06.12.14
CAFC Shown to be Incapable of Ruling on Garbage/Disgraced Monopolies Time After Time, So Perhaps It Should be Barred From Ruling on Patent Issues
Summary: Now that the US Supreme Court smacks down some more flawed rulings from CAFC (regarding patents) it is time not only to limit patent scope but also prevent CAFC (the court behind software patents) from ruling on patent scope ever again
There is a reason for cautious optimism when it comes to the US patent system. The bar is being raised by the highest court, dealing for the most part with business method patents. Here is a good article highlighting some background information:
If you want to blame someone for the explosion of patent litigation in recent years, a good candidate is the US Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit. That’s the appeals court responsible for handling appeals in all patent cases. Over the past decade, the Supreme Court has slapped down its rulings, which the high court has seen as too friendly to patent holders and patent applicants.
Here again we have ramifications for software patent — a subject that SCOTUS never directly addressed (not even in the Bilski Case). SCOTUS refuses to deal with many very important issues these days even with assassination (without trial) of US citizens by CIA drones and the protection of CIA sources by a journalist (Risen). There is actually a pair of decisions here, as noted earlier this month. To quote: “The US Supreme Court issued rulings this morning in two of the five patent cases it heard this term. In both cases, the high court unanimously struck down rules created by the US Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit, the nation’s top patent court.
“The two rulings continue a pattern that has developed over the past several years, in which the Supreme Court has overturned key Federal Circuit rulings, finding them too favorable to patent-holders and too harsh on parties accused of infringement.”
Here is another report which says “The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday refused to make it easier to hold companies liable for encouraging others to commit patent infringement.”
Not everyone is happy about it. Quite expectedly, Fortune, a pro-plutocrats paper, promotes software patents because there is impact on them. To quote this one article: “For a method patent to be infringed, says the high court, the infringing party must deliberately perform all the steps.”
There are several other articles which allude to the effect on software patents.
While plutocrats’ papers continue to associate patents with achievement, it is rather clear that for patents to be effective a tool they should be scarce and hard to attain.
The CAFC clearly serves the interests of patent lawyers by always expanding the scope of patents and even copyrights. SCOTUS almost always vetoes it. The CAFC is the biggest booster ever of software patents and other such monopolies on software (API copyrights for example) because it is inherently incompetent or simply corrupt. To quote just one pundit: “What do you know? The Supreme Court has completely shot down two more decisions from the “patent appeals court,” which is supposed to be an expert in patent law. The court of appeals for the Federal Circuit (CAFC), which was set up explicitly to cover “complicated” patent cases, has been getting shot down by the Supreme Court left and right over the past few years, often unanimously. It happened a month ago on fee shifting and it happened twice more today on key patent cases: Limelight v. Akamai and Nautilus v. Biosig.”
Let this remind us that CAFC issues decisions that are almost always the opposite of what’s just, especially when it comes to patents.
It should not be surprising to see overzealous patents boosters who are also patent lawyers (like Gene Quinn) scrambling to defend the CAFC, which is not a court but more seemingly a front for patent lawyers.
CAFC is apparently no longer a court but rather an occupier working at the behest of patent lawyers (just look what judges were added to CAFC, it’s more like entryism). It should be de-funded, re-booted, or altogether shut down. █
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