inventors

Efficient Infringers: A Vibrant Source of Innovation Fatigue

Among the many barriers to innovation success, one of the most painful and dangerous is rapidly gaining momentum in the United States due to an almost perfect storm of challenges to patent value. I speak of the blight of “efficient infringers,” the many companies, often large and politically influential, who make the cruel calculation that …

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CNN Finally Covers a Great American Inventor and His Patent

Pop stars seem to get all the publicity, so it’s cool that CNN finally did a major story about a real inventor and his useful, practical, real-world anti-gravity patent, US Patent #5255452, “Method and Means for Creating Anti-gravity Illusion” by Michael J. Jackson. Heard of him? Apparently this inventor did a little singing and dancing …

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Immigration and Innovation

Many of the greatest inventions in America came from immigrants. See Steve Brachman’s article, “American innovation has been fueled by immigrant inventors” at IP Watchdog. Nearly all of our inventions, in fact, came from people who were either immigrants or descendants of immigrants (sometimes we seem to forget our own roots!). Immigrants with skills and …

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How Abstract Is Your Automobile?

Be careful about the vehicle you’ve been driving. As sturdy, tangible, useful, and inventive as it looks to you, it may turn out to be merely an abstraction, perhaps nothing more than the mere idea of “transportation” or “going places,” making it unworthy of the thousands of patents protecting its numerous technologies — if the …

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More Cold Water on the Fire of Innovation: Unnecessary Patent Reform

Abraham Lincoln said that the patent system “added the fuel of interest to the fires of genius.” Today the fires of genius and the fire of innovation itself is getting doused with something less helpful than fuel. These fires are being cooled and, in some cases, extinguished with harsh attacks on the IP rights that …

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A Need To Save the US Patent System: A Warning from Dana Rohrabacher

Many leading IP professionals working with the US patent system are growing increasingly concerned about the weakening of the IP system there. Some are so concerned that they are wondering what steps can be taken to save it. Save it from what, you might ask? Save it from erosion of the basic property rights that …

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The Anti-Patent Revolution in the United States

Many intellectual property practitioners worldwide are scratching their heads over what is happening to IP in the United States. There’s a revolution underway that over the past few years seems to have steadily eroded the value of patents and any semblance of predictability and order in the law. Patents can still be valuable, if you …

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Simple Steps Can Dramatically Increase Participation in Innovation

At the IP Business Congress Asia 2014 (IPBC Asia 2014), a collection of IP experts from around the world are here in Shanghai, China sharing best practices and advice to help fellow IP workers. Yesterday during a panel discussing ways to build a world-class in-house IP team, a comment from the audience provided a valuable …

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David and Googleliath (or VSL vs. Google): A Small Company Fighting a Giant Reminds Us Why Software Patents Matter

A small start-up company fighting one of the great giants of all time: it’s a classic story of David vs. Goliath, or in this case, David vs. Googleliath (a.k.a. VSL vs. Google). Many small companies have claimed that Google misappropriated trade secrets or other IP, but rarely has Google graciously (and accidentally) cooperated in providing …

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America’s Anti-Patent Revolution: Stoking the Engines of Innovation Fatigue

My latest post here at Innovation Fatigue lamented the actions of the USPTO in their apparent war on patents involving natural products. New information makes the story even more troubling than before, indicating that more than just judicial error and bureaucratic blindness was involved. The steps taken appear much more deliberate and political than that, …

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