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Can’t wait to see the patent system break under AI. It’s time for patents to go away or at least lower the timeframes of protection so we don’t stifle the innov

Can’t wait to see the patent system break under AI. It’s time for patents to go away or at least lower the timeframes of protection so we don’t stifle the innovation waves that are inevitably coming. Whole areas will be off limits and dominated by a few companies — the patent system is a system for the olden times. The patent system unfairly enforced incumbent advantage and needs to be reformed.

thewataccount 3y ago
I'm very curious to see if patents/copyright/IP just become "washable" with AI making them near useless. Given the recent determinations, it almost sounds like since it won't be human made, it might not be protectable? Not to mention the exceptions generally made for modifications to the IP to improve it.
- qeternity 3y ago
  People are going to work around this. Midjourney generates an image, but then I change the opacity 0.01% and so it becomes copyrightable (or whatever the smallest amount of human modification is required).
  - thewataccount 3y ago
    > but then I change the opacity 0.01% and so it becomes copyrightable AFAIK Courts generally have determined it must be "transformative" for fair use, and for patents - but like a substantive change. You can't just add a pixel in a corner and call it good. https://www.justia.com/intellectual-property/patents/types-of-patents/improvement-and-new-use-patents/ https://www.justia.com/intellectual-property/patents/types-o... Slightly different (was for getting a patent for ai work) - https://cdn.arstechnica.net/wp-content/uploads/2023/02/AI-COPYRIGHT-decision.pdf https://cdn.arstechnica.net/wp-content/uploads/2023/02/AI-CO...
- orhmeh09 3y ago
  Do you mean like, "Here is an algorithm for attention-based sequence transduction neural networks. Come up with an algorithm that is as similar as possible and produces the same outputs, but is unencumbered by patents"?
  - thewataccount 3y ago
    Essentially yes. You can already do it very effectively for code.
    - orhmeh09 3y ago
      Neat. Is there any way to thwart this? Edit: I suppose no more than you could prevent a human from trying to do the same.
      - morkalork 3y ago
        Sure, stop issuing patents for software!
      - pclmulqdq 3y ago
        Alice would like to have a word. That case (Alice Corp vs CLS Bank) makes it hard to have a software patent, particularly if that software has no physical effect on the world.
    - kazinator 3y ago
      Code is a specific expression covered by copyright, not an incredibly broad claim that covers everything from toasters to spacecraft. If the code's algorithm is patented, you cannot get around the patent by using different function and variable names and perturbing the code organization.
      - mort96 3y ago
        Worth noting that you can't just get around a piece of code's copyright by using different function and variable names and perturbing the organisation either. At least not if you're a human. I bet you're correct and we wont be able to use ML models to strip code of its patents the way we use them to strip code of its copyright protection. But I wouldn't have expected the copyright stripping trick to work either, yet here we are.
- sp332 3y ago
  This only works for copyright. Patents don’t protect parallel inventions. And trademarks cover anything that could confuse a potential customer, even unintentionally.
  - anticensor 3y ago
    Trademarks are field specific, unlike copyrights and patents.
    - sp332 3y ago
      Right. If your use of the trademarked name or logo is not infringing, you can just copy and paste it. No laundering necessary.
  - thewataccount 3y ago
    Yeah definitely doesn't cover trademarks as they are for something else like you said. To my understanding patents do allow for either "improvements" or anything that achieves the same result as long as it's not the same solution as the patent? They would certainly be a lot trickier then copywrite/IP but I think LLM's would still be able to generate possible solutions? One thing I'm thinking of for example is medication analogs - there's common substitutes you can make that achieve the same or better results that you can make. To my understanding redbull actually did this (without ai) to modafinil with this patent - https://patents.google.com/patent/US20210380545A1/en https://patents.google.com/patent/US20210380545A1/en EDIT: Modafinil might have expired but it looks like redbull filed their patent before the expiration.
    - sp332 3y ago
      When arithmetic coding was patented, lots of projects avoided using it. There was no workaround that got the same results without infringing.
pclmulqdq 3y ago
I'm not so sure it's going to break. Google may have a hard time enforcing this one thanks to Alice, but we will see if they try. Given that there has been no lawsuit against OpenAI, I'm guessing that they aren't planning to.
kelseyfrog 3y ago
Even just making patents un-assignable would be an improvement.
cynicalsecurity 3y ago
Besides, both China and Russia give zero shit about Western patents.

thewataccount 3y ago

I'm very curious to see if patents/copyright/IP just become "washable" with AI making them near useless. Given the recent determinations, it almost sounds like since it won't be human made, it might not be protectable? Not to mention the exceptions generally made for modifications to the IP to improve it.

qeternity 3y ago
People are going to work around this. Midjourney generates an image, but then I change the opacity 0.01% and so it becomes copyrightable (or whatever the smallest amount of human modification is required).
- thewataccount 3y ago
  > but then I change the opacity 0.01% and so it becomes copyrightable AFAIK Courts generally have determined it must be "transformative" for fair use, and for patents - but like a substantive change. You can't just add a pixel in a corner and call it good. https://www.justia.com/intellectual-property/patents/types-of-patents/improvement-and-new-use-patents/ https://www.justia.com/intellectual-property/patents/types-o... Slightly different (was for getting a patent for ai work) - https://cdn.arstechnica.net/wp-content/uploads/2023/02/AI-COPYRIGHT-decision.pdf https://cdn.arstechnica.net/wp-content/uploads/2023/02/AI-CO...
orhmeh09 3y ago
Do you mean like, "Here is an algorithm for attention-based sequence transduction neural networks. Come up with an algorithm that is as similar as possible and produces the same outputs, but is unencumbered by patents"?
- thewataccount 3y ago
  Essentially yes. You can already do it very effectively for code.
  - orhmeh09 3y ago
    Neat. Is there any way to thwart this? Edit: I suppose no more than you could prevent a human from trying to do the same.
    - morkalork 3y ago
      Sure, stop issuing patents for software!
    - pclmulqdq 3y ago
      Alice would like to have a word. That case (Alice Corp vs CLS Bank) makes it hard to have a software patent, particularly if that software has no physical effect on the world.
  - kazinator 3y ago
    Code is a specific expression covered by copyright, not an incredibly broad claim that covers everything from toasters to spacecraft. If the code's algorithm is patented, you cannot get around the patent by using different function and variable names and perturbing the code organization.
    - mort96 3y ago
      Worth noting that you can't just get around a piece of code's copyright by using different function and variable names and perturbing the organisation either. At least not if you're a human. I bet you're correct and we wont be able to use ML models to strip code of its patents the way we use them to strip code of its copyright protection. But I wouldn't have expected the copyright stripping trick to work either, yet here we are.
sp332 3y ago
This only works for copyright. Patents don’t protect parallel inventions. And trademarks cover anything that could confuse a potential customer, even unintentionally.
- anticensor 3y ago
  Trademarks are field specific, unlike copyrights and patents.
  - sp332 3y ago
    Right. If your use of the trademarked name or logo is not infringing, you can just copy and paste it. No laundering necessary.
- thewataccount 3y ago
  Yeah definitely doesn't cover trademarks as they are for something else like you said. To my understanding patents do allow for either "improvements" or anything that achieves the same result as long as it's not the same solution as the patent? They would certainly be a lot trickier then copywrite/IP but I think LLM's would still be able to generate possible solutions? One thing I'm thinking of for example is medication analogs - there's common substitutes you can make that achieve the same or better results that you can make. To my understanding redbull actually did this (without ai) to modafinil with this patent - https://patents.google.com/patent/US20210380545A1/en https://patents.google.com/patent/US20210380545A1/en EDIT: Modafinil might have expired but it looks like redbull filed their patent before the expiration.
  - sp332 3y ago
    When arithmetic coding was patented, lots of projects avoided using it. There was no workaround that got the same results without infringing.

pclmulqdq 3y ago

I'm not so sure it's going to break. Google may have a hard time enforcing this one thanks to Alice, but we will see if they try. Given that there has been no lawsuit against OpenAI, I'm guessing that they aren't planning to.

kelseyfrog 3y ago

Even just making patents un-assignable would be an improvement.

cynicalsecurity 3y ago

Besides, both China and Russia give zero shit about Western patents.