[8498] in Commercialization & Privatization of the Internet
Re: Multimedia has been patented
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Glenn S. Tenney)
Sun Nov 21 00:01:29 1993
Date: Sat, 20 Nov 1993 21:01:09 -0800
To: com-priv@psi.com
From: tenney@netcom.com (Glenn S. Tenney)
At 9:17 PM 11/20/93 -0500, Barry Shein wrote:
>It's nice to hand out titles and depts, how many people in this "whole
>group" and how many of them have any credentials in the software area
> ...
I don't know, but it isn't difficult to find out... It is a requirement
that they all have an engineering degree, and I think the software group
also requires a CS but I'm not certain.
>Sorry, I have 20 years of experience in this area, I can hold strong
>and specific opinions, I understand a few of the issues (I realize
>many here just sink into generalities as if we were all just babbling
>about things we know little about, car mechanics and plastic surgeons
>etc.) I really believe I have the credentials and experience to look
>at a patent like the Compton's one and say ``this is absurd!'' and not
>be merely spouting uneducated opinion.
And, with my thirty years experience in this area and the last twenty
dealing with intellectual property issues, I agree that this one is utterly
absurd -- and I've said so earlier.
>Ok, so you go to someone(s) in the field and you ask what to look for
>and where (not their opinion, tho that's good also, but where you
>might find prior art up to the standard needed), as with anything.
Well, you have some ACM and IEEE journals that until recently weren't
available electronically. Add to that, but it is VERY difficult to
"translate" an academic article of theory to a patent with a detailed flow
chart. What the PTO wanted was a db of prior art in the same or similar
form to the way patents are written. The PTO gets this for mechanical
things (drawings are drawings) and chemicals -- yet the prior art might be
a BASIC or C program and the patent app is in patenteese (sp? for a made up
word?).
>This db would indeed be handy to have, but it's hardly necessary.
It is necessary for there to be prior art. Just because you and I know
thus and so does not support a challenge in court. It might, but if you
can point to the XYZ journal or the QRZ book it is much much more powerful.
>Ok, fine, then shut it down and don't issue any more software patents
>until it is fixed.
> ...
>Would you keep an emergency room open staffed by undergrad bio
>students because you couldn't afford doctors? ...
Well, actually most people WOULD prefer an attempt to save their lives in
an ER than to pass away while everyone sat there watching. I don't think
that's a good analogy... I *DO* think that we've got to get the PTO to
stop issuing "bad" patents (of any discipline!), but I do believe that
there are many valid things to patent.
>My point hardly rests (or cares) on this having happened or not
>happened before. ...
>I know about my field, and my business area, and if it's causing
>damage (and I think it is) then I get to complain and try to get it
>fixed. Do you think people generally should be placated by hearing
>that crazy things have happened before?
Of course not, and I agree with you. What I was saying is that our field
is no different than any other new technology that hasn't had a long
history of patents. There are many out there who have said that "our field
is different" or that "there should be no software patents" and the like.
I was suggesting that we all need to step back and first see that this new
technology is not so different than other new technologies -- except that
(a) it is changing much faster than ever seen before, and (b) the cost to
invent is so low that there are millions of inventors out there coming up
with the same invention...
>>Why do you not include those companies have done with their patents in your
>>complaint?
>
>Sorry, this isn't a sentence and I really can't figure out what it's
>trying to say.
> ...
>>And what about the decisions in courts that were wrong? It is
>>NOT just the PTO!!!
> ...
>What exactly is this, a call to apathy? Someone got screwed over
>before so get used to it???
Sorry, I was in a hurry to take a kid someplace and rushed... My point
here, and the one below, is: Why focus on just the PTO as the problem?
The problem is much more complex than that. The problem includes those
companies which are blackmailing an industry with patents that they should
know are ludicrous. The problem includes the legal system that validates
inappropriate patents and makes it virtually impossible for a small
enterprise to afford to challenge inappropriate patents.
>>Do you use a Hayes compatible modem? If so, then why
>>didn't you flat out refuse to support them if you felt the Hayes patent was
>>wrong?
> ...
>But I've followed this software patent scene for almost a decade, the
>Hayes thing didn't escape me (pardon the expression), ...
I never did understand how that patent survived. If I recall correctly,
emacs used the concept of "guard time" long before Hayes thought of making
a modem (look at the function keys on a VT52 -- I thought emacs checked the
time delay between escape and the next character to decide whether it was a
function key or a meta key).
---
Glenn Tenney
tenney@netcom.com Amateur radio: AA6ER
Voice: (415) 574-3420 Fax: (415) 574-0546
