[btilly]

This decision saddens me.

I strongly believe that the pursuing of patents gets in the way of the collaboration that helps science progress. It creates evidence of innovation (ie patents), but slows actual innovation.

Anything that gives universities more of an incentive to pursue the patent angle, which this judgment does, will therefore be bad for science. :-(

(In CS, whole areas have become minefields for this reason. For example go out and implement a wavelet compression algorithm for images without violating any patents. Are you sure you didn't violate patents? Really sure? Exactly!)

[strbean]

> I strongly believe that the pursuing of patents gets in the way of the collaboration that helps science progress. It creates evidence of innovation (ie patents), but slows actual innovation.

See the mess around CRISPR patents for an excellent example of this.

[bhl]

The CRISPR debacle is a funny story because on one side you have a public institution and on the other side you have a private institution.

However, both in reality are publicly funded whether that be through government grants or tax breaks on endowments. I think we should do a trade: an institution that in someway benefits from the public should get credit for the discovery but patent goes back to the public.

Edit: I realize there’s a chance that whatever I just said, there’s a small European country that already has implemented this idea.

[silexia]

Patents are a gigantic scam and the entire system should be scrapped. True free market would allow competition. This is just an artificial monopoly and it's needless and does not help competition.

[Retric]

What’s crazy is universities don’t fund research. That’s a more central issue. They both directly profit from research and want to then own the results of that research, it’s a parasitic relationship with funding agencies.

[skosuri]

They do. Most universities also rely on other sources to supplement research including donations, endowment spending, ip, and even tuition.

[Retric]

When a university’s are extracting more money from doing research on net then they invest in research that’s not funding. They do get rather creative with accounting, but that’s irrelevant to this discussion.

EX: A students tuition paid for by a research grant does not count as R&D spending by the University or even R&D.

[egdod]

See the motivation to fund CRISPR research for a counterpoint.

[elkos]

Was the bulk of CRISPR research mostly funded by private emtities or was it government funding in EU, US and others? Where the private emtities even going to undertake CRISPR research if there was no public funding?

Would be interesting to see a study that showcases which was the major factor to research on that field is.

[refurb]

You’re getting downvoted, but I agree.

At least in biotech, patents drive a ton investment. How else do you get companies with billion dollar series A’s?

[rileymat2]

But in this case, a research institution is getting more money, presumably to be able to fund further research. It seems like a perfect counter example of what your worries are about slowing progress.

[btilly]

I bet that the money that they get will largely go to lawyers, administration, and increased efforts around finding/litigating patents on current research.

I am extremely dubious that it will result in research that advances the state of science. Science flourishes best when you share results and hypotheses early and often, then get feedback/inspire others. But that type of communication threatens patents, so inspires people to put their research into black boxes until the legal paperwork has been filed.

[tooltalk]

what "black box" are you talking about? Caltech is a major research institution -- their invention was published and widely cited (according to Google, by 840+ papers), so others clearly benefitted from their work. It seems only major tech companies making billions by selling wireless gears didn't know about it.

[staticautomatic]

Patent litigation is expensive but you would hardly need a billion-dollar war chest to monetize a portfolio with a successful litigation history. Between contingency fee arrangements and litigation financing, you could essentially print money with little downside risk, albeit with far less upside potential than if you paid sticker price to litigate.

[shoguning]

This judgment sounds big but it can be appealed and Caltech may never collect a penny. A $200 million judgment against Apple was thrown out less than 2 years ago [1].

Most tech transfer programs at universities don't break even, they usually lose money [2]. This is even more insane than it sounds because the research is already paid for. Tech transfer deals don't even cover the university lawyers.

If the patents were so valuable why wouldn't the universities be starting unicorns left and right with actual investors or actual revenue? Instead they try to get the money through litigation.

It's sad (and a waste of money) that universities have become fixated on being get-rich-quick patent trolls instead of doing transformational research.

[1] https://www.reuters.com/article/&apple-wins-reversal-in-univ... [2] https://www.ipwatchdog.com/2017/10/09/the-changing-face-of-u...

[tooltalk]

Sure, if VirnetX's ordeal with Apple is any indication, Apple/Broadcomm would drag out the suit as long as they could -- and I predict that this can last 5-7 years easily.

>If the patents were so valuable why wouldn't the universities be starting unicorns left and right with actual investors or actual revenue? Instead they try to get the money through litigation.

Not sure where you are coming from, but there are many University research tech spinoff's in the US, especially in the SF Bay area.

[njarboe]

Yea, there is this company called Google. Stanford licensed them the PageRank algorithm for stock and later sold it for a total of $336 million in the mid 00's. Check out this for info[1]

[1]https://matr.net/news/why-stanford-is-celebrating-the-google...

[michaelt]

> If the patents were so valuable why wouldn't the universities be starting unicorns left and right

There's a vast gulf between the Fraunhofer MP3 patent and the commercial success of the iPod, Spotify and suchlike.

[reissbaker]

"But that type of communication threatens patents..."

Patents, for all their downsides, are designed to get scientists to share results. Without patents you have enormous disincentive to sharing repeatable results: you can't charge money for it if anyone can go and copy you. With patents, you can freely share results and still charge money.

Should patents last as long as they do? Should there be a cap on how much companies can charge for patented medicine, since it's effectively a temporary government-granted monopoly on curing disease? All reasonable questions, but I don't think abolishing (non-software) patents would improve communication between scientists.

[coldpie]

Did CalTech's filing of this patent help Apple or Broadcom's engineers create their devices? I sincerely doubt it. This is just patent trolling, and Caltech should be shamed for it.

[throwaway_tech]

>Did CalTech's filing of this patent help Apple or Broadcom's engineers create their devices?

No but Apple's patent for rounded corners didn't help Samsung engineers from creating their devices...and yet Apple filed the patent and sued Samsung for patent infringement.

Caltech should be championed for trolling a troll.

[nodamage]

> No but Apple's patent for rounded corners didn't help Samsung engineers from creating their devices...and yet Apple filed the patent and sued Samsung for patent infringement.

It's unfortunate that this story has now been twisted into "Apple suing Samsung over rounded corners", when in actuality Samsung deliberately produced a 132-page report comparing the iPhone to their current phones at the time and pointed out hundreds of features and design elements they should steal from the iPhone user interface.

https://archive.org/details/436142-samsung-relative-evaluati...

If you read through the report it's pretty blatant and goes well beyond "rounded corners".

[throwaway_tech]

>Samsung deliberately produced a 132-page report comparing the iPhone to their current phones at the time and pointed out hundreds of features and design elements they should steal from the iPhone user interface

But that doesn't really matter, you can adopt concepts and designs from 3rd parties (including competitors) so long as the same is not protected.

The "rounded corners" was patented and infringement of the patent was a count on the lawsuit, and Samsung was found liable for infringing that patent.

What is unfortunate and "twisted" is claiming a research university is a patent troll. Research universities develop and patent new technology all the time, you could say its part of their business model, and historically they are happy to license their patents to commercial entities to take to market...very rarely do universities actually develop their new inventions for commercial purposes. Most would consider it a win-win to shift costs of development to universities, not universities being patent trolls.

[nodamage]

> But that doesn't really matter, you can adopt concepts and designs from 3rd parties (including competitors) so long as the same is not protected.

Maybe it's legal but I don't think it's ethical. And while implementing someone else's concept in your own way is one thing, point for point copying of a user interface that someone else designed is entirely another.

> What is unfortunate and "twisted" is claiming a research university is a patent troll.

I never claimed this.

[mcphage]

> Apple's patent for rounded corners didn't help Samsung engineers from creating their devices

Yes, the time and money Apple spent designing their devices saved Samsung quite a lot of money and effort when they had to design their own.

[coldpie]

If Caltech ever framed their lawsuit in those terms, I would agree with you. I doubt they have. Caltech clearly has a history of patent trolling.

https://www.law360.com/articles/652442/dish-hughes-escape-so...

https://www.reuters.com/article/intuitivesurgical-lawsuit-id...

https://www.zdnet.com/article/sony-settles-digital-camera-la...

[dgacmu]

You don't seem to use the common definition of a patent troll. Caltech very clearly is in the business of inventing real, new technology. You can disagree with their filing of infringement lawsuits, but they're not a troll in the way the typical NPE is.

[loeg]

I think you can be a "real" inventor in the sense that NPEs are not and still be in violation of the nominal intent of the patent system. Caltech is here. You can call that trolling or not; OP never claimed that Caltech was literally an NPE. It's absurd that parallel invention of similar techniques, without awareness or observation of the filed patent — which USPTO often grants for extremely trivial software constructions — puts you in violation.

It's especially absurd that 4x damages were awarded against Apple here when Apple is just a customer of the allegedly infringing party. 4/5 of Broadcom's customers were not assessed damages — why pick on Apple in particular? (I mean, we all know why — they have cash.)

[exjdjeejfh]

It sounds to me like you're the one purposely changing the definition to discredit them. It's obvious from social cues that they're not using a strict legal definition.

[travisporter]

Aren’t most patent lawsuits settled? I’m sure similar sized institutions have also settled patents. It may be normal

[amelius]

> But in this case, a research institution is getting more money, presumably to be able to fund further research.

Yes, research that can't be used for reasonable amounts of money, and therefore out of reach for startups.

[dev_tty01]

Sorry, but your comment is completely wrong.

https://innovation.caltech.edu/startups/

[gowld]

Those are Caltech startups, not other startups using Caltech inventions.

[bsinger98]

I completely disagree. If I invent a new technology I should have the right to sell it. It is not fair for the inventor to create a novel technology only to have a huge corporation steal your idea. It is similar to China stealing US IP, it ruins the incentive to actually invent new ideas. If I create something novel, I deserve a short term monopoly so I can compete against established corporations.

For example, look at the Wright Brothers. They invented the airplane and didn't make any money. They spent their entire life suing people for stealing their idea. The system should encourage and incentivize creating ground breaking inventions.

[rudedogg]

> If I create something novel, I deserve a short term monopoly so I can compete against established corporations.

I agree, but I don't think the current patent system does this. I think the length of patents should be reduced dramatically, 5 years sounds reasonable.

It's crazy when you think about how patents last for 20 years, which doesn't really work with the current pace of technology IMO (as an example, the iPhone wasn't released until 2007). So you can't use anything Apple patented to make the ORIGINAL iPhone work until... 2027? That doesn't seem good for humanity to me.

If the lengths were reduced, and the requirements much more strict, I think the world would be a better place.

- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Term_of_patent

[PunchTornado]

Not gonna work. getting a new patent in genetic sequencing takes 10 years of research. then in 5 years you sell only a couple of products, especially if you're not the market leader. Then your competitor can use your idea while you invested billions in it.

Think about oxford nanopore and illumina for example. if illumina could just use their patents after 5 years and given that they already have 90% market share, they would be dead.

[ddxxdd]

Solution: allow a company or individual keep a patent up until (total assets - total liabilities) / (research costs) is greater than 15.

[egdod]

It’s not at all unheard of for a patent to take 5 years to be granted. Do those folks just lose out? Or do we base patent term on issue date instead of filing date? (NB: it used to be that way, and it invited all sorts of gamesmanship.)

[choward]

Maybe if they only lasted five years there wouldn't be as many applications since they wouldn't be as valuable so processing could be faster.

[simonh]

Their problem was that other engineers didn’t actually use the novel tech the brothers invented in their airplanes. The basic idea of putting an engine with a propeller on a winged vehicle was not novel, it had been tried many times before. It was simply a matter of power to weight ratios and aerodynamics knowledge crossing the right threshold.

Their key innovation was wing warping for control, but the industry rapidly switched to flaps and ailerons, leaving the brothers’ main innovation behind. Their aerodynamic concepts were advanced, but again others pushed beyond their concepts very quickly.

So their technical innovations were brilliant, but not used extensively by later engineers.

[dev_tty01]

No, this is not correct. Actually, they also patented flaps and ailerons or anything else that could manipulate the wings outer surface to adjust roll.

Their real contribution was coordinated flight control. That is, rotation or roll (via warping or whatever) in coordination with rudder. This is what really made stable air flight possible. They figured this out through tremendous personal expense, scientific method, and personal risk. A sustained multi-year effort. Seems reasonable to get at least some licensing revenue when others copy it.

[salawat]

You realize the Wright Brothers in particular are an absolutely horrible example of the patent system working right?

Their patent trolling is credited with setting back the development of the United States aviation industry for years.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wright_brothers_patent_war

So really, the only benefit is the actual patent ending up in the public domain, at the cost of further slowing down the field when someone ends up with patent rights assigned andisfeeling particularly litigous.

[alasdair_]

I agree somewhat. The problem is that there are so many bullshit patents in the world that mostly just create a minefield for those trying to create new things.

A proposal (in “Radical Markets”) I agree with is to charge a property tax of, say, 2% for each year that a patent holder wants to keep the patent. The value of the patent is whatever the owner decides it should be but (to prevent claims of $1 values) the owner must sell the patent to the first entity willing to pay more than the declared value.

This, in theory, would ensure that only patents that were genuinely useful would be kept around rather than being used as tools to stifle innovation or rent seek for those that actually create great works.

[amohn9]

This assumes you can make a reasonable estimation of the commercial value of the patent at filing time, which is unlikely.

[loeg]

Maybe it goes to auction each year and the current owner gets a chance to outbid the final price? Whoever wins the auction gets to pay the 2%.

[6gvONxR4sf7o]

If you invent a new technology as part of a grant funded by my tax dollars, it's much less clear.

[p1necone]

The problem seems to be that the bar for "novelty" in software patents is extremely low. (Amazon's patent on 1 click ordering is probably my favorite example).

[loeg]

My (least) favorite example is that Microsoft got at least 3 patents out of Exfat in the late 2000s for trivial extensions of FAT32, which incorporated long-public, in-no-way-novel techniques to FAT in basically the most obvious possible way to add the features. (Basically: hashed directory entries for speed of lookup; a single extent design that only works for 100% contiguous files; and a free bitmap.) These things were easily predated by the same techniques in, e.g., ext3 (2001) and classic Berkeley FFS from the 80s, but MSFT gets to prevent unlicensed 3rd party ExFAT implementations until 2029, if not further.

[dylan604]

Is this why we don't have any progress in the wavelet world? When I first heard about wavelet compression, it was supposed to be so much more impressive than DCT based algorithms. The only wavelet encoder I'm familiar with is JPEG2000, and it's adoption has not really been too wide.

Are the patents for wavelet more oppressive than H.26[4-5]?

[canada_dry]

I thought this was an interesting take on intellectual property/patents i.e. “gongkai”:

https://www.bunniestudios.com/blog/?p=4297

[b1ur]

I personally think that patents are necessary to promote independent (i.e. non-corporate) innovation. If an individual has a novel idea they should be entitled to some of the money that a corporation makes using that idea.

Of course, the US patent system is pretty deeply flawed. I participated in a study involving patent infringement allegations between two big companies, and my opinion was consistently "Why was this patent approved?"

[coldpie]

> If an individual has a novel idea they should be entitled to some of the money that a corporation makes using that idea.

Absolutely not. Suppose I, Mr Independent Inventor, come up with some idea and convince the patent office to grant me a patent, and then proceed to do exactly nothing with it. Five years later, Ms Employed Engineer working at ABC Corp comes up with the same idea, and they manage to turn it into a product, which becomes successful. I contributed nothing to their product. Why on Earth am I owed any money for their work?

[colejohnson66]

You’re twisting the GP’s comment. They never said you should be able to sit on it; They said, if you invent it, you should get something. If it’s invented by two different people with no relation or knowledge of each other, the winner takes all approach is wrong.

> Why on Earth am I owed any money for their work?

And what about when ABC Corp steals Mr. Independent Inventor’s idea and makes millions on it? How is that fair?

[loeg]

> If it’s invented by two different people with no relation or knowledge of each other, the winner takes all approach is wrong.

Unfortunately, the US patent system is winner take all; i.e., wrong.

[yalogin]

How about patents created by public universities should automatically be in the public domain so every one benefits. After all, they are government funded.

[basementcat]

This used to be the case until the passage of the Bayh-Dole Act.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bayh%E2%80%93Dole_Act

[pacetherace]

Universities want to generate royalty from the patents. Their motivation is not to block others from using their patents.

[poizan42]

> For example go out and implement a wavelet compression algorithm for images without violating any patents.

Aren't those expiring around this time? I'm thinking a lot of the work was in the late 1990ies, e.g. jpeg2k was developed 1997-2000.

[Aperocky]

What happen if I create an algorithm and then put it up with GPL? Can someone sue me for just writing code?

[yalok]

Patents and code licensing rights are not related. You may release your code under GPL and if it violates some patent, the owner may sue you or whoever uses your code.

[egdod]

€ I strongly believe that the pursuing of patents gets in the way of the collaboration that helps science progress

Do you have any evidence for this belief?

[msla]

I agree that research institutions shouldn't pursue patents, but I think patents in general have some value, because they discourage companies from relying on trade secrets, which used to be the norm, and is why certain ancient and medieval inventions were lost once the guilds dissolved and took their trade secrets with them.

[zzzzzzzza]

how do we know trade secrets would be as effective today?