[Patents] Re: difficulty vs technicity

[ramon@jl1.quim.ucm.es (Ram'on Garc'ia Fern'andez)]

On Sun, Apr 29, 2001 at 11:32:18PM +0200, PILCH Hartmut wrote:
> Ram'on wrote:
> 
> > When patents are used to protect complex algorithms, this protection is
> > equivalent to copyright protection. Like copyright protection, sooner
> > or later another programmer comes with an alternative free solution.
> > For example, this is happening with LZW (PNG) or MP3 (Vorbis).
> 
> Patents don't seem to work well for that purpose.
> Writing a description and a set of claims is wasteful and misleading.
> Even when the algorithm is very complex and based on a lot of work, the
> patent claims will still tend to be very broad and trivial.
> This is the case at least for many compression patents such as Stac
> ISDN HiFn. 

But this is because patent offices are not doing a good work, and are
interpreting the law according to an ideology where any minimally
original idea is worth a monopoly
(http://www.softwarelaw.com/Obviousness.htm has an interesting page
about the legal meaning of "non-obvious". I this one think it is still
there).

Doing a reform of the patent system is very difficult. They are
self-justifying. Since I am doing my Ph D Thesis in a public
university, I have some experience with institutes that are no longer
needed and offer redundant services to survive. I think that the same
happens with the interpretation of the law of patent offices. As
patent examiner Jozef Halberszt explained:

> Why, because any patent office grants as a rule and rejects as an
> exception. Alternative approach is unrealizable. Do you think that a
> public institution that rejects 90% applications can survive?

However, that reform is not imposible. Of course, it would require
lot of intelligence. But it would be good for all industrial sectors.

It would require:

- Changing of the law. Something beyond "non-obvious".

- Changing methodology. Design a system where examiners cannot be
pressed to accept trivial patents.

And probably many other things.

Ramon