Intellectual Ventures on This American Life
npr.org
npr.org
Also this was a great piece of journalism.
Tim O'Reilly launched BountyQuest a while ago http://oreilly.com/pub/a/oreilly/ask_tim/2003/bountyquest_10... but that died off, not sure a for-profit organization can be in the business of challenging dubious patents for a long time.
I started listening to the This American Life podcast after I heard a piece on the financial crisis. Their reporting of business matters is truly extraordinary. Their stories often have a narrative that I think it is possible to disagree with, but the sheer depth with which they tackle a subject is amazing, and incredibly informative.
Their non-business related shows are great, too, but very different. If you liked this piece, check out some of their archived shows. You'll learn a lot.
You can regulate (I'm not saying it's easy, but you can) or you can give the store away.
Public investment in effectively policing IP might well mean more effective assignment and more limited scope. Leaving the landscape more open for innovation. In my interpretation, leaving more in the hands of the public good.
And, if you truly believe in that "guy with a good idea and good execution", in the touchstone "entrepreneur", then providing and environment where s/he is not immediately threatened by crushing financial (not technical, but financial -- rights purchased, lawyers purchased, laws purchased) concerns would seem paramount.
People aren't willing to pay the price and effort of maintaining the common good, and then they wonder why their ideology predicated upon it does not work.
The power of monopoly for 15 years? Such a potent legal bludgeon needs to be administered very carefully. Instead of being designed carefully and insightfully, the current patent system is designed to be as bureaucratically obfuscated as possible. It just looks like a bunch of complicated stuff is happening, but what's really happening is that lawyers are being paid tons to shoot meaningless arcane gibberish back and forth.
It would be like licensing canisters of nerve poison, with the licensing process designed by a paranoid schizophrenic.
We have a system that is fundamentally designed to reward the people who pay. Significant filing and legal resource fees. Prosecution fees, to issuance and then in subsequent disputes. Increasingly, you can't even "enter the game" without deep pockets. (Except, I guess, to "sell" to one or another IP troll. Essentially making you their agent, rather than the reverse.) Putting us on the road to a class-based system with regard to patent (and perhaps IP more generally) rights.
Decide that intellectual property falls out of common property. It is a licensed, limited monopoly. Regulate it as such. Review it closely, and grant it with suspicion and due investigation.
How are you going to define such a system? Not on the basis of fee-based service and the primacy of private ownership (ueber alles).
Monitor how things proceed, and when they start to get out of kilter, adjust. IP is not some sacrosanct right; it's a tool. Use it effectively.
But... large portions of the populace continues to be sold propaganda to the contrary. Too stupid to pay the price it takes to effectively manage the IP commons.
(A corresponding point in all this: People "lament the off-shoring of jobs", but buy all their cr-p from overseas producers who benefit from flaunting the IP rights that elevate domestic producers' costs. Too stupid to see the hypocrisy in this, not to mention the self-destructive nature of the behavior.
One might argue that they are circumventing a broken rights system. In which case, why do they continue to subject domestic producers (and so, generalized, themselves and their own employment) to it?
Or, one might argue that those IP rights are a benefit to society. In which case, why are they circumventing them in their own actions?
For myself, I'd say that some rights are legitimate -- meaning beneficial to society -- and others not. By ignoring the distinction, we reduce individual choices to immediate self-motivation and short term benefit, but abdicate any coherent policy necessary to long term benefit.
We'll never have a perfect system. But it could be made less FUBAR than it is. If not, we really are screwed.)
You're probably trying to find something that's not there. Just read what's there. I'm not disagreeing with you.
We have a system that is fundamentally designed to reward the people who pay.
Yes, people pay for mumbo jumbo, then they get to do stuff in the legal system. How about a system where we get results that aren't nonsense? We need to incentivize the patent office to avoid being full of shit.
"We're a disruptive company that's providing a way for patent-holders to recognize value that wasn't available before we came on the scene, and we are making a big impact on the market. That obviously makes people uncomfortable. But no amount of name-calling changes the fact that ideas have value."
NO, ideas by themselves are meaningless. Take it from a guy who loves coming up with new ideas for products and businesses, but isn't so good at the execution part (that's me).
Ideas have value only when they are part of a shipping product. The more popular that product, the more valuable the idea behind it becomes. The sad truth is that right now there are a lot of patent holders who aren't even using most or all of their patents, and instead they just use them to make money off others or sue them.
If patents aren't completely abolished (by far the best outcome for the world and innovation), you should at least not be allowed to flaunt your patents unless they are already part of your shipping products. And even in that case, you should be allowed to license it for only a few short years, like 3-5 years - not decades.
And ideas should under no circumstance be patentable.
Maybe off topic, but this reminded me of a certain statement about poetry, by the poet WH Auden:
For poetry makes nothing happen: it survives
In the valley of its making where executives
Would never want to tamper...Being from germany This American Life was off my radar until about a year ago, but listening to just two episodes instantly got me hooked and turned this podcast into an essential weekly habit. This kind of investigative reporting and the ability to tell, structure and plot everyday life experiences are a pleasure to listen to.
The same applies to the lengthy frontpage reports of The New Yorker - turned me into a subscriber of the iPad edition. If print businesses follow this route of intensive and detailed reporting, there will be no need to compete with the often-complained-about online resources, which may be faster but often lack the detail and on site journalism a staff like The New Yorker's can pull off.
The New Yorker is basically philanthropy. According to the comments of more then a few journalists, the guy who owns the new Yorker doesn't care if it makes money, or even if it looses some money because he just wants to be the guy that owns the New Yorker.
I think that what it comes down too is that not enough people like news like this.
Another problem is that its hard for something like TAL to do all the news. There needs to be more local, and regional shows like TAL to get useful coverage.
That being said I am glad to know that so many people like good journalism, it means at least there is a hope that it will pull through.
That sounds more like Harper's, which is run by John R. MacArthur, the same family as the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation, which gives MacArthur "Genius" grants and is the "more just, peaceful, and verdant" sponsor of NPR.
Read this epic thread about him sponsoring a trip to elBulli for FatGuy, founder of eGullet
http://forums.egullet.org/index.php?/topic/138044-my-last-an...
snip
OK, so now I have to keep FG honest by relating two of his classic comments during the meal.
We were all mesmerized by the black truffle series. After the braised/raw endive dish (which arrive in transparent packages "en papillote"), there was a pause in the conversation. FG broke the silence with a profound observation "I think that the black truffle really helped that dish".
Reallly? The endive wasn't enough by itself? The rest of us didn't know whether to laugh, or quietly tell the server to stop pouring him wine.
But the classic of the whole evening is when we went back out on the terrace to have petit fours. Thierry Rataureau turnes to FG and says "So, Steven what do you think?" It was Thierry's first time at elBulli and he was contemplating the meal.
FG, who had noticed how little light there was on the terrace turned and said "I think I'm going to need flash".
That's the kind of deep culinary insight that we've all come to expect from him
A great time was had by all of it - it was a great group, and a great meal. It is also the end of a era, which made us all a bit sad, but also happy that we had been there to partake in it.
"Ferran Adria is going to ascend to the ultimate expression of the culinary arts: he's going to become a food blogger. Actually he's going to become more like Nathan M.: head of a kitchen lab and creator of dishes, without a restaurant."
-FatGuy
I don't like IV, but I feel like Myrhrvold probably does believe in what he's doing.
At some point it becomes more like watching your Hacker News karma go up than it has to do with having a real impact in your life, but that doesn't mean the wealthy stop caring about it.
In other words... well, sure Myrhvold is wealthy... but he's not Helú, Gates or Buffet wealthy. He's just a chump compared to those guys.
Unfortunately, the title and abstract just tell you the general area of the patent, not the details, and it is the details that matter. You'd expect to see many patents with similar titles, and even similar abstracts, even though the patents might be covering things that are very very different.
I'd love feedback and ideas
The only ones it found were inventors who said they couldn't understand the dumb legal language of the claims, and thus, said all was stupid. Obviously, someone is stupid, and the news team could have found many inventors who did understand the language. Why is such slanted journalistic article seen as having truthful?
If the other side isn't presented, I'm always suspicious whether the story has integrity rather than sensationalism.
> Imagine an inventor out there — someone with a brilliant idea, a breakthrough. This inventor has a patent, but companies are stealing his idea. And this inventor doesn't have the money or legal savvy to stop them. That's where IV comes in. It buys this inventor's patent, and it makes sure that companies who are using the idea pay for it.
What a bunch of bullshit. They're not helping any inventors. Their overly broad "orange juice" patents make it impossible to do anything without violating one of them.
http://www.thisamericanlife.org/radio-archives/episode/441/w...
If the other side isn't presented, I'm always suspicious whether the story has integrity.
The Planet Money / This American Life team brings tears to my eyes they're so good. While I won't say they don't have any sacred cows (I don't know that they do or don't), they're certainly not afraid of skewering many articles of faith.
I've also been a long, long time listener of Terry Gross's "Fresh Air", and it seems to me that it improved markedly during the aughts by tackling serious political issues. I don't know if that change is my perception or the program (my first memories are of its coverage of the Clarance Thomas Supreme Court nomination).
On The Media is also usually pretty good, though it can be a little uneven.
I have to say that the anchor programs -- Morning Edition / ATC, and Talk of the Nation -- have lost much of their edge. ToTN particularly seems to play to drama rather than fundamentals (its Political Junkie segment especially, starting with the intro soundbites all of which are sensationalistic).
APM's financial programs (Marketplace Radio / Marketplace Money) wouldn't know sound financial advice and perspective if it gave them a black eye. Internet sources rule here, largely on the sacred cow basis (and TAL/PM blow them out of the water).
But overall, it's among the better of the large broadcast organizations.
If Lodsys is the patent trollester collecting IV revenue through a Certificate of Interested parties back deal with IV that might explain how methodical Apple is moving to decimate Lodsys/IV..
sounds like we are being had by IV...whereas they license a patent than turn around sell patent to a party where they take aback-end deal percentage of revenue and that new company than sues for patent infringement the same companies that licensed said patent with IV..for me that is cleary somewhat fraud..