“The U.S. House of Representatives has voted to approve a bill that would overhaul the U.S. patent system and allow for a new review of patents after they are approved by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office,” Grant Gross reports for IDG News Service.
“The America Invents Act would also allow the USPTO’s director to set the fees for patents, with the aim of giving the agency enough money to process a long backlog of patent applications,” Gross reports. “The bill would also change who is awarded a patent from the first person to create a new invention to the first person to file for a patent. Most other countries award patents to the first person to file.”
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Gross reports, “Many large tech companies have been pushing for changes in the U.S. patent system for years. The USPTO approves too many questionable patents, leading to patent lawsuits, critics have said… The U.S. Chamber of Commerce and the Information Technology Industry Council, an IT trade group, were among the groups supporting the legislation… The Senate passed [a simliar] bill in March, and lawmakers from two chambers will now have to work out differences in the two pieces of legislation before voting again on the bill.”
Read more in the full article here.
[Thanks to MacDailyNews Readers “Fred Mertz” and “Lynn Weiler” for the heads up.]
Well there goes the blank check to Samsung, Google et al. Feel free to restart the copiers. Courtesy US govt
looks like the district court in east texas might be going out of business…
I don’t understand why Google gets away with copying large chunks of other companies’ intellectual property and the case drags on indefinitely in court while the infringed upon lose billions of dollars in sales because customers are duped into buying the copy rather than the real thing, yet the FBI bashes down the doors of counterfeit merchandise pedlars who are no less guilty than Google.
The USPTO is a broken down organisation with no teeth to enforce patent infringements.
You americans really have some law, don’t you?
The U.S. legal system is really f*cked up, no doubt about it. But the whole world is going to Hell in a handbasket. Is it really better where you live? Where is that?
Don’t know about BZ, above, but where I am, Canada—- in some ways, yes. Our banking system took nowhere close to the hit the US banks and related institutions did— because of REGULATION. Our boys couldn’t play the same ridiculous, over-leveraged games your boys got away with. Also – tiny number of lawsuits compared to the US, including patent.
I bet you don’t have the same idiotic “spread the wealth” politicians that pass laws requiring financial institutions to finance people for homes they couldn’t afford in the first place because of REGULATION and then these same dumbass politicians hide their head in the sand as they hold hearings on who to blame as the scapegoat because it is never THOSE colossal brain dead morons!
And now the “people” that brought you the previous Patent System are here to fix it
It was that same lack of regulation that ALLOWED the financial institutions to play games to begin with.
Isn’t it obvious that without a framework of rules, most companies will try and get away with anything to turn a buck?
No so.
The USPTO is a victim of endless political meddling over the last 30 years.
It is one of the few government agencies mandated in the Constitution, pays it’s own way and actually has been returning a profit to the Treasury. Instead of being treated like a need and valuable profit center the USPTO has been subjected to much of the same political BS as the rest of the Government.
Even though it is profitable, when the shutdown happens in August, USPTO employees will be sent home just like other civil servants. Despite it’s importance to innovation and our economy, the pay freeze and hiring freezes that hit other civil servants apply to them as well. It is an understaffed activity despite it’s importance to our nation.
The scientists and lawyers who work at USPTO are paid significantly less than their counterparts in private industry and receive less generous benefits. Is this any way to treat highly skilled people doing a critical job? The mismanagement has happened under every Administration for the last 30 years and under Congresses under control if both parties. Plenty of blame to go around.
What you and up with are overworked and underpaid people who come in, get some experience & then cash out by going into private law firms and industry for more money, better working conditions and better benefits. That condemns an office that should be highly stable to a revolving door.
This bill addresses none of that. My bro is a Physicist (BS/MS) and Attorney (JD) who works in IP. It’s not idle opinion.
You repeatedly cite political meddling, but provide no examples. Can you?
Could be worse. Take a look around. That said, it could be a lot better, too. We will continue to work on it.
“The Senate passed [a simliar] bill in March, and lawmakers from two chambers will now have to work out differences in the two pieces of legislation before voting again on the bill.”
Translation: Nothing is actually going to get done and we’ll just end up with the same old garbage.
One can only imagine what a horrible mess the U.S. patent system will be after being overhauled by the House of Doofuses!
I suppose that the Senate will have *nothing* to do with the result? What an asinine comment.
I hope there is a website to review patents. Now anyone with an idea but no actual invention can prevent any actual innovation. Why bother creating anything when the rights belong to someone has thought of it but will never create it. This setup looks bad for inventors but great for bridge trolls.
DC is run by paid for lawyers and lobbyists.
Nothing will change for the better.
Until the patent system will require applications to actually make a prototype, it’s all ganna be BS.
There should be a working prototype, else the patent should go to anyone with the first working prototype. Otherwise all future innovation will belong to two or three corporations because they would own the extremely well-paid or well-extorted patent people.