March 31, 2006

Nathan Myhrvold on Patent Reform

Much of the online debate about patent reform has been centered on addressing the problem of information technology patent law "abusers". In his Inventors Have Rights, Too!, Nathan Myhrvold argues against the weakening of patent laws. The way he sees it, the software industry is invoking the "patent troll" as the source of their troubles, when the real problem is a widespread disregard for the rights of legitimate patent holders. According to his reasoning, should patent law be reformed to protect the software industry, the real loser would be the lone inventor.

My own set of perspectives on patent reform have been influenced by slashdot, boing boing, and other "open source geek" feeds, so I was very happy to have been challenged by what he wrote today.

Many of the largest tech companies have a standing policy that engineers are not allowed to read patents or check whether their work infringes. Why bother to look, if you know you'll find lots of infringement? Besides the cost, it's a distraction that might hurt time to market. Their strategy is simple -- damn the torpedoes, full speed ahead.

The trouble is, this cavalier attitude toward the law runs afoul of the rights of legitimate patent holders and the big tech companies know this. Rather than pay out a small fraction of their huge profits, they're fighting a campaign to weaken patent laws for the little guy. Some of this has taken place in Congress under the banner of "patent reform."

Source: Inventors Have Rights, Too!

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