Software patents

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What do you think about patents

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Total votes: 15

alex.barylski
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Software patents

Post by alex.barylski »

I'm already convined that software patents are a good thing...

However, while reading a newsletter from the Green Party (Who I was thinking of voting for this next Canadian election) I noticed one of there objectives is to reduce software patents to 7 years instead of 20 or whatever it is now....

Silly IMHO...it could take that long to get everything off the ground financially, marketing, etc...

So I ask this question only to see what others think and maybe try and understand the madness behind NO SOFTWARE patents... :?

I personally have had 2 ideas on the back burner for a few years now...

One which could make me a bit of cash and the other is a technological innovation which I would likely release to the public as GPL for non-commercial use...

The way I see it, I dedicate time and effort into developing and conceptualizing something and someone makes money off my work, I should profit too...

Thats the one thing i have against OSS or the FSF anwyays...

I've always liked Stallman's quote: "Free as in speech not as in beer" or whatever...

I see no harm in patents...they don't stifle innovation...they prevent someone more business oriented than the inventor from taking the idea and making more money from it without you benefiting...

I'm always suspiscious of people who argue against software patents...

Mostly because, they likely never had a unique enough idea to bother patenting...

The problem I have with patents, isn't actually the patents fault...but rather the weak process by which a patent is granted (especially in the US).

Amazons one click or Netflix and their business process of renting movies online via the USPS...those are silly patents...

For the most part, however I'm all for patents!!!

Comments???

Cheers :)
Deemo
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Post by Deemo »

wouldnt software patents basically kill most of the godness of the open source community? no...software patents are bad news
alex.barylski
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Post by alex.barylski »

Deemo wrote:wouldnt software patents basically kill most of the godness of the open source community? no...software patents are bad news
How do you figure?

You could still make code freely available...

Useage would be limited to educational use or non-commercial...

The code you would still have full access to, but if you wanted to use it commercially...and planned on making money from it...you paid...

To me that makes lots of sense...

Except for maybe small time independant developer (Which I am BTW)...whom wanted everything FREE so they could make the most money from projects they did...

Thats stupid...and that stifles innovation...

Cheers :)
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m3mn0n
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Post by m3mn0n »

I extremely dislike software patents. Especially ones defined in such a general sense that it will impede on the ability for people to be creative and break down a monopoly and try to at least cut into a market where someone utterly dominates or has total/exclusive control.

Also, didn't someone once patent a method in which a Microsoft office product interacted with something and once Microsoft implemented that feature, the guy sued Microsoft for patent infringement. Yes, for basically making a new feature in its own software. I'm not sure if there is truth to that story, but a friend told me such an incident happened a while ago.

The Yahoo vs. Xfire lawsuit also comes to mind. It's just so stupid IMO.
Roja
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Re: Software patents

Post by Roja »

Hockey wrote:I'm already convined that software patents are a good thing...
Well, lets start there, because I completely disagree.

Perhaps you want to make a webpage where people can upload images, and have them automatically resized and formatted. Something similar to Flickr, perhaps.

You spend a year or two coding out all the bugs, polishing it up, and making it work well.

Then, someone contacts you and informs you that the equations you use for resizing are patented, along with the image format itself. You literally cannot make a resizing function without violating the patent.

Its not an abstract example - its what literally occurred for over a decade thanks to the patent on LZW, which impacted GIF's.

It is playing itself out again with browser plugins, click-to-buy (one click shopping patent), and even streaming media (burst).

Patenting an *idea*, with no specific implementation wasn't ever the intention of patent law. There is a reason why traditional patents require a diagram, and a specific implementation. Its meant to be limited to a specific way to do things, and was originally meant to reward for a short term, the investment needed to develop new technologies.

Software patents arent a unique method, arent short term, and don't reward new technology - just the opposite. They are overbroad, long-term, and prevent early implementors by making them do research on every possible patent thats out there before implementing anything.

I'm interested in hearing what you think are positive about software patents.
Hockey wrote:However, while reading a newsletter from the Green Party (Who I was thinking of voting for this next Canadian election) I noticed one of there objectives is to reduce software patents to 7 years instead of 20 or whatever it is now....

Silly IMHO...it could take that long to get everything off the ground financially, marketing, etc...
Name *one* software solution in wide use today that has not changed fundamentally since introducing it to the market seven years ago. Not Windows. Not Unix. Not Novell.

Software changes dramatically fast. Two years means obsolete. Patenting a process - a nonspecific method of doing something - means that no one can produce anything similar. No competition at all. Imagine if yahoo patented internet searching when it debuted - we'd have no google, no ask jeeves, nothing else. Is that an ideal you want to strive for?
Hockey wrote:The way I see it, I dedicate time and effort into developing and conceptualizing something and someone makes money off my work, I should profit too...
Nothing stops you from profiting off of freedom/opensource software. A huge variety of companies do exactly that - mysql, zend (php), linux (redhat, suse, etc).. You can profit without owning the exclusive ability to anything remotely similar to what you do.

In fact, market examples prove the value in *not* having patents. The internet (built on the no-patent implementations of smtp, tcp/ip, and more) has produced more unique products than virtually any other invention in the modern age, save the computer. Even the computer proves that point - the closed architectures, held under patents, failed, withered, and become a minority member of the market, while the fast moving competitive open architectures (x86) ended up the dominant force, providing not only tremendous profit, but also providing more value to the world in general.

Remember, patents aren't meant to ensure a profit. They are there to reward investment in research. When you remove the limits on patents, as we've done with software patents, you end up reducing the value to the world, and often, also the potential profit.
Hockey wrote:I see no harm in patents...they don't stifle innovation...they prevent someone more business oriented than the inventor from taking the idea and making more money from it without you benefiting...
On the contrary, they stifle innovation in a wide variety of ways. They put a cost into the simple act of developing a product. When *ideas* cost money to even try, innovation by definition is stifled.
Hockey wrote:Mostly because, they likely never had a unique enough idea to bother patenting...
I have contributed to multiple patent applications, and have several that I plan to patent in the future. That doesn't change my stance that *software* patents, and the current length for patents in general is wildly non-beneficial.
Hockey wrote:Amazons one click or Netflix and their business process of renting movies online via the USPS...those are silly patents...
And yet those are both prime examples of *software* patents, and they've both been upheld after multiple examinations as "unique" enough according to the definition used for software patents.

Perhaps it would help if you explain what about software patents you think is beneficial. All your arguments seem to support the original concepts of patents, not the new extensions that are making software patents possible.
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Post by Roja »

Hockey wrote:
Deemo wrote:wouldnt software patents basically kill most of the godness of the open source community? no...software patents are bad news
How do you figure?

You could still make code freely available...

Useage would be limited to educational use or non-commercial...
NO.

If you create a patent-violating piece of code, distribution of it is illegal, regardless of its use. Thats the danger of patents. It doesn't care about use. It doesn't care about intent.

You cannot at all create a solution which violates patents and provide it to the public. The patent owner can sue, and have the materials removed, and can in some cases get damages for the loss of income that your competiting (nocost) solution would have provided.

See the stifling yet? :)
Gambler
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Re: Software patents

Post by Gambler »

Hockey wrote:I'm already convined that software patents are a good thing...
The way I see it, I dedicate time and effort into developing and conceptualizing something and someone makes money off my work, I should profit too...
This is complicated. The issues of IP always are. Can you say that person who saw your application and wrote something similar is using your idea? What if someone writes similar application without looking at yours? Etcetra.

Besides, software is already covered by copyright.
alex.barylski
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Re: Software patents

Post by alex.barylski »

Roja wrote:
Hockey wrote:I'm already convined that software patents are a good thing...
Well, lets start there, because I completely disagree.

Perhaps you want to make a webpage where people can upload images, and have them automatically resized and formatted. Something similar to Flickr, perhaps.

You spend a year or two coding out all the bugs, polishing it up, and making it work well.

Then, someone contacts you and informs you that the equations you use for resizing are patented, along with the image format itself. You literally cannot make a resizing function without violating the patent.

Its not an abstract example - its what literally occurred for over a decade thanks to the patent on LZW, which impacted GIF's.

It is playing itself out again with browser plugins, click-to-buy (one click shopping patent), and even streaming media (burst).

Patenting an *idea*, with no specific implementation wasn't ever the intention of patent law. There is a reason why traditional patents require a diagram, and a specific implementation. Its meant to be limited to a specific way to do things, and was originally meant to reward for a short term, the investment needed to develop new technologies.

Software patents arent a unique method, arent short term, and don't reward new technology - just the opposite. They are overbroad, long-term, and prevent early implementors by making them do research on every possible patent thats out there before implementing anything.

I'm interested in hearing what you think are positive about software patents.
Hockey wrote:However, while reading a newsletter from the Green Party (Who I was thinking of voting for this next Canadian election) I noticed one of there objectives is to reduce software patents to 7 years instead of 20 or whatever it is now....

Silly IMHO...it could take that long to get everything off the ground financially, marketing, etc...
Name *one* software solution in wide use today that has not changed fundamentally since introducing it to the market seven years ago. Not Windows. Not Unix. Not Novell.

Software changes dramatically fast. Two years means obsolete. Patenting a process - a nonspecific method of doing something - means that no one can produce anything similar. No competition at all. Imagine if yahoo patented internet searching when it debuted - we'd have no google, no ask jeeves, nothing else. Is that an ideal you want to strive for?
Hockey wrote:The way I see it, I dedicate time and effort into developing and conceptualizing something and someone makes money off my work, I should profit too...
Nothing stops you from profiting off of freedom/opensource software. A huge variety of companies do exactly that - mysql, zend (php), linux (redhat, suse, etc).. You can profit without owning the exclusive ability to anything remotely similar to what you do.

In fact, market examples prove the value in *not* having patents. The internet (built on the no-patent implementations of smtp, tcp/ip, and more) has produced more unique products than virtually any other invention in the modern age, save the computer. Even the computer proves that point - the closed architectures, held under patents, failed, withered, and become a minority member of the market, while the fast moving competitive open architectures (x86) ended up the dominant force, providing not only tremendous profit, but also providing more value to the world in general.

Remember, patents aren't meant to ensure a profit. They are there to reward investment in research. When you remove the limits on patents, as we've done with software patents, you end up reducing the value to the world, and often, also the potential profit.
Hockey wrote:I see no harm in patents...they don't stifle innovation...they prevent someone more business oriented than the inventor from taking the idea and making more money from it without you benefiting...
On the contrary, they stifle innovation in a wide variety of ways. They put a cost into the simple act of developing a product. When *ideas* cost money to even try, innovation by definition is stifled.
Hockey wrote:Mostly because, they likely never had a unique enough idea to bother patenting...
I have contributed to multiple patent applications, and have several that I plan to patent in the future. That doesn't change my stance that *software* patents, and the current length for patents in general is wildly non-beneficial.
Hockey wrote:Amazons one click or Netflix and their business process of renting movies online via the USPS...those are silly patents...
And yet those are both prime examples of *software* patents, and they've both been upheld after multiple examinations as "unique" enough according to the definition used for software patents.

Perhaps it would help if you explain what about software patents you think is beneficial. All your arguments seem to support the original concepts of patents, not the new extensions that are making software patents possible.
Whoa...quite a response... :)

I agree that many software patents are stupid...

I recall a case where 3DSMAX or something patented a UI widget...that I disagree with...it's to broad...

The idea of a search engine...nothing revolutionary...it's a trivial idea which anyone would have thought of....same goes for Windowing systems, etc...

Those are not the ideas I would consider patentable...

However look at compression...

RLE is most obvious...I stumbled across this idea when I was 15 and thought I invented something revolutionary :P The concept is pretty simple...

Then look at Huffman, quite a bit more complex...and IMHO a patentable idea...

Regardless of implementation...the idea (for it's time) was unique enough that as long as the author patented it first...so be it!!!

LZW uses different technique an enhanced version of Huffman sorta...

But different enough to prevent patent infringement I would think...

It's been a while since I've dabbled into compression, so I should really watch my P's and Q's :P

My point being, I think patenting code is silly...I think patenting broad ideas is silly...or business processes for that matter...

But when an idea is developed and everyone uses it for some time, despite obvious deficiencies and no does anything to improve it - when some lone individual or small group reinvents the way things are done...ie: improving compression, encryption, etc...

Why isn't that patentable?

It's likely what your patenting is unique enough to qualify...and likely highly specialized so it's not overly obvious.
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Re: Software patents

Post by Roja »

Hockey wrote:Those are not the ideas I would consider patentable...
Thats a key problem with your line of reasoning. It is not what you consider patentable that matters. It is what the law supports, as written, and how it has been applied by the patent office.
Hockey wrote:RLE is most obvious...I stumbled across this idea when I was 15 and thought I invented something revolutionary :P The concept is pretty simple...
Most patents - software or not - are actually relatively simple concepts. Thats the argument put forward for having patents for them - so that a competitor can't immediately duplicate the concept, stealing your market share without the cost of development.

The more simple the concept, the more you would need a patent. The patent is supposed to be a trade between the state and the inventor. The state gives the inventor exclusive rights to profit on the idea, in exchange for the inventor taking the time to research and develop it. Notably, patents were supposed to be limited in scope, applicability, and term. All of those are being removed and extended, reducing the value to the citizenry to make that exchange.
Hockey wrote:Regardless of implementation...the idea (for it's time) was unique enough that as long as the author patented it first...so be it!!!
So be it? "Oh well" as a legal argument doesn't do well. ;)

Just getting there first as the only requirement means that corporations could patent everything, and you'd have to pay a royalty to even take down notes in class ("Patent: A method for documenting vocal directions").

The thought of having to pay for every thing I create is not one I'm comfortable with, and I suspect "So be it" doesn't actually fit what you feel on the matter. :)
Hockey wrote:My point being, I think patenting code is silly...I think patenting broad ideas is silly...or business processes for that matter...
And yet you argue for the defense of exactly that. Software patents do all of those things.
Hockey wrote:But when an idea is developed and everyone uses it for some time, despite obvious deficiencies and no does anything to improve it
Careful - that usually happens when things ARE patented, not the opposite. Patents ensure a lack of competition, remember? With legally enforced non-competitiveness, there is no market pressure to improve a product despite obvious deficiencies!

With an open market competition, there is that pressure, and more.
Hockey wrote:- when some lone individual or small group reinvents the way things are done...ie: improving compression, encryption, etc...

Why isn't that patentable?
You question should be "Why shouldn't that be patentable". It is, and so are a huge number of other things - including business methods, general concepts, non-specific implementations, and of course, software methods.

Making a marginable improvement on a system in existance gives you a market advantage. When people see that you offer a version of Zip that gives 10 times better compression tomorrow, you'll beat out Winzip for marketshare.

But if that compression method was patented (like LZW was), you have no incentive to improve it, for the length of the patent. Why improve the method, if you have an exclusive non-compete market for it? People are paying, people can't get a reasonable alternative, and patents terms are extending longer and longer. Worse, more and more patents over increasingly broad and non-specific concepts are being granted. How long til someone is granted a patent for a Santa Claus hat? Oh wait, they already did.
Hockey wrote:It's likely what your patenting is unique enough to qualify...and likely highly specialized so it's not overly obvious.
Just the opposite. The patent system is rubber-stamping virtually everything, specifically because congress has extended patents to such non-specific concepts as software and business methods, and extended their terms to unreasonable links.

Working under such rules, what IS unique, or specialized, or even reasonable?

Everything. And thats why software patents make absolutely no sense to support. At all.
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Chris Corbyn
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Post by Chris Corbyn »

BAD, VERY BAD!!! I don't think i need to go into why but put it this way, it could completely destroy the project I work on for a living since the big-shot company (with a much worse competing app) can afford the patents, we cant and wouldn't get them if we could. Patenting simply destroys the evolution of better software since you can't compete.
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Re: Software patents

Post by alex.barylski »

Roja wrote:
Hockey wrote:Those are not the ideas I would consider patentable...
Thats a key problem with your line of reasoning. It is not what you consider patentable that matters. It is what the law supports, as written, and how it has been applied by the patent office.
Hockey wrote:RLE is most obvious...I stumbled across this idea when I was 15 and thought I invented something revolutionary :P The concept is pretty simple...
Most patents - software or not - are actually relatively simple concepts. Thats the argument put forward for having patents for them - so that a competitor can't immediately duplicate the concept, stealing your market share without the cost of development.

The more simple the concept, the more you would need a patent. The patent is supposed to be a trade between the state and the inventor. The state gives the inventor exclusive rights to profit on the idea, in exchange for the inventor taking the time to research and develop it. Notably, patents were supposed to be limited in scope, applicability, and term. All of those are being removed and extended, reducing the value to the citizenry to make that exchange.
Hockey wrote:Regardless of implementation...the idea (for it's time) was unique enough that as long as the author patented it first...so be it!!!
So be it? "Oh well" as a legal argument doesn't do well. ;)

Just getting there first as the only requirement means that corporations could patent everything, and you'd have to pay a royalty to even take down notes in class ("Patent: A method for documenting vocal directions").

The thought of having to pay for every thing I create is not one I'm comfortable with, and I suspect "So be it" doesn't actually fit what you feel on the matter. :)
Hockey wrote:My point being, I think patenting code is silly...I think patenting broad ideas is silly...or business processes for that matter...
And yet you argue for the defense of exactly that. Software patents do all of those things.
Hockey wrote:But when an idea is developed and everyone uses it for some time, despite obvious deficiencies and no does anything to improve it
Careful - that usually happens when things ARE patented, not the opposite. Patents ensure a lack of competition, remember? With legally enforced non-competitiveness, there is no market pressure to improve a product despite obvious deficiencies!

With an open market competition, there is that pressure, and more.
Hockey wrote:- when some lone individual or small group reinvents the way things are done...ie: improving compression, encryption, etc...

Why isn't that patentable?
You question should be "Why shouldn't that be patentable". It is, and so are a huge number of other things - including business methods, general concepts, non-specific implementations, and of course, software methods.

Making a marginable improvement on a system in existance gives you a market advantage. When people see that you offer a version of Zip that gives 10 times better compression tomorrow, you'll beat out Winzip for marketshare.

But if that compression method was patented (like LZW was), you have no incentive to improve it, for the length of the patent. Why improve the method, if you have an exclusive non-compete market for it? People are paying, people can't get a reasonable alternative, and patents terms are extending longer and longer. Worse, more and more patents over increasingly broad and non-specific concepts are being granted. How long til someone is granted a patent for a Santa Claus hat? Oh wait, they already did.
Hockey wrote:It's likely what your patenting is unique enough to qualify...and likely highly specialized so it's not overly obvious.
Just the opposite. The patent system is rubber-stamping virtually everything, specifically because congress has extended patents to such non-specific concepts as software and business methods, and extended their terms to unreasonable links.

Working under such rules, what IS unique, or specialized, or even reasonable?

Everything. And thats why software patents make absolutely no sense to support. At all.
I'll try and make this brief :)

I've said or thought I did numerous times...that I believe in the patent system, but I don't agree with all of it...

UI patents like 3dsmax, thats crazy!!! It's a design...a visual element...like a painting...so if anything...that would fall under copyright, not patents!!!

Source code...should not be patentable...again...its literary, so at best falls under copyright...

Even implementation details should not be patentable...

If I patented an algorithm for counting to 20, who cares whether I do it incrementally by one or by steps of five?

General ideas, should not be patentable...

The idea of a search engine, knowledgebase, etc...their to vague...

However if there are a few search engines (Lycos, Yahoo, Google, etc) and Google conceptualizes the idea of page rank...in that a web site rank will increase tremendously based on how many other sites link to your site...especially if those sites are also considered quality (lots of citations)...

Then yeah...IMHO thats possibly a patentable idea...Thats atleast what the topic was for Page or Brin's masters thesis - I read that somewhere like National Post or something...I'm pretty sure I did anyways :roll:

LZW...an extension on already existing compression algorithms...another patentable idea...

It is this which I am advocating as proper...nothing more...

So in this sense...I agree with software patents, although more of an algorithm or technique than anything...

I have my idea of what a patent should require...and dont' really care about anything else...

If what you say is true and MOST patents are easy concepts...who cares??? The way I see it....if its such an easy concept, just reinvent the wheel without infringing on the patent....thus making the patent for easy concept obsolete :)

Basically what I was doing, was defending or trying to...the ideas which I've considered seeking patanet protection on...

Their both highly specialized and not overly obvious...otherwise it would have been done already :)

Thats my story and i'm sticking to it :)

Cheers :)
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Post by Deemo »

my question is, who is to decide what is too broad and whats not?
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Post by feyd »

Deemo wrote:my question is, who is to decide what is too broad and whats not?
the patent office and its enlisted "experts" ... whoever they are.. :roll:
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Maugrim_The_Reaper
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Post by Maugrim_The_Reaper »

The problem with software patents is that companies (or individuals) do not patent an implementation - they patent an idea. It may be labelled a design, or a method, or any other hoky-poky phrase, but its usually an idea. Not like its been implemented afterall. There probably isn't even a picture or graphical representation attached...

But ideas are dangerous you see, they spead like a virus when created. So for a business to make money from an idea, they need to make sure other people with the same idea aren't allowed to use it. They choose to make ideas a commodity, no longer a shared and free resource. So they use patents - and worse, they do their best to push software patents (and any other peculiar practices) onto every nation that will listen. Some countries still see ideas as free, a non-corporeal body of knowledge which the public has a right to.

Patents are therefore bad. They can't be justified other than by reference to competitiveness, and therefore the profits, of those that claim them. They can't usually be claimed to have a concrete use or implementation. They defy common sense in many (not all!) cases. They end up limiting the ideas other programmers can safely use - no matter if they came up with it independently, or implemented it where no implementation previously existed - its enough that they used a idea someone else owned. Which of course is difficult to avoid when everyone is not checking every idea that pops into their head against some massive database of obscure descriptions...after all no one could possibly have patented something so obvious...right?

IMO ideas cannot be owned - its a horrible practice to see that. What if Liberty were patented way back when and every revolution was obliged to pay a charge for the privilege of implementing the idea? Ludicrous isn't it, yet whenever anyone decides to follow a 3D model around with a camera on a computer screen you'd think they'd know it is certainly a patented idea - and that the game industry forks over a lot for the privilege of implementing that idea to avoid being sued. Definitely ludicrous.

I wonder if I'll be charged with patent fees next time I do that on Blender? ;) Shh, don't tell anyone...
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m3mn0n
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Post by m3mn0n »

Maugrim_The_Reaper wrote:What if Liberty were patented way back when and every revolution was obliged to pay a charge for the privilege of implementing the idea? Ludicrous isn't it
Indeed... haha that's a hilarious analogy
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