Not much if any experience with patents - nor with VC, for that - but on the few occasions I have talked to such the question has been asked of sheer adherence to "the standard". I would guess that the whole patent system is designed simply to protect the big ones, if small guys are left to get some crumbs every now and then it is only for the sake of the systems credibility/public acceptance.
My way is for things I have done and believe are worth something I just keep them non-public. If someone is smart enough to overtake me by seeing what I have done then he deserves to do that, this is what life/evolution has been all about, for as long as we can look back anyway.
Actually, human cultural evolution has been about wide-spread sharing of tools and techniques since the earliest days. "Intellectual property" is a very modern notion.
And even in the modern era, those places and times we associate with the greatest variety of invention (Scotland during the era of Watt, et al, Southern Germany in the late 18th century, Central England at the height of the steam age) were marked by almost no patent protection, or patent laws that were tacitly ignored.
This is a complex subject, and the law tends to be the bluntest of instruments.
snipped-for-privacy@ieee.org (Eric Jacobsen) wrote in news:4eac16c9.325269432 @www.eternal-september.org:
Patents do not necessarily encourage innovation. I filed my only patent application when I was a junior in EE (about 30 years ago). I received it several years later.
I haven't filed another one since, even though I have had many ideas that I think would qualify. When I see an individual with many patents, I don't assume that the person is brilliant or creative, I just assume that he has worked for large companies.
I have owned small businesses for most of my career. I don't file patents because they are expensive to file and maintain and impossible for a small company to defend. Today we have bidding wars on bankrupt companies just so that the large companies can threaten each other and keep anyone smaller than Fortune 500 out of the game.
All a big company needs to do is threaten a small company, and they win. It will bankrupt most small companies if they fight even when they have a strong patent. Not all small companies want to be sold to larger entities.
I do look at patents from time to time and I am often amazed at how obvious many of them are. Many are rehashed prior art that I already know about (and I'm sure many others do as well). Patent examiners are rarely design engineers, most don't have any real idea if something is new or not. Software patents are even more absurd since most prior art exists as trade secrets embedded in code.
No one is required to license a patent. If I had a patented method that could cure cancer, I could let everyone die for the next 20 years or so if I didn't want to share.
One of the worst things about patents is that no one knows how silly a patent application is until in becomes a patent. This is why we have so many junk patents.
If Congress actually wanted to do something useful, they would make the expiration date for most patents about 5 years and speed up the actual review process. Twenty years is almost forever in technology.
I don't think that first to file is an advantage. I just means that we will see even more junk patent applications that haven't been thought out, just filed to make sure someone else isn't first.
Most of the ideas that I have had that I think were patentable came from trying to solve a new problem. Novel solutions can be easy when looking at a problem the first time. The catch is that several people may be looking at the same problem at essentially the same time. No one really remembers the second guy who discovers something (or the second guy who files). This gives the first guy more than a head start, it can be the game changer.
I have read many people say that the holder of the patent gets reasonable royalties from licensing. That assumes that they want to license. I will never understand the Polaroid/ Kodak case. Polaroid was basically granted a permanent patent by constantly tweaking their existing patent and not letting anyone else in the game. Digital cameras were the only way to kill the Polaroid monopoly.
I agree. The reform isn't really changing anything. They could make a patent support fee significant sum of money; say, $100k per year. That would invalidate many worseless patents; leaving only the important and actually working ones. Set a requirement that the original inventor could waive the fee if he makes profit from his patent within 3 years, either by making product or by licensing; otherwise the patent goes into public domain.
Alternatively, the fee could gradually increase with time. The first year would be a relatively cheap $10,000 - enough to avoid most time wasters, but cheap enough that a small company with a good idea can afford it. Jump to $100,000 for the next year, and increase geometrically each year after that. Patents that really are worthwhile, and generate substantial licensing fees, would be kept for longer. Most would be kept long enough to give the inventor a head-start over the competition, then released to the public domain.
It may make sense for the increase factor to depend on the field - it should be high (such as 2) for patents in fast-moving fields such as electronics, but lower (maybe 1.25) in slower fields such as medicine.
Of course, for many actively used patents, this system exists already - it's just that the steadily increasing fees are paid to lawyers and other legal fees, rather than to patent offices.
You can make the above statement, but that doesn't make it true. Patents provide a means for an inventor to profit from the invention with protection from the government. You can talk about the problems about patents, but that doesn't make them 100% bad. The problems are with the implementation and not the concept.
y
.
How is it a loss for the inventor? Yes, money flows from the licensees (the ones who feel the patent is worth paying for) and the inventor (the one who spent the time and effort to create the invention that others didn't or couldn't.
What would happen if there were no patents? Small companies would be limited to low cost manufacturing making virtually no profit while the large companies are able to reduce their cost of production and make much larger profits. The playing field will never be level, but patents help to even it out. Otherwise the small companies have only one choice, tiny niche applications that aren't worth the trouble of the big companies.
Since we have been all talking at length about patents and I for one (and probably many others) need to update my map as to actual costs in today's world.
Can anyone share what is really costs to patent something?
Initial filings? Assume that you don't have in house lawyers.
Maintenance costs?
Litigation (Not necessarily the really big cases like Apple vs Samsung)?
rickman wrote in news:581b0c05-090c-4cae-b846-ca2aad5b9d82 @n38g2000yqm.googlegroups.com:
Patent filings are not free. There are up front costs and maintenance.
If you own a useless patent, it probably isn't worth the up front costs. If you have a really good patent, you probably can't afford to protect it.
We would use trade secrets. This is precisely how software has been protected historically since most of the IP is hidden in object files.
Small companies would be
Small companies can be more agile
The playing field will never be level, but
How?
For example, Not so long ago, I reviewed a patent on a PGA/Attenuator circuit held by Hewlett Packard. It was incredibly obvious and certainly exists in many earlier designs. I think I knew this circuit approach 25 years ago.
That said, I don't dare use it. They could sue me into bankruptcy even if I could prevail in the courts.
If you are a DSP specialist, read Microsoft's partioned convolution patent. They list prior art and then seem to claim that they are patenting the same prior art.
There is a great discussion about this patent by Angelo Farina if you are interested.
Otherwise the small companies have only
This may be true. Its a good reason to have much shorter life cycles for patents.
snipped-for-privacy@ieee.org (Eric Jacobsen) wrote in news:4eaf1463.521263955 @www.eternal-september.org:
I think the VC argument is not very compelling. Less than 1 out of 2500 US businesses are funded by VCs. The average investment is in the millions of dollars.
Sure VCs want to see patents. They have deep enough pockets to go to war. They are also all about harvest in the 5-10 year period where the potential payback is huge for a few of their bets. I don't fault VCs. I just recognize that most companies (including companies with patentable ideas) are not actually funded by VCs.
Erik, lets say you have a good patent and some big company wants to challenge you. Do you have a few extra million dollars to sustain a fight? (If you do, give me a call) What if you don't want to be owned by the big company?
I bet that Samsung & Apple will end up spending a $100 million dollars before somebody gives up.
Apple makes some great products. Aren't we all glad Xerox didn't wipe them out when Apple commercialized most of the Parc Place ideas. I like my mouse.
Polaroid held a monopoly on their camera technology even though the original idea went back to the 1940s. I think this might have been due to the fact that if you have the basic patent rights completely tied up, there is absolutely no incentive for another entity to make further improvements on a technology they can't commercialize for 20 years. So Polaroid just kept making incremental improvements, that effectively monopolized the technology until a paradigm shift obsoleted the whole method (digital camera). (This is speculation on my part, someone can explain it if I am wrong)
Actually, I am not anti-patent. I just thing the game is completely rigged to favor the large companies at the expense of small innovative companies and individuals.
Real patent reform would make the filing process more transparent (like disclosures before some 20 something engineer grants the patent), had actual peer review, were written in English (or for a technical patent, engineering or science English as opposed to lawyer obfuscation), automatically expired in a reasonable market period like 5 years, and didn't take 3 years to grant.
Imagine if disclosure happened before a patent was granted. All someone might need to do is identify the same invention already exists as prior art. This would eliminate a huge number of the existing application and backlog. This would be especially true for software patents since many of these are "invisible" without close inspection.
There is a tremendous amount of prior art that exists that was never patented. A patent examiner might make an assumption that if they can't find prior art in the patent record, that somehow this means that an idea is new.
I don't fault the inventor. I am sure that many of us have reinvented things without intentionally stealing someone else's idea. Tukey & Cooley rediscovered the FFT in 1965, but Gauss invented it first in 1805. I don't think anyone thinks that Tukey & Cooley were stealing Gauss's invention. Fortunately, we didn't have software patents or the FFT and probably all its derivatives would have been held hostage for 20 years, or at least until the historians corrected the record.
What in business in not slanted to the large company? They get the big money makers and the rest of us get the crumbs or what we can snatch off their plate. Even mid size companies have to think about what they are doing if they want to produce a BIG product regardless of the patent issues. What would be the point of ramping up to design and build millions a year of something that a much larger competitor can produce for $5 less?
Is the reason why there are still just two big FPGA companies patents? No entirely, it is as much an issue of the enormous cost and time required to build such an infrastructure.
Patents are the mainstay of large high tech companies, but what about high tech isn't slanted to the big companies? I just think "completely slanted" is an overstatement. There are plenty of individuals and small companies who have benefited greatly from patents.
In the real world, for all intents and purposes, patents are NOT public, because
1) they are written by lawyers who are deliberately trying to communicate as little information as possible,
2) many employers "forbid engineers and software developers from reading patents as a matter of policy"
IEEE sponsored Town Hall meeting/lunch/workshop Nov. 5 - Patent Reform and YOU
Congress has recently enacted sweeping patent reform that is adverse to small inventors and entrepreneurs. The IEEE National Capital Area Consultants Network and Baltimore Consultants Network want you to know what has happened and how patent reform will affect the individual or small-business entrepreneur. We have put together a Town Hall meeting with a panel session and workshop. The event is open to the public, and IEEE student members are especially welcomed to participate. Lunch and a networking reception are included. IEEE Student members may bring a guest at no additional cost. Door prizes will be awarded!
The NCACN welcomes IP experts Dr. Lee Hollaar and Dr. Amelia Morani who will present the current landscape of U.S. patent law and lead the workshop.
Your admission ticket includes a complimentary lunch and admission to the networking reception. IEEE members can preregister to attend at a discounted price of $10, and IEEE student members will receive one guest admission as part of their $10 ticket price. IEEE discounted prices are available only by preregistration until 6pm on November 4. General admission is offered for $20 per person by preregistration and at the door. All registered attendees will be eligible for door prizes.
$20 - general admission $10 - IEEE member or guest (expires Nov. 4 6pm) $10 - IEEE student member with 1 complimentary guest admission (expires Nov. 4 6pm)
RSVP:
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Thank you, and we hope to see you there! Monica Mallini, PE
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You guys missed a really great discussion today. We had to expert presenters and two representatives from the Patent Office. They discussed a lot of issues that have been raised here. I only wish I had taken better notes. I did get the chance to speak directly with Dr Lee Hollaar who spoke of several ways to deep six a patent. One is to file (free) with the patent office a notice of a publication which would represent prior art. This is attached at an application or even a granted patent. If the patent holder tries to enforce the patent by filing suit in court the lawyer would be guilty of filing not in good faith or some such legal term and would be in deep sneakers with the court. There were other things that can be done and they don't require you to be a lawyer or use one.
I was very impressed with the knowledge of the presenters as well as the USPTO representatives. Probably the most useful thing that was said was that there are many views of the new law but it is the law. Those who are most aware of it and use it are the ones who will most profit. Getting an attitude about it accomplishes nothing.
BTW, many of the provisions don't take effect for over a year. So it is just like an election, file early and file often!
Thanks for the update. I wish I could have been there.
Regarding the ability for the public to file prior art notice of publication, was there any discussion about how that is checked or processed? What's to stop someone from filing something only marginally related as "prior art" to be attached to a patent? Sounds like a strategy that could be used by someone nefariously trying to kill a good patent.
No, this was a response to my question after the presentation. I don't think any attachment will "automatically" kill a patent. I believe the point is that if you truly have prior art, you don't need to spend a ton 'o money to fight a patent even if it is granted.
It was discussed in the meeting that there is an application called "provisional" IIRC that is only $125 to file and in essence sets the date of filing if you then follow up within the year with a full application. A significant aspect of this is that you have no obligation to follow up but in any event the filing becomes "prior art" registered with the USPTO. No one can subsequently apply for a patent on that same invention.
I don't share the opinion of some that the patent system is completely broken. I think the problem is that people don't know much about it and seem to have knee jerk reactions to problems they do find. My car is far from perfect, but it gets me where I want to go. But I guess your mileage may vary. :)
"A significant aspect of this is that you have no obligation to follow up but in any event the filing becomes "prior art" registered with the USPTO. No one can subsequently apply for a patent on that same invention."
Provisional application is not published by USPTO and automatically expires in one year
It cannot be used as "prior art" by USPTO or anyone else unless it is followed by a formal non-provisional application that is published and claims the benefit of a provisional
This issue was discussed by the four member panel and no one disagreed with the speaker, Dr Hollaar. Remember this included two representatives from the USPTO. Even if the provisional application expires, it constitutes prior art because it was filed with the USPTO. I am pretty sure I don't have this wrong because it was presented as a fail safe way of establishing prior art for the filing fee of only $125. Dr. Hollaar had this as a bullet in his presentation and then followed up with a full discussion on it.
Why do you say a provisional application can't be used as prior art? I'm not certain whether it is published or not. But the USPTO has the application so they know it's prior art.
Provisional patent applications aren't new, fwiw. They're a means to establish the "priority date" for an invention, in other words the file date, even if a full patent application isn't ready. There are some basic rules concerning limits on the content, e.g., IIRC one can't add claims to the subsequent patent application that aren't covered by material in the provisional application.
The nice thing is that a provisional is cheap and easy to file, and doesn't have a specific format. e.g., it is not unusual to file a draft of a paper to be published describing a new technology as the provisional application for any patents that might come out of it.
Establishing the "priority date" by filing a provisional patent may be more important in the US now that we're moving to a first to file system.
I suspect you mean "priority date" rather than "prior art".
Otherwise they may have been saying that a provisional can be used as evidence of "prior art" against competing applications, assuming a formal application is eventually filed to replace the provisional.
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