Groklaw Says Microsoft Patent Portfolio Now Worthless 219
twitter writes "P.J. concludes her look at the Bilski decision: 'you'll recall patent lawyer Gene Quinn immediately wrote that it was bad news for Microsoft, that "much of the Microsoft patent portfolio has gone up in smoke" because, as Quinn's partner John White pointed out to him, "Microsoft doesn't make machines." Not just Microsoft. His analysis was that many software patents that had issued prior to Bilski, depending on how they were drafted, "are almost certainly now worthless." ... He was not the only attorney to think about Microsoft in writing about Bilski.'"
Turing machines and turning machines (Score:5, Insightful)
Good (Score:4, Insightful)
It's always invigorating to read twitter flamebait in the morning, but I doubt anyone can make a case that Microsoft (or, before CmdrTaco's edits, "M$") is a patent troll, or that it uses patents offensively. Even that FUD about Linux infringing 200+ patents is nothing more than hot air.
If anything, Microsoft has been a large target for patent trolls, and they have been rather successful at it IIRC. I think it's amusing to see people like our notorious troll here obsess with Microsoft's patent portfolio when there are smaller and more dangerous fish to fry in this delightful niche.
Someone might want to call IBM and let them know about this though. And Google. If Microsoft's patent portfolio is "worthless" then so is everybody else's. Which is a good thing, don't get me wrong, but I think it will be a while before courts start punishing actual patent trolls.
This is good news! (Score:4, Insightful)
It is great that software patents are finally being examined and reformed. Software patents are incredibly stupid as they can be incredibly broad and are for the sole purpose of stifling innovation. Instead of keeping large corporations from stealing and others inventions and making the inventors effort worthless, software patents do the opposite and allow large corporations from patenting broad techniques that almost always have prior art and leeching off other large corporations or hurting the American Consumer by stifling innovation and creating monopolies.
Patents in themselves and Intellectual Property are good at times but when it comes to software patents, all they do is cause abuse. For example many of our largest corporations have had a lot of their money stolen by patent trolls.
Patent law needs to be reformed and the Government needs to something about how large corporations are taking advantage of their resources to prove that they have the right to do techniques such as "webpages", "structured documents", or "contextual advertisements". Such broad things like that really shouldn't be reserved by anyone.
Patents are useful and are necessary in order to reward people and companies for spending R&D money to fund a lab or years of research. But software patents are basically a race for the first patent troll to type up an idea and spend the money to patent it. They don't have any benefit to anyone and they don't encourage anything except for companies to bully others and to squash competition.
Re:It doesn't matter... (Score:5, Insightful)
It depends on how you file, whether you use a law firm etc. What is certain is that defending a patent is NOT cheap. Going up against MS is kind of like a college kid who can't really afford school trying to defend themselves against the RIAA.
If software patents fall away to only those that actually make sense, or fewer, perhaps the industry can get back to making innovative software and creating value rather than working on protective measures to stave off patent suits.
Thinking laterally, this means also that smaller developers won't have to worry so much about falling foul of patents. This is nothing but a good thing.
Re:It doesn't matter... (Score:5, Insightful)
Sigh... it's Groklaw... (Score:4, Insightful)
Is there some reporting and analysis of this matter from a more impartial source than Groklaw? I'd love to believe what PJ writes, but the history of software patents is one of cleverly worded applications exploiting and widening every possible loophole to expand the scope of patentability. I think Groklaw is putting a very optimistic spin on this.
Re:Good (Score:5, Insightful)
If it's backed, however tepidly, by an army of Microsoft lawyers, does it still count as hot air?
Granted, Microsoft's stance is far removed from the sniping virulence of the average patent troll. Still, a troll's a troll, even if it's the lame level 5 in the dungeon entryway.
Re:Good (Score:3, Insightful)
He, this article is flamebait (PJ said something completely different, but the poster probably didn't RTFA), but that doesn't makes your comment less so. Microsof can't really sue FOSS for patent enforcement, but that doesn't make their actions less damaging. Also, most people don't care about trolls that go after big companies because, well, they don't administer big companies themselves. Most people care about people, and small companies, so they care about big companies that go out of their way to put small companies out of business.
Re:Some patents still apply (Score:5, Insightful)
They've got a patent on an optical mouse using a blue LED, don't they?
Re:Sigh... it's Groklaw... (Score:3, Insightful)
If we were all lawyers, our opinions might even matter!
He's looking for a lawyer's opinion on this... Preferably one with less bias than Groklaw has.
Re:It doesn't matter... (Score:5, Insightful)
Right. But it's effectively no change... Microsoft really can't afford to piss off IBM with a patent suit against anyone over Linux. That's what SCO v. IBM has shown the world -- IBM is the world's largest patent holder, they've staked a good portion of their business on Linux, and if you mess with Linux, IBM is going to send their Nazgul after you, just as they 'blackened the skies of Lindon, UT' with lawyers.
Even Microsoft can't go up against IBM in a patent fight. Tring to beat IBM in a patent fight is like trying to take down an F-22 with a slingshot.
Re:"Microsoft doesn't make machines." (Score:5, Insightful)
And Logitech outsources to factories in China, which get the raw materials from other companies, who lease the mineral rights from governments, which exist only through the will of the people, who were born from some other people, ad infinitum. Your point? For all practical purposes, Microsoft indeed makes mice and Xboxes, and Apple makes Macs and iPods. The person who signs the paycheck of the assembly line worker is irrelevant.
Re:"Microsoft doesn't make machines." (Score:3, Insightful)
So you're saying that Microsoft didn't build the Xbox because it was built out of components from Microsoft suppliers? Then I suppose you want to credit STMicroelectronics [findarticles.com] and others as the manufacturer of that "Seagate" HDD? [Yes, I know the article's old, but it was the first one I found mentioning one of Seagate's suppliers and I didn't feel like searching for a more recent one.]
I think you'd be hard-pressed today to find anything whose creation (and the creation of all its subparts) could be credited to one individual or company.
Re:"Microsoft doesn't make machines." (Score:3, Insightful)
It looks to me like any method patent which isn't specific to a particular lump of hardware which implements it (ie. a pure software patent, as opposed to, say, a patent covering a piece of software which is then loaded onto a device sold by the manufacturer) is invalid.
Yes and no. Yes, this is one way to interpret the decision. No, not everyone is interpreting it this way. The crux of the matter is what it means to be "tied to a particular machine", and specifically, whether a general purpose computer is a "particular machine".
My own interpretation is that general purpose computer patents are still valid, although media-fixing-instructions style patents probably aren't. YMMV. IANAL. Etc.
Re:Good (Score:5, Insightful)
Patents are like nuclear weapons. The big boy have the majority of them, but there's a tacit agreement (ala Mutually Assured Destruction of the Cold War) that they are for deterrent purposes only. The third-world Chihuahua dogs of the patent scene like Eolas are using their limited arsenal as they can to wrest some cash from the big boys. Sometimes that works, and sometimes it doesn't.
What we all need is complete disarmament, so the big boys can't bluster about theirs and the little yapping dogs can't use theirs either. Everybody wins.
Fresh off the wire: Apple sued over iPhone web browsing [msn.com], by another little patent troll. Reform is needed to stop this. I think companies like Microsoft, IBM, Google and Apple would be more than happy to stop pursuing defensive patents if the IP laws in the US and elsewhere ensured that they are not going to get nailed by the yapping dogs.
Re:It doesn't matter... (Score:3, Insightful)
Because Novell and one or two other nearly-bankrupt Linux distributors were paid hundreds of millions of dollars by Microsoft to pretend that Microsoft's patents weren't bogus. Sounds like a good deal to me. Say, Microsoft, if you want to toss a few million dollars my way, I'll say that your patents are A-ok, too.
Re:Not so fast (Score:4, Insightful)
What if you use virtual memory?
In this universe, you get Virtual memory exhausted (ENOMEM) and then the OOM killer forces your program to halt.
But really: What is a machine? (Score:3, Insightful)
Yeah, Turning engine/Turing engine, joke funny, ha ha. (My laptop's hostname is, BTW: "turing")
But what really does constitute a "machine"? It's easy to name examples that ARE machines, such as the BMW parked in front of my office. That's a machine; no contest.
On the other hand, a math function written in polynomial notation is definitely NOT a machine. That's been found over and over again.
But computers combine the two; It's easily possible to create a "virtual machine" in software, using a 3D toolkit. Not a "virtual machine" like VMWare, I mean a 3D representation of a physical machine. For example, you can simulate engine parts, pistons, bearings, etc. You could, using a 3D toolkit, create a fully functional copy, part-by-part, of the BMW parked in front of my office. You could compute the air compression within the cylinder walls, you could compute the coefficient of drag, in short, it IS a machine, rendered in software.
You can look at it, and using a joystick/keyboard, interact with it; you can enter it and "drive". Since you can even take it apart with virtual "tools", put it back together again, and since it obeys the laws of physics within its virtual world, how is it NOT a machine?
Auto manufacturers do this all the time - "create" cars virtually for crash, drag-coefficient, and general performance testing prior to making prototypes. It saves billions of dollars annually, as well as dramatically reducing time to market.
But is that a machine from the perspective of the patent office? Based on my understanding, the answer is probably no.
Re:But really: What is a machine? (Score:3, Insightful)
Simple. It has to be an actual, physical machine. Not a virtual machine.
You can look at it, and using a joystick/keyboard, interact with it; you can enter it and "drive". Since you can even take it apart with virtual "tools", put it back together again, and since it obeys the laws of physics within its virtual world, how is it NOT a machine?
You can't touch it. That's what makes it virtual.
Auto manufacturers do this all the time - "create" cars virtually for crash, drag-coefficient, and general performance testing prior to making prototypes. It saves billions of dollars annually, as well as dramatically reducing time to market.
These are mathematical models, not actual cars.
Another way to look at it is that 'virtual' means 'not real'. A virtual machine is, by definition, a not really the machine it's acting like. A patent on a real thing shouldn't apply to a not real thing. For those, only virtual patents should apply, which would involve virtual lawyers and virtual licensing requirements. Which is nice, because virtual money is much easier to come by.