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Cloudflare defeats patent troll Sable at trial

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Re: Cloudflare defeats patent troll Sable at trial

#111

Post by akersten »

Solvency wrote: post #97
s_dev wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Software is just fancy math being executed. Math can't or at least shouldn't be patentable e.g. imagine the absurdity that would ensue if you could patent a number not that that hasn't happened (HD DVD encryption). I'm aware every piece of IP or Copyright can be represented with a really big number (a mp4 file is really just a big number) but it's not the number that's the patentable aspect.

Hardware is just fancy physics. Medicine is just fancy chemistry.

Math, however, is uniquely identified in the law as non-patentable.

Re: Cloudflare defeats patent troll Sable at trial

#112

Post by KMnO4 »

robertlagrant wrote: post #92
thelastgallon wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Patents are property and we need taxes/fee on it. $500/year per patent, will ensure use it (if you think it is valuable) or lose it. This is no different from domain names, most people pay $10 - $100/year just to keep a domain name. Some domain names are used, most aren't. These taxes can fund free education or healthcare or defense.

> These taxes can fund free education or healthcare or defense Why only those things?

Appeal to emotion. Taxes go towards all publicly funded projects, but it’s easier to convince people that a new tax is a good thing when it goes towards these things that benefit everyone.

Re: Cloudflare defeats patent troll Sable at trial

#113

Post by phpisthebest »

thelastgallon wrote: post #79
duped wrote: post #31

There needs to be a "use it or lose it" doctrine/law around technological IP. I get all the arguments around creating a market for the patent rights, but it just leads to these bottom feeders creating no value and increasing costs for the industry and consumers.

Patents are property and we need taxes/fee on it. $500/year per patent, will ensure use it (if you think it is valuable) or lose it. This is no different from domain names, most people pay $10 - $100/year just to keep a domain name. Some domain names are used, most aren't. These taxes can fund free education or healthcare or defense.

>>These taxes can fund free education or healthcare or defense.

is it is always a bad idea to ear mark a tax for a specific purpose. Especially if you desire to use the tax as a punitive measure to reduce that which you deem bad for society, if it works now you need to come up with the money for the thing you funded elsewhere because all government programs are permanent

Look at smoking, all kind of things were funded on the back of smoking taxes, and when those punitive taxes worked to reduce smoking the revenue dried up but the budgets for for those programs did not so now the money had to come from somewhere else....

Using the tax code to punish or reward behavior is always bad

Re: Cloudflare defeats patent troll Sable at trial

#114

Post by brlewis »

rockbruno wrote: post #33
anonzzzies wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If we take the position that an inventor But most software patents aren't inventions; they're just brain farts with money behind them. They might not be trolls, but they went to the toilet, had some random idea I had 20000 times in my life already, but they patent it genuinely thinking it's anything original. There are many none trolls, like the famous Amazon one-click buy one; everyone in web dev invented that in…

>had some random idea I had 20000 times in my life already, Aren't patent systems already supposed to reject "inventions" that are common sense? Perhaps the problem is not the system itself but rather the humans who are approving these.

It is not reasonable to expect humans to assess the novelty or obviousness of software "inventions". Too many of them can be created too fast for any conceivable patent office to handle. The only solution is for Congress to write a law saying algorithms can't be patented. SCOTUS tentatively said it already, but nobody listens to them.

Re: Cloudflare defeats patent troll Sable at trial

#115

Post by yread »

hsuduebc2 wrote: post #39
fuhrtf wrote: post #34

Cloudflare is like Google early days. They could spend resources on things for the good of the all. In this case they’re spending millions when they could have settled for much cheaper. Thanks Cloudflare.

Hope they wouldn't end like google. But you are right. Thank you Cloudflare.

CloudFlare will be much scarier than Google as a villain

Re: Cloudflare defeats patent troll Sable at trial

#116

Post by adverbly »

thelastgallon wrote: post #79
duped wrote: post #31

There needs to be a "use it or lose it" doctrine/law around technological IP. I get all the arguments around creating a market for the patent rights, but it just leads to these bottom feeders creating no value and increasing costs for the industry and consumers.

Patents are property and we need taxes/fee on it. $500/year per patent, will ensure use it (if you think it is valuable) or lose it. This is no different from domain names, most people pay $10 - $100/year just to keep a domain name. Some domain names are used, most aren't. These taxes can fund free education or healthcare or defense.

This is an interesting point of view. Reminds me in some sense of some of the ethical justifications behind land value tax or property taxes.

The intention of legally enforced ownership is primarily to encourage development - and not to incentivize speculation as we seem to be doing in many situations. It seems reasonable to tax such speculation.

I'm inclined to agree with you.

Re: Cloudflare defeats patent troll Sable at trial

#117

Post by bashinator »

coldpie wrote: post #96
adabyron wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Newegg was famous for doing this as well. Glad to see Cloudflare keeping the "Don't be evil" concept alive.

Newegg's fall was so sad to see. From an top-notch seller of tech with an admirable legal team that made headlines, to yet another no-name online flea market.

So true. Thank goodness for Microcenter and B&H. Especially the latter still has a hand-curated product selection.

Re: Cloudflare defeats patent troll Sable at trial

#118

Post by nordsieck »

freejazz wrote: post #103
nordsieck wrote: post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> $500/year per patent, will ensure use it (if you think it is valuable) or lose it. Not really. Some patents are fantastically valuable to patent trolls. Some are not. A $500/year fee isn't going to deter a "company" of lawyers who are making millions soaking businesses with patents that should never have been granted. If you want a scheme that actually does what you want, you'd need something like: The owner of the…

>making millions soaking businesses with patents that should never have been granted. Invalidity arguments and IPRs suddenly aren't things?

> Invalidity arguments and IPRs suddenly aren't things?

I'm sure that you're aware that when you go to court, the result is never certain. Bad ruling happen all the time.

Re: Cloudflare defeats patent troll Sable at trial

#119

Post by shagie »

brlewis wrote: post #108
shagie wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Board game rules fall under patents. It has an example of the garage process, patent, infringement, and win. https://www.insurancejournal.com/news/west/2012/11/26/271633... > A company headed by a Colorado professor who invented a strategy board game has won a $1.6 million patent infringement verdict. > ... > Innovention prevailed in a patent infringement against MGA, Wal-Mart Stores and Toys R Us. A federal court in…

> Board game rules fall under patents Please supply evidence. All links in your comment relate to a patent to an invention where lasers are an essential part of the claims. I'm not convinced that rules alone would be patentable subject matter.

https://www.upcounsel.com/board-game-patents

https://patentpc.com/blog/example-of-how-a-board-game-is-pat...

https://boardgamegeek.com/thread/493249/mythbusting-game-des...

https://www.theiplawblog.com/2019/04/articles/intellectual-p...

http://www.gamecabinet.com/info/PatentSearch.html

https://boardgamegeek.com/filepage/93654/blue-and-gray-paten... (Blue and Gray) - this particular one is well known because Sid Sackson went trawling through patents and found it and wrote about it. From https://archive.org/details/gamutofgames0000sack/page/9/mode...

> THE FILES OF PATENTS that have been granted are a fruitful hunting ground for forgotten games, although going through these files, as anyone who has ever been involved in a patent search well knows, is a time consuming job. Often the patented games are downright silly, such as a set of dominos made of rubber so that they can double as ink erasers (No. 729,489) or a sliding block puzzle with edible pieces so that a player who despairs of a solution can find consolation in gratifying his stomach (No. 1,274,294). Often the patents are repetitious: There are over a hundred variations of the well-known checkerboard and over a thousand different baseball games.

> But often the patented games are a fascinating reflection of their time: races to the North Pole, war games to capture the Kaiser, automobile games, in the infancy of the automobile, and radio games for the crystal-set fanatic.

https://patents.google.com/patent/US2026082A/en (Monopoly)

https://patents.google.com/patent/US5662332A/en (Magic The Gathering)

https://patents.google.com/patent/US6352262B1/en (Icehouse)

Re: Cloudflare defeats patent troll Sable at trial

#120

Post by thomastjeffery »

rakoo wrote: post #22
djbusby wrote: post #7

Lots of patent hate in the first few comments. If we take the position that an inventor should be able to try and get profit from their invention how can we protect that without patent system?

> If we take the position that an inventor should be able to try and get profit from their invention The premise is flawed, the conclusion can only be wrong. Patents are an invention by the bourgeoisie to extend their control of the production of anything and extract as much money from it, but to make it acceptable they have the play the image of the "lone inventor in their garage". This inventor doesn't exist. No in…

To continue your point, here is my proposal to replace intellectual property: Pay the inventor for their work, not the result of that work.

This has several advantages:

1. Inventors get paid to fail. Failure is a critical step in the process of invention.

2. Inventors get paid immediately. How can an inventor be expected to have time to invent something if their only means of income happens after the work of invention? Any person who is working should earn a living.

3. An inventor can quit. If you aren't getting anywhere on a project, then you can go do something else!

4. Another inventor can pick up where they left off. Fresh eyes bring new perspective.

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