of the collapse of the Roman empire (which saw great advancement post 500BC, when it began issuing patents) was a similar form of corruption. Again, not the fault of the patent, which history shows actually does encourage investment of time, money, and other resources in advancing technology and the arts, but rather the fault of poor enforcement of patent laws.
we should, rather, amend patent laws in a way that prevents such abuse going forward.
Patents also encourage the creation of that medicine in the first place. Don't forget that no company is going to invest billions in the research and development of a drug when the first buyer can simply pop the pill into a spectrum analyzer, figure out what's in it, and, because there's no patent protection, make their own without spending billions; which, of course, enables them to sell it for pennies, while the company that actually did the work must sell for dollars.
Does it suck that companies must charge a higher price to cover their R&D costs? Sure it does, but if their ability to recover those costs was not guaranteed, many fewer would bother. Do some companies abuse their monopoly position? Sure they do, but many also do not; it's not inherent in the position.
How does Roche ensure that they, at a minimum, recoup the billions they spend developing a new drug, absent a patent? One way would be to charge billions for the first pill; that way, when someone reverse engineers it to make their day-one generic, Roche has already recouped their costs and can afford to compete on price. Can you think of another way? And, if not, who do you think is going to pay billions for that first pill? I'd venture to guess, nobody; but your shortsightedness blinds you to reality.
All of that said, drug companies are scum and, really, the worst of the worst in this regard. Really, they're the only entities which worse represent the concept of the patent than patent trolls.
Shortening patent terms to a year or so, as is more in line with how long it takes to get a product to market today versus how long it took in 1790 when those terms were set, would alleviate that issue to a large degree.
we should, rather, amend patent laws in a way that prevents such abuse going forward.
To elaborate on that, I suppose I really mean "enforce the non-obviousness and specificity clauses as they already exist" which, in reality, is what's no longer happening in many cases, allowing broad patents to be granted for things that are obvious to anyone skilled in the relevant field. Patent laws were specifically crafted to prevent this, and that wording still exists today; the problem is not with the law, but with its application.
Don't blame the concept of the time-limited patent for the corruption of the administration. Fix what's broken, not what's not.
They are written vague on purpose, because to be specific, would allow others to build upon your patent, and patent their improvements, locking you into a stale old way of building said invention, never able to improve it.
This is precisely the type of abuse, by a handful of unscrupulous assholes (patent holders being, relative to the entirety of the population, a handful of people), which I propose we amend patent laws to prevent.
And, by amend, I truly mean "actually enforce the laws as written", since they already require some degree of specificity.
For the sake of our dear readers, continuing on with your comment:
As a libertarian, I am all for the repealing of most patents, and the shortening of the term of protection.
Indeed, repealing patents which do not follow the laws as currently written, which require a degree of specificity, lacking in many, and a degree of non-obviousness to a skilled professional in the relevant field, lacking in many others, would be the first necessary step in actually enforcing those laws as written.
It's debatable whether the term should be shortened; many would argue it should be extended, as was done with copyright. Personally, I believe that patents and copyright were given the terms they were originally given based on how long it took to produce and circulate a work at the time that those respective laws were written; as both now take considerably less time, yes, I agree that the terms should be shortened.
Are you saying it never happens that someone, inspired by someone else's patent, possibly even for a product or concept that hasn't been put into production, then comes up with their own novel, possibly even better, way of doing $thing? I, personally, know people who've done just that, who would not have had the resources to reverse engineer $thing in order to do so. In at least two of those cases, even having said resources would not have helped, absent the patent, as $thing was never in production and did not physically exist in order to reverse engineer.
Your "given that it was actually used in a product, service or production process" limitation is a straw man, at best.
Well... as a statistician, you should be familiar with basic math. If something has a probability of 0.1% and an event occurs that makes that thing 1000% more probable, 1000% being 10x (1000/100), it now how a probability of 1%. If another, similar event occurs, that thing, then, has a probability of 10%. Once more and it becomes 100% certain. Yes, as you statisticians like to point out, margins of error and all that also apply.
He may have worded it poorly, I'll grant you that; but his intent should have been obvious to anyone not hell-bent on being a pedantic prick.
As made evident by how far we progressed in the many decades which preceded patents, versus how little progress has been made since 1790, right?
No. No, I was right the first time. You can't own something that doesn't exist; and patents do server the purpose of forcing dissemination of information in exchange for temporary protection. That, in turn, allows others to build on previous work and make nice things, many of which we actually can own. That a handful of unscrupulous assholes has found a way to circumvent that should not negate all of the good aspects of patents; we should, rather, amend patent laws in a way that prevents such abuse going forward.
Patents are also why we can own nice things.
Except for the fact that you're flat out wrong, whereas I merely paraphrased in order to fit several different messages (as it changes based on which browser you're launching) into a single terse statement. Microsoft never used that qualifier; they did, however, say Edge is safer than Chrome and Firefox. Funny, I've never seen that popup for IE, Opera, or any other browser that isn't Chrome or Firefox.
But, they did specifically call out those two... then proceed to lose to them at Pwn2Own.
Oh, and before you say "the government will have thought of that and will keep said historians on staff or, at least, said typewriters in inventory"... yeah... sure they will... because people like you would never have said "this won't be an issue, we don't need to do that".
Oh... wait... that's right! If they do, it will be because of people like me, who can see the writing on the wall... while people still know how to write.
He could mean any multitude of lost skills as a result of current trends. As he specifically mentions losing the ability to write, I can come up with a number of scenarios in which that might be, well... less than ideal, shall we say.
Let's just say, a couple generations from now, only a select few "historians" know how to write. Typewriters are already a relic of the past, they aren't gonna be any easier to find 30 years from now, so all text-based communication is done via computers by that point. What happens when communication networks are taken out? No calls, because no communication network. No internet because no communication network. No pont-to-point because no communication network. Are you seeing a pattern here? Handwritten letters, delivered by courier, would sure be useful in that scenario.
And I don't just mean to let Grandma know little Johnny is okay. I mean for the dissemination of military intelligence relating to the attack that took out said communication networks; e.g. who just decided to start a war with us. It makes it a fair bit easier to send the missiles to the right location if we can get teams out to the launch sites (since the communication networks are down and we can't launch remotely) with the correct coordinates to send the missiles to, doesn't it?
If course, that's just the first scenario my just-woke-up, pre-coffee brain came up with, without really giving it much thought. I'm sure, if you put just a tiny bit more effort into it than I did, you'll be able to come up with others.
Oh, you've never seen it? I may have paraphrased, because the message is slightly different depending on which browser you're launching, but, well, it happens. In fact, it was reported here back in November.
Of course he can't, he's making a logically reasoned prediction. There can't possibly be sources, as the kids he's talking about are just now old enough to be in kindergarten; they haven't grown up to not know how to do any more than point.
I, for one, agree with him to a degree. It's entirely possible that is the path we are heading down. Unlike you, I also understand that there's no point in arguing about whether or not that's where we're headed, since it's too late to do anything about it if we are, and time will tell one way or the other. You won't be any more right or wrong in a decade when we find out, regardless of whether or not an anonymous internet commenter can provide sources today.
You mean like the perspective they cast by popping up an "Edge is the most secure browser" message every time you click a Chrome or Firefox icon in Win 10?
Class action over the "Edge is the most secure browser" popups in Win 10?
Yup, we've had that for a while now.
microsoft store: failed to compete with apple store and was rolled into best buy as a kiosk
Right next to the Apple kiosk in the Best Buy down the street from the mall with the Microsoft Store in it, which happens to be across from the Apple Store. In case you missed it, my point is that they both have both.
microsoft surface: failed to compete with iPad or android.
Mostly because it's not trying to; it runs a full desktop OS and is intended to replace desktop/laptop functionality on the low- to mid-end, with some useful tablet functionality mixed in. I don't use a Surface, myself, but I did just invest in a similar platform from Dell for my company; seems to be working well thus far.
Azure: failed to compete with aws/ec3/rackspace.
It's almost a completely different offering than the rest. Yes, there's some overlap in virtualized hosting and load balancing, but Azure does offer services the others do not, just as Amazon offers their own unique services; I'm not sure WTF ec3 is, I think you meant EC2, which is AWS, and Rackspace doesn't really offer anything unique of their own. In fairness, I thought like you do until I looked at Azure a month or so ago. While I wouldn't use it for all of my needs, I did find a place for some of what it offers (Azure AD and a handful of related services, for example) in my organization. Those are things I, quite simply, can not get from AWS/EC2 or Rackspace.
This is a new redmond, and with it comes moronic decisions like [...] porting random linux applications like SSH to windows.
SSH on Windows has been my primary use case for Cygwin for years, and I know I'm not alone in that. The fact that it's less random and more a full install of Ubuntu makes it all the more useful. Throw in XMing and, since Microsoft was actually responsive to complaints about things not working quite right early on, and fixed most of the issues in a single release, you can run most any CLI or GUI Linux application that you could run in a native Ubuntu install, right in Windows. I do wish they'd do something to make file sharing between Windows and Windows/Ubuntu a bit less completely-fuck-your-access-from-either-platform-y, but there are workarounds for that and the offering is still very much beta, so meh.
Everything else, though, you pretty much nailed.
Have you used recent versions of Windows or Office? You could have stopped at "everything" and been just as right. I say this as a primarily Windows shop that keeps a few Macs handy and runs infrastructure primarily on Linux.
I'm using a laptop, but it's plugged in at the moment. I, also, am using a computer not powered by a lithium-ion battery.
So you're saying the power comes from the battery's copper top?