$400 Million IP Experiment Making Some Nervous 262
BrianWCarver writes "IP Law & Business shines the spotlight on Intellectual Ventures, the IP start-up founded in 2000 by former Microsoft chief technologist Nathan Myhrvold. According to some estimates, Intellectual Ventures has amassed 3,000-5,000 patents, with the help of a $400 million investment from some of the biggest technology companies, including Nokia, Intel, Apple, Sony, and Microsoft. As the patent stockpile grows, so does the speculation--and the fear. IP lawyers and tech executives worry that Intellectual Ventures is less interested in changing the world with big ideas, and more focused on becoming an über patent troll, wreaking litigation havoc across industries with its patents."
I knew I should have patented... (Score:4, Funny)
Re:I knew I should have patented... (Score:5, Interesting)
Focus instead on the real problems with the current parent system:
-companies and their engineers are discouraged from using or even looking at existing 3rd party patents due to a stupid interpretation of the willful infringement rule
-it is too expensive to apply for patents, especially for individuals
-it is far too expensive and time-consuming to get legitimate judgements against infringers
-obvious or prior-art patents are routinely granted, and the examiners' incentives encourage this
-patents are often issued that either do not work or do not fully and comprehensibly disclose how to implement the invention
-there is no automatic licensing scheme (as for public playing of music) or overall royalty % cap to asuage the fears of companies that they'll get nibbled to death by various IP holders for acknowledging all the patented technology that goes into making a state-of-the-art product.
Decent points, but (Score:5, Insightful)
NB:
-If the invention is, e.g. "one-click shopping" the public will reply "who gives a fuck?! duh!" Hence the non-obviousness requirement.
This is why patent-trolling is not just name-calling. Many companies (and here it seems we have the epitome) have, as their business model, making-it-impossible-for-others-to-do-their-work-w ithout-paying-us-a-fee.
Patents are supposed to be about collecting-a-fee-for-helping-others-do-their-work- better. In particular: helping them do it better in a way they might never have imagined.
Re:Decent points, but (Score:3, Insightful)
And now "imagining" means "purchasing". In no way, shape, or form should patents be assignable to a third party. The potential for abuse has already been realized in the courts again and again.
Just look at the name of the company. They were set up, specifically to be a patent troll. Obviously the companies in question figure half a billion dollars is chump change in return for what they can get with just a few "settlem
Re:I knew I should have patented... (Score:3, Insightful)
Patents are "supposed" to be used for exactly what we the people decide they should be used for. They are an artificial temporary monopoly that WE citizens have agreed to allow (through our representatives) in exchange for the economic benefit that goes along with the monopoly. That benefit is a window of opportunity to recoup the investment in R&D used to create
Re:I knew I should have patented... (Score:5, Funny)
For the better, no doubt (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:For the better, no doubt (Score:5, Insightful)
Not that soon, I think... but eventually it might.
Right now, too many too powerful have too much to lose should the status quo change.
Re:For the better, no doubt (Score:2, Redundant)
The patent system will be fixed about the time the copyright system is fixed. That time is never.
The RIAA, MPAA, and Disney buy votes for their latest bill at the same time the large patent holders are "donating" money to those congressional members. The only difference is that right now, the copyright/drm lobby is using Benjamins and the patent lobby is using Jacksons.
Re: (Score:2)
Re:For the better, no doubt (Score:2)
MIT's Technology Review (a wonderful magazine - on par with Scientific American) has covered Dr. Nathan substantially with his [current] underlying philosophy and what he's going to do (mine patents) now that he's got his JD, focusing upon patent law.
The cover (May '04?) has a quote to the effect, "You can't outdevelop Microsoft but you can outinvent them", leading into an article about his efforts.
Regardless of what one feels about this type of business model, at least he's being open about it.
What
Re:For the better, no doubt (Score:3, Insightful)
If by "everyone" you mean "established monopolies"... Say Apple and Microsoft agree to play together. With their pooled resource they have "a system of libraries for a graphical user interface that allows other applications to run" patented. Who is going to be able to challenge them in their markets? Or what if GSK patents "a system for cloning brain cells", even though they don't have the technology or products develope
net here! (Score:5, Informative)
Re:net here! (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:net here! (Score:3, Insightful)
I mean, the attempt alone to push it through as a sidenote in the fishing committee... Fishy doesn't even come close to how that reeked.
Re:net here! (Score:3, Informative)
That is incorrect. (Score:5, Informative)
In fact, they were recently held as a 'good example' by the FFII.
Re:That is incorrect. (Score:2)
Patent Bashing (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Patent Bashing (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Patent Bashing (Score:2)
IP is the oil of the information age (Score:5, Insightful)
Just like skyrocketting oil prices have convinced politicians on the need for alternative energy sources. Sure an economic standstill works, but it's horribly painful for everybody (except for those who are profiting short-term).
What is really needed is an education effort on IP reform. Not just for the politicians, but for the public at large, so they can elect forward thinking leaders.
Re:IP is the oil of the information age (Score:2)
I can't tell if you're being sarcastic, but if you are, there's a big difference. There is to my knowledge no legal barrier to alternative energy sources, it's just a difficult problem to solve. The lack of real progress here has been the lack of a push and the financial investment required to make developments, as well as an apparently deep-seeted need to try to one-up your neighbor in terms of the size
Re:IP is the oil of the information age (Score:2)
EPA regulations, tax breaks, import tariffs, energy policy, research funding, foreign policy, etc. are all ways the politicians have their hand in "encouraging" whatever they think is best.
At the same time, the patent problem is a legal problem by definition, and thus MUST be solved by politicians. There's also I think no social inertia to overcome to solve this problem. The average joe doesn't
Re:Patent Bashing (Score:3, Insightful)
On the contrary; maybe having the economy dragged to a standstill is the only way to let the politicians realize the folly of the 'everything's patentable' world. If it would lead to change, the temporary stagnation might be worth it.
The way I see it, without this whole IP/patent business, the situation is as follows:
Re:Patent Bashing (Score:2)
Their "ambition" will undo them (Score:2)
Re:Their "ambition" will undo them (Score:2)
The idea of a self-correcting mechanism is nice, and would indicate their is some sanity left in our government, but somehow I doubt that. It's sad that we have to depend on Corporations will get sick of other corporations doing this and will bring a correction to things - that's not how our government ought to be. Fo
Re:Their "ambition" will undo them (Score:3, Insightful)
I want to be a scientist know... (Score:5, Funny)
Sign me up!
International Impact (Score:5, Insightful)
Imagine in 10-20 years, China becomes the biggest economy in the world, it ignores all the US patents, and just use those patents to roll out their own products.
For example, a patented medicine sold by an US company to Africa at $10 per bill, and the same "Made-In-China" pill cost $0.01, what is to stop Africa from buying from China instead?
Right now US is still powerful enough so that other countries must agree to certain rules/laws made in USA, in exchange for free trade deals, but when that strength faded, so will the leverage.
I draw this opinion from the recent, possible change of international whaling law, where Japan is about to gather enough votes to start commercial whaling again. So what is deemed illegal in the last few decades will soon become acceptable when the power shifted.
Re:International Impact (Score:5, Insightful)
Since software is often not a real product (it's a tool that is used to make other products), this could have a serious effect on the US economy. In the worst case, this would start happening to Free Software - it would be free-beer for any non-US company to use, but cost money for the patent license in the USA.
Re:International Impact (Score:2, Interesting)
If everyone cross licenses patents, then this isn't an issue anyway. Depending on the $$ in the market they may be giving up too much, then they just pay the patent fee. Open source software is a possible solution to the issue but thats not immune from silly-ass lawsuits (see SCO vs IBM). Besides in the USA, software is only copyrighted not patented (yet).
Re:International Impact (Score:2)
It's my understanding that the trade deficit is largely due to the amount
of oil we import.
Re:International Impact (Score:3, Insightful)
Excuse me? What, exactly, have we been talking about for the past 11 years then? See: http://cloanto.com/users/mcb/19950127giflzw.html [cloanto.com] and http://burnallgifs.org/archives/ [burnallgifs.org] for some background. Also see: http://swpat.ffii.de/pikta/xrani/mpeg/index.en.htm l [swpat.ffii.de]
Hell, for a more generic discussion see: http://www.bitlaw.com/software-patent/history.html [bitlaw.com]
(Score: 3, interesting) my A$$. Should be (Score: -1, wrong)
Re:International Impact (Score:2)
One would expect that the USA an
Re:International Impact (Score:3, Interesting)
To all the naysayers, this already happens. A company I worked for in the mid-90's decided to stay out of the US market and concentrate on China instead after receiving a threat of a patent lawsuit from one of our competitors. The idea was obvious, and we'd actually implemented it before the US based patent holder, but it wasn't worth fighting it.
Re:International Impact (Score:3, Informative)
You mean like the US did a couple of hundred years ago ?
Same thing that happened then - you end up with a new world power.
Re:International Impact (Score:2)
Re:International Impact (Score:3, Informative)
However, American publishers continued to regard the work of a foreign (i. e., non-resident) author as unprotected 'common' property. Thus, although the Berne Convention greatly simplified the copyright process among European nations, numerous unauthorized American re-prints continued to appear until 1891, when the United States finally agreed to discontinue sanctioning literary piracy. In 1896 the American Congress joined the international copyright union, after petitions directed at it by such noted Brit
obligatory... (Score:2, Funny)
All your base are belong to us...
In soviet russia, parents patent you.
Political Leverage (Score:5, Interesting)
It should be easy to figure out. (Score:5, Insightful)
Anybody who has been throught the early years of Microsoft's war on the IT industry knows what kind of a person he is. Suffice it to say he is not a nice guy trying to make the world a better place.
Here's how it works (Score:5, Interesting)
What Intellectual Ventures could do is create a patent pool for the present members of the club.
It works like this: Microsoft transfers its patent portfolio to IV in return for a license to IV's patent portfolio. This is no loss to MS because they've already cross-licensed everything with Philips, Cisco, etc. -- all of whom do the same. From the POV of club members, nothing changes, except perhaps that they spend much less money negotiating cross-licensing agreements and pay a bit to IV for the convenience.
On the other hand, now IV has practically all of that throw weight. Anyone not an "Executive Member" of the club will have to pay (dearly!) to use any of the IV portfolio. What's more, Mutually Assured Destruction doesn't work because IV doesn't actually do anything -- they can't be sued for infringing patents when they don't make anything.
The upside to the club (aside from convenience noted above) is that any of the "little people" who get uppity are now facing the combined throw weight of all of the patents in the world -- and the club members don't have to accept the public-relations liabilities.
It's a total win-win situation. For instance, if done right Microsoft could keep Linux tied up in court forever without ever themselves taking a PR hit. Sort of like the BSA except for suppressing potential competition instead of keeping customers in line.
Re:Here's how it works (Score:5, Interesting)
I find it hard to believe this troll group will be used for the evil people seem to be claiming. More likely, it will be used as a massive reserve for defensive patents. Much like a defensive alliance between nations, you won't see members picking fights and suing people actively, but instead the group exists to allow for a collective means to *defend* from REAL patent trolls.
Re:Here's how it works (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:Here's how it works (Score:2)
Re:Here's how it works (Score:3, Interesting)
Making money off patents casts you as a pariah in the business community.
Is IBM a pariah? IBM makes more than $1B per year from patent licensing.
Lots of Evil Promisses and History to Keep (Score:2, Troll)
Why should you say so when they have spoken for themselves? "we owe it to our shareholders to have a strategy [slashdot.org]" says Steve Ballmer. The SCO case speaks louder than words about intent.
Nokia might not like seeing its patent troll baby being used to quash one of its own business partners. So what happens when this sort of conflict of interest arises?
Do
Open Source comanies are doing basically the same (Score:4, Informative)
Back in January, Red Hat reversed a longstanding policy and allowed the Mono
We missed it at the time, but Fedora hacker Greg DeKoenigsberg posted an explanation in late March. The answer, as it turns out, may offer some clues of how the software patent battle might play out.
Back in November, the Open Invention Network (OIN) announced its existence. OIN is a corporation which has been set up for one express purpose: to acquire patents and use them to promote and defend free software. The OIN patent policy is this:
Patents owned by Open Invention Network will be available on a royalty-free basis to any company, institution or individual that agrees not to assert its patents against the Linux operating system or certain Linux-related applications.
The list of "certain Linux-related applications" is said to exist, though it has not, yet, been posted publicly. But Mono is apparently on that list. So anybody who files patent infringement suits against Mono users, and who is, in turn, making use of technology covered by OIN's patents is setting himself up for a countersuit. Depending on the value of the patents held by OIN, that threat could raise the risk of attacking Mono considerably.
Re:Here's how it works (Score:2)
$400 million is not that much (Score:2)
Re:$400 million is not that much (Score:2)
Looking at it that way, if even two out of their 5,000 patents turn out to be of similar 'quality' then their investors could be looking at a 100% return. If it weren't for the fact that I really don't want to encourage this kind of behaviour, I would be looking at buying shares...
[1] Technically, NTP had either more or fewer than one patent, and it's still not quite clear which.
They haven't lost the case yet!! (Score:2)
Patent Companies & Patent Auctions (Score:3, Informative)
If you are in the mood to swallow some Grade A tripe, check out their business plan [intellectualventures.com].
1. Invention Labs.
2. Invention Research & Development.
3. Invention Library (tm).
4. Market Enablement.
5. Profit!
By the way, the "tm" after the Invention Library means trademark. Yes, they've even patented terms in their business plan.
Re:Patent Companies & Patent Auctions (Score:2)
That "TM" on the end there means that they consider it to be their trademark. It doesn't hold any legal weight. If they had a registered trademark, that would be an ®, it would have legal weight, and it still wouldn't be a patent.
Perhaps you were trying to be funny, but mis-information isn't humorous.
Re:Patent Companies & Patent Auctions (Score:2)
Re:Patent Companies & Patent Auctions (Score:2)
You don't need a reason to file a civil lawsuit, so that's a pretty dumb point.
yah think? (Score:2)
Hold that thought (Score:5, Funny)
'They can't be screwing around with a bunch of ideas for that long,'
Why not? I've been screwing around with the idea of screwing around with multiple hot chicks since I can remember. Wish I could get a patent on that.
Re:Hold that thought (Score:5, Funny)
Now that's one case where I really wish I had prior art...
been here before (Score:5, Insightful)
Maybe we'll have the same corrections this time but without the economic collapse. Did I just suggest we've learned anything from the past? Very sorry, I'll stop now.
Re:been here before (Score:2)
Reading the Wikipedia article you linked to; doesn't this prove the exact opposite?
At that point the U.S. was off the gold standard which led to those two crooks cornering the gold market. I don't see the fundamental flaw - isn't it more like the fundamental benefit?
Re:been here before (Score:2)
Hmmmmmmmm.... I wonder ...... (Score:2)
Wonder what the reaction would be to a company that tries to monopolize the legal use of implementations (i.e. patents) in the whole IT biz
DDOS on USPTO (Score:4, Interesting)
Create an open source patent organization and start applying for software patents on behalf of open source coders for every little piece of innovation. The idea is to keep the threshold of what qualifies as innovation low to generate a huge list of patent applications.
Anything useless from "emphasizing email addresses containing a numbers in a word processing document" to "a real fancy way of optimizing inner loops in interpreted languages" to "a memory management code for NUMA architecture"
The important goal is not to get a software patent but to demonstrate the weakness of the system.
This will overwhelm the patent office. at best cause a change in thinking of policy makers. at least it will cause a headache for the patent mongers.
Patent commons - already underway (Score:2)
Wednesday August 10, @07:51PM
Rejected
The powers that be rejected this story. Funny thing is AFAIK ODSL operates slashdot. I guess they just didn't want you to know.
Re:Patent commons - already underway (Score:2)
Re:DDOS on USPTO (Score:2)
The patent office is well built to resist denial of service attacks like that - it costs a shitload of money to apply for a patent. That does mean that few "small inventors" can ever afford a patent, but it prevents it from getting "bogged down" at least.
Paper or plastic? (Score:3, Interesting)
Now, if you could figure out how to turn other people i
My understanding of IV (Score:5, Interesting)
As I understand IV from some people working with them (with the caveat that my understanding is not based on a direct relationship with them, but lunch conversations/rumor):
1) The $400M is NOT an investment. It is blackmail, like protection money. Company X pays IV for the costs of a patent portfolio with the understanding that IV will not sue Company X based on those patents (i.e. they get a license). So, Company X pays protection money to IV and IV gets new patents paid for to go sue others on.
2) There is no "speculation" that IV is a troll. As I understand it, that is their purpose.
3) IV doesn't invent anything. They buy blocks of patents on the cheap (especially if they get other firms to pay) from some other company's firesale. Usually these patents are an unusable mess and require massive clean-up. But, if you buy thousands of patents you'll hit gold eventually.
4) As a troll, if you don't have deep pockets, IV doesn't care about you (unless you have something to sell). This is cincontrast with real companies that often use their patents to prevent a second company from making a product. IV just wants money.
Let's see this for what it is, shall we? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Let's see this for what it is, shall we? (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Let's see this for what it is, shall we? (Score:2)
IP lawyers (Score:2)
90% of IP lawyers are patent trolls. They just don't like being out-trolled.
ventures/vultures (Score:2)
first pass i read that as vultures and thought slashdot was getting quite flamey in its article summaries. not to say its not a correct play on words, but a wee bit flamey nevertheless.
Whom would they sue? (Score:2)
I'd love to see it (Score:2)
The only way the big guys will come over to our side on Patent reform is if they
get reamed by an "uber patent troll".
Get teh popcorn!
Re:I'd love to see it (Score:2)
Good... (Score:2)
Now of course big corporations are not interested in a free market but society in general is/should be.
With free I mean a market in which companies can compete, not a completely unregulated market. IMHO, collections of patent should be subject to anti-trust scrutiny.
They've created a monster! (Score:2, Redundant)
IP lawyers and tech executives worry that Intellectual Ventures is less interested in changing the world with big ideas, and more focused on becoming an über patent troll...
Wouldn't Apple, Sony, Microsoft, and Nokia be the companies most targeted by a patent troll? Everytime some company we've never heard of pops up with submarine patent to try and rake in mill
Hooray for IP cartels! (Score:2)
Video Interview with him on CNET (Score:4, Interesting)
Basically, his rationale is that because companies don't permit engineers to check patent portfolios and many companies don't actively check patents against their own products a lot of companies are in trouble.
Personally, though I'm not quite convinced. I believe it is a way to squeeze out the small players in the market. There's something about this guy that after seeing the video demonstrates one thing: not trustworthy. His body language and voice show through right away.
I wonder how much it costs to join the "club" and I wonder what kind of contract you have to sign to get in.
Some useful links (Score:3, Informative)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abstraction_physics [wikipedia.org] Yeah, its up for deletion but that doesn't invalidate it. But its really not original research either.
http://developer.osdl.org/dev/priorart/wiki/index
Patent upfront costs: technical-0, legal -lots (Score:3, Interesting)
If you are an IP lawyer with not much technical skill, its ok if your idea isnt really new. It does not cost you much to submit more than one application, and the wording on some makes it new. But that is determined later. You have low upfront cost.
it will backfire on them (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:No wonder some are nervous! (Score:2, Insightful)
They are proposing adding a 5th octet as an interim move until v6 is widely adopted.
That doesn't sound far off from what they're trying to do: patent every neat idea they can. "Hey! A fifth octet. IPv5! V5... hey! Patent a 5 cylinder internal combustion engine! {repeat ad infinitum}"
Re:why would they do that? (Score:4, Funny)
Re:why would they do that? (Score:2)
- sm
It's just not one big player (Score:5, Insightful)
On the face of it, this sounds advantageous. It allows more cool features in processors and alleviates those three companies from having to worry about getting involved in frivolous lawsuits with their main competitors.
Now perhaps Intel patented the XOR operation. Sure the patent is blatantly unfair, but since IBM and AMD can already use it then they have no need to fight intel's patent. THe only person who would want to fight it would be some new player in that space, but who'd have the resources?
If large corporations start broadly cross-licensing technologies then it'll effectively kill the little guy and sew up the market.
Re:It's just not one big player (Score:2)
Re:It's just not one big player (Score:2)
Look
Patenting XOR: It's Been Done (Score:3, Interesting)
Sounds more like an extortion racket (Score:2)
For the low price of $100k/year you can be covered in case you've accidentally violated one of our patents.
Few of the main investors there are famous for levelling the playing field.
Re:why would they do that? (Score:2, Informative)
It's pronounced like "itch", not "itchay"
Wrong. The "i" is pronounced like a long e ("ee"), the "ch" is soft (like "sh"), there is no hard 't'. Phonetically, it is closer to "neesh".
Re:IV (Score:2)
Not to worry. Soon we will move to IPv6 and then their thousands of patents will be useless... much like moving up a version of AOL will simply make your internets slower and less reliable.
Re:Prior Art -- the Untouchable IP (Score:3)
Parental Responsibility (Score:2)
Do you have to spoil the child? Beat it? Ignore it? Lead by example? What circumstances can create a creature so base as a patent troll? To they have even a shread of scruple left?
Re:Parental Responsibility (Score:2)
Do you have to spoil the child? Beat it? Ignore it? Lead by example? What circumstances can create a creature so base as a patent troll? To they have even a shread of scruple left?
Actually just give it everything it wants, its ego will grow exponentially larger. If they had any discipline they may have realized that there actions will have reactions that may have negative circumstances.
Re:Please please bring it on (Score:2)
The patent system will not be changed until it wreaks havoc across the land. It will be a painful process, but isn't change always such?
The only problem is that - when the dust finally clears and we awaken to sanity - the rest of the world will have sped far ahead. We've already lost our technological edge; to see this one must merely glance at our international partners. Broadband speeds orders of magnitude faster than our typical domestic cable/dsl, for a fraction of our cost. A growing trade deficit