80-Year-Old Inventor Gil Hyatt Says Patent Office is Waiting For Him To Die (venturebeat.com) 108
Dean Takahashi, reporting for VentureBeat: Gil Hyatt has gotten many rewards from his days as an inventor. In 1990, he received a fundamental but controversial patent on what he called the first microprocessor, or computer on a chip. It was 22 years late, but he nosed out rivals such as Intel in being the first to file for a patent application in 1968. He then licensed that patent and 22 of his 69 other patents to Philips Electronics, which then began enforcing them on the rest of the electronics industry and collecting royalties.
Philips' efforts netted Hyatt more than $150 million, though the state of California would try for 24 years to take a big chunk of that money for taxes. It argued that Hyatt pretended to move to Las Vegas in 1991, but in 2017, he finally prevailed in convincing the tax board that he really did move. But at 80 years old, Hyatt still isn't resting on the rewards he got. In fact, he's still in a bitter battle with the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office. He claims the office is sitting on his remaining applications, and is waiting for him to die. Hyatt sued to get the patent office to issue his remaining patent applications. The patent office declined to comment, citing the litigation. Further reading: Gil Hyatt interview: Why patent examiners gave controversial patents a scarlet letter.
Philips' efforts netted Hyatt more than $150 million, though the state of California would try for 24 years to take a big chunk of that money for taxes. It argued that Hyatt pretended to move to Las Vegas in 1991, but in 2017, he finally prevailed in convincing the tax board that he really did move. But at 80 years old, Hyatt still isn't resting on the rewards he got. In fact, he's still in a bitter battle with the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office. He claims the office is sitting on his remaining applications, and is waiting for him to die. Hyatt sued to get the patent office to issue his remaining patent applications. The patent office declined to comment, citing the litigation. Further reading: Gil Hyatt interview: Why patent examiners gave controversial patents a scarlet letter.
why are they calling him that? (Score:4, Insightful)
Why are they calling him an inventor? Just because he got patents that automatically means he is one? It's clear he scammed a broken system (well, it works as it's designed actually, but broken for humanity as a whole in the sense that we all get fucked by it)
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It's for legal reasons. Turns out that "Patent Troll" is a Trademark of "International Patent Troll Consortium".
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Reads more like an early patent troll? (Score:4, Interesting)
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Fine, apply it equally. Book manuscript, publish it or lose it. Movie script, make it into a movie or lose it. Logo design, use it or lose it. Painting, sell it or lose it. Book manuscript, turn it into a movie or lose movie rights. Photography, sell it or lose commercial rights.
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You're confusing patents with copyright.
That's not so say copyright is not insanely broken, but we are discussing patents, which (correct me if I'm wrong) currently stand at a reasonable 20 years, and actually do benefit both the creator, as well as society as a whole. It's one of the few ways left for a smart person to break into big money by being smart, solving problems, and working the system.
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AFAIK, patents on chemical and pharmaceutical do bring a net benefit to society, but other patents don't.
Bessen, James & Meurer, Michael J. (2008) Patent Failure [princeton.edu]. Princeton University Press.
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I have to respectfully disagree. The patent itself is the motivator to invent better and novel ways of doing things. Without the patent, we would likely not have a great many awesome things we have today. The short(er) time-frame of a patent allows the market to change things after the creator has had his day.
What bothers me is the way that tech giants go about applying for them. I'm no expert,and this is purely observation from the outside, but it really seems like the giants apply for patents on every lit
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Patents are a motivator for invention, but not the biggest one in most industries (Lopez, 2009, p. 21). (This is a meta-analysis. If I remember right, I found this paper to be an amusing read, becaus
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So I write a book, take it to bunch of publishers, it doesn't get printed. You "happen" to write a similar book and it gets published or made into a movie. Guess what?
https://www.nytimes.com/2004/0... [nytimes.com]
etc.
https://www.google.com/search?... [google.com]
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Controversy (Score:5, Interesting)
In 1990, he received a fundamental but controversial patent on what he called the first microprocessor, or computer on a chip. It was 22 years late
First "on a computer" patent troll.
So the first MCU that used an instruction set, but made from individual transistors, was made in 1953. Vacuum tubes that worked as transistors were older yet.
The first integrated circuit that was designed to act as a transistor was built in 1956 and the design for it was a couple years before that.
Gil Hyatt filed in 1968, over a decade before each and every component of his invention was already invented and put together using the same IC structure his patent described.
The reason Fairchild and Intel fought so hard was in essence because *at best* Gil Hyatt invented the second MCU instruction set to ever exist, but fairchilds was the third and Intel was the forth.
If Gil deserves a patent on an existing design that only differs in the instruction set, then neither fairchild or intels also-different instruction set should be covered by the same patent.
If Gil's covers all future instruction sets to ever be invented, then being the second inventor he should lose his patent to Geoffrey Dummer instead.
This guy is a patent troll who's only real "first" was to file the original "an existing thing, on my computer" patent.
Re:Controversy (Score:5, Informative)
Here is another interesting side note from a court case:
https://www.boe.ca.gov/meeting... [ca.gov]
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Just geezing here...
I moved to California in early 1991 from a state with no income tax (on earned income). I filed my federal taxes for tax year 1990 in April of 1991, using my California address as my current address. The California Franchise Tax Board (FTB) "made a determination" that I had been a California resident for the tax year 1990 on the basis of the address I used when I filed my federal taxes for tax year 1990. I protested that I had not been a California resident in 1990, and that they did
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I (foolishly perhaps) insisted that I didn't need to prove I wasn't a resident...
Innocent until proven guilty!!! Oh wait, this is not a criminal matter (at least not yet!). You (and your employer, investment broker, etc) provide documentation so the FTB can verify you paid the correct amount of taxes. Lots of people fraudulently claim residence where they don't actually live in order to avoid paying taxes. People in the FTB may or may not be jerks, but are they supposed to just let everyone claim anything they want without documentation and then pay whatever taxes they choose? For
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In particular, CA tried to tax retirement income of those who moved to Nevada.
Our response, given that we have to give full faith and credit to sister-state judgments, was to make all property in the state exempt for judgments for income tax on retirement income . . .
hawk
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Surely it should be to Tom Kilburn or F.C. (Freddie) Williams, as the Manchester SSEM had the first true instruction set.
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Your words sound plausible yet your typo unconsciously triggers me to reread and check the dictionary.
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Not sure which is worse... (Score:3, Interesting)
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It would be curious to see if there is an heir to said patents regardless of original creation or "patent-obtained" technologies going forward. In the end a last Will and Testament could throw a wrench into the proverbial wait for the patents to shift ownership in their entirety.
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Well it should be - if an immortal company can own one.
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And as resentful as ever, considering California is the fifth largest economy on the planet, while Michigan is number 37. Even Massachusetts beats Michigan.
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Well it would, wouldn't it? It starts to cancel itself out when you factor in population and cost of living
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There's a reason California's housing and rental prices are high, while some other states' are so low. It's because people want to move to California, and out of those other states.
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Re:Not sure which is worse... (Score:4, Funny)
California is one of a small handful of states that put more money in Federal coffers than it takes out (Texas is the only red state in that category). It may make you feel a very big person to make fun of California, but more than likely it's true that wherever you live in the US, California could buy your state. Whatever it's problems, it is one of the major economic engines not just of the United States, but of the entire world.
Before you start mocking the size of your neighbor's penis, you should probably take a good hard long long in the mirror at your own.
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Re: Not sure which is worse... (Score:1)
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Hi Gil! I didn't know you read Slashdot!
California FTB is like that... (Score:5, Interesting)
California Franchise Tax Board (California's version of the IRS) is like that.. My wife and I bought a house in Las Vegas in 1994, and she moved into the house then and went to work for a local hospital. I got a tiny studio apartment near work in San Diego, as I had a job I liked and there was a rumor going around that there were going to be layoffs in the near future and I'd hoped to get laid off vs quiting. The wait for the layoffs wound up being close to 2 years, so I did quite a bit of flying up to Las Vegas over the weekend for that time. The layoffs finally happened in Dec 1995, and I was laid off. I moved my stuff up to Las Vegas and got unemployment. During the nearly two years I was still working in San Diego, I filed state income tax returns showing my California wages but did NOT show wife's Nevada wages. To make a long story short, I had to pay a tax attorney quite a bit AND nearly two years to convince the FTB that Nevada wages were NOT taxable by California, even though I had California wages. The CalFTB can FUCK OFF.. Soooo damn glad we escaped that nuthouse...
Stupid (Score:2)
Stupid. If California is such a "shit hole" why does it have some of the highest property values in the US. For every negative California has I'd wager whatever backwater you live in has two.
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Stupid. If California is such a "shit hole" why does it have some of the highest property values in the US.
That's easy, beaches and sunshine.
For every negative California has I'd wager whatever backwater you live in has two.
I'll take mosquitoes in the summer and snow in the winter over shit in the streets all year.
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Because significant parts of it have some of the best weather in the US which is never too cold, never too humid, rarely too hot. I never travel during the height of summer or winter now because of it.
Or how about another fundamental basic, food? We're America's produce basket and year round I can eat good quality produce either grown here or in Chile who has the same climate, just in the opposite hemisphere and a very convenient chipping distance away.
The fundamental root of California's attraction isnt co
Re:California FTB is like that... (Score:4, Interesting)
Michigan taxed me for wages I made in California, even though I moved out of the wolverine state two years prior. This happens a lot and has little to do with the pulsing horror that is California's bureaucracy and more to do with how individuals files their taxes. You really have to dot your "i"'s and cross your "t"'s to keep the tax man off your back.
It's a very common trick for people in Bay Area to retire to Reno-Tahoe and cash out their stock to avoid a lot of taxes. The Franchise Tax Board is wise to this one and sometimes will try their best to extract everything they can before they leave. People make think that their money is theirs, but they earned it in California and probably owe taxes on it. That they can leave without paying taxes is more of a loop hole than a right, and you can expect many states to not be very nice about it.
I'd much rather it were explicitly dealt with in federal regulations so that we can deal with it fairly, like a 50/50 split between old and new state. Rather than states like California chasing people for decades on seemingly minor issues as sort of an intimidation policy against tax cheats (the FTB secretly views you as a tax cheat)
They're also fun if you move out of the country (Score:2)
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It's a huge state -- ya got a lotta woik ahead of u!
Me Too! (Score:4, Interesting)
He claims the office is sitting on his remaining applications, and is waiting for him to die.
Me too; and I'm only 50!
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Thumbing without editing because auto-correct based on key layout's likely mispresses is patented...
Maybe he'd have died fat and happy by now if hebhadn't been fougbt so hard all along the way.
They're not waiting for him to die (Score:4, Insightful)
As someone who lives in one state and pays every dime of taxes owed with zero deductions (stopped getting those when my kid turned 17.5) screw this noise. Enjoy civilization? Pay your dues like everyone else.
Yes (Score:3)
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"I favor progressive taxation. Meaning the larger benefit a person receives from society the more they pay for it's upkeep and improvement."
There is literally no way to interpret "progressive taxation" in this way, nor is there any way to measure "benefit a person receives from society" sufficiently to support such a taxation approach.
Progressive taxes are those (Score:3)
America had it's best years when the top marginal tax rage (income over $12 million/year adjusted for inflation) was 90%. Things started going downhill when Reagan sl
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" If the people who use the club the most don't pay their dues the club goes to ruin. "
You mean like the poor?
People need to realize about patent durations (Score:2)
This patent was issued in 1990 - it expired after 17 years, in 2007. US patents are only good for a limited amount of time, somewhere between 3.5 years and 17 years (depending upon if you want to pay the maintenance fees to keep the patent in force). He's not collecting on the concept of a microprocessor any more.
As far as his other pending patents, it appears the USPTO is playing games with him, as inventors 65 years old or older qualify for expedited examination, and it should take no more than a year f
It's when they're dying that they attack. (Score:4, Interesting)
Tired of companies inventing something great, then they stop innovating and instead sink all their money into lawyers and sue sue sue. Die Die Die.
Actually, it's when they're dying that they sue, sue, sue.
When a tech company is doing well, their money is better spent innovating and staying ahead of the pack. When they're getting behind, it's still better spent on getting ahead.
During this period patent portflios are mostly used defensively against other company's suits. Find some patents in the portfolio the other guys can be accused of infringing and counter-sue. Then settle for a cross-licensing agreement, and maybe a true-up payment if one side has a bigger pile of relevant patents.
But when they're dying, they're desperate. That's when they go through their portfolio and sue anybody they might be able to make money from.
(Been there, dealt with that: Northern Telecom was on the ropes. They'd been a big player in the design of SONNET and had a lot of patents on it. So they went after anybody with patents that looked like they were doing something SONNET-related that might infringe on one of theirs. So I and my co-architect got to spend a few weeks writing, for our lawyers, a set of analyses of why each of several NT patents didn't cover the stuff in our patents, or other chunks of the chips we'd designed that looked like they just MUST have an infringing component. B-b )
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When a tech company is doing well, their money is better spent innovating and staying ahead of the pack. When they're getting behind, it's still better spent on getting ahead.
Except so many choose to die and therefore sue. It's not like IBM doesn't have an R&D budget.
Prick (Score:2)
so is everybody else (Score:2)
I think it's safe to say that lots of other sensible people are hoping that this 80-Year-Old patent troll dies, the sooner the better. I certainly do.
(No, I'm not defending the patent office.)
Maybe? (Score:3)
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The USPTO has a shadow classification, "SAWS", for specific people that is basically "never issue this person another patent, ever, for any reason." Not only is this true, its a fact now in court evidence that this classification was placed on him.
The USPTO is just favoring large corporations over the little guy here, because they are scumbags.
Patent troll vs kleptocrats (Score:2)
He and the People's Republic of California deserve each other. This story reads like the punchline of a canonical lawyer joke.