Respectfully: how the hell would that be a valid patent? Feels like patenting the idea of writing text in white on white on a Word document such that you don't lose it but it doesn't get printed.
It's just insane to ever call that "an invention".
Companies acquire indefensible patents all the time. They are used in bulk to threaten smaller competitors ("we've got 500 patents in this field, better not bring your product to market"). This is one reason why patents can be terrible for competition.
About 25 years ago, this was explained to me as "sword patents and shield patents".
Sure, some can use patents as swords, to suppress legitimate competition, or to extract undue rents. But you can also use patents as shields, to protect in various ways against those swords.
If I ran a BigTech (like the original warm-fuzzy Google reputation), I'd be registering any plausible patents, and have lawyers figure out how to freely license-out the ones that weren't key secret sauce, under terms that figuratively poisoned anyone doing illegitimate sword patents.
They are also used in bulk to defend against larger competitors using this type of threat. In a war where the ammunition is garbage, you either lose or you start hoarding garbage.
Patents are part of the game you have to play, like it or not. If you don't patent your inventions somebody else will and they will come after you with their lawyers. Patents are used defensively far more often than they are used offensively in these stupid "Intellectual Property" battles.
Because of this, there is absolutely no point in shaming someone for patenting a thing, especially when they are apologetic about it like parent is, and most especially when they are not threatening to weaponize the patent themselves.
No, I don't buy it. If the patents are publicly and perpetually freely licensed except for defensive-only purposes, then sure, they're not unethical. Red Hat's patent promise ( https://www.redhat.com/en/about/patent-promise ) is one example. If patents were actually intended for defensive purposes only, then this would be an easy and uncontroversial thing to do. However, in practice this is vanishingly rare, and lawyers fight against it tooth & nail. This tells you that the companies do not actually file them for defensive-only purposes, unlike what you claim.
Yes, that's the reason for the "except for defensive purposes" part. Quoting from Red Hat's promise:
> Our Promise also does not extend to the actions of a party (including past actions) if at any time the party or its affiliate asserts a patent in proceedings against Red Hat (or its affiliate) or any offering of Red Hat (or its affiliate) (including a cross-claim or counterclaim).
Company B may still consult its portfolio and exercise it against Company A defensively, because Company A revoked its license of Company B's patents by asserting against Company B in the first place.
So in other words, Red Hat does not freely license their patents, they say "you are free as long as you don't come after us." Which is exactly the system 99% of companies follow, just more formally stated. Yet you berated the poor guy from Pebble for even obtaining the patent he did??
> Which is exactly the system 99% of companies follow, just more formally stated
Not just formally, but in a legally binding manner, including if the patent is acquired by another company (eg during a company purchase). Even if the original filer has the best intentions, companies change ownership or change legal strategy or go out of business. Patent trolls buy up those patents from closed companies. Legally licensing your patents for defensive-only purposes means they can't ever be used by any of those bad actors.
If the intent of these patents is truly only for defense, then why isn't it common to use a license like this? They lose nothing by it.
> Yet you berated the poor guy from Pebble for even obtaining the patent he did??
Yes. It is IMO unethical to create software patents that aren't covered by such a legally-binding license.
"including if the patent is acquired by another company (eg during a company purchase)"
Honest questions, I promise: Is that true? Has that ever been tested in court? Why don't more corporations or patent lawyers advocate for this? Is it because the types of engineers that post on hacker news are requesting it not be done?
Look, nobody likes patent trolls, we all hate weaponized patents. It's great that you want to fix the situation. I just think you are barking up the wrong tree trying to lay guilt trips on engineers for doing what their lawyer advised them to do.
Nothing is certain in courts, obviously, but Red Hat's license is very explicit that that is the intent:
> Red Hat intends Our Promise to be irrevocable (except as stated herein), and binding and enforceable against Red Hat and assignees of, or successors to, Red Hat’s patents (and any patents directly or indirectly issuing from Red Hat’s patent applications). As part of Our Promise, if Red Hat sells, exclusively licenses, or otherwise assigns or transfers patents or patent applications to a party, we will require the party to agree in writing to be bound to Our Promise for those patents and for patents directly or indirectly issuing on those patent applications. We will also require the party to agree in writing to so bind its own assignees, transferees, and exclusive licensees.
If a court somehow overturned that, I wouldn't hold it against the patent filer.
> Why don't more corporations or patent lawyers advocate for this?
My opinion is it's because the patents have value as a weapon, not only for defense (this here is my disagreement with your original claim that these patents only exist for defense). De-fusing the weapon by using a legally binding license like this lowers the value of the patent in a potential purchase scenario. In other words: "money."
> I just think you are barking up the wrong tree trying to lay guilt trips on engineers for doing what their lawyer advised them to do.
Nah. If you do a bad thing, you are responsible for the bad thing you did. I think the OP can probably handle a little light scolding from some anonymous person on an Internet forum. My hope is that they, and other readers, learn from this mistake and don't do it again.
I replied to one comment thread. Perhaps you should put on your big boy pants and use the little [-] thing to minimize threads you aren't interested in reading.
> Because of this, there is absolutely no point in shaming someone for patenting a thing
Well I wouldn't shame someone whose job was to patent something absurd. I was just saying that this is not an invention at all, and any system that protects that "innovation" is a broken system.
I think the magic is in the context of Unicode. Which also makes it almost twice as ridiculous from my point of view. Because it seems to be doing exactly what unicode is meant to do.
But doesn't it say that the whole patent system is broken? I get the "you pay to file a patent, it's your problem if it's invalid in the end". But the side effect of that is that whether it's valid or not, it's a tool you can use to scare those who don't have the resources to go to court.
It's like those completely abusive non-compete clauses in work contracts (yes in some countries that's the norm). They are completely abusive and therefore illegal. But it still hurts the employee: I have friends who have been declined a job in a company because the company did not want to take any risk. The company was like "okay, it's most likely an invalid clause, but if your previous employer sues us it will anyway cost resources we don't want to spend, so we'd rather not hire you". So an illegal, invalid clause had the effect that the company who abused it wanted. Which means it's a broken system.
It's just insane to ever call that "an invention".