Desert wrote:
Control algorithm patents are very common.
Oh well. I guess I wouldn't understand why those patents were granted either. :(
To be fair, I know lots of people who have been granted patents that seem kind of, well, non-non-obvious.
Consumers never benefit from patents; only the patent owners benefit.
Wasn't there at least a wink-wink / nudge-nudge / say-no-more in there at one time?
I was a bit too black-and-white with the statement above. In theory, the ability to patent inventions encourages invention. So in that sense, consumers benefit. If there were no IP, companies would attempt to keep all inventions as trade secrets (at best) or wouldn't invent at all (at worst).
But I agree that it's amazing what can be patented. There are some pretty obvious ideas in the patent database.
Maybe I should patent the HBPP...
Sorry, but I think the "on sale bar" would prevent that.
BTW, I'm working on a patent application right now so this is "top of mind" for me.
I have quite a few patents. In my experience they're often less magical than many people think. You can patent pretty much any solution you can think of, whether it's a visual design, a physical object, or an algorithm for solving a problem. But the idea that the patent office carefully researches every patent up front and only grants patents for completely original, specific ideas is a quaint simplification. There's always room for interpretation, and the real action is after the initial patent is granted where competing teams of lawyers negotiate the gray areas. The broader your initial filing, the more legal room you have to maneuver.
When people submitted ideas for patents at a very large former employer, the group patent attorney scheduled brainstorms where people would think of every possible application for a particular idea so that he could stuff the patent with claims. I remember him explaining (I'm paraphrasing) "It's not just about what we plan to do with it, but also about protecting the company from future lawsuits by establishing prior art when others do patent searches".
Basically, especially when you're talking big corporate, patents are really about competing lawyers than competing ideas. That's why individual patents are often so confusing and make no sense from a product perspective. Trying to read too much into them misses the point.
Last edited by Tyler on Tue Dec 01, 2015 1:21 pm, edited 1 time in total.
I think a lot of people use too much hindsight bias when evaluating obviousness of patents. Plus, your assertions that (1) the patent is obvious and (2) provides no value, are conflicting. Usually making a complex system that provides no value is the opposite of obvious (i.e. Counterintuitive). If it provides no value, nobody will implement it, no problem.
However, I think this will be useful. If you are a pedestrian, say crossing a crosswalk, it would be very helpful to know if a car is going to stop for you vs just slowing down.
Tyler is spot on, though. For a parent you just have to convince one engineer at the pto. To enforce a parent, you have to convince jurors who hear a lot of expert testimony from both sides
Last edited by dragoncar on Tue Dec 01, 2015 1:38 pm, edited 1 time in total.
Desert wrote:
Good discussion. I have a small pile of patents as well, even though I don't consider myself terribly creative.
In some fields, the concept of "freedom to operate" becomes very important. For example, in the hydrogen fuel cell space, there were so many patents granted that it became quite difficult to build a practical fuel cell system for many companies.
Any patent lawyers here? I've known several engineers who went on to law school to become patent attorneys. Unfortunately, I think it's generally a very boring profession. But one does get to use the word "plurality" a lot, so there is that.
LOL, I'm a patent lawyer and find it pretty interesting. Instead of working on one project per year (that was a typical product cycle when I was an engineer), I see 1-2 inventions per week -- always cutting edge stuff, like the tech they are thinking of putting in the version after the version they are releasing next year (consider, for example, that the first iphone was released in 2007, but has patent filings from 2005). I guess it completely depends on your practice, though... if your clients have boring products then maybe it would be a boring job. I don't do litigation, though, which has almost no interesting technologies since they are usually many years old by the time it gets to trial (there are plenty of interesting legal aspects to litigation, however, if that's your thing).
Last edited by dragoncar on Tue Dec 01, 2015 8:01 pm, edited 1 time in total.
Desert wrote:
Good discussion. I have a small pile of patents as well, even though I don't consider myself terribly creative.
In some fields, the concept of "freedom to operate" becomes very important. For example, in the hydrogen fuel cell space, there were so many patents granted that it became quite difficult to build a practical fuel cell system for many companies.
Any patent lawyers here? I've known several engineers who went on to law school to become patent attorneys. Unfortunately, I think it's generally a very boring profession. But one does get to use the word "plurality" a lot, so there is that.
LOL, I'm a patent lawyer and find it pretty interesting. Instead of working on one project per year (that was a typical product cycle when I was an engineer), I see 1-2 inventions per week -- always cutting edge stuff, like the tech they are thinking of putting in the version after the version they are releasing next year. I guess it completely depends on your practice, though... if your clients have boring products then maybe it would be a boring job. I don't do litigation, though, which has almost no interesting technologies since they are usually many years old by the time it gets to trial (there are plenty of interesting legal aspects to litigation, however, if that's your thing).
Wow ... I'm sorry if my comment was offensive. I honestly figured there were no patent lawyers on this forum. At least I'm making progress in my never-ending quest to offend each and every person on this board!
Did you spend any time as a practicing engineer, or did you head straight to law school after Eng school?
You didn't offend me, just wanted to share what I found interesting. It's definitely a conversation stopper at parties, unless I'm talking to someone who has a great idea for perpetual motion :-)
I was a computer engineer for about 4 years before going to law school.
Last edited by dragoncar on Tue Dec 01, 2015 8:15 pm, edited 1 time in total.
Seriously, I thought patents were just security theatre. They're no good unless enforced. File as many as you like, but unless you got the muscle named Bubba to do something about a violation, what good is it?
Last edited by MachineGhost on Tue Dec 01, 2015 9:04 pm, edited 1 time in total.
"All generous minds have a horror of what are commonly called 'Facts'. They are the brute beasts of the intellectual domain." -- Thomas Hobbes
Disclaimer: I am not a broker, dealer, investment advisor, physician, theologian or prophet. I should not be considered as legally permitted to render such advice!
Desert wrote:
Unfortunately, I think it's generally a very boring profession. But one does get to use the word "plurality" a lot, so there is that.
I'll see your "plurality" and raise you a first and second "embodiment".
I'll fold.
I guess for a software patent they use "implementation" more than "embodiment", but maybe that's just a matter of style? I know my wife is getting tired of saying "implementation" dozens of times while reading the application out loud to me.
BTW, this is my second patent application. The first one was granted a couple of years ago. The lawyer who licensed that one from me told me that it wasn't worth that much because no one would ever re-invent it by accident, so it wouldn't produce much (if anything) in infringement payments. Isn't that the opposite of what the patent system was supposed to do, that is, to protect original inventions that were unlikely to be invented independently?
Last edited by Libertarian666 on Tue Dec 01, 2015 9:23 pm, edited 1 time in total.
TennPaGa wrote:
I'll see your "plurality" and raise you a first and second "embodiment".
I'll fold.
I guess for a software patent they use "implementation" more than "embodiment", but maybe that's just a matter of style? I know my wife is getting tired of saying "implementation" dozens of times while reading the application out loud to me.
"Embodiment" vs. "implementation" is purely stylistic. You can switch it up with "aspect," "example," and so on. I've got a macro that converts "IVE" into "In various embodiments" to save on typing :-P
BTW, this is my second patent application. The first one was granted a couple of years ago. The lawyer who licensed that one from me told me that it wasn't worth that much because no one would ever re-invent it by accident, so it wouldn't produce much (if anything) in infringement payments. Isn't that the opposite of what the patent system was supposed to do, that is, to protect original inventions that were unlikely to be invented independently?
The patent system is "supposed" to incentivize publication of your ideas by offering a time-limited exclusive right to practice the invention. If nobody is likely to independently come up with your invention, it's likely better off as a trade secret.
I guess for a software patent they use "implementation" more than "embodiment", but maybe that's just a matter of style? I know my wife is getting tired of saying "implementation" dozens of times while reading the application out loud to me.
"Embodiment" vs. "implementation" is purely stylistic. You can switch it up with "aspect," "example," and so on. I've got a macro that converts "IVE" into "In various embodiments" to save on typing :-P
BTW, this is my second patent application. The first one was granted a couple of years ago. The lawyer who licensed that one from me told me that it wasn't worth that much because no one would ever re-invent it by accident, so it wouldn't produce much (if anything) in infringement payments. Isn't that the opposite of what the patent system was supposed to do, that is, to protect original inventions that were unlikely to be invented independently?
The patent system is "supposed" to incentivize publication of your ideas by offering a time-limited exclusive right to practice the invention. If nobody is likely to independently come up with your invention, it's likely better off as a trade secret.
Yeah, that probably would have been best for my previous invention, except that it turned out that we were too late to market to sell very much of the product, so the patent application represented most of the value.
:(
