Nathan Myhrvold’s Evil Genius

by edw519 • 17 years ago

53 32 17 years ago

tptacek8• 17 years ago

You read this article and get the impression that Myhrvold hires people to sit around saying things like "laptop batteries that get 40 hours per charge!", which he writes down and files patents for.

But from what I understand, from being involved in several patent filings, you can't just patent an idea. You have to patent an enablement of an idea. A patent that can't be used by someone skilled in the applicable arts to implement the patented concept isn't supposed to be defensible.

Commenters on this post repeatedly argue that engineers do all the real, hard work, and that the ideas themselves are trivial. That's probably true. But all that hard work is also patentable; if I'm dumb enough to file for "40 hour batteries", and you file for the chemical process that makes 40-hour batteries work without melting through the floor, you win, right?

frognibble• 17 years ago

You probably win because your patent has broad claims covering all 40 hour batteries. It does not matter that I know how to make them and you don't.

tptacek8• 17 years ago

As I understand it --- as in, what I've managed to retain from multi-hour conversations with IP lawyers trying to sell me services --- that's not actually how it works.

(a) if your broad claims and best-known-mode are insufficient to instruct someone as to how to build a battery, your patent won't matter, and

(b) just because you patent a 40-hour-battery concept doesn't mean you've patented the concept of a 40-hour battery. Every aspect of battery design that you didn't document and claim in your patent is itself patentable. You can patent technology that you yourself cannot build because of other overlapping patents.

raganwald2• 17 years ago

You and I both win provided neither of us tries to actually make the batteries. Instead, we wait for someone who does and sue them. If we try to make them, we discover that while you patented something about 40 hours and I patented something about chemistry, neither of us patented something about manufacturing them and a third troll sues us.

The point of the article is that the only losers are the ones who try to do anything tangible that requires a collection of patented ideas to function.

tptacek8• 17 years ago

This implies that you can, sitting at a table with a pint, come up with the key patentable ideas for the 40 hour batteries. The odds rather favor the people building batteries in earnest, don't they?

CamperBob7• 17 years ago

But from what I understand, from being involved in several patent filings, you can't just patent an idea.

Unfortunately, while that's how it was supposed to work, that's not how it does work.

Amazon's "one-click" patent is an obvious case in point: they own the idea of executing an Internet shopping transaction with a single mouse click. No matter how divergent your implementation is from theirs (and to be fair to Amazon, Barnes & Nobles' implementation wasn't very divergent) they effectively own the core idea and, by extension, any work you put into it.

It's utterly impossible to argue that this state of affairs encourages progress in the useful arts and sciences, or otherwise benefits society in any way.

tptacek8• 17 years ago

Amazon didn't just patent an idea. They patented an extremely effective embodiment of that idea. One-click wasn't a pint-glass-and-bar-napkin patent.

ajb4• 17 years ago

Software is different. For most commercial programs, it's obvious in advance whether they can be implemented or not. Okay, there are lots of academic computer scientists devising new, unobvious algorithms, but I think a relatively low proportion of businesses need new algorithms. Whereas all new medicines, to take the other extreme, require new science.

henryl2• 17 years ago

I've considered becoming a patent lawyer for precisely this trend. It is a type of investment vehicle that will get much more notice in the future and subsequently make a few billionaires along the way.

CamperBob7• 17 years ago

Why not just skip all those pesky law classes, and become a bank robber? You'll have the same net effect on society, and the women are better-looking.

mattmaroon• 17 years ago

For most bank robbers, the "women" are the guys they share a cell with. I'll take the billionaire option over that.

henryl2• 17 years ago

While acknowledging your quip for what it is, I would argue that monetizing a portfolio of patents that were legally acquired (either 1st or 3rd party) while capturing profit due to inefficiencies in the system is no different than what a typical hedge fund manager does so I don't see the problem. Inventors are able to bring liquidity to their otherwise illiquid patents and LPs get a return.

tptacek8• 17 years ago

It's surprisingly hard to become a patent lawyer, isn't it? You need an engineering degree and a law degree and industry experience, right?

sfraser• 17 years ago

It seems so appropriate that this truly evil venture is headed up by someone coming from Microsoft.

tptacek8• 17 years ago

Yeah, I mean, just look at all the evil Bill Gates has wrought upon the earth since he left.

bwd2• 17 years ago

One of the comments on the article suggests applying for a patent on the "patent troll" business model and then suing these guys. Fans of recursion will notice that you could then apply for a patent on the "patent on the 'patent troll'" business model, and then we're really off to the races.

nomoresecrets• 17 years ago

One day - just one day - I'd like to see a discussion about patents where someone doesn't suggest patenting something 'amusing' that already exists and has years of prior art.

ajb4• 17 years ago

I do wonder whether Nathan Myhrvold really believes that patents are a good thing. There seem to be three possibilities:

- Myhrvold really believes that patents make the world a better place.

- Myhrvold is cynically extracting money from a broken system

- Myhrvold wants to bring down the patent system; IV is intended to make the absurdity of the system as blatant as possible, and make money at the same time.

I hope it's the last one.

sriramk• 17 years ago

First, I haven't met Nathan personally but from everything I see about him internal to Microsoft (from his time at the company) and his time outside, he is a very, very smart man. And quite rich. I think assigning simple labels like 'good' and 'evil' doesn't quite cut it.

My opinion/guess (with zero inside knowledge) is that Nathan doesn't really care about the patent side of the equation much. He just wants to do interesting ideas and get people in the room to dream up of (and sometimes build) cool stuff. Some of their work around nuclear power is super interesting for example. The patents are just a revenue stream for them to continue doing this.

pchristensen• 17 years ago

Complex indeed: http://www.ted.com/talks/nathan_myhrvold_on_archeology_anima...

"Nathan Myhrvold talks about a few of his latest fascinations -- animal photography, archeology, BBQ and generally being an eccentric genius multimillionaire."

Nathan Myhrvold’s Evil Genius

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