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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

#121

Post by krylon »

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 vaguely recall some guy in Australia took out a patent on the wheel a couple of years back as part of a crusade to show how broken the patent system was.

https://www.newscientist.com/article/dn965-wheel-patented-in...

Re: Vigilante engineer stops Waymo from patenting key lidar technology

#122

Post by [deleted] »

lisper wrote: post #100
Schwolop wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

[deleted]

Re: Vigilante engineer stops Waymo from patenting key lidar technology

#123

Post by mLuby »

sdenton4 wrote: post #120
true_religion wrote: post #117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is not a deservice. Its indicative of how poorly we view our own profession that everyone with other skills must be more than engineer, merely by applying them. A lawyer who becomes mayor is still a lawyer. A doctor who runs a phamacology company is still a doctor. And yes, and engineer who founds a company still retains the core skills and prestige of their hardwon profession. Or at least, I think they should.

Hardwon profession: Three weeks in a boot camp followed by two years on the bloody frontlines of the Framework Wars...

I support our troops.

Re: Vigilante engineer stops Waymo from patenting key lidar technology

#124

Post by anticensor »

krylon wrote: post #121
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 vaguely recall some guy in Australia took out a patent on the wheel a couple of years back as part of a crusade to show how broken the patent system was. https://www.newscientist.com/article/dn965-wheel-patented-in...

It is an innovation (i.e. minor) patent, though, not utility (i.e. invention needed) patent. Some patent offices have this kind of patent and it usually has less protection and easier application than utility patents.

Re: Vigilante engineer stops Waymo from patenting key lidar technology

#125

Post by anticensor »

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.

https://patents.google.com/patent/US20170213291A1

He patented automated patent troll. Unfortunately, this will not hold in court.

Re: Vigilante engineer stops Waymo from patenting key lidar technology

#126

Post by [deleted] »

bsder wrote: post #33
consp wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

5 years, from filing to market to making profit is really short. Maybe it works for simple parents but I'm pretty sure most true inventions (and smaller companies with somewhat less complicated patents) will not be able to profit properly from the patent that way.

Tough. The nominal goal of a patent is to encourage innovation--not rent seeking. And, if you can't monetize the patent within 5 years then maybe the patent really isn't that important or you really don't know how to implement the thing in the patent. That suggests that maybe you shouldn't be granted the patent in the first place. Making patent terms short also has the upside that the big guys will want stricter revi…

[deleted]

Re: Vigilante engineer stops Waymo from patenting key lidar technology

#127

Post by still_grokking »

> In March, an examiner noted that a re-drawn diagram of Waymo's lidar firing circuit showed current passing along a wire between the circuit and the ground in two directions—something generally deemed impossible.

Oh! Someone took inspiration in real magic[1].

[1] http://www.catb.org/jargon/html/magic-story.html

Re: Vigilante engineer stops Waymo from patenting key lidar technology

#128

Post by anticensor »

lbriner wrote: post #77
adrianN wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maybe patents should come with a prototype.

Maybe your competitor finds out while you are trying to build the prototype, builds one more quickly and gets the patent before you!

This also fullfills the purpose as all parties are encouraged to innovate.

Re: Vigilante engineer stops Waymo from patenting key lidar technology

#129

Post by mustacheemperor »

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

Worth noting that both of those patents were re-examined and later rejected. Not excusing its larger flaws, but a system with throughput like the USPTO must make mistakes occasionally, and these were corrected.

Re: Vigilante engineer stops Waymo from patenting key lidar technology

#130

Post by true_religion »

sdenton4 wrote: post #120
true_religion wrote: post #117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is not a deservice. Its indicative of how poorly we view our own profession that everyone with other skills must be more than engineer, merely by applying them. A lawyer who becomes mayor is still a lawyer. A doctor who runs a phamacology company is still a doctor. And yes, and engineer who founds a company still retains the core skills and prestige of their hardwon profession. Or at least, I think they should.

Hardwon profession: Three weeks in a boot camp followed by two years on the bloody frontlines of the Framework Wars...

To be fair, when you become a doctor it is because your peers grant you the title, not merely due to your GPA.

Outside the US, engineering is the same. Within the US, there is no formal board for software engineerig but we can at least informally say one is an engineer if other engineers would recognize them as such. I know people whom graduated bootcamps and could qualify as engineers, albiet inexperienced ones, and those who have finished 4 years of schooling but cannot practice engineering.

The guy in the article was inducted into the Academy of Science and Engineering at 34. Whether that makes him pretigious or not isn't the question, but there is no doubt in my mind that he is an engineer.

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