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This is particularly troubling in the US, where the company could file for a patent after seeing the commit, but claim to have "invented" the idea before. IANA
by brlewis 16y ago
This is particularly troubling in the US, where the company could file for a patent after seeing the commit, but claim to have "invented" the idea before. IANAL, but I think the burden of proof would be on anyone who challenged the patent.
- kristiandupont 16y agoI was going to argue why I think you are wrong but I am also not a lawer so instead, I will point out that IANAL comments in legal threads generally provide more noise than signal. Maybe we should strive to avoid them?
- brlewis 16y agoA reply from a lawyer would be ideal, but since the rest of us are affected by the legal system, I do think some attempts to understand it are worthwhile. Here's a link to argue against me, but does it apply after the patent is granted, or only before? There's presumption of validity after. http://patents101.com/2009/03/date-of-invention-first-to-invent http://patents101.com/2009/03/date-of-invention-first-to-inv...
- stonemetal 16y agoWhat are your arguments? He is right the US is first to invent. I think he is wrong in the claim to have invented it earlier bit is easy, the repo commit time line(and mailing list emails etc.) would give a firm date which the claiming party would have to have proof of inventing before. That is to say it isn't like a criminal case where only one side has to prove anything both parties have to prove invention dates.
- mcherm 16y agoIf the patent is granted, then any litigant bears the burden of proof in disproving it. The cost of patent litigation is sufficient that any institution would have difficulty pursuing such a case to that point, much less a group of volunteers that maintain an open source project.