Reform Could Kill EFF "Patent Busting Project"

netbuzz alerts us to a letter the EFF sent today to Senators Leahy and Specter pointing out a deleterious clause in the current draft of the Patent Reform Act of 2007 — which EFF generally supports. As written, the proposal would kill the EFF's Patent Busting Project. Fine print in the bill would limit the time in which a patent could be challenged, by anyone other than those suffering direct financial harm, to one year after the patent's grant. Since the EFF is non-profit it would have a hard time showing financial harm.

Who writes this stuff?

[Bryansix]

We need line by line, letter by letter editing comments for bills. I want to know which dumbass sneaked this into the Bill.

Financial harm?

[Anonymous Coward]

Err, what? Of course non-profits can suffer financial harm. Do you think they can't be sued, for example, or stolen from, or anything like that? What can't happen is that their profits are diminished - since they haven't got any -, but they sure can be harmed financially.

How is financial harm defined ?

[Alain Williams]

Fine print in the bill would limit the time in which a patent could be challenged, by anyone other than those suffering direct financial harm, to one year after the patent's grant.

Simple: The EFF buy one copy of software from someone who has had to pay patent extortion. The price that the EFF paid was presumably higher than it would have been if the software house did not have to pay patent dues ... thus the EFF has suffered financially.

Play these parasites at their own game!

patent incontestability is so bad

[waterbear]

The last thing the world needs is incontestable rights that were wrongly granted in the first place.

I can just hear the bill's defenders saying 'but this limitation would not be incontestability'. But patents are rights that can be asserted against the public generally. So this limitation on who can contest them, would be incontestability by a large section of the persons affected by the rights.

-wb-

Need a way to Monitor Congressional Bills

[Anonymous Coward]

Sneaking in wording like that into a bill is a big problem in Congress. Wouldn't it be great, like the Wikipedia tracing project, if we could find a way to find which congressman inserted what weasel words, when and who their donors are?

Re:Dangerous!!!!

[ScrewMaster]

Have we been bought and sold again fellow netizens?

Left to themselves Congresspeople generally aren't too bad ... it's the undue influence that's causing most of the problems.

Re:Second Patent Office

[John Whitley]

Heh, I've been making a similar quip/thought-experiment for a long time about having a "de-legislature", the only function of which is to remove law from the books.

But the real problem with both of these ideas is that the existing organizations (legislatures, the USPTO, etc.) really just need to operate for the good of individual citizens, without undue influence by the desires of powerful individuals, organizations, or corporations.

Taking my de-legislature case as an example, it'd be just as bad/good as the original depending on the level/lack of influence by external power influences. A corrupt de-legislature removing laws inconvenient to the powerful would be a pretty awful thing. The same problem applies to a corrupt "office of patent revocation"; it'd just make matters even worse than they already are.

Re:Who writes this stuff?

[arb phd slp]

Once we add CVS and source control the next thing we need is a compiler that actually turns the bill into a final form so that the "not" and "amended to add..." gets added into the sentences so we can see them in context instead of hundreds of pages away.

The reason no one reads the PATRIOT act is because it's almost all partial-sentence amendments to existing laws that are you can't see in context without access to a law library. Compile the source code of the nation so we can read it!

Re:Non-Profit can be harmed

[XaXXon]

Let's also be clear that "non-profit" does NOT mean "does not make money". It has to do with what your goals are. In a for-profit company, your goal is to make money for yourself or your stock holders or whatever. For a non-profit, your goals relate to the betterment of the community you serve. "Non-profit" actually has very little to do with money. Many non-profits have vast sums of money in trust. In fact, if you spend all your money, you're probably not doing a very good job.

Re:Gaming the system?

[Jeremi]

Still, how does one prevent the EFF folks from starting a sister corporation who creates a prototype of a potentially infringing device and claiming 'harm' since they can't sell it?

I think it's easier than that.... the EFF just needs to compile prior-art information and post it on a public web site, and if and when the patent troll tries to sue anybody, the people/companies being sued (and who are thus "being harmed") already have their case researched for them.

Re:What about consumers?

[Anonymous Coward]

Hmm... As soon as you hire a lawyer, and ask him if you can contest the patent, you have been financially harmed by it (...)

Re:Dangerous!!!!

[amirulbahr]

All Americans suck because they think:

Left to themselves Congresspeople generally aren't too bad ... it's the undue influence that's causing most of the problems.

The real problem is that law makers think it is their job to... well, make laws. They become consumed by the process and can only think in terms of "more laws, more laws, more laws", never "let's sit back and do nothing for a while". I think we all need more Ron Pauls.

p.s. that was a joke about all Americans sucking of course