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You say that like patents are inherently bad and, therefore, any time patents are invalidated that's a good thing. I know the software industry has a grudge aga

by eridius 11y ago

You say that like patents are inherently bad and, therefore, any time patents are invalidated that's a good thing. I know the software industry has a grudge against software patents, but Apple's slide-to-unlock isn't a software patent, it's (I believe) a design patent. I don't know what kind of patent the autocorrect one is (I have no idea what it covers).

baldfat 11y ago
The patent was invalidated. "... the appeals panel said the patent is invalid because of prior art." http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2016/02/appeals-court-reverses-apple-v-samsung-ii-strips-away-apples-120m-jury-verdict/ http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2016/02/appeals-court-rev... > patents are inherently bad It is a GREAT thing when obviously easy to show prior art shows that it was not an innovation. This also shows the weakness and the loyalties of jury of our peers in cases like this. When I saw the prior art and video it was clear their was prior art. Our current system hinders innovation and causes a hostile environment for anyone creating anything in technology today.
- eridius 11y ago
  I wasn't commenting at all on why it was invalidated, or whether the invalidation was correct. I was responding to the comment > I interpret that they didn't find on narrow grounds, the Federal circuit just invalidated a bunch of patents. That's good, right? The way the comment is phrased, it makes it sound like ajross is saying that it's good that the Federal circuit just invalidated patents. Which is to say, it sounded like ajross was saying that it's good for patents to be invalidated in general, as opposed to whether it was correct for this particular patent to have been found invalid. > Our current system hinders innovation and causes a hostile environment for anyone creating anything in technology today. You're talking about software patents here. Design patents are different. Which was kind of the whole point of my comment. Note: I don't know if I'm using the phrase "design patent" correctly here, because IANAL and I don't know if there's actually a specific legal term for that. What I'm referring to here is a patent that describes some aspect of user experience, which is different than a patent that describes how to accomplish something. It's easy to accidentally infringe on software patents because it's easy to accidentally do something the same way someone else did without knowing. But for these "design patents", you typically infringe these because you explicitly want to copy what the patent holder is doing, i.e. you don't infringe on these things accidentally.
  - ajross 11y ago
    > Design patents are different. How?
    - dragonwriter 11y ago
      Design patterns are in many respects more like trademarks than they are like utility patents, software or otherwise. They protect identity, not function.
    - sbuk 11y ago
      Design patent is such a wrong headed way of describing what they actually are. Trade dress or copyright is much more appropriate.
  - baldfat 11y ago
    Design patents are evil and need to just be copyrights or trademark issues and not something for patents. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Design_patent https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Design_patent
michaelmrose 11y ago
Patents are mostly bad and the bar for invalidating even horribly ridiculously bad ones is so high that if a patent was struck down in court it was probably on the wrong side of ridiculous and thus its demise is indeed a good thing.

by eridius 11y ago

baldfat 11y ago

The patent was invalidated. "... the appeals panel said the patent is invalid because of prior art." http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2016/02/appeals-court-reverses-apple-v-samsung-ii-strips-away-apples-120m-jury-verdict/ http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2016/02/appeals-court-rev... > patents are inherently bad It is a GREAT thing when obviously easy to show prior art shows that it was not an innovation. This also shows the weakness and the loyalties of jury of our peers in cases like this. When I saw the prior art and video it was clear their was prior art. Our current system hinders innovation and causes a hostile environment for anyone creating anything in technology today.

eridius 11y ago
I wasn't commenting at all on why it was invalidated, or whether the invalidation was correct. I was responding to the comment > I interpret that they didn't find on narrow grounds, the Federal circuit just invalidated a bunch of patents. That's good, right? The way the comment is phrased, it makes it sound like ajross is saying that it's good that the Federal circuit just invalidated patents. Which is to say, it sounded like ajross was saying that it's good for patents to be invalidated in general, as opposed to whether it was correct for this particular patent to have been found invalid. > Our current system hinders innovation and causes a hostile environment for anyone creating anything in technology today. You're talking about software patents here. Design patents are different. Which was kind of the whole point of my comment. Note: I don't know if I'm using the phrase "design patent" correctly here, because IANAL and I don't know if there's actually a specific legal term for that. What I'm referring to here is a patent that describes some aspect of user experience, which is different than a patent that describes how to accomplish something. It's easy to accidentally infringe on software patents because it's easy to accidentally do something the same way someone else did without knowing. But for these "design patents", you typically infringe these because you explicitly want to copy what the patent holder is doing, i.e. you don't infringe on these things accidentally.
- ajross 11y ago
  > Design patents are different. How?
  - dragonwriter 11y ago
    Design patterns are in many respects more like trademarks than they are like utility patents, software or otherwise. They protect identity, not function.
  - sbuk 11y ago
    Design patent is such a wrong headed way of describing what they actually are. Trade dress or copyright is much more appropriate.
- baldfat 11y ago
  Design patents are evil and need to just be copyrights or trademark issues and not something for patents. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Design_patent https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Design_patent

michaelmrose 11y ago

Patents are mostly bad and the bar for invalidating even horribly ridiculously bad ones is so high that if a patent was struck down in court it was probably on the wrong side of ridiculous and thus its demise is indeed a good thing.