4 ms·

How does anyone start a company these days and not accidentally infringe on a bunch of nonsense patents?

by dcl 3y ago

Dalewyn 3y ago
You license the patents as applicable, if that's an option. Otherwise, you go and make+patent your own invention. Maybe have a good legal team to research patents too.
- asmithmd1 3y ago
  The problem is companies can just ignore your request to license a patent. Did you know the reason any artist can "cover" another artist's song is that Congress added "compulsory licensing" to copyright law? For 9.1 cents per copy of a song, you can record your own version and sell it. We need to do the same thing for patent claims. Set a floor of, IDK, $100 per copy of a patent claim infringement. As it is now, damages are completely, un-capped and you have to pay for a lawsuit to get a jury to decide how much a patent is worth.
  - andromeduck 3y ago
    Cap total proceeds at 20% of final product cost after a few years of exclusivity.
ocdtrekkie 3y ago
This is far less than nonsense: Google partnered with Sonos explicitly to get access to their internal designs, and then copied them. This is closer to industrial espionage than inadvertently stumbling across patent infringement.
- gpm 3y ago
  > Google partnered with Sonos explicitly to get access to their internal designs, and then copied them If anything this ought to be strong evidence that the patents failed to disclose the invention and are invalid. Patents are a deal where you publicly disclose your invention in exchange for a temporary monopoly. If someone has to get access to your internal designs to copy them, they shouldn't be protected by patent. Edit: (Note I'm talking about how the law ought to work, I'm not claiming this is strong evidence under current US law that the patents actually are invalid)
  - makeitdouble 3y ago
    A patent is at best a recipe, and expertise on how to make the stuff work best in the real world is still extremely valuable.
    - tadfisher 3y ago
      A recipe isn't patentable on its own, though. For most inventions you either need to demonstrate you have already built the thing, or have provided the thing to the PTO along with the application. For software, though, it seems you don't need to do either.
- nl 3y ago
  While it's true that Google partnered with Sonos and then copied the features they saw Sonos having success with I'm not aware of any allegations they used internal Sonos documents. If that happened I'm surprised that no case summaries mentioned this anywhere! Can you link to this?
- fuzzfactor 3y ago
  If they were proper partners I would think they would be working together using Google's money along with Sonos patents as a team without needing to license the patent except to those other than the partnership. I'm not very well informed but it looks like Google was simply an untrustworthy partner and they split up unamicably.
kabes 3y ago
Especially in the audio/video world this is close to impossible. It's a patent minefield

How does anyone start a company these days and not accidentally infringe on a bunch of nonsense patents?

by dcl 3y ago

How does anyone start a company these days and not accidentally infringe on a bunch of nonsense patents?

You license the patents as applicable, if that's an option. Otherwise, you go and make+patent your own invention. Maybe have a good legal team to research patents too.

asmithmd1 3y ago
The problem is companies can just ignore your request to license a patent. Did you know the reason any artist can "cover" another artist's song is that Congress added "compulsory licensing" to copyright law? For 9.1 cents per copy of a song, you can record your own version and sell it. We need to do the same thing for patent claims. Set a floor of, IDK, $100 per copy of a patent claim infringement. As it is now, damages are completely, un-capped and you have to pay for a lawsuit to get a jury to decide how much a patent is worth.
- andromeduck 3y ago
  Cap total proceeds at 20% of final product cost after a few years of exclusivity.

ocdtrekkie 3y ago

This is far less than nonsense: Google partnered with Sonos explicitly to get access to their internal designs, and then copied them. This is closer to industrial espionage than inadvertently stumbling across patent infringement.

gpm 3y ago
> Google partnered with Sonos explicitly to get access to their internal designs, and then copied them If anything this ought to be strong evidence that the patents failed to disclose the invention and are invalid. Patents are a deal where you publicly disclose your invention in exchange for a temporary monopoly. If someone has to get access to your internal designs to copy them, they shouldn't be protected by patent. Edit: (Note I'm talking about how the law ought to work, I'm not claiming this is strong evidence under current US law that the patents actually are invalid)
- makeitdouble 3y ago
  A patent is at best a recipe, and expertise on how to make the stuff work best in the real world is still extremely valuable.
  - tadfisher 3y ago
    A recipe isn't patentable on its own, though. For most inventions you either need to demonstrate you have already built the thing, or have provided the thing to the PTO along with the application. For software, though, it seems you don't need to do either.
nl 3y ago
While it's true that Google partnered with Sonos and then copied the features they saw Sonos having success with I'm not aware of any allegations they used internal Sonos documents. If that happened I'm surprised that no case summaries mentioned this anywhere! Can you link to this?
fuzzfactor 3y ago
If they were proper partners I would think they would be working together using Google's money along with Sonos patents as a team without needing to license the patent except to those other than the partnership. I'm not very well informed but it looks like Google was simply an untrustworthy partner and they split up unamicably.

kabes 3y ago

Especially in the audio/video world this is close to impossible. It's a patent minefield