This case says nothing about the ability to have copyright in 3d meshes in general. It is really about one that is merely a slavish reproduction without ANY creative input (e.g. no colors, textures, etc.)
I would wager good money--this is a bet and not legal advice--that a mesh that makes artistic choices will be treated in a fashion VERY similar to a photographer or someone making lifelike oil paintings.
Um. No. The last unsupported statement in the summary is at least half wrong: "companies that produce goods may not be able to stop modelers from imaging those products."
This case says nothing about this point. The companies may have copyrights, design patents, trademarks, etc. The fact that someone hired to make lifelike reproductions using wire meshes has no copyright in the work doesn't mean that no one has rights in it.
In any event, the real effect is pretty obvious: modelers should just charge MORE for their work so that they're fully compensated for the work product purchased by the company. Meshworks made a mistake in this case; they assumed that their work would be a loss-leader for the other portion of the work awarded to another company.
As for racing games, assuming that the modeling is done in-house, there will be no effect on price. If its done by a thrid party, it'll be MORE expensive (a cost ultimately passed along to you, the consumer).
And you must live in an alternate reality where Democrats understand that the laws of supply and demand regulate gas prices and allow for increased production in addition to increased efficiency to bring the cost of oil down.
You must live in a reality where everything is black and white. Higher gas prices means fewer gas consumers whilst lower prices brings more consumption. We're witnessing that right now. For envirodems, lower consumption is a GOOD thing not a bad thing.
Moreover, higher gas prices means that other source of energy that are arguably "better" from a sustainability/environmental perspective but previously unworkable given the price of gasoline become much more appealing.
Besides, an increase in domestic production would have such a SMALL impact on the overall cost of gasoline and any impact would be fleetingly short lived. The US simply does not have enough oil reserves to make much of a lasting impact.
Finally, there's a really good argument that we should drain the cheap oil from other places first and keep our oil reserves until a time it actually matters. Using our reserves now would probably not give us a real good return on its value.
My impression was that the case law remains somewhat patchy
There are definitely aspects that are open to debate--there are few areas of law that are set in stone. But, I think that there is a self-perpetuating myth on Slashdot that EULAs remain largely untested. The fact of the matter, courts apply the same rules of contracts to EULAs as they do to anything else.
There are definitely some areas where courts more liberally seek to help consumers OUT of EULAs, but those tend to be the same places that courts do the same thing for regular contracts.
I can't expound on foreign law.
Interesting. Does this suggest then that the main threat to corporations is more from any management failure in due diligence in controlling a company's code assets?
Maybe. I'm not sure it's the main threat. It is definitely a threat. It is also the threat that brings the legal issues associated with OSS/GPL to their attention.
The problem is that once it becomes an issue, it is difficult and expensive to rid yourself of problem given the very viral nature of the rights. Even if a company decided against using the code, but looked at it, there is arguably a potential copyright infringement problem if the company releases something similar.
OSS is a problem for many software business NOT in the business of "free."
there is as-yet little legal precedent in the US backing up any sort of EULA-type "agreement" that restricts how end users can actually use the end products.
Not true, but oft-cited on Slashdot. There are a number of cases at district court levels that have backed EULAs and a few appellate court cases too.
The ones that lose are typically those that impose huge burdens on the consumer: changes in law, venue, arbitration, etc. A recent case placed a limit on non-transfer clause, but the court hinted that the original purveyor was probably in breach, not the person that was actually sued.
Furthermore, EULAs aren't just software oriented. There is a long history of cases that impose restrictions from contracts that consumers don't get until, arguably, it's too late.
As such, *all* end users are essentially free to do what they want with software under *any* license, within the (admittedly obfuscated, and currently imperiled) bounds of copyright.
The GPL in all its various forms simply attempts to define that proper permission. If folks don't like what such permission entails, fine -- bloody well don't use GPL-covered code.
The funny thing is, many corporate entities would probably agree with you. A number of places I know have zero tolerance for OSS in their workplace, but those rebellious techies use it anyway.
Even those that are more accommodating are nevertheless hesitant because OSS comes in so many flavors, not just GPLv#. This makes managing obligations next to impossible.
Whining about not getting a free ride just makes people look like wankers. Whine, whine, whinge. Meh.
While, I'm sure there are some that would like to commercially exploit the work of others, this is NOT the usual posture in which most companies encounter GPL/OSS. It's usually because some 3rd party contractor used it in a package the company intended to commercially sell or because an employee decided it would make their life easier. Then the problems become VERY acute.
Of course, Intellectual Property is well understood amongst lawyers. However, most lawyers are only acquainted with using IP for commercial advantage.
If I had mod points, I'd mod you up "+1 Funny." *hint hint*
As an IP lawyer, the reality is: few lawyers understand intellectual property. Even fewer understand sufficiently well to give reasoned opinions about a particular area. Patent law and copyright law are sufficiently dense to make even broaching the topic with anything but broad strokes difficult. I would wager that most lawyers couldn't give you the definition of a copyrightble work.
Some lawyers recognize that they can leverage IP language into a commercial advantage against an unwitting opponent with little or no retaliation, but that's different.
The acceptance of fax signatures has to do only with fact that fax machines have been around for a long time
This is part of it, but the real reason why is that the law (E-SIGN and various other state versions) have basically said that you can't deny a signature MERELY because it's electronically signed.
Oh, and also because its silly not to accept an electronic signature.
It might surprise people but there's hardly a reason NOT to accept a fax/electronic signature since a signature is really meaningless in the business context. It is essentially EVIDENCE. It's not conclusive. There are certain enumerated situations (like wills and real estate) where signatures are a big deal, but these are not the day-to-day transactions people usually think about.
In a contract, the question is whether the parties intended to form a contract. A signature can be evidence of that. So can clicking a button. So can doing s/First Last/. So can paying for the goods. So can accepting the goods. So can performing. So can stating so in an e-mail with a contract attached. And on and on.
Besides, the risk of fraud exists regardless of whether you get a real signature or otherwise. Again, even when there's a fraud, the signature becomes evidence of the fraud. Heck, even requiring in person signature is not a sure fire way to prevent fraud. Frequently the person accepting an actual signed contract will not be in a position to evaluate whether the signature is in fact true or fraudulent.
The law ALREADY defines the elements of contributory infringement. First, you need knowledge of the infringing activity. That's pretty easy in these cases. The torrent tracker sites purpose seems to be infringement. Second--and here's the distinction from Google et. al.--material involvement: inducement, causation, contribution, etc.
Take a look at the Grokster case.
Also, everyone should realize that this concept is not new or original to copyright/patent law. Take a look at what happens to people selling burglary tools. As in those cases, the question ultimately becomes whether there is a substantial non-infringing purpose and not just some trivial non-infringing purpose.
And, again, I'm not going to take a position one way or another vis-a-vis Google's liability, but it seems pretty clear that general purpose searches and caches are not subject to the same standard as a search whose primary purpose is to direct infringers to their desired content. It's for these reasons Dell, Gate, HP, Compaq, Apple, etc. would not be subject to indirect infringement even though absent the computers they sold the would-be infringers may not have had the ability to infringe.
Frankly, I'm not really sure WHY people are defending these sites.
Actually, it is. What does Google link to that isn't copyrighted?
Not the same. I said, "UNLAWFUL copies." If a news agency wants to put up their copyrighted photos on a website, then someone browsing their site isn't a copyright infringer. Ditto for a search engine that POINTS to those sites. The index is to a bunch of LAWFUL copies.
In this case, we have UNLAWFUL copies of copyrighted works. Someone ripped them from a DVD, CD, or TV and posted them on the internet. It's not the copyright owners actions, it's a direct infringement by a third party (hence indirect copyright infringement in this case).
That said, I do think (and have always thought) that Google's position is legally precarious when is massively archives, stores and repurposes copyrighted works. But, that's not the issue here.
Well, no. These sites' purpose and content consisted substantially of indexing and enabling the search for unlawful copies of copyrighted works. While Google certainly has some capability to do this as well, I don't think most people would see that as a substantial portion of their content or their purpose.
But this is a much lesser disclosure, in that there are heavy restrictions on what you can do with it.
And, commensurate with that less disclosure is narrower patent scope. I don't see the issue. Large number of claim limitations just means that there's less patent protection and more alternatives.
So patents ONLY provide a benefit when the patented thing would otherwise never be invented (or at least not be invented for another several years).
Well, again, how do you know that a priori? How can you possibly know something "will never be invented (or at least not be invented for several years.)" If you're able to make those predictions, quick, start investing your money.
Now, the SCOTUS has recently held that something will be obvious (thus not patentable) when it is obvious to try. But, the obvious to try standard needs something more the mere post-fact reasoning. For example, if people know that doing X will provide some known result with pretty good reliability, and it's known that there are only 100 ways to do X, then the fact the X^3 may not have been done before will not make it non-obvious (i.e. it will be obvious since it was obvious to try).
I'm really glad you're not creating patent policy.
Fine, I accept your premise that the reality without a patent system is unknowable under modern concepts of industrialization. The grandparent is also wrong by exactly the same argument (if not more wrong as described below) since there's no way to know whether innovation is in fact being held hostage by the patent system.
But, the evidence we do have basically shows: increases in technologies coinciding with increases in patent filings. The last 100 years have been a boon for both. While Pre-modern patent law shows slow steady growth on par with historical trends for the previous ten thousand years. Someone can feel free to find those charts for me--I know they're out there.
It's easy. Try being on a site someplace with a laptop that you're trying to show a virtual representation of the end result. For that matter, any time you're in a place where you cannot sit and there is no table.
Also, I can think of a number of very small computers, iphones, blackberries or things of slightly larger size which is necessarily held in one hand.
publish what they'd otherwise try to keep as trade secrets
Not everything that is patentable (or ought to be patentable) must also be trade secret. This is a perfect example (actually most any mechanical invention is a good example). Once it's sold, used, displayed, demoed, described, photograph, etc. it would lose any and all protection.
Now, arguably, one of the purposes of patents is to encourage people to disclose EARLIER rather than later. Here, you probably see this disclosure before you've actually seen it sold, used, displayed, demoed, described, photograph, etc.
obvious when inspected
Just about EVERYTHING seems obvious once you see it. That's the whole reason why the patent law painstakingly tries to AVOID doing your above analysis.
hold progress hostage by recording their daydreams
I don't know what this means. Patents have been around for 200 years and progress hasn't slowed by anyone's account.
Moreover, this is hardly a "daydream" which seems to imply fanciful idea. There's probably almost NOTHING stopping them from implementing it right now. There are probably lots of real estate agents, contractors, etc. that would love to have a laptop that they could hold and show when there is not a table nearby.
Finally, nothing stopped someone from introducing this idea (without patent protection) before this patent. So as far as I can tell, to the extent this moves progress forward and giving other people ideas, the publication of the patent has done it's job.
* Like a good slashdotter, I have not actually looked at the patent or RTFA.
Damage awards are generally taxable if they were intended to compensate the taxpayer as follows: compensation for lost wages or profits; punitive damages, even if they relate to a physical injury or sickness; amounts received in settlement of pension rights when the taxpayer did not contribute to the plan; interest on any award; damages for patent or copyright infringement, breach of contract, or interference with business operations; and back pay and damages for emotional distress received under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964.
Again, what world do you live in? There are so many holes in your theory I don't even really know where to start.
But, first, sick people are usually in the WORST position to spend significant amounts over the long term. If the disease is fatal, afflicts children, or afflicts only a few then your theory makes no sense. If the disease has a good treatment, but no cure (like diabetes), your theory makes no sense.
Second, at least in the US, most "sick people" don't actually foot the bill for their own illnesses; insurance companies do. If there was one group with incentive, its the insurance companies.
Third, "really sick people" (whatever that means) likely wouldn't have the time or resources to spend significant amounts of money over the decades it takes to develop and bring a drug to market. The likelihood that really sick people would see a cure in their lifetime probably approaches zero.
Fourth, your equation $X+$Y is probably better represented as a probability. As stated, it sounds like those would be knowable costs, but there are diseases for which people have been searching for a cure for which none has been found despite large commercial and non-profit efforts: cancer, diabetes, Alzheimer's, etc.
Finally, the period of exclusivity for a drug is far shorter than you're letting on. Once discovery, clinical trials, and manufacture is complete, drug patents have about 7-10 years of exclusivity--that's not even half a generation.
So, I'm not sure where you're getting your theories, but it might be time to go back to the drawing board.
No offense, but what reality are you operating in?
It's important to first note that most companies DON'T do the original research. The discovery often arises out of research very far removed from commercial products. Where it goes from there is a very difficult problem to solve since the barriers to the first entity are very HIGH.
To get to market a drug has to be "discovered," make it through clinical trials, and be marketable at a cost that's "profitable." This whole process for the first company is prohibitively expensive and risky. A follower would have neither the risk nor the cost associated.
This assumes that you can even GET the product from the research. There's a huge death valley of products whose cost just to get started down the commercialization process makes it all but impossible.
That's why, for example, you don't see many non-profit or research institutions trying to capitalize on their own research. Rather, they get the protection and sell those rights (or license them) for a FRACTION of the actual market value.
Absent protection, few people would have ANY incentive to take the risk when the next person can do it for nothing.
First, the taxing authority you propose may not be that of the IP owners. A defendant can bring suit in their own jurisdiction EVEN if they're the bad actors--it's called declaratory judgment.
Second, the awards in IP cases aren't proportional to the ACTUAL value of the ip on the open market. That's not new; and it was never a proxy for that value. Excluding punitive damages (for willfulness), awards in patent cases are usually for a "reasonable royalty." But a reasonable royalty in litigation isn't calculated as if the transaction had occurred before there was infringement.
In addition, a value of a patent might not be the value assigned in a license relationship, but instead in the ability to exclude others.
Third, judgments and amounts gained by settlement ARE taxed just like in any other case.
Fourth, IP IS TAXED! Why does everyone assume it's not. Check the tax code.
Fifth, and I'd have to look into this, but I'd imagine any attempt by a LOCAL government to tax IP based on local real estate taxes will run afoul of not imposing multiple taxes on the same property: e.g. attempts to tax the same property in many localities.
Well, frankly, the inventor is very unlikely to be the same person to take the drug to market. And, in order to convince someone to do that, they're going to want to know that their effort will not be wasted.
At least in the case of pharmaceuticals and biotechnology, the arguments favoring patent protection have a lot more to do with the time and cost to get the invention to market than in many other fields. Simply getting a drug through clinical trials is a VERY expensive and risky endeavor.
What makes you think that IP isn't taxed? Contrary to your post, IP is taxed (at least in the US). There really are two basic tax issues that are difficult for any taxation: when is there a tax event and how do you value the ip.
The tax code actually does a reasonable job answering both of these questions. If you look at the tax code, IP is taxed like all other intangible things. Licenses are taxed upon the income received by the license. Assignments (sale) are taxed much like other capital. Court judgments and settlement payouts from lawsuits will be taxed like any other award.
Companies like Microsoft spend a lot of effort to move their IP into low tax jurisdictions.
It's unlikely that you'd see a real estate like tax imposed on IP for a couple reasons: 1. it depreciates since each year its useful life shortens with each passing year; 2. Valuing a particular piece of IP is nearly impossible in the abstract.
This is more easily explained when you realize that the money spent on marketing turns into actual sales FASTER, more RELIABLY than taking a drug from discovery to market.
Is the money you gain from prohibiting others from using the same idea in a generic drug worth the lives lost by those who are unable to afford your prices?
You've phrased this exactly backwards: is giving up a short term of exclusivity worth all the lives SAVED because someone took the time to invest the money in getting that drug from discovery through clinical trials.
Without patent protection, you'd have a free rider problem.
in my opinion it would be unfeasible to maintain two sites
I call B.S. Separation of content and presentation is a known technique. Good tools to do this have been around for the web for at least the last 8 years. Their is almost no additional cost if you're doing it right in the first place.
Besides, this only has benefits for the site owner. It will not only be accessible for those without access to broadband, but also accessible by those with mobile devices like Blackberries.
In my days as a web developer, people thought I was crazy that people would actually want to browse the internet on a mobile device. But the truth is, most business would probably benefit from considering these users. For example, restaurants, airlines, movie theaters, transportation services, tourist-oriented sites, hotels, newspapers, web based e-mail services, etc. all likely will have users that are on mobile devices.
Do you know how awesome it is to be able to scroll through a restaurant's menu online while you're standing in an airport? Or to even find one?
Even personal interest hobby sites would probably benefit. Nothing like killing time while you wait.
Pretty silly to impute the remarks of another onto a candidate. Do we even need to look at the things the religious right has said that John McCain embraces? Remember back in the last election when McCain wanted nothing to do with them?
Slashdot Mirror
This case says nothing about the ability to have copyright in 3d meshes in general. It is really about one that is merely a slavish reproduction without ANY creative input (e.g. no colors, textures, etc.)
I would wager good money--this is a bet and not legal advice--that a mesh that makes artistic choices will be treated in a fashion VERY similar to a photographer or someone making lifelike oil paintings.
Um. No. The last unsupported statement in the summary is at least half wrong: "companies that produce goods may not be able to stop modelers from imaging those products."
This case says nothing about this point. The companies may have copyrights, design patents, trademarks, etc. The fact that someone hired to make lifelike reproductions using wire meshes has no copyright in the work doesn't mean that no one has rights in it.
In any event, the real effect is pretty obvious: modelers should just charge MORE for their work so that they're fully compensated for the work product purchased by the company. Meshworks made a mistake in this case; they assumed that their work would be a loss-leader for the other portion of the work awarded to another company.
As for racing games, assuming that the modeling is done in-house, there will be no effect on price. If its done by a thrid party, it'll be MORE expensive (a cost ultimately passed along to you, the consumer).
You must live in a reality where everything is black and white. Higher gas prices means fewer gas consumers whilst lower prices brings more consumption. We're witnessing that right now. For envirodems, lower consumption is a GOOD thing not a bad thing.
Moreover, higher gas prices means that other source of energy that are arguably "better" from a sustainability/environmental perspective but previously unworkable given the price of gasoline become much more appealing.
Besides, an increase in domestic production would have such a SMALL impact on the overall cost of gasoline and any impact would be fleetingly short lived. The US simply does not have enough oil reserves to make much of a lasting impact.
Finally, there's a really good argument that we should drain the cheap oil from other places first and keep our oil reserves until a time it actually matters. Using our reserves now would probably not give us a real good return on its value.
There are definitely aspects that are open to debate--there are few areas of law that are set in stone. But, I think that there is a self-perpetuating myth on Slashdot that EULAs remain largely untested. The fact of the matter, courts apply the same rules of contracts to EULAs as they do to anything else.
There are definitely some areas where courts more liberally seek to help consumers OUT of EULAs, but those tend to be the same places that courts do the same thing for regular contracts.
I can't expound on foreign law.
Maybe. I'm not sure it's the main threat. It is definitely a threat. It is also the threat that brings the legal issues associated with OSS/GPL to their attention.
The problem is that once it becomes an issue, it is difficult and expensive to rid yourself of problem given the very viral nature of the rights. Even if a company decided against using the code, but looked at it, there is arguably a potential copyright infringement problem if the company releases something similar.
OSS is a problem for many software business NOT in the business of "free."
Not true, but oft-cited on Slashdot. There are a number of cases at district court levels that have backed EULAs and a few appellate court cases too.
The ones that lose are typically those that impose huge burdens on the consumer: changes in law, venue, arbitration, etc. A recent case placed a limit on non-transfer clause, but the court hinted that the original purveyor was probably in breach, not the person that was actually sued.
There's a now out of date article from a couple years ago by Mark Lemley that discussed "terms of use": http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=917926
Furthermore, EULAs aren't just software oriented. There is a long history of cases that impose restrictions from contracts that consumers don't get until, arguably, it's too late.
Simply not true; see above.
And I'm not sure what is imperiled about the bounds of copyright. If anything, they're about to be extended: http://williampatry.blogspot.com/2008/06/acta-call-to-arms-no-more-secret.html
The funny thing is, many corporate entities would probably agree with you. A number of places I know have zero tolerance for OSS in their workplace, but those rebellious techies use it anyway.
Even those that are more accommodating are nevertheless hesitant because OSS comes in so many flavors, not just GPLv#. This makes managing obligations next to impossible.
While, I'm sure there are some that would like to commercially exploit the work of others, this is NOT the usual posture in which most companies encounter GPL/OSS. It's usually because some 3rd party contractor used it in a package the company intended to commercially sell or because an employee decided it would make their life easier. Then the problems become VERY acute.
As an IP lawyer, the reality is: few lawyers understand intellectual property. Even fewer understand sufficiently well to give reasoned opinions about a particular area. Patent law and copyright law are sufficiently dense to make even broaching the topic with anything but broad strokes difficult. I would wager that most lawyers couldn't give you the definition of a copyrightble work.
Some lawyers recognize that they can leverage IP language into a commercial advantage against an unwitting opponent with little or no retaliation, but that's different.
Oh, and also because its silly not to accept an electronic signature.
It might surprise people but there's hardly a reason NOT to accept a fax/electronic signature since a signature is really meaningless in the business context. It is essentially EVIDENCE. It's not conclusive. There are certain enumerated situations (like wills and real estate) where signatures are a big deal, but these are not the day-to-day transactions people usually think about.
In a contract, the question is whether the parties intended to form a contract. A signature can be evidence of that. So can clicking a button. So can doing s/First Last/. So can paying for the goods. So can accepting the goods. So can performing. So can stating so in an e-mail with a contract attached. And on and on.
Besides, the risk of fraud exists regardless of whether you get a real signature or otherwise. Again, even when there's a fraud, the signature becomes evidence of the fraud. Heck, even requiring in person signature is not a sure fire way to prevent fraud. Frequently the person accepting an actual signed contract will not be in a position to evaluate whether the signature is in fact true or fraudulent.
I'm not neglecting anything.
The law ALREADY defines the elements of contributory infringement. First, you need knowledge of the infringing activity. That's pretty easy in these cases. The torrent tracker sites purpose seems to be infringement. Second--and here's the distinction from Google et. al.--material involvement: inducement, causation, contribution, etc.
Take a look at the Grokster case.
Also, everyone should realize that this concept is not new or original to copyright/patent law. Take a look at what happens to people selling burglary tools. As in those cases, the question ultimately becomes whether there is a substantial non-infringing purpose and not just some trivial non-infringing purpose.
And, again, I'm not going to take a position one way or another vis-a-vis Google's liability, but it seems pretty clear that general purpose searches and caches are not subject to the same standard as a search whose primary purpose is to direct infringers to their desired content. It's for these reasons Dell, Gate, HP, Compaq, Apple, etc. would not be subject to indirect infringement even though absent the computers they sold the would-be infringers may not have had the ability to infringe.
Frankly, I'm not really sure WHY people are defending these sites.
Not the same. I said, "UNLAWFUL copies." If a news agency wants to put up their copyrighted photos on a website, then someone browsing their site isn't a copyright infringer. Ditto for a search engine that POINTS to those sites. The index is to a bunch of LAWFUL copies.
In this case, we have UNLAWFUL copies of copyrighted works. Someone ripped them from a DVD, CD, or TV and posted them on the internet. It's not the copyright owners actions, it's a direct infringement by a third party (hence indirect copyright infringement in this case).
That said, I do think (and have always thought) that Google's position is legally precarious when is massively archives, stores and repurposes copyrighted works. But, that's not the issue here.
Well, no. These sites' purpose and content consisted substantially of indexing and enabling the search for unlawful copies of copyrighted works. While Google certainly has some capability to do this as well, I don't think most people would see that as a substantial portion of their content or their purpose.
This case really isn't that surprising.
And, commensurate with that less disclosure is narrower patent scope. I don't see the issue. Large number of claim limitations just means that there's less patent protection and more alternatives. Well, again, how do you know that a priori? How can you possibly know something "will never be invented (or at least not be invented for several years.)" If you're able to make those predictions, quick, start investing your money.
Now, the SCOTUS has recently held that something will be obvious (thus not patentable) when it is obvious to try. But, the obvious to try standard needs something more the mere post-fact reasoning. For example, if people know that doing X will provide some known result with pretty good reliability, and it's known that there are only 100 ways to do X, then the fact the X^3 may not have been done before will not make it non-obvious (i.e. it will be obvious since it was obvious to try).
I'm really glad you're not creating patent policy.
Fine, I accept your premise that the reality without a patent system is unknowable under modern concepts of industrialization. The grandparent is also wrong by exactly the same argument (if not more wrong as described below) since there's no way to know whether innovation is in fact being held hostage by the patent system.
But, the evidence we do have basically shows: increases in technologies coinciding with increases in patent filings. The last 100 years have been a boon for both. While Pre-modern patent law shows slow steady growth on par with historical trends for the previous ten thousand years. Someone can feel free to find those charts for me--I know they're out there.
Draw whatever conclusions you want.
It's easy. Try being on a site someplace with a laptop that you're trying to show a virtual representation of the end result. For that matter, any time you're in a place where you cannot sit and there is no table.
Also, I can think of a number of very small computers, iphones, blackberries or things of slightly larger size which is necessarily held in one hand.
Not everything that is patentable (or ought to be patentable) must also be trade secret. This is a perfect example (actually most any mechanical invention is a good example). Once it's sold, used, displayed, demoed, described, photograph, etc. it would lose any and all protection.
Now, arguably, one of the purposes of patents is to encourage people to disclose EARLIER rather than later. Here, you probably see this disclosure before you've actually seen it sold, used, displayed, demoed, described, photograph, etc. Just about EVERYTHING seems obvious once you see it. That's the whole reason why the patent law painstakingly tries to AVOID doing your above analysis.
I don't know what this means. Patents have been around for 200 years and progress hasn't slowed by anyone's account.
Moreover, this is hardly a "daydream" which seems to imply fanciful idea. There's probably almost NOTHING stopping them from implementing it right now. There are probably lots of real estate agents, contractors, etc. that would love to have a laptop that they could hold and show when there is not a table nearby.
Finally, nothing stopped someone from introducing this idea (without patent protection) before this patent. So as far as I can tell, to the extent this moves progress forward and giving other people ideas, the publication of the patent has done it's job.
* Like a good slashdotter, I have not actually looked at the patent or RTFA.
As far as I know, taxation of civil judgments is common. Certain awards are probably excluded from income, but not to the extent you seem to think so.
A quick google search has at least one law firm saying exactly this: Taxation of Legal Damages:
Again, what world do you live in? There are so many holes in your theory I don't even really know where to start.
But, first, sick people are usually in the WORST position to spend significant amounts over the long term. If the disease is fatal, afflicts children, or afflicts only a few then your theory makes no sense. If the disease has a good treatment, but no cure (like diabetes), your theory makes no sense.
Second, at least in the US, most "sick people" don't actually foot the bill for their own illnesses; insurance companies do. If there was one group with incentive, its the insurance companies.
Third, "really sick people" (whatever that means) likely wouldn't have the time or resources to spend significant amounts of money over the decades it takes to develop and bring a drug to market. The likelihood that really sick people would see a cure in their lifetime probably approaches zero.
Fourth, your equation $X+$Y is probably better represented as a probability. As stated, it sounds like those would be knowable costs, but there are diseases for which people have been searching for a cure for which none has been found despite large commercial and non-profit efforts: cancer, diabetes, Alzheimer's, etc.
Finally, the period of exclusivity for a drug is far shorter than you're letting on. Once discovery, clinical trials, and manufacture is complete, drug patents have about 7-10 years of exclusivity--that's not even half a generation.
So, I'm not sure where you're getting your theories, but it might be time to go back to the drawing board.
No offense, but what reality are you operating in?
It's important to first note that most companies DON'T do the original research. The discovery often arises out of research very far removed from commercial products. Where it goes from there is a very difficult problem to solve since the barriers to the first entity are very HIGH.
To get to market a drug has to be "discovered," make it through clinical trials, and be marketable at a cost that's "profitable." This whole process for the first company is prohibitively expensive and risky. A follower would have neither the risk nor the cost associated.
This assumes that you can even GET the product from the research. There's a huge death valley of products whose cost just to get started down the commercialization process makes it all but impossible.
That's why, for example, you don't see many non-profit or research institutions trying to capitalize on their own research. Rather, they get the protection and sell those rights (or license them) for a FRACTION of the actual market value.
Absent protection, few people would have ANY incentive to take the risk when the next person can do it for nothing.
Many many problems with your theory.
First, the taxing authority you propose may not be that of the IP owners. A defendant can bring suit in their own jurisdiction EVEN if they're the bad actors--it's called declaratory judgment.
Second, the awards in IP cases aren't proportional to the ACTUAL value of the ip on the open market. That's not new; and it was never a proxy for that value. Excluding punitive damages (for willfulness), awards in patent cases are usually for a "reasonable royalty." But a reasonable royalty in litigation isn't calculated as if the transaction had occurred before there was infringement.
In addition, a value of a patent might not be the value assigned in a license relationship, but instead in the ability to exclude others.
Third, judgments and amounts gained by settlement ARE taxed just like in any other case.
Fourth, IP IS TAXED! Why does everyone assume it's not. Check the tax code.
Fifth, and I'd have to look into this, but I'd imagine any attempt by a LOCAL government to tax IP based on local real estate taxes will run afoul of not imposing multiple taxes on the same property: e.g. attempts to tax the same property in many localities.
There's probably a lot more. So sorry, try again.
Well, frankly, the inventor is very unlikely to be the same person to take the drug to market. And, in order to convince someone to do that, they're going to want to know that their effort will not be wasted.
At least in the case of pharmaceuticals and biotechnology, the arguments favoring patent protection have a lot more to do with the time and cost to get the invention to market than in many other fields. Simply getting a drug through clinical trials is a VERY expensive and risky endeavor.
What makes you think that IP isn't taxed? Contrary to your post, IP is taxed (at least in the US). There really are two basic tax issues that are difficult for any taxation: when is there a tax event and how do you value the ip.
The tax code actually does a reasonable job answering both of these questions. If you look at the tax code, IP is taxed like all other intangible things. Licenses are taxed upon the income received by the license. Assignments (sale) are taxed much like other capital. Court judgments and settlement payouts from lawsuits will be taxed like any other award.
Companies like Microsoft spend a lot of effort to move their IP into low tax jurisdictions.
It's unlikely that you'd see a real estate like tax imposed on IP for a couple reasons: 1. it depreciates since each year its useful life shortens with each passing year; 2. Valuing a particular piece of IP is nearly impossible in the abstract.
This is more easily explained when you realize that the money spent on marketing turns into actual sales FASTER, more RELIABLY than taking a drug from discovery to market.
It's really not that surprising.
You've phrased this exactly backwards: is giving up a short term of exclusivity worth all the lives SAVED because someone took the time to invest the money in getting that drug from discovery through clinical trials.
Without patent protection, you'd have a free rider problem.
Besides, this only has benefits for the site owner. It will not only be accessible for those without access to broadband, but also accessible by those with mobile devices like Blackberries.
In my days as a web developer, people thought I was crazy that people would actually want to browse the internet on a mobile device. But the truth is, most business would probably benefit from considering these users. For example, restaurants, airlines, movie theaters, transportation services, tourist-oriented sites, hotels, newspapers, web based e-mail services, etc. all likely will have users that are on mobile devices.
Do you know how awesome it is to be able to scroll through a restaurant's menu online while you're standing in an airport? Or to even find one?
Even personal interest hobby sites would probably benefit. Nothing like killing time while you wait.
Even though you obviously missed the point of the GP's post, I'll also tell you that you're probably wrong about the patents being expired.
If a secrecy order is imposed, the START of the patent term is the date that the secrecy order is lifted. http://www.bitlaw.com/source/mpep/120.html
According to TFA, the patent on the bomb hasn't been declassified, so, presumably, there would be a patent still once it was granted.
Pretty silly to impute the remarks of another onto a candidate. Do we even need to look at the things the religious right has said that John McCain embraces? Remember back in the last election when McCain wanted nothing to do with them?