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____/ Phil Da Lick! on Wednesday 24 September 2008 09:25 : \____
> Robin T Cox wrote:
>> <quote>
>> Life-saving scientific research is being stifled by a "broken" patent
>> system, according to a new report.
>>
>> "Blocking patents" are delaying advances in cancer medicine and food crops,
>> says the Canada-based Innovation Partnership, a non-profit consultancy.
>> </quote>
>> http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/7632318.stm
>>
>> <quote>
>> OTTAWA – (9 September) The world’s intellectual property system is broken.
>> It’s stopping lifesaving technologies from reaching the people who need
>> them most in developed and developing countries, according to the authors
>> of a report released in Ottawa today by an international coalition of
>> experts.
>>
>> “We found the same stumbling blocks in the traditional communities of Brazil
>> as we did in a corporate boardroom,” said Richard Gold, professor of
>> intellectual property at McGill University and chair of the International
>> Expert Group that produced the report. “Most striking is that no matter
>> where we looked, the lack of trust played a vital role in blocking
>> negotiations that could have benefited both sides, as well as the larger
>> public.”
>> </quote>
>> http://www.theinnovationpartnership.org/en/archives/news/24/
>
> The whole problem is that the IP agenda is being driven by basically a
> combination of patent lawyers and big business interests.
>
> I remember 20 years ago Bill Gates at a seminar somewhere mocking IBM
> for being a lumbering old dinosaur stuck in the past whilst MS and Apple
> were the dynamic future. He didn't like it then that IBM were using
> protectionist tactics and now 20 years on MS is becoming as bad, if not
> worse. I suppose its part of the big business lifecycle. Big question is
> will MS reinvent itself as IBM did?
They got inside without the fences (just stealing everyone's ideas). Now they
want Gates and (garden) Walls.
Latha Jishnu: The mouse that bit Microsoft
PATENTLY ABSURD
,----[ Quote ]
| Here’s what Gates wrote in an office memorandum in 1991. “If people had
| understood how patents would be granted when most of today’s ideas were
| invented, and had taken out patents, the industry would be at a complete
| standstill today. . . I feel certain that some large company will patent some
| obvious thing related to interface, object orientation, algorithm,
| application extension or other crucial technique.”
|
| This was the year after Microsoft launched Windows 3.0, the first of its new
| operating systems that would become hugely popular across the world. Yet,
| three years down the line, Microsoft had changed from a kitten that was
| content with copyright protection to an aggressive patents tiger. In 1991,
| Microsoft had filed fewer than 50 patent applications whereas last year it
| was awarded 1,637 patents, almost a 12 per cent increase in the number of
| patents it received in 2006. According to IFI Patent Intelligence, the rise
| in Microsoft’s patents portfolio bucked the general trend in 2007 when the
| number of patents issued by the US Patents and Trademark Office dipped by 10
| per cent. Apparently several thousand of the company’s filings are still
| pending.
|
| All this may prompt the reader to conclude that there is indeed a direct
| correlation between IPR and growth — and wealth — as the company claims. Not
| true, says Mark H Webbink, a US Supreme Court lawyer who is a recognised
| voice on IT issues. Charting the company’s revenues, R&D spending and patent
| filings from 1985 onwards, he shows that the spike in patent filings occurred
| long after the Microsoft “had become well established and was being
| investigated for its monopolistic practices”. Webbink contends that patents
| did not spur the launch and rapid growth of the mass market software
| industry. On the other hand, patents have become a threat to software
| innovation, he warns.
`----
http://www.business-standard.com/india/storypage.php?autono=330566
- --
"There is such an overvaluation of technology stocks that it is absurd. I would
include our stock in that category. It is bad for the long-term worth of the
economy."
--Steve Ballmer, Microsoft's CEO
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