Bonum Certa Men Certa

The Anti-35 U.S.C. €§ 101 Lobby Pushes Old News Into the Headlines in an Effort to Resurrect/Protect Software Patents

Advanced Voice Recognition Systems, Inc. ("AVRS") has meanwhile sued Apple with what looks like software patents "in the field of speech recognition and transcription" (according to its own press release)

AVRS history
So the whole 'company' is just a pile of patents (since its inception)



Summary: The software patenting proponents (law firms for the most part) are still doing anything they can -- stretching even months into the past -- in an effort to modify the law in defiance of Supreme Court (SCOTUS) rulings

35 U.S.C. €§ 101 isn't too complicated. Based on (or partly inspired by) several SCOTUS decisions, Section 101 limits patent scope and notably eliminates patents on abstract things (or ideas, including algorithms). The USPTO's current guidelines ought to assure that no software patents will be granted anymore; nevertheless, there are conflicting interests. That's why inter partes reviews (IPRs) and court challenges are needed. But, as one might expect, the patent maximalists aren't happy; they see this as an "attack" (a word they use) on their occupation or an attempt to "kill" (also a word they sparingly use) patents. They nowadays sling their guns and shoot from the hip at IPRs, at judges, and at courts. Some if not many are based in Texas, so the gun-slinging metaphor seems apt; not to mention their obsession with words like "attacks" and "kills". They call some tribunals "death squads", evoking a colourful metaphor of genocide.



"They don't profit from innovation; they make a living from extortion and lawsuits."Anything that these patent maximalists (some we call "extremists" because they go even further) throw at 35 U.S.C. €§ 101 is easy to debunk; they just cannot tolerate patent quality, patent justice and so on. They want a culture of protection rackets, not of innovation. They don't profit from innovation; they make a living from extortion and lawsuits. Their trade involves writing threatening letters, demanding money.

35 U.S.C. €§ 101 hasn't been in the headlines lately, partly because of the summer vacation. Some pundits wrote about Mayo, which also helped shape 35 U.S.C. €§ 101. We wrote about Vanda 3 weeks ago in "The Dangerous Adoption of Patents on Life and Nature" and 3 months ago in "The Federal Circuit's (CAFC) Decisions Are Being Twisted by Patent Propaganda Sites". The case is about Mayo, not about Alice, and it isn't as "high level" as either of them. In a sense, it's hardly even a big deal at all. This is very old news, too. Why is Donald Zuhn catching up with it weeks if not months late? Is this the best method for pushing their anti-35 U.S.C. €§ 101 agenda yet again (as news is slow)?

Earlier this week Zuhn (McDonnell Boehnen Hulbert & Berghoff LLP) wrote:

The memorandum explains that in Vanda, the Federal Circuit determined that the claims at issue are "patent eligible under 35 U.S.C. €§ 101 because they are not 'directed to' a judicial exception" (emphasis in memorandum).


Why is this being brought up in July? Heck, why does Managing IP now cover SAS Institute v Iancu? Its latest issue is summarised as follows (this week): "The issue’s cover story assesses the impact that the US Supreme Court’s SAS Institute v Iancu decision has had– and will have – on the Patent Trial and Appeal Board."

The Patent Trial and Appeal Board (PTAB) is safe owing to Oil States (the far more important decision). No coverage of the more important decision? Not even in the cover story? Intentional bias? Bias by omission again?

Even Watchtroll's PTAB bashing has slowed down considerably, knowing that -- as per recent events (notably Oil States) -- the quality of patents in the US will continue to be scrutinised and PTAB not crushed. This is sadly what we've come to expect from media which is literally run by law firms -- an epidemic that suffocates real journalism regarding patent matters.

Yesterday Watchtroll resumed its PTAB bashing, cherry-picking an old Apple case. Another patent maximalist has since then brought up a Federal Circuit case, saying that in "Apple v Contentguard (Fed. Cir. 2018); Fed. Cir. Held that Patent Claims for a Copyright Management System Do Not Qualify for CBM Review: http://www.cafc.uscourts.gov/sites/default/files/opinions-orders/16-2548.Opinion.7-11-2018.pdf …"

Anything which concerns Apple is, as usual, receiving a lot more attention. In fact, yesterday we saw this new press release from Advanced Voice Recognition Systems, which is a "patent assertion" entity (more or less), as covered in the past weekend's posts. There seem to be no actual (finished) products and they merely list lawsuits and patents in their Web site as though these are their products. From their press release:

Advanced Voice Recognition Systems, Inc. ("AVRS") (OTC: AVOI) announced today that it has filed a lawsuit in the United States District Court-Northern District for Arizona against Apple, Inc. ("Apple") for infringement of U.S. Patent No. 7,558,730 entitled "Speech Recognition and Transcription Among Users Having Heterogeneous Protocols" (the "'730 Patent"). The '730 Patent is the first of AVRS' family of patents in the field of speech recognition and transcription


Those are software patents. They're algorithms. Watchtroll is also (on the same day) promoting the HEVC patent trap [1, 2] -- a trap which very clearly concerns patented software in large amounts (many patents, probably too many to challenge at scale, as per the MPEG-LA strategy). Watchtroll wrote:

HEVC (also known as H.265) is a video compression standard originally developed to provide high quality video coding using half the bandwidth.


Software patents all over this. All should be considered void under 35 U.S.C. €§ 101, but there are so many patents that nobody has the funds or will to challenge them all. Certainly not companies like Apple, which actively pariticipate in this "thickening" or "thicketing" (setting up barbwire around industry 'standards').

"Mozilla complained about it yesterday, dubbing it “An Invisible Tax”."The Section 101 conundrum will no doubt continue to occupy the media for a year (if not years) to come. The "thickening" (as in patent thickets) of software standards/APIs, preventing participation by those who lack a large number of patents, is what's at stake. Mozilla complained about it yesterday, dubbing it "An Invisible Tax".

Recent Techrights' Posts

The Goal of Coopetition Assumes You're Friends
it will never work with Microsoft
Seductive Mirage or Allure of Complex, Proprietary Coffee Machines (or Similar White Elephants)
Software is a lot like those things
Hate Mail From Anonymous Cowards
if this persists, we'll need to escalate
Informal Open Letter to the Lawyer of the Microsofters (on Who's Funding the SLAPPs Against Techrights)
Whenever I ask about the funding they try to change the subject and act all aggressive
 
Links 10/08/2025: From Social Control Media to Prison, New Examples of Windows TCO
Links for the day
Sloppy Reporting About Slop, or How The Register MS Lowers Its Standards
Maybe the management isn't even aware of this
IBM's Strategy: Cull 'Expensive' Workers, Replace Them With Cheaper Ones
So far we saw not even one rebuttal or challenge to the claim of Red Hat layoffs scheduled for tomorrow
If You Attack Somebody Too Much You Legitimise and Strengthen That Somebody
at the end those attacks add up to a "martyr" status
The Man Who Helped Microsoft Kill Linux is Trying to Delay Our Lawsuits Against Him
By conservative estimates, and based on court documents submitted by them, they're prepared to spend over a million dollars on lawyers, fighting against me and my wife
Gemini Links 10/08/2025: Gen Con 2025 and Framework Laptop
Links for the day
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Saturday, August 09, 2025
IRC logs for Saturday, August 09, 2025
The Register MS (Microsoft) or The Register AI (Slop)?
What a slopfest!
Is Red Hat About to Give the Boot to GNOME People Who Helped Microsoft 'Secure' (Monopolised) Boot?
It was always a dumb idea to play along with Microsoft's hardware mischief
Sales of Windows on PCs (Windows Licences) Go Down
Microsoft has a big problem in its hands
The Hype That Microsoft and The Register MS (Among Others) Promote Helps Stage DDoS Attacks on Free Software Sites
Microsoft is, to put it bluntly, pure evil
Links 09/08/2025: Putin Allegedly to Visit Alaska (Which He Deems Part of Russia), Mike Tyson Sued for Copyright Infringement
Links for the day
Slopwatch: Linux Journal, LinuxSecurity, and Google News With Its Slopfarms of Choice
SEO spam, made with LLMs
Follow the Money: The Register MS Gets Paid to Promote "Hey Hi" Ponzi Scheme/Hype, Some Fake 'Articles' Might Be Composed by LLMs Already
paid to promote slop
Gemini Links 09/08/2025: Rethinking Aliases and Posting on Gopher vs. the Web
Links for the day
Links 09/08/2025: Apollo 13 Astronaut Jim Lovell Dies, Slop Future Bleak
Links for the day
After Shutting Down Studios, Divisions, Applications (e.g. Skype) Microsoft is Also Shutting Down 'Apps'
Cuts all around as layoffs persist this month, Microsoft tries to get many people to resign, and debt skyrockets
Most of Geminispace Can Probably Fit on a CD-ROM or a DVD (the Textual Part)
If one excludes very large capsules and ones that contain non-textual contenty
Eventually UEFI 'Secure Boot' Will be Dropped (Users Will Demand Its Removal and Boycott Its Pushers)
we expect OEMs will just listen to users
The Register MS: We Know Slop is a Bubble and Mindless Hype, But We Get Paid to Participate
Call out the culprits
There Are Probably Over a Million Pages in Geminispace
there are two many limitations which merit a mention when it comes to assessing magnitude
Microsoft Lunduke is Just Provoking People for Provocation's Sake
Be forewarned and remember where this guy came from: Microsoft
Besieged by Plagiarists Who Play With LLMs and Image Fusions
We really need to exercise or use our collective voice to oppose Serial Sloppers
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Friday, August 08, 2025
IRC logs for Friday, August 08, 2025
Gemini Links 09/08/2025: Water Painting and Political Violence
Links for the day
Slopwatch: LLM Sloppers in Google News, LinuxSecurity, and More
they also perpetuate some falsehoods as the LLMs lack any comprehension
Links 08/08/2025: China King of Plastics and US Dictator Plans to Meet Russian Dictator
Links for the day
Gemini Links 08/08/2025: Cracking a Family Member's Password and Overdose of Slop
Links for the day
Red Hat's Latest Talent Hunt, Day Ahead of Mass Layoffs, is Yet Another Microsoft Executive
Red Hat will apparently commence mass layoffs early this coming Monday
Links 08/08/2025: "Quit Facebook" and High Cost of Microsoft/Windows Shown Again ("BlackSuit")
Links for the day
Good Morning, Readers of The Register MS
Things The Register MS could (but does not) cover this morning
Why Gemini Protocol Has a Bright Future
Maybe Gemini Protocol's promise becomes more appealing as the Web turns to slop and bloat
It's a Lot Easier to Participate in the Unethical System Than to Oppose Injustices in It
Going after powerful and high-budget interests is never easy
Microsofters Filed Two SLAPPs Against Us, Now They Cannot Keep Up With Judges' Orders
For over 4 months already their facilitator in London has been under investigation by British authorities because of what's being done to my wife and I
Censorship Regarding Red Hat Layoffs
Talk about this? They'd rather not.
Struggling to Cut Costs, Microsoft Continues Shutting Down and Cancelling Stuff This Month
There are August layoffs at Microsoft
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Thursday, August 07, 2025
IRC logs for Thursday, August 07, 2025
Fake 'Linux' Articles, Written by Bots to Take Traffic Away From Real Articles
LLM slop helps replace information with junk or misinformation
When Google's Googlebombing of "Gemini" Was Not Enough; They Now Also Googlebomb "Gemini Space"?
We know GAFAM not only worries about Gemini Protocol but also attempts to 'infiltrate' Geminispace
The Register MS Promotes Microsoft Slop, Assumes All Readers Use Microsoft Windows
Microsoft really dominates the site
Gemini Links 08/08/2025: KDE/Qt Development and What's Missing From "Retro"
Links for the day