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>The idea that VR now has a viable market is not patentable. You're missing the point. The issue wasn't that VR now has a viable market (it always did), the is

>The idea that VR now has a viable market is not patentable. You're missing the point. The issue wasn't that VR now has a viable market (it always did), the issue was that a good implementation was now viable. And its not just that it can be implemented, its that we generally know how they did it. From this perspective, after having seen a fully working prototype, it can seem obvious that VR technology was just on the horizon. My point is this is a fallacy; its easy to say climbing mt. everest is possible when you can look down and see the path someone else just treaded before you. In a similar vein, judging something as "obvious" and thus not patentable after it has been invented is flawed.

marvy 13y ago
I agree that things often seem obvious in retrospect, even if they were not obvious before. But that's ok. The point of patents is not to protect things that are obvious in hindsight. The point is to protect things that are not obvious even after you see them. Things that make you want to say: ok, it's right in front of my eyes, but what is this magic?
- axman6 13y ago
  No, they're not. You may like to believe this, but it's not a fact. Many inventions are quite mundane, but doesn't mean they weren't inventive (ie, non-obvious) at the time. And the other thing that most people seem to forget is that examiners must be able to show that the invention is obvious to be able to object to it, there must be proof that a person skilled in the art _world_ do X. you might counter that by saying the applicant must say why it is inventive, but that's something that is impossible to do (except in circumstances where the common general knowledge in the art has been that X is impossible, and then you show that you have done X). Simple things should not be ineligble for patents, and what you are proposing is excluding from patent protection anything that is simple. Also if you're looking at a patent that is in a field that you're skilled in and you can't understand it "ok, it's right in front of my eyes, but what is this magic?" then the patent hasn't fully disclosed the invention and it shouldn't have been granted (or you're just not skilled enough, many patents require vast amounts of knowledge to be able to understand and the "person skilled in the art" may be a team of people).
  - deong 13y ago
    I think the last paragraph there is self-contradictory. Simple things shouldn't be patentable, precisely because the invention doesn't need to be fully disclosed. To take a silly example, let's say I propose a patent on the process of painting a house green. That's the entire text of the patent. Should it be granted? No. In part because I haven't fully disclosed the invention. But what could I possibly add? "Step 1. Cover house with green paint." A government granted monopoly is a big gun. Far too big if the goal is just to provide you with revenue. Government works for the people, not one company, and if we're going to give you the right to exclusively profit from something, we demand to get something in return. The thing we demand is knowledge. We want to know how you did it so that after your monopoly expires, everyone can benefit from the increase in knowledge. If your "invention" is so simple that we all already know how to do it, then we don't need the "full disclosure" of a patent, and we don't need to buy your description of painting the house green for the enormous cost of having to pay you exhorbitant fees for every green house for the next two decades.
    - axman6 13y ago
      Firstly, your example is so ridiculous I can't see how it adds anything to the discussion. No, it would never be granted a patent, so what exactly is your point? Secondly, you have accurately described the patent system; > if we're going to give you the right to exclusively profit from something, we demand to get something in return. The thing we demand is knowledge. We want to know how you did it so that after your monopoly expires, everyone can benefit from the increase in knowledge. But you go off the rails when you confuse simple and known. The point of a patent is to disclose the invention in a clear enough way for someone else to be ablwe to perform it. Once you know the answer, it probably will seem simple. But that does not mean it's not inventive (ie, no one else has done it before, and you qwere the first to have made that knowledge available to the public).
      - deong 13y ago
        I'm not confusing simple and known; I'm just including both in the decision as to whether something is eligible for patent protection. As the patent office is required to do (the term used in patent law is "non-obvious" rather than simple, but it's the same concept). You aren't eligible for a patent just because you did something first.
- josephlord 13y ago
  > The point of patents is not to protect things that are obvious in hindsight. You might like that to be the case but most of the canonical examples of things that should be patented are just that sort of thing. For example various patents have been granted for paper clips[0]. If it still isn't obvious how it is done after people see it you could argue that the patent isn't necessary - trade secret would do. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paper_clip https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paper_clip
tracker1 13y ago
When was Lois & Clark on the air... I seem to remember an episode of that which contained the concept of an immersive VR experience fairly well, and pretty sure that was more than 20 years ago... I'd be hard pressed to find any concept in the past 20 years specifically regarding software that is truly unique and deserving of a patent. IMHO combining obvious or existing idea + on a computer, isn't patent worthy, and neither is combining two+ obvious ideas on a computer.
- hackinthebochs 13y ago
  Please re-read my comments and understand that I was not using VR as an example of something that should be patented. Why are people incapable of comprehending an argument as presented, rather than attempting to make connections that do not exist in the text?
  - Perseids 13y ago
    It is because you started your part of the discussion with: >> Could I reproduce this patented system without ever reading the patent just by looking at the results of it > This reasoning is deeply flawed. There is a tendency for something to seem "easy" or "obvious" after the fact, but this is ignoring all the insight, effort, and risk it took to find that initial successful path to the solution to begin with. Take a look at the Occulus Rift for example. You're right, you didn't explicitly say that Oculus Rift is an example for a system that could be patented because it is more complex than it seems. But if I had wanted to make the point that I believe it is patentable I could have phrased my argument in the same way as you did to imply it implicitly. > Why are people incapable of comprehending an argument as presented, rather than attempting to make connections that do not exist in the text? Because communication is always context dependent. It's easiest to see in the extreme ends, for example math, where you invent an entire sublanguage / dsl for precise communication and still your definitions change with the context you are working in: Does a ring contain a multiplicative identity element? Which operations is the homomorphism homomorphic in? We leave out these details, because most of the time it helps communication because everyone is on the same page as you anyway and those extra bits and pieces distract from the core argument. Then there is stuff that the reader is faster to figure out for him- or herself than reading "the proposition is true for the base case n=0 of the induction as (3-0)^2-9=0" or sometimes even faster than "the base case is obvious"

marvy 13y ago

I agree that things often seem obvious in retrospect, even if they were not obvious before. But that's ok. The point of patents is not to protect things that are obvious in hindsight. The point is to protect things that are not obvious even after you see them. Things that make you want to say: ok, it's right in front of my eyes, but what is this magic?

axman6 13y ago
No, they're not. You may like to believe this, but it's not a fact. Many inventions are quite mundane, but doesn't mean they weren't inventive (ie, non-obvious) at the time. And the other thing that most people seem to forget is that examiners must be able to show that the invention is obvious to be able to object to it, there must be proof that a person skilled in the art _world_ do X. you might counter that by saying the applicant must say why it is inventive, but that's something that is impossible to do (except in circumstances where the common general knowledge in the art has been that X is impossible, and then you show that you have done X). Simple things should not be ineligble for patents, and what you are proposing is excluding from patent protection anything that is simple. Also if you're looking at a patent that is in a field that you're skilled in and you can't understand it "ok, it's right in front of my eyes, but what is this magic?" then the patent hasn't fully disclosed the invention and it shouldn't have been granted (or you're just not skilled enough, many patents require vast amounts of knowledge to be able to understand and the "person skilled in the art" may be a team of people).
- deong 13y ago
  I think the last paragraph there is self-contradictory. Simple things shouldn't be patentable, precisely because the invention doesn't need to be fully disclosed. To take a silly example, let's say I propose a patent on the process of painting a house green. That's the entire text of the patent. Should it be granted? No. In part because I haven't fully disclosed the invention. But what could I possibly add? "Step 1. Cover house with green paint." A government granted monopoly is a big gun. Far too big if the goal is just to provide you with revenue. Government works for the people, not one company, and if we're going to give you the right to exclusively profit from something, we demand to get something in return. The thing we demand is knowledge. We want to know how you did it so that after your monopoly expires, everyone can benefit from the increase in knowledge. If your "invention" is so simple that we all already know how to do it, then we don't need the "full disclosure" of a patent, and we don't need to buy your description of painting the house green for the enormous cost of having to pay you exhorbitant fees for every green house for the next two decades.
  - axman6 13y ago
    Firstly, your example is so ridiculous I can't see how it adds anything to the discussion. No, it would never be granted a patent, so what exactly is your point? Secondly, you have accurately described the patent system; > if we're going to give you the right to exclusively profit from something, we demand to get something in return. The thing we demand is knowledge. We want to know how you did it so that after your monopoly expires, everyone can benefit from the increase in knowledge. But you go off the rails when you confuse simple and known. The point of a patent is to disclose the invention in a clear enough way for someone else to be ablwe to perform it. Once you know the answer, it probably will seem simple. But that does not mean it's not inventive (ie, no one else has done it before, and you qwere the first to have made that knowledge available to the public).
    - deong 13y ago
      I'm not confusing simple and known; I'm just including both in the decision as to whether something is eligible for patent protection. As the patent office is required to do (the term used in patent law is "non-obvious" rather than simple, but it's the same concept). You aren't eligible for a patent just because you did something first.
josephlord 13y ago
> The point of patents is not to protect things that are obvious in hindsight. You might like that to be the case but most of the canonical examples of things that should be patented are just that sort of thing. For example various patents have been granted for paper clips[0]. If it still isn't obvious how it is done after people see it you could argue that the patent isn't necessary - trade secret would do. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paper_clip https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paper_clip

tracker1 13y ago

When was Lois & Clark on the air... I seem to remember an episode of that which contained the concept of an immersive VR experience fairly well, and pretty sure that was more than 20 years ago... I'd be hard pressed to find any concept in the past 20 years specifically regarding software that is truly unique and deserving of a patent. IMHO combining obvious or existing idea + on a computer, isn't patent worthy, and neither is combining two+ obvious ideas on a computer.

hackinthebochs 13y ago
Please re-read my comments and understand that I was not using VR as an example of something that should be patented. Why are people incapable of comprehending an argument as presented, rather than attempting to make connections that do not exist in the text?
- Perseids 13y ago
  It is because you started your part of the discussion with: >> Could I reproduce this patented system without ever reading the patent just by looking at the results of it > This reasoning is deeply flawed. There is a tendency for something to seem "easy" or "obvious" after the fact, but this is ignoring all the insight, effort, and risk it took to find that initial successful path to the solution to begin with. Take a look at the Occulus Rift for example. You're right, you didn't explicitly say that Oculus Rift is an example for a system that could be patented because it is more complex than it seems. But if I had wanted to make the point that I believe it is patentable I could have phrased my argument in the same way as you did to imply it implicitly. > Why are people incapable of comprehending an argument as presented, rather than attempting to make connections that do not exist in the text? Because communication is always context dependent. It's easiest to see in the extreme ends, for example math, where you invent an entire sublanguage / dsl for precise communication and still your definitions change with the context you are working in: Does a ring contain a multiplicative identity element? Which operations is the homomorphism homomorphic in? We leave out these details, because most of the time it helps communication because everyone is on the same page as you anyway and those extra bits and pieces distract from the core argument. Then there is stuff that the reader is faster to figure out for him- or herself than reading "the proposition is true for the base case n=0 of the induction as (3-0)^2-9=0" or sometimes even faster than "the base case is obvious"