StrangeSox

Soxtalk's ad banner is now referring me to patent lawyers, lol

QUOTE (iamshack @ Dec 20, 2011 -> 12:39 PM) There you go again. Sorry. I bring up Apple because they have been the ones making the most innovations. And I am still waiting for you to address my questions and my points. You like to steer things in your way and condescendingly attack the people you are debating against, which is why I usually just ignore you. I guess I'll go back to that philosophy again now. Lighten up, Francis is a joke from Stripes. I was trying to convey that the fanboy jab was light-hearted. How awesome Apple is or isn't (and they do make great, innovative products) is irrelevant to the general question of whether software patents are a good idea. I think I've addressed every one of your questions except for the click-wheel, which I would say it patentable since it's an actual implementation of a user-interface and not the concept of "using a finger to control a device"

QUOTE (iamshack @ Dec 20, 2011 -> 12:30 PM) Why is it that you are allowed to insult me, and then when I defend myself, you tell me not to focus on the point about which you insulted me? Lighten up, Francis. I threw out the fanboyism thing because you were focusing so much on how awesomely awesome Apple's innovations are and how they need protection from everyone stealing from them. It's wrong (see Nokia) and it is irrelevant to discussing whether we need software patents or not. This argument isn't about Apple or Google or Microsoft or any one company in particular.

QUOTE (iamshack @ Dec 20, 2011 -> 12:18 PM) It's not an issue of Apple fanboyism. It's an issue of Apple being far and away the best innovators in media and media devices over the last decade, and as a function of that, them having innovation after innovation which has then been wholesale copied by the rest of the market. It bothers me that they would be required to spend the money to develop products that are better, only to have them copied within months of their release. That is not a great path to innovation in my opinion. Apple is one player, do not focus on them. Like I said, they are also sued for infringement and buy millions upon millions of dollars worth of patents and licenses. Everything wrong with the software patent system doesn't revolve around Apple.

QUOTE (iamshack @ Dec 20, 2011 -> 12:03 PM) I agree in regards to the rent-seeking. As for the monopoly, perhaps the time should be lessened on software patents...perhaps something like 24 months would be more reasonable now. That would certainly help eliminate crap like 15 year old patents on the concept of streaming music that weren't novel when they were granted. http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20110728/...us-market.shtml

QUOTE (iamshack @ Dec 20, 2011 -> 11:57 AM) Ok, I admit the phone number hyperlink is not the best example for the point I am trying to make. However, it does seem odd to me that one company seems to bring all these ideas to market (which costs millions of dollars, btw, another point Y2H conveniently passed over), when other companies did not. Apple has taken devices that really did suck, and improved them. As a result, they filed patents, which, IMO, should be protected. While some are more trivial than others, the point remains that their innovations cost millions of dollars and should provide them with more protection than simply the time it takes for someone else to reverse engineer their product and bring a copycat to market. So this boils down to Apple fanboyism? Plenty of companies bring technology to market and hold patents. It's not like Apple isn't constantly defending itself from patent infringement lawsuits or spending tens of millions or more on licensing them. Read that patent that started this discussion. It is a basic description of a pattern-analyzing algorithm that then turns matches into hyperlinks. It did not cost them millions of dollars to invent this. They didn't have to spend a dime to bring it to market if they wanted to sit on it and prevent others from doing so. It is a concept in someone's head, not a method of actually implementing it, and it shouldn't be protected. That's what that article was about. Apple sued HTC for violating their patent on clickable phone numbers in text messages. Apple is not alone in this, of course. Yes, software code is copyrighted. Much like a book, I couldn't take the whole chunk of code and rewrite a few segments and call it my own. My contention is that these basic concepts do not deserve any protection, any more than physical concepts of inventions or technologies do. I can copyright my story, but I can't patent a literally device or a plot line. Apple should not be allowed to bar HTC from independently devising their own system and method of clickable phone numbers, instead forcing them to pay a licensing fee or simply refusing to grant them a license. This is one specific example, but it is endemic to software patents.

QUOTE (iamshack @ Dec 20, 2011 -> 11:48 AM) So then you are of the opinion that the market should offer the ultimate protection? Whomever designs the best product will ultimately make the most money? What technology ultimately succeeds isn't that simple, but more or less I'd agree with that. It is much preferable to granting monopolies on simple concepts and allowing billions of dollars of rent-seeking.

QUOTE (iamshack @ Dec 20, 2011 -> 11:43 AM) I am not claiming that it does. You have taken this argument and turned it into what you are arguing and what you hope I will argue so that you can make me look foolish. What I have argued is that there has to be some sort of protection available. Without it, there will also be negative consequences, which, conveniently, you have failed to recognize. I agree that the patent office is antiquated, and seemingly has struggled to keep up with modern technology. The system needs to be overhauled so as to address many of the concerns you and Y2H have mentioned. Well, you came up with the chair analogy, which I think perfectly demonstrates the problem with software patents and how they're fundamentally different from other patents. And it started with you saying that you didn't see anything wrong with Apple's hyperlink patent, and Y2HH and I trying to explain why we feel it's fundamentally a bad thing. No one is trying to make you look foolish. I don't know if software patents need to be heavily reformed or completely eliminated; I've seen convincing arguments on the later. I have not seen very many good arguments in favor of preserving them. Apple etc. are working within the confines of the law and exploiting it to their best advantage. I also do not blame them for amassing thousands upon thousands of defensive patents. I do blame them for engaging in patent trolling. I also blame the US Patent Office and the court systems for making such a mess of this in the first place. As a concept? No. How Apple implements that concept? Sure.

QUOTE (iamshack @ Dec 20, 2011 -> 11:25 AM) How would you suggest there is any protection for software innovations then? Copyright the code, possibly allow patents for specific implementations of a concept instead of making basic concepts patentable. Why should Apple be given a patent for the 'novel' invention of what is essentially a hyperlink? Why should they be allowed to extract money from anyone who wants to use this very basic concept? What good does that serve anyone aside from Apple shareholders? Patents were created in order to protect the profit incentive for inventors, not to give companies the ability to hold monopoly on concepts. One of the areas where my ideology crosses with libertarians like Tim Lee at CATO. The European Patent Office rejected Amazon's ridiculous one-click payment patent, which it still holds in the US.

QUOTE (iamshack @ Dec 20, 2011 -> 11:15 AM) Bulls***. It's very likely that there is some sort of technology in my massage chair that you have to pay me for in order to utilize. If I want to use that technology, sure. If I want to build a chair that massages you with a completely different implementation, I don't. You don't hold a patent on "massage chair" as a concept, which is how software patents tend to work. You would hold monopoly on the entire concept of massage chairs. Anyone who wanted to design and build one, regardless of functionality, Rent-seeking is a drag on the economy. Allowing the creation of overly broad patents that allows companies to rent-seek for very basic concepts hurts the economy and hurts innovation. But that's part of the whole patent-trolling problem. Come up with a basic concept, patent it, never even try to implement it, and then force a company to pay you. It's not a good thing. I'm not against patents as a concept. I'm against what our current software patent system is.

QUOTE (iamshack @ Dec 20, 2011 -> 11:10 AM) The assembly line was patented, by Ransom Olds. This unintentionally works even better as an analogy for software, as the patent office will grant patents for existing technologies and ideas that may already be covered under another broad patent. Some google searching seems to call into question whether Olds was ever granted that patent. I would be very surprised to learn that it patented the basic concept of an assembly line, and I would be curious as to how Ford got around it if that were the case.

QUOTE (Y2HH @ Dec 20, 2011 -> 11:07 AM) You mean just like you could design a cranking system on a car slightly differently and have it start? It's the same. The issue is that many of these patent holders are not coding anything, they're not writing any software...they're just patenting unimplemented ideas that may someday be of use and suing people for it. General use stuff aside, it's such a mess that there are patent holders out there and their company exists ONLY to get patents, but never actually attempt to do anything with them other than strong arm people or litigate. That's insane. Exactly. They'll collect thousands of patents and then go sue anyone and everyone who does basically anything, since it's in violation of a patent. Or, they'll strong-arm companies into giving them money to license these patents. These groups have caused billions of dollars of drag on our economy and technological innovation while adding absolutely nothing. It's a clear sign that the system is broken.

QUOTE (iamshack @ Dec 20, 2011 -> 11:04 AM) The problem is in the way software or software innovations are created versus how more tangible inventions are created, would be my guess. I am not a software writer or anything, but my guess is I could write a code for something like this that is just slightly different than the way someone else wrote it to accomplish the same goal. And I can build a massage chair that's a little different from your massage chair and not violate any patents, since I haven't copied your implementation but just the concept. Does Apple really deserve a 20 year hold (or however long the patent is for) on the concept of making a phone number clickable on a phone? How is this really any more novel than automatic email address recognition and linking? How does this help society and our economy as a whole to give one company such a broad monopoly? I think it's notable that a good portion of the software development community is strongly against software patents.

FWIW the patent office is pretty seriously under-staffed and under-funded.

QUOTE (iamshack @ Dec 20, 2011 -> 10:57 AM) Do you honestly support a system where I can simply buy your invention, take it apart, figure out how it works, and then rebuild it and sell it? That's what companies were doing with some of Apple's technology. Reverse engineering goes back to antiquity. Do you honestly support a system where you can patent the broad concept of something, never make any attempts to actually design or market something utilizing that concept, and then sue anyone who later makes something that infringes on your patent? Who came out with the first disc brakes for cars? Should they have been allowed to hold a 20 year patent on that concept? What about the concept of using an electric starter to start a car instead of a hand-crank? Should that be patentable? If not, why should software concepts be given such broad protections? edit: better example, should Henry Ford have been able to patent the concept of an assembly line utilizing interchangeable parts for manufacturing? That is the scope that many of these software patents cover.

QUOTE (iamshack @ Dec 20, 2011 -> 10:52 AM) I don't disagree. Am I allowed to do that? But there has to be some protection. When I see something designed that is head over heels better than any product that has come to market, and then suddenly a year later, all the products on the market are basically mimicking that product because all the other companies reverse engineered it, I think that is wrong. That's more or less the entire history of technological innovation, though. Is my understanding wrong that, outside of software patents, it is the actual implementation of the concept that is patented?

QUOTE (Y2HH @ Dec 20, 2011 -> 10:48 AM) It's beyond antiquated. It wasn't written with software in mind, because it was enacted BEFORE anyone thought of patenting software based ideas. It has to be rewritten completely in light of the newer technologies and realities that exist. Applying an out of date method of law to a modern idea does not and cannot work...hence why the lawsuits we are seeing are as absurd as they are. The main problem, as I understand it, is that basic, broad concepts are given patent protection and not actual implementation. When Edison patented the light bulb, he didn't get a patent on producing light via radiation from electrical resistance, he got a patent for his specific implementation of that idea. Apple didn't get a patent for how they implemented what is a simple extension of a hyperlink, but over the entire concept of making a hyperlink on a smartphone via pattern recognition.

QUOTE (iamshack @ Dec 20, 2011 -> 10:42 AM) Maybe you should learn how the law works. In the case of software patents, it's broken!

QUOTE (iamshack @ Dec 20, 2011 -> 10:37 AM) I disagree. You have no clue how frustrated I used to become when I was finding a number on one screen and trying to go back to my dialing screen and type in the number from memory, realizing I forgot some numbers and going back to the number, then going back to the dialing screen, etc. In patent law, there is a concept where if there is really only one good way to do something, than that is not really something that is patentable. For instance, you can't patent the idea for a chair. You can patent an idea for a chair that massages your back, or a chair that rocks, or a chair that has a cooler for your beer in it, but you cannot patent a simple chair. In this instance, Apple is improving about the idea of web browsing. They are allowing you to access information from the screen you are browsing directly with the functionality of the phone. I think that is a design improvement that deserves recognition under the law. If we want to compare your analogy here, then we need to be able to patent the concept of a massage chair without actually designing a functional massage chair or making any efforts to do so, and the patent needs to cover any implementation whatsoever of a chair that massages you, allowing you to patent-troll anyone who tries to market a massage chair. Even if the concept was already executed years or decades before you were granted your patent. Apple's "invention" here is no more novel than a weblink, which allows "you to access information from the screen you are browsing directly."

get out. This American Life had a good episode on patent trolls this summer. I thinks bmags posted it way back when. http://www.thisamericanlife.org/radio-arch...-patents-attack

QUOTE (Y2HH @ Dec 20, 2011 -> 10:29 AM) Because they weren't. Touchscreens with such features have existed for years, Apple was simply the first to go to mass market with them. Slide to unlock is one thing...touching a number on a touch screen to dial it is something else entirely. To make a better example for you, that's like patenting the idea of a LINK in a web browser. Since Netscape did it first, no other web browsers should ever be able to do it again without paying them! One is an idea/specific method to unlock, the other is a basic fundamental usage. There is a pretty huge difference. And the problem is there's many valid patents out there that are akin to a patent on a web browser link. Amazon owns a patent on "online cart checkouts" which virtually every website where you can buy something is in violation.

QUOTE (Y2HH @ Dec 20, 2011 -> 10:13 AM) It's akin to having a patent on a round steering wheel. It's literally a patent on being able to touch a phone number in an e-mail on a touch screen device and you're phone calling that number. It's absurd. Right. I have no problem with Apple's specific code for doing so being copyrighted, but software patents have become this gigantic mess of broad patents on the most basic of concepts. Patent trolling has cost the economy billions of dollars. edit: here's the actual patent There is no reason Apple should be able to hold a monopoly on the rather obvious concept of clicking a phone number to call it. That same functionality has existed in email on computers for ages. All of these patents and the patent trolling companies are seriously boxing in innovation when something like "transmitting music data over IP" is copyrighted. There's a good reason a significant portion of the software development world opposes software patents and why they're not granted in many countries.

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Dec 20, 2011 -> 09:07 AM) Maybe they were referring to the chick he supposedly got it from?

QUOTE (Y2HH @ Dec 20, 2011 -> 08:19 AM) There are millions of such examples. Yup

An example of everything wrong with software patents: U.S. Backs Apple in Patent Ruling That Hits Google