Patent Filings Down

from the good-news dept

Patently-O has received some data on recent patent filings showing that they continue to trend downward. The post blames the economic crisis, though it admits that other factors (such as the courts restricting the most egregious problems with the patent system, as well as the Patent Office itself increasing quality standards) may have had an impact as well. What I find odd, though, is the claim in the post that this downward trend in patents is a "crisis." The complaint is that since the USPTO is funded by application fees, seeing a drop makes it more difficult to fund the USPTO. But, that leaves out the simple fact that if you're receiving fewer applications, then the Patent Office shouldn't need as many resources either. Considering the large number of bad patents that got through over the years, and the resulting flood of applications from others hoping to strike it rich by gaining monopolies on obvious ideas, it should be seen as a good thing that applications are finally dropping. If anything, we should be wondering why they're not dropping more. Patents were supposed to be given out in the rarest of circumstances, when other incentives weren't enough. Somewhere along the way, those who controlled the patent system seemed to forget this and lose their way. Bringing back a sense of sanity to the system can only be a good thing for those who want to encourage innovation (those who make money off of the patent system, obviously, tend to have a different opinion -- but I'd rather focus on encouraging innovation, rather than encouraging patent attorneys making exorbitant salaries).

Filed Under: patent filings, patents

Can You Automate Patent Processing?

from the that-seems-fraught-with-problems dept

One of the big complaints with the current patent system is the amount of time it takes for an application to actually go through the process of approval. Supporters of the patent system often insist that the "solution" is to fund the Patent Office with more money so it can hire a lot more examiners. Of course, this suggests that the problem is a linear one, and it can be fixed by just throwing money and bodies at the problem -- when there's little evidence that's the case. Some of us have always believed that the real way to fix the problem is to bring the patent system much closer to its original purpose, where patents were the exception, only to be used in exceptional cases where other incentives wouldn't do the job. However, over in Europe they seem to think there's a third way: better automating the patent process. A European consortium has been working on something called "PATExpert," which they describe as using "semantic web" technologies. Unfortunately, details aren't particularly forthcoming, and for all the talk of the "semantic web" over the years, it's been little more than buzzwords and hype from what we've seen. Throw in the word paradigm, and you have to wonder if what's been built does anything even remotely useful:

"The greatest success of PATExpert has been to initiate the change of the paradigm currently followed in patent processing services from textual to semantic."

It would be great if someone could explain that in plain English, because it sounds like gibberish trying to sound intelligent. But, back on point, it's hard to see how any "automated" system would actually help in the process of approving patents. Considering how many mistakes are made and bad patents allowed through, I'd worry that automating the process is only likely to create significantly more problems.

Filed Under: automation, patent filings, semantic web