Bonum Certa Men Certa

PTAB Helps Defend and Encourage Work by Actual Technology Companies in the US, the Patent Trolls' Lobby is Upset

Parasitic firms find it harder to troll

High Tech Inventors Alliance members



Summary: The Patent Trial and Appeal Board (PTAB), which continues to invalidate software patents by the thousands, comes under attack from the expected sites, namely those that are fronting for patent trolls and parasites

THE appeal board/judges at the USPTO are very popular. Everyone loves them. Except parasites with low-quality patents.



The High Tech Investors Alliance, a pro-PTAB group which was created not too long ago, explains that having no potent software patents (and other low-quality patents) is a good thing. Here is what the media said some days ago:

The High Tech Investors Alliance has responded to contentions that recent legislation and US Supreme Court decisions, including the Alice Corp v CLS Bank case, have weakened the US patent system.

In an open letter, the association, whose members include Adobe, Amazon, Google and Intel, said that the facts “tell a completely different story”.

“Innovation has thrived—indeed exploded—as measured by ever significant metric. Research and development spending, venture capital investment, startup activity, and patent applications each have increased dramatically, while the US GDP has grown by a healthy 9 percent to the highest level in history,” it explained.


As usual, it's worth checking the response from the patent extremists. Have they got any valid arguments against PTAB? Not really.

IAM continues with its anti-PTAB rhetorics, also in India, typically by speaking to maximalists. Here is what it wrote some days ago about India’s Intellectual Property Appellate Board:

In the meantime, the upshot for rights holders is that a key part of the patent system simply does not work. Essenese Obhan of Obhan & Associates calls the situation “disastrous” for patent owners, explaining: “All appeals from controller orders remain pending, as a result of which patent owners whose patents were wrongly refused by the patent office are stuck while their patent term slowly expires”. While clients can approach the court on a writ regarding opposition and revocation cases, doing so adds to their cost burden.


As a reminder, IAM keeps lobbying India for software patents. We covered examples earlier this year, for example in:

  1. China Adopts Software Patents and IAM 'Magazine' (Lobbyists) Continues to Shame India Into It
  2. IAM Just Can't Stop Pushing for Software Patents in India
  3. IAM 'Magazine' as Megaphone for Chamber of Corporates (CoC), Which Tries Shaming India Into Software Patenting
  4. IAM Helps Enemies of India's Interests Lobby for Software Patents in the Country
  5. IAM 'Magazine' in a Campaign to Destroy India's IT Industry and Help Patent Trolls There
  6. IAM is a Think Tank for Patent Trolls, Software Patents, the EPO, Microsoft, and Whoever Else is Willing to Pay
  7. The Patent Microcosm's Failed Push for Software Patents Resurgence in the US and Similar Attempts in India and China


Over at Managing IP, another site of patent maximalists, Fitzpatrick was entertained with a so-called 'study' (likely biased because of the firm behind it). To quote:

For the first time, the Patent Trial and Appeal Board has upheld the majority of claims in IPR proceedings for four consecutive quarters, a Fitzpatrick 2016 study reveals


They are trying to promote the illusion that PTAB is getting weaker, probably in an effort to attract more business.

Patently-O, another site of patent maximalists, said this a few days ago: "Post-AIA patent applications are now trickling up to the PTAB in ex parte appeals from examiner rejections. In the recent decision Ex Parte Kirk, APPEAL 2017-003486, (Patent Tr. & App. Bd. Oct. 26, 2017), the Board affirmed an examiner’s obviousness rejection based upon the combination of a 102(a)(1) reference (an application published prior to Kirk’s effective filing date) and a 102(a)(2) reference (an application published subsequent to Kirk€´s effective filing date, but filed prior to that date). In the appeal, the Board did not expressly consider the propriety of applying 102(a)(2) references to the obviousness analysis. See also, Ex Parte Linkedin Corp., APPEAL 2017-005043 (Patent Tr. & App. Bd. Sept. 25, 2017)."

PTAB is certainly working as hard as ever and is doing the right thing. It also eliminates many software patents. To quote the latest examples, courtesy of the pro-software patents Patent Buddy:



The next post, which is about Alice, will show that software patents are weaker than ever. They're basically being revoked even if they were granted before Alice. Thanks to PTAB for the most part...

Recent Techrights' Posts

What's Very Vexing to GAFAM, EPO and Others Is That It's Incredibly Hard to Censor Us (and Nobody Ever Successfully Did That Before)
resist, do not capitulate
Receiving SLAPPs and Collecting Them Like Trophies (the SLAPPs Always Fail)
People who file lawsuits bring even more attention to themselves (or to embarrassing statements about them)
Year of GNU/Linux on the Laptop?
It's not happening only in Lenovo
What People Must Understand About the Open Source Initiative (OSI)
some facts about the Open Source Initiative (OSI)
More Copyright Lawsuits Against LLM Slop Providers and Suppliers of LLM Slopfarms Would Benefit Society
It's not just bad for the Web and for society; it's also legally dangerous
 
Links 27/04/2025: Death of Nest Thermostats, Death of Metaverse
Links for the day
Links 27/04/2025: Projects Workflow and Discovering Technology
Links for the day
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Saturday, April 26, 2025
IRC logs for Saturday, April 26, 2025
Microsoft Isn't on the Map in USSR
To them, it's either Google or Yandex
In Central America Windows Became a Small Force
These are countries where Windows used to have well over 95% of the "market"
Site May be Even Faster Now
It basically takes less than a tenth of a second to serve the page
Many of the Scandals Are Interconnected (Overlapping People and Corporations)
We're only getting started
Links 26/04/2025: General Assassinated in the Town of Balashikha, US Promoting Seafloor Mining
Links for the day
Links 26/04/2025: Facebook Layoffs Again, Remembering What's Real, and Say No to Mass Surveillance
Links for the day
Links 26/04/2025: NOAA Budget Cuts and "Dog Days Ahead"
Links for the day
In defence of JD Vance, death of Pope Francis
Reprinted with permission from Daniel Pocock
Three Years in Prison for Disney Employee’s ‘Menu Hacking’: The Economic Fallout of Digital Menus
Reprinted with permission from Ryan Farmer
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Friday, April 25, 2025
IRC logs for Friday, April 25, 2025
Links 25/04/2025: Slop Fatigue and Patent Judges Flocking to Fake, Unconstitutional and Illegal Kangaroo Court (UPC, Captured 'Justice')
Links for the day
Gemini Links 25/04/2025: Night Manager and Devuan in Hosting
Links for the day
Approaching 10,000 Articles/Pages Since Going Static
Trying to silence or derail the site was always a dumb strategy
Windows Falls to New Lows in Nicaragua, Now Below a Quarter (It Used to be Almost 100%)
Another all-time low for Windows
Microsoft is Shedding Off Loads of Staff and That Can be Dangerous Too
Working for Microsoft is a choice; nobody forces you to do it
Richard Stallman and the Unix Philosophy
When asked about systemd people must remember that RMS speaks as an active Board member of the FSF and also the founder of the FSF
The Cost (to Linux) of LLM Slop
Slop 'artists' like Fagioli are far from harmless
Links 25/04/2025: Ubisoft Spyware, Hegseth Fails at Tech on Every Level
Links for the day
Gemini Links 25/04/2025: Food Forest Update and Facebook Destroying the Net
Links for the day
Get Rid of Back Doors, Don't Obsess Over Bounties and Other Corporate PR Stunts (or Needless Reboot Rituals)
Security as a term has mostly lost its meaning due to repeated misuse for many years
Serial Sloppers Are Killing the Web (They Probably Don't Care, Either)
Slop is a disease on the Web
Streaming Apps Are “Investor Fraud” That Kills the Planet
Reprinted with permission from Ryan Farmer
Things Get Increasingly Nasty at Microsoft Ahead of the Fake Results and May's Mass Layoffs Wave
They try to get people to 'resign' so that they won't count as layoffs and the company's 'wellbeing' will seem better
IBM's Debt Ballooned by 8.5 Billion Dollars in Just 3 Months!
Hallmark of a company in a state of disarray, trying to spend its way out of trouble
Big Trouble in GNOME
even GNOME people admit the CoC went wrong
Slopping the Trough: Disney Plus Loses Billions and the Decline of Physical Media in America
Reprinted with permission from Ryan Farmer
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Thursday, April 24, 2025
IRC logs for Thursday, April 24, 2025