It is, but do you have a solution or proposal to fix it. I have tried to brainstorm some ideas to make it better but I have nothing.
The only reasonable idea is to make the plaintiff pay for all court fees if they lose, like in the UK. But that only hinder these small companies or individuals fighting a big corporation who has taken their idea and may be not concern a large company whose lawyers will cost considerably more than the defendant's if it were the other way around.
Any ideas?
I think the foundation of the patent system should be based on protecting real products from being directly copied and having the market stolen away from them. Not protecting vague ideas until someone else comes up with a product that is related to them.
So basically, you can only patent the unique aspects of an existing product (or a product destined to be released to the market within a reasonable amount of time). If that reasonable amount of time expires without the said product being released, then you lose your patent.
Until patents are tied to real products (and real losses associated with copycat products), we'll continue to see companies whose entire business model is patent and sue.
I think small companies just take a look at anything they've patented in the past and hope some other company treaded on it so they can finally make some money..
Maybe it's because Dell is in Texas, too. So they would have an easier time getting the case moved to Round Rock since it would still be in-state? I imagine this company "operating out of" Marshall means they have a tiny office leased in some building.
Needless to say, this is a stupid lawsuit. I mean, gimme an f'in' break.
W.r.t. fixing the patent system, the idea of marrying patents with products is misguided. Whether or not technology is for sale in the market place is irrelevant to ownership, and ownership is the crux of the biscuit. The central question is: what constitutes intellectual property?
This is the principle. Pragmatically, patent law must also protect "open source" technology--akin to copyleft concepts. I may innovate something of true import that I wish to give away and simultaneously prevent others from appropriating. How else can I protect my intellectual property but by patenting it and then disposing of it as I wish? Yet another pragmatic aspect is incentive. In order to encourage innovation, inventors must have ownership of their creative ideas; otherwise, we get nothing but state of the art candles and abacuses (hyperbole, but you get the idea).
An important thing to remember is that patent protection doesn't last forever. Patented ideas eventually enter into the public domain. Perhaps a good start to fixing the system would be to limit the period of time that patent protection is enjoyed for ideas of dubious merit. I don't know how the merit threshold is determined in today's world. If there is none, or if this is too difficult to discriminate, another idea is to limit patent protection periods relating to fast-paced industries accustomed to rapid growth.
I don't think that patenting novel mathematical formulas is beyond reason; I'd say the same of genes and hybridized plants. It takes knowledge and creativity to discover these things. Once discovered, they have value--value enough that it makes sense to confer property status to them, such that more people will be inclined to innovate new ideas themselves.
Quote:
Originally Posted by sandro
The idea that you can patent a mathematical formula is inane. Imagine if that had been around hundreds of years ago. Should we have to pay every time we calculate a square root?
Imagine if that had been around: thousands of years ago when "square root technology" was first developed. How inane would that have been given that there was little practical application for it? It's silly to say that this technology should be protected today, in the age of electronics, in the age when we actually have calculators and computers. I don't think it would have been at all beyond reason to have patented this back then. And that's entirely the point: individuals discover properties of reality and are rewarded with property rights for their findings over some portion of their lives; after some reasonable period of time, the properties of reality are just that and nobody owns them; but the creator must be given his due. Who knows: if the concept of patents was around thousands of years ago we may have gotten calculators that much sooner.
Note that nothing forces individuals to patent their creations/discoveries. Some may choose to keep these secret and profit from proprietary ventures in perpetuity--or until somebody else figures out what the universe is capable of. This is significant inasmuch as it concretizes the ultimate reality that information wants to be free as much as it wants to be owned. In the end, nothing is new because it was already there--a property of existence. The point of patents is to advance civilization by rewarding creators under the concept of justice.
Even so, the plaintiff is confident that it can freeze out both of the computer sales giants with a permanent injunction on their services and a request that Apple and HP pay "enhanced" damages for what's claimed as deliberate infringement. CWC supports its argument by pointing to a successful defense of its two patents in a dispute with office supply retailer Staples.
Neither Apple nor HP has commented on the new lawsuit.
Problems with our patent system as well as many other problems are a result of the direction America has taken in recent decades. America was an experiment which involved and required that the morality of people be up to a certain level. The patent system has become an excuse for people to give in to greed and lust for money. Lawsuits are now commonplace. Yes, the system is broken. But no matter how well-designed the system were to become, people would still take advantage of it and find loopholes to feed their greed. More government control is NOT the answer. It is never the answer. Read your history.
Problems with our patent system as well as many other problems are a result of the direction America has taken in recent decades. America was an experiment which involved and required that the morality of people be up to a certain level. The patent system has become an excuse for people to give in to greed and lust for money. Lawsuits are now commonplace. Yes, the system is broken. But no matter how well-designed the system were to become, people would still take advantage of it and find loopholes to feed their greed. More government control is NOT the answer. It is never the answer. Read your history.
I agree, we've replaced business ethics with a legalistic (what can we get away with) business mentality. A society without etiquette & protocol, without a real sense of some moral value & preservation, just isn't a civilized society at all.
The most astonishing thing about patents like these is how obvious it is that someone sat down with an idea that wasn't very broad at all, & then had a lawyer write it up for them so that it could include as many possible scenarios as they could. Very obvious that this one was architected to sue future infringers & not to actually put the idea into practice.
The problem started when they started awarding patents for algorithms, business processes and genes.
patenting a business process should be allowed. the issue is that it needs to be very specific. just being able to patent "online shopping" or "custom built computers" is not specific enough. just like copyrighting "hot chick makes over smart geek to turn him into perfect boyfriend" isn't enough to go from idea to story.
well in this case, they would have to sue every company that uses a similar game or it would be tossed out for just going after a huge moneymaking company. it would be seen as trying to make a buck off the big boys and not really defending a patent.
the key is what exactly the patents say. are they for the mere idea, in which case every company with online shopping could be in danger, no matter what they sell. or is it for the exact system they are using for their orders. and can Apple etc defend themselves by saying that they enhanced the system by making it all online. similar to copyright's fair use because you are parodying or analyzing a work.
what next, the book companies get hit for copying 'online book selling' or has someone already tried that one
Comments
And that's all this is.
It is, but do you have a solution or proposal to fix it. I have tried to brainstorm some ideas to make it better but I have nothing.
The only reasonable idea is to make the plaintiff pay for all court fees if they lose, like in the UK. But that only hinder these small companies or individuals fighting a big corporation who has taken their idea and may be not concern a large company whose lawyers will cost considerably more than the defendant's if it were the other way around.
Any ideas?
I think the foundation of the patent system should be based on protecting real products from being directly copied and having the market stolen away from them. Not protecting vague ideas until someone else comes up with a product that is related to them.
So basically, you can only patent the unique aspects of an existing product (or a product destined to be released to the market within a reasonable amount of time). If that reasonable amount of time expires without the said product being released, then you lose your patent.
Until patents are tied to real products (and real losses associated with copycat products), we'll continue to see companies whose entire business model is patent and sue.
Maybe Dell already paid them off?
Maybe it's because Dell is in Texas, too. So they would have an easier time getting the case moved to Round Rock since it would still be in-state? I imagine this company "operating out of" Marshall means they have a tiny office leased in some building.
Surly almost every website with a composite ordering system would be subject to this? What a load of BS!
Bunch of losers.
W.r.t. fixing the patent system, the idea of marrying patents with products is misguided. Whether or not technology is for sale in the market place is irrelevant to ownership, and ownership is the crux of the biscuit. The central question is: what constitutes intellectual property?
This is the principle. Pragmatically, patent law must also protect "open source" technology--akin to copyleft concepts. I may innovate something of true import that I wish to give away and simultaneously prevent others from appropriating. How else can I protect my intellectual property but by patenting it and then disposing of it as I wish? Yet another pragmatic aspect is incentive. In order to encourage innovation, inventors must have ownership of their creative ideas; otherwise, we get nothing but state of the art candles and abacuses (hyperbole, but you get the idea).
An important thing to remember is that patent protection doesn't last forever. Patented ideas eventually enter into the public domain. Perhaps a good start to fixing the system would be to limit the period of time that patent protection is enjoyed for ideas of dubious merit. I don't know how the merit threshold is determined in today's world. If there is none, or if this is too difficult to discriminate, another idea is to limit patent protection periods relating to fast-paced industries accustomed to rapid growth.
I don't think that patenting novel mathematical formulas is beyond reason; I'd say the same of genes and hybridized plants. It takes knowledge and creativity to discover these things. Once discovered, they have value--value enough that it makes sense to confer property status to them, such that more people will be inclined to innovate new ideas themselves.
The idea that you can patent a mathematical formula is inane. Imagine if that had been around hundreds of years ago. Should we have to pay every time we calculate a square root?
Imagine if that had been around: thousands of years ago when "square root technology" was first developed. How inane would that have been given that there was little practical application for it? It's silly to say that this technology should be protected today, in the age of electronics, in the age when we actually have calculators and computers. I don't think it would have been at all beyond reason to have patented this back then. And that's entirely the point: individuals discover properties of reality and are rewarded with property rights for their findings over some portion of their lives; after some reasonable period of time, the properties of reality are just that and nobody owns them; but the creator must be given his due. Who knows: if the concept of patents was around thousands of years ago we may have gotten calculators that much sooner.
Note that nothing forces individuals to patent their creations/discoveries. Some may choose to keep these secret and profit from proprietary ventures in perpetuity--or until somebody else figures out what the universe is capable of. This is significant inasmuch as it concretizes the ultimate reality that information wants to be free as much as it wants to be owned. In the end, nothing is new because it was already there--a property of existence. The point of patents is to advance civilization by rewarding creators under the concept of justice.
...
Even so, the plaintiff is confident that it can freeze out both of the computer sales giants with a permanent injunction on their services and a request that Apple and HP pay "enhanced" damages for what's claimed as deliberate infringement. CWC supports its argument by pointing to a successful defense of its two patents in a dispute with office supply retailer Staples.
Neither Apple nor HP has commented on the new lawsuit.
[ View this article at AppleInsider.com ]
Problems with our patent system as well as many other problems are a result of the direction America has taken in recent decades. America was an experiment which involved and required that the morality of people be up to a certain level. The patent system has become an excuse for people to give in to greed and lust for money. Lawsuits are now commonplace. Yes, the system is broken. But no matter how well-designed the system were to become, people would still take advantage of it and find loopholes to feed their greed. More government control is NOT the answer. It is never the answer. Read your history.
I agree, we've replaced business ethics with a legalistic (what can we get away with) business mentality. A society without etiquette & protocol, without a real sense of some moral value & preservation, just isn't a civilized society at all.
The most astonishing thing about patents like these is how obvious it is that someone sat down with an idea that wasn't very broad at all, & then had a lawyer write it up for them so that it could include as many possible scenarios as they could. Very obvious that this one was architected to sue future infringers & not to actually put the idea into practice.
Thanks for the patent post Slewis.
http://dockets.justia.com/docket/cou...ase_id-109924/
The problem started when they started awarding patents for algorithms, business processes and genes.
patenting a business process should be allowed. the issue is that it needs to be very specific. just being able to patent "online shopping" or "custom built computers" is not specific enough. just like copyrighting "hot chick makes over smart geek to turn him into perfect boyfriend" isn't enough to go from idea to story.
I guess they seen to think they can sue whom ever they want!
http://dockets.justia.com/docket/cou...ase_id-109924/
well in this case, they would have to sue every company that uses a similar game or it would be tossed out for just going after a huge moneymaking company. it would be seen as trying to make a buck off the big boys and not really defending a patent.
the key is what exactly the patents say. are they for the mere idea, in which case every company with online shopping could be in danger, no matter what they sell. or is it for the exact system they are using for their orders. and can Apple etc defend themselves by saying that they enhanced the system by making it all online. similar to copyright's fair use because you are parodying or analyzing a work.
what next, the book companies get hit for copying 'online book selling' or has someone already tried that one