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Cloudflare defeats patent troll Sable at trial

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Re: Cloudflare defeats patent troll Sable at trial

#211

Post by petsfed »

victorbjorklund wrote: post #193
criddell wrote: post #125

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maybe when you file the patent, you have to submit an anticipated value statement and you are taxed some % / year on that anticipated value. If somebody violates the patent, you can sue them for up to the amount you anticipated, but not more. In the future you can amend the value claim, but you can only adjust it down.

So someone inventing something for say mobile phones in the 80s that is still used would have estimated their patentent to not be so useful because the number of mobile phones wasnt that high. And if Apple violated their patent they would just pay pennies because of that? It is extremly hard to estimate the worth of a tech 30 years into the future invented today. Take a tech invented today and tell me what the market…

If you invented and patented something in the US in 1989, you'd have protections until 2009 at the latest. If it wasn't usable until 2013, then that sucks for you, but it is what it is. Your invention doesn't get 20 guaranteed years of profitability. You get 20 years to figure out how to make it profitable.

The two are very different concepts.

edit: this is why you don't patent every damned thing, just the things that you believe will be profitable over the next 20 years. Otherwise, the cost of researching and filing the patent, as well as maintaining it, may well exceed whatever profit you actually get from the thing.

Re: Cloudflare defeats patent troll Sable at trial

#212

Post by tracerbulletx »

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.

I think a better model would just be something like adverse possession, where if the owner of the patent hasn't developed it, or done certain things it can be nullified.

Re: Cloudflare defeats patent troll Sable at trial

#213

Post by baobabKoodaa »

AlbertCory wrote: post #107

this is an excellent summary of how the system works. Every month HN has a thread like this, and every month the usual suspects rant about how patents are fucked up, and there needs to be this, that, or the other. And nothing changes. Ask your local candidates for Congress if they'll support removing patentability for software. That's how you solve this problem.

> Ask your local candidates for Congress if they'll support removing patentability for software. That's how you solve this problem.

That's not how any of this works. You don't think some people have already "asked their local candidates for Congress" about this? Surely you have personally done that? If you have, then how come the problem still exists? Clearly your action of "asking your local candidate for Congress" did not solve the problem...

Re: Cloudflare defeats patent troll Sable at trial

#214

Post by awesomeMilou »

mike_d wrote: post #136
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…

> The owner of the patent chooses the fee that they pay per year. And anyone can pay that fee * the remaining years on the patent * some multiplier (probably in the 2-10 range) to prematurely end the patent. So basically ending patents? If you invent something fantastic, say a way for a self driving car to perfectly sense its surroundings, Ford could just come in and pay whatever amount to invalidate your patent and…

> If you invent something fantastic, say a way for a self driving car to perfectly sense its surroundings

That sounds like a highly constructed example, and even if we take it for bare value, makes a lot of assumptions, for example that whatever you invent is patentable.

The way you phrase it also makes it sound like patents are all about individual contributions, when in reality the era of lone genius inventors is long over (if they ever existed). In the US, it's practice for your funding institution to keep all the rights to your inventions, so if you invented the perfect sense for self driving, it's highly likely that a company like Ford already has the patent, because they quite literally own your intellectual output.

Imo, I feel the same way like OP, there needs to be a use it or loose it doctrine, just like there is with trademarks. Overall the legislation around intellectual property and copyright feels to be in favor of big corps at the moment and should be heavily castrated.

Re: Cloudflare defeats patent troll Sable at trial

#215

Post by froggertoaster »

yashap wrote: post #175

Nice to see Cloudflare fighting the good fight, but patent trolls aren’t the only issue with software patents. A major issue that people talk about way less is well funded/large companies getting bullshit patents, and using them to sue their small startup competitors into the ground. It doesn’t even matter if they win - when a company with billions in the bank sues a company with millions in the bank, the small compa…

> A major issue that people talk about way less is well funded/large companies getting bullshit patents, and using them to sue their small startup competitors into the ground.

Do you have any examples?

Re: Cloudflare defeats patent troll Sable at trial

#216

Post by awesomeMilou »

spaceguillotine wrote: post #165
aftbit wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You either die a hero or you live long enough to become a villain.

[flagged]

> it took a mass shooting to get them to stop protecting 8Chan

While I agree with moving against bad actors on the internet, it's not CloudFlares role to play the censor. Let's be real, legislators and law enforcement already have the tools available to move against these type of platforms and pushing corporations into censorship gives me the same kind of vibes like when politicians ask for ever increasing (and useless) surveillance and empowerment in law enforcement capabilities.

Re: Cloudflare defeats patent troll Sable at trial

#217

Post by declaredapple »

dosethree wrote: post #47
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.

just abolish the patent system entirely. at minimum, for software

I'm on board with this. It shouldn't exist for software, I'd be happy to see it go for hardware too.

I'd be more on-board with the idea if non-software patents only had say a 5 year lifespan

Re: Cloudflare defeats patent troll Sable at trial

#218

Post by declaredapple »

ummonk wrote: post #202
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.

So if I invent something but don’t have the capital to manufacture it myself, I shouldn’t be able to make money from licensing it to companies?

> but don’t have the capital to manufacture it myself

You're looking at 10k to file it, and then all it gives you is the ability to sue. If [insert company] violates it, you could easily be looking at 100k+ for litigation that you may or may not win.

> So if I invent something

My problem is you don't need to "invent" anything. You just need to be the first to file the paperwork (and have the cash to do so).

"[sensor] on [smartwatch, glasses, goggles, belts, chairs, whatever]" and now nobody else can do it for 20 years. Even if it's blatantly obvious that an chair can sense if you're sitting in it to turn on the tv automatically.

Re: Cloudflare defeats patent troll Sable at trial

#219

Post by sophacles »

anonymouskimmer wrote: post #141
spongebobstoes wrote: post #130

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can you provide some recent examples of where patents likely played a positive role in innovation?

Fifty years ago they paid for Xerox's PARC where WYSIWYG and GUI interfaces were first developed targeting a mass audience.

Right, I was so glad when those patents expired because the Xerox monopoly on my computer usage was annoying.

Re: Cloudflare defeats patent troll Sable at trial

#220

Post by IG_Semmelweiss »

cynix wrote: post #176
IG_Semmelweiss wrote: post #147

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Domain names pay per year because there's an ongoing service attached. There's no such thing for patent (besides fee to file) Why punish patent holders because of patent trolls or garbage patents ? Make it unprofitable to be a troll, and they will go away. Trolls need to be tagged , like pirates. There should be rules to make hunting for trolls profitable. For that, you need a "bounty". Here's my take: In any patent…

> loser must disclose the ultimate name of the beneficial owners (or material, if public) of the loser. EINs not allowed. The "trolls" are thus, branded. So TrollCo will just pay a different homeless person $100 to be the owner on paper for each of their patents?

Sure. Let them deal with getting the homeless persons to sign up. Open a bank account, pay taxes, get credit cards, run payroll, process permits, etc.

I don't think you fully appreciate how tough is to run a business with someone's name on top of every document. Not to say its not possible for a determined actor, but its going to eliminate a lot of options from the get go.

Then, let a judge find out!

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