[Asterisk-Dev] Re: writing a GPL G.729? [OT]

[Steve Kann]

Steve Underwood wrote:

> Schaefer, Mark wrote:
>
>> I'd like to see what you say about software patents when you come up 
>> with a truly unique and innovative solution in software.  Patents are 
>> designed to protect the innovators.  If software innovation is not 
>> protected, then there is little incentive to innovate.  As the US 
>> Constitution says, one goal of the state is "To promote the Progress 
>> of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Authors 
>> and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and 
>> Discoveries"
>>
>> Without patents, here's what would happen: 1) You spend a year 
>> designing a brand new algorithm that represents a quantum leap in 
>> switch efficiency and throughput.  2) You build that algorithm into a 
>> new line of switches that perform ten times better than the competition.
>> 3) Your competitor reverse-engineers your algorithm and puts it into 
>> their switches.
>> 4) No company invests in switch R&D because its a cost center and 
>> there is no financial reward.
>> 5) Despite what Richard Stallman says, you would not see Universities 
>> step up to do all R&D.  Do we really think that Universities innovate 
>> without thought of financial gain?  MIT has one of the biggest Patent 
>> offices of any University.
>>
>> The only people I see complaining about software patents are the 
>> people who don't create anything new.
>>  
>>
> This kind of argument holds no water whatsoever.
>
> First, 99.99% of the world's software is not protected by patents. It 
> was still written, though. Much of it still makes lots of people lots 
> of money. Patents are demonstrably not necessary to foster innovation 
> in software.
>
> Second, patents have degenerated into a land grab, and don't represent 
> the fruits of real labour at all. The subject is G.729. Another name 
> for that is CS-ACELP  - conjugate structure algebraic code-excited 
> linear prediction. The last part - linear prediction - it pretty old. 
> In the 1930s people like Durbin and Schur worked out efficient 
> algorithms for that without any commercial imperative. That was pretty 
> innovative stuff. The next bit - code-excited - refers to a technique 
> invented in about 1980 by guys at Bell labs. They never patented it. 
> Perhaps the huge compute power it needed at the time made them think 
> it was a waste of time. They still did *really* ground breaking work 
> on this. Then came a few people who never made much of a splash. They 
> reduced the compute quite a bit. No patents, and very little 
> recognition. The GSM started to get people's attention. The Europeans 
> were actually going to make compressed digital voice a mass market 
> thing. There was feeding frenzy. Every dumbass technique you can think 
> of was suddenly patented. The algebraic sum, and the conjugate parts 
> of G.729 are where all the patents are, and they are the least ground 
> breaking aspects of the whole codec. There is no solid relationship 
> between innovation and patents. Patents are normally worded by lawyers 
> who know how to achieve the biggest land grab, without being so broad 
> they won't get the patent through. There might not even be any 
> engineering involved.
>
Exactly (I was originally going to write this in a separate post).  The 
idea of patents is useful.  What's been lost is the goal:  "to promote 
the progress of science and useful arts".

It used to be that there was a high bar for filing a patent.  Your 
invention used to need to show a "spark of genius".  Now, that threshold 
has been legally changed to an invention which is "non-obvious", and 
even there, that threshold is clearly not applied.    Hence you have 
these patents:

Take a look at this great patent from 1975:
http://patft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?Sect1=PTO1&Sect2=HITOFF&d=PALL&p=1&u=/netahtml/srchnum.htm&r=1&f=G&l=50&s1=4,022,227.WKU.&OS=PN/4,022,227&RS=PN/4,022,227 


My more modern favorite (2002):
http://patft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?Sect1=PTO1&Sect2=HITOFF&d=PALL&p=1&u=/netahtml/srchnum.htm&r=1&f=G&l=50&s1=6,368,227.WKU.&OS=PN/6,368,227&RS=PN/6,368,227 


More winners:
http://patft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?TERM1=5523741&Sect1=PTO1&Sect2=HITOFF&d=PALL&p=1&u=%2Fnetahtml%2Fsrchnum.htm&r=0&f=S&l=50 


http://patft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?Sect1=PTO1&Sect2=HITOFF&d=PALL&p=1&u=/netahtml/srchnum.htm&r=1&f=G&l=50&s1=6004596.WKU.&OS=PN/6004596&RS=PN/6004596 


-SteveK