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If the computer is necessary - | 443 comments | Create New Account
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doesn't mean that it's always practical
Authored by: Gringo_ on Sunday, December 30 2012 @ 03:12 PM EST

You miss the point. Practical or not, if the task can be performed without a computer, it is abstract and therefore not patentable. In fact, any task that can be done on a computer can be done in the head, or with pencil and paper. Though it may take many hands, and take awhile, it clearly abstract. There is no physical substance!

[ Reply to This | Parent | # ]

Difference
Authored by: OpenSourceFTW on Sunday, December 30 2012 @ 04:06 PM EST
You can't pump a well/do sewing/generate a usable amount of electricty with just
your brain.

You can, however, mentally execute an algorithm to compute the hp required to do
the above.

Therefore, if you can patent doing something "with a computer", then
you should also be able to patent doing something "in your head" and
"with a calculator" and "with a pencil and paper." There is
no difference except for the computing medium. Even software that controls
something can be replaced by a person pressing buttons. It may be exceptionally
ineffective, but patentability does not require effectiveness or efficiency.

Nothing physical is occurring except that which is generated as a result of the
internal, nonphysical calculation.

[ Reply to This | Parent | # ]

what's the point of a steam engine patent?
Authored by: Wol on Sunday, December 30 2012 @ 04:52 PM EST
Making a steam engine?

In this example "with a lathe" would be surplus verbiage.
The point of a patent is it should tell you *what* to do,
not *how* to do.

With a steam engine, there are many ways you can make the
lynch-pin that goes into the driving rods. HOW you make the
pin is irrelevant. WHAT you do WITH the pin is what matters.

Likewise, in this case, HOW you do the calculations (with a
computer? in your head? on paper?) is irrelevant. What
matters is what you DO with the results.

Get rid of all this "how" verbiage, that is extraneous to
the actual result, and a lot of patents would vanish.

Cheers,
Wol

[ Reply to This | Parent | # ]

If the computer isn't necessary
Authored by: Anonymous on Sunday, December 30 2012 @ 07:24 PM EST
An unaided human can't output nearly the torque of a steam
engine.

I think the idea is that if a person can do with pencil and
paper, the computer is just speeding up the process, and using
a computer to speed up computation is as obvious as water
being wet.

[ Reply to This | Parent | # ]

If the computer is necessary -
Authored by: Ian Al on Monday, December 31 2012 @ 02:38 AM EST
the invention may still be non-patentable subject matter.

The Bilski invention included extensive data collection on energy derivative offers and potential purchaser usage patterns together with complex statistical analysis to match offer with user.

The use of a computer is essential or else the offers would go past their sell-by date and the profit-making deals would not be made.

The Bilski patent never mentions a computer, but a computer is essential to use the patented method. Despite the fact that a computer is absolutely essential to make the method useful, the Supreme Court found the invention to be an abstract idea and an invalid patent.

Any machine, method or process invention that includes a computer, smart phone or touch tablet claim should first be reviewed without those claims. If the remaining claims are unchanged in meaning and the claimed functions are not rendered meaningless, then the invention is almost certainly abstract ideas.

If the claimed functions are rendered meaningless, then the computer is essential to the meaning of the claims. Applying more precision, the invention is an algorithm executable by a processor manipulating binary symbols. Inventions which are math algorithms are non-statutory matter and should not be awarded a patent, according to the law.

Finally, any claim which includes the phrase 'implemented on a computer', is an invalid claim. In the words of the Supreme Court in Flook,
It would make the determination of patentable subject matter depend simply on the draftsman's art and would ill serve the principles underlying the prohibition against patents for "ideas" or phenomena of nature. The rule that the discovery of a law of nature cannot be patented rests, not on the notion that natural phenomena are not processes, but rather on the more fundamental understanding that they are not the kind of "discoveries" that the statute was enacted to protect. The obligation to determine what type of discovery is sought to be patented must precede the determination of whether that discovery is, in fact, new or obvious.
In Bilski, the Supreme Court opined:
Flook stands for the proposition that the prohibition against patenting abstract ideas “cannot be circumvented by attempting to limit the use of the formula to a particular technological environment”
If it is a business method, the courts may still find that, in some way, it is not abstract. In that case, at least in the US, the patent holder has the monopoly on that method. However, a computer programmed to execute the method does not directly infringe on the patent. Only people carrying out all the steps of the process or all the aspects of the method are infringing the patent.

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

[ Reply to This | Parent | # ]

Is the process "enter 2+2= into calculator, review result" patentable?
Authored by: Anonymous on Monday, December 31 2012 @ 11:51 PM EST

I wouldn't at all be surprised to find out that if the Supreme's reviewed that question the answer would be a unanimous, definitive NO!

And why is that question appropriate? Why is the answer definitive?

Because patenting nothing more then the application of software to a computer is exactly the same as patenting a math algorithm as applied to a calculator. No more, no less.

RAS

[ Reply to This | Parent | # ]

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