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Famous judge spikes Apple-Google case, calls patent system “dysfunctional”

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Re: Famous judge spikes Apple-Google case, calls patent system “dysfunctional”

#101

Post by chives »

yesyes wrote: post #74
grellas wrote: post #68

Judge Posner is indeed a brilliant and highly-respected jurist and his views on our problematic patent system will undoubtedly resonate and help the cause of reform. In his courtroom role as such, though, he can have only limited impact on the broader patent debate. The judge entered a tentative ruling saying that he was inclined to dismiss the entire case on the merits with prejudice (meaning, to kill all the claims…

"OK, kids, time to stop squabbling in the sandbox and go home." The problem is that these kids have weekly allowances in the hundreds of thousands. And most lawyers do not discriminate among potential clients by maturity level, they discriminate by net worth. They are happy to become instruments of a sandbox squabble, for a price. The kids don't do the squabbling. They pay lawyers to do it for them.

"OK, kids, time to stop squabbling in the sandbox and go home."

I could say the same for our judicial system up until now. Slam them all day if you'd like (referring to the judge), but all the patent troll rulings up to this point has precipitated this state of affairs.

Re: Famous judge spikes Apple-Google case, calls patent system “dysfunctional”

#102

Post by yesyes »

chives wrote: post #101
yesyes wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"OK, kids, time to stop squabbling in the sandbox and go home." The problem is that these kids have weekly allowances in the hundreds of thousands. And most lawyers do not discriminate among potential clients by maturity level, they discriminate by net worth. They are happy to become instruments of a sandbox squabble, for a price. The kids don't do the squabbling. They pay lawyers to do it for them.

"OK, kids, time to stop squabbling in the sandbox and go home." I could say the same for our judicial system up until now. Slam them all day if you'd like (referring to the judge), but all the patent troll rulings up to this point has precipitated this state of affairs.

Yes. All lot of judges are complicit in patent trolling. They are not like Posner. The Eastern District of Texas is one example. Patent trolls have to shop around for venues because not all judges are going to welcome these type of suits. You could say Posner might not be well versed in patent law, but to see what these companies are doing does not require such knowledge. These are needless lawsuits that are used as a means of (i.e. a substitute for) negotiation. This comes from the lack the maturity to negotiate like professionals. And the lack of professionalism to use the patent system as a means of protecting a developing or existing business and not as a means extortion^W"capital allocation".

Re: Famous judge spikes Apple-Google case, calls patent system “dysfunctional”

#103

Post by molmalo »

nathantotten wrote: post #88
te_chris wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

By the rich for the rich then? Sounds about right. Seriously though, you want 3 privileged, white men to decide the fate of your entire country? I'm all for smart people coming up with solutions, and I know your comment wasn't mean't to be taken too seriously, but this is just ridiculous. Technocracy is not the answer, no matter how much technologists would love it to be.

The founding fathers were all privileged white men.

And then you had almost a century of slavery...

I think that he has a point in saying that if you have an heterogeneous society, it's not wise to put all the power in an homogeneous group.

Re: Famous judge spikes Apple-Google case, calls patent system “dysfunctional”

#104

Post by lmarinho »

Sniffnoy wrote: post #45
lmarinho wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'd also refer to Hilbert's Axioms[1], which are the basis for the modern treatment of Euclidean Geometry. [1] http://www.gutenberg.org/files/17384/17384-pdf.pdf

No, the basis for the modern treatment of Euclidean geometry is the explicit construction of the plane as R ^2. Axiomatization is reserved for things like set theory and elementary number theory. Although Hilbert's axioms aren't exactly even a proper axiomatization anyway, seeing as it's a second-order axiomatization, and thus requires some ambient set theory. But if you've got set theory, you may as well construct i…

Good point, my statement was poorly formulated. While I agree that analytic geometry and other developments in the field could be more fundamental, Hilbert's formalization can still be useful to express more precisely what one means by "points" and "lines", being, I think, applicable to the current discussion.

Re: Famous judge spikes Apple-Google case, calls patent system “dysfunctional”

#105

Post by Porter_423 »

I think you’re mis-interpreting his blogpost based on your own biases. The “dysfunctional patent system” is probably a comment on the organizational problems of the USPTO (i.e. it being understaffed and overloaded) rather than any inherent flaws in the patent system itself (e.g. what many think of the on-going patent lawsuit war). From what I’ve seen, judges and jurists tend to accept that the patent system is practically sound, and any complaints they make about it tend to be about the bureaucracy and inefficiencies of the USPTO. Especially since this judge is a very strong supporter of capitalism (in the linked blog itself), I’d guess that he’s also a strong supporter of intellectual property rights.

Re: Famous judge spikes Apple-Google case, calls patent system “dysfunctional”

#106

Post by joshuahedlund »

arjunnarayan wrote: post #5

This opinion is both extraordinary and extremely significant. Richard Posner is probably the most prolific legal intellectual not on the supreme court. He co-writes, along with Gary Becker (Nobel Prize winner in Economics) this excellent blog http://www.becker-posner-blog.com/ Posner is the author of the 4th most cited Law Review article in the field of intellectual property law[1]. Most telling of all is this statis…

Why is Posner NOT on the Supreme Court?

Re: Famous judge spikes Apple-Google case, calls patent system “dysfunctional”

#107

Post by derleth »

te_chris wrote: post #96
reader5000 wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't believe a racial attack is in any way an appropriate response to portman's comment.

That wasn't a racial attack, it was pointing out that the 3 people who he proposed to "fix" everything were among the most privileged people on the planet (in part due to the colour of their skin). This was done to try and make the point that, given past history, another round of letting the most privileged people on the planet come up with "solutions", probably won't get us very far.

> That wasn't a racial attack

You explicitly mentioned race. It's racist.

Re: Famous judge spikes Apple-Google case, calls patent system “dysfunctional”

#108

Post by wpietri »

derleth wrote: post #107
te_chris wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That wasn't a racial attack, it was pointing out that the 3 people who he proposed to "fix" everything were among the most privileged people on the planet (in part due to the colour of their skin). This was done to try and make the point that, given past history, another round of letting the most privileged people on the planet come up with "solutions", probably won't get us very far.

> That wasn't a racial attack You explicitly mentioned race. It's racist.

I see. And if I point out that the KKK is all white dudes, then I'm also being racist? What a meanie I am!

Pointing out the unbalanced composition of a group meant to solve society's problems is not in any way racist. It's a specific application of the general rule that humans have hard time understanding the experiences of people different than themselves, especially when there's privilege involved.

Re: Famous judge spikes Apple-Google case, calls patent system “dysfunctional”

#109

Post by reader5000 »

molmalo wrote: post #103
nathantotten wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The founding fathers were all privileged white men.

And then you had almost a century of slavery... I think that he has a point in saying that if you have an heterogeneous society, it's not wise to put all the power in an homogeneous group.

Yeah dude white people are all the same.

Re: Famous judge spikes Apple-Google case, calls patent system “dysfunctional”

#110

Post by hyperbovine »

joshuahedlund wrote: post #106
arjunnarayan wrote: post #5

This opinion is both extraordinary and extremely significant. Richard Posner is probably the most prolific legal intellectual not on the supreme court. He co-writes, along with Gary Becker (Nobel Prize winner in Economics) this excellent blog http://www.becker-posner-blog.com/ Posner is the author of the 4th most cited Law Review article in the field of intellectual property law[1]. Most telling of all is this statis…

Why is Posner NOT on the Supreme Court?

He's too opinionated. I'm serious. Ever since Bork, the trend has been towards finding nominees who have left the smallest possible paper trail of potentially damning legal opinions. And so you're left with the farcical confirmation hearings of e.g. Elena Kagan. The majority of sitting justices are/were not brilliant jurists or legal scholars for this very reason.
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