Court limits 'business method' patents

[LinuxMint-4]

Court limits 'business method' patents

Posted on Thu Oct 30, 2008 3:45PM EDT

http://tech.yahoo.com/news/ap/20081030/ ... urt_case_1


WASHINGTON - A federal appeals court on Thursday ruled against a man trying to patent a business idea, a decision with far-ranging implications for the financial services and high-tech industries, which have major players on both sides of the issue.

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit ruled against Bernard Bilski, who wanted to patent a method for hedging against weather-related effects on businesses. Because his process did not involve a particular machine and did not physically transform anything, the court said, the process was not eligible for a patent.

Relying heavily on 1970s-era U.S. Supreme Court decisions that established the "machine-or-transformation test," Chief Judge Paul Michel wrote for a nine-judge majority that Bilski's patent application did not meet this definition of "process" under patent law.

The court affirmed the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office's denial of Bilski's patent, saying the agency's interpretation of the "process" was correct.

Consulting firm Accenture and banking company Goldman Sachs Group Inc., among others, believed that processes like Bilski's should be eligible for patents.

Denying the patent "eliminates a whole class of innovations from protection — business methods that rely on humans for execution," Accenture wrote in a fact sheet arguing for reversal of the patent office's decision.

But Bank of America Corp., Wachovia Corp. and a host of other companies argued in court briefs that allowing abstract ideas to be patented "hinders rather than promotes innovation."

Companies that rely on computer-related patents could take heart from the court's statement that processing data counts as "transformation," making them patent-eligible. But the court punted on the question of whether mentioning a computer is enough to argue that a process involves a machine.

Two judges filed long dissents, arguing the decision could disrupt industries operating with patents that could be affected by the decision.

[jturning]

This is good news. Maybe software patents are on their way out.

Blog post that touches on it with links:
http://legalpad.blogs.fortune.cnn.com/2 ... ahoo_quote

Did big patent ruling doom software patents?

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit’s blockbuster patent ruling Thursday in the In re Bilski case obviously has important repercussions for the future of software patents, a subject I wrote about in the post entitled, “Ending software patents: Has the time come?“

Since I am under a difficult deadline on an unrelated matter, I can’t yet tackle this subject myself, but I did want to refer readers to a couple remarkable postings from a pro-software patent attorney who takes the position that Bilski amounts to a complete rejection of the whole notion of software patents - a position that, if true, would have enormous repercussions for companies like Microsoft (MSFT), which has invested millions to compile vast arsenals of them, as well as the patent-threatened Linux community, and its promoters like Novell (NOVL) and Red Hat (RHT). The poster, Gene Quinn, is a New Hampshire patent attorney at White & Quinn, and a contributing editor to the PLI’s (Practicing Law Institute’s) Patent Brief Web site, where these posts appear.

I haven’t read Bilski yet, so I’m not vouching in any way for the cogency of Quinn’s interpretation, but I just wanted to let readers see the posts, assess them, and express comments. For a quick summary of Bilski and why it’s important, here’s the Wall Street Journal Law Blog’s discussion. Here’s Quinn’s first post, entitled Federal Circuit Decides Software No Longer Patentable, and here’s the second, entitled “State Street Overruled … PERIOD.”

Pro patent view worth reading (their anguish pleases me):
http://www.pli.edu/patentcenter/blog.as ... ink&id=368

Today is a sad day for those of us who believe in the patent system. Conversely, today is a wonderful day for those who have unsuccessfully sought to weaken patent rights under the guise of patent reform. In the In re Bilski decision issued by the Federal Circuit today the court choose to overrule the famous State Street decision that allowed business method patents to become popular, but they also unceremoniously rules that software and other electronic devices are not patentable subject matter. At a time when our economy is in a downward spiral the Federal Circuit has dealt an enormous and unjustified blow to the very heart of our high-tech economy. Not only is this stupid, but there is absolutely no legal justification for this ruling. The Federal Circuit decided not to issue a decision on the case before them, but rather to use this relatively easy case to put an end to the protection of innovations that drive the engine of our economy. Even Congress was wise enough to step back from the brink and refused to enact so-called patent reform legislation. To bad the Federal Circuit was not equally wise.

Bugz