[Patents] Re: Defensive Publishing

[phm@a2e.de (PILCH Hartmut)]

> > > "Advocates of defensive publishing tend to sit in one of three
> > > different camps. There are those who see it as simply a component part
> > > of a good IP strategy, choosing which inventions to patent, and which
> > > to simply place in the public domain; there are those who see it as a
> > > way of cleaning up the patent system, helping to ensure that only
> > > fundamental inventions are patented, and therefore as a way of
> > > resolving the overload crisis currently gripping patent offices around
> > > the world; and there are those who view it as an alternative to
> > > patenting, and who tend to believe that -- as a tool created for the
> > > industrial age -- the IP system is no longer appropriate in today's
> > > economy."
> >
> >Good observations, although I don't exactly understand where the last camp
> >is to be found and what its beliefs are.  I don't know anyone who would
> >say without differntiation that "the IP system is no longer appropriate".
> >Also, I don't understand how such a position could be a reason for
> >engaging in defensive publishing.
>
>
> I guess the reasoning goes like this: if more and more inventions were put
> into the public domain, there would be less for others to patent. So if the
> open source community (and everyone else who wanted to prevent the
> "privatisation" of knowledge) bombarded the world with
> inventions/innovations (and thus made it impossible for anyone else to
> patent them) then they would gradually enlarge "the commons" at the expense
> of the private.
>
> Is that not a possible (if perhaps impractical and naive) scenario?

OK, I understand that by group 3 you are referring to the "opensource
leaders" and other software professionals who were quoted by IP.com as
endorsing the scheme.  But I think their ideas are different and
heterogenous.  I would therefore reword your last paragraph as

"and there are those who view it as a short-term strategy against the
proliferation of obnoxious software patents, and who tend to believe that
the patent system should not be applied to software at all."

--
Hartmut Pilch                                           http://phm.ffii.org/
Protecting Innovation against Patent Inflation        http://swpat.ffii.org/
80000 signatures against software patents         http://www.noepatents.org/