> Smart people invent things. Then they get to protect the intellectual property on what they invents.
Then all previous knowledges we get from ancestors should be protected. The dead also deserve a share.
Court: Google infringed patents, must pay 1.36 percent of AdWords revenue
121–130 of 193 posts
Re: Court: Google infringed patents, must pay 1.36 percent of AdWords revenue
#122Earlier quoted context omitted.
Oh come now. Patent trolls are a massive nuisance, but they don't represent an existential threat to this country - let alone all of human civilization.
Lol, it's probably hyperbole. But think about it - what exactly does American produce these days? Yes, they still have a heavy manufacturing base - but that's declining and fast. If you stifle innovation, you've basically shot yourself in the foot.
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Re: Court: Google infringed patents, must pay 1.36 percent of AdWords revenue
#123Wow! As a patent agent, those patents are pure MONEY patents, incredibly broad, especially to have been published in 2001 (but with a priority date of 1996) Here is the money claim: A search engine system comprising: a first system for receiving informons from a network on a continuing search basis, for filtering such informons for relevancy to a query from an individual user, and for storing a ranked list of relevan…
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Re: Court: Google infringed patents, must pay 1.36 percent of AdWords revenue
#124What does this mean for ad-supported startups? Does anyone have specifics on the patent issue here? I didn't get it from the news coverage.
I haven't read the patents yet. According to the original article and it's comments, looks like there are two aspects are infringed: auction model and user re-targeting model. It looks like the auction model based on the number of hits is pretty obvious now, but it was not quite obvious in 1999. The re-targeting model is definitely novel in 1999.
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Re: Court: Google infringed patents, must pay 1.36 percent of AdWords revenue
#125google got shafted...or was it the other way around...? Good day!
Re: Court: Google infringed patents, must pay 1.36 percent of AdWords revenue
#126Yeah, just get rid of patents. They serve no purpose any more today.
Re: Court: Google infringed patents, must pay 1.36 percent of AdWords revenue
#127What's also terrible about the patent system is there is simply no way for any of us to tell, when we develop something, if we're infringing on patents or not. We're all subject, at any time, to being subject to some massive infringement lawsuit. What I do not understand is why the big companies do not all get together and lobby to abolish software patents. Do they think that if they acquire enough patents, they will…
As a programmer, this is exactly what I fear. It is also why I will not create a startup company, and have my dream crash because of a failed and corrupt system.
Assuming this goes through with no successful appeal Google will have to pay 1.36% of their revenue related to a particular infringing product to Vringo for a period for which they were well aware of this patent until it expires in 2016. This example gives nothing to indicate that any business you start will be crippled by patent issues.
Now legal costs and/or Lodsys like trolls might be a real threat to a fledgling business but they seem to have gone quite quiet for the moment.
Re: Court: Google infringed patents, must pay 1.36 percent of AdWords revenue
#128> Even though there was no evidence of copying—Vringo admitted as much What a ridiculous system we all operate under. You come up with a mathematical formula for ranking some text on a page (in this case, what ads to show first), and you could now owe $250M/year to some company you've never heard of because they already bought the rights to that formula. It turns my stomach; sorry that I have nothing of more substanc…
The lack of an independent invention defense (or some variation of this) is pretty much 80% of what's wrong with patent law in my opinion. A sampling of the issues an independent invention addresses: * Obviousness. Patents are required to be non-obvious to a "person holding ordinary skill in the art", but obviousness is highly subjective and difficult to assess (especially for a non-technical jury). In contrast, eval…
This is the core problem. The probability of two independent "inventors" (i.e., software engineers) discovering a similar solution is very high.
Before software engineering, the probability of this happening may very well have been low enough to where nobody cared.
But if you're writing code, you are relying on and creating thousands of "inventions" a day. To "claim" one of those inventions so that nobody else can use it is absurd.
The law just doesn't get that yet, which is weird, because big tech companies have been getting burned by it for decades now. I guess they just figure the benefits>costs for them, and when peons get screwed, who cares?
Re: Court: Google infringed patents, must pay 1.36 percent of AdWords revenue
#129Earlier quoted context omitted.
As a programmer, this is exactly what I fear. It is also why I will not create a startup company, and have my dream crash because of a failed and corrupt system.
Assuming this goes through with no successful appeal Google will have to pay 1.36% of their revenue related to a particular infringing product to Vringo for a period for which they were well aware of this patent until it expires in 2016. This example gives nothing to indicate that any business you start will be crippled by patent issues. Now legal costs and/or Lodsys like trolls might be a real threat to a fledgling…
Good point.
It's no indication, but it would generate fear and doubt when I code. What if the code I'm writing right now is patented by some company taking advantage of a system, with resources searching everywhere just to sue? I probably wouldn't, but I could become paranoiac because of this, looking on the internet to find if I am infringing patents, instead of being productive.
It's true 1.36% seems like nothing, but for a small company, it could mean a lot. Plus, it would be heart-breaking (or even outraging) to know that a program I made on my own, with no knowledge about some software patent, nor ill intention, gives money to someone that has nothing to do with it.
And, as you mention, legal costs, time wasted and stress could easily be real threats to a startup.
Re: Court: Google infringed patents, must pay 1.36 percent of AdWords revenue
#130Earlier quoted context omitted.
The lack of an independent invention defense (or some variation of this) is pretty much 80% of what's wrong with patent law in my opinion. A sampling of the issues an independent invention addresses: * Obviousness. Patents are required to be non-obvious to a "person holding ordinary skill in the art", but obviousness is highly subjective and difficult to assess (especially for a non-technical jury). In contrast, eval…
Cigarette companies don't get those kind of super-sized judgements against them, gun manufacturers don't. Why the hell should Google? My favourite part is just how good the Microsoft lawyers are - "we will pay 5% of whatever Google pays" is an incredibly good deal and shafts Google quite nicely at the same time. And anyway, isn't this really obvious - to anyone? I have scanned the patents referenced and frankly I don…
Gun manufacturers/dealers are protected from civil liability by unconstitutional legislation.