Bonum Certa Men Certa

The Anti-Section 101 (Pro-Software Patents) Lobby Looks at New Angles for Watering Down Guidelines and Caselaw

Section 101 (35 U.S.C. €§ 101) withstands endless lobbying against it

Section



Summary: By focusing on jury trials and patent trolls the proponents of bunk, likely-invalid abstract patents hope to overrule or override technical courts such as the Patent Trial and Appeal Board (PTAB)

IT SHOULD NOT surprise anyone that USPTO officials who came from the litigation 'industry' are upset at the Federal Circuit under Chief Judge Sharon Prost. As we shall show in later posts, she too has come under criticism if not attacks from the usual suspects. For those who forgot or haven't been following these affairs, Sharon Prost replaces a corrupt Chief Judge who was caught red-handed and is nowadays lobbying along with patent maximalists. They really hate Section 101, which basically invalidates just about any software patent.



A patent maximalist called Janal Kalis has just noted that "PTAB Affirmed an Examiner's [Section] 101 Rejection of Claims in a Thompson Reuters Patent Application for Docketing: https://e-foia.uspto.gov/Foia/RetrievePdf?system=BPAI&flNm=fd2017005527-11-07-2018-1 …"

This is the usual; whenever PTAB gets involved and Section 101 is brought up the likelihood of invalidation/rejection is very high. Berkheimer has changed practically nothing.

"...whenever PTAB gets involved and Section 101 is brought up the likelihood of invalidation/rejection is very high."So what will those patent maximalists do about Section 101 and about PTAB? "Despite Misleading Question, Berkheimer Case Has Legs at the Supreme Court," Dennis Crouch says. Crouch himself is a very vocal patent maximalist and opponent of Section 101. And no, he's just trying to sway the court's stance, having long promoted software patents and patent trolls. The EFF has also just urged the Justices at SCOTUS to examine the case because they want closure (the court repeatedly declines to revisit the subject). Crouch mentioned "go[ing] to a jury." To quote: "In my view, the question presented by HP’s attorneys intentionally creates confusion as the Federal Circuit did not rule (1) that eligibility is a question of fact; or (2) that any aspect of the eligibility question goes to a jury. Rather, the Federal Circuit has repeatedly ruled, including in Berkheimer, that the question of “eligible subject matter is a question of law.” I’ll also note that no court following Berkheimer has seen eligibility itself as a question of fact or attempted to get a jury verdict on the issue. I contacted David Salmons (counsel of record for HP) to see what I’m missing about the misleading question, but he did not respond."

He was later admitting a mistake, citing patent troll Finjan. These Berkheimer pushers (who are software patents boosters) cite Microsoft's patent troll Finjan in relation to letting a nontechnical jury decide on patents (a big mistake). His mea culpa:

In my recent Berkheimer post, I wrote that “that no court following Berkheimer has … attempted to get a jury verdict on the issue.” Turns out that I’m potentially wrong.

In the pending case of Finjan, Inc. v. Juniper Network, Inc. (N.D. Cal. 2018), Judge Alsup has ordered a jury trial on the “inventive concept” question. In its order, denying summary judgment, the court found that the Claim 10 of Finjan’s U.S. Patent No. 8,677,494 was directed to the abstract idea of “collecting data, analyzing data, and storing results.” (Alice Step 1). However, the court decided to wait for trial to determine the inventive concept question...


Looking at this troll's affairs, it's pretending to be an actual company, it attracts some investment, and it speaks of 'sales' when all it really does is litigation. This is the kind of firm that needs to go bankrupt because it's a classic troll.

"Logical arguments about the scientific contribution of such patents (or detriment thereof) don't seem to bother them. A facts-based, evidence-based discussion just doesn't appeal to these people."Jury trials, as we have been pointing out several times over the past year, are more likely to get things wrong; jury trials are not suitable for technical matters involving patents, which they don't understand (particular scientific disciplines). This is misapplying one principle of law to granting of a monopoly. Juvan Bonni, who works with Crouch, has incidentally just promoted these two recent papers. One of these is sort of 'court bashing' by Cambridge Technology Law (a push against PTAB); they just loathe patent quality, so they try to discredit the court and AIA. How typical. More lobbying as “papers” (the Koch Brothers sponsor some other attacks on PTAB, using 'scholars' in institutions they sponsor). The second of those two speaks of juries in patent litigation. Watchtroll has meanwhile taken this further with N. Scott Pierce (Saul Ewing Arnstein & Lehr, LLP), who repeats the same arguments (more or less). What we find noteworthy here is that almost a year later (10 months) they are still pushing Berkheimer, engaging in revisionism about Oil States (no matter what SCOTUS ruled this past summer) and obsess over faulty jury trials (based on misinformation) so as to discredit the court. Logical arguments about the scientific contribution of such patents (or detriment thereof) don't seem to bother them. A facts-based, evidence-based discussion just doesn't appeal to these people. They never wrote a single line of code.

Recent Techrights' Posts

Someone Should Remind Microsoft Lunduke That Microsoft Hires Many Sexual Criminals and Pedophiles as Well
Microsoft Lunduke on an "expedition" to find one or more perverts, then generalise to everyone in the "community"
Cash Machines (ATMs) Make Mistakes and They're Proprietary Software
Correcting mistakes is a colossal challenge
Yes, Microsoft is the Problem
"I am no MS shill."
Another Failed Use Case for Chatbots (LLM): Legal Advice and Analysis
They're just some self-discrediting toy that costs way too much to operate
Nonfree Software in My Bank, by Richard Stallman
Updated 8 hours ago
 
Links 29/07/2025: Data Brokers Gone Wrong/Rogue and "Copyright Thicket"
Links for the day
Slopwatch: Linuxconfig.org, Linuxsecurity.com, Fagioli, The Register
Today's "Slopwatch" isn't the first article about LLM slop
We Cover Topics Other Sites Are Too Afraid to Cover (Even When They Know the Facts)
It's not that they doubt the truth, they just realise there may be consequences for talking about it
They Try to Tell Us the Free Software Foundation Inc is Dying, But Its Revenue Doubled Since the Dot-Com Bubble Burst
Being in "Activism" is never easy; but it does positive things for society
It's About the Cost of Workers, Not the Fictional Skills Shortage (That Does Not Exist, the Media Spreads False and Sometimes Self-Fulfilling Narratives)
This issue isn't limited to computing, some dub it "globalism"
Links 29/07/2025: More Pushbacks Against Slop and More Praises of Tom Lehrer
Links for the day
Gemini Links 29/07/2025: Purple Yarrow and Understanding Op Amps
Links for the day
This Monday WebProNews Absolutely Flooded the Web With Fake (LLM Slop) 'Articles' About "Linux", Google News Promoted Them as Legitimate
All of the following are fake articles attributed to pseudonyms or authors that don't exist; the images are also slop. Why does Google promote these?
Linuxiac is Not a Slopfarm, But at Least Some of Its Articles Are Machine-Generated Fakes
what we said about it was correct
Expect More Microsoft Layoffs
"Are more job cuts coming?"
Microsoft Behaving Like It's Running Out of Money to Pay Salaries
Does that seem like the behaviour expected from a company which claims it is "worth" trillions?
LWN Downtime Due to Linode, Not LLM Bots
"I’ve received an email letting me know that there is a potential for data loss."
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Monday, July 28, 2025
IRC logs for Monday, July 28, 2025
Links 28/07/2025: Science, Health, and Conflicts
Links for the day
Gemini Links 28/07/2025: Healthy Self-Image With Autism and a "New Life"
Links for the day
Links 28/07/2025: COVID-19 Sped up Brain Aging, "Circumvention is More Popular Than Compliance"
Links for the day
Richard Stallman is Usually Right Because He Thinks "Outside the Box"
he is able to observe society (mores and norms) as somewhat of an outsider
LWN Has Been Down for a Long Time, Another Casualty of LLM Bots?
Time will tell. How much time though?
Slopfarms Versus 'Linux' (and Against People Who Write Real Articles About GNU/Linux)
LLM slop in slopfarms by Brian Fagioli and Redazione RHC
Gemini Links 28/07/2025: Bila Yarrudhanggalangdhuray and Running pkgsrc in a FreeBSD Jail
Links for the day
Microsoft Turns News Sites Into Spamfarms
Is the site The Register MS the next IDG?
The Register MS/The Register US
On Saturday I contacted them for a comment (before issuing criticism)
Hacking revelations at Vatican Jubilee of Digital Missionaries
Reprinted with permission from Daniel Pocock
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Sunday, July 27, 2025
IRC logs for Sunday, July 27, 2025
The Week to Come
Planning ahead
LLM Slop Has Only Been a Boon for Misinformation Online
The very same companies that were supposed to maintain quality (again, not limited to Google with PageRank) are now actively participating in generating and spreading slop
When They Tell You It's Free, Does That Mean No Charges (If So, Who's Paying and Why)?
there's "no free lunch"
We're Going to Focus Less on the Molotov Cocktail-Throwing Microsofters and More on Patents
We can get back to focusing on what we wanted to focus on all along
Just Trying to Keep Web Sites Honest (Journalistic Integrity)
the latest articles in LinuxIac are real
Links 27/07/2025: Political Affairs, Data Breaches, Attacks on Freedom of the Press
Links for the day
Gemini Links 27/07/2025: Hot in Japan and Terminal Escape Codes
Links for the day
Links 27/07/2025: More Microsoft Layoffs Coming, Science and Hardware News
Links for the day
Links 27/07/2025: FSF Hackathon and "Hulk Hogan Was a Very Bad Man"
Links for the day
Gemini Links 27/07/2025: DAW Mixer Chains and Simple Software
Links for the day
The Register MS is Inventing or Giving Air Time to New Conspiracy Theories so as to Distort the Narrative As High-Profile Agencies Fall Prey to Microsoft Holes
But the problem is holes, i.e. Microsoft making bad products; the problem is Microsoft
Most Editors at The Register Are American, Including the Editor in Chief, a Decade-Long Microsoft Stenographer (Writing Prose to Sell Microsoft)
It's not easy to tell where the site is based (we tried) because it's hiding behind ClownFlare and CrimeFlare hasn't been well lately
Pushers of systemd Rewrite History (Richard Stallman Said UNIX "Was Portable and Seemed Fairly Clean")
Unlike systemd
"New Techrights" Soon Turns 2 (A Few Days Before the FSF Turns 40)
We have a lot more to say about LLM bots
When Silence Says So Much
Garrett, a 'secure' boot pusher, will need to defend himself in the UK High Court
The Register in Trouble
There is not much that can be done at this point
Trajectory of The Register: From News Site/s Into "B2B"... and Into Microsoft Salespeople
Something isn't right at The Register
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Saturday, July 26, 2025
IRC logs for Saturday, July 26, 2025
Misinformation in Social Control Media
Social control media passes around all sorts of tropes
Slopwatch: Fake Linux 'Articles' and Slopfarms With "Linux" in Their Names/Domains
throwing bots at "Linux" to make some fake articles