[Patents] patent pools enforcing per-copy-licensing mode of software development

[PILCH Hartmut phm@a2e.de]

> >If we use the criterion, "new, useful and non-obvious", trivial patents
> >meet this criterion and will be granted.  For example, a problem that
> >takes two hours to be solved is "non-obvious" but it is probably
> >trivial.
> 
> Again, this complaint applies to all areas of technology, not just
> software.  

Yes, it applies also to the drafting of strategies for winning lawsuits.
Consequently, those should be patentable as well.
On the other hand, it usually does not apply to finding a new drug.

> Second, what does it mean to take "two hours" to solve
> a problem?  I can solve such problems in a few hours only because
> I have a few decades worth of experience.  

And so do most other "persons skilled in the art".
E.g. the lawyers skilled in finding new winning strategies.

> The amount of time is a
> lousy way to measure the difficulty of problem - read about the
> mathematician Paul Erdos, who could take one look at a mathematical
> problem on a blackboard that other mathematicians had been trying
> to solve for years, and solve it in seconds.  His solution process
> was neither trivial or obvious.

The point of reference of the patent system is not the genius but the
"person skilled in the art".

> And for those patents, software or not, that seem trivial and
> obvious, there is often enough prior art to invalidate the patent,
> if given to the patent examiner.  The problems with the patent
> system are not its nature, but its implementation.  And implementation
> is much easier to deal with than its nature, which is why I have been
> arguing for seven years to improve the implementation.  It is doable
> and would eliminate a lot of the crap issuing.

The facts show that it hasn't been done successfully.
There are good reasons to believe that it is in practise not doable.
If it is doable, then do it.
By focussing on dissuasion of other strategies, you create the impression
that you are not really interested in doing it but only interested in
creating some hypothetic alibi for the patent system.

-phm