Bonum Certa Men Certa

Software Patents Roundup: Why PCT and Not IPR; Why Patents Kill Standards; Why Software Patents Are Insane

Software patent on rise



The Cathedral is bizarre. It tries to tame the legal system to essentially illegalise the Bazaar, which produces excellent products very efficiently and at a very low cost. In the case of software, no physical products need even be produced.

“It cannot be stressed often enough, but companies like Novell and Microsoft will continue to deceive the public for their own selfish interests...”Whether you find this sad or amusing probably depends on which side you are on. What we discover here is nothing but intellectual fences being set up by those who are in the inner circles enjoying a flow of money from those who have no opportunity to compete. The laws were adjusted to make it so.

Doug Mentohl has found a few bits of news that illustrate some of this, adding colour to the problem at hand.

Patents, Copyrights and Trademarks Are Not the Same Thing



It cannot be stressed often enough, but companies like Novell and Microsoft will continue to deceive the public for their own selfish interests where the status of patents should be perceptually elevated and made 'harder'.

I am not a fan of the term “Intellectual Property” for many reasons. One is that it is confusing as it makes an analogy to tangible property which confuses non-lawyers, and lumps together very different areas of law. This is why many people in policy circles use the acronym PCT which stands for “Patents, Copyrights, Trademarks and other related rights”.

[...]

Historically software was not patentable, and it is only recent that this changed.

The US Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) fought software patents prior to 1981. This changed after a 1981 US Supreme Court Case (Diamond v. Diehr) which involved an industrial process for the molding of rubber products, which included software. While this was not really a software patent, but an industrial process that happened to include software, this was seen as opening the doors to pure software patents and then later to business model patents. Many of these decisions were made by the US Court of Appeals for Federal Circuit which specializes on patents, and is seen by many to be a biased interest group in the debate about what should be patentable.


Interestingly, the the anti-spam (CAPTCHA) word at the bottom of the article came up as "windows". Coincidence? Refreshing the page (viewing it for the second time) brought up the word "cheese". In any event, slides of the presentation are included in this page.

Patents in a Standard Make Patent Ambush, Legal Assault



This was pointed out before and also shown using an example from the news, the context being Microsoft's OOXML. Just because something becomes widespread or standardised does not mean that associated software patents are rendered moot. Here you have a new example of this.

MPEG-2 Patent Owners Sue Target Corporation for MPEG-2 Patent Infringement



PEG LA, LLC, world leader in alternative one-stop patent licenses, today announced that several MPEG-2 patent owners have filed an enforcement action in the Federal District Court of the Southern District of New York against Target Corporation (“Target”) and Doe Corporations 1-10, fictitious names for corporations currently unknown to the plaintiffs, for infringing patents essential to the MPEG-2 digital video compression standard used worldwide in digital television broadcasting and DVD.


Let this remind you not to touch OOXML.

flickr:2400034217



Program Guides Patented Because They Are Electronic



How would you respond to lawsuit threats and extortion extraction of money for "onscreen electronic program guides"? Many things, once they become electronic and have an implemented equivalent, are suddenly finding themselves 'owned' by individuals and used for profit.

Gemstar-TV Guide International, which holds numerous patents to onscreen electronic program guides (EPGs), said Monday it has reached a patent license deal with cable TV set-top manufacturer Digeo, which effectively ends patent lawsuits between the two companies.

[...]

Gemstar-TV Guide filed the patent infringement lawsuit against Digeo in October 2006, alleging the company’s Moxi interactive television program guide infringed upon patents it owned. Digeo later filed a countersuit against Gemstar-TV Guide alleging it had infringed some of Digeo’s EPG technology patents.


One favourite example of digitising ideas to have them patented is Amazon's recommendations system which is based on history of purchases. It's the equivalent of book recommendations by a librarian who is familiar with the literature. When computerised it can be claimed a 20th- or 21st-century 'invention' worthy of a patent.

Recent Techrights' Posts

Michael “Monty” Widenius: It Started in 1983 With Richard Stallman (RMS)
The other co-founder of MySQL is a bit notorious for confronting RMS rather viciously
For the Second Time in a Few Weeks Microsoft Lunduke Makes False Accusations Against Senior Red Hat Staff to Incite a Despicable 'Troll Army'
Nothing that Microsoft Lunduke claims of says can be trusted
su lisa && rm -rf /home/ibm/power
Novell was ruined by another person from IBM, Ronald Hovsepian
A Record Demand at Microsoft: Demand to Cancel
What we're witnessing is a very ungraceful destruction of XBox
 
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Thursday, October 02, 2025
IRC logs for Thursday, October 02, 2025
Slopwatch: Linux Journal, Google News, and LinuxSecurity
They carry on polluting the Web with fake articles
Gemini Links 02/10/2025: Kubernetes With FreeBSD and robots.txt
Links for the day
Links 02/10/2025: 'Open' 'AI' Resorting to Gimmicks and Fake Funding, Europe’s ‘Drone Wall’ Discussed
Links for the day
Links 02/10/2025: Brave Passes 100M Users Milestone, Kodak Selling Its Own Film Again
Links for the day
Microsoft is Losing Europe
Hence all the "support" and "discount" offers that are limited to Europe
The Free Software Foundation Starts Fund-raising for 40th Anniversary
New pop-up 2-3 days ahead of the 40th anniversary event
Systemd Breaks Networking in Debian and Microsoft Staff Rushes to Make Face-Saving Excuses in LWN
Microsoft's bluca is already there in the comments, his Microsoft money pays for LWN to let him leave comments early
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Wednesday, October 01, 2025
IRC logs for Wednesday, October 01, 2025
What the End of XBox Will Look Like: a Fiery Crash
XBox is the next Skype. It won't last much longer. Expect many more layoffs.
Richard Stallman is Going to Finland to Give a Talk Next Thursday
A day later he speaks in Sweden
Gemini Links 02/10/2025: SMTP Pipelining and End of ROOPHLOCH 2025
Links for the day
Slopwatch: Plagiarism, Fake Articles, and FUD About Linux
not a day goes by without Google News feeding FUD from slopfarms
Gemini Links 01/10/2025: Chat Control and End of Life
Links for the day
Links 01/10/2025: Long Covid Risk Reiterated, "Bitcoin Queen" Caught
Links for the day
Links 01/10/2025: EA $55 Billion Deal is Debt and Slop "Raises Vishing Risks"
Links for the day
Bluewashing at Red Hat Means Redundancies
The man who sold Red Hat to IBM meanwhile became a Microsoft Mono booster
After Killing OpenSource.com, IBM ('Red Hat') and OSI Told Us OpenSource.net Would Replace It (But That Didn't Happen)
Now it's time to move on, perhaps tarnishing the "Open Source" label some more (for whatever sponsor wants this)
Linux is Not a Community Project, It's a Wall Street Product
The core goal should be freedom
Bad Actors Abusing the Free Software Community, Vandalising It Using Rogue Politics and Old Tactics
Oil giants have long attempted to do this; now, the digital equivalent of Big Oil does this in technology
Social Control Media Isn't the Future, The Federation or Fediverse Isn't Growing, People's Accounts Vanish for Good
users' accounts will get deleted, not just become inactive
IBM is Failing, This Helps Show Wall Street is Entirely Detached From Actual Commercial Performance
IBM is unable to grow, it's just constantly shrinking
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Tuesday, September 30, 2025
IRC logs for Tuesday, September 30, 2025
Clerical Aspects of Publishing and Development
In Free software, the management aspects are considerably reduced
Slopwatch: Fake Articles and Google News Promoting "Linux" Spam or Bot-Generated Fear, Uncertainty, Doubt (FUD)
These slopfarms help misplace blame
Third Wave of Microsoft Layoffs in September, This Time Many in Liverpool Affected
Be ready for more waves of layoffs ahead of the so-called "results" in late October