Tech Giants Bankrolling IP Hoarding Start-Up 528
theodp writes "Microsoft alum Nathan Myhrvold so strongly believes intellectual property is the next software that he's studying for the patent bar exam. His company, Intellectual Ventures, doesn't actually make anything - only patent attorneys roam the hallways. Myhrvold isn't the only true believer. Microsoft, Intel, Sony, Nokia, Apple, Google, and eBay have contributed to a $350M bankroll which the firm is using to buy up existing patents that can be rented to companies who want to produce real products."
A company built on patents only? (Score:5, Funny)
Re:A company built on patents only? (Score:5, Insightful)
This company is no more than a gang, you pay the fee, they protect you from the other IP whores. And not only is this legal, the taxpayers actually pay for it, when this bullshit floods the courts. I think some vigilante justice is in order.
Re:A company built on patents only? (Score:5, Interesting)
Although, the sad part is that the comman man is just as responsible as anybody else for this outcome. We have empowered them through our complacency and utter lack of regard for anything other than what is on our damn televisions every night. We have been enslaved to technology, and as a result those that produce that technology own us all. Especially, now that what we see on television (our defacto standard for the propogation of our culture) tells us that men have to be ignorant fools who are only interested in football, sex, gadgets, and being retarded with their friends to fit in. And women just have to buy everything including a perfect body to do the same. We are trained to be submissive idiots, questioning those who are otherwise.
Oh well, at least we still have our sweet... sweet capitalism. At least we have a choice of where we buy things. You know ma & pa shop down the street or Wal-Mart up the street for 70% less (which coincidentally enough is all you can afford now that you work there). Good thing McCarthy came along and kept us from falling into the hell hole of desperation that is communism.
And at least we still have our voice in our government. You know our solitary occasional whispering voices, compared to industries full time lobbyists. I am perfectly satisfied with all of my governmental representatives are you
Re:A company built on patents only? (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:A company built on patents only? (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:A company built on patents only? (Score:4, Interesting)
That depends upon your definition of "war". Tax evasion is now at epidemic levels, and that only makes sense, since the Neo-Libs and Neo-Cons both want to make government power more focused: much more narrow and intense. As long as you avoid the withering glare of the All-Seeing Eye of the modern Sauron (i.e. the Federal Government), you can pretty much get away with anything you like. You little Hobbitses -- Sssss! -- can scrabble around in Eriador, raising tomatoes and chickens
In short, an environment it being created in which is will be difficult to obtain a welfare check of any sort, but it will be easy to evade all kinds of taxation. This is well within the Neo-Con vision of future government. Any fool can see it. And there's your civil war
Re:A company built on patents only? (Score:5, Insightful)
The mere fact that companies can openly perpetrate this sort of flim-flam says something about how far into la-la-land our legal system and our culture have gone. There was a time when such behavior happened behind closed doors and involved discreet payoffs to officials. Now IP pirates proudly wave their sabers and flash their gold teeth. There was a time when the media and the public would have been outraged by such brazen manipulation of the system. Now the primary response is more along the lines of, "I wish I'd thought of that."
I don't really think this sort of thing will stifle innovation -- people with great ideas will still want to see them become reality. What it will do is ensure that more of the beans end up in fewer people's piles, which is the way the economy has been going anyway for some time. In the future, if you have a clever idea you will have to look around for the right Baron to pay your tithe to, so you don't get caught poaching in the royal forest.
Re:A company built on patents only? (Score:4, Insightful)
Were this done, we would not have the problems we are having now.
Think it won't work? Look at history. So long as companies are kept in check the people flurish. When one or more companies become overly powerful - the people suffer. Just like when governments become overly powerful. Both tend to intrude into the private person's life and both tend to try to dominate, like a dog, everything a person tries to do.
On the funny side: I wonder how many times you can patent a flashlight as a cat toy? And how many times will a company buy that patent?
Re:A company built on patents only? (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:A company built on patents only? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:A company built on patents only? (Score:5, Insightful)
We have set up a system that punishes the risk takers and achievers and rewards the lawyers, the greedy, the immoral, and the bastards.
Nice.
I am not a "true believer" (Score:3, Insightful)
But..... patents are *very* costly to enforce in court, and they are also *risky* to defend in court. Indeed, one adverse judgement, and your valuable patent becomes a wort
Re:I am not a "true believer" (Score:4, Insightful)
Linux (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Linux (Score:4, Insightful)
I'd like to thank the USPTO (Score:3, Funny)
Re:I'd like to thank the USPTO (Score:3, Insightful)
Yeah, and this USA is pushing/forcing other countries to adopt. But hey, this is capitalism, so it must be good :-/
Re:I'd like to thank the USPTO (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:I'd like to thank the USPTO (Score:4, Informative)
One entry found for mercantilism.
Main Entry: mercantilism
Pronunciation: -"tE-"li-z&m, -"tI-, -t&-
Function: noun
1 : the theory or practice of mercantile pursuits : COMMERCIALISM
2 : an economic system developing during the decay of feudalism to unify and increase the power and especially the monetary wealth of a nation by a strict governmental regulation of the entire national economy usually through policies designed to secure an accumulation of bullion, a favorable balance of trade, the development of agriculture and manufactures, and the establishment of foreign trading monopolies
- mercantilist
- mercantilistic
Re:I'd like to thank the USPTO (Score:3, Insightful)
Here's a quick question for you. If the local police are enforcing a bad law, whom do you blame? If you blame the police officers, then you are entirely ignorant of how criminal law is written and amended. That observation is not irrelevant to your comment about the USPTO. Rub a few together and you'll see my point.
Re:I'd like to thank the USPTO (Score:4, Insightful)
However, the USPTO has a vested interest in encouraging as many patents as possible, since more patent applications == more income, and a bigger patent office is a bigger kingdom for the people in charge. Plus, it's just plain easier to rubber-stamp the stuff coming in without checking it thoroughly. That's why we see the exact opposite of the approach I described above.
Basically, if a law is really bad, the local police often don't bother enforcing it. They've got better things to do. The USPTO doesn't have anything better to do, and it enforces the bad laws that it oversees with great enthusiasm.
Re:I'd like to thank the USPTO (Score:5, Insightful)
Inventor gets paid for selling his patent for X to Microsoft. Now whether X is a patent for an artificial brain or a triple-click on a mouse has nothing to do with the fact that MS now has one more patent in their arsenal. What is another choice? Ban people from assigning their patents? How then will the people that file them make money and what is their incentive to file the patent, thus disclosing it to the world? There isn't one and they'd be better off using it as a trade secret. Or, as the argument goes, if companies did not have clauses in their employment contracts stating that everything done on company time was property of the company (i.e., an agreement to assign all IP rights), then the inventors would walk out the door with millions of dollars in R&D to go to the competitor. Please propose a better solution given the real focus of the article.
-truth
Re:I'd like to thank the USPTO (Score:3, Insightful)
The problem is that we have a bunch of bad patents in the wild. Unfortunately, any issued patent is presumed valid by the courts unless overwhelming evidence is gathered against it at great expense.
The problem here is that the worse an issued patent is (overbroad, obvious, not novel, sub
Re:I'd like to thank the USPTO (Score:5, Insightful)
The USPTO is primarily paid to examine patents, not issue them or except maintenance fees. The USPTO receives roughly 350,000 applications per year (7000 per week) and issues about 1000-1500 per week.
it could probably reduce the number of granted patents by a factor of 10 just by interpreting the letter of the law
Interpreting law is what judges do. Most people seem to like it that way. I suppose police you suggest that police officers interpret the law as well? It's never been their job before, but I bet they could realize lots of "results".
never giving the applicant the benefit of the doubt
And this is how patents have been examined for over one hundred years. Good idea, unfortunately it's not new.
doing exhaustive prior art searches
Can you define prior art? I am talking about the legal definition. Have you ever debated prior art with an attorney? Have you ever signed your name and submitted papers to a federal court where your entire argument depends on a date you found on a website? Do think that's a fun or easy thing to do?
and generally making it a royal pain in the ass to get any patent.
The USPTO receives more than 7000 applications per week and issues about 1250 per week. It has also expanded to address the growing backlog and break even (the backlog is no longer increasing in almost every department.) I'm curious where you establish "royal pain in the ass", since more than 80% of patent applications are abandoned in the current system.
However, the USPTO has a vested interest in encouraging as many patents as possible, since more patent applications == more income, and a bigger patent office is a bigger kingdom for the people in charge. Plus, it's just plain easier to rubber-stamp the stuff coming in without checking it thoroughly. That's why we see the exact opposite of the approach I described above.
I guess you're just being funny now. If there were the slightest shred of truth to your hyperbole, then why does the USPTO issue about 1250 patents per week but we read about maybe 1 or 5 per month at most? Why do people always fall back on the "swinging sideways on a swing" or the "one click purchase" patents? If reality and facts were on your side, then wouldn't we be reading about hundreds or thousands of "rubber stamped" patents per month? Per year?
Of course, it's not really your fault. You probably aren't aware that when a patent ends up on the front page, the examiner's entire career is in jeopardy. You probably aren't aware that the examining process takes 12-48 months and involves 10-200 pages of correspondence between the attorneys and the examiners. You probably aren't aware that having a high issue percentage is taboo among examiners and definitely not something to talk about. Finally, you probably aren't aware that 35 U.S.C. 102 states "a person shall be entitled to a patent unless..." which means that ultimately, the attorney can push the application to a board of appeals, in which case the decision to issue is largely out of the examiner's hands yet the examiner's name is still on the issued patent.
Basically, if a law is really bad, the local police often don't bother enforcing it. They've got better things to do.
What, like prohibition? I guess you never heard of the war on drugs? I guess you haven't seen police officers enforcing segregation? You have a seriously deficient understanding of the difference between interpreting law and executing law. If you combine those powers, you have bad results. They are kept separate for very important reasons.
The USPTO doesn't have anything better to do, and it enforces the bad laws that it oversees with great enthusiasm.
Once again, the USPTO doesn't "oversee" anything. Interpretation of the law is done by judges. The USPTO issues a patent if it fails to enforce the application - "a per
Re:I'd like to thank the USPTO (Score:5, Insightful)
Yes, and there wouldn't be so many patents to examine if people didn't think that they had a good chance of getting them issued. The more that get issued, the more that get examined. Are you sure that you're not including applications that get re-examined? In my experience (I have well over a dozen patents, courtesy of my former employers), most applications ultimately get approved.
Have you ever debated prior art with an attorney?
Yes. I've been pulled into patent lawsuits.
Have you ever signed your name and submitted papers to a federal court where your entire argument depends on a date you found on a website? Do think that's a fun or easy thing to do?
Who the hell cares if it's fun or easy? If the patent examiner sees evidence that there's prior art on of a website, then its his civic duty to investigate further before yanking a chunk of knowledge out of the public domain for 20 years.
. If there were the slightest shred of truth to your hyperbole, then why does the USPTO issue about 1250 patents per week but we read about maybe 1 or 5 per month at most? Why do people always fall back on the "swinging sideways on a swing" or the "one click purchase" patents? If reality and facts were on your side, then wouldn't we be reading about hundreds or thousands of "rubber stamped" patents per month? Per year?
Because a vast numbers of bogus patents are issued but haven't yet been "discovered" by the appropriate leeches. That's one of the things that this VC new venture is going to be involved in. It doesn't matter if 95% of the patents are reasonable. One bad patent can cause orders of magnitude more economic damage to an industry than the economic worth of a typical good patent.
Of course, it's not really your fault. You probably aren't aware that when a patent ends up on the front page, the examiner's entire career is in jeopardy.
Sure, there's always going to be a couple of low-level scapegoats per year to cover the collective asses of the whole system.
You probably aren't aware that the examining process takes 12-48 months and involves 10-200 pages of correspondence between the attorneys and the examiners.
Sure I am. I've been through the process many times. All it takes is ca$h, a good attorney and some technical jargon. My employers have patented some of my brilliant ideas, and some of my less-than mediocre ideas, depending mainly on how many patents they wanted to get that year. I've never noticed any correlation between the quality of the idea and the difficulty of obtaining a patent. (BTW, have you ever noticed that one of the main jobs of an attorney is to simply reformat technical documentation into double-spaced courier font for $200/hr, changing every 's' ending on a plural noun to the phrase "a plurality of". How can you read that monospaced crap all day?)
the attorney can push the application to a board of appeals, in which case the decision to issue is largely out of the examiner's hands yet the examiner's name is still on the issued patent.
The board of appeals is an integral part of the overall flawed system.
What, like prohibition? I guess you never heard of the war on drugs?
That would be mainly pushed by the feds headquartered in the same city as the USPTO.
I guess you haven't seen police officers enforcing segregation?
I'm not aware of any current laws requiring segregation. Back when police did enforce it, they were part of the problem, when instead they should have been protesting and resisting the laws instead of saying "I'm just doing my job here".
The USPTO does not have authority to "reject" an application (in the sense that the USPTO says "no" and the case is final) - it can only attempt to convince the attorneys that an appeal would be a waste of time, then the applicant abandons.
Any
Exports. (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:Exports. (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Exports. (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Exports. (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:how does this get modded up ? (Score:3, Informative)
world trading partners tend to share certain interests and values, among them the principle of reciprocity. Patent Law of the People's Republic of China [most.gov.cn] (Article 18)
the european perspective (Score:3, Informative)
But it's true, and you can imagine it, you just need to try. Well, okay, part of the reason why Coke is more expensive in Europe is probably because people can and will pay the higher price. But it also is more expensive to manufacture, because, for example, the people who fill it into bottles need to be paid more over he
Re:the european perspective (Score:3, Insightful)
But yeah, it's funny how the differences in culture work. Here wine is a luxury, but we drink all the Coke and chocolate we can handle until we get fat and have a heart attack. But now I'm getting really off-topic too...
Re:the european perspective (Score:3, Funny)
Re:Exports. (Score:3, Interesting)
and here's the ingredients list for the Italian Coke from the bottle I kept as a souvenir:
Well, I guess you're right! America gets corn syurp and/or sugar, while Italy only gets sugar. It's also
A more retched hive of scum and villany... (Score:5, Interesting)
The way I see it, These guys will basically crank random noise into the patent system until virtually every idea that trys to come into production will have a lien of some kind on it. Thereby blocking any kind of developement by the small guy, only the mega corps will be able to produce new ideas and they will keep the pace as slow as possible to maximize there profit returns on current technology. In short THIS Bites.
Re:A more retched hive of scum and villany... (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:A more retched hive of scum and villany... (Score:5, Insightful)
Private property != intellectual property.
One is private, and is meant to stay that way. It does
not affect public.
The other is coveted, and meant to be used. It affects the
rest of the society.
When you patent an idea, you are not doing the same thing
as planting a flag in the ground and building a house for yourself. You are taking a piece of "society" and claiming it for yourself.
Re:A more retched hive of scum and villany... (Score:5, Insightful)
On that thought. Aristotle was wrong too! The four elements? Preposterous. Let's forget Aristotle ever existed. Same with Descartes. The world is deterministic? Ha! Newton? Corpuscles? Not likely! Let's forget all these historical figures and their entire work because in the end they were incorrect. They must have nothing to teach us.
Re:A more retched hive of scum and villany... (Score:3, Funny)
Thanks
George W. Bush
Re:A more retched hive of scum and villany... (Score:5, Interesting)
It's worth pointing out that even Friedrich Hayek, whose famous "The Road to Serfdom" is (rather unfortunately) much beloved by conservatives, fully endorsed regulation as necessary to ensure a level playing field and protect consumers. Hell, I think Adam Smith said something similar. Point being, there's nothing necessarily contradictory about combining free markets with regulation, and Marx wasn't really saying anything original or particularly insightful. You can be strongly pro-capitalism and also favor strong regulation; this was pretty much Clinton's position.
The problem is that most modern capitalism advocates tend to be strongly anti-regulation, for reasons ranging from absurdly idealistic to transparently selfish, and hence most people equate support for free-market capitalism with naked greed and opportunism. (Plus, of course, the dominant party in the USA is really just another group of mercantilists, pro-business instead of pro-capitalism.)
Re:A more retched hive of scum and villany... (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:A more retched hive of scum and villany... (Score:4, Insightful)
I say, let's hope for scenario #1!
Re:A more retched hive of scum and villany... (Score:3, Insightful)
On slashdot, the little guy is often considered to be the open source developers. Maybe, in this case, the answer to this kind of problem is for the Free Software Foundation to actively pursue aquisition of a high profile patent portfolio. The FSF probably already has one of the largest intellectual property portfolios on earth. Why not extend it to patents?
The patents could be licensed "for free" on a I'll show you mine if you show me yo
"Don't be evil" (Score:5, Insightful)
Prisoners' Dilemma (Score:4, Insightful)
As a short definition of "evil," I submit that "evil" is the "willingness to fuck over other people for your own profit." That provides a quick-and-dirty litmus test for evilness.
The current marketplace encourages evil. Google is a prime example-- they make a big deal about how they don't want to do evil, but then they invest in a company which is designed from the git-go to perform evil.
The reason is simple: if they don't, they will be in a world of pain when everyone else starts using trivial patents as weapons of restraint. (99.999% of all patents are trivial, IMNSHO).
So, either they do evil now and protect themselves, adding to the decay of honest business; or, they take the moral high road, and risk death by a thousand lawsuits.
In an area where thugs rule the streets, only thugs may walk the streets free of worry. Our current system is ruled by thugs. Google is just arming themselves like the rest of the miscreants; but by doing so, they are joining them.
Re:Prisoners' Dilemma (Score:3, Interesting)
Love of money is the root of all evil.
There, nice and easy to understand and 100% correct.
It is harder for a rich man to get into heaven then for a camel to go through the eye of a needle. Rich people become rich because they love money. If they have richness thrust upon them (inheritance, IPO etc) they stay rich because they fall in love with money and want to keep it for themselves.
This makes sense... (Score:5, Interesting)
"Patent owners get money upfront for the dusty ideas sitting on their shelves, the investors get the rights to use the ideas without being sued and Myhrvold gets to rent those same ideas to other companies that need them to continue creating products. Intellectual-property experts say his plan is audacious and unprecedented, customized for a new, rapidly dawning business environment."
It certainly seems like a Win-Win... of course, until the first lawsuits start flying. But we'll just have to see how this shakes out. In the meantime, it makes sense to parlay information as a product in "The Information Age", and that's what's being done here.
Re:This makes sense... (Score:5, Insightful)
Suppose you're a big-name software company and you find out something you're doing infringes a 15-year dormant patent that he's bought rights to. You can afford to pay his $500,000 (or whatever - but it won't be small) license fee. If you're a small time engineer trying to get an idea going out of your garage, you can't.
This is a more streamlined engine still going down the wrong track.
Hey I like that metaphor.
Patents should be "use it or lose it" (Score:5, Interesting)
The sad thing is, this has always been the biggest danger with patents, but the people who could make a difference were too busy worrying about the big-guy-licensing-out-little-guy problem (or making their own money, depending) to notice.
Patents should work like trademarks: if you aren't actually using the invention and don't have any plans to do so within a reasonable timeframe, you automatically lose the patent rights and anyone can use the knowledge your patent documentation provides. (It would be better if you had to demonstrate a use or intended use before a patent application was approved, but that's obviously unrealistic right now.)
there goes Google's claim to the moral high ground (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:there goes Google's claim to the moral high gro (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:there goes Google's claim to the moral high gro (Score:3, Informative)
Dont know what gave you that idea. Its not like they have ever given away their own IP. However they will license it to you for a fee, its almost as if they think that their ideas and work are worth money. How insane is that?
Same old story, sorry. (Score:5, Interesting)
Apple lost (this was the one lawsuit many of us were hoping would sink Microsoft once and for all) because their UI elements were not 'patented'. They learnt well from this lesson and have since been patenting every widget under the sun.
I fully expect Google know their history well, and also know that Microsoft is sniffing around their territory. They would be fools to think that Microsoft would treat them any differently to Apple, and are probably thinking how to protect themselves as best they can.
Re:there goes Google's claim to the moral high gro (Score:3)
Google is a business, not a charity. It exists to make money and for no other reason.
Goodbye, competition. Hello, Lawyers. (Score:5, Insightful)
The small software houses can't afford to hire patent specialists, and the big behemoths will steal the ideas out from under the little guys. I wonder how well the patents will hold up in other software-rich countries, like India, Russia, Croatia and Serbia.
the new bubble?!?!?!?!?!? (Score:5, Funny)
I sure as hell hope litigation and royalty fees aren't going to be the "new" new economy.
As a side note, with how many "patents" Amazon has, I'm pretty surprised they aren't on board with this.
sigh...
Re:the new bubble?!?!?!?!?!? (Score:3, Interesting)
Hey, good job fellas! (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Hey, good job fellas! (Score:5, Interesting)
There are a few problems of course. Certain companies in the US and EU will kick up a stink and political/economic pressure will no doubt be bought and applied. So it will need to be a fairly wealthy and largely self sufficient country, or have some other bargaining chip. Laws might get passed banning "gray imports", but that's not a problem for the seller if they have a disclaimer stating that it is up to the buyer to check import regulations before ordering and they do not accept liability for goods seized by customs. It's even easier if the product is a software program of course, there are already plenty of websites offering software for download upon recipit of credit card details, both legit and otherwise.
This whole "patent company" idea looks more like a great way for a country to hand over more control to lawyers and its industry overseas to me. And how will the overpaid lawyers get their nice shiny cars, watches and other luxury goods when their own laws prevent them from importing them?
Re:Hey, good job fellas! (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Hey, good job fellas! (Score:3, Insightful)
You don't really think other countries go along with our crazy patent system out of choice, do you? They know they're getting screwed, but they hope to make up the difference with lower labor
Re:Hey, good job fellas! (Score:3, Interesting)
"You know, I've been thinking about this kind of thing too. Just as we currently have Tax Havens, how much longer before we have the "Patent Haven"?"
How much longer? About 3 years ago. 8^)
I'm currently living in a small Pacific Island Nation (think: Cryptonomicon) which is selling itself as being conveniently free of certain obstacles to international, Internet-based commerce. I've often found myself thinking that it would be a great place to set up a software and services shop. Palm trees, hyper-affordab
Calling all... (Score:3, Funny)
Apple zealots and google bashers please enter stage left.
Back to basics (Score:5, Insightful)
Copyright is to reward authors NOT publishers and distributors.
Trademarks are to help consumers identify choice b/w products NOT assist virtual monopolies stifle competition.
Patents are to promote innovation and reward inventors NOT allow lazy rich companies to 'rent-seek' from others.
People need to remember that IP law ultimately exists to help the public. If it is not doing that it is seriously flawed.
Slippery slopes (Score:3, Insightful)
We seem to have "progressed" from companies that competed on product (ie free market choice), to those that competed on lock-in (eg. MS anti-trust stuff) to those that compete by making IP roadblocks.
Perhaps soon the minimum start-up "capital" for a tech organisation will be measured in patents and not dollars. The patents would be like nuclear weapons: sufficient threat to prevent other people suing you and shutting you down. The small organisation with no IP capital would be shut out.
Nobody is going to benefit if this happens.
Re:Slippery slopes (Score:5, Insightful)
This isn't really new. When was the last time you saw a new automobile manufacturer in the US? It's not because it's hard to make cars. There are tons of places to outsource production. The thing which makes it nearly impossible is selling them. In the US it's illegal in almost most states to sell automobiles without going through dealerships. In other words, it's illegal to sell new cars and trucks directly to consumers.
Because any new automobile manufacturer would be locked out of the current dealerships, he'd either be out of luck or would have to build thousands of dealership across the country. A daunting task for sure.
Now the same type of behavior is taking place in computers. It shouldn't be surprising at all. The downsides of course will be no real innovation and rising prices. But you probably knew that already.
Re:Slippery slopes (Score:5, Interesting)
Do you consider yourself a capitalist? Do you respect your politicians and trust them to uphold the economic system that made us great? Bad news. Your politicians are failing you, they are using government control to hurt innovation, progress, and competition. Your elected politicians do not believe in the free market, they don't believe in capitalism, and they certainly don't value innovation.
Take as another example the music/video industries . They are being kept alive by the government, not by the market. In a free market economy, we would let them collapse without shedding a tear.
Re:Slippery slopes (Score:3, Insightful)
Governments need to intervene in markets in order to keep them free: it's only government intervention that can ensure that contracts are enforceable, that companies don't collude, and that people get t
Re:Slippery slopes (Score:3, Funny)
There's still a slope? I thought it was a long-time mudslide that receded into the ocean years ago!
Re:Slippery slopes (Score:4, Informative)
As quoted in Lessig's OSCON speech (kudos to whoever made that Flash presentation), Bill Gates has been thinking along these lines for a while:
Title should read... (Score:5, Funny)
You know what the coolest thing is? (Score:3, Informative)
Orwellian World (Score:3, Interesting)
It's scary. Each passing year seems to move us inexorably closer to an Orwellian society. Soon it won't be possible to have an original idea any more without the system crying foul and demanding you hand over cash for a part of it.
There needs to be a change in the Law. Once you take out a patent, you have 2-3 years to bring a product to market that makes use of the idea, or you loose claim to the patent altogether. Further more, the patent should then be transformed into an Open Patent. Available for anyone, free of charge. This is the only way to prevent further abuse of the system.
Astral Plane Privatisation - the new Land Grab (Score:3, Insightful)
In contrast, unrestricted patents have no intrinsic usefulness, rather than the imposition of an artificial scarcity.
Unlimited-scope patents (eg patents on software concepts) could be useful if they actually facilitated innovation.
I can actually see how a non-technical lawmaker could imagine a developer tackling some design/coding issues, entering a few search words into a patent company website, and getting pages of concepts which this developer then uses to write a better program, or finish the task in less time.
However, I could see the Republican Party converting en masse to Islam before this happens.
This sweeping regime of unrestricted, increasingly fine-grained patents amounts to an historically unprecedented privatisation of the Astral Plane (which I define here as the space of all possible realities, imaginings, concepts, ideas).
Up till now, the Astral Plane has been traditionally honoured as a Public Common, except where expressed into the physical plane in concrete tangible form (eg specific text, music, machinery etc).
If my own (small) country makes any moves to legislate this Astral Plane land-grab, I'll do everything I can - even agitating for national strikes etc - to stop it.
A sound investment... (Score:3, Insightful)
What about IBM? (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:What about IBM? (Score:3, Interesting)
egh (Score:3, Interesting)
It's a pain enough as it is trying to find a nice domain name these days. At least when you find one you know it's yours & you can own it with certainty.
If all these "patent hoarding" companies are going to be out there claiming any broad idea that might ever be useful you won't even be able to tell if your idea's already patented or not. It won't be a simple/instant check on register.com, it will be a "Egh... well, let's start up the business, make a few million, and then hope we don't get our !@# pounded 5 years from now from 4 patent-hoarding companies claiming to have already thought of something kind of similar. What a mess.
Freedom? Ha! You must be joking... (Score:3, Insightful)
Not that big a surprise.... (Score:3, Interesting)
That doesn't surprise me, once I think about it. Haven't all of those companies been stung by patent lawsuits in recent years, of one kind or another?
It makes sense that they'd want to invest in a company devoted to buying up unused patents, rather than waiting for the owners of those unused patents to jump out of the shadows and claim Apple or Microsoft is infringing on an unused idea they had fifteen years ago.
shows you what bullshit patents have become (Score:3, Insightful)
Unfortunately, many of the usual suspects are a member of this little club. Fortunately, if this company can do it, lots of other companies can do it, too. And if one of their client is being sued by another patents-only company, it doesn't matter how big their portfolio is: cross-licensing won't get them out of their legal troubles.
So... (Score:3, Insightful)
I am getting too old to be in Software anymore... (Score:3, Interesting)
I understand Lawyers get paid whether they win or not.
I am serious here. 44 is not too old to start over, right?
The IP Armageddon Commences at Last (Score:5, Interesting)
It's like a dream. I remember posting this more or less same comment in a PC Magazine online forum back in '98 or '99.
This is the endgame, folks. This is what Gates has had planned for years -- the real endgame. Not some iffy market monopoly over PC operatings systems and office software.
This is the whole enchilada. They want to own EVERYTHING worth owning. This is why the "Intellectual Property" meme has been pumped so hard these past few years. the real reason why the RIAA, MPAA, the SPA, and all the overseas equivalents are suing anything that moves. It's the natural outcome of the Digital Millenium Copyright Act.
The biggest boys are pooling their resources to start the ultimate monopoly. They want to put a meter on every conceivable human idea they can beg, buy, borrow or steal. I'm not overstating how enormous their ambition is. Don't look at the distracting smiling face; keep your eyes on the magicians' hands.
I DO understand that they are talking about patents. But it's really irrelevant. They are going to force revenue to precipitate out of the ether into their hands that dwarfs anything Gates ever dreamed of. And that kind of wealth, driven by monoploy players, will be used to buy up more than merely patents.
It's why MS has been pumping the RIAA and MPAA to adopt MS proprietary codecs. It's why the X-Box REALLY exists. It's about owning the culture, or more precisely, the circulatory system of the culture. They want to own processes, patents, and eventually, every piece of ownable video, audio, and images of art. They will own the newspapers, or at least the means of disseminating the newspapers. All cable networks. They want the internet(s) under their control, if only to control the information flow so it can't affect their power.
The biggest boys are lining up for a piece of something even they can't visualize. The ultimate shape of this monster will be worldwide. It's power will be greater than any government or combination of governments.
They won't permit any real change in patent or copyright laws. They might let us have token victories on things that don't matter much, but the final shape will be dictated by them.
Here's the final outcome:
A loose confederation of very wealthy men will run a structure composed of corporations that will really, truly own every copyrighted work of man. They will own our history. They will meter it out to their advantage. Witness (NBC?) refusing to permit use of a copyrighted video of Bush making an idiot of himself on TV before the election, just because they could, no reason necessary.
And these corporations will hold copyrights and perhaps even patents, in some form, for ever-extended periods of time. Effectively for eternity. Corporations can't die. They can't go to jail. You can't arrest them. They are fictions designed to hide real men from real responsibilty for their actions.
We're going to have immortal fictions own our world. Americans say, "So what? I'll buy stock."
That's why privately owned corporations are all the rage right now. Why some of the biggest are invite-only for those they deem worthy. ICANN was bought by one of these monstrosities. Some corporations are buying back their own stock with an eye to, well, not share the wealth.
I'm only pointing out the obvious.
I'm not anti-business. I'm anti-corporation. There is a difference. I want expiration dates on IP. I want the corporate shield for individual malfeasance to be gone. I want this incestuous network of greedy buggers to hew to some kind of law that they didn't write themselves. We fought long and hard to break up the 19th century trusts that were smothering the life out of representative government; I DON'T want them back, only immortal, anational, and unkillable.
Agreed: all hell is about to break loose (Score:5, Insightful)
Well today, there are those who believe that the entire purpose and meaning of the information age is leverage their IP holdings to the four courners of the earth for unlimited growth and profit. But what the information age really demands is the uninhibited and unrestricted flow of information. At first they passed harsher laws until a person who coppies a CD can get worse penalities than a violent murderer, then they extended the terms of copyrights to effectively forever, then they tried to fence themselves off from the rest of the world using Digital Rights Managment technology. Well all hell is about to break loose.
Re:The IP Armageddon Commences at Last (Score:3, Interesting)
> I want expiration dates on IP
I thought we already have those [wikipedia.org].
OK, seriously now
> I'm not anti-business. I'm anti-corporation. There is a difference. I want
> expiration dates on IP. I want the corporate shield for individual
> malfeasance to be gone. I want this incestuous network of greedy buggers to
> hew to some kind of law that they didn't write themselves. We fought long and
> hard to break up the 19th century trusts that were smothering the life out of
> representative governmen
As a developer... I think my response is... (Score:3, Insightful)
Since releasing software in closed-source proprietary form isn't very neighborly, and lacking GPL protection a nasty, patent-owning company can take it right out from under you in a court case, even preventing you from using your own stuff...
Well...
Looks like it's pretty pointless to try and sell software. So much for THAT idea. Even if I release it open-source I could still get sued over the patent thing.
It occurs to me that I might go on the hacker model, in which I write whatever software I want, and only release it to my friends, who I trust. They, in turn, give me their cool stuff. And we, as a group, get stuff the rest of the world doesn't even know exists. It's like The Force, baby. Some have it. Most don't.
Alternately, I can write something and sign over the copyrights to the FSF, who have much better legal resources than I do. This is as good as keeping it under the rug, only it lets many people use it.
Then again, I could mix the two approaches. I could keep a version of my software with "special sauce" for myself and my friends, and let the FSF have a more vanilla version...
Looks like we're all heading underground, me hearties! W00T...
Only in America could something this evil exist... (Score:3, Insightful)
GJC
Future income for programmers... (Score:3, Funny)
1. Write books. You can't be sued for writing about how to do something. Freedom of speech protects you, and as a "copyright holder" the Machine will think you're one of its cogs. Must... Protect... COG!!!
2. Get a joe job doing IT for a public agency or college or whatever. Can't be sued for working with existing tools. Only people who produce and sell tools will be sued.
3. If you create software for your own internal use, no one can sue you for THAT, either. So, make software that does something interesting, and rent out your services DOING that something interesting without making it clear exactly how you're doing it ("Elves do it for us. Sign here"). You're not selling a thing anymore, just a service (in a better world, you'd be able to sell the something interesting and let everyone do it for themselves, but the dicks are in charge, so tough luck, world).
4. Be a consultant setting up bland, boring, same-old systems for boring, staid, large companies. You're just a technician! No patent infringement here.
Simple Fix (Score:4, Insightful)
Given the state of politics in the US nowadays (Score:3, Funny)
Software patents battle ground against... (Score:3, Informative)
Abstraction enters the picture of computing with the representation of physical transistor switch positions of ON '1' and OFF '0' or what we call "Binary" notation. However, computers have far more transistor switches in them than we can keep up with in such a low level or first order abstract manner, so we create higher level abstractions in order to increase our productivity in programming computers. From Machine language to application interfaces that allow users to define some sequence of action into a word or button press (ie. record and playback macro) so to automate a task, we are working with abstractions that ultimately accesses the hardware transistor switches which in turn output to, or control some physical world hardware.
Programming is the act of automating some level of complexity, usually made up of simpler complexities, but done so in order to allow the user to use and reuse the complexity through a simplified interface. And this is a recursive act, building upon abstractions others have created that even our own created abstractions/automations might be used by another to further create more complex automations. In general, if we didn't build upon what those before us have done, we then would not advance at all, but rather be like any other mammal incapable of anything more than, at best, first level abstraction. But we are more, and as such have the natural human right and duty to advance in such a manner.
There is an identifiable and definable "physics of abstraction" (abstraction physics), an identification of what is required in order to make and use abstractions. Abstraction Physics is not exclusive to computing but constantly in use by
Abstraction Physics has yet to be established/recognized in a broad "common acceptance" manner, similiar to the difficulty in the acceptance of the hindu-arabic decimal system (which included the concept that nothing can have value - re: the Zero place holder). It took three hundred years (from inception) for the innovation of the now common decimal system to overcome the far more limited Roman Numeral system. (NOTE: mathmatics and the symbol sets used are also abstractions and therefor a subset of abstraction possibilities and certainly an application of abstraction physics.) Though the act of programming is still younger than many who apply it, we are technologically moving at a much faster rate of incorporating innovations and better understandings of reality. There is a physics to abstraction creation and use which can be used to model and create a non-patentable user friendly general use, and dynamic, automation (abstraction creation and usage) tool, that also allows for organized placement and access of abstractions in a logical or mapable and navigateable
I'd use this. A market for buying Patent stuff (Score:3, Interesting)
I'm sorting through 2100 patents and applications that match my keywords. So far nothing that I would infringe. But there are two outcomes:
1. Yes, I'm the first one to this idea.
or a realistic probability that
2: I could infringe on someone's generically worded patent.
Okay, so if that is the playing field, what would you anti-this-idea zealots suggest??
If I infringe, then I have to look at who has the patent and attempt to contact them. I'd have to look up where their office is, and even if they're alive.
Then I have to attempt to make contact. Phonecalls and emails out of the blue for them, cold calling for me. Then the lawyers step in and negotiate.
So a lot of ball-ache, and the kicker is that once I call they know that I'm interested, and they can start to probe me to see how much it's worth to me.
With this idea, I can see advantages for having one [or several] known company who unifies the process:
1) Known address
2) Contact details for sales
3) Secretaries to take my inquiries
4) Some corporate information so that I don't have to spend £££ getting my lawyers to translate their lawyers' documents. These are all in slightly different and convoluted Legalese. 5) A range of products so I can see how much they charge for other things
6) A better chance of them not ripping me off when they know I'm interested.
As an organistation who deals with this all the time, they'd know which are the ideas that are worth a lot to someone, rather than a idea that is close to expiry and has a lot of other patents. Single patent holders like to think their ideas are going to earn them £££ x 10^£££ and try to extort you for even the simplest idea.
For those people who bitch and moan in this topic, I have to ask: How many patents have you actually applied for? Did you think through all the avenues, including actually having to license someone elses idea instead of just complaining about You versus The Man??
Re:Patent for using air to breathe (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Seventeen years is a blink of an eye... (Score:5, Insightful)
Seventeen years is an incredibly long time in the world of IT. That means that patents from as far back as 1988 (when people were just getting excited about the new 386) are still valid now in the US.
you don't understand (Score:5, Insightful)
Have you ever written any substantial piece of code? Chances are that you are infringing dozens of patents. Are you "scum" or a "sponger" because of it? I don't think so, since I doubt you even know of the existence of the patents you are infringing.
Many ideas that are being patented are so obvious that many people have them independently. The one who happens to be first to the patent office wins.
The real scum are the people who patent things that they know full well (or should know) are part of the public domain: ideas that others have talked about, ideas that have been discussed, ideas that are in textbooks. They steal from the public ideas and property to the tune of billions of dollars.
Re:This is terrible. (Score:3, Interesting)
Why?
a.) It encourages creative development.
b.) Those with patented ideas get rewarded.
Maybe there is some perversion going on here, but I wouldn't say complete.
Re:This is terrible. (Score:3, Insightful)
In all likelyhood the small guys will get sued and instead of competing, the big software players will just litigate anything that dare competes or is innovative.
Linux itself violates over 50 patents according to some experts. Everything from accessing a cpu via assembly to multitasking is owned by someone or some company.
If MS ever wanted to kill Linux they could sue Linus and the di
tulips (Score:4, Insightful)
The end is coming for the corporate kings, and it's nonsense like this that will expedite their demise.
Go, Bill, Go...
Re:America: Fucking itself in the ear again (Score:3, Informative)
Megacorp: 2000384348783 Enterpreneurs: 0