Bonum Certa Men Certa

Patenting Bar Raised by US Courts, But the Patent Microcosm (Now Infesting 'Bloomberg Law' and Other Media) Fights Back With Deception

Bloomberg Law hires people with a solid journalistic background to become reporters, but they're speaking to the wrong people (patent maximalists and the likes of IAM, not engineers who practice the underlying concepts)

Malathi Nayak on Coons



Summary: Misleading language and bad advice dispensed by the legal 'industry' demonstrates strong resistance to the principles of patent quality (limiting patent monopolies to what actually justifies such monopolies)

"Blockchain this, blockchain that..."



We live in an age of hype and marketing. Not to mention law firms that keep 'name-dropping' novelty-sounding things they have no technical grasp of.

"OIN seems to believe that the solution is to hoard yet more such patents, but in reality the goal should be to void them all."Many of today's patents disguise themselves as "blockchain", but actually they're software patents that should be seen as patent-ineligible. OIN seems to believe that the solution is to hoard yet more such patents, but in reality the goal should be to void them all. It might be enough to petition PTAB a few times to informally invalidate -- by extension -- many similar patents (in the same domain).

Malathi Nayak, writing for Bloomberg Law (Wall Street media's coverage of legal matters is very often tilted in favour of lawyers' interests), has just perpetuated this hype ("Blockchain Patent Race Is on, but Hurdles Await"). To quote:

A wide array of corporations, including Alphabet Inc.’s Google and Bank of America, are lining up to enter a potentially lucrative club: one that allows them to own patents on blockchain technology.

But getting past the patent office’s velvet rope won’t be easy.

Blockchain inventions — from digital currencies to super-fast, secure trading systems — often cover software and financial service-related technologies. The U.S. Patent and Trademark Office has a track record of leaving applicants out in the cold if they seek patents for presenting other types of software or financial services inventions that are too abstract or obvious.


All these US (granted by the USPTO) patents are likely bogus because they're software patents (it's a bubble with hype on its side). But Bloomberg Law then persisted; it went further and continued to spread this kind of "propaganda" (throughout this week). There's no such thing as "Blockchain Patent Attorney," but here they are with "It’s Not Easy Being a Blockchain Patent Attorney" (retitled since). It's pure hype intended to market software patents which are almost literally worthless. To quote:

Blockchain tech might be poised to revolutionize how companies like Bank of America operate and cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin trade. But inventors trying to patent their ideas in the field—and stake their claim on future profits—are facing hurdles at the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (PTO).

“Though there’s been a surge of these patent applications, winning or scoring these patents on these technologies won’t be easy,” Bloomberg Law reporter Malathi Nayak said in a recent podcast episode of Code & Conduit.

Bloomberg Law data shows a wave of new applications have hit the patent office in recent months, but only a fraction have won patents.


This is basically more from the same person, Nayak.

"One can count about half a dozen synonyms for software patents above (they also explicitly say "software patents")."We need to call out such misuse of hype and sometimes buzzwords (like "AI"). Examiners are being fooled by these. Watch this new buzzwords galore about an upcoming event: "Topics will include internet and mobile litigation, international IP, privacy and data security, Cloud/SaaS, patent litigation, blockchain and cryptocurrency, software patents, digital marketing, the Internet of Things, connected privacy, and the practice of IP law."

This is typical. One can count about half a dozen synonyms for software patents above (they also explicitly say "software patents"). Suzanne Monyak has just published this 'article' (more like an ad) which says "Hsiao came to the firm from Brown Rudnick’s Boston office, where he worked in intellectual property litigation related to high-tech medical and software inventions as a patent associate."

When they say "software inventions" they mean software patents, i.e. something which is being phased out.

"...patent quality is being improved, the bar is being raised by the courts (more so than by the granting authority, USPTO)."As we'll show and discuss this coming weekend, software patents are as weak as they can be in the US. It's getting worse for them over time. That's because patent quality is being improved, the bar is being raised by the courts (more so than by the granting authority, USPTO).

When the patent microcosm speaks of "strong patents" (or "STRONGER" at a legislative level) they mean the exact opposite. Andrew J. Maas and David Winwood say they want more low-quality (rubbish) patents -- that's what they mean by "stronger patents". Mind the image of the very top (from Nayak), including the brands/bodies named and the word "Stronger". These are patent extremists' circles, IAM included.

Recent Techrights' Posts

Datamation, Where I Used to Publish Articles, Appears to Have Been Sold to TechnologyAdvice Only to Become a Slopfarm
I'd prefer to not associate with that site anymore
 
How Software Patents Were Viewed or Their General Status Changed Over Time
A rough summary
We Are Turning 19 in One Month, FSF Turns 40 in 3 Hours (CET)
For our anniversary next month we still have no concrete plans
Patent Docs (or PatentDocs) Learned the Wrong Lessons From the Death of TypePad
Had they gone ahead with an SSG, they'd become a lot more future-proof
USPTO Patent Bubble Already Imploding, After Decades of Artificial Inflation, Entire Offices Close for Good
we can deduce that financial pressures (lack of "demand" for monopolies) play a role
TikTok is Not Harmless (Being CheeTok in the US Will Advance Orange Agenda)
Social control media isn't "fun and games"; it's a digital weapon that lets hostile groups or nations infiltrate others, then turn them against themselves
Andy Farnell and Helen Plews Explain What "Modern" Tech Does to Old People
Imposing terrible tech "religion" on people is not helping them
Tomorrow the Free Software Foundation (FSF) Turns 40 and Its Web Site is Still Slow Due to DDoS by LLM Slop Bots
For an advocacy group, uptime is important (for its message to remain accessible)
Slopwatch: Google News as a Firehose of LLM Slop About "Linux"
Google News is really bad
Links 03/10/2025: "NPR’s Economics Lessons Come With Neoliberal Spin" and Canada Post at Risk
Links for the day
Gemini Links 03/10/2025: Panic Attacks and Food Adulteration
Links for the day
Links 03/10/2025: Lawyers Caught Using LLM Slop Explain Why They Did It, LibreSSL 4.1.1 and 4.0.1 Released
Links for the day
FSF Board Grew 50% Since Last Year, Has New President, Turns 40 in Two Days
It's a good move for the FSF and - by extension - for software freedom
Links 03/10/2025: Conflicts, Death of TypePad, and TikTok/CheeTok Gives a Boost to Far Right Groups in Europe
Links for the day
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Thursday, October 02, 2025
IRC logs for Thursday, October 02, 2025
Slopwatch: Linux Journal, Google News, and LinuxSecurity
They carry on polluting the Web with fake articles
Gemini Links 02/10/2025: Kubernetes With FreeBSD and robots.txt
Links for the day
Links 02/10/2025: 'Open' 'AI' Resorting to Gimmicks and Fake Funding, Europe’s ‘Drone Wall’ Discussed
Links for the day
Links 02/10/2025: Brave Passes 100M Users Milestone, Kodak Selling Its Own Film Again
Links for the day
Michael “Monty” Widenius: It Started in 1983 With Richard Stallman (RMS)
The other co-founder of MySQL is a bit notorious for confronting RMS rather viciously
For the Second Time in a Few Weeks Microsoft Lunduke Makes False Accusations Against Senior Red Hat Staff to Incite a Despicable 'Troll Army'
Nothing that Microsoft Lunduke claims of says can be trusted
su lisa && rm -rf /home/ibm/power
Novell was ruined by another person from IBM, Ronald Hovsepian
A Record Demand at Microsoft: Demand to Cancel
What we're witnessing is a very ungraceful destruction of XBox
Microsoft is Losing Europe
Hence all the "support" and "discount" offers that are limited to Europe
The Free Software Foundation Starts Fund-raising for 40th Anniversary
New pop-up 2-3 days ahead of the 40th anniversary event
Systemd Breaks Networking in Debian and Microsoft Staff Rushes to Make Face-Saving Excuses in LWN
Microsoft's bluca is already there in the comments, his Microsoft money pays for LWN to let him leave comments early
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Wednesday, October 01, 2025
IRC logs for Wednesday, October 01, 2025
What the End of XBox Will Look Like: a Fiery Crash
XBox is the next Skype. It won't last much longer. Expect many more layoffs.
Richard Stallman is Going to Finland to Give a Talk Next Thursday
A day later he speaks in Sweden
Gemini Links 02/10/2025: SMTP Pipelining and End of ROOPHLOCH 2025
Links for the day
Slopwatch: Plagiarism, Fake Articles, and FUD About Linux
not a day goes by without Google News feeding FUD from slopfarms
Gemini Links 01/10/2025: Chat Control and End of Life
Links for the day
Links 01/10/2025: Long Covid Risk Reiterated, "Bitcoin Queen" Caught
Links for the day
Links 01/10/2025: EA $55 Billion Deal is Debt and Slop "Raises Vishing Risks"
Links for the day
Bluewashing at Red Hat Means Redundancies
The man who sold Red Hat to IBM meanwhile became a Microsoft Mono booster
After Killing OpenSource.com, IBM ('Red Hat') and OSI Told Us OpenSource.net Would Replace It (But That Didn't Happen)
Now it's time to move on, perhaps tarnishing the "Open Source" label some more (for whatever sponsor wants this)
Linux is Not a Community Project, It's a Wall Street Product
The core goal should be freedom
Bad Actors Abusing the Free Software Community, Vandalising It Using Rogue Politics and Old Tactics
Oil giants have long attempted to do this; now, the digital equivalent of Big Oil does this in technology
Social Control Media Isn't the Future, The Federation or Fediverse Isn't Growing, People's Accounts Vanish for Good
users' accounts will get deleted, not just become inactive
IBM is Failing, This Helps Show Wall Street is Entirely Detached From Actual Commercial Performance
IBM is unable to grow, it's just constantly shrinking
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Tuesday, September 30, 2025
IRC logs for Tuesday, September 30, 2025
Clerical Aspects of Publishing and Development
In Free software, the management aspects are considerably reduced
Slopwatch: Fake Articles and Google News Promoting "Linux" Spam or Bot-Generated Fear, Uncertainty, Doubt (FUD)
These slopfarms help misplace blame
Third Wave of Microsoft Layoffs in September, This Time Many in Liverpool Affected
Be ready for more waves of layoffs ahead of the so-called "results" in late October