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Vigilante engineer stops Waymo from patenting key lidar technology

arstechnica.com

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Re: Vigilante engineer stops Waymo from patenting key lidar technology

#91

Post by gota »

femto wrote: post #52
discjockeydom wrote: post #22

I have actually reviewed this man's supposedly vigilante's submission to the USPTO and it is clear that this story is not what it seems. The document is a highly professional 95+ page document of complex legal argumentation that only a law firm with a small team of lawyers with a lot of prior experience doing this could have put together. It contains lots of lawyer speak and contemporary argumentation that a lay pers…

Elsewhere it's mentioned that Swildens was on the receiving end of a 3 year battle over patent infringement, where he was a founder and so intimately involved. After an apprenticeship like that it would be unsurprising if he could emulate a team of lawyers.

I was about to comment something similar. I've myself worked with patent lawyers and can emulate their speech to some extent.

Re: Vigilante engineer stops Waymo from patenting key lidar technology

#92

Post by chongli »

pentae wrote: post #25
discjockeydom wrote: post #22

I have actually reviewed this man's supposedly vigilante's submission to the USPTO and it is clear that this story is not what it seems. The document is a highly professional 95+ page document of complex legal argumentation that only a law firm with a small team of lawyers with a lot of prior experience doing this could have put together. It contains lots of lawyer speak and contemporary argumentation that a lay pers…

Perhaps thats where the $6000 of his own money was spent, having a lawyer/lawyer friend edit his document into legal speak?

I would've thought the $6000 only covered the cost of filing the challenge with the PTO.

Re: Vigilante engineer stops Waymo from patenting key lidar technology

#93

Post by ChrisSD »

jonathanstrange wrote: post #67

If the US patent office did their job, then there would be no need for "vigilante" engineers. Maybe the reporting of the patent situation is a bit biased but from what I've heard over the years it appears to me that every second patent should be invalid and has prior art.

That would require someone to pay the US patent office to do their jobs.

I believe paying for government services is considered a contentious issue in the USA.

Re: Vigilante engineer stops Waymo from patenting key lidar technology

#94

Post by Schwolop »

erpellan wrote: post #53
steve_adams_86 wrote: post #2

That's stunning that (evidently) no one noticed the patents were for a physically impossible design. Was the legal battle even about the designs or more so for posturing?

Patents are broken. I give you: The Stick. https://patents.google.com/patent/US6360693 HN discussion: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2102388 Also: we all owe license fees for using gravity. https://patents.google.com/patent/US6368227B1/en

I see yours and raise you this: https://patents.google.com/patent/US20070244837

"System and method for extracting value from a portfolio of assets" - a.k.a. The process of being a patent troll is patented.

Re: Vigilante engineer stops Waymo from patenting key lidar technology

#95

Post by spydum »

1_player wrote: post #84
thaumasiotes wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is a good answer to the question "why did Waymo have a patent that could be invalidated by one guy with $6000?" But it's a terrible answer to the question "if one guy with $6000 could get this patent invalidated, why couldn't Uber?"

Probably because none of the lawyers on Uber's side had the credentials to stop and ask themselves "hey, is this even patentable?!" Nobody consulted any engineer. Just lawyers fighting each other, and the side with the biggest pockets won.

Absolutely believable - I’ve been amazed at some of the foolishness of general councils at LARGE corps. They may know law, but they can suck at getting details right about engineering problems. Heck even when it comes to law, can’t tell you how many times I have heard “we will need to consult outside council”..

Re: Vigilante engineer stops Waymo from patenting key lidar technology

#96

Post by simias »

coldtea wrote: post #85
calcifer wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is really funny that a conspiracy theory posted by an anonymous person with no backing evidence whatsoever is sitting at the top of this thread.

It's as if people can still think for themselves and make arguments from the available information (even if they prove to be wrong), instead of expecting the final story to be handed down to them... The reference to the "95+ page document of complex legal argumentation"? That's evidence in support of the claim in the comment. Parent didn't make up that it's a complex lengthy legal document themselves. Sure, the theor…

The original poster doesn't provide any substantive evidence of what they're claiming (since then they've posted a link to the document without further discussion). They have an account with very little activity so we don't really know who they are or how knowledgeable (and how biased) they are on these issues. I think some skepticism is very much warranted and I don't understand why their comment sits at the top of the thread. They're not making "arguments from the available information", they're just making a statement without providing evidence.

>But that this is no simple "engineer vigilante" is evident

It is not to me. It's plausible that he might not be but I haven't seen a conclusive demonstration either and I'd sooner trust Ars over "some anonymous poster on HN who says it's not true".

I tried reading the PDF provided and I found it very obtuse and verbose, but then again so are patent applications as far as I'm concerned. I'm genuinely incapable of judging the level of skill and dedication required to create something like that. If you are I'd very much like to hear about it instead of throwing vague accusations. Is is that implausible that a skilled engineer used to dealing with patents could come up with something like that on their own or with only minor outside help?

Re: Vigilante engineer stops Waymo from patenting key lidar technology

#97

Post by 1_player »

spydum wrote: post #95
1_player wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Probably because none of the lawyers on Uber's side had the credentials to stop and ask themselves "hey, is this even patentable?!" Nobody consulted any engineer. Just lawyers fighting each other, and the side with the biggest pockets won.

Absolutely believable - I’ve been amazed at some of the foolishness of general councils at LARGE corps. They may know law, but they can suck at getting details right about engineering problems. Heck even when it comes to law, can’t tell you how many times I have heard “we will need to consult outside council”..

See, I'm being absolutely cynical and tongue-in-cheek here, but my understanding about the modern law is that lawyers aren't fighting for the "truth" or "common good" nor they are in the "righting wrongs" business.

Their only job is doing whatever the client wants done. A _good lawyer_ wins a case even when it's total bollocks. The fact that it is bollocks is not a concern at any level.

https://youtu.be/oYj7q_by_2E?t=5m56s

Re: Vigilante engineer stops Waymo from patenting key lidar technology

#98

Post by Symmetry »

jonathanstrange wrote: post #67

If the US patent office did their job, then there would be no need for "vigilante" engineers. Maybe the reporting of the patent situation is a bit biased but from what I've heard over the years it appears to me that every second patent should be invalid and has prior art.

In any classification system you're going to get false positives and false negatives. We could improve the situation through better funding to the Patent Office but given the breadth of things getting patented it's a really fundamentally hard problem and thank goodness for recent changes to US patent law making it easier to invalidate bad patents.

Re: Vigilante engineer stops Waymo from patenting key lidar technology

#99

Post by rcxdude »

1_player wrote: post #97
spydum wrote: post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Absolutely believable - I’ve been amazed at some of the foolishness of general councils at LARGE corps. They may know law, but they can suck at getting details right about engineering problems. Heck even when it comes to law, can’t tell you how many times I have heard “we will need to consult outside council”..

See, I'm being absolutely cynical and tongue-in-cheek here, but my understanding about the modern law is that lawyers aren't fighting for the "truth" or "common good" nor they are in the "righting wrongs" business. Their only job is doing whatever the client wants done. A _good lawyer_ wins a case even when it's total bollocks. The fact that it is bollocks is not a concern at any level. https://youtu.be/oYj7q_by_2E?t…

This is how adversarial justice systems are supposed to operate. The idea being that you get lawyers advocating in the best possible way for either side, so the argument is 'fair'. This is in comparison to an inquisitorial system, where one party is charged with investigating the case and exposing the 'truth'. This is more prone to bias and ability on that one party but it does generally mean that the level of resources each side has matters less.

Re: Vigilante engineer stops Waymo from patenting key lidar technology

#100

Post by lisper »

Schwolop wrote: post #94
erpellan wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Patents are broken. I give you: The Stick. https://patents.google.com/patent/US6360693 HN discussion: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2102388 Also: we all owe license fees for using gravity. https://patents.google.com/patent/US6368227B1/en

I see yours and raise you this: https://patents.google.com/patent/US20070244837 "System and method for extracting value from a portfolio of assets" - a.k.a. The process of being a patent troll is patented.

As an experiment I once applied for and received a patent on a faster-than-light communications system:

https://patents.google.com/patent/US7126691B2/en

The patent system is FUBAR.

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