6 ms·

Stay Classy Makerbot

213 points by thealphanerd 12y ago

rubiquity 12y ago
I'm completely ignorant here, but when I read a "slew of patents" have been filed, two things come to mind: 1. A startup that is trying to raise some funding is filing the patents as a requisite of an investor (it sucks, but it's part of the startup/investor game) 2. A startup that was acquired by a larger company and the acquirer is trying to protect its shiny new purchase I noticed Makerbot was acquired by Stratasys last year so point #2 seems likely. These filings are likely to be more on the behalf of Stratasys than Makerbot. Again, I'm not saying it's right, just saying it isn't surprising.
- JoshTriplett 12y ago
  > 1. A startup that is trying to raise some funding is filing the patents as a requisite of an investor (it sucks, but it's part of the startup/investor game) > 2. A startup that was acquired by a larger company and the acquirer is trying to protect its shiny new purchase In particular, it seems far too common for a patent troll to see a company that just got funded or acquired and figure they can extort some of the new funding. So it makes perfect sense for a newly acquired or invested-in company to spend some of the new funding they just got to set up a small stack of defensive patents or publications. That said, for both of those cases it would potentially be cheaper and equally effective to file defensive publications rather than patents.
  - pgeorgi 12y ago
    patents won't help against patent trolls. These "non-practicing entities" have the distinct advantage of not doing anything that could have them infringe on a patent (in particular given that legal procedures aren't patentable).
  - mnutt 12y ago
    Defensive patents are not effective against patent trolls, since the trolls do not produce any products. The publications do make sense, though.
    - akerl_ 12y ago
      Defensive patents are effective against patent trolls, because if you have your defensive patents covering the things you do, you can bring those to court as proof of the origin and creation date of your ideas, should the patent trolls come knocking.
      - noonespecial 12y ago
        Yes you can bring them to court along with your million dollars and 6-8 months of time and aggravation. You'll likely "win".
      - sitkack 12y ago
        But if you want to defend against trolls and do not seek your own patent monopoly, patents don't make sense. Slow and expensive. Other means are vastly cheaper.
  - gamacodre 12y ago
    > That said, for both of those cases it would potentially be cheaper and equally effective to file defensive publications rather than patents. Do you mean a Statutory Invention Registration[1]? That seems almost as troublesome as putting together a regular application, just without some of the followthrough. Or is there actually a solid way to establish prior art just by publishing your method? I've been wondering if there's some threshold of "publication legitimacy" that's required for this, or if posting the method up on pastebin would work. I found a piece on how to establish prior invention for business methods[2], but that only protects the folks that can document their own prior use. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Statutory_Invention_Registration https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Statutory_Invent... [2] http://www.fenwick.com/fenwickdocuments/new_defense.pdf http://www.fenwick.com/fenwickdocuments/new_defense.pdf
    - ihnorton 12y ago
      > Or is there actually a solid way to establish prior art just by publishing your method? There is a service [1] that does this, and is registered as a "mandatory to search" resource with the WIPO. It costs $120/page, which is steep, but surely cheaper than patent prosecution. There are other "mandatory search" archives [2] under the Patent Cooperation Treaty "Minimum Documentation" rules, many of which are academic journals. These are not the only means of "public disclosure" but my (very limited) understanding is that the patent office is guaranteed to look at the sources on that list. [1] http://www.researchdisclosure.com/publishing-disclosures http://www.researchdisclosure.com/publishing-disclosures [2] http://www.wipo.int/standards/en/part_04.html http://www.wipo.int/standards/en/part_04.html
      - pbhjpbhj 12y ago
        Any public disclosure anywhere in the world forms part of the prior art. Dates are hard to establish for webpages and so they're not generally a good form of disclosure - "defensive publication" is the term if anyone wants to find more info. >"the patent office is guaranteed to look at the sources on that list" The PCT minimum documentation is what must be available. The examiner will have to balance time and costs (databases of journals can be costly to interrogate) against their considerations of what material it would be useful to search. In the UK the examiners used to keep up with journals appropriate to their field - so publishing an article in a trade journal or maker magazine about 3D printing would be a reasonable place for disclosure in this case. There's another option for those familiar with the patent system - pick a country with low fees and file an application, get an A-publication and abandon the application. In the UK that will cost £30 (~$50) on application plus £150 for the search (you can file both online and get £30 off). It doesn't matter how big your application is; you don't get charged more for a 1000 page application than you do for a single page. It won't get refused until after publication even if it's absolute nonsense. It can however take a couple of years but you can reduce that to about 5 months by getting an accelerated search. Aside: Theoretically you could break the UKIPO by submitting an application that's millions of pages long. Under R48(1) the UK office has to provide copies to anyone on request for a fee of £5 (with a Form23). There doesn't appear to be a restriction on the address either, anywhere in the European Economic Area is fine. However there's also a rule that requires one to provide, or pay, for 3 paper copies of an application to be made IIRC.
- ebildsten 12y ago
  Now that the USPTO is a first-to-file system, they may have felt pressure to file for defensive patents before someone else did so offensively and came after them.
bryans 12y ago
The author claims prior art based on things that were published in 2013, but Makerbot filed their provisional application on October 29, 2012. This also explains why the patent was filed October 29 of 2013, as that would be the last date they can file. I don't really care if you hate the patent system, or hate that somebody wants to treat 3D printing as a traditional business instead of altruistically open sourcing all the things. To publicly lambaste a competitor through disinformation just because they don't share your personal values is about as classless as it gets. This is open-and-shut witch-hunt territory.
- danvoell 12y ago
  Is it possible to include claims in the patent filing that weren't in the provisional? Just curious.
  - mixmax 12y ago
    yes it is, but they get their own filing date. Source: I have a few patents, and have done this.
  - gumby 12y ago
    Sure, the chance to straighten out the claims later is a big part of provisionals. In fact provisionals don't even need claims, but for certain international patents to get the filing date you need to include at least one claim to make it a "patent filing" for those countries. Provisional patents are a US specific thing. The way to think of a provisional is that it's a way to get a description on file by a certain date. Then if you subsequently file a patent application within that time you can refer to the provisional to get the benefit of the earlier filing date. The claims in the actual patent are the ones that matter and they refer to the description in the actual patent. In fact I'm not sure the examiner really looks at the provisional at all, since the claims and description of the patent application itself are what matter in regards to granting the patent. So what does the provisional do? Example: let's assume bicycle cranks didn't exist and I filed a provisional 1 Feb 2013 for a crank with an odd number of teeth. I just wrote it up in relatively casual style ("a wheel with an odd number of protrusions around its circumference sized such that links of a chain could fit between them, and pedals attached to radial posts"). Then on the 15th of January 2014 I file a patent application for a bicycle crank with odd and even numbers of teeth. My description now takes up several pages and includes drawings done in the crazy style required by the patent office. My provisional just included a hand drawing or two and a couple of sentences of description. If I tried to sue you over this patent for making bike cranks with an even number of teeth, and you had begun in July 2013, I'd be out of luck. But if you used an odds number of teeth my protection for my granted patent would extend back to Feb 2013. I could still lose because the casual description might be ambiguous enough that you could convince the jury that it didn't really describe the actual, patented invention. Because of this patent attorneys try to make provisionals as close to real patents as possible, and often urge you to simply skip the provisional step. (BTW there are domains where patents make sense. Where most NH readers are, in software, I consider patents an abomination).
bernardom 12y ago
Business reality: patent trolls exist. Rational strategy: patent things that you think you have no business patenting. Use for defensive purposes. If Makerbot starts using such patents offensively, then anger is warranted. Not before.
- hyborg787 12y ago
  How do you avoid the chilling effects of patents existing then without getting into patent pools or cross-licensing arrangements? People will be hesitant to put any time into R&D if they don't have assurances their work won't be quashed by lawyers.
  - nova 12y ago
    Funny how patents are supposed to encourage innovation and they're doing exactly the opposite.
  - bernardom 12y ago
    Just commented on this below (sorry it's so late). It's an arms race! The system is broken. But I wouldn't blame an individual for picking the right strategy to maximize their chances.
- rhizome 12y ago
  If Makerbot starts using such patents offensively, then anger is warranted. Not before. The problem with that is that you don't know whether they'll use the patent offensively or defensively until after it's granted.
  - general_failure 12y ago
    Right, one cannot start a competing company assuming that Makerbot won't sue.
    - bernardom 12y ago
      Great points. But isn't this the dictionary definition of "don't hate the player, hate the game?" They need to arm themselves to survive an attack... which makes it so everyone else has to arm themselves in case they attack... arms race!
higherpurpose 12y ago
Does prior art, even backed by concrete proof, still matter now that US also has a "First to file" patent system?
- travisp 12y ago
  Yes. Prior art still invalidates patents under first to file. Actually, the system is harder now in some ways (and easier in others) because it's closer to "first to publish" than other "first to file" systems: > an applicant could file a U.S. patent application covering an invention that was the subject of a publication provided the publication was dated less than 1 year earlier. This was true even if the publication was by another individual or entity that independently arrived at the invention on his or her own. Effective Saturday, March 16, 2013, if another individual or entity independently arrived at the invention and published an article before the first inventor filed the first inventor who filed will be unable to obtain a patent. http://www.ipwatchdog.com/2013/03/16/a-brave-new-patent-world-first-to-file-becomes-law/id=37601/ http://www.ipwatchdog.com/2013/03/16/a-brave-new-patent-worl... A lot of the people calling "end of world" around "first to file" don't really know what the new system means (not their fault, it's complicated!). What first to file does is mean that if you keep your invention secret, you can't then claim it as prior art for someone else down the road or claim that you actually deserve the patent because you invented it first. At least in this way, it makes uncertainties around patents a lot fewer.
- throwawaykf05 12y ago
  That is a common misunderstanding around these parts, one that I addressed just a few days ago. See this subthread: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7738749 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7738749
lotsofmangos 12y ago
The reprap ormerod is using an infra-red sensor for bed levelling, so no contact force. http://uk.rs-online.com/web/p/3d-printers/7952333/ http://uk.rs-online.com/web/p/3d-printers/7952333/ There was a nice bed levelling project I saw on hackaday a couple of years ago that was cool as well, I think their method isn't covered by this patent either - http://hackaday.com/2012/04/23/automated-bed-leveling-with-our-3d-printer/ http://hackaday.com/2012/04/23/automated-bed-leveling-with-o... Also, the idea of bed leveling using contact force and other methods was discussed in the reprap forums at least as far back as January 2008 - http://forums.reprap.org/read.php?1,8028 http://forums.reprap.org/read.php?1,8028
- makomk 12y ago
  Careful - Makerbot's parent company has a recent history of stretching 3D printing patents to sue over things that are obviously and fundamentally different from what was actually patented.
- TaylorAlexander 12y ago
  This is why patents like this are annoying. The idea of automated bed leveling wasn't novel by the time this patent had been filed, and doing it with force measurement is an obvious method to someone interested in automated bed leveling. There's nothing novel about doing bed leveling with force measurement.
jamesdullaghan 12y ago
Does anyone care to explain to me why there is no patent service that takes care of this process for open projects for protection of said projects? A patent would be granted under an open entity, but never used, unless a company used the patent for closed source. It seems that this could be a great way to fund open source projects. Reverse patent trolling.
- nitrogen 12y ago
  There's http://www.openinventionnetwork.com/ http://www.openinventionnetwork.com/. There used to be http://www.linuxdefenders.org/ http://www.linuxdefenders.org/ but it's not resolving for me.
e_modad 12y ago
Terence is doing something vitally important. 3D printing is likely to be a "next big thing" and we have a duty to ensure the technology stays as open as possible. As a community, we're lucky that ideas like 'open source' and 'freedom to tinker' are highly valued. Each of us has benefited tremendously from that commitment. But it wasn't an accident. Hackers, scientists and engineers have been fighting mini-battles over those ideas since the days of the 60s counter-culture. When I stop and think about it, I feel a lot of gratitude and respect for our colleagues who set the precedent for an open Internet so early on. We have an obligation to pay that precedent forward so that technologies like 3D printing and DIY Bio can develop into vibrant ecosystems like the Internet.
scoofy 12y ago
Shameless plug: Bld3r.com co-founder here. I started working on bld3r, because i was unsatisfied with thingiverse (owned by makerbot/stratasys). I'd like to see the community put a stop to a potential facebook-like hold on 3D model sharing learning since we are learning makerbot is very rapidly changing their culture from open hardware cultural icons, to an anti-social corporate subsidiary. I'll hit some fairly basic bullet points: * We are a functional 3D printing repo and social network, and in the top 3 alternatives to thingiverse. * We on github (AGPL), and i'd happily accept pull requests: https://github.com/bld3r/bld3r https://github.com/bld3r/bld3r * We are built on google's app engine, so you can take our site and use it as a base for building your own social network and launching it in a couple hours or a couple of days. * One major feature is that you do not have to upload 3d models to us. You can if you want, but you don't have to. We'd actually prefer if people host files elsewhere (via dropbox, github, tpb, etc., even thingiverse). You can then submit a link to your object and it'll appear on our front page crowd-sourced with reddit-style voting. * We do not sell 3d printers, so if you do, we'd love to give you some free advertising while we grow our site. We are currently working on a contest feature, so within a month, if you want to host a contest, you can design what you want on our site, and launch it to promote your printers (Lulzbot was the first of such manufactures to do so, and we are very grateful to them for the notable bump in traffic and name recognition). There are many more things we do to prevent even ourselves from exploiting a network effect in 3D repos. We are not without our warts right now (this is neither of our main occupations, it's just a labor of love to keep 3D printing open), but please give the site a visit if you're interested. I live in SF and my co-founder lives NYC. We'd both be happy to get a beer and talk about the site if anyone is interested in using it as a base for another open social network. http://www.bld3r.com http://www.bld3r.com
the_watcher 12y ago
Has MakerBot acted on any of these patents? If they are acquiring them defensively (a good move if they plan on working on them, lest a patent troll file the patent), I don't have a big problem with this. Of course, assuming altruistic motives is naive, I just wonder what their motives are.
- fudged71 12y ago
  As I posted above, Makerbot was bought by Stratasys. Now Stratasys is attacking Makerbot alternatives such as Afinia. http://3dprintingindustry.com/2013/11/26/stratasys-throws-curve-ball-smacks-afinia-lawsuit/ http://3dprintingindustry.com/2013/11/26/stratasys-throws-cu...
- kam 12y ago
  It doesn't matter. Without a legally-binding pledge limiting the patents to be used only defensively, there is a chilling effect on innovators in the space. The threat of a lawsuit discourages development and investment.
  - the_watcher 12y ago
    That's true, although even a non-legally binding pledge (do pledges like that exist? IANAL, but from my time in law school, seems like the best solution would be to set up a foundation with a goal of using patents defensively and filing it under its name or something) is better than a troll filing the patent, in my opinion
noonespecial 12y ago
Complaints about the author, methods, prior art etc aside... I've got a lathe here from the late 80's that has CNC. It has tool depth sensing via electrical contact and a bed leveling algorithm. Taking stuff that has existed for 30 years that anyone with community college level machine shop training knows about, tacking "with the 3d printerz!1!!" on and running to the patent office is a giant dick move on the same level as all of the "on the intertubes" patents we've been dealing with. They may have great intentions. Who knows, but boy-howdy if it walks like a troll...
- fudged71 12y ago
  Same thing with networking, queueing etc. It has existed since the dawn of desktop printers, but now that they add "3D" to the name, it's considered a novel invention? The patent system is flawed.
sitkack 12y ago
This whole thing is stupid. Leveling is a problem, "autoing" it is not patent worthy. Lots of things have some solution applied to them to "auto". This is a case of patenting a problem, not the solution. And if the solution (sensors and actuators) have been applied elsewhere, then there isn't anything patentable here. Move on, solve harder problems. The Stewart Platform [0] was invented back in the early 50s, I could apply an SP to any leveling problem. I shouldn't be able to patent leveling anything at this point. Leveling is a solved problem. Putting a computer in a feedback loop is a solved problem, one should not be able to patent feedback loops or computers or trivial applications of both. [0] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stewart_platform http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stewart_platform
klunger 12y ago
OK, a few things. 1. Patents are very VERY specific. Someone can have a patent for Thing A and you can make Thing B that is quite similar to Thing A, with just a few minor adjustments, and it is not an infringement. This is why there are tons of patents out there that describe pretty much the same thing, with very minute differences. The takeaway is: just because Makerbot / Stratasys is getting a patent on autoleveling does not mean no one else can do autoleveling. It just means they cannot do it the exact same way. 2. A patent troll is an entity that has a patent portfolio, but has no actual products related to anything in that portfolio. They make their money by suing people (or bullying little guys into settling out of court). Makerbot / Stratasys makes 3D printers. It is not trolling for them to file patents related to 3D printing technology. You might think the patent system is broken or feel that patent filing is not in the spirit of open source hardware (valid points which I personally share), but it is not trolling. So, let's not undermine the legitimacy of those criticisms by conflating one particular (arguably douchey) business strategy with patent trolling (another, unarguably douchey strategy).

213 points by thealphanerd 12y ago

I'm completely ignorant here, but when I read a "slew of patents" have been filed, two things come to mind: 1. A startup that is trying to raise some funding is filing the patents as a requisite of an investor (it sucks, but it's part of the startup/investor game) 2. A startup that was acquired by a larger company and the acquirer is trying to protect its shiny new purchase I noticed Makerbot was acquired by Stratasys last year so point #2 seems likely. These filings are likely to be more on the behalf of Stratasys than Makerbot. Again, I'm not saying it's right, just saying it isn't surprising.

JoshTriplett 12y ago
> 1. A startup that is trying to raise some funding is filing the patents as a requisite of an investor (it sucks, but it's part of the startup/investor game) > 2. A startup that was acquired by a larger company and the acquirer is trying to protect its shiny new purchase In particular, it seems far too common for a patent troll to see a company that just got funded or acquired and figure they can extort some of the new funding. So it makes perfect sense for a newly acquired or invested-in company to spend some of the new funding they just got to set up a small stack of defensive patents or publications. That said, for both of those cases it would potentially be cheaper and equally effective to file defensive publications rather than patents.
- pgeorgi 12y ago
  patents won't help against patent trolls. These "non-practicing entities" have the distinct advantage of not doing anything that could have them infringe on a patent (in particular given that legal procedures aren't patentable).
- mnutt 12y ago
  Defensive patents are not effective against patent trolls, since the trolls do not produce any products. The publications do make sense, though.
  - akerl_ 12y ago
    Defensive patents are effective against patent trolls, because if you have your defensive patents covering the things you do, you can bring those to court as proof of the origin and creation date of your ideas, should the patent trolls come knocking.
    - noonespecial 12y ago
      Yes you can bring them to court along with your million dollars and 6-8 months of time and aggravation. You'll likely "win".
    - sitkack 12y ago
      But if you want to defend against trolls and do not seek your own patent monopoly, patents don't make sense. Slow and expensive. Other means are vastly cheaper.
- gamacodre 12y ago
  > That said, for both of those cases it would potentially be cheaper and equally effective to file defensive publications rather than patents. Do you mean a Statutory Invention Registration[1]? That seems almost as troublesome as putting together a regular application, just without some of the followthrough. Or is there actually a solid way to establish prior art just by publishing your method? I've been wondering if there's some threshold of "publication legitimacy" that's required for this, or if posting the method up on pastebin would work. I found a piece on how to establish prior invention for business methods[2], but that only protects the folks that can document their own prior use. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Statutory_Invention_Registration https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Statutory_Invent... [2] http://www.fenwick.com/fenwickdocuments/new_defense.pdf http://www.fenwick.com/fenwickdocuments/new_defense.pdf
  - ihnorton 12y ago
    > Or is there actually a solid way to establish prior art just by publishing your method? There is a service [1] that does this, and is registered as a "mandatory to search" resource with the WIPO. It costs $120/page, which is steep, but surely cheaper than patent prosecution. There are other "mandatory search" archives [2] under the Patent Cooperation Treaty "Minimum Documentation" rules, many of which are academic journals. These are not the only means of "public disclosure" but my (very limited) understanding is that the patent office is guaranteed to look at the sources on that list. [1] http://www.researchdisclosure.com/publishing-disclosures http://www.researchdisclosure.com/publishing-disclosures [2] http://www.wipo.int/standards/en/part_04.html http://www.wipo.int/standards/en/part_04.html
    - pbhjpbhj 12y ago
      Any public disclosure anywhere in the world forms part of the prior art. Dates are hard to establish for webpages and so they're not generally a good form of disclosure - "defensive publication" is the term if anyone wants to find more info. >"the patent office is guaranteed to look at the sources on that list" The PCT minimum documentation is what must be available. The examiner will have to balance time and costs (databases of journals can be costly to interrogate) against their considerations of what material it would be useful to search. In the UK the examiners used to keep up with journals appropriate to their field - so publishing an article in a trade journal or maker magazine about 3D printing would be a reasonable place for disclosure in this case. There's another option for those familiar with the patent system - pick a country with low fees and file an application, get an A-publication and abandon the application. In the UK that will cost £30 (~$50) on application plus £150 for the search (you can file both online and get £30 off). It doesn't matter how big your application is; you don't get charged more for a 1000 page application than you do for a single page. It won't get refused until after publication even if it's absolute nonsense. It can however take a couple of years but you can reduce that to about 5 months by getting an accelerated search. Aside: Theoretically you could break the UKIPO by submitting an application that's millions of pages long. Under R48(1) the UK office has to provide copies to anyone on request for a fee of £5 (with a Form23). There doesn't appear to be a restriction on the address either, anywhere in the European Economic Area is fine. However there's also a rule that requires one to provide, or pay, for 3 paper copies of an application to be made IIRC.
ebildsten 12y ago
Now that the USPTO is a first-to-file system, they may have felt pressure to file for defensive patents before someone else did so offensively and came after them.

bryans 12y ago

The author claims prior art based on things that were published in 2013, but Makerbot filed their provisional application on October 29, 2012. This also explains why the patent was filed October 29 of 2013, as that would be the last date they can file. I don't really care if you hate the patent system, or hate that somebody wants to treat 3D printing as a traditional business instead of altruistically open sourcing all the things. To publicly lambaste a competitor through disinformation just because they don't share your personal values is about as classless as it gets. This is open-and-shut witch-hunt territory.

danvoell 12y ago
Is it possible to include claims in the patent filing that weren't in the provisional? Just curious.
- mixmax 12y ago
  yes it is, but they get their own filing date. Source: I have a few patents, and have done this.
- gumby 12y ago
  Sure, the chance to straighten out the claims later is a big part of provisionals. In fact provisionals don't even need claims, but for certain international patents to get the filing date you need to include at least one claim to make it a "patent filing" for those countries. Provisional patents are a US specific thing. The way to think of a provisional is that it's a way to get a description on file by a certain date. Then if you subsequently file a patent application within that time you can refer to the provisional to get the benefit of the earlier filing date. The claims in the actual patent are the ones that matter and they refer to the description in the actual patent. In fact I'm not sure the examiner really looks at the provisional at all, since the claims and description of the patent application itself are what matter in regards to granting the patent. So what does the provisional do? Example: let's assume bicycle cranks didn't exist and I filed a provisional 1 Feb 2013 for a crank with an odd number of teeth. I just wrote it up in relatively casual style ("a wheel with an odd number of protrusions around its circumference sized such that links of a chain could fit between them, and pedals attached to radial posts"). Then on the 15th of January 2014 I file a patent application for a bicycle crank with odd and even numbers of teeth. My description now takes up several pages and includes drawings done in the crazy style required by the patent office. My provisional just included a hand drawing or two and a couple of sentences of description. If I tried to sue you over this patent for making bike cranks with an even number of teeth, and you had begun in July 2013, I'd be out of luck. But if you used an odds number of teeth my protection for my granted patent would extend back to Feb 2013. I could still lose because the casual description might be ambiguous enough that you could convince the jury that it didn't really describe the actual, patented invention. Because of this patent attorneys try to make provisionals as close to real patents as possible, and often urge you to simply skip the provisional step. (BTW there are domains where patents make sense. Where most NH readers are, in software, I consider patents an abomination).

bernardom 12y ago

Business reality: patent trolls exist. Rational strategy: patent things that you think you have no business patenting. Use for defensive purposes. If Makerbot starts using such patents offensively, then anger is warranted. Not before.

hyborg787 12y ago
How do you avoid the chilling effects of patents existing then without getting into patent pools or cross-licensing arrangements? People will be hesitant to put any time into R&D if they don't have assurances their work won't be quashed by lawyers.
- nova 12y ago
  Funny how patents are supposed to encourage innovation and they're doing exactly the opposite.
- bernardom 12y ago
  Just commented on this below (sorry it's so late). It's an arms race! The system is broken. But I wouldn't blame an individual for picking the right strategy to maximize their chances.
rhizome 12y ago
If Makerbot starts using such patents offensively, then anger is warranted. Not before. The problem with that is that you don't know whether they'll use the patent offensively or defensively until after it's granted.
- general_failure 12y ago
  Right, one cannot start a competing company assuming that Makerbot won't sue.
  - bernardom 12y ago
    Great points. But isn't this the dictionary definition of "don't hate the player, hate the game?" They need to arm themselves to survive an attack... which makes it so everyone else has to arm themselves in case they attack... arms race!

higherpurpose 12y ago

Does prior art, even backed by concrete proof, still matter now that US also has a "First to file" patent system?

travisp 12y ago
Yes. Prior art still invalidates patents under first to file. Actually, the system is harder now in some ways (and easier in others) because it's closer to "first to publish" than other "first to file" systems: > an applicant could file a U.S. patent application covering an invention that was the subject of a publication provided the publication was dated less than 1 year earlier. This was true even if the publication was by another individual or entity that independently arrived at the invention on his or her own. Effective Saturday, March 16, 2013, if another individual or entity independently arrived at the invention and published an article before the first inventor filed the first inventor who filed will be unable to obtain a patent. http://www.ipwatchdog.com/2013/03/16/a-brave-new-patent-world-first-to-file-becomes-law/id=37601/ http://www.ipwatchdog.com/2013/03/16/a-brave-new-patent-worl... A lot of the people calling "end of world" around "first to file" don't really know what the new system means (not their fault, it's complicated!). What first to file does is mean that if you keep your invention secret, you can't then claim it as prior art for someone else down the road or claim that you actually deserve the patent because you invented it first. At least in this way, it makes uncertainties around patents a lot fewer.
throwawaykf05 12y ago
That is a common misunderstanding around these parts, one that I addressed just a few days ago. See this subthread: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7738749 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7738749

lotsofmangos 12y ago

The reprap ormerod is using an infra-red sensor for bed levelling, so no contact force. http://uk.rs-online.com/web/p/3d-printers/7952333/ http://uk.rs-online.com/web/p/3d-printers/7952333/ There was a nice bed levelling project I saw on hackaday a couple of years ago that was cool as well, I think their method isn't covered by this patent either - http://hackaday.com/2012/04/23/automated-bed-leveling-with-our-3d-printer/ http://hackaday.com/2012/04/23/automated-bed-leveling-with-o... Also, the idea of bed leveling using contact force and other methods was discussed in the reprap forums at least as far back as January 2008 - http://forums.reprap.org/read.php?1,8028 http://forums.reprap.org/read.php?1,8028

makomk 12y ago
Careful - Makerbot's parent company has a recent history of stretching 3D printing patents to sue over things that are obviously and fundamentally different from what was actually patented.
TaylorAlexander 12y ago
This is why patents like this are annoying. The idea of automated bed leveling wasn't novel by the time this patent had been filed, and doing it with force measurement is an obvious method to someone interested in automated bed leveling. There's nothing novel about doing bed leveling with force measurement.

jamesdullaghan 12y ago

Does anyone care to explain to me why there is no patent service that takes care of this process for open projects for protection of said projects? A patent would be granted under an open entity, but never used, unless a company used the patent for closed source. It seems that this could be a great way to fund open source projects. Reverse patent trolling.

nitrogen 12y ago
There's http://www.openinventionnetwork.com/ http://www.openinventionnetwork.com/. There used to be http://www.linuxdefenders.org/ http://www.linuxdefenders.org/ but it's not resolving for me.

e_modad 12y ago

Terence is doing something vitally important. 3D printing is likely to be a "next big thing" and we have a duty to ensure the technology stays as open as possible. As a community, we're lucky that ideas like 'open source' and 'freedom to tinker' are highly valued. Each of us has benefited tremendously from that commitment. But it wasn't an accident. Hackers, scientists and engineers have been fighting mini-battles over those ideas since the days of the 60s counter-culture. When I stop and think about it, I feel a lot of gratitude and respect for our colleagues who set the precedent for an open Internet so early on. We have an obligation to pay that precedent forward so that technologies like 3D printing and DIY Bio can develop into vibrant ecosystems like the Internet.

scoofy 12y ago

Shameless plug: Bld3r.com co-founder here. I started working on bld3r, because i was unsatisfied with thingiverse (owned by makerbot/stratasys). I'd like to see the community put a stop to a potential facebook-like hold on 3D model sharing learning since we are learning makerbot is very rapidly changing their culture from open hardware cultural icons, to an anti-social corporate subsidiary. I'll hit some fairly basic bullet points: * We are a functional 3D printing repo and social network, and in the top 3 alternatives to thingiverse. * We on github (AGPL), and i'd happily accept pull requests: https://github.com/bld3r/bld3r https://github.com/bld3r/bld3r * We are built on google's app engine, so you can take our site and use it as a base for building your own social network and launching it in a couple hours or a couple of days. * One major feature is that you do not have to upload 3d models to us. You can if you want, but you don't have to. We'd actually prefer if people host files elsewhere (via dropbox, github, tpb, etc., even thingiverse). You can then submit a link to your object and it'll appear on our front page crowd-sourced with reddit-style voting. * We do not sell 3d printers, so if you do, we'd love to give you some free advertising while we grow our site. We are currently working on a contest feature, so within a month, if you want to host a contest, you can design what you want on our site, and launch it to promote your printers (Lulzbot was the first of such manufactures to do so, and we are very grateful to them for the notable bump in traffic and name recognition). There are many more things we do to prevent even ourselves from exploiting a network effect in 3D repos. We are not without our warts right now (this is neither of our main occupations, it's just a labor of love to keep 3D printing open), but please give the site a visit if you're interested. I live in SF and my co-founder lives NYC. We'd both be happy to get a beer and talk about the site if anyone is interested in using it as a base for another open social network. http://www.bld3r.com http://www.bld3r.com

the_watcher 12y ago

Has MakerBot acted on any of these patents? If they are acquiring them defensively (a good move if they plan on working on them, lest a patent troll file the patent), I don't have a big problem with this. Of course, assuming altruistic motives is naive, I just wonder what their motives are.

fudged71 12y ago
As I posted above, Makerbot was bought by Stratasys. Now Stratasys is attacking Makerbot alternatives such as Afinia. http://3dprintingindustry.com/2013/11/26/stratasys-throws-curve-ball-smacks-afinia-lawsuit/ http://3dprintingindustry.com/2013/11/26/stratasys-throws-cu...
kam 12y ago
It doesn't matter. Without a legally-binding pledge limiting the patents to be used only defensively, there is a chilling effect on innovators in the space. The threat of a lawsuit discourages development and investment.
- the_watcher 12y ago
  That's true, although even a non-legally binding pledge (do pledges like that exist? IANAL, but from my time in law school, seems like the best solution would be to set up a foundation with a goal of using patents defensively and filing it under its name or something) is better than a troll filing the patent, in my opinion

noonespecial 12y ago

Complaints about the author, methods, prior art etc aside... I've got a lathe here from the late 80's that has CNC. It has tool depth sensing via electrical contact and a bed leveling algorithm. Taking stuff that has existed for 30 years that anyone with community college level machine shop training knows about, tacking "with the 3d printerz!1!!" on and running to the patent office is a giant dick move on the same level as all of the "on the intertubes" patents we've been dealing with. They may have great intentions. Who knows, but boy-howdy if it walks like a troll...

fudged71 12y ago
Same thing with networking, queueing etc. It has existed since the dawn of desktop printers, but now that they add "3D" to the name, it's considered a novel invention? The patent system is flawed.

sitkack 12y ago

This whole thing is stupid. Leveling is a problem, "autoing" it is not patent worthy. Lots of things have some solution applied to them to "auto". This is a case of patenting a problem, not the solution. And if the solution (sensors and actuators) have been applied elsewhere, then there isn't anything patentable here. Move on, solve harder problems. The Stewart Platform [0] was invented back in the early 50s, I could apply an SP to any leveling problem. I shouldn't be able to patent leveling anything at this point. Leveling is a solved problem. Putting a computer in a feedback loop is a solved problem, one should not be able to patent feedback loops or computers or trivial applications of both. [0] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stewart_platform http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stewart_platform

klunger 12y ago

OK, a few things. 1. Patents are very VERY specific. Someone can have a patent for Thing A and you can make Thing B that is quite similar to Thing A, with just a few minor adjustments, and it is not an infringement. This is why there are tons of patents out there that describe pretty much the same thing, with very minute differences. The takeaway is: just because Makerbot / Stratasys is getting a patent on autoleveling does not mean no one else can do autoleveling. It just means they cannot do it the exact same way. 2. A patent troll is an entity that has a patent portfolio, but has no actual products related to anything in that portfolio. They make their money by suing people (or bullying little guys into settling out of court). Makerbot / Stratasys makes 3D printers. It is not trolling for them to file patents related to 3D printing technology. You might think the patent system is broken or feel that patent filing is not in the spirit of open source hardware (valid points which I personally share), but it is not trolling. So, let's not undermine the legitimacy of those criticisms by conflating one particular (arguably douchey) business strategy with patent trolling (another, unarguably douchey strategy).