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Considering the increasingly vocal outcry of rampant patent abuse, it's also possible that tech giants begin publicly stating their position towards US patent l
by Taft 15y ago
Considering the increasingly vocal outcry of rampant patent abuse, it's also possible that tech giants begin publicly stating their position towards US patent law: it needn't exist (or one of the many alternatives that have been proposed). If the market can metabolize that, patent law reform isn't far away.
- VMG 15y agoCouldn't the tech giants cooperate and introduce a system that benefits the top 10% and exclude the long tail of smaller companies? That could be even worse.
- kwis 15y agoI'd argue that the existing system does just that. The big boys have portfolios of patents that they fling at each other until some sort of cross-licensing deal is reached, whilst smaller players just have to cross their fingers and hope that nobody decides to tax them too extravagantly. I omit the possibility of creating non-infringing products simply because it's virtually impossible to bring any meaningful product to market without infringing on somebody's overly broad patent.
- burgerbrain 15y agoWorse? That is exactly what we have right now!
- VMG 15y agoThey are still suing each other. There could be a system where there is a cartel that only sues the small ones.
- beagle3 15y agoThat's already happening. Google, MS, Apple, IBM, Intel, AMD/ATI, nVidia, AT&T and a few others already have cross-licensing deals essentially between everyone and everyone. It's just that HTC and Samsung are not part of _this_ cartel.
- burgerbrain 15y agoThat is the current system's default mode of operation. What do you think MPEG LA is?
- tsotha 15y agoThat's essentially the situation in hardware. All the big players have portfolios of patents which they swap in cross-licensing deals. As a newcomer you have no chance of breaking into the business since you don't have a portfolio of your own - you'd get sued out of business.
- jxcole 15y agoI would agree except that a bunch of companies just bought some patents for $4.5 billion. If patents become ineffective, the value of that purchase is $0. Very few companies are going to look on this as a positive thing.
- erydo 15y agoThey already purchased those patents, though. It's kind of a sunk cost. They wouldn't be losing $4.5 billion cash if patents became worthless, they'd be losing ammunition for a type of fight that they wouldn't have to deal with anymore. That's like saying, "We can't stop fighting this war, then all our guns would be worthless."
- wanderful 15y agoIt's very much like saying that, which doesn't mean it's not persuasive reasoning. It may not be ultimately rational reasoning, but it appeals to many people. That's why it's called the sunk cost fallacy. :)
- erydo 15y agoYep, I was referring to the fallacy. I know people don't always make rational decisions—and there are many other considerations here besides—but I thought it worth pointing out that it's not quite so obvious that the large companies would be against patent dissolution.
- randallsquared 15y agoThat seems like a very common thing for people to say just after buying 4.5 billion USD worth of weapons.
- wheels 15y agoBad analogy. The war isn't over patents, it's general competition. It's more like the UN pushing you to sign a treaty pledging not to use nukes just after you spent a pile acquiring them. Now if patents were only used defensively (which they're obviously not in this case, since Apple went on the attack) the analogy would then be banning ballistic missiles right after acquiring a ballistic missile defense system, which would be easier to swallow.
- smashing 15y agoWhat Congress considers patent reform and what you, and many on this site, consider patent reform hold to two distinct philosophies.