5 ms·
I know there has been a spat of these recently, but I always think about Robert Kearns and his lifelong battle against Ford for his intermittent windshield wipe
by at-fates-hands 14y ago
I know there has been a spat of these recently, but I always think about Robert Kearns and his lifelong battle against Ford for his intermittent windshield wiper patent.
As much as we hate patent trolls, once and a while, there is an exception to rule which proves us all wrong.
- nitrogen 14y agoIs an intermittent windshield wiper really worthy of a 20-year monopoly?
- bduerst 14y agoDepends on how much you have invested in it.
- thirdtruck 14y agoAnd even then, I could spend the rest of my life on digging holes and refilling them. I might have invested countless hours in such effort, but that does not grant it any inherent value.
- bduerst 14y agoDid Ford try to infringe on your patent for hole digging?
- nitrogen 14y agoThe value of a patent is not in whether it is infringed, but whether it is both novel and non-obvious. Many software patents are neither, as evidenced by the recent spate of lawsuits over patents that largely amount to "regular expressions, but on a PHONE!!111."
- thirdtruck 14y agoIf my theoretical competitor wants to spend their time and resources on an inherently fruitless endeavor, all the more power to them.
- rbanffy 14y agoHow much you spend to invent something is irrelevant. The criteria revolve around usefulness and non obviousness.
- bduerst 14y agoIt's completely relevant. Ensuring distribution of costs for new technology is one of the primary reasons for having patents in the first place.
- rbanffy 14y agoAre you proposing patents should be granted for those who spend tons of money, regardless of how innovative or useful the results of their inventive process are?
- bduerst 14y agoI'm proposing that patents encourage the production and disclosure of new technology, and that the inventor has a temporary monopoly with which to re-cooperate the costs of doing so.
- rbanffy 14y agoStill, how much you spend inventing something is not related to how useful (or obvious) your invention is. If you spent US$ 10 million developing something obvious, you still don't deserve a patent on it.
- bduerst 14y ago>If you spent US$ 10 million developing something obvious, you still don't deserve a patent on it. That's up to the USPTO to decide, not you.
- rbanffy 14y agoExactly. And how much money you spent developing your invention should not be taken into consideration. If you do it, you reward inefficiency.
- makomk 14y agoFord thought it worthwhile enough to steal the design from him when he came to show it to them and fight him in court for years for the right to use it without paying, so it might well be "worthy of a 20-year monopoly".
- nitrogen 14y agoI imagine "worthwhile enough to steal the design" and "worthy of 20-year monopoly" are mostly independent variables. There are plenty of ideas worth "stealing" that aren't worth a patent.
- hfs 14y agoTangible item vs. intangible idea with no actual working implementation. I can patent the idea of time travel with enough vague descriptions of an implementation that don't require a great knowledge of the subject on my part, that doesn't mean I can make it happen. Should that really qualify for a patent?
- thirdtruck 14y agoBut the question of "does the small guy ever benefit from patents" tells us nothing useful. Only the proportion of cost to benefit matters here. People sometimes win the lottery. Does that provide reason enough to start buying tickets instead of groceries?