Bonum Certa Men Certa

Attributing Negligible Differences to Whatever Suits the Loudest Opponents of the Patent Trial and Appeal Board (PTAB)

Meter time expired



Summary: The U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) has limited/restricted patent grants based on 35 U.S.C. €§ 101, adding to a number of factors which contribute to statistics in litigation and appeals; but the anti-PTAB lobby wants us to believe that there's a resurgence for patent maximalism (the very opposite of what's really happening)

THE ANTI-PTAB lobby we've just mentioned is hoping that the USPTO rather than patent courts will somehow end PTAB. They think that the USPTO should just castrate itself. As if patent quality should not matter anymore...



But that's not going to work. They rely on Iancu becoming so obviously a 'mole' of the patent microcosm -- a move that would likely be career suicide for him. Signed by Joff Wild, Richard Lloyd, Jacob Schindler, Bing Zhao and Adam Houldsworth (i.e. almost everyone at IAM) was this article which speaks of "electrifying opening keynote address by USPTO Director Andrei Iancu," whom it lobbies to help IAM's clients, the patent trolls and thugs. It's too revealing. Here is Watchtroll with the headline "Iancu: More 101 Guidance and PTAB Reforms Coming Soon", preceding or coinciding with Dennis Crouch's post that said: "Under Dir. Iancu, the USPTO appears to be moving away from eligibility rejections. The chart below shows that the past year about 8% of all examiner rejections were eligibility rejections. Over the past three months, that statistic has dropped to about 6.6%. During that time, the PTO has officially changed its approach via the Berkheimer memo, and Dir. Iancu’s leadership lends authority to the Office’s approach to broader eligibility."

"Half a year after Berkheimer we have still not seen any profound impact."Like we said some days ago, that's a very minor difference that can be attributed to all sorts of things. Charles Bieneman, on the face of it, is still 'pulling a Berkheimer' (also coined "Berkheimer Effect" by his site). There has been so solid evidence of it. Here is what he wrote: "Turning first to the first prong of the Alice patent-eligibility test, the court considered the defendant’s argument that the claim “boils down to . . . functional results” of receiving and testing a packet, that was forwarded for further tests if it passed, and dropped if it failed. According to the defendant, the claim was analogous “to a human resources manager receiving a job application, checking if there are open positions, and dropping the application if not, but checking further for requisite training or experience if so.” The court agreed with the defendant that the claim was directed to an abstract idea, noting that the plaintiff’s own description of the claim described an abstract concept, “organizing security tests into an information sharing hierarchy.”"

Half a year after Berkheimer we have still not seen any profound impact. The law firms made false predictions, hoping to (mis)use such predictions to attract business. Here's the other post he made last month (he slowed down considerably by the way). Bieneman should not promote the idea that granted US patents deserve the "Presumption of Patent Validity", especially those granted before Alice and Mayo, but here is what he wrote:

A plaintiff seeking to enforce patents claiming automated methods for uploading multimedia content was ordered to pay defendants’ attorney fees based on a finding of an “exceptional case” under U.S.C. €§ 285. Cellspin Soft, Inc. v. Fitbit, Inc., No. 4:17-CV-5928-YGR (N.D. Cal. July 6, 2018). The court had previously granted motions to dismiss because claims of U.S. Patent Nos. 8,738,794; 8,892,752; 9,749,847; and 9,258,698 were not patent eligible under 35 U.S.C. €§ 101 and the Alice/Mayo test. Relying on Inventor Holdings, LLC v. Bed Bath & Beyond Inc. (Fed. Cir. 2017), the court found the case exceptional because the claims were not only “manifestly directed to an abstract idea,” but, unlike the Inventors Holdings litigation, were sought to be enforced after a lot of post-Alice precedent should have made clear that the claims were patent-ineligible.


PTAB has served to demonstrate that many US patents now deserve the presumption of invalidity. Patent quality seems to be improving, but a lot of patents which haven't yet expired are still around and only few of these (a tiny proportion of the whole) were tested in court.

"Patent quality seems to be improving, but a lot of patents which haven't yet expired are still around and only few of these (a tiny proportion of the whole) were tested in court."Now watch the spin about PTAB, citing a very minor difference, albeit in a direction that suits Michael Loney's agenda (so he won't treat is as an anomaly or something almost negligible). To quote:

The Patent Trial and Appeal Board’s institution rate was 58.4% in the first two calendar months after the Supreme Court ended the practice of partial institution – down from the 2018 fiscal year rate of 62% up to the end of April

The initial effect of the Supreme Court’s SAS Institute v Iancu decision has been to push down the institution rate of petitions at the Patent Trial and Appeal Board (PTAB).


But Iancu has only been there for a few months. He has barely even changed any rules (proposals at best). All the above seems like leap of faith from Dennis Crouch et al. The difference is also minor and overlooks the fact many no longer bother applying for patents with abstract stuff in them. The same goes for litigation. Only the 'stronger' cases end up before a court. That's just expected. It's their risk analysis.

Recent Techrights' Posts

[Video] Richard Stallman's Talk in Sweden, Attended by Nearly 700 People, is Now Online
The Web page is in Swedish, but the talk is in English
Coping With the Site Going More Mainstream
Fame is no laughing matter
21 Pages in Less Than 7 Hours is No Joking Matter
We've become a lot more effective and efficient
Generation Chaff - Phase V: Censorship of Dissent (Painted as Harassment or Terrorism)
Censorship is all around us now
Generation Chaff - Phase IV: Apps Only Few Companies Decide On
Tools are being collectively confiscated, under the premise or false prospect of "security"
 
The Serial Slopper Starts Up - or Restarts - His Plagiarism Machine (LLMs)
Serial Sloppers like these don't belong in news sites. That's why he got sacked by BetaNews.
Links 24/10/2025: Esperanto Music History, Anxiety, and New Portals
Links for the day
Slopwatch: LinuxSecurity.com, Linux Journal, and Pet Slopfarms of Google News
Why does Google News still advance these fake sites to the top of search results?
Links 24/10/2025: Inequality Grows, Billion-Dollar Scam Center Industry
Links for the day
Links 24/10/2025: "Independent Media in Cambodia is Collapsing" and Serious F5 Breach
Links for the day
They Never 'Put Down' Corporations
There are "pests" that are traded in Wall Street
Correct Information is a Valued Asset in the Age of Slopfarms and Public Relations (PR) or Spin
Publishing suppressed facts is never easy
The Register MS Continues to Bag Money to Promote a Ponzi Scheme, Even Money From China
Today in the front page
analytics.usa.gov: The Only Supported Version of Windows (This Past Week) is Only Used by About 13.9% of People in the US, the Home Base of Windows
Even Vista 7 is still used more
Rust is Very Secure
If only Rust itself is secure
Who Will be Held Accountable for Breaking Ubuntu by Imposing Rust on Otherwise-Functional Programs, in Effect Replacing GNU With Proprietary Microsoft (GitHub)?
they're practical people who merely point out that a bunch of buffoons not only ruin Ubuntu but also every future distro based on Ubuntu
Generation Chaff - Phase VIII: In Summary
Like "Science" with a capital "S", what we see here commercial interests usurping everything
Generation Chaff - Phase VII: Curtailing Alternative Media
There was always an obligation - a collective duty of sorts - to uphold independent journalism
Generation Chaff - Phase VI: Centralisation of Information (X, Cheetok/Fentanylware)
Would you trust information when controlled by such people?
Generation Chaff - Phase III: Slop and Plagiarism
A lot of the current so-called 'economy' is built upon false valuations
Generation Chaff - Phase II: "Cloud", Blockchains and Other Hype
For those of us who turned down those propositions there was a struggle; we needed to justify not having skinnerboxes or "social" accounts in some site run by a private company
Generation Chaff - Phase I: Social Control Media
IRC predates the Web
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Thursday, October 23, 2025
IRC logs for Thursday, October 23, 2025
More Clues Shed on Collapse of Microsoft XBox
XBox is basically circling down the drain as Microsoft implements 2-3 waves of layoffs each month
'Vibe Coding' Doesn't Work
In a lot of ways, so-called 'Vibe Coding' is already considered vapourware or a passing fad promoted in the media by managers who try to justify mass layoffs, especially ridding companies of "very expensive" software engineers
Links 24/10/2025: Microsoft's Killing of XBox Connected to Revenue/Profit Problems, "How Elon Musk Ruined Twitter"
Links for the day
Gemini Links 24/10/2025: 86,400 Seconds and "Society's Task"
Links for the day
Slopwatch: Google News and Slopfarms That Relay Nonsense From LLMs
Google News, which once prioritised or used to care about provenance and quality, is feeding slopfarms
Links 23/10/2025: More Health Concerns Over Dumb Chatbots (LLMs) and "Talking Cars" as Latest Buzz
Links for the day
Gemini Links 23/10/2025: Daylight Savings Time and Duration Shorthand
Links for the day
Links 23/10/2025: LLM 'Hallucinations' (Defects) in Practical Code 'Generation', China Becomes More Economically and Technologically Independent
Links for the day
Why We Support Richard Stallman and You Probably Should Too
It's not about being "Richard Stallman fan", it is about maintaining the right to hold positions (on technology) like his
Linux Foundation Uses LLM Slop to Promote Microsoft in Linux.com (Again), Rendering It a Linux-Hostile Slopfarm
Openwashing with slop by "Linux.com Editorial Staff", which basically seems to be a bot
Some Large German Media Covers Richard Stallman's Talks in Germany Earlier This Week
LLM-based chatbots are just "bullshit generators" (as he has long called them)
Links 23/10/2025: Windows TCO Galore and "The Internet Is Going to Break Again"
Links for the day
Trouble in Red Hat/IBM and a Retreat to Ponzi Economics in Search of Wall Street Market Heist
Would you invest your life savings in this kind of crap?
Who Asked Software in the Public Interest (SPI) for a Refund? ($100,000, Resulting in Losses of $267,201 in 12 Months, Highest-Ever Losses)
The IRS does not reveal who or what's tied to this refund (or the cause/reason)
Social engineering attack: Debian voted to trick you on binary blobs
Reprinted with permission from Daniel Pocock
Techrights Will Always Stand for Women's Rights
We even invest money - personal savings that it - in our principles
Certified Lawyers Should Know Better (Than to Intimidate Us With Man Who Drives on Motorcycle Through a Really Bad Storm Between Distant Cities, Then Collects Photos of Our Home)
Mentioning someone was in prison for bad things isn't a crime, it's a public service
The "AI" (Slop) Bubble is Already Imploding
"ChatGPT Usage Has Peaked and Is Now Declining, New Data Finds"
The So-called "Sexy" Buckets (AI, Quantum) Cannot Save IBM From Reality, Shares Tank
"No matter how much financial hocus-pocus they use to reclassify revenues to land in the "sexy" buckets (AI, Quantum), it still smells old and musty - just like this company."
Paul Krugman is Wrong About the Scope of Mass Layoffs in the United States
A few years ago society was accelerating its journey towards feudalism, boosted by COVID-19
Links 23/10/2025: Proprietary Blunders and CISA's Latest Disclosure of Holes
Links for the day
Gemini Links 23/10/2025: Fast Past (F1), 99.9% Uptime
Links for the day
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Wednesday, October 22, 2025
IRC logs for Wednesday, October 22, 2025
Slopwatch: Google News is Promoting Fake 'Articles' About Fake Xubuntu, Fake Articles About Replacing Windows With GNU/Linux
The quality of the Web deteriorates and unless someone cleans up the mess, real sites will lose an incentive to produce anything
When "AI Layoffs" Mean Layoffs Due to the "AI" Bubble Popping
many people that are laid off by Microsoft claim to be specialists in "AI"
Mysterious grant forfeited, $100,000 from Software in the Public Interest accounts 2023
Reprinted with permission from Daniel Pocock
Evidence: bullying, student union behaviour: Armijn Hemel's FSFE resignation
Reprinted with permission from Daniel Pocock
Evidence: psychological abuse, stalking, Galia Mancheva, Susanne Eiswirt ignored by FSFE judgment for Matthias Kirschner
Reprinted with permission from Daniel Pocock
Helping FSFE scam victims and conference organisers
Reprinted with permission from Daniel Pocock
Nigerian fraud in FSFE constitution
Reprinted with permission from Daniel Pocock
Worrying and Amusing Stories of "Clown Computing" Gone Awry
Many of these disasters could be avoided
Links 22/10/2025: Amazon Plans to Replace Workers With Robotics, AWS and Clown Computing in General Ridiculed
Links for the day
Gemini Links 22/10/2025: Niri Completely Changes Multitasking and Overview of Diff-ers
Links for the day
Links 22/10/2025: Study on Misinformation by Slop and Heavily Debt-Sabbled Microsoft OpenAI (ClosedSlop) Uses "Browser" as Gimmick/Distraction
Links for the day
They've Already Spent Close to a Million Dollars on Lawyers and Sent Us About 50 KG of Legal Papers (Sponsored by Mysterious Third Party) to Try to Censor Techrights, Without Success
They try to overcompensate with sheer volume for a lack of solid, clear arguments (we are the victims here)
12 Months Ago the 'Hulk Hogan of UEFI' Officially Went 'Tag-Team'
We're actually sort of flattered or proud that such despicable people are so desperate to censor us
"Cloud Computing" Was Always a Joke, But This Week Was the Punchline
Maybe stop following tech trends and fashions
"Cloud Computing" Does Not Mean Safety
Fault tolerance is related to the notion of software freedom
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Tuesday, October 21, 2025
IRC logs for Tuesday, October 21, 2025
The Fall of Windows: From Something to Nothing
Of course Microsoft will pretend everything is fine and "just trust the hey hi" (AI)