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Senate Vote Tomorrow Could Give Helping Hand to Patent Trolls

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Re: Senate Vote Tomorrow Could Give Helping Hand to Patent Trolls

#21

Post by AlbertCory »

alwa wrote: post #2

I know absolutely nothing about this act, but I was put off by the EFF’s tone of righteousness here. As a rule of thumb I worry when I hear something described in absolute or moralistic terms: rarely do complicated things happen just out of pure villainy. For slightly more detailed perspective into what proponents might be thinking, CSIS suggests that the status quo effectively allows large companies with armies of l…

I gave some up above.

The EFF is indeed self-righteous. That doesn't mean they're wrong.

Re: Senate Vote Tomorrow Could Give Helping Hand to Patent Trolls

#22

Post by AlbertCory »

CuriousCosmic wrote: post #8
DidYaWipe wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"PERA would remove a threshold challenge to patent validity" Whatever that means...

The threshold they are referring to is the Alice/Mayo test. https://crsreports.congress.gov/product/pdf/IF/IF12563 > The Supreme Court decisions referenced above established what has come to be known as the two-step Alice/Mayo test for patentable subject matter. The first step of the Alice/Mayo test addresses whether the patent claims are “directed to” an ineligible concept (i.e., a law of nature, a natural phenomeno…

I don't think you can really expect non-lawyers to understand that.

"Why is it being pushed?" and "who are the backers and the opponents?" would be better questions to ask. "What will be the practical consequences for software-intensive companies?" is another.

If software were not patentable (as it was not before 1982) then we probably wouldn't be having this discussion.

Re: Senate Vote Tomorrow Could Give Helping Hand to Patent Trolls

#23

Post by rayiner »

alwa wrote: post #2

I know absolutely nothing about this act, but I was put off by the EFF’s tone of righteousness here. As a rule of thumb I worry when I hear something described in absolute or moralistic terms: rarely do complicated things happen just out of pure villainy. For slightly more detailed perspective into what proponents might be thinking, CSIS suggests that the status quo effectively allows large companies with armies of l…

To be clear, Fed Soc itself doesn’t take policy positions. (And it’s not clear to me what the “conservative” position on patent issues would be. Traditionally, plaintiff’s lawyers are liberals.)

Re: Senate Vote Tomorrow Could Give Helping Hand to Patent Trolls

#24

Post by AlbertCory »

zonethundery wrote: post #20
dctoedt wrote: post #16

Inactive patent lawyer here (these days my practice is in other areas). 1. This bill doesn't appear to address Alice/Mayo unpatentability under 35 USC § 101. https://www.congress.gov/bill/118th-congress/senate-bill/222... 2. My concern is that this bill seems to inappropriately raise the evidentiary bar for a patent challenger to prove invalidity in an inter partes review in the USPTO: - Existing law, at 35 USC § 316…

1- It's PERA that changes the alice/mayo test. PREVAIL is the old STRONGER Patents act that is introduced every Congress. 2- Yeah, the one 'reasonable' complaint of IPR critics is the different evidentiary bar for litigation vs IPR. IANAL but it's difficult to find a member of the patent bar outside of pharma/npe's that supports either bill.

> the patent bar outside of pharma/npe's

that's it exactly. Pharma really should have its own patent regime, or at least, software & pharma should not have the same one.

Re: Senate Vote Tomorrow Could Give Helping Hand to Patent Trolls

#25

Post by AlbertCory »

rayiner wrote: post #23
alwa wrote: post #2

I know absolutely nothing about this act, but I was put off by the EFF’s tone of righteousness here. As a rule of thumb I worry when I hear something described in absolute or moralistic terms: rarely do complicated things happen just out of pure villainy. For slightly more detailed perspective into what proponents might be thinking, CSIS suggests that the status quo effectively allows large companies with armies of l…

To be clear, Fed Soc itself doesn’t take policy positions. (And it’s not clear to me what the “conservative” position on patent issues would be. Traditionally, plaintiff’s lawyers are liberals.)

"traditional" patents (mechanical, chemical, electrical, biological) should be separated from software.

The former have some claim to validity under the law, sometimes. The latter: almost never. That's at the root of the problem.

Re: Senate Vote Tomorrow Could Give Helping Hand to Patent Trolls

#26

Post by derf_ »

dctoedt wrote: post #16

Inactive patent lawyer here (these days my practice is in other areas). 1. This bill doesn't appear to address Alice/Mayo unpatentability under 35 USC § 101. https://www.congress.gov/bill/118th-congress/senate-bill/222... 2. My concern is that this bill seems to inappropriately raise the evidentiary bar for a patent challenger to prove invalidity in an inter partes review in the USPTO: - Existing law, at 35 USC § 316…

> (As I understand it, every reputable Ph.D.-granting institution requires the candidate to do a literature search to demonstrate novelty.)

It is also worse than that, because for most dissertations, your committee is generally going to be more widely-read than the candidate, and have discussed the topic with them for years. Although the candidate may have more specific knowledge by the time they are finished writing the dissertation, the committee is going to have much broader knowledge of the field in general, and is pretty likely to be aware of the relevant prior art anyway.

A closer analogy would be saying the Ph.D candidate must be issued the degree unless a randomly chosen undergraduate can show the research wasn't sufficiently novel.

Re: Senate Vote Tomorrow Could Give Helping Hand to Patent Trolls

#27

Post by nceqs3 »

nitwit005 wrote: post #18
alwa wrote: post #2

I know absolutely nothing about this act, but I was put off by the EFF’s tone of righteousness here. As a rule of thumb I worry when I hear something described in absolute or moralistic terms: rarely do complicated things happen just out of pure villainy. For slightly more detailed perspective into what proponents might be thinking, CSIS suggests that the status quo effectively allows large companies with armies of l…

When large agricultural firms lobby congress, they always talk about the "small farmer". Similarly, with patent law, you have huge businesses talking about small firms or single inventors. Which is to say, they lie a lot. Take it with a gain of salt. Unfortunately they also frequently get non-profits to be their mouth pieces, which makes finding some sort of unbiased alternate viewpoint difficult. As a practical matt…

>Unfortunately they also frequently get non-profits to be their mouth pieces

Important to note that the EFF is also a nonprofit, which is funded by big tech.

Re: Senate Vote Tomorrow Could Give Helping Hand to Patent Trolls

#28

Post by tptacek »

rayiner wrote: post #23
alwa wrote: post #2

I know absolutely nothing about this act, but I was put off by the EFF’s tone of righteousness here. As a rule of thumb I worry when I hear something described in absolute or moralistic terms: rarely do complicated things happen just out of pure villainy. For slightly more detailed perspective into what proponents might be thinking, CSIS suggests that the status quo effectively allows large companies with armies of l…

To be clear, Fed Soc itself doesn’t take policy positions. (And it’s not clear to me what the “conservative” position on patent issues would be. Traditionally, plaintiff’s lawyers are liberals.)

It seems plain from their site that they do. Did you mean to say, FedSoc doesn't have an IP law position?

Re: Senate Vote Tomorrow Could Give Helping Hand to Patent Trolls

#29

Post by doctorpangloss »

AlbertCory wrote: post #17

Former tech advisor to Google Patent Litigation here. The Ex Parte Reexamination is a fundamental tool for fighting against patent trolls: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reexamination They can also be used by big companies to steal IP from small inventors. However, this is not why the backers of this bill are trying to limit them. When a troll buys up a patent from the early 2000's, they hope to stretch its claims, wi…

Google’s patent strategy is to patent everything it sees and hears about. This is a good case of it: https://patentpandas.org/stories/company-patented-my-idea . As long as patent attorneys are on quotas at Google, they will be filing bullshit patents they didn’t invent all the same as the trolls.

Anything sincere about US patents must always be about how they should cost basically nothing to file correctly by inventors themselves. Otherwise it’s just rich people suing other rich people.

Especially software patents. If you are pro startup you are anti software patent. The status quo is a deadweight transfer from investors to patent attorneys.

The more you think and read about this, the more it will piss you off.

Re: Senate Vote Tomorrow Could Give Helping Hand to Patent Trolls

#30

Post by j-bos »

bluGill wrote: post #14
j-bos wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What happens if the genes escape ala Monsanto seeds on the wind?

Depends on details. Monsanto doesn't worry about seeds on the wind. The cases I've read have come down to the fact that they escaped to someone who was trying to take those genetics. The farmer planted next to a round-up ready field, and then saved seeds - this would have been fine except the farmer then used those seeds and sprayed round-up which ensured all the plants without the round-up ready genes died and his n…

Huh, hadn't read that context until now. Thanks
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