Bonum Certa Men Certa

Patents Roundup: When the Patent Systems Turn Against People and Adjust According to Patent Lawyers and Their Largest Clients



Reform jokeSummary: A look at the Singaporean, US, and Chinese patent systems, which are all becoming more aggressive and more disconnected from public interests, in favour of large multinational corporations

THE following article is an outline of various bits of patent news that are too short to merit an article of their own.



Singapore as Hub for Patent Trolls



We recently wrote about Creative (what's left of it) staging a patent war against Android and by extension against Linux [1, 2]. What was interesting about it might be the role of Singapore, not Texas. Singapore is increasingly becoming a venue of patent trolls, not just notorious tyrants, tax evaders, and exploited labour from south Asia (I know about this having studied the country for about 4 years and visited the country as well). Based on IAM, a proponent of patent trolls, Singapore's role as a litigation and/or trolling hub is on the rise. Here is the part about Creative:

There are, though, exceptions to this broad trend. Creative Technology is one clear example. The company was a pathfinder in the field of MP3 and audio products, and as its device business has declined, it has turned to its patent portfolio to shore up its balance sheet. In March it launched US patent litigation against Samsung, LG, Lenovo and others over an MP3 player patent that has previously yielded a $100 million settlement with Apple. Nevertheless, the amount of legal and transactional IP expertise in Singapore probably exceeds the ability of local companies to put it to use.


Appeals



Putting aside various pieces that are less relevant to us, Lexology published "Pending Patent Trial and Appeal Board’s (PTAB) Final Written Decision Does Not Require Stay and Does Not Justify Rule 60 Relief: WesternGeco LLC v. ION Geophysical Corp."

"This is basically about tilting the system against defendants/challengers and in favour of patenters (as usual), by giving them an opportunity to change their patent (or application) after it had been granted."PTAB increasingly creeps in or enters the debate because it helps demolish software patents, albeit not at a pace high enough to undo the USPTO's terrible work (not doing quality assessment or prior art search, just granting almost everything that arrives as an application, sooner or later).

Writing about Inter Partes Reviews at PTAB, Patently-O recently noted that: "In a short opinion, the Federal Circuit has reaffirmed the USPTO’s tightly restrictive approach to amendment practice in Inter Partes Review (IPR) proceedings. Under the rules, a patentee has one opportunity to propose amendments or substitute claims. However, the motion to amend will only be granted if the patentee also demonstrates in the motion that the proposed amendments would make the claims patentable over the known prior art. See Idle Free Sys., Inc. v. Bergstrom, Inc., IPR2012–00027, 2013 WL 5947697 (PTAB June 11, 2013)."

This is basically about tilting the system against defendants/challengers and in favour of patenters (as usual), by giving them an opportunity to change their patent (or application) after it had been granted. Are any rules at all capable of passing which seek to restore sanity and fix this system, except when Congress or the Supreme Court get involved (the former gave us PTAB and the latter gave us Alice)? Shearman & Sterling LLP writes in favour of secrecy in "The Patent Agent Privilege" (more on secrecy later) and judging by some of the upcoming major patent cases, claim construction at the PTAB may be under attack already (as part of Cuozzo Speed v Lee, which we wrote about before).

"When will patent applications not be presumed eligible by default, even when challenged by PTAB (whereupon the patenter gets a rather bizarre right to alter the patent)?"Speaking of Congress, remember that PTAB only came after the America Invents Act (AIA) and some patent lawyers treat it as an obstacle which they want to get rid of rather than respect or honour (the same goes for Alice). A guest post in Patently-O, composed by a person who "received a (gratis) copy of this text" to write a review about it, isn't particularly positive about it. Jason Rantanen says about this book, "Patents After the AIA," that "the authors were under significant time pressure in getting this project out the door" and he points out many problems with the book. Well, this is what one ought to expect from political and self-serving 'books'.

How far will this terrible system go? When will patent applications not be presumed eligible by default, even when challenged by PTAB (whereupon the patenter gets a rather bizarre right to alter the patent)?

First They Went After Your Software (Abstract), Now After Your Life



Any patents on life at the USPTO should be seriously considered the pinnacle of institutional failure. Some companies now claim to 'own' the food chain (usually through GMO monopolies) and some claim to 'own' health treatment, DNA/genome, etc. Such privatisation or looting of the Commons is turning what's public (and abundant in nature) into private property of few who are extremely affluent.

"Such privatisation or looting of the Commons is turning what's public (and abundant in nature) into private property of few who are extremely affluent."Nevertheless, ethics thrown aside, patent lawyers love these; the more, the merrier (more income). "Elena S. Polovnikova is an attorney with Kilpatrick Townsend & Stockton LLP," says her biography, and here she is promoting patents on life at the site which is most notorious for software patents advocacy. Patents on life now exist at EPO (most controversial such patents) and at the USPTO. Companies like Monsanto want to own everything in nature using patents, which they themselves 'interject' into fields by what many call GMO 'contamination'. Watch IAM ([1] below) playing a role in pressuring India, a large victim of Monsanto (where many farmers commit suicide due to it), into this massive scam which is patents on life/biology. Watch IAM running sponsored 'analyses' (paid-for ads) [1, 2] to that effect. Shame on IAM. There's an evil aspect to it and it is now a wholly parasitic business (associated with bureaucracy around this). No wonder groups march to the EPO sites to protest such patents. It's just about as unethical as it can get, probably even worse than software patents.

Openwashing the USPTO



Speaking of IAM with its endless propaganda, watch it serving as the USPTO's megaphone (de facto marketing) while the USPTO itself is openwashing (with "Open Data") the whole operation ("Patent and Trademark Office Uses Open Data to Bring Patent Info to the Masses").

"When will sanity be restored and when will the USPTO recognise that its role should be to promote innovation, not grant and promote monopolies?"Bringing monopolies to "the masses" is more like inducing willful patent infringement, thereby making "the masses" more legally liable and thus indebted. When will sanity be restored and when will the USPTO recognise that its role should be to promote innovation, not grant and promote monopolies?

China and SEPs



The USPTO, as we explained earlier this month, had amended its guidelines in lieu with a pro-software patents decision (involving Microsoft, which seems rather happy about it). The SIPO in China did something similar before that. The USITO woke up to it a long time later and wrote:

The guidelines for infringement have two major changes: 1) It deleted the clause about standard-essential patents (SEPs) 2) It deleted the clause about joint infringement


These "standard-essential patents" are basically a weapon against FOSS, very much like FRAND. These are patent thickets which deny entrance by FOSS contenders -- the same sorts of thickets which IAM keeps promoting (it's all about patent conglomerates that use patents to perpetuate and guard their dominance).

Secrecy in the Eastern District of Texas



In other news of interest, the EFF recently managed, after a huge endevaour and some repeated failures, to unseal details of a patent case. Watch how Blue Spike, a parasite which we covered here before [1, 2] (it had won the EFF's Stupid Patent Of The Month award two years ago), sought to keep itself immune/safe from criticism:

In a victory for the First Amendment and public access to court proceedings, a magistrate judge ruled in favor of EFF’s motion to unseal documents in a patent case in the Eastern District of Texas. This means that the patent owner in that case, Blue Spike, will no longer be able to shield from the public its arguments about how the defendant infringes its patents. Also, the court has indicated that it will publish public versions of important rulings that, until now, had been completely hidden from the public.

[...]

In its response, Blue Spike did not dispute that the First Amendment applied. Instead, it argued that because EFF wanted to write more blog posts about Blue Spike—posts Blue Spike felt were disparaging—the public should not be allowed to examine Blue Spike’s claims of infringement. In other words, because Blue Spike does not agree with EFF’s commentary about its litigation, it contends that we (and the public at large) should not see the relevant court records at all.


We are not hoping to abolish the patent system but to see a system which actually promotes innovation, transparency, sharing of information and so on, not extortion, secrecy, protectionism, and deception.

Related/contextual items from the news:


  1. Political pressure on examiners is no way to reform India's patent system
    The battle over the Indian patent sought by Gilead Sciences for its Hepatitis C drug Sofosbuvir (branded Sovaldi) seemingly came to a conclusion last week when the country's patent office reversed course to grant the US drug maker protection for the compound. It’s another reminder that while India is well-known to be a difficult jurisdiction for pharmaceutical innovators, things don’t always play out according to that script. But last week also saw the public airing of troubling accusations of political pressure brought to bear on patent examiners in this high profile case. As the country mulls reforms to its IP system, it’s important that these questions be addressed.


Recent Techrights' Posts

The Register MS (Situation Publishing) is Participating in a Ponzi Scheme
The market in "tech" seems awful when a lot of it sells a fraud and journalism about this market is part of the fraud
Mass Layoffs in Starbucks... and Society Loses Nothing of Value
Society might even be better off if Starbucks shuts down entirely
Matthew J. Garrett Behaved in a Similar Fashion to 4Chan and Kiwi Farms
Opposites attract? Are they opposites at all?
Drew DeVault Suggests "CoC Enhancement", Starts Trolling Projects in Microsoft GitHub
And it backfires immediately
 
Links 27/09/2025: Australia Might Ban Microsoft GitHub for Young People, Likely Illegal Executive Order Turns TikTok Into Cheeto Propaganda
Links for the day
Repeating the Lies to Promote a Ponzi Scheme is Not OK Because "Many Other Sites Do This" (Including Slopfarms)
They already work on the next Ponzi scheme
Glimmer of Hope: More People Realise and Come to Accept "AI" is Just a Giant, Elaborate Ponzi/Pyramid Scheme That Will Leave Everyone Worse Off (Except the "Top of the Pyramid")
quoting Einhorn and some comments
Do Your Job and Demand Your Compensation - But in That Order.
We'll do our best to convince the Judge to award all costs to us (lawyers, barrister, LIP bills etc.) plus judgements against them, for abusive litigation and needless suffering associated with that abuse
Like Nazi Germany and Volkswagen
Tell us all about "freedom" when your government runs a Ponzi scheme
Microsoft Sponsored This Man, Microsoft Sponsored His Behaviour (and He Controls Microsoft)
They get what they paid for
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Friday, September 26, 2025
IRC logs for Friday, September 26, 2025
He Talks Too Much, He Says Dumb Things
only British when that suits him
Slopwatch: FUD and Plagiarism (Working Against Linux) Promoted and Rewarded by Google News
Shame on Google News
Reminder: We're Unloading Some Publications to Tux Machines
About 15 years ago I was struggling to keep up with TechDirt
The E-mail Protocol is for Text
bad netiquette
Gemini Links 26/09/2025: Slop in OpenStreetMap and MOPML (My Own Private Markup Language)
Links for the day
Links 26/09/2025: More Provocations Against NATO by Russia (Near Alaska, USA), Microsoft Booster Accenture Has Mass Layoffs
Links for the day
Links 26/09/2025: Hardware, Security, Health, and Nuclear Armament
Links for the day
Links 26/09/2025: "Digital Fatigue" and Slop Frenzy (Hype) Ruining Work Productivity, Culture, Languages
Links for the day
Brett Wilson LLP Unwilling to Disclose or Explain How 'Hulk Hogan of UEFI' Pays for His SLAPPs Against Us (He Cannot Afford These), So We Are Escalating
Escalated in the British authorities
What 'Hulk Hogan of UEFI' Could Learn From Jimmy Kimmel About the 'Streisand Effect'
Lawyering up is risky and is usually doesn't work
Linux is Replacing Apple
Apple is money down the drain. Not only are the gadgets overpriced; they cost a lot to maintain and keep going over time
"We don't have that kind of relationship with Microsoft. The only public key that every UEFI firmware is guaranteed to have is Microsoft's, and only Microsoft owns the private key."
This is how to sabotage GNU/Linux distros that Microsoft does not control
Slopwatch: linuxconfig.org, linuxsecurity.com, and Google's Promotion of the Worst and Most Prolific Slopfarms
Over in Google News it has been quite chaotic this past day
Gemini Links 26/09/2025: Reading RSS Feeds, ROOPHLOCH 202
Links for the day
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Thursday, September 25, 2025
IRC logs for Thursday, September 25, 2025
Links 25/09/2025: More European Airports Shut Down Due to What Seems Like Russian Drones
Links for the day
Gemini Links 25/09/2025: Amiga Revived and Hackers (UTF-8)
Links for the day
Purchasing Concert Tickets in 2025 in Manchester: The "Modern" Experience
I recently spent a couple of days here testing the "terrain" in order to better understand how large public venues, for concerts rather than sporting events like football, currently "work"
Links 25/09/2025: French Unions Want Another Strike, Super Typhoon Ragasa Kills Many
Links for the day
Microsoft 'Secure Boot' and Shim as Barrier or Obstacle to New GNU/Linux Users Trying to Escape Microsoft
Just as intended all along
Lovers and Haters
Always beware hate preachers and demagogues (or how they frame issues or whose fault they distract from)
Focusing on What People Have in Common Instead of Killing and Cancelling One Another
Men and women of both "wings" stand to gain a lot by working together on common interests
'Cancel Culture' Isn't About Enforcing Ethics (and It's Done by People on the Right, Not "The Leftists")
Smarter folks would leave social control media
Russia's Attack on Europe (and NATO) Will Worsen Censorship and Corruption in Europe
Can we still debate issues that predate the invasion of Crimea?
Lawyers Should Permanently Lose Their Licence (and Worse) for Using Chatbots in Legal Work
They not only waste people's money and time. They pollute the literature with falsehoods. They commit perjury. [...] Brett Wilson LLP sent the Judge nearly 1,000 pages of material (mostly mine, copied without proper permission) shortly before a short Hearing, which lasted less than an hour
GAFAM and MATA (Mythical, Metaphor) as Explained by analognowhere.com
They're instruments of suppression that sponsor the oppressor
We've Already Mentioned Who Nowadays Funds Garrett's SLAPP Against Us (Not Garrett), Let's Examine Who Sponsored His Litigation Partner (Other Than Microsoft Salaries There's a Buddy of Bill Gates)
it's alleged that the Serial Strangler from Microsoft got money from him
Florian Müller: Using Software Patents to Attack Software Developers, Agitate Against Patent Reform
He also promotes attacks on the German Constitution and laws
Reliance on Typepad Seems to Have Doomed the Voice of Software Patents and Patent Maximalists in PatentDocs
Follow the money
UEFI 'Secure Boot' is Potential Mayhem to the Environment (Older and Leaner Distros Stop Working)
creating new problems, disguised as "solutions" to problems that do not exist
Sometimes 'Cancel Culture' Backfires Badly
There's no such thing as "too much" coverage
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Wednesday, September 24, 2025
IRC logs for Wednesday, September 24, 2025
Links 25/09/2025: Jimmy Kimmel Returns to Air (With Limitations) and London Stansted Airport Latest to Have Incident (Fire)
Links for the day
Slopwatch: Fake Articles, SPAM With Slop, and Google News Directs People to Read Slopfarms
why does Google News insist on still linking to prolific slopfarms?
Gemini Links 25/09/2025: New Game for Gemini Protocol, Eleven, and Network Solutions Woes
Links for the day