Posted on 08/19/2020 3:27:20 PM PDT by Pelham
"Google was one of the three largest bundlers of contributions to President Obama. The year after the America Invents Act was passed, Google contributions were almost $1 million. Google spent $18 million on lobbyists.
What did Google get for its money? A new, weaker patent system that allows challenges to patents outside of court, without a jury, without presumption of validity, using a low standard of proof. Google and friends killed the presumption that makes patents valuable. The expectations of patent owners that their rights would be enforceable against infringers....
"As the U.S. weakens its patent system, other countries are strengthening theirs. China in particular is beefing up its patent infringement remedies like injunctions and allowing ever higher damages awards. So the center of the intellectual property universe will move to China. That can only be bad for U.S. inventors and companies. China designs its IP policies to protect Chinese entities.
The United States Congress has effectively redesigned our intellectual property policies to protect political contributors, many of which are multinational corporations that have no loyalty to the United States because a majority of their revenue is sourced (and kept beyond the reach of US taxes) overseas. Anti-patent, market dominating multinational Elites like Google are loyal to profits and their ability to dominate markets.
A Banana Republic only continues to exist as long as it can supply the bananas. Today, the Elites need the U.S. less and less. They keep trillions of dollars overseas to avoid taxes, they build their products in Asia and their largest markets are quickly becoming Asian as well. We are selling our democracy to the highest bidder while those same bidders are planting all their new banana trees elsewhere. Go ask the people of Honduras what United Fruit and Dole are doing for them now.
(Excerpt) Read more at ipwatchdog.com ...
Bkmk
And “American leaders” like the Clinton’s and Bidens and many others are filling their pockets with traitors money.
Bookmark
My quick scan of the article not even hint that there was a problem with “patent trolls”, companies that apply for trivial, already in use, or other frivolous patents that were already undermining the patent system.
There have been numerous high profile cases, including SCO (Santa Cruz Operation) which was once a real company but devolved into a lawsuit company trying to shakedown other companies involved with UNIX. IBM was the wrong dog to taunt, and they were taken down. It is the rare time that the IT community at large rooted for IBM.
I don’t know about the law in question, but the system was already broken before it came into play.
“Move over Patent Trolls, Efficient Infringement has arrived on the Hill”:
https://www.ipwatchdog.com/2016/10/25/efficient-infringement-arrived-hill/id=74131/
“Now troll abuses have been judicially curbed by: (1) new requirements for pleadings; (2) new district court discretion to address abusive patent enforcement by cost shifting; and (3) the threat of state and federal fines based on new initiatives defining abusive trolling as an unfair and deceptive practice. Perhaps most importantly, the recent FTC Patent Assertion Entity (PAE) case “study” characterized past Hill references to “patent trolls” by anti-patent lobbyists as “unhelpful” (case study. p.17). Thanks to this, pro-patent advocates no longer need to offer a seminar on arcane patent litigation in order to prevail in the debate. Simply put, there is nothing to see here. The courts have addressed the problems to the extent there were problems to be addressed, and even the FTC found that the use of the term “patent troll” was unhelpful because it was prejudicial and unwarranted to lump all patent owners together as if simply owning a patent somehow makes you a villain.
But now, after quickly dispatching with the patent troll meme as much ado about nothing, we can, should and must now unleash a more simplified counter attack by referencing a commonly deployed patent abuse known as “efficient infringement.” This deliberate disdain for patent property is the business model driving mega-tech IT incumbents to continually pressure Congress to enact measure such as HR 9 and S.1137.
Efficient infringement is a cold-hearted business calculation whereby businesses decide it will be cheaper to steal patented technology than to license it and pay a fair royalty to the innovator. Large entities realize there are a certain number of patent owners that are just simply not going to assert their patents for one reason or another, frequently because they don’t have the money to do so. Then there is another group of those that will assert their patents but will not win. The calculation progresses to realize that there is a small group of those who are likely to assert and prevail, thanks to all the hurdles put in place (i.e., patent eligibility challenges, the PTAB, etc.). The calculation further recognizes that even if a patent owner prevails a permanent injunction is virtually impossible to obtain as the result of the Supreme Court’s decision in eBay v. MerchExchange, and damages are likely to be minimal thanks to a continual judicial erosion in damages available to victorious patent owners who hold valid patent rights that have been adjudicated to be infringed.
This cold-hearted business approach to stealing intellectual property resonates when it is conveyed properly. Here is a simple script for research universities to use when they communicate with candidates’ pre-election and Staffers and those who prevail after the election. These arguments are easily adaptable to all pro-patent advocates.
There are companies who do nothing but file patents with the intent of blocking the competition. "First to Find" greatly discouraged that because it would be wasted money. It isn't coincidence that Communist China has been ripping off intellectual property from other creators.
It's also not a coincidence that you see more and more instances where something was designed better pre-Obama and the newer versions are flawed, especially when it comes to human factor design patents.
Without "First to Find", more and more innovation gets locked up and hidden away. Why share anything with anyone if you get nothing in return?
The idea of a patent was to offer an inventor an incentive to share their knowledge in Consideration for an exclusive period of use. Stradivarius's techniques for violin making were the impetus behind it as his secrets died with him. Some of the greatest designs were from individuals; the revolver, the Wright Brothers' airplane, Marconi's radio. "First to File" cuts out the brainpower and replaces it with corporate control.
In very recent years, there have been some MASSIVE lawsuits that have been settled by exchange of patents (e.g. Apple vs. Qualcomm, I believe). So these patents must have some value, still, or maybe they do, but only for large players.
Hard to take an article seriously that says this:
“So the center of the intellectual property universe will move to China.”
fixing the patent system tofavor small business and individuals is one of the prerequisites for renewal of American business and economy
Oracle and Sony are the ultimate patent trolls. Google and Microsoft learned from their example.
Giant tech firms are on equal terms when it comes to being able to afford extensive litigation. So they don’t often do it, they trade. And as the article points out innovation isn’t the top concern of tech giants. Defending market share is.
It’s entirely different when it is Big Tech vs startups or other small inventors. Efficient Infringement is the calculated policy of openly stealing IP when the counter party won’t be able to afford years of court costs and years of delay. And the situation became vastly worse with the creation of the PTAB during Obama.
“So the center of the intellectual property universe will move to China.”
—————————
Fixed:
“So the center of the intellectual property theft universe will move to China.”
It was just three weeks ago that Apple and Qualcomm entered into a peace treaty. The revelations about Apple’s coordinated efforts to manipulate the licensing market by shrewdly challenging inferior patents to beat down prices should have led to the FTC dropping its pursuit of Qualcomm.
It is no secret that Apple has urged regulators all over the world to chase Qualcomm for alleged anticompetitive licensing practices, but it has now come out in federal court proceedings that Apple just didn’t like the rate it agreed to pay Qualcomm and decided to manipulate the marketplace and then use that manipulation to pull the wool over the eyes of regulators, including the FTC, in an attempt to leverage a better deal with Qualcomm.
Apple succeeded in achieving peace with Qualcomm, although the company has been badly beaten by Apple in near collusion with regulators all over the world. So why would the FTC continue to persecute Qualcomm given the revelations in the Apple/Qualcomm litigation that demonstrate that Qualcomm did not seek an unreasonably high licensing rate?
Indeed, the facts that came out in the Apple/Qualcomm litigation demonstrate clearly, through Apple memoranda, that Apple believed Qualcomm’s patent portfolio to be more valuable than others in the space and engaged in a coordinated effort to challenge those weaker portfolios to beat down the license rates of those inferior portfolios. They then refused to negotiate with Qualcomm, which in and of itself, should have prevented any entitlement to claim rights to FRAND (fair, reasonable and non-discriminatory) rates.
All the while, Apple was hoping to dupe decision makers into actually believing the licensing rates for the patents they knew were inferior were relevant when determining the licensing rate for Qualcomm’s significantly higher quality patent portfolio. Sadly, it seems as if it worked. Judge Koh bought it, and so did the FTC.
Several weeks ago the Wall Street Journal Editorial Board aptly put it like this:
“The question now is why the FTC wants to shoot the wounded after the war is over. Beyond reducing Qualcomm’s royalties—thus giving Huawei a competitive edge—regulators are setting a bad precedent of using antitrust law to intervene in contract disputes. This would create uncertainty and hamper 5G investment.”
Meaningless Rhetoric
There is no doubt that the FTC’s pursuit of Qualcomm at the behest of Apple has given Huawei a competitive advantage, which is hard to understand for those who have followed the U.S.-China trade negotiations. While Huawei is poised to be banned from the U.S. marketplace by the Trump Administration, the company has found itself exempt from the blacklist for 90 days, according to reports from the Wall Street Journal. The timing of this ban and subsequent exemption suggests it has more to do with politics and negotiation tactics between the United States and China, with the Trump Administration attempting to give negotiators more time to reach a deal while a deadline hangs over Huawei’s head. Meanwhile, Qualcomm continues to be beaten and bruised and Huawei pays no price, and likely never will be excluded from the U.S. marketplace. It would seem the Trump Administration’s rhetoric on China and Huawei is meaningless.
Whatever the case may be, the Wall Street Journal Editorial Board is right, but didn’t go far enough. The continued FTC pursuit of Qualcomm was worse than shooting the wounded after the war is over. It was more like executing the prisoners of war after a peace treaty has been signed.
The FTC should have done the right thing and admitted they had no case after the Apple/Qualcomm peace was achieved. That would have been the appropriate move for a prosecutor who is concerned with achieving justice.
CAFC killed it with State Street Bank (allowing patenting of business methods)
I do not follow these things closely, but your description is consistent with Apple’s behavior in recent years. It saddens me, because Qualcomm is an aggressive player, but not an unfair one. They are also Taiwan (R.O.C.) not CCP, and that should count for something.
Bad patent behavior by large companies goes back to Philo Farnsworth and earlier.
Google is evil.
Use Bing for Search and get paid $5 in rewards every few weeks.
“Philo Farnsworth”
One of my favorite obscure inventors. I don’t know if it’s true but I read that he was a teenager driving the family farm tractor when he figured out how to create television. His education that paved the way came from a stack of magazines, possibly Popular Science.
Apple is indeed one the worst of the Efficient Infringers. Their corporate culture appears to have come from the Mafia
Interesting how patents got weaker while copyright was extended forever. Life of the author +70 years is a joke.
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