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I'm personally against patents, but even if I were to assume they do provide the common good used to justify them, the #1 problem with patents is that the peopl

by psyc 10y ago

I'm personally against patents, but even if I were to assume they do provide the common good used to justify them, the #1 problem with patents is that the people who grant them appear to be either completely unqualified, or under too great a workload. Or both.

mtgx 10y ago
I think I'd prefer it if filing for a patent would cost like $500, or even less, but then the USPTO would reject most applications by default, instead of accepting most applications by default, as they do now. I'd prefer a rejection bias over an acceptance one. And I think a patent costing however many thousands of dollars it does now puts some pressure on USPTO employees to accept most patents.
- joombaga 10y ago
  >> I think a patent costing however many thousands of dollars it does now puts some pressure on USPTO employees to accept most patents. Why? Fear of lawsuit?
Someone1234 10y ago
Even if they did do a better job of reviewing patents in certain countries, people would just shop around until they found the most lenient international patent office and file there. The US Patent office in particular decided many years ago that they simply weren't qualified to review all patents and just left it to the courts to deal with the fallout. Realistically a patent examiner cannot be qualified in all areas; so they'd need to gather industry experts which would make patent filing pretty expensive (plus a lot of experts disagree, so where do you set the standard?).
- Animats 10y ago
  A patent examiner cannot be qualified in all areas Which is why the USPTO has a large number of specialist patent units.
- ScottBurson 10y ago
  > The US Patent office in particular decided many years ago that they simply weren't qualified to review all patents and just left it to the courts to deal with the fallout. Right... but then, in the courts, an issued patent has a presumption of validity! This is arguably the biggest problem. I believe that before a patent can be used in litigation, the patentee should have to show its validity in more depth than the PTO requires, including objective evidence of nonobviousness [0]. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Graham_v._John_Deere_Co.#The_Patent_Act_of_1952 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Graham_v._John_Deere_Co.#The_P...

by psyc 10y ago

mtgx 10y ago

I think I'd prefer it if filing for a patent would cost like $500, or even less, but then the USPTO would reject most applications by default, instead of accepting most applications by default, as they do now. I'd prefer a rejection bias over an acceptance one. And I think a patent costing however many thousands of dollars it does now puts some pressure on USPTO employees to accept most patents.

joombaga 10y ago
>> I think a patent costing however many thousands of dollars it does now puts some pressure on USPTO employees to accept most patents. Why? Fear of lawsuit?

Someone1234 10y ago

Even if they did do a better job of reviewing patents in certain countries, people would just shop around until they found the most lenient international patent office and file there. The US Patent office in particular decided many years ago that they simply weren't qualified to review all patents and just left it to the courts to deal with the fallout. Realistically a patent examiner cannot be qualified in all areas; so they'd need to gather industry experts which would make patent filing pretty expensive (plus a lot of experts disagree, so where do you set the standard?).

Animats 10y ago
A patent examiner cannot be qualified in all areas Which is why the USPTO has a large number of specialist patent units.
ScottBurson 10y ago
> The US Patent office in particular decided many years ago that they simply weren't qualified to review all patents and just left it to the courts to deal with the fallout. Right... but then, in the courts, an issued patent has a presumption of validity! This is arguably the biggest problem. I believe that before a patent can be used in litigation, the patentee should have to show its validity in more depth than the PTO requires, including objective evidence of nonobviousness [0]. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Graham_v._John_Deere_Co.#The_Patent_Act_of_1952 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Graham_v._John_Deere_Co.#The_P...