Mutant Rob sez, "This is a NY Times article that refers to a paper which says 'Since 2000, patent judges have been appointed by a government official without the constitutional power to do so.' This could 'undo thousands of patent decisions concerning claims worth billions of dollars.'
Big news."
Charles Miller, a spokesman for the Justice Department, said the government had no comment. “There is really nothing we can say at this time,” he said.
But the Justice Department has already all but conceded that Professor Duffy is right. Given the opportunity to dispute him in a December appeals court filing, government lawyers said only that they were at work on a legislative solution.
They did warn that the impact of Professor Duffy’s discovery could be cataclysmic for the patent world, casting “a cloud over many thousands of board decisions” and “unsettling the expectations of patent holders and licensees across the nation.” But they did not say Professor Duffy was wrong.
If it was a legislative mistake, it may turn out to be a big one. The patent court hears appeals from people and companies whose patent applications were turned down by patent examiners, and it decides disputes over who invented something first. There is often a lot of money involved.
Link
(Thanks, Mutant Rob!)
The Eastern District of Texas is home to a crooked court that is in the pocket of patent trolls, handing down ludicrous rulings in favor of the trolls, whose "head offices" are tiny, unoccupied offices in empty, dusty office buildings, the rent on which entitles patent trolls to claim that their rights are being infringed […]
Last year while I was on tour in Australia with my novel Walkaway, I sat down for an interview with legal scholar Rebecca Giblin (previously), whose Authors' Interest project studies how we would craft copyright (and other policies) if we wanted to benefit creators, rather than enriching corporations; we talked about the power and limits […]
Last August, Florida's prison system announced that it was switching digital music providers and would be wiping out the $11.2 million worth of music that it had sold inmates -- music they'd paid for at $1.70/track, nearly double the going rate for music when not purchased from prison-system profiteers.
Looking to de-clutter your kitchen counter? Start with those multiple, tangled charging cables for your multiple, power-hungry devices. There’s a workhorse solution for all those power needs, and it’s just as just as well suited to travel as home use: The Scout Wireless 5000mAh Charger. Compact and sleek at nine ounces, it doesn’t look like […]
Use a single password for every website, and you’re compromising your security. Use a different one each time, and you’re bound to lose track of them. The solution? RoboForm Everywhere, a catch-all tool that will not only manage the passwords on every site you visit but generate better ones. As a simple password database, it’s […]
Just a reminder: Print isn’t dead. And now that printers are becoming as portable as cell phones, it might be around for quite some time. Enter the MEMOBIRD Mobile Thermal Printer, a mini-printer that is versatile, portable – and most importantly, never needs a refill on ink or toner. Measuring just a few inches around, […]
