USPTO Needs Reforms
With all the resent court cases and news articles surrounding technology patents, the United States Patent and Trademark Office needs to be gutted and reemed. They need to get some people in there that understand technology and get public feedback on patent applications before they approve them. I am all for inventors and businesses being able to protect their work and their interests, but some of the patents being approved these days are laughable. It is only a matter of time before the USPTO is completely irrelevant because the patents they approve mean nothing.
Some dumb patents (all in the news in the past month):
Some dumb patents (all in the news in the past month):
- Amazon's Use of viewing history to identify related products
- David Contois' Computer control system and UI for media playing devices (currently suing Apple over their iPod interface)
- Amazon's Method and system for displaying and editing of information
- AOL Sued for Displaying Call Info in VoIP Service
- Genese's Transmitting information over a network (1998 - I think the Internet predates this one)
- Microsoft's Video game scoring based upon goals achieved
posted by Bill Blankmeyer at
14:53
1 Comments:
Another absurd Patent I came across last night was for Sony's Method and system for generating sensory data onto the human neural cortex. This is basically them patenting the idea of the matrix for use in video games and entertainment. So, they have a patent on the technology that they haven't even been able to create yet, just the idea. This is stifling innovation right there. If I were to come up with a way to actually do it, I couldn't because they already have the patent. And where does Sony get off...I'm pretty sure the Wachowski brothers came up with the idea. Surely, taking their idea and saying we would do that in video games isn't worth a patent.
By
Bill Blankmeyer, at 01 July, 2005 08:59
Post a Comment
<< Home