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| Authored by: stegu on Wednesday, August 08 2012 @ 07:16 PM EDT |
> How many people hear have actually read the patents?
Perhaps more than you think. Groklaw readers are
more literate and more willing to do some discovery
of their own than most online communities.
> How many people actually know how to properly
> interpret the patents?
Probably only a handful. However, the fact that a
community composed to a large extent of software
geeks can't properly parse a tech patent in their
own field of expertise is very, very sad, and it
is a telling sign of deep rot in the patent system.
A patent that is unreadable to a person skilled in
the "useful art" in question ought to be declared
invalid, because it does not disclose anything to
the people who should benefit from the disclosure.
Why is it that patents are considered so special
that they are allowed to stray so far from plain
English and play tricks with words?
If contracts were written specifically to hide their
true meaning to the ordinary people who were expected
to sign them, it would likely be considered fraud.
Could an unreadable, obfuscated patent text be
considered fraudulent if this issue was taken
to court? The obfuscation is deliberate, and
patent attorneys are trained in how to play the word
games and "hide the ball". Their dirty tactics
is a public secret, and we need to make it more
of an embarrassment.
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- "mod parent up" - Authored by: Anonymous on Thursday, August 09 2012 @ 01:15 PM EDT
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| Authored by: cjk fossman on Thursday, August 09 2012 @ 05:10 PM EDT |
I cited BS&F and MoFo as counter-examples to the statement
about lawyers having access to the best tech experts.
I don't read patents because I can't be contaminated by the
content. But there are people here, with IDs, who can and
do. Based on their track record when it comes to finding
bogosity in patents, I'm willing to trust them.
"Technical matters are just as open to interpretation as
laws." I like that one. I'll use it the next time the
software I write doesn't do (a) what the client asked for
and (b) I agreed to supply. It's much better than
explaining that gamma rays must have flipped a bit in
memory.
"How many people actually know how to properly interpret the
patents?" Please. Patents must describe the invention such
that a skilled practitioner in the art can reproduce it.
This place is crawling with skilled practitioners; if they
say the patents fail this test, or any other for that
matter, you should believe them.
Additionally, others here have already explained that
patents obfuscate tech details by using unique terminology
in place of the standard terms of the art. In other words,
they are hard to understand because they are gibberish.
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