Bonum Certa Men Certa

Patents Roundup: IAM's Claims About India, Lawyers' Patent Bias, ITC for Microsoft, and PTAB Against Kyle Bass

Urbis



Summary: Another weekly summary, focusing on issues that pertain to or affect Free software in particular

THIS post looks at the past week's news and groups the news by topic.

Software Patents in India



The patent maximalists from IAM wrote at the very beginning of this week that "India is becoming more receptive to software patents", despite the fact that software patents are not allowed in India. IAM is framing India's policy as a bad thing: "Two subject areas have long dominated critiques of the Indian patent system by foreign (and especially US) companies and government bodies: pharmaceuticals and software. But, the recent release of new guidelines for the examination of computer related inventions (CRIs) by the Indian Patent office (IPO) provides the latest sign that the country may be headed in a more software-friendly direction. That has the potential to affect not just filing activity in the country, but also efforts to sign up licensees there."

We have not seen this anywhere else in the media, only in IAM, which is strongly biased on favour of software patents. India is hopefully not falling into the software patents trap at the same time that the US is cracking down on software patents (court rulings post-Alice and consequently new examination guidelines).

ITC Defends Microsoft



"For years, despite lack of fairness, the ITC has helped Apple (US-based company) ban rival imports."The 'International' Trade Commission is not international at all; it's a US apparatus for US megacorporations, as we have shown before. Now that Microsoft hypocritically complains the ITC defends one patent troll (Microsoft) from another (smaller) patent troll, based on several news reports [1, 2, 3, 4].

This whole episode mostly serves to show how biased the ITC really is. For years, despite lack of fairness, the ITC systematically helped Apple (a US-based company) ban rival imports. This affected only rivals from east Asia. The ITC bureaucracy ought to be challenged. Who does it really serve?

Patent Bias



Watch patent lawyers and propagandists at IP Watchdog pretending everything is great and that even patents on business methods are possible, post-Alice. They're asking questions like, "Are Patents Getting Their Mojo Back?" Well, the very opposite is true.

Prof. Mark Lemley of Stanford Law School recently came up with an eye-catching headline, "Faith-Based Intellectual Property". It's the title of a paper whose abstract bemoans policies that are based on dogma rather than reality. The abstract states: "The traditional justification for intellectual property (IP) rights has been utilitarian. We grant exclusive rights because we think the world will be a better place as a result. But what evidence we have doesn’t fully justify IP rights in their current strong form. Rather than following the evidence and questioning strong IP rights, more and more scholars have begun to retreat from evidence toward what I call faith-based IP, justifying IP as a moral end in itself rather than on the basis of how it affects the world. I argue that these moral claims are ultimately unpersuasive and a step backward in a rational society."

The term "faith-based IP" (ignoring facts, embracing dogma) resembles the terms often used in the copyright debate, where the wishes and the interests of the very few (moguls and middlemen) outweigh public interests. It's class war. Controversial new laws are being used to authorise passage of wealth and power to few plutocrats' hands -- plutocrats who also happen to bribe politicians for these laws to be passed.

Meanwhile, a plutocrats' oppressive tyranny uses a famous casino's hotel (I was there earlier this year just to look around) in order to harbour more ‘IP’ nonsense, as covered by IP Kat (with its new policy for comments) in a four-part series [1, 2, 3, 4], concluded by this final (belated) part. Watch how lawyers collude or conspire in super-expensive places to just monopolise things; public input has zero impact on their decisions or findings.

PTAB Versus Kyle Bass



Kyle Bass was mentioned before, but rarely regarding the patent pressure he was using to crash companies (we covered this once before, but not in great depth). According to this, "Kyle Bass, the hedge fund manager who filed a number of inter partes review petitions against pharmaceutical companies, has struck terror into the shriveled hearts of the pharmaceutical industry. The first petitions he filed were against Acorda Therapeutics, and its stock dropped on the news.

"The pharmaceutical industry immediately started lobbying to change IPR procedures to make themselves invulnerable. Senator Coons even offered an amendment to the PATENT Act to block IPR petitions from anyone who hasn’t been sued for patent infringement. (The amendment failed.)"

PTAB's involvement is noteworthy here. There's more about PTAB in IP Kat and bigger sites for lawyers [via]. To quote the most prominent article: "Kamholz was on the front lines as the America Invents Act (AIA) remade the PTAB and created new proceedings that revolutionized patent litigation. About 60 new administrative judges, many with prestigious resumes in private practice and government service, have joined about 25 veterans of the PTAB’s predecessor, the Board of Patent Appeals and Interferences, to take on most of the inter partes reviews (IPRs) and covered business method reviews to date."

Here too we have patents being used by billionaires (or at least millionaires) to rig the market. When will more people out there realise who the patent regime really serves?

Recent Techrights' Posts

Leaks and Whistleblowers: Our Plan for Today
Society simply cannot advance when too many people self-censor
The Same People Who Attacked Richard Stallman (RMS) Are Attacking Daniel Pocock to Discourage People From Listening to His Information
Pocock is being demonised for the same reasons and by the same people who attack RMS
We Are Safe in a Modern "Tech" Society, Right?
People are safer if they control their own computing
The Way Things Are Going, They May Soon Stop Saying "Web Address" and Instead Say "Chrome Address"
The Web isn't built or based around open Web standards anymore. It's centered around user-agent.
Microsoft as a Golden Cage
"I was laid off by Microsoft and can't find a job. I'm weeks away from giving up my apartment and moving across the country to live with family."
Weekend Discussion About How IBM's Bluewashing of Red Hat Will Cause "Enshittification" for Users
"I worked at a software company that was acquired by IBM so I knew it was game over for RedHat the day they were acquired"
Brett Wilson LLP Getting Sued by Its Very Own Clients, a Legal Story That Has Made the Mainstream News (Law360)
Law360 or Law.com are about as mainstream as one can get in that "sector" (litigation 'industry')
 
Gemini Links 13/10/2025: Good Films, Wizard of Earthsea, Upgrading the Steam Controller's Stick
Links for the day
It's Not Justice When One Side Denies the Other Side the Ability to Even Speak
At this stage, Brett Wilson LLP is in my humble opinion acting in contempt of the Court
Links 13/10/2025: Australian Catholic University Uses Slop to Libel Students, Canada Threatens to Kill Beluga Whales
Links for the day
How Not to Silence Tux Machines (It'll Only Backfire, Badly)
defending Microsoft while attacking this site
Slopwatch: UbuntuPIT and Google News
It seems abundantly clear that Google News and Google in general participates in the slop epidemic
Vincent Danjean (not INTERPOL), Claire Bardel & Debian pregnancy cluster
Reprinted with permission from Daniel Pocock
Christmas lynchings: Martin Krafft (madduck), Penny Leach (mjollnir) & Debian pregnancy cluster
Reprinted with permission from Daniel Pocock
Gemini Links 13/10/2025: Birthdays and "Committee Unable to Contact Nobel Prize Winner"
Links for the day
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Sunday, October 12, 2025
IRC logs for Sunday, October 12, 2025
Your Typical Anti-Richard Stallman (RMS) Cancellist
"About the RMS cancellation"
Richard Stallman (RMS) Has Announced His Talk in Rome Less Than 20 Hours in Advance (and on a Sunday)
Why did he wait until the night before?
GNU Tools Cauldron Event in Portugal: Videos Now Available via Invidious
Go have a look
Slopwatch: GNU/Linux Sites That Became Slopfarms and Spamfarms
The Web is a mess and "Linux" or "Ubuntu" sites became part of the problem
Richard Stallman's Talk 25 Hours Away, Aula Magna Palazzo del Rettorato (CU001), Sapienza Università di Roma (Piazzale Aldo Moro, 5)
The talk is 25 hours away and we see some QR code for it
Gemini Links 12/10/2025: Watches, the Depression of 2026, Gamboling with Odds
Links for the day
Links 12/10/2025: 'False' DMCA Claims and Slop Facing Perils Again (the Hype Wears Off)
Links for the day
Microsoft Has Just Lost Privacy Case in Austria and Its Latest Moves Make a Complete Ban Seem Imperative
Microsoft is not a software company, it's a spying agency that uses software to collect data
The Register MS: Microsoft is the Security Expert, Not the Prime Culprit, So Buy More Microsoft
This front page feature is devoid of any actual substance, it's just Microsoft copypasta
Paris 'Love Nest' & Debian Outreachy: from Lycée Lakanal to ENS Cachan, Cr@ns, nepotism
Reprinted with permission from Daniel Pocock
Stefano Zacchiroli (Zack) & Debian pregnancy cluster
Reprinted with permission from Daniel Pocock
Lucas Nussbaum & Debian pregnancy cluster
Reprinted with permission from Daniel Pocock
Gemini Links 12/10/2025: "Palm Computering", Further Exploration of Slide Rules, and Key Takeaways from The Well-Grounded Rubyist
Links for the day
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Saturday, October 11, 2025
IRC logs for Saturday, October 11, 2025
Tomorrow: Founder of the Free Software Foundation and of GNU/Linux, Richard Stallman, Speaks in Roma (Rome), Italy at 4PM
GNU/Linux is more important than ever in this dystopian world
Microsoft and Apple Are Rare Topics in Geminispace
in Geminispace it's rather safe to assume everyone is into BSD, GNU/Linux, and sometimes retro
Qualcomm and Manchester United Appear to Have Dumped Microsoft (Qualcomm Now Invests More in Linux, Apparently)
It's a relief to no longer see Microsoft logos and brands on a local football club's gear (I'm not a Manchester United fan, but not a foe either)
As Guest of Honour in Rome, Founder of the Free Software Foundation to Speak ("Distinguished Lecture") After Introduction by Leonardo Querzoni
Happy hacking...
All Things Open is Proprietary
The OSI has become a front group of proprietary software openwashers, led and sponsored by proprietary giants
When Microsoft Lays Off Lots of Workers They Say It "Invests in AI" (a Lie), Now It's "Reshuffles" or "Microsoft Tightens"
Microsoft "news" by bots
"I saw Richard Stallman give a talk in the mid 80s, which began my fear and loathing of software patents" and "Richard Stallman was always right."
"By betraying the legacy of our ancestors, we’ve set ourselves on a path toward self-destruction — moral, intellectual, economic, and ultimately biological."
There Were Several Waves of Microsoft Shanghai Layoffs in 2025, Western Media Continues to Turn a Blind Eye to Chinese Layoffs of an Epic Scale
Sometimes select Taiwanese news sites (published in English) or automated translations are all we have
Brett Wilson LLP Spreads Trumpism to the United Kingdom, Looking to Profit From 'Legal Colonialism' (Overriding Sovereignty)
There's growing recognition of this conundrum worldwide
The Demise of Shopping in Person
In a world like this, how valued is the customer?
This Past Friday, "Nearly 700 People Came to Listen to RMS!" (Richard Stallman)
"Nearly 700 people came to listen to RMS!"
Distinguished Lecture by Richard Stallman This Coming Monday in Rome
After "Free software, Crucial for Freedom in a Digital World"
Slopwatch: UbuntuPIT Churning Out Plagiarism and the Slopfarm LinuxSecurity Turns to Pseudonyms
Our hunch is, UbuntuPIT will sooner or later realise that this toxic approach is just harming UbuntuPIT and tainting the reputation of past articles
The Lawsuit by Clients of Brett Wilson LLP Against Brett Wilson LLP is Officially On, It is Progressing, The 'Experts' Pick Outside Law Firms (RPC and Mills & Reeve) to Spare Them From Litigants in Person
So it is probably quite potent
Gemini Links 11/10/2025: Nyctography, Gerrymandering, and Lurking
Links for the day
The 'Culture Wars' in Free Software Have Gone Out of Control
Social control media amplifies such utterly infantile discourse
Teaser: To Compensate for the Fact Our Clients Are Terrible Human Beings Who Strangle Women (While on Microsoft's Payroll) and We Get Paid by Mystery Parties We Bombard You and Your Wife With Almost 10 Kilograms of Legal Papers
If you can't win an argument, then drown the other side with papers?
Links 11/10/2025: World Mental Health Day 2025, Another European Legal Defeat for Microsoft 360
Links for the day
MIT Technology Review is Part-Time SPAMfarm of Billionaires and Mega-Corporations
Does MIT operate its own "b2b" SPAMfarm?
Open Source Initiative Executive Director Leaves, Replacement Sought by Monopolists, Not the Community or OSI Members
Serves to show who runs this show...
Links 11/10/2025: China-US Tensions Grow Again, "Hey Hi" More Widely Recognised as Bubble Made of Capital That Doesn't Exist
Links for the day
Now Confirmed in Western Media: Microsoft Azure Layoffs This Month
Affirmed by more sources moments ago
Peter O'Callaghan QC represented grandparents, Westernport Hotel, at Liquor Royal Commission
Reprinted with permission from Daniel Pocock
Either The Register MS Divests From FOSS Coverage or Liam Proven is on Long Holiday
Publishers perish when their audience loses trust in them
Microsoft Cancelling Another Datacentre is a Sign of Financial Trouble and Lack of Growth
The debt continues to grow
Gemini Links 11/10/2025: An Evening at the Fair and Fast Fourier Friday
Links for the day
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Friday, October 10, 2025
IRC logs for Friday, October 10, 2025