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I feel a project the SemiWiki community and its supporters should take on for the benefit of everyone is to stop fraudulent patents in their tracks by posting them on SemiWiki making them public knowledge in an official forum. This would avoid conflicts like the Steve Jobs rounded corners on electronic devices phony patent. Many, many patents have been issued that break the rule of not being obvious to PROFESSIONALS IN THE FIELD. This would benefit everyone, but the law firms that engage in these conflicts. A person or company would still have their name attached to it and a firm date of issue established, but it would be for posting something new that would be obvious to professionals in the field. This could actually speed up the pace of technology and benefit everyone.
I'll start with a click to question for video educational lectures. If a student at any time didn't understand something in a lecture or needed further elaboration, they would click to get further information or listen to other students ask a question on that area and the instructors answer or a text explanation. They could also have the option of clicking for live help for someone with expertise in that particular area for an additional fee.
Any opinions, comments or improvements that could be made are welcome and wanted.
Expect some major resistance from the established legal system that makes their livelihood from filing patents and defending patents, it's big money for sure.
Remember that in the jury case of Apple vs. Samsung that the jurors actually believed that rounded corners on a rectangular shape was in fact a patentable idea. It was quite simple to show prior design art of rectangles with rounded corners, so that patent claim was thrown out.
If auto makers were to patent the shape of their cars, then our courts would be jammed with litigation because there is so much re-use of car shapes between all auto companies.
In every EDA and IP lawsuit the lawyers have gotten rich, while at the same time draining the precious bank balances of the parties involved. Typically, the company with the larger income will prevail in court, because they can out-spend their smaller opponent. So in that regard, the larger companies benefit more from patents and litigation than the smaller companies do.
Sadly, this shows the patent office is not doing their job. Even a quick web search would reveal many, many patents shouldn't be granted. Not even that in many cases where if you weren't blind you would see it in the every day world around you. Hopefully this can be brought to surface to the point literally everyone sees the patent office needs reform so that they actually do their job. If these blatantly obvious patents hadn't been granted in the first place, everyone including the person applying for the patent would be saved much time and trouble. This is an ideal example how the government gets paid to make a situation worse for all involved, except the law firms. Since most legislators are lawyers, it makes one wonder.
I agree. The blatantly obvious patents that are granted are ridiculous. Is there a way to contact the patent office and give opinion when the application is filed? That way engineers can just get alerts when a patent application is filed within their field of expertise. Hey wait...maybe that idea is patentable!
Don't expect much innovation out of the patent office. Just like many government agencies, employees basically get jobs for life no matter how poorly they perform. Even when they so called privatize something, the rules and regulations are often so onerous they just create a private version of the government culture with only incremental improvements. I think all patent applications should be posted in full online. This junk patent game is a serious drag on the economy. The issue of international patents also needs to be addressed. The US need hard core negotiators like Trump has lined up with Carl Icahn to represent the US in China and Japan. I don't endorse Trump or anyone else at this point, but in negotiations we need someone at least as tough as the people on the other side of the table. It's time for the US to stop being a doormat in many trade and IP negotiations. Also in this faster and faster moving world, the length of patents should be adjusted accordingly.
