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So I can patent "using a stapler to staple together 27 sheets of paper"? | 335 comments | Create New Account
Comments belong to whoever posts them. Please notify us of inappropriate comments.
Machines don't have intentions
Authored by: Ian Al on Saturday, July 14 2012 @ 01:58 AM EDT
The intentions of the law are the intentions of the people who wrote the law.

If a computer is used to commit a crime such as fraud, it is the person using
the computer that is committing the crime and not the computer. The computer is
one of the tools used. A plea that 'it was the computer what done it. I told it
not to' is likely to be a poor defence.

Why would a method or a process patent not be about people doing things with the
intent to achieve a result? Why would the law construct such very different
meanings to dictionary words and not declare those different meanings in the
part of law where they are used (ยง 100)?

If a computer user uses a patented mathematical algorithm to play back a
compressed music file it is the computer user doing it with the intention of
infringing on the method patent. The computer is just the tool used by the user
to execute the patented algorithmic method.

---
Regards
Ian Al
Software Patents: It's the disclosed functions in the patent, stupid!

[ Reply to This | Parent | # ]

Calculating a Fast Fourier Transform on a computer.
Authored by: Ian Al on Saturday, July 14 2012 @ 02:17 AM EDT
From Wikipedia:
A fast Fourier transform (FFT) is an efficient algorithm to compute the discrete Fourier transform (DFT) and its inverse. There are many distinct FFT algorithms involving a wide range of mathematics, from simple complex-number arithmetic to group theory and number theory;
Benson:
The mathematical procedures can be carried out in existing computers long in use, no new machinery being necessary. And, as noted, they can also be performed without a computer.

The Court stated in Mackay Co. v. Radio Corp., that "[w]hile a scientific truth, or the mathematical expression of it, is not a patentable invention, a novel and useful structure created with the aid of knowledge of scientific truth may be." That statement followed the longstanding rule that "[a]n idea of itself is not patentable." Rubber-Tip Pencil Co. v. Howard, 20 Wall. 498, 507. "A principle, in the abstract, is a fundamental truth; an original cause; a motive; these cannot be patented, as no one can claim in either of them an exclusive right." Le Roy v. Tatham, Phenomena of nature, though just discovered, mental processes, and abstract intellectual concepts are not patentable, as they are the basic tools of scientific and technological work. As we stated in Funk Bros. Seed Co. v. Kalo Co., "He who discovers a hitherto unknown phenomenon of nature has no claim to a monopoly of it which the law recognizes. If there is to be invention from such a discovery, it must come from the application of the law of nature to a new and useful end." We dealt there with a "product" claim, while the present case deals with a "process" claim. But we think the same principle applies. ...

It is conceded that one may not patent an idea. But in practical effect that would be the result if the formula for converting BCD numerals to pure binary numerals were patented in this case. The mathematical formula involved here has no substantial practical application except in connection with a digital computer, which means that if the judgment below is affirmed, the patent would wholly pre-empt the mathematical formula and in practical effect would be a patent on the algorithm itself.
Flook:
Our approach to respondent's application is, however, not at all inconsistent with the view that a patent claim must be considered as a whole. Respondent's process is unpatentable under 101, not because it contains a mathematical algorithm as one component, but because once that algorithm is assumed to be within the prior art, the application, considered as a whole, contains no patentable invention. Even though a phenomenon of nature or mathematical formula may be well known, an inventive application of the principle may be patented. Conversely, the discovery of such a phenomenon cannot support a patent unless there is some other inventive concept in its application.

Here it is absolutely clear that respondent's application contains no claim of patentable invention. The chemical processes involved in catalytic conversion of hydrocarbons are well known, as are the practice of monitoring the chemical process variables, the use of alarm limits to trigger alarms, the notion that alarm limit values must be recomputed and readjusted, and the use of computers for "automatic monitoring-alarming." Respondent's application simply provides a new and presumably better method for calculating alarm limit values. If we assume that that method was also known, as we must under the reasoning in Morse, then respondent's claim is, in effect, comparable to a claim that the formula 2(pi)r can be usefully applied in determining the circumference of a wheel. As the Court of Customs and Patent Appeals has explained, "if a claim is directed essentially to a method of calculating, using a mathematical formula, even if the solution is for a specific purpose, the claimed method is nonstatutory."

---
Regards
Ian Al
Software Patents: It's the disclosed functions in the patent, stupid!

[ Reply to This | Parent | # ]

So I can patent "using a stapler to staple together 27 sheets of paper"?
Authored by: Anonymous on Friday, July 20 2012 @ 07:04 PM EDT
Because your pro-patent bullshit arguments lead inevitably to that conclusion.
It's a "new use" for the stapler, right, according to your bogus
arguments?

[ Reply to This | Parent | # ]

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