More Patent Insanity

Man, how I hate corporate lawyers and the patent office! Have you seen Michael Crichton's article in The Times?

It seems that every week, some insane/inane patent is brought to light. How is it that the patent office ever allowed business process patents? I won't go on to restate Chrichton's article, read it for yourself.

When I had my company, people were often suggesting that we patent our processes and scientific techniques, but I would rebuff those efforts as most of what we did was obvious or had prior art. Sadly, had we tried, we probably could have obtained patents, as did one of our competitors who somehow managed to receive a patent on 3-dimensional reconstruction.

I'm all for companies protecting their novel inventions. But the number of process and software patents granted has grown tremendously. If you start reading some of those patents and can get past the legal mumbo-jumbo, you learn just how inane they are. The Amazon One Click Shopping patent is a classic example.

The problem lies at the core of the patent system. If the patent office had more critical criteria for permitting patents, including peer review, we'd see a precipitous drop in stupid patents. Without that, we're doomed. Technology companies are valued largely on their intellectual property. So it behooves them to amass as large a portfolio of patents as is possible. Additionally, companies have to use patents defensively - patent everything possible in order to avoid being sued by competitors for violating their patents and increase the barriers to entry into their markets. It's a downward death spiral which has led to a sort of patent arms race.

Now, the system is so heavily entrenched, that there's little we can do. There has been a backlash against stupid software patents, and we can only hope that it slows the tide. But I don't have much hope. Businesses simply have too much power.