Bonum Certa Men Certa

Symptoms of the Sickness of the Patent System and Apple's Infinite Greed

Steve Jobs with patent
Original photo by Matt Buchanan; edited by Techrights



Summary: The patent system receives more mockery and jabs while monopolies like Apple exploit it in order to marginalise competition

PATENTS are not an ethical thing in general, but their original intent was a positive one. The patent system was created to protect the small guy/girl (the "inventor") from the big companies. That's at least part of the story. Nowadays, the patent system does exactly the opposite thing by crushing the small guy/girl (unless it's a patent troll and a parasite) and the funny thing is that public money is being used to fund this injustice.



As TechDirt puts it

Why Does The US Gov't Get To Patent Research Paid For By Public Tax Dollars?



An anonymous reader links us to a report from The National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), which came out earlier this year, that highlights how, in 2008, the US government brought in $170 million (pdf) by licensing federally (i.e., taxpayer-funded) technology and patents to private companies.


This is not the exception by the way. Other countries are doing this and in some cases, the entities generated by taxpayers turn into patent aggressors (CSIRO for example [1, 2]). In other cases, publicly-funded research, some of which gets classified as academic, turns into startups with patents which are in turn being used to exclude the public. This practice is commonplace in medicine.

What's not helping here is: 1) too many patents are being granted too easily; 2) patents are being granted to monopolies; 3) patents are too broad in terms of scope; 4) litigation/application is too expensive for the small guy/girl to be able to afford.

The written description requirement for patents is perhaps about to change, based on this new article.

The court stated, “The ’516 patent discloses no working or even prophetic examples of methods that reduce NF-kB activity, and no completed synthesis of any of the molecules prophesized to be capable of reducing NF-kB activity”


This seems to address issues with patents in general but not with software patents. How about those notorious "over the Internet" patents, which are acquired for just about anything in the analogue world, only when applied as a digital service? How about "on the cloud" patents, which TechDirt considers to be a looming problem?

With so much focus on "cloud computing" these days, companies looking to leap into the cloud and to embrace the agility and flexibility it provides are being warned that there may be a looming problem on the horizon: patent litigation. Seriously. As with pretty much any hot area of technology these days, there's a pretty big patent thicket around cloud computing -- even if the basic technology really isn't all that different than what's been around for ages. But, of course, that won't stop opportunistic companies from claiming their patents cover new cloud services (or of having some players in the field attack competitors with patents).


Here we have a new patent from a company that 'innovated' "wireless handset communication system" and sued Apple (because Apple has cash).

In 1999, a company called NetAirus Technologies applied for a patent on a “wireless handset communication system,” and though laughably broad, the United States Patent and Trademark Office granted it in 2006. Now, four years later, the company is using it to come after Apple (AAPL). On Friday, NetAirus filed suit against Apple, alleging that the iPhone–as a concept–infringes on its intellectual property.

[..]

How a patent so overly board could have made it through the USPTO is beyond me.


Apple is hardly a victim of this system though. Apple is an aggressor against Free software and against software in general now that it attacks Ogg Theora along with Microsoft. We covered the subject in:



One post that received too little attention is this opinion piece which says:

Maxwell's comments aside, I know that I personally contacted Theora's handlers (Xiph.org) at multiple points on Friday about the alleged patent issue and did not receive the courtesy of any response from them. If Apple or other patent holder had a similar experience, perhaps they have been contacted and Maxwell just doesn't know about it (yet).

Frankly I'm not surprised that a patent pool is being assembled against Theora at this time. As a Theora user myself (Firefox 3.6 !!) I've seen how good the codec is which makes it a potential threat to the patent holders. Good technology unfortunately always seems to be at risk from those who think that their intellectual property is being infringed upon.

That said, I would hope that one of the various open source patent commons can step up and help out Theora with some defensive patents and/or legal assistance. The great thing about open source is that the code is open, so if someone does come forward and show a patent claim (legitimate or otherwise), there is always an opportunity to code around it.


The patent system and software patents in particular have become a threat to culture. Being passive is not an attractive option here.

“One of the ways that the EPO has done this is by issuing software patents in defiance of the treaty that set it up.”

--Richard Stallman

Comments

Recent Techrights' Posts

Our Case is a Very Easy Win, the SLAPPs From Microsofters Were a Grave Error, and Censoring Information Won't Work (It'll Only Ever Backfire)
Censoring is what people do when they lose the argument
 
Slopwatch: Mindless Slop Pieces, Fake Images and Text, Linux FUD on the Cheap
spewed out by Microsoft-controlled LLMs
Links 04/06/2025: Workers' Strikes, Sudan Exodus
Links for the day
Links 04/06/2025: Linux Foundation PR Spam and Lee Jae-myung Wins Election
Links for the day
Gemini Links 04/06/2025: Future Leaders of the World and Platforming Jordan Peterson
Links for the day
Links 04/06/2025: WSL Backfiring on Microsoft and "Disney, Microsoft Announce Massive Layoffs"
Links for the day
Say the Truth, the Rest Will Follow
There's no guarantee that writing the truth will result in an audience (or readership), but over time - in the long run - people generally gravitate towards what they know or feel to be crude truth, not just what's comforting (albeit false or self-deluding, usually groupthink dictated from above)
How to Expose High-Level Corruption Without Getting in (Too Much) Trouble
Democracy depends on free press and freedom of the press depends on being able to safely publish (and keep available) material that bad people don't want to be known to anybody
In-Depth EPO Coverage at Techrights Turns Eleven
11 years is a very long time
Windows Measured Below 10% in Afghanistan, GNU/Linux Gaining a Lot
about 80% are Android (Linux) users, compared to only about 10% for Windows
Poland's Political Predicament and Social Control Media
Democracy and fake "tech" don't mix well; the latter tends to interfere with the former and that's why we get more "Putins" out there
EPO: Taking Away From the Staff to Give More to the Rich
The Central Staff Committee (CSC) wrote to EPO staff earlier this week
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Tuesday, June 03, 2025
IRC logs for Tuesday, June 03, 2025
Abuse Inside the Polish Patent Office (UPRP) - Part I: It's a Lot Like the EPO
we can commence a series soon
Gemini Links 04/06/2025: Inescapable Questions and Quitting All "Oligarch Tech"
Links for the day
Slopwatch: Linux FUD From Slopfarms, Blaming Linux for Microsoft Issues; Even WebProNews Has Become a Slopfarm (Googlebombing "Linux" With Slop Images and Fake/Plagiarised Text)
The Web is really getting bad; it's also overwhelmed by fake material or plagiarised material, wherein the plagiarism gets disguised/hidden by LLM sausage factories
Links 03/06/2025: Tiananmen Square Massacre Censorship and Growing Military Activities Around Taiwan
Links for the day
Linux is Already Dominant (Android), Let's Make GNU/Linux Dominant in Desktops/Laptops as Well
"Dr. Stallman recently warned everybody about Microsoft."
The Loyalty to Microsoft and the Salaries From Microsoft (Funding SLAPPs Against Techrights and Tux Machines)
Garrett always knows better. He knows everything best.
Windows Falls in Italy as GNU/Linux Jumps to 5%
Italy knows a thing or two about digital autonomy
Nigeria is All Android and Google
Windows down to almost nothing in Africa's largest population
Mass Layoffs at Microsoft (Second Wave) Not Limited to Redmond
"More layoffs at Microsoft as axe falls in Washington and California"
Gemini Links 03/06/2025: Forth System and "Common Lisp is a Dumpster"
Links for the day
The Leaks Were Right: Mass Layoffs at Microsoft in May, Then Another Wave in June
Just as we've been saying for over a month
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Monday, June 02, 2025
IRC logs for Monday, June 02, 2025
Last Article From Australia's Sam Varghese Was a Year Ago and It Covered the Release of Julian Assange, Who Will Apparently Come Back as 'Politician'
It'll soon be exactly 12 months
Hungary Seems Hungry for Linux
Windows down by a lot
Like in Europe, Bad News for Microsoft in US and Canada
If it loses those "regions", then what's left?
About 8 Waves of Mass Layoffs at Microsoft in 2025 (in Less Than 5 Months), Now Vista 11 "Market Share" Decreases
Really bad news for shareholders of Microsoft
statCounter Sees Bing "Share" Falling Over 0.5% in One Month, Now Lower Than Before the ChatGPT/Bing Chat Hype
Bing has been part of the mass layoffs for quite some time
After Microsoft's Bankruptcy in Russia Android (Linux) Will Dominate Asia Completely
Windows probably peaked in "XP" or "2000"
Microsoft's Demise is a Global Phenomenon
mass layoffs justified using mindless buzzwords
All-Time Highs for GNU/Linux in EU and the UK, All-Time Lows for Microsoft
Combining ChromeOS and GNU/Linux, it adds up to and almost reaches 6%
India: Windows Falls to 50% in Desktops/Laptops and 8% Overall
laptops/desktops fell to 16% of the whole
statCounter: GNU/Linux Up to 4.7% "Market Share" This Month
30,000 Microsoft jobs may be eliminated by year's end
Microsoft is in Trouble and Microsofters Know It
"I've been happy on Win 3.11 for years."
[Video] New Introduction to Richard Stallman's Contributions Including GNU Emacs, GNU/Linux, and Software Freedom
from the channel previously bullied for supporting RMS
Links 02/06/2025: South Korea to Vote, Russia Blitzed From Within
Links for the day
Links 02/06/2025: Political Leftovers, DRM, and Patents
Links for the day
Links 02/06/2025: Microsoft Spins Layoffs as "Slop", Frontier Settles Lawsuit
Links for the day
When You Publicly Boast About Wanting to Violently Attack People (Even Colleagues) Finding a Job Will Prove Difficult
there's a lesson to be learned here
The Web We Lost, the Information Lost Due to Microsoft's Attacks on Companies Like Yahoo! (Before the LLM Slop Frenzy)
When it comes to news sites, what can we say?
Covering Corruption in Poland, Including a War on Science (Due to Bad Politicians)
What we're about to show is that skilled and experienced scientists in Poland are besieged by bureaucrats
Gemini Links 02/06/2025: "Star Wars Day" and "Security Day"
Links for the day
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Sunday, June 01, 2025
IRC logs for Sunday, June 01, 2025