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Okay, so MPEG-LA is clearly a rent-seeking organization, we agree on that. However, MPEG enables the rent-seeking behavior by MPEG-LA, quite deliberately. I do

by cure 8y ago

Okay, so MPEG-LA is clearly a rent-seeking organization, we agree on that. However, MPEG enables the rent-seeking behavior by MPEG-LA, quite deliberately. I don't think it is unreasonable to say that MPEG are complicit and a big part of the problem. People are always making excuses for MPEG. Secondly: in the case of MPEG-G (the genomics 'standard' that is being developed by MPEG), the very same people who are working on MPEG-G, as part of the MPEG working group, are the people who are filing the patents. See the hackernews thread on MPEG-G that I linked above. That means the rent-seeking behavior is not only the domain of the 'separate and completely unaffiliated entity' MPEG-LA. MPEG is just as bad as MPEG-LA.

rayiner 8y ago
You keep saying rent seeking, but it doesn’t mean what you think it means. If you’re building a standard and charging people money to use it, that’s not rent seeking by definition because you’re creating value. Rent seeking would be if MPEG-G folks tried to use their patents to extract royalties for things people were already doing.
- cure 8y ago
  I know what rent-seeking means, and I understand your point, but I disagree with it. I think you are giving the MPEG-G folks too much credit here. Unfortunately, the (software) patent system does not distinguish between people actually innovating and rent-seekers. Patents very explicitly give their owners broad rights to shut down any use of their patented inventions through injunctions. If you think that the MPEG-G patents are not going to be enforced in case someone was already doing what they were doing before the patent was granted, well, have I got a bridge to sell you... As for MPEG-G creating value, I think that is highly debatable. See this post: https://datageekdom.blogspot.com/2018/09/ https://datageekdom.blogspot.com/2018/09/, which summarizes the MPEG-G situation as "Patents + extensive high profile marketing + lack of evidence for benefit". That's not a valuable contribution to society. It's simply a tax on the bio-informatics community.
  - rayiner 8y ago
    > Unfortunately, the (software) patent system does not distinguish between people actually innovating and rent-seekers. Patents very explicitly give their owners broad rights to shut down any use of their patented inventions through injunctions. That's sometimes the case for software patents in general, but not for patents tied to a standard like MPEG-G, where the point is to get people to pay for being compatible. I've looked at a couple of the MPEG-G patents, and if you're infringing the MPEG-G patent it's probably because you're actually using MPEG-G without paying for it, not because you happened to independently recreate the same thing.

by cure 8y ago

rayiner 8y ago

You keep saying rent seeking, but it doesn’t mean what you think it means. If you’re building a standard and charging people money to use it, that’s not rent seeking by definition because you’re creating value. Rent seeking would be if MPEG-G folks tried to use their patents to extract royalties for things people were already doing.

cure 8y ago
I know what rent-seeking means, and I understand your point, but I disagree with it. I think you are giving the MPEG-G folks too much credit here. Unfortunately, the (software) patent system does not distinguish between people actually innovating and rent-seekers. Patents very explicitly give their owners broad rights to shut down any use of their patented inventions through injunctions. If you think that the MPEG-G patents are not going to be enforced in case someone was already doing what they were doing before the patent was granted, well, have I got a bridge to sell you... As for MPEG-G creating value, I think that is highly debatable. See this post: https://datageekdom.blogspot.com/2018/09/ https://datageekdom.blogspot.com/2018/09/, which summarizes the MPEG-G situation as "Patents + extensive high profile marketing + lack of evidence for benefit". That's not a valuable contribution to society. It's simply a tax on the bio-informatics community.
- rayiner 8y ago
  > Unfortunately, the (software) patent system does not distinguish between people actually innovating and rent-seekers. Patents very explicitly give their owners broad rights to shut down any use of their patented inventions through injunctions. That's sometimes the case for software patents in general, but not for patents tied to a standard like MPEG-G, where the point is to get people to pay for being compatible. I've looked at a couple of the MPEG-G patents, and if you're infringing the MPEG-G patent it's probably because you're actually using MPEG-G without paying for it, not because you happened to independently recreate the same thing.