By bfwebster on Jan 29, 2009 | In Intellectual property, Lawsuits, Main, Patents | No Comments »
The US Federal Court of Appeals ruling upholding the lower court decision for In re Bilski has now been appealed to the US Supreme Court:
Not since 1981 has the Supreme Court undertaken to spell out the kinds of inventions that are eligible for patent rights — the exclusive rights to produce or use an invented device or process, or to license it to others for a royalty fee. Much has changed since then in the world of commerce, not least the digital revolution. On Wednesday, the Court was asked to bring the law up to date — an effort that, it is clear, could be highly controversial, depending upon what path patent law modernization might take.
The new case is Bilski, et al., v. Doll (not yet assigned a docket number) — a case that has generated hot and even worldwide controversy since two inventors in 1997 filed an application for a patent on a new method of conducting business. In much-simplified form, the method devised by Bernard L. Bilski and Rand A. Warsaw provides ways to hedge against the business risks that come with the inevitable rise and fall of prices for commodities. (The petition filed Wednesday is available in a link contained within this press release. The link includes the lower court decision at issue; it is a large file.)
On the one side of this controversy in its largest sense are those — like Bilski and Warsaw themselves — who argue that patents must be available to encourage innovation in devising new ways to conduct business in the global information-based economy, including encouragement for new ways of digitizing business methods.
On the other side are consumer advocacy groups and free-market devotees who worry that patent monopolies could tie up methods of creative thought processes, including teaching, judging, creative writing, making medical judgments, or picking juries (some current, real examples of claims).
There is also the possibility, or so it is argued, that the validity of thousands of existing patents may now be in question under a new test of patent eligibility that is at the center of the new case. That is a test devised by the Federal Circuit Court of Appeals, in a 9-3 en banc decision last October rejecting patents on all of the Bilski-Warsaw claims.
Of course, this doesn’t mean that the Supreme Court will take the case. But if they do, it could have some profound implications for patent law, and in particular for process and software patents, depending upon how the justices rule and how broad or narrow their ruling is. ..bruce..
By bfwebster on Jan 20, 2009 | In Articles, Baseline, IT Project Management, Main, Management | No Comments »
[Cross-posted from brucefwebster.com]
I’m currently writing a series of columns for Baseline on how to deal with frozen or reduced IT budgets due to the current economic troubles. Here are the first two columns:
Next up: how to deal with personnel issues. ..bruce..
By bfwebster on Dec 19, 2008 | In Intellectual property, Lawsuits, Main, Patents | 3 Comments
The In re Bilski (545 F.3d 943 [Fed. Cir. 2008]; here’s a PDF of the decision) court decision placed significant new limits on so-called “process” or “business method” patents, which possible implications for many software patents.
Well, I just received an e-mail from Joel Miller of the ABA Intellectual Property Law Committee (of which I’m a member) that include two decisions: a US District Court decision (Classen v. Biogen et al.) invalidating several patented methods for “evaluating and improving the safety of immunization schedules”, and a US Federal Court of Appeals ruling upholding that decision based on In re Bilski. Here’s the entire text of the latter’s decision:
In light of our decision in In re Bilski, 545 F.3d 943 (Fed. Cir. 2008) (en banc), we affirm the district court’s grant of summary judgment that these claims are invalid under 35 U.S.C. § 101. Dr. Classen’s claims are neither “tied to a particular machine or apparatus” nor do they “transform[] a particular article into a different state or thing.” Bilski, 545 F.3d at 954. Therefore we affirm.
Here are the patents that were held to be invalid (with links):
Interesting times ahead. ..bruce..
By bfwebster on Nov 20, 2008 | In Articles, Baseline, IT Project Management, Main, Software engineering, Surviving Complexity | No Comments »
My latest Baseline column is up, and it talks about why you should read these five books now, if you haven’t already…and if you have read them, you should probably re-read them. ..bruce..
By bfwebster on Nov 3, 2008 | In Articles, Baseline, IT Project Management, Main, Management, Surviving Complexity, Training | No Comments »
I’ve written previously about the “Dead Sea effect“, in which your best IT engineers and managers leave over time, leaving behind an IT staff that is slowly becoming less competent and effective. Obviously, to counteract the Dead Sea effect, you want to hold onto your best IT people.
My two latest Baseline columns talk about ways to retain IT staff. The first column talks about making an effort to align your staff’s individual professional goals with your organization’s goals. The second column talks about how to improve your IT staff while encouraging them to stay with your firm.
As always, feedback is welcome here or there. ..bruce..