Patent System is a Roadblock to Innovation
Silicon Valley is a battleground. Human lives are not claimed, but innovation is deterred. Patents were originally meant to protect invention, however, no matter how seemingly good the intentions are, there’s also a way or two to weaponize the good stuff.
The sad thing is, tech companies can be the very enemies of the innovation they pursue. They hoard patents not only to protect themselves, but also to attack their competitors, and sometimes earn money doing so. Microsoft, for example, has earned 3 times more from suing HTC’s use of Microsoft patents than from the consumers’ patronage of Windows Phone 7. Funny but scary, isn’t it?
Moreover, Google paid $12.5 billion for Motorola Mobility for 17,000 patents while Microsoft and Apple paid $4.5 billion for the Nortel patent portfolio. Analysts believe that the patent buyouts are tremendously overvalued. I think so too.
Actually, patent wars among tech companies are not even half as absurd as what goes on with patent trolls, a sub-market borne of outdated policies and spurred by greed. They are non-practicing entities who purchase patents just so they can sue inventors and earn money from their products’ success. Come to think of it, 35,000 patents and not even a single invention to call their own? They’re certainly being proactive in the defense of the patent system, but they’re taking it way too far.
But what’s going on in the mobile sector right now is a matter of software patents. And if you will, let’s compare software to spoken language. You combine and recombine words to form new meanings as much as you would tailor together different ideas to form a new piece of software. If you don’t patent language, why do it with software? Because it’s just downright ridiculous to sue a French man for speaking German, maybe?
Here’s an infographic that looks at the destruction that’s taken place over the patent wars when it comes to software. The cloud and mobile are major movers in this ongoing saga, and there’s no telling how the story will end.
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