Re: [PHP4BETA] Professional PHP by Schumann

Zeev said: > As I said in my other post, it's not Amazon that should be blamed, it's the > system that might allow them to actually register this as a software patent. Weeell, he said wading in to the fray, Prior to the Reagan administration it was difficult, time consuming (3-5 years was typical, often twice that), and expensive ($1000's in legal and other fees) to get a patent. And after all that time, there was no assurance you would actually get one. A case in point was the optical maser (AKA laser) - the original inventor was refused a patent in the 1950's. He lucked out, as after some 20 years of expensive appeals, he received the patent, I think in the early 1980's. Since his patent rights started at the time of award, his licensing fees were based on what was by then a very popular technology and he made much more $ than he would have starting in the 1950's. Also, the Patent Office didn't have the staff expertise or budget to pass judgment on the huge volume of patents on rapidly advancing technologies in many fields. And they ended up in the middle of, or worse, as the defendant of, many large expensive patent suits. Business really needed a more streamlined process. Under Reagan, the Patent Office was pressed to reduce the time to process, and the solution was to basically grant anyone who wants one a patent, which just amounts to a right to sue. The patent holder must essentially prove his patent in court, instead of to a patent examiner who probably doesn't have the tools to evaluate the invention. This may seem messy, but it accomplishes the task much better than the old system. By filing the patent, you have asserted your rights as of a certain date, and quantified those rights by the patent content. The patent office acts as a kind of postmark or turnstile - you have documentation of your claim. The patent holder gets his patent in a few months and can proceed to make whatever money he can. If others think the patent isn't a good one, everybody can bring their experts in and make a substantive decision (via negotiation, arbitration, or trial) without involving the patent office. It's not perfect, but since they went to this approach nearly every measure of success of the Patent Office has greatly improved. Hugely more patents get through the system in about 1/10th the time, and if there is going to be a dispute, it gets to the courts four or five years sooner and doesn't involve the Patent Office (saving ME money!) A rather interesting example, which I understand went something like this - a poet sought and was refused a patent in 1948 or thereabouts for the idea of using color in text to express meaning. In the late 1970's this patent application presented a potential threat to stability in the computer graphics industry. If he appealed and won, he could start adversarial proceedings against all the makers of computer graphics devices and software. So Tektronix, HP, and several other graphics companies cut a licensing deal and jointly supported an appeal for the poet, which succeeded with their help. The licensing deal was handled in such a way that anyone could use this technology without further fees, I think. The poet ended up with some cash, the industry avoided a war, we can do what we want with text color.