Intel's proposed BSD + Patent License

[Laura Majerus]

I'll jump in here, not to defend or explain the patent system (heaven
forfend I even try that on this list!), but to point out that 35 U.S.C.
sect. 273 offers some potential relief in the situation you describe.  It's
intended to provide a defense to people who were commercially using a
patented business method more than a year prior to the patent's filing.
It's a confusing and complicated law and has not seen wide use (yet).

Laura A. Majerus
Fenwick & West LLP
2 Palo Alto Square
Palo Alto, CA 94306
Phone: 650-858-7152
Fax:    650-494-1417
http://www.fenwick.com


> -----Original Message-----
> From: email at greglondon.com [mailto:email at greglondon.com]
> Sent: Tuesday, October 30, 2001 6:25 PM
> Cc: license-discuss at opensource.org
> Subject: Re: Intel's proposed BSD + Patent License
> 
> 
> On Tue, 30 October 2001, Russell Nelson wrote:
> 
> > Essentially, we are all of us completely and totally screwed by the
> > patent system.  If I invent something that you have put into your
> > (unpublished -- at least as far as the patent system is concerned)
> > code for decades, and patent it, I 0WN J00.  Doesn't matter 
> if you're
> > IBM and I'm Joe Blow, or vice-versa even.
> 
> 
> given:
> 
> http://www.nolo.com/encyclopedia/faqs/pts/pct3.html#FAQ-294
> 
> =Patents must be novel (that is, it must be different from all 
> =previous inventions in some important way).
> =
> =Patents must be nonobvious (a surprising and significant 
> development) 
> =to somebody who understands the technical field of the invention.
> 
> I don't see how you could patent something that I've had in
> code for decades. It's neither nonobvious nor novel.
> 
> Granted, software patents can be a pain
> (Some perl/tk widgets had to have functionality
> ripped out because they supported a patented image format)
> 
> and, IMHO, stupid (the "one-click" patent from days gone by)
> 
> but has the scenario you described actually happened?
> (i.e. decades old code getting patented out from under someone)
> 
> Greg
> 
> 
> 
> --
> license-discuss archive is at http://crynwr.com/cgi-bin/ezmlm-cgi?3
> 
--
license-discuss archive is at http://crynwr.com/cgi-bin/ezmlm-cgi?3