If you are an innovator, inventor, or if you have a new product or service on the market which is patentable, you are surely aware of the new patent laws regarding issues of first to file, or first prototype built. It seems we've had terrible time with companies that have been abusing our patent laws and rules. And we've unfortunately hurt our small businesses, inventors, and entrepreneurs by making so many regulations, and increasing the cost for patent lawyers, and the hassles of filing patents.
One of the biggest problems we see is that of patent squatters, and those companies that attempt to receive patents for obvious ideas, that are coming forth in the future. Those who are first to file with an obvious idea, hold the industry for ransom, and they never have the least bit of interest in ever producing a prototype, product, or ever entering the market.
Their only game is to file the patent, and modify the patent as the technology advances so they can sue the first company that wishes to actually build or use the device, algorithm, business method, or concept in commerce. This does the very opposite of promoting innovation or the flow of capital to new inventions, as was intended by the United States Patent and Trademark Office.
Last month there was a very interesting article in "Apple Talk" on the CNET News Online Magazine Website. The article was titled; "Scoop: Bounty set for invalidating patents," published on June 15, 2011. In this piece, by techno-guru Josh Lowensohn, it stated;
"A group which targets companies for infringing on its patents is now in the crosshairs of a company offering to pay a bounty for research that seeks to invalidate those patents. Article One Partners, a business that crowdsources intellectual property (IP) research, has launched three new studies into patents held by the suspected squatter."
The article goes onto explain that there will be; a reward to the party that finds prior art, or examples of pre-existing technologies or other IP that could be used as evidence to invalidate one or more of suspected infringing patent squatters patent holdings or filings.
Indeed, this is one way to combat patent squatters, and build a case against their activities, as they use our patent laws much differently than they were ever intended, and in the process they are actually hurting innovation, and slowing down the for progression of mankind. Obviously this is a huge problem, one which has been going on far too long.
Worse far too many of these cases are being won by patent squatting companies, and corporations rather than litigating will settle for millions of dollars, or continued royalties far off into the future. Indeed, every single consumer that buys a product in some way is paying extra to pay for those royalty streams to a company that didn't deserve them, or theoretically didn't deserve them as per the exact wording of the law, but obviously intended to manipulate those laws, rather than earning an honest living. Indeed I hope you will please consider all this and think on.