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What we really need is to find a way to stop patents from being granted for the implications of a technology. Connecting computers together into a network is ha

What we really need is to find a way to stop patents from being granted for the implications of a technology. Connecting computers together into a network is hard, figuring out that once they are connected together, they might interact with each other is not. It is novel in that they couldn't interact that way before, and now they can, but that novel behavior isn't an invention its merely an implication enabled by the real work of doing the connecting. Its like patenting the idea of driving your car to Grandma's. Letting trolls steal the implications from the inventors (and from society at large) with noting more inventive than little bits of paper with use cases on them is almost a crime against future humanity. Of course the web is interactive, that's why the real inventors made the damn thing in the first place.

ohyes 15y ago
> It is novel in that they couldn't interact that way before, and now they can, but that novel behavior isn't an invention its merely an implication enabled by the real work of doing the connecting. Its like patenting the idea of driving your car to Grandma's. I'd say the proper term for it is 'discovery'. Connecting computers together in a network and creating the infrastructure (ethernet, routers, DNS servers, stuff like that) is all actual invention. If someone creates an ethernet that is 200x better than what we currently have, or a much better way of routing packets etc, they should get credit for that invention and be able to patent it. Once you have the physical infrastructure, anything else that you do with it is just discovering a neat property of a system which has already been created. It is like patenting gravity, the Pythagorean theorem, or a certain chord progression. (Imagine if someone had patented IV-V-I, we wouldn't have had nearly 60 years worth of music!) In this way, I would say that Berners-Lee didn't invent the web, he discovered an extremely interesting and useful property of combining computer networks and hypertext.
- eridius 15y ago
  Inventing hard things is worth patenting. Discovering emergent phenomena is not.
  - jaekwon 15y ago
    If it's so hard, do you really need a monopoly enforced by statute? The harder it is, the more natural temporary monopoly you get until others start copying you. I say, nothing is worth infringing upon a creator's right to create. Please correct me if I'm wrong. Even if there are some cases where a patent might have been beneficial overall, you still have to weigh the benefits against the costs of having a patent system at all. How much GDP is spent on patents in general?
    - eridius 15y ago
      Inventing hard things is hard, but copying other people's inventions is significantly easier. Don't forget, part of the point of the patent system is to encourage inventors to publicly document how their invention works so other people can use it (with licensing), instead of keeping it secret and possibly having the knowledge lost over time. It seems to me that if someone can describe superficially what an invention does and you can build it on the spot, then it probably doesn't deserve a patent. For example, if you were to describe the appearance of an engine block to me, I wouldn't be able to replicate the combustion engine, and it's probably worth patenting. But if you tell me that the user clicks on one button to purchase an item without going through a checkout phase, I can easily replicate that without any knowledge of how it works. Although come to think of it, that basically negates all business method patents.
      - erichocean 15y ago
        > Although come to think of it, that basically negates all business method patents. You said that like that's a bad thing...
      - mironathetin 15y ago
        Just look at the results of patent. Large companies with money copy, despite of patents. Thats why all smartphones look the same and do the same. If its about Samsung against Apple, there will be endless lawsuits. If its Samsung against you, Samsung will go on using your patent and there is not much you can do against it. This is an old argument: patents protect large companies. It is still true. Just imagine where the internet would be now, if every website developer had to face lawsuits from various ingenuous inventors, who happened to use his two lines of code before him. It would only be manageable to develop internet code by Google and Facebook, with enough lawyers in their backoffice.

ohyes 15y ago

> It is novel in that they couldn't interact that way before, and now they can, but that novel behavior isn't an invention its merely an implication enabled by the real work of doing the connecting. Its like patenting the idea of driving your car to Grandma's. I'd say the proper term for it is 'discovery'. Connecting computers together in a network and creating the infrastructure (ethernet, routers, DNS servers, stuff like that) is all actual invention. If someone creates an ethernet that is 200x better than what we currently have, or a much better way of routing packets etc, they should get credit for that invention and be able to patent it. Once you have the physical infrastructure, anything else that you do with it is just discovering a neat property of a system which has already been created. It is like patenting gravity, the Pythagorean theorem, or a certain chord progression. (Imagine if someone had patented IV-V-I, we wouldn't have had nearly 60 years worth of music!) In this way, I would say that Berners-Lee didn't invent the web, he discovered an extremely interesting and useful property of combining computer networks and hypertext.

eridius 15y ago
Inventing hard things is worth patenting. Discovering emergent phenomena is not.
- jaekwon 15y ago
  If it's so hard, do you really need a monopoly enforced by statute? The harder it is, the more natural temporary monopoly you get until others start copying you. I say, nothing is worth infringing upon a creator's right to create. Please correct me if I'm wrong. Even if there are some cases where a patent might have been beneficial overall, you still have to weigh the benefits against the costs of having a patent system at all. How much GDP is spent on patents in general?
  - eridius 15y ago
    Inventing hard things is hard, but copying other people's inventions is significantly easier. Don't forget, part of the point of the patent system is to encourage inventors to publicly document how their invention works so other people can use it (with licensing), instead of keeping it secret and possibly having the knowledge lost over time. It seems to me that if someone can describe superficially what an invention does and you can build it on the spot, then it probably doesn't deserve a patent. For example, if you were to describe the appearance of an engine block to me, I wouldn't be able to replicate the combustion engine, and it's probably worth patenting. But if you tell me that the user clicks on one button to purchase an item without going through a checkout phase, I can easily replicate that without any knowledge of how it works. Although come to think of it, that basically negates all business method patents.
    - erichocean 15y ago
      > Although come to think of it, that basically negates all business method patents. You said that like that's a bad thing...
    - mironathetin 15y ago
      Just look at the results of patent. Large companies with money copy, despite of patents. Thats why all smartphones look the same and do the same. If its about Samsung against Apple, there will be endless lawsuits. If its Samsung against you, Samsung will go on using your patent and there is not much you can do against it. This is an old argument: patents protect large companies. It is still true. Just imagine where the internet would be now, if every website developer had to face lawsuits from various ingenuous inventors, who happened to use his two lines of code before him. It would only be manageable to develop internet code by Google and Facebook, with enough lawyers in their backoffice.