FTC Issues Report Critical Of Patent Policy

hayek writes "The Federal Trade Commission issued a report yesterday regarding failings in current U.S. patent policy. Among other things, the FTC recommends that the burden of proof on parties challenging patents in court be lowered from the current 'clear and convincing' standard, to the easier 'preponderance of the evidence' standard. Even if you don't think the FTC recommendations go far enough, implementing them would be a good start to solving some of the problems caused by the current system." nolife points out a report at Law.com indicating that, under the current system, "Patent examiners have from 8 to 25 hours to read and understand each application, search for prior art, evaluate patentability, communicate with the applicant, work out necessary revisions, and reach and write up conclusions."

Simple solution...

[Anonymous Coward]

Force a rather large deposit. If the patent is found to clearly be invalid, don't return the deposit for wasting the examiner's time. To keep this from hurting small inventors, make it only apply to organizations applying for more than 3 in a year.

public review of claims

[rifftide]

Is there a reason why patent claims aren't posted on the www for public comment before they're approved? I can't think of any.

Patent-Free Filing with USPTO?

[u19925]

I had a thought that USPTO should also accept proposal for patent-free ideas. In this, people should be allowed to submit idea that USPTO should certify that it is free of patent. If USPTO is competent enough to grant patent by saying, this hasn't been done before; they should be able to certify that this doesn't violate any patent. Once it is granted, people should feel free using this idea. In case someone wants to file a patent lawsuit on this patent-free idea, then the burden of proof should be on plaintiff. By default the idea should be considered patent free.

This would be a tremendous boost to standard organization. We no more will get surprise .gif, .jpg, eolas etc patents.

The cost of such patent-free filing should be at par with patent filing.

Presumption of validity is the main problem

[rollingcalf]

Not only are patents presumed valid when they are challenged in court, they are presumed valid even before granting, to the extent that the burden is on the patent officer to establish why it should not be granted. That is utterly ridiculous. When someone applies for a patent, they are making a blatant and sweeping claim against the whole human race; essentially, they are saying that no one else in the history of the earth has built something like it.

Strong statements like that should be backed up with extremely solid evidence. While it is not possible for an applicant to conclusively prove a negative, the burden of proof should still lie on the applicant's shoulders, forcing them to impress the patent examiners and convince them that there is a strong likelihood that they are the first one on earth to put the alleged invention together.

A solution

[puppet10]

"Patent examiners have from 8 to 25 hours to read and understand each application, search for prior art, evaluate patentability, communicate with the applicant, work out necessary revisions, and reach and write up conclusions."

I suggest that business method patents be eliminated by statute to reduce the workload on the patent examiners to improve the amount of time to devote to each patent application.

Re:Funny coming from this Administration

[Brandybuck]

Bush campaign donors

<rant>
Take your damned blinders off and join the real world. Yes, Bush had a lot of big campaign donors. So did Gore. So does every candidate. Maybe Nader didn't take any from for-profit corporations, but he's far from clean in the "no special interests" department.

Yeah, as you can tell, you just hit my hot button. It's been getting hotter over the last year, and it finally blew. You're the lucky one I get to spew on. This isn't directed at Democrats, because the Republicans do the exact same thing when they don't have a president in office.

I'm sick and tired of this football mentality the US has about politics. You act like it's a damned football game, rooting for the home team and booing the visiting team. If you're a Democrat then your attitude is that a Republican president can do nothing right. If you're a Republican, then off course the Democratic incumbent is Evil Incarnate. Both sides seem to forget that there's very little real difference between the two.

Is [Clinton|Bush] really at fault for every evil in the world? You guys certainly act like it.

Would we still have this patent problem if Gore was in office? Of course we would, you nimwits! Would we still have the MPAA and RIAA? Considering the overwhelming support those two organizations have among Democratic office holders, the answer is again an obvious yes. Would we still be in Iraq? Considering Clinton's military activity, if Gore was anything like him we would be knee deep in conflict somewhere. The only difference would be a higher probability of UN support. BFD!

Now if Buchanan, Nader or Brown had won the election (by some miracle), then things would have been different. But they still wouldn't provide the perfect paradise everyone claims Bush is denying to them.

Sidenote: Someone I know made his opinion known in a very emotional way. "Evil #$*&% stupid $&@# Republicans!", he said. Then ten minutes later in the conversation, "I can't understand why my mom voted for Bush." Did he realize he just called his mother "Evil #$*&% stupid $&@#"? I somehow doubt it.

I don't like Bush. I voted for Brown (while holding my nose). Bush isn't my "home team quarterback". But that's no excuse for me to insert some jab at him with every post I make. All it does for you is to proclaim your home team allegiance. Nothing more.

Re:Crazies like Franken?

[brlewis]

Yes, you should thank me. Not everyone would call Franken's letter a lie. I notice you carefully chose your hyperlink in such a way as to avoid the part that shows the original letter and says it "reads like a joke." I wish lies like "I will be the Education President" were as funny.

And thank you for confirming that you have no rational argument against what Franken presents in his book, except lame ad-hominem attacks.