Bonum Certa Men Certa

Supreme Failure: With SCOTUS Approval of Patent Trolls and a Push by Justice Department to Reinforce Copyright on APIs (at SCOTUS Level) the Future Looks Gloomy

US Supreme Court darkens the future

US Supreme Court



Summary: The patent system goes wild in terms of scope, the nature of the plaintiff (merely purchasing patents), and the extension of patents to monopolies on named APIs (by virtue of deranged interpretation of copyright law)

WE are deeply disturbed to see Federal-level interventions and rulings in favour of the patent industry, including the most parasitic elements of it. People must learn the reality of these injustices and rise up in opposition before it's too late. The gap between the rich and the poor rapidly widens because of these outrageous moves, which involve passage of ownership, not just physical ownership but also monopoly on simple ideas.

Florian Müller, a booster of Oracle against Android, covered the White House's attack on Android and on software developers, urging the SCOTUS to allow/endorse patentability of APIs (by denying an appeal).

"The gap between the rich and the poor rapidly widens because of these outrageous moves, which involve passage of ownership, not just physical ownership but also monopoly on simple ideas."The SCOTUS also helps trolls (against Cisco) right now, as demonstrated by a decision that even British patent lawyers are denouncing. "Commentators have picked up on the identity of the patentee," wrote IP Kat, "a troll/patent assertion entity/non-practicing entity/etc - as being the headline grabber in this case, if only to paint a picture of General Counsel throughout Silicon Valley being on the edge of their seats awaiting this decision. However, the Court's comments in this respect were limited. The Court said that they were well aware of the industry that had developed in which patents were being used primarily for obtaining licensing fees. Such conduct can create a "harmful tax on innovation". However, because no issue of frivolity had been raised by the parties in this case the Supreme Court did not comment further, except to reinforce the power that the district courts have in dissuading frivolous cases."

I personally find the US patent system very intimidating. The rulings are almost always made in favour of Big Business interests; if not soon, then some time later. Based on these two new reports, Samsung now goes further with Android by patenting software. This is a software patent pertaining to computer vision, which is my area of research. It's all reducible to math and the US allows this math to be patented and monopolised. Yesterday I saw the article "Auction Co. Can't Shake Suit Over $2M Software Patents". How can software patents be sold for so much? How can they be sold at all? This beats the purpose (original purpose of the patent system) because patents just become passable weapons. To quote the article: "A California judge on Friday tentatively refused to toss an inventor’s suit alleging an auction company botched its handling of video technology patents she held with her software programmer ex-husband by selling them for vastly less than their $2 million minimum value, ruling the auctioneer had a fiduciary duty to the inventor."

"The rulings are almost always made in favour of Big Business interests; if not soon, then some time later."These "handling of video technology patents" are software patents, which again cover math. This is clearly a problem, but groups like the EFF continue losing focus. They should tackle scope of patents, not 'quality' of pertinent patents or patent trolls.

Consider this latest post from Adi Kamdar (EFF). "What a waste of resources," iophk wrote to us. "It is the ability to patent the wrong things that is the core of the problem not 'bad' patents or 'trolls', though they are also a problem."

Kamdar wrote:

Amidst the clamor of surveillance reform and TPP Fast Track negotiations, Congress is still finding time to work out the kinks of patent reform. One of the big topics of the day: inter partes review (IPR). This procedure lets third parties (like EFF) challenge bad patents (like the one used to go after podcasters).

We joined Engine, Public Knowledge, and R Street in sending a letter [PDF] to the Senate Judiciary Committee urging them to strengthen the IPR procedure, making it more accessible to and a more powerful tool for those of us acting in the public interest.


The EFF is once again wasting its time fighting "bad patents" rather than software patents.

In other news, there's this new article which talks about copyrights, trademarks and patents collectively, referring to them all as "Intellectual Property". The part about patents says: "A common question that is often asked by founders is whether they can get their software patented."

Software as a whole cannot be patented, but parts of it, in few parts of the world, can probably be patented.

The article says: "The short answer to this is “no- software cannot be patented per se,” i.e. a computer program is not independently patentable." If the Justice Department gets its way, not only part of a program will be a monopoly but also APIs (covered by copyrights). It often seems like everything just gets worse, not better. Maybe this whole patent system (or by extension the so-called 'IP' system) needs a revolution and a reset.

Recent Techrights' Posts

Slopwatch: LinuxSecurity, UbuntuPIT, and Google News
We've also just noticed more slop from UbuntuPIT
 
Links 09/10/2025: Farewell to Jane Goodall, California Bans Algorithmic Price-Fixing
Links for the day
Gemini Links 09/10/2025: Lost Wages and a Saga Of Continuing To Use Palm PDAs
Links for the day
Richard Stallman's Talk in Helsinki is Done. Tomorrow Göteborg.
There are scarce details in Finnish about Dr. Stallman's talk
New XBox Leaks Probably Serve to Confirm XBox's Collapse (Many More Layoffs)
It's very much consistent with what many other sites have reported lately
The Slop Song
The train wreck marches on
LLM Slop/Advanced Plagiarism Flooding the Zone With Capital That Does Not Exist
Many publishers out there still participate in this bubble instead of calling it what it is
Links 09/10/2025: Sacked Microsoft Workers Make "Sackbird", IBM Taps CockroachDB for PostgreSQL
Links for the day
"Happy Hacking Day" Richard Stallman Talk This Afternoon (From 14:00 to 16:00) at Haaga-Helia University in Pasila
Richard Stallman in Helsinki, Finland
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Wednesday, October 08, 2025
IRC logs for Wednesday, October 08, 2025
Links 09/10/2025: Impact of Microsoft Layoffs, More Data Breaches
Links for the day
Gemini Links 09/10/2025: Autumn Blues and C IRC Bot
Links for the day
Slopwatch Appreciated by Real Authors of GNU/Linux Articles
We do try to keep on top of those things
Upgraded R.R.R.R.R.R. Today
The Web of 2025 is full of garbage, not limited to slopfarms
Freedom From Proprietary Prisons
Forking always an option
IBM's Watson Died in 1956, Now Watson Dies Again
IBM is becoming just a reseller of GAFAM and other stuff
Microsoft Says That Constant Mass Layoffs Are Success, the Media Isn't Buying This Microsoft Narrative Anymore
If people in the media feel an obligation to repeat whatever lies Microsoft tells, what point will there be to the media?
Links 08/10/2025: "Mali Puts Free Speech on Trial" And Apple Enforces Dictatorship
Links for the day
Links 08/10/2025: ‘Death to Spotify’ and Law to Ban Loud Commercials on Streaming (Dis)Services
Links for the day
Links 08/10/2025: Real Innovation and Nina.chat is Dead
Links for the day
Links 08/10/2025: Y2K38 Bug is a Vulnerability, Chat Control in Europe a Threat
Links for the day
Microsoft Windows is No Longer an Operating System, It's Surveillance Project
Why is this even legal to preload on PCs outside the US?
How and Why Once-Legitimate Sites Turn Into Slopfarms
Many sites will go offline and many social control networks will shut down once they realise or even openly admit they spend money and time gardening a bunch of bots and slop
UbuntuPIT Became a Slopfarm and Gnoppix Tarnishes Its Own Brand With Slop
It fits all the characteristics of mildly-edited (if at all) slop
Slopwatch: Linux Journal and Other Slopfarms
GAFAM needs to go the way of the dodo
Gemini Links 08/10/2025: "Seek Seek Revolution" and Gradient Backgrounds
Links for the day
Qualcomm Arduino Takes Aim at Raspberry Pi
Qualcomm is a Microsoft partner
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Tuesday, October 07, 2025
IRC logs for Tuesday, October 07, 2025
Stagnation of the Economy and What Free Software Can (or Could) Do For It
If your economic model is based on a pyramid of lies, it won't last very long
Social Control Media is Sinking
it would rightly seem like the era of centralised "social" sites (they're not social, they're about controlling the users) is ending, not overnight but gradually
Participation in Cancel Culture Detrimental to One's Career
A cautionary tale
Passion Wins
we've increased the number of birds we feed to 100+
How Solderpunk and Sean Conner Started Gemini Protocol (and, Collectively, Geminispace) Back in 2019
Based on the "official" history
Arduino is Now a Patent Bully (Qualcomm)
Qualcomm has just bought Arduino
Many Years of Microsoft Cancellations and Faked (Acquired) Revenue "Growth"
XBox is basically the "next Skype"
The Comment TheLayoff.com Has Just Censored for Criticising a Ridiculous Puff Piece of IBM Management
If comments get censored for their "style" rather than their substance, then society will be worse off
The Power of Writing Down Facts
The more we write and publish, the more people will know what happened
Microsoft's Non-Denying Denial About XBox's Death is Already Being Shattered to Pieces
Like Microsoft's 'open' 'hey hi', heralding meaningless non-committing agreements with AMD is little more than vapourware
Slopwatch: UbuntuPIT Joins the Slopfarms Club
Slopfarms gonna slop
Links 07/10/2025: Privacy at Risk, GAFAM Remains Off the Hook
Links for the day
Gemini Links 07/10/2025: Modern Retro Console Idea and Batch vs Bash
Links for the day
Links 07/10/2025: International Criminal Court (ICC) Convicts Ali Kushayb; Moroccan Imprisoned for 'Offensive' Shirt
Links for the day
Links 07/10/2025: EU' Chat Control is Back, US Cracks Down on Democracy
Links for the day
Techrights Pursues Justice and Truth Because, Without Those, Society Descends Into Chaos
most people reject dogma and pseudoscience
Upcoming Talks by Richard Stallman in Helsinki, Göteborg, and Rome
Join with him and share the software
Something Bad is Happening in the Open Source Initiative (OSI)
The latest OSI blog post is from a Microsoft operative and a few weeks ago the Executive Director left
TLS 1.3 Dominates Geminispace (99% of Known Capsules)
it's nowadays safe to assume almost every capsule can handle TLS 1.3
Why soylentnews.org Has Been Having Technical Difficulties Lately
The network has been going up and down quite a lot this past week
A Statement Against Violence
The facts are on our side
They've Run Out of Things to Rebrand or Label as "AI"
The next few years will be interesting because if Microsoft lays off tens of thousands of workers each year, there won't be much left except mountains of debt and dying brands
The Register MS is Still Being Paid to Participate in the "AI" Ponzi Scheme Which Will Crash the Economy
The Register MS is hoping to get lucky by tricking people into a scam
Richard Stallman Confirms His Talk in Göteborg This Coming Friday
"The hosts say that the list will not be given to the state"
Most of the "Linux" Results This Morning in Google News Are LLM Slop From the Same Slopfarm, Plagiarising Phoronix
The main question is, does Google even care at this point?
Gemini Links 07/10/2025: Civil War and "Goodbye Web"
Links for the day
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Monday, October 06, 2025
IRC logs for Monday, October 06, 2025