Hacker News Reader

Comment by gmaslov | Hacker News Reader

Sounds like a situation that the patent system was supposedly designed to prevent. But, from the article linked by yapcguy:

> He refused to patent the recipe as that would mean making it public and risking its theft

Wouldn't patenting the formula prevent it from being "stolen"? Or is our patent system truly good for nothing at all?

View on HN

SpaceX does not patent any of their stuff for the same reason; it can be stolen by people outside of the country and the patent is essentially directions on how to do so.

I forget the quote exactly, but there was an interview with Elon and the lady was asking him about not patenting things at SpaceX. He said something along the lines of "Patents aren't going to do you much good when your competitors are other country's governments".

"We have essentially no patents in SpaceX. Our primary long-term competition is in China—if we published patents, it would be farcical, because the Chinese would just use them as a recipe book."

Source: http://www.wired.com/wiredscience/2012/10/ff-elon-musk-qa/al...

I'm sure he's said it a few times. This is the one I was referring to -

> Even more so when he tells us that none of the design innovations in the rocket are patented. “Since our primary competitors are national governments, the enforceability of patents is questionable,”

http://blog.ted.com/2013/02/27/transforming-transportation-e...

Depends who's doing the stealing. If you patent something, someone else can read the patent. Then they learn what you are doing. From there, they can either find a way around what you patented, seek licensing from you, or blatantly copy you. If they copy you or go around what you are doing, you can sue them (provided they are in the country you filed the patent in).

Only in countries where patents hold sway.

And when the largest manufacturing base in the world resides under a political system with and spotty record on patents and copyright, I cannot really blame him.

I hope the info he gave his wife is 100% perfect and that she doesn't let it die on the vine.

It doesn't prevent theft, it just easens getting compensation for theft.

Numerous patent authors have put deliberate errors in the patent to prevent copying.

> Numerous patent authors have put deliberate errors in the patent to prevent copying.

Seems to me anyone discovered doing that should at the very least have their patent annulled and have to return all licensing fees they've made. The whole point of a patent - in theory, anyway - is it's a bargain, a contract between an inventor and the rest of society. In return for getting a monopoly on an idea for 20 years, you have to thoroughly publicly document it, so that after your 20 years is up, the idea becomes open to all.

Putting deliberate errors in a patent "to prevent copying" is trying to get the benefit of this bargain without paying the price. It's a fraud on society.

Teva Canada Ltd. v. Pfizer Canada Inc.[1] is interesting because Teva alleged that Pfizer broke that bargain in their Viagra patent.

The SCC sided with Teva, and in the news at the time it was reported that the patent was now invalid. However the SCC filed a clarification saying that they didn't rule the patent invalid, just that Pfizer's order against Teva producing a generic version was dismissed.

[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Teva_Canada_Ltd._v._Pfizer_Cana....

Patenting a formula prevents it from being stolen legally. Nearly any one on whom you can't enforce the law(like say foreign nation) will now treat your patent disclosures as a recipe book.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com