Patenting statistical techniques? Can you say WTF?

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/05/13/jobs/an-actuary-proves-patents-arent-only-for-engineers.html?_r=2

by chewxy • 14 years ago

11 6 14 years ago

nytimes.com

chewxy2• 14 years ago

It's a pretty common statistical technique - random sampling, and he wants to patent it. WTF??

Anyone thinks this is madness?

halad• 14 years ago

Agreed, the article itself reads almost like a piece of satire.

pjscott• 14 years ago

The patent in question:

http://www.google.com/patents?id=avgEAgAAEBAJ&printsec=f...

And yes, it does look like he just took fairly common statistical methods, added a bunch of awkwardly-worded stuff about how it's financial data, and you're storing it in a computer memory, so that makes it special. Or my interpretation could be off; it's not exactly a miracle of clear writing.

chewxy2• 14 years ago

My question: would Prior Art be considered?

guan• 14 years ago

It looks like there’s a second patent with the same title:

http://patft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?Sect1=PTO1&Sec...

camkego• 14 years ago

Can I say jackass here?

Patenting statistical techniques? Can you say WTF?

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