Featured in this episode of Chaos Lever
Aaah, patents. The system once created to “promote the progress of science and useful arts, by securing for limited times to authors and inventors the exclusive right to their respective writings and discoveries.”
That was written in the US Constitution, which was, embarrassingly, news to me. What the patent system has become, however, is a disjointed morass wherein anyone can patent anything, even if they don’t do any work.
They’re called nonpracticing entities, or more commonly, patent trolls. These patents are given out freely by the patent office, and then the trolls sue legit business and open-source projects for ‘licensing.’
Unfortunately it’s often cheaper to just pay them rather than fight- you know, almost like it’s extortion. Almost like what criminals do.
Now the patent office is apparently looking to implement rules to make it harder for third parties to help fight to get these trolls. In the past, large organizations like the EFF could help in the fight against patent trolls.
And of course, they’re trying to do it by cover of night with no congressional oversight. Almost like they don’t want anyone to know what they’re doing to make their extortion easier. Almost like what a criminal would do.
The deadline for comments is just 2 weeks away, and in the meantime the Linux Foundation is doing a webinar, uh, today, June 7th, to talk about the issue.