More patents = more INNOVA~1?

There was a glimmer of hope about a month ago when talks about a reform began to materialise. In hindsight, optimism was premature. Shortly thereafter came the opposition and the lobbying, which has had some impact, sadly enough.

"In hindsight, optimism was premature."It appears as though the patent system remains and will remain entangled in the mess which it led itself into. This must the consequence of being motivated and run by lobbyists and the commercial interests of companies that can afford influence. We covered all of this before and provides many references to support the fact that the patent system is in a sad state and that internal issues have had it possessed by industry forces, not independent assessors or promoters of invention, let alone the consumer.

Some of the very latest articles demonstrate the issues which must now be coped with (or better yet -- corrected). The following news, for instance, shows us that companies are stung because of poor quality control in the USPTO.

Vonage denied the claims, arguing that Sprint's patents were flawed and shouldn't have been approved.

Is peer review inexistent? Some time ago it was said that people are paid better if they just approve a patent rather than reject it, which gives an incentive to spurious patents. It's another moronic case of quantity over quality, which is something that Neelie Kroes recently criticised, the context being Microsoft's abuses.

If you thought you had already seen ridiculous patents, then watch this:

Dublin-based firm Adwalker has been granted a US patent for its wearable interactive digital media platform.

Can USPTO save itself from becoming another toothless, clawless and dishonored tiger such as Ecma and the ISO?

While Congress continues to fight over patent reform (often missing the bigger issues for those that the lobbyists are most interested in), it's been the Supreme Court that's been doing its best to bring some sanity back to the patent system.

It is at least acknowledged -- not just by outsiders -- that the system is broken and possibly irreparable. It's easier to reject weak standards (c/f OOXML) and patents (c/f Microsoft's patent on sudo) then it is to throw them away after they had been accepted, filed, and possibly paid/compensated for.