Amazon Asks Congress to Curb Patent Abusers

theodp writes "As Amazon urged Congress to change the law to protect the e-tailler from patent abusers, Rep. Lamar Smith had a question: 'Could not Amazon.com be accused of being a troll for patenting the one-click?' Smith asked, a wry smile on his face." While it's nice to see to see tech companies behind such legislation, it would seem there's some pots calling the kettle black, so to speak.

Amazon a troll ?

[Anonymous Coward]

Only if they use their patent to stop someone from doing something.
If they use it to attract collaborators (Show me yours and I'll let you see mine ...), or give it to the 'patent commons' that seems to be being established, then that might be something useful.

A simple fix for patents

[Umbral Blot]

Ok, there have been a lot of complicated improvements on patent law suggested, so let me propose a really simple one: there can be only so many patents owned in total by a corporation (patents owned by employees count towards this total). Yes you can patent like crazy, but that would mean giving up your old patents. Or you could just patent when it is really needed, just as the system was meant to be used all along.

Patents are a double edged sword

[Freaky Spook]

They can exist to benefit the inventors & business's using them to protect their ideas or be abused, i don't think we will ever see a balance, much the same way the internet has allowed many people to make an honest buck and a lot of people to also make a dishonest profit.

Unfortunatly its the speed of which patents go through approval, and legal proceedings related to patent infringment which seem to cause most of this problem, not the patenting themselves.

Spending years in court for a patent dispute seems so stupid, especially as when the cases end technology has progressed to such a point where the dispute becomes redundant.

Lawyers seem to be the people benefiting most from the patenting system, perhaps finding a way to move patents from the judicial system and having its own tribunal/mediation system devoid of corporate law??

This idea will probably get struck down, but idea's do needed to be made about it, we will only see innovation be stifled and small business unable to cope from the preassures of big business eventually.

Re:A simple fix for patents

[HugePedlar]

That would never work. Consider a company like Bell Labs vs some mom & pop garden-tool manufacturer. How can you apply the same patent limit across the board? You can't. Companies with more products need more patents, whether or not they need to be applied more appropriately.

who cares

[illuminatedwax]

There's no way they can truly shut down patent trolls without dismantling the entire software patent system or making it completely impervious to small developers (the people that patents are really supposed to "protect"). If you have a "loser pays" technique, then the larger companies are just going to drown the small man into debt. Trolls already pay in lawyers' fees when they do lose, and the problem with trolls is that they are usually right. If you say that products must be actively developed, the troll will do it themselves... v e r y s l o w l y. And what if the patent holder is going to college, or another situation.

Patent trolls either exist or you get rid of the whole system.

Fix the patent system altogether

[Opportunist]

The patent system is broken. Not just its practice.

When you can get patents on trivial implementation, legal pitfalls open up to EVERY business. When you create a webpage (even for non-profit), even if you just write a simple program, you could already be facing terrible problems. Especially in the non-profit area, patents pose a serious threat.

Imagine Boyer-Moore being patented. Or any other "best" algorithm. If you're in the non-profit "market", you're out of biz. You cannot pay patent royalties. Same goes for small businesses. You simply cannot afford to pay for the patents you'd have to use to actually create sensible software.

Patents serve a purpose, allright. But the purpose has reversed. The idea behind patents was to give the developer an incentive to publish it, so others can build on it and learn from it, while still giving you the exclusive right to gain from it financially, so people have an incentive to invent AND publish.

It turned into the opposite. Patents currently harm development and progress. And this has to be remedied. Just patching certain implementations isn't going to solve the problem. The whole patent licensing system has to be redone to fix it.

How about a rising annual patent fee?

[enitime]

How about this for a start:

A patent needs to be renewed every year. Failure to renew and it lapses into public domain. There's a fee every renewal.

If you want to discourage holding onto patents for long periods of time, have the annual fee doubled every year. No one would hang on to patents for 20 years anymore.

Re:How about a rising annual patent fee?

[Umbral Blot]

One problem: the worst offenders, giant companies, can pay any reasonable fee amount without blinking basically forever. On the other hand small companies wouldn't and would be placed at an unfair disadvantage. However your idea isn't all bad, it just needs a little tweaking. If we make the fee based exponentially on time or on exponentially based on the number of other patents held, or both, then it might work. Small companies with few patents pay little, bug companies with over a thousand patents get it in the shorts. We all win because (in theory) the money collected in this way reduces our taxes.

Re:How about a rising annual patent fee?

[avasol]

How about this? Or is this way too "un-american" in this day and age... If the patent can be deemed to improve the general quality of life, or specifically health, education and even understanding - maybe the Government should be able to "buy out" the patent and use it for the good of all mankind.....

software patents (!?)

[N3wsByt3]

First of all, we have to ask ourselves, what, exactly, a patent is. A lot of pro-swpat advocates use terms as Intellectual Property (IP) rights, while those encompass a lot of different concepts, such as copyright (which is already used for software). We can find the following definition:

A patent is a set of exclusive rights granted by a government to an inventor or applicant for a limited amount of time (normally 20 years from the filing date)... Per the word's original definition, the theory of patent legislation is to induce the inventor to disclose knowledge for the advancement of society in exchange for a limited period of exclusivity. Since a patent grants the right to exclude others from practising the invention, it gives the owner a monopoly in the economic sense. There is an ongoing debate about whether the benefits of patents outweigh the costs, particularly with respect to software patents.

A patent, thus, is not meant as an inherent right for financial compensation for the inventor. A patent is a state-ordained monopoly, that excludes others of exploiting or using similar ideas, even when they have come up with those ideas independently by themselves, for a certain time-period. Now, this seems rather unfair (in copyright this is not the case), but apart from that, why does the state give a monopoly to someone, while we all know monopolies are generally not good for the economy, nor for the consumers? This is why: a patent is a monopoly, given by the state, because it (is supposed to) promote innovation. It follows that, if it doesn't achieve its goal of promoting innovation, it should not be granted, period.

Now, while to some extend this may apply to patents in general (as a study done in the 80ies by the Australian government has shown), seen the particular incremental nature of software, and the more intensive studies done on them, it has become ever more clear that softwarepatents DO NOT promote innovation, on the contrary. It logically follows there is no compelling reason in respect to 'stimulating innovation' to grant patents on software.

Some swpat-proponents point to the USA, and claim there the evidence is shown: "the USA has swpat, and look at all those big, mighty IT-corporations!" This, however, is a complete fallacy: they 'forget' to mention that all those big foreign IT-companies were founded and grew to the behemoths they are today, in the ABSENCE of softwarepatents (which, in the USA, only started in earnest after 1991). So, it is not "thanks to" softwarepatents, but rather the reverse. Actually, it could be argued that the IT-business in the USA bloomed, exactly because they weren't patents around, back then. And in fact, this is well known by anyone working in the business of IT, and exactly what a well-known USA CEO has said in the early 90ies, someone who can know it.

Bill Gates said it best, in one of his internal memos:

"If people had understood how patents would be granted when most of today's ideas were invented and had taken out patents, the industry would be at a complete standstill today."

Mind you, this has been said by one of the most prominent IT-CEO on the planet, acknowledging exactly what softwarepatents actually lead too. Not surprisingly, since swpat are allowed in the USA, his solution to the problem was "patenting as much as we can" so he could go for "patent exchanges with [other] large companies". Of course, Bill had the means to gather together a multi-million dollar software patent portfolio to defend his company (and thus did.) Most of the SME's (Small and Medium-sized Enterprises), let alone the individual developer, don't have such means and allowing swpat can only spell hardship for small businesses and open source software.

Even Bruce Chizen, chief executive of Adobe Systems Inc. and chairman of the Business Software Alliance, which is leading the charge for the technology industry in the USA, acknowledges that allowing software patents in the 1990s was a bad idea.

Contrary to the pro-swpat camp, it

Are they really a patent troll?

[Xtifr]

To be fair to Amazon, while I think the one-click patent is nonsense, and I have nothing but contempt for their attempts to enforce it, at least it's something they're using! I generally think of a patent troll as a company that exists for no other purpose but to squeeze money out of patents. Amazon seems to be more interested in preventing others from using their precious technique than it persuading others to use it, and to pay for the privilege. Plus they actually have a business plan of sorts. We can argue later over whether it's a good plan or not, but it is a plan and it doesn't just involve suing other companies.

I hate to argue in Amazon's defense, but does being a hypocrite actually make them wrong? Doesn't it more depend on whether they're...well...wrong or not? If Charles Manson called for stronger penalties for mass murderers, would he be wrong just because he's Charles Manson? If Ken Lay asked for stronger legal protections for stockholders, would he be wrong just because he's Ken Lay? If Darl McBride called for mandatory jail time for anyone who files a fraudulent lawsuit, would he be wrong just because he's Darl McBride? If Natalie Portman asked me to rub hot grits all over her sweaty, naked body, would....

Er, sorry, guess that last one didn't make much sense, but I needed something to get the image of Ken Lay and Darl McBride out of my mind! :)

(Natalie--call me!) :)

patents

[sciencecneisc]

i read all these articles about various seemingly simple things being patented, and Amazon.com's got a few of those for sure. the true abuse is the time length. i hear patent stuff is increasing so these are better thought out before approval but if you can't avoid patenting generic things at least give patent holders less time to exploit the public. patent and copyright last too long.

Re:Our Tax Dollars At Work, People

[Enderandrew]

As a country, does the United States really manufacture anything besides ideas anymore? If intellectual property weren't property, we'd be even more screwed than we are. Conversely, if a global government actually enforced IP laws, the US would be beyond rich.

Re:Are they really a patent troll?

[Sky Cry]

I have to say, it's not about whether being hypocritical makes you wrong or not. They aren't hypocrite in the first place.

They aren't asking everyone else to be nice, while they are being mean. They are asking for a rule, that would force everyone, that is including themselves, to play nice. There's no hypocricy in that, because right now they are bound by different rules and they have to behave according to these rules.

Result: trade secrets & industrial espionage

[MCRocker]

Just abolish them.

Great idea! Then everybody will jealously guard every innovation as a trade secret and industrial espionage will surge.

If you think office security is a pain now imagine what it'll be like when the stakes are raised.

There are already problems with onerous non-competition clauses in high level employee contracts. With no patent protection, you could expect EVERY knowledge worker to have to sign a contract saying that if they quit, that they can't work in any, even vaguely, similar career. So, if you're a software person and you quit, you better not be doing software anything for anybody else in your next job.

It'll be like all of the nasty parts of cyberpunk coming to fruition.

OK. I exaggerate. However much we all hate (software) patents, there probably does need to be some force that encourages invention disclosure for the greater good. The patent system may need massive overhaul, but abolishing it altogether ends up producing the problems that prompted its' creation in the first place. There's a reason that alchemy got nowhere for centuries... they all kept their research secret.

Re:who cares

[penix1]

"Then we're back to the days when people hide their research to protect it, and development progress grinds to a halt again where every company reinvents the wheel. Lots of unnecessarily wasted resources."

I call BS on this especially with method patents...

You are telling me that companies use the patent system for looking for new ideas?!?!? If they do that they are liable for willful infringement on anything they use. Most patent specialists advise their clients to NOT look at the patent office stuff for this reason alone.

B.

How about a cost of research sharing model?

[MCRocker]

Here's a crazy idea: Instead of allowing patent holders to set their own licensing terms, congress could impose a 'cost of research sharing' model that, with some safeguards, requires anyone wishing to implement a patented idea to pay 51% of the research costs that have not already been paid by someone else to those who have already paid into the patent. This turns the monopoly into a cabal that shares costs. Naturally, there would have to be some fairly difficult to structure laws about the nature of what can be included in research costs, but I think this has the potential to really open things up.

One way of looking at patents is as a means of protecting the original inventor's investment in the idea so that first movers are not unduly penalized for having made the effort and taken the risk only to have it stolen by someone else who doesn't have to bear the costs of coming up with the invention.

If the original inventor wants to get rich off an idea, they should still have to have be competitive producers of the implementation of that idea and bear the risk that someone out there can do it more profitably than they can, but not have the handicap of competing with those who didn't have to bear the invention process costs.

First mover advantage and invention cost sharing aught to be enough for an inventor to succeed. there's no reason to give them a monopoly that provides no incentive to be efficient or innovate any further. History is rife with examples of patented innovations that stagnated for 17 years. Then, only after the patent expired, an explosion of new innovations moved the field forward.

To explain the idea further... imaging it costs $100 to invent some patentable idea. Then, if some other company wanted to produce a product or service that used the idea. They could do that, by paying $51 to the inventor for a license. If a third producer joined in they would pay, $25.50 to both the original inventor AND the second company. So each gets just a little more than half of what they had to invest in the first place. A fourth producer would pay $12.25 to each of the first three and so-on.

This system would not lock anybody out and would share the cost of the innovation with a tiny advantage to those who jump aboard first to encourage investment in research.

Re:Result: trade secrets & industrial espionag

[SillyNickName4me]

Great idea! Then everybody will jealously guard every innovation as a trade secret

Which in quite a few cases means not being able to sell a product that uses it.. sounds like a real good idea.....

and industrial espionage will surge.

Heh, as if that isn't happening already at a large scale...

If you think office security is a pain now imagine what it'll be like when the stakes are raised.

Most 'office security' serves the same purpose as airport security, its making sure they can say 'but we tried to prevent it really' and to make people think about not taking risks. More of it won't do shit to stop industrial espionage.

There are already problems with onerous non-competition clauses in high level employee contracts.

Those clauses should really be dealt with by law. It is absurd to ban someone from working in their field of choice because it is economically destriuctive. You effectively force a person to not contribute for a specific amount of time, resulting in lost production/inventiveness during that time.

With no patent protection, you could expect EVERY knowledge worker to have to sign a contract saying that if they quit, that they can't work in any, even vaguely, similar career. So, if you're a software person and you quit, you better not be doing software anything for anybody else in your next job.

How good I live in a country where this is simply out of the question since such clauses in contracts hae been found to be entirely unenforcable here (and actually in much if not all of the EU).

But at any rate, as I already said, this is a seperate problem that needs to be dealt with, regardless of patents.

It'll be like all of the nasty parts of cyberpunk coming to fruition.

OK. I exaggerate. However much we all hate (software) patents, there probably does need to be some force that encourages invention disclosure for the greater good. The patent system may need massive overhaul, but abolishing it altogether ends up producing the problems that prompted its' creation in the first place. There's a reason that alchemy got nowhere for centuries... they all kept their research secret.

I beg to differ with your conclusion.

1. Where I live, patents existed already in the 1600s. Examples of patents preventing further invention, stalling development of an entire country even, are also dating back to the 1600s.

2. Alchemy had some interesting but usually pretty impossible objectives, and did not often employ scenmtific methods to study things. Those are the main reasons it never got anywhere, where they wanted to get didn't exist to begin with.

At any rate, you have one valid point here, how to get companies to release information on their inventions to the public so that such information can be reused.

I don't know the answer, but I do know a system that allows you to document your inventiuon in ways to prevent reproducing it (read the typical software patent for examples of this) and where you can prevent your competition from using your invention (as opposed to can force your competition to compensate you for a bit for using your invention) is really seriously broken and is not accomplishing the desired result either, while it is expensive for everyone.

So in the end, yeah, a workign patent system might be even better, but abolishing the current system is very very likely a much better idea then keeping it.

BigCo and the Patent Troll

[plr]

The term "Patent Troll" when originally coined was aimed at companies that bought patents (primarily software and typically purchased through a bankruptcy liquidation) with the sole intent of forcing licensing deals. However, the use of the term has now spead to everyone that has a patent they seek to enforce against BigCo. BigCo wants protection from small companies with patents -- what protection are they willing to grant smallco from BigCo. BigCo has all the advantages -- more patents, money to pay lots of lawyers, money to ride out the lengthy legal battle, and money to lobby Congress. BigCo is certinaly not about to change their habits of bulk patenting -- they just want small co to have higher hurdles. Small companies have limited resources to create businesses around every good idea and concept they generate. That does not mean they should be prevented from protecting, marketing and licensing that concept. That is how small-co hopes to become big-co. The biggest issue I see is that patent holders (big and small) have established license rates that force costly battles. If the licensing rates were upfront and affordable many of the disputes would go away. But I don't see that happending soon. I just hope Congress has not fallen deaf to the concerns of small co.

OT: Corruption

[dwandy]

To work, your proposal would have to first require hauling everyone in our Government out into the street and shooting them, and then replacing them with people who weren't corruptable.
At this point, any solution or system that assumes a government that acts in the best interest of its citizens, and not for the direct personal gain of the representatives themselves, is flawed.

The more I look at politics, the more I'm convinced that it's political 'donations' that are at the heart of most major problems we have.

I still think that the answer, therefore, is to make it 100% illegal for anyone to give or donate any amount of money to a politician or political party.
Campaign money would come out of taxes* and be equal by candidate, so it's no longer 'rich and/or corrupt(able) guy wins'. Major media (minimum size?) like TV, newspaper etc would be required to provide space where the candidates could 'post' their platform.
Is this perfect? Hell no, but I think it's a lot better than the overtly corrupt system that exists now.

*Don't forget, as a consumer you're already paying for the campaigns out of the profits which they get from you. And as a corporation gets bigger and more profitable, they push for more and stronger legislation to make them more profitable which they use to buy even stronger laws... this method is fairly perfected by the likes of the mpaa and riaa.

Re:Result: trade secrets & industrial espionag

[Don853]

I think it's also open to debate whether the 20-year term of most patents has become obsolete (can you say 'yes, definitely'?). If 20 years was the proper term of a patent in a time when a letter took a week to send from one coast to the other, then certainly 3-5 years would be the correct "inflation adjusted" value today. Also, we need to fix the loopholes that some companies exploit in order to unfairly extend patents beyond the maximum.

This may be true in some industries (computer hardware and software especially, since even 5 years is long past irrelevancy for a lot of ideas), but it is not universally true. Take the pharmaceutical industry for example: The patent is filed before the beginning of the approval process, which may take 8-12 years in and of itself, leaving the company the remaining 8-12 years to recoup its investments (if it is indeed approved).

I completely agree that the number of bad patents is probably a small minority that happen to generate a lot of press, especially on sites like /.

Re:Our Tax Dollars At Work, People

[wrook]

The US is already beyond rich.

Some stats that I picked up from Googling around (you might want to verify the numbers).

Average Yearly Salary worldwide: ~$5,000 US
85th percentile Yearly Salary in the world: $2,182 US
Average Yearly Salary in US: $29,000 US
Average Yearly Welfare Benefits for those on Welfare in the US: ~ $11,200

So the average salary in the US is nearly 6 times the average salary in the world. And more than 10 times the 85th percentile salary (the reason the average is so high is just because us fat b@stards are so stinking, filthy rich). Not only that, but the average person on welfare is making more than 2 times the world average salary and more than 5 times the 85th percentile salary.

So the poorest people in America are making 5 times for than the richest 85 percent of the people in the world. We don't need to make Americans richer, IMHO.

Good ideas...something has to be done

[larryau]

The top 2 ideas are very good. I remember hearing a story about a little girl being awarded a patent because she developed a style or way to swing on a playground swing. And although the story was cute it was just plain stupid. It demonstrated by far how out of control patent system has become. Another is medical and chemical companies have been getting patents on peoples genes. People who have rare genetic conditions. The company patents there gene so that no other company can work out a cure for the condition. And they don't have to ask you if they can patent your gene. Apparently even though it does not belong to them they can patent it. It has just gotten way out of hand. It no longer serves the original intent. Huge companies can use patents to stifle innovation and such from small companies or the lone inventor. On the other side the companies that have to continually fiend of the patent troll also loose out by drawing there resources. This all is kind of like a karma response to the years of backwater deals in which the large companies lobbied congress to weaken the patient laws. And the countless judges who are appointed to oversee many of these cases have absolutely no experience in patent law. Its all coming back around now to bite those who contributed to the sorry state our patent system is in now.