6 ms·

How To Kill Patent Trolls

80 points by dean 15y ago

ohashi 15y ago
I appreciate the idea and love the crowdsourcing model. However, if I need to invalidate a patent, there might often be more urgency than hoping for the crowd sourced solution. Not to say it isn't viable, but maybe it's something best used in conjunction with a team of experts?
- bryanlarsen 15y ago
  I would think that offering a $10,000 reward to the first person to come up with the solution would create a better sense of urgency than paying a firm $200 per hour to do the search. The firm gets paid more if it takes them longer, so why would they hurry?
- peterb 15y ago
  If this were to gain momentum, then I think the exact opposite would happen. Crowd sourcing is like a human map-reduce. The bad patent is "mapped" to people who know something about the subject and each searches independently sometimes sharing results. Analysis is done to "reduce" the result to provable prior art. Further, I think they should remove the award. I would do this for free. Sites that pay people to contribute almost always fail (think Mahalo vs. Wikipedia). Patent trolls affect all of us. This is something everyone could get behind. Edit: by "exact opposite" I mean crowd-sourcing could produce good results faster, with greater urgency, than any expert.
  - dvdkhlng 15y ago
    About doing this for free: thought the same. Receiving money might even complicate things wrt tax or other employment contracts. I wonder if they'd allow one to surrender any payments, instead having them directly donated to EFF, FSF or other non-profit organizations that are fighting with or are endangered by (software) patents.
seanc 15y ago
If only defending a patent suit was as simple as finding the prior art. Most patent trolls will happily invite you to take your prior art claim to court, knowing full well you can't afford to do it.
- pwg 15y ago
  > Most patent trolls will happily invite you to take your prior art claim to court If you (the defendant) has found good prior art (either by this method or some other method), you can also file for a re-examination with the USPTO using that new prior art. Still somewhat expensive, but significantly less expensive than going to court, and if the patent is found invalid it is just as dead.
  - vibrunazo 15y ago
    But does invalidating a patent usually work well a intended? We see so many obviously ridiculous patents, that one might think that if they are so sloppy to approve patents on the first place, that they'll be just as sloppy in a re examination. Or is the re examination all that much rigorous and accurate?
    - wisty 15y ago
      There's something like a million pending patents backing up the system. I think their attitude is "screw it, just approve everything, and let the courts sort it out". If you call for a re-examination, they might think twice, because they'll look bad if the courts suggest they screwed up.
      - ktizo 15y ago
        Could you automate a patent troll using a variation on the SCIgen software and effectively ddos the entire patent office with nonsensical gibberish? Am I bad for thinking of such things? ;)
        deleted 15y ago
arikrak 15y ago
I think the solution needs to be more ambitious. What if the "invention" is not prior art, but other people can come up with the same idea on their own? Does that deserve to be patented so that the company that was one week late will need to pay patent fees? Maybe the whole patent process should be crowd-sourced and patents should only be granted if no one can think of the same idea. (I discuss this more here: http://zappable.com/2011/08/how-to-fix-the-patent-system/ http://zappable.com/2011/08/how-to-fix-the-patent-system/)
- alttag 15y ago
  > What if the "invention" is not prior art, but other > people can come up with the same idea on their own? Then at the very least, it's evidence for obviousness, which (although a tougher sell) can also invalidate a patent. EDIT: IANAL
  - prodigal_erik 15y ago
    Unfortunately "obvious" in patent law tends to mean there is published work suggesting putting stuff together in that way. If nobody has discussed the problem (e.g., you were the first to work on it), it somehow doesn't matter that anyone competent would have promptly settled on the same solution you did, and we aren't getting anything of value in return for your generation-long monopoly on it. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inventive_step_and_non-obviousness#Teaching-suggestion-motivation_.28TSM.29_test http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inventive_step_and_non-obviousn...
ktizo 15y ago
Well, priorart.org is available for purchase. All it really needs is a wiki and a bug tracker on there... [edit]...oops, available by broker. :(
- vibrunazo 15y ago
  Ilike that idea. While offering money for the crowd is a nice idea. The confidentiality agreement may have been startling their progress. Maybe they would find more prior art if users were expected to contribute out of live for a bogus patent free world.
  - ktizo 15y ago
    Was thinking that you treat a patent as a bug, then submit it through the bug tracker and the result ends up on the wiki.
moldbug 15y ago
Is there something I'm missing here? Granted, there are more and more trolls these days. RSI is a real concern. You'll want a light weapon without a lot of recoil. And it should probably take an extended clip, to minimize reloading. Not to sound like a fanboy, but the Glock 17 seems perfect to me. All firearms can jam, so do bring a spare... Seriously: why would anyone think seriously about how to fix this system? Why would anyone imagine it can be fixed? The only relevant question is how to kill it. Glock or no Glock, everything on God's green earth can be killed.
- monochromatic 15y ago
  ... what? Also, it's a magazine, not a clip.
- TheAmazingIdiot 15y ago
  It reminds me of a poster I saw in the Occupy group. "Reform or Reveloution? Societal change just doesnt happen without a very large delta inducing that change. For example, we can view the changes from 9/11: creation of TSA, creation of Department of Fatherland.... Homeland security, breakdown of freedoms of travel and search. Change can also go the other way. We only have a large chunk of the Middle East to look at, starting with Tunisia. What I have studied a portion of is how the United states got where it is today. And time and time again, corrupt laws are passed for the reason of knee jerk or 'security'. Those politicians also promise never to use those laws against us, which in 5 or so years undoubtedly are. Perhaps the base Constitution is correct, although I think clarifications are in order. Perhaps not, considering the claim I have read that it was written solely for white landowners. I don't have the answers, but I can spot corruption when I see it. And when it's this endemic, revolution is the only way to fix it. Gods hope it's a peaceful one.
maqr 15y ago
I've always wondered why there isn't a crowdsourcing entity that pays out rewards for finding infringement (patent, copyright, whatever).
jinhwang 15y ago
Does anyone have any past experience with this? How much did it cost you? I'm creating an app that deals with real-time information and geo-location... It seems that patent trolls will be lurking everywhere. As a young startup, we don't have the money to go out there and make an attempt at protecting ourselves.

80 points by dean 15y ago

I appreciate the idea and love the crowdsourcing model. However, if I need to invalidate a patent, there might often be more urgency than hoping for the crowd sourced solution. Not to say it isn't viable, but maybe it's something best used in conjunction with a team of experts?

bryanlarsen 15y ago
I would think that offering a $10,000 reward to the first person to come up with the solution would create a better sense of urgency than paying a firm $200 per hour to do the search. The firm gets paid more if it takes them longer, so why would they hurry?
peterb 15y ago
If this were to gain momentum, then I think the exact opposite would happen. Crowd sourcing is like a human map-reduce. The bad patent is "mapped" to people who know something about the subject and each searches independently sometimes sharing results. Analysis is done to "reduce" the result to provable prior art. Further, I think they should remove the award. I would do this for free. Sites that pay people to contribute almost always fail (think Mahalo vs. Wikipedia). Patent trolls affect all of us. This is something everyone could get behind. Edit: by "exact opposite" I mean crowd-sourcing could produce good results faster, with greater urgency, than any expert.
- dvdkhlng 15y ago
  About doing this for free: thought the same. Receiving money might even complicate things wrt tax or other employment contracts. I wonder if they'd allow one to surrender any payments, instead having them directly donated to EFF, FSF or other non-profit organizations that are fighting with or are endangered by (software) patents.

seanc 15y ago

If only defending a patent suit was as simple as finding the prior art. Most patent trolls will happily invite you to take your prior art claim to court, knowing full well you can't afford to do it.

pwg 15y ago
> Most patent trolls will happily invite you to take your prior art claim to court If you (the defendant) has found good prior art (either by this method or some other method), you can also file for a re-examination with the USPTO using that new prior art. Still somewhat expensive, but significantly less expensive than going to court, and if the patent is found invalid it is just as dead.
- vibrunazo 15y ago
  But does invalidating a patent usually work well a intended? We see so many obviously ridiculous patents, that one might think that if they are so sloppy to approve patents on the first place, that they'll be just as sloppy in a re examination. Or is the re examination all that much rigorous and accurate?
  - wisty 15y ago
    There's something like a million pending patents backing up the system. I think their attitude is "screw it, just approve everything, and let the courts sort it out". If you call for a re-examination, they might think twice, because they'll look bad if the courts suggest they screwed up.
    - ktizo 15y ago
      Could you automate a patent troll using a variation on the SCIgen software and effectively ddos the entire patent office with nonsensical gibberish? Am I bad for thinking of such things? ;)
      - deleted 15y ago

arikrak 15y ago

I think the solution needs to be more ambitious. What if the "invention" is not prior art, but other people can come up with the same idea on their own? Does that deserve to be patented so that the company that was one week late will need to pay patent fees? Maybe the whole patent process should be crowd-sourced and patents should only be granted if no one can think of the same idea. (I discuss this more here: http://zappable.com/2011/08/how-to-fix-the-patent-system/ http://zappable.com/2011/08/how-to-fix-the-patent-system/)

alttag 15y ago
> What if the "invention" is not prior art, but other > people can come up with the same idea on their own? Then at the very least, it's evidence for obviousness, which (although a tougher sell) can also invalidate a patent. EDIT: IANAL
- prodigal_erik 15y ago
  Unfortunately "obvious" in patent law tends to mean there is published work suggesting putting stuff together in that way. If nobody has discussed the problem (e.g., you were the first to work on it), it somehow doesn't matter that anyone competent would have promptly settled on the same solution you did, and we aren't getting anything of value in return for your generation-long monopoly on it. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inventive_step_and_non-obviousness#Teaching-suggestion-motivation_.28TSM.29_test http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inventive_step_and_non-obviousn...

ktizo 15y ago

Well, priorart.org is available for purchase. All it really needs is a wiki and a bug tracker on there... [edit]...oops, available by broker. :(

vibrunazo 15y ago
Ilike that idea. While offering money for the crowd is a nice idea. The confidentiality agreement may have been startling their progress. Maybe they would find more prior art if users were expected to contribute out of live for a bogus patent free world.
- ktizo 15y ago
  Was thinking that you treat a patent as a bug, then submit it through the bug tracker and the result ends up on the wiki.

moldbug 15y ago

Is there something I'm missing here? Granted, there are more and more trolls these days. RSI is a real concern. You'll want a light weapon without a lot of recoil. And it should probably take an extended clip, to minimize reloading. Not to sound like a fanboy, but the Glock 17 seems perfect to me. All firearms can jam, so do bring a spare... Seriously: why would anyone think seriously about how to fix this system? Why would anyone imagine it can be fixed? The only relevant question is how to kill it. Glock or no Glock, everything on God's green earth can be killed.

monochromatic 15y ago
... what? Also, it's a magazine, not a clip.
TheAmazingIdiot 15y ago
It reminds me of a poster I saw in the Occupy group. "Reform or Reveloution? Societal change just doesnt happen without a very large delta inducing that change. For example, we can view the changes from 9/11: creation of TSA, creation of Department of Fatherland.... Homeland security, breakdown of freedoms of travel and search. Change can also go the other way. We only have a large chunk of the Middle East to look at, starting with Tunisia. What I have studied a portion of is how the United states got where it is today. And time and time again, corrupt laws are passed for the reason of knee jerk or 'security'. Those politicians also promise never to use those laws against us, which in 5 or so years undoubtedly are. Perhaps the base Constitution is correct, although I think clarifications are in order. Perhaps not, considering the claim I have read that it was written solely for white landowners. I don't have the answers, but I can spot corruption when I see it. And when it's this endemic, revolution is the only way to fix it. Gods hope it's a peaceful one.

maqr 15y ago

I've always wondered why there isn't a crowdsourcing entity that pays out rewards for finding infringement (patent, copyright, whatever).

jinhwang 15y ago

Does anyone have any past experience with this? How much did it cost you? I'm creating an app that deals with real-time information and geo-location... It seems that patent trolls will be lurking everywhere. As a young startup, we don't have the money to go out there and make an attempt at protecting ourselves.