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Mistral Patent for “Code implemented tool calls”

patentsgazette.uspto.gov

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Re: Mistral Patent for “Code implemented tool calls”

#131

Post by Balooga »

david_draco wrote: post #42
Roark66 wrote: post #34

It is quite funny an EU company patenting a software feature that is basically unpatentable in EU in the US. Clearly this is an attempt to prevent similar patents from being weaponised against them in the US. No one cares about such stuff in Europe.

Unfortunately patent offices are using loopholes that reintroduce software patents. Patent law says that a pure software patent is not possible, it has to be combined with a specific hardware application to make it an invention. So they fill in a patent for "XX implemented on a hardware operating on land, in the air, in space, on, or under water.". That's essentially a software patent.

> operating on land, in the air, in space, on, or under water

Thunderbirds are Go!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D_mBUaPsX6o

Re: Mistral Patent for “Code implemented tool calls”

#132

Post by [deleted] »

_fizz_buzz_ wrote: post #118
ffsm8 wrote: post #108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think you didn't understand what I was trying to say. Fraunhofer didn't do licencing before joining up with Thomson. That's why - back in the 90s - there were no litigation anywhere even though everyone ignored their patents. Then Frauenhofer joined up with Thomson and that's where your understanding joins up with reality: now the Frauenhofer does licencing and sues anyone that's not paying them. My whole comment w…

I feel your argument is shifting. Also, it was Fraunhofer that was threatening developers at the end of the 90s not Thomson. Fraunhofer will very aggressively defend their patents/licenses.

[deleted]

Re: Mistral Patent for “Code implemented tool calls”

#133

Post by ffsm8 »

st_goliath wrote: post #128
ffsm8 wrote: post #108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think you didn't understand what I was trying to say. Fraunhofer didn't do licencing before joining up with Thomson. That's why - back in the 90s - there were no litigation anywhere even though everyone ignored their patents. Then Frauenhofer joined up with Thomson and that's where your understanding joins up with reality: now the Frauenhofer does licencing and sues anyone that's not paying them. My whole comment w…

> I think you didn't understand what I was trying to say. They don't do this sort of thing... oh wait, they do. But we are still wrong to judge their character by their own actions , because... evil French people made them do it?

[flagged]

Re: Mistral Patent for “Code implemented tool calls”

#134

Post by derefr »

_fizz_buzz_ wrote: post #118
ffsm8 wrote: post #108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think you didn't understand what I was trying to say. Fraunhofer didn't do licencing before joining up with Thomson. That's why - back in the 90s - there were no litigation anywhere even though everyone ignored their patents. Then Frauenhofer joined up with Thomson and that's where your understanding joins up with reality: now the Frauenhofer does licencing and sues anyone that's not paying them. My whole comment w…

I feel your argument is shifting. Also, it was Fraunhofer that was threatening developers at the end of the 90s not Thomson. Fraunhofer will very aggressively defend their patents/licenses.

I think what GP is saying is that, upon Fraunhofer's licensing of their technologies to Thomson, Thomson demanded (perhaps contractually) that Fraunhofer defend their patents so that Thomson could actually "get something" for having licensed those patents.

This is pretty common when a company exclusively licenses a patent: they demand that the patent holder sue anyone using the tech who isn't them, so that they actually benefit in the market from the exclusivity. Without that enforcement, the money they were paying for exclusivity would be for nothing.

Thomson just made this kind of arrangement in the context of a non-exclusive license — getting Fraunhofer to start legally enforcing their patent rights at all, so that Thomson and whoever else licenses Fraunhofer's patents could benefit in the market from having licensed the patents, by ensuring that non-licensees aren't getting to use the patented tech for free.

In the US, such an arrangement is unnecessary (to the point that it might be causing a miscommunication in this conversation!), since patent holders tend to legally protect their patents all on their own, suing non-licensees for use of the patented tech even when there are no licensees demanding to "get the benefit they paid for." In Europe, patents aren't sued over by default, with enforcement instead only beginning when the patent is licensed and the licensee demands enforcement so that they can benefit.

Re: Mistral Patent for “Code implemented tool calls”

#139

Post by TZubiri »

If you are a software developer and you sell your time and IP for money to employers. I highly recommend not looking at patents if you don't want to reduce your market price by introducing the liability of patent infringement. Especially don't publicly comment about the patent, there's almost no upside.

The idea of patents is not to read a feed of the new ones and to discuss them as innovations, it's for the patent holders to use as proof in the future that they had already thought about a thing. The best strategy, in any case, is to publish your own patents, or to document your inventions privately or through your own public channels. Such that in the future IF you are sued for patent infringement, you can prove you didn't arrive at your IP by stealing theirs.

Obligatory: I Am Not A Lawyer

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