I'm in tech but not in the valley. How accurate is HBO's representation of patent trolls?
It's a documentry, not just the patent troll part, but the whole thing.
Cloudflare’s fight with a “patent troll” could alter the game
81–90 of 285 posts
Re: Cloudflare’s fight with a “patent troll” could alter the game
#82Earlier quoted context omitted.
>The real solution is to either make sure prior art and non-obviousness requirements are properly enforced or just dismantle the whole thing as unworkable. Obviousness is the key issue for me. I suspect most people, even those who work in the technology fields, are not aware that it is considered essentially impossible to prove obviousness (source: I have worked as a consultant on several patent litigation cases). So…
This has always bothered me. The standard is supposed to be "non-obvious to an expert in the field" and yet they hand out patents like candy for things that are obvious to the most casual observer. My solution is to cap the number of patents granted every year to, say, 1000. Patents would be ranked from least to most obvious and actual prior art investigation would take place (because the number is manageable). The o…
As I said in response to a comment upthread, the existence of an implementation by someone who had no knowledge of the patent should be prima facie evidence that the idea is obvious to an expert in the field. That should get the patent invalidated.
Re: Cloudflare’s fight with a “patent troll” could alter the game
#83I think that this is absolutely brilliant. I've been against the patent of generalistic ideas, and basic processes for a very long time. Anything in software should not really be patentable, unless there is a concrete implementation of an invention, it's not an invention, it's a set of instructions. Let software work under trade secrets, but not patents. Anyone can implement something they think through. It's usually…
Software is already covered by /copyright/ law. It does not need patents.
Re: Cloudflare’s fight with a “patent troll” could alter the game
#84It is all about finding a correct pressure point. Long time ago certain Philadelphia area law firms decided to represent vegan protesters that created a major mess in a couple of high end restaurants. A certain flamboyant owner of one the restaurants targeted decided to have a good time applying his version of asymmetric warfare. The next partners from those law firm showed up to wine and dine their clients in the es…
That's pretty weak.
How so?
Re: Cloudflare’s fight with a “patent troll” could alter the game
#85I think that this is absolutely brilliant. I've been against the patent of generalistic ideas, and basic processes for a very long time. Anything in software should not really be patentable, unless there is a concrete implementation of an invention, it's not an invention, it's a set of instructions. Let software work under trade secrets, but not patents. Anyone can implement something they think through. It's usually…
Software is already covered by /copyright/ law. It does not need patents.
Copyright covers implementations, not ideas. I have no moral objection to truly novel inventions in computer science being protected by patents. An innovative search algorithm, a compression scheme, etc. Its shit when MP3s and GIFs were encumbered, but they were genuine inventions whose sharing publicly genuinely advanced the public good.
The kind the patent trolls use are not innovative in the same way. We need a stricter definition of obvious to one versed in the art, not a ban throughout the field.
Re: Cloudflare’s fight with a “patent troll” could alter the game
#86Earlier quoted context omitted.
This account seems more like poor planning on part of the lawyers. I would assume representing a client would imply a sort of temporary boycott on the part of the lawyers towards the client's legal adversary.
In a large firm, a lawyer isn't going to go through the active cases for every partner in the firm when choosing where to take clients for dinner.
It seems a bit naive, then, to assume that the people you're litigating against will civilly keep their anger in Lawyer-Land and never hold a grudge in real life.
Re: Cloudflare’s fight with a “patent troll” could alter the game
#87Earlier quoted context omitted.
Just so we're clear though, the disarmament that we should aim for is to change physics so that nuclear weapons don't work at all, right? Because that's an option, we could change how the patent system works.
Land mines are a much better metaphor for patents than nuclear weapons are. Say what you will about the evils of nuclear warfare, but we haven't seen any world wars lately, and nuclear weapons are to thank for that state of affairs. Patents (and land mines) are a lot less useful to society.
> Say what you will about the evils of nuclear warfare, but we haven't seen any world wars lately, and nuclear weapons are to thank for that state of affairs.
It seems disingenuous to assume that the way it happened is the only way it could have happened. MAD exchanged the near-certainty of world war for a coin-flip between mostly-peace and total annihilation. We can certainly be happy that we lucked out on the coin-flip, but I don't think it follows that MAD was a policy of pure wisdom and sanity.
Re: Cloudflare’s fight with a “patent troll” could alter the game
#88Earlier quoted context omitted.
I don't think it's fair to say that nuclear weapons are why we don't have world wars anymore. I believe it has a lot more to do with globalization and the fact that most countries now recognize that it's a lot more profitable to trade with other countries than to go to war with them.
I used to think that was the case, too, and then someone pointed out how incredibly well-connected and economically interdependent the world was in the years leading up to WWI. Global trade back then was like our modern dot-com boom, but with real money and merchandise. People were sure it would change everything. Turned out not so much. As long as the lives of the old men who ran the world weren't personally at risk…
Another possible non-nuclear explanation is democratic peace theory.
Re: Cloudflare’s fight with a “patent troll” could alter the game
#89Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Why on earth aren't non-practicing entity patent lawsuits outlawed? The NPE category includes universities and researchers. Many inventions can't be brought to market without significant capital, and not all inventors are interested in commercializing their inventions themselves. Just because you're not personally going to build a billion dollar chip fabrication facility to implement the new silicon etching process…
But an exception could be made for these Or another idea, make patents non transferrable.
Then people would just license them. It wouldn't change anything.
Most custom-written software is actually licensed, not sold (since the contractor is not an employee). It makes no real difference.
Re: Cloudflare’s fight with a “patent troll” could alter the game
#90Earlier quoted context omitted.
Software is already covered by /copyright/ law. It does not need patents.
Copyright covers implementations, not ideas. I have no moral objection to truly novel inventions in computer science being protected by patents. An innovative search algorithm, a compression scheme, etc. Its shit when MP3s and GIFs were encumbered, but they were genuine inventions whose sharing publicly genuinely advanced the public good. The kind the patent trolls use are not innovative in the same way. We need a st…
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