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Software is The Glass Bead GameSoftware is The Glass Bead GamePosted Jan 30, 2012 17:52 UTC (Mon) by nybble41 (subscriber, #55106)In reply to: Software is The Glass Bead Game by giraffedata Parent article: LCA: Addressing the failure of open source
> I assume the claims of click-to-unlock (which I assume people include in the "software patent" category) talk about features of an iPhone (a piece of hardware) more than about computation steps.
That's "slide to unlock", and it's not a feature of the iPhone hardware, but rather a feature of iOS (software). The hardware used is completely incidental to the subject of the patent. Actually, it's more of a user-interface patent than a software patent--as you say, it's not really about the computational steps involved--but if anything, UI patents are even harder to justify than patents on algorithms. A trademark would be much more appropriate (and more limited in scope).
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Software is The Glass Bead Game Posted Jan 31, 2012 1:25 UTC (Tue) by giraffedata (subscriber, #1954) [Link] it's not a feature of the iPhone hardware, but rather a feature of iOS (software). I meant that the iPhone itself is a tangible item. There is a valid perspective where it the implementation is irrelevant and all you see (and buy and sell and use) is a physical box that does stuff when you touch it in various ways. It might not be relevant for patent purposes, in some views, how the builder got the machine to behave the way it does, just that the machine does.
Software is The Glass Bead Game Posted Jan 31, 2012 1:42 UTC (Tue) by dlang (✭ supporter ✭, #313) [Link]
if it's a matter of the hardware, then someone who develops different hardware that uses the same gesture should not have anything to worry about.
'slide to unlock' can be implemented on any touchscreen or touchpad device. Such devices have been out for a LONG time.
so what is it that makes the apple patent on slide to unlock anything other than a software patent?
Software is The Glass Bead Game Posted Jan 31, 2012 2:25 UTC (Tue) by giraffedata (subscriber, #1954) [Link] I'm certainly not saying that slide-to-unlock is not a software patent. In fact, we've been using it as an example of one all along. And I am only guessing as to what the claims of that patent are. I'd like to know, actually (not enough to read it, though). But I'm willing to bet, still, that they don't include program listings or identify a particular piece of software, so if one's definition of software patent is a patent on some software, it isn't one of those.
Software is The Glass Bead Game Posted Jan 31, 2012 2:39 UTC (Tue) by jrn (subscriber, #64214) [Link]
Ok, here's a simple question to help flesh out what you are saying. US patent 4558302 (LZW compression) is pretty old and easy to find online. Its figures do include some code listings, though if they didn't I don't think that would change anything. It is definitely not a patent of any particular software package; it is a patent on the algorithm.
Is it, in your view, a software patent?
Software is The Glass Bead Game Posted Jan 31, 2012 3:03 UTC (Tue) by giraffedata (subscriber, #1954) [Link] Is it, in your view, a software patent? I don't know. Remember, I'm the guy who says he doesn't know what the term "software patent" means. Incidentally, though I have only a passing familiarity with patents, ISTR there is stuff in an application besides claims, like stuff that demonstrates the invention is actually complete and useful, so drawings and code listings might be in there without being part of the claims.
Software is The Glass Bead Game Posted Jan 31, 2012 5:32 UTC (Tue) by dlang (✭ supporter ✭, #313) [Link]
nothing in a patent is required to be 'useful'
Software is The Glass Bead Game Posted Jan 31, 2012 16:08 UTC (Tue) by giraffedata (subscriber, #1954) [Link] nothing in a patent is required to be 'useful'One thing I do remember from a class long ago is the three pillars of patentability: the invention must be new, useful, and nonobvious. I just googled that phrase to make sure I hadn't fabricated it in my mind over the years, and I got a bunch of hits.
Software is The Glass Bead Game Posted Feb 1, 2012 12:53 UTC (Wed) by java_developer (guest, #82469) [Link]
dlang a patent does have to be useful, at least in the US which may not be where you are based.
Software is The Glass Bead Game Posted Feb 1, 2012 19:22 UTC (Wed) by dlang (✭ supporter ✭, #313) [Link]
in theory you are correct, but in theory it must also be novel and non-obvious.
in practice, the person applying for a patent doesn't even have to prove that the idea works (no working models required)
Software is The Glass Bead Game Posted Jan 31, 2012 3:33 UTC (Tue) by nybble41 (subscriber, #55106) [Link]
> It might not be relevant for patent purposes, in some views, how the builder got the machine to behave the way it does, just that the machine does.
See, this right here is the real problem. Before the advent of general-purpose computer and software--and software patents--a patent did only cover a specific implementation: how the machine or process works, not the end product. You don't get a patent for steel; you get a patent for a particular process which produces steel. You don't get a patent for "devices which do X", you get a patent for "a specific, non-obvious design for a device which does X". Accomplishing the same end by sufficiently different means does not infringe the patent.
How a machine works may not be relevant from a *consumer's* point-of-view, but when it comes to patents the machine's inner workings are the entire point of the exercise. There is simply no *point* in granting a patent which monopolizes the end result without revealing anything non-obvious about how that result was achieved; such patents are 100% public cost with no public benefit.
Software is The Glass Bead Game Posted Jan 31, 2012 4:39 UTC (Tue) by giraffedata (subscriber, #1954) [Link] But what is internal and what is end result is a matter of perspective too. Imagine a patent for mousetraps that is for avoiding slapping your finger when you try to bait it. It claims a switch away from the trap area that locks the trap open, You unlock it from a safe distance after you're done baiting. One could say you patented the end result of a mouse trap that doesn't close while you're baiting it, or one could say you patented the end result of having a mouse trap with a remote switch, covering every possible implementation of that switch.A slide-to-unlock switch on a pocket touch-screen device is not qualitatively different. I don't see any point to struggling with the semantics of end result and implementation here, because the real point is the obviousness. Whether you view the obvious thing as an end result or an implementation doesn't matter; the public loses either way if someone gets the exclusive right to it. Maybe what general purpose computers did was just make it really easy to invent really big things and messed up the balance.
Software is The Glass Bead Game Posted Jan 31, 2012 5:31 UTC (Tue) by dlang (✭ supporter ✭, #313) [Link]
in your mousetrap example you are not getting a patent on all remotely activated mousetraps, only for your particular combination of hooks, levers, etc that you used.
software patents generally do not include code listings, at most they include pseudocode (and even then, usually as an example "this patent could be implemented like this")
It's frequently hard for the original inventor to match up the patent legalese with the description of the idea that they submitted to the legal department.
if you have never read any software patents, you really don't have any idea how bad they are.
Software is The Glass Bead Game Posted Jan 31, 2012 5:38 UTC (Tue) by nybble41 (subscriber, #55106) [Link]
> One could say you patented the end result of a mouse trap that doesn't close while you're baiting it, or one could say you patented the end result of having a mouse trap with a remote switch, covering every possible implementation of that switch.
Either way, the real "end result" is an unclosed, baited mouse trap. You can't patent that. What you can patent is device which makes achieving that state a bit easier, provided it meets the other criteria, such as non-obviousness.
> A slide-to-unlock switch on a pocket touch-screen device is not qualitatively different.
First, there is no "switch" involved. The hardware (touch screen) is not the subject of the patent. Second, this isn't a software patent; it covers a virtual user-interface pattern, not an algorithm. This isn't so much a case of patenting what a mouse-trap does (which would be bad enough) as patenting what a mouse-trap *looks like*, which is even further outside the domain patents were intended to cover. As I said before, a trademark would be much more appropriate here.
Regarding actual software patents, however, such as a patent on a compression algorithm or a form of encryption, the qualitative difference is obvious: You build a mouse-trap, but you *evaluate* an algorithm. An algorithm is just as complete in your head, or worked out with pencil and paper, as it is running on a computer. The computer is just a tool to speed up the process, just as the pencil and paper serve to supplement your memory. The mouse-trap, on the other hand, is of no direct use to anyone until it's given physical form.
Not that any of this really matters, of course, as regular patents are just as devoid of legitimacy as software patent. They're not the same thing, but that doesn't make them any more just.
Software is The Glass Bead Game Posted Feb 1, 2012 13:43 UTC (Wed) by java_developer (guest, #82469) [Link] GiraffeData said:But what is internal and what is end result is a matter of perspective too. What you're saying is true. It's a problem with examiners, judges and the courts that they are not equal to seeing through the distorting perspective presented to them by patent attorneys and their clients who seek to impose a distorted notion of what should be patentable subject matter for the purpose of restricting competition in the second case and siphoning off vast sums of capital for non-value producing activities in the first case. GiraffeData said: Maybe what general purpose computers did was just make it really easy to invent really big things and messed up the balance. It's not a bad way of expressing it. Actually, what computers did was advance society in astronomical ways. Later, much later, what IP lawyers did was conceive of a scheme to inject themselves, like a virus, into that value stream and create a diseased condition whose symptoms are, the creation of value is slowed to the point of extinction relative to what it had been prior; the IP attoneys extract obscene amounts of money from the creators of that value; insurmountable barriers to entry upon would-be creators of value is introduced; huge amounts of time and energy are spent warring over patents which have a net negative value to everyone but IP attorneys; would-be creators of value are discouraged from the field.
There is no reason that equally abstract things are not patented except the current regime of IP everything didn't arrive on the scene prior to their existence. The examples are endless and everywhere. For instance, novel plot twists clearly should be patentable - they fit the criteria: useful? - the novelist generates economic activity just because she's clever; non obvious? - by definition; advance the art? - other novelists can use variants on the new plot twist, after paying the original novelist. Surely such a scheme must increase economic activity and increase a nation's wealth if IP Maximalist's arguments are to be believed. So why are novel plot twists not patentable? Ahem... Patent #0239489023234: A Plot Twist Involving Gender Deception An entity, in one realization a man who is in love with another entity , in one realization a woman, whereby the first entity deceives the second entity through the device of disguising their gender, using for instance a wig and makeup, for the purpose of obtaining a more intimate proximity to the second entity. Blah blah blah, fuckin' blah blah blah, fuckin' blah, fuckin' blah, fuckin' blah blah blah....
Application Number 28734897239723 Filing Date: MAR 2010 Patent Number 98247892374923784 Issue Date 6222646 Feb 1 2012 The ONLY reason society is not now jammed to the gills and floating lifeless on top of a dead stream of innovation is because there was no computer on which to realize novels and no IP attorneys looking over that computer thinking... "hmmm....it's a machine, isn't it?"
Software is The Glass Bead Game Posted Feb 1, 2012 13:03 UTC (Wed) by java_developer (guest, #82469) [Link] nybble41 said:Actually, it's more of a user-interface patent than a software patent--as you say, nybble41 a user interface patent is almost always a software patent. I am not aware of any patents being placed on user interfaces which are not software based. If there such a thing out there, then it's an abomination also. Either you're patenting the software code itself, in which case it's called a "copyright" and not a patent, or you're patenting what the thing does and and a series of steps involving abstract things, irrespective of the code that underlies it. This later case is what a software patent is. Therefore user interface patents ARE software patents- they patent an end result , from the POV of programmers, regardless of how it's realized in code. They are defined on things which are purely abstract in nature and can be "realized" in many different ways. So not only is slide to unlock covering the Apple interface, it's covering ALL interfaces.
Software is The Glass Bead Game Posted Feb 1, 2012 17:42 UTC (Wed) by nybble41 (subscriber, #55106) [Link]
> nybble41 a user interface patent is almost always a software patent. I am not aware of any patents being placed on user interfaces which are not software based.
I agree that user interface patents are almost always about interfaces implemented in software. However, when I use the term "software patent", I am specifically referring to a patent on an algorithm, not the vague and likely over-broad "patent on an invention that is typically implemented with software" which was expressed elsewhere.
Something like "slide-to-unlock" can be said to contain a very simple algorithm ("if a slide gesture is recognized, unlock the device"), but the patent is really about a distinctive style (sliding vs. entering a code, or tapping a button, or any of the other means of unlocking touch-screen devices used before), not the algorithm, which ought to be rather too trivial and obvious to qualify for a patent on its own merits, even assuming patents on algorithms were generally acceptable.
> If there such a thing out there, then it's an abomination also.
Agreed, 100%.
> Either you're patenting the software code itself, in which case it's called a "copyright" and not a patent, ...
You don't "patent the software code". As you said, code is covered by copyrights, not patents. A software patent--a patent on an abstract algorithm--would cover *all possible implementations* of that algorithm in software code, including independent clean-room code written without knowledge of any other implementation or the patent itself, which is much broader than the copyright on specific code implementing the algorithm.
> ... or you're patenting what the thing does and and a series of steps involving abstract things, irrespective of the code that underlies it. This later case is what a software patent is.
I agree that this is what a software patent is, but user interface patents are something else entirely. The slide-to-unlock patent, for example, doesn't seek to monopolize the "algorithm" of sliding your finger along the screen to unlock the device (which, as an action performed directly by a human, would be rather dubious as the subject of a patent), but rather the "look and feel" of the interface presented by the device, the graphics drawn on the screen combined with the device's response to a particular input gesture, without reference to the algorithms for producing those graphics, recognizing that gesture, or actually unlocking the device.
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