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https://patents.google.com/patent/US4405829A/en https://patents.google.com/patent/US4405829A/en https://patents.google.com/patent/US6285999B1/en https://patents

by patrec 3y ago

https://patents.google.com/patent/US4405829A/en https://patents.google.com/patent/US4405829A/en https://patents.google.com/patent/US6285999B1/en https://patents.google.com/patent/US6285999B1/en https://patents.google.com/patent/US7478074B2/en https://patents.google.com/patent/US7478074B2/en

Jalad 3y ago
These links seem to be self defeating in nature. First, most of them are math related, except you get the computer to do the math. You can't (or shouldn't) be able to own or outlaw math. The last link is a Support Vector Machine as far as I can tell. Those were discovered in like 1964 according to Wikipedia. And then it was patented in 199x? That's absolutely wild
- patrec 3y ago
  > First, most of them are math related, Nope. At least not for any reasonably sane definition that would not apply to all software. > Those were discovered in like 1964 according to Wikipedia. And then it was patented in 199x? Maybe before whining about how Vapnik got an unfair patent for something someone else did in 1964, try learning something about SVMs and their history. It's quite insulting.
kbenson 3y ago
From what I can gather, that's RSA, PageRank, and the idea of neural networks and how to train them (or some specific subset or advancement of that I think?). I agree these are novel and not something immediately obvious. I think what's happening (what always happens) is that people overreact and have a hard time finding nuance when they are upset. Amazon's one-click patent was ridiculous. Is Google's PageRank? Maybe. Is the RSA algorithm or how to train neural networks? I don't know. Encouraging the development of these by granting limited time monopolies on them seems like it would encourage people to develop them, but if there was a different way to reward the inventors I would be interested in the details (i.e. less blanket statements that it would be as good, but reasoned thought at a minimum and data if we are so lucky as to have some). Sometimes the problem is not the idea but the implementation. Maybe that's the case with some types of patents.
- patrec 3y ago
  Almost, the last patent is about SVMs which are a different ML learning paradigm (one that completely eclipsed neural networks for some time, for what it's worth). > I think what's happening (what always happens) is that people overreact and have a hard time finding nuance when they are upset. Yup. I agree that software patents, in the US at least, are a bit of a cluster-fuck, but it's evidently not true that nothing non-trivial was ever patented.
Lapha 3y ago
Not to detract from the point too much, but RSA was independently discovered in 1973.
feoren 3y ago
-- Method for node ranking in a linked database (PageRank) An application of Bayes' Theorem (1763) and heavily related to Markov chains (1906). Build a Markov chain of simulated users clicking around the internet and build its weights with Bayes' Theorem and you basically have PageRank. It's clever, but no more clever than what thousands of software engineers invent every day. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bayes%27_theorem https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bayes%27_theorem https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Markov_chain https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Markov_chain -- RSA A pretty strong example, but largely based on Diffie-Hellman key exchange published a year before and known since 1969. At least this one was granted to its actual inventors. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diffie–Hellman_key_exchange#Cryptographic_explanation https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diffie–Hellman_key_exchange#Cr... -- Support vector machine "The original SVM algorithm was invented by Vladimir N. Vapnik and Alexey Ya. Chervonenkis in 1964. In 1992, Bernhard Boser, Isabelle Guyon and Vladimir Vapnik suggested a way to create nonlinear classifiers by applying the kernel trick to maximum-margin hyperplanes. The "soft margin" incarnation, as is commonly used in software packages, was proposed by Corinna Cortes and Vapnik in 1993 and published in 1995." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Support_vector_machine#History https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Support_vector_machine#History Patent issued in 2004 to none of the above people. Fail. Patent has FORTY YEARS of prior art. Should never have been issued. I personally remember SVMs being considered "old school" AI in my college AI class in 2005.
- patrec 3y ago
  Ugh, I pasted the wrong patent there for number 3, but Vapnik does in fact hold a couple of SVM related patents. Concerning the "FOURTY YEARS of prior art", well SVMs without the kernel trick are about as much prior art (and useful) as perceptrons compared to Deep Neural networks.
- Spivak 3y ago
  > An application of Bayes' Theorem... > but largely based on Diffie-Hellman key exchange published Novel applications are patentable.
  - feoren 3y ago

by patrec 3y ago

Jalad 3y ago

These links seem to be self defeating in nature. First, most of them are math related, except you get the computer to do the math. You can't (or shouldn't) be able to own or outlaw math. The last link is a Support Vector Machine as far as I can tell. Those were discovered in like 1964 according to Wikipedia. And then it was patented in 199x? That's absolutely wild

patrec 3y ago
> First, most of them are math related, Nope. At least not for any reasonably sane definition that would not apply to all software. > Those were discovered in like 1964 according to Wikipedia. And then it was patented in 199x? Maybe before whining about how Vapnik got an unfair patent for something someone else did in 1964, try learning something about SVMs and their history. It's quite insulting.

kbenson 3y ago

From what I can gather, that's RSA, PageRank, and the idea of neural networks and how to train them (or some specific subset or advancement of that I think?). I agree these are novel and not something immediately obvious. I think what's happening (what always happens) is that people overreact and have a hard time finding nuance when they are upset. Amazon's one-click patent was ridiculous. Is Google's PageRank? Maybe. Is the RSA algorithm or how to train neural networks? I don't know. Encouraging the development of these by granting limited time monopolies on them seems like it would encourage people to develop them, but if there was a different way to reward the inventors I would be interested in the details (i.e. less blanket statements that it would be as good, but reasoned thought at a minimum and data if we are so lucky as to have some). Sometimes the problem is not the idea but the implementation. Maybe that's the case with some types of patents.

patrec 3y ago
Almost, the last patent is about SVMs which are a different ML learning paradigm (one that completely eclipsed neural networks for some time, for what it's worth). > I think what's happening (what always happens) is that people overreact and have a hard time finding nuance when they are upset. Yup. I agree that software patents, in the US at least, are a bit of a cluster-fuck, but it's evidently not true that nothing non-trivial was ever patented.

Lapha 3y ago

Not to detract from the point too much, but RSA was independently discovered in 1973.

feoren 3y ago

-- Method for node ranking in a linked database (PageRank) An application of Bayes' Theorem (1763) and heavily related to Markov chains (1906). Build a Markov chain of simulated users clicking around the internet and build its weights with Bayes' Theorem and you basically have PageRank. It's clever, but no more clever than what thousands of software engineers invent every day. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bayes%27_theorem https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bayes%27_theorem https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Markov_chain https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Markov_chain -- RSA A pretty strong example, but largely based on Diffie-Hellman key exchange published a year before and known since 1969. At least this one was granted to its actual inventors. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diffie–Hellman_key_exchange#Cryptographic_explanation https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diffie–Hellman_key_exchange#Cr... -- Support vector machine "The original SVM algorithm was invented by Vladimir N. Vapnik and Alexey Ya. Chervonenkis in 1964. In 1992, Bernhard Boser, Isabelle Guyon and Vladimir Vapnik suggested a way to create nonlinear classifiers by applying the kernel trick to maximum-margin hyperplanes. The "soft margin" incarnation, as is commonly used in software packages, was proposed by Corinna Cortes and Vapnik in 1993 and published in 1995." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Support_vector_machine#History https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Support_vector_machine#History Patent issued in 2004 to none of the above people. Fail. Patent has FORTY YEARS of prior art. Should never have been issued. I personally remember SVMs being considered "old school" AI in my college AI class in 2005.

patrec 3y ago
Ugh, I pasted the wrong patent there for number 3, but Vapnik does in fact hold a couple of SVM related patents. Concerning the "FOURTY YEARS of prior art", well SVMs without the kernel trick are about as much prior art (and useful) as perceptrons compared to Deep Neural networks.
Spivak 3y ago
> An application of Bayes' Theorem... > but largely based on Diffie-Hellman key exchange published Novel applications are patentable.
- feoren 3y ago