European Software Patent Horror Gallery 88
siggifiggi writes "Heise has a news-item about a list of trivial and stupid patents already granted in Europe. The list was created by the Association for the Promotion of a Free Informational Infrastructure." The best one is the patent on controlling one computer from another (which would technically include controlling your computer with a keyboard that had a microchip in it, to say nothing of telnet!
Re:Ah, But... (Score:1)
So with patents, it's like this: let them patent anything they want, if it's a bad patent it'll be revoked when challanged. Problem is until such time it's still a patent and everyone has to do a search before they do anything to avoid infringing. And every person that opts to pay the fee rather than fight it (because it's easier and cheaper) makes the claim that much stronger.
My patent submission will be.... (Score:1)
an adminstrative entity, with no particular physical configuration, which accepts applications for things, ideas, methods, procedures, or any other random string of thoughts, and records what was registered as belonging to the registering party, granting them (the resistering party) rights to the intellectual property of the thing, idea, method, procedure, or string of random thoughts which was registered.
Re:awareness (Score:1)
Re:Not every patent clerk is Einstien (Score:1)
fridge design. Don't know if he was
such a good examiner but he abused
the system like evryone else.
Re:Software Patents are bad. (Score:1)
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Bush's assertion: there ought to be limits to freedom
My patent application (Score:1)
Description: The patent covers the 'swap' operation, both on a primitive (type) as well as complex object level.
Rationale: I will then be able to sue the pants off anyone making use of any sequence of instructions which will swap the values of 2 memory locations/areas. Just about every sorting routine and countless other applications use this, so I should now be able to retire
Re:When you live in glass houses... (Score:1)
Now that I reread it, I agree it's probably a poor choice of words; my general point was intended to be that this is pervasive around the world and in all subjects, not just technology.
--bdj
Solution: invoke the process against itself? :) (Score:1)
Solution: invoke the process against itself? :) (Score:1)
Re:Controlling one computer using another (Score:1)
another patent idea (Score:1)
Or is that one allready done?
Patent on Breathing (Score:1)
As I am a nice person exhaling will be free and only inhaling will be patented so from now on you can exhale as much as you want but you will have to pay the "1-Person Breathing license". This license is a 1-user-1-life license to breath and is non transmissible between users. (Did we tell you that you'll be very sorry if we find you cheating on us? We hired the same land-sharks^Wlawyers Microsoft has!)
You will be able to purchase multiuser-1-life packages for pets and other house animals but you will not use them for human consumption.
A third way to license breathing is on a "Pay-as-you-go" basis which pretty much explains everything.
Now - gimme yer' money or hold your breath! You have no right to breathe!
In the next episode - Patent on Shitting(tm) - or in other words "Thou shall not shite!"
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Re:Priceless (Score:1)
its like a silly atm that gives you recipes instead of money. i think they should have it read the recipe out using john cleese's voice.
Re:OFF TOPIC POST: (About Moderation) (Score:1)
I agree with you. I guess to better explain the way I feel, let's take something like Mozilla. I'm not personally an open-source zealot. I think the idea of multiple browsers & whatnot is a good idea, and a user-supported browser is a great idea... but I'm not a programmer. There is very little I can add to such a movement, so I tend to stay out of those discussions. (I don't like to post my "uninformed" opinions unless it seems really necessary) There are lots of stories that I *DO* relate with and respond to, and I obviously can't post AND moderate those kinds of discussions. So what I do is attempt to moderate interesting or informative posts in threads that aren't normally my cup of tea. It may mean that I occassionally mod something up that is undeserving, but I would rarely use the (+1 informative) rating unless I was reasonably informed myself. If something seems plausible or interesting and i don't have the experience to judge its inherent truthfulness, I'd mod it as "interesting". A well thought out post, even if it contains factual errors, may well spark a discussion that will lead to real answers.
(I've already lost 4 karma points for this little thread, which just goes to show that some people are just plain idiots. MY TITLE says that the post is off-topic... why would anyone need a moderator (much less 4) to tell them that it was off-topic when I announced it myself?)
-The Reverend (I am not a Nazi nor a Troll)
Re:A possible solution to patent madness? (Score:1)
Looks like someone beat you to it. This patent about A method for fulfilling requests of a web browser [espacenet.com] seems to be indicating any dynamically created web page.
Oops.
Someone should teach the patent guys about job security and self preservation.
forge
Glad to see it! (Score:1)
Now, can anyone comment on what international treaties might force the imposition of these here and/or our gaffs there?
- technik
mo' patents (Score:1)
They pretty much cover all of Unix (Score:1)
Re:What about prior art? (Score:1)
It does. That's the one on the left, written in German.
It's not only stupid ones, check the top 10.000 (Score:1)
Re:When you live in glass houses... (Score:1)
Pointing this out just makes me give up (Score:1)
I get the feeling that it would be the equivalent of arguing with fundamentalist Christians about evolution.
Re:That's innovative... (Score:1)
Re:Patents are cool! (Score:1)
A relationship on bad
flame off
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Re:this is good (Score:1)
I do agree, please, no misunderstanding, that interlectual property should be mobile in any sense. But some fields need more time than others. It's good to show, that we want less patents, but we have to realize, that they won't go away for the next, say 30 years.
flame off
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Re:When you live in glass houses... (Score:1)
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Re:When you live in glass houses... (Score:1)
I'm sorry, but where on earth did you get the idea that anyone considered the US Patent Office to be the pinnacle of intellectual achievement? This is, to my knowledge, one of the first /. articles covering stupid patents granted by a country other than the US.
Please refrain from complaining about hypocrisy when it does not actually exist.
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Re:What if patents applied to other silly areas (Score:1)
The Death Star in Star Wars (small ships)
The droid armies of Episode 1 (central computer)
The Madness season, by C.S. Freidman (more hive minds)
The Man-Kzin Wars (don't fight well collectively, no FTL drive)
The list goes on and on.
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Owner of patent (Score:1)
You could do alot of harm with it. Let's just hope that these stupid patents are in good hand. The comunity could create patents that do stupid things as well and try to find all stupid things that haven't been patented yet and patent them.
Kinda like buying every gun on the market and making shure that no "crazed maniac" will have access to a gun.
Re:The future of Patents (Score:1)
Let's say everything is patented. For the sake of argument, let's presume scratching you left ear with the right hand is patented. Now, everyone scratch his ear with the opposite hand every once in a while, but they don't go after these people.
Now, someone starts to do things the big guns don't like (human rights campaigning for instance), so they wade through all recorded appearances of that person until they find an image of him scratching his left ear with the right hand. Boom, troublemaker is in jail.
To get a little closer to current reality, s/scratch ear/having MP3 in your HD/.
Uh-oh. (Score:1)
I may have seen this trick somewhere before.
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Re:Controlling one computer using another (Score:1)
Re:OFF TOPIC POST: (About Moderation) (Score:1)
I see it this way: trolls have a virtually infinite capacity to post. Moderators have finite moderation points. So its better to upmoderate good posts (especially good AC posts, which I try to watch for) than to downmoderate the trolls.
However, I have to take issue with one thing you said:
When doing actual moderation, I look for stories that I wouldn't be interested/knowledgeble enough to post in... and then I look for informative or interesting posts.
If you're not knowledgeable enough yourself to post on a story, how can you be knowledgeable enough to tell whether someone else's post is informative?
Now, maybe I'm being too harsh. Maybe you personally, in such a case, only upmod as informative those posts with links to outside sources. I just had to speak up because it's a pet peeve of mine--all too often I see posts with half-truths, misinformation, or outright falsehoods upmoderated as "Informative".
I don't know if it's you personally or not. But as a general plea to moderators, please don't upmoderate posts as "Informative" unless you have some way of verifying yourself that the facts presented are accurate. (Links to an independent source, finding an independent source yourself, or having expertise yourself in that area.) If you don't you'll just make me (or some moderator who does have expertise in that area) cancel out your moderation with a "-1 Overrated" (since /. doesn't have "-1 Misinformative".)
Re:Scary patent (Score:1)
Keyboards with microchips?! (Score:1)
http://www.blitzbasic.com/
Re:Quality control is not one of CmdrTaco's habits (Score:1)
Re:Somebody tell me ... (Score:1)
Apparently you're in possession of an enlightened view of this subject that would benefit the SlashDot community. Unfortunately, you don't tell us what it is. Would you care to share with the squwakers your vision of 'prior art', or are you just here to shake your head, go "tsk tsk" and move on to criticize the next topic? If you're not going to follow through, why'd you even waste time posting this?
Just so that I'm not equally guilty of adding to the bitch quotient without adding to the info quotient, here's the Black's Law Dictionary of prior art:
Re:What about prior art? (Score:1)
bm :)-~
What about prior art? (Score:1)
Both the EPO and it's American cousin are administrated by Normal People(tm). We geeks often forget to make things plain for them.
bm :)-~
Quality control is not one of CmdrTaco's habits. (Score:1)
Now, if CmdrTaco was a real Linux zealot, then he'd say "ssh" instead of Telnet. Also notice how he forgot the closing parenthesis! Rob, you hypocrite! You always tell us to "Use the Preview Button!", and you forget to use it yourself!
Re:Keyboards with microchips?! (Score:1)
Well, the Amiga's keyboard actually had a little CPU (about as powerful as the C64's main processor) with an onboard ROM, but if you open up your PC/Mac keyboard today, you'll still find a keyboard processor chip. Without it, you'd need a cable with about 20 wires in it to connect your keyboard.
Software Patents are bad. (Score:1)
Not enforcable - yet? (Score:1)
The end of the Heise article states that at this time, trivial patents or ones with a broad claim are nearly impossible to enforce in court. Software patents are generally illegal, anyway.
The danger, however, lies in the European Patent Office trying to get permission to issue software patents. They want more revenue for themselves - if I recall correctly, the EPO actually has a positive cash flow - they're not tax-sucking bureaucrats, they're money-sucking ones! And being allowed to issue patents on software and genetics/molecules would increase their revenue stream immensely. The patent office has no reason whatsoever to make sure that patents make sense in any way. They get the same fee, whether it's a stupid patent or a sensible one. Don't let them! Europeans, complain to your MEP!
Re:Not every patent clerk is Einstien (Score:1)
Re:Patents are cool! (Score:1)
If the description is published in an internal document, there would be no proof that the document was actually created on the date that the company claims that it was, ala the following conversation:
BRUCE - Hey. I have a great idea! Let's invent High Definition Television!
JIM - But Bruce, High Definition Television already exists, someone else holds the patent.
BRUCE - Aha! But we could put together a little business case that describes the technology in it's entirety and then back-date it for 1972! We would blow the HDTV patent out of the water due to prior art! Ha ha ha!
JIM - My God! It just might work! You are a genius man!
Re:Patents are cool! (Score:1)
Of course, a better solution would be to get rid of the patent office all together.
And just a quick reply to your sig:
I voted for Harry Browne.
Meow. (Score:1)
Poo on you all. I adore it when the editorial staff does stuff like this which will encourage folks to get off their tushies and do something about something. There are thousands of people on here, many of whom should be taken seriously... this combo here integrate analysis, data, and a way to do action.
Re:Patents are cool! (Score:1)
Originality (i.e., no prior art)
Non-obviousness
It works
The obviousness restriction was put in to prevent people from patenting things like "all inventions that use the principle that heavy things usually fall down."
The problems seems to be that patent examiners are chosen because (a) Nothing is obvious to them, and (b) They wouldn't know prior art if it bit them on the ass. I recall that perpetual motion machines have occasionally been granted patents, so they're not always that diligent about seeing the invention work either.
Patents are a dillema (Score:1)
Re:Patents are cool! (Score:1)
Re:Patents are cool! (Score:1)
Re:Owner of patent (Score:1)
Re:Glad to see it! (Score:1)
My favorite... (Score:2)
I guess that would make Doom for SysAdmins [slashdot.org] illegal in Europe. America will remain the leader in shotgun based process management!
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Patenting multitasking? (Score:2)
So, Linux and Windows NT (just to name two of them) must be violating this patent, right?
It's publication date is 1995, March 22th. Okay, we can debate about which OS classifies as the first multitasking system - probably Multics which was 'invented' in 1965, 30 year earlier!
(I am not sure that Multics is actually the first since I'm not that old yet ;)
this is good (Score:2)
This is also good as it shows how many dumb patents have been issued by the European office. My favorite so far is "controlling one computer by another", which they say telnet does. I think that this is the beginning of patent reform. Maybe this will open the eyes of the US, European, and Asian patent offices and make them realize that they are issuing patents on 20 year old technology and obvious technology.
The biggest problem with the patent arena is that it is filled with laywers. If it were up to many technologists I think the ideas would be more likely open like the HTML, XML, IEEE, and RFC standards are. I know that I'd like to see much of these ideas open rather than closed.
I don't want a lot, I just want it all!
Flame away, I have a hose!
Direct link (Score:2)
Pope
Freedom is Slavery! Ignorance is Strength! Monopolies offer Choice!
Europa defeats SW-patents (at least for now)!! (Score:2)
On the FFII mailing list it has just been reported that the EPO Diplomatic Conference today voted unanimously to maintain the exception in Art 52.2c this time. This means that Europe will be still free of (pure) software patents.
Unfortunately the Fight isn't over yet. The next round will be in European Union. It is therefore very important and urgent, if you consider software patents to be more harmful than useful, to send your opinion by email to:
consultation@eurolinux.org
as soon as possible and, in any case, before December 15th, 2000. You can write in the official language of any member country of the European Union.
Ville
My DeCSS archive:
Controlling one computer using another (Score:2)
Cisco's worth quite a bit these days.
Re:Patents are cool! (Score:2)
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everyone was born right-handed, only the greatest overcome it.
Re:Not yet valid (Score:2)
I think the generic term you are looking for is "fraud".
Re:Charge 'em with Fraud (Score:2)
Problem is that as in the US criminal law tends to have a blind spot towards crimes commited by organisations. How does a system set up dealing with individuals handle a corporate entity? At some point, even in a civil action brought after the organisation has been "killed" the guilty people need to be identified.
I bet people would research their patents a lot more thoroughly before submitting them if this was the case, and I bet the PTO would be a lot less likely to rubber stamp them through and let the courts settle things.
Part of the problem appears to be patent examiners too eager to pass a patent. The point of the application should be to convince a skeptic. If the examiner is not convinced or dosn't understand the application then it should be dismissed. Maybe something like a criminal court is needed for examinging patents, rather than the current system.
Re:Ah, But... (Score:2)
Also you can't challange a law simply by objecting to a cop and taking the case to the highest court is a rather ticky job for a convicted criminal. In theory whilst the original trial judge might be obliged to dismiss the case (and find the prosecution in contempt) the chances of this happening are remote.
Legally challenging a law is likely to be at least as hard as lobbying not to have it passed in the first place. Wonder how hard it is for a third party to get a patent application dismissed...
When you live in glass houses... (Score:2)
--bdj
What if patents applied to other silly areas (Score:2)
Patent 57. A plot device whereby invaders from space initiate an attack, but are destroyed due to a fatal susceptability.
examples:
War of the Worlds (H.G. Wells) [fourmilab.ch] (Earth germs)
Independence Day (computer germs)
Mars Attacks (country music)
Mr. T. (Score:2)
He needs to round up these jibber-jabberin' bozos, drive them in his very fast van to the coast and then throw them helluva far. He's tough.
I'm Filing A Patent On Patents (Score:2)
Not every patent clerk is Einstien (Score:2)
A possible solution to patent madness? (Score:2)
Then sue the patent office, claiming that their website infringes on your patent!
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That's innovative... (Score:2)
Ah, But... (Score:2)
The only way to defend yourself against this is to have your own portfolio of patents so that when they say "You're using telnet! We're going to sue you" you can say "Oh yeah? Well you're using printf, so we're going to sue you too!" Then you settle down into a cross licensing agreement so that you can use telnet and the other guy can use printf.
Or the free(speech) pcanywhere clone (Score:2)
Path name conversion (Score:2)
If there's any item on this list that's a joke someone slipped by the examiners, this is it. The technical claim describes in excrutiating detail what's involved in "converting at least a portion of the ASCII path name... and sequentially writing said unparsed string, character by character, into said buffer..."
I wonder what else is in my 1990 Turbo C++ "stdlib.h" library which is now a patent violation?
Great idea! (Score:2)
Patent 58. A plot device whereby the protagonist(s) is/are rescued from impending doom by unforseeable circumstances.
I have patented the Deus Ex Machina! MPAA, you are MINE! MUAHAHAHA!!!!
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Re:Somebody tell me ... (Score:2)
Oooo... I love this one... (Score:2)
CmdrTaco, expect a letter in the mail shortly from our lawyers.
European Comission funding "forces" it (Score:2)
Of course, to them, a patent, even stupid ones, are excellent exploitation results. Most of the times, when commercialisation of the product becomes hard ro too expensive, a patent is a good way to justify the funding.
I am not sure which one is evil, EC officers or european companies/universities...
Re:Patents are cool! (Score:2)
Re:Somebody tell me ... (Score:2)
1. WTF does this site have to do with first-to-file vs. first-to-invent? Are you claiming that if Europe was first-to-invent, none of these would have been granted? Poppycock. They're two orthogonal issues. After all, the US has plenty of stupid software patents despite being first-to-invent.
2. The US constitution says nothing about whether the US patent system should be first-to-file or first-to-invent. Switching to first-to-file would not require a consitutional amendment.
3. It's a common misconception that first-to-invent is better for small inventors. The flawed logic goes, "Well, large corps can write up a patent application faster than the individual inventor, so even if they invented something a few months later than the individual inventor, they can still get the application in first." That's true to an extent. What people fail to realize is that first-to-invent is even worse for the individual inventor. With first-to-file, if a large corp and an individual inventor have filed applications for the same invention, a court will simply look at the "date received" stamp on the application, and whoever has the earlier date wins. With first-to-invent, the individual inventor comes to court with his one mediocre patent lawyer, and the large corp comes to court with their dozens of crack attorneys, and each tries to prove that they "invented" this invention before the other. Who do you think will win?
With first-to-file, yes, there's an advantage to being able to file quickly, but there's also not much room for legal wrangling if you weren't the first to file.
Somebody tell me ... (Score:2)
Re:Patents are cool! (Score:2)
Patents are cool! (Score:2)
There is absolutely nothing wrong with a company taking out a patent on something that may appear outwardly to be "stupid."
Many companies do this on a regular basis simply to ensure that no one else can get that patent and possibly prevent them from using the idea/technology.
The problem arises when companies actually begin to try and enforce their "stupid" patents (can we say 'one-click shopping?'). It is at that point, when companies begin to enforce stupidity that we should go to the Courts and overturn such things.
There. I feel better.
Priceless (Score:2)
Not yet valid (Score:5)
It is very important to note that these patents represent threats to European software developers in the future, rather than things which have already happened.
The European Patent Convention (EPC) specifically forbids [eurolinux.org] patents on computer programs, but the European Patent Office (EPO) has tried to bend this rule by saying that a computer program with a 'technical effect' is not a computer program 'as such'. This has allowed them to start granting patents on software even though software is clearly excluded by the EPC. So all the computer programs described in this patent horror gallery are considered by the EPO as not being computer programs 'as such'.
However, not everyone agrees with this ingenious new definition. So 'software patents' as granted by the EPO are not necessarily enforceable. But what the EPO is now trying to do is to have the law changed so that they can happily grant software patents without the inconvenience of having to redefine terms used by existing laws. If software is made patentable, all the software patents granted will suddenly become enforceable and leave European companies open to attack.
So it's not too late to do something about this. The European Commission is holding a publi c consultation [eu.int] asking for comments on whether the law should be changed, and many national patent offices are doing the same. (The EPO and EPC are not part of the European Union, but there is an overlapping membership and many countries are waiting for the Commission to make a recommendation.)
Also sign EuroLinux's petition [eurolinux.org] which gives some links for more information about what I wrote above.
Thank God! (Score:5)
Charge 'em with Fraud (Score:5)
Of course best of all is just not allowing patents on software (Or business processes.)
It's not only about article 52 ! (Score:5)
Bernhard Lang writes:
is proposed by EPO, so that it can change the EPC (european patent convention, i.e. the very text under discussion) to put it in agreement with other international treaties. Agreement is of course what the EPO considers as agreement. For example, if EPC 52.2 modification does not pass, but EPC 33 does, EPO could decide that its interpretation of the TRIPS agreement requires to remove EPC 52.2 and allows patenting software, or what else. Given the past record of the EPO, their propensity to bend rules that have been fixed, you can guess what will happen if you give them the right to change the rules according to their own assessment of the situation.
By the way, it is not clear that all countries are aware of what is hidden in the proposed modification of 33. More national lobbying and information has beenshould be done on that issue.
Hope for those learning English in Europe (Score:5)
Okay class, lets say the phrase we just learned... "I dream of america where my underwear flap is not covered by five simultaneous patents, and where the drugs can come in generic form."
Good class.
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